Robert F. Kennedy Jr. suspended his independent presidential campaign on Friday, announcing to supporters that he would remove his name from ballots in ten swing states but keep it on elsewhere. In those ten states, Kennedy is urging his supporters to back Republican Donald Trump.
During his Arizona speech, Kennedy praised his campaign volunteers and supporters for their efforts in securing ballot access in numerous states. However, he lamented the challenges his campaign has faced, particularly from the Democratic Party, which he accused of engaging in “lawfare” to prevent him and his running mate, Nicole Shanahan, from appearing on various state ballots.
Kennedy also criticized mainstream media and social media platforms for censoring his campaign, though he clarified that his criticism was not a personal complaint but part of a broader “journey” he experienced through his campaign. He did, however, praise alternative media and young voters for helping to amplify his message.
Despite his campaign efforts, Kennedy acknowledged that he no longer sees a realistic path to victory. He told the audience, “In my heart, I no longer believe I have a realistic path to an electoral victory,” before announcing that he would suspend, rather than terminate, his campaign.
“I cannot in good conscience ask my staff and volunteers to keep working their long hours or ask my donors to keep giving when I cannot honestly tell them that I have a real path to the White House,” Kennedy said, before noting that his decision was the best course of action for “ending the Ukraine war, ending the chronic disease epidemic, and for finally protecting free speech.”
Kennedy outlined that he would remove his name from ballots in ten swing states where he could potentially influence the election outcome but keep it on in all other areas where he has qualified. In those swing states, Kennedy urged his supporters to vote for Republican Donald Trump. However, he also still urged supporters in states where Republican Donald Trump and Democrat Kamala Harris are expected to win handily to still vote for him, as well as noted the possibility that neither Trump nor Harris might reach the necessary 270 electoral votes needed to secure the presidency and that he could still play a role in the outcome.
Kennedy also shared details of his previous meetings with Trump and mentioned that they agreed on many issues. However, he did not confirm any plans to be appointed to a future Trump administration.
It is not yet clear how Kennedy’s suspension and endorsement of Trump in key states will impact the joint fundraising agreements his campaign has entered into with the Libertarian National Committee, the Reform Party of Florida, and several state parties.
I can’t resist one last section of reply to Jim – after this I’ll let it go unless someone asks me to finish.
“Your admission to doing worse to employees than Trump does not reflect well on you.”
I’ve done many things that don’t reflect well on me, but the point was that what led to the termination of an employee employer relationship was far from one sided. Replacing employees is not easy, and quite disruptive. Many people react badly to being fired in various unpleasant ways, understandably. I’m not sociopathic enough to not feel bad about having to do that when when it’s very well earned.
Sifting through applicants is a pain and a crapshoot. Onboarding new employees and getting them up to speed, seeing whether there’s actually and not only theoretically a good fit and whether their skills and past experience translate, etc – tasks being undone or mismanaged in the meantime, etc, etc – so, the tendency is to wait far too long to actually fire anyone.
To get to that point, the person in question has generally ignored multiple attempts to remedy the situation, mishandled many things habitually, caused numerous problems, etc.
So, a boot on the way out is often more than earned. Chasing good money after bad by covering expenses for someone after they are already terminated for cause, generally by providing negative net return on investment, should not be presumed to be sociopathic.
It is, however, often counterproductive, engendering further retaliation, ill will, etc. I recommend avoiding the temptation to treat chronic ingrates with even a fraction of the kick they deserve, but have at times yielded to temptation even against better judgement. And sometimes, the kicker was well aimed, precluding further subversion by others still employed. Each situation is different.
I think it’s unfortunate that it’s considered sociopathic if employers don’t cover expenses after some one is fired – is it sociopathic if employees quit working the moment they learn they will no longer be paid, or should we expect them to complete every task they started as employees, but now as volunteers? I think such expectations of employees and employers would be on parallel. The relationship between the two has become skewed, largely by government interference.
Stewart, your level of vociferousness about Trump far exceeds anything you said about Harris or her team. We agree about no point in voting and about racial relations in the deep south. In my personal experience, racism is much worse up north. We’ve both lived in the deep south and in the northeast – would you agree? Southern racism is tempered by familiarity – blacks and whites know each other well, and have their whole lives. Up north, many people live in segregated neighborhoods and have little to no interaction with people of other races.
I belatedly note that I never finished my series of replies to Jim. Is there any point in going back and continuing where I left off? I’d probably be talking to myself. If any interested readers exist, please let me know. Otherwise, not any point
There is plenty to hate about Harris’s agenda as well. Please note that I said her agenda. I have no personal opinion about her, other than that she seems rather bland and she has a horrible laugh. Her advanced team is also a bunch of smug jerks. I met a few of them a couple of months ago in the barber shop. I was the only white person in the room at the time and they treated me as if I was shit hanging off the wall. (Everyone else who lives here and who frequent the local barbershop do not treat anyone like that. They are all wonderful people and my friends. And yes, the community barbershop has much better barbers and more intelligent conversations/debates than the “white“ barbershop.)
For those of you that think racism is dying, yes Charleston still has black churches and white churches. Black barbershops and white barbershops, etc. And you do see that damn confederate flag places.
I am already disenfranchised in Congress, having accidentally moved into Clyburn‘s hereditary district two years ago when I moved a half mile up the road from where I had been living. (The mistake seems to be this side of the street. I had just had a heart attack when I moved, so I wasn’t paying close enough attention.) Clyburn is as bad as Thurman, Hollings and the rest of that political generation were. Once they get in office, regardless of party, you usually only get them out in a coffin – and then sometimes months after they have actually died.
Not the Mace is that great. A Citadel graduate, and therefore someone to never vote for, but at least the elections are sometimes competitive.
There is no real choice for president on the ballot here. And neither of our senators is up for reelection, so I don’t have the ability to vote against either of them. Even though much of his cognitive ability may have been consumed by the dead worm in his head, Kennedy was at least an option to talk about as a protest vote.
One thing is certainly clear: Kennedy is getting more than his 15 minutes of fame.
As previously predicted here somewhere some states are saying no to the name withdrawal. See:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/rfk-jr-ballot-battleground-states/
On the topic of Trump Derangement Syndrome: https://x.com/NicoleShanahan/status/1829291690277966165
There is plenty to rationally hate about Trump (and about Kennedy) without needing to resort to manic dishonesty with oneself and others.
Gadfly, re dropped out see
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2024/08/tulsi-gabbard-endorses-donald-trump-as-robert-f-kennedy-jr-and-gabbard-join-trumps-transition-team/#comment-2741680
“My name will remain on the ballot in most states. If you live in a blue state, you can vote for me without harming or helping president Trump or vice-president Harris. In red states the same will apply. I encourage you to vote for me.”
Clearly Kennedy has not dropped out of the race, no matter how much wishful thinking on the part of uniparty mouthpieces and yourself try to spin it that way.
Uhh, no, to any nutters, he dropped out.
I quote from a news site.
“Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. will remain on New Mexico’s general election ballot, despite dropping out of the presidential race.”
https://nmpoliticalreport.com/issues/elections/rfk-jr-will-remain-on-the-ballot-in-n
“you can dismiss every time Trump praises an authoritarian by saying “he didn’t really mean it”, then there is no point in providing quotes.”
I don’t think I did that, but your time is yours to allocate as you see fit. Trump says a lot of things which he may or may not believe and contradicts himself frequently, often in the same sentence. You might prove that Trump sometimes praises authoritarians. He seems to believe that praise works better on them than condemning them , and they tend to return the favor. It may be a bit harder to prove he admires them. It’s up to you, not up to me to decide whether making an effort to do so is worth your time.
I won’t uncritically accept that he admires authoritarians based on what I remember learning elsewhere or in this discussion so far. I’m also not precluding the possibility that he might. You can try to convince me or anyone who hasn’t made up their mind if you want. Up to you.
“Vladimir Putin has straight up killed multiple political opponents, had others beaten or poisoned, and imprisoned thousands for the crime of criticizing his war but, sure, keep pretending he isn’t authoritarian just because you think he would win an election. This is the same Russia that in 2022 imposed a 15 year prison sentence for criticizing their war, and just banned Youtube because it did not want its citizens getting information that wasn’t state-controlled. I forgot – how many CEOs have fallen out of 6th story windows after criticizing the Ukraine invasion, now? Someone used to keep a list, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen it. Hitler won an election, also, I guess that means Hitler was not authoritarian.”
Hitler was appointed chancellor by Hindenburg. He won elections only after he was already in power. It’s not necessarily clear who has killed various people you claim Putin killed. Maybe he killed them. Maybe people willing to piss off the Russian government leaders are also prone to pissing off mob bosses, their foreign Intel service handlers, business or romantic rivals, or who ever else might go about killing people who irk them. Criticism of the Ukraine operation abound in Russia, openly under real names even, so the crimes must have been more specific.
“It should also be pointed out that Trump is not particularly anti-war, as much as he sometimes likes to claim, and his supporters love to believe. In the 2015-6 primaries he was actually calling for a major escalation in Syria with tens of thousands of US troops on the ground and advocated in favor of the torture of prisoners in the Middle East. He initially supported the Iraq war, and Obama’s actions in Libya, and only turned against them later, after they became unpopular. After he became president, early on he was heavily criticized for the number of drone bombings he was doing in many countries, so he simply stopped publishing the data so that the media had nothing to report on. At one point before the data stopped being reported Trump was drone bombing various countries at 5 times the rate Obama had done it, and Obama had been a major escalation over Bush 2. Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Libya – for some reason THOSE attacks actually done by the US military don’t count as war, but giving aid to Ukraine so it can defend itself from attack does.”
Aside from what I believe is your misdiagnosis of why the US regime sends the Ukraine regime aid you are correct, and as I previously said, Trump is only the peace candidate when compared to his chief opposition. The reason US meddling in Ukraine is particularly concerning is that Russia is a nuclear power and it would probably be a good idea to avoid bringing it into direct military conflict with the nuclear powers of EU/NATO if possible. At least, a lot more should be done to keep that from happening.
Ukraine is not far from where the first two world wars sparked off – Serbia and Poland, if my memory problems haven’t gotten worse at a faster rate than I realized. That area is a tinderbox for particularly severe multipolar conflicts resulting in even far greater loss of life than the endless wars in the Islamosphere. The technology of ear is even more concerning now than it was last century.
Trump is a warmonger, and Harris is an even worse warmonger. Candidates who are less war prone than Trump stand no chance of winning. Why the unnecessary lecture? I’m not a Trump supporter. I think he’s marginally less bad than Biden and Harris . If you want an argument with a Trump sycophant, they’re not hard to find. I’m not one, and thus far none have replied here.
“And Trump’s attempt to remove anyone in the country that he believes is “poisoning the blood” is another similarity. Before Hitler began murdering them, he first just tried to chase them all out of the country. Any immigrant or potential immigrant (Trump’s “Jews”) from south of the border and also Muslims was targeted by every legal means Trump could employ. He was limited by the courts.”
Trump never attempted to remove all Latin American or Muslim immigrants. The actual policies were much less drastic. I noticed you’ve now expanded your claims from all illegal immigrants to apparently also include legal immigrants. And at least strongly imply that he plans to commit genocide since you say Hitler tried to chase out all the Jews. That is only a similarity if you don’t look at all the countries which didn’t attempt to but actually did chase all the Jews out of their countries. The vast majority did not go on to attempt genocide.
I also don’t see why, if Hitler really tried to chase off all the Jews, he didn’t just order all Jews to leave the way all those other countries did. He was dictator after all – there were no independent courts to stop him had he ordered it. Was the Gestapo and Wehrmacht, SS et al incompetent to carry out such an order? Hitler’s general mental incompetence aside, was he too incompetent to issue it? I think if Hitler really wanted all the Jews out, they would have been out.
What Hitler did was make life for Jews less and less pleasant, which I guess you must have meant by chasing them off. Self deportation is one response to a country making some people feel less welcome.
If that’s what you meant, what did Trump do to make all Latin Americans and Muslims want to self deport? How well did it work? What has he proposed along those lines? If he has, does it seem like something he might actually try, and courts might actually allow? I’m unaware of such policies. Trump did succeed in temporarily slowing the flow of illegal immigrants – that’s about it. He held up some asylum seekers and caused inconvenience for some travelers and that’s a far cry from deportation of millions solely based on ethnicity or religion, much less genocide.
The problem with your slippery slopes is the extremely steep gradient. At some point, check against actual road conditions.
“Yes, there are policy similarities between Trump and Hitler. ”
There are also policy similarities between Democrats and Hitler. For example, gun “control” and a possible desire for war with Russia. It would be pretty hard to have zero policy similarities. Tariffs were traditional U.S. policy during most of U.S. history, so insufficient evidence of Nazi views – this was mainly before Nazis.
“Your attempt to absolve Trump by pointing out that a bunch of other people 100 or 200 years ago were also casually racist is odd.”
Well, it takes more to be a racist Hitler loving Nazi sociopath than reading a Hitler book, sending out a tweet about poison and stiffing some contractors or firing people with a little kicker. The evidence, if we can call it that, is just grossly underwhelming for such a strong claim. Thus far we’ve only come up with things for which racist Hitler loving Nazi’s would be only a small subset of much larger sets.
It’s plausible that reading Hitler decades earlier inspired Trump thoughts about poison. Knowing what I do of Trump , it seems likelier that his thoughts are inspired by some other tweet he just read or the last person he talked to in person or on the phone or his paranoid fears of being poisoned. Trump lives mentally in the now, not in shit he read 35 years ago. You always want to be the last person who talked to Trump before he makes a decision, because the ones before that are forgotten by the time he’s at that point.
But maybe it made a big impression – I just don’t see it as a strong piece of evidence.
“Poisoning the blood of our country” is a pretty unique turn of phrase for someone who has allegedly never read Hitler’s speeches. Hitler mentioned ‘poisoning the blood’ of the country or ‘blood poisoning’ several times. Trump used it as a reference to all illegal immigrants. Trump just believes that all illegal immigrants are criminals, terrorists, and mentally insane, so of course he can claim that he was only referring to those insane criminals – but they are the same group.”
Please share when and where Trump said ALL illegal immigrants. Like Trump, I assume some are good people, regardless of whether they come from or even through Mexico. Trump is reported to be a germophobe, which is pretty ironic given his history of promiscuity, but then I never claimed he’s consistent. Poison is still poison when diluted. There’s a point of dilution where that’s no longer true, but it doesn’t have to be pure poison to qualify as poison.
Its possible I just missed where he said ALL illegal immigrants. If so, please provide that.
“Your assertion that Trump loved Hitler specifically because Hitler hated Jews is a straw man, as is your claim that Trump was “just like Hitler.””
Well, I didn’t know one could be a Nazi without hating Jews. Especially a Hitler loving, racist Nazi. All things Stewart said about Trump. If Trump is any of those, there is nothing I remember seeing below which is evidence of it. Reading a collection of Hitler speeches isn’t evidence of being a racist Hitler loving Nazi. I was not any of those before, during or since I read it. Therefore, I have to consider the possibility that Trump isn’t any of those things either if he also read it.
“It is not in dispute that Trump had the collection of Hitler speeches. ”
Ok, so what? As I also explained – I’ve had the same collection. It didn’t make me a Hitler fan before, during or afterwards.
“Your attempt to cast doubt on that fact by pointing out that it was his ex-wife who first brought it to public attention is typical of the illogical rhetoric used by the right. ”
I’m not the right or any other direction. I’m me. I don’t identify with political labels like that. I simply didn’t realize there was any other source for the tidbit. I covered the remaining explanations assuming it was true. I withdraw any now irrelevant portions about the original source. That leaves a lot of things I already said standing.
“Trump himself later admitted he had it. He even mentioned who gave him the book, falsely claiming that the man who gave it to him was Jewish.”
OK. The book isn’t contraband, thankfully. He had in his possession a book. Why does that make him a fan of the author? I have read Hitler, Marx, Muhammad, and many, many other authors I don’t agree with or admire. If you have not, my opinion is you should. My opinions are worth as much as my vote would be if I bothered to vote, but still, it’s good for you. Give it a try if you have not already.
“You can choose to believe he did not read them if you wish, just as many Democrats may choose to believe Clinton never inhaled. ”
I don’t have an opinion or care whether he read it. I read it. It didn’t make me a Nazi, Hitler admirer, racist, or any more sociopathic than prior to reading it. It’s more plausible to believe Trump didn’t read it because reading requires more effort than sucking on a joint, but I still don’t care whether he read it or not. Clinton has smoked plenty of weed and snorted plenty of coke. Trump has by all accounts read very few books if any. But the more important point is still that regardless of whether he read it or just meant to, nothing about that in itself is evidence he’s a Hitler fan.
“But, it was apparently not a long form book but, rather a collection of speeches, which could be read in short intervals. This also would have been 35 or so years ago, so presumably his mind was somewhat sharper.”
Any book can be read in short intervals. A mind can be sharp and still has to make the effort of being distracted from sex, tv, phone calls etc long enough to read something longer than a tweet or, I guess in those days, bathroom graffiti or playboy cartoons or newspaper headlines about oneself. Trump has attention deficit disorder. You can hear it in the way he forms his sentences, contradicting and reinforcing his points repeatedly. But let’s say he read it. How would that show that he admires Hitler?
“Stewart’s claim was that Trump loved Hitler. He did not expound on what it was about Hitler that he believed Trump loved (presumably it wasn’t his mustache), and he did not say that Trump was “just like Hitler”. ”
If so, his claim still falls short since reading Hitler’s books didn’t make me love Hitler, reading Marx books didn’t make me love Marx, etc. He at least somewhat hinted what Trump allegedly loved by also saying Trump is racist. So far The evidence introduced to prove Trump is either racist or loves Hitler is…not evidence.
“don’t understand how my criticism of Oliver is original and unique. A ticket is a ticket. The VP selection does matter and always has. His choice was horrible.”
It’s original and unique in that I haven’t seen it before. I’ve seen any number of people criticise some of his issue positions, lack of impressive resume, and even that he’s an open homosexual. If I’ve ever seen anyone express the view that their big problem with his campaign is his VP pick, I’m not remembering it.
I still don’t know what your beef with the VP pick is either. The one thing I’ve seen is that he has worked in law enforcement. So?
Laws exist, and someone will enforce them. Is it better to leave all those jobs in the hands of people who see government as about the right size or too small, or assholes who couldn’t care less and just enjoy flexing their authoritah , enjoying low key protection money freebies, earning a fat pension, good benefits, job security, fringe benefits like banging badge bunnies, access to law enforcement databases, blackmail, bribes, evidence slipping out the back door, getting to bear and intimidate people with little to no chance of consequences, etc?
I’d think a libertarian who is also a fairly decent person, if such exist, would want one of those jobs so it wouldn’t go to someone who would misuse the badge more than they would. Plus, it provides good personal background in seeing many things first hand from the irrationality of bureaucratic decisions to judicial corruption and many other things candidates could use to help hone a more effective message. There are, in fact, ways for LEOs to do good things with their job if they choose to. There are also many ways for them to misuse that same authority. Thanks to government employee union protection, they can do pretty much what they want except snitch on fellow officers corruption and criminal activities.
Maybe you have some other issue with him like some fine point of ideology or speaking style. I don’t see why it would matter, given how few people will ever pay attention to either as far as this candidacy goes.
“And as far as some of those campaign event statements that you say never happened: I saw several of them happen. ”
I missed where I said that. I’m pretty sure I didn’t.
“Among them includes that he did tell supporters to take action against protesters and that he would pay the legal bills.”
Empty rhetoric. Show me one time one took an action against a protester much less had such a legal bill paid. Unlike TDSers, Trump rallygoers know throwaway applause lines when they hear them. Statements like that are an opportunity to repeatedly chant USA, not to actually beat anyone. Are you aware of any violence at any Trump speech ever where violence was directed by Trump and his fans against opponents? I’m not. I know of one where a disturbed young man with no clearly discernible ideology directed violence against Trump and his fans.
Has there been other Trump rally violence I missed? Where’s Trumps SA goons waging street war? Comparisons to the Nazis are way past overwrought, despite actual neonazis using those events as opportunities to troll for recruits while passing themselves off as Trump superfans.
They did the same to Ron Paul. But, they don’t get many recruits no matter where they go, and generally lack the actual physical courage of the original 1920s and early 30s German nazis. They are dead end losers who genuinely have nothing they personally did to be proud of so can only find pride in something they did nothing to earn, like their race. And unlike their ideological forebears, they would actually just urinate on themselves if it ever does come to physically confronting antifa or blm thugs, followed by running away, begging for mercy, trying to switch sides, offers to perform felatio, etc.
In any case, Trump doesn’t support them, they only pretend to support him (except when they don’t – e.g. Blood Tribe), and they’re too cowardly to do more than fantasize about ideologically based violence, much less actual race war. Real Trump supporters don’t do any of that, and certainly don’t beat protesters at Trump rallies.
“I remember watching it live on Fox covering the event and then repeated ad-nauseum there and elsewhere. I am pretty sure that was the 2016 campaign.”
So in 8 years and hundreds of rallies no actual violence, only rhetoric? Yeah, definitely not Hitler.
“As far as whether any specific crime against certain people was Biden or Obama or Trump, I really don’t care. Their administrations all abused people in one form or another.”
Exactly. The machinery of government marches on. Few people realize how restrained any president is in significantly changing what it does. Change is very marginal out of necessity. Armies of lawyers, judges and bureaucrats, congressional hearings, staff disloyalty, media alarmism, blackmail, and many other things prevent anything more dramatic. What remains is very incremental, minor stuff, futzing at the edges, which overheated political rhetoric turns into epic battle of apocalypse stuff.
In reality, through, governing is way less exciting than campaigning, and the president – any president – has far less power in reality than in theory . As a practical matter, if he or she tries to majorly change the course of government activity, especially in a direction of less of it, most of what will result will be friction and frustration.
Trump won’t have much more power to enact his fantasies, promises or rhetoric a second time around than a first. Anyone who has their hopes up about it will be disappointed again. Anyone who expects Hitler, Putin, Xi, Mussolini, Pinochet, or even Orban will just get Trump 1.1.
Or, we can have Harris and an even bigger disaster than everything that was wrong with Biden.
One of those will happen. You might get a negligible chance of actually deciding which one if you vote in one of only a few states.
Or you can send a message by voting for someone basically guaranteed to lose. This year, the message you’ll send is that you vastly overestimate how many people pay attention to these set of fart in the wind message candidates and their alleged campaigns and views.
My message by not voting is that this election is a sham, the choices suck, my vote won’t matter anyway, so I’d rather just post messages that nobody will read because they’re way too long online as my way of expressing my disaffection with the direction of government. Both will have the same effect on actually changing anything, that is absolutely none. Voting would involve going out of my way as well as enabling privacy violation through the voter registration process. Whining online is easier and less annoying. Since both change nothing, I’d rather whine online than vote. I vote no, how about that?
Unimportant – It is not in dispute that Trump had the collection of Hitler speeches. Your attempt to cast doubt on that fact by pointing out that it was his ex-wife who first brought it to public attention is typical of the illogical rhetoric used by the right. Trump himself later admitted he had it. He even mentioned who gave him the book, falsely claiming that the man who gave it to him was Jewish.
You can choose to believe he did not read them if you wish, just as many Democrats may choose to believe Clinton never inhaled. But, it was apparently not a long form book but, rather a collection of speeches, which could be read in short intervals. This also would have been 35 or so years ago, so presumably his mind was somewhat sharper.
Stewart’s claim was that Trump loved Hitler. He did not expound on what it was about Hitler that he believed Trump loved (presumably it wasn’t his mustache), and he did not say that Trump was “just like Hitler”. Your assertion that Trump loved Hitler specifically because Hitler hated Jews is a straw man, as is your claim that Trump was “just like Hitler.”
“Poisoning the blood of our country” is a pretty unique turn of phrase for someone who has allegedly never read Hitler’s speeches. Hitler mentioned ‘poisoning the blood’ of the country or ‘blood poisoning’ several times. Trump used it as a reference to all illegal immigrants. Trump just believes that all illegal immigrants are criminals, terrorists, and mentally insane, so of course he can claim that he was only referring to those insane criminals – but they are the same group.
Your attempt to absolve Trump by pointing out that a bunch of other people 100 or 200 years ago were also casually racist is odd.
Yes, there are policy similarities between Trump and Hitler. Hitler also believed economic self sufficiency was a good idea and used import tariffs to move in that direction. That was a necessary prelude to the war, just as Putin’s attempt to insulate Russia’s economy prior to restarting his Ukraine invasion was a necessary step. Economic interdependence makes war more difficult. Autarky makes war easier. And Trump’s attempt to remove anyone in the country that he believes is “poisoning the blood” is another similarity. Before Hitler began murdering them, he first just tried to chase them all out of the country. Any immigrant or potential immigrant (Trump’s “Jews”) from south of the border and also Muslims was targeted by every legal means Trump could employ. He was limited by the courts.
It should also be pointed out that Trump is not particularly anti-war, as much as he sometimes likes to claim, and his supporters love to believe. In the 2015-6 primaries he was actually calling for a major escalation in Syria with tens of thousands of US troops on the ground and advocated in favor of the torture of prisoners in the Middle East. He initially supported the Iraq war, and Obama’s actions in Libya, and only turned against them later, after they became unpopular. After he became president, early on he was heavily criticized for the number of drone bombings he was doing in many countries, so he simply stopped publishing the data so that the media had nothing to report on. At one point before the data stopped being reported Trump was drone bombing various countries at 5 times the rate Obama had done it, and Obama had been a major escalation over Bush 2. Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Libya – for some reason THOSE attacks actually done by the US military don’t count as war, but giving aid to Ukraine so it can defend itself from attack does.
Vladimir Putin has straight up killed multiple political opponents, had others beaten or poisoned, and imprisoned thousands for the crime of criticizing his war but, sure, keep pretending he isn’t authoritarian just because you think he would win an election. This is the same Russia that in 2022 imposed a 15 year prison sentence for criticizing their war, and just banned Youtube because it did not want its citizens getting information that wasn’t state-controlled. I forgot – how many CEOs have fallen out of 6th story windows after criticizing the Ukraine invasion, now? Someone used to keep a list, but it’s been a while since I’ve seen it. Hitler won an election, also, I guess that means Hitler was not authoritarian.
If you can dismiss every time Trump praises an authoritarian by saying “he didn’t really mean it”, then there is no point in providing quotes.
Your admission to doing worse to employees than Trump does not reflect well on you.
The allegation that junior staff were not allowed to look Harris in the eye or address her directly did not date from her time as VP or US Senator, but back when she was the Attorney General. And it did not come from any of her staff but, rather, a relative of someone who briefly interned there andwho only had second hand knowledge. To my knowledge, no actual staffer has made those claims. In any case, no one was defending Harris. Dragging her in is just whataboutism.
The possibility that Trump’s supporters might not have actually stolen anyone’s coats is a thin reed to hang on when the verifiable fact is that Trump told them to do it. Again with the excuses – “he didn’t really mean it”. How do you know what he really meant?
You are wrong that Trump supporters did not initiate violence against protesters.
You are wrong when you claim that Trump’s child separation policy began under Obama. Under Obama, separations occurred in a small number of instances when it was believed that the child was not actually a relative of the accompanying adult. Otherwise Obama – like previous administrations – had a family detention policy for up to three weeks or they were simply released and told to show up for hearings later. There was a drastic change under Trump, who wanted to end the “catch and release” policy. Rather than charging illegal immigrants with a civil violation (other than those with outstanding warrants), Trump began charging all illegal immigrants criminally. Under US law, that required that children be separated. That was known by the Trump administration and Trump himself said losing their children was intended to be a deterrent to illegal immigration. But, I’m sure he didn’t really mean it.
Trying to compare the policy under Obama and Biden with that of Trump is absurdly false and you should stop listening to right wing propaganda lies. Those policies were not remotely similar. And don’t try to hide behind “the bureaucracy did it”. Trump did it. He signed off on the policy change and he defended it in the press until his poll numbers started to tank.
Your defense of anti-immigration policies by pointing out the hazards of illegal immigration is mind boggling in what it ignores – the hazards of not illegally immigrating. There is a very good reason the risk is taken.
There is no evidence of Joe Biden having been bribed. There are only insinuations of it by right wing propagandists. There is no actual evidence, just claims that they have evidence.
I have no idea why you think China sending a balloon over the US is evidence of Biden being beholden to the Chinese. It was shot down as soon as it was no longer in danger of coming down on populated areas and they had a plane trail it which was intended to block its transmissions. A similar balloon was launched while Trump was in office. I think it was shot down near Hawaii.
Intellectual property theft by the Chinese has been going on for decades. Biden has done nothing different on that front than Trump.
The only comments from Waltz that I have seen on China have been balanced. Example: “I don’t fall into the category that China necessarily needs to be an adversarial relationship. I totally disagree, and I think we need to stand firm on what they’re doing in the South China Sea, but there’s many areas of cooperation we can work on.”
Chinese fentanyl? That has been going on for a long time, including the entirety of the Trump administration. Nothing new there, nothing to do with Biden or the Democrats.
Fauci and Wuhan? Covid started under Trump. I have no idea where you are going with that. The virus came from a Chinese wet market, anyway. The Wuhan thing is for people who like conspiracy theories.
Your right wing conspiracy theories about “young men of military age” has an obvious explanation: young men, everywhere and always, are the most willing to take the risk of moving to a new country. There is no conspiracy there.
If you had ever bothered reading interviews with Chinese immigrants you would know why they are coming in greater numbers now. During Covid gangs in various Central American and nearby countries made contact with Chinese gangs in order to make money smuggling potential immigrants. That was during Covid – Trump’s last year in office. The relationships came to fruition after Trump was gone. The Chinese immigrants themselves have explained why they are suddenly leaving China in greater numbers: China’s extreme and prolonged Covid lock downs finally made them realize that China has no future.
What are you even talking about, that Democrats ignore Chinese saber rattling? Biden said he would defend Taiwan militarily. Pelosi made a deliberate visit to Taiwan. Just a couple of months ago they sailed guided missile cruisers through the Taiwan Straight. How did these things manage to be memory-holed?
I have no idea where you are going with the “PRC lite D covid response” stuff. Both Republicans and Democrats were equally responsible for shut downs and money printing. AFAIK, every governor, Republican and Democrat, had some degree of lock downs for some length of time. And 60% of the stimulus helicopter money drops were done by Trump.
“did, however, spend the first 30 years of my life growing up and living in the Philadelphia area. Everyone there was affected when Trump would scrub up a project and not pay people. He is a horrible businessman and a crook and always has been. And yes, I knew people personally who worked for small companies that he hired for his Atlantic City Casino project and then refused to pay even after they did the work correctly and to completion.”
We might know some of the same people but what does that have to do with whether Trump is a “sociopathic Hitler loving racist”? What you’re talking about is typical NY real estate developer/promoter/speculator behavior in at least the 1980s for sure, and he was far from the worst. Reportedly, he didn’t stiff people who worked on his petitions, so maybe he changed his ways as far as that goes.
Even if not, that’s just being greedy. Racist much less Hitler loving is a different question. You might think his business practices sociopathic unless you consider who his peers were. I’d rather not repeat stories about what some of them did, but there’s levels of sociopaths among his then competitors that are far above anything I know Trump to have ever done.
But, none of those psycho freaks are running for president, and I’m not trying to contract with Trump on a building project so let’s talk about his competition now, not then.
Kamala Harris is a sociopathic freak who has repeatedly failed upwards all her life. Far more importantly, which one is likeliest to exacerbate global tensions, overtax and overregulate the economy more and quicker, bring in more of the wrong kind of immigrants – and no, that’s not a racial comment, I mean individual qualities – appoint judges and justices who will enable more crap from gun confiscation to bureaucrats running amok to a million other things. The record strongly suggests Harris will be worse than Biden, who was worse than Trump overall as president.
Since we both live in states that are a foregone conclusion, and even in a battleground state our individual votes would be astronomical scale unlikely to change the outcome, we can safely discuss message candidates.
The short answer is that this year they all suck and wouldn’t send any message I’d want to send. Their campaigns are all too weak to send a message hardly anyone would notice, anyway.
Randall Terry might be the least bad of the bunch, but his campaign is very underwhelming. I’ve seen no general media coverage above IPR and BAN. The ballot access effort is trash to non-existent and far short of what’s promised. He can’t make up his mind if he wants to campaign for Trump or against both. If he’s raising any nontrivial money for his ads, it’s yet to show up in the reports. It’s not quite the 60 days yet but there was something about hitting smaller stations before that. Did any of that happen? Not as far as I know. It seems he completely collapsed. I doubt there’s time for his campaign to deliver any appreciable amount of what it promised. Lots of people know him or know who he is, but I guess they won’t get past that he’s “running for president” enough to give him money. Or at least more than token amounts.
Kennedy has already essentially collapsed. The quasi withdrawal is stupid. His campaign won’t get past being a funding mechanism for lawyers and ballot contractors. A step above “No” Labels but meh. What message would I be sending anyway? On a whole host of issues he may as well be Jill Stein or Cornel West. No thanks.
Chase Oliver is the libertarians tripping over their own shoelaces. Being libertarians, they will put a tremendous amount of effort into aggressively self destructing and making absolutely sure they make the least impact possible, especially given starting resources. It’s increasingly clear their party is headed in the irreversible direction of splinters and diminishing over time , much like the socialist partylets, reform party post 2000, American / AIP post 1976, etc. They had a good run for a US Minor party and occasional bright spots at the presidential level – Ed Clark, Ron Paul, Harry Browne – but the run is done and it’s swirling down the bowl from here. In retrospect, Aleppo was their death knell.
The far left isn’t sending any message I want to send, but thankfully they’re already fractured multiple ways so they will all fly below the radar too. Had West stuck with the Greens he may have pushed the democrats even further left to head him off at the pass. With both of them in separately, Harris has nothing to worry about from that end.
For some reason, PSL is making an unusually strong ballot access run this year. Maybe someone died and left them money. The message that the solution for US issues is explicit Marxist-Leninism is unlikely to make any impact. Serious communists fly under the radar as Democrat progressives.
Cosplaying with hammer and sickle banners is almost as self marginalizing as David Duke Nazi cosplay as a college student. It’s kind of hard getting past those photos as an older suit and tie politician. He almost reached escape velocity, but not quite. The tourism hospitality industry ensured he wouldn’t get to the senator or governor level because smarter racists don’t associate with Nazi and kkk cosplay. Burn out Sanders got as far as he did because his younger, more explicit Marxist self largely avoided public hammer and sickling.
So, de la Cruz has a low ceiling, regardless of campaign competence. But, from my vantage, that’s good, since her message is that government isn’t nearly big enough as it is.
“do not have Trump derangement syndrome. That is neither real nor disease. ”
I’m not your doctor and I’m not here to diagnose you. It’s a fact that Trump causes extremely polarizing reactions among many people. Calling him a sociopathic Hitler loving racist seems deranged based on anything I’ve ever seen, as much as some of his fans more or less implying if not outright saying he’s the second coming of Yeshua ben Yosef Khristos.
Whether TDS belongs as a diagnosis in the DSM VI is way above my paygrade. It’s a colloquial shorthand for taking the polarizing effect he attention whores for, swallowing the bait hook line and sinker, and then flopping around like a fish out of water saying batshit stuff you would normally know better than to say or require much more persuasive evidence for when it comes to other people. Associated symptoms often include frothing around the mouth area, flushed facial skin, bulging neck and forehead veins, retinal distention and loss of focus, knee jerk reactions, and involuntary screeeeeeeeching. On occasion, medium to severe symptoms can resemble a toddler tantrum, complete with screaming, crying, pounding fists on surfaces, etc, which can be pretty disturbing when it’s a full grown adult human.
While I don’t know of any surefire remedy, extraction of cranium from rectum has been known to help.
Trump isn’t anywhere close to Hitler or Jesus. He’s a fairly shitty businessman who inherited most of his wealth, hasn’t matched the returns of a stock market index fund for his family business, succeeded much more as an entertainer, is an attention junkie who’s good at getting it, and a marginally less terrible president than those he ran against would have or have been. He’s also known for shoddy products and services, squeezing coins, grabbing vaginas, and other such marginal pursuits. Once upon a time, he used to be an actual altar boy, in a literal sense.
“was actually Trump, not Biden, who said that he “like(d) President Xi a lot, he was a very good friend of mine during my term”,
Trump has more linguistic talent than Biden, especially for providing public massages of the anal openings of Xi and other such folks. But actions speak louder than words. Biden steers policy in directions which benefit Xi. Biden family gets money from the CCP and cutouts with 10% for the big guy. Connect dots how you want. Or not. If I’m Xi, I’m voting Harris Walz early and often, metaphorically or not.
“If Trump is elected and Taiwan hesitates more than a few days to pay the protection money, China has a window of opportunity”
To do what exactly? Do I remember it wrong that you were the one recently claiming that the PRC is not actually logistically capable of attacking or invading Taiwan? Either way, if Taiwan is actually in need of protection from the thugs I pay protection money to from their own neighborhood thugs, I’d rather they pay for it than have to make bigger weekly payments due to their needs. I don’t want anything bad to happen to them, but that only seems fair.
Speaking as an extortee, I prefer my extortionists use what I pay for my protection and their other alleged services which I need to pay for if I don’t want bad things to happen to me, as opposed to using it to protect and otherwise allegedly serve folks on the other side of the planet. Am I really being that much of an asshole here? I mean, I work for my money, or used to and saved what I managed. If they’re getting protected, who’s more responsible to pay for it, them or me?
“What exactly caused you to believe that the Democrats are beholden to Xi Jinping?”
Lots of things. There’s the personal bribery of the Biden family. There is ongoing industrial and every other form of espionage, including the infamous spy balloons, intellectual property theft and dumping of knockoff goods among many other things. There’s the very odd history of Walz kowtowing to the PRC – spend a bit of time digging into that one sometime. There is the Chinese role in the black market fentanyl trade. There is whatever weird crap went on between Fauci, Wuhan institute of virology and who ever all else.
There’s the aforementioned mass migration, including what appears to be from the outside columns of the Chinese People’s Army: young men of military age and bearing who Some how got out of China (something that’s usually hard to do without government permission) coming in unvetted and uncontrolled into the US along with who knows what equipment to be assembled here (some with them as they cross the border, some in the mass of containers shipped every day from China).
We could spend the rest of our lives on the details, but what’s more relevant here: democrats constantly minimize or sweep it under the rug. Whenever they control the criminal investigations machinery, nothing is ever looked into of this sort, or the investigation dies on the vine. The same is true in congressional hearings. The infotainment outlets more aligned with them report on any of this stuff less, and minimize or excuse it more when they do, than those which aren’t.
That also holds true when it comes to reporting on Chinese internal repression, saber rattling in its neighborhood, etc. They seem to be largely unconcerned.
As quid pro quo, the PRC lite D covid response flexed the various muscles and tendons of repression, a fair amount of income was redistributed along with many small businesses shut down, various forms of loss of liberty were normalized in the minds of many, the surveillance state got a big shot in the arm so to speak. The predictable inflation wave that followed hurt some people and benefited others. D and PRC interests have generally been aligned.
As more quid pro quo, Biden’s aren’t the only family that received financial, sexual or other forms of payoff.
I’d guess Xi would prefer more rather than less war and conflict tying up the resources of Europe and the US, thus giving the PRC more of a free hand while their competitors are busy elsewhere, particularly fighting each other. Wars also create a market for Chinese arms exports. PRC benefits from limits through sanctions on some Russian exports elsewhere as well, especially energy. D policies stoking conflicts in Europe and West Asia benefit the PRC and Xi.
Etc, etc, etc.
“Or when he told his violent supporters to steal some protestor’s coats and throw the people outside in a freezing Vermont winter.”
Did anyone have coats stolen and thrown outside in the winter? As I recall, no. Some people take Trump’s oral flatulence seriously and literally. Apparently, no Trump supporter in attendance was among such people. Such expressions are better understood as mere frustration at rude hecklers disrupting a speech and turning it into entertainment for the crowd. No one actually gets hurt or is in any serious danger. To my knowledge, the only violence that ever occurred at a Trump rally was against Trump and his supporters , Not by them.
“Or the child family separation policy. Some 1,400 kids still haven’t been reunited with their parents because the Trump administration didn’t bother keeping records. Apparently it was worth it to teach the immigrants a lesson.”
Apparently, a policy which started under Obama and continued under Biden was only worthy of being turned into propaganda talking point and evidence of sociopathy during the portion of its enforcement when a Republican served as POTUS. The federal bureaucracy does many mean things to many people. They are not all or in main part the personal initiatives of the chief executive.
Conversely, the lack of such a policy is also not consequence free. It has an explanation besides merely being mean to kids and parents for the sake of being mean. The less sociopathic explanation is that it was meant to be a disincentive to large scale immigration of unvetted immigrants growing further out of control.
There are many rational arguments to be made, regardless of whether you agree with them, as to why it growing further out of control isn’t the best idea.
Without going through those, even if your sole concern is the well being of actual or potential immigrant children and families, whatever ill effects they suffer as a result of it aren’t the only downside risk potentials they face. Women and children, and probably boys and young men, are frequently and repeatedly raped along the way. Some die from exposure and lack of medical care, drown in rivers, etc. Terrorist cartels are systematically enriched. Fentanyl and other deadly addictive poisons are brought in along with the families. Many people end up victimized by various forms of human trafficking, sexual and otherwise. And so on.
Disincentives to further expansion of this phenomenon aren’t solely explained by sociopathy, even if your sole concern is the well being of the migrants without any concern for how everyone else might be impacted and even if you think Trump personally created the policy (he didn’t).
“would say Trump also exhibits sociopathic behaviors. There were several instances of staffers going on trips for one thing or another and Trump firing them while they were away, just so they had to pay for their own transportation back. ”
That’s a very weak piece of alleged evidence. I’ve done worse to employees who justly earned being fired, and had worse done to me by former bosses when parting our business relationship. What all might they have done on their end to lead to that?
Is Trump unique, even say among the leading remaining contenders in this particular presidential election, in this regard? Harris had a 92% staff turnover rate, which I think is pretty high. Her human resource leadership skills included, reportedly, frequent foul mouthed verbally abusive beratement of employees and workplace rules like only senior staff allowed to address her directly or look her in the eye. Junior staff were to be seen and not heard, speak when spoken to, do as told, and not displease mistress by elevating their gaze, and staff at any level had verbal punching bag among their job duties.
Perhaps a certain level of sociopathy is conducive to success in politics, or perhaps even success in general, especially when it’s competitive, and/or when the chief skills required are verbal persuasion, rhetoric, and people management? That seems pretty plausible to me. You?
Incidentally, I’ve read that same collection of translated Hitler speeches, as well as “my struggle,” also in translations. That didn’t result from admiring Hitler, or in admiring Hitler after I read them. I wasn’t a Nazi before, during, or after reading them. It didn’t make me like them more. Supposing we accept the reported hearsay of a bitter ex as established fact, can you think of any alternative explanation for such a fact than “Trump is a Nazi,” or would it be better to accept that is your preferred explanation because it fits what you would like to believe better?
I’ve read Marx, the Quran, etc . It didn’t make me a communist or Muslim. Have you read much in the way of things you don’t agree with? I highly recommend it, if not. Regardless of the answer, it’s hard to imagine you could really believe that hearsay from a bitter ex is fact or that there’s no other reason Trump may have wanted to read it.
Why that book, and not the much better known My Struggle? It seems a more logical explanation to me might be that Trump sought to learn from Hitler’s ability to influence people through rhetoric, not the content per se. Hitler was something of an idiot savant when it came to that. Otherwise, he was pretty much a loser in all his other pursuits.
I’d have to refresh my memory whether he was an artist, house painter, or both, but I remember he wasn’t particularly successful at whichever it was. He was iirc a brave soldier, but ended up injured, so not some remarkable warrior. He wasn’t financially successful at any profession before dictatorship. As a putsch leader, he failed and ended up in jail. I’ve read nothing to suggest he wasn’t heterosexual, but also nothing to lead he had any success with any women before Eva Braun either, and it took him becoming close to dictator of Europe to get anywhere with her. He didn’t father children, so there’s no proof he got past first base with her, either. As a politician, his early career was rather devoid of electoral success. As an author, the only reason any appreciable number of people read his work is the events of his dictatorship. I don’t speak German well enough to judge, but the translations don’t lead me to believe the written word or power of ideas made him memorable.
There was one thing in life Hitler was unusually good at: stirring up a crowd during a live or radio broadcast speech. That alone elevated him to any success in life and reason anyone remembers him now. So, some one who would like to be very good at persuading people might read a collection of his speeches to help learn some techniques of persuasion.
Who might want to learn to be more persuasive verbally? Examples could include a businessman who cuts deals for a living, aspiring politician, or entertainer who might want to have a hit show. All things Trump has done for a living. That seems to me to be a more plausible explanation for why Trump would want to read that book than admiration for Hitler or his views.
“It is also well established that Trump admires authoritarians (Putin, Victor Orban, Kim Jung Un, etc.)”
When you uncritically consume the spin of a multifaceted propaganda and information manipulation operation long enough, and don’t balance it with sufficiently differing perspectives nearly enough, it’s easy to believe that some things are well established.
There’s a world of difference between the people you mention, and authoritarian seems like an excessive term for Putin and Orban. Populist, nationalist, and strong CEO model of leadership might seem authoritarian from one perspective, but there’s little doubt that Orban and Putin would win any honestly conducted election in their countries regardless of your beliefs about how honestly their more recent elections were actually conducted, or, by way of comparison, say the most recent US elections.
Populism, nationalism and the strong CEO model aren’t necessarily aspects of authoritarianism, either. A quisling regime which rolls out the red carpet for foreign domination, contrary to the popular will of their own country, can be just as or more authoritarian than one which strongly asserts its nationalist views and policies. An elitist regime which concentrates power in the hands of faceless and interchangeable junta, college of mandarins, unelected bureaucracy, weak puppets of oligarchs, aristocracy, and many other forms of joint or cooperative rule can be just as or more authoritarian than a popular demagogue.
As for Kim, idiot son of an idiot son, he’s essentially an absolute monarch like what ruled most of the world for most of history and still rules much of it today – a step past authoritarian. Marxist ideology is a thin surface veneer in the DPRK; it’s essentially more feudal, with the party fulfilling roughly the functionas of the medieval Catholic church system, Shinto, etc.
Regardless of definitions or conflations: precisely what has Trump said or done to lead you to conclude who he does or doesn’t admire? Do mob bosses admire more successful mob bosses, hate and envy them, have some mix of feelings? Trump knows enough about strong CEOs, mob bosses, and world leaders to know that praise or admonishment have certain results, regardless of how genuine or phony the sentiments expressed. He’s also often quid pro quo, returning praise for praise and insults for insults.
And, he has diarrhea of the mouth (like me) and contradicts himself constantly (I try to do it less; results may vary). From his word salads, which are Rorschach test more than anything else, you can pull out admiration for various people if that’s your goal. But, feel free to try to establish what you think is well established with actual quotes or better yet actions if you think it’s worth your time, not that you need my permission of course.
I can’t say that I find it to be well established, though.
“And he has used language reminiscent of NAZIism, saying that immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country”. ”
If you look for things that sound vaguely Nazi, you’ll find them sooner or later, particularly when you are perfectly willing to put the worst possible spin on anything, take it out of context, and or accept dubious reports as fact – much as a Nazi propaganda operation would do.
In that particular case, I forget the context if any, but I’m pretty sure it was a reference to the individual as well as organized criminals, terrorists, scammers, insane people etc who are coming in or in some case being dumped into the US by foreign governments as part of the uncontrolled mass immigration under Biden.
When you provide terrible incentives and effectively no controls, of course terrible people and terrible organizations/groups of people/governments will take advantage of them. The nazilike propaganda operation which sweeps the entire actual and potential set of problems with this reverse lebensraum under the rug will then also imply or flat out state that it was a statement about all immigrants.
Even if we buy the spin that it’s an ethnic/racial comment, that didn’t set the Nazis apart during Hitler’s time. Racist attitudes were not socially taboo then, and you can find plenty of more explicitly racist quotes by, for example, Churchill or Woodrow Wilson, among many others. You wouldn’t want to intersectionally examine the published and reported expressions of the US founders in this way – we’d be a Nazi nation from day one by that standard.
Hitler was fairly far end of the scale in perpetrating a government and social emphasis on that sort of thing, but the imperialism, colonialism and slavery that elevated Europe for centuries leading up to that time was often justified in racial terms, which was far from unique or one sided in human history. That didn’t stop with Hitler, either.
Hitler was also fairly far end of the scale in focusing his country’s government, economy and society on a military buildup and war to conquer Europe and environs. However, he wasn’t unique in that way either – Stalin, Churchill and FDR just turned out to be better at it than he was. Losers don’t tend to write the most widely consumed accounts and interpretations of historical events in most cases.
To take a very short quote that would have been completely unremarkable in Hitler’s time from the leaders or leading opposition leaders of any nation and jump to “Trump is Hitler” says more about the people behind the propaganda point than it does about Trump. How about looking at somewhat more distinguishing thing about Hitler, such as all the provocative rhetoric, military buildup and smaller military moves that set the stage for world war? Democrats and the left are relatively more Hitleresque than Trump in their excessive demonization of Putin and Russia and continued efforts to stoke up a third world war. Trump is, by comparison, the leader of the peace party. But only by comparison.
Has Trump said anything remotely approaching setting the stage to kill millions of Americans based on race, ethnicity, religion, or national origin? Is he the leading proponent of stoking international tensions and wars or possibly wider or bigger scale future wars in US politics today? I don’t see any persuasive evidence for that, or for any Hitler comparisons that flow from it.
The phone keeps restarting, so we’ll have to do this piecemeal. First claim:
“Trump was reported to have kept kept the book “My New Order”, a collection of Hitler’s speeches, by his bed as far back as 1990. (Much as Clinton claimed he never inhaled, Trump has claimed he never read them.)”
Reported by his ex wife during or after acrimony in a divorce. It’s not exactly new or unusual about exes to say ugly things about each other. Supposing the claim is factually true, it’s not exactly hard to believe he didn’t actually read it, since it’s far more widely reported that he’s not much of a reader, particularly of long format writings such as books. And supposing he did read it, what he allegedly found admirable about Hitler was his mastery of crowd manipulation as a rhetorician and demagogue.
It’s several orders of speculation logic jumps to assume that he found racism, national socialism, fascism or dictatorship to also be admirable. Of course, the TDS crowd will make those jumps each and every time, reading into every alleged tidbit of evidence their desired conclusions.
While it wasn’t the case in 1990, it would be hard to make the case today that Trump is a fan of Hitler’s hatred of Jews. Trump’s favorite daughter is a convert to Judaism, her kids and husband are Jewish by birth, Trump is a friend and fan of Netanyahu and the most pro Israel president the US ever had, etc, etc.
We can examine the claims that he has negative views of other ethnic, religious or racial groups separately, and will, but it seems a particular stretch to say he’s prejudiced against Jews, which was of course Hitler’s biggest obsession. The one statement I’ve seen reported that sounds prejudiced in that way – that he only wants short guys in yarmulkes doing his books – was actually a compliment to Jews, saying they tend to be better at a certain type of task than other groups of people. That’s it he actually even said it at all.
That’s a long way from being just like Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist German Workers Party.
You seem to be conflating Unimportant and myself.
Regarding the parts that seem addressed towards me. you lay out exactly what I was driving at, but don’t seem to grasp what I meant:
The sources are an ex-wife who had a bone to pick with Trump and had already fabricated allegations against him in the past, and a bunch of far-left fake news media – and yes that certainly includes Fox “News” – which were always spreading misinformation to attack him. Given every other defamatory lie they’ve spread about him, all this does is discredit the allegations while doing no harm Trump.
Regarding the parts about Trump that seem to be addressed to Unimportant, I certainly have some thoughts – which I had originally typed out – but since it doesn’t directly concern me, I will keep them to myself for now.
Regarding not voting for Oliver because he picked ter Maat as a running mate:
It was an especially dirty quid pro quo. After being voted out, Mike ter Maat endorsed Chase Oliver in a faux point of parliamentary procedure (according to Michael Rectenwald) or a point of personal privilege (as I remember it) during voting, to influence the outcome of that vote.
In return, he would replace Kristin Alexander, as Oliver’s running mate. Ter Maat didn’t mention that Rectenwald has made him the same offer, and it worked: the vote was hijacked and Rectenwald was voted out.
They then proceeded to lie to delegates that many states would lose ballot access if they elected NOTA over Oliver, and that also worked. And just like that, the illegitimate Oliver-ter Maat ticket was fraudulently secured.
But while ter Maat is certainly the overtly treacherous viper in all this, Oliver was at least as much a part of their conspiracy.
What lost Oliver any credibility he may have otherwise been believed by some to have had – in reality, zero any way you cut it – was his part in defrauding the nominating convention, not the fact that he did so with ter Maat specifically.
For example, if he had made a crooked deal against ter Maat, by which Rectenwald dropped out and endorsed him during the fifth ballot, then that would have been equally discrediting of him – and in that scenario of Rectenwald rather than of ter Maat.
The report of him having Hitler’s writings by his bed and reading them at night came years ago from his first wife.
I do not have Trump derangement syndrome. That is neither real nor disease. I did, however, spend the first 30 years of my life growing up and living in the Philadelphia area. Everyone there was affected when Trump would scrub up a project and not pay people. He is a horrible businessman and a crook and always has been. And yes, I knew people personally who worked for small companies that he hired for his Atlantic City Casino project and then refused to pay even after they did the work correctly and to completion.
I don’t understand how my criticism of Oliver is original and unique. A ticket is a ticket. The VP selection does matter and always has. His choice was horrible.
And as far as some of those campaign event statements that you say never happened: I saw several of them happen. Among them includes that he did tell supporters to take action against protesters and that he would pay the legal bills. I remember watching it live on Fox covering the event and then repeated ad-nauseum there and elsewhere. I am pretty sure that was the 2016 campaign.
As far as whether any specific crime against certain people was Biden or Obama or Trump, I really don’t care. Their administrations all abused people in one form or another.
I despise Trump, but that was just unhinged.
“Trump was reported to have kept kept the book “My New Order”, a collection of Hitler’s speeches, by his bed as far back as 1990”
Reported by whom?
“he has used language reminiscent of NAZIism, saying that immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country””
That’s a reach and a half.
“Trump admires authoritarians (Putin, Victor Orban, Kim Jung Un, etc.)”
Which of those are authoritarians? Kim and Trump himself. Neither Putin, nor Orban.
“There were several instances of staffers going on trips for one thing or another and Trump firing them while they were away, just so they had to pay for their own transportation back.”
Yes, he does like his trolling, as well as shaking things up and rotating his staff for no (apparent) reason. That isn’t sociopathic behavior though.
“Or the instances at his rallies where he would tell his violent supporters to “rough up” protestors and that he would pay for their legal fees.”
Yeah, that never happened. Unfortunately. I would have a lot more respect for him, if he had told patriots to quell the BLM insurrection and that he would take care of their legal fees.
“Or when he told his violent supporters to steal some protestor’s coats and throw the people outside in a freezing Vermont winter.”
Again, that never happened. Unfortunately. If by protestors, you mean the Soros-paid (national) socialist rioters and looters, that would have been awesome.
“Or the child family separation policy. Some 1,400 kids still haven’t been reunited with their parents because the Trump administration didn’t bother keeping records.”
This old chestnut again? That was Obama, not Trump, though Biden certainly carried it forward in full force.
“What exactly caused you to believe that the Democrats are beholden to Xi Jinping?”
Which party takes the most money from the CCP? Which party allows PRC immigrants and agents to illegally enter the US? Which party is fighting to ensure the PRC can continue sending pregnant women to deliver anchor babies in the US? Which party leaks classified documents to CCP spies they are screwing? Which party did least to support the Hong Kong protests? Which party suggested using PRC-made software for voting machines? The Republicans aren’t good by any stretch of the imagination, but the Democrats have been consistently even worse.
“Was it Biden’s global restrictions on semiconductor exports to China”
And whose economy did that damage more, the US or the PRC? Just like Biden’s silly anti-Russian sanctions, it almost exclusively hurt Americans.
“Biden said the US would absolutely defend Taiwan militarily in the event of a Chinese invasion”
Biden has said a lot of things, some of them even coherent or intelligible. But at the end of the day, he has done more to push for a Chinese-Taiwanese war than Trump, Obama, Bush, Clinton, Bush, Reagan, Carter, Ford and Nixon put together. And Taiwan is more unsure of American support than under any previous US president ever.
“Biden has not only kept all of Trump’s tariffs on China, he has added more?”
Yeah, the one on processing units back-fired particularly spectacularly. Let’s add tariffs against the PRC on a product that is assembled in the PRC out of components from the PRC. What could possibly go wrong? LOL
“It was actually Trump, not Biden, who said that he ‘like(d) President Xi a lot, he was a very good friend of mine during my term'”
Since Xi has so much control over our elections, that was a “useful” thing to say. Was it morally justifiable? Absolutely not. Does it mean anything? Not beyond showing that Trump is willing to say anything if he thinks it will help him.
“that he would only defend Taiwan, maybe, if Taiwan paid enough protection money”
I doubt it. That sounds far too sensible for Trump. Next you’ll tell me, he will leave NATO if they don’t start paying their share.
“If Trump is elected and Taiwan hesitates more than a few days to pay the protection money, China has a window of opportunity.”
The PRC has had a window of opportunity for almost four years now. We’ve seen an increase in naval skirmishes and violations of airspace. The only reason that the PRC hasn’t gone to war against (the Republic of) China yet, is because of Putin intervention to keep Xi from starting WWIII.
Trump was reported to have kept kept the book “My New Order”, a collection of Hitler’s speeches, by his bed as far back as 1990. (Much as Clinton claimed he never inhaled, Trump has claimed he never read them.) And he has used language reminiscent of NAZIism, saying that immigrants were “poisoning the blood of our country”. It is also well established that Trump admires authoritarians (Putin, Victor Orban, Kim Jung Un, etc.)
I would say Trump also exhibits sociopathic behaviors. There were several instances of staffers going on trips for one thing or another and Trump firing them while they were away, just so they had to pay for their own transportation back. Or the instances at his rallies where he would tell his violent supporters to “rough up” protestors and that he would pay for their legal fees. Or when he told his violent supporters to steal some protestor’s coats and throw the people outside in a freezing Vermont winter. Or the child family separation policy. Some 1,400 kids still haven’t been reunited with their parents because the Trump administration didn’t bother keeping records. Apparently it was worth it to teach the immigrants a lesson.
What exactly caused you to believe that the Democrats are beholden to Xi Jinping? Was it Biden’s global restrictions on semiconductor exports to China, the fact that Biden said the US would absolutely defend Taiwan militarily in the event of a Chinese invasion, or the fact that Biden has not only kept all of Trump’s tariffs on China, he has added more?
It was actually Trump, not Biden, who said that he “like(d) President Xi a lot, he was a very good friend of mine during my term”, and that he would only defend Taiwan, maybe, if Taiwan paid enough protection money. If Trump is elected and Taiwan hesitates more than a few days to pay the protection money, China has a window of opportunity.
Stewart Flood, I’m by no means a Trump sycophant, but sociopathic, Hitler loving racist? He was president for four years. This is Trump Derangement Syndrome run amok. What’s your evidence for this? If anything, it more closely resembles Harris or Biden, aside from choice of favorite dictator. Why do sociopathic sinister control freaks always project their characteristics unto their opposition?
Besides, Hitler, as horrible as he was, wasn’t even the worst dictator of his own time, much less all time. FDR was a friend, working ally and fan of an even worse dictator, Josef Stalin. DP leaders ever since have followed suit, as has the independent left , running cover for every mass murdering thug from Mao to Pol Pot to Che and too many others to name.
Xi JInping is the obvious puppetmaster of the D leadership today. Biden is a handpuppet quisling, and Walz seeks to set new records in bowing and scraping to the CCP.
Your criticism of Oliver is at least novel, at least based on what I’ve seen. Points for originality.
I don’t see much point in voting. If it was effortless and honestly tallied and reported, and if my vote was not background noise in a 9 figure electorate, Trump seems a marginal lesser evil, like the last two times. But the task is essentially impossible by design, and the only human ever capable of competent political leadership at that scale wanted no part of it.
@Michael Gilson cc. Darryl Perry
Richard Winger is indeed monitoring the problems RFK is encountering in trying to get removed from battleground ballots:
– Indiana: https://ballot-access.org/2024/08/24/robert-f-kennedy-jr-remains-on-indiana-ballot/
– Michigan: https://ballot-access.org/2024/08/24/michigan-secretary-of-state-says-robert-f-kennedy-jr-cant-withdraw/
– Nevada: https://ballot-access.org/2024/08/25/nevada-state-court-hearing-on-challenge-to-robert-f-kennedy-jr-petition/
At least living in a “red” state he is still an option on my ballot this fall.
The democrat is a cackling fool.
The republican is a sociopathic, Hitler loving racist.
The libertarian…well…I would probably vote for Oliver if his VP pick were someone else. Oliver lost all credibility with that pick.
West? Ha! The Greens? Double ha!
Where’s a good classical liberal party when you need one?
But a man with a dead worm in his head? Classic protest vote. IF I VOTE. The only election I ever skipped voting in since I first voted at 18 in ‘76 was 2020.
The 12th Amendment is terribly unclear on what happens if you a tied for third place in the EC and if that means both candidates or neither or somehow you pick one of them are to be eligible in the House.
“the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President”
Is not exceeding three in reference to “persons” or “numbers”?
Moot point because we’re probably never going to see a contingent election again, and if we did have one the scenario of the third-place candidate winning is a fantasy.
If it went to the House and RFK somehow was the third candidate on a faithless elector, he wouldn’t just get no state votes, he probably wouldn’t get any individual member votes. The Venn diagram of “few (if any) House Rs left who are anti-Trump enough to plausibly not vote for him” and “people who like RFK” has zero overlap.
RFK was a mixed bag for me, great on a few issues, not so much on others.
The premise of his independent run was that he’d be up against Trump and Biden. And that he could reach the polling numbers to get in the presidential debates. With Biden out, and the campaigns arranging their own rules for the debates, he could only hope to be a spoiler, and perhaps get matching funds. I don’t blame him for taking this tack, except for endorsing Trump.
RE: Darryl W Perry
August 24, 2024
How many states actually allow a candidate to remove themselves from the ballot?
Hi Darryl,
Not sure how that goes. I believe some states you can if before a deadline, others not even death will remove you.
Is Richard Winger monitoring? He is likely to know.
–MG
Joe Wendt
August 24, 2024
Kennedy wasted people’s time and money. He is a loser.
———–
Sounds like the LP MC
I’m glad this putz is dropping out. Looks like we at the brotherhood have finally got what we wanted. Next, Trump will lose and we can instate our NWO and Bilderberg Agenda Reset.
How many states actually allow a candidate to remove themselves from the ballot?
Kennedy wasted people’s time and money. He is a loser.
Maybe the faithless electors can make a bi-partisan agreement, and have 3 Democratic electors vote for Romney, and 3 Republican electors vote for Manchin, so that both of them would be the 3rd place finishers, and thus create some room for negotiation in the House delegations.
Likewise, if the Republican electors were smart, some of them would vote for Manchin to make him the third choice.
If, in the unlikely event that the electoral college is split 269-269, I suspect that several faithless Democratic electors will conspire to vote for Haley or Romney, or some other Republican acceptable to them, to force that 3rd choice onto the House
There is one other possible outcome if the electoral college is split 269-269, and the House delegations are split 25-25, and thus deadlocked. The person selected by the Senate (it would have to be either Vance or Walz, because the Senate can only choose from the top two electoral vote getters) to be Vice-President would become President, as the office of President would be vacant on inauguration day.
For him to even be considered by the House he needs at least one electoral vote. If, in the unlikely event that the electoral college splits 269-269, at least ONE faithless elector has to vote for someone else for that third person to even be considered by the House. I suspect that if it WERE to split 269-269, there would be MORE than one faithless elector in the effort to get that 3rd spot.
Presumably, if there were more than one person getting a vote by a faithless elector, then ALL of them would be in the 3rd spot, UNLESS someone gets at least TWO faithless electors to vote for them.
Also, they have to vote by state delegations. For any 3rd “compromise” candidate to even be considered, the delegation would have to be split 25-25, and thus thoroughly deadlocked, and open to a third possibility.
If all those unlikely events were to occur, history would be truly made. Could the Constitution survive such an outcome?
He misunderstands how a contingent election works under the 12th Amendment. He would not be an eligible candidate in the House in the case of a 269-269 tie, it’s only for the top three vote getters in the Electoral College, so you have to get at least one EV. And while he could conceivably get a faithless elector in the case of a 269-269 tie, so could literally anybody else.
RFK had already collapsed to 3, 4, 5% in the polls. For comparison, Johnson (who in many ways has followed the most similar trajectory with a comparable amount of prominence and a polling peak in the low double digits) at this point in 2016 was still getting 8, 9, 10%.
If he’d stayed in the race it’s entirely possible he wouldn’t have even cracked 2% in the end, and certainly wouldn’t have done much better than that if he did.
“My name will remain on the ballot in most states. If you live in a blue state, you can vote for me without harming or helping president Trump or vice-president Harris. In red states the same will apply. I encourage you to vote for me. And if enough of you do vote for me, and neither of the major party candidates win 270 votes, which is quite possible – in fact, today our polling shows them tying at 269-269, then I could conceivably still end up in the White House in a contingent election. But in about ten battleground states, where my presence would be a spoiler, I’m gonna remove my name – and I’ve already started that process – and urge voters not to vote for me.”
So not only is he not dropping out of the race, he is encouraging voters outside of ten battleground states to go vote for him in November. Myth busted!
Though, as I said below, he delusional is he thinks this House of Representatives would ever elect him in a contingent election.
“Three great causes drove me to enter this race, in the first place, primarily. And these are the principle causes that persuaded me to leave the Democratic Party, and run as an independent, and now to throw my support behind president Trump. The causes were free speech, the war in ‘Ukraine’ and the war on our children.
[…]
President Trump says that he will re-open negotiations with president Putin and end the war overnight, as soon as he becomes president. This alone would justify my support for his campaign. Last summer it looked like no candidate was willing to negotiate a quick end to the ‘Ukraine’ war, to tackle chronic disease epidemics, to protect free speech: our constitutional freedoms, to clean corporate influence out of our government, or to defy the neocons and their agenda of endless military adventurism. But now one of the two candidates has adopted these issues as his own to the point that he has asked to enlist me in his administration. I’m speaking of course of Donald Trump.
[…]
I’ve made the heart-wrenching decision to suspend my campaign and to support president Trump.”
I knew Kennedy was both dishonest – he’s a politician and a Kennedy, after all – and to some extent stupid – despite all scientific evidence to the contrary, he is mindlessly hysterical about the “anthropogenic climate change” hoax and blindly believes modern “autism” “diagnoses” are no less reliable than they used to be -but I didn’t believe him capable of flamboyantly committing character and career suicide on such a grand scale.
When has Trump ever demonstrated any interest in tackling Big Pharma rather than propping it up, or in protecting the freedom of speech and other constitutional freedoms of anyone besides himself, or in removing corporate influence from government rather than switching up which corporations get to influence government?
If Trump actually holds such interests, let him swallow his pride and say so in public. Let him admit he was wrong about covid and apologize, instead of doubling down and insulting victims to their faces. If he isn’t man enough to say openly what Kennedy and Shanahan have claimed he told them in private, then he isn’t man enough to run the country.
Kennedy mentions getting enlisted in Trump’s administration, but as I explained before, now that he has sold out to Trump by (partially) endorsing him, he will not be able to hold on to it.
If he “publicly” or “furiously” disagrees with Trump, as he says their arrangement would allow him to, then he will be kicked out immediately.
If he doesn’t and is a good little yes-man, then he will be kicked out as soon as his unpopularity with his own former supporters whom he sold out, and his unpopularity with Trump’s sycophants who got jabbed out-the-wazoo, start to negatively affect the Trump administration. Or as soon as Trump needs a scapegoat for something. Or as soon as Trump just grows tired of him or wants to shake things up. Whichever comes first really.
“He told me president Trump was anxious to talk to me about chronic disease and other subjects, and to explore avenues of cooperation. He asked if I would take a call from the president. President Trump telephoned me a few minutes later and I met with him the following day. A few weeks later, I met again with president Trump and his family members and close advisers in Florida. In a series of long and tense discussions, I was surprised to discover that we are aligned on many key issues. In those meetings he suggested that we join forces as a unity party. We talked about Abraham Lincoln’s team of rivals. That arrangement would allow us to disagree publicly and privately, and furiously if need be, on issues over which we differ, while working together on the existential issues upon which we are in accordance.
[…]
Following my first discussion with president Trump, I tried unsuccessfully to open similar discussions with vice-president Harris. Vice-president Harris declined to meet or even to speak with me.”
So, if Kennedy is to be believed, Trump approached him to discuss cooperating; not the other way around. And he then approached Harris to give her the same opportunity, which she declined.
It sounds like Trump’s offer of cooperation and to enlist Kennedy into his administration, were made before any discussion of Kennedy’s partial endorsement, and were in no way contingent upon it.
There was never any quid pro quo. Myth busted!
“In those swing states, Kennedy urged his supporters to vote for Republican Donald Trump.”
When did he say this? I recall him saying he urged voters in the states where he was removing his name from the ballot, not to go and vote for him anyway. But I do not recall him urging them who to vote for instead. Though it can be reasonably concluded from everything else he said that he would not want them voting for Harris.
“he did not confirm any plans to be appointed to a future Trump administration.”
He said, Trump “has asked to enlist me in his administration”. And that Trump “suggested that we join forces as a unity party”, which “would allow us to disagree publicly and privately, and furiously if need be, on issues over which we differ, while working together on the existential issues upon which we are in accordance.”
“he’s aiming to be maybe selected by the House”
Then he’s delusional. The duopoly controlled house is far less likely to elect him than the electorate is.
“become a one man pressure group”
Which is almost equally delusional. If he pushes back against Trump in a way Trump dislikes, he’s out. If he garners negative attention of a kind that displeases Trump, he’s out. If Trump ever needs a scapegoat for anything, he’s out. If Trump merely get tired of him or feels like another reshuffle, he’s out.
…And the gold medal for mental gymnastics goes to:
“he HAS effectively dropped out, even if he uttered no such actual words.”
An adorably focused withdrawal.
“ending the Ukraine war, ending the chronic disease epidemic, and for finally protecting free speech.”
An end to the US government subsidies to the Ukraine war would be a blessing.
“Suspending” his campaign means he HAS effectively dropped out, even if he uttered no such actual words.
First, NO “suspended” campaign in recent times has “unsuspended.” Don’t @ me with Perot 1992. First, he did a full drop-out before coming back. Second, a real billionaire, back when that meant more, he was running on his own dime.
Brainworm Bobby “suspended” in all likelihood, rather than dropping out, in part to stay eligible for FEC money that he might get.
Again, no “suspended” campaign has unsuspended.
Certainly, no campaign that has endorsed another candidate has “unendorsed.”
Per Mr. Spock’s sagacity, a difference that makes no difference IS NO DIFFERENCE.
==
Otherwise, as far as his speech? I don’t know which was worse:
The untrue Camelot dreck;
The conspiracy theories;
The pity party;
Or the general stupidity.
He’s just too old to be a swinger.
So he’s aiming to be maybe selected by the House and at worst verify support to become a one man pressure group?
Almost sounds like the old Nolan LP electoral/balance of power tactic. Holy Tomato.
Interesting poll @ https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/polling-on-trump-rfk-jr-alliance/