The book that everyone is talking about—Michael Wolff’s “Fire and Fury”—was excerpted in “New York” magazine.
It is fascinating and frightening, in that it confirms our worst fears about the man who is president. According to the book, he is ignorant, semi-literate, vain, narcissistic, and had no expectation of winning. He just wanted fame and fortune, not the presidency.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
FYI He already had fame and fortune. All the rest might be true, but that’s true of a lot of other powerful men, many of them, sadly, career politicians.
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WH & Trump Press Secretary/Spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders blows a friggin’ gasket — or comes as close as she’s yet to blowing a gasket — when asked about the Wolff book:
” … the people of this country, who frankly could care less about a book full o’ lies.”
(4:52 – )
(4:52 – )
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Most disturbing about this excerpt is that there is nothing in it we didn’t know already know or strongly suspected to be true. The most frightening thing is that there are significant numbers of people to whom this doesn’t matter and compliant Republicans in control of Congress, the executive branch, the judiciary, and at the state level whose only interest is to cash in as much as possible before the bottom falls out, everyone else and the nation’s present and future be damned.
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My Russian control agent, Ekatarina, directed me to post this: https://www.salon.com/2016/11/09/the-hillary-clinton-campaign-intentionally-created-donald-trump-with-its-pied-piper-strategy/
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Dienne, your sarcasm doesn’t change facts.
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Correct. It is a fact, according to the DNC’s own documents, that the Democrats deliberately promoted Trump because they thought he’d be easier to beat. It’s an uncomfortable fact, I realize.
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All the GOP candidates were losers
Trump won the nomination because he had a Message. I am the one. I can fix all your problems. I have all the answers. And I am not a woman.
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What “facts” are those?
That the Clinton campaign thought that if Ted Cruz or Donald Trump was running against her they would have a better shot at winning than if Jeb Bush was running?
Do you have some kind of unrequited love for Jeb Bush or perhaps Ohio Governor Kasich that you wish one of them were President instead? Would that finally stop your outrageously blaming everyone but YOURSELF for spending all fall insisting that Hillary Clinton was absolutely, positively no worse than Donald Trump?
You were the one who not only couldn’t pull the lever for Clinton to stop Trump, but who spent the entire fall repeating ad nauseam the right wing talking points about how corrupt and awful the baby bombing Hillary was. There was absolutely no difference between the Russian troll propaganda posted about Hillary clinton and the things you posted on here.
The only people to blame for Trump’s victory are the people who voted for him and the people who insisted that Hillary was just was bad so it was fine if he won. Look in the mirror.
Your posting of this memo — which says that it would be better to have right wing candidates like Ted Cruz, Ben Carson, or Donald Trump making the Republican Party own up to their very right wing agenda instead of pretending to be mainstream — makes sense. Your characterizing it as evil in order to blame everyone but yourself for your actions is truly rich.
You told us over and over again that Trump was no worse than Clinton. If anyone is to blame, it is your embracing the right wing propaganda rather than showing some judgement about Trump.
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Dienne can hardly be held responsible for Trump’s election. There is plenty of blame to go around and I agree that much of it can be laid on the doorstep of the Democrats.
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Blaming the people who voted AGAINST Trump for Trump is the road to fascism. And it’s offensive. You are blaming ME because I identify as a Democrat and voted for Hillary in the general election and supported her candidacy after the guy I wanted in the primary lost?
If you don’t blame the people who voted for the guy espousing the most hateful racist and xenophobic ideas because Hillary didn’t pander enough to them, then I truly fear for this country.
Did you READ the platform that Hillary Clinton offered?
Trump DEFEATED every single “better” Republican candidate. And Hillary Clinton was weakened by some of the nastiest propaganda and attacks since Al Gore and John Kerry and oh yes – every other Democrat who was made to look like fools by a supposedly “liberal” media who couldn’t wait to prove their “unbiased” creds by treating every misstep as if it was evil and corrupt.
And Hillary still won the popular vote. And more votes than any of the so-called “progressive” Dems who lost to right wing Republicans.
I’m sick of being blamed for Trump and I will argue with all the “All Democrats are evil” haters who smear de Blasio and Warren as no different than Cuomo and Booker. You are wrong and you are responsible for Trump far more than any of us who voted for Hillary Clinton and fight hard to make the Democrats a more progressive party without trying to kill the party if we don’t get our way each time.
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WAIT, WHAT?
… here we are at a moment in history like no other, and you guys are arguing about HILLARY AND THE DEMS. Geeze.
It is no accident that every channel, every conversation is about how dumb and dangerous is the critter in the WH. The release of that book, finally confirming what everyone knows — that he is incompetent, and senile– was timed for this moment.
YOU KNOWS WHO OWNS THE MEDIA… they are telling the people HE HAS TO GO.
And this media frenzy about the dope in the WH, comes when?
… a few days after he claims HIS ‘button’ is ‘bigger and more powerful?’
There is an adolescent in the WH — who has the power to annihilate millions, and start armageddon!
The oligarchs do not wish to rule over a nuclear wasteland. They are lighting a fire under this man, who just today, removed the regulations that prevent drilling in the waters that surround our nation.
He scared the poop out of everyone! The GOP woke up, too… someone has to say the emperor has no clothes on his tiny button.
…and you re talking about HILLARY?
He will not be impeached… he will convinced to ‘retire’ and to leave.
Humiliation is the last thing this supreme egotist can endure, and this is just beginning!
Bannon turned on him becasue he knew it was time to see him GONE!
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The DEMs need to take their blame for Dump as potus, too.
http://www.truth-out.org/speakout/item/41377-democrats-and-devos-partners-in-the-illusion-of-school-choice
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Most definitely you are correct! I voted HRC only because I knew it would be a disaster if Trump won. I didn’t like much about HRC, but she would have been better than Trump any day of the week. I don’t like having to choose between the lesser of 2 evils. Unfortunately, it back fired and ALL of us are stuck with this nightmare for a very long time. Time for some change at the DNC and it’s time that the DNC starts listening to the public’s wants and needs instead of the wants of Special Interest groups. Politicians are not “for the people” anymore and the citizens are starting to wake up to this fact.
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Except that there are many of us who liked HRC in 2008 and 2016. Some people like to believe that she was not who Democratic voters wanted. The influence of the DNC only goes so far. Real people have to vote for the candidates. In 2016 the majority of registered Dems voted for HRC.
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But how many registered Dems didn’t vote at all? Either because they thought HRC would beat Trump or because they couldn’t stomach the thought of voting for either one? The DNC didn’t put up the candidate that “the people” wanted, they put up the candidate that special interest groups wanted. The DNC is a well oiled machine and they had a plan that didn’t work. Now we ALL are stuck in this nightmare.
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Anyone who “couldn’t stomach the thought” of voting for Hillary Clinton wasn’t going to vote for any Democrat, period. I heard a lot of nonsense from fake Bernie Bros attacking Clinton, but every single Bernie voter that I know — including those who worked actively for his campaign — had absolutely no problem supporting Hillary Clinton as a candidate against Trump.
Of course, there were probably some stupid 20 somethings who were just a deluded by the Russian “Hillary is evil” propaganda as the white working class Trump voters who believed him when he promised to help them. There are ignorant fools everywhere.
And FYI – saying that the DEMS are for school choice is like saying that the Dems are pro-war. Some Dems are for school choice and some are not, and it was very clear that Hillary was willing to speak out against the lies of pro-school privatizers in a way that Bernie Sanders wasn’t willing to do. They may have both been more friendly to charters than some Democrats, but lumping all Democrats into some “pro-charter” characterization merely serves to defeat your friends.
Look, I heard the same anti-Hillary people on here telling me that Bill de Blasio was a pro-charter right winger whose goal was o only to please billionaires. So excuse me if I find this kind of idiocy “it’s all the Democrats fault” to be sickening. I am a democrat and how dare you blame me. Or the many good Democrats who are not to blame for Trump.
If you want to blame YOURSELF, then do. But it is offensive to hear you blame me for Trump because I voted for a democrat. You sound like a troll.
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NYC public school parent
“Anyone who “couldn’t stomach the thought” of voting for Hillary Clinton wasn’t going to vote for any Democrat, period.”
I voted for Clinton so your anyone is clearly wrong !! I certainly could not stomach her . So clearly, I not only voted Democratic, I voted for Clinton .
1 in 10 Sanders supporters who voted !, voted for Trump. The major concern seemed to have been trade .
But it is absurd to say that all of candidate A’ s supporters should vote for candidate B because the other candidate is measurably worse .
But what probably cost her the election was not those Bernie voters who didn’t show up but the Black and minority vote that didn’t show up in 16 but did in 12 . It is highly unlikely that they were Sanders voters as that between 70 and 90% of Black primary voters voted for Clinton.
Try again
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/registered-voters-who-stayed-home-probably-cost-clinton-the-election/
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Joel,
You voted for Hillary so that proves my point. You didn’t spend the entire fall posting on here telling us that Hillary was just as evil as Trump and there was no difference whether Trump won or Hillary.
Do you know a lot of Bernie voters who — like dienne77 — refused to vote for Hillary because she was just as bad as Trump? I don’t.
Are your friends who believed Hillary was just as bad as Trump still claiming they were right like dienne77 is? Do you say to them, “yes Trump is bad but Hillary would have been bad too so I’m, glad you are spending all your energy to remind us that the fault is not in the people who voted for Trump but in the people who voted for Hillary.”
“But it is absurd to say that all of candidate A’ s supporters should vote for candidate B because the other candidate is measurably worse.”
That’s NOT what I am saying so quit putting words in my mouth.
What I am saying is that if you spent the entire fall posting non-stop that candidate B is as evil and corrupt as Trump and there is no difference between them, and you are STILL insisting that you were right all along, then you are either a troll or as deluded as Trump’s supporters are.
And if you are STILL posting on here that you were right all along that Trump couldn’t be any worse than the evil Hillary every time someone posts about some of the awful things that Trump has done, and you have the chutzpah to blame the people who voted for Hillary instead of spending their time acting as if she was the second coming of Satan, then you deserve to be called out on your nasty posts.
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^^^By the way, I would LOVE to talk about the targeted voter suppression that went on in this election, especially in primarily Democratic communities.
You think it was just a coincidence that so many African-American voters legally registered were struck off the rolls while all those Republicans and Trumps managed to be registered to vote in two states with no problem?
But dienne77 would rather say that it’s all the Dems fault for nominating evil Hillary, one of the most qualified candidates to run for President that I have had the privilege to vote for. Would Bernie have been better? In some ways. But it’s not often I can vote for someone I think will change things for the better. So hearing dienne77 BLAME me for supporting the evil Hillary who she worked so hard to undermine all fall is truly appalling given what this post is about — the terrible man she thinks was just like Hillary so who cared if he won.
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Hillary won the popular vote.
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👍👍
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How can we change education in America so that 50% of voters don’t choose such an abomination?
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I’ll go out on a limb and say that the election of Trump has very little to do with K-12 education. We could end up with a Trump or a Hitler even if everyone had a PHD in astrophysics and/or history. Some very smart and well educated people voted for or supported Trump for whatever reason. There are a whole host of reasons why we got this two legged disaster, one of the major ones being the blankety-blank electoral college; it should have been abolished more than 100 years ago.
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So Jefferson et al were wrong –education has little to do with the success of our republic?
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Don’t know that I agree with your education piece. But…
We have to stop electing people who have no sense of ethics or integrity.
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It was far less than 50%. More like 41%, that chose Trump. But your other feelings are right on the mark.
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ponderosa: Absolutely yes, education has a lot to do with the success of our democratic republic. Education is crucial and of paramount importance to the nation and to the individuals who make up the nation. All that being said, I am loathe to blame any failing in our education system for the triumph of Trump. Maybe we could improve the teaching of critical thinking and comprehension skills? There are so many other factors that lead to Trump.
From cosmopolitan by Gina Mei, 11-10-16: According to the United States Election Project, nearly half of eligible voters (46.9 percent of approximately 231,556,622 people) did not vote in the 2016 election. And while not the lowest voter turnout in history (that honor goes to the 1996 election between Bill Clinton and Bob Dole, with 49 percent of eligible Americans abstaining from voting), the numbers are much lower than they were in both 2012 and 2008, particularly among Democrats.
While it might be easy to assume that these numbers reflect a lack of passion from the Democratic party this year, Republicans actually saw a lower voter turnout compared to the 2012 election, as well — albeit much less dramatically. Many sources argue that the reasoning for this is in part due to the fact that it is the first election since the Supreme Court ruled against the Voting Rights Act in 2013. This led to the closing of over 800 polling places across the country, and stricter ID requirements for voters in multiple states.
Of those who were eligible to vote, 25.6 percent voted for Hillary Clinton Clinton, 25.5 percent voted for president-elect Donald Trump, and 1.7 percent voted for Gary Johnson. Of those who were eligible to vote in swing states, 36.5 percent abstained from voting, 29.9 percent voted for Clinton, 30.9 percent voted for Trump, and 1.9 percent voted for Johnson. End quote.
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Yep. Targeted voter suppression. And not only did they make it harder for people likely to vote democrat to vote, but they used propaganda — very likely with help from the Mercers — targeted specifically toward voters likely to be moved by it. Even if just enough to have them sit at home.
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Empty suits are everywhere.
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While I agree with the book’s point of view, I don’t really think it’s going to change anyone’s opinion. Those who already consider Trump incompetent & unfit as President will wave the book around & say, “Aha! See? I told you!” & those who support him will say, “So what? Fake News®!”
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Pretty much, which is why I don’t waste a lot of breath or bandwidth worrying about what an oaf Trump is. What good does it do?
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Dienne,
You save all your venom for the Dem candidate. Never any firvthe idiot ruining our government. Curious.
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Listening to the news each day makes me think of the juvenile delinquent’s mother who doesn’t even bother to start with, “Hello?” when the phone rings. As soon as she picks it up, she just goes straight to, “What’d he do now?”
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I noticed that too about dienne77.
Trump is PRESIDENT. If you can’t “waste any time” criticizing him you are enabling the evil to continue. Can you imagine all the Germans in the 1930s saying “oh I just can’t waste my time saying anything bad about Hitler because what good does it do, I will concentrate on attacking all the people criticizing Hitler and saying they are just as bad because that’s so much better.”
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Dienne’s writing on this blog is hardly venomous, and her underlying point seems to be almost willfully ignored: that the very same LOSERS – please feel free to provide empirical evidence of why this statement is not so if it offends you – who lost the presidency to the most unpopular candidate ever, both houses of Congress and two thirds of the state governments in the space of seven years are still maintaining their stranglehold over the Democratic Party.
All during the years when the Clintons were spitting on the New Deal and turning the Democratic Party over to the Donor Class, we were told that is was a necessity, that labor had to be kicked in the throat in order to appease political realities and win, even if it meant deeply betraying the Party’s base.
If that was ever true, it certainly isn’t now: the Clinton-Obama wing of the Party has demonstrably failed at the only metric that matters, winning elections.
That’s not venom; that’s history, and reality.
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Can not argue with that.
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Nicely said!
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It’s not reality.
I could say “if only the Democrat appealed to their “base” – those racist white guys who want to blame non-whites and immigrants for their economic hardships — they might win elections just like the Republicans”.
FYI — the TWO big wins for Democrats this year — in Alabama and Virginia — appealed to exactly the things that voters care about. Public education. Respect for women. Fairness.
We had the Bernie surrogate who was pro-charter in Virginia and he couldn’t win the primary. The Bernie Sanders surrogate would have LOST*** the general election so it’s a good thing Northam defeated him. And then the Democrat who did win won BIG over the Trump Republican. Because he cared about the issues Bernie’s candidate abandoned. Like public education.
That is the winning issue and many Dems are embracing it. Just because ALL of them are not does not mean they are all right wing corporate tools and it’s offensive of you to imply that.
***I don’t know if he would have lost but I decided to embrace the Bernie Sanders’ fans logic as they tell us that Bernie was 100% bound to defeat Trump so by their logic I know that Bernie’s candidate is 100% bound to lose to the Republican in Virginia.
Look, I want the Democrats to be more progressive, too. And they are. If the Republican budgets didn’t convince you there IS a difference between Dems and Republicans, then who is it that is supposed to lead you to the promised land? Please name your beloved candidates? Because Jill Stein is not someone I want leading our country.
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It is interesting that many members of the cast of characters have fallen by the wayside. Some of his former associates and allies are now at odds with Trump. A number of them have been fired, or they have chosen to disassociate themselves from Trump like Morning Joe. The biggest flip, of course, is Bannon who has moved from campaign manager to enemy and harsh critic. As for Ivanka, I doubt she will ever be our first woman president. After “the Donald” is done with his “brand,” I sincerely doubt too many Americans will want to hear the name again. Trumplandia will be remembered like the Titanic.
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As we say, from your mouth to God’s ears
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You are a god. It is your ears.
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Judi,
If I had any power other than words, this would be a far different world, and we would not have a Moron in the West Wing.
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retired teacher
Assuming the 16 election was not the last free election we have as flawed as it was.
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I think the real question is if there will be a nation left to remember this political abomination at all.
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Greg,
At this moment, I predict that Democrats will win the House in 2018 and stop Trump’s worst plans. They will not waste $18 Billion on a Wall that Mexico was supposed to pay for.
Look, we have a nut as Prez. We will persist and elect people to stop him, then oust him and hos disreputable loony crew.
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Kimmel suggest that they photoshop a wall, and show it to him… he won’t know the difference.
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I hope it happens but remember that Hitler purged Ernst Röhm once he had no more use for him.
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Everyone in Trumpworld Knows He’s an Idiot
Michael Wolff’s new book shows the cynicism of all those covering for the president.
Trump, Wolff’s reporting shows, has no executive function, no ability to process information or weigh consequences. Expecting him to act in the country’s interest is like demanding that your cat do the dishes. His enablers have no such excuse.
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“Expecting him to act in the country’s interest is like demanding that your cat do the dishes.”
Now just a minute! I had a cat when I was a child, & she always left her dish clean!
🙂
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If all is true and it probably is not. What I noticed upon reading some of it is how everyone is trying to get something from him. In his situation, lots of things are being done, not in his interest but or there own. Rich donors want benefits,workers want to be relevant and legislators want political points. It saddens me that no one seemed to be in office to do a good job or help the American people. If trump is mentally diminished by this job, who will come forward to protect the country? Not Pence or his other enablers because they are part of it. We can only hope that stable leadership will take over.
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“You Can’t Make This S— Up”: My Year Inside Trump’s Insane White House
4:00 AM PST 1/4/2018 by Michael Wolff
Author and columnist Michael Wolff was given extraordinary access to the Trump administration and now details the feuds, the fights and the alarming chaos he witnessed while reporting what turned into a new book…
Donald Trump’s small staff of factotums, advisors and family began, on Jan. 20, 2017, an experience that none of them, by any right or logic, thought they would — or, in many cases, should — have, being part of a Trump presidency. Hoping for the best, with their personal futures as well as the country’s future depending on it, my indelible impression of talking to them and observing them through much of the first year of his presidency, is that they all — 100 percent — came to believe he was incapable of functioning in his job.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/michael-wolff-my-insane-year-inside-trumps-white-house-1071504
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There’s absolutely no integrity anymore.
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Wolff quotes economic adviser Gary Cohn writing in an email: “It’s worse than you can imagine … Trump won’t read anything—not one-page memos, not the brief policy papers, nothing. He gets up halfway through meetings with world leaders because he is bored.”
While Trump and his allies, as well as some mainstream journalists, have attacked the accuracy of Wolff’s book, Trump’s allergy to reading is among the most fully corroborated assertions Fire and Fury makes.
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Bette Midler @BetteMidler tweeted
Trump & Bannon have turned on each other BIGLY. It’s impossible to pick a side. It’s as if Cancer & Ebola got into a fight.
Truer words…
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this is a good one, by Michelle Goldenberg about what was learned from the Wolff book:
Everyone in Trumpworld Knows He’s an Idiot – The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/04/opinion/fire-fury-wolff-trump-book.html?_r=0
My takeaway is the last paragraph:
her last paragraph from below: “There’s an old joke, recently cited by Josh Marshall of Talking Points Memo , that describes where we are right now: A guy falls from a 50-story building. As he flies by the 25th floor, someone asks how it’s going. “So far, so good!” he says.
“Eventually, we’ll hit the ground, and assuming America survives, there should be a reckoning. Trump, Wolff’s reporting shows, has no executive function, no ability to process information or weigh consequences. Expecting him to act in the country’s interest is like demanding that your cat do the dishes. His enablers have no such excuse.”
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I just heard an interview with Wolff on NPR. He sounds quite reasonable.
Yeah, Trump is a train wreck. Could he be our worst president ever?
Of course, history shows that the United States is resilient enough to survive even a terrible president. But what happens when we have a string of ineffective presidents in a row? (Case in point, the years leading up to the U.S. Civil War.)
When did our political train start to go off the rails? You can trace it back many years, I guess.
Bill Clinton bumbled into a nasty G.O.P. ambush. He should have known better. We should have been focusing on things like Osama bin Laden, not Ken Starr.
Which brought us directly to eight years of Bush Jr. Boy, did he blow a chance to really lead our country when we needed it. Remember those months right after 9-11. George W. could have asked all of us to make real sacrifices for our nation. Instead we were told to keep shopping. Meanwhile our military bore the burden, fighting multiple wars including in Iraq. Iraq?
Obama was hamstrung by the economic disaster he was left to handle and a Republican opposition that so often seems willing to destroy the very institutions conservatives used to stand up for. (There was that stunning moment when a G.O.P. House member called out “liar” to the President.) But why did Obama choose to target groups like public school teachers and journalists, for example. Meanwhile, corporate America so often got a pass. Where was his backbone when we really needed it?
Now we’ve got Trump, recycling the same, stupid “Trickle Down” economics ideas that Reagan tried back in the 80s. But it’s worse, much, much worse in many ways.
So, we’re in quite a mess. Whether this disaster is the result of the weaknesses of the individuals we have chosen as leaders or the systematic dysfunction of our political culture in recent decades can be debated.
It seems clear, though, that we need a president of Lincoln’s caliber right about now. Who is he or she?
As for this moment in time, the fact that Trump is living in the same building that Honest Abe called home makes me feel ill.
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Bizarre, Unverified and Fraudulent: Michael Wolff Steps Inside the Trump Presidency: The Daily Show
The Daily Show with Trevor Noah
Published on Jan 4, 2018
In Michael Wolff’s book “Fire and Fury,” the reporter claims that Donald Trump never wanted to be president and that most of his administration thinks he’s incompetent.
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OK. Everybody stop making fun of Donald. The poor guy can’t help being unable to think like people. It’s not his fault he can’t read. Donald, keep trying. Actually, Donald, you really should stop eating Big Macs in bed all night. That’s not helping. Look, we all know you don’t want to be in the office with everybody talking about you but, rules are rules. Here you are. So, we’re all going to have to pull together and help Donald graduate so he, and so we all, can move on. Ivanka, help me clean up all the spitballs and paper airplanes Donald left.
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InService: I LOVE your indepth insights. Donnie will never grow up but it is nice to have someone pick up his spit balls and paper airplanes. (Might also need help in picking up the McDonald’s cheeseburger wrappers, paper cartons that hold extra size french fries and the 12 cans of Coke.)
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Thank you, Carol. Donald eats McDonald’s in his locked bedroom while he watches televisions (yes, plural) and won’t let the White House staff change the linens until he says so. Picture that if you dare. He says it’s fake news. He is the adolescent in Group D who eats Hot Cheetos when your back is turned to write on the whiteboard, always denying it with red cheese dust on his fingers, shirt, and desk. He struggles learning the material. He is impatient, easily distracted. He bullies. He needs an evaluation. He needs an IEP.
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Wait, I thought Trump was Hitler?
Well, he’s Putin’s go-fer. Everyone knows that.
C’mon, I knew all along he had Alzheimer’s!
OK, enough snark, but I will continue playing Devil’s Advocate:
Like most of us, I didn’t think Trump would be elected, but I wrote on the pages of this very blog before the election that if he was, his presidency would be a Regency, akin to a trusted vizier governing behind the scenes in place of the King in his dotage, or of an Idiot Prince.
If there’s even a dram of truth to that (and can’t reasonable inferences from Wolff’s book be drawn that there is?) then we should ask, “Which is preferable, an incompetent, dysfunctional Trump administration increasingly subject to ridicule, or a far more competent and effective (and quite evil) Pence administration?”
I wouldn’t wish Alzheimer’s or dementia on any family, even the Trumps, but if the major levers of the state are not in in his hands (and do you really think they are?) then his disintegration is more a concern for him and his family, and perhaps less for the inhabitants of the US and the world than people fear.
The situation is so dire all around, that in a perverse, contrarian-but-real way, there’s less to lose with the gridlock that is likely to ensue from an increasingly incapacitated Trump in office.
Consider this as well: you know the obsequious/at-your-feet-or-at-your-throat nature of the Washington press corps and media. Can’t you just picture them groveling and sniveling before the “sober, serious, statesmanlike” President Pence, the man who “saved” us from the Nightmare of Trump? The fawning coverage writes itself. That media sycophancy that is likely to follow a Pence succession will enable him to do far more damage than Trump.
No, for now, the paradox is that gridlock is our friend, and the chances of that are paradoxically increased by this monstrous man staying in office longer, and to potentially cause lasting political damage to the Republicans and Christian fascists, as well.
Meanwhile, as that happens, the Democratic Party needs to renovate itself and become a vehicle for serving the interests of the people and the nation, which means the dominance of the Clinton-Obama wing of the Party needs to end, along with trying new things/reviving old things that are known to work.
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You are so right that “gridlock is our friend”. I will take Trump any day over Pence as POTUS. Trump’s handlers need to do a better job of hiding his phone so that he can’t tweet us into nuclear annihilation with another country, though. Both parties are scurrying like cockroaches in the daylight now…..and I think that’s a good thing. Citizens are waking up and noticing that we’ve” been had” by a bunch of greedy charlatans that we have allowed to have access to our tax dollars. I’ve been saying for years that we have taxation but NO representation. Time to hit the reset button.
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His aides should not only hide his cell phone, they should hide his big nuclear button. Then lock him in a closet.
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His nuclear button isn’t really big. It just looks big compared to his tiny hands.
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Call me a hopeless optimist, Diane, but I’m convinced the “football” – White House/military slang for the nuclear codes/”button” – which Donnie has access to is a facsimile.
Certainly, if the military and intelligence officials surrounding Trump have a gram of patriotism in their bodies, they’s ensure that.
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Michael,
I hope you are right about the football. Ie, the nuclear codes.
The man with the Big Big Button on his desk has the intellect of a very small child. No insult intended to small children, who are usually curious and eager to learn.
The definition of Malignant Narcissist fits him.
He might wake up angry and push the button to show how Big he is.
Our only hope is that he realizes that he puts all his Trump properties at risk by blowing up the world.
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Diane, are you aware that CDC is preparing for a nuclear war?
…………………..
CDC to hold briefing on how public can prepare for nuclear war
This comes amid rising tensions between the U.S. and North Korea
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has scheduled a briefing for later this month to outline how the public can prepare for nuclear war.
“While a nuclear detonation is unlikely, it would have devastating results and there would be limited time to take critical protection steps. Despite the fear surrounding such an event, planning and preparation can lessen deaths and illness,” the notice about the Jan. 16 briefing says on the CDC’s website, which features a photo of a mushroom cloud.
The notice went on to say that most people don’t know that sheltering in place for at least 24 hours is “crucial to saving lives and reducing exposure to radiation.”..
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cdc-nuclear-blast-briefing-nuclear-war-emergency-preparation-north-korea-tensions/
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I didn’t know that. I wonder if Trump told them to do that but I don’t think he thinks ahead or cares about anyone else outside his immediate family
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When a rotting ship goes down, the rats leave because they can smell the coming disaster.
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Not to harp on the point, Diane, but I’m convinced that Trump has been given the Fisher-Price version of the nuclear “football.”
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It’s frightening you would post this.
No doubt there were people in Nazi Germany talking about how at least Hitler isn’t as bad as those other regular old politicians and maybe Hitler is a little crazy but what’s the big deal about that anyway.
Stop with this mythical “Clinton-Obama” wing that controls every move of the Democrats. Was Al Franken a member? Is Liz Warren? Amy Klobuchar? Surely Joe Biden is a member in good standing of this evil cabal that needs to go, right?
Democrats don’t march in lockstep. Sometimes the most progressive on one issue are right wing pro-charter on education. And vice versa. Fight for the candidates who are progressive but quit smearing the entire Democratic party as these corrupt losers. No wonder people vote against their interests for Republicans who offer them nothing at all except lies. Why should they vote for any progressive
Democrat when so many progressives tell them the entire party is evil.
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NYC public school parent
Everything is just fine no need for change . look how much we have been winning . Since 94 Democrats have controlled the Senate 6 years . Controlled the house 4 years . . That’s a 24 year period . It is also a period that coincides with the Clinton’s DLC style Corporate friendly Democrats controlling the party .
Everything is fine here, no need to change a thing .
The Republicans have a secret weapon,Clinton style Democrats .
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No, Joel, everything is not fine.
A moron is running the country and has handed the government over to the religious right.
Time to organize and fight back.
Stop the bickering and nitpicking and act.
The left is magnificent at forming a circular firing squad. Don’t do it.
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When people say things like you just did, there is something very, very wrong. Hillary was a bad president. Dad! Bad! Bad! Sad ! Sad Sad!
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Leave it to NYCpsp to heap fallacy upon fallacy, and bring Hitler into it.
The historical analogy is clearly false, since Hitler outlawed all political opposition, whereas the Democratic Party still nominally exists as a opposition party, and given its catastrophic electoral losses in recent years, needs to have an honest discussion – something the “Meritocratic/Creative Class” wing of the Party insists on avoiding at all costs – about how to come back from that.
And as a matter of fact, Joe Biden, author of the federal bankruptcy law that prohibits dissolving student loan debt, and steadfast defender of the banking industry – though rarely reported, Delaware is equivalent to Panama or the Cayman Islands as a place to hide assets and evade taxes – most certainly is a member of that political wing (something you seem blissfully unaware of) and does need to go, asap.
Then again, the Republicans are too stupid to use that fact against him in the 2020 election, aren’t they?
And yes, Franken was a member of that cohort, as well.
Finally, you pose the wrong question at the end of your comment. The issue isn’t, “Why should people vote for any progressive candidate when so many progressives tell them the entire party is evil?”
It’s, “Why should people vote for captive Democrats who can’t be relied upon to defend their interests?”
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The country has a two-party System. Third and fourth and fifth parties come and go. The two-party system chooses who will control the government. Choose one and fight to make it better.
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dianeravitch
I have spent hours every Tuesday for the last year on Pine Lawn rd (that’s long Island for the non New Yorker’s) with a small group of resistors informing the Public of the threat . Have been to at least a half dozen major Demonstrations , twice to DC in my own car. .Was at a pathetically small protest on Wall Street two weeks ago ,too little too late to fight the tax Bill Have used social media to attack the right wing agenda with Labor groups who have some members , who are all to willing to accept Trump . And my Facebook page is now private because it is a little too vulgar for most.
I don’t think I need the lecture about Trump or Trumpanzees .
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Sorry, Joel, for misinterpreting your comment. It is a struggle to get everyone to look ahead to fix our wounded political system instead of being continually mired in past internecine squabbles.
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Michael Fiorillo,
Al Franken is a “captive” Democrat who won’t defend my interests so I should oppose him. Joe Biden is a “captive” Democrat who won’t defend my interests so I should work hard to defeat him. But the DFER loving Bernie-endorsed candidate WILL defend my interests so I should vote for him because Michael tells me so.
No thanks. I can judge for myself. There is something truly mind-boggling about so-called progressives telling voters that THEY know what is in their best interests and no one else does.
I will not agree with you that Al Franken does not have my best interests at heart but the pro-DFER Bernie-endorsed candidate does.
I probably disagree with Franken on some issues just like I disagree with Bernie on some issues. But the angry people like you who insist that I am deluded for thinking Franken is better than a DFER democrat that Bernie fought so hard to defeat the one defending public schools is truly behind my understanding.
No wonder the Dems are in trouble. Quit telling people to vote against what they believe in because a self-defined “progressive’ knows what is best for them.
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I , too are fed up with people who tell me that I am a fool. I am tired of labels and stereotypes such as ‘progressive’ or ‘liberal’ etc etc ad nauseam.
Make an argument for your own beliefs with which I can agree or disagree, but stay away form ad hominem attacks on ME. As they say at Oped, I am a “feisty” old lady, and BTW, I loved Franken and I went to school with Bernie… sat next to him in social studies.
I know what they say, and although they are flawed, like every politician, they are GOOD MEN…. PERIOD!
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Joel,
If you aren’t going to blame the evil Jimmy Carter whose defeat lost the Democrats the Senate and – as a result – the Supreme Court, then what exactly is your point?
It all started with evil Carter, didn’t it? When his evilness led to the defeat of progressive Democrats in the Senate.
When was this mythical time you think that the evil Democrats destroyed? Under the evil LBJ??
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NYCpsp,
You consistently misread what I and others write, and you do it so often that I assume it’s intentional. Either that or you just have poor reading comprehension.
Either way, it makes your arguments transact at an extremely high discount.
To put it as simply and concisiely as possible for you: Yes, we should work hard to defeat Joe Biden, within the Democratic Party, and to end the dominance of that entire wing represented by him, the Clintons and Obama. We can thank them for their service, and then usher them offstage.
The issue you can’t or won’t acknowledge is that it’s actually possible to say that of course the Democrats are (usually) better than the Republicans, but that they have increasingly fatal political flaws – Hillary Clinton being a case in point, irrefutably so – that must be addressed, lest it continue to be vulnerable to the nationalistic/xenophobic/racist hijacking of populism represented by Trump.
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Michael Fiorillo,
I would very likely support a progressive candidate in almost every primary. (I would always vote for a pro-public school Dem like Northam over a DFER tool like Tom Perriello because I don’t believe voting for DFER Dems is good for public education but perhaps you would sacrifice public education for some other progressive cause and that’s just as legitimate as my view.)
HOWEVER if the majority of Democrat voters in that primary vote for someone like Joe Biden instead who is flawed but perfectly fine on many issues, and Joe Biden is running against a guy like Mitch McConnell, I will not spend the entire campaign posting on every blog I can telling everyone I know how awful and corrupt and terrible Biden is and how he is only in politics to make himself rich and will sell out America to the highest bidder and will happily bomb lots of little babies in foreign countries and he is just going to do whatever right wing Wall Street people tell him to do even if it destroys America because Biden has absolutely no redeeming qualities and is so untrustworthy that you can bet he plans to sell out every democratic ideal because there is absolutely nothing, not one thing, that makes Biden worth voting for and can I mention all the evil things Biden plans to do.
That’s what is wrong with some progressives. I despise Tom Perriello’s DFER position. But you better believe that if he had won the primary and was running against the right wing Ed Gillespie I would not repeat every single right wing attack against Perriello — identifying myself as a Democrat who wanted every voter to know exactly how evil and corrupt my own party was to choose such an awful and terrible man like Perriello who plans to sell us all out to the highest bidder and has absolutely no redeeming qualities that would make one vote for him since he is absolutely no better than Gillespie.
I would not help the right wing and Ed Gillespie by repeating non-stop throughout the campaign the most outrageously untrue characterizations of Perriello as 100% corrupt with absolutely no redeeming qualities and he is just as bad as Gillespie. No difference.
I would shut up, do my best to elect Tom Perriello, and once he had defeated right wing Ed Gillespie I would work like a dog to convince him that his selling out public education was wrong and if he decided to sell out public education anyway, I would work like a dog to defeat him in the next primary and nominate a Democrat who actually supported public education.
That’s how politics work. You don’t pretend you are sacrificing for some greater cause when you throw a tantrum because more people voted for the candidate you didn’t want in the primary and you are so mad you didn’t get your way that you want to punish us all by fighting hard to make sure everyone knows how evil the Democrats are for not nominating the guy you wanted. You don’t work hard to sabotage the candidacy of the flawed Democrat you didn’t vote for running against a truly terrible right wing Republican. You don’t repeat non-stop the lying right wing propaganda against the Democrat and give it more weight because “even Democrats” admit how evil their own candidate is. You don’t do your best to DEFEAT the Democrat because it isn’t the guy YOU wanted when that flawed Democrat is running against a truly scary right wing Republican.
And let me tell you something, Michael F. If Perriello had defeated Northam and some disaffected Northam voters on here were posting non-stop right up to the election about how how corrupt and evil and awful Periello was and how he was no better than Gillespie and a liar and crook and would sell us all out, I would be responding to those disaffected Northam voters the way I responded to you and dienne77 during the election. I would tell every person who repeated the nasty right wing lies about Perriello having absolutely no redeeming qualities because he was a complete sell out who planned to do evil as soon as he was elected that they were helping the right wing. I would tell them that I wondered if they were trolls because they are repeating the same lying propaganda that the right wing was putting out about Perriello and even if Perriello wasn’t perfect he was a perfectly viable candidate and far, far better than Gillespie.
Get it?
I’m not willing to sabotage this country by throwing a temper tantrum because the voters didn’t agree with me about my choice of primary candidate. And I will call out every person who does try to sabotage this country by throwing a temper tantrum and repeating the right wing lies to smear the primary candidate that defeated the one they wanted.
And it doesn’t matter whether the Democrat who won the primary is more left wing than I like or more conservative than I like. If a supporter of the losing candidate is repeating lying right wing propaganda to smear the Democrat who did win the primary because they are so angry that they don’t care if a right wing Republican wins, I will call out their lies.
If you can’t understand that point of view, then that explains why we will never see eye to eye. You think I am not progressive but I suspect I am more progressive than you are on many economic issues.
But if I don’t get my way I don’t throw temper tantrums and try to destroy the Democrat who defeated the Democrat I preferred. Especially when that dem is running against a truly right wing Republican whose victory will do serious damage to our country.
I wish people would grow up. Sometimes your candidate loses the primary. Sometimes your candidate wins. You don’t throw a temper tantrum and help destroy the country because you are mad more voters in the primary didn’t agree with you. Think about the country.
Grow up.
And that goes for any moderate or conservative Dems who are mad that a progressive candidate beat theirs in the primary and have decided to keep repeating that the progressive candidate is actually pals with a terrorist and lies about her background to get a job and pays $700 for a coat because he is a fake progressive. If I hear that kind of nasty right wing propaganda posted by self-described Democrats who want to destroy a progressive candidate, I will call them out on it too. It’s a lie.
Get it?
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Thank you for expressing this.
When my daughter was very young & wanted a box of cookies, & we said she could have one cookie & she threw a tantrum, we said, “Would you rather have some of what you want or none of what you want.” It seems to me that’s an essential message for functioning effectively as an adult.
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I do get it, NYCpsp: you’re a windbag, incapable or unwilling to argue honestly or cogently.
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Don’t feed the bellows.
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No, you don’t get it at all.
You don’t argue – you lecture me in the most mansplaining way about how I believe there is no need for change because I believe everything the Democratic Party does is perfect and I just don’t understand like smart people like you understand that I was supposed to spend the fall campaign bashing and ranting about how corrupt and evil the Democratic candidate was to try to undermine her candidacy. I just don’t understand like you do that the only way for Democrats to become more progressive is to fight for more progressive candidates. I just don’t understand that the way to fight for progressive candidates is to rant and rail about how evil and co-opted and awful most Dems are — including people like Al Franken.
I’m sick of being mansplained. I will fight very hard for progressive candidates to win the democratic primary. And if more democrats vote for the less progressive candidate than the one I want, I will fight very hard to DEFEAT the right wing Republican in the general election.
Does that bother you? Do you want to mansplain about how instead of defending the winning democratic candidate from dishonest right wing propaganda attacks I was supposed to repeat those attacks myself because my progressive candidate didn’t win and the only way to effect change is to rant about how corrupt and awful the Democratic Party is and help sabotage the campaign of that winning corrupt and awful candidate who defeated mine in the primary?
I believe in change. I believe in fighting for progressive candidates. I don’t believe in sabotaging the candidates who defeat those progressives with lying propaganda smearing them as totally corrupt and evil with no redeeming qualities and no different than right wing Republicans.
The fact that I had to defend Mayor de Blasio against attacks by self-defined progressives on here who kept insisting he was crooked and corrupt and one of those co-opted Dems who are no different than right wing Republicans is why your point of view is so dangerous. You have convinced voters to believe every nasty attack on a Democrat because – of course – they are democrats and therefore are evil and corrupt and any misstep is a sign that they are 100% in the tank and will sell us all out in a second. And then you wonder why Dems keep losing?
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Wow! Yogurt that right
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The only reason I might prefer Pence to Trump is my gut-sense (not without some basis in reality) that a President Pence would be less likely to blunder and bluster his way into a nuclear conflict. But after pausing, I conclude Trump and his chaos is preferable. And if the Dems actually manage it retake the House this year, I really hope they don’t go down the impeachment road.
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I say take them down one at a time. Trump is unfit to be president. Pence won’t blunder into a nuclear war but he will try to set the clock back 100 years. We can beat him but only if Trump has not incinerated us all.
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Impeachment would be folly. It won’t succeed, and the process will only raise public support for Trump and create/reinforce the impression that opposition to Trump is simply partisan politics. The Republicans saw this happen this with the Clinton impeachment. Trump is the president. Defeat him in 2020 at the polls and on policy.
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FLERP!’s post reminds me of everything that is going wrong with this society.
This isn’t about “Trump and his chaos are preferable”.
This is about RULE OF LAW. If Trump and his cabinet are guilty of wrong-doing, then they need to go. I don’t care if Pence is “worse” if he is acting legally and appropriately and if he isn’t, we should call for his removal too.
FLERP!’s view is absolutely no different than the Republicans in Congress. They could care less about right and wrong — it’s all about political calculation and what gets them what they want. And if Trump is “better” than Pence, well then who cares if laws have been broken or we have non-stop lying. What a truly cynical view. The Republicans certainly agree with FLERP! and mirror his or her cynicism.
When that view takes over — when even supposed Democrats embrace it when they should know better — we are in big trouble.
Thank goodness that in 1973 we didn’t have the same cynical view “let’s stop looking closely at Nixon because Agnew is so bad.”
People believed in right and wrong. In honest debate. It wasn’t perfect but we didn’t see the cynicism of FLERP! where everything is all about political calculation and what is right and true is not as important. As long as Nixon is better than Agnew, FLERP! says that’s the only relevant point. Who cares what dishonesty he is doing or what laws he is breaking!
Lying is never okay. Nor is law-breaking. And if that means President Pence, that’s what we get. At least, that is the only view that really makes democracy work. Because all you do is enable MORE lying and enable more covering up the lies when you excuse them and say “I sure hope the people with power to do something don’t do it because I have decided that the liar is preferable to the person who would replace him.”
I understand now why FLERP! gets so angry at me when I call out Eva Moskowitz and her lies and why FLERP! always tries to undermine me if I dare to point out when Moskowitz is blatantly lying. I understand now why FLERP! keeps insisting that he still doesn’t have enough evidence to know if Moskowitz should be investigated — after all, she’s probably better than the alternative in FLERP!’s eyes.
This entire post reveals a cynicism that is truly sad. As long as it gets me what I prefer, I’ll support the liar and fight against anyone who wants to remove the liar from her position because dishonesty is perfectly fine as long as I decide the alternative is worse.
But I do understand FLERP!’s constant defense of Eva Moskowitz a little better now.
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Totally with Flerp about the folly of attempting impeachment.
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Michael and FLERP!,
If Mueller’s investigation reveals coordination into dirty tricks and improper actions by members of the Trump campaign and family and the President used the power of his office to cover up their crimes and obstruct justice, you think the Dems should not impeach? Just let him stay in office?
I would agree with you if all Mueller found was evidence that Trump was having an affair with a willing staffer and trying to cover it up. I would even agree with you if Mueller found that Trump used to grab women by the p***y’s when he had his tv show.
But the parallels are NOT to Clinton but to Richard Nixon. If Trump is obstructing justice to cover up for his campaign’s illegal activities and to protect himself, and the dems act like wimps and say “oh that’s fine we’ll just wait until 2020”, then I will agree with Michael that there is something terribly wrong with the Democrats in the Senate and any independents who join them in saying we need to ignore Trump’s wrongdoing until 2020.
I recently watched Frost/Nixon and I heartily recommend it. I identified with the 2 researchers who wanted to show Nixon’s criminality to the country and frustrated that Nixon was weaseling his way out of answering questions and Frost was doing a terrible job of pushing him.
But I can’t imagine how frustrated they would have been if Nixon had served out his full term and had retired with full Presidential honors like Reagan. At least the Democrats took action. If Nixon had not resigned, would you have counseled the Democrats not to impeach because doing the right thing isn’t as important as doing what is political?
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Lots of fake news and phony recriminations going on in these comments. Maybe the biggest laugher is that somehow Hillary Clinton is responsible for Trump. This is what a number of conservatives are now saying, while they simultaneously trash Bob Mueller and heh FBI to try and tarnish the Russia conspiracy investigation.
Here’s the crux of the matter, as noted by James Fallows at The Atlantic:
“The details in Michael Wolff’s new book Fire and Fury make it unforgettable, and potentially historic…But what Wolff is describing is an open secret…Fire and Fury presents a man who is profoundly ignorant of politics, policy, and anything resembling the substance of the world’s most demanding job. He is temperamentally unstable. Most of what he says in public is at odds with provable fact…much of what he asserts is a lie… everyone around him considers him unfit for the duties of his office… members of the Republican majority in Congress know what is wrong with Trump…They know. They could act. And they don’t…”
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/01/it-was-an-open-secret/549653/
Not only is is that “they don’t,” but some Republicans are very actively trying to shield Trump from any accountability, and working to obstruct a full reporting of the truth about the 2016 election. Thus they are taking the side of Russia rather than that of the Republic. There’s a word for that.
So, this is what we now have, as described by Susan Glasser at Politico:
“Trump sat down for dinner on September 18 in New York with leaders of four Latin American countries…By the time the dinner was over, the leaders were in shock…The word they all used was: ‘This guy is insane.’…his own secretary of state called Trump a ‘fucking moron’…Seasoned diplomats who have seen Trump up close throw around words like ‘catastrophic,’ ‘terrifying,’ ‘incompetent’ and ‘dangerous.’…when it comes to Trump and the world, it’s not better than you think. It’s worse.”
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2018/01/02/donald-trump-foreign-policy-analysis-dangerous-216202
And people here are quibbling over the Clinton-Sanders thing…still.
Meanwhile the entirety of the right-wing message machine — from Fox to Charles Grassley, a top Trump accomplice — is now focused again on already-debunked conspiracy theories while a mentally unbalanced man-child sits in the White House, and top Republican leaders seem far more intent on obstructing justice and undermining democratic values and principles than in protecting and defending the Constitution.
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Democracy,
I agree with you. At a time when the federal government is in the hands of an ignorant, possibly senile man, reliving the Clinton-Sanders race is as relevant today as arguing about whether Kennedy stole the 1960 election from Nixon with the help of Mayor Daley.
The Republicans are taking action—Grassley and Graham want to prosecute Christopher Steele, the British spy who gathered the evidence for the infamous dossier and reviewing the bank records of the firm that hired him, but not the taxes of Trump. Instead of investigating Russian efforts to interfere with our election, they are actively seeking to punish anyone who tried to expose it. Instead of protecting future elections from foreign intervention, they seek to distract attention in order to protect Trump.
Anyone who cares to reclaim our democracy will join the Indivisibles in their community, get active in the Network for Public Education, or the ACLU, or The Southern Poverty Law Center, or the NAACP, or another of the many groups fighting for our rights.
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Because Trump is a constant distraction. They need to keep him around as the show master. Mean while, behind the scenes, Pence, under direction from the Koch Bros. and Mercer are getting things done and no one is noticing. Trump just signs what he’s told to sign and says what he is told to say. Trump knows nothing about politics. Ever notice Mike Pence in the background….smiling that evil grin….as Trump signs another EO? Trump is too stupid and narcissistic to realize that he’s just a puppet. Just a puppet and nothing more.
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dianeravitch
Who is more dangerous Trump or the party that he represents .
Are you shocked that Graham and Grassley went after Steel .
Are you shocked at the callousness of the Republican agenda . At a tax bill that was essentially the greatest attempt at social re -engineering since the Great Society aimed at reversing the New Deal. . Trump is a vehicle that they are willing to ride on, to achieve their agenda . Willing to grovel at his feet to achieve that agenda .
But the real question is how did we get to this point. How have Republicans managed to control both houses of Congress for 3/4 of the last 24 years . The House 7/8ths .
Lofgren explained it in 2012 .The Republicans have tried to portray both parties as being the same and then running on social issues .
Obviously the Democrats since Bill Clinton have been more than willing to accommodate them. I will spear you rehashing the details .
Just look at the education wars as a microcosm for the entire economy. Look at Teachers unions doing battle with Democratic Mayors , Governors , Presidents . By the way who is winning the political battle on Common Core . Meaning which party is taking the heat regardless of who was the initiator of the policy agenda . If we say that the concept grew out of the Business Roundtable in the late 80s . Out of the Reagan administrations depiction of “A Nation at Risk”
Out of a desire to privatize public schools and break the teachers Unions with in them .
What “Svengali like powers do the Republicans poses ” that frames this as a Liberal Democratic attack on freedom ?. Magnify that dynamic throughout the economy , trade , immigration, even labor policy . ……
The answer to that has to be the Democrats have been their magic wand .
So the reason that the Sanders / Clinton debate is critical is not a personality debate . It is a battle for a new direction for the Democratic party . What should be obvious is that something has to change.
Lofgren’s latest article is worth the read.
https://www.mikelofgren.net/will-conservatism-end-nihilism/
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So you believe the answer is for Democrats to purge Al Franken and Elizabeth Warren and Bill de Blasio from the party along with Corey Booker and Andrew Cuomo?
Who gets to decide WHICH politicians are suitably progressive and who isn’t since you despise what VOTERS want? I want to purge Bernie Sanders’ pro-DFER candidate who wanted to turn Virginia into the next NY State with charters running amok and billionaires celebrating. Who gets to decide?
What you are really doing is blaming VOTERS who don’t want those
democrats. Maybe voters are making choices for the politicians who will stand up for public education over politicians who throw it under the bus but give lip service to other progressive ideas.
Who do you BLAME for Jimmy Carter’s abandonment of so many democratic principles? He should have been purged according to people like me who knew how right wing and evil he was. And hey, my repeating of all that over and over again — along with tube media — certainly brought us the Reagan revolution and the defeat of nearly ALL liberal Democrats in Congress.
I wonder who YOU blame for the 1980 fiasco? The evil Jimmy Carter?
And I can’t stand how older female politicians are ONLY judged by conservative actions but men like Bernie get a pass on all their conservative actions. Every politician has flaws. Stop demonizing Democrats.
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Trump isn’t senile. He’s always been like this.
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Sorry for multiple posts. Tech error.
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I agree with your points.
However, if someone tries to claim that the people who supported Hillary Clinton are responsible for Trump, then I will call them out. It is offensive to the many voters who actually believed she was a perfectly good candidate being smeared by the right wing because she was so dangerous to their agenda.
And the reason I think it is important is because the NEXT “Hillary/Al Gore/John Kerry/whoever” is going to be subject to the same smearing attacks and if a group of disaffected voters throwing a tantrum because their chosen candidate wasn’t anointed help the right wing with their smears, we will get another Trump. And it will be on THEM, not the people who voted for the perfectly fine Democrat.
The only reason Obama ran is because the disaffected Hilary voters acted like grown ups and didn’t join in on every right wing attack on Obama and give them a credibility they should not have had.
“Evil” and co-opted Bill Clinton gave us Ruth Bader Ginsburg. “Evil” and co-opted Obama gave us Sotomayor and Kagan.
Sometimes adults can’t act like spoiled children when they don’t get their way and should be looking at the bigger picture.
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^correction: The only reason Obama WON (not “ran”)
And mea culpa, not the “only” reason, but the Hillary voters didn’t decide to jump on every misstep and repeat the right wing attacks that Obama was pro-terrorist or whatever memes they tried but which never gained traction because the media could not report that “so many Democrats” agreed with those right wing attacks so they must be true. That never happened with Obama. But it did with Clinton/Kerry/Gore/Dukakis and every other Dem who lost not because voters disagreed with their positions, but because voters thought they were lying, corrupt, unfeeling jerks.
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NYC PSP and Dienne,
The discussion of Hillary and Bernie is officially over. I will delete future comments on this thread.
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Diane,
I’m sorry if that’s what my post seemed to be about to you. I really don’t want to be re-hashing that argument. I actually like Bernie a lot and voted for him in the primary.
I truly don’t know what to do about people who want to change the subject from all the wrongdoing and serious and frightening issues about the Trump White House by posting over and over again about how much to blame the Democrats are for Trump.
We are talking about potential treasonous actions by a sitting President and they are focused on blaming the people who voted for Hillary.
If you think it is better that I ignore when a discussion of Trump gets derailed by people who prefer to talk about how the Democrats are all to blame for it, then I will.
But I will state for the record that I think we are in a very dangerous time with Trump and the right wing is desperate to distract by blaming anyone but Trump himself and his enablers in the REPUBLICAN Party for his actions. And that’s where the focus should be. On illegal acts by Trump’s campaign, White House, and the Republican Party to pursue their goals.
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I agree with your major points, with one relatively small, but significant, quibble: “Fake news” refers to statements expressed as fact that are known by the person who states them to be false. “Fake news’ is not opinions the responder disagrees with. I point out this distinction because following last year’s “fake news” revelations, social discourse has proceeded to what I like to call “Fake News 2.0”,® 🙂 where claims labeling a statement as fact news are themselves fake news. This practice was, if not originated, certainly popularized, by Mr. Trump & has been enthusiastically adopted by his surrogates & supporters as a go-to response for any opinion, or even proven, documented fact, they wish to dismiss out of hand without bothering to present a coherent argument. I’d like to think that those of us who support reasonable, civil dialogue can do better.
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ERROR: claims labeling a statement as fake news”
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“being, like, really smart”? “Very stable genius” || Good grief. His insecurity and narcissistic blatherings will never stop. I do expect geniuses to be able to speak in complete sentences and make sense when they speak their native languages.
……………..
This just came through on the NYT alert:
BREAKING NEWS
President Trump, in a flurry of tweets, defended his mental capacity, saying he is “a very stable genius”
Saturday, January 6, 2018 8:11 AM EST
President Trump, in an extraordinary defense of his mental capacity and fitness for office, described himself on Saturday as a “genius” and “a very stable genius at that.”
In a series of Twitter messages that seemed to respond to revelations in a new book, Mr. Trump defended himself by charting his rise to the presidency, saying one of his chief assets throughout his life was “being, like, really smart.”
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Anyone who continually tells you how smart they are is not smart at all.
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“…being, like, very smart” is a classic, but my all-time favorite still dates from the campaign, when he said, when referring to his education,”… I have a lot of words… I have the best words.”
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This is slightly off topic but one that I think needs serious consideration. Immigrants who have contributed to our society are constantly living in fear of being deported. I detest the bigotry that Tump is showing and I detest his lack of concern or compassion for anyone who is not wealthy and white male. How unfortunate that he has always lived a life of luxury and has no idea the suffering these people have endured.
I believe that everyone has some innate goodness inside. Trump’s is so far down that no-one will ever find it. He is ignorant and full of hatred because he simply doesn’t understand so much of what humanity has had to endure.
The status of Temporary Protected Status for Salvadorans is in danger. Most of these immigrants have lived here for 20 years or more.
They left their native lands because of extreme hardships and violence. They are afraid to go back. 80% of them have stable jobs in the US and 61% have at least one child who is a US citizen. US born children cannot sponsor a visa for their parents until they are 21 years old. Four bills are now in Congress that would allow current recipients to apply for permanent residency.
Will These Salvadorans Loose Their Status?
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This is a NYT video and should be available to everyone. You do not have to be a paid subscriber to watch this video.
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joe herman…Trump Could Destroy the Entire Human Species, Says Yale Psychiatrist Who Warned Congress Members http://www.newsweek.com/trump-could-destroy-entire-human-species-says-yale-psychiatrist-who-warned-772328?utm_source=email&utm_medium=morning_brief&utm_campaign=newsletter&utm_content=read_more&spMailingID=2752404&spUserID=NDg3OTEyNTEyOTkS1&spJobID=950270956&spReportId=OTUwMjcwOTU2S0
President Donald Trump’s mental health might lead to the extinction of the human species, the Yale psychiatrist briefing lawmakers on the president’s psychological state told Newsweek on Friday.
If it were possible, Dr. Bandy Lee said, “we would be declaring a public health emergency that needs to be responded to as quickly as possible.”
“As more time passes, we come closer to the greatest risk of danger, one that could even mean the extinction of the human species,” she said. “This is not hyperbole. This is the reality.”
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Perhaps , the reason that my IRA has been sitting in a money market fund since early August ,missing a 15% run up. Not that I expect the end of the world but a war on the Korean peninsular is not out of the question. Nor is the fact that it could be precipitated by a US first strike and it could go nuclear .
But is the psychiatrist a Nuclear physicist or is he a millatary annalist.
There are a whole slew of reasons to be concerned about Trump one of them is his instability and unfitness for the office . But you better believe he is not the only one in the Trumpanzee party who is leading us to war in the Korea’s .
As a side note remember it was Bernie Sanders who said in the first debate that Korea presents the greatest foreign policy challenge . While Hillary was rambling the neocon view that moving NATO eastward was a good Idea . What neither new at the time was that the American president would be the bigger threat. And an even bigger threat to democracy .
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edit button = knew
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Can’t argue with that.
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But we still have progressives insisting that Trump is not nearly as dangerous as Pence. That’s the road to fascism, helped by progressives who can’t understand the difference between a right wing politician and a right wing demagogue fascist.
And fyi — Hitler didn’t turn Germany into a fascist state right away. It took time.
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WHAT IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE.
Trump is a lunatic. There is no argument to be made. Pence my be an authoritarian, and his politics make me long for Killery, Shillery, but he is not trying to prove himself to his dead dad, and he is nOT SENILE.
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Delusional hubris is not genius. We are in deep trouble with this clown and his supporters.
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Sometimes “Not the News” by Andy Borowitz is probably a whole lot closer to the real news than we might think, such as this: “White House Staff Forced to Act Out Michael Wolff Book for Non-Reading President:” https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:eWnu1yPw4-gJ:https://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/white-house-staff-forced-to-act-out-michael-wolff-book-for-non-reading-president+&cd=2&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us
Meanwhile, this morning, our “non-reading president” made a lot of claims which should prove to anyone with an ounce of not so common sense just how delusional he truly is: “Trump Insists He’s a ‘Very Stable Genius’ In Response to Mental Fitness Concerns” http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/01/trump-insists-hes-a-very-stable-genius.html
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This one is for Drumph…
“It’s raining, it’s pouring … ”
BY MOTHER GOOSE
It’s raining, it’s pouring,
The old man’s snoring.
He got into bed
And bumped his head
And couldn’t get up in the morning.
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The Perils of Mixing Masculinity and Missiles – The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/05/opinion/security-masculinity-nuclear-weapons.html?mabReward=S3ALS1&recid=0ym8uYI7bWWRksNGIhh3amjhnuK&recp=7&action=click&pgtype=Homepage®ion=CColumn&module=Recommendation&src=rechp&WT.nav=RecEngine
“Something seemed to click for people across the political spectrum this week, even among those least inclined to see the world through a gendered lens: When Mr. Trump tweeted, “I too have a Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button works!” the nuclear saber-rattling at Kim Jong-un of North Korea sounded a lot like, well, penis-measuring.
“Sad. But significant? From most commentators, the response has been an eye-rolling dismissal of Mr. Trump’s tweet as “juvenile” — yet one more impulsive, impolitic, dangerous and unpresidential act by a president like no other. But methinks not only that the president doth protest too much about his “Nuclear Button,” but also that many commentators are still missing the point. This is not simply a trivial, if embarrassing, sideshow.
“Ideas about masculinity and femininity matter in international politics, in national security and in nuclear strategic thinking. Mr. Trump — with his fragile ego and his particularly obsessive concern with his reputation for manliness — may have brought these dynamics to the surface, but they have been there all along, if in less crude and lurid ways.”
read more…because the size of his …’hands… is very important to him, and masculinity and power are the subject of the national conversation at the momen, as this article points out.
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The psychiatrist who briefed Congress on Trump’s mental state: this is “an emergency”
The case for evaluating the president’s mental capacity — by force if necessary.
By Eliza Barclay vox.com Jan 5, 2018, 10:10am EST
The longer Donald Trump is in office, the more he shocks and alarms us with his strange and extremely unpresidential behavior.
From the incoherent, fallacious interview he gave the New York Times on December 28 to Tuesday’s tweet about his “nuclear button” to his smearing of Steve Bannon, the incendiary remarks keep getting more menacing and portentous of disaster. As Vox’s Ezra Klein recently wrote, “The president of the United States is not well.”
But how unwell is he, really? Could the behavior be caused by some illness eating away at his mental capacity, or is it just bad behavior?
This is a question of crucial importance, not just because the vice president and the Cabinet (or Congress) would need certainty about his mental incompetence to invoke the 25th Amendment and declare him unable to do his job — an option that, while still highly unlikely to be used, is now regularly being discussed…
https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2018/1/5/16770060/trump-mental-health-psychiatrist-25th-amendment
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When was Trump “well”? I must have missed that period of his life.
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LOL. Indeed.
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Exactly!
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From newyorker.com: The Increasing Unfitness of Donald Trump
The West Wing has come to resemble the dankest realms of Twitter, in which everyone is racked with paranoia and everyone despises everyone else.
…In the meantime, there is little doubt about who Donald Trump is, the harm he has done already, and the greater harm he threatens. He is unfit to hold any public office, much less the highest in the land. This is not merely an orthodoxy of the opposition; his panicked courtiers have been leaking word of it from his first weeks in office. The President of the United States has become a leading security threat to the United States.
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/15/the-increasing-unfitness-of-donald-trump
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I’ll bet this article is appearing because of looney Trump and his ignorant Tweets. It is published in a newspaper coming from Hong Kong.
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SCMP.COM
South China Morning Post
Published on South China Morning Post (http://www.scmp.com)
Where China’s top leaders will hide to survive nuclear fallout
Stephen Chen binglin.chen@scmp.com
Published on January 6, 2018, 10:04 pm
A nuclear bunker for China’s top leadership, their subordinates, troops and staff is built within the world’s most deeply buried limestone karst caves that extend more than 2km underground, beneath an unusually thick, hard layer of rock, a geological survey has found.
Read More: http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2127059/beijings-nuclear-bunker-located-worlds-most-deeply-buried-karst
Links
[1] http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2127059/beijings-nuclear-bunker-located-worlds-most-deeply-buried-karst
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What an embarrassment this man is! And what an embarrassment it is that almost half the active electorate voted for him. Aie yie yie. Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse. . . .
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https://www.google.com/amp/www.newsweek.com/robert-reich-trump-may-be-dumb-he-has-plenty-emotional-intelligence-773200%3famp=1
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Rolling Stone: Taibbi: Why Michael Wolff’s Book Is Good News!
..Trump by most accounts is worst of all, and the horror effect is enhanced by the seemingly total absence of redeeming qualities in his personality. But a guy who fell backwards into the presidency and has been too brain-hampered upon arrival to do much with the office – there are worse narratives.
Just remember, Trump could be cunning, focused and bursting with willpower, in addition to being a gross, ignorant pig. We can only hope that Wolff is right that he isn’t both.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/taibbi-why-michael-wolffs-book-is-good-news-w515045?utm_source=email
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Companies That Announced Big Bonuses After GOP Tax Cut Are Now Laying Off Their Workers
By Tara Culp-Ressler, ThinkProgress
07 January 18
Nice “trickle-down economics” you’ve got there.
At least two major companies that publicly announced large bonuses for their employees after the passage of a massive GOP-led tax overhaul — which represented a windfall for wealthy Americans and big corporations — quietly laid off hundreds of workers at the same time…
https://thinkprogress.org/companies-gop-tax-bonuses-layoffs-fdf07fdf90d2/
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How Actual Smart People Talk About Themselves
Hint: not by discussing IQ
…But generally the cliche is true: The clearest mark of intelligence, even “genius,” is awareness of one’s limits and ignorance.
On the other hand, we have something known as the Dunning-Kruger effect: The more limited someone is in reality, the more talented the person imagines himself to be. Or, as David Dunning and Justin Kruger put it in the title of their original scientific-journal article, “Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficulties in Recognizing One’s Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-Assessments.”
Read More:
http://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2018/01/how-actual-smart-people-talk-about-themselves/549878/?utm_source=eb
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Watch this video. He leaves out a large part of the song and then comes in again at the end. What happened to his superior intelligence? His genius has left him once again.
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Trump Doesn’t Know the Words to the National Anthem
Consequence of Sound
Published on Jan 8, 2018
President Trump had trouble singing along to the National Anthem prior to the 2018 College Football National Championship.
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Bette Midler (@BetteMidler)
“Trump doesn’t start work til 11AM & takes ‘executive time’ breaks all day. Thank god he’s lazy & not devoted to fucking things up
full-time.”
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