Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[solinari6]

Looking back on history, one of the first things Obama did when he got into office was to make it clear that no investigations of the Bush administration would ever happen. I could easily see Biden doing the same for Trump. I am hoping that Warren or Sanders would not do this.

You sure about that? Biden's made it really clear he wouldn't pardon Trump at least, I'm not sure where you are getting the idea that he wouldn't prosecute him either.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaig...cted-president

Biden told Radio Iowa that he wouldn't follow the example of former President Ford, who pardoned his predecessor, President Nixon, so Nixon would not be prosecuted for his role in the Watergate scandal.

“It wouldn’t unite the country,” Biden said. “You’d say: ‘Wait a minute. I get a parking ticket and I’ve got to pay it. This happens to me and I’ve got to go to jail. This guy does all these things that put us jeopardy and he gets off? I think this is of a different nature."

"I think President Ford, God love him he’s a good guy, I knew him pretty well, I think if he had to do it over again he wouldn’t have done it ... because he didn’t get reelected,” he added.

[Edge-]

Somebody I follow on Twitter said it best: "Washington DC booing Trump at a baseball game the same day the US took out the top terror target in the world says more about Washington DC than it does about Trump."

Did you watch the briefing? Trump did more to take away from his own win than anything else done this weekend. Seriously, he's incapable of getting out of his own way.

People can both appreciate that our armed forces took out a serious threat while also hating Trump and wanting him removed from office if wrongdoing is proven. And we can do that without Trump talking about a military operation like it's a god-damned Michael Bay flick. Or staging photo's hours after the operation took place so he'd look presidential with "his generals" in a messy as fuck room, because he was on the god-damned fucking golf course while things actually happened.

[ParanoiD84]

The Washington Post had a real hard time pinning down how they wanted to describe this.

Started out with "Islamic State's 'terrorist-in-chief'", which became "Austere religious scholar", before finally settling on "extremist leader". A roller coaster of emotions!

Haha yeah i can see that they have a little hard time making up their minds there

[shimerra]

Somebody I follow on Twitter said it best: "Washington DC booing Trump at a baseball game the same day the US took out the top terror target in the world says more about Washington DC than it does about Trump."

You're right. It says they're using his own chant against him. A chant he frequently encouraged to try and smear a political opponent is now being used against him for his own vastly more profound and significant wrong doing.

It's even more funny when you factor that Trump himself talked shit about any credit given to Obama himself but now is trying to use this to deflect from bad impeachment press happily doing the exact thing he criticized Obama for publicly. With a staged photo op to boot.

Trump's shitty behavior, which you will always excuse and justify, deserves derision and it says more about Trump because he's despicable enough to warrant that type of response. It's admirable that people don't tolerate such illegal and corrupt behavior from a political figure. More people need to step up like the multiple whistleblowers.

[Elegiac]

I guess that's fair. He's engendered a lot of animosity.

Nice weasel words.

It's never "Trump has done a bad thing", it's always "Trump has made some people mad" - in the same vein of non-apology as "sorry that you got offended".

Hint: Instead of repeatedly observing that "people be mad", maybe you should take some time to understand why they are mad. Since you know, that was your whole shtick re white knighting for working class whites when they voted for a racist sexual predator.

[Dacien]

You're right. It says they're using his own chant against him. A chant he frequently encouraged to try and smear a political opponent is now being used against him for his own vastly more profound and significant wrong doing.

It's even more funny when you factor that Trump himself talked shit about any credit given to Obama himself but now is trying to use this to deflect from bad impeachment press happily doing the exact thing he criticized Obama for publicly. With a staged photo op to boot.

Trump's shitty behavior, which you will always excuse and justify, deserves derision and it says more about Trump because he's despicable enough to warrant that type of response. It's admirable that people don't tolerate such illegal and corrupt behavior from a political figure.

I guess you sort of have to rise above, or hope that you're better than what you disdain in your opponents. I get the whole fighting fire with fire, but the winning move for Trump's adversaries is not, I don't think, to adopt his strategies.

Or maybe it just doesn't matter and it was just a bunch of people at a baseball game having fun, what do I know?

[Elegiac]

I guess you sort of have to rise above, or hope that you're better than what you disdain in your opponents.

Cute, considering you've split considerable ink trying to justify your decision to vote for Trump as a moral compromise in order to get a few Supreme Court seats.

Clearly you seem to think doing uncivil things is okay when it suits *your* ends.

[Omega10]

You sure about that? Biden's made it really clear he wouldn't pardon Trump at least, I'm not sure where you are getting the idea that he wouldn't prosecute him either.

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaig...cted-president

I hope you are correct. Well I doubt he would pardon Trump. But would he repeat what Obama did and just not investigate anything else "to avoid dividing the country". And, after Obama backed off from Bush, republicans most definitely DID take that as a sign of weakness and accelerate their attacks. Would Biden basically repeat what Obama did?

The quote you provided leads me to rule out a pardon to Trump by Biden. That is definitely a good start

[Poopymonster]

I wonder if someone will puzzle this out and see if there is a theme between all the "spending time with their families for the first time ever" GOP members. .

Probably realizing how much shit they're going to be in, they want to spend what time they have left with their families?

[Dacien]

Cute, considering you've split considerable ink trying to justify your decision to vote for Trump as a moral compromise in order to get a few Supreme Court seats.

Clearly you seem to think doing uncivil things is okay when it suits *your* ends.

Well my vote didn't even matter, and never would have. I live in California. If my vote mattered maybe I would have put more thought into it. It's tough though because those Supreme Court seats were monumentally important. As a political ideology, I do believe conservatism is better for the country.

[shimerra]

I guess you sort of have to rise above, or hope that you're better than what you disdain in your opponents. I get the whole fighting fire with fire, but the winning move for Trump's adversaries is not, I don't think, to adopt his strategies.

Or maybe it just doesn't matter and it was just a bunch of people at a baseball game having fun, what do I know?

Hardly. I don't expect a crowd at a sports game to rise above. I do expect the president of the united states to. You apparently expect the crowd to but not the president. By your logic no political satire or comedy can ever be made essentially. Which seems quite stupid. Republican politicians are sure rising above when they bring cell phones into SCIF aren't they?

Key difference is Trump had to lie about the nature and extent of wrong doing. Trump's has gone miles beyond that making Hillary's offense look like a ticket for letting your parking meter expire. The statement is much more fitting for Trump than it ever was for Hillary.


And honestly your considerations, and many Trump voters, shouldn't really be taken into account until you can actually see and acknowledge the wrong doing and not deny, deflect, and excuse. At this point there's a significant percentage that are doing their best to prove Trump right when he said he could murder someone in Time square and not lose a vote.

Well my vote didn't even matter, and never would have. I live in California. If my vote mattered maybe I would have put more thought into it. It's tough though because those Supreme Court seats were monumentally important. As a political ideology, I do believe conservatism is better for the country.

Conservatism resulted in Trump. Which has damaged American international relations and soft power for decades to come. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.

We also have them to thank for increased money in politics via citizens united. Funny enough my great grandfather owned a newspaper in Montana back when the copper barons were buying up all the local news papers so they could control the news and manipulate public opinion. Unlike many of his contemporaries he refused to sell on principle. He was one of the most ardent supporters to basically the types of laws Citizen's united overturned because he didn't feel the right should be able to buy political power and valued the importance of a free press. Something Trump has constantly attacked and undermined. That was a conservative in its actual sense. Not whatever you've become.

We also have them to thank for okaying forced arbitration. A practice that is profoundly anti consumer and anti working man and pro large corporation. And again have them to thank for blowing a giant hole in the deficit but always whining about big government but cutting taxes while increasing spending.


Democrats at least generally don't cut taxes or try and increase them to match spending increases. Hmmm that seems much more fiscally responsible and in line with supposed conservative values. Or if they are cut they're cut to benefit the people not the people with the deepest pockets to appease their lobbies.

[Nurasu]

Well my vote didn't even matter, and never would have. I live in California. If my vote mattered maybe I would have put more thought into it. It's tough though because those Supreme Court seats were monumentally important. As a political ideology, I do believe conservatism is better for the country.

Conservatism has a funny record of always looking like absolute shit in the history books.

[Drutt]

I hope you are correct. Well I doubt he would pardon Trump. But would he repeat what Obama did and just not investigate anything else "to avoid dividing the country". And, after Obama backed off from Bush, republicans most definitely DID take that as a sign of weakness and accelerate their attacks. Would Biden basically repeat what Obama did?

If even half of what Trump is reported to have done proves to be true, he needs to be prosecuted.

You cannot send a message that it's OK to get elected into the highest office in the land and then abuse it for personal gain. That principle should be beyond contention.

[Breccia]

If even half of what Trump is reported to have done proves to be true, he needs to be prosecuted.
.

Speaking of which, Trump's refusal to pay his bills is now an official case.

Yeah, see, if you incur $200,000 or whatever in security fees, and you don't pay it, then technically your campaign just got a big contribution, and the FEC has been called. Especially considering, say, El Paso doesn't want to contribute to Trump's campaign, they'd make a pretty compelling witness.

[Elegiac]

Well my vote didn't even matter, and never would have. I live in California. If my vote mattered maybe I would have put more thought into it.

Lol, no.

Ignorance or "my bad, lol" are cop outs - you and the rest of Trump's America were warned, repeatedly, of what he was and the dangers in letting him near the reins of power. And when the time came to actually make a decision, all of that information was disregarded in pursuit of what amounted to be a white supremacist unicorn. Trump supporters proved willing to put their communities, their friendships, and their families in the trash in support of a manifestly wicked person.

They don't get sympathy, and they don't get forgiveness. The unrepentant should be made to feel the consequences of their choice for as long as Trump remains in living memory.

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It's tough though because those Supreme Court seats were monumentally important. As a political ideology, I do believe conservatism is better for the country.

You live in a state that is literally on fire and without power because of climate change and a largely unregulated private company being greedy shits, and you have the gall to say this? Top kek.

Hey. @Dacien.

What's your response gonna be if those shiny new Trump judges give the OK to his national emergency bullshit and the next Democrat uses that as precedent for mass gun seizures or ramming through the Green New Deal without Congress?

[Edge-]

It's tough though because those Supreme Court seats were monumentally important. As a political ideology, I do believe conservatism is better for the country.

And this is everything wrong with the current Republican ideology. They've gladly, openly, unapologetically politicized the courts and made it an issue for voters, which it never should be.

You don't even see anything wrong with that.

[Elegiac]

And this is everything wrong with the current Republican ideology. They've gladly, openly, unapologetically politicized the courts and made it an issue for voters, which it never should be.

You don't even see anything wrong with that.

In before we get something ripped off McCarthy in the vein of "How Liberals Politicized the Supreme Court" as if Brown and Roe were partisan legislation.

[Edge-]

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/o...-raid-n1073001

President Donald Trump painted a vivid picture for the world of the deadly U.S. military raid on ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, a raid that only a small number of people witnessed in real time.

A "beautiful" and "talented" dog got injured. A robot had been on standby to aid in the hunt for al-Baghdadi if needed. U.S. Special Operations Forces arrived in eight helicopters and were on the ground for about two hours. They entered al-Baghdadi's compound within seconds by blowing holes in the side of the wall. They chased al-Baghdadi into a web of underground tunnels — many of them dead ends — that they already knew existed. Before the U.S. forces left for the 70-minute, "very low and very, very fast" helicopter ride back along the same route from which they arrived, they captured some of al-Baghdadi's henchmen and seized "highly sensitive material and information" outlining the origin of ISIS and plans for future plots.

A few of those colorful details were wrong. Many of the rest were either highly classified or tactically sensitive, and their disclosure by the president made intelligence and military officials cringe, according to current and former U.S. officials.

Again, the Republican party can never say anything about information security ever again. Ever.

Hillary could run a private email server as president if she were to somehow run and win in 2020, and they'd need to shut the fuck up because they don't have a leg to stand on.

[PACOX]

Democratic Sen. Chris Coons disagrees with "lock him up" chants at Game 5 of the World Series.

"I frankly think the office of the President deserves respect, even when the actions of our President at times don't" https://cnn.it/2WrMiJe

Ahh the kitty cat Democrats and Chris Coons is definitely one of them. You really think they were booing the office? They were booing say the United States as a whole? Chris Coons is about as stupid as Trump when he believes if you don't agree with corruption you hate America. Spineless Democrats.

Meanwhile Trump charges every Democrats with treason every day. What's more dangerous? Citizens expressing their disapproval or the head of state accusing critics with one of the highest crimes on the books?

[Dacien]

And this is everything wrong with the current Republican ideology. They've gladly, openly, unapologetically politicized the courts and made it an issue for voters, which it never should be.

You don't even see anything wrong with that.

I guess I shouldn't say conservatism in the same breath as the Supreme Court. But let's make no mistake: If Hillary had won and nominated a more left-leaning judge to take the seat, a lot of possibilities are opened up. Unfortunately, judges on the Supreme Court do develop a reputation in how they decide cases, and there are plot points out there by respected institutions placing them on a political spectrum based on those decisions. Ideology is a thing. To say nothing of the originalism vs. living document debate.

- - - Updated - - -

What's your response gonna be if those shiny new Trump judges give the OK to his national emergency bullshit and the next Democrat uses that as precedent for mass gun seizures or ramming through the Green New Deal without Congress?

I'm not a prophet. I can't foresee that a Hillary appointee would somehow be better (as I see it) for the country. In judging the possibilities, a Hillary-appointed judge seemed to be much more likely to be at odds with issues I care about than a non-Hillary appointee.