Donald Trump Presidency discussion Thread VI

TomOnBoard

Itssoeasy wrote: »

Wait so that was the quote that caused the outrage ? Ah here it's clear as day reading that quote only once what she meant.

Look, Barron Trump is 13 years old.. NO-ONE has the right to introduce him in ANY way into a confrontational process that is designed to prosecute his Dad, and take him out of the highest office in the land..

I am absolutely convinced that Trump is impeachable, but FFS, how can it be right in ANY sense, that a 13-year old's name would be used in a wordplay by someone who was appearing before the Committee to provide non-partisan education as to why an impeachment is currently necessary. Her abuse of Barron's name in this way, seriously undermined her credibility from a non-partisan perspective.

As Chelsea Clinton has said REPEATEDLY, ("It's high time the media & everyone leave Barron Trump alone & let him have the private childhood he deserves") and huge kudos to her for doing so: LEAVE BARRON ALONE!! He has no part to play in the cut and thrust of the Washington Games, and NO-ONE has the right to involve him for their own political reasons!

Itssoeasy

TomOnBoard wrote: »

Look, Barron Trump is 13 years old.. NO-ONE has the right to introduce him in ANY way into a confrontational process that is designed to prosecute his Dad, and take him out of the highest office in the land..

I am absolutely convinced that Trump is impeachable, but FFS, how can it be right in ANY sense, that a 13-year old's name would be used in a wordplay y someone who was appearing to provide non-partisan education as to why an impeachment is currently necessary.

But I can see what she was trying to get across. Trump can't give any of his kids titles however much he might want to. That's the point she is clearly making. I'm sure in hindsight she might made her point a better way but for Melania trump and the Donald trump Jr to come out and pretend like they're outraged over this when baron trump probably didn't mind that much. I'm surprised Donald trump Jr knows his half brothers name given his younger half sister Tiffany is shunned by them(which may be a blessing in disguise) is just rich.

TomOnBoard

Itssoeasy wrote: »

But I can see what she was trying to get across. Trump can't give any of his kids titles however much he might want to. That's the point she is clearly making. I'm sure in hindsight she might made her point a better way but for Melania trump and the Donald trump Jr to come out and pretend like they're outraged over this when baron trump probably didn't mind that much. I'm surprised Donald trump Jr knows his half brothers name given his younger half sister Tiffany is shunned by them(which may be a blessing in disguise) is just rich.

Ah, look.. it doesn't matter a whit what she was trying to do. The fact is that she abused that child by injecting him into the debate. If its not obvious that NO part of a 13-year old's existence should be used in a Congressional Impeachment hearing, then I can only say that no more argument on my part can possibly influence your opinion. .

Christy42

TomOnBoard wrote: »

Ah, look.. it doesn't matter a whit what she was trying to do. The fact is that she abused that child by injecting him into the debate. If its not obvious that NO part of a 13-year old's existence should be used in a Congressional Impeachment hearing, then I can only say that no more argument on my part can possibly influence your opinion. .

Abuse is taking it a bit far to say the least. It was a bit of word play on his name. Not the smartest but hardly a massive deal. I can't see why it would have an effect on the kid.

Without the outrage he probably wouldn't have heard of it (especially as it wasn't a great piece of wordplay).

TomOnBoard

Christy42 wrote: »

Abuse is taking it a bit far to say the least. It was a bit of word play on his name. Not the smartest but hardly a massive deal. I can't see why it would have an effect on the kid.

Involving a 13-year old in a hugely controversial process that is being played out on TVs across the world by playing word-games based on that child's name is surely abusive of that child's right to privacy and to a childhood.

It was absolutely wrong. She apologised for using his name. Please just STOP justifying and/or finding even a fraction of a percent of justification for why she may have been justified in doing it..

Introducing ANY element of a child's life into partisan political argument is ABUSIVE to that child..Please STOP justifying it!

Itssoeasy

TomOnBoard wrote: »

Ah, look.. it doesn't matter a whit what she was trying to do. The fact is that she abused that child by injecting him into the debate. If its not obvious that NO part of a 13-year old's existence should be used in a Congressional Impeachment hearing, then I can only say that no more argument on my part can possibly influence your opinion. .

I said the woman in hindsight probably wishes she had used another example.

Oh for Christ sake Tom for a poster who is normally on the ball that's a ridiculous claim to make. She in no way abused him.

And in reference to you mentioning Chelsea Clinton I agree with what she says but she was coming at it from a standpoint of how she was treated when she was a child in the Whitehouse and being called horrible names by rush limbaugh which I agree no child in that position should be targeted like that.

Edit: rush Limbaugh compared Chelsea Clinton to a dog. That was intended to be mean and going after her appearance. What the professor did was use a poor example to make a very good point about titles and how Americans can't have them.

Jesus effing Christ

pixelburp wrote: »

Heck there's the running rumour that it was ( I want to say) Seth Meyers mocking Trump at one of Obama's dinners that spurred him towards making a bid. Actually no sorry, wasn't it Obama himself doing his own skit? That'd make the rumour more credible. I remember the cuts to the audience, Trump looking utterly, utttterly ticked off. The room is laughing but he's sitting there with a flat, unmoving smile while his eyes burn.

Look at the amount of political gain this one evenings work bought trump.
That skit would have been anticipated weeks in advance he may not have come with the idea, not to laugh but id imagine his facial expressions (more dog whistling) were well acted out beforehand.
All his beefs are totally staged, its a main part of the trump show.
The bidan camp seems to have learnt a thing or two from the trump camp.
If you've absolutely nothing to offer when it comes to your political record just attack the enemy hard and people forget how useless you are.

Brian?

TomOnBoard wrote: »

Involving a 13-year old in a hugely controversial process that is being played out on TVs across the world by playing word-games based on that child's name is surely abusive of that child's right to privacy and to a childhood.

It was absolutely wrong. She apologised for using his name. Please just STOP justifying and/or finding even a fraction of a percent of justification for why she may have been justified in doing it..

Introducing ANY element of a child's life into partisan political argument is ABUSIVE to that child..Please STOP justifying it!

It’s not abusive in any way, shape or form. It’s ,at worst, poor form old boy. It’s just not cricket.

I’m pretty sure I’ve seen Baron Trump trotted out at political events. Where was the outrage then?

Brian?

Itssoeasy wrote: »

I said the woman in hindsight probably wishes she had used another example.

Oh for Christ sake Tom for a poster who is normally on the ball that's a ridiculous claim to make. She in no way abused him.

And in reference to you mentioning Chelsea Clinton I agree with what she says but she was coming at it from a standpoint of how she was treated when she was a child in the Whitehouse and being called horrible names by rush limbaugh which I agree no child in that position should be targeted like that.

Edit: rush Limbaugh compared Chelsea Clinton to a dog. That was intended to be mean and going after her appearance. What the professor did was use a poor example to make a very good point about titles and how Americans can't have them.

Limbaugh didn’t compare her to a dog, he nicknamed her the Whitehouse dog which is much worse. I think she was 15 at the time.

everlast75

https://twitter.com/jdawsey1/status/1202767169999818752?s=19

Yet another issue that Republicans seem to disregard when it's Trump.

For someone who lies so much to the public, do people not understand when an adversary knows the truth it means they have leverage?

I understand how some people might have the view of "**** the political class - Trump has their head spinning" or "dems are bad because PC culture has gone bad" or **** the working class" or "**** the immigrants" (all views forwarded over time on this thread by pro Trump people) but at what point in time do people realise this guy is incompetent to the point of being profoundly dangerous to national security?

Christy42

TomOnBoard wrote: »

Involving a 13-year old in a hugely controversial process that is being played out on TVs across the world by playing word-games based on that child's name is surely abusive of that child's right to privacy and to a childhood.

It was absolutely wrong. She apologised for using his name. Please just STOP justifying and/or finding even a fraction of a percent of justification for why she may have been justified in doing it..

Introducing ANY element of a child's life into partisan political argument is ABUSIVE to that child..Please STOP justifying it!

How is his privacy affected? She said his name. We knew his name already. This is not close to abuse.

As I said. Without the Pearl clutching the kid would go on none the wiser. Childhood unaffected. As is it won't make any difference to the kids childhood. His name was mentioned. He was not dragged into the room to testify or anything like that.

She wasn't mean about Baron himself unlike the dog quote.

As someone said it is poor form to involve someone's kids but abusive is going off the deep end.

jjpep

Dick_Swiveller wrote: »

Were you as vocal about your objection to children being put in cages during the Obama administration?

But what about....

Putting kids in cages is always wrong.

everlast75

jjpep wrote: »

But what about....

Putting kids in cages is always wrong.

This whole false equivalency was debunked about a year ago. The facts are there if people want to see them. Obama did not separate families as a deterrent. Obama didn't insist on charges for families crossing the border. Obama used "catch and release" etc etc etc

jjpep

everlast75 wrote: »

This whole false equivalency was debunked about a year ago. The facts are there if people want to see them. Obama did not separate families as a deterrent. Obama didn't insist on charges for families crossing the border. Obama used "catch and release" etc etc etc

Yep. But even if it was true that Obama did it, it wouldn't make it right. That's the point. To quote literally every ones mother ever, if Johnny next door jumped off a bridge, would you? It's one of the things I really don't get about trump supporters - if Hillary, Obama, whoever, was so bad why do they use them as examples of behaviour that it's okay for trump to copy? And that's without even addressing the fact that most of these behaviours or events didn't happen.

Gbear

jjpep wrote: »

Yep. But even if it was true that Obama did it, it wouldn't make it right. That's the point. To quote literally every ones mother ever, if Johnny next door jumped off a bridge, would you? It's one of the things I really don't get about trump supporters - if Hillary, Obama, whoever, was so bad why do they use them as examples of behaviour that it's okay for trump to copy? And that's without even addressing the fact that most of these behaviours or events didn't happen.

Because they don't actually give a ****.

Their arguments don't exist on their own merits.
They're there to either shut down debate entirely, or just to childishly reverse it on the level of "I know your are but what am I?!".

All that is required is that someone totally ignorant about the subject doesn't realise they're obviously nonsense, because that's who they're trying to convince. For everyone else, theyre happy enough that there's any debate at all about issues that aren't actually debatable.

It's no different to the tactics used for decades by anti vaxxers, Christian fundamentalists and climate change denialists.

The question is whether the person in question is a Bannon type - someone who knows the arguments are nonsense and is making them in bad faith because his goals require conning people, or whether the person is merely ignorant, or incapable of following the structure of an argument.

Trump is the latter. I suspect Hannity and Tucker Carlson are the former.

Quin_Dub

Gbear wrote: »

Because they don't actually give a ****.

Their arguments don't exist on their own merits.
They're there to either shut down debate entirely, or just to childishly reverse it on the level of "I know your are but what am I?!".

All that is required is that someone totally ignorant about the subject doesn't realise they're obviously nonsense, because that's who they're trying to convince. For everyone else, theyre happy enough that there's any debate at all about issues that aren't actually debatable.

It's no different to the tactics used for decades by anti vaxxers, Christian fundamentalists and climate change denialists.

The question is whether the person in question is a Bannon type - someone who knows the arguments are nonsense and is making them in bad faith because his goals require conning people, or whether the person is merely ignorant, or incapable of following the structure of an argument.

Trump is the latter. I suspect Hannity and Tucker Carlson are the former.

It think in Trumps case the motivation is far simpler - It's about what makes him look/feel good (or makes him money)

He isn't interested in truth vs. lie , good vs.bad - All that matters is "does this make me look/feel good and do I get money out of it?"

Absolutely nothing else matters to him.

Gbear

Quin_Dub wrote: »

It think in Trumps case the motivation is far simpler - It's about what makes him look/feel good (or makes him money)

He isn't interested in truth vs. lie , good vs.bad - All that matters is "does this make me look/feel good and do I get money out of it?"

Absolutely nothing else matters to him.

True, but my impression is not that he is particularly aware of this on a meta level.

He's not thinking, "I know it's wrong to put kids in cages, or lying endlessly is bad, but I need to do this to win".

Rather, he has an extremely loose grasp on reality, within his mind, reality is whatever suits him.

I don't think cynicism is his issue. It's that honesty is an alien concept to him, in a similar way to how you or I might be unable to wrap our heads around 7-dimensional geometry.

serfboard

Gbear wrote: »

It's that honesty is an alien concept to him

Just like every other used-car salesman.

aloyisious

According to NYT, Don is not going to state his case at the Senate impeachment hearings. It seems his policy will be to let the GOP take care of the issue. It'll be nice of his legal team to confirm or deny the report. A yes would be something different from the Trump campaign when it comes to the NYT reporting on his activities compared to his opinion of its reporting.

PropJoe10

aloyisious wrote: »

According to NYT, Don is not going to state his case at the Senate impeachment hearings. It seems his policy will be to let the GOP take care of the issue. It'll be nice of his legal team to confirm or deny the report. A yes would be something different from the Trump campaign when it comes to the NYT reporting on his activities compared to his opinion of its reporting.

That makes sense, because there's no way any competent attorney would allow Trump to testify under oath. He'd incriminate himself within 30 seconds.

TomOnBoard

PropJoe10 wrote: »

That makes sense, because there's no way any competent attorney would allow Trump to testify under oath. He'd incriminate himself within 30 seconds.

He has already incriminated himself repeatedly.... however, his GOP protectors use deflection and bluster as their principal defense strategy. Regrettably, that's not likely to change much in the Senate and the GOP Senators will make a show of thmselves and destroy any semblance of honesty and rectitude that body used to enjoy. All to continue reaching out to the Cult of Trump.

kowloon

PropJoe10 wrote: »

That makes sense, because there's no way any competent attorney would allow Trump to testify under oath. He'd incriminate himself within 30 seconds.

Did Giuliani say something to that effect some ways back about the Russia probe?

PropJoe10

TomOnBoard wrote: »

He has already incriminated himself repeatedly.... however, his GOP protectors use deflection and bluster as their principal defense strategy. Regrettably, that's not likely to change much in the Senate and the GOP Senators will make a show of thmselves and destroy any semblance of honesty and rectitude that body used to enjoy. All to continue reaching out to the Cult of Trump.

Yeah, I meant that his attorneys will know that its much easier to explain/excuse/deflect his ramblings when he's not under oath. Letting him answer any questions under oath would be an absolute car crash.

You're quite right, though. The Senate Republicans will continue their tactics - the only thing that'll ever change that is a swing in public opinion, and right now, its hard to see what can make that happen. The power of Trump's misinformation campaign is winning over truth and facts, unfortunately, and I'm not sure what the Democrats can do to change that.

26000 Elephants

PropJoe10 wrote: »

The only thing that'll ever change that is a swing in public opinion, and right now, its hard to see what can make that happen.

His financial records will do that. It's been the elephant in the room for 3 years, and he is running out of road in his quest to hide them.

Next friday will be an interesting day. 3 cases up for consideration.

StringerBell

Dunno, the SC issues a hold on the appeal courts decision and it will likely be near the end of January before they hear the case, once Trump eventually appeals properly to the SC to stop the subpoenas proceeding regarding his financials.

eire4

On a side note AG Barr make a very chilling statement in an interview this week. I have talked before about how the US IMHO is now an oligarchy and that under this regime one that is leaning towards authoritarianism well Barr certainly backed that up when he stated quite clearly in an interview that any communities (and I think we all know who he meant) that do not show the police respect can expect no protection from the police. Very chilling comments to say the least if not unexpected.

everlast75

While Rudy is off somewhere in Ukraine, blowing up the defence of "no quid pro quo", Trump is embarrassing himself yet again, this time talking sh1t... literally

https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/1203055422388736000?s=09

Igotadose

everlast75 wrote: »

While Rudy is off somewhere in Ukraine, blowing up the defence of "no quid pro quo", Trump is embarrassing himself yet again, this time talking sh1t... literally

WTAF? What next, we all need to preserve our precious elements?

Scariest to me is how, compared to his usual speeches, how smooth he sounds.

aloyisious

I'm looking forward to the Rudy presentation of his docudrama being filmed in Ukraine and Hungary covering the Bidens. It seems Rudy has been in both countries meeting with former Ukraine prosecutors and Admin staff [Lutsenko in Budapest, Viktor Shokin and Kostiantyn H. Kulyk in Kyiv] in an effort to rebuff the impeachment charges.

What's not certain is if Rudy is continuing these activities as one of the President's counsels or as what remains of the backdoor non-DOS route. If it's the former, it might be why he's still allowed into Ukraine; if it's the latter then a "why" question arises, given his anti-Ukraine activities leading up to and after the sacking of the official US representative to Ukraine. MSN is covering a copy of a Washington Post report covering Rudy's present-day activities in Ukraine with Andriy Derkach.

https://bipartisanreport.com/2019/12/06/rudy-giuliani-seen-meeting-with-foreign-officials-in-ukraine/

amandstu

Igotadose wrote: »

WTAF? What next, we all need to preserve our precious elements?

Scariest to me is how, compared to his usual speeches, how smooth he sounds.

Who flushes their toilets 10 or 15 times?

I have very poor pressure but I just wait for the cistern to fill and one flush does it.

Is this one of the President's nightmares we are listening to?

He is a germophobe by some accounts.