Cont: The Trump Presidency VI

[blutoski]

The problem isn't that they have to concede that Trump is stupid. They have to also concede that they have been stupid. Remarkably, persistently, willfully stupid.

This is where I'm looking for a political strategy that gives reasonable, loyal, people who are finding themselves bound by GOP partisanship... some sort of... out. A narrative they can internalize whereby they are victims of - rather than creators of - the Trump administration.

"We weren't stupid, we were tricked."

Problem: there may not be many people in this demographic, percentage wise. There is a countertheory that none of them were tricked. They want a white supremacist in the whitehouse, and they got one. They want international cooperation and economic stability dismantled, in order to weaken the western democracies and soften them up for theocratic, xenophobic dictators, and that's nicely in progress.

 

[uke2se]

Trump lies far, far more than any President or Presidential candidate ever has. This is not even close. And no, this has nothing to do with politics. There are plenty on the far right and far left who hold political positions that I dislike far more than Trump. They are wrong, just like Trump is. But they are not shameless liars like he is.



You are not just a groupie, you are shameless liar for Trump. You are like Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf except at least he was doing his job. You would like to set up a North Korea-like state here because you are that delusional about your own positions.

I am not trying to shame you or change your mind. I am just pointing up what you are.

An interview with Frank Schaeffer from 9 years ago where he talked about the religious far-right is more appropriate for looking at the alt-right, white nationalists and the rest of the Trump/Authoritarian groupies.

---
Maddow: … How do you work to move people off of that position? It doesn’t seem like facts are relevant in trying to move people away from these beliefs.

Schaeffer: You don’t work to move them off this position. You move past them.

Look, a village cannot reorganize village life to suit the village idiot. It’s as simple as that, and we have to understand: we have a village idiot in this country. It’s called fundamentalist Christianity. (alt-right, white nationalists, Trump/authoritarian groupies)

And, until we move past these people, and let me add as a former life-long Republican, until the Republican leadership has the guts to stand up and say it would be better not to have a Republican party than to have a party that caters to the village idiot, uh, there’s gonna be no end in sight.

---
It might be too late to move past the alt-right/white nationalists/Trump/Authoritarian groupies. That time was in early 2016, but instead the media didn't do their jobs, and the voting population refused to take this trainwreck of unenlightened, racist, sexist, fascist idiocy seriously. We might need to hit rock bottom and then hope that society can recover over the subsequent decades.

This pretty much echoes my view exactly. There's no reasoning with the hard right. The rest of us simply has to move past them, marginalize them in every way we can, and wait for them to die. Hopefully, over time there will be fewer of that particular category of stupid, and civilization will survive.

 

[uke2se]

T There is a countertheory that none of them were tricked. They want a white supremacist in the whitehouse, and they got one. They want international cooperation and economic stability dismantled, in order to weaken the western democracies and soften them up for theocratic, xenophobic dictators, and that's nicely in progress.

Over the year and a half since Trump's election, I have been swayed more and more towards this position due to the actions and words of Trump supporters.

I think they got what they wanted. These aren't people we can reason with.

 

[Segnosaur]

The republican tax cut bill was passed over 4 months ago. We've had at least a little time for the economy to adjust to both the details of the tax plan, plus any extra cash that consumers or business now have as a result of the reductions in the tax rates.

It was supposed to stimulate the economy, and it was supposed to pay for itself through the increased economic activity that would result. So what's the effect that it has had?

- GDP growth is actually SLOWER than it was at the end of 2017, dropping from 2.9% to 2.3%. Ok, maybe that's just a seasonal thing. The problem is, investment growth at the start of 2018 is actually lower than it was at the start of 2017, falling from 5.4% to 4.6%. So both GDP growth and investment growth have slowed.

- A survey by the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta has found that roughly 3/4 of businesses have made no plans to increase their capital spending either for this year or for next year as a result of the tax cuts.

So obviously what we need is MORE tax cuts. The problem was obviously they didn't cut taxes enough.

https://www.epi.org/publication/tod...-the-economy-has-clearly-hit-full-employment/

http://macroblog.typepad.com/macroblog/2018/03/what-are-businesses-saying-about-tax-reform-now.html

 

[ponderingturtle]

The republican tax cut bill was passed over 4 months ago. We've had at least a little time for the economy to adjust to both the details of the tax plan, plus any extra cash that consumers or business now have as a result of the reductions in the tax rates.

Hell for example no one knows what the tax implications of trading baseball players are under the new law, so as no one understands it why should we be able to say what the results will be?

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/19/us/politics/baseball-tax-law-.html

 

[blutoski]

Over the year and a half since Trump's election, I have been swayed more and more towards this position due to the actions and words of Trump supporters.

I think they got what they wanted. These aren't people we can reason with.

I still want to try, and continue the socratic dialogue, because I think there's a continuum, and a portion can be persuaded. It may be enough to secure competent governance for the foreseeable future.

We're in a situation of four forces that all nations need to adapt to: climate change, technological advancement pace, economic globalization, and population growth. The USA needs to change, and it looks like when presented with Clinton's model of modernization versus Trump's model of nostalgia, this time around the electorate went with nostalgia.

That won't work, it'll make things much worse, but what's not clear to me is whether the public will absorb the cause->effect relationship, or will failure lead to doubling down.

 

[The Don]

I still want to try, and continue the socratic dialogue, because I think there's a continuum, and a portion can be persuaded. It may be enough to secure competent governance for the foreseeable future.

We're in a situation of four forces that all nations need to adapt to: climate change, technological advancement pace, economic globalization, and population growth. The USA needs to change, and it looks like when presented with Clinton's model of modernization versus Trump's model of nostalgia, this time around the electorate went with nostalgia.

That won't work, it'll make things much worse, but what's not clear to me is whether the public will absorb the cause->effect relationship, or will failure lead to doubling down.

Well yes and no, Clinton did get 3 million more votes.

 

[Stacko]

Dr Bornstein is back.

In February 2017, a top White House aide who was Trump's longtime personal bodyguard, along with the top lawyer at the Trump Organization and a third man, showed up at the office of Trump's New York doctor without notice and took all the president's medical records.

The incident, which Dr. Harold Bornstein described as a "raid," took place two days after Bornstein told a newspaper that he had prescribed a hair growth medicine for the president for years.

In an exclusive interview in his Park Avenue office, Bornstein told NBC News that he felt "raped, frightened and sad" when Keith Schiller and another "large man" came to his office to collect the president's records on the morning of Feb. 3, 2017. At the time, Schiller, who had long worked as Trump's bodyguard, was serving as director of Oval Office operations at the White House.

"They must have been here for 25 or 30 minutes. It created a lot of chaos," Bornstein said, who described the incident as frightening.

 

[Arcade22]

He later tweeted on Tuesday morning: "It would seem very hard to obstruct justice for a crime that never happened."

Trump posted this but is it really true? I mean even if Trump would have personally been cleared of any wrongdoing, if he panicked or otherwise thought that he was going to risk criminal charges or something, then surely interfering with and trying to scuttle the investigation would still qualify as a criminal offence?

 

[Bob001]

Trump posted this but is it really true? I mean even if Trump would have personally been cleared of any wrongdoing, if he panicked or otherwise thought that he was going to risk criminal charges or something, then surely interfering with and trying to scuttle the investigation would still qualify as a criminal offence?

No, it's not true. Lying to investigators or trying to conceal evidence are separate crimes, apart from the original allegations. Martha Stewart didn't go to prison for insider trading; she went down for lying about it. Etc.

 

[Bob001]

Dr Bornstein is back.

In his TV interview, he said he felt shocked, saddened, abused etc. But neither he nor anybody in his office called the cops and reported a robbery in progress. Unless the heavies had a court order or a signed release from Trump, they were entirely in the wrong. And even then, the doc is required to provide copies of records; the originals are his property.

 

[mgidm86]

As the Presidents personal physician is this doctor required to divulge Trumps information to the press whenever they ask? I'm wondering why he told them what meds he was taking. If that's what he's supposed to do then fine, but if not I'd be a little pissed if my doctor revealed I was taking anti-hair loss drugs.

Seems like the biggest story of the week so far so I don't want to miss out on anything!

 

[TheL8Elvis]

In his TV interview, he said he felt shocked, saddened, abused etc. But neither he nor anybody in his office called the cops and reported a robbery in progress. Unless the heavies had a court order or a signed release from Trump, they were entirely in the wrong. And even then, the doc is required to provide copies of records; the originals are his property.

In theory, he either ought to report a theft, or suffer consequences for violating HIPAA now that this is public knowledge.

In reality, I doubt either willhappen.

 

[blutoski]

As the Presidents personal physician is this doctor required to divulge Trumps information to the press whenever they ask?

No, and actually it's probably illegal, per HIPPA.

I'm wondering why he told them what meds he was taking. If that's what he's supposed to do then fine, but if not I'd be a little pissed if my doctor revealed I was taking anti-hair loss drugs.

I would be, too.

Seems like the biggest story of the week so far so I don't want to miss out on anything!

Agreed, this is not big news. Assuming it's true, the drug does not have cognitive side effects. It's also used to treat enlarged prostates, which is also not job impacting.

It seems like this 'raid' happened back in February?


Finally: the personal doctor for a man who boasted about sexually assaulting women feels he was 'raped' when asked to photocopy some documents. Rich white men really are the original special snowflakes, is my takeaway from all this.

 

[ponderingturtle]

No, and actually it's probably illegal, per HIPPA.

Yep just like it is illegal for the IRS to release his tax returns. It is just that after Nixon cheated on his taxes it became standard for politicians to do that.

 

[Minoosh]

It seems like a relatively slow news day, judging by CNN's home page earlier today, yet CNN manages to put Trump issues at the top of the page with an analysis on why neither party wants to talk about Stormy Daniels.

Man, they are really riding Stormy Daniels harder than she's ever been ridden before, and that's saying something.

Playing this analysis so prominently seems like a reach to me. If the MSM (or Fox, for that matter) wants more credibility, they shouldn't be manufacturing Trump headlines at every turn. It's not that there's any shortage of legitimate Trump news stories.

It's fine as analysis but top of the page? It's there to get clicks.

ETA: I don't really blame CNN or anyone for trying to get clicks, but IMO it's a business decision, not an editorial one.

 

[Bob001]

.....
Finally: the personal doctor for a man who boasted about sexually assaulting women feels he was 'raped' when asked to photocopy some documents. Rich white men really are the original special snowflakes, is my takeaway from all this.

The doc wasn't asked to photocopy documents. He says his visitors took the originals, and spent half-an-hour rummaging through his files.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Dr Bornstein is back.

Just when you thought it couldn't get any weirder.


Adds a bit of cred to Stormy's thug story, doesn't it?

 

[blutoski]

The doc wasn't asked to photocopy documents. He says his visitors took the originals, and spent half-an-hour rummaging through his files.

That's the part that seems improbable, but let's go with that. He feels raped by requests for paperwork. Must have a tough life.

/// ETA: Trump advocates a death penalty for rapists, is he going to demand prosecution for these guys? Or is he soft on rape now?

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

In his TV interview, he said he felt shocked, saddened, abused etc. But neither he nor anybody in his office called the cops and reported a robbery in progress. Unless the heavies had a court order or a signed release from Trump, they were entirely in the wrong. And even then, the doc is required to provide copies of records; the originals are his property.

Don't know, what if it actually sounded like a mob shakedown? Surely the doc knew Trump's bodyguard, he had reason then to think it was a theft on Trump's orders.

Just saying the story is credible, crime reported or not.