When a student comes to complain about their grades, I will answer…
I’m building a wall.
When the local bank asks why I’m waving that gun in the clerk’s face, I will answer…
I’m building a wall.
When the police come to arrest me and tell me to come out with my hands up, I will say…
I’m building a wall. I’m building a wall.
It seems to be the answer to everything.
Great gog, but that man is infuriatingly obtuse. At least the press are beginning to look a bit exasperated with him, too.
Let’s see now, multiple judges have “given bad rulings against me”, the latest judge gets an attack because of “I’m building a wall”, over a third generation US citizen’s familial origin.
What we need is for a reporter to actually rip him a new hole over each waffle, deflection and tangent he runs off on, not letting him up for air until we actually see how thin his skin really is.
“I have very strong, very thick skin”
Just the most reflexive deny all accusations, brag about everything bullshitter.
The press shouldn’t be exasperated with Donald Trump; they should be openly hostile. Every media outlet needs to be absolutely merciless in their questioning, to show Donald Trump as the bigoted, bullying coward that he is. He’d be finished in a heartbeat if they started giving him the respect he so richly deserves.
Instead, they’ll keep treating him with kid gloves because he’s a member of the ruling class. And just maybe the whole world will burn for it.
I still prefer “I’m wishing you into the cornfield”.
I am still undecided on whether Trump is obtuse or merely playing to the obtuse demographic. Not that it matters. Even if you don’t believe what you say, running on a fascist platform makes you a fascist.
@John, I could always remind annoying folks, “Hey, down the road from me is a petting zoo and alligator feeding farm, all at the same site. Let’s hope nobody gets confused as to the purpose of each section”. ;)
The worst part is, that’s a true story, a “farm” whose attraction is a petting zoo and alligator feeding. Aka E. Coli spreading and an activity best not observed after a large meal.
I’ve successfully avoided visiting the place.
Were you there?
Is it a cell wall?
I have my hands against my head trying to keep my jaw from falling to the floor. I’m not supposed to take people like this seriously. This can’t be real. This is insane. Please, make it stop.
I can understand voting for a complete blithering moron for an office whose main responsibilities can be carried out by following someone else’s lead, i.e. a legislator, if you think they’ll vote for the right policies.
But even if you think that rubber-stamping the Republican Congress’s agenda is a-ok, how could ever think that putting this blithering ignoramus in charge is a good idea? At this point, I think that in his own way, George W. Bush was actually smarter than Trump, because he realized his limitations. But Trump really does think that he has a “good brain.”
Trump has overtly threatened the press. He’s been doing so for months. Why are they on his side at all?
How can this happen? Well, there are people who have been arguing, in comment on this very blog, that Trump is no different from Clinton and that, in fact, his foreign policy would be better. I don’t know if they’ve changed their minds yet or not now that he’s been endorsed by Putin and the North Korean dictator.
Doubt he has enough moral fibre for that one.
I do solemnly swear
(or affirm)
that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States,
and will to the best of my ability,
preserve,
protect
and defend
the Constitution
of the United States.
Blimey!
That interviewer was extremely supine in the face of Trump’s bluster.
I’m sure when he comes to Britain soon he won’t get such a soft ride.
Bring on Paxman.
For an expert demolition job on the UK’s very own MiniTrump see YouTube: Eddie Mair vs Boris Johnson (Full Interview).
Build your wall, someone will dig a hole, and someday your wall will fall
Can’t we all compromise on building a thirty-foot wall around Donald Trump? I’m pretty sure Mexico would, in fact, pay for it.
Ooh, yes! Just make sure to make the circumference Donald Trump body-sized (with a little room to gasp for breath), and not Donald Trump ego-sized (the universe probably isn’t enough, and that gets expensive).
Walls have a history of not-working, or at least of not accomplishing what they were allegedly supposed to accomplish, so building a wall around teh trum-prat would very probably be as effective as not voting for Clinton because Sanders wasn’t nominated. I suggest a more likely to succeed approach: Rocket both the wazzock and Clinton into the Sun.
Stop being silly. a Cobalt wahead would suffice.
@12
I am doubting that commenters here are actually asserting such simplistic equivalency.
In any case, Hillary has behind her a magnificently successful career made of pushing lobbyist-friendly, ineffective. and overall, horrible foreign policy proposals. Too often, Hillary has revealed her readiness towards relying upon slippery double-speak, outright lies, or showing us two of her many and shifting faces. One glaring example is her stated, yet obviously put-on, “reluctance” to place American troops into harms way. As head of the State Dept., her deadly and sometimes thankfully ignored international-conflict proposals were just part of the poisonous fruit borne of Hill and Bill’s luxurious and lengthy existence at/as the core of Washington establishment politics. I should expect Hillary to quickly pivot in support of TPP after the election. Yuck.
On the other (weirdly under-sized) hand, to my knowledge, Donald hasn’t yet proposed many workable or widely sell-able policy ideas. In the realm of foreign policy, he offers only reality-show sound-bites. These farts-of-the-brain can only be attractive to dim-bulb flag wavers that hate the world, raging that America is not “great.” USA USA USA. His limp non-proposals are mere bluster borne of rage at his own impotence and bankruptcy of substance. Fearful alarmists and Hillary’s “Correct The Record” bullies, here and elsewhere, need not be so ridiculous because Donald will receive no more than minimal or fleeting support from either a future Democraticly-led Senate or even a Republican-led House. The House’s only real hope is to see him produce a solidly conservative S.C. Justice nominee, anyhow. Beyond that, neither legislative assembly will be willing to work with him on any of his clownishly-silly foreign-policy “proposals.” Only the daft are actually expecting a Trump Administration be successful in arming Japan and South Korea with nukes “just to see what happens.” That piece of fluff is the definition of a non-starter, anyways, since neither of our two closest East Asian allies would be willing to accept possession of nuclear arms, in my opinion. Ridiculous. The rest of the world would recoil at President Clown on an unprecedented scale. He would open his bully mouth to speak in simple, easily-digested, off-the-cuff phrases of division or even hate-promotion, painfully highlighting and exposing fault-lines within or surrounding every nation or group that he might target. There is no middle ground with him and people of conscience will organize in opposition. Conversely, people of deficient conscience would organize in opposition to people of conscience. His entire term of office would be a “push,” Las Vegas-style.
Trump would be best remembered as President Dead-In-The-Water while President H. Clinton would have rousing success accomplishing much of what past Republican presidents would have wished they could do, though likely not until her second-term administration. See? Hillary and Donald are not equal. Not in any way, at all.
!!! BernieOrBust !!! (added here just to bait you, chum)
See, #22 is exactly the sort of thing I’m talking about. Just the sort of thing that took me from being a Bernie donor to being a Clinton voter. Why do you think Trump would be dead in the water? The Republicans are rallying around him just like they would any other candidate. There’s no reason to believe that they wouldn’t support him while he was in office the same way they would any other candidate. And not all the world would “recoil” from him. North Korea and Russia are looking forward to a Trump presidency. They think it would be in their best interests to have a weak, incompetent leader in the US. NK is probably correct. Putin is underestimating the effect that it would have on the world economy if the US defaulted on its debt–which, I would remind you, is the Trump PLAN for how to deal with the debt–creating hyperinflation in the US, destabilizing the dollar, and destroying at least China’s, Japan’s and most of Europe’s economies. But by all means hold your breath for Mr. “I got fewer popular votes but only because women and minorities don’t know what’s good for them” Sanders.
Tsk. As I realized when I reread the original post, my comment was terribly inappropriate.
I should have just said, “I’m building a wall.” Because what other comment is ever appropriate?
Don’t worry, dianne, I’m sure our resident Vicar will be along shortly to remind us that Clinton is, in fact, history’s greatest monster.
I’m building a wall.
You are Groot.
Groot 2016!
And here I am, just another brick.
If I had to choose between an angry whitey-pandering regurgitator of canned speeches who hasn’t accomplished anything of national note over multiple decades in office and an immensely qualified, diversity-affirming strong leader, I choose President Hillary Clinton!
I can get liking Clinton over the alternative, but I really can’t help but feel uncomfortable when people lionize someone with a pretty established history of trying to deny people like me rights.
Vivec, that is understandable, but think about this instead: are the supreme court nominees that Trump will nominate more or less likely to damage your rights than the ones Clinton will nominate?
@32
I am firmly in the “Will hold my nose and vote for Clinton over any republican” camp, so yes, I agree with that. My problem isn’t with people choosing Clinton over Trump, my problem is with people buying this revisionist view where she is the most accepting person ever (and didn’t consistently support homophobic legislation).
I am a big Bernie fan and, I am willing to vote for Clinton come November without reservation. The country will be better for it and she can be made to do the right thing with consistent pressure from the electorate.
In contrast, Trump is a clown and con-man that invigorates the worst aspects of our society (racism, sexism, xenophobia, etc). Even the worst aspects of Hillary pale in comparison to Trump on a good day. Trump will make us pine for days of the Andrew Johnson administration. He will set the Supreme Court as majority reactionary for 20 years.
#18 The Mexicans will only build that wall if it is sound-proof. Design matters.
Two questions an interviewer should ask Trump:
1. Have you instructed your legal counsel to file a motion to have the judge dismissed?
If yes:
2. Has your legal counsel filed a motion to have the judge dismissed?
Cuts through the bluster and shows Trump to be wearing no clothes.
Andy,
I can tell you what the answer will be:
1) We’re looking into that. We’re looking into that. The problem is that they’ve made it very, very hard to recuse a judge — and that’s one of the things I’m going to change, by the way — so it’s very hard to do. But I have had lots of very very smart lawyers tell me that we have grounds to do so, so we’re looking into that.
As Diana observes @ 12, if Trump actually becomes President, I seriously worry for the future of our species. That is not a joke, nor is it hyperbole – Trump is clearly the most dangerous Republican nominee (almost certainly soon to be Presidential candidate) in history. Dangerous to marginalized groups and especially women, dangerous to the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law, dangerous to the democratic process, dangerous to the economy, dangerous to the environment, and certainly presenting a danger of starting a potentially apocalyptic military conflict for either no reason or titanically stupid ones.
That anyone would willingly risk a Trump Presidency just to stick it to Hillary Clinton is utterly incomprehensible to me. It is horrifyingly shortsighted, and indeed may well prove downright suicidal.
There shouldn’t be a single interview that goes by in which the media don’t ask Trump, “maybe you ‘can’t’ disclose your taxes, but surely you remember about what you paid.”
@#11, dianne
Can you, and Democrats in general, stop asking this question? The answer is so obvious that it makes you look stupid.
The press covers Donald Trump because they are trying to make money, and covering Donald Trump makes them money. If you missed it, Les Moonves (president and CEO of CBS) freely admits that Trump is bad for America but great for profits. They literally made more money showing Trump’s jet sitting on the tarmac instead of covering a Bernie Sanders speech. If, let’s say, MSNBC decided to stop covering Trump and their profits dipped, the people who made the decision to stop covering Trump would be kicked out of their jobs and replaced with people who disagreed. I don’t like this, but there’s no question that this is what is going on.
(And threatening the press will make no difference. If a journalist gets threatened and doesn’t suck it up, Trump will stop giving that network access, and once again the journalist will be fired. The White House does this as well with press conferences, as does the military with “embedded” reporters; it’s what has turned the press corps into a bunch of stenographers for the official government positions.)
Furthermore, those of you who are itching to get Sanders to quit: don’t be too sure you want that. If Sanders concedes, Hillary Clinton will be old news. Covering Clinton once she has the nomination will be worth less money to news organizations than covering Trump’s latest shenanigans. Once Clinton has the nomination, the American media will be all-Trump, all the time.
Trump is quite possibly an idiot savant; his behavior takes perfect advantage of things which have been obvious for decades now (Americans don’t care about policy, Americans like obnoxiously aggressive politicians, if you are powerful enough your scandals don’t matter, if you win the nomination of one of the two major parties the rest of the party will at least nominally fall in line with you). If he’s doing it consciously, then he’s a genius (although not an admirable one). If he’s doing it accidentally, then he is a more perfectly-adapted parasite than anything in nature. Clinton has grasped some of these things — she knows people don’t care about policy, or else her policies would be a mirror of Bernie Sanders’ rather than warmed-over Republican leftovers from the 1970s — but she doesn’t take advantage of them the way Trump does. Say what you like, the man has a talent for it — like Typhoid Mary had a talent for spreading disease.
@#25, CaitieCat, Harridan of Social Justice
Greatest monster? No. There are lots of people worse than Clinton. But none of them are running for president right now. As far as causing disaster for America, she’s level with Trump. She’s more articulate than he is, but I honestly don’t care about that. If Trump starts World War III with China because he’s a loudmouth, it will be no worse than if Clinton starts World War III with Russia because she’s war hawk who thinks all other countries can be bullied and pushed around at will.
She’s also certainly nowhere near as smart as her admirers claim she is; aside from helping write the TPP as Secretary of State, which is NAFTA on steroids, even after NAFTA was admittedly a disaster, and pushing for the destruction of Libya when the example of Iraq was still in the public eye, she continues to champion bad policy left and right. For a slightly less-talked-about example, she’s still saying that all encryption should have back doors for governmental spy agencies to use, even though there is even greater agreement among computer scientists, mathematicians, and IT experts that this is a bad idea than there is among climate scientists that climate change is real, and it doesn’t take an exceptional level of intelligence or imagination to see why. At this point she has definitely been told, and she’s still pushing for it. (As is, incidentally, Obama.) On issue after issue, Clinton continues to be wrong, wrong, wrong, in ways which are bad and dangerous.
Incidentally, thanks to the influence of “Democrats” like Clinton, the guy who actually wrote SOPA — you remember, the infamous copyright bill which absolutely everyone on the Internet hated, and which Hillary Clinton supported? — is going to be helping write the Democratic Platform for the convention. But somehow this is still acceptable. Because Trump, I guess. The more the Democrats rely on the idea that they are the Lesser of Two Evils, the less urgent it becomes to avoid the Greater of Two Evils.
Hills will be the bridge into a more liberal future.
Drumpf will be the mushroom cloud at the start of The Day After.
And Bernout “I’m only here for the white guys” Sanders will run the country into the ground after which the Right will emerge strengthened and take over the place.
That’s what traitors to liberalism like Vivec and Vicar want.
Uh, no? I did say that I’m going to vote for Hillary.
Also, I’m skeptical that somebody who has consistently attempted to deny me rights in the past will be the “bridge into a more liberal future”, but I’m willing to take that chance over someone who will absolutely keep trying to.
So, applehead, your solution to defeating Trump is to insult and effectively discourage Sanders’ fans from voting? Are you sure you’re not working for Trump?
Trump’s wall reminds me of the anti-Kaiju wall in Pacific Rim:
http://pacificrim.wikia.com/wiki/Anti-Kaiju_Wall
It definitely didn’t keep out the kaiju, but this could be what Trump has in mind. (Pardon the overstatement there.)
applehead @40:
Funniest thing I’ve read all week. Stirs up memories of the PUMAs in 2008. Good times.
Vicar @39: I’m building a wall.
Okay, somewhat seriously now: Fine, viewers are, for whatever reason, willing to watch Trump in action and covering his antics makes money for the media. That’s all very well, but isn’t the media made up of people with self-awareness, memory, and imagination? Trump is proposing to make it easier for him to sue the press for libel. That would cost them a lot of money. You know, money, that thing you just said was their primary motivator? Are they really that unable to see that they’re exchanging a dollar today for the loss of a thousand tomorrow?
Sigh. Possibly not. Why should they be any different from any other US corporation?
@applehead:
Sniff, sniff. Is that disappointed idealist I smell? Oh, wait, that’s me. Never mind.
Actually, Sanders would not run the country into the ground. Economically, he has the best chance of any of saving it. If he had gotten the nomination (and it’s extremely unlikely, but not yet technically impossible that he still could), he’d probably have a fairly good economic policy. Despite what everyone seems to think, his proposals are no more radical than, say, FDR’s and would likely have a similar benefit. Assuming Congress could be made to go along with them, at least in part. He’d probably extend and expand the Obama recovery and possibly even decrease the US’s appalling gini coefficient. That’s why I voted for him in the primary. That’s why I donated to him. He is, in fact, the only one with a plan that is likely to reverse the forces that are driving the US and world economies into the ground, i.e. the excessive concentration of wealth and related misbehavior of corporations and wealthy individuals. Clinton will likely do just enough to kick the problem down the road and Trump would bring about the end times, economically, now. In short, I voted for him to prevent the revolution.
But then there turned out to be a couple of problems. First, as you identified, Sanders really just can’t seem to get it into his head that minorities and women count for something. This could be fixable. People can be convinced to change their positions. Think about Merkel’s initial versus current position on asylum seekers, for example. But, secondly and fatally, he failed to get enough votes. Not including the superdelegates, he is behind in both vote count (as far as we know, given the problems of caucus states*) and delegate count. He is currently polling about 45% in California. Even if the polls are wrong and he wins California, it’s a proportional representation state. He’d have to win BIG, like 70% or more. That means, he’d have to do 25% percent units better than he’s polling. And frankly, that kind of disparity between polls and election results would suggest some sort of voter fraud. In short, I think he’s done and should concentrate on helping in the senate and house elections and shaping the platform. But, as I’m neither male nor really white, he’s not asking me.
*Bernie did better in caucus states and worse in primary election states, meaning that he is probably less popular than he appears with the general electorate.
@43, ck, the Irate Lump:
As if the white-ethnocentric Bernie Bro LINOs weren’t a liability rather than an asset. Perpetual Independent Sanders parasitized the Party he so hates for the necessary money and resources to have a shot at the Presidency, and his treason let to his fall.
The diverse Obama coalition and the undecideds is all what’s needed for a Hills win.
@48
I’m neither white, nor a male, nor a “bernie or bust” person, so maybe you can keep your idiotic insults targeted at people that it actually applies to next time?
One other point re whether to hold your nose and vote for Clinton or stay home (or vote for Trump): A Clinton presidency would be much more likely to open the space for a left-wing candidate in 2020 or 2024 than a Trump presidency, even assuming nothing worse happens during the Trump presidency than the usual right wing evil. If Trump is elected, the Dems will conclude that the country is swinging right and will nominate a Bill Clinton or Al Gore clone. If Clinton, with a Bernie inspired left wing platform wins, they’ll conclude that the country is moving left and respond accordingly.
For decades, white men have been telling women and minorities that they have to be patient, that the US is just not yet ready to let go of its prejudices, that it’s not yet ready for a (woman/black/whatever) president. So, guys, the country’s just not ready for the guy you want. Can’t you do what you’ve been preaching for so long and have some patience?
I wish I had something substantial to add but Jesus fuck some days I can’t stand this god damn fecal fountain of white supremacy.
This is by far the easiest election for my family and I to vote in. Eyes closed easy.
Justin Trudeau “Mr Donald Trump- tear down that wall!!
Trump doesn’t care if the press is exasperated or not, as long as he keeps getting airtime. I suspect he still, directly or indirectly (reports about him), gets more airtime than the other candidates combined, by a healthy margin.
I’m not convinced that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, but it seems to be Trump’s motto, and it seems to be at least marginally successful.
@48 You’ve been repeatedly schooled here that Bernie supporters aren’t all-white. Yet you keep saying so. Recent polls of Californians are split, and actually do lean Sanders in many cases, on whether Hispanics there will be abandoning Hillary on Tuesday.
But you are free to remain mistaken and vacant of ideas, ignoring the fact that Sanders’ supporters are not even close to the white, man-boy oldsters you purport them to be. We can all enjoy reading all about these mythical “bros” on the pages of The Wall Street Journal and here in this forum whenever Applehead chants to us with a recycling of Hillary’s failed meme that BernieBros-are-an-embarrassment.
Here’s a nickel! Now, can I cross your bridge there,
AppleheadShrek?!@23
You should stop pretending that anyone here is saying that Hillary=Trump. It is a straw-man and I went ahead and took your bait right there. What I did not do was claim that Hillary=Trump. Stop, just stop, already. Jeesh.
I’ve already done that for you in @22:
Can anyone here please cite just one (1!!!) foreign policy proposal from Donald that anyone excepting a Gohmert could support. Just one proposal? Can’t do it, eh? Well, then. When it comes to international matters, “President” Trump will be dead in the water, as I’ve said. It is silly to claim that a shout-out from Kim or Putin amounts to anything more than drive-by meddling in an American election.
Nearly no one in the Republican establishment is rallying around childish ideas that will be impossible to support in actual practice. Republican hatred of Hillary and “libtards” is what is driving that party unification. Fear-mongering is what you do. We get it, yes. However, that weak-and-wobbly support for the man doesn’t reflect any wide endorsement of his stupid ideas.
@ The Vicar (via FreeThoughtBlogs), #39, and generally
Clinton’s support for an encryption back door isn’t born of a lack of intelligence. Hillary Clinton is, first and foremost, an authoritarian. This, for me, was most clearly expressed in her answer to the question about Edward Snowden in the first Democratic debate.
Snowden made the people in power look very bad. It doesn’t matter if what he did was right or wrong, as far as Clinton is concerned, making one’s betters look bad is an unpardonable offense. The peons (everyone not rich and powerful) obey. She’s a more tolerant authoritarian than some. One may politely pose questions to the power that be, so long as they bow and scrape appropriately, and she may deign to grant the appropriately submissive a few crumbs from the royal table, but only so long as they never forget who’s in charge. Clinton is not unique in this; most everyone in the Democratic leadership is the same way. Look at the way the Obama administration has gone after whistleblowers.
Prior to the first debate, I’d thought Clinton was better than that. My jaw dropped when she gave that answer- I literally could not believe what I’d heard. I’ve never heard a Democratic politician make such a blunt authoritarian statement during a primary campaign. But as I’ve watched her debate performances and speeches, as I’ve read through her platform, it’s clear that obedience to power is the central theme. Not liberal or progressive ideals. Certainly not justice.
All that being said, Clinton is a much better candidate than Trump. She is a capable diplomat, she understands statecraft, and she is considerably more intelligent. And, perhaps most importantly, I don’t believe she enjoys making people suffer the way Trump does. She’ll still do it to maintain the status quo, but she won’t do it just because someone calls her names.
Clinton is, all in all, much less likely to destroy the world than is Trump. It’s foolish to think that she’ll make the world a considerably better place, but she probably won’t make it much worse either. That’s probably the best we can hope for, at least in this presidential election. In any case, I’ll probably grit my teeth, swallow my principles, and vote for (lesser) evil yet again.
Also, @ applehead, #40,
“Traitors to liberalism?” Really? I get supporting Clinton as the lesser evil, I even get supporting her because she’s an accomplished stateswoman, but pretending she’s some great liberal lion is utterly ridiculous. That she is substantially to the left of an actual fascist demagogue does not make her a progressive.
@#40, applehead
So… you support someone who thinks the banks shouldn’t be reregulated, doesn’t want universal healthcare (let alone single-payer), explicitly says that Obama’s foreign policy is flawed because he wouldn’t start wars and says she will “fix” that, is against privacy, wants to prosecute whistleblowers, helped write a trade agreement which will utterly destroy all unions once and for all, and you think I am a traitor to liberalism.
Irony is dead, folks. Applehead, here, killed it.
@#46, dianne:
We live in a world in which fossil fuel companies are literally willing to doom all of civilization in order to turn a momentary profit, and there are whole political movements which are deliberately aiding and abetting them, and you are surprised that journalists are willing to do this? No wonder you support Hillary Clinton — you apparently have no awareness whatsoever of how the world works, and no knowledge of history.
@#56, vucodlak:
Um, no.
Mandatory back doors will pretty much blow up our entire financial system at this point. It’s not just online retail any more; banks use the Internet, too, to send transaction data. If all encryption is broken, which is what mandatory back doors will do, authoritarians will discover that money, which props up all that authority, is suddenly deeply and horribly broken and untrustworthy and probably impossible to fix. It’s genuinely a level of stupid mistake on a par with defaulting on the debt.
Go and listen to the “we came, we saw, he died” clip. Then go dig up the audio recording of Hillary Clinton laughing about how she demonized a raped 12-year-old girl to the jury while defending her rapist back before she stopped being a trial lawyer — she downplays the incident in her memoirs, but the interview exists and she is very proud of how clever that tactic was — and you may want to reconsider the question of whether or not she enjoys making other people suffer. It would certainly explain the whole warmongering thing, as well as the continued support for NAFTA-on-steroids (a.k.a. the TPP).
Oh, and just a remark in general:
Hillary Clinton supporters were shocked and dismayed this last week to discover that in polls, Clinton was neck-and-neck with Trump.
Nobody else was, because there have been polls about that particular contest — “if the election were held tomorrow, and the candidates were Trump and Clinton, which would you vote for” — for a few months now, and Clinton has always been in that position. Clinton supporters have basically been putting their fingers in their ears and screaming “la la la I can’t hear you” whenever this was mentioned, because Sanders did significantly better in those polls — Independents love Sanders, and they frequently hate Clinton with the force of a million suns.
Well, if you are a Clinton supporter, you should really be hoping that the media at least waits to attack Trump effectively, because those same “if the election were tomorrow and your choices were A and B” polls showed that Clinton would definitely lose to just about every other Republican. Yes, including Ted Cruz. Trump is such a buffoon that he had worse ratings than Clinton, but he’s the only individual person who does. It’s been a while since they stopped asking about the other candidates in the Republican field, but at the time when this was still happening the trend was for Clinton to be losing ground gradually. It seems unlikely that this trend has reversed itself — in fact, if anything, all the Trump demonization means that some of Clinton’s support is almost certainly conditional on Trump remaining in the race. (And before you ask: Sanders didn’t have these problems; he was ahead of all of the Republicans all along.)
If Trump gives up now, or his supporters start backing away from him to the point where the Republican Party can safely change the rules of the convention to exclude him somehow (or otherwise scuttle him), then the Republican nominee will be somebody Clinton does not stand a chance of beating. You don’t want Trump to go down in flames until after it’s too late for the Republican Party to come up with an alternative strategy, and that means waiting not only until after the Republican convention but until after at least some of the deadlines for the Republicans to get a nominee listed on the various state ballots. If the Trump candidacy is withdrawn or invalidated at pretty much any time before then, Clinton loses automatically.
(Then again, the rules as written for that sort of thing basically don’t apply to the Republicans and the Democrats, so chances are that the Republicans could pull a past-the-deadline nomination and get away with it.)
@55: So let me get this straight: You’re claiming that if Trump won “no one” would support his policies so it would all be okay? Because if the US elected Trump they would only do so because…what? Because they hate Clinton? Because they are nostalgic for Reagan and want another TV star? Because they think his hair is so cute? Nothing to do with his policies at all?
Maybe not, but the US seems to contain an awful lot of Gohmerts who will support him just fine. See, for examples:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3576098/New-poll-shows-57-percent-agree-Donald-Trump-America-foreign-policy.html
http://thehill.com/policy/defense/274521-poll-half-of-american-voters-back-trumps-muslim-ban
I’m sorry, but your claim that Trump’s policies wouldn’t be enacted is about as reality based as a claim that if Trump is elected it will all be okay because we’ll just pray to Satan and a portal to hell will open up and swallow Trump. If he’s elected, he’ll do the Muslim ban with popular support. He’ll withdraw from international treaties, with popular support. He’ll default on the US’s loans, with popular support.
@dianne, Trump can no more withdraw from a ratified treaty than he could declare himself emperor.
Ratified treaties are the law of the land, per the US Constitution, Congress has to withdraw from them, not the POTUS.
Frankly, if Trump got into the White House, he’d likely end up getting himself impeached within a week.
Assuming that Putin didn’t nuke D.C. during the inauguration, which is what I’d do if he were elected. Park a boomer off the coast, launch while he’s en route to being sworn in. It’d be the only way to be sure he didn’t get control of our nuclear arsenal.
As my military career revolved around knowing what the other bastard was going to do before he did and was rather successful, perhaps we should consider the notion of a nuclear armed Trump. All he’d need is a yes man for SecDef and the two man rule would become worthless.
Um…not really. Actually, Clinton has been way ahead at various points and been close to neck and neck at other points. It’s bounced around a lot. Check out the graph on the page below. Note that Clinton has been “neck and neck” at various points, but bounced back and there is no clear overall trend.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_trump_vs_clinton-5491.html
As for the “but Sanders does better against Trump” claim, that’s because the Republicans have not yet run against Sanders. They have never attacked him in any way more substantial than Trump running from a debate against him. If he was the nominee, it would be trivially easy for them to find ways to make him unpalatable to the average US-American. Note that the polls in the last comment I made suggest that the US is feeling very isolationist right now and specifically feeling negative towards working with other countries. Are they really going to turn around and support Sanders’ plan for boots on the ground in Syria in coalition with the UN? Are they just going to blow off his past remarks about abolishing the CIA when they’re feeling so paranoid about Islam that they want a complete ban of Muslims entering the US? I suppose anything could happen, but it all seems highly unlikely.
Sanders didn’t even win the majority of Democrats over. And, no, he does not poll better with independents. I know that your fantasy is that if only it weren’t for the machine, Sanders would be the nominee and he’d sweep into the White House on the adoring support of the whole country, but it’s just not true. Sanders only did as well as he did because he manipulated the Democratic machine. He did well in caucus states, where turnout is lower and having a few, loud and dedicated followers can overwhelm the opinion of the majority.
I liked Sanders for most of the campaign. I supported him up to the moment he threw women under the bus and directed the bus to run over them to show how angry he was at the system. Even now, I support his economic reforms because I think they’re what’s needed to save the US economy. But he’s not going to be the next president. Even if he won the nomination, he wouldn’t win the general election. He’d be crushed by Trump’s attacks, once they started coming. Heck, he could barely handle Clinton’s rather mild attacks on him. It’s not happening, not this year. Maybe if some of the young liberals down ticket who Clinton is supporting get elected, they can run in 8 or 12 years and get the real reforms started. But that won’t happen if Trump wins.
@wzrd: If Trump chooses to withdraw from a ratified treaty, who can stop him? This is not a rhetorical question: I’m really not sure who could or would stop him from doing so, if he chose to. The Republican Congress? Not likely. Foreign powers? How? The US has most of the world’s nukes (or did Russia surpass them finally?) or at least enough to destroy the world. So military force is out, moral persuasion doesn’t work on Trump (or US-Americans in general), and Trump will likely have already tanked the US’s credit rating so economic pressure would be redundant at best. The US people? They support his actions. The US military? Might be. But recent polls suggest that the military supports Trump. And if they do decide to stop him, that means a military coup. Not the greatest outcome, even if it’s necessary to stop a nuclear war or whatever other disaster Trump decides to bring about that day.
Again, why and by whom? Congress is the only party with the power to impeach the president and if Trump is elected, the Congress will almost certainly be Republican. Republicans are rallying around Trump. Why would they impeach him?
But you’re not Putin. At least, I assume you’re not: the internet being what it is, I suppose you could be. Anyway, Putin endorsed Trump. He’ll party if Trump’s elected because Trump will destroy the US’s economy and make it less of a threat to Russian power. He’ll only use nukes if Trump does so first.
@#61, dianne
You better hope so, because Clinton’s plan is to put 70000 boots on the ground without the UN — and against the Russian military, incidentally, as well as the Syrian one. Yes, she has said this. I know you don’t actually know what your candidate stands for, otherwise you couldn’t possibly support her, but please try to keep up.
Because we all know that Clinton is totally going to do what the majority of Americans wants, amiright? That means no more wars, no more surveillance of our own citizens, and Medicare for all. Oops, no, she’s against all three of those — and in all three cases, unlike the CIA thing, she would actually be making things worse.
A claim which ignores the exit polls in the southern states Clinton “won”* in which 75+% of people who voted for her admitted they did so only because they had never heard of Sanders. I don’t think you can legitimately claim she’s more popular with them on those grounds.
*I would give a lot to see people, regardless of their favored candidate, stop talking about Democratic candidates “winning” states. Unlike the Republican Party, every state in the Democratic primaries assigns delegates proportionally, unless a candidate gets less than 15% of the vote, in which case they get nothing. This being the case, saying that either Sanders or Clinton “won” a state which was close — which has been a lot of them — is just plain stupid, and even in the non-close states, it’s misleading, particularly in light of the superdelegate system: in states where Sanders “won” by a large margin, Clinton still ended up with about the same number of delegates total thanks to superdelegates who are willing to vote against the will of their state.
Ah, the outright lies come out. Where, in your opinion, does Clinton’s enormous negative rating come from, then? More people view her unfavorably than the total number of Republicans by quite a bit.
It’s funny; up until Sanders started doing better in caucus states, Clinton supporters were saying that he was going to lose because he was losing caucus states. So you’ll pardon me if I ignore you here.
Speaking as someone who has been reading your comments all along, I know that’s an outright lie. You never supported him. Did you forget where you were posting this? You’ll only get paid if your claims are actually believable, you know.
So… you’re supporting a candidate who you admit is going to let the US economy crash? Wow, sheer genius.
He’s been fighting with one hand tied behind his back, frankly, because in order to appease
idiotspeople who value loyalty to the party over good policy, he has been trying hard not to do anything which might harm Clinton in the general. You may not think so, because you think his very mild comments about Clinton are packed with malice, but you’re a Clinton partisan. Everyone else has been sitting there wishing he would use more force.Young liberals Clinton is supporting? Who are they? The only person Clinton’s campaign is supporting is Clinton; they literally stole back the money she had said she would give to down-ticket campaigns, and she stands with right-wingers like Wasserman-Shultz over their more liberal challengers.
Here’s my reference for saying that Sanders isn’t doing well among independents. http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/sanders-isnt-doing-well-with-true-independents/
What’s yours for saying it’s an “outright lie”?
Nope. I’m saying I’m supporting a candidate who will kick the problem down the road 4-8 years, with some improvements in the situation, rather than one who would destroy the economy outright. Clinton’s first term would be essentially Obama’s third. The economy improved under Obama. But a number of problems remain unaddressed, such as the lack of growth of the minimum wage and the increasing income disparity between rich and poor. Clinton won’t help that much, just as Obama didn’t, but she won’t make it worse either. She might do some minor reforms like increasing the federal minimum wage and maybe increasing taxes on the 1%. Those would be helpful, but not the fundamental reforms that are needed. Those will come only when we get a competent liberal in position. And, as Sanders has shown, it isn’t him either.
I give your post a 10/10 for insults and rhetoric and a 1/10 for fact based. You’ll do great in Trump’s America.
@dianne, no, I’m not Putin, I’m a US citizen. But, I did work in an environment where understanding an adversary or even potential adversary thinks is of primary concern and that started during the Cold War.
Russians don’t take chances, rightfully so, considering their environment. They’re also somewhat risk-adverse, but also know that following that adverse consideration created problems in the past.
I know Russian thinking well enough that, when Cold War I ended, one transplanted Spetsnaz type that I personally recognized halted on a CONUS installation weapons qualification firing line, as I did, the last time I saw him and he myself, we were doing our very level best to kill each other on a mission that has never officially “happened”.
We ended up drinking together, he, a Commissioned Officer, me, an NCO, which is also somewhat unheard of.
We tipped glasses to our losses.
If recalled from retirement, I’d still kill him, if ordered, he’d do the same.
We gave our word of honor to perform any duties that were lawful orders and our word of honor knows no expiration date.
We also both found loopholes in our orders and released foreign nationals for a good reason.
For me, I am indeed a monster from hell and beyond, but only under some very, highly controlled honorable conditions.
It’s one of the reasons I drink myself to sleep at night.
We’ve been wrong, but I was and remain forced to follow US policy. I’ve found Zeroith Law in some circumstances and am expanding that.*
*See Azimov. And no, I’m not a robot, at all, nowhere near that. Generals worried at my success, “I’m glad that you’re on *our* side”.
Suggestion, stop fucking up, lest I lose fidelity and move onward to someone more honorable.
Just a suggestion.
Geez, wzrd, you’re not Putin OR a robot? What are you doing on the internet then? (That’s sarcasm in case it wasn’t clear.)
Your tell all book, should it ever be declassified, sounds like it would be fascinating and terrifying. But I’m still left with the question: Who could and would stop Trump from, say, withdrawing from ratified treaties if he chose to do so? Would even Putin be willing to start a nuclear war over something that is, after all, to his advantage? No US in NATO, less opposition to whatever it is he wants to do in the Middle East or Eastern Europe or wherever else. A weak, isolationist US is just what Putin would want. If you’re arguing otherwise, I’m sorry, but I did not understand the argument well enough to either agree or disagree and have to ask you to restate it for my comprehension.
@dianne, I quite intimately recall a similar peril in the Persian Gulf, shortly after I retired from the military and took on a civilian contractor’s job (with due competition with other prospects, both civilian and prior military).
I’ve learned to loathe regulatory capture, into the extreme of loathing. Hence, my mentioning it here.
The military has contractors, it’s done so for longer than my Daughter of the American Revolution mother’s line existed, it’s not new at all.
The company underperforms, scope creep has been exhausted, hire their former military supervisor, now retired. Carroy and stick, my balls, it’s Platinum Bullion on a rope, nobody minding the helm in some aspects, as everyone wants that platinum.
I bailed from it when Dad started having worrisome health problems. Not that I played well with others in that environment, as I was the “cowboy”, as I insisted upon following regulations.
I saw the cloistersmurf that ensued when everyone did their own thing, I regulated everything in within the realm of law, enforced regulations and hence, laws, I was the “bad guy”.
That also protected them from *real* bad guys, known and novel threats.
I became the IASO for a significant US military installation.
To the point where, a PRC actor was preparing to attack US government assets, we had prior notice, due to shenanigans on our part, I prepared for the nascent attack, went on leave to the US, after 400 notices, I made a personal, roaming international telephone call back to my partner to confirm the attack.
A few hundred dollars later, the attack was confirmed.
We defeated the singularly most successful attacker on US networks at the time. Zero penetration and we were specifically targeted.
So, I’m good at how the other SOB thinks.
I’d ad tactical things, such as people maneuvering to do bad things to us, but things get… NDA land.
I think fast, I think multiple levels into things, I consider adversaries potential actions, how to counter them.
And no, I’d shoot myself in the head before considering *that* impossible office.
Candor and POTUS are mutually exclusive and I’ve long been lousy with candor.
With my closest friends, I also expect equal candor.
I’ve never had a problem being called an asshole, when such a thing was required.
My wife and I did raise two children successfully, I’ve trained dozens of NCO’s. It goes with the duties required.
Still, my wife and I recall a few repeated memes amongst various Generals, “You could raise an army on every continent”.
Why in the hell would I *ever* want to?
That haunts far too many nights.
I far prefer friends, peace, shared plenitude.
You know, peace and quiet and food/water.
All while experiencing a failed alternator, walking four miles to work at 80 – 95 degree temperature, with 30 – 99% humidity, largely being nearing the temperature range.
While recovering from hyperthyroidism, hypertension, abdominal aortic dilation, massive weight loss, massive muscle atrophy and more.
One of our primary considerations to the duty position was, the sheer and utter inability to quit, despite any natural notion to do so. Indeed, it is one of the primary considerations.
Using one’s mind, despite being two days or a bit more lacking sleep was also a primary consideration.
Lack both and a bit more, lose your SF billet and believe me, there are a lot more things to consider.
Exhaustion, consideration that things went sideways, still manage to re-create mission.
That kind of thing.
Have you got a hint on my perspective?
@59:
Oh. my! You’ve twisted my words, haven’t you? Is it your default move to begin by lying about what other people have spoken? Much like Hillary often does? She lies about what she has said. She lies about what Bernie has said. Delores Huerte lies about what true-blue-liberal Sanders supporters have said. Barnie Frank, DWS, John Lewis. Up and down the fucking line. Lies, lies, lies. What’re you going do next? Call the media and complain that I just threw a chair at you?
Read my actual words from @21:
* only be attractive to dim-bulb flag wavers that hate the world
* no more than minimal or fleeting support
* neither legislative assembly will be willing to work with him
* His entire term of office would be a “push,” Las Vegas-style.
And my words from comment @55:
* no more than minimal
* anyone excepting a Gohmert
* Nearly no one
* doesn’t reflect any wide endorsement
Take back or correct your lies about what I’ve said here and apologize, please. You and Hillary use shitty tactics. Even you (and especially her) know this to be true. I’ve just called you out as a liar. What have you to say for yourself?
Nope, nope, nope. You are imagining that U.S. Presidents are dictators who can rule by fiat. So lame. Your hair is on fire. Your pants and your hair, both. Not a good look for you.
@68: Again, high marks for rhetoric, not so great for facts. Recent polls suggest that a lot of Trump’s more isolationist policies have popular support. See the links in #59 for support for that statement.
And, once again, if Trump is elected, who is going to stop him from banning Muslims from entering the US (to use one example)? Congress? Congress will be Republican. The people? They support the ban. The Supreme Court? Maybe…depending on how many justices he can pack in there and how honest they turn out to be, but it wouldn’t happen quickly and in the country that found the Patriot Act constitutional, I’m by no means certain that the ban wouldn’t stand. Homeland security? Why would they? Who would have the right and ability to stop him from doing so? Please do try to come up with some sort of evidence, rather than just random insults.
Great. Now I don’t know who to vote for.
That wall just got ten feet higher!
Yuge! It’ll be yuge!
@69:
I’ve not insulted you. I’ve insulted Applehead. Are you here correcting the record via multiple sock-puppet accounts? Please don’t tell me to review your history of comments here because long-running sock-puppets are still sock-puppets. You’ve repeatedly lied about what I’ve said and I’ve not responded in kind. No one here is putting straw in your mouth. #BrockTheRecord
See @my-ass for your answer. Seriously? Read your U.S. Constitution. Fucking read an eight-grade Social Studies book. Note that these above are not insults directed at you.
[insult] My ass to your face. Pwaaaauuugh. You swooning delicate flower petal, you. [/insult] These are what insults look like.
@73: No, I am not applehead and have argued with them extensively upthread, as you would know if you’d read the comments. But you’re quoting me and then farting out unsupported insults so the only possible conclusion is either that you meant to insult me or that you are very, very confused.
And, no, you did not answer the question. You babbled Trumpianly around the question. In short, you have no answer. Too bad. In general, I expect more from people who comment on Pharyngula, but I guess no blogs readers are all winners.