Now for some cool space stuff to remind us of that fact...
One of the very best podcasts around is Science & Futurism with Isaac Arthur - a series of wonderfully detailed and cogent explorations about super-science possibilities that dissects almost every aspect you can list regarding interstellar travel, alien motivations, star drives, terraforming or the Fermi Paradox. This one - on “black holes as weapons” - naturally refers to my own novel Earth (which he flatteringly calls his Book of the Month about 27 minutes in). But I highly recommend the entire series.
A video shows that the speed of light – blazing fast to us on Earth – kinda crawls in sci fi terms, taking 3 grinding minutes to reach Mars at its closest. And that’s “the fastest speed there is.”
Things are turning doubtful for Planet Nine. Which means the next planet out from us may be Proxima Centauri b, so well appraised by the new Chilean ESPRESSO radial velocity scope that researchers found that Proxima b is 1.17 times the mass of Earth. It orbits its star in just 11.2 days. Similar amounts of sunlight, engendering ‘goldilock’ thoughts… though small red stars are flare stars, so Proxima b receives about 400 times the amount of harsh flare radiation as Earth receives from its Sun. Life would be... different.
The Devonian extinction 359 million years ago seems likely to have happened from a stripping of the protective ozone layer.
Was ‘Oumuamua the Interstellar weird-visitor an elongated chunk of hydrogen ice? It’s claimed that could explain many of its unusual properties.
The UAE hopes to build the Mars Scientific City, as part of the Emirates Mars Mission to establish a human colony on the Red Planet by the year 2117. The city will sprawl across 177,000 square metres (1.9 million square feet), an area about twice the size of Alcatraz Island. Funny how there’s no mention of lessons learned from Biosphere 2.
The space station is getting a brand spanking new toilet that will recover and recycle water from feces. “Our future goals are to stabilize and dry the metabolic waste to make it microbially inactive and possibly reuse that water, reduce the amount of consumables for the potty.” Ah, technical terminology.
Joel Sercel’s TransAstra Corp. Aims to leverage some modest NIAC grants to mine water – and thus propellant – from both asteroids and deposits in sunless craters at the lunar poles. Their tall tower innovation -- Sun Flowers -- will make affordable solar power feasible in dark icy places near the Moon's poles while doomed Beatle rovers powered by the Sun Flowers will use microwaves to vaporize and then capture frozen water ice near the poles so that it can be converted to high performance rocket propellant.
Stunning images of Jupiter in infrared, compiled from Earth and the Juno Spacecraft.
A tiny Chinese satellite in lunar orbit captured incredible images of a total solar eclipse over South America last year. How cool that an image from near the limb of the moon spots the moon’s own shadow eclipsing daytime on the Earth.
==Beyond our solar system ==
New Horizons has traveled so far that it now has a unique view of the nearest stars. "It's fair to say that New Horizons is looking at an alien sky, unlike what we see from Earth," said Alan Stern, New Horizons principal investigator "And that has allowed us to do something that had never been accomplished before — to see the nearest stars visibly displaced on the sky from the positions we see them on Earth." The Voyagers couldn’t do such fine parallax so this is a milestone.
Sara Seager and her colleagues now study examining how E. coli bacteria and yeast - prokaryotes and eukaryotes - would react to a hydrogen atmosphere. Both reproduced normally, but at lower and slower rates than in oxygenated air. Simply amazing and lends credence to the notion of “hydrogen civilizations” based on worlds like Jupiter. “Sentient hydrogen breathers have even made appearances in some rationally-based science fiction, such as the Uplift novels of David Brin.” Thanks, though the possibility also appeared in works by Poul Anderson’s, Greg Bear and Clifford Simak.
Of course then there’s the pressures… and providing water and energy…
In Existence I pose a future when humanity sends out probes beyond 550 astronomical units to peer back, past the rim of the sun and use the solar gravitational lens to explore a dangerous cosmos. Astronomers already use g-lens lineups to gain valuable samples from very distant times and locales. Now comes a model suggesting that the rims of black holes might refract bits of light from *every* direction right at us on Earth. Meaning some singularities out there may be telling stories about… everywhere, all the time. Oh, the instruments to gather that light and then separate/deconvolute those samples into anything useful aren’t available. In fact, they will be almost godlike, compared to our own current methods. But so? We’ve made such leaps before. More pertinently, have others, already?
Even more pertinently, how do we save and boost a civilization that’s confident, good-enough and capable of rising to such challenges?
Yeah, solar g-spot missions are suddenly all the rage at NIAC!
And here’s another paper on the topic. “Photometric Limits on the High Resolution Imaging of Exoplanets Using the Solar Gravity Lens.”
One of you wrote in: “Golly! Where was I reading about this a few years ago? ;^)” Golly, indeed.
In my novel Existence, there’s a point when millions of tiny probes are sent forth to discover the state of the cosmos in unique ways. One possible discovery? If the gravitational disturbances caused by purported “Planet 9” – which has never been observed – are caused by a midget black hole. Such a swarm of micro probes may be the only way to find out.
And if these were common… reviving the MACHO theory for dark matter… then we’d also get a pretty good explanation for the failure to detect any interstellar travel.
48 comments:
Congratulations on NIAC. That's such exciting stuff.
I second your love of Isaac Arthur's videos. Honestly, he's the best, and he just got married.
As I recall, there are also hydrogen breathers in Joe Haldeman's Bound trilogy. It makes you wonder about life back when the ambient temperature of the universe was like bath water. I know, I know, the life itself would have to be made up of larger atoms that didn't exist yet. Still I can't let the idea go.
Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't.
For those (like me) who are a bit surprised whenever our host lumps Japan with the US as the most space-capable nations,
https://www.mhi.com/news/story/200608.html
"Their tall tower innovation -- Sun Flowers -- will make affordable solar power feasible in dark icy places near the Moon's poles while doomed Beatle rovers powered by the Sun Flowers will use microwaves to vaporize and then capture frozen water ice near the poles so that it can be converted to high performance rocket propellant."
...doomed Beatle rovers? Powered by Sun Flowers??? This reads like Yellow Submarine: The Gritty Reboot.
I meant "domed" beetles not doomed Beatles... ach
Small Black holes could be a navigation hazard for interstellar travelers - but they could also be incredibly useful as power sources
I wouldn't be too hard on the Emiratis concerning Biosphere's shortcomings. It's refreshing to hear about anyone setting a target date more than a lifetime in the future. An antidote to the short termism rut maybe.
It's kinda hard to maintain good feelings about celebrating July 4 amid the COVID pandemic and Trump's equating of White Grievance with Americanism. But I did sign up for (at least a month of) Disney+ for the sole purpose of watching the recording of the original cast performance of "Hamilton". I feel better now.
Happy 4th, to those for whom the date applies.
Lorraine: That would be the kind interpretation. They are asking their people to be aspirational and to think long term. My attitude is that if we're going to the stars we want to try to be worthy of going to the stars. Before they worry about martian cities they might want to deal with the fact that something like 40% of their population is immigrants working under quasi-slave conditions. To be clear, I've only read about conditions in the Emirates. I haven't actually been there myself. If anyone has first hand knowledge and wants to defend them, please do.
I fondly remember Ben Bovas' Jupiter, for a variety of reasons: The unrelentless and almost fanatic resolve of the researchers, the depiction of a resurgent theocracy ...
and the idea of the Leviathans, toppling standard believe systems.
I sometimes wonder how traditional religions would integrate possible alien civilizations into their world view. Or would it shatter them? Is there a good book that addresses this?
"Doomed Dome Beetles." Thanks for the inspiration, sounds like a new idea for a monster entry for my planned D&D-In-Space-Campaign. A pest or perhaps an intelligent swarm creature to be found in ghost colonies and lost space stations.
"Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't."
Closest I can come is a Star Trek novel where one of the minor characters had a hobby - every time they detected a trace of a radio-frequency broadcast from Earth, he'd collect and collate the data. He'd already managed to reproduce several episodes of "The Jack Benny Program" from the radio, and was on the verge of getting enough data to screen an entire episode of "I Love Lucy".
Jon S:
Closest I can come is a Star Trek novel where one of the minor characters had a hobby - every time they detected a trace of a radio-frequency broadcast from Earth, he'd collect and collate the data. He'd already managed to reproduce several episodes of "The Jack Benny Program" from the radio, and was on the verge of getting enough data to screen an entire episode of "I Love Lucy".
Did they allude to the obvious--that someone might stumble across old episodes of Star Trek?
"Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't."
"Macroscope" by Piers Anthony was nominated for a Hugo Award in 1970. It describes a starship/telescope combination that allows detailed viewing of Earth's ancient past. Interesting read, but a bit long for my ability (took me a year).
Macroscope was good, before Piers Anthony went Xanth cuckoo.
My canonical Star Trek graphic novel FORGIVENESS has the Enterprise 300 lt years from Earth pick up a transporter beam... the FIRST transporter bean... transmitted into space from Earth 300 years before.
Happy Treason against the Throne day, everybody! Here's a link to an article in today's Guardian that should cheer most of the folk here on Brin's blog: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2020/jul/03/science-coronavirus-pandemic-donald-trump-make-america-great-again
" doomed Beatles..."
Paul and Ringo may have some thoughts on that.
"Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't."
Not looking at earth, but Pandora's Star by Peter F Hamilton uses the concept and is also an excellent book.
frabjoustheelder:
Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't.
Sounds like a great idea for a futuristic detective series, though. Someone who can piece together clues to recent events by "looking" at them from space, or by evesdropping on recent phone transmissions and the like.
scidata:
...but a bit long for my ability (took me a year).
That's what Psychohistorical Crisis was like for me. I enjoyed the book, and I actually didn't mind being "in" it for a long time, but some of it was a slog to get through.
scidata:
It describes a starship/telescope combination that allows detailed viewing of Earth's ancient past. Interesting read, but a bit long for my ability (took me a year).
Funny. After my first response that Donald Kingsbury's Psychohistorical Crisis took me a year to read, I realize that that book also counts as a "detailed viewing of Earth's ancient past." From a certain point of view, anyway.
scidata and DB: Those both sound great and are exactly what I was looking for. Absolutely fantastic job on the premise, David. That's a perfect ST plot.
Harry Chapin was another artist who left us way too soon.
Today, this one is wryly appropriate...
https://genius.com/Harry-chapin-up-on-the-shelf-lyrics
...
And I used to have a country once,
But where it went I do not know.
[Chorus:] Where do you think you might have lost it?
And I used to raise the flag at dawn,
But that was very long ago.
[Chorus: ] Maybe you can find it where you tossed it.
...
Happy 4th of July to those of us that live in the most famous rebellious colony in history, and our fellow travelers everywhere.
Please work to make our Union more perfect. Preaching to the choir, I know!
I don't say it enough, but I'm proud of all of you. Let's keep up the good works. And double down on making it better.
(Oh, and watch Hamilton, if you can. Larry has it right - it is a cultural monument. A myth, aimed like an arrow at the heart of so many things that are wrong. Wicked. And complex, like the man.)
larry Hart:
"Sounds like a great idea for a futuristic detective series, though. Someone who can piece together clues to recent events by "looking" at them from space, or by evesdropping on recent phone transmissions and the like."
That's exactly what I was thinking. It would also work to write a noire that takes place in a world where light travels at walking speed. I don't know why I'm giving these ideas away. I actually want to write them.
Is anyone else having difficulty getting the HTML tags to work?
See also Bob Shaw's "Slow Glass" stories that let you view past events.
"Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't."
There's a neat youtube short on DUST.
Using the Sun as a gravity lens was the topic of a recent article by the Planetary Society.
David beat me to it re: Bob Shaw.
The hazards of micro black holes to interstellar travel were first raised in Doc Smith's "Skylark of Space" (1919!?), when Seaton & co. nearly get caught by one. Black holes weren't described as such until the 1960s. Smith referred to his singular object as an invisible 'dead star'. It is *possible* Smith got the idea from Scwarzchild's work in solving Einstein's field equations for general relativity (although he airily dismissed special relativity as 'just a theory' for his tale of FTL space travel.)
A lot of sociology, culture, and politics comes down to memetics, especially in the internet age. Citizen Science research shows that this is not a new or even strictly human phenomenon.
https://gizmodo.com/a-viral-new-bird-song-in-canada-is-causing-sparrows-t-1844245103
Micro Black Holes
If you were using the British Interplanetary Societies Daedalus probe as an example it would have a forwards "shield" in the form of a few kg of fine dust fired in front of the spaceship
The intention was to vaporise anything that was too large to hit and too small to see in ime to avoid
If you fire the dust faster it would hit the black hole and be visible as it interacted with its event horizon - hopefully in time for the spaceship to alter course
https://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2020/Pres/Maps/Jul06.html#item-1
The six states that Biden is already contesting are likely to be the key to the election. If Trump wins the three biggest ones, Florida (29 EVs), Pennsylvania (20), and Michigan (16), he gets to exactly to 270, which doesn't leave any margin for error. If he wins those three but loses ME-02 and NE-02, Biden wins 270 to 268
The elephant in the room that no one is talking about is the still-unannounced supreme court decision on faithless electors. If the election is that close, a few electors changing their vote could decide the outcome. And I expect there will be great effort to bribe or threaten just enough electors to flip the total.
The "good news" if you can call it that, is that there will be several weeks after the election with an announced winner for the public to get used to the idea that one candidate has "won" the electoral vote. If the other candidate acts all mysterious and confident and "Just wait!", we'll know something untoward is up. Whether that will matter is yet to be determined.
"Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't."
There's a story called "What Time Is It?" by Jack Haldeman http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/title.cgi?53469 - FTL is used to go far enough away from Earth so that aging Baby Boomers can see episodes of Howdy Doody again.
I hope to God I am reading this correctly, but it appears that the supreme court decided that states can indeed enforce electors to vote for the candidate they were elected to vote for. Not only that, but it was a unanimous decison.
If true, then I owe Tim/Tacitus2 an apology for not having enough faith in the system.
http://live.scotusblog.com/Event/Live_blog_of_opinions_-_Monday_July_6_2020
Bottom line: "A state may enforce an elector's pledge to support his party's nominee--and the state voters' choice--for President."
by Amy Howe 9:11 AM↑30
Permalink
It is by Kagan. The vote is basically unanimous.
by Amy Howe 9:11 AM↑15
Roberts, Ginsburg, Breyer, Alito, Sotomayor, Gorsuch, and Kavanaugh join her opinion.
by Amy Howe 9:12 AM↑6
Supreme Court ruled against faithless electors.
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-07-06/supreme-court-electoral-college-states-voters
Acacia
Thanks to everyone for the interesting reading/viewing list.
David Brin: loved the slow glass story. It looks like he wrote an entire book around the idea. Gonna get my local book store to order it for me along with your ST novel.
Atomsmith: Dust is shockingly good sometimes. I greatly enjoyed your recommendation
Acacia H.: I saw that. What is the rationel now for having an electoral college?
"Can anyone else think of any scifi where the characters use FTL to look back at past Earth? I can't."
Offhand I can think of a couple, though only one involved Earth itself.
The first one is that most awesome tome of cheese penned by perhaps the greatest carny of our time, L Ron Hubbard. I speak of Travolta's Bane, Battlefield Earth. I actually read this thing long ago and, god help me, seem to remember it quite well. In it the hero, Johnny "Goodboy" Tyler sends probes out to calculated distances from Earth to observe past events of interest on Earth. The time frame was relatively short though, not historical time frames.
Not precisely the same category but very thoughtfully done, in the Exordium pentalogy by Sherwood Smith & Dave Trowbridge a standard tactic of the largest Panarchy naval vessels is to use their FTL capability and large sensor baseline to observe past events. For example, coming onto the scene of a past battle or other event of interest and skipping out light-hours or light-days away to look back and see what happened. The tactic was also used routinely throughout the course of an engagement in order to analyze previous moments in the engagement. This tactic was also used to enable a single ship to fire weapons at a target vessel from more than one bearing while arriving at the target at the same time. And of course the enemy is using the same tactics against you.
"Monday’s ruling upholds a $1,000 fine against Peter Chiafalo, one of three Washington state electors who cast their ballots for Colin Powell rather than for Democrat Hillary Clinton, who won the state’s popular vote."
Doesn't this just uphold the penalty for the faithless vote? Or does the ruling negate/change the vote?
I can see an elector choosing to vote their conscience and paying the fine.
Just to be clear, I think most news stories are getting the faithless elector thing wrong by stating that states want to sanction electors who vote differently from the state's popular vote. The important issue is whether electors are allowed to vote differently from how state law requires them to, whether that's the state's popular vote, a compact to go with the national popular vote, or (Nebraska and Maine) the popular vote for their district.
The important thing is that the voters should get what they're voting for on the ballot. If we want to go back to the founders' notion that the people vote for electors themselves and those electors then choose which presidential candidate to cast their vote for, I wouldn't object on principle, but then it's the electors who should be campaigning and letting you know why you should (or shouldn't) vote for them as individuals, and the electors' names which should appear on the ballot.
If I just get to vote for Joe Biden, but the elector pledged to Joe Biden gets to do whatever he feels like, then I the voter am completely disenfranchised. And I'm surprised and glad to see the supreme court agree with me, and not by a 5-4 decision. Keep this up, and I might start capitalizing the court's name again. :)
Unanimous, at that. One fear was that states with red admins that vote blue in November might elect EC delegates to vote for Trump anyway. That, at least, is one cheat denied them.
I'll blog the following some time. Here'e your preview:
Folks on both right & left rejoice over the near unanimous decision that states can force to 'faithless" electors to vote as the state's voter majority declared, for president. Well, you'll not be surprised to learn that I have a more complicated opinion. Sure, the one dissenter on this Court decision - Thomas - is the purest poison. Plus, this may scotch scenarios where -say- WI GOP legislators try to steal the state's electoral votes from Biden. And yes, as-is the Electoral College is a travesty, not behaving like a "college" of sages, at all. OTOH, for Kagan to write that electors were never meant to be anything other than mathematical conduits is disingenuous. The very word "College" suggests that in the ideal case they might *meet and deliberate* to choose the very best person as Chief Executive.
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-07-06/supreme-court-electoral-college-states-voters
Distance made that ideal impossible, in olden times. Today, it's a mockery because parties assign slates of names as electors pledged to their candidate... and in most states voters never even see the electors' names. That doesn't have to be so! Especially in these modern, cyber-times. One could envision a dozen different ways that electors themselves might be chosen with voter input, making them more than honorary rewards for party service.
But something else. Back in late November 2016, I tried to circulate a notion... that ONE ride person might rent a luxury resort hotel somewhere, provide extra security, and simply declare: "All recently elected Electors may come at free business class travel and stay for two weeks, unbothered by anyone except hotel service staff. They may do or say anything they like, relax, argue, be a 'college' or not. Hands-off."
Three sentences that would rock the nation. If more than 270 did show up, there'd be a 'quorum' of sorts for conversation and argument, though the voting would still come back home in each state, in mid-December. And sure, the electors would mostly be party loyalists, even hacks. Still, picture it. Envision 2016... and the subsequent Kaine-Pence Administration...
Oh finally note this case was actually very specific: "Monday’s ruling upholds a $1,000 fine against Peter Chiafalo, one of three Washington state electors who cast their ballots for Colin Powell rather than for Democrat Hillary Clinton, who won the state’s popular vote." Hence the Court declared that states may “punish” electors who decide to go their own way. It still doesn’t prevent the actual act of voting for someone other than their party’s candidate. Hence, an elector might vote against a monster as a willing, sacrificial act… or else take the penalty as the cost of a bribe. As usual, the Court has ‘clarified’ almost nothing.
frabjoustheelder:
What is the rationel now for having an electoral college?
Simple. It would take a Constitutional amendment to change it, and a Constitutional amendment requires a 2/3 vote in the Senate and ratification by 3/4 of the states. Since that would require most of those Senators and states to vote for themselves to lose influence, they're not likely to do so.
David Smelser:
"Monday’s ruling upholds a $1,000 fine against Peter Chiafalo, one of three Washington state electors who cast their ballots for Colin Powell rather than for Democrat Hillary Clinton, who won the state’s popular vote."
Doesn't this just uphold the penalty for the faithless vote? Or does the ruling negate/change the vote?
I can see an elector choosing to vote their conscience and paying the fine.
You are correct that a certain amount is still up to state law. But I feel much better with the ruling, and this is why:
Washington in particular levies a fine on faithless electors. Other states actually retroactively remove them and replace them with an elector who votes as the state intended. In other words, they make it impossible to actually vote faithlessly (and have it count). And even if it's just the fine, it still has a discouraging effect.
More importantly, the electors typically are chosen by the state parties in one form or another. If my state goes for Biden, it will send a slate of electors to vote for Biden which have been chosen by the Democratic Party in my state. To be a "voter of conscience" who feels compelled to vote for Trump but was put onto the Democratic slate, one must be a deep cover sleeper agent. Not saying it's not possible, but the likelihood is low.
Given that fact, a faithless elector is less likely to be a (say) Republican in Democratic clothing than he is to be a Republican (or Democrat) who is so disenchanted with his own party's candidate that he can't vote for that candidate. In 2016, we saw that on both sides, although more leaned against Hillary. In 2020, I suspect that there's more danger of a Republican elector dumping Trump than of a Democrat voting against Biden. That might explain why the court unanimously voted as they did.
Finally, the ability of states to regulate elector behavior could be a bulwark against attempts at bribery or threats to coerce an elector to flip. That would be the real danger of a Trump upset, especially if the electoral vote is close.
Scidata
If you take Jung’s idea that “we don’t just have ideas,
Sometimes Ideas have us.” An put it in mathematical form you end up with memetics.
If you do that, people like Larry and myself might point out that you anthropomorphizing and supernaturalizing ideas. And some people might think there is something wrong with that, others might take the idea to places you don’t like.
In space news, I do appreciate earth observing satellites, this is a good time to watch the arctic sea ice melt. It has been quite a melt year so far, the refreezing season was good and we started the melt season with more than expected ice, but the melt season has been very conducive for melting – maybe because of the lack of contrails from aircraft over the artic. We might see open water from the Siberian side all the way to the north pole, but a complete melt out looks to be out of the question.
Dr Brin:
OTOH, for Kagan to write that electors were never meant to be anything other than mathematical conduits is disingenuous
You are correct about "never meant", but I'd say that the way most state elections are held implies that very thing. We're not given the chance to vote for an elector or even know anything about them as individuals. We vote for Trump or Biden, and whichever wins our state (in most cases) wins the number of electoral votes that the state has. What's disingenuous is to hold elections on that basis and then say that the outcome isn't determined by those elections.
Hence the Court declared that states may “punish” electors who decide to go their own way. It still doesn’t prevent the actual act of voting for someone other than their party’s candidate. Hence, an elector might vote against a monster as a willing, sacrificial act… or else take the penalty as the cost of a bribe.
True, but other states don't just impose fines. There was at least one case where the state invalidated the vote of a faithless elector and replaced him with a faithful one. The ruling allows states to escalate as necessary.
As usual, the Court has ‘clarified’ almost nothing.
Even so, if they had ruled the other way, they'd have opened the door for a public relations campaign to get the public used to the fact that the "real" contest doesn't happen until Dec 15 and has almost nothing to do with the November election. This way, that won't happen. If the Republicans do cheat, it will be obvious to the public that they cheated, even to those who like the cheating outcome. It will undermine Trump's legitimacy even more than it already is. (Note while the same applies to cheating by Biden, I just don't envision that happening)
I noted it on Facebook and see that Zepp also notes it here: the vote was unanimous. Thomas did not dissent; he concurred (saying that the penalties were allowed under the 10th Amendment as a right reserved to the States as opposed to the controllin opinion finding the power in Article II, Section 1). Gorsuch joined Thomas as to Part II of the Thomas opinion (and did not join in Thomas' textual anaylisis).
To address Larry's question about whether a faithless elector can be faithless and just accept a fine, it depends on the state law. In the companion case, Colorado v. Baca, Colorado law allowed a faithless elector's vote to be voided and the elector replaced by a substitute elector. The Court said that was OK, too.
David
Your plan to have the electoral collage steal the election from Trump in 2016 could have caused an armed insurrection and maybe precipitated a hot civil war. It is a good way to lose the mandate of heaven.
It looks like that the hatred of Trump, the 100,000’s of people dead from the bungled response to the pandemic, the biggest economic downturn sense the great depression and the rioting in the streets should be enough to get the Democrats the presidency, the house and senate.
(But 2020 is a year of an astrological grand mutation and this year is not done screwing with us yet, things may be different by November, I would not be too surprised to see war break out and/or a currency crisis before the end of the year.)
While jim is likely right that some Trump supporters might have gone to the streets in 2016, the overwhelming Clinton popular vote would likely have squelched that. Only note it was CLINTON who was betrayed by faithless electors and there were no riots.
I shrug off jim's pathetic hostility as irrelevant.
What IS SFnally interesting is to ponder the state of the nation today, had Hillary won. I assert our stomachs would be just as knotted in political agony and angst. YES the civil service would still function smoothly as they did for the final - legislatively useless - six years of Bill's and Barack's administrations. Well run with zero legislative adaptgation to modern times, all stymied by a volcanically raging GOP.
But that rage would likely have gone totally violent by now. I cannot see how, in that parallwl world, the Republican-Foxite treason would be so close to total repudiation. Perhaps there is a silver lining.
Now onward
onward
onward
Dr Brin:
Only note it was CLINTON who was betrayed by faithless electors and there were no riots.
We don't yet have a test case where the outcome was changed by faithless electors. Not only in recent memory, but ever. If that does happen, we'll see what the reaction of the public is.
If Hillary had nominally won the electoral vote, but lost due to faithless electors, it would have at least raised questions of legitimacy even beyond what were raised in the real 2016 election. Trump was able to credibly argue "If the game had been different, we would have campaigned in California" (even if his contention that he would have won California is suspect*). A harder case to make would be "There's nothing in the Constitution that prevents me from bribing or blackmailing a few electors."
* It also makes no sense. If the game were the national popular vote, it wouldn't matter who "wins" California. The Californians who voted for him would add to his total just like the Iowans or Nebraskans would, and the same would go for Hillary. "Winning" a state would just be like winning a city or a county is now--a perhaps-useful piece of information, but no determination of anything.
onward
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