Cont: The Trump Presidency X: 10-10 'til we do it again

Status
Not open for further replies.
Fine question!

Evangelicals seem to support this philandering, selfish *******.

Trump is too unpopular. The non religious are too small a percentage of the population. It just isn't mathematically possible for the majority of the opposition to be non religious.
 
Just admit I was right.

No. Your statement implied, to me, there was some kind of connection when in fact there's not.

Furthermore, you are using a highly debatable definition of religious. I don't think you're even technically right for some legitimate definitions of religious.

Just admit you're overly pedantic, as always.
 
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-real-reason-they-hate-trump-1540148467

Not that every leftist hates America. But the leftists I know do hate Mr. Trump’s vulgarity, his unwillingness to walk away from a fight, his bluntness, his certainty that America is exceptional, his mistrust of intellectuals, his love of simple ideas that work, and his refusal to believe that men and women are interchangeable. Worst of all, he has no ideology except getting the job done. His goals are to do the task before him, not be pushed around, and otherwise to enjoy life. In short, he is a typical American—except exaggerated, because he has no constraints to cramp his style except the ones he himself invents.

He's not right, but he's not wrong.

Personally I do find people who embody the qualities described here to be insufferably grating. Their personal and professional lives being a flaming train wreck of insipid drama and otherwise easily-avoided calamities just tend to confirm my initial suspicions.

Also, gotta love an anti-intellectual screed from a Yale grad who writes for WSJ.

Mmm. Rather than saying that he's not really right or wrong, I would say that he's utterly full of crap in his attempt to whitewash Trump and make him sound like an average American.

Mr. Trump’s vulgarity? I don't care about that. Seriously, why would I? That, for an example of "vulgarity," Trump claimed to be just fine with sexually assaulting married women and grabbing women by the pussy invokes distinctly different issues than vulgarity, though.


his unwillingness to walk away from a fight,

This... just makes me go WTF? After how Trump fired Comey alone, it should be clear that this cannot be referring to anything good. After he rolled over so many times on all kinds of things, it can easily be seen that it can't be a meaningful description. On the other hand, he's quite happy to act as a cyberbully. He's quite happy to double down on his trade war. His unwillingness to walk away from a fight is more akin to a spoiled, petulant child whose parents aren't around to rein them in and tell them to play nice. The "unwillingness to walk away from a fight" isn't meaningfully a thing in the first place, so this is simply bs.

his bluntness,

President Donald Trump insulted a female reporter telling her that she "never" thinks even before she had a chance to ask her question. He lied, a lot, about our allied countries. That kind of "bluntness?" Yeah, the problem there isn't "bluntness."

his certainty that America is exceptional,

This is rather questionable from the start, but invokes more complex things, regardless. I have never found pride in the greatness of our country to be a bad thing, in and of itself. On the other hand, American exceptionalism is often used to justify claims that we are somehow fundamentally different from others, without any valid justification, which... is quite grating, given that I much prefer valid argumentation.

his mistrust of intellectuals,

...More specifically, that he just keeps proclaiming that he understands things better than the actual experts on whatever. That, I do have a problem with. And the "average" American should overwhelmingly have a problem with.

his love of simple ideas that work,

This is another WTF. Likely, he's referring to things like the wall and how the GOP were selling their tax cuts for the rich. With the wall, it literally cannot work up to the hype. It's a simple solution that doesn't address so much of the actual problem. As for the tax cuts for the rich and how much things have been "simplified," it may be worth noting that the taxes may actually be a bit more complex, in total.

and his refusal to believe that men and women are interchangeable.

Women! You're good as waitresses, secretaries, and flight attendents! Stay away from the thinking and manual labor jobs! :rolleyes:

Worst of all, he has no ideology except getting the job done.

That actually is unintentionally valid enough. A very, very important word that should be there is "legally," when it comes to the "average American," though. Trump's long shown disdain for the law is generally considered a very bad thing, when partisanship isn't overruling it. Similarly, the priorities and nature of "the job" should also be concerning. When "the job" is using government office to make personal profit, that's usually called corruption. When "the job" is garnering personal praise and adulation rather than working for the betterment of the country, that's rewriting the point of the job.

You quoted a guy who's desperately spinning things in his attempt to call black, white, Delphic Oracle. That you find the description grating even after the absurd whitewashing is telling, though.
 
No. Your statement implied, to me, there was some kind of connection when in fact there's not.

Furthermore, you are using a highly debatable definition of religious. I don't think you're even technically right for some legitimate definitions of religious.

Just admit you're overly pedantic, as always.

Highly debatable? It is Gallup's which is self identify as. One/atheist/agnostic.
 
Trump is too unpopular. The non religious are too small a percentage of the population. It just isn't mathematically possible for the majority of the opposition to be non religious.

I don't believe this. There is probably no polling organization than Pew so I don't doubt their numbers only how people answer the question. For example, is someone truly religious if they never read the Bible but attend Christmas Eve Midnight Mass every year? People consistently exaggerate their religiosity. I use to attend Church maybe twice a year and self-identified as Christian for decades because I didn't want people to believe I was a Godless heathen.

So IMV, this sort of comes down to definitions. When I say someone is religious, I'm thinking someone who attends church, regularly and takes religious doctrine seriously and probably tithes.
 
Last edited:
I don't believe this. There is probably no polling organization than Pew so I don't doubt their numbers only how people answer the question. For example, is someone truly religious if they never read the Bible but attend Christmas Eve Midnight Mass every year? People consistently exaggerate their religiosity. I use to attend Church maybe twice a year and self-identified as Christian for decades because I didn't want people to believe I was a Godless heathen.

So IMV, this sort of comes down to definitions. When I say someone is religious, I'm thinking someone who attends church, regularly and takes religious doctrine seriously and probably tithes.

Religious is simply relating to or believing in a religion. That means atheists, agnostics, and those who never thought about it are non religious.

ETA here is the Gallup entry. There isn't much room for level

https://news.gallup.com/poll/200186/five-key-findings-religion.aspx
 
Last edited:
This is rather questionable from the start, but invokes more complex things, regardless. I have never found pride in the greatness of our country to be a bad thing, in and of itself. On the other hand, American exceptionalism is often used to justify claims that we are somehow fundamentally different from others, without any valid justification, which... is quite grating, given that I much prefer valid argumentation.

Not only that, but Trump has repeatedly made the claim that, if anything, America is no longer exceptional. That's the entire gist of the MAGA slogan (that and the racist dogwhistle).

But this element is very telling about the person who wrote it. If you don't believe in the American myth of manifest destiny, then you're not a real American. You don't have the faith, and that's more important than anything else.
 
Trump Tweets

"The people of Puerto Rico are wonderful but the inept politicians are trying to use the massive and ridiculously high amounts of hurricane/disaster funding to pay off other obligations. The U.S. will NOT bail out long outstanding & unpaid obligations with hurricane relief money!"
 
Religious is simply relating to or believing in a religion. That means atheists, agnostics, and those who never thought about it are non religious.

ETA here is the Gallup entry. There isn't much room for level

https://news.gallup.com/poll/200186/five-key-findings-religion.aspx

My point was this gets down to definitions. When I say someone is religious, I mean what I said on my earlier post and if this Gallup poll is how you define it, fine. You're not wrong and I'm not wrong. We just describe things differently. I don't view someone who self-identifies as say Catholic and believes almost none of the tenets of Catholicism as actually Catholic or necessarily religious.
 
I don't believe this. There is probably no polling organization than Pew so I don't doubt their numbers only how people answer the question. For example, is someone truly religious if they never read the Bible but attend Christmas Eve Midnight Mass every year? People consistently exaggerate their religiosity. I use to attend Church maybe twice a year and self-identified as Christian for decades because I didn't want people to believe I was a Godless heathen.

So IMV, this sort of comes down to definitions. When I say someone is religious, I'm thinking someone who attends church, regularly and takes religious doctrine seriously and probably tithes.

Trump disapproval is at 52%. For it to be majority non religious, they would need to be over 26% of the US population. That would be 25% greater than the current reported numbers.
 
Trump disapproval is at 52%. For it to be majority non religious, they would need to be over 26% of the US population. That would be 25% greater than the current reported numbers.

According to the definition of Gallup or Pew that would be correct. But as I said earlier this comes down to definitions.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Back
Top Bottom