Some Comments on the US Elections and that Which Is and Isn’t Said

Interesting but there’s a couple of pieces missing.

First, you’re holding Clinton to account for her crap decisions taken while in power. You don’t mention any good decisions she made. It’s very utilitarian to add up good and bad, but if you’re going to list the bad you might want to think about the good.

Second, Trump wasn’t in power during that period.

You fail to even mention Trump’s policies and statements, for example that Mexicans are rapists, banning Muslims from entering the US, or his recent comments on the Central Park 5 (echoing his call for the death penalty in 1989).

You fail to think about whether they had any impact while he only had soft power.

You don’t mention the impact they might have if he was in power.

Personally I don’t like voting for the lesser of two evils (I live in Britain, that logic would have led me to vote for Blair – something I never did), but sometimes the bigger evil is that bad that actively voting against them is worthwhile.

Looking at Trump I think, to paraphrase Buffy, he’s the season’s big bad…

A pox on both their houses.

But Trump won’t start a nuclear war with Putin…

Sigh, Bernie was a pushover who let Hillary steal the nomination and rape his followers. What we needed was someone who would fight and take it to Hillary and fight her vote suppression, and force her to obey the law. We didn’t get that from Bernie.

Till enough people get fed up enough to take up arms, there will be no change.

Ian,

One aspect that is worth considering is what happens with the respective bases if each becomes President. Meaning, Trump is the far right’s darling, racist boy – if he wins they’ll throw their full weight behind his worst impulses. Forced deportations, unleashing the already militarized police force on the most vulnerable segments of the USA, extending the tax holidays for the rich, etc. They won’t have any time or patience for rehashing these “scandals” from the election. It’ll be full speed ahead and damn the torpedoes.

On the left, it is a different tale. Clinton barely survived her primary battles with the far left. No matter what her supporters claim, she limped to the finish line in June – Sanders really gave her a run for her (prodigious) money. Since then though and despite extracting concessions to the Dem platform, she’s been running to the right (as much as possible) and enrobing herself in special interest money. This has not sat well for Progressives. They might be holding their tongue to get through the election (and Progressives HATE Trump), but she is not getting a free pass. If she wins, IMHO she will be facing a very active and pissed off base by the time she has her inaguration.

The point being her scandal sheets are not going unread, just action is being delayed. Trump is so insipid and frankly embarrassing that letting him in the Oval Office is so much worse to Progressives than facing 4 years of Obama III. Hillary is not getting a blank check no matter what she thinks, Progressives have not forgotten the primary and DNC tricks. Many of us just can’t stand to allow the human orange rind to take the Presidency due to our anger.

Ian Welsh:

Ludicrous. Whatever you think of H. Clinton and her foreign policy failings (and I’m not going to even argue against that perception since I largely share it), heres the deal my man:

Trump will most certainly be much much worse, not just on foreign but also domestic policies.

Clinton suffers in this comparison in your mind, I am guessing, because she has an established record in public service that is likely to accurately predict what kind of leader she will try to be (note the word “try). OTOH, Trump does not have such a record to draw from so apples-to-apples comparisons are meaningless.

So then on what basis do we judge him? Well, if you cannot overlook the danger that he poses to, well, everything he touches (his record in the private sector is abysmal, and it could very well be that his is responsible for bringing harm or death to people on a smaller scale), after his remarkable heinous comments about Clinton at the debate, toward women and minorities his whole life, and especially after his recent post-debate remarks essentially trying to stir up a coup with the expected complicity of Putin, then I would mirror your argument that it is certainly not worth the time to attempt to prove it to what should be obvious to any rational pragmatic person.

a] I agree with Ian’s point; “Unfortunately I was wrong in 08 about how unhinged she was in relation to foreign affairs. She has since proved she’s a foreign policy “uber hawk” (aka: monster).” – me too.

b] And I agree with Tom permalink; “But Trump won’t start a nuclear war with Putin…”

And given that Bernie in the end was the “shlepp-dog” Bruce Dixon so accurately predicted, My support of Jim [who’s he] Webb looks [again] correct.

But for reason’s a&b I will vote for Trump.

Trump will have no effect on domestic policy, no loyalty to the Republican hierarchy and will have some control over foreign policy [that which the deep state will allow].

The dumb thing I am doing by voting for Trump is, as I have pointed out before, the deep state has every incentive to do a dallas on Trump because, Pence is a neocolonialist [aka neocon] of the 1st order. Trump should have picked Gen [ret] Mike Flynn if he wanted some life insurance.

I’ll add, never have I seen the CorporateMedia so blatantly hamfistedly pushing a candidate, it’s the real obscenity of this race and will have a longer effect on the Republic [in name only] than either Trump or Hillary…that is, if we survive Hillary’s coming world war.

@pkw

I thought Trump was way off base with his comments about the CP5 but a little reading the history of that story shows he is nearer the truth than those who try to portray these young guys as innocents. The technical mistake that was made by the prosecution was trying and getting convictions for the penetration part of the attack which wasn’t proven even though it is likely at least some of them did perform that act. The rest of their crimes committed that night were proven and include attempted murder, beatings, riot and other lesser crimes and they were convicted by a multi-racial jury. Trump is right to be upset these criminals have gotten a multi million dollar payoff and it is a shame that the victim of their crimes can’t sue them and take that money.

I see your media has a problem reporting what Trump actually said about illegal immigrants or about proper screening of Muslims coming to the US. If you read what he actually said and not what Clintonites tell you he said his position might seem more reasonable. I don’t like the idea of walls or borders but no one else is offering any viable ideas on how to stop the immigrant deaths on our southern border which average two a day.

Hillary would definitely be worse. Dropping bombs on Muslims is worse than denying them entry into America. Building a wall to keep Mexican people in their own country would be worse than building a wall to keep Palestinians in an apartheid situation.

Trump is a vile misogynist

You misspelled “womanizer”. Shouldn’t words mean something?

Jesus H. Christ.

The freaking problem isn’t which asinine, idiotic side of the “conversation” you come down on – i.e., whether you support a war criminal or talking/raping piece of human refuse – it’s that you’re having a freaking “conversation” in the first freaking place!!!

What is so very very hard about this idea to get through to people? At least could you all try and be the least bit aware of the propaganda being smeared into your face and the effect it has on your minds? Please. Do try.

One of the oldest tactics TPTB have used to subjugate it’s peon population is the false “debate” about issues so that situations/issues/viewpoints that would normally be contrary to the thoughts/well-being of the populace are promulgated/normalized – e.g., GWOT, federal debt, etc etc etc.

Over the recent past, some on the fake-left have even been perspicacious enough to notice the tactic and point it out to others but for some “unknown reason” – umm, I’ll take “Propaganda and its Cognitive Effects on a Willfully Blind and Arrogant Populace” for $100, Alex – self-same fake-left Einsteins can’t seem to wrap their heads around the false “debate” – i.e., the US electoral Spectacle -that they are blinded by ONCE AGAIN what with their “discussions/conversations” about horrible candidates/people that – wait, here’s the kicker – DO NOTHING but further legitimize the Spectacle and therefore close-off/destroy any attempts at beginning to create some alternate avenue of action.

Aside: are the fake-left blogs helping or harming humanity by providing an arena for said “conversations” especially as said “conversations” can easily be generated and sculpted by TPTB? Discuss.

Really, it’s not just about how to strategically vote or not voting . It’s about NOT EVEN talking about this stupid mind-trash that is being rammed down your gd throats. It’s about not being forced to have stupid, Spectacle-legitimizing conversations about human garbage. Voting is so far down the line of where we need to start going that we shouldn’t even pay heed.

“But, but, that’s just the reality we live in!”, screams the fake-left, “We just have to talk about the human garbage in front of us!”

Pathetic.

Hey, why not, at least begin to try and change that reality by at not acting like a bunch of gd lick-spittles for our masters all the time by having the “conversations” they set out for us to have in the first place?

“It is also true, as Trump says, that Bill Clinton is a piece of work when it comes to women (no, spare me) and that Hillary has attacked those who accused him.

But what is more interesting to me is that a norm has been violated. Male politicians regularly molest women.”

All true but what has happened is that there has been a social sea change going on, what has been accepted for just about ever, is becoming unacceptable.

This is a natural development with the ever increasing confidence in women to make their own decisions and break the social conditioning they have been brought up with. They feel confident enough now to go for careers even in traditionally male dominated areas. Part of that confidence is not accepting appalling behaviour by some (many?) men any longer.

We see that in the US statistics where more heterosexual women are single than partnered. They just won’t accept someone who is appalling just to have a male partner these days, they’d rather be on their own and be happier

Men in their usual way haven’t picked this up, that the rules are changing rapidly, what was acceptable or more accurately ‘tolerated’ even a few years ago no longer is. Not universal across all sub sections of women, ‘traditional’, religious women who are conditioned to accept such male behaviour (and even bringing up their male ones to act that way) and them sacrificing their lives, still cling to that, but given the outcry from evangelical women even that is starting to break.

This is no overnight development, this has been brewing for decades now and is starting to come to a head. Sure the heated atmosphere of an election campaign makes it seem to many men that it is an aberration, it is not, it is just a sign of the times.

I’ve been reading comments by women, vast numbers telling of their repeated sexual abuse even from early childhood. Something they all covered up and hid, even blamed themselves over. But they are not hiding it any longer and want it to stop.

The statistics are appalling, 16% of male children sexually abused and a whopping 25% of girls. For many women the abuse carries on in adulthood. And the vast majority (90%+) is by men, though there are some women who do that too of course, albeit mostly to children.

So men are going to have to change, a lot. The pathetic homosocial male model with its ‘faux’ masculinity and hatred of women…and the terrible emotional damage it does to men themselves …is coming to an end.

a] I agree with Ian’s point; “Unfortunately I was wrong in 08 about how unhinged she was in relation to foreign affairs. She has since proved she’s a foreign policy “uber hawk” (aka: monster).” – me too.

Me, three.

At this point, I’ll bet Bill Clinton is just happy that none of his “locker room talk” has ever been recorded. He’s at least as big a sexual predator as Trump.

Also, if you deplore the horrific violence America inflicts upon the rest of the world, you should prefer that Trump be the winner (which is not the same thing as voting for him) because his incompetence might well drive the American war machine into a ditch.

This whole election bruhaha has an uncanny resemblance to the pre-invasion lies of 2002-03.
All of the facts were there for any to see.
Usians will get the president they deserve; this is a certainty.
May the gods help you, because nothing else will…

Ian, you got this one exactly right, I have nothing to add to your post.

metamars
October 13, 2016

Welcome to the Matrix; U.S. version. Or maybe Orwell’s world where;
“War is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength.”
Noble effort your’s; but I fear to no avail…
The ignorant Usian’s will elect Clinton; because they are ignorant automatons, ruled by fear and uncertainty.

@ V. Arnold

Honestly, negative emotions I’ve seen expressed against Trump seem to usually be anger and contempt, and less so, disgust. I personally don’t know anybody who fears Trump. Of course, I’d expect illegal aliens would have more cause to fear for their future in the US, should Trump prevail.

The main stream media (other than Fox news) is solidly in Clinton’s camp, including a few “surrogates” (wikileaks). Either people seek out information that is suppressed via main stream media, or truth tellers find other means to get the information to them, anyway. One of my recurring topics is the ongoing failure of activists, who oppose the plutocracy, to fight them effectively. (google “metamars” and “the plutocrats are laughing at you” for some of this.) Some of the same things that activists don’t do nearly enough of (chiefly, IMNSHO, pampleting) I also don’t see the Trump campaign doing – not in my part of NJ, anyway. (The other big sin of activists is not forming voting blocs, even lower-barrier-to-entry punitive ones.)

I also, just this morning, sketched out how Trump should fight the formidible Hollywood cultural bias against him. ( http://tinyurl.com/grtxqg9) Of course, his campaign is not doing that, either (disregarding whining about it, which is hardly helpful).

At the end of the day, Trump is his own worst enemy in using his hundreds of millions of dollars of free exposure, via the main stream media, to educate the public either about Hillary’s defective positions, or even his to educate about his own positions. He strikes me as basically lazy, in the sense of undisciplined. People are willing to make allowances, knowing he’s not a seasoned politician, but he’s been at this for a couple of years. Apparently, he really thought he could talk and bluster his way into the Presidency. Dumb, really dumb. IMO, a father figure, or maybe a sports psychologist, who would literally slap him in the face (or at least get in his face and yell) and tell him to apply himself, might be just what he needs to get his butt in gear and his head in the game. He’s improved his communication skills, but still needs to go further.

======

From a more general, systemic POV, this book develops the thesis that Americans have been dumbed down, deliberately: http://www.deliberatedumbingdown.com/MomsPDFs/DDDoA.sml.pdf

The frightening conclusion at the end of all this: America’s political system is so broken, so corrupt, so much a smokescreen for how power is actually exercised… that it will only allow persons like Trump and Clinton to become the candidates between which the Peasantry is supposed to choose.

Whichever one is chosen (read: When Hillary goes to Her Coronation), they will be an emptysuit figurehead whose job is to ensure that the endless buffet at the Swine Trough for America’s Owner Class will continue.

The premise that Trump is less likely to start a nuclear war than Clinton hinges on whether he’s in control of his advisers like Putin of his oligarchs rather than the other way around.
And of his comparative Russophilia.

What is happening now is that the deep state is being somewhat exposed. In the wikileaks material (and among other releases) we see arms deals, uranium deals, deals with bankers, deals with the DOJ/ FBI, all kinds of foreign influence on American elections from dictatorships around the globe, nearly complete collusion of the “press” with the Clinton campaign and the amazing disdain for the lives of people who aren’t in the oligarchy.

Because the collusion between the oligarchy and the press is nearly complete, citizens are not allowed awareness of what is being exposed. While Trump is an MCP and I think this is also a worthy story, it is bizarre to see how this story hides deeper information about how our nation really works. The deeper information is what the Clinton e-mails show.

I see no reason to vote for either candidate. There are many people who plan to vote third party, we just aren’t allowed to know that. For example, after the first “debate”, CNN queried their focus group. 5 said they would vote Clinton, 2 said they’d vote Trump and 12 said they would vote third party (almost twice the number of Trump and Clinton voters combined). This was not the expected or acceptable response so CNN changed it, nearly in real time, to 12 “undecided” voters.

By no means would I vote for either person. In the meantime, the more important thing we can do is become as informed as possible and be as altruistic towards others as we can. Obama is about to go to war against Russia. That’s truly insane. He will do this through further attacks on Syria, which as Clinton coldly pointed out, would cause a lot of Syrians to die (not that there’s anything wrong with that). He’s also in process of destroying yet another nation, Yemen.

There is no doubt that these people are cruel and do not care about the lives of the people, this earth or any living creature upon it. To confront such cruelty and indifference takes a will to justice, courage and the ability to care about others.

metamars
October 13, 2016
From a more general, systemic POV, this book develops the thesis that Americans have been dumbed down, deliberately:

Indeed, that is true, but, this is not a recent occurance: It’s been going on for well more than a century. It began with forced education following the Prussian educational system. And that was developed from the Hindu schools in India. The cast system required a compliant population and the Hindu schools were especially good at teaching docility.
Usians (and the west in general) are infantilized from birth and kept from maturity well past puberty; not the natural course of human developement.
Read John Taylor Gatto’s book; The Underground History of American Education. The link below is a free audio of the entire book;
http://www.unwelcomeguests.net/Category:Audiobooks#The_Underground_History_of_American_Education.2C_read_by_Lyn_Gerry_.26_Robin_Upton

S. Brennan,

I was speaking ironically.

USGinc. is in business to kill. I hate that my country will not stop killing people. I was just using gallows humor to express my horror. I don’t think the oligarchy does think there’s anything wrong with killing Syrians or anyone else.

Obama is deciding if he’ll start WWIII tomorrow. I believe I will be protesting that.

Ernst Thälmann would be proud of you, Ian.

Wow, none of you twits know what will happen. It’s amazing how many fortune tellers pop up once election year comes around.

Fact. Hillary Clinton has a long record of being corrupt, being a hypocrite, and being a war hawk.

Fact. Hillary Clinton broke up a Libyan peace deal because Gaddafi didn’t support her campaign in ’08. That is beyond psychotic and far worse than anything Trump has done in his life.

Fact. Under Obama, 8 million undocumented immigrants were deported.

Fact. Clinton supported the coup in Honduras, and then deported the children of murdered left wing activists who were targeted by the military junta that overthrew Zelaya. She sent them to their doom, knowingly.

Fact. Bill Clinton is a rapist and has abused women his entire life, and the neoconlib pussy shit left don’t care. Feminism is not about women. It is a political card that is played when it is advantageous for the pussy shit left, and ignored when it is inconvenient.

Fact. Lesser of two evils is not a logical argument. It is based on unharnessed utilitarianism, which was eventually rejected by utilitarians themselves. That is why we have a modified version called Rule or Act Utilitarianism. Seriously, open up a basic moral theory book and read, you dumb fucks.

Fact. The Clinton Foundation is a slush fund and takes money from anyone including foreign countries that brutalize gays and women, of which the pussy shit left professes such concern, except, like their position on feminism, when it is inconvenient.

Fact. Voting LOTE has led directly to the rise of Trump. So, your dumb shit logic is to continue voting for the same conditions that led to the rise of the thing that you don’t want? Dumb fucks.

Fact. Trump is lewd towards women. Trump is a bullshit artist. Trump runs shady business deals. However, despite what you pussy shit left may wish to be true, Trump is not a mass murderer, and you do not have a magic crystal ball. Hillary Clinton IS a mass murderer.

Fact. Bill and Hillary supported brutal sanctions on Iraq in the 90’s which led to more Iraqi deaths than George W Bush’s war. It is estimated that around 1 million Iraqis died under those sanctions, including 500k children.

Fact. Bill Clinton’s economic policies led to the 2008 financial collapse. He deregulated the banks, built up a giant tech bubble, and hired Ayn Rand dick suckers to run his policies. And Hillary wants him to run her economic agenda.

Fact. We no longer have a vibrant fourth estate. Objective journalism is fucking dead in this country- thanks pussy shit liberals! We now have journalists openly red baiting and colluding with a political party. You asshole pussy shit liberals never think of the unintended consequences, do you? You know, like what happens if a real fascist comes to power?

Anyways, you dickheads need to pull your collective heads out of your asses. You are worse than neocons, and Trump is clearly not the greater evil.

Oh, Ian, if you decide to delete this shithead; please feel free to delete my response.

https://symbalitics.blogspot.com/2016/10/godel-11-cohen.html

You have heard of Paul Cohen, like is not. This is why you should.

While “hardlefthook” insults are indiscriminate, I think his factual points are largely correct

Particularly his point about LOTE bequeathing Trump. Democrats [DNC types] in the mid/late 70’s held a decade long coup against FDRist who were far far far greater in number by slowly helping the Republicans pick them off whether through election funding or agreeing to “investigate” certain members. As a result of this self serving sabotage we have two Republican parties, or more properly, a single party system with no checks or balances, in a word, Fascism. Yes, yes not as ugly as some…yet.

Populist FDRists, no matter how talented are smothered effectively by the Democratic party, Jim Webb was given 1/7th the speaking time in a debate rigged by Wasserman and when he complained of the unfairness the media and Democratic party spoke as one with a universal barrage of “WHINER”. Webb is a guy who wrestled a Virginia senate seat away from Republicans, Secretary of the Navy; an Emmy Award winning journalist, author of ten books; taught literature at the United States Naval Academy; Fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics; two tours in Vietnam as a platoon commander, awarded the Navy Cross for heroism in Vietnam, the Silver Star, two Bronze Stars, and two Purple Hearts. And he gets called a whiner for asking for fairness. Now from Hillary’s emails, we now know that making sure that nobody ever got a chance to hear Webb was Hillary/Wassermann’s top priority in the first two debates.

Instead time was given to Bernie, an ungainly figure they thought, but so thirsty were Democrats for populism a “socialist”caught fire. Fortunately, Hillary people had a crack team of firefighter ready…and we know now that Bernie was a 1st class bullshitter because he could have won the presidency had taken Jill Stein’s offer.

Nope; LOTEism got us Trump and for reasons I’ve outlined above, I’ll be voting for him. After this election the Republican will “fix” their nomination process so a populist will never be heard of again.

And please the Trump said this evil and that evil, Hillary is a mass murderer for money, a war criminal…she’s got the evil meter pegged at it’s limit, she must be stopped, if that mean Trump, so be it.

From yesterday’s Fbook posting

=============================================

Q: “who in their right mind doesn’t hate everything about Trump”

A: Jill Stein, Green Party Candidate for US President

Jill Stein: “On the issue of war and nuclear weapons, it is actually Hillary’s policies which are much scarier than Donald Trump who does not want to go to war with Russia. He wants to seek modes of working together, which is the route that we need to follow not to go into confrontation and nuclear war with Russia…It’s Hillary Clinton that wants to start an air war with Russia over Syria by calling for a no fly zone…we could slide into nuclear war very quickly from her declared policy in Syria. ”

It’s interesting to note that Jill Stein and Trump converge on foreign policy and that’s important because, Trump is opposed by the elites of both parties as well as corporate media. Outside of the powers of the Presidency [almost all of them relate to foreign policy], Trump will have no ability to effect any domestic programs…only foreign policy.

So, if you are in a non-swing state where the election is already decided, like many of my friends, I would encourage you to vote for Stein if wish to express your disgust with the actions of Hillary/Obama’s cruel and legally unauthorized wars of aggression that have cost hundreds of thousands their lives, while displacing millions…but…feel that equal, or greater, weight must be given to Trumps spoken word.

Even if foreign policy is a wash (though I don’t think it is, cf. metamars’ comment), the TPP is a rather big difference.

Right-wing economic policies are effectively locked in straight across the board if that goes through, and the current Administration’s McCarthyite railing against TPP opponents makes Clinton’s “opposition” look pretty dodgy.

Right now “evergreen” (term-unlimited) patents are still a U.S.ian anomaly. Enshrining them in an international treaty would be a gigantic leap in the direction of neo-feudalism.

Yes, hardlefthook (asshole) has made points re: Clinton; but who here doesn’t already know these things?
His arrogant, insulting holyer than thou crap is just pathetic, IMO.
He stated the obvious, duh!
So, where’s the meat?

“But there is no reason to vote for Trump at all.”

Actually, there are billions of reasons to vote for Trump. As in: concern for the welfare of most of the world’s population. Trump’s foreign policy is more in the realm of realpolitik, and while he may not respect women too much, he does respect power. And he understands that Russia, especially, by virtue of it’s plentiful nuclear arsenal and delivery mechanisms, has lots and lots of power. He also understands that America is in a weakened state, due to massive debts and declining stability in the world order, and that fresh wars and destablizations are as idiotic as they are immoral.

A nuclear war would be a worst case scenario for the entire world. But even under less apocalyptic scenarios, Trump would generally be better. (Dealing with North Korea may well be an exception, IMO. Also, not sure he’d be any better with respect to militarily weak nations in, say, Africa, than would HRC.)

Chronicles magazine’s brilliant foreign affairs editor, Srdja Trifkovic, rated Trump’s April 27 foreign policy speech a B+. (https://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/america-first-controversy/) Says Trifkovic:

“Donald Trump’s foreign policy speech last Wednesday deserves at least a solid B+ and you can read my take on it in the June issue of Chronicles. It offered an eloquent argument for offensive realism, based on the fact that the international system—composed of sovereign nation-states pursuing their interests—is still essentially competitive and Hobbesian. Trump is the only candidate who understands this cardinal fact, and who unambiguously states America is not and should not be an exception to that timeless principle.”

It’s quite appropriate to point out his inconsistencies, flip flops, and lies. Likewise, his goofy “You take the oil, folks!” sure sounds like a war crime, though not the fatal sort that Hillary blood-soaked hands have helped engineer. However, it’s also clear that Trump’s been generally consistent in terms of his statements with respect to Russia and the Syrian quagmire, and condemnation of the destruction of Libya under “Tick Tock” Hillary Clinton’s ‘leadership’. (http://theduran.com/julian-assange-exposes-hillary-clintons-libya-tick-tock-list-a-step-by-step-guide-to-destroy-libya/)

Oh, and we should NEVER forget* that the Obama administration was content to NOT attack ISIS oil tanker caravans (https://www.rt.com/news/327063-russian-intelligence-oil-tankers-turkey/), until Russia shamed them into doing so (apparently for only a single time). ISIS’ expansion served American geopolitical purposes, at the time, and it’s just that sort of war crime enabling (non)action that we can expect more of from Hillary, whether or not she was in office when the Russians took their reconnaissance photos of the ISIS oil tankers.

Nobody knows for sure what either would do when in office. But the signs of radically different behavior, on war and peace issues, are all there.

* shame on Trump for not emphasizing this every chance he gets

Even Goldwater wouldn’t have been likely to start a nuclear war, the Daisy Ad notwithstanding.

Hillary grew up under the same Duck and Cover/Instant Incineration mantra most of the rest of her generation did. It was deliberately terrifying propaganda that still has an effect on people of her generation. There are exceptions to the rule, however.

The closest the US and Soviet Union got to a nuclear war was in October of 1962 over the Soviet missiles in Cuba. The military general staff were almost all in favor of a first strike; Kennedy and Khrushchev managed, barely, to prevent that from happening. Cooler heads prevailed.

The American general public, Hillary included, experienced a kind of existential fear of what might happen that I doubt anyone who wasn’t alive and conscious then can imagine.

Trump was around at that time, too, of course, but he was in military school, not public school. I don’t know what was taught there at the time but we shouldn’t assume the boys at the NY Military Academy didn’t learn that nuclear war was a survivable option. It was a widely shared opinion within the military at the time — it may still be.

It’s nonsense to imagine that Trump means anything he says in public. There is no policy position he holds that he can’t and won’t change in a heartbeat.

There are so many reasons not to vote for Hillary, but there is no reason at all to vote for Trump.

Again, there is no reason to believe anything the man says in public. And if you do believe it, you’re a perfect mark for his con. The con is his business model and his way of life. That won’t change if you put him in the White House.

There is no reason to vote for him, not even to “stick it to The Hag” — which is pure nihilism.

There are plenty of reasons not to vote for her, and I don’t plan to. I may leave the president line on my ballot blank as I’ve done in the past. But I don’t have any intention of voting for either of the two major party candidates.

What’s propaganda is the oft repeated claim that Trump “won’t get us into a nuclear war with Russia (and Hillary will).” You don’t know that. There is no way to know that, pure and simple.

And if you believe it, you’ve been conned.



Just seen on C-Span, this viewer comment from “Deplorable One”, re U.S. plan to cyber attack Russia:

“We’re supposed to risk world peace because they exposed Hillary lies?”

Yes, apparently we are, and will, according to Biden.

Look, anyone with a functioning brain cell should just break down and admit to themselves that there is no way we are going to get out of this mess we’re in without a lot of people dying, and start to re-frame all our political thinking accordingly.

No Hollywood ending for us. Reality bites.

Below is a link to a Mark Twain essay on his running for the governor of New York. It makes this election pale by comparison;
http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/galaxy-december-1870-memoranda/ri17029

@ks

Deciding that tactically a vote for Trump is better than a vote for Clinton while making it clear that by and large both are abhorrent does not constitute waving pom poms. Nor even does recognizing that on some matters, to the extent it is possible to understand what either of these idiots would do, Trump is more correct than Clinton.

This was the subject matter of an Ian posting https://www.ianwelsh.net/the-need-to-believe-in-goodness/

Finally my observation of the two is that we are having to choose between a Berlusconi (Trump) and a Mussolini (Clinton).

Of course the obvious option is to opt out of making such a choice.

@ks

I haven’t seen anyone here post anything that would suggest that Trump is a good candidate. Virtually everyone here that has posted anything marginally supportive of Trump has started with the proposition that both candidates suck but have then gone on to explain why they think that either he is less of a problem than Clinton or to counter the inane arguments from the Clinton camp that Trump is either Hitler or, and in their reading worse, Putin.

To claim that Trump is in this race the only populist (for better or worse) does not constitute an attempt to tease “deeper meaning.” Again let me urge you to read Ian’s earlier article.

@ ks

Ya mean Trump might have a “private” position that is different from his “public” position, like your wannabe queen???

You are so covered with BS, you’re stinking up the place.

So predictable, so one-note. So boring.

hvf: Your concerns about neo-liberals and neo-conservatives are totally valid …but Trump is not a solution, though he may point to one for the future.

His mistakes are legendary and no doubt will be written about extensively in the future but the #1 he made was to side with divisive forces…the religious right (especially) and the so called ‘alt right’.

Both those groups are not fighting positively for a particular interest group, say for more jobs and higher wages for the working classes, they are against various other sub-groups, selling the true ‘opium of the masses’. That if that group (‘women’, ‘SJWs’, ‘spics’, ‘niggahs’, poofs’ and ‘trannies’) is put down (heck better, even totally eliminated with lots of blood) then everything will be right again.. wages will go up, more jobs will magically appear, things will get cheaper and all the rest.

It is, and always has been, total nonsense ..but it appeals and always has done to a significant minority of the population. Those too stupid and/or programmed to attack the elite white heterosexual males that dominate society and are the real cause of their problems. It is no coincidence that the religious right’s social programming is designed to support (heck idolise) such people, while demonising all others, hence they are always the darlings, foot soldiers and useful cannon fodder of those elites.

It also signalled (to those that follow such things) that Trump was kidding, he is no more anti-neo-liberal or neo-conservative than Clinton is. Whether or not that was his true position all along or he just gets blown with the wind doesn’t matter. The key thing is that if he couldn’t face down the toxic religious right and bend them to his will (after all where else could they go, so how hard could it be?) then there is zero chance he will make any difference against the far more powerful neo-liberals and neo-cons when in power and will simply follow them as well….on top of creating and feeding class, sexual, race and gender divisions…maybe to the point of open war breaking out.

So you have 2 candidates, both corrupt, both (in the end) will follow neo-liberalism and neo-conservatism, but one will unleash a wave of hatred and/or violence against a large number of sub-sections of society.

Sure that will generate a large ‘psychological wage’ for those doing the attacking. Go out with your mates and kill a ‘pooftah’ and you feel good, especially in a high bullying/high violence culture like the US but it still doesn’t pay the bills ….

In other words the belated political awakening of the poorer white males, that they have been dudded by many decades of this ‘psychological wage’ while their pockets have been picked, has been aborted and they are right back, though far more viscously, to the beginning again.

The lesson is clear to his successors, stay middle of the road on social issues to keep women and LGBTI onside as they are dangerous these days, stay away from racism to keep all the melting point on your side, stay on topic about trade pacts, Wall Street, infrastructure investment, be anti-war, pro US jobs and all the rest and you will romp it in. Basically be Sanders, who if he was running would be 20 (at least) points ahead at this point.

@realitychecker,

Hush. If you were capable of it, you should be embarrassed into silence by now. All of your truly one note “Red Queen!!!” diversionary squawking won’t cover the fact that you got duped by Trump’s clown show….well no, it’s worse as you willingly duped yourself . Oh well…

@ Lisa

Not addressing your entire analysis here, although I find your persistent fears of extinction to be a bit too hysterical and influential in your perceptions, but you also made many observations I would agree with. However, may I focus on this:

“Trump, ironically, was originally a rebel against this process, the first-ever party-crasher to bulldoze his way past the oligarchical triad of donors, party leaders and gatekeeping media. But once he got in, he became the ultimate servant of the horse race, simultaneously creating the most-watched and most regressive election ever.”

I would ask, very seriously, if after having achieved the virtual miracle you described in that paragraph, and knowing, through the direct experience of getting to the nomination, what a thoroughly rigged system and the true nature of the “triad” and the Clinton machine meant in actual practice, would you not consider it to be within the realm of possibility that at that point he decided that the only way he could expect to win the rest of the way was to gather votes the old fashioned way, by pandering to those whose votes would be necessary to get him over the finish line?

I’m not saying this was certainly his reasoning, but it seems reasonable to me from a purely pragmatic POV. And if so, can you really blame him, as we are seeing the Clinton folks revealed to be the most incredibly unethical and duplicitous cheaters ever to have been exposed as they are thru the emails coming out daily?

Hard to blame him for doing what is necessary to make his whole campaign have a chance of reaching the goal in the final phase, isn’t it?

Mike: You are pushing at straws, the religious right and the so called ‘alt-right’ are neo-liberal and neo-conservative through and through as well as being socially divisive…and he has sold out totally to them

So the odds are he will be little different from Clinton on those issues, while creating a wave of hatred and violence against a whole range of people, not the least my group the LGBTI, but also women, migrants, Muslims, Hispanics, any non-‘christians’, POC and all the rest.

So ‘might’, ‘maybe’ but ‘unlikely’ and with a terrible price as well. He’d tear the country apart, already is doing so.

If you wanted real change you all should have been out there fighting the Democratic elite to get Sanders up.

@relitychecker,

My “identity group”? What the are you talking about? If you mean race and implying that I’m black and blacks have always voted for Democrats then you’re just being sill and and baiting. Blacks started out mostly Republicans for obvious reasons then started to switch when the New Deal happened and further moved to Democrats when Truman integrated the Army and went much further in after the passage of the Civil Rights Act and has carried on since. Given what was, and is, on offer between the two major parties those were, and are, rational decisions.

Meanwhile you’re nursing your apparently eternal butthurt about voting for Obama by….”opening you eyes” to Trump. So savvy. I can only laugh at you at this point.

realitycheck: “he decided that the only way he could expect to win the rest of the way was to gather votes the old fashioned way, by pandering to those whose votes would be necessary to get him over the finish line?”

I have stated repeatedly how he could win, as shown by his poll results during his candidacy run and the polls for Sanders.

Stay middle of the road on social matters (women, LGBTI, get some of their votes and not rile them up to fight against you), stay away from racism (to pick up votes from the black and hispanic, etc communities, the Dems have pissed them off so much they are easy targets), keep hammering away about Wall st, trade pacts, jobs for Americans and all the rest.
Easy win….

Note his poll results when Trump actually did that, if he had stayed that way he’d be 5-10% ahead right now. Talk about snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.

But by siding with the right wing (religious and ‘alt right’) divisive force he blew it, totally. I mean Clinton has to one of the most unelectable candidates in US history because of her record. The GOP didn’t need a Trump to win they just needed some middle of the road candidate ..except they had none, they were all extremists, all even more unelectable than Clinton .. which is a real feat when you think about it.
Not only was Clinton unelectable before the candidacy fights, by the way her team did it they pissed off huge numbers of Dem (etc) voters, who if not actually going to vote for Trump would have sat this one out.

It took the work of a ‘genius’ to motivate them all to fight for HRC…

The GOP’s ‘anointed’ one was first Bush who predictably collapsed then that nutjob Cruz who was even more unelectable than Clinton.

The US will not elect a ‘christian’ extremist nutjob no matter how much you hope for that. Not going to happen, the women’s vote alone will ensure that. The fact that religious nuts all come along with extreme racism and LGBTI hate just decreases their chance even more.
So a women hating, LGBTI hating, racist, sharia-‘christian’ is not going to get up. Rather a real populist needs to create a ‘grand coalition’ , at the very least be not threatening to those groups that can effectively fight against them.

How hard is that?

@ ks
@ Lisa

Blacks will vote for Hillary no matter what she does. Women will vote for Hillary no matter what she does.

Her lies, corruption and illegalities are on full display for all to see, while all one can do re Trump is SPECULATE and play the gypsy mind-reader game.

There’s your fucking reality check.

@ ks

You care about your hopes for blacks getting favorable treatment, and are willing to fully embrace blatant and widespread political corruption and illegality to keep that hope alive.

All your deflections (e,g, Did you ever vote non-Dem in MODERN TIMES was the issue above, ya know? But, as usual, you deflected, and asked what the issue was; maybe you just can’t read???), and all your ridiculous logically fallacious ad hominems, just can’t hide that obvious bottom line truth.

As a lawyer, I understand how critical the rule of law is to a free society, so I am standing first and foremost against the proven corrupters of that basic principle.

I am very comfortable with the merit of my position. You may feel free to burn in hell for yours.
Your low regard for your own personal integrity is your problem, not mine.

Sigh.

“Blacks will vote for Hillary no matter what she does. Women will vote for Hillary no matter what she does.
Her lies, corruption and illegalities are on full display for all to see, while all one can do re Trump is SPECULATE and play the gypsy mind-reader game.
There’s your fucking reality check.”

The lack of analysis is sad actually. Firstly you have to understand WHY blacks tend to vote for Democrats these days ..and the answer is not all good for either party.
Firstly black elites have been totally co-opted within the Democratic party and, mostly, have sold out. This is despite the total betrayal of black people by the Dems and decades of anti-black men and women actions.

You would think this would be fertile ground for the GOP to pick up votes …sadly not, because it has become steadily ever more racist, a symptom of the GOPs embrace of the ‘religious right’ and the tea party people. So POC have nowhere to go and they have not developed the far more effective organisational methods that the LGBTI community have to ‘police’ their representatives.
A very similar process has happened with feminists, with the elite white middle./upper class DC ones having little in common with the vast majority of women, especially those poor and/or POC. Though in this case new feminist organisations are building up to counter that… organisation that more closely match LGBTI ones in structure.

The polls show that the vast majority of college educated women are voting (with many holding their noses) for Clinton. But, sadly many women who are not are (or were) voting for Trump. So it is not so clear cut as you make it.
Trump’s anti-women outbursts have cost him dearly, since it has mobilised many of even those earlier Trump women supporters to dump him. Of course everyone knows that the male GOP elite are all the same (except when they are paedophiles of course) but as long as they stayed quiet about it those conservative women could stick their heads in the sand and live in ‘hope’ that those men would somehow change (hint: they never will) .

The message to women from the GOP now is simple: ‘goodbye abortion and contraception, hello second class citizenship and being little more than a set of holes and a womb for men to use and abuse’. The endless scandals of while middle class males raping women and children and getting off with it just adds to that message.
Yes you can rape your 12 year old daughter and it is ok, provided you are white and middle class (being religious helps a lot too).
This has infuriated women, especially those conservative ones that (stupidly) believed all the tosh from conservative men about ‘cherishing and protecting women’…as if.

Note: As trans women, we notice the total hypocrisy about all the hype about ‘dangers’ of trans women in bathrooms, while the Trumps boast about their sexual abuse and all those white men get off ..even with raping their 12 year old daughters. So who is the danger here?

So the political landscape is intimately mixed with what is happening in the social sphere. Those usually conservative women, normally GOP voters, are waking up to what a pack of turds their conservative men are really like and how the party has now gone totally misogynist …. And from sheer self interest they are moving towards the Dems (bad as they are they are nowhere as bad as the Republicans now) or simply abandoning the GOP and not voting.

So your cartoon like ‘models’ of society and voters are just that ..cartoon like that bare little relationship to reality..

“What truly baffles me, in all sincerity, is that nobody like you, or ks for that matter, ever seems to be able to find their way to showing that they place any value on fundamental concepts like rule of law, accountability, civil liberties, or political corruption, which are things that are crucial to the entire community and to overall freedom itself, and not just to folks in your particular personal life-slots.

We do, a lot. A heck of a lot. Just take civil liberties alone, we have long been victims of being denied those ..so we are very pro them, for us and for others. The ‘rule of law’ we are more skeptical about because (a) it has often been used against us or (b) is ignored when it comes to us. Still plenty of laws in some US states against homosexual sex after all..so where is your ‘rule of law’ then when it contradicts basic justice?

Life is different when you are one of ‘outside’ groups, attacked and denied basic rights, the perspective is very different. No one is under any illusions about Clinton and the Dem elites or how the GOP is now dedicated to our destruction…I will say that again dedicated to our destruction. But we have to be tactical in what we do to first protect us and secondly advance us getting basic rights and acceptance.

We’re re only a small group, you 95% who have caused all the other problems go and fix them yourself ..we are just trying to survive here. Don’t blame us for the problems you created. It is not LGBTI people pushing neo-liberalism, or war with Russia after all..that’s you lot mostly male, white, heterosexuals (you claim) and middle/upper class. And you have all the power and wealth.

Forgive us for sure noticing all these other issues, but concentrating our limited resources on what matters to us the most, right here and now. Being transgender myself it matter a lot, life or death actually, to get access to medical resources, ending legal discrimination, stopping violence and murder against us, getting legal recognition and all the rest. The rest is up to you lot….after all you created it all, we didn’t.
Naturally faced with two candidates one stating they will eliminate us from society, the other won’t and though they may be as bad as each other on all other issues ..guess who we are going to vote for? Against the immediate threat.

You are not an outsider so you don’t care, ok I get that your personal interests are dominant for you…but ours are to us and we face much bigger stakes than you do.

Another interesting article. Same argument ‘US white males got a psychological wage from the oppression of women/POC/LGBTI/etc while their pockets were picked by the wealthy’, for ages they blamed said groups for their economic problems which were caused by white heterosexual wealthy (nearly all) males, who played (and still play) them like a fiddle.

For a (very) brief moment they looked like awakening politically, but they have slumped back to their same old, programmed into them, reflex ‘its all the niggahs, feminists, pooftahs, trannies, etc fault’ while the elites laugh (at them) all the way to the bank…

They can’t seem to grasp the simple concept, if you are at the bottom then you have to make alliances with others in the same (or similar) boat to gain political power. That your self interests are much more similar to them, rather than those wealthy white males idolised so much. That others being oppressed may make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside but doesn’t pay the damn bills.

Oh well, maybe the next election….

http://www.lgbtqnation.com/2016/10/america-divided-rebellion-angry-white-men/

How to lose an election 101:

“A year ago, before the primaries, Clinton appeared to have an advantage with women as the likely first female nominee of a major political party. But in the Democratic primaries, she had trouble attracting support from younger women, especially young white women.

And before the disclosure of the lewd tape of Trump bragging about making unwanted sexual advances to women, he was holding the overall advantage among white female voters. ”

“In early September, the Washington Post and Survey Monkey had Clinton up 23 points among white women with a college degree. But as of mid-September, Trump was still leading among white women without a college degree.

Now, according to a PRRI/Atlantic poll conducted as the video of Trump’s hostile talk about grabbing women was released, non-college-educated white women are split, with Clinton and Trump each winning 40 percent of their votes.

Keep in mind that white women without a college education preferred GOP nominee Mitt Romney by 20 points over President Obama in 2012. Among all white women, Romney won by 14 percentage points but still lost among women of all races by 12 points — and lost the election.”

“Trump’s failure to defeat Clinton among white women with no college education, combined with her edge among college-educated white women — as well as her huge advantage among black, Latina and Asian women — has created an overall 33 point advantage for Clinton among all women, according to the PRRI/Atlantic poll.”

“That is unprecedented, so much so that the poll looks like an outlier.”
“But a FiveThirtyEight average of national polls done in October still gives Clinton a 15 point lead among women. And that edge among women is the heart of the growing Clinton lead over Trump both in national polls and in swing states.

A CBS Battleground poll taken last week found Clinton leading Trump by 8 points in Pennsylvania, 48 to 40. And here’s the real kicker: 53 percent of Pennsylvania women told pollsters that the tape caused them to view Trump in a worse light. ”

http://thehill.com/opinion/juan-williams/301250-juan-williams-women-will-doom-trump

@realitychecker,

I’m glad that was your final reply as there are only so may times you can restate the same bits of dumb and tine deaf nonsense. Also, you’ve been reduced to misrepresenting as neither Lisa nor I ever said the “personal/all” issue was an either/or matter. You think black people who don’t want to continue to get killed by the police aren’t interested in economic inequality/justice? That’s silly. While you have been waxing poetic on the internet, the mostly minority fast food workers who have been spearheading the nationwide $15 minimum wage movement say hi.

The final reality is that you don’t speak for or actually do anything for “the community” and your supposed “balancing act” is, as I said above, just empty posturing and smug trash talking .