The Trump Presidency

[iceaura]

You seem to think that some attack, like that by the ISIS, sorry, US airforce against Deir Ezzor, answered by Russians shooting down the airplanes of the attackers, is nothing problematic at all?

I don't think Putin's threatening of the journalistic speculations of the Washington Post junior staff is the closest thing to global war Putin has ever threatened, no. It looked like typical harmless posturing for the Russian audience - they like that kind of stuff, and Obama could be counted on to understand.

The problem comes now, with two of these guys in power, and one of them unstable - because Trump will play to his audience as well, and he'll back his big mouth with real weapons. It's important that Putin - clever though may be - realize what a thin skin and quick trigger Trump has.

It's possible that Putin was too clever here, just as many US rightwing authoritarians were, in backing Trump. The guy really is President - I'm not sure they thought that through.

Even this would be less dangerous than a war against Russia.

But far more dangerous than a few raids in Syria.

The point which matters is not even that the CIA has actually used torture, many secret services do such things, but that it had the permission to do it. So that those who have tortured were completely safe from the US justice, as safe as the SS in Auschwitz was from the justice of the III.

That isn't true. They weren't - that was their problem, and the reason the program ended upon exposure, and the W administration destroyed so many files and scrabbled around hiding the chain of responsibility and evidence of what actually happened. It was a serious mess, and the effort to prosecute was blocked only by decision of the White House - Obama's White House - on political grounds, faced with the Crash of the economy etc. Obama had his hands full, for those seven months or so in 2009/2010 when he had a functioning Congress.

I'm in favour of a multipolar world, with a lot of independent sovereign countries, much more than states today.

So you say - but you favored Trump's (and by extension the US Republican Party's) power-based and semi-colonial foreign policy over the less imperial and more negotiation-oriented Clinton's.

Without doubt, Clinton would have been very dangerous. Clinton means fight for the US empire, with all means which are available.

Not compared with Trump. Clinton leaned more toward negotiation, etc. - was far more moderate in her means, as her entire career makes obvious. Trump's administration and the US Republican Party is fascist - you are keeping that in mind? You do realize what that means?

Trump is simply less evil. That's all

That isn't true. You've been misinformed, somehow.

When and if Congressional Republicans get to that point, impeachment could be quick.

They never impeached W&Cheney. Trump is cooperating with the Court nominations, etc, and impeachment would interfere with that. Meanwhile, the Dems might see some advantage in not making impeachment easy on them - Trump's injury to the country is in a great part Republican Party policy, and the Dems have less to gain, cynically, from removing the embarrassing figurehead than the Reps do.

Seeing the next two years of news headlines be about the latest doings of this Republican President, as he represents the Republican Party and attaches his personality and demonstrated abilities to the entire Republican brand and agenda, is something an appropriately cynical Dem might learn to appreciate.

 

[Quantum Quack]

Remember Trump is chummy with Putin who is assisting the Assad regime:
The atrocities of this arrangement are yet to be fully exposed:
Amnesty International has every reason to be confident that witness testimony is accurate....

Schmelzer,
How can you support Putin when this sort of issue will be hanging over his head for the foreseeable future?
How can Trump be wanting the USA to affiliate itself with this sort of arrangement?
The truth about Russian sponsored Syrian actioned atrocities of this kind will eventually come out and have to be dealt with... what then?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-...saydnaya-prison-amnesty-international/8246556
Perhaps the final expungement of Russian influence is indeed necessary not unlike what happened to Nazi Germany at the end of ww2..

 

[Kittamaru]

Puppet

​

Six paragraphs among the most important you might read this week:

Mr. Trump got away from the White House this weekend for the first time since his inauguration, spending it in Palm Beach, Fla., at his private club, Mar-a-Lago, posting Twitter messages angrily — and in personal terms — about the federal judge who put a nationwide halt on the travel ban. Mr. Bannon and Reince Priebus, the two clashing power centers, traveled with him.

By then, the president, for whom chains of command and policy minutiae rarely meant much, was demanding that Mr. Priebus begin to put in effect a much more conventional White House protocol that had been taken for granted in previous administrations: From now on, Mr. Trump would be looped in on the drafting of executive orders much earlier in the process.

Another change will be a new set of checks on the previously unfettered power enjoyed by Mr. Bannon and the White House policy director, Stephen Miller, who oversees the implementation of the orders and who received the brunt of the internal and public criticism for the rollout of the travel ban.

Mr. Priebus has told Mr. Trump and Mr. Bannon that the administration needs to rethink its policy and communications operation in the wake of embarrassing revelations that key details of the orders were withheld from agencies, White House staff and Republican congressional leaders like Speaker Paul D. Ryan.

Mr. Priebus has also created a 10-point checklist for the release of any new initiatives that includes signoff from the communications department and the White House staff secretary, Robert Porter, according to several aides familiar with the process.

Mr. Priebus bristles at the perception that he occupies a diminished perch in the West Wing pecking order compared with previous chiefs. But for the moment, Mr. Bannon remains the president’s dominant adviser, despite Mr. Trump’s anger that he was not fully briefed on details of the executive order he signed giving his chief strategist a seat on the National Security Council, a greater source of frustration to the president than the fallout from the travel ban.

(Thrush and Haberman↱)​

So, yeah.

This is your White House.
____________________

Notes:

Thrush, Glenn and Maggie Haberman. "Trump and Staff Rethink Tactics After Stumbles" The New York Times. 5 February 2017. NYTimes.com. 5 February 2017. http://nyti.ms/2l9HtUU

Holy shit... that is just terrifying. I think Bannon needs charged with something (I wouldn't mind seeing it be Treason), and Trump impeached for gross incompetence (for signing EO's without knowing WTF they were doing!)

 

[Quantum Quack]

Holy shit... that is just terrifying. I think Bannon needs charged with something (I wouldn't mind seeing it be Treason), and Trump impeached for gross incompetence (for signing EO's without knowing WTF they were doing!)

Utterly mind boggling to think that the POTUS is signing exec orders with out knowing what he is signing...

 

[iceaura]

Utterly mind boggling to think that the POTUS is signing exec orders with out knowing what he is signing...

True of Reagan, and W. Standard, for Republican Presidents since 1980. Welcome to a post-Reagan Republican administration.

And we've known for a while now that Trump does not - and probably cannot - read.

I think Bannon needs charged with something (I wouldn't mind seeing it be Treason)

This is Bannon's job. How is that a crime?

 

[joepistole]

Trump, the warrior of the people, that great voice for the common man, attempted to repeal the Fiduciary Rule which required brokers to put the interests of their clients above their own interests and with most everything else Trump has done, led to more confusion.

"If you needed any more proof that progressives stink at coming up with catchy names for things, consider that we’re now defending something called the “fiduciary rule.” But defend it we must.

I’m talking about a rule change from the late Obama era intended to reduce conflicts of interest between financial advisers and their clients saving for retirement. Most people are unaware that any such conflicts exist, but they do, and at significant costs to retirement savers. By requiring financial advisers to follow an established, fiduciary standard, the rule, which was slated to take effect in April, is simply intended to more closely align the interests and goals of those trying to do the right thing — save for retirement — and their advisers.

Last Friday, the Trump administration signed an executive order designed to undermine the rule before it takes effect. In an economy in which retirement security is already too precarious, doing so is a big policy mistake. But it is also a particularly blatant example of the phoniness of President Trump’s populism. His order is a gift to financial markets and a slap at some of the people who voted him into office, most of whom, according to a recent poll, support the fiduciary rule (65 percent support; 17 percent oppose).

The rule insists that those who advise clients on where to invest their retirement savings must put their clients’ interests ahead of their own profits. For example, when someone on the cusp of retirement rolls over their 401(k) into an IRA, the rule would generally prohibit the adviser from nudging the client into an investment product that gives the broker a kickback while hurting the investor’s long-term yield. It would prohibit unnecessary rollovers, overactive buying and selling that generates brokers’ fees at the expense of returns, and the kind of fee-generating overmanaging of funds that, with compounding, shaves real money off returns."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/post...-on-retirement-savers/?utm_term=.a9450ae1fd68

 

[paddoboy]

Is there any truth in the following article?
It can't be, was my first reaction!
https://www.theatlantic.com/politic...nistrations-softcore-holocaust-denial/514974/

The Trump Administration's Flirtation With Holocaust Denial
The White House statement on Holocaust Remembrance day did not mention Jews or antisemitism.

Holocaust denial is alive and well in the highest offices of the United States. It is being spread by those in President Trump’s innermost circle. It may have all started as a mistake by a new administration that is loath to admit it’s wrong. Conversely, it may be a conscious attempt by people with anti-Semitic sympathies to rewrite history. Either way it is deeply disturbing.

 

[Quantum Quack]

Another point of interest that may have come about since the ramp up of intelligence efforts re: Russian hacking is the corruption inquiry being conducted on Israel's PM, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Allegations of Graft ( receiving gifts for favor) are not new of course however the relationship DJT has with Netanyahu comes under the microscope. Especially when you consider the current problems Israel is having with real estate.
According to some reports Trump has been Netanyahu's close friend for many years.

Is it coincidental that Netanyahu is now under investigation for graft?

 

[joepistole]

Is there any truth in the following article?
It can't be, was my first reaction!
https://www.theatlantic.com/politic...nistrations-softcore-holocaust-denial/514974/

The Trump Administration's Flirtation With Holocaust Denial
The White House statement on Holocaust Remembrance day did not mention Jews or antisemitism.

Holocaust denial is alive and well in the highest offices of the United States. It is being spread by those in President Trump’s innermost circle. It may have all started as a mistake by a new administration that is loath to admit it’s wrong. Conversely, it may be a conscious attempt by people with anti-Semitic sympathies to rewrite history. Either way it is deeply disturbing.

Trump's son-in-law is an observant Jew and so is his daughter. So I find it difficult to believe Trump would be antisemitic. His policies to date have been very Israel friendly. Are there antisemitic folks in Trump's inner circle? Probably.

It appears Bannnon is mostly running the show, and Bannon may very well be antisemitic: hence the mixed messages. The organization he led prior to jumping on the Trump Train was known for its "alternate facts" and promotion of racism. I don't think Trump, as evidenced by his campaign, has any qualms about using racism and racists to advance his agenda. I think Trump sees racism as a tool which he can control and master in order to advance his agenda.

 

[paddoboy]

Trump's son-in-law is an observant Jew and so is his daughter. So I find it difficult to believe Trump would be antisemitic. His policies to date have been very Israel friendly. Are there antisemitic folks in Trump's inner circle? Probably.

It appears Bannnon is mostly running the show, and Bannon may very well be antisemitic: hence the mixed messages.

thanks for that.

 

[joepistole]

Another point of interest that may have come about since the ramp up of intelligence efforts re: Russian hacking is the corruption inquiry being conducted on Israel's PM, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Allegations of Graft ( receiving gifts for favor) are not new of course however the relationship DJT has with Netanyahu comes under the microscope. Especially when you consider the current problems Israel is having with real estate.
According to some reports Trump has been Netanyahu's close friend for many years.

Is it coincidental that Netanyahu is now under investigation for graft?

I think that is just one of many. Now that Trump is POTUS a lot of effort will go into researching his business dealings.

Trump makes his money by licensing his name to developers. Now why would anyone want to pay Trump to put his name on their building is beyond me. There are many more names that are much better. So I think Trump gets the desperate. From what I have seen Trump gets the worst of the worst. They are the only ones willing to pay Trump for the use of his name. He has been reported to have dealings with some very sleazy characters.

 

[Quantum Quack]

If they prove a Trump link to the controversial settlement (see Kerry's distress) what happens then?

 

[joepistole]

If they prove a Trump link to the controversial settlement (see Kerry's distress) what happens then?

I'm not sure what you are referencing.

The question is how much more will congressional Republicans take? If Trump keeps having weeks like the last 2, it won't be long. Trump's love for Putin, even to the point of drawing a moral equivalence between Putin and the US, is pissing off a lot of congressional Republicans.

Trump was never popular. He isn't popular now. His presidency rests on very unstable soil. If he he continues to piss off congressional Republicans with his Putin love affair and his incompetence, he won't be around for long. He may well become the first president to ever be removed from office by Congress.

 

[Quantum Quack]

It's part of the 2 state Israel/Palestine issue that BN has been flogging.
If it can be found that DJT and BN have colluded to make a sizable profit over the building of the new settlements 2500 homes(?) Would Trump get away with it?. The investigation into BN could prove very revealing.
BN=Ben Netanyahu

 

[joepistole]

It's part of the 2 state Israel/Palestine issue that BN has been flogging.
If it can be found that DJT and BN have colluded to make a sizable profit over the building of the new settlements 2500 homes(?) Would Trump get away with it?. The investigation into BN could prove very revealing.
BN=Ben Netanyahu

It would be devastating to Trump, and as strong as the Jewish lobby is in America, it wouldn't be good for Israel either.

 

[Quantum Quack]

Google graft Israel
Also IMO
Trumps stance on Iran is excessive. Possibly due to his relationship with BN

 

[joepistole]

Google graft Israel

I'm aware.

 

[Quantum Quack]

Gosh he is a dill!

"The White House has sent journalists a list of terror attacks it believes did not receive adequate attention from Western media — including five incidents in Australia, one of which was determined to be a murder case."​

www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-07/white-house-lists-terrorist-attacks-that-were-under-reported/8248434
He doesn't understand that the Jihadist's love media coverage more than he does...
Also all Australian cases including all our murder cases are/were reported quite well here, with out any sign of cover up.
What a fool!

 

[Quantum Quack]

On Trumps state visit to the UK

 

[Schmelzer]

Oh I disagree with most of your biased predictions. You fail to take into account the possibility of innovation in world affairs, innovation that transcends your medieval mechanistic approach to power sharing.

Indeed, I don't believe in innovation in such questions like power sharing.
I have, indeed, believed some time after 1989 believed in something like a "state of law" as well as the US supporting something similar in international law.
I abandoned this naive belief during the Kosovo war.

Re: your concerns about USA dollar dependency:
Have you not heard of a global currency that is not Nationality aligned. That has a common global utility rather than value?

There has been such a currency in the past, named gold.

You appear to be fixated with old systems and not allow for genuine innovation. The Bitcoin phenomena is a good example of recent innovation.

Don't worry, I'm familiar with bitcoin. I have some of them myself.

I don't think Putin's threatening of the journalistic speculations of the Washington Post junior staff is the closest thing to global war Putin has ever threatened, no. It looked like typical harmless posturing for the Russian audience - they like that kind of stuff, and Obama could be counted on to understand.

Ok, once you want to ignore this case, quite obviously because the warmonger was, in this case, your beloved Obama, your choice.

So you say - but you favored Trump's (and by extension the US Republican Party's) power-based and semi-colonial foreign policy over the less imperial and more negotiation-oriented Clinton's.

Because I disagree with your opinion (which is, I know, unquestionable truth) about Clinton being less imperial.

Trump's administration and the US Republican Party is fascist - you are keeping that in mind? You do realize what that means?

It means you hate him. That's all.

How can you support Putin when this sort of issue will be hanging over his head for the foreseeable future?
How can Trump be wanting the USA to affiliate itself with this sort of arrangement?
The truth about Russian sponsored Syrian actioned atrocities of this kind will eventually come out and have to be dealt with... what then?

What I support is a multipolar world. I support Putin because he also fights for a multipolar world, not because Russia would be a nice place to live for me. What Putin supports in Syria is the least evil, and the least evil in Syria is Assad. Given the alternatives, Assad remains the least evil even if these stories would be true. Or what would you think is less evil? Daesh or Al Qaida?