Usa Thread

[Coss]

In the coverage, I caught a quick note from one of the talking heads about Trump's racism. A quick google search found this article:

 

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/8/16/16155668/trump-history-racism-charlottesville

 

and examples of Trump's racism.

 

Excerpt

 

1991: A book by John O’Donnell, former president of Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City, quoted Trump’s criticism of a black accountant: "Black guys counting my money! I hate it. The only kind of people I want counting my money are short guys that wear yarmulkes every day. … I think that the guy is lazy. And it’s probably not his fault, because laziness is a trait in blacks. It really is, I believe that. It’s not anything they can control."

[Flashermac]

[Coss]

Tee hee.

[Coss]

US President Donald Trump fires White House chief strategist Steve Bannon

 

 

https://www.stuff.co.nz/world/americas/95946512/white-house-chief-strategist-has-resigned-announcement-delayed--report

[cavanami]

If this guy wasn't doing a good job then yes, fire him!

[Flashermac]

Here's the reason ... the usually far right Bannon was finally starting to talk sense. That pissed off his boss.

 

" ...To recap: During a stretch where the president of the United States has stepped in white supremacist quicksand and spoken breezily about nuclear war, Bannon gives an “interview†outside of the normal mélange of media outlets, and well beyond the far-right press. In that interview Bannon frames himself as explicitly anti–white supremacist and against unhinged and unproductive nuclear saber-rattling, while painting himself as the true voice of the American worker in the White House fighting to get big bad Goldman banker types to, at last, take on China."

 

 

http://www.slate.com...spiciously.html

[Flashermac]

Trump doesn’t seem to like being president. So why not quit?

 

 

Evidence is piling up that Donald Trump does not really want to be president of the United States.

 

He certainly doesn’t look happy in the job. In his previous life, Trump met whomever he wanted to meet and said whatever he wanted to say. But like all presidents, he finds himself ever more isolated, and his displeasure shows on his face. The loneliness of the job — which so many of his predecessors have ruefully reported — is wearing on him.

 

And it’s more than that. Past presidents also tell us that no one can fully appreciate the dimensions of the job in advance. With no previous political experience, Trump’s learning curve has been even steeper than usual, and the more he sees of the job, the less he wants to do it. He balks at the briefings, the talking points, the follow-through.

 

He was drawn to the fame of it, as he once told me aboard his private jet. “It’s the ratings . . . that gives you power,†then-candidate Trump explained. “It’s not the polls. It’s the ratings.†He loves being the most talked-about man on Earth.

 

But unlike reality TV stars, presidents aren’t famous for being famous. They command the world’s attention because they are the temporary embodiments of America’s strength, aspirations and responsibilities.

 

It is a paradoxically self-effacing fame. The job demands that hugely competitive, driven, ambitious individuals — for that’s what it takes to win the job — inhabit a role that requires them to be something other than nakedly themselves.

 

As some Trump associates tell it, he never intended to be elected. But having won the part, he doesn’t want to play it, a fact irrefutable after Charlottesville. Rather than speak for the nation — the president’s job — he spoke for Trump. Rather than apply shared values, he apportioned blame.

 

The presidency calls for care and cunning. All successful presidents have known when to say less rather than more. George Washington’s second inaugural address was 135 words long. President Abraham Lincoln often disappointed clamoring crowds, telling them that the risk of a wrong word made it too dangerous for him to deliver a speech. President Ronald Reagan was famous for cupping his ear and shrugging as he pretended not to hear an untimely question.

 

Did these men ever itch to win an argument, as Trump did in his Tuesday news conference, with such disastrous results? Of course they did. But a president can’t indulge such impulses.

 

Discipline in thought and speech is the machinery by which a president leads a free people. He hasn’t the power to purge his enemies or censor the press. His strength rests on his ability to persuade. His power grows through a record of hard-won results. He seeks friends and respect, not enemies and outrage. Between fired aides (strategist Stephen K. Bannon got the boot Friday) and fleeing allies, Trump is losing friends faster than a bully at a birthday party.

 

Reflecting more and reacting less: That’s how a president gets through all seven days of a week supposedly focused on infrastructure without having his advisory council on infrastructure implode. With enough of that focus and discipline, a president might eventually foster an infrastructure bill — an actual law with real money behind it, something more than bluster — that creates jobs and feeds progress and raises spirits.

 

It’s hard work. As shareholders in this enterprise, Americans are asking what disciplined, focused labor Trump performed to pass a health-care bill. What hard ground has he plowed, what water has he carried, to grow the seeds of tax reform?

 

The president’s job is to understand that the world has plenty of troubles in store for this nation. His role is not to add to their number. There will be moments when the president must stir us up, so in the meantime, his task is to keep us calm.

 

If Trump were still in private business, he would have no trouble diagnosing this situation. A serial entrepreneur like Trump learns to recognize when a venture isn’t panning out. Over the years, he splashed, then crashed, in businesses as diverse as casinos, an airline and for-profit seminars. His willingness to fish has always been matched by a willingness to cut bait.

 

Or, as a veteran boss, he might see his predicament as a personnel move that hasn’t clicked. Trump has made many, many hires over his career, and some (as recently as Bannon’s) don’t work out. “Not a good fit,†the saying goes.

 

The presidency is not a good fit for Trump. It’s a scripted role; he’s an improviser. It’s an accountable position; he’s a free spirit. Yes, the employment contract normally runs four years. But at his age and station, what’s the point of staying in a job he doesn’t want?

 

 

https://www.washingt...m=.063f3b6414ee

[Steve]

How long before a civil war breaks out in America? And why do the Alt Right bring in heavily armed militia man???

 

http://www.huffingto...kushpmg00000063

 

Not even close to civil war. The anti war movement in the '60s was much worse and antognistic when compared in context and level. If you strip it all away its really the fear from the changing demographics which has nothing to do with immigrants and blacks. Whites have simply stopped having kids, and the opiate epidemic, embracing of homosexuality (not judging), self inflicted detrimental economic policies making raising a family financially unfeasible is doing it but the scapegoats are others.

 

This other stuff is a pretext for fear of a future where they are no longer a numerical majority and the fear of a loss of power real or imagined.

[Steve]

I'm aghast that Trumpo is blaming the alt left "who came charging at the alt right".

 

It's obvious to Trumpo, that the alt left caused this - "James Alex Fields Jr., the 20-year-old Ohio man accused of second-degree murder and other charges after authorities said he plowed his car into a crowd of counter-protesters near the scene of a white supremacist rally that erupted into violence."

 

There was nothing such as alt left in terms of size and relevance to the alt right who are nothing but KKK and Neo Nazis rebranded. Why they are still being hailed as something different than that as if its new, is another matter. Anyway until Trump and people on the right started trying to equate Antifa which I guarantee you, 99.9 percent of the people, including myself, have never heard of prior, goes to show you how morally corrupt they are. Why haven't we heard of these 'alt lefts'? Misnomer by the way? They weren't relevant. The only time you will hear of any of them is when the G8 meets and you have some anarchist groups for that but the rest of the time, nothing.

 

And to put things in context, Americans have ALWAYS went after neo Nazis. George Rockwell, a somewhat famous leader of the ameircan Nazi party in the '50s and '60s used to march in Skokie, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago that is predominantly jewish and many of them were either holocaust survivors or children of them. He marched there for a reason obviously and the police had to come to protect the neo Nazis. No one was saying both sides were wrong then. The KKK, Nazis and other white supremacist groups have had many marches and had to have police protect them. Was it right for those opposed to want to go after them for their constitutional right to free speech? No, it was not right but the general public was sympathetic as well as politicians both local and federal at the the time because they understood they were there to provoke. They often chose their areas to march carefully knowing it would provoke people. They were attempting to march in south Dallas, SOC, south oak cliff, all black, impoverished area until black residents told them if they come they are coming out with guns. Right to say that? No, its wrong. But no batted an eye knowing that the white supremacist aim was to incite by marching there. Plenty of militia areas in Montana to march in and get support.

 

So, this whole 'both sides are wrong' while legally is so, is using legality to mask the fact that Trump's only remaining loyal core base are racists. Pure and simple. They were many who voted for him who did not attend his rallies. They were working poor who bought the promises of jobs out of desperation but were embarrassed to admit they voted for him. The 'Bradley effect' (google it) where people would tell pollsters one thing but voted the opposite.

 

The white supremacists wanted confrontation. Its always been their MO. Any news is good news. Its why they don't march in areas where they are popular. They walk the thin line of free speech and inciting a riot. They want to test the boundry of unpopular speech. There have been a litany of marches that the general public didn't approve of historically in recent memory, the Black Panthers, LBTGQ, Women's rights, abortion rights, no violent counter protesters. So , why does the white supremacists bring that out of the common person far more than other groups who are deemed socially unpopular?

[Steve]

Seems its possible Robert E. Lee himself didn't want monuments to the confederacy

 

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/08/18/us/robert-e-lee-slaves.html?mwrsm=Facebook&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fm.facebook.com%2F

 

The general did, however, object to the idea of raising Confederate monuments, writing in 1869 that it would be wiser “not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife.â€