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Originally posted by 1kiki:
So, I have a question for you, second. . . .
Do you have a plan to address her broken actions and rein her in?

Or are you going to ride her all the way down?

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
He's a weak pathetic pile of bull shit and should be shot for consorting with the enemy..........
namely Putin (his man crush).

Do you WANT an overt military confrontation with Russia? This is a test to see how crazy you are.

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Originally posted by second:

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Originally posted by 1kiki:

Do you WANT an overt military confrontation with Russia? 1kiki used black letters on a black background to hide: "This is a test to see how crazy you are."

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If Putin invades a Baltic nation (all are part of Nato) to reunite the Russian speakers with the Motherland, then Putin is crazy. Crazy people can always invent a justification for acting crazy: It is Mother Russia whispering into his ear, telling Putin to reunite all her scattered children into one family again.

Back to Trump:

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump

Dwyane Wade's cousin was just shot and killed walking her baby in Chicago. Just what I have been saying. African-Americans will VOTE TRUMP!
11:26 AM - 27 Aug 2016
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/769571710924263424

This particular tweet isn’t going to do too much of anything to debunk the notion that Trump simply lacks a certain level of human empathy that we expect from a president. An innocent woman is dead. Children have lost their mother. A family is grieving. And Trump is making a boast about his electoral performance. From any other candidate it would be considered shocking, but staying shocked is a challenge as we watch the Trump campaign unfold.

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Originally posted by second:

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Originally posted by 1kiki:

CONGRATULATIONS SECOND! You've passed the test and are certifiably crazy! No wonder you like that crazy bitch Hillary so much!

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I have papers proving I'm certifiably lazy. Crazy papers I don't have.

Donald Trump and his new team think they have 73 days to turn this campaign around. They’re wrong.

Early voting begins in 28 days in Minnesota and in 32 other states soon after that. And already 90 percent of Americans say they’ve decided. For all the televised daily drama this race has provided, the final outcome itself is shaping up to be less dramatic than any presidential election since 1984.

“Kellyanne is good at this, but she’s got a very damaged candidate and it’s very late in the game,” said Tony Fratto, a GOP operative in Washington and former deputy press secretary to President George W. Bush. “I think it’s too late, in fact. I don’t believe he can change. All of this is trying to trick voters into thinking there is a better Donald Trump out there. There is no better Donald Trump.”

Asked to name a smell they might associate with this election, participants in a focus group conducted by Peter Hart in Wisconsin last week gave the following responses: “sulfur,” “rotten eggs,” "garbage,” “manure” and a “skunk’s fart.”
www.politico.com/story/2016/08/trump-campaign-turn-around-out-of-time-
227457

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Because of the Constitution, there is no way for me to rein in Hillary, no more than I could rein in Bush/Cheney and their rein of error.

But Congress can by refusing to approve thousands of Hillary's judicial and cabinet and department appointments and all her budgets and all her drafts of legislation.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:

And then we come to the nub, the ONE THING that Congress can't stop: military intervention

Please reconsider our past 16 years ... more, if you count Bill's great adventure in Yugoslavia. The USA has been rampaging through the world:
. . .

Pivot to the East. China and the USA tussling over the South China Sea.

. . .

I could bring up other examples of the United States destabilizing nations across the globe, with links.

What I want you to consider... take your head out of Texas for a moment, take a deep deep breath and ask yourself ...

... Breathe...

.... breathe ...


When, in the past 16 years, has USA foreign policy NOT... I repeat NOT .... been a total clusterfuck, killing hundreds of thousands (if not millions) and leaving broad swathes of the globe in ruins?

And when has Congress ever stopped these clusterfucks?

Please, try to answer those questions.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:

The USA has been at CONTINUOUS war for 13 years, and in that time destroyed or destabilized eight nations. (I forgot Yemen, which we can add to the list. Also Honduras.) That's quite a record. Yanno, WWII only lasted four years for us.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:

Not eight short years ago, you were frothing at the mouth because of GWB being a disastrous Commander in Chief. And in a discussion about Hillary's responsibility for Libya, did you not argue that only the President had the authority to send in American troops, absolving the Scy of State from any responsibility? Back then, you were OK with blaming the President. But now, are you trying to say that the President is just an innocent bystander to what Congress does? Is "Congress" your current excuse for the string of military and intelligence nightmares under Bush and Obama?

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Not eight short years ago, you were frothing at the mouth because of GWB being a disastrous Commander in Chief. And in a discussion about Hillary's responsibility for Libya, did you not argue that only the President had the authority to send in American troops, absolving the Scy of State from any responsibility? Back then, you were OK with blaming the President. But now, are you trying to say that the President is just an innocent bystander to what Congress does? Is "Congress" your current excuse for the string of military and intelligence nightmares under Bush and Obama? - SIGNY

You're so serious. Lighten up. SECOND

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Did you ever see the movie Speed (1994)? Sandra Bullock must drive a city bus full of passengers faster than 50mph or else the bus explodes. Hillary will be playing the role of Sandra Bullock and the Pentagon is the city bus. Congress plays the role of Dennis Hopper, the bus bomber who choose the speed of 50mph and is monitoring the bus by watching TV coverage from traffic helicopters.

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If it was Trump driving instead of Hillary, he’d be on the sidewalk crushing pedestrians with the bus.

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:

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Not eight short years ago, you were frothing at the mouth because of GWB being a disastrous Commander in Chief. And in a discussion about Hillary's responsibility for Libya, did you not argue that only the President had the authority to send in American troops, absolving the Scy of State from any responsibility? Back then, you were OK with blaming the President. But now, are you trying to say that the President is just an innocent bystander to what Congress does? Is "Congress" your current excuse for the string of military and intelligence nightmares under Bush and Obama? - SIGNY

You're so serious. Lighten up. SECOND

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Yeah, because nothing is more hi-larious than killing a million people and destabilizing a whole region. Do the lives of poor brown people elsewhere mean so little to you that it's inappropriate (in your mind) to be serous about them?

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Did you ever see the movie Speed (1994)? Sandra Bullock must drive a city bus full of passengers faster than 50mph or else the bus explodes. Hillary will be playing the role of Sandra Bullock and the Pentagon is the city bus. Congress plays the role of Dennis Hopper, the bus bomber who choose the speed of 50mph and is monitoring the bus by watching TV coverage from traffic helicopters.

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Because the Republican Congress has managed to plant an explosive under the President's chair???

That has got to be the dumbest analogy I've read in quite a while! What credible threat can Congress bring to the table that it has not done already? Delay appointments? Block bills? Fail to pass a budget? Block appropriations? Been there, done that! Congress is like Dennis Hopper, with a sparkler instead of a bomb.

A Republican Congress will be as obstructive with Hillary as they were with Obama, which is why almost nothing of Hillary's domestic agenda will make it through, and why the DNC platform is 95% DOA.

But, let's take you at your word: Let's say that Congress will allow some of Hillary's domestic agenda through if she would only go to war with the "enemy" of the day.

Is that really a bargain she should be making? Is that really a bargain you would want? What promises to do more damage: starting yet another foreign war, or sliding on some domestic priorities?

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If it was Trump driving instead of Hillary, he’d be on the sidewalk crushing pedestrians with the bus.

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So you imagine. But unlike Hillary, who we have reliable foreign-policy experience with (war, more war, proxy war, and after that... maybe nuclear war) we really don't know what Trump would do.

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Originally posted by 1kiki:

And I hope you realize there are safeguards in place to prevent a US 'rogue president' from starting WWIII with an impulsive nuke launch.

CLINTON OTOH will stumble into war with the full support of Congress, the State Department, and the CIA. There is literally nothing standing between her policies and WWIII.

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
But with trump as president, watch out, WWIII could easily start with a stupid remark or thoughtless utterance from the SFB-in-Chief.

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Originally posted by 1kiki:

And once again you've dodged the facts I posted with your usual off-topic personal snark.

You make a GREAT advocate for your position! Not. Which is why I'll continue to scroll past.

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
But with trump as president, watch out, WWIII could easily start with a stupid remark or thoughtless utterance from the SFB-in-Chief.

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Originally posted by second:
What does Donald Trump believe? Whatever the last person to talk to him does, apparently.

Trump tends to echo the words of whomever last spoke to him, making direct access to him even more valuable, the people said, requesting anonymity to talk about internal campaign discussions.

Trump’s blithe inconsistencies, and his maddening insistence that the media is just misinterpreting what he said before, make a lot more sense if "Trump tends to echo the words of whomever last spoke to him."

That might mean we’ll never really know what Trump is thinking about immigration — or anything else. It should be treated as a terrifying trait in a possible future president.

The answer to “What’s President Donald Trump doing on immigration?” — a question on which the lives of millions of people hang — might depend on his schedule for the day.
www.vox.com/2016/8/29/12691276/trump-believe-flop-flop

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Originally posted by SHINYGOODGUY:
The people don't do their homework, well Trump's cadre of followers anyway:

The stats of Immigration: . . .

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Originally posted by second:

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Originally posted by SHINYGOODGUY:
The people don't do their homework, well Trump's cadre of followers anyway:

The stats of Immigration: . . .

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They don't care about statistics. Telling Republicans that the facts don't support their arguments is futile because they are voting what is in their hearts, not facts. That is all the "facts" they need.

How immigration fueled a backlash

Between 1990 and 2014, the share of foreign-born citizens in the United States went from 7.9 percent to 13.9 percent — a near doubling. The last time the share of foreign-born citizens got this high (about 100 years ago), it provoked enough nativist backlash in the 1920s to largely close the borders for four decades, until 1965.

The rising tide of immigration has indeed provoked some backlash, and that backlash has been channeled into the Republican Party. Political scientists Marisa Abrajano and Zoltan L. Hajnal have found that negative views about immigrants contribute to stronger identification with the Republican Party among whites, even controlling for all the usual variables that typically explain partisanship (including ideology). They also found that whites with strong anti-immigration views actually shifted their partisan identification from Democrat to Republican in the late 2000s. These findings are reported in their 2015 book, White Backlash: Immigration, Race, and American Politics.

Some of this, Abrajano and Hajnal argue, is because Republican politicians "have been much more vocal and adamant in their opposition to immigration." Therefore, "the millions of white Americans who feel real anxiety about immigration are drawn to the political party that has promised to ease such concerns."

How race and identity became the central dividing line in American politics
www.vox.com/polyarchy/2016/8/30/12697920/race-dividing-american-politi
cs

Twenty years ago, the United States had bitter partisan politics, and it also had some bitter racial and ethnic conflicts. But those were largely two different kinds of conflicts. Today they’ve merged.

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Originally posted by second:
A twitter war with Mexico began this afternoon. Trump and the president of Mexico are having a fight because this is apparently how the world works now:

Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump

"Mexico will pay for the wall!"
5:31 AM - 1 Sep 2016

Enrique Peña Nieto @EPN

"Repeating what I told you in person, Mr. Trump: Mexico will never pay for a wall."
2:06 PM - 1 Sep 2016
https://twitter.com/EPN/status/771423919978913792

After meeting President Enrique Peña Nieto, Trump said that he and the president did NOT discuss the question of who would pay for Trump’s proposed wall on the US–Mexican border. Then Trump went to a rally in Phoenix where he delivered a speech about the evils of immigration and reiterated that Mexico WILL pay for the wall.

If Politifact notices, Trump's twitter war will be scored as "Liar, liar, pants on fire." -- www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/

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Originally posted by SHINYGOODGUY:

Lying Trump. What a dick! Of course, he thinks that his followers will blindly believe him and not Nieto.

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Originally posted by second:

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Originally posted by SHINYGOODGUY:

Lying Trump. What a dick! Of course, he thinks that his followers will blindly believe him and not Nieto.

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I saw the article Who’s to Blame for the Rise of Hate Groups? Donald Trump, for One

But I think it is more helpful to understand it as Obama’s existence is at fault for this windstorm and Trump is just the most clever opportunist of all the Republicans who ran in the primaries for President (or the biggest dick, whichever you prefer) who is surfing the waves blown by that Obama storm. A sample from a longer article:

How Obama's election fueled a backlash

Obama's election was widely viewed as a landmark of race relations progress. But looking back, it now seems increasingly clear that his presidency activated a racist backlash.

Political scientist Michael Tesler, for example, has found that "old-fashioned racism returned to white Americans' party identification in the early Obama era because the country elected an African-American president from the Democratic Party." He also found that whites with strong racist attitudes turned much more sharply Republican following Obama's election, including some who had previously been Democrats.

More recently, in a new book, Post-Racial or Most-Racial: Race and Politics in the Obama Era, Tesler documents what he calls "the spillover of radicalization." That is, because of "Barack Obama's omnipresent position as a historic racial figure, and his embodiment of race as the first African-American president," racial attitudes were constantly being activated.

As a result, racial attitudes started to independently predict feelings towards seemingly unrelated issues, like health care. And issues that might not have once been partisan issues, like whether 12 Years a Slave deserved an Oscar for Best Picture, have became deeply partisan.

How race and identity became the central dividing line in American politics
www.vox.com/polyarchy/2016/8/30/12697920/race-dividing-american-politi
cs

At least in Texas, the Republicans were furious that a black man would dare run for President back in 2008. It has been eight years and their anger never cooled down. "Oh, we're not racists; it is Obama's policies that make us mad!" Sure thing, Tex. I believe you. Ha!

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Originally posted by G:
You are thinking too much Second. You will never change the minds of Trump followers like that.

Couple thoughts:

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Originally posted by second:
September 13: Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi tells the Orlando Sentinel that her office is "currently reviewing the allegations" that Trump University has defrauded its students.

September 17: The Trump Foundation makes a $25,000 contribution to a PAC backing Bondi. The Florida Attorney General's office backtracks, telling the Orlando Sentinel there was never any consideration of joining the lawsuit against Trump U because they had received only one complaint during the time Bondi was in office. This was untrue: the AG's office had received a couple dozen complaints, but had weeded them out so they could say there was only one.

We have a case that's a mere hair's breadth away from Donald Trump bribing the Attorney General of Florida, who is a Republican. There's only the slightest wiggle room for believing that the events in Florida are all just a big coincidence. Maybe they deserve a little bit of front-page attention?

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2016/09/did-donald-trump-try-bribe-atto
rney-general-florida

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Originally posted by second:
In Three Steps Trump Reveals His Secret Plan to Defeat ISIS!

1) "I know more about ISIS than the generals do, believe me." Everybody believes, except Hillary.
www.facebook.com/cnn/videos/10154213275786509

2) "All I can tell you is that it is a foolproof way of winning." The only one fooled is Hillary.
www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/may/28/donald-trump-declines-share-h
is-foolproof-plan-win/

3) Sept 6, 2016: "I am also going to convene my top generals and give them a simple instruction: They will have 30 days to submit to the Oval Office a plan for defeating ISIS."
www.politico.com/story/2016/09/donald-trump-isil-isis-227807#ixzz4JWjH
CBMe

All Trump’s Generals, if he wins, will be Obama’s Generals until noon on Inauguration Day. Or Hillary’s Generals after noon if she wins. Therefore Hillary knows as much today as Trump has ever known about Trump’s Secret Plan to Defeat ISIS! I guess we never needed Trump’s secret knowledge about ISIS in order to defeat ISIS after all. Sad!

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Kevin Cirilli @kevcirilli

Trump campaign spokeswoman says that they thought Larry King interview was going to be on King's podcast -- not RT.
8:44 PM - 8 Sep 2016
https://twitter.com/kevcirilli/status/774060857483403270

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Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump

I never fall for scams. I am the only person who immediately walked out of my ‘Ali G’ interview
10:44 AM - 30 Oct 2012
https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/263335564412076032

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
Trump's not going to win. Though Clinton may lose.

WHY did the democrats shoehorn such a weak candidate into the slot, again?

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Several days ago, the WSJ reported that in a change of strategy, Hillary would tone down her personal attacks on Trump to distance herself from an increasingly uglier mudslinging campaign on both sides. It didn't last long: perhaps after she saw the latest polls which continue to slip away from her favor, and confirm the two candidates are again neck and neck, on Friday night during an LGBT fundraiser for her campaign in New York hosted by Barbara Streisand, Hillary unleashed an unprecedented ad hominem attack on what amounts a quarter of America, calling half of Trump's supporters a "basket of deplorables."

Cited by BuzzFeed, Hillary made a statement which 4 years ago effectively lost Mitt Romney the election: "you know, just to be grossly generalist, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables."

“Right?” she said as the crowd laughed and applauded. “The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic -- you name it,” Clinton continued. “And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up. He has given voice to their websites that used to only have 11,000 people -- now have 11 million. He tweets and retweets their offensive, hateful, mean-spirited rhetoric.”

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Originally posted by SIGNYM:
SECOND, from what you post, it sounds to me like Hillary isn't running against Trump, she's "really" running against .... Putin??? . . .

This whole but Putin thing is disingenuous both from Hillary and from you.
. . .
I've got to say, SECOND, Hillary's campaign has not brought out the best in you: you've given up honesty, common sense, and that great liberal virtue "tolerance".

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Originally posted by 1kiki:
Trump's not going to win. Though Clinton may lose.

WHY did the democrats shoehorn such a weak candidate into the slot, again?

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Originally posted by G:

“He just called for higher defense spending without giving us a number and without telling us how he is going to pay for it.”

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We shouldn't read too much into what Trump is saying. Odds are it'll change tomorrow. That's because his policies are more cultural markers than they are actual, well, policies. Trump seems to say things to show people that he's like them rather than to show them what he'd like to do. One day that might be saying that he'll pay off the entire national debt in eight years, and the next that actually "this is the time to borrow;" that he wants to raise taxes on the rich, and actually slash them; or that he thinks the Fed should raise rates, and actually keep them where they are. He's able to pull this off even when he isn't telling his supporters what they usually like to hear, because more important than what he says is how he says it. It's the anger, the affect, the sense that he not only feels their pain but shares their rage that matters here.

It's post-policy politics. It's about having the right feelings instead of the right proposals.

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Originally posted by 1kiki:

Second - if you REALLY BELIEVE that Hillary will win - AND ALSO - if you REALLY BELIEVE that she might not - either way, you should forget Donald.

You need to focus on

- what will make Hillary a better candidate?
- what will make Hillary a better president?

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Originally posted by 1kiki:

Because if she's going to win, then Donald doesn't matter. But if she might lose, it's not just that Donald is gaining ground, it's also that Hillary is losing. And Hillary is losing because of the issues she's tried to lie her way around or ignore, rather than addressing up front.

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