US Politics January 2018: "You All Just Got A Lot Richer"

Are the Fake News Awards tomorrow? Smart of him to avoid conflict with the Golden Globes.

Hahaha

https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-am

(Bannon's openly bootlicking now.)

I don't think he'd like Fakebook, either.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmO0Bh4oHo0

Jake Tapper of Fake News CNN just got destroyed in his interview with Stephen Miller of the Trump Administration. Watch the hatred and unfairness of this CNN flunky!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 7, 2018

i hate to say it but tapper did just get bodied by a guy who could easily be mistaken for a face painted on an egg

also cool that trump's flunkies are now doubling down on trump being a genius

http://edition.cnn.com/videos/politics/2018/01/07/white-house-adviser-stephen-miller-full-interview-sotu.cnn

Fred Durst, can you help...stop the violence?

Please sir, just stop this manipulation and raise the bar. You have this wonderful opportunity to make our world better. We unmistakably need a role model and leader for the now, and the future. This isn’t the way.

— Fred Durst (@freddurst) January 7, 2018

i hate to say it but tapper did just get bodied by a guy who could easily be mistaken for a face painted on an egg

That's some fine weed there you're smoking.

i fuckin wish

srsly tho tapper came across like a peevish maiden aunt the whole way through and failed to land a single solid blow despite multiple openings, including two (2) recitations from miller that trump was a 'self-made billionaire'

Well suffice to say there's swathes of people out there not agreeing with you at all.

This Jennifer Rubin column is hilarious.

Trump’s emotional and mental limitations should debunk a number of rationalizations from his devoted cultists, who insisted he was the best choice in 2016, cheered his first year in office and continue to pretend he’s fit for office. He’s sounding presidential. No, he’s reading off a teleprompter, likely with very little comprehension. He’s playing four-dimensional chess with Kim Jong Un. No, he’s impulsively lashing out, with the risk of provoking a deadly clash. He’s a master manipulator when he shifts from position to position, sometimes in the same sentence. No, he likely doesn’t realize what contradicts what or remember what he originally said. His use of alternative facts is a brilliant scheme to control the press narrative. No, he’s incapable of processing real information and driven by an insatiable need for praise and reaffirmation.

Rubin was the queen of the Mitt Romney cult when he was running for president; I wonder what she'll do or say if/when Romney's elected to the Senate and becomes a reliable Trump sycophant?

I mean given the situation, Reagan did a fairly remarkable job of hiding his slide into dementia, but I suppose that's there's no person that could have done a better job, he was ultimately a career actor so maybe it was that ability to recite lines in front of a camera that never quite left him, like when you see Alzheimer's patients that can still play piano pieces from memory

look i'm not happy about agreeing with trump either but here we are

I tweeted this but this Joan Didion quote from the forward of Slouching Towards Bethlehem keeps running through my mind wrt Fire and Fury:

"My only advantage as a reporter is that I am so physically small, so temperamentally unobtrusive and neurotically inarticulate that people tend to forget my presence runs counter to their best interests. And it always does. That is one last thing to remember: writers are always selling somebody out."

durst turning out to be a "have you no decency SIR" lib makes a lot of sense to me

What's next: Look for Don Jr. to accept the statement graciously. But Bannon has further to go with President Trump: Axios has learned that POTUS has said that he wants surrogates who appear for him on TV to "bury Steve."

Axios' Jonathan Swan reported last night: Trump has been working the phones over the past several days, telling allies they need to choose between him and Bannon.

https://i.imgur.com/LEICkqt.jpg

Personally I have no stannage for the Wolff book and am not going to buy or read it (I suspect my wife will).

But I like DT's collusion in keeping it in the forefront of the news. Possibly it will succeed in keeping attention on the major talking points, e.g.: he's stupid, impulsive, rash, infantile, distractable, narcissistic.

Trumper die-hards gonna be Trumpers forever, and dismiss the whole thing as Fake Fakery from Fake-News Central.

But there may be some persuadable audiences out there who conclude that whatever flaws the book itself has, the basic image of a Toddler-in-Chief rings true.

, Reagan did a fairly remarkable job of hiding his slide into dementia, but I suppose that's there's no person that could have done a better job, he was ultimately a career actor so maybe it was that ability to recite lines in front of a camera that never quite left him, like when you see Alzheimer's patients that can still play piano pieces from memory

bingo

There were no winners in that Tapper Miller face-off

^I really got very little sense from that Tapper interview what he was even trying to get from Miller. The whole thing came across as another advertisement for Trump

CNN specializes in these kinds of segments, with the hosts and the assholes being interviewed shouting over each other. I don't see the point.

ILX discussion?

lol

The interviews never seem to go far enough in revealing to the viewers what they need to see about that person. Instead, by even indulging them they have the effect of affirming the legitimacy of their views

Rolling US Politics Feb 2019 - "With friends like these, who needs enemies."

But there may be some persuadable audiences out there who conclude that whatever flaws the book itself has, the basic image of a Toddler-in-Chief rings true.

― failsun ra (Ye Mad Puffin)

that's the thing, isn't it, it's all about persuadable audiences. everything boils down to the long, hard task of reaching out to the diehards (because the street doesn't go both ways; i'm not sure there's anybody who distrusted the president in january 2017 who is now thinking "nah, he's a stable genius"). trump supporters are, right now, the only people who matter, and until we get republicans - not just "trumpists", to whatever extent they're differentiable from republicans - out of positions of power, there's not really much else to be done politically.

or anything even to talk about, really. we fill up threads like these with half-assed jokes and idle speculation because what else is there? personally i don't think idle speculation is of any benefit and have other places to make half-assed jokes, so i'm not a regular around here, only when i'm bored and too lazy to find something else to do.

so you're above this is what you're saying

rushomancy, I agree that it's about persuadable audiences, but I disagree with the next bit.

That is,, I don't regard diehards as persuadable (in fact those terms are opposite in my mind). If you're persuadable you're not a diehard; if you're a diehard you're not persuadable.

Republicans who voted R in 2016 because they always vote R (but are not otherwise Red-Hat nutjobs) strike me as possibly persuadable away from Trump. Not necessarily towards Democrats. I want them to be disgusted, demoralized, and either stay home or blow their votes on principled third-party

And I don't think Trump supporters are "the only people who matter." As has been noted here many times, left/liberal/progressives and Dem-curious folks who stayed home are a more fertile and better source of votes than the same fucking Trump people we keep hearing about.

Republicans who voted R in 2016 because they always vote R (but are not otherwise Red-Hat nutjobs) strike me as possibly persuadable away from Trump

which is why Nicole Wallace, Michael Steele, Jennifer Rubin, Joe Scarborough, and the other conservatives to whom MSNBC cedes considerable airtime get no credit from me for courage

fwiw I’m glad rushoman has found other things to occupy his head space since IIRC he was having a real hell of a time on the post-election threads a year ago

Red Hat Linux should sue the GOP imho

Something Bannon didn't apologize for:

-Suggesting Kushner is a money launderer and that Mueller could nail him and the president for it through Deutsche Bank.

— Kyle Cheney (@kyledcheney) January 7, 2018

Stephen Miller has the affect of a prematurely-balding high school student who recently took an entire box of cold medication and is in the midst of delivering the debate that will cost his forensics team the chance to go to regionals.

"fwiw I’m glad rushoman has found other things to occupy his head space since IIRC he was having a real hell of a time on the post-election threads a year ago

― El Tomboto"

yeah, it was a rough time. since then i've moved across the country, got a new job, bought a house, started drinking more, completely restructured my personal belief system. been a busy year.

"so you're above this is what you're saying

― j."

not really - i mean if i was above this i wouldn't be reading or posting in this thread, would i? if i were to rephrase myself, i'd say that i'm trying to develop a less immediate approach to political engagement, which obviously doesn't play well in this thread.

"rushomancy, I agree that it's about persuadable audiences, but I disagree with the next bit.

That is,, I don't regard diehards as persuadable (in fact those terms are opposite in my mind). If you're persuadable you're not a diehard; if you're a diehard you're not persuadable.

Republicans who voted R in 2016 because they always vote R (but are not otherwise Red-Hat nutjobs) strike me as possibly persuadable away from Trump. Not necessarily towards Democrats. I want them to be disgusted, demoralized, and either stay home or blow their votes on principled third-party

And I don't think Trump supporters are "the only people who matter." As has been noted here many times, left/liberal/progressives and Dem-curious folks who stayed home are a more fertile and better source of votes than the same fucking Trump people we keep hearing about.

― failsun ra (Ye Mad Puffin)"

i'm sorry if this sounds cynical, but in a certain sense it's easier to destroy political consciousness than it is to instill it. i say this as someone who has had certain practical questions about the sustainability of our current system of government and someone who has, over the past year, gained a great deal of empathy for people who disengage from political action.

direct political engagement is stressful, often confrontational, causes people a lot of upset, much of it unneccessary. i used to disdain and hector who didn't vote, people who didn't watch the news, and i don't think that had any productive point whatsoever. for most people, there are other, more effective ways to change the world besides direct political action.

what i see about trump as an opportunity, and i think that we will wind up whiffing this, is that trump provides a unique opportunity to smash the republican party ideologically, and i believe that smashing the republican party ideologically is more important than getting trump himself out of office. because at the end of the day trump is symptomatic of a tendency towards uncompromising political cruelty. so for the democrats to attempt to sell people the lie that you can be a republican without being a trumpist, to try and salvage the dregs of the party, is ultimately for them to sign their own death warrant.

I agree with smashing the GOP in November 2018 and to tie Trump and the GOP together -- a task made easier in the last few weeks, I might add. But you won't kill the party.

Not with that attitude

Hey, has anyone done a taxonomy of Fire and Fury vs. The Power and the Glory vs. The Sound and the Fury vs. Blood and Soil?

I think The Sound and the Fury is the one that features an idiot man-child, and is otherwise full of virulent racism and inappropriate sexual desires.

the fire and the fury is the theme song to "the wire". "the power and the glory" is a prog-rock concept album about richard nixon by gentle giant (their best album). i don't know about those other two.

btw if i was too subtle, i posted a dl link way back upthread with an gratis epub copy of fire and fury for those of you curious to browse and discard

i know most of the time ILX frowns on that kinda activity but if there were ever a case where it seemed appropriate, this is it
i don't wanna enrich ANY of the players in this game

https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/fire-and-fury-is-a-book-all-too-worthy-of-the-president/

The President of the United States is a deranged liar who surrounds himself with sycophants. He is also functionally illiterate and intellectually unsound. He is manifestly unfit for the job. Who knew? Everybody did.

So why has a poorly written book containing this information, padded with much tedious detail, become an overnight sensation, a runaway best-seller, and the topic of every other political column, podcast, and dinner conversation? It seems we are in bigger trouble with reality perception than we might have realized.

it would be a little ironic if a president who doesn't read is ultimately taken down by a book. i doubt it'll hurt him too much, though. i haven't checked in on the conservosphere but i'm assuming that they're convincing themselves that nothing in the book is real

if this is all some kind of next level put-on orchestrated by bannon then shame on me for falling for it but damn this is addictive reading, just one obnoxious anecdote after another. for real this book is making trump somewhat sympathetic, like a lovable silver spoon cad protagonist in an adam sandler or chris farley (RIP!) movie (who don't get me wrong never in a million years would i vote for, nor do i approve of adam sandler, just recognizing that there is an appeal there that isn't entirely false consciousness / greed). the disdain real billionaires and everyone really who knows him has me -- god save my soul -- sort of rooting for him in a way i never have before

btw if i was too subtle, i posted a dl link way back upthread with an gratis epub copy of fire and fury for those of you curious to browse and discard

Masha Gessen, a staff writer, has written several books, including, most recently, “The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia,” which won the National Book Award in 2017.

oh, let's click this link

Frequently bought together
The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia
+
Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House
Total price: $34.71
Submit
Add both to Cart

the disdain real billionaires and everyone really who knows him has me -- god save my soul -- sort of rooting for him in a way i never have before

the shocking twist that no one could have expected in 2018!

it's like rodney dangerfield is back from the dead to assume the presidency

He was the winner and now expected to be the object of awe, fascination, and favor. He expected this to be binary: a hostile media would turn into a fannish
one.

And yet here he was, the winner who was treated with horror and depredations by a media that in the past, as a matter of course and protocol, could be depended on to shower lavish deference on an incoming president no matter who he was. (Trump’s shortfall of three million votes continued to rankle
and was a subject best avoided.) It was nearly incomprehensible to him that the same people — that is, the media — who had violently criticized him for saying he might dispute the election result were now calling him illegitimate.

Who knew? Everybody did.

This is both untrue and smugly superior. If everybody knew this the world would look different than it does today. This is the writing of a person in an information bubble, within which everyone does know Trump is manifestly unfit. The writer fails to recognize there are more than 300 million Americans and at least 50 million of them are actively supportive of Trump and perhaps another 100 million are only vaguely aware of his words and actions.

So why has a poorly written book containing this information, padded with much tedious detail, become an overnight sensation

Simple answer: hope that maybe by breathlessly reporting all the most horrific details from the book, they will penetrate the minds of a few million more citizens, and convince them of what the writer seems to think "everybody knows".

a racist sexually predatory rodney dangerfield who's probably the biggest traitor in american history, if not the anti-christ, that is

the disdain real billionaires and everyone really who knows him has me -- god save my soul -- sort of rooting for him in a way i never have before

the shocking twist that no one could have expected in 2018!

― Karl Malone, Sunday, January 7, 2018 2:57 PM (nine minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

A Presidency of Dunces

doubtful that donald j. trump is as big a boethius fan as ingnatius j. reilly

I find myself feeling the Obama years to have been a wasted opportunity to turn against the right. Healthcare coverage was expanded without changing its delivery through employment and private insurance companies, the things that make the healthcare system so hated. This protected those who work in the industry, it was a conservative move. Since keeping what people hate makes people hate you, the country now has an “outsider“ for president. Obama was elected as an outsider (yes, I know that you all know he wasn’t one). Why trust another Dem to change the hated system? Dems are boring, they fix little things while shitty things stay shitty or get shittier. This moron is president because people want excitement, “change” I guess. I know this is all obvious but I’ve been wanting to say something about why I’m so pessimistic about the USA.