Donald Trump

[SWP's back]

Warning from history.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

Nicely summed up.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

How can someone be this unfathomably stupid?

 

[DrBlueBob]

Nicely summed up.

Add a couple more; just in case.

 

[DrBlueBob]

Warning from history.

I felt many months (years?) ago that there were ugly parallels with mid 1930's Germany but I pretty much dismissed those thoughts as hyperbole. Never in my wildest nightmares did I really think that we would see the dismemberment of democracy such as we are witnessing.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

I felt many months (years?) ago that there were ugly parallels with mid 1930's Germany but I pretty much dismissed those thoughts as hyperbole. Never in my wildest nightmares did I really think that we would see the dismemberment of democracy such as we are witnessing.

Said it pretty much from the start and was shot down in flames by a more than a few posters. Over the last 3 1/2 years the number of posters arguing against this point of view has dwindles to just the odd one or two who either refuse to see, or can't see the wood for the trees.

 

[SebastianBlue]

I felt many months (years?) ago that there were ugly parallels with mid 1930's Germany but I pretty much dismissed those thoughts as hyperbole. Never in my wildest nightmares did I really think that we would see the dismemberment of democracy such as we are witnessing.

I’ve been going on about it for so long my missus’ brother took to calling me Cassandra for a laugh last Christmas. Everyone in this thread can expound about how ****ing annoying I have been on the subject. A few have had the same perspective from the start, as well, and were just as ****ing annoying about it. ;-)

Funny bit about my brother-in-law, though: he’s now angry he can’t get his citizenship in time to be able to vote in the election, is posting daily rants on Twitter about rising authoritarianism and fascist ideals in the US and Switzerland (including militantly anti-Trump content), and is apparently defacing Trump signs and flags in the area of eastern Oregon in which he and his new wife now live (really ingratiating himself to his new community).

He doesn’t recall our discussions in which he laughed off my analysis of what was happening, saying I was “conspiratorial”, “paranoid”, and “massively exaggerating the threat to the US”. Or the running joke from last year. Funny that.

Oh, and he supported United up until this last season when he ‘switched’ to Liverpool because he “realised they were a club that matched his ideals and played football the right way”, the glory hunting ****.

But the important bit is he came around to the real danger here in the end. Can only hope more will over the next month (and beyond) and America finds the least destructive path through this absolute mess.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

This is likely to be Trump's pick for SC.

If she accepts the nomination, then that's her integrity out the window, and it will call into account EVERY single ruling she ever makes as an SC judge.

 

[west didsblue]

I’ve been going on about it for so long my missus’ brother took to calling me Cassandra for a laugh last Christmas. Everyone in this thread can expound about how ****ing annoying I have been on the subject. A few have had the same perspective from the start, as well, and were just as ****ing annoying about it. ;-)

Funny bit about my brother-in-law, though: he’s now angry he can’t get his citizenship in time to be able to vote in the election, is posting daily rants on Twitter about rising authoritarianism and fascist ideals in the US and Switzerland (including militantly anti-Trump content), and is apparently defacing Trump signs and flags in the area of eastern Oregon in which he and his new wife now live (really ingratiating himself to his new community).

He doesn’t recall our discussions in which he laughed off my analysis of what was happening, saying I was “conspiratorial”, “paranoid”, and “massively exaggerating the threat to the US”. Or the running joke from last year. Funny that.

Oh, and he supported United up until this last season when he ‘switched’ to Liverpool because he “realised they were a club that matched his ideals and played football the right way”, the glory hunting ****.

But the important bit is he came around to the real danger here in the end. Can only hope more will over the next month (and beyond) and America finds the least destructive path through this absolute mess.

I posted this over two years ago

Comparing Trump to Hitler’s entire period as leader is of course stupid but it’s not quite so stupid to compare Trump’s campaign and first year in power with Hitler’s.
Both campaigns were based on scapegoating minorities; Jews in Hitler’s case, Mexicans and Muslims in Trump’s.
They both had regular rallies where they would appeal to their supporters’ fears and prejudices.
In power, Hitler spent the first year getting laws changed to give him more power. Trump has been loading up the judiciary with right wingers in an effort to do the same.
One of Hitler’s catchphrases was “Lugenpresse” which effectively means “Fake News”.
They both managed to get a similar proportion (around 45%) to elect them and relied on that support to implement their agendas.

Ultimately I would like to think that the democratic structures in place in the US are more deeply entrenched than those in 1930s Germany and the US isn’t recovering from a war that they lost 15 years earlier so I can’t see the rest of Trump’s time as President being in any way similar to Hitler’s. But it’s quite alarming that it’s gone this far.

I’m less sure now that the latter part of my 2018 post will prove to be correct.

 

[SebastianBlue]

I posted this over two years ago

I’m less sure now that the latter part of my 2018 post will prove to be correct.

I would go back and grab one of my posts from two or three years ago but I’ve posted so much in this thread that not even the mod search feature will return results beyond a year ago. ;-)

Suffice it to say, I have never been particularly confident that American institutions and political norms would be sufficient to restrain the sort of threat the Trump regime represents.

 

[west didsblue]

I would go back and grab one of my posts from two or three years ago but I’ve posted so much in this thread that not even the mod search feature will return results beyond a year ago. ;-)

Suffice it to say, I have never been particularly confident that American institutions and political norms would be sufficient to restrain the sort of threat the Trump regime represents.

Yep, I certainly didn’t predict back then the huge effort that the administration would make in interfering with and delegitimising the upcoming election.
The worrying thing is that all the tactics and strategy being used couldn’t possibly have come from Trump’s tiny brain. There must be a significant number of intelligent legally trained criminals in the background who have come up with all of it.

 

[SebastianBlue]

Yep, I certainly didn’t predict back then the huge effort that the administration would make in interfering with and delegitimising the upcoming election.
The worrying thing is that all the tactics and strategy being used couldn’t possibly have come from Trump’s tiny brain. There must be a significant number of intelligent legally trained criminals in the background who have come up with all of it.

Oh, there definitely are (and have been—many have gone because of how difficult it turned out to be to *completely* control a man child psychopath). Some aren’t necessarily as much intelligent as learned, drawing on previous horrific regimes and dubious/disastrous political movements for inspiration, and finding allies in Congress to enact various monstrous strategies.

But a few are actually clever, unfortunately, like Barr, and are using Trump to enact their visions for America.

And Trump, in his fleeting moments of relative lucidity (and I do mean relative), is happy to go along as far as it keeps him in power and mostly protected from legal and criminal peril.

He has to stay in office, otherwise absolutely everything comes crashing down, which makes the ideologues and clever monsters even more dangerous now and if he gets a second term.

 

[SWP's back]

Is it about time we had an election thread as there are so many posts to share now that concern both Biden and Trump, such as this

 

[SWP's back]

 

[SebastianBlue]

Is it about time we had an election thread as there are so many posts to share now that concern both Biden and Trump, such as this

I’ll bring it to the council.

I did raise it awhile ago and it was decided there was no need at that point, but I think it being a month out now may have increased the benefit of having a separate thread.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

I’ll bring it to the council.

I did raise it awhile ago and it was decided there was no need at that point, but I think it being a month out now may have increased the benefit of having a separate thread.

Can you even separate it?

Trump is reliant on his re-election to keep him from criminal liability.

 

[SebastianBlue]

Can you even separate it?

Trump is reliant on his re-election to keep him from criminal liability.

Separate the debate, you mean?

I was referring to a ‘2020 US Elections’ thread, which would be used for any all direct discussion about the elections in general (not just presidential).

Right now a lot of posts that aren’t necessarily about Biden or Trump or BLM are going in those threads, and I think more of that will happen as we get closer and closer to the election.

But, again, can’t promise it’ll be signed off on. We discuss these sorts of threads before starting them (or not merging them) at the larger mod level because they require special attention to even keep open (think Brexit thread), so there needs to be commitment to providing that from a few of us.

And I am stupid enough to implicitly offer my time by suggesting it. ;-)

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

Separate the debate, you mean?

I was referring to a ‘2020 US Elections’ thread, which would be used for any all direct discussion about the elections in general (not just presidential).

Right now a lot of posts that aren’t necessarily about Biden or Trump or BLM are going in those threads, and I think more of that will happen as we get closer and closer to the election.

But, again, can’t promise it’ll be signed off on. We discuss these sorts of threads before starting them (or not merging them) at the larger mod level because they require special attention to even keep open (think Brexit thread), so there needs to be commitment to providing that from a few of us.

And I am stupid enough to implicitly offer my time by suggesting it. ;-)

I guess a separate thread might be worthwhile, but so much of the election skullf*uckery is purely about keeping the Orange Don out of prison, therefor inextricably linked to Trump.

 

[SWP's back]

I guess a separate thread might be worthwhile, but so much of the election skullf*uckery is purely about keeping the Orange Don out of prison, therefor inextricably linked to Trump.

Absolutely mate and thus everything Trump does at present is aimed at the election. I was reading before that the GOP have over 1,000 cases in court at present all trying to reduce the voter turnout.

Seriously, any **** ever tries to tell me that the US should be looked up to or that it’s a leading democracy ever again and I’ll chin them.

 

[SebastianBlue]

I guess a separate thread might be worthwhile, but so much of the election skullf*uckery is purely about keeping the Orange Don out of prison, therefor inextricably linked to Trump.

To be fair, so much of living in America (and the world) is now based around oposing/supporting Trump, so many threads could be merged to this one based on direct/indirect connection to El Parásito Naranja! ;-)