The Daily Mirror never ceases to amaze.
They should buy up Trump's tabloid, the National Enquirer and install an editor that stops kissing right-wing butt.
Trump is no Winston.
IMHO he is much more like Neville Chamberlain.
Both born to rich families.
Both failures in business until their fathers bailed them out.
Both Conservatives and enemies of the working stiffs.
And both Appeasers!
I know...and the NYT was all, "oh, donald being donald"
ReplyDeleteI think the NYT is getting to used to The Donald and his silly antics...like this is a quirk of his that we're just going to have to get used too.
I'm glad the English are outraged...they should be.
Germany should be outraged, too.
In fact all of Europe should be outraged by Donald Trump.
They are. Except of course his partners in crime over there. Viktor Orban in Hungary is but one example, there are others.
DeleteBut I think his insults towards Justin Trudeau, Angela Merkel and Theresa May have strengthened them politically. Being slandered by the baby-snatcher is now seen as a badge of honor.
There have been times in my life I have been ashamed to be an American, have been aghast as my country, or its leaders, or some of my fellow citizens have done great wrong.
ReplyDeleteThe sensation of being embarrassed, though...that's a new one.
It's like We the People had an opportunity to choose the Form of the Destructor...and we chose Elmer Fudd. Or Ernest, that dopey rube from the movies. Our Evil lacks even the frightful banality of a Himmler, or the stern brutality of a Stalin. We've chosen to destroy ourselves through a professional wrestling heel.
WASSSSSSSSF
"We've chosen to destroy ourselves through a professional wrestling heel."
DeleteIt will make for an interesting chapter in American History for future High School students in their government classes...especially, when the caricature of Trump is compared to other national leaders.
But honestly, it's not the comparison I dread, but the questions those students will ask...
"Why?"
"How?"
"Didn't the early American's know this would happen?"
I pity their teacher answering those questions.
FDC - I am not embarrassed. The ones that should be embarrassed are those Americans that supported him.
DeleteOr the Americans that did not like him but held their nose and voted for him anyway so as to keep Grammy Clinton out of the WH.
Or the Americans that stayed away from the polls because they got sucked in and believed the phony meme put out by undercover GOP hacks that both parties are the same.
Or the Bernie-or-Bust Americans that stayed away from the polls because they were PO'ed at the DNC for not giving a lifetime Independent as much support as they gave a Democratic candidate.
Eff em all I say (WARNING not fitten for children or office):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prSd6DaoSwQ
To answer your final question, Sven, I think it's a "yes and no".
DeleteThe Framers seem to have had an unrealistic faith in their fellows in the governing class. They had a dread of "faction" - what we'd call political parties - and presumed their successors would, too. They particularly, and foolishly, in my opinion, assumed that their successors would approach governing as a calling or a charge and not as a tool for personal or economic advantage. The notion of a Trump, whose only interest is his gross appetite for lucre and fame and whatever he can stuff in his maw or on his cock, would have been utterly inconceivable to them as a part of their idea of governing.
But...they DID presume that some sort of scoundrel or blackguard might get elected, which is why they included the provision for impeachment. Their idea was that when one of these proto-Trumps got into office his peers would act against him and destroy him before he could do real harm. Again, I think they were fooling themselves, as the past two years have shown; the lure of power, especially the power to use a Trump to do the sort of damage a conventional politician might have mitigated, if for no other reason than his investment in the system being ruined, is just too strong.
So...I think it's more no than yes, now I've laid it out. We're paying the price for the Framers' inability to conceive of the toxic combination of a conman and a cabal of greedy morons willing to empower the moron to sate their shortsighted lusts.
Sheerakhan:
ReplyDeleteDo American schools still teach Civics? I thought the GOP had managed to squelch that a decade or two ago.
Ok...now I'm not just embarrassed and angry. Now I'm really worried. I kind of scoffed at the whole "Putin has his hand up Trump's ass and is making his mouth move" thing, but their presser this morning was truly La-la Land.
ReplyDeleteFirst, Trump says that his pal Pootie will get the GRU to investigate itself. WTF? Seriously? And Orange Foolius says that's an "incredible offer". Ummm..."incredible" is one way to describe it, yeah.
Then Trump says Pootie was “extremely strong and powerful in his denial today.” and adds that he “didn’t see any reason” why Russia would interfere in America’s elections." Trump basically credits Putin ahead of his own intel agencies. I can get being skeptical of US intelligence - they haven't exactly been the most truthful of outfits - but because of the word of a kleptocratic former Sovieet spook?
Maybe the weirdest single thing Trump said was that he personally fixed America’s relationship with Russia in a matter of hours. “...that changed as of about four hours ago — I really believe that.” Yeah, I'm glad you believe that. Now I've got a Nigerian oil minister on the line for you...
His response to the question about Russian interference in 2016 was a bizarre rant about Hillary Clinton’s emails. “Where is the server? What is the server saying?” What the fucking fuck is that?
Not only is this dude a serious fucking loon, he's a loon that appears to be his pal Putin's sock puppet.
Now THERE's an interesting chapter for Civics 101; the Siberian President!
I don't know about you, Chief, but the first thing that sprang up in my mind was, 'sock-puppet."
DeleteWASF
Sorry, he is not behaving like a sock puppet of Putin. If he was, he would have behaved a lot more credibly. Trump was being 100% Trump. And he is a pure product of the American political system. Do not let the Russians become a convenient scapegoat for America's failings.
DeleteCredibly? Since when has this idiot EVER acted "credibly"? His whole misrule has been one ridiculous clusterfuck after another. It's been his Congressional GOP pals that have been doing the real heavy evil lifting.
DeleteThat's kind of the point; a GOP "product of the American political system" would be...not doing this. NObody in the "American political system" has done this since the end of WW2 and the Red Scare. I agree this is 100% pure uncut Trump...but it's because he's been hooked on Russian mob money since he was going broke in the casino biz back in the Nineties. This is Trump being what Trump is - a owned asset of the Russian mob.
And as for the Russians...they aren't a scapegoat FOR American's failings. The Russians are helping ENHANCE America's failings. That's the critical difference in how we need to deal with them.
Look, it's not rocket science; if you want to get the water out of the carpet you've gotta fix the leak in the roof, too. It's not an either-or deal. The Russian kleptocrats are happy to help our own domestic kleptocrats. To defeat the latter we need to cut them off from the former. To fix or own problems we've got to get the Russian bastards kicked out along with the Kochs and the Waltons and the Pences and the Trumps. They're not two different things, as we're seeing; it's part and parcel of a loose assembly of autocrats and thieves and greedsters.
My personal recommendation is a close shave by the National Razor...
I agree, Trump does not behave credibly. Which is why the sock puppet theory leaks.
DeleteI also agree that the focus should be on the kleptocratic elite, where ever they may be found. And for Trump, this means that he needs to be separated from his "deplorable" base. The Washington Establishment hooting about the Russians strengthens him. Bernie Sanders tirelessly droning on about economic injustice provides an example of a constructive approach to opposing Trump and his ilk.
Sadly, this gets the GOP base entirely wrong.
DeleteI don't have the link - I'll look it up later today - but Sanders did one of those townhall-type discussions with a bunch of these jokers right after the election. And he did what he does, tried to get them to see that they were being played, that their bosses and the Kochs and the GOP were picking their pockets, and that voting for people who would rein in the banksters and plutocrats and tax the rich to fund services and infrastructure would help them.
And they totally didn't buy it. They clung to their guns and their God and their fear of the nigras and Mooslims and no taxes because freeedummmm!
The same problem is showing up in the EU; populist programs aren't making these gomers more liberal.
So, no. The answer is doing to the base what the USN did to the Japanese in 1944; bypass them, cut them off (in this case by mobilizing non voters and disenfranchised voters and taking power at the polls), and let them die.
And mobilization means connecting the dots; from Putin to Koch to Ryan to Trump. The fallacy is seeing the Russia thing as a distraction. It's not. It's all part of the same corruption and autocracy.
I cheerfully admit that I do not understand American politics. I agree that you need to amass a sufficient group of voters to turf them out. Sanders (and Corbyn) do this by relentlessly banging on economic justice issues and ignoring all the shiny personality based horse race glitter.
DeleteThey clearly feel that stressing a few issues, repeated ad nauseum is better than harping on every horrible action of their political opponents.
But...but...what I'm trying to get through here is that they DON'T do that. Sanders' "Our Revolution" organization has made little headway into people of color, a core Democratic/anti-Rightwing constituency. His economic message hasn't gotten a ton of aisle-crossers from the Right. He's an appealing figure to people like me, older white liberals who like the New Deal.
DeleteCorbyn appears to have all the appeal of a polonium sandwich to much of the British public; he's one of these people who you either REALLY like or really hate.
Neither of these guys has translated their economic populism into general political strength.
Both Labour and the Democratic Party need to tie everything together; the foreign ratfucking, the vampire squid, the poisoning of our air and stealing our water to feed their rich masters...it's ALL the GOP is, all the time. There's no reason to leave anyone out; poor people, working people, immigrants and naturalized citizens (don't think that Miller and Bannon aren't looking to feed YOU to their C.H.U.D.s, kids...), the sick and disabled, GLBTQ people...ALL of us are endangered by these goddamn Gilded Age cosplayers.
I think you sell people short. They're perfectly capable of seeing the malefactors of great domestic wealth working in hand with the malefactors overseas. That should be in the news, all night, every night, until these people are exterminated to the last shoelace eyelet.
And what the hell to make of this:
ReplyDelete“Unfortunately, no matter how well I do at the Summit, if I was given the great city of Moscow as retribution for all of the sins and evils committed by Russia, over the years, I would return to criticism that it wasn’t good enough — that I should have gotten Saint Petersburg in addition! Much of our news media is indeed the enemy of the people.”
Now you and I know perfectly well that this idiot didn't write that. If he can spell "retribution", let alone know what it means, I will carry his iPhone from here to the Halls of Montezuma and kiss his orange ass when I get there.
But WTF DOES it mean? "The great city of Moscow"? "sins and evils"? That ain't real estate shyster talk. That's downright apocalyptic. That's a streetcorner preacher ranting about Hellfire and the Ending of Days. That may be the single weirdest thing I've ever read attributed to this gomer, and I've read some really, really weird shit.
Reportedly his famous advice to May about how to handle Brexit was "to sue the European Union, not negotiate with them".
ReplyDeleteWith hindsight, shouldn't everyone have known that exactly this was his "advice"? Is there any possibly more typical "advice" he could have offered, short of also proposing to lie?
Turns out that the Russian mafia (i.e. the Russian government) was all in on the National Rifle Association, too;
ReplyDeletehttps://washingtonmonthly.com/2018/01/18/did-a-russian-crime-boss-fund-trump-through-the-nra/
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2018/07/16/another-huge-arrest-in-the-russia-investigation/
Steady hold factors, comrade!
Perhaps the most succinct assessment of this insane Helsinki meeting came in a comment on a,piece from The Intercept wherein Greenwald tried to lump this in with every other meeting between US and Soviet/Russian heads of state;
ReplyDelete"I have no problem with Trump talking to Putin. I have a problem with Trump talking FOR Putin."
Greenwald is one of the key reasons we ended up with Dufus Donny in the White House.
DeleteHis statement is true. But he should still bow down and the kiss the feet of every American as an act of abject apology.
It wasn't Greenwald - it was just some jamoke commenting ON Greenwald's insistence that all this talking "with" Russia is good and just like Kennedy and Khrushchev meeting and Ronnie and Gorby and jaw-jaw being better than war-war. The point was that it was Glennie that insisted that it was all just Business As Usual and it isn't.
DeleteAgree with Ael.
ReplyDeleteThe heel-spur-in-chief is doing this on his own. He wants to match or beat the Nixon reachout to Mao, the Clinton reachout to Trần, and the Obama reachout to Rouhani and Raúl. But he is being played big time. At least Trump's alter-ego, Neville Chamberlain, did his appeasing at Munich because he was looking to avoid war. Alas, the pussy-grabber is doing it to massage his own ego.
Again...to the degree all this "says" anything about the DOPUS it merely reflects what those of us who watched him thru his progress through the Seventies, Eighties, and Nineties know; he's just a greedy, ignorant, egotistical asshole. He kicks down and kisses up. He's mobbed up, has been for decades, and has adopted a lot of mob styling (including gross incompetence - he'd fit right in with "Big Chicken's" boys...) His groveling before Pootie is just a wannabe's licking the backside of a made guy.
ReplyDeleteNo, the real shame belongs to the rest of the GOP. The lunatic base and every elected Republican who is just fine with all this; the C.H.U.D.s because it knuckles the poors and the darkies and the queers and triggers the libruls, and the Ryans and McConnels and Pauls because they get the Gilded Age they and their masters want.
At least back in the Cold War the spies and betrayers had faith in the glorious proletarian revolution to justify their treason. To sell yourself to end gay marriage and the carried interest penalty? That may be the worst excuse for American treason since 1860...
In a weird way, all of this makes more sense when you realize Trump doesn’t see himself as the leader of the US, or Putin as the leader of Russia. He sees them as The Leaders of White Civilization, and nation-states are an inconvenience to their goals, which is exterminating the brutes. Suddenly it's not an issue of "treason" or "subornation" but Pinky and The Brain (I'll leave you to figure out who is who) executing their cunning plans to wipe out the Brown Heathen Godless Humanist Menace.
ReplyDeleteThis is so sad it's almost funny.
ReplyDeleteI used the tag "Trump as court jester" in the post right after this one. I clicked on the link and went to the post, one of Lisa's from 2016 ("The Fool On The Hill").
Here's what Lisa wrote in the post:
"Mr. Trump is outside, and is not bought and sold; he is therefore, unsafe to those who would continue the current disarrayed status quo. He, moreso than the other party puppets, is a man situated in place and time.
He may not be a man for all seasons, but he is a man for this season."
...and found this, part of my reply in the comment section:
"Perhaps the most delicious irony of this whole awful election is this "go steal Hillary's emails, Pooty!" thing from Trump.
Because Trump, blowhard, ignoramus, and fake tough guy, thinks he's made a "deal" and he's gonna play the Russian sigint people to his gain...not realizing (since he's Trump and never thinks beyond his no-it's-not-tiny-it's-really-YUUGe-tip-of-his-pecker) that he's effectively given the Russian spooks an invitation and excuse to hack President Trump and Secretary of State Gingrich's email.
While the former KGB hard man - the 21st Century Man of Steel - Putin sits and smiles at the combedover imbecile, knowing that he can play the hollow fool like a fucking ocarina. You can practically feel his contempt for Trump from orbit.
It's enough to make a fucking cat laugh."
Christ, what fools we were.
And I don't JUST mean what Lisa wrote in this post.