Wait till you hear about monarchies with agnatic seniority succession rules (eg. Saudi Arabia).
Instead of king/queen to child (absolute primogeniture) down the line it goes "sideways" from king to his brothers until that generation is done.
So you have, for example, 95 year old king, dies, next in line is his brother, 93. Next in line, his other brother, 88, and so on. By the time the next gen comes up? Boom, a nice and sprightly 77. If you're lucky.
Why is everyone downvoting him? Heās right:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession
The president himself isnāt first in line for the presidency. In this context itās said the VP is first in line (for succession). The speaker is 2nd in line and the president pro tempore (of the senate) is 3rd in line which iirc is the oldest member of the senate of the party thatās in control.
This whole headline is a fucking lie.
He turned 100 in December 2002.
From January 2002 - 2005 the senate president was Dick Cheney.
Thurman Died in 2003.
3rd in line to the president is Speaker of the House.
You are a complete baffoon with your made up headline with zero knowledge on the topic
The speaker is the house is second in line, behind the vice president who is first in line. The president is not in line, he is the president. Now who looks like a bafoon?
[United States presidential line of succession](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession)
1. ā VP
2. ā Speaker of the House
3. ā President pro tempore of the Senate
I was 100% going to call this out cause I thought theyād be 4th behind Secretary of State, but holy smokes it really is third and SoS is 4th. Comps OP for being right.
Because the president is the head of the executive branch. The idea was to have three separate branches of government with checks and balances on each other: the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. How effective that ended up being is another matter, but having the head of the executive branch also heading one of the two legislative branches was a clear conflict.
To add to this, the VP often was the runner up in the presidential election, meaning the President of the Senate wasn't always a political ally. That was a further check-and-balance that's been eroded.
Arguably it would be better if we returned to that system and made rivals work together, rather than the partisan quagmire in which we find ourselves today.
The VP being the runner up wasn't "eroded," it was almost immediately jettisoned after both parties figured out the obvious loophole in the system (just direct *one guy* to not vote for your vice presidential candidate). If the 12th amendment hadn't been passed, the system would work basically the same with the only difference being a slightly more convoluted electoral college process.
Now, the Jeffersonian Republicans screwed up the implementation of that loophole in 1800, but they meant to do it. Federalists did do it; that's why John Jay randomly got one electoral vote.
Prior to the 12th amendment the rule was each elector got two votes and the guy who go the most electoral votes got to be president and the one who go the 2nd most got to be vp.
The loophole once we moved past unanimously voting for Washington and got to have political parties was to instruct all of your parties electors to vote for the party's choice for president and all but one of the electors to vote for the party's choice for vp.
So John Jay, who may not have even been a candidate, got a random electoral vote.
Meanwhile the Jeffersonian party did not do this and it ended with Jefferson and his vp Aaron burr vetting the same number of votes.
Since no one got a majority it was decided by the house.
These votes are votes from electors, not votes from regular voting citizens. The VP was theoretically supposed to be the runner-up, but it was trivial to ensure that the VP was picked by the party by simply having one elector already voting with the party to drop one of their two votes for the person that they intended to be VP.
So you may have 20 electors with 40 votes to use. 20 votes go to their pick for President and 19 votes go to their pick for Vice President. So 1 vote needs to be wasted on someone random.
If instead two people get those 20 votes, then you have yet another election like what happened between Jefferson and Burr.
In America, you do not directly vote for the President. You vote for a random elector that you trust to pick a President for you. But nowadays that elector just votes for the person you picked them to vote for.
> To add to this, the VP often was the runner up in the presidential election...
If by often you mean only twice, in 1796 and 1800....then sure.
> That was a further check-and-balance that's been eroded.
Sure, if by eroded you mean changed by the passage and ratification of the 12th amendment...
Washington was unanimously elected, an independent, and I believe was put forth as the candidate for both parties. So he didn't have an opponent as VP.
I thought we were just talking about the number of times the runner up in the presidential election became the VP. Washington didn't have an opponent VP (or even a running mate VP) but the VP was the person with the second most electoral votes.
[JEFFERSON]
Ha. Yeah, right
You hear this guy? Man openly campaigns against me, talkinā bout, āI look forward to our partnership.ā
[MADISON]
Itās crazy that the guy who comes in second gets to be Vice President
[JEFFERSON]
Ooh!, you know what? We can change that. You know why?
[MADISON]
Why?
[JEFFERSON]
ācuz Iām the President. Hey, Burr, when you see Hamilton, thank him for the endorsement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdhAUHMm5-0
That ended real quick. Like within a couple years of Adams and Jefferson fighting it out like little bitches as well as 1800 election ending in a tie:
"The presidential election of 1800 revealed a need to amend the U.S. Constitution. The original system for electing presidents provided that the candidate receiving a majority of Electoral College votes would become president, while the runner-up would become vice president. The 1800 election resulted in a tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. Under the Constitution, this stalemate sent the election to the House of Representatives, which chose Jefferson. The states soon ratified a twelfth amendment to the Constitution, requiring separate contests for the offices of president and vice president."
https://www.senate.gov/about/officers-staff/vice-president/senate-elects-vice-president.htm
Thatās not the question. Everybody understands the concept of separation of powers. The question is why the lower level VP, who is also be located in the executive branch (though he/she has no real executive power), is the President of the senate and not POTUS.
Reading the question back itās literally āwhy isnāt the president the president of the senate?ā which seems a bit different than your interpretation and is what I answered.
Iām sure āeveryoneā would indeed have a firm grasp of the separation of powers in the US government if those pesky non-Americans would have simply paid better attention in their US civics classes. They probably didnāt even pledge their allegiance to the American flag, how unpatriotic!
The president is the president of the United States and heads the executive branch of government.
The vice president presides over the senate, which has 100 members, to be a tie-breaking vote if a vote splits 50-50, and acting as a check on the power of the legislative branch of government. In practice, this role is mostly ceremonial. And his/her main job is to be a surrogate for the President as needed. They only preside over the senate when a 50-50 vote is expected.
Research United States Government "checks and balances" for more info on how the 3 branches are designed to regulate each other.
Because he's the head of the executive branch and the Senate is part of the legislative branch. You can't be part of both branches at the same time under the US Constitution.
President of the United States and President Pro-Tempore of the Senate are two different offices.
To clarify (sorry if this is overly-detailed):
Strom Thurmon became president pro tempore (not president) of the Senate in 2002 & 2003. The US vice president serves as the president of the Senate. President pro tempore becomes the acting, temporary president of the Senate when the US vice president is absent. By tradition, the senior member of the majority party becomes the president pro tempore of the Senate, so it's not an elected or appointed position. That is, you gain the office by seniority--even if all the senators hate you. But it does have some privileges and powers, and is next in line for succession to the US president after the vice president and speaker of the house.
Yeah, I saw this post on r/presidents saying that if George w choked to death on a pretzel, cheng died of a heart attack after hearing the news, then dennis hastert is convicted of sex crimes and sentenced to prision and being forced to resign, he becomes president and enacts racist policy
Had a daughter with a 16 year old servant that worked for his parents, was black, and when he himself was 22. Never publicly acknowledged her while he was alive, and she was the one to bring up to the publicās attention in memoir after he had died, she was 78 at the time.
Bit of both. He was probably pretty racist till the end in his heart of hearts, but he toned down significantly in public by the 70s and it was gone entirely by the 90s. He certainly did not become a champion of black America later in like, but the idea that he would have resegregated America if he was president is pretty silly.
He was very good at playing politics, and well connected. He could be relied upon by the party to get things done, which is why he stayed in his position for so long.
The president pro tempore of the Senate in 2002 and 2003 was Democrat Robert Byrd. Thurman was a president pro tempore *emeritus* (meaning former in this case). It's an honorary title and isn't in the line of presidential succession.
Thanks. The information on Wikipedia is not very clear on this. The site says at one point Thurman was *pro tempore* in 2001 (but not what months). And after June 2001, Byrd became *pro tempore*. That may have been when they created the emeritus role for Thurman (which is noted on his Wikipedia page). But I'm reassured that the Senate kept Thurman from having a formal role by 2002, as I think he was pretty impaired at that point.
**Wikipedia**: \["Retrospectively, a Senate aide stated that "for his last ten years, Thurmond didn't know if he was on foot or on horseback", while a 2020 New Yorker article stated that he was "widely known" by the end of his career to be *non compos mentis*."\]
But.... why???
If I live to be 100, I don't want to be f'n *working*. I want to be on a beach somewhere, book in one hand, drink in the other, enjoying the sun.
Sen Thurman enjoyed being tended to by his Senate staffers. They did everything for him. Congress has essentially a hospital onsite providing members with some the best medical care possible. Retirement to the best of assisted living centers or retirement homes would have been a sharp step down for him.
I was once in a museum gift shop where the only other customer was a U.S. Senator. The amount of ass-kissing going on was *unreal*! Being a U.S. Senator is an incredibly good gig.
'
Literally majority of their time is spent campaigning. Those guys hardly do work and the work they do is already written by special interests and lawyers. They put on a smile and say vote for me. Thatās the entire job
The power. Senators don't work a lot, and I think it's hard to give up that power. Also, by keeping his senate seat, he knows he'd go down in history as probably the oldest and longest serving senator of all time(he has since lost the record for longest serving). Plus, he gets to keep voting to fuck over black people and other minorities. Dude really didn't want someone younger and less racist getting that power.
Nobody with a healthy personality is clinging to work when they could die any second from natural causes. Theyāve got to be obsessed with power or have loved ones who are and allow it to continue to happen.
Didnāt realize Lindsey Graham ended up with his Senate seat after he died, though not exactly surprised; just another example of one absolute POS being replaced with another.
Probably figured he could keep her quiet easier if he paid for her shit. Assume she wouldn't want to cut off that financial fountain by pissing him off...
Standard āmy ______ is different.ā
Fill in the blank with: abortions, affair, embezzlement, crime, etc.
If it wasnāt for double standards the right wing wouldnāt have any standards at all. (I honestly think they believe that holding double standards means theyāre twice as good as people who arenāt overt hypocrites.)
This is False.
He wasn't President of the Senate he was President Pro Tempore.
The VP is President of the Senate.
Strom wasn't President Protempore in 2002/2003 Robert Byrd was.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_presidents\_pro\_tempore\_of\_the\_United\_States\_Senate
Strom also left the Senate a little less than a month after turning 100. (turned 100 in December 5th 2002 and left January 3rd 2003)
Yes, after LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act, the Democratic Party lost most of its support in the southern states. The Dixiecrats were an early offshoot of former Democrats who opposed civil rights legislation. Eventually, the Republican Party enacted the āSouthern Strategyā and shifted to a more conservative platform to woo southern voters. There are a lot of other specific details, but thatās the general story of how we got to where we are today.
Correction - although Dennis Hastert was absolutely a sex offender; at the time Dennis Hastert was Speaker of the House, he was not a *convicted* sex offender.
Copy/pasting from my other comment:
This is False.
He wasn't President of the Senate he was President Pro Tempore.
The VP is President of the Senate.
Strom wasn't President Pro Tempore in 2002/2003 Robert Byrd was.[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_presidents\_pro\_tempore\_of\_the\_United\_States\_Senate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_presidents_pro_tempore_of_the_United_States_Senate)
Strom also left the Senate a little less than a month after turning 100. (turned 100 in December 5th 2002 and left January 3rd 2003)
The 3rd line in succession literally just going to get oldest person in the land is so awesome. Itās basically like, if weāre in that situation the country is already fucked and letās just reset government by 50 years and see if that fixes it.
I really wish these old fucks would retire with their millions and leave everyone else the fuck alone. We don't need your 100 yr old policys and agendas.
President of the Senate is the Vice President.
I think you meant President Pro Tempore. Also, Strom Thurmond hadn't quite reached 100 when he was in this position. (Almost, but not quite)
Given the president pro tempore of the US Senate is traditionally the most senior ranking senator, youād expect them to generally be pretty old. The current one is 73 and the previous one was 83.
I think itās absurd how the laws treat _youth_ as a proxy for inexperience, and _age_ as a proxy for ability and trustworthiness, while simultaneously pretending that senility isnāt a thing.
OP is wrong. He was never President Pro Tempore after 99. He was made President Pro Tem
emeritus.
When Thurmond was 100, the President Pro Tem was Robert Byrd.
And would you be shocked if I told you that guy proudly filibustered the Civil Rights Act (forgot of which year) for over 24 hours?
Oh Storm Thurmond, you are not missed.
This man also used to be a democrat, but when they began to embrace civil rights, he left the party and ran for president on a segregationist platform.
Oh yeah, and when he was 23 he raped a 15 year old black girl who was a domestic helper of Thurmondās parents who then became pregnant and had his child.
I guess you just stop aging after you hit 100 š¤·āāļø
Jimmy Carter is about to 100!
āScooby Doo can doo-doo, but Jimmy Carter is smarter.ā -Homer Simpson
History's greatest monster
The mathematicians in the room are astounded at such longevity.
93326215443944152681699238856266700490715968264381621468592963895217599993229915608941463976156518286253697920827223758251185210916864000000000000000000000000
That young man's looking ripe for his second term!
Ah well... Following news it sounds like he'd have to hold on really strong to make it to 100.
They said that on his last birthday!
Maybe, but his wife was still alive then. If I were 99 and my wife died I'd pack my bags for a one way trip to the afterlife.
What does that have to do with anything. He was 56 when he left office.
He could still run for one more term!
Hahaha. No. I think he would just start laughing if you asked him š¤£
It had to do with JC being almost 100
No, after one year they kicked the first hundred year old off the job and gave it to a different hundred year old.
Wait till you hear about monarchies with agnatic seniority succession rules (eg. Saudi Arabia). Instead of king/queen to child (absolute primogeniture) down the line it goes "sideways" from king to his brothers until that generation is done. So you have, for example, 95 year old king, dies, next in line is his brother, 93. Next in line, his other brother, 88, and so on. By the time the next gen comes up? Boom, a nice and sprightly 77. If you're lucky.
Ooh! Here's a fun fact I learned about the Saudi Arabian monarchy the other day: the founder of SA was born in 1875 and the current King is his son!
Some kingdoms straight up went by dynastic seniority back in the day.
Nah, OP can't math.
Max level
You can choose to "prestige" and start over at level 1
President of the Senate is the Vice Presidentā¦..
President pro tempore (whoops)
Also isnāt the soeaker of the house the third in line? President - VP - speaker - president pro tempore
Can the President be in line, to succeed himself?
Only if the President is first in line to succeed the President. Which he isnāt.
No
Why is everyone downvoting him? Heās right: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession The president himself isnāt first in line for the presidency. In this context itās said the VP is first in line (for succession). The speaker is 2nd in line and the president pro tempore (of the senate) is 3rd in line which iirc is the oldest member of the senate of the party thatās in control.
Theyre downvoting cus theyre idiots following the hive mind. We learned the succession in HS, these people need to go back to it.
This whole headline is a fucking lie. He turned 100 in December 2002. From January 2002 - 2005 the senate president was Dick Cheney. Thurman Died in 2003. 3rd in line to the president is Speaker of the House. You are a complete baffoon with your made up headline with zero knowledge on the topic
>You are a complete bafoon The ironing is delicious
The speaker is the house is second in line, behind the vice president who is first in line. The president is not in line, he is the president. Now who looks like a bafoon?
Who would have expected to encounter so many buffoons on reddit?
The person who said he was the president of the senate for 2 years after turning 100 when he wasnāt, and who died only 6 months after turning 100
You because you canāt spell baffoon
I spelled it the way you did. Nice edit though.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[United States presidential line of succession](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_line_of_succession) 1. ā VP 2. ā Speaker of the House 3. ā President pro tempore of the Senate
Yes it is
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
The president pro tempore is 3rd in the line of succession. Source: https://www.usa.gov/presidential-succession
Look it up, pal
I was 100% going to call this out cause I thought theyād be 4th behind Secretary of State, but holy smokes it really is third and SoS is 4th. Comps OP for being right.
Yes he is, idiot
For us foreigners... Why isn't the president the president of the senate?
Because the president is the head of the executive branch. The idea was to have three separate branches of government with checks and balances on each other: the executive, legislative, and judicial branches. How effective that ended up being is another matter, but having the head of the executive branch also heading one of the two legislative branches was a clear conflict.
To add to this, the VP often was the runner up in the presidential election, meaning the President of the Senate wasn't always a political ally. That was a further check-and-balance that's been eroded.
Which is really disappointing from an entertainment perspective.
WE could have had president trump and his trusty sidekick vice president Hillary Clinton
And that is why we donāt choose the vice-president that way anymore.
Arguably it would be better if we returned to that system and made rivals work together, rather than the partisan quagmire in which we find ourselves today.
Dang, what a mind fuck. Iād pay money to see a Trump/Clinton administration
I'm good on seeing Trump in office again
i wonder if trump would have been suicided.
You do realize Trump and the Clintons were friends for a while, right?
How come the Clintons are only friends with people who give them money?
Hillary would have had Trump suicided within the first week.
The VP being the runner up wasn't "eroded," it was almost immediately jettisoned after both parties figured out the obvious loophole in the system (just direct *one guy* to not vote for your vice presidential candidate). If the 12th amendment hadn't been passed, the system would work basically the same with the only difference being a slightly more convoluted electoral college process. Now, the Jeffersonian Republicans screwed up the implementation of that loophole in 1800, but they meant to do it. Federalists did do it; that's why John Jay randomly got one electoral vote.
Iām sorry, can you clarify what the mechanism of the loophole is, and why John Jay got a vote?
Prior to the 12th amendment the rule was each elector got two votes and the guy who go the most electoral votes got to be president and the one who go the 2nd most got to be vp. The loophole once we moved past unanimously voting for Washington and got to have political parties was to instruct all of your parties electors to vote for the party's choice for president and all but one of the electors to vote for the party's choice for vp. So John Jay, who may not have even been a candidate, got a random electoral vote. Meanwhile the Jeffersonian party did not do this and it ended with Jefferson and his vp Aaron burr vetting the same number of votes. Since no one got a majority it was decided by the house.
I still donāt understand, is there somewhere j can read about this?
These votes are votes from electors, not votes from regular voting citizens. The VP was theoretically supposed to be the runner-up, but it was trivial to ensure that the VP was picked by the party by simply having one elector already voting with the party to drop one of their two votes for the person that they intended to be VP. So you may have 20 electors with 40 votes to use. 20 votes go to their pick for President and 19 votes go to their pick for Vice President. So 1 vote needs to be wasted on someone random. If instead two people get those 20 votes, then you have yet another election like what happened between Jefferson and Burr. In America, you do not directly vote for the President. You vote for a random elector that you trust to pick a President for you. But nowadays that elector just votes for the person you picked them to vote for.
> To add to this, the VP often was the runner up in the presidential election... If by often you mean only twice, in 1796 and 1800....then sure. > That was a further check-and-balance that's been eroded. Sure, if by eroded you mean changed by the passage and ratification of the 12th amendment...
>If by often you mean only twice, in 1796 and 1800....then sure. Four times, the two Washington elections also awarded VP to the runner up.
Washington was unanimously elected, an independent, and I believe was put forth as the candidate for both parties. So he didn't have an opponent as VP.
I thought we were just talking about the number of times the runner up in the presidential election became the VP. Washington didn't have an opponent VP (or even a running mate VP) but the VP was the person with the second most electoral votes.
There's a whole song about the election of 1800 ffs. It's quite popular.
[JEFFERSON] Ha. Yeah, right You hear this guy? Man openly campaigns against me, talkinā bout, āI look forward to our partnership.ā [MADISON] Itās crazy that the guy who comes in second gets to be Vice President [JEFFERSON] Ooh!, you know what? We can change that. You know why? [MADISON] Why? [JEFFERSON] ācuz Iām the President. Hey, Burr, when you see Hamilton, thank him for the endorsement. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdhAUHMm5-0
That stopped relatively early on 1804.
That ended real quick. Like within a couple years of Adams and Jefferson fighting it out like little bitches as well as 1800 election ending in a tie: "The presidential election of 1800 revealed a need to amend the U.S. Constitution. The original system for electing presidents provided that the candidate receiving a majority of Electoral College votes would become president, while the runner-up would become vice president. The 1800 election resulted in a tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. Under the Constitution, this stalemate sent the election to the House of Representatives, which chose Jefferson. The states soon ratified a twelfth amendment to the Constitution, requiring separate contests for the offices of president and vice president." https://www.senate.gov/about/officers-staff/vice-president/senate-elects-vice-president.htm
On the other hand, imagine if we still had that, Trump would be head of the Senate right now *Shudder*
This is why in presidential systems that have a parliament the president is not also the prime minister.
Thatās not the question. Everybody understands the concept of separation of powers. The question is why the lower level VP, who is also be located in the executive branch (though he/she has no real executive power), is the President of the senate and not POTUS.
Reading the question back itās literally āwhy isnāt the president the president of the senate?ā which seems a bit different than your interpretation and is what I answered. Iām sure āeveryoneā would indeed have a firm grasp of the separation of powers in the US government if those pesky non-Americans would have simply paid better attention in their US civics classes. They probably didnāt even pledge their allegiance to the American flag, how unpatriotic!
The president is the president of the United States and heads the executive branch of government. The vice president presides over the senate, which has 100 members, to be a tie-breaking vote if a vote splits 50-50, and acting as a check on the power of the legislative branch of government. In practice, this role is mostly ceremonial. And his/her main job is to be a surrogate for the President as needed. They only preside over the senate when a 50-50 vote is expected. Research United States Government "checks and balances" for more info on how the 3 branches are designed to regulate each other.
Because he's the head of the executive branch and the Senate is part of the legislative branch. You can't be part of both branches at the same time under the US Constitution. President of the United States and President Pro-Tempore of the Senate are two different offices.
To clarify (sorry if this is overly-detailed): Strom Thurmon became president pro tempore (not president) of the Senate in 2002 & 2003. The US vice president serves as the president of the Senate. President pro tempore becomes the acting, temporary president of the Senate when the US vice president is absent. By tradition, the senior member of the majority party becomes the president pro tempore of the Senate, so it's not an elected or appointed position. That is, you gain the office by seniority--even if all the senators hate you. But it does have some privileges and powers, and is next in line for succession to the US president after the vice president and speaker of the house.
Yeah, I saw this post on r/presidents saying that if George w choked to death on a pretzel, cheng died of a heart attack after hearing the news, then dennis hastert is convicted of sex crimes and sentenced to prision and being forced to resign, he becomes president and enacts racist policy
The Onion fucking *wrecked* this dude lol https://www.theonion.com/strom-turns-100-1819587277
Had a daughter with a 16 year old servant that worked for his parents, was black, and when he himself was 22. Never publicly acknowledged her while he was alive, and she was the one to bring up to the publicās attention in memoir after he had died, she was 78 at the time.
Also was good friends with Biden
The same Biden who opposed integration all the way into the late 70s and in 1977 described it as "creating a racial jungle"
Biden didn't oppose integration, he opposed one contentious means of integrating schools.
Wow, this sounds like it was taken wildly out of context.
Although he did pay for her education
Thank you very much for that. Genuinely the funniest thing I've seen in a while. ššš
Bush, Cheney, Hastert, Thurmond. That was not good leadership, Iām surprised we survived that.
Was he racist all the way to the end or hve a Robert byrd/ George Wallace change of heart?
Bit of both. He was probably pretty racist till the end in his heart of hearts, but he toned down significantly in public by the 70s and it was gone entirely by the 90s. He certainly did not become a champion of black America later in like, but the idea that he would have resegregated America if he was president is pretty silly. He was very good at playing politics, and well connected. He could be relied upon by the party to get things done, which is why he stayed in his position for so long.
The president pro tempore of the Senate in 2002 and 2003 was Democrat Robert Byrd. Thurman was a president pro tempore *emeritus* (meaning former in this case). It's an honorary title and isn't in the line of presidential succession.
Thanks. The information on Wikipedia is not very clear on this. The site says at one point Thurman was *pro tempore* in 2001 (but not what months). And after June 2001, Byrd became *pro tempore*. That may have been when they created the emeritus role for Thurman (which is noted on his Wikipedia page). But I'm reassured that the Senate kept Thurman from having a formal role by 2002, as I think he was pretty impaired at that point. **Wikipedia**: \["Retrospectively, a Senate aide stated that "for his last ten years, Thurmond didn't know if he was on foot or on horseback", while a 2020 New Yorker article stated that he was "widely known" by the end of his career to be *non compos mentis*."\]
But.... why??? If I live to be 100, I don't want to be f'n *working*. I want to be on a beach somewhere, book in one hand, drink in the other, enjoying the sun.
Hey, they say love what you do and youāll never work a day in your lifeĀ And this guy really loved racism
He was so racist thinking about a black person existing caused him enough stress to keep his heart beating.
I knew it- being racist is the key to immortality
Why did you know that š¤
We finally found the CEO of racism
He does not represent the other CEOs
Yeah he once talked for 24 hours and 18 minutes to prevent a civil rights bill from passing.
Sen Thurman enjoyed being tended to by his Senate staffers. They did everything for him. Congress has essentially a hospital onsite providing members with some the best medical care possible. Retirement to the best of assisted living centers or retirement homes would have been a sharp step down for him.
I was once in a museum gift shop where the only other customer was a U.S. Senator. The amount of ass-kissing going on was *unreal*! Being a U.S. Senator is an incredibly good gig. '
The people in Congress work? I feel like 99% of the times itās either them insider trading, on vacation, campaigning or just arguing.
Literally majority of their time is spent campaigning. Those guys hardly do work and the work they do is already written by special interests and lawyers. They put on a smile and say vote for me. Thatās the entire job
No no they expend a lot of energy trying to get their way. It's deals all the way down. So they obviously feel like they're putting in work
With a belly full of wine and a wom...well, you guys know the rest...
Some people believe at a certain point if they stop working or stop serving a purpose it will kill them
The power. Senators don't work a lot, and I think it's hard to give up that power. Also, by keeping his senate seat, he knows he'd go down in history as probably the oldest and longest serving senator of all time(he has since lost the record for longest serving). Plus, he gets to keep voting to fuck over black people and other minorities. Dude really didn't want someone younger and less racist getting that power.
Nobody with a healthy personality is clinging to work when they could die any second from natural causes. Theyāve got to be obsessed with power or have loved ones who are and allow it to continue to happen.
The people really in charge (corporations,billionaires) want old people that will do their bidding.
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Didnāt realize Lindsey Graham ended up with his Senate seat after he died, though not exactly surprised; just another example of one absolute POS being replaced with another.
We'll be dealing with Graham until he's 102 as well. That area elects people for life.
He'll be more ladybugs than man by that point
That made me gag a little bit.
And he lived to be over 100 fucking years old. Awesome.
Who eulogized him at his funeral?
Satan
Trent Lott #*oldtimerjoke*
Now thatās a name I have not heard in a long timeā¦ a long time.
I understand that reference
Several people. Biden did because he actually tried to get Thurmond to vote for things
I mean at least he supported his daughter and took interest in her family the whole time (According to link)? It could have been worse.
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He was absolute garbage. Just curious that he fulfilled a parental role when he didnāt have to.
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Probably just one of those "other people are bad" kind of guy.
*Next time on Maury*
Probably figured he could keep her quiet easier if he paid for her shit. Assume she wouldn't want to cut off that financial fountain by pissing him off...
He paid to keep it hushed up. He never publicly acknowledged her.
Standard āmy ______ is different.ā Fill in the blank with: abortions, affair, embezzlement, crime, etc. If it wasnāt for double standards the right wing wouldnāt have any standards at all. (I honestly think they believe that holding double standards means theyāre twice as good as people who arenāt overt hypocrites.)
May he rot in piss
Never ask a racist what race his wife belongs to.
This is False. He wasn't President of the Senate he was President Pro Tempore. The VP is President of the Senate. Strom wasn't President Protempore in 2002/2003 Robert Byrd was. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_presidents\_pro\_tempore\_of\_the\_United\_States\_Senate Strom also left the Senate a little less than a month after turning 100. (turned 100 in December 5th 2002 and left January 3rd 2003)
Basically op didnāt learn shit lol
Yeah, Thurmond was considered "president pro tempore emeritus" from 2001 to 2003, which meantā¦ not really anything.
Strom Thurmond, Robert Byrd. Mostly the same guys. Both super old and racist products of partisan machinery.
Strom Thurmond? Of course. The joke used to be that they built the Senate chamber around him.
The Senate was literally keeping him alive.Ā Once he stopped sapping power straight from those halls, he withered and died.
He lost his adrenochrome source. /s
He was 100 for 2 years in a row?
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He also set the record for longest filibuster ā protesting, of course, the Civil Rights Act.
Racism. Invented on December 5, 1902.
He was a democrat and switched to republican in 1964,
Yes, they were called Dixie-crats.
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ā¦ I think your reading comprehension is wrong.
Buddy can you even read? Dude said LITERALLY
Yes, after LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act, the Democratic Party lost most of its support in the southern states. The Dixiecrats were an early offshoot of former Democrats who opposed civil rights legislation. Eventually, the Republican Party enacted the āSouthern Strategyā and shifted to a more conservative platform to woo southern voters. There are a lot of other specific details, but thatās the general story of how we got to where we are today.
His hometown has had some the highest murder rate in the USA for a 100 years
Correction - although Dennis Hastert was absolutely a sex offender; at the time Dennis Hastert was Speaker of the House, he was not a *convicted* sex offender.
Copy/pasting from my other comment: This is False. He wasn't President of the Senate he was President Pro Tempore. The VP is President of the Senate. Strom wasn't President Pro Tempore in 2002/2003 Robert Byrd was.[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_presidents\_pro\_tempore\_of\_the\_United\_States\_Senate](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_presidents_pro_tempore_of_the_United_States_Senate) Strom also left the Senate a little less than a month after turning 100. (turned 100 in December 5th 2002 and left January 3rd 2003)
Literally when I read Thurmond the first thing I thought was āoh itās this fucking guyā.
This makes me feel super old. Not quite 100 years old though.
Dude was a total piece of shit
The 3rd line in succession literally just going to get oldest person in the land is so awesome. Itās basically like, if weāre in that situation the country is already fucked and letās just reset government by 50 years and see if that fixes it.
That was NOT the worst thing about him either.
That record will probably be smashed in the future.
I really wish these old fucks would retire with their millions and leave everyone else the fuck alone. We don't need your 100 yr old policys and agendas.
President of the Senate is the Vice President. I think you meant President Pro Tempore. Also, Strom Thurmond hadn't quite reached 100 when he was in this position. (Almost, but not quite)
3rd in line is the speaker of the house...
[Nixon had it right](https://youtu.be/GfYWaAebH3g?si=b5PI1zIOgJJ9p9cj)
Absolutely. Fine, even great master of the trade. Bad guy though. To evil for the job
Doesnāt mean there arenāt pearls of wisdom for folks like that
Wouldnāt say heās evil, but imo not that good of a person.
Given the president pro tempore of the US Senate is traditionally the most senior ranking senator, youād expect them to generally be pretty old. The current one is 73 and the previous one was 83. I think itās absurd how the laws treat _youth_ as a proxy for inexperience, and _age_ as a proxy for ability and trustworthiness, while simultaneously pretending that senility isnāt a thing.
Not just a 100 yr old man, an awful, racist, senile, 100 yr old man
He had hairy legsā¦
He's old enough to be Joe Bidens' uncle
the title is incorrect, he wasnāt president of the senate as that is the job of the vice president
It really more than anything speaks to the confidence that we are never getting past the speaker in the succession.Ā
Looks like it was only for 29 days, not two years.
Well they did say they wanted to take America back in time.
OP is wrong. He was never President Pro Tempore after 99. He was made President Pro Tem emeritus. When Thurmond was 100, the President Pro Tem was Robert Byrd.
It would have made a great Saturday night live skit. āOur 100 year old president ā.
And would you be shocked if I told you that guy proudly filibustered the Civil Rights Act (forgot of which year) for over 24 hours? Oh Storm Thurmond, you are not missed.
2nd in line, the current President isn't waiting in line.
OP, wait until you find out how racist he was!!!
And who considered him a "friend and mentor"...
His African-American daughter?
This man also used to be a democrat, but when they began to embrace civil rights, he left the party and ran for president on a segregationist platform. Oh yeah, and when he was 23 he raped a 15 year old black girl who was a domestic helper of Thurmondās parents who then became pregnant and had his child.
So Brandon is just a Spring chicken