Today Joe Biden is to be sworn in as the New (finally) US President. Personally I don’t care if you support Biden or Not. I am just happy after that Incident on Jan 6 that he is actually being sworn in being protected by no less than 24,000 members of The National Guard with Shoot to Kill orders, and unknown number of Law Enforcement… some put that number up by an additional 10,000. Not to mention undercover agents patrolling the crowd, and there numbers for now are being kept secret.
Believe me I could go into the fallout from that incident but I won’t. Just Google it and it is truly amazing.
Personally I will be happy when things get fully back to normal and I could visit DC again.
But I have to address the Giant Orange Baby, and his truly insane followers, many of whom are facing decades in prison, all the while wondering why they weren’t pardon. I heard that one yesterday.
Despite all the rumors/ fears I really hope today is peaceful. To me it’s just plain uncomfortable to know that your boss has called on everyone of his employees to take their gun to work. Yes, I am serious.
To why this article I found a piece on the National Geographic site on other issues when a new President is about to be sworn in, I hope you enjoy.
Outgoing President James Buchanan stood by in 1860 as Southern states prepared to leave the Union, maintaining that it was “beyond the power of any president” to do anything about it—and saddling the incoming Abraham Lincoln with the Civil War. Another lame-duck president deliberately sabotaged an incoming administration and pushed the nation into the economic depression known as the Panic of 1893. The transition during another economic crisis in early 1933 was so bad Congress moved up future inaugurations from March to January.
John Adams and the ‘midnight judges’
In December 1800, Federalist President John Adams had just lost reelection when Supreme Court Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth resigned his post. With the end of his term only three months away, Adams acted. “Adams did not think of himself as a ‘lame duck,’” writes historian Richard A. Samuelson. “He saw no reason why he should cease to exercise the powers of the office just because he would soon no longer hold them.
Adams and his fellow lame-duck Federalist Congress moved swiftly both to replace the chief justice and reshape the judiciary in line with their vision to expand federal powers over the states. After confirming Secretary of State John Marshall to the Supreme Court, Congress passed the Judiciary Act of 1801 that reduced the Supreme Court from six seats to five and created 16 new federal judgeships. By February 24, Adams had submitted his nominations for those roles—then signed a few other judgeship commissions on March 3, his last day in office. (Why the Supreme Court ended up with nine justices.)
Democratic-Republicans, an early political party led by President-elect Thomas Jefferson, were outraged. Seeing these actions as a partisan attempt to pack the court and subvert their agenda, the lawmakers repealed the law before it could go into effect. In the years since, Adams’ last-minute appointments have become known as the “midnight judges”—and a prime example of lame-duck sabotage.
Hostilities between Herbert Hoover and FDR
In 1932, the effects of the Great Depression were rippling across the country when Republican incumbent Herbert Hoover faced off against Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the presidential election. Roosevelt campaigned and won on “a new deal for the American people” that would ease suffering by expanding the role of the federal government and “distributing wealth and products more equitably.”
Hoover opposed these New Deal policies as a threat to individual liberty—and worked to undermine them before Roosevelt could take office. As historian Eric Rauchway writes, Hoover spent the months following the election trying to persuade Roosevelt to abandon the New Deal and issue public promises to balance the budget. Hoover even asked the President-elect to co-create an economic commission, a move that the New Yorker notes would have allowed Hoover to enact his own agenda before Roosevelt’s term began. Roosevelt declined.
Hoover and Roosevelt didn’t get along personally, either, and had several contentious meetings right up until Inauguration Day on March 4, 1933. But Roosevelt would be the last president to be forced to wait until March to take office: Earlier that year—having already decided that the lame-duck period was too long—the nation ratified the 20th Amendment that moved up Inauguration Day to January 20. (The U.S. has never delayed a presidential election. Here’s why it’s so tricky.)
Furry Times 