A lot of sports people do have these superstitions. I think it's all about establishing confidence and a feeling that you are in control. Imagine entering a high pressure contest against a player or team of similar ability to yourself. You are a great player, but so is your opponent. You can influence the outcome of the match, but you can't control it by yourself, because your opponent has a say as well. Superstitions of the 'if I do x then y' variety can help to establish confidence by creating a mental environment in which you have control.

Does anyone have an opinion on how Trump's actions over the next couple of months could impact the vital GA senate run-offs in January?
Once AK and NC are in, it looks like a 50-48 advantage for Republicans... so if the Dems can somehow win both of the two GA run-offs, they'd wrest control of the senate.

Will Trump concentrate his remaining time on the 'stolen' election rather than on the forthcoming GA run-offs? Will he and his party focus mostly on what has gone rather than what is to come, and potentially lose the senate as a result?

I'd say the same thing. One thing that's quite surprising though is just how low the points totals are for those teams: 3, 2 and 1 for the bottom 3. As a rough approximation, they've played 1/5 of their total league games this season. If we extrapolate based on performance so far, they'd finish on 15, 10 and 5 points for the whole season. Whilst the rest of the teams have been inconsistent, those at the bottom have been consistently bad.

Voting update:

I've counted the votes, and remarkably we have achieved a cross-party consensus and have a working majority of 52.6% for "grudgingly, saying he's being forced out despite winning the election".
However, that's not how I voted, so I'll keep the poll open until I get the result I want - that's how these things work, right?

The Arsenal/Villa game perfectly exemplifies the immense unpredictability of the Premier League this season. Just when you think you have some confidence in what will happen, the opposite happens! Villa started the season extremely well, including that insane Liverpool result... but since then looked to have been found out a bit, and got hammered by Southampton and Leeds... it looked like Villa's early season form was an anomaly and they'd drop back down the table quite rapidly. Meanwhile Arsenal looked good, especially off the back of the win against Man U... and were at home against struggling Villa. Looked like a solid home banker... and what happens? Villa flick a switch somewhere and go back into 'Liverpool' mode, and put 3 past Arsenal without reply for a comprehensive away win. It's crazy... I wouldn't like to put a bet on anything in the Prem at the moment.

Yes, but Trump has a huge amount of support, too. Let's not forget that over 70m voted for Trump this time around - that's more, for example, than Obama ever got.
Biden's selling point essentially was "I'm not Trump"... the election was all about Trump and Trumpist politics, he's a polarising character, and he can get voters to turn out - both for him and against him - like no-one else.

This isn't a Trump-bashing thread. "Lame duck" covers every outgoing president during the transition. It doesn't have to be an oppositional thing, either. For example, George W was praised effusively by Obama for how easy he made their transition. This time, though, voters from both sides know that Trump won't go quietly or happily. The question is what he might do during the next couple of months. And the associated question, given how much of a vote-winner Trumpism is/was, is to what extent will other prominent Republicans continue to work with him and further his agenda?

I was wondering what sort of carnage a furious and vengeful Trump might wreak between now and Biden's inauguration, but then I found this article, which covers most of it. Apologies for yet another Trump/election thread but it's a broad discussion and I wanted to focus on a specific aspect: the immediate aftermath. What do we think will happen?

There has been talk of a self-pardon, or putting Pence in charge to pardon him for some of his most egregious offences. Not sure how successful this would be, but he'll certainly try - won't he? Another aspect to all of this is the vital Georgia run-offs. Will a couple of months of Trump-fuelled chaos give the Democrats these seats? Now that he's lost, it seems extremely likely that Trump's actions will focus even more on what benefits himself rather than the country. I'd imagine he couldn't care less what happens in future GA elections; that's a problem for someone else to deal with. And to what extent will prominent Republicans continue to back him? Will they break ranks? Will they continue to mostly support him given that almost 50% of voters still love the guy? Appreciate that the transition itself is largely handled by civil servants, so should be smoother than might be envisaged were it entirely Trump-managed. But still, lame duck, baseball bat...

If someone can make a bet that size, then likely the money doesn't matter to them. If they don't mind losing $5m, then presumably they're not immensely bothered over winning the bet and netting $10m  (or whatever) either.
However - a bet this size obviously makes news around the globe, so I wonder if it's a mega-rich Trump fan who is trying to influence opinion a bit to increase the chances of getting him re-elected?
Obviously Trump has lost now, but the timing of the bet is a bit suspicious, along with the almost-irrelevance of making the bet at odds of 37/20.

It's not dumping. Whenever the price starts going up quickly, the FOMO starts, and the price invariably overshoots where it 'should' be. The price rise stops, and then turns into a small drop. It happens just about every time; I don't think it's a reason for concern at all. The general trend is still upwards.

It's not an alien spaceship, it's his spaceship. He designed and built it. He pilots it. Better than anyone else. This is the greatest spaceship. All the other spaceships are frauds.

Assuming the Biden win becomes official, how will Trump leave the White House? Appreciate there are various definitions of 'official', and that we still have some time before moving day...

I think Trump will drag it out beyond that point. Even if the media turns against him and stops granting him airtime, he still has his own communication channels. The man will never, ever accept that he's been defeated in anything, or that he's been wrong in anything. Can you imagine him admitting that he called wrong on even the most insignificant event, such as a coin toss or a dice roll? Or that he lost in a golf match? Let alone that he's come second in a two-horse race for leader-of-the-free-world, with billions of people watching on.

For Biden supporters the election has two possible outcomes:
Biden wins
Biden loses

For Trump supporters* the election has two possible outcomes:
Trump wins
Trump wins but is cheated out of victory

It's absurd. The problem is that a proportion of the Trump base are backing him through faith rather than reason. That's why facts have no effect on them.
Of course some benighted countries do have elections where the result is determined prior to ballots being counted. America really shouldn't want to become one of those countries.

*_{Not all Trump supporters, obviously. But the loudest ones tend to grab the attention.}

---

Further to this, the fallout could get messy and violent. Will he leave the White House quietly? Will he encourage armed extremist nut-jobs to vote with their guns? I think it's a genuine concern. It's difficult to rule anything out at this point. The Biden campaign's tongue-in-cheek comment that "the United States government is perfectly capable of escorting trespassers out of the White House" could yet come to pass.

No, it's a good article. Clear, concise and brimful of facts. But you don't have to take the Guardian as the source... cracks are appearing in the ranks, Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger (Illinois) has just tweeted advising Trump to "STOP Spreading debunked misinformation... This is getting insane." https://twitter.com/RepKinzinger/status/1324503564891414528

Meanwhile, at the last count (as of 27 August), Trump has made 22,247 false or misleading claims in 1,316 days in office (obviously this will have increased somewhat over the couple of months since then). The next question, I suppose, is that once he's no longer a figure in prominent public office, and his Twitter account is no longer invulnerable, will he be banned instead of just having all his posts tagged?

I'm no fan of Trump, and whilst I think he's a bit of a low-watt bulb, there's no disputing that he's a fantastically skilled demagogue. Just wondering what might happen if he loses his primary avenue of communication...

Thanks for the clarification! That doesn't surprise me at all.

Sounds like PA and GA are getting close to the finish line now, with Biden ahead in both, and accelerating; should be all over soon. Well, apart from the months of legal wrangling and potential civil unrest.

The big rises we are seeing at the moment are surely due to the US election. Look at what's happening with the 'normal' stock markets, for comparison. Bullish sentiment is returning across the board; this isn't specific to crypto.
Bitcoin is still regarded in the main as a highly speculative 'good times' asset, something to buy when everything is looking good, in the hopes of reaping some big returns. Similarly it's the first thing to be sold once an economic crisis hits. What we're seeing now is that Trump is likely on his way out, with the more stable Biden coming in, but also Biden being hampered by a Rep-controlled senate in what changes he can realistically effect... so no new big taxes or regulation for businesses.

It's not as simple as that. In certain swing states - Pennsylvania among them - the Republican state legislature resisted pressure to allow early counting of mail-in votes. The reason being of course that in-person votes will favour Trump, whilst mail-in favours Biden. So if they delay counting the mail-in votes, they can control the narrative - and make it appear that Trump has an early lead, which then suspiciously starts to disappear as the "late" (early) mail-in ballots are eventually counted. Trump can cry fraud, and demand that the votes he wouldn't allow to be counted early can't be counted late either. In delightful parallel to the incumbent, the strategy is absurd, simplistic, and moronic.

The thing is though that Liverpool drop relatively few points over the course of a season. It's not like they are expected to lose another 6 or 7 games to give opportunity for Man City to catch up. The fewer points they drop elsewhere, the more vital a win is in the head-to-head. Here's the table last season at the start of lockdown - Liverpool played 29, won 27, drawn 1, lost 1... in this sort of situation any points loss can be crucial.


https://extratime.media/2020/07/26/premier-league-2020-epl-table-before-lockdown/

Yes. Some swing states are prevented, by their Republican legislatures, from counting mail-in ballots before election day. The reason being that mail-in votes will favour Biden, so these states can then call a Trump win on the day, and make it look like Biden is stealing the state when his "late" (i.e., early) mail-in votes start to be counted. Trump can then complain that the election is being stolen, and demand that these "late" (i.e., early) votes are not counted. Very simplistic strategy of manipulating opinion, which is what we've come to expect...

I think, given the standards they've set over the years, this result has to be considered a failure. If United are struggling already against weak teams in the group stages, then they are unlikely to progress very far in the competition, and certainly not challenge to lift the trophy. They're not the team we've been used to over the last few decades.

There's also the point that if Biden wins, he then faces a Republican-controlled senate. It's this I think that's a key driver of the buoyant markets. Biden is not going to be able to implement higher taxes, tougher regulations, etc., if he has to get through the Rep senate to do so. Republicans have also flipped some House seats. A Biden administration is not going to have free rein.