I always knew that the sleazy Con clown Donald Trump was spectacularly unfit to be the President of the United States.
How could he not be when he's a crass demagogue, a bigot, a misogynist, a rabid climate change denier, and an abysmally ignorant Con man who makes it up as he goes along?
But it wasn't until I watched him perform at NBC's Comander-in-Chief Forum the other night, that I finally realized how dangerous he could be if he ever occupied the White House.
For it was madness.
It was as Matthew Yglesias writes, beyond shocking.
What Donald Trump said at Wednesday night’s Commander-in-Chief Forum on the aircraft carrier was shocking. He specifically defended Vladimir Putin as superior to Barack Obama, suggested women serving in the military should expect to be raped, hinted at a political purge of the officer corps, blatantly lied about his own past statements on Iraq and Libya, and called on the American military to commit war crimes.
It was shocking, but we are not shocked.
And what makes it beyond shocking is because we are now in the nightmare zone where madness sounds normal.
For Trump's claim that he has a secret plan to destroy ISIS, and that if his generals don't agree he'll fire them, sounds to me like he doesn't understand the proper relationship between the President and the military.
Or he's channelling Hitler...
The guy whose speeches he used to keep on his bedside table, according to one of his many wives.
His bromance with Vladimir Putin, is exceeding the limits of hero worship...
And starting to border on treason.
As well as giving us a very good idea of what kind of powerful leader or dictator Trump would like to be.
And of course this is a bad joke:
MATT LAUER: But what have you done in your life that prepares you to send our men and women into harm's way?
DONALD TRUMP: I think the main thing is I have great judgment. I heard Hillary Clinton say I was not against the war in Iraq. I was totally against the war in Iraq. You can look at Esquire magazine from 2004. You can look at before that. And I was against the war in Iraq; I said it's going to totally destabilize the Middle East, which it has. It's been a disastrous war. And perhaps almost as bad was the way Barack Obama got out. That was a disaster.
As well as a Big Lie.
This is not true. Trump supported the invasion of Iraq, and then in 2006 he pushed for an immediate pullout from Iraq. According to Trump, the thing that makes him qualified to run American national security policy is his good judgment, and his key examples of that good judgment are made up.
And what makes all of this even more disturbing, is that while Trump is spewing garbage and lying in plain sight.
It has generally been my experience that when people pepper their speech with the phrase “believe me,” they are not to be believed. The default position among people of honor — the silent agreement between speaker and listener — is one of truth and trust.
But Donald Trump is not a person of honor. Presidents lie. Politicians lie. People lie. But Trump lies with a ferocious abandon.
More Americans trust him than they do Hillary Clinton, and for that the media is largely to blame.
For treating Trump like he was just a normal candidate, instead of a dangerous demagogue disconnected from reality...
This is not an honest man. This is not a trustworthy man. The fact that people believe he’s honest is a result of a failed media that aims its sincerest critique at Clinton’s deficiencies with the truth, but applies an entertainment standard to Trump that corrects falsehoods but doesn’t castigate him for them.
There is no reasonable explanation or salable excuse for the media’s behavior this presidential cycle. History will look back at this period and it will not be kind to the Fourth Estate. We will all have to one day ask ourselves, “Where was I on Trump and the truth?” Far too many of us will be found wanting.
And yes, as Tony Schwartz the ghostwriter of Trump's book The Art of the Deal, and a man who knows him well, wrote yesterday:
It is time to imagine what might happen if Trump should becomes President.
It is time to imagine Trump's America.
I still think Trump is going to lose, but when madness becomes normal anything can happen.
So the media must do its job, and expose all his lies.
And for the sake of us all, make sure that dangerous maniac is defeated...
Fact is that ISIS birth and delivery have CIA written all over them. At this moment our Kurdish backed freedom fighters are being attacked by our Nato partner Turkey. And we all know who pays ISIS bills and where they get their weapons (13 hours in Bengazhi style)
ReplyDeletehi Steve...is their any conspiracy story you don't believe? The rise of ISIS is entirely due to the Iraq War, and while it was almost certainly funded by our "allies" like Saudi Arabia, the Democrats were not responsible, and Donald Trump can only make things worse...
DeleteContrast how the Russians fight ISIS vs the Americans. The Russians in two weeks did more damage than the Americans in two years. Never forget the lesson of Rushbaldi. ISIS was created to end the Assad regime in Syria. Assad is very likely as bad as K street makes him out to be, but on his worst day he is better than the actors behind ISIS.
DeleteGlad to hear that Matt Lauer was widely chastised by his colleagues on his handling of Trump on NBC's Commander in Chief Forum. I think CNN is the worst in this regard. I saw clips from an interview where Trump was spewing his usual lies, the interviewer said that she asked him to give examples to back up something he said. However, the taped conversation was not played for us to see for ourselves. So the reporter basically covered herself by asking the question, but in the safe test possible way, so as to not piss off Trump.
ReplyDeleteI say take off the kid gloves. As Obama has said during GOP candidate debates, Trump needs to get used to this if he wants to be President. Americans need to see him challenged, and his reactions to being challenged.
TS
hi TS...yes, Matt Lauer's performance was appalling, he was totally biased, and clearly out of his depth. And I agree with you it's time to take off the kid kid gloves, and pound Trump like he deserves...
DeleteYa keep banging your pots and pans on the roof you incessant child, when Trump wins by a landslide in November then you can shake your fist at a cloud.
ReplyDeleteHow is Trump becoming President even remotely a good thing?
Deleteanon 11:41 so again we have no facts nor evidence to back up your belief that Hillary is the Devil, and Trump the Christ. Just insults for those of a different opinion. ~GS
Delete"Shake your fist at a cloud" - if Trump wins it could be a mushroom cloud
Deletehi anon 11:41...if I'm a child you must be an angry old man, sitting on his porch waving his walking stick in the air, and cursing passersby. And believe me, when your angry bigot Trump is crushed and humiliated in November, you will be the one shaking your fist at the clouds...
DeleteAgreed one hundred percent that Trump showed how dangerous he could be and that he was unfit to become CIC (Commander In Chief). However, many presumably independent voters, and this is based on the many comments from those who had watched the NBC program, also thought that Hillary also showed herself unfit to be CIC.
ReplyDeleteIt is widely reported now that Hillary swore that she would never ever send any boots on the ground into Syria and Iraq. There are many things seriously wrong about that pronouncement. First, most people know that there are already American boots on the ground there (American Special Forces). Thus it implies that either she is unaware, even after having served as SOS, of what her own government/Obama had been doing. The alternative is that she is lying again on an issue which is of great importance/interest to many Americans, and non Americans. Many people are very sick of the warmongering and disastrous regime change policies that both the Democratic and Republican governments had been carrying out around the world, and especially in the mid East.
Then of course there is the more important issue: how could any competent CIC ever promise that there will never be any need for ground troops? Putting aside that it is obviously bad military strategy to tell your enemies what your plans are ahead of time, there is also the obvious question of how she could ever be sure that ground troops will never be needed if she intends to continue to fight the terrorists, as she has been repeatedly proclaiming?
And, BTW, the MSM has already been dumping on Trump - just watch especially CNN, NBC or read the NY Times and Washington Post. I am no fan of Trump (and do not want him elected) but it has been obvious even to me that almost the entire MSM, except for FOX (and it is not MSM), has been unashamedly rooting for Hillary. This point (the MSM bias for Hillary) has been stated by respectable, non partisan journalists (the latest a few days ago being Robert Parry who had exposed the Reagan Iran contra scandals who had lamented about the new McCarthyism being practiced by Hillary and Dems with the support of the MSM).
Add in the fact that Hillary has been outspending Trump by something like ten times on attack/negative ads, and current polls are showing that Trump is still competitive with her. And that more voters actually think she is more dishonest and untrustworthy than Trump.
Doesn't the above suggest something? Especially since by now everyone knows what a buffoon, bigot, misogynist, .... Trump is. It suggests that the issue is not Trump - it is Hillary, eh?
hi anon...you're right that Hillary Clinton is not her own best friend, and her lack of popularity is an issue. But she at least is a known quantity, and knows what she is saying and doing unlike the angry orange, who as I said in my post is making it up as he goes along. And is a bigot, a misogynist, and a dangerous demagogue. As for the question of boots on the ground, the American trainers, like our trainers, don't qualify as boots on the ground. And the one who sounds like he wants to send in fighting troops is Trump himself. So while the choice is not the greatest, Clinton is by far the lesser evil...
DeleteIt is not so amazing that Trump supporters do not realize what a bigot, buffoon, misogynist, liar and failure Trump is, as the MSM have given lots of opportunity for him to rant and rave about Hillary without noting fallacies in his speeches or the opinions of people that do understand the situations. It is very hard to see how he can be considered a worthy candidate when he attacks so many traditional and sacred items that serve to protect the US Constitution, let alone have so much support from US patriots. I hate the thought of Hillary being in the Oval Office, but dread Trump being there. ~GS
ReplyDeletehi GS...I think you sum up the situation well. It's not a great choice. But Trump is the greater danger, for his record couldn't be worse, he is a bigot who sounds like a fascist, and he would only lead his country and the world to disaster...
DeleteTrump is running his political campaign like a real estate project.Typically the steps are recognize a need,develop a vision,sell the vision to prospective backers,turn an army of lawyers,architects,and contractors loose to seal the deal and build the project.Presto the project is turned from vision to reality but actually implemented by all of the people in the middle not the visionary.
ReplyDeleteIn Trumps case he often develops a vision which potential backers and his own team view as faulty but rather than abandon or modify it he doubles down with a whole bag of tricks to bully potential backers into supporting the project. These include a myriad of false rumors,bribery and replacing anyone in his crew that aren't in tune with the vision.Eventually enough support is garnered to proceed and again the army of lawyers, architects engineers and contractors are turned loose to convert it into reality. In this case the probability of success is much lower but if it is successful Trump takes the credit, if not he simply walks away and moves on to the next vision.He has learned his 'persuasive' techniques well and the career politicians who were all playing a different game have been caught flat footed. Normally a loud egotistical real estate developer wouldn't stand a chance but people are so fed up with the lies and political status quo that they are willing to consider his vision. Unfortunately the vision is faulty, the proposed construction site is fully occupied and cannot be vacated for renos or rebuilding, and the experienced project crew is non existent.If Americans want change above all else Trump is certainly the man but it won't be the change they expect.
RT
hi RT...yes Trump's campaign is as false as many of his buildings, that are made and designed by others, and only have the Trump name plastered on them, in order to give them a semblance of class, which of course is totally laughable. He was, is, and will always be a grubby Con man, who is fooling his supporters into believing he stands for real change, when he really stands for more of the same or worse. A man who would eliminate the minimum wage, give the rich huge tax breaks, set back the rights of women and LGBT people by appointing right-wing reactionaries to the Supreme Court, and almost certainly lead us merrily into the Third World War. He is a clear and present danger that must be crushed beyond recognition....
DeleteThe democrats had a chance to field a worthy candidate in Sanders, and instead chose a Wall street corporatist like Clinton. If Trump gets in it'll be the democrat establishment who will be to blame.
ReplyDeleteHillary or Trump is sort of like choosing between gonorrhea or syphilis. A better choice could have been STD or penicillin, but alas...
I can understand that some people fear Trump so much that they feel they have to support the lesser evil (no question she is the lesser evil on most, not all, issues; some respectable people had said that she was more dangerous than Trump to the world because of her warmongering; just look at the neoMcCarthyism that she and the Dems are now practising, accusing anyone who supports a dialogue with Putin as essentially being Russian lovers; remember how our own Harper used to accuse Layton and Dion of being Taliban lovers)?
ReplyDeleteHowever, the lesser evil is still "evil". Chris Hedges, another Pulitzer prize winning journalist, in explaining why he is voting for Jill Stein, the Green candidate, had stated that voting for Hillary would not solve the problems in the long run. He suggested that Hillary was part of the establishment responsible for those ills in the first place because she is their candidate.