Trump is "a clear and present danger"

Discussion in 'Politics' started by Ivan Seeking, Aug 9, 2016.

  1. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    I also think that Trump is over estimating the "power" of the President considerably. The USA system of governance is typically very robust. "Lame Duck" presidents are not unknown.
     
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  3. sculptor Valued Senior Member

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    It seems that all presidential candidates make promises that they can not keep. The most obvious is claiming to have the power granted to congress. Checks and balances seem meaningless to candidates.
     
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  5. Michael 歌舞伎 Valued Senior Member

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    I am sort of astounded that people actually believe Trump or Hillary, themselves ,believe any of what they say.

    Really?!

    You really thought Obama believed in Change We Can Believe In? I mean Jesus H Christ, we just invaded another country today - which we're now bombing, and Barrack Nobel Peace Weiner Obama doesn't even have the decency to mention it to the public - who, in all honestly, couldn't give two free-shits anyway. So, why bother?

    Yeah, you're probably on Google right now looking up the name. We just put ground troupes in Libya, and are, again, bringing the freedom, one bomb at a time.

    The only two people in the race, IMO anyway, who possibly might have maybe believed some of their own bullshit were: Sanders and Cruz. Sanders, because he actually drank the kool-aid and, despite a century of economic failure, has total faith in The State. Cruz, equally as religious, has faith in The God - who chose him to run. ** Paul possibly believed 50% of his own bullshit.

    As for Trump, everything you hear him say, he's making up - mostly on the spot. As for Hillary, she's saying whatever the strategists tell her the Plebs want to hear her say. They both tell simple narratives, for simple people. It's called Democracy.
    Both are Statists.
    Both are Authoritarians.
    Neither are going to fix the problems we face.

    Thus, the voting public's choice is clear: Trump, whom only the Gawds and Baby Jebesus knows what he'll do - probably more of the same; or: more of the same.


    We, the people, can only be sure of one thing: Americans would absolutely love nothing more, than to watch bankers and ex-bankers have their necks broken and tossed off Tarpeian Rock. My guess is, a politicians will come along, and do just that. I mean, Blood Lust is really only a few missed McHappy Meals away from running amok....

    LOL
     
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  7. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    I was trying to work out how to deal with a Muslim friends fear that Trump may gain office and suggested that Trump himself would not have the power to do anything much at all with out the support of congress AND the Judiciary.

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    It is the sheer scale of his and his followers delusion that is mind blowing...and the fact that it can have such an impact globally because so many people fall for the same misunderstanding of how the USA system functions.

    It all comes back to the facts and not the fiction.

    For example regarding USA financial positioning globally..
    So many here are talking about serious concerns about financial instability etc ... yet when you look up the ( independent ) international credit rating agencies you find that the USA enjoys a pretty high rating. AA+, AAA, aaA, with a TER of 97.
    Compared to the fearful opinions constantly floated about USA financial stability one could legitimately wonder WTF are they going on about....
     
    Last edited: Aug 13, 2016
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  8. Ivan Seeking Registered Senior Member

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    Except, for example, that he only need surround himself with a few of the right yes men to launch a nuclear attack. He can start wars all by himself. He could declare martial law based on some bogus threat. Abuse of executive powers has to be challenged. That takes time. I can easily see him forcing a Constitutional crisis and who knows where that lands. In the meantime the damage done could be irreversible.

    Create a sufficiently scary threat and rally the people to war. Before long it would be argued that Trump had nothing to do with it. He was just protecting 'merca.

    How much damage could a sociopath [or hyper-narcissist] do given the most powerful army in the world and the most powerful armory of nuclear weapons in the world?

    When told that the military and intelligence officers would refuse unlawful orders, such as orders to commit torture, Trump responded, "They would follow MY orders".

    People who refuse his orders would be forced to resign [perhaps declared enemy combatants and sent to Gitmo] and replaced with people loyal to Trump. That is how petty dictators like Trump seize power. And don't believe it couldn't happen here. It is happening right now!
     
    Last edited: Aug 13, 2016
  9. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    hmmm.. perhaps it's a wake up call on how "executive powers" or the "constitution" can be protected from a President that goes nuts...

    To be honest we in Australia had a similar problem with a recent Prime minster who was struggling under the massive weight of Da'esh, mass migration, asylum seekers and huge budgetary issues. He eventually was removed from high office by his own party but it raises the question of how democracies deal with the mental health issues of it's leadership.
     
    Last edited: Aug 13, 2016
  10. The Esotericist Getting the message to Garcia Valued Senior Member

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    Billy T died? That's sad.

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  11. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    From VOX:
    ===========================
    If President Trump decided to use nukes, he could do it easily
    Zack Beauchamp on August 3, 2016, 2:50 p.m. ET

    Wednesday morning, NBC’s Joe Scarborough said something profoundly frightening about Donald Trump. In a private conversation with a foreign policy expert, Scarborough reported, Trump asked — repeatedly — why we have nuclear weapons if we don’t use them.

    "Several months ago, a foreign policy expert on the international level went to advise Donald Trump. And three times [Trump] asked about the use of nuclear weapons. Three times he asked at one point if we had them why can't we use them," Scarborough said.

    Obviously, this isn’t gospel; it’s a thirdhand report of a conversation that may or may not have happened. But it tracks with what Trump has said publicly. When MSNBC’s Chris Matthews told Trump in March that presidents shouldn’t suggest they might use nukes, as Trump has done repeatedly, the candidate responded with a question: "Then why do we make them?"

    This raises some very, very scary questions about Trump’s judgment. It suggests that he doesn’t know the basic way nuclear weapons are supposed to work — deterring attacks on the United States — and that he might be the first president since Harry Truman to order the use of nuclear weapons.

    The natural question to ask, then, is whether he could actually do that. The answer is deceptively simple: Yes, he can. No matter what.

    The president has basically unconstrained authority to use nuclear weapons, a seemingly insane system that flows pretty logically from America’s strategic doctrine on nuclear weapons. The US needs a system to launch weapons fast for deterrence to work properly, which means one person needs to be able to order the use of nukes basically unencumbered. The president is the only possible choice.

    This entire system, however, is built around a basic faith in democracy: that the American people will elect a sober, stable leader who understands the seriousness of nuclear weapons. Someone not named Donald Trump.

    In 2008, then–Vice President Dick Cheney said something pretty chilling about nuclear weapons during a Fox News appearance. According to Cheney, the president is always accompanied by a military aide carrying a briefcase, called the "nuclear football," which allows the president to launch nuclear weapons. The president can launch at whomever, whenever:

    He could launch a kind of devastating attack the world's never seen. He doesn't have to check with anybody. He doesn't have to call the Congress. He doesn't have to check with the courts. He has that authority because of the nature of the world we live in.

    This may sound like Cheneyian hyperbole. But Ron Rosenbaum, a journalist who wrote a book about America’s nuclear weapons, looked into Cheney’s claims as part of a 2011 Slate piece. He concluded that they were basically accurate.

    "No one could come up with a definitive constitutional refutation of this," Rosenbaum writes. "Any president could, on his own, leave a room, and in 25 minutes, 70 million (or more than that) would be dead."

    . . .

    "It's up to the president," Kingston Reif, the director for disarmament and threat reduction policy at the Arms Control Association, tells me. "The advisers that make up the national command authority are obliged to obey and execute the order."
    ========================
     
  12. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

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    Trump is the guy who wants to torture people. This is the man who wan to subject some Americans to secret military trials. I guess we can take comfort in the knowledge he would not do away with trials completely.

    Do you really think Americans are that crazy? Trump received only 40% of the Republican Party vote. The Republican Party is a minority party. Trump is lagging in all the national polling. Trump doesn't even have the complete support of his party. His party is split. His support is limited to blue collar whites which is a dwindling demographic.

    Trump will get skunked in the fall election. I have do doubt he will blame others for his defeat. It's what The Donald does. It's what he has always done. It's what narcissists do. It's what he is doing even now. But he will have little credibility.

    There is no central legal authority in the United States. Every state in the Union conducts its own elections. Each state has its own election rules. So a mass conspiracy of the kind Trump is now preaching is almost impossible to conceive. It's possible to rig one or even a few states but 50 states? And then there is a matter of the polling, which make it very difficult to pull off the massive kind of conspiracy which Trump would need to legitimize is conspiracy claims.

    So I don't think Trump's assertions will go far or cause much social distress. Sure, the idiot faction of the Republican Party will be upset. But they are a minority of Americans - not even close to being a majority of Americans, and they live mostly in rural areas and in the South. I don't think Trump wants to be inside a jail cell nor do I think Trump's followers want to be inside a jail cell for suborning violence. They are big on talk, but that's pretty much where it ends.

    As I previously wrote, Trump reached his zenith during the Republican convention. It has been down hill for Trump since and it's not going to get better for Trump in the remaining 87 days. From here on out things only get more difficult for Trump. In 6 weeks he faces the first presidential debate where he will be expected to debate policy. Policy isn't The Donald's strength. Up till now, he has been able to get by with mindlessly repeating Republican memes and insulting others before a Republican audience. That won't work for him going forward. In a few weeks, the polling numbers he's now receiving will look good by comparison. Trump destroys his credibility with each passing day. He's now accusing Obama and Hillary of founding ISIS. That works for right wing Republicans. It doesn't work for most Americans.

    So rest easy, this election isn't even close, and Trump's destroys whatever credibility he may have once had with each passing day.
     
  13. Ivan Seeking Registered Senior Member

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    957
    Here in the US, the President has the authority to deploy troops for a limited time without Congressional approval. That Congress is no longer required is a serious problem. The trouble there is time. We often don't have time to debate the course of action in emergencies.

    And a scarce few are required to authorize a nuclear attack. I think he does need two other people to agree, like the VP and Sec of Defense. The article above suggests not but I have read that three people have to sign on. Nonetheless, it isn't hard for someone like Trump to find two yes men.
     
    Last edited: Aug 13, 2016
  14. Ivan Seeking Registered Senior Member

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    957
    There is too much at stake to make any assumptions. Elections can turn on a dime. I would hope the electoral college would fulfill its duties and reject Trump even if he wins the electoral vote count. But again, there is too much at stake to make any assumptions. The enemy has to be exposed and driven into the dirt every day from now until the election. Don't forget, he has Putin trying to sabotage the election. So Trump has the old KGB guard working on his behalf.

    Trump is the greatest threat to the Constitution that has existed in my lifetime. He is the guy the Constitution and the founding fathers warn us about. He IS the enemy within. Complacency and a failure to recognize the threat for what it is, are the greatest enemies of all.
     
    Last edited: Aug 13, 2016
  15. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

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    All that is true. We much remain vigilant. But the real threat to our Democracy is the organization which created him and nurtured him i.e. the Republican entertainment industry which allowed Republicans to live in a fact free world and where they were carefully taught to eschew information from non approved sources i.e. the mainstream media.
     
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  16. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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    I think one of the most important questions that needs to be asked of Trump is : "How much time do you spend in front of a mirror or watching reruns of the video footage taken?"
    It would be very interesting to witness his reaction...to the question.

    It took the worlds media quite a few years to eventually learn not to publish Da'esh brutality footage. ( making a big difference to their global impact) I wonder how long it will take before the media acts ethically and changes the way they feed Trumps Narcissism.
     
  17. arfa brane call me arf Valued Senior Member

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    Yeah, When are we going to see the New York Times or Washington Post report on the latest Trump antics like:

    Donald Trump held a rally somewhere today, probably in a state he has close to no chance of winning, jeez, that Donald, what a character.
    Nothing much happened, but a few protesters were evicted and Trump said a few things. Not very interesting or accurate things, but, yes, he can still talk.

    Now on to the the Olympics, . . .
     
    Last edited: Aug 13, 2016
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  18. sculptor Valued Senior Member

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    It seems to me that Trump is voicing peculiar radical provocative verbiage to get free press in a perhaps ill-conceived means of countering the disparity of the monies available to Clinton for campaign adds.

    Has a debate schedule been agreed upon? Will Gary Johnson be allowed into the debates?
    Are we to forever be subjected to the tyrannical monopoly of the "2 party system"?

    .................................
    meanwhile:
    Jesse Ventura: "Trump risks assassination if the establishment/old guard likes Pence more than him."
    Entertaining interview: (Shit politicians say)

     
  19. joepistole Deacon Blues Valued Senior Member

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    So it's the old Roger Ailes orchestra pit strategy is it? Well, no doubt that is a part of it and that worked well for him in the Republican primaries. But he's no longer running in a Republican primary. The voter base is very different. Most of the American voter base doesn't routinely consume right wing entertainment.

    The Donald hasn't done anything that doesn't occur everyday across the land in the world of right wing entertainment. The Donald is a great right wing entertainer. That's why he has become as successful has he has been in right wing i.e. Republican circles. That's why he won the Republican primaries. But he now faces a much different voter base. He suffers from the same delusion which plagues most everyone in the world of right wing entertainment, he thinks right wingers represent a majority of the the American people, and clearly they don't. Be began believing his own bullshit, and that's his problem.

    A debate schedule was agreed upon by both parties more than a year ago. If Johnson or any 3rd party receives more than 15% in the polls, they will be included in the debates. But thus far Johnson hasn't been able to break into double digits. The only one who was able to do that was Ross Perot.

    The 2 party system isn't the problem. The problem is the way we elect or officials. The problem is much broader and more pervasive than just the 2 parties. California has to some degree managed to eliminate the 2 party system within the state. They have primaries but they aren't driven by political parties. The two top vote recipients then run in the general election regardless of party. So you can have people of the same party running against each other in the general election which will be the case in California this year. And they have eliminated gerrymandering within the state. Those are things you don't see in Republican controlled states. Republicans have no interest in changing the election system or in making the election processes more democratic, because if that were the case, they wouldn't be even close to having majorities in both or even one house of congress.

    That's nonsense.
     
  20. Ivan Seeking Registered Senior Member

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    When a man running for President wants to violate decency and Constitutional law at every turn, and proudly says so, when he praises dictators and wants to employ their methods, and proudly says so, he MUST be taken seriously. It is foolhardy in the extreme to assume otherwise.

    I am reminded of how the Germans were sometimes forced to tour the concentration camps after the war ended, sometimes with the stench of dead bodies still filling the air, to force them out of denial. They refused to believe what was right before their eyes.

    When Trump says he wants to use nuclear weapons, torture people, kill innocent families of terrorists, and bypass the US Justice system for citizens, I believe every word he says. The risk-to-benefit ratio, and basic decency, demand it!
     
  21. Quantum Quack Life's a tease... Valued Senior Member

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  22. arfa brane call me arf Valued Senior Member

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    Many people are saying the Trump campaign is now at condition Orange.
     
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  23. Ivan Seeking Registered Senior Member

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    Many people are saying that is damn funny!

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