Trump

[MasterMischief]

I am glad to see Republicans taking swift and dramatic action by stating, "If true, that would certainly be troubling."

[HannibalBarca]

No words I can add that would improve on Randy Rainbow.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=242&v=sWTiFcl9OhU

[gaggedLouise]

White House top legal counsel Don McGahn will be exiting some time this autumn.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/aug/29/don-mcgahn-resign-trump-white-house-counsel

[Twisted Crow]

This is egregious and irresponsible, coming from the president of a well-established democracy...

The U.S. is a Constitutional Republic with "Democratic Representation". Not digging at you with this nitpick, I just want that to be known. Really, I wouldn't call my country a "well-established" anything, given that full description invites such informal descriptions. But I take no offense and mean none, I say this with the assumption that you weren't being too literal.

[Roleplay Frog]

The U.S. is a Constitutional Republic with "Democratic Representation". Not digging at you with this nitpick, I just want that to be known. Really, I wouldn't call my country a "well-established" anything, given that full description invites such informal descriptions. But I take no offense and mean none, I say this with the assumption that you weren't being too literal.

I cannot supress my urge to ask in which kind of republic a candidate lacking the majority mandate of the people can get elected. Sharp tongues might call it more of a two party oligarchy, not to say that that was the intent, but that's what many people in power have worked long for it to become.

But all of this would be kind of derailing the thread.

[Twisted Crow]

While some might oversimplify us as "republic (or federal republic)" or a "representative democracy", what concerns me is the potential for lost focus in how we Americans identify our nation's government structure more precisely. What feels decidedly less "democratic" to me is actually just how we are represented in truth versus how we are represented on paper. How our elections actually work versus how it is overly simplifed at our schools, to cite a peeve of mine.

Sharp tongues might call it more of a two party oligarchy, not to say that that was the intent, but that's what many people in power have worked long for it to become.

That is actually closer to what I would call it, in reality.

[Roleplay Frog]

What feels decidedly less "democratic" to me is actually just how we are represented in truth versus how we are represented on paper.

I mean, North Korea is a democracy.. on paper.

[Twisted Crow]

That is kind of my point, though. And a reason why I don't see anything well-established about it... unless we are are refering to the illusion aspects of it. I feel that those are indeed well-established.

[Twisted Crow]

I see Trump as a poster child of this actually. Not so much that he was the winning horse and "therefore crony capitalist republic"... but more so how he won. By the numbers (last I looked), people seemed to... well, not "want" Hillary, but perhaps settle for her over Trump. Yet, due to how we color the lines in our game of political elections... that is not who the people received.

I realize this opens a series of illusions in of itself (i.e., "Isn't Democracy supposed to be neat and tidy?" or what have you). But I guess what I am trying to fathom is how we are "democratic" in words or "in spirit", but not in practice.

While Trump irks me as a shining example of this in my eyes, perhaps these sentiments do belong in their own thread. Apologies of this seemed out of left field. :-/

[HannibalBarca]

As older programmers used to say...GIGO: garbage in, garbage out.  We get what we put into the system.  Too few people partake in the system, and the system fails.

[Mechelle]

I am not sure if this is really "Trump" or "other news", but readers may remember that anti-Trumo protesters flew a balloon of Donald Trump, wearing a nappy (diaper) over London at the time of his visit.

This angered the Trump fans over here, and they have now arranged to fly a balloon of Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, wearing a yellow bikini, as he has worked against body-shaming advertisements on the Underground (and there is a subtext that he is Moslem and therefore would be offended by bare flesh). Unfortunately, the Trump fans have got angry again, as Khan has not taken offence, giving permission for the balloon, and joking that yellow is not his colour. One of the organisers of the second balloon  seems to have outed as an anti-Semite too.

[gaggedLouise]

I am not sure if this is really "Trump" or "other news", but readers may remember that anti-Trumo protesters flew a balloon of Donald Trump, wearing a nappy (diaper) over London at the time of his visit.

This angered the Trump fans over here, and they have now arranged to fly a balloon of Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, wearing a yellow bikini, as he has worked against body-shaming advertisements on the Underground (and there is a subtext that he is Moslem and therefore would be offended by bare flesh). Unfortunately, the Trump fans have got angry again, as Khan has not taken offence, giving permission for the balloon, and joking that yellow is not his colour. One of the organisers of the second balloon  seems to have outed as an anti-Semite too.

Why am I not surprised over this? 

Meanwhile, Trump is threatening to lock Canada out of a revamped NAFTA if said deal doesn't look like Trump wants it to be, and also threatening to take the US out of the WTO: on both points he's waving about his old grudge that such treaties/organisations are disfavouring the US and allowing other members to grab millions of jobs plus a free ride. And rolled into the NAFTA threat on Canada, he's also threatening Congress: don't even try to meddle with the way I'll run this or "I will simply terminate NAFTA entirely & we will be far better off...".  I wonder what Mike Pompeo is thinking about his boss? :)

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1035905988682018816

To make it even better, Canada is the no. 1 trading partner of three out of four US states, both on export and import, while Mexico comes second on that rank (the number of US states where a country is the no.1 export market or provider of import goods), but Trump couldn't care less (check out the US trade maps in one of the top replies to his tweet). Trump is clearly mentally still living in a world where Canadians and Mexicans are funny small cousins from the countryside and movie cons, where Chinese people are strange litttle Chinamen pulling around yokes and carts far away and where Europe is completely dependent on US money and US goods. 

[Ironwolf85]

you basicly summerized his worldview...
well to be honest, imagine a 70 year olf man who has watched nothing but fox news for his political information throught most of his life.

[gaggedLouise]

you basicly summerized his worldview...
well to be honest, imagine a 70 year olf man who has watched nothing but fox news for his political information throught most of his life.

Yep, he thinks you can turn the clock back to the early fifties (except for the Eastern Bloc of those days)... :) That was when he started school, I think.

[gaggedLouise]

Trump has passed a new "you can't make this shit up"-hurdle. In connection with the ongoing prsecution of two Republican House representatives who are seeking re-election by November, for several serious white-collar crimes, he is slamming the judicial system for having the gall to try to put two of his allies on trial so close to elections. Effectively, he's arguing that they should get preferential treatment or even a free ride by the law, because they're his cronies (the two were among the very first GOP congressmen to endorse Trump during the primaries) and he think's they're good guys.   

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-45405757

CNN's Anderson Cooper does an excellent job of explaining why this is in grave breach of the basics of the US political system (and constitution): https://edition.cnn.com/videos/politics/2018/09/04/donald-trump-jeff-sessions-kth-sot-ac-vpx.cnn

Of course when it was about "crooked Hillary" Trump was all "lock her up" about her, on rather less serious allegations and even closer to the elections.

And yes, he is also slamming Sessions over this. Why can't Jeff learn who is his boss? :)

[gaggedLouise]

Legendary Watergate and post-9/11 reporter Bob Woodward does his own Michael Wolff book, but hopefully with better attributions of who is saying what. If you've read Fire & Fury you'll recognize the outlines, it seems, and some of it sounds just as buffoonish:

John Kelly on Trump, at a staff meeting in his office:

He's an idiot. It's pointless to try to convince him of anything. He's gone off the rails. We're in crazytown, I don't even know why any of us are here. This is the worst job I've ever had.

https://edition.cnn.com/2018/09/04/politics/bob-woodward-book-donald-trump-fear/index.html

[Callie Del Noire]

Just when I think the president can’t scare me more.  Making protests illegal.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-suggests-protesting-should-be-illegal/2018/09/04/11cfd9be-b0a0-11e8-aed9-001309990777_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.1c68e14cdb69

[Ket]

Yeah well, he'd have to change the Constitution for that.

[Orval Wintermute]

Legendary Watergate and post-9/11 reporter Bob Woodward does his own Michael Wolff book...

But if you go back a month or so Trump was complimenting Woodward, calling him honest & honorable etc.

[Roleplay Frog]

Yeah well, he'd have to change the Constitution for that.

Or you know set the ReichstagCongress on fire, blaming the communists.

[TheGlyphstone]

I mean, he also suggested after his last State of the Union address that people who don't support him are traitors, so this sort of rhetoric isn't exactly new.

[Ket]

I mean, he also suggested after his last State of the Union address that people who don't support him are traitors, so this sort of rhetoric isn't exactly new.

Anyone who blindly fully supports any sitting president needs to clean out in between their ears.

I don't even listen to half the crap he spews. Because most of it is all a ratings ploy. This man knows reality TV, knows how to get people riled up over perceived drama that doesn't even exist. Ignoring him is the best thing anyone can do for most of what falls out of his mouth, as he gobbles up the attention like Big Macs. If only the media would learn this tactic...

[Callie Del Noire]

Anyone who blindly fully supports any sitting president needs to clean out in between their ears.

I don't even listen to half the crap he spews. Because most of it is all a ratings ploy. This man knows reality TV, knows how to get people riled up over perceived drama that doesn't even exist. Ignoring him is the best thing anyone can do for most of what falls out of his mouth, as he gobbles up the attention like Big Macs. If only the media would learn this tactic...

But but.. ratings....

I wish they’d reinstate something like the fairness doctrine. It wasn’t perfect but I think we need to make media acknowledge something beyond ratings in news

[Roleplay Frog]

Make the media great again?

[gaggedLouise]

But if you go back a month or so Trump was complimenting Woodward, calling him honest & honorable etc.

Didn't he say that about Michael Cohen, too, as long as he was nice and obedient to Trump? :)