Trump

[Vrede too]

Tell the Senate: Block the CEO of Exxon from running the State Department!

In the wake of Russia's invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea Exxon opposed sanctions, has lost an estimated $1 billion and has been energetically lobbying to have the sanctions lifted. Conflict of interest, anyone?

[Vrede too]

I'm over it. I'm just watching him "drain the swamp" by stocking the swamp with largest beasts than we've ever seen in a cabinet. He's such an outsider don't cha know??

No tantrums? Mr.B lies yet again.

Remember this:
We Americans that voted for someone other than Putin/Trump outnumber Trumpettes by about 11 million and Putin/Trump got the second highest vote total. Then, including voters that stayed home we non-Trumpettes outnumber Trumpettes by about 75% to 25%.

PUTIN/TRUMP HAVE NO MANDATE
GET OVER IT!

[Vrede too]

What the What? Kanye West Meets With President-Elect Donald Trump at Trump Tower in NYC

FEMA Director?



Bush Doesn't Care About Black People

Would it really be that much more bizarre than other Trump picks?

[JTA]

Hey you guys. Does everybody remember when the right would make fun of Obama for excessive use of "umm" and "ugh" when giving speeches, but then Trump came along and can barely form a coherent sentence let alone a coherent argument during the debates? Nah. Trump's their man, and we should stand behind the president regardless.

[Mr.B]

"Hey you guys. Does everybody remember when the right would make fun of Obama for excessive use of "umm" and "ugh" when giving speeches, but then Trump came along and can barely form a coherent sentence let alone a coherent argument during the debates? Nah. Trump's their man, and we should stand behind the president regardless."

This reinforces my statement I made a few days ago, that got shot down...
"intelligence is not always the result of "book learning".

[rstrong]

Hey you guys. Does everybody remember when the right would make fun of Obama for excessive use of "umm" and "ugh" when giving speeches, but then Trump came along and can barely form a coherent sentence let alone a coherent argument during the debates? Nah. Trump's their man, and we should stand behind the president regardless.

Obama is the best orator of any president or presidential candidate in decades. He showed it time and time again during the 2008 campaign, with no teleprompter.

But then Irish premier Brian Cowen had a teleprompter gaffe. Obama then ad-libbed a good-natured and well-received joke - rather than using a teleprompter.

Rush Limbaugh of course reported it as Obama having a teleprompter gaffe. No credible reporter or blogger would repeat the smear or take anything Rush has said in the last 20 years as truth. In other words it was spread far and wide by the Fox News and other pundits on the right.

"Umm" joins teleprompters, private mail servers, not wearing a flag lapel pin, not expanding F-22 production, regulations, taxes, executive orders and many more things that are peachy-keen when the Republicans were in power, but suddenly became horribly wrong when Democrats are elected.

Trump mocked the use of teleprompters, and even declared that they should be banned in Presidential politics. And yes, of course he then started using them.

[JTA]

Hey you guys. Does everybody remember when the right would make fun of Obama for excessive use of "umm" and "ugh" when giving speeches, but then Trump came along and can barely form a coherent sentence let alone a coherent argument during the debates? Nah. Trump's their man, and we should stand behind the president regardless.

Obama is the best orator of any president or presidential candidate in decades. He showed it time and time again during the 2008 campaign, with no teleprompter.

But then Irish premier Brian Cowen had a teleprompter gaffe. Obama then ad-libbed a good-natured and well-received joke - rather than using a teleprompter.

Rush Limbaugh of course reported it as Obama having a teleprompter gaffe. No credible reporter or blogger would repeat the smear or take anything Rush has said in the last 20 years as truth. In other words it was spread far and wide by the Fox News and other pundits on the right.

"Umm" joins teleprompters, private mail servers, not wearing a flag lapel pin, not expanding F-22 production, regulations, taxes, executive orders and many more things that are peachy-keen when the Republicans were in power, but suddenly became horribly wrong when Democrats are elected.

Trump mocked the use of teleprompters, and even declared that they should be banned in Presidential politics. And yes, of course he then started using them.

I've taken up a new late night hobby. It involved digging through Trump's tweets. There's a veritable treasure trove of goodies buried in there.

Trump's hypocrisy knows no bounds.

What makes it all the more shocking is it's blatantness. There's absolute no question about it. Not even your run-of-the-mill vague politician-like statements that can be weaseled out of. Nope. Straight up declarative "A is B" type statements.

The cynic in me stands triumphant above the rotting corpse of my defeated idealism

[JTA]

"Hey you guys. Does everybody remember when the right would make fun of Obama for excessive use of "umm" and "ugh" when giving speeches, but then Trump came along and can barely form a coherent sentence let alone a coherent argument during the debates? Nah. Trump's their man, and we should stand behind the president regardless."

This reinforces my statement I made a few days ago, that got shot down...
"intelligence is not always the result of "book learning".

Yeah I agree. Wisdom is also something that cannot be gleaned entirely through book learning, in my opinion, as well.

[O Really]

A comment that "intelligence is not always the result of 'book learning'" might get shot down because intelligence is never the result of learning from any source. Intelligence is genetic - what you do with it can make a big difference. And in many cases, it doesn't matter how you learn, but whether you learn. Problem with Trump and a lot of his picks has nothing to do with intelligence per se, but whether they've learned (from any source) the things necessary to do the jobs they're selected for. It doesn't matter how "smart" Trump is, unless he's majorly psychic, he can't possibly know what's going on around the world if he skips intel briefings. He can't possibly know whether or not the Russians tried to affect the election (unless of course Putin told him). He is still a civilian, with no real authority, and can't have the sources necessary to know the stuff he claims. "Idiot" used to have a real psychological definition, meaning a person with a specific level of low IQ. The term isn't in official use anymore, and it's pretty clear even an intelligent person can be an idiot.

[Vrede too]

Only someone with an impediment to intelligence, perhaps hubris in this case, would reject the "book learning" of intelligence briefings.

"intelligence is not always the result of "book learning".

A comment that "intelligence is not always the result of 'book learning'" might get shot down because intelligence is never the result of learning from any source....

Irony. Not sure whether it's a lack of intelligence or book learning.

[bannination]

A comment that "intelligence is not always the result of 'book learning'" might get shot down because intelligence is never the result of learning from any source. Intelligence is genetic - what you do with it can make a big difference. And in many cases, it doesn't matter how you learn, but whether you learn. Problem with Trump and a lot of his picks has nothing to do with intelligence per se, but whether they've learned (from any source) the things necessary to do the jobs they're selected for. It doesn't matter how "smart" Trump is, unless he's majorly psychic, he can't possibly know what's going on around the world if he skips intel briefings. He can't possibly know whether or not the Russians tried to affect the election (unless of course Putin told him). He is still a civilian, with no real authority, and can't have the sources necessary to know the stuff he claims. "Idiot" used to have a real psychological definition, meaning a person with a specific level of low IQ. The term isn't in official use anymore, and it's pretty clear even an intelligent person can be an idiot.

Intelligence is really a quite hard thing to define because it really is an abstract concept. You can be born with the ability to absorb and memorize things quicker sure. To me the measure of intelligence is just the passion to learn, (which usually involves book learning, unless you want to repeat making discoveries that have already been made in the last century, I mean, who wants to rediscover calculus??).

With that said, Trump could possibly be a very intelligent person that has totally wasted that trait by lack of a passion to learn anything at all.

More likely he's an idiot that also had no passion in learning simply because he never had to (golden spoon), and had no interest in it.

I think we're saying the same thing in different words.

[Vrede too]

Tell the Senate: Block the CEO of Exxon from running the State Department!

I don't have a problem with globalism per se, though I do object to some of its manifestations. It is hilarious, though, that one of Trump's biggest appeals to his Trumpette's was his anti-globalism. It would be hard to name a more globalist person than the CEO of Exxon. Trumpette's have been made fools of, again.

[Mr.B]

I'm at the point in my life that I don't care who runs what, or even if they have the runs.

All the fussing, fuming, fighting, screaming, and cursing is merely a sign of the times; people wanting what they believe in right and to hell with what anyone else thinks, come hell or high water.

In all my years, I can't recall a worse leadership election than what we have just experienced, and with the constant rise in Internet and hacking capabilities, it ain't gonna do anything but get continually worse.

I'm sitting back and watching.

[bannination]

I'm at the point in my life that I don't care who runs what, or even if they have the runs.

All the fussing, fuming, fighting, screaming, and cursing is merely a sign of the times; people wanting what they believe in right and to hell with what anyone else thinks, come hell or high water.

In all my years, I can't recall a worse leadership election than what we have just experienced, and with the constant rise in Internet and hacking capabilities, it ain't gonna do anything but get continually worse.

I'm sitting back and watching.

It'll only get worse if Trump kills freedom of expression, which he seems to be strongly for. That's the scary part. Otherwise we'll continue to get better and better, as we have been -- .

[bannination]

Hey you guys. Does everybody remember when the right would make fun of Obama for excessive use of "umm" and "ugh" when giving speeches, but then Trump came along and can barely form a coherent sentence let alone a coherent argument during the debates? Nah. Trump's their man, and we should stand behind the president regardless.

I remember them also making fun of the way Mrs. Obama dressed...... as if she wasn't presidential enough. Now we have a soft core lesbian porn first lady. Go figure.

(Not that I care what she does, just the hypocrisy.)

[O Really]

Only someone with an impediment to intelligence, perhaps hubris in this case, would reject the "book learning" of intelligence briefings.
.

To make matters worse (as if), "briefings" is really just the name of it. Some presidents have had an in-person meeting, but others (I think including Obama), gets a very short (brief) written summary, from which he can ask questions or ask for more detail. Trump doesn't have to "hear the same thing every day." It's quite possible from what he says that he doesn't even know what he's turning down.

[bannination]

Every unified republican government ever has led to a financial crash

That settles it, definitely moving some money into some safer investments before year end.

[Vrede too]

The Shrubcession took 6 1/2 years, but it was a doozie.

[O Really]

It's getting ridiculous the extent so many people are trying to "normalize" Trump. And the number that ignore what's in front of their face to say "well, let's give him a chance." He gets a chance and new chances every day. He gets to appoint cabinet members and he appoints a Secretary of Education who has a long history of opposing public education. He appoints as Secretary of Energy a guy dumber than a bag of rocks, who has no idea what the Department of Energy is responsible for even though he wants to eliminate it. He gets to practice being President, so he twitter-attacks private citizens over their First Amendment rights. At what point can normal regular US citizens say Trump is a really bad choice and most of what he does is not going to be in the best interest of the US or its citizens. Do we have to wait until Wal-Mart shelves are totally empty because he ruined trade relations with China? Do we have to wait until schools are closed for lack of funding or Social Security and Medicare turn into tax credits? At what point can we say the man has bad ideas, makes bad hiring decisions, seeks advice from dangerous people, is by any number of objective business measures a poor manager, and ignores the counsel of those knowledgeable in technical matters?

I can't speak for everyone, but in my case it's not sour grapes that Hillary didn't win. Hell, I said before that if one of the clown car riders was going to win I'd probably have Trump than, say, Cruz. But looking at it just on specifics, without considering ideology (which he has none anyway), the man is already making a big mess and he's not even in office yet.

And besides, isn't anyone going to tell him and his fans that "draining the swamp" hasn't been considered a good thing to do for decades? And that most real swamps that were drained have turned into ecological disasters one way or another?

[JTA]

It's getting ridiculous the extent so many people are trying to "normalize" Trump. And the number that ignore what's in front of their face to say "well, let's give him a chance." He gets a chance and new chances every day. He gets to appoint cabinet members and he appoints a Secretary of Education who has a long history of opposing public education. He appoints as Secretary of Energy a guy dumber than a bag of rocks, who has no idea what the Department of Energy is responsible for even though he wants to eliminate it. He gets to practice being President, so he twitter-attacks private citizens over their First Amendment rights. At what point can normal regular US citizens say Trump is a really bad choice and most of what he does is not going to be in the best interest of the US or its citizens. Do we have to wait until Wal-Mart shelves are totally empty because he ruined trade relations with China? Do we have to wait until schools are closed for lack of funding or Social Security and Medicare turn into tax credits? At what point can we say the man has bad ideas, makes bad hiring decisions, seeks advice from dangerous people, is by any number of objective business measures a poor manager, and ignores the counsel of those knowledgeable in technical matters?

I can't speak for everyone, but in my case it's not sour grapes that Hillary didn't win. Hell, I said before that if one of the clown car riders was going to win I'd probably have Trump than, say, Cruz. But looking at it just on specifics, without considering ideology (which he has none anyway), the man is already making a big mess and he's not even in office yet.

And besides, isn't anyone going to tell him and his fans that "draining the swamp" hasn't been considered a good thing to do for decades? And that most real swamps that were drained have turned into ecological disasters one way or another?

Another frightening prospect that seems like a good idea on the surface is congressional term limits, something Trump and his supporters are supposedly hung ho for, that has all kinds of unintended detrimental consequences, especially given the current state of the executive branch.

Philosophical arguments aside for a moment, now more than ever do we need our experienced congresspeople to take the leadership helm and provide guidance and push back against unsavory acts and decisions by Trumps rogue executive. A legislative branch filled with newcomers ever few years would not bode well in resisting an overly strong, potentially corrupt executive.

Luckily congressional term limits are unlikely to occur.