America

[Son of Mathonwy]

Reaction in an Atlanta bar to Trumpf's mugshot on the screen after he got arrested for racketeering



'Murica for reals. Brings a tear to the eye.

Love the Georgia case - he can't t get a presidential pardon for that one.

[Mikey Brown]

Hooray! Everything is fixed!

[morepork]

Pretty sure it's not real, but ah well..

[Sandydragon]

Why the fuck can’t the Dems find someone with some charisma. Anyone. The next election shoudmnt be close but you feel it will be

[Sandydragon]

As much as another Trump candidacy is a cause for concern; Ramaswany looks even worse. Just as nuts but with potential to be around longer and have more energy.

It’s an odd lineup when Mike Pence looks like the best candidate.

[Mikey Brown]

Oh don’t make me go and look in to any of these people, you bastard. Ok perfectly (not at all) happy living in ignorance.

[Puja]

As much as another Trump candidacy is a cause for concern; Ramaswany looks even worse. Just as nuts but with potential to be around longer and have more energy.

It’s an odd lineup when Mike Pence looks like the best candidate.

I'm just glad it looks like De Santis is fading away. The thought of that dude in power was terrifying.

Puja

[Sandydragon]

As much as another Trump candidacy is a cause for concern; Ramaswany looks even worse. Just as nuts but with potential to be around longer and have more energy.

It’s an odd lineup when Mike Pence looks like the best candidate.

I'm just glad it looks like De Santis is fading away. The thought of that dude in power was terrifying.

Puja

They all seem to be trying to vie to be the heir to trump. Trump and his absurd philosophy has captured the Republican Party completely; whether the other candidates believe his crap or not none of them dare denounce him or it and most are just trying to be a younger version of the original.

[morepork]

It's just endless culture war. They are all puppets for vested interest and they hide behind faux outrage to get votes. It's fucking pathetic and toxic in equal measure.

[Coco]

Word on the street is Gavin Newsom (California Governor) has been given the nod to run for President if Joe Biden does not run.

[Puja]

Word on the street is Gavin Newsom (California Governor) has been given the nod to run for President if Joe Biden does not run.

I mean, I think every Democrat apart from Joe Biden himself would be very happy if he didn't run, given his age/infirmity/desire to avoid doing anything that might be considered progressive, but I thought it was already confirmed that he would go for another term?

Puja

[Coco]

Word on the street is Gavin Newsom (California Governor) has been given the nod to run for President if Joe Biden does not run.

I mean, I think every Democrat apart from Joe Biden himself would be very happy if he didn't run, given his age/infirmity/desire to avoid doing anything that might be considered progressive, but I thought it was already confirmed that he would go for another term?

Puja

We shall see. With more than a year until the election, who knows how it plays out.

I do know Newsom plans on debating DeSantis in the near future and Kamala Harris is having a bit of a fit about that. It will be interesting to see if it happens.

[Puja]

Hmm. I mean, Newsom's far from perfect (recent hugely problematic approach to homelessness, combined with a hugely problematic attitude to being stopped by court decisions about that), but he does have the major advantage of not being 82 at the next election. I think if Biden stepped down, then he'd probably wipe the floor with the Republican nomination (which is going to be Trump, lbr). I think I'm tentatively in favour, although I still can't see it actually happening. I think we're due for a rematch of the gerontocracy in Biden vs Trump.

Puja

[Coco]

Never know... I live in California and am very familiar with both Newsom and Harris - I am not impressed with either of them. I have been curious about RFK Jr., though... I cannot lie.

[Sandydragon]

Hmm. I mean, Newsom's far from perfect (recent hugely problematic approach to homelessness, combined with a hugely problematic attitude to being stopped by court decisions about that), but he does have the major advantage of not being 82 at the next election. I think if Biden stepped down, then he'd probably wipe the floor with the Republican nomination (which is going to be Trump, lbr). I think I'm tentatively in favour, although I still can't see it actually happening. I think we're due for a rematch of the gerontocracy in Biden vs Trump.

Puja

Biden has done more than he’s given credit for, but it’s hard to ignore his advancing age and question if it’s time for
Him to retire.

He probably can beat trump but it’s another case of going for the lesser evil rather than being genuinely inspired. And this time
Biden can’t campaign from his cellar.


Is it a convention that a sitting president is unchallenged or an actual rule?

[Puja]

Hmm. I mean, Newsom's far from perfect (recent hugely problematic approach to homelessness, combined with a hugely problematic attitude to being stopped by court decisions about that), but he does have the major advantage of not being 82 at the next election. I think if Biden stepped down, then he'd probably wipe the floor with the Republican nomination (which is going to be Trump, lbr). I think I'm tentatively in favour, although I still can't see it actually happening. I think we're due for a rematch of the gerontocracy in Biden vs Trump.

Puja

Biden has done more than he’s given credit for, but it’s hard to ignore his advancing age and question if it’s time for
Him to retire.

He probably can beat trump but it’s another case of going for the lesser evil rather than being genuinely inspired. And this time
Biden can’t campaign from his cellar.


Is it a convention that a sitting president is unchallenged or an actual rule?

Convention, and not one that's uniformly followed. Robert F Kennedy Jr is actively challenging Biden at the moment, although it's not much of a challenge. He's polling at between 10%-20% of the vote, which is fluctuates depending on where in the RFK Jr cycle the people who are being polled have gotten to yet. It goes from, "Hey, he's not an octogenarian and he's got a famous political name. Yeah, sure I'd be interested in him," then goes through a quick google, a "Jesus holy fucking christ", and then back to, "I guess Biden's not so bad and he'll probably survive another few years, right?"

If someone like Buttigieg broke ranks and primaried Biden, I suspect they'd stand a pretty good chance, but everyone credible is staying in lockstep behind the party machine, waiting for the turn they've been promised to come around. I suppose it does make better long-term career sense to do that rather than invite the boss to step outside.

I agree that Biden isn't given credit for some of the good he's done, but he's also not slated for some of the shit he's pulled either. His handling of immigration and refugees has been abhorrent in places. At least Trump openly let you know that he just didn't like brown people; Biden's kept up the same Trump policies just because he doesn't want a ruckus and regards people dying to be less distasteful than upsetting some voters.

Puja

[Coco]

It is starting to seem as if the Democratic Party views Biden as more of a hinderance than a viable candidate now, and may be looking for ways to put him out to pasture. Harris on the ticket as VP is not helping him.

[Puja]

He's also not helped by the cavalcade of conspiracy theories about Hunter's legal troubles somehow involving him. I think it's undeniable that, whatever the dodginess of Hunter's dealings (and I've yet to see much evidence of it being spectacularly crooked), Joe was very careful to keep church and state separated and avoid any hint of impropriety - with the desperation that the Republicans and the right wing press have had to try and find something to make him "just as bad", you'd have thought they'd've found something if it was there to be found.

However, that hasn't stopped them from slinging muck and enough of it has stuck in the public consciousness to turn Trump's unprecedented legal troubles into being on a sliding scale of politicians' corruption which Biden is presumed to also be on.

Puja

[Mikey Brown]

I’m sure Biden is clever enough to insulate himself to some extent from the incredibly dodgy dealings. That’s about the most generous reading I’ve got.

The American dream died with Bernie.

[J Dory]

Never know... I live in California and am very familiar with both Newsom and Harris - I am not impressed with either of them. I have been curious about RFK Jr., though... I cannot lie.

https://www.cbc.ca/listen/cbc-podcasts/ ... ential-bid

[morepork]

It's sad to see an environmental law champion pivot from that admirably altruistic motivation to making a living off anecdotal anti-science. In doing this he has hijacked some horrible racist tropes and he is a cluster fuck of profoundly unconstructive narrative that through social media has influenced the very highest levels of public service. He appears genuinely deluded. Not Ronny Ray-Gun levels of cognitive decline, but nevertheless profoundly unfit for public office. His aggressive support for Andrew Wakefields vested claims of autism resulting from the MMR vaccine is probably the single biggest contribution to anti-science in the history of contemporary medicine. Anyone supporting him suffers from not only scientific illiteracy, but a callous indifference to the public good that rates up there with the Laffer curve.

[Donny osmond]

Apropos of nothing at all... copied from X:

Post
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CALL TO ACTIVISM
@CalltoActivism
A British writer penned the best description of Donald Trump I’ve ever read:

“Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?”

A few things spring to mind. Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed. So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever. I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.

Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface. Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.

And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead. There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.

• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish: ‘My God… what… have… I… created?' If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.”

[Son of Mathonwy]

Apropos of nothing at all... copied from X:

Post
See new posts
Conversation
CALL TO ACTIVISM
@CalltoActivism
A British writer penned the best description of Donald Trump I’ve ever read:

“Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?”

A few things spring to mind. Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem. For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed. So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.

Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever. I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman. But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.

Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers. And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.

There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface. Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront. Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul. And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist. Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that. He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat. He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.

And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully. That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead. There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.

So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:

• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.

• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.

This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss. After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum. God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid. He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart. In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.

And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish: ‘My God… what… have… I… created?' If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.”

There's a lot of truth in that. Or a lot that I agree with, anyway.

It does seem mysterious that so many like Trump. Even on one of his stronger image points - ie that he acts tough all the time (which must appeal to some people) - he seems to me to just be acting tough, not genuinely a tough guy at all.

But look at Boris Johnson. Why was he so popular? It's all image - almost a caricature of a certain kind of Britishness - and most importantly, a highly recognisable one. Switch those British features for American ones and you'd almost get Trump ( and the Brits would suddenly hate him). Trump was already highly recognisable from TV. He just threw in a whole lot of dumb populist, nationalist things and captured a lot of those usually missed by politics. People who don't know much about how things work, but who knew Trump. That's the populist's appeal (just as it was for Johnson) - it requires no prior knowledge.

As for the Americans, yeah it's kind of shocking that any human being likes Trump, but I expect a whole lot of Americans think exactly that and are embarrassed that their fellow countrymen support him (as I do re my countrymen and Johnson).

It does seem particularly weird that religious people get behind such an obvious sinner as Trump. But I guess their skill at believing in invisible things is handy when it comes to finding Trump's positive features.

One thing I disagree with in the article is the suggesting that being a bully is the 'most unforgivable of all things' to the British sensibility. Boris Johnson, anyone? Piers Morgan? Gordon Ramsey? The writing style of The Sun? Sorry, bullies are pretty popular here too.

[Mikey Brown]

He did say a load of the right stuff though. It should have been obvious he never had any real intention (or probably didn’t give a shit either way) of following through on any of it, but the whole “drain the swamp” thing was pretty valid. He knew he could exploit the position for his own gain (like everyone else does) and doing the rallies made him feel like a rock star.

That interview from the 90s where he talked about running as a republican because he thought it would be easier said it all really. Pitting the poors against eachother, under the guise of liberty/freedom etc, whilst giving the nod to those with wealth that they can buy his support is pretty basic stuff but it did the job for a while.

For what it’s worth I thought he said a whole lot of funny stuff, it’s just a shame he was also such a huge cunt. He did such a fantastic job of highlighting what a fucking clown show the whole setup is that I’m sort of amazed everything just went back to normal after being exposed like that.

Much like Johnson he seemed to know his image was all wrong for a politician but he could play off of that. I’m not saying he’s some 4D chess genius, but it was entertaining to see you can wing it to that degree. Johnson seems much more malevolent. Both awful cunts who duped their voter base in the end though.

[Sandydragon]

He did say a load of the right stuff though. It should have been obvious he never had any real intention (or probably didn’t give a shit either way) of following through on any of it, but the whole “drain the swamp” thing was pretty valid. He knew he could exploit the position for his own gain (like everyone else does) and doing the rallies made him feel like a rock star.

That interview from the 90s where he talked about running as a republican because he thought it would be easier said it all really. Pitting the poors against eachother, under the guise of liberty/freedom etc, whilst giving the nod to those with wealth that they can buy his support is pretty basic stuff but it did the job for a while.

For what it’s worth I thought he said a whole lot of funny stuff, it’s just a shame he was also such a huge cunt. He did such a fantastic job of highlighting what a fucking clown show the whole setup is that I’m sort of amazed everything just went back to normal after being exposed like that.

Much like Johnson he seemed to know his image was all wrong for a politician but he could play off of that. I’m not saying he’s some 4D chess genius, but it was entertaining to see you can wing it to that degree. Johnson seems much more malevolent. Both awful cunts who duped their voter base in the end though.

Trump has cunning I think. He was riled into running for president allegedly because Obama insulted him, and then thought the best way was not to be like other politicians. I don’t like Steve Bannon but I wouldn’t claim he was thick and with him in trumps ear he was able to whistle the right notes for the left behind in the US