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If you are going to break a 250-year precedent of never prosecuting former presidents, it better be over something pretty damn serious.

Why?

Cause it will begin a huge tit for tat response with soon every president and governor going to prison

Riddle me this. Then why haven't Republicans been doing this anyway? There has been deep-seated unspeakable visceral venomous hatred for clinton, then obama, and now Biden that touches the most basic passionate basis of Republicans lives, especially the activists face. If you think for one instance that Republican restraint was be out of the goodness of their hearts rather than the fact that the ugly reality is that Prosecuting someone for a crime, even in the most bum  rural red counties against a disliked liberal politician, is actually rather difficult. There is nothing whatsoever to trigger a republican response here because weaponizing the courts and going after their political enemies is already been their modus operandi for 30 years. If you truly believe this is going to move the needle then you're being even more clueless than usual.

If you truly believe that a president shouldn't be prosecuted because then political enemies will try to prosecute them somewhere, then surely you feel that way about all elected officials. You don't think for a second local political races and rivalries can be every bit as bitter and hate failed as those in National politics? What on Earth would stop a district attorney who defeated an incumbent whom they personally and professionally and politically despised and drumming up charges against them? It's absolutely no different weather you're talking about a County district attorney in rural Texas versus the presidency. Now, try to respond to that line of logic without something along lines of Mitt Romney agrees with you and so does the prime minister of belgium.

1. The reason they did not do it is cause they were afraid of a tit for tat response as well

2. Also I never said they should be granted full immunity as I believe stuff like Jan 6th, Nixon sabotaging Vietnam peace talks were stuff that should be prosecuted.

It is why I also said I support an expeditated appeals process to either the highest state court or SCOTUS depending on what is a federal or state crime to deal with this as well

Plenty of governors, senators, congressmen, and judges have been prosecuted for various misdeeds over the years. Should they not have been? Why is it okay to hold every other official high or petty responsible for their actions but not the President? Why is it only the prosecution of the President that will bring your “tit for tat” doomsday scenario to pass? 

There are many who said that the impeachment of Bill Clinton following on the report from Ken Starr (Chamber) was in response to the Democrats would have been impeachment (and conviction) of Richard Nixon, even though most Republicans in Congress weren't in Congress at that time (at least, I don't think they were, this was over 20 years later.)

There may even have been some who argued that Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats unwillingness to impeach George W Bush for lying the U.S into war was to end this 'tit for tat.' But, if that claim has been made, I think the evidence for that is very weak. The reality is, for all of Pelosi's extraordinary abilities as Speaker she isn't perfect (nobody is) and she's made it clear many times that she also favors the privileges of the wealthy and powerful (her trying to keep it legal for Congress people to essentially engage in insider trading is one example of that.)

When Pelosi said before the first impeachment of Trump that it was 'the last thing she wanted to do' she was definitely telling the truth. So, I don't think this goes any deeper than that.

Finally, of course, even with W. Bush lying the U.S into war, there has always been an uncomfortableness with holding Presidents accountable for their actions as President, which is one thing that OSR has been arguing, and which I can somewhat appreciate.

In this case, impeaching W. Bush over this would have shown that many members of Congress (both the House and Senate) took W Bush at his word and never read the actual reports (Bob Graham did and voted against the Iraq war but he was limited in what he could say was in the reports, at least publicly.)

I also previously mentioned how during the Nixon impeachment hearings in the House, they voted against impeaching Nixon on the bombings of Laos and Cambodia, which though illegal under international law, were also clearly done by Nixon in his actions as President/Commander in Chief.

Interestingly they also voted against impeaching Nixon for misusing the Army Corps of Engineers who built for Nixon a swimming pool for Nixon at his 'alternative' White House in Loma Linda California to 'enable the Secret Service to better protect Nixon.'

So, I think there is little evidence that Democrats and Republicans want to avoid a 'tit for tat' but I certainly think there is some kind of mutual protection racket. Of course, given that prosecutors and courts are independent of this (except for especially the Republican Supreme Court) to the degree that the politicians are unable to write laws that fully protect themselves, the prosecutors are still able to go after them, as we see with Trump here.

What's up with EFF winning a central part of Johannesburg with 41% of the vote?

Black university ?

It’s Braamfontein, home of Wits university. Actually one of the top universities on the country, the EFF also won a voting district around the university of Cape Town, which stands out even more considering the demographics of the surrounding areas. And those are pretty much the top universities in the country. The EFF won some student elections recently, they have a very strong student vote. Legacy of the fees must fall protests and all.

https://twitter.com/BenHowe/status/1796293772805886423

[Don't Try This At Home]

Don't Try This At Home

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C7qwggpteun/

Yeah, the thing that's really inexplicable (and inexcusable) with the Biden administration's handling of these issue is why they feel the need to make these big public announcements instead of quietly giving Ukraine the go-ahead and only confirming afterwards that they'd done so with his blessing. The advantage of having the element of surprise should be obvious.

In the long run Russia is going to find adaptations to changes in the battlefield dynamics one way or the other, but of course those adaptations are going to be less efficient than them being able to strike right across the border with impunity. Every strategic gain by Ukraine is a win.

Knife attack in Mannheim on anti-islamic activists, several people, including police officer, hospitalized. Perpetrator was shot by Police. Shocking video of the attack can be found on Twitter
https://m.bild.de/regional/baden-wuerttemberg/mannheim-brutaler-messerangriff-auf-islam-kritiker-6659a3c9c370a679ea9df3dc?t_ref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F

Also, for who will follow the elections...

i'll explain the process but around 3PM local time the last voting booths will close, usually it takes until 5pm local time before the first results come in, mostly from rurals and small sample sizes but it can give an indication of the first trends.

Usually its the evening when the bunch of the results come in, and the cities etc. That'll be around midday/afternoon for US time on sunday.

We don't have an exit poll tradition (perhaps this might be the first time we will have an exit poll), but we've never had one before. So that means that usually quite a few results have to come in before we know what direction it is going.

Likely though what i anticipate:

Gains for VB (far right) and far-left. And sizeable losses for the Greens seem almost near guaranteed. Gains for LE seem also guaranteed because their gains are consistent and outside MoE at this point.

Anything else i'm less certain off, but I suspect mild losses for NVA, mild gains for Vooruit, mild losses for OVLD, mild loss for PS and mild gain (?) for MR.

what will be the likely new government? The same big tent group we have now plus LE?

It’s very strange in that anything below a 1997 style result for Labour will be met and presented as a disappointment but no-one is at all ready for the possibility that Labour could get north of 450!

Everyone has been reporting these huge poll leads but just assuming it will come down in a campaign because of ‘muh magic’ or ‘muh President Sunak’.

Like with the locals the thing that is making me think it could be a bigger landslide is the scale of Tory voters in safe seats (e.g ones they have held since 2005 or even 79!) who are not going to support them.

Also, for who will follow the elections...

i'll explain the process but around 3PM local time the last voting booths will close, usually it takes until 5pm local time before the first results come in, mostly from rurals and small sample sizes but it can give an indication of the first trends.

Usually its the evening when the bunch of the results come in, and the cities etc. That'll be around midday/afternoon for US time on sunday.

We don't have an exit poll tradition (perhaps this might be the first time we will have an exit poll), but we've never had one before. So that means that usually quite a few results have to come in before we know what direction it is going.

Likely though what i anticipate:

Gains for VB (far right) and far-left. And sizeable losses for the Greens seem almost near guaranteed. Gains for LE seem also guaranteed because their gains are consistent and outside MoE at this point.

Anything else i'm less certain off, but I suspect mild losses for NVA, mild gains for Vooruit, mild losses for OVLD, mild loss for PS and mild gain (?) for MR.

[Vooruit:]

Brussels parties are all those shown here, with the exception of CN. I almost decided to include the single-issue Viva Palestina because I thought it'd be funny, but decided against it, in part because they haven't polled above 1%.

Good chance though that they'll be outside the ones you've mentioned in Brussels because they have a sitting delegation that they'll be the best performing political party in Brussels. I doubt it'll be enough for a seat and it'll mostly act as a spoiler for the left wing parties who already are pro-Palestine.

But the reason they wouldn't poll above 1% is because the voters for such party would not be reachable by phones and probably would be low info muslim voters which Brussels has a lot off (some districts even majority muslim). A party named ISLAM once got elected to city council in Molenbeek. And this one seems likely to have more support than ISLAM which was explicitly pro-sharia law.

The dude running the party also is to some extent famous, at least i know him for quite some time. Don't underestimate that party, i would say.

Voor U [For You] also probably should have been included. They have a good chance of hitting 1%, they just were never included in a poll yet. (which i think Viva Palestina was neither) Though almost zero chance they break electoral threshold somewhere.

Polling in Belgium generally sucks tho. Malta has more polls than we do. Lots of criticizing from media generally on the process of poll conducting and therefore they only decide/choose to only do a few or once each year for that reason (even if a "poll" is so important, that we've had chairpersons of a party resign because of one single bad poll, because we have so few polls).

yeah, that's the main issue with using the polls, but it's the best I can do without including a bunch of parties that are almost certain to not get in. South Africa would've been a nightmare to do without the restrictions I had there, and even that was a bit difficult to decide because parties like PA and RISE weren't being polled but had enough support to show up in those "what party should you support" tests.

The stances of the Flemish political parties on Israel-Palestine according to Het Nieuwsblad (newspaper)

Vooruit: (social democrat)

Vooruit advocates immediate recognition of the Palestinian state, the unconditional release of the hostages and maximum access for humanitarian aid in Gaza. They also want to impose economic sanctions on Israel.

CD&V (christian democrat)

In favor of recognition of Palestine, an essential step for them to achieve a two-state solution. CD&V also advocates economic sanctions against Israel, such as a boycott of products from the occupied territories, and wants to evaluate the association agreement between the EU and Israel.

Open VLD (liberal)

Within Open VLD there is division about the recognition of Palestine and about the embargo for products from occupied territories.

N-VA (liberal conservative, flemish nationalist)

N-VA advocates a two-state solution, but does not currently support the recognition of Palestine or economic sanctions against Israel. The party does reject the Israeli occupation policy. The party mainly wants to focus on diplomatic pressure to end the conflict.

Vlaams Belang (flemish nationalist, right-wing populist)

The party supports a two-state solution. But Flanders cannot do more than condemn war crimes on both sides, it sounds. Vlaams Belang wants to suspend developmental aid to Palestinian areas. According to the party, this will only end up with Hamas.

Groen: (green politics)

Groen wants to recognize Palestine as soon as possible. The party also wants economic sanctions against Israel and calls for a total embargo. If it were up to the Greens, Israel would no longer have a place at international events and the Belgian government could no longer coöperate with Israeli authorities.

PVDA (marxist)

The party that goes the furthest in its position is PVDA. The party talks about a genocide and wants to oblige Israel to declare a ceasefire. All ties between our country and Israel must be immediately broken.

See: https://talkelections.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=261285.1175

thanks for the info, I was wondering about it because not all parties had a specific plank on their website about it.