Humans have the remarkable ability to carry opposing views in their heads, with heartfelt passion. How do you square "love thy neighbor as yourself" with the supreme cruelty and emotional torture of separating children from their mother? Justifying this horrific act with "that will teach these criminals from invading our country." (Has anyone else noticed that there is no migrant invasion of Russia?)
A contractor working on our house admired our house cats. Then observed that he has "friends upriver" who shoot cats for fun. Some of these proud outlaws go to church and praise Jesus in the morning and attend a Trump hate rally in the afternoon.
... the whole thing is often called an "experiment" (not sure where that started) and it's more or less held together through thick and thin (Civil War, Depressions). Right now the test tubes are certainly on high boil.
And I don't think November results will cool the fires.
So we have two old men with histories of repeated mendacity. But it’s off limits to talk about the lies of one, because “but Biden”.
Not gonna fly Abraham.
You missed perhaps the most important aspect of why so many people are willing to overlook Trump’s lies.
Trumps lies don’t directly hurt us. When he says he’s the greatest businessman ever, it doesn’t take food off my table, or money out of my pocket.
When Biden says the border is secure, another 10,000 illegals move into town and start sucking up tax money, and more people die of Fentanyl poisoning.
If you want to vote for Joe Biden, go for it. I wont because he harms me, my friends and family.
That's inconsistent. Biden has nearly doubled the border guards. 1,000's are stopped at the border everyday. But, there 2 things to consider. The border is 2000 miles. Monitoring every inch is impossible. The second thing is that the countries south of the border experienced way worse economic hardship due to Covid. The US has recovered faster than any other developed nation and the countries south of us are in bad economic shape and want their poor to leave. Conversely, the US has 3.4% unemployment and wages are rising. Agricultural businesses are not able to find cheap labor anywhere and so are eager to hire foreign labor. Its a perfect storm
Now there is a strong immigration bill ready to be signed by Congress. Trump has told congress to not pass it because it will make Biden look bad. He doesn't care what it does to your family.
I think Trump's efforts to BLOCK a bi-partisan immigration bill (after about 40 yrs) so that he can use the issue to his own advantage shows that he puts his own political career ahead of the country.
He shows again that he doesn't care about you or me or anyone other than himself. Border security is just an election promise for Trump. Remember I'll build the Wall and Mexico will pay for it? Whatever happened to that promise? Never happened because he never meant it; it was nothing more than an election slogan, a 3-syllable chant at his rallies.
I fear Trump because he's skilled political operator (promise them what they want to hear) with millions who follow him because he tells them what they want to hear.
But it's pure narcissism: block a bi-partisan bill (how rare is a bi-partisan anything?) that isn't perfect but will do something at least for the country - block it because he wants to use the issue in the election. Pure narcissism.
I guess the stable genius has forgotten JFK's "Ask not ..."
Biden and the Dems have a lot of failings, but it's Trump who's stepping in and saying No, don't fix the problem. I want the problem for my campaign.
TJSwift I can't believe you said with complete seriousness that Trump's lies haven't hurt anyone. Trump's Covid lies alone cost tens of thousands of American lives at a low bar. He told the whole country there was nothing to worry about! And the elections theft lies are just as damaging. He lied his way into office, and all the way through, and has fundamentally removed from reality the minds of millions of Americans.
What Covid lies? That the vaccine would give immunity? That it would keep people from spreading it? That you might not die?
No, lad. Those were all Democrat lies.
And if you really believe that 80 million people voted for a doddering meat puppet that campaigned from his basement I’ve got a low mileage used car for sale that you must look at.
Biden is an amazing politician who has 40 years of legislative experience. But if you prefer an entertaining circus clown, with a slue of indictments including sharing top secret documents with our enemies, than experience, wisdom, and patriotism won't matter to you
Well, TJ, from your response I can see we don't live in the same reality. You can deny Trump's lies all you want, they're right in front of your eyes. It was a global pandemic, Trump mishandled it, and he lost the election due to his mistakes. I fully believe Trump would have won in 2020 if not for how badly he bungled the whole thing.
On top of that, you are proposing even more lies about how the election was stolen. 60 failed court cases proved Trump was lying about that. It's clear this convo isn't going anywhere productive. But just focusing on the Coronavirus pandemic, do you believe Trump was telling the truth in all these direct quotes?
Jan. 22, 2020: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China. It’s going to be just fine.”
Feb. 7, 2020: “It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flu... This is deadly stuff.” [Trump in a private interview with Bob Woodward from The Washington Post made public on Sept. 9, 2020]
Feb. 10, 2020: “I think the virus is going to be—it’s going to be fine.”
Feb. 10, 2020: “Looks like by April, you know in theory when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.”
Feb. 24, 2020: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA… the Stock Market starting to look very good to me!”
Feb. 25, 2020: “CDC and my Administration are doing a GREAT job of handling Coronavirus.”
Feb. 26, 2020: “The 15 (cases in the US) within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
Feb. 26, 2020: “We're going very substantially down, not up.”
Feb. 26, 2020: “Well, we're testing everybody that we need to test. And we're finding very little problem. Very little problem.”
Feb. 26, 2020: "This is a flu. This is like a flu."
Feb. 27, 2020: “It’s going to disappear. One day, it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
*Well, TJ, from your response I can see we don't live in the same reality. You can deny Trump's lies all you want, they're right in front of your eyes.*
Excuse me, but fuck your reality. Trump lies. Biden Lies. Obama lied. Bush lied. IDGAF about the lying; they all lie. What I care about is how those lies affect me.
The Coronavirus scam is fully documented. The number of times the CDC has back tracked, "updated", deleted previous press releases and outright lied to us is enough to convince all but the most dim person they're corrupt.
The very first thing I did when the virus became news, was to look up the known characteristics; particularly the size. The dimeter is 100nm. You want to guess what the minimum opening in a surgical mask is? No? How about a cloth mask sporting your favorite sportsball team, or some sequins?
It was all bullshit, man. Covid killed the same people that flu kills; old people and people with existing problems. Everyone else had a couple of bad days. And what REALLY should piss you off is what they did to kids. The death from Covid among kids 20 and younger was .0001%. But they still had kids wearing those fucking masks and shut the schools down.
Sorry, not sorry for my frank language; I have no patience with Covidiots.
Thank you for articulating a difference that I struggle to explain. There is a materiality test for every action. What is that actual material harm done. I find that many people cannot do that assessment well. They do not compartmentalize their emotional impacts from a calm calculation of cost vs benefit, harm vs help, risks vs rewards.
I always ask that question. What was Trump actually done to materially harm the people that hate him? Nothing really. Now, Joe Biden's policies have caused, and are causing, massive material harm to the majority of the population. And Joe Biden is aligned with the establishment also responsible for massive harm to the people.
Mean Tweets don't measure up by an order of magnitude.
1 million+ Americans dead from Covid would argue that Trump's mishandling of the pandemic resulted in material harm done to them. Trump could have done much more to slow the spread, encourage people to wear masks, follow CDC guidance - that would have saved a lot of lives. Instead he lied over and over again.
Biden lies too, yes (though I expect we'd disagree on what qualifies as lies) - but the scale and severity are just really not comparable. The thing is, when you already believe Trump's lies, everyone else looks like liars when they disagree.
1 million? Lol,no. not even counting guys who crashed their motorcycles, or drowned due to Covid. The masks did nothing but make laughingstocks of the nitwits wearing them.
No, Trump could not have done more to slow the spread especially with Democrat attacking every policy decision he made or attempted to make. Trump led the country when we did not know much about the virus. Biden promised to end COVID and many more people died while he was in office. And then the Biden Democrats caused even more human harm with their stupid draconian pandemic policies.
Trump could have done a lot more to slow the spread. He lied about the risks, downplayed it in public while in private he understood it was "a plague," and refused to promote mask-wearing which would have prevented the virus from spreading so easily. Those 3 things could have saved a lot of lives.
Look at my comment reply to TJSwift for direct quotes from Trump's mishandling of the pandemic. All he had to do was let the CDC do its job, but he undercut them and Fauci at every step while (as you correctly point out) "we did not know much about the virus." As we learned and CDC guidance changed, Trump threw Fauci under the bus instead of supporting him and explaining that we were still learning about this completely new virus.
It's to the point now that Fauci is getting death threats and requires constant guard to protect him.
Trump was President when the Covid vaccine was developed and administered. Trump is telling congress not to pass the new border control bill developed by him and Republican leaders.
Mr. Swift, Trump also claimed he'd secured the border (pre-Covid) when he had not, and he also claimed the vaccine provided immunity from Covid (which it certainly does, in the ordinary medical sense of boosting our effective immune response).
Trump imposed tariffs on Chinese and other countries' goods and said China and other countries would pay them, but it's we who pay for tariffs--ordinary Americans--not China. Trump initiated a tax cut heavily skewed to benefit the wealthy and claimed he was strengthening the American economy, while the cuts in fact massively increased the deficit and debt with minimal benefit for all Americans but the wealthy. Trump claimed Covid was completely under control for the two months when the US had the best chance of effectively responding; he encouraged people to ignore it in their everyday lives while privately (and correctly) saying it was spreading at a terrifying rate. Trump asserted that climate change was a Chinese hoax and opposed any form of technological shift to respond to it, at a cost ordinary Americans in cities, towns, and rural areas will be paying for generations. Trump lied and has never stopped lying about the integrity of our electoral system of government, ratcheting up the demonizing rhetoric of division that bonds his base to him personally and poisons all of our lives as we try to get along every day.
Frank asks, "What has Trump actually done to materially harm the people that hate him? Nothing really," and you agree with him. I can't really understand how the two of you can fail to see it.
Trump did more to secure the border than any other President in the past 20 years, including GW Bush. The inflow was staunched to a trickle.
All this, despite the active opposition of the reprobate, anti-American Democrats and the deliberate inaction of the feckless GOP.
Our economy, the real economy that matters to me and you, was better by every measure under Trump.
Everyone would be better off if they’d stop buying the cheap Chinese crap they don’t need. We need to pick up our mining of rare earth minerals and take back our own manufacturing capabilities.
Trump will likely not help with that, but neither will the trash in control of the doddering meat puppet in the White House.
TJ wrote: "You missed perhaps the most important aspect of why so many people are willing to overlook Trump’s lies. Trumps lies don’t directly hurt us. When he says he’s the greatest businessman ever, it doesn’t take food off my table, or money out of my pocket."
That's a very interesting explanation: "Trump's lies don't directly hurt us."
You're saying most Trump supporters know he's lying, but don't care.
Thanks for that; it's gonna take some thinking about.
And ps, I'm no great fan of Biden or the Dems; it's Trump (and his MAGA movement) that scares me, and my goal here is to try to understand the thinking (or sometimes non-thinking) behind Trump's loyal supporters.
I'm trying to understand the thinking process of people who don't see Trump as a liar or a threat, and comments from Frank and TJ and others "help" in the sense of giving me insight into their thinking.
When TJ says he gauges lies by their consequences and impact on his life, that helps me understand and gives me food for thought - from TJs perspective, he (and I assume others) admit Trump lies, but they don't care unless it impacts them personally. That's a uniques perspective; not all MAGAs are blind adherents of the Lyin' King.
And it shows again that there isn't ONE reason or one type of Trump follower. There are subsets, and TJ is representing (I think) that group of Americans who think "a pox on both their houses" and would prefer as little govt involvement in their lives as possible - but in the current Dem-Rep dichotomy, they see Trump & Repubs as the lesser of 2 evils.
Maybe I should let TJ speak for himself, but for me he has thrown more light on understanding how and why people support Trump.
I take your point. But I put more weight into what you do than what you say. Trump will say anything to line his pockets. Not doing anything is the same as doing something and through Trump’s neglect and incompetence he has hurt everyone regardless of whether it's sitting on your chest or miles away.
Biden is not very charming or headline creating but he gets things done that immediately help people. The covid relief package saved my ass and continues to help to this day.
Biden does a lot of dumb things to. Like tolerating a genocide going on right in front of him/us.
Trumps lost NYC (his home town) in the 2016 election by 84% and 79% in the 2020 election but NYC had decades of bullshit from him and his family so that's scans. I doubt if this will help you figure out why people support him knowing he's a habitual liar but I can identify with being a flippant sarcastic asshole I just don't want him running the country and scaring the shit out of the rest of the world IMHO
Of the two Trump followers I know one is a man who is a malignant narcissist. The other is a woman who is a born again Christian. The narcissist, is also a pathological liar.
The Christian woman believes Donald Trump is the chosen one to lead her and the flock to the Rapture where, at the end of the world, they will fly up to heaven, and be with Jesus. People like Franklin Graham lead the effort to teach this nonsense. It’s all in the Bible, book of Revelations.
My neighbor is an evangelical minister. We never discuss politics, but once I asked him how people with strong spiritual values can support someone like Trump. He said Trump's appeal was one word: abortion. How anyone can believe Trump has a moral bone in his body is beyond me, but he promised (and delivered) on anti-abortion judges on the Supreme Court, so his hold of evangelicals is unshakeable: he delivered for them, and they'll deliver for him.
So there are a lot of 1-issue people willing to overlook his flaws in order to get their issue addressed.
Beyond the abortion issue, I cannot fathom how supposedly "Christian" people can fall Trump; I have to give him credit as America's Greatest Conman. (Sadly, Hitler was Germany's greatest conman, and that didn't end well).
Trump will say anything to help Trump; and he knows what his followers want to hear.
I believe the abortion issue is important, of course. But I believe many devout Christians, evangelicals, born agains, just use that issue for explanation purposes, so they don’t have to cop to going for the rapture baby.
The woman I spoke of above, says one of her most important issues and why she favors Trump is the border problem. She never mentions abortion. She’s a childless woman, and in my observation, hasn’t experienced empathy to a very large extent.
my wife predicted that the expected Red Wave of 2022 midterms would crash on the overturning of Roe v Wade, and we also saw pro-choice ballot issues win in solid red states. That's the women's vote, she says, and now that SCOTUS is ready to ban abortion drugs, she thinks there will be a similar blow-back from women in Nov. 2024.
She's an excellent forecaster, so I hope she's right again and American women save American democracy.
we've been married over 50 years and my policy has always been "you're right, dear, and I'm wrong" (because being with her was more important than being right)
But on things like this, she actually is right. The timing of SCOTUS decision will be important; hopefully it'll be close enough (maybe in the summer) to stir up emotions and voter turnout for Nov.
Clearly SCOTUS and MAGA are off-side on this issue, and hopefully will be their downfall.
It will be their downfall Abraham. There are many busy folks who don’t have the time to voice their opinions on these forums. But what’s to say? They already know what they’re going to do. Vote against the attempt to take away our God given rights.
Biden tells real lies like he breaths. Trump uses imperfect speech like do most normal Americans and the media chattering class exploits it for a disingenuous media circus. Trump's opposition lies about Trump more than Trump lies.
Here's my issue with Trump's "imperfect speech" in this case. In the middle of this speech, he says, "Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley --" then switches gears to talking about the January 6th Committee supposedly destroying all the evidence. He had time in that interval to actually THINK about what he was saying and who he was talking about. Instead, after the tangent he went on, he comes back to "Nikki Haley -- is in charge of security. We offered her 10,000..." I understand that due to the primary election, he'd have Nikki Haley on the brain. What I don't understand is how he can't seem to identify the right person for his weird interpretation of January 6th. And on top of that, how is it advantageous for him to be talking about January 6th at all? Does he not understand that "anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law" applies until he is convicted or acquitted in that same court of law?
Also, "Biden tells real lies like he breaths[,]" and "Trump's opposition lies about Trump more than Trump lies." Can you support those statements with any unbiased evidence from legitimate news sources? I'm always open to learning new things, but I haven't seen evidence of anything resembling these two statements. What I do see is a fulfillment of Abraham's point #3 above. I've said it many times in many different places: no matter how badly you may want it to be so, whataboutism is not an argument or a defense.
I think if it wasn't for "whataboutism" many Trump-supporters wouldn't have a response to any criticism of Trump.
Also, I kind of stuck to his "pathological lying" as a focus, but that little clip sure reveals something about his declining mental fitness (oops, here comes the "Biden is more unfit")
2. the Nikki Haley clip isn't "imperfect speech"; it's a blatant lie; or, he's seriously confused.
3. his opposition lies more than trump - again, that's just deflection.
Frank, you're an intelligent, educated, reasonable, engaged citizen: can you really say (without denial, defence, or deflection) that Trump doesn't have a problem telling the truth?
AW, like you I believe Frank is an intelligent person. But he is not responding to the question of your post, which is why so many people have shifted their political allegiance to a pathological liar. This isn't a question Frank can really respond to because he denies the premise. If Frank wrote a blog item that asked, "Why are so many Democrats willing to overlook the fact that Biden lies like he breathes" how could you and I respond? We wouldn't, we'd deny the premise, just as Frank has denied yours. The two positions appear functionally equivalent and the questions appear mutually non-adjudicable.
To get at the difference I think you need to look for an answer to your question and then compare what the answer to Frank's question might be. I think at that level you will find that some of the symmetry disappears. Here are a few respects in which I think the evidence shows some difference that may be enlightening.
1) Although a common factor in some of both faith in Trump and faith in Biden is probably political/cultural "tribalism," faith in Trump among MAGA followers seems unreserved, faith in Biden among Democrats seems hedged by doubts (as we see when the "mainstream media" highlight every Biden gaffe and factcheck him when he does say something that isn't true--which he has certainly done).
2) Among those on the left of center, outright criticism of Biden and heightened awareness of his weaknesses comes mostly from the extreme left--progressives don't like him and those who are most accurately described as "woke" see no essential difference between the two men: they're both equally purveyors of an oppressor for of late-stage capitalism. Among those on the right of center, outright criticism of Trump is strongest among those closest to the center: the anti-Trump "RINOs." During Trump's term in office I was tracking the alt-Right and white nationalism and many of those people were very critical of Trump. But they gradually came to support him and are now monolithically happy with him--the most visible example is Nick Fuentes. Progressives are increasingly distancing themselves from Biden.
3) Those who support Biden generally base their views on what is presented in traditional news sources, or "mainstream media"--what Trump/MAGA labels "fake news." (I do believe these media generally have a liberal bias--although a large part of it is the inheritance of what was once establishment centrism.) Those deeply committed to Trump often base their views on Fox News, which was established as a Reagan Republican media outlet (and for which I think MCNBC provides a rough parallel), but also very broadly get their news from "alternative media" sources, such as YouTube channels, Alex Jones-style inheritors of the Limbaugh tradition, and social media. That last set--people who "do their own research"--seems highly invested in apophenic thinking: conspiracy theorizing that "connects the dots" to form a red-pilled expose of the illusory web of lies that blue-pilled sheeple have been taught to believe.
I think that examining these elements of the issue can help clarify how the apparent equivalence of the MAGA and Vanilla-Democrat worldviews are actually different in kind. There are other angles I think could be helpful as well, but this comment is already way too long.
thanks Robert, long but deeply knowledgeable and insightful; i'll have to re-read and re-think. But something in there caught my attention:
An insightful Trump-supporter with a very individualist perspective (kind of a "pox on both their houses") suggested that the map could be divided into 2 Americas, but from your answer and others I think there are more than 2 subsets of Americans.
The old Right-Left dichotomy doesn't hold for me any more. Clearly there are hard-core MAGAs (with more subsets), never-Trumpers, single-issue folks (anti-abortion) etc, while the Left is clearly fracturing.
And there are plenty of 3rd parties forming.
So the old Repub-Dem paradigm is shifting underneath our feet.
Whatever happens in November, the future of American political parties (and leadership) is unclear to me.
I don't think there has ever been a stable R-D paradigm, AW. When I was first politically active in the early to mid-1960s both parties were uneasy coalitions: the GOP included a large, socially liberal wing (Rockefeller types) and the Dems had the Dixiecrats. The Democrats fractured into ex-Dixiecrats, centrists, and the antiwar Left, while the GOP went through a longer arc of throwing out their liberals (they'll finally finish the job on the national level when Romney's term ends) and welcoming back an extremist fringe that they had largely ousted post-McCarthy (even Goldwater shunned them).
And don't forget that Roosevelt's 1932 campaign accused Hoover of leading America to "socialism." I think the parties are seldom what they seem.
agreed, but now the coalitions are breaking down - seems to me the most rock solid political constituency is Trump's MAGA base.
The good news is that it's reached its ceiling and can only splinter off subsets: some Rs will have trouble supporting him if he is convicted; others will abandon him if he softens his anti-abortion stance, etc.
All of this keeps bringing me back to Yeats's poem The Second Coming (written just after WW1 and prophesying the rise of Hitler and Stalin):
"things fall apart, the center cannot hold
the best lack all conviction
and the worst are full of passionate intensity"
ps, my peace of mind comes from seeing it all as chapters in history books, and we just happen to be living through this chapter.
Trump colluded with Russia to win in 2016 and might be a Russian agent.
Trump's move to restrict flights from China during early COVID was xenophobia.
Trump’s travel ban from five Muslim-majority countries during COVID was prompted by discrimination against Muslims or went beyond his authority.
Trump's 2017 tax cuts were only for the “rich” despite studies showing 80 percent of the population benefitted.
Trump was putting immigrant kids in cages, when the media photos were from 2014.
Trump compelled the Ukrainian government to hand over dirt on Joe Biden, after Joe Biden had pressured the Ukrainian government to fire a prosecutor investigating a company his son Hunter worked for. But Trump was guilty of impeachable offenses.
Trump led an insurrection.
Just a few media lies about Trump. Now do you want me to list all the Biden lies?
to me, most of those statements are "media lies about trump":
- his bromance with Putin (and other dictators) shows an alarming love of dictatorships, and Russia certainly tried to influence 2016 (and is doing it today)
- xenophobia - how about "vermin ... poisoning the bloodline of America"
- 80% of population benefitted to some degree; top % benefitted the most.
- Trump led an insurrection: if he didn't, why have so many of his lawyers and defenders pleaded guilty; and why were so many Jan.6 "peaceful protesters" convicted of so many crimes? Do you no longer believe in the American justice system?
And, by the way Frank, your whole list was deflection: look over there at the media liars. And then a bonus deflection: "want me to list all the Biden lies" - pure defection.
I guess you really believe everyone else is lying, but not Trump?
“how about "vermin ... poisoning the bloodline of America"
You’re quoting that verbatim. Which “vermin” are p”oisoning the bloodline” of America”? Who are you quoting, Abraham? Name that villain and cite the instance he said it. What do those ellipses mean, Abraham? Is that an accurate quote?
We have questions. Please clear this up for us. Thanks.
Good point, TJ. You're asking for credible evidence.
1. Trump on Truth Social, Dec.16, 2023: "Illegal immigration is poisoning the blood of our nation."
2. Trump at New Hampshire rally, Nov. 11, 2023: "we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists, and radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country"
So, two statement given at two widely separated times, discussing tow widely different topics. And yet you combined them in one quote. That is something I'd expect from leftist propaganda mill, Abraham. Shame on you.
And you did not even get the quotes right. "Poisoning our blood" is not the same as "poisoning our bloodline".
The first suggests we're being poisoned, which is silly. The latter suggests the ethnic cohesion of America is being deliberately undermined, which is an objective, undeniable fact.
I really think it's not useful to try to rebut these, AW, but . . .
It's hard to resist pointing out that the "travel ban from five Muslim-majority countries during COVID" took place in 2017--obviously it couldn't have been because the countries were Muslim: it was because there was going to be Covid three years later and we had to stop it at its source in the Middle East. And the media also lied in saying the order went beyond the President's authority, relying only on the irrelevant fact that it was so ruled by multiple federal courts.
Frank is absolutely correct that Joe Biden pressured the Ukrainian government to fire a prosecutor, and there was a connection to Burisma, the firm employing Hunter Biden. Biden specified at the time--as did our European allies--that the prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, had to go because he *wasn't* prosecuting rogue firms, including Burisma. But there they go again, those media, quibbling over details! There's certainly a lie in there somewhere, and we might as well attribute it to the news media, because . . . Fake.
And, yes, indeed: the "kids in cages" thing. *Obama* built the chain-link cages in 2014, not Mr. Trump! All Trump did was to make thrifty use of those cages and place kids he'd separated from their families in them. Not. His. Fault. The cages were already there! Why did the press lie by saying he'd put kids in them without specifying that if it weren't for Obama already building them the Trump administration might well have built kindergartens for those kids instead!
And Trump did not lead an insurrection! He couldn't have. The Secret Service physically coerced him into driving back to the White House when he tried to lead it. He was an innocent bysitter, helplessly watching the insurrection on TV while it was led instead by Ray Epps.
Well, this is what happens when I let myself off the leash.
I'm not a defender of Joe Biden or the current Democratic party, but (from my reading of history) America is approaching a precipice (not unlike Germany in the 1930s) where fundamental democratic institutions begin to fall (look at Trump's unrelenting attack on the American justice system) and where Truth and Facts are replaced with Lies and Propaganda.
All of the book reviews on this site are reflections and projections of what can and does happen when someone like Trump (and his fawning sycophants) obtains power.
Tim Snyder's line haunts me: "any election can be the last"
But to return to the key point, we need to better understand why this has happened, and why intelligent people like Frank see the world as they do. Part of it involves acknowledging every valid point they make about Democratic/liberal/progressive errors. Part of it involves recognizing that there are reasonable underlying disagreements about past history and current policies. Part of it involves resisting the urge to reduce them to caricatures by imagining how the world actually appears to them.
But, from my perspective, the most challenging thing is to understand how it is possible that they see in Trump anything other than a sociopath wielding power. Twenty years ago when Trump was in the heyday of his tabloid mogul fame, I would plan my routes through my native NYC specifically to avoid having to see his name on buildings because the growing celebrity of his toxic persona made me feel a deep anxiety about American society. How could we be so ill as to celebrate such a person? And I can guarantee that partisan politics had nothing whatever to do with it--he was a *Democrat*, like me. But I'd still add a quarter mile to a walk to avoid seeing his name. I wasn't doing it to make a point; I was usually walking alone. I just did it.
He was seriously confused and didn't even KNOW he was seriously confused. I also note that not one of his supposed supporters shouted out something like, "NANCY PELOSI!! LOCK HER UP!" Not one of those people tried to help him. It says a lot on a few different levels.
Humans have the remarkable ability to carry opposing views in their heads, with heartfelt passion. How do you square "love thy neighbor as yourself" with the supreme cruelty and emotional torture of separating children from their mother? Justifying this horrific act with "that will teach these criminals from invading our country." (Has anyone else noticed that there is no migrant invasion of Russia?)
A contractor working on our house admired our house cats. Then observed that he has "friends upriver" who shoot cats for fun. Some of these proud outlaws go to church and praise Jesus in the morning and attend a Trump hate rally in the afternoon.
Happy Easter.
A huge section of this country has apparently decided that truth and democracy don’t matter.
It hasn’t since April, 1865.
... the whole thing is often called an "experiment" (not sure where that started) and it's more or less held together through thick and thin (Civil War, Depressions). Right now the test tubes are certainly on high boil.
And I don't think November results will cool the fires.
Question.
Who are the likely candidates for President this year?
Unless one of them drops from old age, I'm guessing Trump and Biden are up for a re-match.
Your guess?
Same.
So we have two old men with histories of repeated mendacity. But it’s off limits to talk about the lies of one, because “but Biden”.
Not gonna fly Abraham.
You missed perhaps the most important aspect of why so many people are willing to overlook Trump’s lies.
Trumps lies don’t directly hurt us. When he says he’s the greatest businessman ever, it doesn’t take food off my table, or money out of my pocket.
When Biden says the border is secure, another 10,000 illegals move into town and start sucking up tax money, and more people die of Fentanyl poisoning.
If you want to vote for Joe Biden, go for it. I wont because he harms me, my friends and family.
That's inconsistent. Biden has nearly doubled the border guards. 1,000's are stopped at the border everyday. But, there 2 things to consider. The border is 2000 miles. Monitoring every inch is impossible. The second thing is that the countries south of the border experienced way worse economic hardship due to Covid. The US has recovered faster than any other developed nation and the countries south of us are in bad economic shape and want their poor to leave. Conversely, the US has 3.4% unemployment and wages are rising. Agricultural businesses are not able to find cheap labor anywhere and so are eager to hire foreign labor. Its a perfect storm
Now there is a strong immigration bill ready to be signed by Congress. Trump has told congress to not pass it because it will make Biden look bad. He doesn't care what it does to your family.
I think Trump's efforts to BLOCK a bi-partisan immigration bill (after about 40 yrs) so that he can use the issue to his own advantage shows that he puts his own political career ahead of the country.
He shows again that he doesn't care about you or me or anyone other than himself. Border security is just an election promise for Trump. Remember I'll build the Wall and Mexico will pay for it? Whatever happened to that promise? Never happened because he never meant it; it was nothing more than an election slogan, a 3-syllable chant at his rallies.
I fear Trump because he's skilled political operator (promise them what they want to hear) with millions who follow him because he tells them what they want to hear.
But it's pure narcissism: block a bi-partisan bill (how rare is a bi-partisan anything?) that isn't perfect but will do something at least for the country - block it because he wants to use the issue in the election. Pure narcissism.
I guess the stable genius has forgotten JFK's "Ask not ..."
Biden and the Dems have a lot of failings, but it's Trump who's stepping in and saying No, don't fix the problem. I want the problem for my campaign.
Talk about hurting the country!
And the 20 miles of wall he did build was apparently so shoddy it has already been tunneled under.
TJSwift I can't believe you said with complete seriousness that Trump's lies haven't hurt anyone. Trump's Covid lies alone cost tens of thousands of American lives at a low bar. He told the whole country there was nothing to worry about! And the elections theft lies are just as damaging. He lied his way into office, and all the way through, and has fundamentally removed from reality the minds of millions of Americans.
What Covid lies? That the vaccine would give immunity? That it would keep people from spreading it? That you might not die?
No, lad. Those were all Democrat lies.
And if you really believe that 80 million people voted for a doddering meat puppet that campaigned from his basement I’ve got a low mileage used car for sale that you must look at.
Biden is an amazing politician who has 40 years of legislative experience. But if you prefer an entertaining circus clown, with a slue of indictments including sharing top secret documents with our enemies, than experience, wisdom, and patriotism won't matter to you
Well, TJ, from your response I can see we don't live in the same reality. You can deny Trump's lies all you want, they're right in front of your eyes. It was a global pandemic, Trump mishandled it, and he lost the election due to his mistakes. I fully believe Trump would have won in 2020 if not for how badly he bungled the whole thing.
On top of that, you are proposing even more lies about how the election was stolen. 60 failed court cases proved Trump was lying about that. It's clear this convo isn't going anywhere productive. But just focusing on the Coronavirus pandemic, do you believe Trump was telling the truth in all these direct quotes?
Jan. 22, 2020: “We have it totally under control. It’s one person coming in from China. It’s going to be just fine.”
Feb. 7, 2020: “It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flu... This is deadly stuff.” [Trump in a private interview with Bob Woodward from The Washington Post made public on Sept. 9, 2020]
Feb. 10, 2020: “I think the virus is going to be—it’s going to be fine.”
Feb. 10, 2020: “Looks like by April, you know in theory when it gets a little warmer, it miraculously goes away.”
Feb. 24, 2020: “The Coronavirus is very much under control in the USA… the Stock Market starting to look very good to me!”
Feb. 25, 2020: “CDC and my Administration are doing a GREAT job of handling Coronavirus.”
Feb. 26, 2020: “The 15 (cases in the US) within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero.”
Feb. 26, 2020: “We're going very substantially down, not up.”
Feb. 26, 2020: “Well, we're testing everybody that we need to test. And we're finding very little problem. Very little problem.”
Feb. 26, 2020: "This is a flu. This is like a flu."
Feb. 27, 2020: “It’s going to disappear. One day, it’s like a miracle, it will disappear.”
*Well, TJ, from your response I can see we don't live in the same reality. You can deny Trump's lies all you want, they're right in front of your eyes.*
Excuse me, but fuck your reality. Trump lies. Biden Lies. Obama lied. Bush lied. IDGAF about the lying; they all lie. What I care about is how those lies affect me.
The Coronavirus scam is fully documented. The number of times the CDC has back tracked, "updated", deleted previous press releases and outright lied to us is enough to convince all but the most dim person they're corrupt.
The very first thing I did when the virus became news, was to look up the known characteristics; particularly the size. The dimeter is 100nm. You want to guess what the minimum opening in a surgical mask is? No? How about a cloth mask sporting your favorite sportsball team, or some sequins?
It was all bullshit, man. Covid killed the same people that flu kills; old people and people with existing problems. Everyone else had a couple of bad days. And what REALLY should piss you off is what they did to kids. The death from Covid among kids 20 and younger was .0001%. But they still had kids wearing those fucking masks and shut the schools down.
Sorry, not sorry for my frank language; I have no patience with Covidiots.
Thank you for articulating a difference that I struggle to explain. There is a materiality test for every action. What is that actual material harm done. I find that many people cannot do that assessment well. They do not compartmentalize their emotional impacts from a calm calculation of cost vs benefit, harm vs help, risks vs rewards.
I always ask that question. What was Trump actually done to materially harm the people that hate him? Nothing really. Now, Joe Biden's policies have caused, and are causing, massive material harm to the majority of the population. And Joe Biden is aligned with the establishment also responsible for massive harm to the people.
Mean Tweets don't measure up by an order of magnitude.
1 million+ Americans dead from Covid would argue that Trump's mishandling of the pandemic resulted in material harm done to them. Trump could have done much more to slow the spread, encourage people to wear masks, follow CDC guidance - that would have saved a lot of lives. Instead he lied over and over again.
Biden lies too, yes (though I expect we'd disagree on what qualifies as lies) - but the scale and severity are just really not comparable. The thing is, when you already believe Trump's lies, everyone else looks like liars when they disagree.
1 million? Lol,no. not even counting guys who crashed their motorcycles, or drowned due to Covid. The masks did nothing but make laughingstocks of the nitwits wearing them.
No, Trump could not have done more to slow the spread especially with Democrat attacking every policy decision he made or attempted to make. Trump led the country when we did not know much about the virus. Biden promised to end COVID and many more people died while he was in office. And then the Biden Democrats caused even more human harm with their stupid draconian pandemic policies.
Trump could have done a lot more to slow the spread. He lied about the risks, downplayed it in public while in private he understood it was "a plague," and refused to promote mask-wearing which would have prevented the virus from spreading so easily. Those 3 things could have saved a lot of lives.
Look at my comment reply to TJSwift for direct quotes from Trump's mishandling of the pandemic. All he had to do was let the CDC do its job, but he undercut them and Fauci at every step while (as you correctly point out) "we did not know much about the virus." As we learned and CDC guidance changed, Trump threw Fauci under the bus instead of supporting him and explaining that we were still learning about this completely new virus.
It's to the point now that Fauci is getting death threats and requires constant guard to protect him.
Exactly.
Trump is that drunk in the bar telling stories about his days in the Navy SEALs.
Biden is the shyster used car salesman cheating you out of your last dollar, to put your wife and kids in a car with bad brakes.
“It’s a cream puff!”
“The border is secure”
“The vaccine gives you immunity from Covid”
Trump was President when the Covid vaccine was developed and administered. Trump is telling congress not to pass the new border control bill developed by him and Republican leaders.
Mr. Swift, Trump also claimed he'd secured the border (pre-Covid) when he had not, and he also claimed the vaccine provided immunity from Covid (which it certainly does, in the ordinary medical sense of boosting our effective immune response).
Trump imposed tariffs on Chinese and other countries' goods and said China and other countries would pay them, but it's we who pay for tariffs--ordinary Americans--not China. Trump initiated a tax cut heavily skewed to benefit the wealthy and claimed he was strengthening the American economy, while the cuts in fact massively increased the deficit and debt with minimal benefit for all Americans but the wealthy. Trump claimed Covid was completely under control for the two months when the US had the best chance of effectively responding; he encouraged people to ignore it in their everyday lives while privately (and correctly) saying it was spreading at a terrifying rate. Trump asserted that climate change was a Chinese hoax and opposed any form of technological shift to respond to it, at a cost ordinary Americans in cities, towns, and rural areas will be paying for generations. Trump lied and has never stopped lying about the integrity of our electoral system of government, ratcheting up the demonizing rhetoric of division that bonds his base to him personally and poisons all of our lives as we try to get along every day.
Frank asks, "What has Trump actually done to materially harm the people that hate him? Nothing really," and you agree with him. I can't really understand how the two of you can fail to see it.
Trump it turns out accepted billions of dollars from the Chinese leader into his personal businesses.
Trump did more to secure the border than any other President in the past 20 years, including GW Bush. The inflow was staunched to a trickle.
All this, despite the active opposition of the reprobate, anti-American Democrats and the deliberate inaction of the feckless GOP.
Our economy, the real economy that matters to me and you, was better by every measure under Trump.
Everyone would be better off if they’d stop buying the cheap Chinese crap they don’t need. We need to pick up our mining of rare earth minerals and take back our own manufacturing capabilities.
Trump will likely not help with that, but neither will the trash in control of the doddering meat puppet in the White House.
TJ wrote: "You missed perhaps the most important aspect of why so many people are willing to overlook Trump’s lies. Trumps lies don’t directly hurt us. When he says he’s the greatest businessman ever, it doesn’t take food off my table, or money out of my pocket."
That's a very interesting explanation: "Trump's lies don't directly hurt us."
You're saying most Trump supporters know he's lying, but don't care.
Thanks for that; it's gonna take some thinking about.
And ps, I'm no great fan of Biden or the Dems; it's Trump (and his MAGA movement) that scares me, and my goal here is to try to understand the thinking (or sometimes non-thinking) behind Trump's loyal supporters.
Your comments help.
“Trumps lies don't hurt us.” Like sitting on pandemic info because he thought it was only killing the poor ie Democrats?
Or his profiteering on PPE and vaccines with Jared?
0r his abandoning the Kurds as a favor to Putin?
Your right it's not the lies as much as the deeds
Hi Chris,
I'm trying to understand the thinking process of people who don't see Trump as a liar or a threat, and comments from Frank and TJ and others "help" in the sense of giving me insight into their thinking.
When TJ says he gauges lies by their consequences and impact on his life, that helps me understand and gives me food for thought - from TJs perspective, he (and I assume others) admit Trump lies, but they don't care unless it impacts them personally. That's a uniques perspective; not all MAGAs are blind adherents of the Lyin' King.
And it shows again that there isn't ONE reason or one type of Trump follower. There are subsets, and TJ is representing (I think) that group of Americans who think "a pox on both their houses" and would prefer as little govt involvement in their lives as possible - but in the current Dem-Rep dichotomy, they see Trump & Repubs as the lesser of 2 evils.
Maybe I should let TJ speak for himself, but for me he has thrown more light on understanding how and why people support Trump.
I take your point. But I put more weight into what you do than what you say. Trump will say anything to line his pockets. Not doing anything is the same as doing something and through Trump’s neglect and incompetence he has hurt everyone regardless of whether it's sitting on your chest or miles away.
Biden is not very charming or headline creating but he gets things done that immediately help people. The covid relief package saved my ass and continues to help to this day.
Biden does a lot of dumb things to. Like tolerating a genocide going on right in front of him/us.
Trumps lost NYC (his home town) in the 2016 election by 84% and 79% in the 2020 election but NYC had decades of bullshit from him and his family so that's scans. I doubt if this will help you figure out why people support him knowing he's a habitual liar but I can identify with being a flippant sarcastic asshole I just don't want him running the country and scaring the shit out of the rest of the world IMHO
Of the two Trump followers I know one is a man who is a malignant narcissist. The other is a woman who is a born again Christian. The narcissist, is also a pathological liar.
The Christian woman believes Donald Trump is the chosen one to lead her and the flock to the Rapture where, at the end of the world, they will fly up to heaven, and be with Jesus. People like Franklin Graham lead the effort to teach this nonsense. It’s all in the Bible, book of Revelations.
Thanks for your comment, Susan.
My neighbor is an evangelical minister. We never discuss politics, but once I asked him how people with strong spiritual values can support someone like Trump. He said Trump's appeal was one word: abortion. How anyone can believe Trump has a moral bone in his body is beyond me, but he promised (and delivered) on anti-abortion judges on the Supreme Court, so his hold of evangelicals is unshakeable: he delivered for them, and they'll deliver for him.
So there are a lot of 1-issue people willing to overlook his flaws in order to get their issue addressed.
Beyond the abortion issue, I cannot fathom how supposedly "Christian" people can fall Trump; I have to give him credit as America's Greatest Conman. (Sadly, Hitler was Germany's greatest conman, and that didn't end well).
Trump will say anything to help Trump; and he knows what his followers want to hear.
I believe the abortion issue is important, of course. But I believe many devout Christians, evangelicals, born agains, just use that issue for explanation purposes, so they don’t have to cop to going for the rapture baby.
The woman I spoke of above, says one of her most important issues and why she favors Trump is the border problem. She never mentions abortion. She’s a childless woman, and in my observation, hasn’t experienced empathy to a very large extent.
my wife predicted that the expected Red Wave of 2022 midterms would crash on the overturning of Roe v Wade, and we also saw pro-choice ballot issues win in solid red states. That's the women's vote, she says, and now that SCOTUS is ready to ban abortion drugs, she thinks there will be a similar blow-back from women in Nov. 2024.
She's an excellent forecaster, so I hope she's right again and American women save American democracy.
I agree with your wife.
we've been married over 50 years and my policy has always been "you're right, dear, and I'm wrong" (because being with her was more important than being right)
But on things like this, she actually is right. The timing of SCOTUS decision will be important; hopefully it'll be close enough (maybe in the summer) to stir up emotions and voter turnout for Nov.
Clearly SCOTUS and MAGA are off-side on this issue, and hopefully will be their downfall.
It will be their downfall Abraham. There are many busy folks who don’t have the time to voice their opinions on these forums. But what’s to say? They already know what they’re going to do. Vote against the attempt to take away our God given rights.
Please excuse me if my wording is clunky. I don’t speak their language.
no apologies necessary.
You made your point clearly. And strongly.
Biden tells real lies like he breaths. Trump uses imperfect speech like do most normal Americans and the media chattering class exploits it for a disingenuous media circus. Trump's opposition lies about Trump more than Trump lies.
Here's my issue with Trump's "imperfect speech" in this case. In the middle of this speech, he says, "Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley, Nikki Haley --" then switches gears to talking about the January 6th Committee supposedly destroying all the evidence. He had time in that interval to actually THINK about what he was saying and who he was talking about. Instead, after the tangent he went on, he comes back to "Nikki Haley -- is in charge of security. We offered her 10,000..." I understand that due to the primary election, he'd have Nikki Haley on the brain. What I don't understand is how he can't seem to identify the right person for his weird interpretation of January 6th. And on top of that, how is it advantageous for him to be talking about January 6th at all? Does he not understand that "anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law" applies until he is convicted or acquitted in that same court of law?
Also, "Biden tells real lies like he breaths[,]" and "Trump's opposition lies about Trump more than Trump lies." Can you support those statements with any unbiased evidence from legitimate news sources? I'm always open to learning new things, but I haven't seen evidence of anything resembling these two statements. What I do see is a fulfillment of Abraham's point #3 above. I've said it many times in many different places: no matter how badly you may want it to be so, whataboutism is not an argument or a defense.
well said, Steve.
I think if it wasn't for "whataboutism" many Trump-supporters wouldn't have a response to any criticism of Trump.
Also, I kind of stuck to his "pathological lying" as a focus, but that little clip sure reveals something about his declining mental fitness (oops, here comes the "Biden is more unfit")
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Hi Frank, you're a fast reader.
1. your reference to Biden is deflection.
2. the Nikki Haley clip isn't "imperfect speech"; it's a blatant lie; or, he's seriously confused.
3. his opposition lies more than trump - again, that's just deflection.
Frank, you're an intelligent, educated, reasonable, engaged citizen: can you really say (without denial, defence, or deflection) that Trump doesn't have a problem telling the truth?
AW, like you I believe Frank is an intelligent person. But he is not responding to the question of your post, which is why so many people have shifted their political allegiance to a pathological liar. This isn't a question Frank can really respond to because he denies the premise. If Frank wrote a blog item that asked, "Why are so many Democrats willing to overlook the fact that Biden lies like he breathes" how could you and I respond? We wouldn't, we'd deny the premise, just as Frank has denied yours. The two positions appear functionally equivalent and the questions appear mutually non-adjudicable.
To get at the difference I think you need to look for an answer to your question and then compare what the answer to Frank's question might be. I think at that level you will find that some of the symmetry disappears. Here are a few respects in which I think the evidence shows some difference that may be enlightening.
1) Although a common factor in some of both faith in Trump and faith in Biden is probably political/cultural "tribalism," faith in Trump among MAGA followers seems unreserved, faith in Biden among Democrats seems hedged by doubts (as we see when the "mainstream media" highlight every Biden gaffe and factcheck him when he does say something that isn't true--which he has certainly done).
2) Among those on the left of center, outright criticism of Biden and heightened awareness of his weaknesses comes mostly from the extreme left--progressives don't like him and those who are most accurately described as "woke" see no essential difference between the two men: they're both equally purveyors of an oppressor for of late-stage capitalism. Among those on the right of center, outright criticism of Trump is strongest among those closest to the center: the anti-Trump "RINOs." During Trump's term in office I was tracking the alt-Right and white nationalism and many of those people were very critical of Trump. But they gradually came to support him and are now monolithically happy with him--the most visible example is Nick Fuentes. Progressives are increasingly distancing themselves from Biden.
3) Those who support Biden generally base their views on what is presented in traditional news sources, or "mainstream media"--what Trump/MAGA labels "fake news." (I do believe these media generally have a liberal bias--although a large part of it is the inheritance of what was once establishment centrism.) Those deeply committed to Trump often base their views on Fox News, which was established as a Reagan Republican media outlet (and for which I think MCNBC provides a rough parallel), but also very broadly get their news from "alternative media" sources, such as YouTube channels, Alex Jones-style inheritors of the Limbaugh tradition, and social media. That last set--people who "do their own research"--seems highly invested in apophenic thinking: conspiracy theorizing that "connects the dots" to form a red-pilled expose of the illusory web of lies that blue-pilled sheeple have been taught to believe.
I think that examining these elements of the issue can help clarify how the apparent equivalence of the MAGA and Vanilla-Democrat worldviews are actually different in kind. There are other angles I think could be helpful as well, but this comment is already way too long.
thanks Robert, long but deeply knowledgeable and insightful; i'll have to re-read and re-think. But something in there caught my attention:
An insightful Trump-supporter with a very individualist perspective (kind of a "pox on both their houses") suggested that the map could be divided into 2 Americas, but from your answer and others I think there are more than 2 subsets of Americans.
The old Right-Left dichotomy doesn't hold for me any more. Clearly there are hard-core MAGAs (with more subsets), never-Trumpers, single-issue folks (anti-abortion) etc, while the Left is clearly fracturing.
And there are plenty of 3rd parties forming.
So the old Repub-Dem paradigm is shifting underneath our feet.
Whatever happens in November, the future of American political parties (and leadership) is unclear to me.
I don't think there has ever been a stable R-D paradigm, AW. When I was first politically active in the early to mid-1960s both parties were uneasy coalitions: the GOP included a large, socially liberal wing (Rockefeller types) and the Dems had the Dixiecrats. The Democrats fractured into ex-Dixiecrats, centrists, and the antiwar Left, while the GOP went through a longer arc of throwing out their liberals (they'll finally finish the job on the national level when Romney's term ends) and welcoming back an extremist fringe that they had largely ousted post-McCarthy (even Goldwater shunned them).
And don't forget that Roosevelt's 1932 campaign accused Hoover of leading America to "socialism." I think the parties are seldom what they seem.
agreed, but now the coalitions are breaking down - seems to me the most rock solid political constituency is Trump's MAGA base.
The good news is that it's reached its ceiling and can only splinter off subsets: some Rs will have trouble supporting him if he is convicted; others will abandon him if he softens his anti-abortion stance, etc.
All of this keeps bringing me back to Yeats's poem The Second Coming (written just after WW1 and prophesying the rise of Hitler and Stalin):
"things fall apart, the center cannot hold
the best lack all conviction
and the worst are full of passionate intensity"
ps, my peace of mind comes from seeing it all as chapters in history books, and we just happen to be living through this chapter.
Trump colluded with Russia to win in 2016 and might be a Russian agent.
Trump's move to restrict flights from China during early COVID was xenophobia.
Trump’s travel ban from five Muslim-majority countries during COVID was prompted by discrimination against Muslims or went beyond his authority.
Trump's 2017 tax cuts were only for the “rich” despite studies showing 80 percent of the population benefitted.
Trump was putting immigrant kids in cages, when the media photos were from 2014.
Trump compelled the Ukrainian government to hand over dirt on Joe Biden, after Joe Biden had pressured the Ukrainian government to fire a prosecutor investigating a company his son Hunter worked for. But Trump was guilty of impeachable offenses.
Trump led an insurrection.
Just a few media lies about Trump. Now do you want me to list all the Biden lies?
to me, most of those statements are "media lies about trump":
- his bromance with Putin (and other dictators) shows an alarming love of dictatorships, and Russia certainly tried to influence 2016 (and is doing it today)
- xenophobia - how about "vermin ... poisoning the bloodline of America"
- 80% of population benefitted to some degree; top % benefitted the most.
- Trump led an insurrection: if he didn't, why have so many of his lawyers and defenders pleaded guilty; and why were so many Jan.6 "peaceful protesters" convicted of so many crimes? Do you no longer believe in the American justice system?
And, by the way Frank, your whole list was deflection: look over there at the media liars. And then a bonus deflection: "want me to list all the Biden lies" - pure defection.
I guess you really believe everyone else is lying, but not Trump?
“how about "vermin ... poisoning the bloodline of America"
You’re quoting that verbatim. Which “vermin” are p”oisoning the bloodline” of America”? Who are you quoting, Abraham? Name that villain and cite the instance he said it. What do those ellipses mean, Abraham? Is that an accurate quote?
We have questions. Please clear this up for us. Thanks.
Good point, TJ. You're asking for credible evidence.
1. Trump on Truth Social, Dec.16, 2023: "Illegal immigration is poisoning the blood of our nation."
2. Trump at New Hampshire rally, Nov. 11, 2023: "we will root out the communists, Marxists, fascists, and radical left thugs that live like vermin within the confines of our country"
Also "live like vermin" is not the same as "you are vermin".
Complete failure; you should delete the whole comment and start over.
So, two statement given at two widely separated times, discussing tow widely different topics. And yet you combined them in one quote. That is something I'd expect from leftist propaganda mill, Abraham. Shame on you.
And you did not even get the quotes right. "Poisoning our blood" is not the same as "poisoning our bloodline".
The first suggests we're being poisoned, which is silly. The latter suggests the ethnic cohesion of America is being deliberately undermined, which is an objective, undeniable fact.
I really think it's not useful to try to rebut these, AW, but . . .
It's hard to resist pointing out that the "travel ban from five Muslim-majority countries during COVID" took place in 2017--obviously it couldn't have been because the countries were Muslim: it was because there was going to be Covid three years later and we had to stop it at its source in the Middle East. And the media also lied in saying the order went beyond the President's authority, relying only on the irrelevant fact that it was so ruled by multiple federal courts.
Frank is absolutely correct that Joe Biden pressured the Ukrainian government to fire a prosecutor, and there was a connection to Burisma, the firm employing Hunter Biden. Biden specified at the time--as did our European allies--that the prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, had to go because he *wasn't* prosecuting rogue firms, including Burisma. But there they go again, those media, quibbling over details! There's certainly a lie in there somewhere, and we might as well attribute it to the news media, because . . . Fake.
And, yes, indeed: the "kids in cages" thing. *Obama* built the chain-link cages in 2014, not Mr. Trump! All Trump did was to make thrifty use of those cages and place kids he'd separated from their families in them. Not. His. Fault. The cages were already there! Why did the press lie by saying he'd put kids in them without specifying that if it weren't for Obama already building them the Trump administration might well have built kindergartens for those kids instead!
And Trump did not lead an insurrection! He couldn't have. The Secret Service physically coerced him into driving back to the White House when he tried to lead it. He was an innocent bysitter, helplessly watching the insurrection on TV while it was led instead by Ray Epps.
Well, this is what happens when I let myself off the leash.
I'm not a defender of Joe Biden or the current Democratic party, but (from my reading of history) America is approaching a precipice (not unlike Germany in the 1930s) where fundamental democratic institutions begin to fall (look at Trump's unrelenting attack on the American justice system) and where Truth and Facts are replaced with Lies and Propaganda.
All of the book reviews on this site are reflections and projections of what can and does happen when someone like Trump (and his fawning sycophants) obtains power.
Tim Snyder's line haunts me: "any election can be the last"
But to return to the key point, we need to better understand why this has happened, and why intelligent people like Frank see the world as they do. Part of it involves acknowledging every valid point they make about Democratic/liberal/progressive errors. Part of it involves recognizing that there are reasonable underlying disagreements about past history and current policies. Part of it involves resisting the urge to reduce them to caricatures by imagining how the world actually appears to them.
But, from my perspective, the most challenging thing is to understand how it is possible that they see in Trump anything other than a sociopath wielding power. Twenty years ago when Trump was in the heyday of his tabloid mogul fame, I would plan my routes through my native NYC specifically to avoid having to see his name on buildings because the growing celebrity of his toxic persona made me feel a deep anxiety about American society. How could we be so ill as to celebrate such a person? And I can guarantee that partisan politics had nothing whatever to do with it--he was a *Democrat*, like me. But I'd still add a quarter mile to a walk to avoid seeing his name. I wasn't doing it to make a point; I was usually walking alone. I just did it.
He was seriously confused and didn't even KNOW he was seriously confused. I also note that not one of his supposed supporters shouted out something like, "NANCY PELOSI!! LOCK HER UP!" Not one of those people tried to help him. It says a lot on a few different levels.
Or he was brilliantly connecting the Nikki Haley brand with Nancy Pelosi. I mean look at all the media coverage that utterance caused.
...and rightfully so.
From "imperfect speech" to lying as a political tactic?
That's right from Trump's playbook: I didn't do it; and if I did, it was brilliant.
How do you know that a politician in lying? His lips are moving. That isn't new. What is new is the media lying.
With the whoppers told by Democrats and promulgated through the media as truth, I don't accept the hyperbole over Trump lies.
"the news media is lying"
does that include FOX?