President Trump: Making America Great Again...

[Walter Sobchak]

Why TF you dragging me into this?

My bad, I fixed the attribution in the original. Apologies.

[old_gregg]

So that establishes Donald Trump was against free market principles, but perhaps you misunderstood my question. You thought I asked "What evidence do you have as to why Candidate Trump did not support free market principles?" What I asked was "who in the last election espoused free market principles?"

while your game of rhetorical fuck fuck might confuse the average dimwitted trump voter, not so for this guy! do you mean to imply that hillary rodham clinton displayed less of a commitment to free market principles than the guy whose campaign was built on a platform of rejecting the key frameworks of american free trade? or are you just doing the circle jerk off thing here?

[old_gregg]

Or maybe it has to to with smug, entitled jerks acting like they believe the crap you write in your posts and people just got fed up with it.

steady, trigger. it's not your fault donny convinced you to vote for him. i forgive you.

[SCcoug]

Hillary said she'd kill TPP.

[creekster]

steady, trigger. it's not your fault donny convinced you to vote for him. i forgive you.

I didn't vote for him, binky, but with so many obnoxious, elitist jerks who think they are so much smarter than everyone who disagrees with them, I can see why he won.

[BlueK]

And if that is Commando's position, he's wrong. Politicians, media, and many voters who are anti-Trump can't imagine any other reason people voted for him, which speaks to their detachment and disregard for the struggle of those in Middle America.

People who don't live in a nice suburb and/or go to work in an office every day are tired of being taken for granted. They're tired of polished politicians, like those I saw a few weeks ago who showed up to a cattlemen's meeting spouting all the talking points and knowing absolutely zero about the challenges of the industry. They're tired of being regulated out of business. They're tired of politicians voting where the money takes them, or saying one thing and doing another like John McCain, who had the campaign slogan "leading the fight to stop Obamacare". I don't necessarily like how it turned out, but people were so shit-full of politicians it came to the point that anybody but a politician would do. This election had nothing to do with racism and everything to do with the arrogance in Washington. And the media still don't get it.

For the neo-nazis in the crowd on Saturday who were wearing Trump hats and t-shirts, it did have something to do with racism. No one is saying they represent all Trump supporters. But they do represent a group of them that for decades has largely not participated in the political process. Now they have someone they like. David Duke came right out at the rally and said Trump finally gave them someone they could vote for who believed like they do. Do I think Trump is the same as them? Not really. I think Trump is a manipulative opportunist who at the same time is so starved for praise and adoration that explains why he is always so sickeningly slow at condemning white nationalists committing atrocities. Remember the creep in Kansas who shot those people for being from India? Trump's statement then was that he is opposed to any violence against AMERICANS. Geez, how convenient. Naturally the dude committing the crime wouldn't call an immigrant from India an American. I'm sick and disgusted at all the times Trump has spoken in such doublespeak around racism throughout the campaign and during his presidency, which I can only logically conclude is a dog whistle to the white nationalist segment of his fan base. They certainly take it that way.

[Commando]

I agree with this ^. I don't think my family who voted for Trump are nazis, but they are in nazi denial. Trump is a sociopath who wants to use the untapped fury of poor bigoted white people to his advantage b/c he is just a giant opportunist in addition to a colossal dildo.

He's been consistently an asshole, referring to undocumented immigrants as 'animals,' creating "Kate's Law" to publicize every incident of crimes committed by undocumented immigrants to shift public regard against them (sound familiar?), ignoring the fact that U.S. citizens are 3x as likely to commit a felony. All this talk of a wall that is a huge waste of money and resources that he refers to as 'necessary.' It's not f*cking necessary, objectively, ass wipe. F*ck Trump-- there's just not much more to it. He doesn't give a shit about humanity or human life. If there was a way to shape every national tragedy or problem to his advantage by exploiting the huge numbers of the passionate ignorant, he's right there working on it. Like he says, he looooooves the poorly educated.

[New Mexican Disaster]

I agree with this ^. I don't think my family who voted for Trump are nazis, but they are in nazi denial. Trump is a sociopath who wants to use the untapped fury of poor bigoted white people to his advantage b/c he is just a giant opportunist in addition to a colossal dildo.

Great band name.

[Non Sequitur]

I don't think it's a dumb take, but I think it's a real stretch to say Trump supports white supremacists. It's even less accurate than calling Obama a Black Panther supporter, and I don't think the big O was a Black Panther guy. Like Obama, Trump is his own supremacist, considers himself superior to others, and is concerned primarily with remaining in power. Unlike Obama, Trump is completely tone deaf and couldn't pick a non-incendiary statement from a short multiple choice list.

Indifferent is a better word than sympathetic, but not much better.

[frank ryan]

The large majority of those who voted for Trump are not racist. The near totality of racists, and fascist/nationalists who voted, did so for Trump.

[Eddie]

...Remember the creep in Kansas who shot those people for being from India? Trump's statement then was that he is opposed to any violence against AMERICANS. Geez, how convenient. Naturally the dude committing the crime wouldn't call an immigrant from India an American...

To me, this is just more evidence that no matter WHAT the guy does, people are going to find something wrong with it. (And honestly - he does and says enough dumb/wrong things that it isn't difficult to find them.)

I believe that to be one of the biggest problems with the political environment these days. We're trying so hard to put our opponents in a bad light, that we couldn't possibly give them the benefit of the doubt and try to find things we agree on rather than more fault. And amid all of this fault-finding we can't even have a productive conversation, because everyone is too busy trying to clarify their position from how it is being presented by the other side.

You don't think it's possible that Trump was trying to say that the people from India are Americans too?

Sure - I'll buy that the dude committing the crime wouldn't necessarily view an immigrant family as "American". But maybe that's exactly what Trump WAS trying to say. This violence was against AMERICANS.

Look - I get it. Trump is an idiot. He understands just enough to gather whatever voters he could - which included the white supremacist crowd. I actually think he has no idea how much he's fanned their flames and emboldened them.

His original tweet on the hate and violence now happening was that we need to come together as one. Not a bad message. But he gets shot down and derided for not saying enough about the KKK and supremacists.

I can get behind that. You can support their right to free speech while disagreeing with what they have to say. There's a way to express that.

So - is Trump more or less complicit in the violence than Obama was in the BLM stuff? Because lets be honest. As smooth as Obama was as a politician and speaker - even he blew important opportunities to address volatile race related events.

Trump is a poor - very poor - politician. He's good at campaigning. He isn't good at uniting the nation after. He needs someone else with a political mindset running his twitter account, and he needs someone helping him consider all sides and potential interpretations when he speaks. But he thinks he's too smart for that. The reality is that, if we're looking for it, we can and will find something wrong with every response to every crisis. But, quite frankly, that doesn't help move things forward. Because then we are left fighting over the minutiae of what was said instead of addressing real issues.

[Eddie]

http://www.nationalreview.com/articl...eating-america

I thought this was a pretty good article - noting that both sides bear blame for the increasing violence. The last couple of paragraphs:

And so here we are. The mainstream Left has been increasingly suckered into walking hand-in-hand with the SJWs while ignoring the most egregious activities of Antifa; the mainstream Right has been increasingly seduced into footsie with alt-right associates while feigning ignorance at the alt-right itself.

That’s why Charlottesville matters: not only because we saw destruction and terror, but because if all Americans of good conscience won’t do some soul-searching and move to excise the evil in their midst, that evil will metastasize. There is a cancer in the body politic. We must cut it out, or be destroyed.

[HuskyFreeNorthwest]

He isn't good at uniting the nation after.

Have we had anyone run for POTUS this millennium that is interested in that? Trump's public indecency is far worse than anyone else, that isn't in question. Obama wasn't interested in uniting, Bush wasn't interested in that. Clinton was so disinterested she resorted to attacking Trump voters directly when she was flailing in her attempts to attack the candidate. If everyone is united why would we need to wear D or R jerseys and support our favorite political team? I don't believe anyone involved in politics now is interested in anything other than keeping the divide wide and angry. The better the divide the more chance you have to blame the other side and more importantly keep your hands on your strongholds.

[frank ryan]

To me, this is just more evidence that no matter WHAT the guy does, people are going to find something wrong with it. (And honestly - he does and says enough dumb/wrong things that it isn't difficult to find them.)

I believe that to be one of the biggest problems with the political environment these days. We're trying so hard to put our opponents in a bad light, that we couldn't possibly give them the benefit of the doubt and try to find things we agree on rather than more fault. And amid all of this fault-finding we can't even have a productive conversation, because everyone is too busy trying to clarify their position from how it is being presented by the other side.

You don't think it's possible that Trump was trying to say that the people from India are Americans too?

Sure - I'll buy that the dude committing the crime wouldn't necessarily view an immigrant family as "American". But maybe that's exactly what Trump WAS trying to say. This violence was against AMERICANS.

Look - I get it. Trump is an idiot. He understands just enough to gather whatever voters he could - which included the white supremacist crowd. I actually think he has no idea how much he's fanned their flames and emboldened them.

His original tweet on the hate and violence now happening was that we need to come together as one. Not a bad message. But he gets shot down and derided for not saying enough about the KKK and supremacists.

I can get behind that. You can support their right to free speech while disagreeing with what they have to say. There's a way to express that.

So - is Trump more or less complicit in the violence than Obama was in the BLM stuff? Because lets be honest. As smooth as Obama was as a politician and speaker - even he blew important opportunities to address volatile race related events.

Trump is a poor - very poor - politician. He's good at campaigning. He isn't good at uniting the nation after. He needs someone else with a political mindset running his twitter account, and he needs someone helping him consider all sides and potential interpretations when he speaks. But he thinks he's too smart for that. The reality is that, if we're looking for it, we can and will find something wrong with every response to every crisis. But, quite frankly, that doesn't help move things forward. Because then we are left fighting over the minutiae of what was said instead of addressing real issues.

Trump struggles with any criticism, even valid ones. He has been made aware of how some of his dog whistle interactions and statements invigorate the racist right. Bannon specializes in catering to extremists. I think Bannon has dictated some of Trump's messaging. He called Breitbart the platform for the alt right. He praised Richard Spencer, the guy who coined the term altright and likes to do Nazi-salutes as a great intellect. Trump's original message on Charlottesville not only didn't go far enough in condemning racist groups, he didn't specifically mention them. Couple that with pretending to not know who David Duke was and to not call him out until pressured, Trump's positions merit criticism.

Trump would do well to ax Bannon, Miller and Gorka (who apparently belongs to some Hungarian fascist order).

[frank ryan]

http://www.nationalreview.com/articl...eating-america

I thought this was a pretty good article - noting that both sides bear blame for the increasing violence. The last couple of paragraphs:

Get back to me when Antifa, which isn't an organized group, kills someone. People who gravitate to Antifa activities are usually hard-core anarchists. They aren't democrats typically, and don't participate in politics. They haven't been integrated into liberal politics, that's significantly different than the altright. I do agree however that the extremes on either end of the spectrum is more embolden and relevant than they have been in a long time.