Half-baked Republican Presidential Fruitcakes (and fellow confections)

Igotadose

recedite wrote: »

Not the same thing at all. Somebody hacked into the democrats system and found e-mails suggesting ways they might shaft both Sanders and Trump. All designed to give an advantage to Crooked Hilary and put her in the White House.
Its not in the realm of treason because none of these characters is the President.
Its just exposing political chicanery, which is always a good thing to do for democracy.

Agree about the chicanery; the DNC has a lot to answer for. However, the hacking's still a crime, and what Trump did might be a crime as well, some US pols have called him on violating the Logan Act. The Logan Act has never been used to prosecute anyone, though, it's ancient (18th century) and is just kept around to make headlines these days.

And if Trump's suddenly the paragon of good behavior, lets see the RNC e-mails. Fair's fair. While they're at it, lets see his damned tax returns once and for all. Hiding his debts to Putin's buddies is what we'd find.

On a different note, is there the equivalent of the Logan Act for Ireland? Can Martin get away with asking the Russians (oh heck, the British) to hack Kenny's systems for political advantage?

robindch

511 wrote: »

Isn't that very ironic coming from you seeing as you'd love nothing more but to censor anything you deem offensive in this world?

Not an especially nice thing to say about another poster - would you like to back that up with evidence which suggests that Links234 seriously wants to ban everything "offensive"?

Qs

Igotadose wrote: »

And if Trump's suddenly the paragon of good behavior, lets see the RNC e-mails. Fair's fair. While they're at it, lets see his damned tax returns once and for all. Hiding his debts to Putin's buddies is what we'd find.

TBF what Trump did as a private citizen isn't equal to what Hillary Clinton did as Secretary of State.

recedite

Igotadose wrote: »

On a different note, is there the equivalent of the Logan Act for Ireland?

Short answer; No.
I was just reading up on it here. It seems that British agents were trying to draw the US into a European conflict, as they have often done since then.
Logan, being a pacifist, acted to defuse the situation and in the process saved countless lives. The timing is interesting; 1798. A big year in Irish history. The British were desperate to fend off creeping republicanism and the desire of common people for more equality. It all came to a head a few years later at Waterloo, when that peasant upstart Napoleon was only barely defeated by the combined royalty of Europe and Russia.

Logan would probably be considered a national hero here, not a traitor.

oscarBravo

recedite wrote: »

Logan would probably be considered a national hero here, not a traitor.

Considering we've cheapened the word "traitor" here to the point where it means "someone whose political views I disagree with", it seems only reasonable that anyone who undermines the government would automatically qualify for national hero status.

robindch

recedite wrote: »

It all came to a head a few years later at Waterloo, when that peasant upstart Napoleon was only barely defeated by the combined royalty of Europe and Russia.

Royalty?

On behalf of the still crappy road network in Russia, poor French army discipline and logistics, a campaign of disinformation by the Russians (wherever did we hear of this before?!), Major Rain, Colonel Sun and General Snow, and most importantly, the small but unsettling Typhus bacterium, I would like to register a most vigorous protest.

Igotadose

Qs wrote: »

TBF what Trump did as a private citizen isn't equal to what Hillary Clinton did as Secretary of State.

Every POTUS candidate since Ford has shared his returns. So should Trump. He's hiding debts to Russian oligarchs - just what you want in your President.

Hilary as SoS did a good job - personally very happy with getting rid of Qaddafi, which is an emotional thing for me, having lost people I care about on flight 103. As well as in 9/11; her being SoS when bin Laden was killed was also good, she undoubtedly was involved in the process.

robindch

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKVwst1RGHw

Hotblack Desiato

recedite wrote: »

It all came to a head a few years later at Waterloo, when that peasant upstart Napoleon was only barely defeated by the combined royalty of Europe and Russia.

LOL, that peasant upstart who styled himself Emperor of the French.

ShooterSF

Obama on Jesus, and the American public cheered:

"our power doesn't come from some self-declared savior promising that he alone can restore order as long as we do things his way. We don't look to be ruled."

Oh no wait, he might have been talking about Trump.

robindch

It's a sign of how far things have come since it's no longer possible to positively identify satire.

TRUMP BOLSTERS FOREIGN-POLICY TEAM BY ADDING CARSON AND PALIN

http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/trump-bolsters-foreign-policy-team-by-adding-carson-and-palin?mbid=social_facebook

BTW, this is satire.

Andy Borowitz wrote:

NEW YORK (The Borowitz Report)—After stumbling badly on an interview question about Ukraine, the Republican Presidential nominee Donald Trump attempted on Tuesday to reassure voters about his geopolitical expertise by adding the retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson and the former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin to his team of foreign-policy advisers.

“Donald Trump always said that, as President, he would surround himself with the best people,” Trump’s spokesperson, Hope Hicks, said. “In Governor Palin and Dr. Carson, Mr. Trump now has the Dream Team.” Speaking to reporters, Palin dismissed the controversy over Ukraine as “much ado about a gotcha question.”

“Donald Trump is one hundred and ten percent correct when he says that no one needs to be worrying about Ukraine,” she said. “If you look Ukraine up on Google Maps, like I just did, it’s right where it’s always been.”

Dr. Carson said that, as President, Donald Trump would support the territorial integrity of Ukraine and “its magnificent network of underground grain tunnels. I cannot overemphasize the importance of Ukraine’s grain pipeline,” he said. “If you choke off Ukraine, Europe cannot bake bread.”

Trump’s spokesperson said that the additions to his foreign-policy brain trust should give voters “great confidence” that a Trump White House would be equal to the challenge of an international crisis. “When that 3 a.m. call comes in, and Mr. Trump is busy on Twitter, Dr. Carson and Governor Palin will be there to take the call,” she said.

Meanwhile, Mitt Romney has come out with some uncommonly straight talk about Trump:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpZGR_eTbAI

Links234

robindch wrote: »

It's a sign of how far things have come since it's no longer possible to positively identify satire.

I think Trump is nigh on impossible to satirize, he comes out with such absolutely incomprehensibly stupid garbage, so often, that it would be an excercise in futility. It's also got this bizarre effect, in that all of the insane, stupid, rambling nonsense he spouts seems to soften the blow of the next piece of outrageous stupidity he yells. Like for example his views on climate change, those alone should be cause for alarm, yet it almost doesn't get talked about because his plan to build a wall between Mexico and the US is so astonishingly idiotic that it takes the focus away from all the other stupid ****.

Another example is that currently Jill Stein is being pilloried for her, if I'm to put it kindly, flakey statements about vaccinations, and rightfully so. Yet there is almost no focus on how Trump thinks vaccinations are causing an autism epidemic.

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/449525268529815552

The same is not happening to Trump, and I can only assume it's because his critics can barely catch their breath before the next controversy, the next outrage, the next example of stupidty from Trump, he's caught in a lie so often that it never gets a chance to be focused on before he's skipped to the next lie. He wants to appoint judges to the supreme court to roll back marriage equality. His response to Khizr Khan is beyond astonishing, that level of callousness and spite would be enough to sink any other politician, but he's got this sort of pidgeon-playing-chess ignorance. His VP pick is like a human garbage fire of hate and ignorance, supporting conversion therapy for LGBT people, among so much more, and now promises Roe V. Wade will be overturned under Trump.


Trump Pushed For GOP To Change Ukraine Position, Now Claims He Didn’t
The pro-Russia change was the only party platform tweak the Trump camp cared about, sources say.

Trump really is the culmination of the GOP's cultivation of ignorance and hate.

Links234

Federal Judge Allows Suit Against Trump University to Proceed

A federal lawsuit by former Trump University students against the school’s founder, Donald J. Trump, will proceed toward trial, the judge in the case ruled on Tuesday. In a written decision, Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel rejected a motion by Mr. Trump’s lawyers to dismiss the case, concluding that the aggrieved former students had raised a genuine question about whether Mr. Trump had “knowingly participated in a scheme to defraud.”

This is some rather good news, and I hope something comes from it.

silverharp

Hillary doesn't look like she is medically fit to keep going , seizures caught on camera , photos of her having to be helped up stairs , freezing on stage.

robindch

silverharp wrote: »

Hillary doesn't look like she is medically fit to keep going , seizures caught on camera , photos of her having to be helped up stairs , freezing on stage.

There are certainly one or two carefully edited videos available on youtube which passed by in one or two feeds last week. But I'm wondering if there's any firm evidence that there's anything more to it than the existence of carefully-edited videos?

silverharp

robindch wrote: »

There are certainly one or two carefully edited videos available on youtube which passed by in one or two feeds last week. But I'm wondering if there's any firm evidence that there's anything more to it than the existence of carefully-edited videos?

either way it should be evident in the next few months, her bobble head episode and her freezing and having to be prompted to keep talking was odd to say the least.

recedite

Episodes of involuntary head bobbing, inappropriately excessive laughter and the persistent coughing all point to her being either an ill person, or else a moderately healthy lizard.

Pherekydes

Better Hillary than Trump. Trump looks like his head will explode any day now. Then it'll come down to the Veeps. Mike (not the full shilling) Pence as CIC?

silverharp

Pherekydes wrote: »

Better Hillary than Trump. Trump looks like his head will explode any day now. Then it'll come down to the Veeps. Mike (not the full shilling) Pence as CIC?

probably better neither of them, President Kaine has a ring to it if a bit Hollywood :pac:

Gary Johnson for president.

Pherekydes

silverharp wrote: »

probably better neither of them, President Kaine has a ring to it if a bit Hollywood :pac:

But would Kaine be Abel?

/I'll get my coat. :pac:

darjeeling

No such thing as bad publicity? This might be the exception:

recedite

Nice to see Al Jazeera being quoted here, even if Trump "advocating the assassination of his rival" is a little far fetched. More likely it was just Trump's black sense of humour showing. Not all that surprising that it would be on his mind, seeing as a real assassination attempt was recently made against him.

Of more interest are the top five trending articles at the top right on that Al Jazeera page.
I can't be bothered reading the story about what the Israelis are doing to babies, but their promotion of The Caliphate is interesting, given that it has been the stated aim of Islamic State all along to revive the Caliphate.

oscarBravo

recedite wrote: »

Nice to see Al Jazeera being quoted here, even if Trump "advocating the assassination of his rival" is a little far fetched. More likely it was just Trump's black sense of humour showing. Not all that surprising that it would be on his mind, seeing as a real assassination attempt was recently made against him.

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/trumps-assassination-dog-whistle-was-scarier-than-you-think-w433615

...their promotion of The Caliphate is interesting, given that it has been the stated aim of Islamic State all along to revive the Caliphate.

Translated from the Arabic ‘Khalifa’, the word ‘caliph’ means successor or deputy.
The caliph was considered the successor to the Prophet Muhammad.

It is a term that has, at times, been abused.

In June 2014, an armed group calling itself the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (known as ISIL or ISIS) declared the establishment of a caliphate and proclaimed its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, a caliph. This proclamation was rejected by the overwhelming majority of the world’s Muslims.

ISIL had attempted to appropriate a title imbued with religious and political significance – and in doing so had cast a dark shadow over a rich history.

Yeah, some real pro-ISIS propaganda right there.

BoatMad

recedite wrote: »

Nice to see Al Jazeera being quoted here, even if Trump "advocating the assassination of his rival" is a little far fetched. More likely it was just Trump's black sense of humour showing. Not all that surprising that it would be on his mind, seeing as a real assassination attempt was recently made against him.

Of more interest are the top five trending articles at the top right on that Al Jazeera page.
I can't be bothered reading the story about what the Israelis are doing to babies, but their promotion of The Caliphate is interesting, given that it has been the stated aim of Islamic State all along to revive the Caliphate.

I can see you're not bothered , presumably you're not bothered to fact check most of what Trump says also ( perhaps everything he says is " black humor", he certainly a comedian )

The article in Aljezzera on Israeli babies refers to the controversy over Yemeni babies in the 50s

" The Caliph" is a piece advertising a three part documentary on the history of Caliphates up to the present IS attempts

ALJezzera is an excellent news site by the way , with many detailed and well researched pieces and provides a useful counterbalance to western outlets.

You are the classic Trump supporter , a surplus of beliefs over facts and a unwillingness to look at alternative perspectives or research the truth yourself. You retreat to your beleifs over reality

recedite

Here's a few facts for you; IS and the Muslim Brotherhood are rival factions with broadly similar ultimate aims. They regularly kill members of each others affiliated organisations, just as the IRA and the INLA used to do in Ireland.

Al Jazeera is sympathetic to the MB, but not to IS.

Al Jazeera has been called a propaganda outlet for the Qatari government and its foreign policy, by analysts and by news reporters, including former Al Jazeera reporters. The network is sometimes perceived to have mainly Islamist perspectives, promoting the Muslim Brotherhood, and having a pro-Sunni and an anti-Shia bias in its reporting of regional issues. It also accused of having an anti-Western bias. However, Al Jazeera insists it covers all sides of a debate, it says it presents Israel's view, Iran's view and even aired videos released by Osama bin Laden.

I am quite willing to listen to what Al Jazeera has to say, just as I am willing to hear others such as Breitbart, and RT, and the BBC.

But the key point is that I am aware that each of these has their own slant on things, and their own agenda to promote.

BoatMad

recedite wrote: »

Here's a few facts for you; IS and the Muslim Brotherhood are rival factions with broadly similar ultimate aims. They regularly kill members of each others affiliated organisations, just as the IRA and the INLA used to do in Ireland.

Al Jazeera is sympathetic to the MB, but not to IS.
I am quite willing to listen to what Al Jazeera has to say, just as I am willing to hear others such as Breitbart, and RT, and the BBC.

But the key point is that I am aware that each of these has their own slant on things, and their own agenda to promote.

That's fine , by saying " willing to listen " you are prepared, say to read or listen to their output. ( just like you would read or listen to the BBC ) , however that's very different to you dismissing a story based on your bias ( Israeli babies or the caliph ) , where you automatically applied your bias ( not theirs )

By all means listen , read , and understand and then filter out the bias. ( all agencies have bias ) . We all have to do that.

The danger is you dismiss or accept without first inspecting and thats a characteristic of Trumps supporters whose following has more akin to a religious cult then polotical support

robindch

recedite wrote: »

Nice to see Al Jazeera being quoted here, even if Trump "advocating the assassination of his rival" is a little far fetched. More likely it was just Trump's black sense of humour showing.

Sense of humor? While Trump can play a crowd brilliantly, he does not have anything that I would recognise as a sense of humor.

In any case, the story has been covered extensively and his "Clinton's control of the USSC can be addressed by 'second-amendment-people" comment is sufficiently ambiguous that it can plausibly read as a dog-whistle request for gun enthusiasts to threaten gun-related violence against Clinton. The backtracking by his handlers and his own subsequent comment that 2A people should 'get out and vote' were unconvincing in the context of the deranged and inflammatory prose with which he's peppered his campaign.

http://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-37029170

robindch

recedite wrote: »

But the key point is that I am aware that each of these has their own slant on things, and their own agenda to promote.

Characterizing the BBC (a charter-based, public-service oriented news outlet) in the same bracket as Breitbart and RT (shiny propaganda outlets) by the use of the slippery term "agenda" - a term one would expect to see in this forum only in quotes from Mr McKevitt's Alive publication - is to misunderstand news at a very fundamental level.

Christy42

robindch wrote: »

Sense of humor? While Trump can play a crowd brilliantly, he does not have anything that I would recognise as a sense of humor.

In any case, the story has been covered extensively and his "Clinton's control of the USSC can be addressed by 'second-amendment-people" comment is sufficiently ambiguous that it can plausibly read as a dog-whistle request for gun enthusiasts to threaten gun-related violence against Clinton. The backtracking by his handlers and his own subsequent comment that 2A people should 'get out and vote' were unconvincing in the context of the deranged and inflammatory prose with which he's peppered his campaign.

http://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2016-37029170

I agree remember he said this in a if Hillary was elected scenario so it would be too late to vote.