George Conway called it perfectly last Sunday

[Pete F.]

Here is how he said it would play out

So we all know what’s going to happen here. Something like this:

1. Trump will go on TV tomorrow and give a speech. On paper, the speech may say some of the right things. It will look somewhat presidential. There’s an off chance it might even be good (grading on a curve).

2. But the problem will be that it was given by Trump, who’s incapable of sincere empathy. So it’ll be hard to believe that he believes the words he said. And his speech won’t address his own hateful, racist rhetoric.

3. So he’ll be roundly criticized for that. And he’ll also be criticized on policy grounds, because whatever he says on that score will not suffice for many people.

4. He’ll see and hear all this criticism on TV, and he’ll stew. And stew. He’ll grow angry and resentful that he was forced to give the speech in the first place.

5. Finally, perhaps within 24 or 48 hours, the narcissistic pressure will break the dam, and his anger and frustration will gush forward.

6. He’ll tweet, otherwise say, or do something that’ll completely undo whatever positive benefit came from the speech.

7. We’ve seen this movie before how many times?

[Got Stripers]

Empathy is not in his vocabulary, he was ripping into candidates and even the mayor of Dayton, he is clueless about how the leader of our country should handle something like this. All he sees is attacking his ratings, his image, his base.
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[Sea Dangles]

Greatest president ever
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[Pete F.]

Trump was supposed to act like an adult for once. Instead he viciously attacked the Mayor of Dayton, Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, Beto O’Rourke, Joe Biden, CNN, the NY Times, and for some reason Shepard Smith.
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Sea Dangles

Greatest president ever
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at a minimum, he’s nowhere near what pete and msnbc and cnn want us to think he is. he has no filter between his brain and his mouth, and he uses terrible words when he’s worked up, and words matter. but he’s not a comic book villain either, obviously.
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Pete F.

Trump was supposed to act like an adult for once. Instead he viciously attacked the Mayor of Dayton, Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, Beto O’Rourke, Joe Biden, CNN, the NY Times, and for some reason Shepard Smith.
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the mayor of dayton said he was terrific in the hospital. if facts matter. but you’re right, it would be nice if he could put a lid on it.

i didn’t see your post where you called out others for using the shooting as a club against political opponents? it only bothers you when Trump does it?
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[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

the mayor of dayton said he was terrific in the hospital. if facts matter. but you’re right, it would be nice if he could put a lid on it.

i didn’t see your post where you called out others for using the shooting as a club against political opponents? it only bothers you when Trump does it?
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Just who is the leader here?

The mayor
The Senator
Some candidate

Or Trump?

Trump never rises above the fray.
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[wdmso]

At what point do the cumulative action of trump begin to matter for his supporters.. and when will the stop with TDS excuse or argument may have been a valid argument year one . Clearly now its just weak and supporters cant even defend him . With a coherent reason or explanation.. its just every one else's fault
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[wdmso]

How sad i just said its every ones elese fault. Then go look at some news. Headline . Funny who cant or wont see this .. clearly the anymeans necessary crowd hard at work. Keeping their eyes and ears closed.. .president turned a day about gun-violence victims into a day about him, in effect making himself the victim.
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[Sea Dangles]

Originally Posted by wdmso

At what point do the cumulative action of trump begin to matter for his supporters.. and when will the stop with TDS excuse or argument may have been a valid argument year one . Clearly now its just weak and supporters cant even defend him . With a coherent reason or explanation.. its just every one else's fault
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You won’t be changing my mind and neither will PeteF. My guess is his support is steadily growing with his leadership for our great country. Maybe you might stop wondering why his supporters stick by him. Who do you prefer out of his potential opposition candidates? Get behind a foolish liberal and support them.
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[Jim in CT]

wdmso, on msnbc this week, there was a pundit who criticized trump for flying flags at half mast until 8/8.

H is the 8th letter, so to some nazis, 8/8 is code for “hail hitler”.

he’s implying that trump picked that date, to send a message to nazis.

he’s not a good guy. but the left is so stung by the loss, that they go way, way overboard in criticizing him. at some point it makes him sympathetic.
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[Got Stripers]

The hard core republicans stick with him because they see the writing on the wall, their party is shrinking and loosing its identity. His supporters will let him get away with anything, they will let him f*ck the environment, they don’t care he has treated our long time enemies better at times than our long time allies. They apparently don't care that Trump has failed on his two big campaign promises, to build the Mexican paid for wall and eliminate Obamacare. He promised to drain the swamp, yet he has filled what small percentage of cabinet posts he can fill with some of the most poorly qualified people ever. He ranted while campaigning that Obama spent too much time golfing, yet he has spent an obscene amount of time at his resorts, costly us millions and making his family money. His family and their businesses continue to profit while he is president, probably one of his key motivations to run in the first place, matters little to him it’s not allowed. Rule of law means nothing to him, BUT he is seen by his party as their best chance of hanging in for another term.

The shrinking party, the fact he gave the rich white republicans a major tax cut and was able to get judges seated they approve of, is why they hang tough and bite their tongues.
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[Pete F.]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

wdmso, on msnbc this week, there was a pundit who criticized trump for flying flags at half mast until 8/8.

H is the 8th letter, so to some nazis, 8/8 is code for “hail hitler”.

he’s implying that trump picked that date, to send a message to nazis.

he’s not a good guy. but the left is so stung by the loss, that they go way, way overboard in criticizing him. at some point it makes him sympathetic.
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You been watching the Swanson heir again obviously.

An audit by the Anti-Defamation League found white supremacist murders in the US "more than doubled in 2017," with far-right extremist groups and white supremacists "responsible for 59% of all extremist-related fatalities in the US in 2017." They were responsible for 20% of these fatalities the year before.
And from the Charleston church massacre through the killing of a protester in Charlottesville and the shootings at synagogues in Pittsburgh and Poway and most recently El Paso , far-right extremists are responsible for -- or suspected of - most of the ideological killings in America in the last 10 years, according to data from the ADL, which tracks extremist activity.
White supremacists are also looking to heavily recruit new members. White Supremacist groups posted more propaganda on college campuses for the third year in a row as they tried to get new young members on board, according to the ADL.
The exact numbers of groups, attacks, and activities are not as specifically known because of a lack of cohesiveness, transparency and data surrounding these types of groups at a federal level.
FBI Director Christopher Wray warned in July, before the El Paso attack, that domestic terrorism threats are on the rise. He said the FBI takes white supremacist hate crimes "extremely seriously."

Of course, none of this could possibly relate at all to Trump's political rhetoric.

On MSNBC Frank Figluzzi, former assistant director of the FBI for Counterintelligence discussed the ramifications of the presidents speech and how fringe groups can interpret words and actions as support and why care should be taken.

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Got Stripers

The hard core republicans stick with him because they see the writing on the wall, their party is shrinking and loosing its identity. His supporters will let him get away with anything, they will let him f*ck the environment, they don’t care he has treated our long time enemies better at times than our long time allies. They apparently don't care that Trump has failed on his two big campaign promises, to build the Mexican paid for wall and eliminate Obamacare. He promised to drain the swamp, yet he has filled what small percentage of cabinet posts he can fill with some of the most poorly qualified people ever. He ranted while campaigning that Obama spent too much time golfing, yet he has spent an obscene amount of time at his resorts, costly us millions and making his family money. His family and their businesses continue to profit while he is president, probably one of his key motivations to run in the first place, matters little to him it’s not allowed. Rule of law means nothing to him, BUT he is seen by his party as their best chance of hanging in for another term.

The shrinking party, the fact he gave the rich white republicans a major tax cut and was able to get judges seated they approve of, is why they hang tough and bite their tongues.
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how did the tax cut effect republicans and democrats differently?
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[Pete F.]

An interesting post by Robert K Kelley

The last few weeks of the Trump Show have been more awful than usual but also inadvertently revelatory @ Trump's coalition.If you've paid attention, you've suspected this stuff for a long time,but bc T says the quiet parts out loud,a lot of GOP masks have definitively dropped:

1. Gun rights advocates now clearly think that routine massacres are an acceptable price to pay for access to long guns. The president's teleprompter speech was so forced & hackneyed, & his desperation to blame anything - video games, mental health, the culture, hate - except easy gun access, was so transparent, that no one serious will ever buy that stuff again. That doesn't mean gun control will happen - Fox and empty-state senators will see to that - but at least the 'debate' is over. The insincerity of these arguments is now undeniable. The NRA & co. now clearly prioritize gun ownership over public safety, and they will say anything to defend a capacious reading of the 2A.

2. A lot of Trump voters are racist. Again, this wasn't too hard to figure out before; the tea party pretty clearly wasn't motivated by limited government. But Trump has ripped the mask off, just as he did with his blatantly fatuous speech on the shootings. Journalists have danced around calling the president racist for 2 years and have hedged for decades on racism as a motivation despite stuff like Willy Horton and the Southern strategy. Those days are now over. 'Economic anxiety' is the standard talking point to deflect this. That is impossible to invoke after 'send her back' caused no drop in Trump's approval rating. It is apparent now that Trump wants the GOP to be like the Nat'l Front.

3. Evangelicals couldn't care less about personal virtue. Here's another Trump 'silver lining': Trump's personal behavior is so appalling - spiteful, mean-spirited, selfish, adulterous - that evangelical support for him auto-demolishes any ethical/virtue argument they make. We never need to take moralistic arguments from religious conservatives seriously again. They're just another interest group now, with no principled belief in elevating our debased politics. I find this sell-out the most disappointing. There is something noble in the notion that politicians should strive for personal virtue. But evangelicals sold their soul to Trump for judges & access.

4. It's all about the tax-cuts and judges. Trump is woefully unfit for the office. Lots of retired GOP officials, like Boehner and Ryan, pretty clearly see that. But they swallowed all the racism, misogyny, narcissism, norm-busting,& so on just for that juicy 2017 tax cut to their donors. Again,you probably suspected plutocracy before. W's 2001 & 2003 tax cuts were upwardly redistributive too. But Trump is so awful that the Congressional GOP's willingness to stand with him anyway has starkly revealed its donor class preferences.

5. Budgetary restraint is for Democratic presidents only. Trump's keynesianism, exploding deficits, & bullying of the Fed for low interest rates to help him get re-elected are now so obvious as to be undeniable. Again, you kind of already knew this, but maybe the tea party was serious and Romney and Ryan really did think we were becoming Greece. Well that story is gone now too. Trump deficit spends with such abandon, that this GOP plank is revealed as insincere also. Kinda makes you wonder what's left?

Trump is woefully unfit & a terrible president, but his inability to lie convincingly is weirdly useful, ideologically at least. Yes, Trump lies and flim-flams all the time, but he when he does, he almost always signals his insincerity via his body language. He says the right stuff for a moment - at Charlottesville or after the shootings - but in such a fake, reading-from-the-teleprompter manner that you can easily decipher his true beliefs. This inability to mouth appropriate platitudes, to lie convincingly, has inadvertently revealed a lot about the GOP coalition and destroyed a lot of its most useful pretenses, e.g., crime, not race, is the concern, or mental health is the culprit of gun violence. This myth-busting is a 'progress' of a sort, which the GOP will come to regret after Trump is gone and no one knows what it stands for besides racism and upper income tax cuts. Aligning with Trump is a Faustian bargain, and the bill will come due. But by demolishing useful, deflective GOP myths, Trump is accelerating that reckoning.

[Jim in CT]

pete, wow, trump is evil, his voters are racist, evangelicals
don’t care about virtue ( none of them!!), author is surprised conservatives like low taxes and judges who abide by the constitution ( what a revelation!)?, only democrat presidents are fiscally responsible ( obama was a real cost cutter!!).

really interesting for sure.

come up for air, dude. you are really, really up to your eyeballs with obsession over the guy. do you think about anything else all day?

these articles played a role in Trumps victory. To democrats, everyone who disagrees with them, is disgusting. it’s not possible to have a principled
disagreement with the left anymore.

o don’t are about skin color, i like
babies to be born, i like
fiscal responsibility, i like
the Bill Of Rights, i think we need to manage who comes across our borders, and i think the data could
not be more clear, that family is the foundation of everything that matters. and i believe if you have a wee wee, you should pee in the men’s room.

my god pete, can you imagine all of the racism and hate i’m carrying around inside me? i should
be locked up.


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[Sea Dangles]

Another musing by the localTDS crew. They support nobody and waste their time trying to stem the tide.
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by Sea Dangles

Another musing by the localTDS crew. They support nobody and waste their time trying to stem the tide.
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it’s unbelievable.
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[PaulS]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

it’s unbelievable.
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And yet you have more posts in this forum than anyone.

[PaulS]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

how did the tax cut effect republicans and democrats differently?
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capping the SALT deductions hurt the blue "donor" states much more than the red "hands out" states

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by PaulS

And yet you have more posts in this forum than anyone.

do i start more deranged threads? trying to inject some reason, but you’re right it’s orobably a waste.
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[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by PaulS

capping the SALT deductions hurt the blue "donor" states much more than the red "hands out" states

so within a blue state, how does it impact republicans and democrats differently?

you’re wrong on the math. before salt taxes were capped, those in blue ( high tax) states had larger federal income tax deductions than someone in a red ( low tax states). so if i live in SC, i paid a higher federal tax rate then someone exactly like me who lives in CT. The people in low tax states were subsidizing people in high tax states. it’s not fair to them.

i got slammed by that salt cap. absolutely slammed. but it’s not unfair. Why should
someone in SC pay a higher federal rate, simply because CT is run by tax and spend
liberals?
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[PaulS]

Well SC does suck and Conn. is much better by almost every measure other than taxes. I've been to myrtle beach a few times visiting friends. Glad to leave when I do. My buddy loves it there bc he lives like a king while the help in his restaurant live crappy lives. My buddy also forgets that is FIL gave him the rest. and bf he had it he had a lousy job delivering flowers.

The impact is now the blue (donor) states are being taxed on $ they paid out to the state. That impacted blue states which are Dem. The Red states had the same ability to take those deductions but they had lower taxes so the cap. doesn't impact them.

The low tax states never subside the high tax states - instead they complain about taxes yet gladly have their hands out to accept $ from the gov. You think they would have some pride and not accept as much $ or at least keep their mouths shut.

[scottw]

Originally Posted by PaulS

Well SC does suck and Conn. is much better by almost every measure other than taxes. I've been to myrtle beach a few times visiting friends. Glad to leave when I do. My buddy loves it there bc he lives like a king while the help in his restaurant live crappy lives. My buddy also forgets that is FIL gave him the rest. and bf he had it he had a lousy job delivering flowers.

The impact is now the blue (donor) states are being taxed on $ they paid out to the state. That impacted blue states which are Dem. The Red states had the same ability to take those deductions but they had lower taxes so the cap. doesn't impact them.

The low tax states never subside the high tax states - instead they complain about taxes yet gladly have their hands out to accept $ from the gov. You think they would have some pride and not accept as much $ or at least keep their mouths shut.

impressive babble

[PaulS]

Originally Posted by scottw

impressive babble

impressive snarkyness.

At what point does it impact your personal life?

[Jim in CT]

Originally Posted by PaulS

Well SC does suck and Conn. is much better by almost every measure other than taxes. I've been to myrtle beach a few times visiting friends. Glad to leave when I do. My buddy loves it there bc he lives like a king while the help in his restaurant live crappy lives. My buddy also forgets that is FIL gave him the rest. and bf he had it he had a lousy job delivering flowers.

The impact is now the blue (donor) states are being taxed on $ they paid out to the state. That impacted blue states which are Dem. The Red states had the same ability to take those deductions but they had lower taxes so the cap. doesn't impact them.

The low tax states never subside the high tax states - instead they complain about taxes yet gladly have their hands out to accept $ from the gov. You think they would have some pride and not accept as much $ or at least keep their mouths shut.

SC is gaining population, CT is one of the very few states losing population. So there’s that.

Paul, are you up for answering a question? here goes.

SC has some godawful places. But there are also thriving suburbs with good schools, a good quality life, and a cheap cost of
living.

How many places does CT have like that? How many places does CT have that offer a good quality of
life with the SC price tag? Zero?
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[scottw]

Originally Posted by PaulS

My buddy loves it there bc he lives like a king while the help in his restaurant live crappy lives.

so if you earn below a certain wage or have a certain job you are living a "crappy life"???..that's pretty crappy and arrogant of you

[scottw]

Originally Posted by Jim in CT

SC has some godawful places. But there are also thriving suburbs with good schools, a good quality life, and a cheap cost of
living.

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my daughter is at school in South Carolina, she loves it there, will go to graduate school there or NC and is not coming back...every time I visit I can't get over how friendly and happy everyone that you meet down there is...it's a stark contrast to the Northeast...and that's everyone from the panhandlers to the folks at the grocery stores and convenience stores to the hotels, airports and on.....I love the the typical northeastern liberal arrogant snobbery that burns brightly when talking about other areas of the country particularly the south, cracks me up

[The Dad Fisherman]

Originally Posted by PaulS

Well SC does suck .

At least Trump was only saying that about one city, you just slammed an entire state.

[The Dad Fisherman]

Originally Posted by scottw

my daughter is at school in South Carolina, she loves it there, will go to graduate school there or NC and is not coming back...every time I visit I can't get over how friendly and happy everyone that you meet down there is...it's a stark contrast to the Northeast...and that's everyone from the panhandlers to the folks at the grocery stores and convenience stores to the hotels, airports and on.....I love the the typical northeastern liberal arrogant snobbery that burns brightly when talking about other areas of the country particularly the south, cracks me up

Yep, my daughter just graduated from school in NC, me and my wife loved it down there, leading contender for retirement right now.

Now she's moved onto graduate school in a 3rd world country,oops I mean, Baltimore.