Donald John Trump: 2016 President-Elect

[backformore]

from that Newsweek article: 

Quote

The Trump family’s dealings in the Philippines will set off a constitutional crisis on the first day of Trump’s presidency, if anyone in the federal government decides to abide by the law. There is serious debate as to whether Trump will be violating the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause—which prohibits office holders from accepting gifts from foreign states—since the majority of his company’s business is with other corporations and developers. That is not the case in the Philippines. The man writing millions of dollars’ worth of checks to the Trump family is the Duterte government’s special representative to the United States. To argue that these payments will be constitutional if they are paid to the Trump children, and not to Trump personally, is absurd. This conflict demands congressional hearings, and could be an impeachable offense.

Quote

America is on the precipice of an unprecedented threat, as allies and enemies alike calculate whether they are dealing with a president they can please merely by enriching his children. President-elect Trump has a monumental choice before him: He can, as he promised during the campaign, protect the sanctity of the presidency—which he can do only by selling his company. Or he can remain corrupted by the conflicts between his country’s future and his family’s fortune.

Saying there isn't much response to the article is premature.  The full article has only been out for a few hours.

[Chicken Wing]

Quote

That "word salad" is what we're now trying to call actual investigative reporting

For real, how sad is the state of this country's collective intelligence if an article that runs more than two paragraphs long and actually covers complex geopolitical issues in an intellectual way -- sometimes with multi-syllabic words! -- is now the equivalent of mumbo-jumbo? Jesus H.

[BBDi]

Given how Trump like to remind us of the grievous error made in going to war on Iraq, it's odd he values Rice's opinion on his SOS choice so highly. 

But putting that aside, Trump's cabinet choices are all predicated on the assumption that everything comes down to business and commerce in the end. While I understand that business considerations can be effectively wielded as both carrots and sticks, I'm frankly disgusted by T's inability to value anything else. 

Reminds me of Oscar Wilde's quote to the effect that a cynic is someone who knows the price of everything but the value of nothing. 

[callmebetty]

4 minutes ago, Chicken Wing said:

For real, how sad is the state of this country's collective intelligence if an article that runs more than two paragraphs long and actually covers complex geopolitical issues in an intellectual way -- sometimes with multi-syllabic words! -- is now the equivalent of mumbo-jumbo? Jesus H.

That's what we get now living in a 140 character world. 

[backformore]

"word salad" actually refers to a specific kind of disordered thought and speech typical of schizophrenia or brain injury.  It's been used more recently to describe when people interrupt themselves mid-sentence and then start a new thought, while never completing the first one, or when people speak in such a confused way that it is difficult to figure out the meaning.   (trump does this fairly often)

Kurt Eichenwald's article is well-written and makes perfect sense.  "word salad"  is kind of the opposite of what he wrote.

[Chicken Wing]

2 minutes ago, backformore said:

"word salad" actually refers to a specific kind of disordered thought and speech typical of schizophrenia or brain injury.  It's been used more recently to describe when people interrupt themselves mid-sentence and then start a new thought, while never completing the first one, or when people speak in such a confused way that it is difficult to figure out the meaning.   (trump does this fairly often)

Yep. I've long wondered if Trump's habit of constantly interjecting his own sentences and speaking almost entirely in asides was due to his being woefully inarticulate or part of some kind of salesman trick to distract people from what he's saying and the fact that he invariably isn't actually saying anything at all. Or if he's brain damaged. One of those.

[Bookish Jen]

14 minutes ago, backformore said:

"word salad" actually refers to a specific kind of disordered thought and speech typical of schizophrenia or brain injury.  It's been used more recently to describe when people interrupt themselves mid-sentence and then start a new thought, while never completing the first one, or when people speak in such a confused way that it is difficult to figure out the meaning.   (trump does this fairly often)

Kurt Eichenwald's article is well-written and makes perfect sense.  "word salad"  is kind of the opposite of what he wrote.

Perfect example of word salad? Sarah Palin.

[izabella]

25 minutes ago, Chicken Wing said:

For real, how sad is the state of this country's collective intelligence if an article that runs more than two paragraphs long and actually covers complex geopolitical issues in an intellectual way -- sometimes with multi-syllabic words! -- is now the equivalent of mumbo-jumbo? Jesus H.

That has long been a problem in this country, and highlighted so well by Trump's governing by tweet.  This country has become a reality show, and people only listen to sound bites.

Every NYT or WaPo article is many, many paragraphs long and they try to write well and give detail and do not get to the main point until several paragraphs in, long after many people would have moved on.  People read headlines and a couple of sentences of an article before they move on.  Or just read Tweets.  If the electorate can't be bothered to read and comprehend, we get what we deserve.

[DollEyes]

14 hours ago, Duke Silver said:

SMH.  Trump is saying a giant "fuck you"....naming Rex Tillerson as his SoS pick.  Putins bitches are going to be running our country.

....Into the ground. 

[MulletorHater]

42 minutes ago, sistermagpie said:

That "word salad" is what we're now trying to call actual investigative reporting, is why Trump doesn't even have to pretend he's not using the presidency to line his pockets. Ratings are actually irrelevant to whether or not the facts are true or the reporting is good. It's not American Idol.  If the Newsweek story is considered less credible than Trump's latest Tweet about how the CIA don't know shit that does not mean Newsweek and Rachel Maddow are wrong, it means many in the US lack critical thinking skills or the attention span to understand a Newsweek article. Big change since Watergate, which was also just word salad from a bunch of elitist reporters with their snooty facts.

Fascinating, isn't it?  But, this is what the Republic has come to when (a) numerous people thought Sarah Palin should be a heart attack or one melanoma too many away from the presidency; and (b) the media and her admirers tried to build her up into this party leader who might consider running for the presidency in 2012.  That's when I knew that we were in trouble and that critical thinking skills had gone the way of the dodo.

I also have to give the side eye to people who shrieked, "LOCK HER UP!" because of the Benghazi embassy attack and the misuse of an email server.  Yet, some of these same people minimize the CIA--and several other intelligence agencies' findings, as well as Kurt Eichenwald's reporting.  Drumpf isn't even hiding that his will be a government for the millionaires, by the billionaires and of the oligarchy brought to us by his Russian handlers.

Evidently, he's "too busy" and "too smart" to pay attention to the daily intelligence briefings.  But, he has plenty of time to tweet, engage in photo-ops with a fellow narcissistic admirer and wife-pimper named Kanye, and selecting yet another one of Putin's bitches to be Secretary of State.  How apropos that the initials for that position are "SOS."  We're going to need that international code for extreme distress in the years to come.  

[PatsyandEddie]

Hopefully he isn't going to take mine with it but I admit I have grave fears for my children and grandchildren. 

[sistermagpie]

31 minutes ago, stewedsquash said:

I will change it and say it was a puff piece, hyped on his twitter the day before as the reason Trump cancelled his business conflicts meeting for Thursday, using way too many words to connect the dots to something that doesn't matter to anyone but the person speaking/writing them and usually the person has an agenda that they are tying to disguise with many many words. 

A puff piece would be something like an article about Milania's decorating skills or something. Substance free, nice things written to be flattering to the subject. Not an article detailing the many conflicts of interest of the President elect.

Whether it uses too many words is subjective but it's just wrong to say that the words only matter to the person writing. Even leaving aside the millions of people who are very concerned about exactly this issue, he's talking about something that's very important and will affect the entire country whether they like it or believe it or not. If Trump actually has these business relationships, the agenda of the reporter doesn't change the fact. 

I know you can certainly disguise meaning with the words you use--we see that a lot. But I don't see how it applies to this article at all. The sentences are perfectly straightforward and to the point.

[KIMBERLYANN11]

17 minutes ago, sistermagpie said:

A puff piece would be something like an article about Milania's decorating skills or something. Substance free, nice things written to be flattering to the subject. Not an article detailing the many conflicts of interest of the President elect.

Whether it uses too many words is subjective but it's just wrong to say that the words only matter to the person writing. Even leaving aside the millions of people who are very concerned about exactly this issue, he's talking about something that's very important and will affect the entire country whether they like it or believe it or not. If Trump actually has these business relationships, the agenda of the reporter doesn't change the fact. 

I know you can certainly disguise meaning with the words you use--we see that a lot. But I don't see how it applies to this article at all. The sentences are perfectly straightforward and to the point.

Yep, some of us don't mind words - we like words.  They are a handy way to communicate.

I've noticed that the DVR has made it so I'm less likely to pay attention to things - it's something I have to be mindful of when it's not something that can be rewound and reviewed.  Likewise, I think the twitter culture makes people lose interest if something requires sustained attention - I've only started using twitter myself, so that's a tendency I'm going to have to be on the lookout for. I think that's part of what's bringing us to where we are today.

[KerleyQ]

40 minutes ago, sistermagpie said:

A puff piece would be something like an article about Milania's decorating skills or something. Substance free, nice things written to be flattering to the subject. Not an article detailing the many conflicts of interest of the President elect.

Whether it uses too many words is subjective but it's just wrong to say that the words only matter to the person writing. Even leaving aside the millions of people who are very concerned about exactly this issue, he's talking about something that's very important and will affect the entire country whether they like it or believe it or not. If Trump actually has these business relationships, the agenda of the reporter doesn't change the fact. 

I know you can certainly disguise meaning with the words you use--we see that a lot. But I don't see how it applies to this article at all. The sentences are perfectly straightforward and to the point.

Yeah, it's a bit disturbing to consider a report that a foreign government is basically holding the Pres-Elect's business partner hostage to force an unfounded extradition to be a puff piece that isn't important to anyone but Eichenwald.  I bet it's important to the loved ones of the people at the center of it.  And it should be important to all of us, as Americans, that our future POTUS is leaving himself open to being extorted like this with his refusal to divest of his worldwide business interests.  Then there's the fact that some of his business interests will become illegal the moment he's sworn in (D.C. hotel), or that his soliciting of business (and favors, like pushing through disputed permits for his projects in their countries) from foreign officials becomes un-Constitutional the moment he's sworn in.  None of this is fluff.  It's real, it's illegal, and it's dangerous.  

Edited December 13, 2016 by KerleyQ

[izabella]

Yes, it SHOULD be important to all of us, but I'm afraid it's too many words for ALL of us to pay attention.  Headlines should read "Trump Blackmailed by Turkey" but it's all complicated and people don't like to read, especially if it means they have to use a brain cell or two to THINK.

Sorry, I'm feeling very discouraged today.

[Sheenieb]

What's infuriating about Eichenwald's article, as great as it was, is that nothing will come from it. 

Growing up, although I was a child, I remember when John Gotti got the moniker "Teflon Don." The FBI couldn't get anything to stick to him, but Trump is the one who really deserves that term. 

Listening to and seeing all of this herd mentality surrounding Trump reminds me of Ionesco's play Rhinoceros. When the rhino first runs through the town square, the townspeople are horrified, then they slowly start to accept it, until they too, turn into rhinos. All except the town drunk, Berenger. Berenger goes from indifference about the town hysteria to action; uttering the line "I will not capitulate!" in the end. 

It's going to be tough out here for the next four years, but let's all try our damnedest to be Berenger.  

Edited December 16, 2016 by Sheenieb

[suomi]

1 hour ago, Bookish Jen said:

Perfect example of word salad? Sarah Palin.

And Elizabeth Hasselbeck.

[sistermagpie]

14 minutes ago, izabella said:

Yes, it SHOULD be important to all of us, but I'm afraid it's too many words for ALL of us to pay attention.  Headlines should read "Trump Blackmailed by Turkey" but it's all complicated and people don't like to read, especially if it means they have to use a brain cell or two to THINK.

But we all know Kanye visited Trump!

And you know, I don't think it's automatically stupid to care about the celebrity. The thing about them is that we know them, so when Kanye and Trump meet it's like two people we know are doing something and it's easier for us to put that in context because we already have the kind of detail in our head that Eichenwald has to carefully lay out in his article.

But it's worth it to read all that because ultimately that really is much more important.

[KerleyQ]

20 minutes ago, izabella said:

Yes, it SHOULD be important to all of us, but I'm afraid it's too many words for ALL of us to pay attention.  Headlines should read "Trump Blackmailed by Turkey" but it's all complicated and people don't like to read, especially if it means they have to use a brain cell or two to THINK.

Sorry, I'm feeling very discouraged today.

I think part of the problem is that, for the bulk of us, the kind of stuff we're talking about being possible now, they're just so far removed from it ever existing.  Yes, they hear stories from prior generations, or from countries that seem so far away that their problems just don't touch our daily lives, but they've never really witnessed it.  So, they don't heed the warnings when the people who remain with us who experienced Hitler's reign say "um, hey, guys?  This all feels awfully familiar to us..."  And they don't really get the danger of allowing a man like Putin to advance into the smaller countries he's hellbent on absorbing into his empire.  We're physically rather isolated, in terms of the fact that we are the strength in our region, there is no other country in spitting distance that is a threat to us.  And my generation (and younger) has absolutely no experience living through the legitimate threat of Russia tossing some bombs our way.  There haven't been bomb drills in schools in generations.  

For some people, something like this is just not in their grasp precisely because they've never experienced it.  It just does not compute to them that we are not the biggest, baddest thing going, or that, yes, other countries would dream of taking a run at us if our leaders act like arrogant assholes on the global stage.  So, everyone, whether it's you or me on a message board or social media, or a prominent reporter and media outlet, is just playing Chicken Little to them.  It's especially true when, for whatever reason, people have bought into the image of this dumpy orange senior citizen who was too wimpy to fight for our country when he was young and healthy, as this intimidating ass kicker who the other countries' leaders are going to fear and bow down to him.  (I mean, seriously, I've seen his followers photo shop his face onto the Hulk, Batman, Superman, Thor, etc).  

So, we have a lack of genuine understanding that the only thing keeping stuff like Hitler from happening again is the memories of the people who were alive and the determination by good people to keep that from happening again, combined with the absurd notion that Trump is this big time asskicker who intimidates the rest of the globe, and they just Do.Not.Get the dangers, and dismiss anyone who does understand the danger as a "sore loser snowflake who needs a participation trophy and a safe space."  

If by "safe space" they mean "fallout shelter," then, yes, I'll take one safe space, please.  

ETA:  I realize I kind of drifted to the more physical global danger from the danger of Trump's economic/business issues, but it's all really part of the same deal.  People don't understand how his investments around the globe can affect us if he's in the White House. And it's awfully easy to casually dismiss shit you don't understand.  It's a lot harder, but far more worthwhile, to set aside one's own preconceived notions and do the work of reading and comprehending why people are sounding the alarm, and exactly what their concerns are.  No guarantee you'll agree with them when you're done, but at least you understand more fully what they're saying, and you are arriving at a more informed opinion than you had before you started.  

Edited December 13, 2016 by KerleyQ

[izabella]

2 minutes ago, KerleyQ said:

For some people, something like this is just not in their grasp precisely because they've never experienced it.  It just does not compute to them that we are not the biggest, baddest thing going, or that, yes, other countries would dream of taking a run at us if our leaders act like arrogant assholes on the global stage.

I guess it will then just be a big surprise for them, like Pearl Harbor and 9/11 were.

[Toomuchsoap]

3 hours ago, backformore said:

EVERYONE must see this -  it's horrifying.   Trump is using the United States presidency to further his own business interests. to a much larger extent than anyone thought.

This isn't new. Or news. People have been speculating on something just like this happening for well over a year. tRump wants to emulate his idol Putin and become one of about two of the world's richest oligarchs. Apparently, Tillerson wants to join them. Someone on this board I believe speculated that before they're through - and with authoritarians they're never through - they'll have carved the world into about four or five sectors with maybe a handful of kleptocrat oligarchs running those sectors all for profit 24/7. The world won't be worth much when they've plundered every last natural resource, poisoned every square centimeter of it, all their coastal paradises inundated by the rising seas, the people dying in droves and too impoverished and sick to care about the crap products they're trying to fob off on them. There will be a tipping point, but we may have reached that very particular tipping point from which there's no possibility of recovery. For anyone. And that includes them.

[random chance]

2 hours ago, backformore said:

"word salad" actually refers to a specific kind of disordered thought and speech typical of schizophrenia or brain injury.  It's been used more recently to describe when people interrupt themselves mid-sentence and then start a new thought, while never completing the first one, or when people speak in such a confused way that it is difficult to figure out the meaning.   (trump does this fairly often)

Kurt Eichenwald's article is well-written and makes perfect sense.  "word salad"  is kind of the opposite of what he wrote.

Yes, seriously - along with being post-factual are we also going to start randomly changing the meanings of words and phrases?

2 hours ago, Chicken Wing said:

Yep. I've long wondered if Trump's habit of constantly interjecting his own sentences and speaking almost entirely in asides was due to his being woefully inarticulate or part of some kind of salesman trick to distract people from what he's saying and the fact that he invariably isn't actually saying anything at all. Or if he's brain damaged. One of those.

Many people have said they believe it's the early stage of Alzheimer's.

[KerleyQ]

3 minutes ago, random chance said:

Many people have said they believe it's the early stage of Alzheimer's.

I'm still thinking this is the case.  It would fit with things like the Carrier issue - he said something about Carrier's jobs at multiple campaign stops, but he could not remember later that he ever said anything about their jobs.  He needed to be shown video footage of when he talked about it.  I could see if it was a one time throw away thing, and it being a case of "well, he was at a stop in Indiana, someone said something about Carrier, and he threw it in there to personalize his speech to that crowd."  I can buy that there are countless little local blurbs that a candidate's people advise them to throw in to their speech in various cities that they don't specifically recall months later.  But, he spoke of it at multiple stops, and he couldn't recall it?  That's concerning when it comes to his mental faculties.  

[proserpina65]

2 hours ago, stewedsquash said:

Word Salad: Thanks all.  I stand corrected on the phrase word salad. Wrong word to use. My brother has schizophrenia and I never heard any of his doctors use that word to describe anything about him. Hmm. I will change it and say it was a puff piece, hyped on his twitter the day before as the reason Trump cancelled his business conflicts meeting for Thursday, using way too many words to connect the dots to something that doesn't matter to anyone but the person speaking/writing them and usually the person has an agenda that they are tying to disguise with many many words. I will amend and say that while the article was researched, written well, made perfect sense, was long and had big words and I read the whole thing and understood what the writer was putting forth, it was a fail as far as what the writer wanted to accomplish. The underlying goal was to take Trump down with the article and so far, no traction.

If you think the very real possibility of our country being sold out in order to line the pockets of the Trump family is "something that doesn't matter to anyone but the person speaking/writing", you obviously haven't been paying attention to anything but FOX News.

[candall]

8 hours ago, Ceindreadh said:

Why is anybody surprised by this? Does anybody really think that Trump will put American interests before his business interests?

...

I've been asking myself "Why is anyone surprised by this?" so much lately, I've started saying it to my dogs.  Yes, the US has snuck in there where we had no business and caused foreign politics to deviate to our supposed benefit.  Yes, Putin saw it would be to Russian advantage for DT to win the election and did what he could to effect that.  As the commercial says, "If you're a _____________, that's what you do."   Is there a tiny little island nation somewhere so content it would resist annexing the neighbor's coral reef, if it meant more tourist dollars in the economy? 

So I can't summon up any outrage at the Russians.  But that's why we employ a zillion people in defense and security and umpteen INTELLIGENCE agencies.  We aren't supposed to count on Russia to keep their bear paws off our democratic process, it's our responsibility to protect ourselves.

So why aren't our duly elected representatives leaping to their feet in unison to demand an investigation the very second there's evidence our country's been lowjacked?  Well, for starters, this administration looks like a goldmine for getting all kinds of juicy new laws enacted that will help the majority secure their political careers, power, bank, etc.  A few honorable voices crying out in the wilderness and a few wily old wolves in sheepwear, like McConnell saying "I'm on it."   (You'd think Americans would mind Russia controlling the US, but there seems to be an extraordinary lack of interest.) 

 

Is anyone surprised DT decided to "postpone" revealing his plan to separate his office from his business?  Ha, as if.  Don't be surprised, either, at the bomb (metaphoric, hopefully) that's about to drop to distract and dilute a large part of the media's focus, and all this pesky talk about Russia and election validity.  That shocker is due to detonate sometime between now and the EC vote.

Why am I in this handbasket and where am I going?

[sistermagpie]

12 minutes ago, KerleyQ said:

It's especially true when, for whatever reason, people have bought into the image of this dumpy orange senior citizen who was too wimpy to fight for our country when he was young and healthy, as this intimidating ass kicker who the other countries' leaders are going to fear and bow down to him.  (I mean, seriously, I've seen his followers photo shop his face onto the Hulk, Batman, Superman, Thor, etc).  

Yes, this is always something that surprises me that there seem to be so many people who actually prefer Trump's brand of "strength" when to me (and I think many other countries) it looks so clearly weak. They reject even actual warfare experience in favor of talking about making business deals in military terms. (There was a really interesting episode of Slate's Trumpcast where they talked to Stephen Metcalf about the Baby Boomer's potential insecurity about warfare as a defining experience and how Trump embodies that.) Outward bluster and over-sensitivity to criticism is a sign of confidence instead of the opposite. Being born into money is hard work and succeeding at college with a scholarship is elitism. It's very strange to me.

[backformore]

39 minutes ago, Toomuchsoap said:

This isn't new. Or news. People have been speculating on something just like this happening for well over a year. tRump wants to emulate his idol Putin and become one of about two of the world's richest oligarchs. Apparently, Tillerson wants to join them. Someone on this board I believe speculated that before they're through - and with authoritarians they're never through - they'll have carved the world into about four or five sectors with maybe a handful of kleptocrat oligarchs running those sectors all for profit 24/7. The world won't be worth much when they've plundered every last natural resource, poisoned every square centimeter of it, all their coastal paradises inundated by the rising seas, the people dying in droves and too impoverished and sick to care about the crap products they're trying to fob off on them. There will be a tipping point, but we may have reached that very particular tipping point from which there's no possibility of recovery. For anyone. And that includes them.

Yes, people have been speculating that Trump will have a conflict between presidential duties and his business interests.   The article outlines how it is already happening, and the consequences.

[Chicken Wing]

7 minutes ago, backformore said:

Yes, people have been speculating that Trump will have a conflict between presidential duties and his business interests.   The article outlines how it is already happening, and the consequences.

Yeah, mostly the talk was all steeped in hypotheticals and speculation, but Kurt's brilliant article illustrates that it's not only more than just a boogeyman that the opposition keeps trotting out to scare people -- it's actually really happening, and this is where and why it's happening, and these are the problems it causes, and this is why we should care about these problems, etc.

[Padma]

Latest irritation with media coverage of Trump--the recount.  107,000 difference down to 80,000 or so and all they say is "basically no change!"  And those THOUSANDS of votes given to Trump that apparently never existed, get no attention at all!

Yes, it ended yesterday when the judge said "No" to recounts in Pennsylvania, just like in Michigan. The press reported Trump added 138 votes in Wisconsin and made the whole thing seem trivial from the beginning. (Hated that nearly every report had to include the phrase, "No one expects Stein's recounts to change anything...."  Why not expect it? You can be sure that if the situation were reversed and Trubby won by nearly 3 million votes but lost the electoral college he and his supporters would have used the past three weeks convincing Americans that a grave injustice had been done--and it NEEDED to be redressed by recounts.

Anyway, the vote difference between HRC and  Trump in those 3 states at the beginning was 107,000.  When the counts began, officials acknowledged because of them that --oop! We gave Trump thousands of votes too many!"

Democrats and media made nothing of the THOUSANDS of votes discrepancy. (Again, you'd better believe Tubby and his fans would have been screaming about the "cheating!")  Maddening!

[Moose135]

1 hour ago, Sheenieb said:

Growing up, although I was a child, I remember when John Gotti got the moniker "Teflon Don." The FBI couldn't get anything to stick to him, but Trump is the one who really deserves that term. 

I grew up in NY and watched the Gotti saga play out on the local evening news.  I've thought the same thing about Trump during the campaign as well.

[AntiBeeSpray]

3 hours ago, sistermagpie said:

That "word salad" is what we're now trying to call actual investigative reporting, is why Drumpf doesn't even have to pretend he's not using the presidency to line his pockets. Ratings are actually irrelevant to whether or not the facts are true or the reporting is good. It's not American Idol.  If the Newsweek story is considered less credible than Drumpf's latest Tweet about how the CIA don't know shit that does not mean Newsweek and Rachel Maddow are wrong, it means many in the US lack critical thinking skills or the attention span to understand a Newsweek article. Big change since Watergate, which was also just word salad from a bunch of elitist reporters with their snooty facts.

But then, you may have been comfortable with the choice regardless of whether or not it was validated by somebody on the snicker list. 

I think everyone knows that voter id laws have nothing to do with recounts. Recounting is making sure the votes that were cast are counted correctly. Voter ID laws are about making it harder for certain groups to vote and were being pushed long before Jill Stein. Voter disenfranchisement is not a just punishment for people getting uppity and demanding their civil rights. Jill Stein isn't the one claiming that illegal immigrants are allowed to vote. I think maybe Drumpf may have been pushing that one hard since losing the popular vote.

Yep. As for the article blaming Jill Stein, guess they had to have someone to blame. Thing is, she only wanted to make sure the election was a fair one. Only thing, Republicans sure as hell don't want their dirty deeds and vote tampering to ever see the light. So why not make it harder for certain parts of the population to be able to vote? Less votes for the liberals and more votes for them. Ugh.

[callmebetty]

I grew up in the Reagan Era, was optimistic college student when the Berlin Wall fell. I remember those images of Russians waiting in line for bread and being excited about jeans. It was so unfathomable to me because I didn't get it. Not really truly.  Moscow on the Hudson and Yakov Smirnoff were funny things. Even seeing images of the Great Depression,  and the huge shanty towns created. And the Holocaust still is such a mind fuck, how was that even possible? The extermination of 6 million people? It guts me and breaks my heart. 

But here we are now and all those real life events that seemed so foreign,  so unbelievable but true. Now we stand on the precipice of something new and we are all going to witness first hand what happens when bad shit happens not just in isolated instances like 9/11 or Boston Marathon bombing or Hurricane Sandy but across the whole board and we've been watching it step by step. And as regular old Joe people there is nothing we can do and by that I mean a huge thing do something like Super hero change things. Yes there is grass roots and local stuff, but that is not going to stop what is headed for us. America is about to encounter something that is going to take years, decades to correct.

It's all so disheartening and fucked up. And none of them are hiding it, they are showing us and telling us exactly what they are going to do.

Edited December 13, 2016 by callmebetty

[Chicken Wing]

Looks like people aren't entirely blind to the potential for corruption that is the Trump Dumpsterfire: A new poll from Morning Consult/Politico shows that 80% of voters believe that Trump's business interests will influence his decision-making in office -- though there are partisan differences on whether that's a good or bad thing. Also, 60% say he should end his interests in companies that have federal contracts, and 50% believe he should put his assets in a blind trust. Still, less than 40% believe he should be required to sell.

[random chance]

1 hour ago, KerleyQ said:

I'm still thinking this is the case.  It would fit with things like the Carrier issue - he said something about Carrier's jobs at multiple campaign stops, but he could not remember later that he ever said anything about their jobs.  He needed to be shown video footage of when he talked about it.  I could see if it was a one time throw away thing, and it being a case of "well, he was at a stop in Indiana, someone said something about Carrier, and he threw it in there to personalize his speech to that crowd."  I can buy that there are countless little local blurbs that a candidate's people advise them to throw in to their speech in various cities that they don't specifically recall months later.  But, he spoke of it at multiple stops, and he couldn't recall it?  That's concerning when it comes to his mental faculties.  

Yep I was not being remotely sarcastic, I was wondering about it quite awhile ago just due to the limited vocabulary and some physical tics, and lately I've seen other people mentioning it.

[Lunata]

4 hours ago, backformore said:

"word salad" actually refers to a specific kind of disordered thought and speech typical of schizophrenia or brain injury.  It's been used more recently to describe when people interrupt themselves mid-sentence and then start a new thought, while never completing the first one, or when people speak in such a confused way that it is difficult to figure out the meaning.   (trump does this fairly often)

Kurt Eichenwald's article is well-written and makes perfect sense.  "word salad"  is kind of the opposite of what he wrote.

Oh yeah, your post reminded me of something I saw on the news just now. Kanye West visited Donald Trump at Trump Tower. I thought Kanye West was still being closely observed in a separate house from Kim and their children. Is he visiting for a potential cabinet post of some kind? “We’ve been friends for a long time,” Mr. Trump told reporters. Asked what he and Mr. West talked about, he responded: “Life. We discussed life.” This, above all else, makes no sense.

Edited December 13, 2016 by Lunata

[Lunata]

'Sikorsky owner’s stock falls as Trump tweets that F-35 program is costly'.

http://www.ctpost.com/business/article/Sikorsky-owner-s-stock-falls-as-Trump-tweets-10790681.php

Sikorsky Aircraft parent company Lockheed Martin saw its stock fall Monday, wiping out nearly $2 billion of the company’s market value, after President-elect Donald Trump tweeted that its F-35 fighter plane program is too costly.

[Keepitmoving]

10 minutes ago, Lunata said:

Oh yeah, your post reminded me of something I saw on the news just now. Kanye West visited Donald Trump at Trump Tower. I thought Kanye West was still being closely observed in a separate house from Kim and their children. Is he visiting for a potential cabinet post of some kind. This, above all else, makes no sense.

 

Note to Trump, since this seems like another "token" black person move,  Kanye West thinks George Bush Jr. hates black people, that's sure as hell what he said on stage in front of millions of people.  Well, this black person hates Kanye West a hell of lot more than I hate Bush Jr. Hell, I don't even hate Bush Jr, but Kanye, I wish the ground would open up and swallow right along with you, ugh.

Edited December 13, 2016 by Keepitmoving

[MulletorHater]

7 minutes ago, Lunata said:

Oh yeah, your post reminded me of something I saw on the news just now. Kanye West visited Donald Trump at Trump Tower. I thought Kanye West was still being closely observed in a separate house from Kim and their children. Is he visiting for a potential cabinet post of some kind. This, above all else, makes no sense.

 

Le sighhhhh...it's called creating a distraction.  He's already canceled Thursday's news conference to address how his demon spawn would be running his businesses--as if that solved any conflict of interest problems.

Now, this visit from the equally self-aggrandizing Kanye, which just happened to occur on the same day that Kurt Eichenwald's Newsweek article hit the newsstands.  Guess what corporate media is talking about?

Or, it could be something else.  As one of my sister's friends reminded me, Kanye does design internment camp wear.  

[twoods]

This is probably the first orange turd hissy fit that I agree with. The US spends way more money on the military than they should, when the money should go to schools and mental health programs. I get mad when these private companies and their CEOs make millions, even billions of dollars at the expense of the taxpayers. 

I do think that all these public hissy fits are used to show the blue collar voter that he is indeed on their side, and to detract that he is going to be wasting taxpayer money on his shuttling and from NY and on his family. 

Edited December 13, 2016 by twoods

[AntiBeeSpray]

16 minutes ago, twoods said:

This is probably the first orange turd hissy fit that I agree with. The US spends way more money on the military than they should, when the money should go to schools and mental health programs. I get mad when these private companies and their CEOs make millions, even billions of dollars at the expense of the taxpayers. 

I do think that all these public hissy fits are used to show the blue collar voter that he is indeed on their side, and to detract that he is going to be wasting taxpayer money on his shuttling and from NY and on his family. 

But I'm betting he's itching to put more money BACK INTO IT. I remember him going on and on about it during the campaign. Wanting to have more defense spending. To him if it helps in an area that HE WANTS, it's not spending too much. If it's in an area he could care less about, then it's spending too much.

[Lunata]

There are more than 160,000 people that are employed working on the F-35 fighter jets. People don't realize what it takes to build a fighter jet. But our national defense depends on our being able to protect our airspace. Airplanes are probably the most expensive defense product made. But conversely last August, Donald Trump vowed to increase military spending by $500 billion dollars over 10 years. Where he plans to put that $500 billion if not in military aircraft, that is at the very forefront of our national defense, then I'm assuming he's going to put those billions into military spending for overseas wars. I only hope that our fighter jets - that average 25 years old - are operating if we ever reach the point when nuclear warheads are in the air heading for San Francisco or New York.

What my original point was that Donald Trump is able to influence the market and specific companies with a tweet and this is extremely dangerous. This isn't the first time in the past weeks that he has influenced the stock market and corporate stock by tweeting either positive or negative comments. To have a large corporation like Lockheed lose $2 billion (with a B) dollars in one single day as a result of one tweet is just scary shit. Lockheed's stock rebounded but this is a very chilling example of how much power this guy has and how he will choose to use it at will.

Edited December 13, 2016 by Lunata

[KerleyQ]

40 minutes ago, Lunata said:

What my original point was that Donald Trump is able to influence the market and specific companies with a tweet and this is extremely dangerous. This isn't the first time in the past weeks that he has influenced the stock market and corporate stock by tweeting either positive or negative comments. To have a large corporation like Lockheed lose $2 billion (with a B) dollars in one single day as a result of one tweet is just scary shit. Lockheed's stock rebounded but this is a very chilling example of how much power this guy has and how he will choose to use it at will.

Completely agree.  When the President of the United States makes a public comment about a company, especially one that implies that they're going to lose a big deal, then it's going to affect the market.  His reckless disregard for that fact is economically dangerous, not just for the company in any specific tweet, but the market as a whole.  

[sistermagpie]

3 minutes ago, KerleyQ said:

Completely agree.  When the President of the United States makes a public comment about a company, especially one that implies that they're going to lose a big deal, then it's going to affect the market.  His reckless disregard for that fact is economically dangerous, not just for the company in any specific tweet, but the market as a whole.

Is there any truth to the claim that there was a big dump of the stock minutes before his Tweet? I saw it in a few places but I don't know if it's real.

[KerleyQ]

3 minutes ago, sistermagpie said:

Is there any truth to the claim that there was a big dump of the stock minutes before his Tweet? I saw it in a few places but I don't know if it's real.

I haven't seen anything confirming, but I've seen a lot of innuendo that he made money off of it.  That would not remotely surprise me.  

[Finagler]

13 minutes ago, KerleyQ said:

I haven't seen anything confirming, but I've seen a lot of innuendo that he made money off of it.  That would not remotely surprise me.  

I wouldn't put it past him.  He has a lot of debt.  Who's to say that these damaging Tweets are timed, he has someone with a 'buy' order standing by.  He tweets bad news, stocks drop, this person buys stocks and then stocks go up.  All he has to do is sell when it's high and he makes money.  

weasel.

[izabella]

16 minutes ago, Finagler said:

I wouldn't put it past him.  He has a lot of debt.  Who's to say that these damaging Tweets are timed, he has someone with a 'buy' order standing by.  He tweets bad news, stocks drop, this person buys stocks and then stocks go up.  All he has to do is sell when it's high and he makes money.  

weasel.

Yes, it's called insider trading.  People go to jail for that.  Ask Martha Stewart.

[Padma]

Tubby could make a lot of money if he holds Exxon stock and Tillerson becomes SOS and revives the $500 billion Arctic drilling deal with Russia (and other things). Other stocks, too. Manipulation is so easy for him now.

We really need to have some proof he sold all his stock in June. Personally, I don't believe anything that Tubby says  "Show me.". He's a pathological liar.

[Lunata]

1 hour ago, KerleyQ said:

Completely agree.  When the President of the United States makes a public comment about a company, especially one that implies that they're going to lose a big deal, then it's going to affect the market.  His reckless disregard for that fact is economically dangerous, not just for the company in any specific tweet, but the market as a whole.  

Even more than his random recklessness is the fact that he arbitrarily picks and chooses whose company he wants to criticize for a specific purpose. He can intentionally cause any company he chooses to lose millions, or in the case of Lockheed, billions in stock prices. Those stocks are owned by ordinary people too, not only rich people. When the stock market tanked in 2008, it took billions of dollars in 401(k) investment savings with it. There are small investors that may have put their savings into one particular stock like Carrier or UTC because they are strong companies. To exploit twitter to manipulate markets, people and even the free press is unconstitutional not to mention that it's illegal.

[izabella]

7 minutes ago, Padma said:

We really need to have some proof he sold all his stock in June. Personally, I don't believe anything that Tubby says  "Show me.". He's a pathological liar.

I'm sure he sold stock to his children if he actually sold anything at all.

[Lunata]

Just now, izabella said:

I'm sure he sold stock to his children if he actually sold anything at all.

He plans to disclose the proof of his stock sale on the same day he discloses his income tax returns.