President 'The Donald' Trump and Surprising Consequences - Mod warning in OP

donaghs

ScumLord wrote: »

After seeing that gas attack, if I was syrian I'd take my chances trying to get into Europe. There's not going to be any quick resolution to this.

About 60% of the population live in government controlled areas. So it depends where you live really. From a bit of googling I can see that places like Damascus and Latakia still have pubs and nightclubs open. http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2016/11/05/500573128/in-damascus-the-bars-are-packed-and-the-wine-is-flowing

But its a fair point, if you're near a conflict zone, there seems to be little regard for civilian casualties on either side.

demfad

In other news:

Kushner Omitted Meeting With Russians on Security Clearance Forms

Happened yesterday. This is serious. That's a felony. Supposed to take a lie detector test for this apparently.

Trump might have no-one left then because just in:

Donald Trump 'considering firing Steve Bannon and Reince Priebus'

Also from yesterday:

C.I.A. Had Evidence of Russian Effort to Help Trump Earlier Than Believed

8 congressmen knew in advance of Trump-Russia. BTW the NYTimes claim that they reported that the FBI had found nothing a week before the election was bogus. Terrible article which helped Trump. Illegal for the FBI to disclose about FISA investigation one way or the other.

@PrisonPlanet and @Cernovich all turning on Trump. Still loyal to Russia though. I'm sure the FBI are already investigating them a long time.

RobertKK

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Hillary isn't an alternative. Trump won the election so these side swipes at Hillary as a means to minimise trump's mistakes, are irrelevant

She was the alternative in the election, compared to 'what is Aleppo'...

Attacking Syria is a major mistake, Trump may have felt he needed to take action to show he took it serious, but it is a messy war, a proxy war and a dirty war, it is hard to believe anything in that war when it comes to who is responsible.
There is the saying that the first victim of war is the truth and we had enough evidence of that this century alone.

I think it was madness by Trump and his team to do this strike based on hearsay, evidence supplied by groups who hate Assad.

There should have been lessons learned from the experience with Iraq and Libya, the alternative doesn't mean better.
Even Egypt needed a coup to rescue itself from the Muslim Brotherhood.

A very bad decision by the Trump administration.

Billy86

Russia suspends agreement that prevents direct conflict with American forces: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/us-russia-air-strikes-syria-suspend-agreement-memorandum-direct-conflict-military-donald-trump-putin-a7671631.html

Russia has said it is suspending a deal with the US to prevent mid-air collisions over Syria in response to US air strikes on a Syrian air base.

The Russian Foreign Ministry said following Donald Trump's decision to fire 59 cruise missiles at a military target in Syria on Thursday, Moscow was suspending a memorandum with the US that prevented incidents and ensured flight safety.

ScumLord

demfad wrote: »

Happened yesterday. This is serious. That's a felony. Supposed to take a lie detector test for this apparently.

Lie detector tests are complete bunkum, nobody with any kind of sense uses them anymore and they have no legal standing.

aloyisious

Ir seems Don's just lost some more supporters.... Anne Coulter (author of In Trump We Trust) and Paul Joseph Watson, editor of Infowars.co. have jumped ship. Anne noted: Media THRILLED that Trump is destroying his presidency, and said that Meddling in the Middle East has destroyed every president who ever tried it.

demfad

ScumLord wrote: »

Lie detector tests are complete bunkum, nobody with any kind of sense uses them anymore and they have no legal standing.

Have you a link for the bold part above?

The 'Security Clearance Forms' that Kushner will have filled out and signed have legal significance. If you lie on them it is a felony.

Reported that lie detector is part of this process. Significant if it was skipped.

demfad

aloyisious wrote: »

Ir seems Don's just lost some more supporters.... Anne Coulter (author of In Trump We Trust) and Paul Joseph Watson, editor of Infowars.co. have jumped ship. Anne noted: “Media THRILLED that Trump is destroying his presidencyâ€, and said that “Meddling in the Middle East has destroyed every president who ever tried it.

Easy to spot paid (American) Russian trolls now. The far-right twitter accounts followed by 100,000s turning against Trump are pro Putin.
These may turn back when Tillerson smooths things out in Moscow next week with pal Putin.
This means that Trump did not get permission from Putin for the attack.

Note Farage condemning Trump also.
Trump his broken with the International conspiracy: Putin, Mercers, Bannon, LePen (and various other far RT groups) in this strike.
How will he be brought to heel?

EDIT: LePen now having a go:

http://ca.reuters.com/article/topNews/idCAKBN179229-OCATP

Billy86

Something else this might help to mask over, temporarily at least... the US created 98,000 jobs in March! Sounds great, eh!? Turns out that is barely half of what was expected (180,000 jobs), which won't help coming into the summer with the tourism industry taking a nose dive since Trump took office. Tourism provides over 5,000,000 jobs compared to 77,000 in coal mining (which mining CEOs say won't be going up, either).

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/07/march-nonfarm-payrolls.html

Leroy42

Billy86 wrote: »

Something else this might help to mask over, temporarily at least... the US created 98,000 jobs in March! Sounds great, eh!? Turns out that is barely half of what was expected (180,000 jobs), which won't help coming into the summer with the tourism industry taking a nose dive since Trump took office. Tourism provides over 5,000,000 jobs compared to 77,000 in coal mining (which mining CEOs say won't be going up, either).

http://www.cnbc.com/2017/04/07/march-nonfarm-payrolls.html

But hold on. One cannot really infer much from one month. No more than a good February could ever be taken as the herald to a new era, despite what Trump claimed, the opposite is true.

You need to see behind the figures to understand what they mean. Apparently the Feb figures were boosted by higher than expected construction jobs as the weather is mild, in March only 6k jobs in construction. Was that due to storms or a downturn in projects?

Trump had about as much to do with March job figures as he did with February, ie little to nothing.

Billy86

Leroy42 wrote: »

But hold on. One cannot really infer much from one month. No more than a good February could ever be taken as the herald to a new era, despite what Trump claimed, the opposite is true.

You need to see behind the figures to understand what they mean. Apparently the Feb figures were boosted by higher than expected construction jobs as the weather is mild, in March only 6k jobs in construction. Was that due to storms or a downturn in projects?

Trump had about as much to do with March job figures as he did with February, ie little to nothing.

Somewhat true, but I think it's safe to say he has played a huge role in the drop off in tourism (projected 4mn less tourists this year) which in itself is contributing quite strongly with retail jobs alone down by 30,000 already.

AbusesToilets

ScumLord wrote: »

Lie detector tests are complete bunkum, nobody with any kind of sense uses them anymore and they have no legal standing.

Every US intelligence agency uses them in their screening process, certain US military units also use them.

ScumLord

demfad wrote: »

Have you a link for the bold part above?

The 'Security Clearance Forms' that Kushner will have filled out and signed have legal significance. If you lie on them it is a felony.

Reported that lie detector is part of this process. Significant if it was skipped.

There are plenty of links online. The bottom line is lie detectors don't detect lies, they can't tell you anything more than a person being under stress, which can be caused by anything.

https://www.quora.com/Truth-Why-arent-Polygraph-machines-used-in-Court

If you ever do take one you can actually throw the results by clinching your but hole. Every time you do it it causes a spike on the polygraph.

There are cutting edge machines in research labs that can tell the operators what someone is thinking (to a certain extent) and it's still not considered a reliable "lie detector" because they don't know the context of the thought, whether it's imaged or remembered, whether asking the question crates a false positive and so on. We're just not there yet.

Christy42

Leroy42 wrote: »

But hold on. One cannot really infer much from one month. No more than a good February could ever be taken as the herald to a new era, despite what Trump claimed, the opposite is true.

You need to see behind the figures to understand what they mean. Apparently the Feb figures were boosted by higher than expected construction jobs as the weather is mild, in March only 6k jobs in construction. Was that due to storms or a downturn in projects?

Trump had about as much to do with March job figures as he did with February, ie little to nothing.

Both the good February and bad March seem like natural variance around the figures from last year. Plenty of the jobs expected in March may have arrived early as it were meaning February got the good numbers etc.

However Trump did try and take credit for the jobs in February so there is a question as to whether he should take the blame here.

Kushner ads more fuel to the Russian story. If nothing else we need to see who lied about Russian interests on there way in. That in itself is a big enough issue that you should be out of the administration. We can see how many are left after that.

Leroy42

ScumLord wrote: »

There are plenty of links online. The bottom line is lie detectors don't detect lies, they can't tell you anything more than a person being under stress, which can be caused by anything.

https://www.quora.com/Truth-Why-arent-Polygraph-machines-used-in-Court

If you ever do take one you can actually throw the results by clinching your but hole. Every time you do it it causes a spike on the polygraph.

There are cutting edge machines in research labs that can tell the operators what someone is thinking (to a certain extent) and it's still not considered a reliable "lie detector" because they don't know the context of the thought, whether it's imaged or remembered, whether asking the question crates a false positive and so on. We're just not there yet.

But the point being you are not supposed to be showing signs of stress. You fill out the form and then they question you on it and compare your answers. Easy to lie on a form but a bit harder when you are asked face to face knowing you have already given an answer that deals with that topic.

Of itself it shows nothing, but taken together, it might indicate something. Then again it might not. But they only need to be manipulated if you are lying

nordicb

So.. they launched 59 tomahawks each worth 1.5M to destroy few ancient migs and kill 10 people. Any sign of sarin in the base, or, as usual... old known scenario... Can anyone think of any benefit for Asad to use these bombs in current situation, it makes no sense.

ScumLord

Leroy42 wrote: »

But the point being you are not supposed to be showing signs of stress. You fill out the form and then they question you on it and compare your answers. Easy to lie on a form but a bit harder when you are asked face to face knowing you have already given an answer that deals with that topic.

Of itself it shows nothing, but taken together, it might indicate something. Then again it might not. But they only need to be manipulated if you are lying

It's still meaningless. A person can be stressed just by the interview, they could have stress at home that the tester doesn't know about, they could just have a higher level of stress hormones signals than normal, they could be a psychopath making the test completely redundant. I can see the test being put in as an excuse to let someone go without giving a valid reason or to stress someone into saying something they wouldn't because they think the machine works. But overall you just can't get anything reliable or definitive out of them. There are thousands of unrecorded variables that can throw the test.

B_Wayne

Fr Tod Umptious wrote: »

I don't know nor care, I think the notion of Trump being a hypocrite was established well before this.

My point I that the Obama administration was weak on foregin policy and now with a new president that is changing.

Under Trump there is a drone strike every 1.25 days... It reeks of him not having a clue tbh. I'm uncertain on if I favour intervention by US in Syria. I do not trust in Trump's ability to handle such an intervention because of his ineptitude when it comes to foreign policy and policy in general. It's a bit like giving a thirteen year old the power to make such decisions.

Leroy42

But nobody is saying that they use them on there own. It is an extra test. You seem to be implying that you stand or fall but the results when that has not been shown to be the case at all. At most it seems they might use the test as an indicator to something.

Manic Moran

There is a leap from "Use chemical weapons and get smacked" to "we will remove you."

The desired endgame is not about Assad, and it's not about reducing casualties in Syria. I'm sure the US would be very happy to see him gone, but is not looking to dispose him themselves. There is no change there, and it seems that unless there are more egregious departures from acceptable military behaviors, the US has declared it is not going any further with this.

The end game is a signal to all that (a) the use of chemical weapons is not tolerated by this regime, and (b) that the US is willing to put teeth behind its position and not just make statements. He really didn't have much of a choice on whether to react, the question was how. This fairly minimalist response (apparently the lightest of the options considered) seems to have achieved the desired effect.

Russia won't do anything, for two reasons. Firstly, they can't exactly go about openly defending chemical weapons use. Secondly, the same argument which has gone against doing anything against Russia after its activities over the last few years (I.e. Do we really want to take them on?) applies to the US.

Unless someone wishes to continue tit for tat, and I don't think anyone does, this will stop here.

Manic Moran

Double post.

demfad

I think these tweets sum up the situation accurately.
This is diversion for two leaders in trouble particularly Trump.
Trump will pretend to be strong. Putin will pretend to react with talk about gunboats and helping Syrian defenses.
It's all a distraction from poor ratings, dissent and in Trump's case, massive trouble coming down the tracks in the form of the Russia investigations.

BoatMad

Trump diverting attention ? , He'll need to fire Tomahawks every day for the next 4 years so

realitykeeper

By bombing Syria, Trump has allied himself with Islamic state against Russia. Hilary Clinton and those who supported her must be delighted he has started the war they were itching for. Meanwhile Muslims terrorists attack Sweden. Would it be better to deter Islamic terrorism by not defending Muslims in Syria as a consequence of such attacks?

Mr.Micro

realitykeeper wrote: »

By bombing Syria, Trump has allied himself with Islamic state against Russia. Hilary Clinton and those who supported her must be delighted he has started the war they were itching for. Meanwhile Muslims terrorists attack Sweden. Would it be better to deter Islamic terrorism by not defending Muslims in Syria as a consequence of such attacks?

Assad should have gone a long time ago. I know one bad guy will be replaced with another equally bad, so the solution is not easy. The Russians have supported Assad and kept him in power. Now that the Americans have joined the mess, perhaps it will see the end of Assad and maybe ISIS there as well. It's rarely about solutions but more about selling arms to whoever.

El_Duderino 09

realitykeeper wrote:

By bombing Syria, Trump has allied himself with Islamic state against Russia. Hilary Clinton and those who supported her must be delighted he has started the war they were itching for.

He hasn't allied himself with ISIS, but they are both opposed to Assad.

He is in opposition to Russia's man though.

Hillary a might be delighted and the republicans are definitely delighted. They must be terribly sorry she didn't join their party to begin with. They'd have been hugely enthusiastic about Hillary the Hawk as President. Speaking about her hawkishness as a negative point must have sat very uncomfortably with trump's supporters.

Order has been restored now as the non-interventionist Trump is being as hawkish as they were denigrating Hillary for being. Plus they get to complete the double think be having a go at Obama for being a pussy for not intervening sooner. The circle is now complete

El_Duderino 09

Oh look, the important thing about this whole Syria bombing is that it's a distraction from everything else that's going on. It's another dead cat on the table

Does anyone here have the power of will to force themselves to believe that Trump acted out of principals here? I doubt it. It isn't consistent with his approach leading up to this. He knew what Assad is and was fine with keeping him as president. Now he has done a 180° about face on supporting Assad.

I expect him to shuffle this issue to the back of the deck and quietly drop his opposition to Assad as President over the next few weeks and months.

This is only a distraction from whatever else is going on. It's one of his most successful 'dead cat on the table' stories of the last few weeks. It's nothing ​new in that sense. It does show an escalation in terms of what it takes to distract from other issues which is concerning. What's next?

Christy42

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

Oh look, the important thing about this whole Syria bombing is that it's a distraction from everything else that's going on. It's another dead cat on the table

Does anyone here have the power of will to force themselves to believe that Trump acted out of principals here? I doubt it. It isn't consistent with his approach leading up to this. He knew what Assad is and was fine with keeping him as president. Now he has done a 180° about face on supporting Assad.

I expect him to shuffle this issue to the back of the deck and quietly drop his opposition to Assad as President over the next few weeks and months.

This is only a distraction from whatever else is going on. It's one of his most successful 'dead cat on the table' stories of the last few weeks. It's nothing ​new in that sense. It does show an escalation in terms of what it takes to distract from other issues which is concerning. What's next?

Exactly, I still want to know if anything will be done with regards Kurchner and lying about Russian interests.

I note that the repeated claims that the Democrats should be bipartisan from the republicans amount to do as we tell you to. I mean they were not consulted on the health care bill, they were not consulted on Gorusch (though I would not expect them to be on that one). Why in the world would the Democrats vote for things they have not been consulted on in the slightest? The Republicans are trying to run everything themselves and failing quite horrifically.

Billy86

El_Duderino 09 wrote: »

He hasn't allied himself with ISIS, but they are both opposed to Assad.

He is in opposition to Russia's man though.

Hillary a might be delighted and the republicans are definitely delighted. They must be terribly sorry she didn't join their party to begin with. They'd have been hugely enthusiastic about Hillary the Hawk as President. Speaking about her hawkishness as a negative point must have sat very uncomfortably with trump's supporters.

Not all, a number row high profile Trump supports have declared themselves off the bandwagon over this. They didn't seem to mind bombing the f*** out of the likes of Yemen, but apparently Putins buddy was where they drew the line.

AbusesToilets

Fairly ineffectual option by the US, I'd agree with commentators that it's more of an effort to appear busy, rather than accomplishing anything of substance.