Sound The TRUMPets! A Thread for Presidential Pondering 2016-2020(?)

[Florestan]

a free press is the enemy of would-be tyrants.

Wholeheartedly agreed but the question is: can a free press, by itself, prevent a would-be tyrant from turning into a full-fledged one? Judging by history, the answer is in the negative.

[Karl Henning]

Wholeheartedly agreed but the question is: can a free press, by itself, prevent a would-be tyrant from turning into a full-fledged one? Judging by history, the answer is in the negative.

I believe, unfortunately, that that is correct.  So it is up the US Congress, really.  And—just as over the past couple of years, whenever there was the latest Trump outrage, and people asked, "Is this as low as he gets?" but, no, a little while later, we find that he plumbs fresh, vile depths—from time to time we ask, "Will Congress now grow a spine?"

I ain't holding my breath.

[eljr]

[Gurn Blanston]

I believe, unfortunately, that that is correct.  So it is up the US Congress, really.  And—just as over the past couple of years, whenever there was the latest Trump outrage, and people asked, "Is this as low as he gets?" but, no, a little while later, we find that he plumbs fresh, vile depths—from time to time we ask, "Will Congress now grow a spine?"

I ain't holding my breath.

The Onion
‏Verified account @TheOnion
Jul 16

GOP Leaders Move Goalposts On Opposing Trump To Him Being Filmed Masturbating On U.S. Flag In Arlington Cemetery https://trib.al/XNu520N

.@SenateMajLdr: "After today's attack on U.S. intelligence agencies, we have officially moved our line in the sand to President Trump being caught on video, vigorously pleasuring himself to completion amid the graves of fallen U.S. soldiers."

.@SenateMajLdr: "Unless we see clear footage of President Trump looking into the camera, his face twisting in pleasure as he climaxes, we will refrain from taking any concrete measures to reel him in."

As usual, The Onion hits it on the head. It must be really hard for them to write satire these days: the satire writes itself from minute to minute...

[Gurn Blanston]

Or this one...

[Karl Henning]

As usual, The Onion hits it on the head. It must be really hard for them to write satire these days: the satire writes itself from minute to minute...

Aye, I noted that piece . . . .

[Zeus]

Are you going to seriously tell us that money play no role in Finland's politics and that Finnish politicians are driven solely and exclusively by patriotism and civic duty?

I think money in politics, though always a problem, becomes more serious when there are large and/or rising inequalities in wealth and income.  Very rich people can easily buy (or rent!) the legislative support they need for the political changes they want (usually initiatives that favor them).

Trump represents, in part, a takeover of the government by the very rich.  In Finland, the problem is probably a little less severe because there is less income and wealth inequality.

JMHO FWIW.

[71 dB]

Are you going to seriously tell us that money play no role in Finland's politics and that Finnish politicians are driven solely and exclusively by patriotism and civic duty?

To some extent money plays a role, unfortunately, but not even close to how it's in the US. In the US everything is done for the benefit of the top 10 % while the "bottom" 90 % of the population has zero effect on politics. In Finland and other real democracies it's not like that. Pretty much everyone has an effect on policies.

[zamyrabyrd]

The Onion ‏Verified account @TheOnion Jul 16

GOP Leaders Move Goalposts On Opposing Trump To Him Being Filmed Masturbating On U.S. Flag In Arlington Cemetery https://trib.al/XNu520N

.@SenateMajLdr: "After today's attack on U.S. intelligence agencies, we have officially moved our line in the sand to President Trump being caught on video, vigorously pleasuring himself to completion amid the graves of fallen U.S. soldiers."

.@SenateMajLdr: "Unless we see clear footage of President Trump looking into the camera, his face twisting in pleasure as he climaxes, we will refrain from taking any concrete measures to reel him in."

As usual, The Onion hits it on the head. It must be really hard for them to write satire these days: the satire writes itself from minute to minute...  

I held my patience until reading the above absolutely ugly, scurrilous piece of garbage. This is moving the goalposts from the toilets into the sewer. How can anyone even think of such a thing, let alone put it into print?

Of course, no one here will take Breitbart seriously but it does pay to hear the other side, why it would have not been a good idea to start WWIII with Russia and/or humiliate Putin during an important diplomatic encounter:

https://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2018/07/17/nolte-helsinki-is-one-of-trumps-finest-moments/

"Last August, some truly evil people showed up in Charlottesville. On one side, you had white supremacists, and on the other, you had the left-wing terrorist group Antifa. A riot broke out, one person was murdered, and another 30-plus others were injured.

Almost immediately, the media crafted a narrative around Charlottesville that determined what Trump was supposed to do, which was to make a statement condemning racism and racists. Which he did, more than once. But he also did something he was not supposed to do and that was to, at long last, make an issue of Antifa, who had been running around for the better part of a year acting as the organized left's Brownshirts.

By having the moral courage to go off-script, Trump used Charlottesville to finally drag these terrorists into the national spotlight, and he did so by telling the truth, by accurately pointing out that "both sides" were responsible for that national disgrace. Trump also had the moral courage to point out there were "good people" on both sides; those who are not racists, who are not left-wing terrorists, who had arrived in good faith to protest against the tearing down of a statue and against racism. The New York Times, of all places, eventually proved Trump correct on this point.

Almost a year later, Trump is still walking around with the flaming arrows in his back over Charlottesville, simply because he told the truth about Charlottesville. Which brings me to what happened Monday in Helsinki.

Once again, and this time with the help of that dirty cop, Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the establishment media and the Deep State believed they had rigged events to a point where Trump was cornered, where he would have no choice but to publicly berate Putin on the national stage for the sin of "interfering in our elections."

What the media wanted was to emotionally blackmail Trump into creating an international scene, a YouTube moment with Putin, where the president would violate every diplomatic norm to publicly shame and berate the Russian president...Wisely, for the good of his country and out respect for the truth, Trump refused to jump in the trap. And now the spoiled children who once again did not get what they want, are having a national tantrum.

Nevertheless, what really happened is this: Trump showed the gangster Putin that he is his own man, that he cannot be bullied by America's corrupt political and media establishment into behaving in a certain way, that he is willing to take those flaming arrows to do what he thinks is right, which, in this case, is to never forget the lessons of Iraq.

Keep in mind that what Trump was supposed to do Monday was to drink the Kool-Aid, was to believe our Intelligence Community (IC) got it 100 percent right about Russian meddling, was to throw diplomacy out the window and publicly embarrass Putin.

Thankfully, Trump refused to do that, and now the spoiled children, just as they did after Charlottesville, are again lying and claiming Trump "sided with Putin," when the only thing Trump's guilty of is remaining diplomatic, which is the whole point of a summit expressly arranged to facilitate peace.

Even if the Russians did meddle in our elections, it appears to have been nothing more than drop-in-the-bucket Facebook and Twitter expenditures that ended up being less than meaningless. Moreover, most of this Russian monkey business occurred after the election and was targeted against Trump.

The worst case scenario is Russia figured out John Podesta's email password was "password" and disseminated his emails. But where is the proof?

Regardless, is it not interesting that Dirty Cop Mueller's kangaroo indictment left out one pertinent fact, the fact that — if you believe any of this — the Russians also tried to hack the GOP, and failed?

We meddle in other country's elections, other countries meddle in our elections, and suddenly I am supposed to give a damn? Russia has been meddling in American politics going back decades and all of a sudden this fact of life demands Trump stage an international incident? Are these people out of their minds? We all know what is going on here — the only reason we are required to suddenly care about decades-old espionage-as-usual is because the media and the political establishment cannot accept losing the 2016 presidential election.

Most of all, we are required to forget that this is the same IC that missed the fall of the Soviet Union, missed 9/11; that led us into a harrowing and pointless war in Iraq*; that used a dossier filled with Kremlin-fed propaganda to frame Trump; that lionizes proven liars like James Clapper, Dirty Cop James Comey, and John Brennan; that hands ego-maniacal monsters like Peter Strzok extraordinary power (and still has him on the payroll); that uses a kangaroo indictment that says the Russians hacked the DNC, even though no one in law enforcement has inspected the DNC server."

*non-existent WMD's

[Karl Henning]

In the US everything is done for the benefit of the top 10 % [....]

In the Trump Era, 10% is quite the overestimate.  Sad.

[Florestan]

To some extent money plays a role, unfortunately, but not even close to how it's in the US. In the US everything is done for the benefit of the top 10 % while the "bottom" 90 % of the population has zero effect on politics. In Finland and other real democracies it's not like that. Pretty much everyone has an effect on policies.

What effect do you have on the policies of the Finnish government? Has the party you vote for ever asked your advice in framing their platform? Assuming this party won the elections, have you ever been asked how their platform should be put into practice and what policies should they adopt in this respect? 

[Karl Henning]

Vladimir Putin has his own version of reality. And [El Presidente Tupé] believes it.

When they emerged after more than two hours in private Monday at their summit in Helsinki, [El Presidente Tupé] and Russian President Vladimir Putin indulged in some of their favorite conspiracy theories. [El Tupé] spoke of "the Pakistani gentleman," echoing false right-wing media reports about a Democratic IT worker, and reprised the debunked theory that the Democratic National Committee withheld its servers — and critical information — from law enforcement. Putin went down the George-Soros-as-puppet-master rabbit hole and claimed, falsely, that a London-based antagonist of his had given Hillary Clinton $400 million. Predictably, the two agreed that the narrative of Russian meddling in the 2016 election — supported by a body of evidence that seems to swell by the day — could not possibly be true because, as [El Tupé] said, "I don't see any reason why it would be." (Of course, he insisted the next day that he'd meant to say the exact opposite.) Putin gave [El Tupé] a soccer ball commemorating the World Cup, but the two may as well have exchanged tinfoil hats.

[...]

So the most significant victory for Putin is that he finally has a partner in the White House who believes his version of events without having to be convinced. Putin has been playing a game of epistemological chicken with the United States, and finally, the United States, in the person of [El Tupé], has blinked.

[Karl Henning]

And meanwhile, even in The National Review . . .

If All of Your Trusted Friends Say You're Wrong ... Maybe You're Wrong

[Karl Henning]

And a separate piece in The National Review:

[...]

Days ago, Coats issued a blistering warning that not only had Russia meddled in our election — undisputed by almost everyone save the president himself — but it is preparing to do so again. But when asked about Russian interference in Helsinki, [El Tupé] replied, "All I can do is ask the question. My people came to me, Dan Coats came to me and some others. They said they think it's Russia. I have President Putin. He just said it's not Russia. I will say this. I don't see any reason why it would be [Russia]. . . . I have confidence in both parties."

Separately, when asked about the frosty relations between the two countries, [El Tupé] said, "I hold both countries responsible. . . . I think we're all to blame. . . . I do feel that we have both made some mistakes."

Amid these and other appalling statements, [El Tupé] made it clear that he can only understand the investigation into Russian interference as an attempt to rob him of credit for his electoral victory, and thus to delegitimize his presidency.

For most people with a grasp of the facts — supporters and critics alike — the question of Russian interference and the question of Russian collusion with the [El Tupé] campaign are separate. Russia did interfere in the election, full stop. Whether there was collusion is still an open question, even if many [El Tupé] supporters have made up their minds about it.

(Of course, the author at bottom asserts that it is all a question of El Tupé's character, and not collusion, no, no, not collusion.  Hold onto those little dreams!)

[71 dB]

In the Trump Era, 10% is quite the overestimate.  Sad.

You are probably right Karl. This 10 % is for the last two decades, which is fair since presidents and goverments come and go... ...althou the damage Trump has already done will take a few decades to fix.

[Karl Henning]

[snip]

Where is the Daily Wire?  Solidly in Propaganda/Contains Misleading Info, and Hyper-Partisan Conservative, spilling into Most Extreme Conservative.  Here, too, this matches my impression formed over perhaps a month of occasional reading there.

I mean to say: today, this week, will all of the post-Helsinki chaos, what is front and center on the Daily Wire site?  Hillary Clinton.  Head in sand, keep the base ginned up with bogus Clinton news.

[Karl Henning]

You are probably right Karl. This 10 % is for the last two decades, which is fair since presidents and goverments come and go... ...althou the damage Trump has already done will take a few decades to fix.

I half fear that some of the damage he has done to American public life, and to the environment, may not be fixed this century.

[71 dB]

What effect do you have on the policies of the Finnish government? Has the party you vote for ever asked your advice in framing their platform? Assuming this party won the elections, have you ever been asked how their platform should be put into practice and what policies should they adopt in this respect?

We have 10 or so parties to choose from, so there is no need to "advice framing platform." I vote for the party/politicians who I think have the correct platform. Of course politicians can be approached for example with email, but I must say I have never done that.

[Florestan]

I vote for the party/politicians who I think have the correct platform.

This doesn't mean you have an effect on their policies, not by a long stretch.

[71 dB]

I half fear that some of the damage he has done to American public life, and to the environment, may not be fixed this century.

I know it's bad, but have faith in your country Karl! Millennials are coming and even if they blast DJ Khaled out of their phones they actually believe in man-made climate change because they are in direct contact with the rest of the World with the same phones. At some point the progressive wave washes over the US and it's a whole new game after that. It all can be fixed by 2050, but there is not much time to waste.