Trump to win?

[jk]

Re: Trump to win?

It is whatever you say it is, until you say it isn't. And then it never was, until you require it to be again.

i give up. i will no longer attempt to discuss these things with you. it appears that that is your wish and if so, i wish you'd said it clearly, earlier. but nonetheless, so be it.

[Woodsman]

Re: Trump to win?

i give up. i will no longer attempt to discuss these things with you. it appears that that is your wish and if so, i wish you'd said it clearly, earlier. but nonetheless, so be it.

To discuss things, we must agree that a thing is a thing and not nothing. You and Santa can't seem to do that in this domain, and so I find I'm talking to myself. And doctor, that's just crazy.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Trump to win?

This explains a lot including why we should tax the hell out of billionaires.
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/gr...-steve-bannon/

[Chris Coles]

Re: Trump to win?

As an original thinker "Brit" looking on, these last few pages of debate have been deeply enlightening as a wonderful illustration of the reality of the human mind. My 72 years have brought me to the conclusion that in every human mind there are two realities; two quite different people; one is the conscious mind always visible to ourselves and the world that surrounds us; the other being our unconscious mind, that serves to drive us from within. To that end, I am a classic "driven" person, with an inner mind that will hit out at me in quite alarming ways; when it does not like the direction my outer self has taken, (or is about to), take.

What is so great about your debates herein is they show how that inner mind can shout out through such debate; the inner thoughts so often never revealed. We see the truth of the two minds; the inner debate combined with the outer reality.

The human race has greatly prospered over the centuries by that combination of selfs; inner and outer. There is nothing wrong with revealing such, to ourselves or to the others surrounding us in such a debate.

Nothing to see here other than just a few humans having a great debate about a future election. Neither side is right or wrong; both sides are showing us their humanity. Enjoy!

[vt]

Re: Trump to win?

These behaviors may ultimately elect Trump:

http://theamericanmirror.com/video-a...dees-gauntlet/

[Woodsman]

Re: Trump to win?

This explains a lot including why we should tax the hell out of billionaires.
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/gr...-steve-bannon/

Mellivora capensis non assis.



Si mundus vult decipi, decipiatur.

In all the elections I've either followed as a spectator or engaged in as an operator, the media inevitably develops these silly narratives about this or that Republican insider as representative some deep and awful thing about the campaign and candidate. We remember the names - Ed Rollins the bare knuckle pugilist and Lee Atwater the bad boy of the GOP (whom the gods destroyed) immediately come to mind. And for the GOP side it's always the same story regardless of who are assigned the role:

"Gee, Bob. [GOP operative] has a reputation as a [fighter/hyper-aggressive/hard-charging/meanie/devious/mysterious]. What do you think that say's about the campaign?

"Well, Sam, I think it means we can look forward to really nasty campaign."

The template never changes for the Democratic operator and here the manager is usually portrayed as similarly aggressive but always guided by the light, always on the right side of history. The classic example must be D. A. Pennebaker's depiction of James Carville and George Stephanopoulos as the ying and yang of Democratic politics - the "ragin' cajun" and the "preppie tough guy - in his film, "The War Room."

In the end, it's the shopworn Manichean narrative the media foist on the public, with Democrats always representing perfect goodness and the GOP the embodiment of the world's evils. The low information folks love a good morality play and the media is happy to warm-up last night's dinner for them.

In this cycle, the villain role was initially assigned to Paul Manafort but it seemed no matter how much the Clinton media attempted to portray him as Trump's evil Svengali, they never could sell it. The public, conditioned to see Trump as a unitary leader, never paid much attention to his staff and Manafort always kept it low key. The short-lived attempt to smear him based on "secret handwritten ledgers" of dubious provenance "found" by a government whose very existence is due entirely to it's role in the New Cold War against Russia seems to me like a transparent effort to advance the Clinton line of Trump as a "Putin's agent." Once it became known that among the high-profile lobbyists registered to represent organizations backing deposed Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich included prominent Democratic lobbyists Anthony Podesta (whose brother John is "the man behind Hillary's campaign") and Republican lobbyists Vin "PNAC" Weber and Billy "PhRMA" Tauzin, the effort fell flat and the media moved on.

Now that Manafort is gone, the Clinton media have a new character in their quadrennial morality play in the person of Steve Bannon. Only Bannon seems unfazed by it all and might actually relish the prospect of being portrayed as Darth Vader to Trump's Emperor Palpatine. Whatever his impact on the Trump campaign, it's clear the DNC media machine and the Clinton camp are struggling to adapt to the turn of events and find themselves having to reorganize their plan.

Mr. Bloomberg's shop advances the "evil Bannon" narrative in this interview starting at 22:50, immediately following a free campaign ad for Hillary Clinton.

I think the departure of Manafort, he was first sidelined, and then gone—the initial read from inside Clinton world on the shakeup was, ‘Wow well, that’s confirming that things are in a giant mess over there,’ so they thought that was good. The departure of Manafort is a bit of a wildcard, right? He was a tempering influence, or at least he attempted to be, and they really don’t know what to expect now. Uncertainty is never a good thing.”

When asked about Bannon she said, “They felt they could draw some sort of box, as long as Manafort was in the picture. He would not let Trump do X, whatever X is, and those lines are basically not there anymore.”

She added, “They are not wrong to say from the beginning, that they expected there to be a bloodbath in September or October, into November, that it would be extremely nasty. And they would be ready for anything. I mean, from Monica Lewinsky to whatever. Hillary Clinton knows, in the process of running for office, all those things will come her way. I think what they didn’t plan for was the sort of complete, unpredictability and kind of, you know, it’s beyond the question of how do they respond. It’s a question of, they have absolutely no idea what they might be hit with on any day, and that throws people off their footing. I think there is definitely now a sense, within a lot of the close Clinton advisers, that, I mean, it’s just buckle up. They figure it’s going to be extraordinarily nasty and unpleasant on a day-to-day basis, and that she is ready for it.”

Curiously absent from the narrative is any focus on Clinton's campaign lead Robby Mook, whom among other accolades is described as the "the first openly gay manager of a major presidential campaign."



What does exist is typical of the media's "four legs good, two legs better" narrative, with Mook described as Hillary Clinton's Mafia don.

His campaigns are known for effectively defining the opposing politician—an essential strategy in today's political landscape, but one that can also have unintended consequences. In 2013, Time called he McAuliffe-Cuccinelli battle, " The Dirtiest, Nastiest, Low-Down Campaign In America," and while Mook's man won, the cost was high: McAuliffe has struggled to make political progress while in office, amid constant battles with an entrenched Republican legislature. "[McAuliffe] didn't have a mandate for having run on anything in their point of view besides 'Ken Cuccinelli sucks,' then they basically shut him down the first year," Benjamin Tribbett, a Virginia political blogger and strategist, told me. "It was like a dog trying to catch a squirrel. What was missing in that campaign was what happens once you catch the squirrel." Suggesting that the hype surrounding Mook may be overblown, Tribbett speculated that he may be good at putting himself on winning campaigns, and then claiming credit when demographics trend in his favor.

It's not hard to see a Mook-managed Clinton campaign playing out the same way. The 2016 presidential election will almost certainly get dirty and negative, but Mook's tactics could push things further in that direction. And in the event that Clinton is elected, a particularly savage campaign could make it next to impossible for her to get her agenda past congressional Republicans already predisposed to blocking her at every turn.

In November, ABC News revealed the existence of a listserv called the "Mook Mafia," a group of 150 or so Democratic campaign vets led by Mook and his buddy Marlon Marshall. The emails reported by ABC were relatively light blows—claims to "smite Republicans mafia-style" and "punish those voters"—but the attitude could raise larger issues as Mook gains a bigger national profile. Having a campaign managed by a man who openly compares himself to a mafia don might not be the best way for Clinton to distance herself from the perception that she is a political insider who sees her nomination as an inevitable coronation. And there's always the possibility that more damning emails or communications between the group have yet to be revealed—unflattering comments from Washington, DC, listservs have a way of revealing themselves at the most inopportune times.

My limited experience informs me that most senior political operatives are not the sort you'd want your son or daughter to marry. In American electoral politics, it is axiomatic that the most successful operatives are those with the least amount of scruples in advancing their candidate's (and their own) interests. While the three-reel morality play inevitably portrays the Democrat as good and Republican as evil, they all seem to come out of the nastiest side of the pond.

It's a job requirement, really, and nice guys should retire to the beach and get a dog.

In the end, it's the candidate who wins or loses an election, with lead staff always winning, either rewarded with plum administration posts or left to cash in via tell-all books or lucrative consulting contracts. It remains to be seen what Bannon's impact will be in terms of Trump's prospects in the final dash to election day. Clearly he has the Clinton camp and her media assets running scared.

[shiny!]

Re: Trump to win?

... Last night in Charlotte, North Carolina, the notoriously unrepentant Donald Trump shocked observers by expressing "regret" for words that "may have caused personal pain."

The entire quote: Sometimes, in the heat of debate and speaking on a multitude of issues, you don’t choose the right words or you say the wrong thing. I have done that, and I regret it, particularly where it may have caused personal pain. Too much is at stake for us to be consumed with these issues.

Wow, after a year, Trump's handlers got him to offer a "sincere" apology.



Oops, not so much.

Trump's reply, "Well they have to take it as they see it" was not warm but showed good boundaries. We're responsible for our words but not for how others interpret our words. He took responsibility by saying he regretted speaking words that caused pain. It's up to the people who felt hurt by his words to decide if it was enough of an apology.

I think Trump is constitutionally incapable of being politically correct. With so many people feeling hurt and offended by so many things nowdays, he's always going to be offending someone. In this era of political correctness run amok, even if he accomplishes nothing else, I hope his candidacy puts an end to PC.

... it's not lying. It's doublethink.

It's knowing and then not knowing as a supreme act of human intellect and will. It's consciousness of complete truthfulness held while delivering exquisitely constructed lies. It's the mental capacity to hold simultaneously two opinions that cancel each other out, knowing them to be a contradiction yet still believing them both with absolutely certainty. It's the expert use of logic to defeat logic. It's laying claim to morality while at the same time repudiating it.

...

It's not mere lying like you and I might lie, to protect ourselves or gain advantage. No, it's the truth of forgetfulness empowered by infallible memory and a willful amnesia applied to the process of lying itself.

It's exquisite and perfect and requires a discipline and commitment no mere truth teller or factualist could possibly achieve. I'm not sure that it's possible to defeat. I think one can only recognize it and call attention to it, as one would a toxic plant or dangerous animal.

I understand what Woodsman is saying from a different paradigm. What Woodsman describes as doublethink is a type of dishonesty that is very real and common in co-dependent addictive systems. Our society is not healthy; it's a co-dependent, addictive society. Current governmental, political, economic, educational and medical systems are highly dysfunctional, like a beat-up old clock. The gears are missing teeth, twisted and bent but they still manage to work together and keep a semblance of time. What happens if you replace one of the bad gears with a shiny new gear? The clock won't run at all. Addicts and co-dependents thus fear change as death and resist it accordingly.

When people are powerless to stop abuse or escape it they often lie in order to survive. Sometimes they lie to themselves so well that they identify with their abuser and become abusers in turn. When people lie to themselves they invariably lie to other people who are also lying to themselves. Their lies become a habit and permanently skew their perception of reality. The choices they make and relationships they choose are all in support of their lies. Their bent perception of truth is a bent gear in a large, dysfunctional clock filled with other bent gears.

Psychopaths lie without conscience or remorse. They believe themselves above the law and immune to consequences. Personally, I think that Hillary Clinton is a psychopath but that's just my opinion, and opinions are not necessarily facts. I don't know if she believes her lies or not.

Then there are the lies told by addicts who will say and do anything keep their fix coming, whether they be addicted to substances, processes or intangibles such as fame, adulation and power. Their lies go hand-in-hand with the lies told by their co-dependent enablers. These are the kinds of lies that 1984 and Woodsman call doublespeak.

People trapped in dysfunctional systems rely on the following coping mechanisms (lies) to survive. Example: A child is beaten or witnesses her father beating her mother or mother beating a sibling:

Repression: I remember it happening but I don't want to think about it.

Suppression: I'll make myself forget it happened.

Minimization: It happened but it wasn't all that bad. He didn't actually break any bones.

Rationalization: It happened but I/she/he must have deserved it. He did it because he loves me.

Denial: It didn't happen. He didn't beat her, she fell and hurt herself because she's clumsy.

Dissociation: I can't bear it so I'll leave my body and watch from the ceiling, or split into different personalities to distance myself.

Trump is confronting our rotten-to-the-core co-dependent political system and threatening the rotten-to-the-core oligarchy that pays for it. He's not my ideal choice of person to do this and he's not doing it tactfully or gracefully, but he's doing it. What he's doing is dangerous. Remember the story of the emperor who had no clothes? When the child shouts, "The Emperor has no clothes!," everyone who praised the non-existent rainment is exposed as a liar or a fool. What do you think they did to that child after the story ends?

[Woodsman]

Re: Trump to win?

...What do you think they did to that child after the story ends?

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Trump to win?

the media inevitably develops these silly narratives

The article was written in October of 2015 and barely mentions Trump. It provides some interesting insights on how the alternative press, right and left, intersect with the mainstream media.

[santafe2]

Re: Trump to win?

too bitter for me. from hot anger to cold anger. my hope was we could get past the anger but i guess not.

While I'm out on this discussion I do think it's important for iTulipers who continue to want change in the US to support Sander's new website and movement, Our Revolution. I joined and donated today and would encourage anyone here willing to work for change to do the same. HRC is far from perfect but if millions of Americans push her in the right direction, we'll be in a better place four years from now. There are currently over 2000 local groups. Join one and work to make this country better.

[Woodsman]

Re: Trump to win?

While I'm out on this discussion I do think it's important for iTulipers who continue to want change in the US to support Sander's new website and movement, Our Revolution. I joined and donated today and would encourage anyone here willing to work for change to do the same. HRC is far from perfect but if millions of Americans push her in the right direction, we'll be in a better place four years from now. There are currently over 2000 local groups. Join one and work to make this country better.

Didn't think you could stay away. Only to call what you do in this thread "discussing" is more of the same doublespeak. Really, it's more like a drive-by; roll down the window, take a few pot shots and speed off. But welcome back just the same.

Supporting Sanders right now is folly unless you don't mind that money going to the DNC and the Clinton campaign.

I think giving any aid and comfort to the Democrats after the underhanded and undemocratic way Bernie was treated at the hands of Hillary and the DNC is a fool's errand. The current leadership must be defeated and I think one of the best ways to ensure that happens is to deny them any financial or in-kind support. Democrats who oppose the Unpopular Front, the neoliberal/neoconservative union of the DNC/RNC and media, can only stay out of their way as they drive the party into the ditch. Only then, after the Clintonistas are purged, is it safe to re-engage.

As it stands, Bernie's organization has barely hatched and is already been co-opted by the Clinton campaign. Regardless of their assurances, any dollars or in-kind contributions benefit Hillary first. Fool me once, shame on you...

The man who led Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign vowed Monday night during a conference call with DNC officials that Sanders was committed to traveling the country to campaign for Hillary Clinton and down-ballot Democratic candidates.

“This is not going to be an easy task and it’s going to take all of us rowing together,” Jeff Weaver said.

The private conference call – which included top Democratic National Committee officials including chief of staff Brandon Davis and state party leaders – was led by DNC interim Chairwoman Donna Brazile, who had met with Weaver and Sanders’ top campaign adviser Mark Longabaugh earlier in the day. According to DNC officials, the three discussed Sanders’ schedule as well as voter mobilization among former Sanders supporters.

Brazile told those on the conference call that Weaver had agreed to help her “through this election process and beyond.”

The call focused on a 50-state strategy for the November election to be implemented soon by members of Clinton’s campaign and Sanders’ former presidential team.

The close interactions between the interim DNC chairwoman and the Sanders campaign is in stark contrast to earlier in the presidential cycle when the campaign criticized now-former DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz as unfairly partial to Clinton.

“I know that sometimes in primaries there can be sharp elbows, and I hope I haven’t bumped into too many of you,” Weaver said on the call. “But as we go forward into the general election, I’m very happy to be working with members of the Clinton team in trying to get the secretary elected.”

Weaver noted that Sanders’ organization Our Revolution has raised nearly $300,000 for liberal Democratic down-ballot and congressional candidates.

Brazile thanked Weaver and the Sanders team for their leadership and organizing ability for up and down the ballot. The team has been “tremendous in reaching out, helping out, filling gaps,” she said...

In private call, DNC flexes unity with Clinton camp and Sanders team

Any dollars to Bernie goes directly to Hillary. It is giving Democrats aid and comfort and a most cynical, if entirely Clintonian, gambit. As for Dan Weaver, the fellow seems too eager to be pushed around by the Clinton campaign, and I can't forget what a milquetoast he turned out to be in the face of Robby Mook's bullying. Left Democrats are better advised to support Jill Stein if they can't stomach a strategic vote for Trump. Giving any aid and comfort to Clinton is typical of the self-defeating, TINA-attitude the Clinton camp demands of Left Democrats. I hope they learned their lesson in the primaries.

My bet is that over the next several months Our Revolution will be exposed as a DNC funding operation. And then it will vanish into irrelevance like Obama's OFA. Holding Clinton accountable is the only chance Left Democrats have to be effective in this election and that means no aid and comfort to the enemy. Rewarding Clinton after what they did to Bernie is just dumb. Why would anyone expect the Clintons not cheat again?

I won't forget Bernie talking of us holding Hillary's feet to the fire and we all saw how well that didn’t work during the convention.Those delegates with ‘silenced’ tape over their mouths said it all perfectly, without uttering a word. And now Bernie is campaigning for Clinton like the good sheepdog he feels he must be.

I'm not falling for it and I hope Left Democrats are smarter that that.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Trump to win?

If you have given up on Chris Hedges or just found him too out there, try this. It is tonic. I have a Polish friend here in Chiang Mai. She says it is spot on. 30 minutes.
http://www.truthdig.com/avbooth/item...irtue_20160819

[vt]

Re: Trump to win?

Hillary sounds a bit short of cash. Maybe she needs Bernie's help.

http://nypost.com/2016/08/21/clinton...or-more-funds/

[santafe2]

Re: Trump to win?

Didn't think you could stay away. Only to call what you do in this thread "discussing" is more of the same doublespeak. Really, it's more like a drive-by; roll down the window, take a few pot shots and speed off. But welcome back just the same.

Supporting Sanders right now is folly unless you don't mind that money going to the DNC and the Clinton campaign.

I think giving any aid and comfort to the Democrats after the underhanded and undemocratic way Bernie was treated at the hands of Hillary and the DNC is a fool's errand. The current leadership must be defeated and I think one of the best ways to ensure that happens is to deny them any financial or in-kind support. Democrats who oppose the Unpopular Front, the neoliberal/neoconservative union of the DNC/RNC and media, can only stay out of their way as they drive the party into the ditch. Only then, after the Clintonistas are purged, is it safe to re-engage.

I get that you want everyone else to share your Republican shit sandwich Woody but I wasn't talking to you or your crayon companions. This is a serious movement. In all likelihood, HRC will win the election. If we stop working to move her away from her neo-liberal tenancies, we may get less from her than we got from Obama over the last eight years. These are professional politicians. They only move in the right direction when we push them. I intend to continue to push the current system in the right direction. I would encourage other iTulipers to do the same. I would encourage you to re-read your posts in support for Sanders before you respond to this post. While I don't think he is the right person to represent the Democratic Party, I do support many of his ideas and the only way to make some of them come to fruition is to continue to work. It won't be easy.

[Woodsman]

Re: Trump to win?

You wouldn't know serious if it kissed you on your cheek, Santa.

You witnessed the lies Obama fed the public during his two campaigns. You witnessed his turn to the right and unmasking as a neoliberal in the truest sense. You saw him double-down on the Cheney administration's worst policies, domestic and international, and you talk about seriousness?

You saw all of this and witness HRC running toward the right with the worst of the neoconservative elements behind her, pushing her further rightward, as she proclaims she will continue the Obama agenda. But somehow, in your Saturday morning cartoon concept of politics, you think enabling her will get you what you claim you desire.

You don't know much, least of all the role of the left in American politics. There's a short little book called "Death of the Liberal Class" you might want to read as it explains what you fail to understand, refuse to understand. The job of the left is not to gain power - beware any leftist who seeks power - but to serve as the conscience of liberals, to pull liberals from their natural tendencies to move right, a tendency made crystal clear by the tenure of William Jefferson Clinton and his wife Hillary. That means rewarding them when they do good and punishing them when they do otherwise. You seem to think that this is the same as handing Hillary a blank check. It is not.

Your rhetoric no longer corresponds with reality. Faced with the prospect of the hard work of actual resistance which is never easy and never without personal cost, you and those like you prefer the fiction of resistance in the form of useless moral posturing that costs nothing, requires no sacrifice, no commitment. Better to secure a place as one of the Democratic Party's self-appointed scolds and pretend that you are part of the debate by issuing pathetic cries of protests, only softly so that no one in authority need be troubled.

In precisely the same way that liberal goodthinkers rewarded Obama with a Nobel Peace Prize on the basis of "hope" alone, people like you are determined to reward Hillary with the presidency. Should that unfortunate circumstance come to fruition, I will be sorely disappointed for a day or so. You, however, will have at least four years to reflect on the disasters your jejune magical thinking has wrought.

And the "next Trump" will in all likelihood fulfill the dark nightmares you've convinced yourself the present one portends.