The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

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Flea
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Flea »

beantownbubba wrote:
Flea wrote:
beantownbubba wrote:Foreign policy is no easy field to master. It is a key element of a president's portfolio and very few have the necessary skills and experience when they arrive in the oval office. So a learning curve is required and a new president should be given the time to get up to speed (if possible, sometimes events dictate otherwise).

But what do we do w/ a president who refuses to learn, who glories in his ignorance? There has always been an isolationist strain in American politics and events consistently prove those folks wrong, yet they persist. So Trump is not alone on that. What does separate him from the pack is his astonishing inability to understand what in fact made America great in the second half of the 20th century, that golden age he would like to return to. What made America great was dominating the world order, serving as the reserve currency, serving as the defender of last (and sometimes first) resort in places near and far and essentially keeping the peace intact (big picture) and the shipping lanes open. The United States made Germany, France, Japan and to some extent the UK what they are today and we did so for OUR benefit (plus of course, being American, we're just really nice guys). The idea that they are ripping us off, taking advantage of us, keeping our economy down is not just wrong, it's bizarre. He's already attacked the status quo in ways that do not seem calculated to reap any benefits for the USA, but if he spends this week pulling the plug on the "western alliance," Germany, France and the others will lose a lot but the US will lose at least as much. The potential for disaster is real (though I can't judge the likelihood) and the way we got here is pretty much insane, or somewhere on the border between irrationality and insanity, or as I like to call it, just plain nuts.

My prediction: NATO is going to fold, Western Europe will forge a new treaty organization without the US or England, and Putin is going to take over the Baltic States again. Anyone up for a wager?
At even odds? What was I saying about just plain nuts? LOL
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by John A Arkansawyer »

One big question is how do you deal with a guy who lies like a rug?



That right there is a big part of the answer. You call him a liar and then you mock him for lying.

Obama was funny but cool. Taking on Trump requires funny and hot. Hard to find that in a risk-adverse Democratic Party.

It's why I so wish that Al Franken were still in the race. I really wish he'd held out for a hearing. While Franken's too conservative to thrill me, he has the skills to cut Trump up one-on-one. In interviews, Franken complained about coming up with funny things to say and his staff shutting him down. "Too risky," they'd say, "and not dignified." Both of those ships have sailed now, but so has Franken's, barring some unexpected development.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by beantownbubba »

Recent events remind me of the day after the Brexit vote, when the most searched term on Wikipedia in the UK was "EU." IOW, folks had no idea what they were voting for.

So let's say Trump undermines NATO to the point that it collapses. His people cheer: Another blow against the elite, the status quo, the internationalists! Then Russia takes Estonia. Queasy yet? Then it takes Latvia and Lithuania. Ummm, yeah, we're upset but not enough to actually do anything. Then Russia decides that there's no reason to engage in any subterfuge in Ukraine and just walks in there, too. I'm starting to hear those murmurs of "that's not what we intended." Germany is in crisis as its population moves further right and further left seeking ways to combat the new version of the old "red menace." People w/ memories or who read history start to flee Poland. Russia and Iran agree on a new division of parts of the Middle East...

BUT, BUT, BUT HOW COULD I HAVE KNOWN?? Wikipedia crashes as hundreds of millions of people search "cold war."
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cortez the killer
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by cortez the killer »

While dangerous and not amusing in the slightest, Russia's social media troll game is pretty fucking impressive. Brexit, Trump and (possibly) the dismantling of NATO.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Smitty »

https://twitter.com/DanielBShapiro/stat ... 7708544001

I don't think we are fully grappling with the possibility that we could be on the on the cusp of a completely new era, a fundamental reshaping of the international order. And I don't mean over the course of the Trump Administration. I mean by next week.

It sounds outlandish to even say it out loud, and some can easily call this hyperbole. I hope to God it does not happen. But we would be insane not to grapple with the possibility.

Trump clearly wants to pull the US out of NATO. He doesn't believe in the alliance (or any alliances); he thinks our allies take advantage of us; he complains that NATO is worse than NAFTA(whatever that means); he seeks purely transactional relations with our closest partners.

Should other NATO members meet their 2% of GDP defense spending targets? Absolutely. Trump is on solid ground to push for it. But to consistently trash allies, undervalue their contributions to our security, threaten to withdraw US troops -- that's him wanting out.

Perhaps most damaging is that his rhetoric is building up hostility to NATO among his supporters. It's a huge breach in the consensus American support for the alliance that has undergirded Western security for 70 years, and it won't disappear when Trump does.

What's more, his passionate desire for friendship with Putin is emboldening Russia & risks doing further damage to European security. If he recognizes Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea, if he seeks to tone down sanctions on Russia over its aggression vs Ukraine, watch out.

This could play out in the next 2 weeks. If he sabotages the NATO summit the way he did the G-7, don't be surprised if he actually makes a move toward exiting NATO. Think he won't? On what basis? Because his staff restrains him? Because of his strategic understanding? Please.

If we get there, the implications are innumerable & terrifying: Russia pawing at Baltics &other E & C European states; breakdown of joint defense structures; withdrawal of US troops from Euro bases; less restrained German foreign policy; weaker US power projection to Eurasia.

That just scratches the surface. We honestly cannot begin to imagine living in a new era without these international organizing structures. Because for all of NATO's challenges, no sane person or American political leader has or would contemplate such a reckless move.

But it could happen. Our President doesn't know the history or strategy, doesn't listen to experts, personalizes everything & makes it transactional, & loves the drama of the outrageous move that dominates cable TV coverage. For him, pulling out of NATO is all gain, no cost.

Even as I write this, it sounds fantastical. I will be the happiest person on the planet if I look back at this thread and say, man, you were way overreacting. But we need to be ready for this awful scenario to play out.

I repeat: we are potentially on the verge of a wildly dangerous cascade of events that will devastate our interests, weaken our leadership, abandon our allies, embolden our adversaries, and make the world a darker and more brutal place.

We have done no planning for this course of action. No one thinks it is a good idea. But one man, whose knowledge and values are wanting, whose motivation is suspect, and whose supporters follow him blindly, could take us there. END
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by dime in the gutter »

Image

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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

dime in the gutter wrote:Image
Damn, Rick Pitino is lookin’ rough
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Flea »

Is Trump physically defecting to Moscow via Helsinki??
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

Flea wrote:Is Trump physically defecting to Moscow via Helsinki??
Would be an appropriate Finnish to this mess
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by John A Arkansawyer »

I'd been thinking along these lines myself, though from a little further to the left:

Clueless
Liberals playing detective are missing an opportunity to engage in meaningful politics.

Osita Nwanevu wrote:It’s clear enough that Trump and the Kennedys are close, and there really is something sinister to be gleaned from that fact. The United States may not be controlled by lizard people or the Freemasons, but it is genuinely run by a small club of elite individuals, many of whom know and fraternize with each other. Every now and then, certain members of that club are appointed for life to a secretive chamber where robes are donned, certain rituals are enacted, and arcane texts are consulted for guidance as to how we are to be ruled. The real conspiracy here is wealth and its impact on anti-democratic institutions, a conspiracy that can’t be seen clearly or fought against without systematic thinking about the way our politics work.
To which I can only (at this time) add this:

Image
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by beantownbubba »

John A Arkansawyer wrote:The real conspiracy here is wealth and its impact on anti-democratic institutions, a conspiracy that can’t be seen clearly or fought against without systematic thinking about the way our politics work.
Agree or disagree this strikes me as an important observation worthy of further examination and discussion, along w/ the more general proposition that we do ourselves harm by letting ourselves be distracted by the scandal du jour. But whoa, does the author lose the thread from this point through the rest of the article. It's too bad, I would have liked to have seen a better analysis jumping off from the quote above.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by beantownbubba »

Lucky for me I didn't watch the FBI Congressional hearing yesterday. The little bits and pieces I saw were bad enough. There's no way around it: Congress is a laughingstock and Congresspeople are pathetic jokes. The stupidity on display was staggering, to say nothing of the complete lack of dignity and seriousness of purpose. Why would anybody think that acting like that in public is a good look, much less in furtherance of the people's business?

I can't imagine being a teenager becoming politically aware in this environment and I have no idea how I would explain the current disaster to any young person who asked. To say the very least, it's embarrassing.

Remember "if you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem"? At this point I don't see how anyone can say that Congress is doing anything other than actively making our problems worse (as opposed to, say, the past X years when the damage they did was more along the lines of passive neglect). Not only does the President need to go, so do all 535 members of Congress in both parties in both houses. I don't know how else to begin to clean up this mess. Since that will never ever happen, one is left w/ the question, what next? I don't know but it's not gonna be pretty.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by cortez the killer »

dime in the gutter wrote:Image
Image
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Flea »

beantownbubba wrote:Not only does the President need to go, so do all 535 members of Congress in both parties in both houses. I don't know how else to begin to clean up this mess. Since that will never ever happen, one is left w/ the question, what next? I don't know but it's not gonna be pretty.
Now THAT'S change I can believe in. Perhaps Melania will pull a Cersei Lannister Sept Of Balor move on the whole sorry lot of them during the State OfThe Union next year.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Zip City »

There’s a handful worth keeping, but just a handful.

I’m curious how that embarrassment compared to the good old day of British parliamentary sniping
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Zip City »

In a sane world, our President would not be having a private, unrecorded meeting with the leader of the country who was just handed twelve indictments for hacking the DNC
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Zip City »

Image
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by scotto »

beantownbubba wrote:There's no way around it: Congress is a laughingstock and Congresspeople are pathetic jokes. The stupidity on display was staggering, to say nothing of the complete lack of dignity and seriousness of purpose.
And the Republican base wouldn't have it any other way. As long as they're pissing off the liberals, the base doesn't care how ridiculous their reps look. In fact, I think they often feel the more outrageous the better.

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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Smitty »

Doug Jones' support of Kavanaugh is seriously disappointing. I mean I understood when I voted for him he was a centrist Democrat at best (otherwise we'd probably have elected Goatfucker), but considering he ran a platform centrally based on civil, voting and abortion rights it's seriously baffling he would support someone like Kavanaugh. Jones also ran on his experience as a US attorney, which doesn't jive with Kavanaugh's belief that a sitting president is essentially above the law and can't be prosecuted until after his term is over. You can't tell me that wasn't a major factor in his being chosen for SCOTUS.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by tinnitus photography »

whatwouldcooleydo? wrote:
dime in the gutter wrote:Image
Damn, Rick Pitino is lookin’ rough
:lol: :lol: :lol:


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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by cortez the killer »

Image
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Mr. B »

cortez the killer wrote:Image
There is no longer such an animal as a Republican Patriot, at least not in the US house or senate.

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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Zip City »

No one is allowed to act surprised about this. This is exactly the man he has always been.

Put another way: "I can't believe the tiger ate MY face!" says person who voted for face-eating tiger
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Flea »

Image
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Tequila Cowboy »

Zip City wrote:No one is allowed to act surprised about this. This is exactly the man he has always been.

Put another way: "I can't believe the tiger ate MY face!" says person who voted for face-eating tiger
I actually was surprised. Did it shock me that it would be a shitshow? Of course not, but that was so far beyond anything that guy has ever done that I was physically shaking.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by Zip City »

Tequila Cowboy wrote:
Zip City wrote:No one is allowed to act surprised about this. This is exactly the man he has always been.

Put another way: "I can't believe the tiger ate MY face!" says person who voted for face-eating tiger
I actually was surprised. Did it shock me that it would be a shitshow? Of course not, but that was so far beyond anything that guy has ever done that I was physically shaking.
But this has never been about the country. It has always been about Trump. And for Trump to say “yes, I won, in part, due to Russian meddling” is to admit his own illegitimacy. We know what a chip he already has on his shoulder about the election.

He views everything as personal relationships, and can’t see beyond them. When he speaks to Putin or Kim, he’s not thinking that he’s speaking for America. He’s speaking for himself.
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

Make America Sovereign Again (of course pronounced like “massuh”)
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

https://nowthisnews.com/videos/politics ... 6-election

can't find this on youtube so it isn't imbedded. MAGA CHUD at her finest :roll: :roll: :roll:
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Re: The Neverending Thread for Political Shit

Post by whatwouldcooleydo? »

tinnitus photography wrote:Image
Image
Son, this ain't a dream no more, it's the real thing

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