Are political threads allowed?

  • New York Magazine had an interesting take on it: Trump, while not especially smart, has a sort of agility that's stood him well over the years and he's just used it to turn on the anti-abortionists. He's seen the GOP's abortion stance hasn't gone down well with the electorate and in particular used that angle to criticise DeSantis. If he's rolled those dice wrong DeSantis could outflank him on the extreme right, plus yes there are other factors that could torpedo his nomination. Also, I read that Murdoch has turned against him, which could have a significant effect.

    Abandon all reason

  • New York Magazine had an interesting take on it: Trump, while not especially smart, has a sort of agility that's stood him well over the years and he's just used it to turn on the anti-abortionists. He's seen the GOP's abortion stance hasn't gone down well with the electorate and in particular used that angle to criticise DeSantis. If he's rolled those dice wrong DeSantis could outflank him on the extreme right, plus yes there are other factors that could torpedo his nomination. Also, I read that Murdoch has turned against him, which could have a significant effect.

    He's definitely street smart.


    There's also the background of him socializing in Democrat circles long before he was a politician, and saying in an interview that if he was going to run for office he'd do it as a Republican because their voters are dumb and would vote for anyone, or something along those lines.


    However. I may be way off base, but between Trump and his unprecedented cocktail of sedition/treason/insurrection/fraud, and Gaetz pulling the levers of power in Congress, I think the GOP is at risk of becoming too batshit crazy even for them, and they may pull back from the brink. Trump is a massive force but my guess is behind closed doors they are wondering how to cut the cord.

  • He's definitely street smart.


    There's also the background of him socializing in Democrat circles long before he was a politician, and saying in an interview that if he was going to run for office he'd do it as a Republican because their voters are dumb and would vote for anyone, or something along those lines.


    However. I may be way off base, but between Trump and his unprecedented cocktail of sedition/treason/insurrection/fraud, and Gaetz pulling the levers of power in Congress, I think the GOP is at risk of becoming too batshit crazy even for them, and they may pull back from the brink. Trump is a massive force but my guess is behind closed doors they are wondering how to cut the cord.

    You'd hope so, wouldn't you? It's one thing for the Republicans to embrace him years back, but having seen him in action (Make America Great Again? More like Make America Exactly the Same but more Divided!) I'd have hoped the party, en-masse, would have had the common sense to distance themselves ASAP, but no, seems only a handful have seen sense. I liked the guy who, when Trump was claiming he hadn't lost against Biden, said "it's time to put the big boy pants on!" One of the problems is Biden is not much better. Sane, but ineffective, so he's made America exactly the same too.

    Ian


    Putting the old-fashioned Staffordshire plate in the dishwasher!

  • He's definitely street smart.


    There's also the background of him socializing in Democrat circles long before he was a politician, and saying in an interview that if he was going to run for office he'd do it as a Republican because their voters are dumb and would vote for anyone, or something along those lines.


    However. I may be way off base, but between Trump and his unprecedented cocktail of sedition/treason/insurrection/fraud, and Gaetz pulling the levers of power in Congress, I think the GOP is at risk of becoming too batshit crazy even for them, and they may pull back from the brink. Trump is a massive force but my guess is behind closed doors they are wondering how to cut the cord.

    I admire your optimism. All I see are people like Greene, Boebert, Gaetz, Gosar and others. They are now so far to the right they have become a cult.


    But they had their chance to use the 'former Democrat' and 'voters are dumb' stuff against him when he first ran, and they collapsed in a heap at his feet.


    Oh, and your previous post said 'Biden beat Trump before'. Yes, he did. Unfortunately Trump himself and a huge number of Republicans have done nothing but say 'Trump won' for four years.

  • I admire your optimism.

    I'm not optimistic. I don't think whoever replaces him will be any better. I'm actually extremely pessimistic in saying I think the Republicans will outmaneuver the Democrats by indirectly getting rid of Trump, while keeping the lunatic fringe you mention onside. I'm also being realistic by admitting I may be completely wrong in this guess.

  • I'm not optimistic. I don't think whoever replaces him will be any better. I'm actually extremely pessimistic in saying I think the Republicans will outmaneuver the Democrats by indirectly getting rid of Trump, while keeping the lunatic fringe you mention onside.

    Having just thumbs-upped this, I'm reminded of how ironic/inappropriate the liking action can be. I mean, you're right but I don't actually like it!

    Abandon all reason

  • Having just thumbs-upped this, I'm reminded of how ironic/inappropriate the liking action can be. I mean, you're right but I don't actually like it!

    Haha I know what you mean. It's a bit of a double-edged sword, same as with the little heart emoji thing on Twitter. It always feels odd 'liking' some atrocious story of personal devastation.

  • I'm not optimistic. I don't think whoever replaces him will be any better. I'm actually extremely pessimistic in saying I think the Republicans will outmaneuver the Democrats by indirectly getting rid of Trump, while keeping the lunatic fringe you mention onside. I'm also being realistic by admitting I may be completely wrong in this guess.

    I'm optimistic, assuming Trump gets the elbow. As a non-American, I'll be happy whoever else gets in, as long as their media exposure is similar to "W", as in "he's a moron, but we can all just laugh at the fool" as opposed to Trump, who wanted to get embroiled in any world event (God help us if Ukraine is still ongoing and he gets in!), and makes a media event of simple things like going to the toilet. Him narcissism borders on certifiably insane.

    Ian


    Putting the old-fashioned Staffordshire plate in the dishwasher!

  • https://www.thedailybeast.com/…or-hamas-attacking-israel


    In this latest self-congratulatory outburst Trump utters not one word of condemnation of the attack or sympathy for those who were killed. It's all about how it wouldn't have happened under his presidency. Wait... on 'Truth Social' he did call the attack a 'disgrace'.


    “It was a big attack with a lot of dead people all over the place.”


    Doesn't the guy have anyone at all who can tell him how to express himself in an even vaguely adult manner?

  • I'd guess he does, but they're like Elvis's staff who didn't tell him to stop eating 13000 calorie burgers, or Michael Jackson's, who didn't say "maybe cut back on the plastic surgery", they don't advise him for fear of being sacked. Similar situation with Putin, I guess, but it's not just the pay packet that will suffer!

    Ian


    Putting the old-fashioned Staffordshire plate in the dishwasher!

  • Doesn't the guy have anyone at all who can tell him how to express himself in an even vaguely adult manner?

    This is someone who publicly does an insulting mocking impersonation of a disabled person, makes derogatory remarks about a dignified elder statesman with a brain tumour, calls the current president a motherfucker and jokingly refers to the savage physical assault on Pelosi's husband. And as you know, those examples are a mere drop in the ocean of his shithousing. He knows that this stuff plays well with his followers and, far from harming his standing in their eyes, enhances it. His supporters think and say those things, in that same unsophisticated juvenile manner and love him for expressing their own attitudes. If there are aides advising him not to say these things he'd ignore and likely fire them.

    Abandon all reason

  • Apparently we a general election on July 4th . The news channels yesterday spent hours and hours and hours telling me. I turned it off. When I turned it back on again they were still telling me. I woke up this morning to the radio and they told me again. Nothing changed. No new news. Labour and Conservative have told me I have a choice to make, just in case I don't know what a general election is. The presenters are making full use of their college media "how to fill airtime with nothing to say" course.

  • Apparently we a general election on July 4th . The news channels yesterday spent hours and hours and hours telling me. I turned it off. When I turned it back on again they were still telling me. I woke up this morning to the radio and they told me again. Nothing changed. No new news. Labour and Conservative have told me I have a choice to make, just in case I don't know what a general election is. The presenters are making full use of their college media "how to fill airtime with nothing to say" course.

    I will as usual be up all night watching results come in, but it's a dispiriting prospect. After 14 years of steadily worsening tory governments, putting some of the most detestable specimens of moral and intellectual vacuum in positions of high office, we're faced with a replacement government that won't be much better. It's like sitting at a table and being told "Let me take that platter of faeces away and serve you this lovely bowl of earwax instead." Uncle Monty in Withnail & I - "Shat on by tories, shovelled up by Labour..."


    Where I live, voting for either won't make a difference as neither are realistically in the running without a gargantuan swing - which, yes, I know can't necessarily be ruled out. But my word, what a lousy system we have.

    Abandon all reason

  • Our political system is rotten to the core. Corruption everywhere. It doesn’t matter who you vote for (in terms of mainstream parties anyway) you’ll be taken on the same journey, and just invited to look through different windows on way.

    Unless there’s an independent in my constituency, I’ll engage in my usual creative ballot-spoiling.