2020 the battle of the septuagenarians - Trump vs Biden, Part 2

Former Republican national security officials endorse Biden. Names on the website and there are plenty of them.


https://www.defendingdemocracytogether.org/national-security/

"We are former national security officials who served during the administrations of Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, George W. Bush, and/or Donald Trump, or as Republican Members of Congress. We are profoundly concerned about the course of our nation under the leadership of Donald Trump. Through his actions and his rhetoric, Trump has demonstrated that he lacks the character and competence to lead this nation and has engaged in corrupt behavior that renders him unfit to serve as President."

Well said.

alchemist33 wrote: »

Re sharks, Stormy Daniels said of a meeting with Trump in 2007 -

Features in Quint's soliloquy in Jaws

"Japanese submarine slammed two torpedoes into her side, Chief. We was comin’ back from the island of Tinian to Leyte. We’d just delivered the bomb. The Hiroshima bomb. Eleven hundred men went into the water. Vessel went down in 12 minutes.

Didn’t see the first shark for about a half-hour. Tiger. 13-footer. You know how you know that in the water, Chief? You can tell by lookin’ from the dorsal to the tail. What we didn’t know, was that our bomb mission was so secret, no distress signal had been sent. They didn’t even list us overdue for a week. Very first light, Chief, sharks come cruisin’ by, so we formed ourselves into tight groups. It was sorta like you see in the calendars, you know the infantry squares in the old calendars like the Battle of Waterloo and the idea was the shark come to the nearest man, that man he starts poundin’ and hollerin’ and sometimes that shark he go away… but sometimes he wouldn’t go away.

Sometimes that shark looks right at ya. Right into your eyes. And the thing about a shark is he’s got lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll’s eyes. When he comes at ya, he doesn’t even seem to be livin’… ’til he bites ya, and those black eyes roll over white and then… ah then you hear that terrible high-pitched screamin’. The ocean turns red, and despite all your poundin’ and your hollerin’ those sharks come in and… they rip you to pieces.

You know by the end of that first dawn, lost a hundred men. I don’t know how many sharks there were, maybe a thousand. I do know how many men, they averaged six an hour. Thursday mornin’, Chief, I bumped into a friend of mine, Herbie Robinson from Cleveland. Baseball player. Boson’s mate. I thought he was asleep. I reached over to wake him up. He bobbed up, down in the water, he was like a kinda top. Upended. Well, he’d been bitten in half below the waist.

At noon on the fifth day, a Lockheed Ventura swung in low and he spotted us, a young pilot, lot younger than Mr. Hooper here, anyway he spotted us and a few hours later a big ol’ fat PBY come down and started to pick us up. You know that was the time I was most frightened. Waitin’ for my turn. I’ll never put on a lifejacket again. So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945.

Anyway, we delivered the bomb.”

Yes! I thought it was pretty good!

Quin_Dub wrote: »

Didn't watch it, but read the reviews.

Went very well by all accounts. Even Fox News said it was excellent, possibly the best speech of his career.

Looks like it highlighted the key problem of Trump's continuous attacks on Bidens mental capacity.

The result of all that rhetoric is that when he comes out with a fairly solid speech without any "Senior moments" it just utterly destroys Trump's entire campaign angle.

Compare that to Trump's speech last night, rambling about sending the police to polling stations , the 2nd amendment being taken away, taxes being quadrupled and once again claiming that the Virus is nearly gone and about to "go away".

He hit all the main points you would expect, pretty much pointing out all the things Trump hasn't done to deal with the complete meltdown America is at the moment and pointing out that the president it supposed to look after all citizens and not just lining his and his flunkies pockets! One comment was that is was nice to see him using full sentences as apposed to Trumps rhetoric and random jibes (paraphrasing)

He never mentioned sharks

jamule wrote: »

He never mentioned sharks

Oh yes he did just yesterday. These are the rantings of a man suffering from some sort of breakdown.

.

duploelabs wrote: »

Features in Quint's soliloquy in Jaws

"Japanese submarine slammed two torpedoes into her side, Chief. We was comin’ back from the island of Tinian to Leyte. We’d just delivered the bomb. The Hiroshima bomb. Eleven hundred men went into the water. Vessel went down in 12 minutes.

Didn’t see the first shark for about a half-hour. Tiger. 13-footer. You know how you know that in the water, Chief? You can tell by lookin’ from the dorsal to the tail. What we didn’t know, was that our bomb mission was so secret, no distress signal had been sent. They didn’t even list us overdue for a week. Very first light, Chief, sharks come cruisin’ by, so we formed ourselves into tight groups. It was sorta like you see in the calendars, you know the infantry squares in the old calendars like the Battle of Waterloo and the idea was the shark come to the nearest man, that man he starts poundin’ and hollerin’ and sometimes that shark he go away… but sometimes he wouldn’t go away.

Sometimes that shark looks right at ya. Right into your eyes. And the thing about a shark is he’s got lifeless eyes. Black eyes. Like a doll’s eyes. When he comes at ya, he doesn’t even seem to be livin’… ’til he bites ya, and those black eyes roll over white and then… ah then you hear that terrible high-pitched screamin’. The ocean turns red, and despite all your poundin’ and your hollerin’ those sharks come in and… they rip you to pieces.

You know by the end of that first dawn, lost a hundred men. I don’t know how many sharks there were, maybe a thousand. I do know how many men, they averaged six an hour. Thursday mornin’, Chief, I bumped into a friend of mine, Herbie Robinson from Cleveland. Baseball player. Boson’s mate. I thought he was asleep. I reached over to wake him up. He bobbed up, down in the water, he was like a kinda top. Upended. Well, he’d been bitten in half below the waist.

At noon on the fifth day, a Lockheed Ventura swung in low and he spotted us, a young pilot, lot younger than Mr. Hooper here, anyway he spotted us and a few hours later a big ol’ fat PBY come down and started to pick us up. You know that was the time I was most frightened. Waitin’ for my turn. I’ll never put on a lifejacket again. So, eleven hundred men went into the water. 316 men come out, the sharks took the rest, June the 29th, 1945.

Anyway, we delivered the bomb.”

It was true, they were delivering bomb parts. Paul Allen paid to find the Indianapolis and did find it, it's in the Philippine sea. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Indianapolis_(CA-35)

So the narrative pushed by Trump, and repeated by some on here, is that Biden is senile old man incapable of cogent thoughts and not suitable for the highest office in the land.

And that by extension, one should support Trump.

So yesterday we saw two speeches, one by each of the candidates.

One was delivered well, following a clear path and hitting on key themes.

In the other we had a man distracted by an insect who then went on a rant about sharks and something about seals.

But of course Trump supporters will wave this embarrassing episode off as just Trump being Trump. Yet again highlighting the massive hypocrisy in their position.

“....Its called save the sharks, I say not thank you, I have other things I can commit funds to.

I recognize Israel’s true capital....“

Jesus, even by Trumps standards is some leap to rambling about seals and sharks to going directly into Middle Eastern politics.

And Biden has lost his mind?

timsey tiger wrote: »

The talking points, must be a bit late today.

They are waiting to see how Fox and Brietbart spin it so they can mirror that.

Leroy42 wrote: »

It is crazy that the US have got to the point where the opposition party are asking people to vote early to try to avoid the POTUS looking to stop them voting.

This is, apparently, the home of democracy, the country that wants to spread democracy to the rest of the world. And essentially the leader of the country is actively looking for ways to stop people voting!

I mean, that is incredible that it has got to that point. Whilst I was one of those that was not happy with Trump winning, I could see where it came from but was worried about the effects.

But I never really imagined that the US would now be looking at a situation whereby the POTUS is actively looking to discredit the entire democratic system.

No matter the result in November the ramifications of Trumps presidency and his attack on the democratic voting rights for US citizens will be felt for years, maybe even decades.

Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »

No matter the result in November the ramifications of Trumps presidency and his attack on the democratic voting rights for US citizens will be felt for years, maybe even decades.

And the most worrying aspect of it is that it seems that a huge amount, the majority I would say, don't even realise what is happening.

For all their gun carrying, we stand for freedom and democracy, this is the US, greatest country in the world etc they seemingly are happy enough to stand by and watch their judicial system be systemically politicised, their voting system politicised and their media become more and more polarised.

For all the money they spend on their military, they real threats are themselves.

Seems like an excellent convention all round for Biden.

duploelabs wrote: »

It's not just the voting rights, I think a lot of the Biden presidency will be closing all the loopholes that Trump exploited to make sure they are not abused again

I wouldn't be too sure about that. There has been plenty of time in the past for DNC to deal with issues like Gerrymandering, corporate donations etc etc but they consistently fail to do anything.

A lot will depend on the results of the Senate and House elections and the impact on who is in majority. If the GoP maintain control of the Senate then Biden will be forced into EO to get anything done and that solves nothing really.

That the parties couldn't come together to deal with such a threat as COVID does not bode well for any cross party work in the future.

Biden can't be seen to change too much, as he will quickly be labelled as ignoring those that didn't vote for him. That that is exactly what Trump did isn't the point.