The Trump Presidency

Discussion in 'Politics' started by joepistole, Jan 17, 2017.

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  1. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    But this is the point: Flood the market with bad information.

    Really, American politics aren't too different from a discussion board, these days. It's just like the half-witted, lazy idiots we have around here; the point isn't to actually have a discussion, but to seed for search engine optimization. Normalization is the goal. One of the ways to do that is saturation and permeation; just scrawl it on every wall, shout it from every street corner, and piss it in every breakfast bowl.

    At some point, people need to start answering for their apparently utterly uneducated presuppositions. We all watched the Benghazi probe; we heard the House Majority Leader boast it was a fraud. We all saw the House GOP stunts poodling for Trump.

    (I'm uncertain what to say to the prospect that Rex Tillerson was a rational voice; Putin's friend spent none of the State Department's funds for responding to the election debacle, publicly proclaiming Americans just aren't up to the task.)
     
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  3. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    I kind of agree with this - the firing of John McEntee is as indicative and suggestive as the firing of Tillerson. Not because he's yet another example of the fact that nobody allowed near Trump for any length of time is uncorrupted - proximity to Trump is by now within reason probable cause for a search warrant or a wiretap - but because that guy is very well informed to be cut loose and left unprotected. That looks like a real sign that Trump has lost some power here:
    https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a19419383/trump-body-man/
     
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  5. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Reading through all the various reports it appears that immediately after Tillerson was reported as agreeing with the UK assessment that the chemical nerve agent used in the UK attack was of Russian origin he is forced to leave the administration.
    Essentially meaning that any one who condemns Russian actions in the Trump administration is quickly removed.
    So beggars the question:
    Does Trump require a Russian neutral or Russian sympathy for someone in his administration to maintain his favor?

    Likely answer: yes!



    Scary implications:

    Would Trump launch a retaliatory nuke strike if Russia launched a first strike against the USA or would he go on and play golf while watching mushroom clouds spring up every where.
    Has the USA no longer, a nuke deterrent against Russia?
    Has the MAD doctrine finally been circumvented?
     
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  7. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    I admit I'm waiting to see how it works that McEntee was so dangerous he had to be escorted out without his jacket, whereupon he went to his new job on the President's re-election campaign.
     
  8. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    Oh I see!

    Rex Tillerson, a man with a distinguished career at Exxon for over 40 years (1975-2017) who worked his arse off to cover for a deplorable Trump administration foreign policy position gets sacked by TWEET!
    Australian foreign affairs minister Bishop knew of the sacking before Tillerson did.!

    When analyzing the video footage of Tillersons departure/transition speech one gets the distinct impression that he is in incredible despair for the future of the USA. From a man of Tillersons standing this is most troubling.

    I am just amazed that a Tweet can be used by a POTUS as an instrument for sacking someone...

    His replacement has no hope in hell of holding his position nor has any one else in the administration. ( nothing new there hey?)
    Working for Trump means just one thing - career suicide.
     
  9. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    The thing about wellbeing, as a measure, is that Trump can affect it quickly - in economic measures he's been coasting on the residue of eight years of competent executive management, and as with all Presidents we'll see the economic effects of his management beginning to kick in during his second year, but wellbeing - that has several more immediate aspects and influences.

    And so: http://news.gallup.com/poll/226517/...Well-Being&g_medium=newsfeed&g_campaign=tiles
    Trump has to protect that guy somehow.
     
  10. ElectricFetus Sanity going, going, gone Valued Senior Member

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    Trump is now an SJW: denies reality because of "feelings" ... oh and openly admits to making shit up.

    He continued: "I said, 'Wrong, Justin, you do.' I didn't even know. ... I had no idea. I just said, 'You're wrong,'" Trump recalled. "You know why? Because we're so stupid. ... And I thought they were smart. I said, 'You're wrong, Justin.' He said, 'Nope, we have no trade deficit.' I said, 'Well, in that case, I feel differently,' I said, 'but I don't believe it.'"

    According to figures provided by the Commerce Department, the US ran a $2.77 billion surplus with Canada for 2017. That figure includes oil and timber. It's unclear what Trump was referring to with the $17 billion figure.
    Trump doubled down on his claim Thursday morning.

    "We do have a Trade Deficit with Canada, as we do with almost all countries (some of them massive). P.M. Justin Trudeau of Canada, a very good guy, doesn't like saying that Canada has a Surplus vs. the U.S.(negotiating), but they do...they almost all do...and that's how I know!" he tweeted.

    --- https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/15/politics/trump-trudeau-trade-meeting/index.html

    It is one thing to be a chronic liar, it is another to openly admit it.
     
  11. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Free time is a limited resource for most people, yet they, including teachers, already volunteer their own time to get concealed carry training. Volunteers make up their own mind which alternatives they wish to sacrifice for others. Pointing out that fact doesn't change the reality that they do.
    Your claim, your burden.
    Oh, I see where you're confused. You seem to think that clearance on inauguration day is mutually exclusive with a presidential clearance waiver.

    So what’s involved in getting a security clearance? Do Trump’s close family members even qualify?

    "As president-elect, he does get to bring whom he wishes to the transition table," Christopher Burgess, CEO of the security firm Prevendra, wrote for the website clearancejobs.com.

    Burgess also pointed out that this has been done before: “John F. Kennedy’s transition team included his brother, Robert Kennedy," who eventually went on to become the president’s attorney general in 1961.
    ...
    Clearance parameters are less straightforward when it comes to presidential transition teams. If the president-elect wants an individual to participate in his security briefings, Burgess says the government would use the “need to know” formula.


    It could “make a case, saying that if this person is here, they need a security clearance," he said.


    So, if the president-elect wants his kids to give him advice, then they have a "need to know."


    Burgess puts it this way: "In order to provide suitable counsel to the president-elect ... Trump’s transition team will need access"—even if that access is to top-secret material.

    And they need it right away. Trump is already getting briefings, and the Jan. 20 inauguration is roughly 60 days away. But it normally takes between 90 and 120 days to process a single application for clearance.
    https://www.voanews.com/a/security-clearance-explainer/3602747.html



    In 2008, after then-President-elect Obama was given one sensitive intelligence briefing at a secure facility in Chicago, he joked, “It’s good that there are bars on the windows here because if there weren’t, I might be jumping out.”

    Though Trump has been given some intelligence briefings on threats and capabilities, there are a series of separate briefs scheduled for the president-elect into what Obama has called “our deep secrets.”

    Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks said she could not provide any information on the schedule for the briefings. Previous presidents received them over the course of the entire transition.
    ...

    Under law and procedures, such covert-action orders are issued by the office of the president, and Obama’s orders will continue unless Trump, as president, changes them. Normally, the president-elect will review current covert actions and decide before the inauguration whether he wants to continue, modify or cease any. He also could add new covert operations after taking the oath.

    Obama received his briefing on covert action Dec. 9, 2008.
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/worl...f9bc40-a847-11e6-8fc0-7be8f848c492_story.html

    So as you can see, if you bother to, Rhodes could have both had clearance on inauguration day AND that clearance not being granted by the FBI.
     
  12. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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  13. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    And that subtracts from school prep in other areas. The school bears a cost.
    Then there's the insurance, oversight, paperwork, inevitable mishaps - - - - all paid by the school.
    Then there's the cost of having that be the setup and no volunteers - having to hire, or compensate, etc.
    From a guy who isn't President yet, sure. Of course.
    Not from Obama.
    Obama could not grant security clearance waivers until he was President.
    And nobody has presented evidence he ever did.
    He didn't have his entire White House running on overextended interim clearances either - last count I saw was something like 40 people in Trump's administration still without permanent clearance after a year but with access to secret and Top Secret material. Obama had none.
    Your source, your claim, your burden. I read your source - if you didn't, it's not too late.
     
    Last edited: Mar 16, 2018
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  14. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    Again, you're sounding like teachers are slaves or something. Like they somehow don't have the same choice of what to do with their personal time that every else does.
    I've already addressed your insurance nonsense.
    The deterrent effect of armed teachers doesn't even require any. Just the possibility.
    So you don't think the president-elect has any clearance authority?
    Again, you don't think the president-elect has clearance authority, while being briefed on matters of national security, and requiring counsel from others not yet granted clearance?
    Okay. You just keep believing that.
     
  15. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    30,994
    You got it.
    That's why Rhodes was being vetted by the FBI in the first place, and why their reluctance to issue interim clearance to him was so large a worry and concern of Podesta among others.
    Quoted for the laugh.

    The deterrent effect of armed teachers has yet to be demonstrated, even if they are present. The deterrent effect of armed guards - as at the Florida school - has yet to be demonstrated. The hazards and costs of armed teachers - accidents, thefts, teacher flipouts, etc - have been shown to exist.

    Meanwhile, the only relevance to the Trump presidency is that Trump once talked about it - the media has yet to fully comprehend the irrelevance of the content of Trump's vocalizations.
     
  16. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    so,
    Putin is about to get re-elected ( As world leader no doubt

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    )
    McCabe gets sacked a few hours before he is due to retire on full pension.
    Tillerson gets the boot by tweet.

    Transition times for :
    Secretary of state - Foreign affairs in total disarray for perhaps a month or so.
    CIA leadership - in disarray for 30 days or so.

    see a pattern?

    reality tv at it's finest...
     
  17. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    ...just means the teachers are taken out first...
    The teachers have been made a greater target, whether carrying or not... thanks to Trump.
     
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  18. Vociferous Valued Senior Member

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    So you actually do think that the president-elect can't consult with advisers about things in his classified briefings, unless they are approved by the FBI?
    Hahaha!
    The vulnerabilities of "gun free zones" has been proven, and the costs you keep imagining have not.
    So you would prefer the students were the first targets?
    Maybe you want to rephrase that.
     
  19. iceaura Valued Senior Member

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    He can't grant them security clearances. That's why Rhodes was being vetted by the FBI in the first place - for an interim security clearance. And according to every single source either of us has linked, Rhodes had a security clearance - at least an interim one - before Obama was inaugurated.

    None of this security clearance circus surrounding Trump plagued Obama. Obama's administration was competent at governance.
     
  20. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    The EU is urging President Trump to consider both significant trans-Atlantic economic links and risks the duties could pose to the broader alliance that shaped the postwar global order. "What we want to do is to clear up this mess. We don’t want a trade war."

    src: Wall Street Journal

    Sorry the article is behind a pay wall that I have no access to.
    Suffice to say that level heads in the EU are extremely worried about Trump and his administrations lack of ...uhmm... economic credentials.
    and significant and serious change is now inevitable IMO...
     
  21. geordief Valued Senior Member

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    Same source?

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...-avoid-trade-war-eu-urges-trump-idUSKCN1GQ1BO
     
  22. Tiassa Let us not launch the boat ... Valued Senior Member

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    Mr. Tillerson, as chief of Exxon Mobil, conducted himself as a man without a country. His job was to destroy the State Department and our ability to function on the world stage. He was a traitor before he had the job, and nothing about his tenure changed that.

    I remember hearing someone on msnbc explaining how upbeat and communicative and happy Tillerson was right before he was fired, and how he apparently really, really wanted and liked the job, which, in turn, was news to pretty much everyone else, and all I could think was, "What liberal media conspiracy?"

    Consider that the whole time Exxon Mobil was pitching fits about global warming and presenting data disputing the circumstance, the company was also executing its plans to accommodate and protect itself against rising sea levels. That is to say, when Tillerson's company roused rabble about climate change, they knew they were lying.

    If Tillerson was sad to lose the job he didn't want and only took because his wife told him so, it is because (A) he was fired, and (B) had not yet finished the job of crippling the State Department. When analyzing footage of Tillerson's departure speech, it's hard to not feel a little sick.
     
  23. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    I shall defer to your take on it as I really have very little exposure to Tillerson's history.
    Just working to the rule that says:
    "Any one working for one blue chip company for 40 years or so and advancing to the position CEO, Chairman and holding that for a few years (11?), has to have certain qualities."

    A man like that does not take being sacked kindly. (by Tweet of all methods!) Especially as it appears he was attempting to do everything he could so as to coverup Trumps foreign policy ineptitude.

    If we assume that there is a certain amount of intelligence in the Administration they would know quite well that the removal of Tillerson in such a manner seriously degrades the transition to the next secretary of state.

    If I were Tillerson I would take time out for at least 30 days, go fishing and tell them all to go choke on adulterated Mackers until I got back.

    'This means that the USA and world generally is going to pay a big price for Trumps inability to staff up properly from the get go and now the cost of such a dismal method of sacking is going to be additional.

    The subsequent timing of Gary Cohn's resignation is also associated in ways yet to be fully discovered or explored IMO.

    No doubt more on this association will come to light in the near future...
     
    Last edited: Mar 20, 2018
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