Elephants Run the Table, Again, and Again, Once More Once Again!

[army judge]

Elephants just keep on winning, and winning, and winning, over and over.

Too darn Much Winning?
One can't ever get tired of winning, or can she/he?
However, losing, too dang much losing.
One soon grows weary of losing!

After Newsmax projected an official clinching of the House majority of at least 218 seats, Republicans have upped their total to 219 with the official victory declaration of Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif.

Calvert is a long-serving House GOP member in the deep-blue state of California.

There was a flip away from Republicans in the state as Rep. Mike Garcia, R-Calif., has officially lost his seat to Democrat George Whitesides.

That sets the latest House tally at 219 Republicans and 210 Democrats with six races remaining too close to call. Republicans lead in three of them.

Breakdown of the remaining races:

• California (five seats): Districts 9, 13, 21, 45, and 47. Republicans lead in Districts 13 and 45.
• Alaska District 1: Republican Nick Begich leads incumbent Rep. Mary Peltola, D-Alaska, in a ranked-choice voting state that would flip a seat to the GOP.

Rep. Juan Ciscomani, R-Ariz., held on to defeat Democrat challenger Kirsten Engel in Arizona's District 6, Newsmax is projecting, which clinched the 218th seat for Republicans, assuring the majority.

Democrats had been hoping to capture control of the House to blunt Republicans' grip on both the presidency and the Senate. In last week's election, Donald Trump recaptured the White House, while the GOP claimed the Senate majority 52-47 with one race (Pennsylvania) yet to be called by Newsmax.

Majority control is likely to smooth the way for enactment of the many elements of Trump's new administration, including plans for a large-scale deportation of illegal immigrants and tariffs on various foreign countries' products.

Trump is also expected to put forth a number of judicial appointments, which would likewise face a smoother road to passage under a GOP-controlled government. That is expected to include one or more Supreme Court justices.

https://www.newsmax.com/us/house-gop-majority/2024/11/11/id/1187620/

 

[Tax Counsel]

A one vote margin for the majority in the House, if that's what the final outcome turns out to be, is no guarantee that Trump will be able to get through everything he wants. Not all Republicans are full on MAGAites.

I would expect the more business minded Republicans to be wary of jacking up tariffs because doing that doesn't hurt foreign countries as Trump mistakenly believes. What it does is drive up prices for the consumer in the U.S. and invites retalitory tariffs, thereby reducing the exports of American firms. Most nations, including the U.S. (at least up until Jan 20 next year) understand that tariff wars don't benefit anyone. It was an effective campaign sound bite for Trump to make it sound like he could make foreign countries pay most of our taxes because most voters don't know any better. However, it tells me that either Trump is totally clueless about how tariffs actually work or he deliberately misled his supporters. Either way, it does not bode well for our tax and trade policies. I suspect once he unveils his plan American businesses will (hopefully successfully) lobby Congress to reject the kind of tariff plan Trump said during the campaign he wants to enact.

It's hard to say what appointments to the Supreme Court will get to make. The two oldest members of the Court are Republicans, Thomas and Alito, and 6 of the 9 were picked by Republican presidents. So if an opportunity does arise for Trump to make an appointment to the Court as of now it's more likely he'll replace one conservative member with another. Although I doubt I'll get to see it, it would be nice if Trump nominates persons to the bench on the basis of overall qualifications for the job rather than how the president thinks they may vote on any particular issue. Recent presidents, including Trump, have generally done the latter, which is most disappointing.