That's Russ — who's running for the Senate again here in Wisconsin — haranguing the protesters back in 2011, when the results of the last election were not being accepted. There had been a fair election. No one was saying there had been fraud or improper counting, but the protesters rejected the legitimacy of the outcome, began working on getting a recall election, and — for many weeks — chanted "This is what democracy looks like." That is: Democracy was — instead of accepting the results of the election — resisting conspicuously and vocally.
Now, let's look at what Donald Trump said at last night's debate:
The moderator, Chris Wallace, asked him if he would make a "commitment" that he will "absolutely accept the result of the election."
(I think I would have said: "It depends on what the meaning of 'result' is. If by 'result,' you mean that we have had a chance to look at exactly what happened in all of the states and we can see that the margin of victory is beyond all remaining allegations of fraud, then I will absolutely accept the result. But if you mean that in a close election, where there is suspicion of fraud or mishandling of the ballots, and the other side is calling that the 'result,' and that I should accept that 'result,' no I will not.")
Here's what Trump said:
I will look at it at the time. I’m not looking at anything now, I'll look at it at the time. What I've seen, what I’ve seen, is so bad. First of all, the media is so dishonest and so corrupt and the pile on is so amazing. "The New York Times" actually wrote an article about it, but they don't even care. It is so dishonest, and they have poisoned the minds of the voters....Notice that Trump isn't talking about fraud and miscounting of ballots there. He's complaining that the voters made the wrong decision. We can't be rejecting the outcome of an election on the ground that the voters thought about it the wrong way! Trump has many good complaints about the media, but if distorted media invalidate elections, we can't have a democracy anymore. There will always be dishonesty and efforts to influence — poisoning — and if we can't get on with it anyway, the whole project of democracy is a bust.
Trump does go on to make a second point, the decent point, that there may be fraud:
If you look at your voter rolls, you will see millions of people that are registered to vote. Millions. This isn't coming from me. This is coming from Pew report and other places. Millions of people that are registered to vote that shouldn't be registered to vote.This is the good point, and he needed to extend it and explain why irregularities in voting require him to withhold his acceptance of the purported results until we can see what happened. But he does not say that. He just drops the idea that there are a lot of names on the voting rolls that shouldn't be there, and stumbles forward trying to get to a different subject:
So let me just give you one other thing. I talk about the corrupt media. I talk about the millions of people. I'll tell you one other thing. She shouldn't be allowed to run. It’s -- She's guilty of a very, very serious crime. She should not be allowed to run, and just in that respect I say it's rigged because she should never --Wallace stops him:
Wallace: But, but --
Trump: Chris. She should never have been allowed to run for the presidency based on what she did with e-mails and so many other things.
Wallace: But, sir, there is a tradition in this country, in fact, one of the prides of this country is the peaceful transition of power and no matter how hard fought a campaign is that at the end of the campaign, that the loser concedes to the winner. Not saying you're necessarily going to be the loser or the winner, but that the loser concedes to the winner and the country comes together in part for the good of the country. Are you saying you're not prepared now to commit to that principle?This is a grand statement by Wallace, and Trump should have shown respect for "that principle," while reminding us of the additional principle that the votes must be legitimate and properly counted and that he will not abandon one principle in preference to the other. Both are treasured, and he will protect both. Well... unless — expecting to lose — he really is laying the groundwork for a post-election political/media career premised on anger and grievance. The first woman President will be the one who gets no honeymoon.
What Trump did say was cutesy and snide:
What I’m saying is that I will tell you at the time. I'll keep you in suspense, okay?And that's where Hillary Clinton jumped in. She called it "horrifying." She said Trump had a habit of saying things are "rigged" whenever they are not going his way. She listed a bunch of things — such as Trump's saying the federal judge in the Trump University case couldn't be fair — and she ends with the silliest thing — the Emmys were rigged against his TV show.
Trump riffs on that last thing: "Should have gotten it." That's cute and gets a laugh, but he needs to be serious. This is important, and he's going for the opening to be funny. Clinton takes advantage:
Clinton: This is a mind-set. This is how Donald thinks, and it's funny, but it's also really troubling. That is not the way our democracy works. We've been around for 240 years. We've had free and fair elections. We've accepted the outcomes when we may not have liked them, and that is what must be expected of anyone standing on a debate stage during a general election. You know, President Obama said the other day when you're whining before the game is even finished....And that's where Chris Wallace calls an end to this segment of the debate. Hillary gets in a few more words. Trump is "denigrating" and "talking down our democracy" and "I, for one, am appalled...."
And Trump has a few more words but they are off topic (about the email controversy), and Wallace steps back in, more firmly, and shuts the door on what will be the biggest story coming out of the debate:
There they go again. The big bad media, poisoning our mind.
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197 comments:
The alienated people who pushed Trump through the primaries will be even more alienated.
Actually, this could have been a brilliant ploy by Trump. His acceptance of the result or not is meaningless. He has no army. All he can do is go to Canada and complain. But by not being definite, he has controlled the headlines. This is all the media is talking about(mostly). Any other mistake he might have made is unimportant. But this issue will, I would guess, change almost no minds. Will anyone who would have voted for Trump or was on the fence, decide that they will not vote for him because he might not accept the results? I would be surprised if anyone would.
Gore, 2000 election, hypocrites.
This is so typical of DJT. There's a good point needing to be made somewhere in his blathering but he doesn't have the verbal skill to clarify it. He blunders on for awhile and finally just cops out with a curt, inaccurate summation. Dems nominate the most despicable person in their entire party (OK, after Harry Reid) and the best we can do to counter her is this celebrity TV host. God help the USA.
After Hillary gets in, election fraud will be institutionalized, and yes - the end of our democracy will be at hand. New York Times is cool with it.
Why aren't democrats concerned with 4 million dead people on the voter rolls? Because they vote democrat. It's not hard.
I fondly recall the story of the politician who conceded defeat by declaring: "The people have spoken ... THE BASTARDS!"
Wait until Trump wins the Overall Vote but Hillary wins the Electoral College.
That is when the Fun begins.
I am Laslo.
The system is corrupt. DC is corrupt. It is a Capitol District that is openly hostile to a majority of its citizens, who are viewed as obstacles to utopia. I don't care who wins. It doesn't matter. The corruption and abuse is systemic. It is broken. We have a professional political class in this country that lies and cheats 24/7 and creates laws and rules and regulations for the rest of us.
I'm done.
"After Hillary gets in, election fraud will be institutionalized, and yes - the end of our democracy will be at hand. New York Times is cool with it"
And the IRS will continue their criminal behavior directed at Republicans.
You fisk in vain.
"There they go again." A reasonably astute GOP pol would have anticipated that.
Trump is "dominating" the headlines alright, in a way that hurts him of course.
Even on issues that don't require much homework, just a tiny bit, the clown manages to misfire.
Poisoning women's minds.
Wait until Trump wins the Overall Vote but Hillary wins the Electoral College.
Which would effectively shut down people who called for abolishing the Electoral College in the wake of Al Gore's victory in the popular vote and defeat among electors.
Here was Hillary Clinton's weirdest statement:
[quote]
We have 17 intelligence agencies, civilian and military, who have all concluded that these espionage attacks, these cyberattacks, come from the highest levels of the Kremlin and they are designed to influence our election.
[unquote]
Here is the beginning of a list:
1. National Security Agency
2. Central Intelligence Agency
3. Defense Intelligence Agency
4. US Army Intelligence and Security Command
5. Office of Naval Intelligence
6. Air Force Intelligence, Surveillance and Recon Agency
7. Marine Corps Intelligence Activity
8. State Department Bureau of Intelligence and Research
9. Homeland Security Office of Intelligence and Analysis
Assuming for the sake of argument that all nine of those agencies "have concluded that these intelligence attacks .... come from the highest levels of the Kremlin", which are the other eight agencies in her list?
If Hillary loses the election, will she blame Vladimir Putin?
The election fraud is already institutionalized. Some of the worst offending organizations were funded by the Obama Administration and the Dems as community activists and outreach. Some of the Porkulus spending money went their way.
People who demanded someone who was not a professional politician got someone who was not a professional politician.
I wonder if without Trump we would have as much evidence that the dems are who we thought they were and we let em off the hook?
People are pretending that Gore never challenged the 2000 election all the way to the supreme count. Obviously he didn't accept the results. Hypocrites!
Trump should fund a news network teaching women how to use their brain.
It was Obama Feb. 16, 2008 saying; "Don't tell me words don't matter: 'I have a dream,' just words? We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal,' just words? 'There is nothing to fear, except fear itself.' Just words?
Words have meaning and describe a situation that needs to be exposed, debated, and dealt with. Corruption in D.C. and it's liberal tentacles spread across this country need to be discussed, debated, and dealt with. Freedom of speech and all that.
It's never one's own mind that is being poisoned, always someone else's.
One thing new and interesting to come out of this election cycle is that it is becoming commonly accepted that words need no longer be interpreted as symbolic language according to their commonly accepted meaning but are now instead to be regarded as nothing more than animal brain level stimuli, to be responded to as desired.
Reading and listening comprehension is out. Stimulus --> Response is in.
"Bark!" --> "Bark!"
So when Trump is asked, against the background of the subornation of the FBI and DOJ, in the context of documented ongoing dirty tricks against his campaign, in the context of most media outlets being documented as friendly extensions of the Hillary campaign, whether he will in advance commit to accepting future, unseen election processes and results he answers "We'll see", the symbolic language packet "We'll see" - that is, maybe yes, maybe no, depending on what the total situation producing those results happens to be - is simply dropped by the receiving media language firewall.
In it's place the animal bark response "No!" is substituted for the actual symbolic language "We'll see" originally used, and the headlines across the board become, "When asked whether he would accept the results of the election, Trump said he would not."
Why would anyone with a rudimentary brain stem commit to this sort of double-bind trap? Had Trump said "Yes" and the election results proved procedurally problematic, he has just set himself up for going back on his "promise". So instead he says "We'll see" - which allows him to say "Yes" if and when the results prove to be legitimate.
But why would he even want to promise anything to a pack of stimulus-response animal brains who are more than happy to demonstrate on just about every occasion that he speaks that they have no problem substituting their own words for his as they most recently did last night?
Whether you like Trump as a person or not, the overwhelming value he's providing here is showing just how casually corrupt our traditionally revered institutions like the press are and what actually standing up to their intimidation looks like. And, of course, costs.
That would be not accepting the result.
Women, you are better than that, is the message.
Not everything does better with feelings-fuzz determining it.
I think Trump won the debate and I think he is going to win the election. Remember Brexit.
Let's turn things around.
Moderator: "Hillary, you're claiming the Russians are trying to influence the election. Will you commit right now to accepting the results?"
Hillary: "Of course! [shimmy]"
Once the women's soap opera news audience goes away, there's a huge shakeout in the MSM, and only a very minor hard news biz survives. There's not much market for it.
@Mike Sweeney - and, so you intentionally ignore the contents of the leaked emails resulting from the hacking. Let's talk about that. How about talking about how they show the media helping Crooked Hillary as much as they can, or the leadership of her campaign attacking Catholics and Evangelicals?
And, the interesting question to me - why would the Russians fear Clinton? Trump is supposed to be the hot headed one. And, they have already paid her off at least once. Why do they fear her? What do they know that we don't? Could it be her violent temperament? Her willingness to go to war? Preference for Muslims over Christians? (Not only are some of her biggest donors fundamentalist Muslims, but her closest aide's family has a long history of being aligned with and working with the Muslim Brotherhood). We just don't know.
Trump would accept that.
Althouse: "Notice that Trump isn't talking about fraud and miscounting of ballots there. He's complaining that the voters made the wrong decision."
I took the first Trump quote to mean the "corrupt media" will call on Trump to concede no matter what evidence of fraud there was in order to push Hillary over the top. Not that the he Trump would abjure the actual vote of the people.
Althouse: "I think I would have said..." but notice Althouse took the rest of the night and a good night sleep after saying, "I watched, but I'm going to wait for the transcript — and the morning — to weigh in."
A nice luxury to have. But I've found myself saying that about everything Trump says. Then I realize I'm not the guy who got him this far.
Alas, a dilemma for the "corrupt media," which Trump do they run with: Trump the lech or Trump the dictator who will roll the tanks on November 9th?
why would the Russians fear Clinton
She's Pro-Choice. That is, she's selective and opportunistic, unprincipled and unpredictable.
Clinton supports global corruption. Trickle-up poverty. Progressive wars. Provocative military positioning. Trials by sodomy and abortion (e.g reformed heads of state, American ambassadors, and babies, too). Impulsive regime changes. Class diversity. Why wouldn't Russia, China, India, etc. fear Clinton clinging to Obama's legacy?
All I'm seeing on social media is #NastyWoman. Similar to his accept-the-vote comment, "nasty woman" is a terrible phrasing for an important point. God, I wish he'd moderate his tongue. Call her a villain. The word still bites, still has the out-of-bounds quality he likes, and is gender neutral. Now the Left will climb on its diversity high horse and ignore the discussion about her cold criminality.
Hillary's 17 intelligence agencies must have agreed that the YouTube video caused the Benghazi attack, too.
kate - Indeed. He could have said "Corrupt villain".
The lost opportunities in this election are staggering. So glad we were duped by the guy who is pretending to care.
Fox News: We demand that you give your abdication speech on stage tonight. ( Note that this is asked only of Trump, and demands Trump's acceptance of Hoax Polling headlines manufactured and touted for 10 days proclaiming "the election is already over."
Trump: let's wait and see the election returns first.
Fox News: We disqualify Trump.
Althouse's first paragraph in parentheses is really the perfect lawyer answer. But Trump isn't a lawyer and I think his shorthand reply was good enough.
The subliminal push by the media over the last week has been that Hillary has already won and it's now just a matter of whether she takes Texas and flips the House, too, so in their mind the question about accepting results is really a question of whether Trump accepts the Hillary victory result everyone else has already accepted or whether he threatens our very democracy by waiting until the votes are actually counted.
Trump was obviously saying that he wouldn't just blindly concede the election in the face of egregious fraud. God forbid that a Republican candidate should stand up to the blatant corruption of the Democrats! I expect the WP or NYT to put a hysterical spin on Trump's comment but to watch Lifelong Republicans like Byron York pretend this is something that it isn't, is just gobsmacking.
Ah well, I suppose the MSM and the GOPe are hysterical for the same reason. Hillary still doesn't have this locked up.
Oh, yes. Hillary will blame Putin. But I'm convinced that it is Israel - and not Russia - doing the hacks. Israel knows the Muslims own Hillary.
One of the computer magazines talked with experts that the government had used to source the hackers and they stated categorically that the Russians weren't behind the hack. Some Russian script had been used to defeat a security feature or two, but that script was part of a lot of hackers' tool kits because the Russian hackers sell their successful script on the dark web and even 4 Chan. Hackers don't start from scratch every time they hack a system. On the basis of all the script used in the DNC hack, it did not match any known Russian hack and the proxy servers used were wrong. The American computer security people keep a database of hacks and use it to identify specific hackers--like a fingerprint.
So as I understand it, the polls are rigged and Trump is not really behind. He's actually way ahead and he's going to win in a landslide. And when he doesn't win in a landslide, when he is, in fact, utterly buried, its because the voting is rigged.
Got it.
A nice luxury to have.
You mean running for President and commenting on your feet on live TV during national debates is more difficult than blog posting and commenting?
Huh. I never considered that. Maybe that's how we ended up with Trump rather than the nation's obvious choice, me.
I thought the lead story this morning would be Hillary wearing white pants after Labor Day.
That's how deep the corruption goes.
I am Laslo.
Althouse said:
"... but if distorted media invalidate elections, we can't have a democracy anymore."
You can leave "anymore" off this sentence and be closer to the Truth.
I am Laslo.
is this system rigged? yes.
media says trump has to accept that system is rigged.
trump he will not accept.
althouse says that trump is wrong. Wallace grandiose statement had nothing to do with what trump is talking about. trump cannot challenge the transition of power. he is not in power. Obama is in power. this is total non-sequitor by the media.
the system is rigged. everyone knows. even media knows. even althouse knows. dems and repubes know it. yet trump has to accept. of course not. the system is more rigged than 4, 8, 12 years ago.
there is no way one of the other repubes would be winning right now. none. the game is rigged. media, polling places, federal judges rulings. all rigged.
I thought the lead story this morning would be Hillary wearing white pants after Labor Day.
I thought the Soong Mei-ling fashion statement was fitting.
Why isn't it more of an outrage that one candidate (supposedly the good one!) accused the other of running to represent a foreign enemy government?
Have we ever seen anything like that?
As has sometimes been the case in this election, Trump has a good point that he fails to make out of either laziness or cluelessness. He assumes everyone follows his assumptions, reads the same news he's cocooned with, and shares his mentality. And it's clear he didn't prepare for a lot of these questions.
A smart man might have said going in "my campaign manager, VP nominee, and daughter have all said I'd accept the results of the election. Hillary and the moderator are likely to press me on that. How do I convey that I accept the norms of democracy but believe Hillary is actually violating those norms by engaging in voter fraud?" And a smart man might have set the stage, not bitching about media bias (news flash--even the LEFT claims the media is biased against them, and the media has always been biased, so claiming that that invalidates our elections throws all previous elections into question, and assumes no election can ever be fair) but actually showing something much worse. Explain that Team Clinton has been registering ineligible voters. Explain the story of the Clinton operatives bussing ineligibles to polls and screwing with absentee ballots. Explain how the DOJ isn't pursuing this. Then say you adhere to the tradition of peaceful transfer of power, and if you lose, you lose, but you will not stand by while an election gets tampered with.
But instead of a smart man, the GOP has this guy.
Trump blew it bigly :-)
It's over...
So, in a week where officials in two Soros-funded organizations are caught on tape bragging about bussing in thousands of ringers to vote (using canvassers to identify missing registered voters), Trump needs to pledge to abide by the results of the election? And note that Hillary isn't asked to take the same promise, in the face of about the numerous claims by Democrats that the Russians are hacking our election.
Trump is dead right in his instincts here: giving up any right to complain about the fairness of the election would be understood as "full speed ahead" by the Soros election riggers.
Of course, the history of Republicans "doing the right thing" by not challenging Democrat corruption of elections (starting with Nixon in 1960) is how we got here.
There's a good point needing to be made somewhere in his blathering. . .
This is the biggest failing of Trump. When I listen to him make an argument, it sounds paranoid and poorly thought through. Then I listen to Guiliani or Gingrich or Pence (or Althouse over the past year) translate and polish it up, and it's not nearly so cringe-inducing. Trump is taking important points and presenting them so poorly, the Left can mock them and low-information voters will dismiss them.
the Hillary campaign and media are clearly coordinating attacks on trump. the new outrage from media fits the Hillary narrative to the tee every time.
the game is rigged. it is not a fair fight. the repube has to be ahead by 5-10 points in reality to make up for the media narrative coordination with the dems.
we need to fight this. everyone. but I am told to accept it. trump gets it; because he has rigged business and bankruptcy law. he understands that system is rigged and needs to be torn down.
"Trump Won't Say If He Will Accept Election results" says the NYT. Thus implicitly giving permission for other newspapers to offer similar headlines.
Because, after all, Trump has an army and he's about to cross the Rubicon with it, right? And not just that Trump (or you, or I, or anyone) has a First Amendment right to question election results.
Perhaps it is the New York Times, and not Trump, that is crossing a Rubicon of sorts here, in transitioning from merely being predictably partisan to becoming a full-throated propaganda outlet?
Trump blew it bigly :-)
It's over...
This seems to be what few people grasp, that whatever happens Trump is not going to melt away back into high end real estate and The Apprentice.
He's a billionaire who now leads at least a good 30% of the electorate, a combination which has effectively gutted the traditional GOP. Whoever wins will be trying to be President in an entirely new political landscape, one in which Trump will remain a far bigger player than, say, Paul Ryan.
There have been more than half a hundred presidential elections in this country, and thankfully in every one the losers accepted the outcome. Every one - except one. The Civil War was the result.
If you think that there are not a sizable chunk of the American people who no longer feel that the United States government represents them, then you haven't been listening. "Governments... derive their just powers from the consent of the governed."
Be happy, Sunsong. The prize is a corrupt villain who is going to tax rape everyone, punish her enemies, reward her corrupt mega-corporate cronies, and institutionalize fraud and corruption to unprecedented levels.
Democrats create shit out of whole cloth--like the Youtube video and Benghazi, like Trump's sniffles at the debate indicating cocaine use, like the Russians promoting Trump--and everyone accepts it as fact. We've entered the post-rational era of American history. Let's check which hashtag is trending most and put that in the history books.
I predict Trump and Clinton will be best buds again in 1-2 years.
trump will be prosecuted by president Hillary. they will find something. someway. the repubes in congress go with it. 100% certain.
"So as I understand it, the polls are rigged and Trump is not really behind. He's actually way ahead and he's going to win in a landslide. And when he doesn't win in a landslide, when he is, in fact, utterly buried, its because the voting is rigged.
Got it."
You created a strawman argument and then pretended to agree with it. He doesn't have to win by a landslide but it would help prevent another 2000 like election scenario of the Dem candidate not accepting the result and contesting the election.
I remember how well the Democrats carried themselves in 2000. Gore conceded, and then he didn't, and then smeared the Fla Secretary of state, and then tried to conduct a partial recount in only the counties that were heavily pro-Gore under the leadership of Bill Daley of the NOTORIOUS Chicago Daleys (who wrote the book on stealing elections), and then on December 13, 2000, five weeks after the election, finally gave a gracious concession speech. It seems to me that, at best, he kept us in suspense, and certainly he did not immediately accept the outcome.
And John Kerry, our current Secretary of State and therefore our foremost diplomatic representative in the world, is still whining that a 140,000 vote loss in Ohio in 2004 was somehow rigged, as is RFK, Jr., an Epsilon semi-moron whose fame is completely dependent on his uncle's stolen election in 1960.
The problem with news outlets like the NYT, WAPO and NBCABCCBSCNN is that they have no sense of irony, and they grimly cling to the party line like Pravda. Couldn't someone break ranks in the interest of competitive advantage?
Heaven help us all.
It's probably the Clinton Foundation running the hacks. It's a brilliant false flag operation. So far the leaks have revealed a smattering of mildly damaging specifics that do nothing to implicate Hillary except to confirm what everyone already knew.
Now when Trump or the RNC run out the known accusations -- influence peddling, corruption, etc. -- Clinton blames the Russians. It's a version of the Manchurian Candidate where she plays Angela Lansbury and James Gregory at the same time.
"There they go again. The big bad media, poisoning our mind."
And it works every time.
"Trump should fund a news network teaching women how to use their brain."
He'll need to hire teachers. I understand Billy Bush is looking for work.
"There have been more than half a hundred presidential elections in this country, and thankfully in every one the losers accepted the outcome. Every one - except one. The Civil War was the result."
Gore didn't accept the 2000 election and contested it all the way to the supreme court.
"now leads at least a good 30% of the electorate" Yeah, that's the ticket. Remains to be seen if the 30% are losers who want to keep losing or might actually want to get on board with 21% of their fellow citizens. Ditching the clueless clown would be a good first step.
Speaking of wishful hopeful thinking: Here's one.
I would have jumped for joy had Trump said this:
After Hillary's bogus claim that she wants to help "small business".
Trump should have said:
"No - Hillary does not want to help small business. She climbs into bed with big business and mega corporations and she says one thing to them, something else to you. She climbs into bed with big banks in order to screw the little guy. Hillary's husband raped women, Hillary is going to tax rape everyone else. Especially her enemies."
I would be a Trump worshiping worshiper after that.
What no one seems to be commenting on: There is a tradition (not as well-developed as the tradition Wallace appealed to) in this country of losers not accepting the outcome of elections.
1) Aaron Burr ends up shooting a guy because he felt he got screwed over in the 1800 election. I think they wrote a musical or something about it.
2) Andrew Jackson won the popular vote and finished first in the Electoral College in 1824 but lost to John Quincy Adams. He never accepted the outcome, alleged a "corrupt bargain" between Adams and Henry Clay, and created the Democratic Party in response.
3) The Democratic Party didn't really accept losing the 1860 election. You can look up on Wikipedia what happened after that.
4) Rutherford B. Hayes became "Rutherfraud" for four years after winning the 1876 election by one Electoral College vote, allocated (as the Constitution requires, right? Right?) to him by a special election commission to sort out the contested EC returns.
5) And for an intra-party dispute: After losing the top spot on the ticket to James Garfield in 1880, Stalwart Republicans were not too happy with their consolation prize, the vice-presidency for Chester Arthur. One Stalwart attempted to rectify the situation in July, but the solution didn't take effect until September.
This stuff isn't new, folks.
I know that the normal thing to do is to concede when the other side seems to have won. But, we have known for a long time that the Dems, in particular, cheat, and they are, essentially, demanding that if they just cheat enough, that we accept the results of their cheating. Up until this election, it has mostly been hidden, with them trying to change the subject with bogus calls of voter suppression. But, the mask is off. We know that they have been voting dead people for a long time, but now it is almost official. We know that they have bused people around for them to vote, manipulated the mentally challenged, etc. And, now, are using federal funding to do it. Republicans, because they traditionally represented the most law abiding segment of the population (the upper middle class) have traditionally just gone along with it, figuring that they just needed to beat the margin of fraud the next time. But what is happening this election is that a lot of those who were on the other side, the cheating side, the Dem side, in past elections, are backing Trump. They know how the game is played. They have seen it their entire lives. Dems almost always cheat, and esp. in their strongholds. They aren't part of the upper middle class, and figure that blindly accepting cheating on the other side is a patsy's game. So, for a lot of Trump stalwarts, his hedging here is just one more reason to support him. He is speaking truth to power, and they love it.
Isn't Hillary setting up this whole campaign to complain that Russia stole it if Trump wins?
There are still people who don't understand that Trump uses ambiguity and free association on purpose?
Wow. Just wow.
Hint: Trump's not the stupid one here. He sees perfectly well when the person on the other side of the table is trying to lead him into a trap, and evades it, not by putting down some other marker that will come back to haunt him, but by painting a word picture that can be interpreted essentially however he wants, when he decides to offer an interpretation later. What's especially funny is that he admits that's what he's doing.
We're so used to the hyper-focus-grouped politicians' banalities—finely honed, very precise words that mean absolutely nothing—that we can't even recognize good ol' ambiguity and obfuscation, the shrewd businessman's refusal to be cornered, when we see it. And boy, do we see it a lot with Trump. Good thing? Bad thing? I sure don't know. Different from the usual in politics? Absofreakinglutely.
We have entered our Brezhnev era.
The Press and the Left will make sure we never get a Gorbachev, much less a Yeltsin.
Lessons have been learned.
I am Laslo.
The media's always the same. Any statement by a non-leftist is first hyped beyond any recognition and then compared to a standard treated as sacred. Meanwhile the left can say anything it wants and we have to understand what they mean according to their own interests after allowing for hyperbole and "starting a discussion".
The result is Clinton supporting BLM which refuses to stand for the National Anthem because America stands for oppression even while Hillary Clinton pretends to believe America has always been great. Which is it?
RE: "bigly"-- he says "big-league", not "bigly". "Big-league" is an old phrase.
Obligatory statement: I say this not to defend Trump, but to edumacate people who want to hear failure to speak coherently.
I think Trump is right that the election is rigged, this election more than ever in history and its obvious the crooked liberal media are all in.
"Obligatory statement: I say this not to defend Trump, but to edumacate people who want to hear failure to speak coherently."
Bigly is a perfectly cromulent word.
Fox News: We disqualify Trump.
The left-right-immoderate "center" nexus. They are all Pro-Choice, selective and opportunistic, unprincipled and unpredictable. Well, other than that they have special and peculiar interests, and receive their religious/moral instruction from gods in the twilight zone.
Throw another baby on the barbie. Whether it is progressive corruption, class diversity, selective exclusion or congruence, social justice adventurism, trickle-up poverty, trials by sodomy and abortion, abortion rites, or whatever Planned Parenthood is "recycling, it's the final solution of progressive liberals, yesterday, today, and forevermore.
Oh, well. Survival of the fittest. We'll see how many dodos, lemmings, and wannabes will follow the twilighters and irredeemables over the cliff.
Bigly is used by people that watch the Michelle Fields tape and see the Rape of Nanking.
""now leads at least a good 30% of the electorate" Yeah, that's the ticket. Remains to be seen if the 30% are losers who want to keep losing or might actually want to get on board with 21% of their fellow citizens. Ditching the clueless clown would be a good first step."
Problem is the 30% hates that 21% far more than anyone else in the country.
Hard core Trumpists don't need a majority--so long as he has millions of people ready to do his bidding, he'll rebuild his shattered fortune. Don't cry for Trump.
The sad part is the country's real problems have been trivialized by this fraud, and those problems will now be "handled" by the fraud's old buddy, Corruptacrat Clinton. Not sure how this is supposed to be better, but I'm sure on Nov. 9th a lot of Trumpists will explain exactly how.
I think in a fair election Trump would win because people want change but I think the crooked Dems are determined to steal it and the equally crooked media have given them carte blanche.
how can anyone trust any of the elite repubes after what backstabbing they have done to the trump voters in the primary.
we have a one party state. might as well be Moscow 1955 0r 2016
"Bigly is used by people that watch the Michelle Fields tape and see the Rape of Nanking."
Yeah I agree with you and some of us are just bigly ugly people.
If he hadn't made the concede comment, the press would have focused on the nasty woman remark. This would have been depicted as an open invitation to every wife beater in America to sock his wife. It would have been a moment of unparalleled squalor never before seen in American politics. And if the Republicans hadn't nominated Trump, they would have nominated some other despicable lout. Decent, honorable people simply do not become Republicans.
dreams said...
I think Trump won the debate and I think he is going to win the election. Remember Brexit.
UK bookmakers have cut the odds on Trump losing, the surge in small bettors is following Brexit patterns of betting http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-elections/punters-rush-to-back-trump-despite-disastrous-week-of-campaigning-a7368196.html
Trumps answer was calculated. It's what he and Bannon wanted everyone hyperventilating over right after the debate.
The systems play:
1) I lose in, a landslide and concede - Lose
2) I win and accept the result - Win
3) People vote for me to make sure there is no contested election - Win
4) I plan on accepting it anyway, but now voter fraud is front and center, and the O'Keefe videos will get more exposure giving me a chance to win - WIN
5) Conversations about rigged elections are a sore spot for Bernie supporters who were screwed by Hillary - WIN
6) The media conglomerate I plan on starting after I lose the election will need those that believe the current media is corrupt (because it is)to tune in and watch. They are my audience. - win
It wasn't a gaffe. It was a calculated play.
I don't approve of "big-league" as an adverb phrase, though. Too French. "Kraut-schtemmengepoopen" would be more appropriate in the American lexicon.
People have noted a number of cases when the losers whined a lot and made trouble and stuff. The Civil War was different. If all Trump does if he loses is whine and refuse to congratulate the winner, I for one will add it to the list of successful transitions that this country has had - similar to Gore v. Bush. On that I don't agree with Wallace.
My concern is that a sizable chunk of the country is a lot closer to the Civil War level of discontent than has happened in my memory. And Donald Trump represents them. And I don't like Trump at all, but basically I agree with them: the system today is set up to rob them while it pretends that they have a say in it.
"Trump: Chris. She should never have been allowed to run for the presidency based on what she did with e-mails and so many other things."
Exactly. If Clinton wins the rule of law is dead.
"My concern is that a sizable chunk of the country is a lot closer to the Civil War level of discontent than has happened in my memory. And Donald Trump represents them. And I don't like Trump at all, but basically I agree with them: the system today is set up to rob them while it pretends that they have a say in it."
Ding.
Is a fair Presidential election possible in the current media environment?
The Democrats do not want fair. They want to win. In this cycle alone, there is clear evidence of collusion between high level Democrats and national media, organized and deliberate provocation of violence and organized and extensive voter fraud. This is at the party level, wholly apart from Clinton's personal dishonesty and quid pro financial corruption.
With limited exceptions, the national media cover this sparingly and dismissively.
Trump is going to lose, but the revolt against corrupt media and government is not necessarily over.
Blogger AprilApple said...
"After Hillary gets in, election fraud will be institutionalized, and yes - the end of our democracy will be at hand. New York Times is cool with it."
This is where all of the stimulus money went.
"the system today is set up to rob them while it pretends that they have a say in it." I should have added, "And treats them with utter contempt".
Blogger dreams said...
"And the IRS will continue their criminal behavior directed at Republicans."
Ding.
Blogger EMD said...
"The system is corrupt. DC is corrupt. It is a Capitol District that is openly hostile to a majority of its citizens, who are viewed as obstacles to utopia. I don't care who wins. It doesn't matter. The corruption and abuse is systemic. It is broken. We have a professional political class in this country that lies and cheats 24/7 and creates laws and rules and regulations for the rest of us.
I'm done."
Ding.
Marxists have used the concept of "false consciousness" for quite a long time now to deny that popular democracy can ever exist at all in a society where the rich own the media. That's a pretty standard argument in the academy, but suddenly "horrifying" when made by someone on the Right.
""My concern is that a sizable chunk of the country is a lot closer to the Civil War level of discontent than has happened in my memory."
Very different. The Civil War was caused by an established southern elite's refusal to accept the new Republican party's victory in 1860. They controlled the governments in the south. The current revolt is opposed by most of the powerful in both parties. It is leaderless, except for Trump, and he has not been a skilled leader. We have had many instances of widespread popular discontent, and it's never clear how it will express itself. Often one of the major parties con-opts the movement. We will see if that happens this time.
Our problems aren't going to be solved by the election coming to an end. They're obviously much deeper than that.
A fraudulent FBI investigation is not a policy discussion. It taints the entire government and it certainly taints Hillary.
It rings pretty hollow for the Democrats and their media surrogates to accuse Trump of undermining public faith in the integrity of the system.
Christopher Hitchens would not be voting Clinton this election.
To paraphrase Churchill: The best argument against democracy can be found by watching a ninety-minute debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.
Blogger robother said...
"So, in a week where officials in two Soros-funded organizations are caught on tape bragging about bussing in thousands of ringers to vote (using canvassers to identify missing registered voters), Trump needs to pledge to abide by the results of the election?"
Ding.
Blogger Meade said...
"To paraphrase Churchill: The best argument against democracy can be found by watching a ninety-minute debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump."
We lost our Republic by becoming a Democracy. The federal government has seized far too much power. Trump's most coherent moment last night was when he said the States would handle abortion. I was amazed.
But all of the douchebags who pretend to be conservative and huddle around their rice bowls ignore this moment of clarity to protect their rice bowl.
I seem to remember hearing "selected not elected" from 2000 - 2008.
The 240 years of tradition must have been before then? Not sure the math works out.
Finally someone has the guts to call out Liberals, the Media, and the Elite establishment on their corrupt hypocritical bullshit.
We've been waiting.
And it's been fun. I can't wait to vote for Donald Trump.
Hillary Clinton during the debate:
We have 17 intelligence agencies, civilian and military, who have all concluded that these espionage attacks, these cyberattacks, come from the highest levels of the Kremlin and they are designed to influence our election.
Are these the same 17 intelligence agencies that convinced her that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction?
Where can the public read this Intelligence finding?
What level of certainty to the 17 agencies express for this finding?
It's all rigged is Trump's main campaign theme. It would be odd if he didn't claim that the voting system is rigged as well.
I saw this elite Republican yesterday. Bastard looked just like Ted Knight in Caddy Shack. He even wore one of them stupid commodore hats.
He got out of a '92 Buick Electra in the Home Depot parking lot, obviously looking for a day laborer. I went up to him, tugged the ol' forelock, and gave him my best 'Si, senor' bit. Went to his house, fixed the broken tiles on his goddam barbeque, and fucked his teenage daughter while he was on the phone with John Kasich. Easiest hundred bucks I ever made. I'm going back next week to trim a dead oak branch that hangs over his garage. I hope his daughter is home.
"Problem is the 30% hates that 21% far more than anyone else in the country."
There are Enemies, Cowards, and Betrayers working to get Hillary elected. It is less than 21% by the way.
"We have 17 intelligence agencies, civilian and military, who have all concluded that these espionage attacks, these cyberattacks, come from the highest levels of the Kremlin and they are designed to influence our election."
Didn't Putin trade in his frumpy old zhena for a super model not long ago? Maybe he is married to Trump's wife. That would explain the chumminess.
Sadly, 97% of the News Media is voting 100% of the time for the Globalist New World Order.
Ergo: we are silly to even claim to be a Nation State with borders...unless Google and Facebook have some known borders.
I think it's interesting Wikileaks could go on for years releasing military secrets and compromising national security and the US government was powerless. But let Assange start embarrassing the Democrats and suddenly his internet is cut off and we're ready to start a cyberwar with Russia.
But it's Trump who is undermining public faith in our institutions.
The names Al Gore (bloated baron of climate buffoonery) and Christine Gregoire (Washington State Governor-D) come to mind. Ms. Gregoire lost to Dino Rossi-R on the first vote count, and again on the second vote count. After each loss more "missing ballot boxes" were miraculously found in the basement of the voter registrar's office in Seattle (King County). Like the Rose law firm billing records, they finally appeared. And you know by the third or maybe the fourth count, enough 'missing" ballots were found to tip the election to Ms. Gregoire.
You don't need the Kremlin to influence the vote in King County. The Dems there do it without any outside help. As long as they are counting the votes (and maybe manufacturing a missing box or two) Truth Justice The American Way and The Democrat Candidate Will Prevail. Doesn't matter what the voters did. Ignorant peasants anyway.
As I've said before, I shall continue to be a Deplorable even if Hillary wins. I am fighting for my country and the fight ain't over yet.
The "seventeen intelligence agencies" thing could, alas, refer to a bunch of private groups like StratFor and foreign IAs. Doesn't seem like a disqualifier to me.
What does seem like a disqualifier is that she thinks seventeen are saying THE RUSSIANS ARE DEFINITELY BEHIND THIS!1!
That sounds like made-up bullshit.
And, since we're on the topic, I'd like a list. Did the CIA, the FBI, and seventeen other IAs issue press releases on how Putin was the puppet-master behind WikiLeaks? I try to keep up, but somehow those seventeen press releases didn't show up in my in-box.
I've said it before and I'll say it again, the next four years are going to be rough. I've never seen a more unhappy US electorate in my lifetime and Trump's loss will only make things much worse. Hillary will inherit a deeply divided country. And she'll most likely only increase the division with whatever radical agenda she attempts to push. Dissatisfaction and anger will be rife. The Republican Party base will fracture into two permanent minority parties with each side blaming the other and nobody forgiving anything.
Here's a fact-check from Bloomberg (a Hillary friend) on the "17 intelligence agencies" lie.
If the 17 intelligence agencies finding is too classified for the public to read, then what is the finding's unclassified title? What is the finding's date?
Most importantly, what is the certainty that the 17 agencies give to their finding?
Do the 17 intelligence agencies include:
* The Coast Guard?
* The Department of Tobacco and Firearms?
* The Department of Agriculture?
Hillary's talking about her secret list of 17 intelligence agencies reminds me of Senator Joe McCarthy's talking about his secret list of 200 known Communists in the State Department.
Amid all the effusive praise for Chris Wallace (guaranteed by his Trump trap question), no one notices the absurdity of his grandiose premise: "to assure the peaceful transition of power." How does this even apply to Donald Trump, do people somehow assume that he currently occupies the White House, that he won't relinquish the Nuclear Football to Hillary?
I often wonder how any of us know how less engaged potential voters respond to things. I'm not sure we can believe our own, respective, intuitions.
I have largely conceded that I do not know how to project what others will do. After all, enough of them voted for Obama and my accurate predictions were ignored.
"If Hillary loses the election, will she blame Vladimir Putin?"
Yes, next question,
"Trump's most coherent moment last night was when he said the States would handle abortion. I was amazed.
But all of the douchebags who pretend to be conservative and huddle around their rice bowls ignore this moment of clarity to protect their rice bowl."
Exactly.
""My concern is that a sizable chunk of the country is a lot closer to the Civil War level of discontent than has happened in my memory. And Donald Trump represents them. And I don't like Trump at all, but basically I agree with them: the system today is set up to rob them while it pretends that they have a say in it."
And they are the people who own 300 million guns and the military and police are largely on their side.
I don't think th election, if Trump loses, is the issue but what Hillary might do after being elected is the match.
The Left is playing the theme that a Trump loss means violence by his supporters. That's not true but Hillary trying to take away rights could do it.
Step 1 - Rig the elections.
Step 2 - Require everyone to believe that our elections aren't rigged.
Step 3 - ?
So we've advanced to step 3. I'm guessing we'll eventually be required to vote for a single DNC candidate at risk of being publically shamed, or worse, since partisan Democrats now own every agency of the Federal government.
do people somehow assume that he currently occupies the White House, that he won't relinquish the Nuclear Football to Hillary?
That is a really good point. With respect to this election, the hysteria is definitely overblown.
The issue is what this says about a potential Trump presidency. Trump has shown numerous instances of disregard for this country's democratic traditions, formal and informal. We don't encourage violence ("maybe he should have been roughed up"), we don't use the levers of power to punish our political enemies (under a Trump administration, Hillary would be "locked up"), people are American regardless of their ethnic heritage (Trump's "Mexican" judge), and we have peaceful transitions of power (Trump will keep us in "suspense").
These little things add up. As bad as Hillary is, and boy is she bad, Trump's undemocratic carelessness disqualifies him.
Bob Boyd said...
I think it's interesting Wikileaks could go on for years releasing military secrets and compromising national security and the US government was powerless. But let Assange start embarrassing the Democrats and suddenly his internet is cut off and we're ready to start a cyberwar with Russia.
But it's Trump who is undermining public faith in our institutions.
Similarly Hillary famously (and juvenile-ly) handed Russia a reset button effectively blaming the tension on America and absolving Putin / Russia. The only reasonable argument for this rapprochement is that tension between powerful countries is dangerous regardless of who is at fault, so she was acting in the American interest. But now she's onstage in front of the entire country and much of the world irresponsibly blaming Russia.
Suddenly her concern over the geo-political risk took a backseat to an opportunity to slime her true enemy Trump.
After Hillary gets in, election fraud will be institutionalized, and yes - the end of our democracy will be at hand. New York Times is cool with it.
After Obama got in, election fraud was be institutionalized, and yes - the end of our democracy is a fact. New York Times is cool with it.
FTFY
This alleged finding of the 17 intelligence agencies about the Kremlin's espionage to influence our elections -- was it briefed to Donald Trump?
If the finding was briefed only to Hillary Clinton, then why was it not briefed to Trump too?
Is the Obama Administration giving intelligence briefings only to the Democratic candidate?
The "17 security agencies" may include the internal IT security departments of the various executive agencies. Like the State Department one whose rules she defied. All of them have an IT operation, or several, and all have security operations.
I suspect that there have been circular reports out for some time about hacking attempts, and there have been a huge number of these in recent years, out after every sort of government data, and it seems that the hackers have often succeeded. The biggest one was last years revelation about the Office of Personnel Management hack of 22 million personnel records. And no doubt much more we havent heard of. Chinese? Russians? Who knows.
Considering the likely circulation of these, its probably easy, but dishonest, to construe a general bulletin about such things to a particular one concerning a couple of private databases (the hacked data in Wilileaks relevant here is not from US Gov systems, but poorly managed private ones).
Anyway, all of this is dishonest from A to Z.
Hillary's 17 intelligence agencies seem to have reached three findings:
1) The Kremlin is committing espionage attacks against the USA.
2) Those attacks include stealing prominent Democrats' e-mails.
3) The purpose of stealing those e-mails is to influence our election.
What level of certainty does the finding give to each element?
Where can the public read an unclassified abstract or executive summary?
Where can the public read the list of 17 agencies that concurred?
"The issue is what this says about a potential Trump presidency. Trump has shown numerous instances of disregard for this country's democratic traditions, formal and informal."
We are not supposed to be a democracy. That we have "democratic" traditions and most of our educated people don't know the difference is a core problem.
Writ Small,
It is the present government that organized violence against Trumps people. Mr. Creamer for one seems, based on his closeness to the President (340 White House visits? He was there twice a week at least) to be something of a confidant and colleague.
What you fear is what you already have. The horses have left the barn so long ago that the doors have rusted open.
buwaya pati at 10:46 AM
The "17 security agencies" may include the internal IT security departments of the various executive agencies.
She called them "17 intelligence agencies".
Blogger campy said...
"After Obama got in, election fraud was be institutionalized, and yes - the end of our democracy is a fact. New York Times is cool with it.
FTFY"
Creamer visited the White House over 300 times and obama personally 47 times.
Anyone who accepts the results of this election is corrupt or an idiot.
I forgot what a douchebag Feingold is. And seriously, he played to aggressively with his sister and still lost? What a pussy.
And they are the people who own 300 million guns and the military and police are largely on their side.
Of course Hillary intends to reverse this situation by executive order.
I'm guessing that the list includes
10) The Federal Bureau of Investigation
11) The Secret Service
Six to go.
They're trying, but we don't believe anything they put out any more. Lies, half-truths (half, at most), misdirections, misapprehensions, prevarications, etc. and so on.
-Video mostly ignored by media is released of Democrats plotting voter fraud. Operative Robert Creamer who visited the WH 300+ times is forced to resign over video where he discusses instigating violence at Trump rallies. Republicans gasp in horror that Trump did not vow to accept election results.
-Democrats rally behind Bill Clinton accused rapist and confirmed sexual abuser. Republicans denounce Trump for joking about grabbing women by the pussy and accusations that he kissed women without consent. Unlike Clinton the alleged victims state he stop when they asked him to.
-Wikileaks reveals Clinton wants open borders. Republicans denounce Trump for wanting to build wall.
If the 17 intelligence agencies' finding is too secret for the public to read, then why is Hillary Clinton blabbing this secret finding on a television show that is being watched by about 80 million people?
People in the arena of politics (Lawyers, Politicians (who are often lawyers),and Journalists), are wordsmiths. They get paid to talk or write in a persuasive manner. Trump, although a bright man, never trained for communicating. Time and again, if he had worded something differently, or brought up further points he would have won the argument. Journalists, and Pundits, in their own social circles, judge each other on there wordsmithing. It's human nature to judge others outside your social circles by the same standards. I saw this when I was in Grad School, and social standing was based on the number and source of their degrees. Businessmen (woman), judge based on the success of their business, often measured in dollars or possessions. Pundits and Journalists hear Trump ans access that he doesn't belong amoungst them, and label him dumb or stupid. Trumps followers are limited in verbal abilities like Trump, and not only overlook his shortcomings, but identify with them. He says what they are thinking, and says it the way they would. Trump may truly believe his rhetoric, or just was smart enough to hear something that others couldn't hear and capitalized on it. Now, I grew up in New York, and have been exposed to Trump for too long. I do not like the man, but give credit where it's due. He heard a large segment of the population, and won the nomination on it. If it's a large enough segment we'll soon find out.
We don't encourage violence ("maybe he should have been roughed up"), we don't use the levers of power to punish our political enemies (under a Trump administration, Hillary would be "locked up"), people are American regardless of their ethnic heritage (Trump is 's "Mexican" judge)
The Democrats certainly encourage (and fund) violence, e.g. Bob Creamer. Hillary would answer for her many felonies that were articulated by Comey, that he refused to prosecute.The "Mexican"judge does belong to a La Raza (The Race, as if Mexican is a race) group.
As for where the "stimulus" money went, yes indeed, a great deal went to subsidize Democrat-aligned groups and institutions. There have been quite good studies of the recipients of government funds out of that. One of the larger instances of legal corruption in world history. Of course, because in the US everything is bigger.
Worse possibly is the regulatory compliance practice of collusion between political activist groups and regulators whereby they have a cyclic process of bringing compaints against private sector entities, having the regulators force a settlement, part of which is funding, a payoff, to the activist group.
This is SOP.
And then there is ongoing collusion via the SEC and financial regulators at all levels, notably through the revolving door system, via consultancies and executive positions, including what seems like a system of cutouts.
In small things and large, every time some corner of the rug is lifted, there is a mass of dirt uncovered. One has to conclude based on such samples that the entire rug is covering up a uniform layer of dirt.
The implication is mind bending; that the modern FedGov is the most corrupt entity in human history.
I doubt Mrs. Clinton or her briefers know or care much about the distinction between "security" and "intelligence".
All large IT security operations include planning and analysis groups, often called "intelligence", btw, concerned with analyzing threats, not just preventing or reacting to them - to identify source, methods, agenda, etc.
Anyway, Clinton is being dishonest of course.
If Trump were black, he'd probably poll about 80%.
So I guess orange isn't the new black after all.
Ray, you bring up some good points. When I was debating back in high school, I often had to debate an issue from the opposite side of my own personal ideology and usually won. This taught me something about the basic manipulative power of persuasion in law and in politics that turned me off of both.
Via Facebook.
"Mark Levin
14 hrs ·
Wallace is wrong. Gore the loser didn't concede to Bush the winner.Gore sued. Repeatedly. And he & his supporters never accepted the results.
1.5K Comments15K Shares"
Went to his house, fixed the broken tiles on his goddam barbeque, and fucked his teenage daughter while he was on the phone with John Kasich. Easiest hundred bucks I ever made. I'm going back next week to trim a dead oak branch that hangs over his garage. I hope his daughter is home.
10/20/16, 10:00 AM
I don't care who you are or who you voting for, that was funny.
That said, all you doom and gloom chickenshits just suck it up and vote for Trump on November 8th. He's not doomed until you betray him, and all of us.
AprilApple, I believe you said that you bet that Hillary and Trump will be friends in the year or two? I don't like to do anything like Chuck does, but I'd love some action on that.
One of the most frustrating things about Trump is that he can take a germ of a good idea and make it sound ridiculous, through hyperbole and posturing.
Everyone knows that this election has been biased by the media, and everyone also knows that even if people vote based on that manipulation, those are the votes and that is that. If Trump or the GOP has a problem with that they need to revisit why they didn't even try to fight the culture war that they lost. But even if people vote for what you think are bad reasons, that is how they voted and everything else is hypothetical.
Everyone also knows that the Democrats will commit actual vote fraud in as many places and to such degree as they think necessary and doable to win key races. Only idiots fail to see that. THIS is a valid complaint and maybe gets at recounts and longer term things like citizenship verification, Voter ID and purging the rolls of obsolete registrations. That would be a legitimate thing to bring up--after all, Gore got recounts in 2000.
But Trump just conflates the two and makes himself look unreasonable because what he says is, literally, unreasonable. He could have said he will accept the ultimate result but is not forswearing the possibility of recounts or challenges if there appears to be good reason. But no, he says something else, much more provocative and with no clear meaning.
When people complain about his "temperament", this is what they mean. It's nothing he has done, it's things he has said that are over-the-top, and may or may not reflect any actual thinking or plan. But, he is what he is and he has had months to consider the consequences of talking like that, and either cannot or does not want to change, so it is a valid thing to worry about and is part of the package that people must vote on.
"But Trump just conflates the two and makes himself look unreasonable because what he says is, literally, unreasonable. He could have said he will accept the ultimate result but is not forswearing the possibility of recounts or challenges if there appears to be good reason. But no, he says something else, much more provocative and with no clear meaning."
Not only that, but watching his argument last night it sounds as though a big reason he thinks the election is "rigged" is that Hillary is even allowed to run. This conflates the concept that she should have been criminally prosecuted (which happens to not even be a legal bar to running for president, though I doubt Trump knows this) and the idea that the election is tilted against him.
It's as though he had too many thoughts trying to fit through too small a funnel at the same time, and it got mushed up like bad Play-Doh.
Blogger AprilApple said...
"I predict Trump and Clinton will be best buds again in 1-2 years."
If so he will have to leave the country and his properties will be much less valuable.
But I seriously doubt this.
It looks college-educated white women are going to destroy our country.
"As we move closer to Election Day, it is becoming clear that college-educated white women will be a key voting bloc for Hillary Clinton, serving as a counterweight to Donald Trump’s support from working-class white men. This is evident in polls taken since mid-summer and could translate into a sizeable vote advantage for Clinton, according to simulations I conducted and depicted in our latest video of the Diversity Explosion: Election 2016 series."
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2016/10/18/watch-the-power-of-the-educated-white-female-vote-in-election-2016/?utm_source=FB&utm_medium=BPIAds&utm_campaign=DivWomen&utm_term=MNF-DivWomen_NoNoCtyUS-50%5E65-M-Think+TanksNoCAnoBHV&utm_content=109968515
And this.
“Democrats have been lying for 16 years, they’re still writing articles about how Bush stole the elections in 2000 and 2004, so this holier-than-thou attitude about ‘oh, this is the first time that the election is not a sacrosanct process,’ it’s a joke,” the former Florida congressman explained. “You guys bathe in that hypocrisy if you want to, I’d just like to hear how the debate went.”
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2016/10/20/holier-than-thou-freak-out-scarborough-tears-into-medias-debate-coverage-video/#ixzz4NeJ5EC58
@ MisterBuddwing
I fondly recall the story of the politician who conceded defeat by declaring: "The people have spoken ... THE BASTARDS!"
Yes, that was Dick Tuck, political prankster and Nixon nemesis. He was running for a rural State Senate in Santa Barbara County. I think it was in 1974 or 1978 and he was a Democrat running in a heavily Republican district. His original claim to fame came as a student at UC Santa Barbara, he conned his way into becoming Nixon's campus advance man and when Nixon showed up for a speech, the auditorium was empty. Nixon told him, "Remind me never to have you plan an event!" But, he somehow got himself involved in another event with the same result. Nixon said, "Oh, it's you again." It was like Charlie Brown, Lucy, and the football.
dreams said...
It looks college-educated white women are going to destroy our country.
Oh the sad irony. Back in college, they were the best part.
Now they've managed to destroy that too...
If Trump wins - they may become buddies again.
If Trump loses - they will remain arch enemies. Trump will be blacklisted across the country and all media. Both parties united on the idea that a non-politician daring to run for office must be utterly eradicated as a lesson to future upstarts.
Trump is disadvantaged by not being a politician.
Political response: "I'm here because I have said, as did Bernie, that everything is rigged by and for the members of the political ruling class like the Clintons. I'm here because I will change that."
It looks college-educated white women are going to destroy our country.
I'm a college-educated white woman about Hillary's age and I'm voting for Trump. So don't blame me!!!
"It looks college-educated white women are going to destroy our country."
"Educated" is a push. "Indoctrinated," or at best "credentialed," is more like it.
RHHardin is onto something.
Brando: "This conflates the concept that she should have been criminally prosecuted (which happens to not even be a legal bar to running for president, though I doubt Trump knows this) and the idea that the election is tilted against him."
Conviction under USC Title 18, Section 2071, relating to destruction or removal of public records, is grounds for removal and a bar to holding future public office. A couple of law professors have argued that it cannot be constitutionally applied to POTUS. Nevertheless....
Mike Sylwester,
"Assuming for the sake of argument that all nine of those agencies "have concluded that these intelligence attacks .... come from the highest levels of the Kremlin", which are the other eight agencies in her list?"
By law, the 17 members of the US intelligence community (IC) are:
- Office of the Director of National Intelligence
- Twenty-Fifth Air Force (US Air Force)
- Intelligence and Security Command (US Army)
- CIA
- Coast Guard Intelligence
- Defense Intelligence Agency
- Office of Intelligence and Counterintelligence (Dept of Energy)
- Office of Intelligence and Analysis (DHS)
- Bureau of Intelligence and Research (State)
- Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence (Treasury)
- Office of National Security Intelligence (DEA)
- Intelligence Branch of the FBI
- Marine Corps Intelligence Activity
- National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency
- National Reconnaissance Office
- NSA
- Office of Naval Intelligence
ODNI heads IC interagency coordination efforts.
Hope that helps!
Mike Sylwester,
"If the 17 intelligence agencies' finding is too secret for the public to read, then why is Hillary Clinton blabbing this secret finding on a television show that is being watched by about 80 million people?"
Well, it's not too secret for the public to read- the Joint DHS and ODNI Election Security Statement was released to the public on 7 October 2016 and posted here by DNI and here by DHS. It's only three paragraphs long, but I'll post the relevant first paragraph here:
"The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process. Such activity is not new to Moscow—the Russians have used similar tactics and techniques across Europe and Eurasia, for example, to influence public opinion there. We believe, based on the scope and sensitivity of these efforts, that only Russia's senior-most officials could have authorized these activities."
You would have to ask Trump why he disagrees with ODNI and DHS's conclusion on this matter.
Obviously, we have too many intelligence agencies. A good place for budget cuts.
Great find Bobby. I got another question what would these same 17 agencys have done had an employee set up their own email server and emailed classified material to that server and other employees without a security clearance. Any ideas? Do you think they would have inferred the "intent" of that employee and told them they did a "boo boo" and let it slide?
Bobby, thanks for the info.
Trump told the truth. If Trump loses he will throw a hissy fit and he will play up the idea he was cheated. He'll use his loss and his complaining for publicity.
So why do people expect Trump to Lie about it and say he will accept the results?? We all know he won't.
For god's sake people, He's not Lying Hillary.
He expanded on his statements today. He simp,y stated that he would accept any result but reserves the right to contest should there be irregularities. What's wrong with that?
If you asked al Gore 3 weeks prior to the election if he would accept the result he of course would say yes. And yet, would then contest the election once irregularities came to light. Which is what happened.
Therefore trump was merely saying he is not going to say he would guarantee he wouldn't contest an election U tip he sees the results of the election. You can't answer thst question and guarantee a result if you don't know the outcome of the election.
And it's become pretty apparent thst the Dems are all sorts of things to try to tilt the election. The tapes that came out shows they are busing people or driving people to multiple polling locations. Podesta revealed that illegals can vote if they have a license. There are millions of people on rolls thst are dead or illegal. And there have been numerous documented instances where people were caught cheating.
Trump is simply saying, if there is a close election in a state and there are perceived problems he reserves the right to contest the result. That is perfectly reasonable.
I'm starting to swing back to thinking Trump may win this. David Goldman is one of the people I rely on to learn what is going on in the world. He has decided that Trump will win because Americans don't trust the media.
I don't know but there are two guys I go to for the truth. He is one.
The other is Richard Fernandez.
The Saudis gave Hillary $20 million. Morocco gave her $12 million.
I don't know but I think it may be November 9 before we know. I hope Trump has good election lawyers.
Including J Christian Adams.
Bobby: "You would have to ask Trump why he disagrees with ODNI and DHS's conclusion on this matter."
And let's ask the Democrats why they decided after the fact that the intelligence reports leading to the invasion of Iraq were unreliable.
I don't know who did the hacking, but I don't believe much of anything that comes from Obama's corrupt government, particularly if it promotes Democrats politically. I doubt Trump does either.
I recently read a column that asserted that Hillary's election will destroy the little trust a majority of Americans have in the U.S. Government. Ya think?
Bobby at 1:53 PM
By law, the 17 members of the US intelligence community (IC) are:
I think it would be more accurate to say that this is a finding of the Intelligence Community rather than of "17 intelligence agencies". I assume that only a few of the listed agencies played any significant role in evaluating the issue.
"And they are the people who own 300 million guns and the military and police are largely on their side."
And this is the real reason for gun control. Not "gun violence", but to put tho option of violence only in the hands of the state.
Bobby at 2:29 PM
Well, it's not too secret for the public to read- the Joint DHS and ODNI Election Security Statement was released to the public on 7 October 2016 and posted here by DNI and here by DHS.
The issued statement is titled "Joint Statement from the Department of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security". The statement seems to be finding of the two organizations ....
1) Department of Homeland Security
2) Director of National Intelligence on Election Security
... not of "17 intelligence agencies". The "Election Security" organization is not even one of the 17 agencies that comprise the Intelligence Community.
--------
Fred Fleitz, senior vice president for policy and programs with the Center for Security Policy, who has worked in national-security positions for 25 years with the CIA, the State Department, and the House Intelligence Committee, says the following:
[quote]
... What Clinton said was false and misleading. First of all, only two intelligence entities – the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (DNI) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) – have weighed in on this issue, not 17 intelligence agencies. And what they said was ambiguous about Russian involvement. ...
My problem with the DNI/DHS unclassified statement is that it appeared to be another effort by the Obama administration to politicize U.S. intelligence. Make no mistake, U.S. intelligence agencies issued this unprecedented unclassified statement a month before a presidential election that was so useful to one party because the Clinton campaign asked for it. The Obama administration was happy to comply. ....
[unquote]
This matter should be examined and discussed some more.
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/441266/hillary-clinton-democratic-emails-hacked-russia?utm_source=nr&utm_medium=facebook&utm_content=fleitz%3Futm_campaign%3Ddem-emails
hombre,
"And let's ask the Democrats why they decided after the fact that the intelligence reports leading to the invasion of Iraq were unreliable."
Yeah, I mean, as far as I can tell, most Democrats at the time (and contemporary Trump, for that matter) intentionally spun intelligence failures in Iraq into deliberate deception for the sake of political expedience-- i.e., they knew from their experience with Vietnam that they could use an unpopular war to win elections, and the only way to protect their serving members (who had voted for the war, like 2004 and 2012 Presidential nominees) was to lie and say that the Bush Administration had lied to them, so that's what they did. Of course, I never voted for any of those Democrats, either.
Mike Sylwester,
"I think it would be more accurate to say that this is a finding of the Intelligence Community rather than of "17 intelligence agencies". I assume that only a few of the listed agencies played any significant role in evaluating the issue."
Just given the DHS-ODNI Joint Statement, I would totally agree with you. Broadly speaking, the DNI does speak for the US intelligence community, but that's on matters resulting from a specific collaborative process. We wouldn't generally say "the 17 intelligence agencies have all concluded . . ." unless it had gone through a rigorous product development process- for example, a National Intelligence Estimate- where everyone had an opportunity to properly insert, vet and contest their respective analyses, and ultimately signed off on the conclusions.
The Republicans in Congress should ask the Director of National Intelligence to clarify publicly whether this statement indeed is a finding of all the 17 agencies that comprise the Intelligence Community.
Bobby at 6:13 PM
Broadly speaking, the DNI does speak for the US intelligence community, but that's on matters resulting from a specific collaborative process. We wouldn't generally say "the 17 intelligence agencies have all concluded . . ." unless it had gone through a rigorous product development process- for example, a National Intelligence Estimate- where everyone had an opportunity to properly insert, vet and contest their respective analyses, and ultimately signed off on the conclusions.
The statement seems to be approved really by only three agencies:
1) Director of National Intelligence
2) Department of Homeland Security
3) Director of National Intelligence on Election Security
The third of those is not one of the 17 intelligence agencies that comprise the Intelligence Community.
The Republicans in Congress should ask the DNI to clarify to the American public the significance of this statement.
* How many of the 17 intelligence agencies concurred?
* Have any of the 17 intelligence agencies refrained from concurring?
* Have any of the 17 agencies dissented?
* Is the publication of this statement a usual or an unusual action?
Mike Sylwester,
"The issued statement is titled "Joint Statement from the Department of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security". The statement seems to be finding of the two organizations ....
1) Department of Homeland Security
2) Director of National Intelligence on Election Security
... not of "17 intelligence agencies". The "Election Security" organization is not even one of the 17 agencies that comprise the Intelligence Community. "
You are confused, sir. There is no "Election Security organization." The name of the release is "Joint Statement from the Department of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security" (I have added bold and italics to break up the sentence so you can better understand its meaning).
Perhaps that's bad English phrasing and it should be worded "Joint Statement on Election Security from the Department of Homeland Security and the Director of National Intelligence"? That I do not know to be true or untrue (I was not an English major), but if so, your beef is with the DNI newsroom.
Regardless, I agree that it appears to be the conclusion of two of (and not all of) the 17 members of the IC. However, given the information we've received so far, we do not actually know that to be true- it is entirely possible that the other agencies were given an opportunity to provide input, although for reasons I'm not at liberty to discuss I personally doubt it is the case.
Bobby at 6:32 PM
There is no "Election Security organization." The name of the release is "Joint Statement from the Department of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security"
Thanks for all your explanations.
The Republicans in Congress should ask the DNI to clarify to the American public the significance of this statement. In particular:
* Were all the 17 intelligence agencies asked to provide input and approval before the DNI published the statement?
* How many of the 17 intelligence agencies formally concurred with the statement?
* Have any of the 17 intelligence agencies refrained from concurring?
* Have any of the 17 intelligence agencies dissented or objected?
* Is the publication of this statement a usual or an unusual action?
* If the publication is unusual, then who requested or initiated it and how was the decision made?
most of you probably noticed that trump is no longer trying to contest the election, but is simply pinging his base over and over, trying to get them to stay engaged and pay attention. that's because he's no longer campaigning to win, but instead is marketing a new media property. 'trump tv', as its theoretically named (alternatively, breitbart tv or as some have suggested stormfront tv) has stayed out of sight of most mainstream media, but some watchers have noticed that trump's son-in-law jared kushner is courting major media investors. there's an obvious void to fill here. most republicans voted for trump because they feel alienated from what previous presidential candidates promised. they believed capitalism would bring them a higher living standard, but instead have seen free trade deals reduce their personal ability to make a living. fox news was always split between the personal line of rupert murdoch, who used it both as a way to discipline republican candidates as well as to gain support for them, and roger ailes, who had his start as a political consultant for richard nixon after he poached him from local tv with a conversation about presumably how the white race is threatened by producerist conspiracies or some shit, and who is more of a true believer in paleoconservatism. murdoch teamed up with some of the strivers in fox news to oust ailes for his years of horrific sexual assaults, freeing him and his loyalists (like sean hannity) up for employment at a new station. trump also has the head of breitbart stephen bannon, again a true believer who was apparently advising trump in august not to bother appealing to anybody with the white working class because that's what worked for bill clinton and nothing's changed since 1996, as his campaign ceo and probably a manger for trump tv. This will open things up at breitbart, leaving milo yiannopolous in charge of the web end of the operation. there's probably something there for alex jones and his new puppetmaster roger stone, one of nixon's election hatchet men, assuming they don't go too far off message. they'll be 'fighting against the establishment' for an audience that feels so disempowered that they believe the government is poisoning them through the regular injections they get to stay healthy and the clouds that form from the ends of airplane engines and still go on acting the exact same way they always do. part of their legitimacy will come from never conceding the election, because they'll look like they're taking a brave stand on behalf of their audience. they'll be there for the 2020 and 2024 elections, although there's a decent chance that the current crisis of capitalism will produce a level of electoral polarization by then that there'll be a far right candidate, a left candidate, and a candidate of the bourgeois center for a little while, which will limit their influence.
The Times loves nothing better than delivering to you half the story.
Whichever side doesn't befit them, they'll protect you from hearing.
Don't you worry at all.
I don't know but I think it may be November 9 before we know. I hope Trump has good election lawyers.
Including J Christian Adams.
10/20/16, 5:15 PM
Oh hell, Doc, for a minute I thought you were going to say including Chuck!
You would have to ask Trump why he disagrees with ODNI and DHS's conclusion on this matter.
10/20/16, 2:29 PM
You know Bobby, that's only confident, that's not very confident or highly confident.
Whatever happened to the principle that the truth is the truth regardless of the source?
Whoever obtained these documents is irrelevant, as are the means by which they were obtained. This is not a legal proceeding and this is not a court dealing with evidence obtained through an illegal search.
Objecting to consideration of their contents on this basis is a mass exercise of a logical fallacy. Its a classic case of ad hominem.
Bad Lieutenant,
Yes. And, of course, even "very-super-highly" confident assessments could very well turn out to be wrong. The IC is composed of humans, after all, and none of us are perfect.
What I find fascinating here is that Trump supporters have routinely attempted to reassure his Doubting Republicans that, despite high levels of ignorance on national security and foreign policy matters, Trump would nonetheless be a good Commander-in-Chief because he will "listen to his advisers." I've expressed doubts about that concept in the past (since he believes he knows more about ISIS than the generals do, why bother taking their advice?).
But here is an example where the intelligence professionals have concluded that they are "confident" Russia is behind the hacks in question, and Trump- rather than expressing his reasons for doubting their analysis (which he probably doesn't do because, let's be real, he probably doesn't have)- concludes "Our country has no idea. ... Yeah. I doubt it, I doubt it" apparently because it does not conform with his desired narrative. That is, he doesn't want to believe it, so therefore the intelligence community has no idea. This is not the tell of someone who will listen to their advisers. Quite the contrary, actually. Indeed, it reminds me of the inner circle of the current occupant of the White House.
what is their evidence, recall they were sure the north koreans hacked sony, but had they demonstrated an interest in motion picture management strategy before, unlikely, the 2002 NIE was probably a better constructed document than what they are offering now, general flynn knows well what is left out of such products as what is included,
Bobby,
The matter of doubt comes not from a judgement on the technical merits of whatever analysis was used to come to those conclusions, but on the more fundamental grounds of trust of ANY institution of the FedGov on any matter with political implications.
The FedGov simply isnt trustworthy. Its certainly not to be trusted to report accurately to the public on the findings of intelligence professionals.
Any more than it can be trusted to report the unemployment rate. Its a travesty.
narciso,
"general flynn knows well what is left out of such products as what is included"
Indeed, he does. As a point of fact, LTG(R) Flynn publicly disagrees with Trump's position and actually agrees with the IC assessment. See, for example, this Christian Science Monitor article from 7 October:
"Michael Flynn, a retired Army lieutenant general, said he agreed with assessments from cybersecurity experts that operatives for the Russian government carried out attacks on Mrs. Clinton's campaign and other Democratic Party organizations, even as he decried the "corruption" that he said the hacks exposed.
"We should not be surprised that a communist state run by a totalitarian dictator wants to expose the weaknesses of capitalism and, frankly, show the level of corruption that exists in our political process," he said.
Asked if he was satisfied with the cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike's attribution of the hacks to a group known as Fancy Bear, which has ties to the government of Vladimir Putin, Mr. Flynn said he was. "Yeah, it seems to make sense that there's a concerted effort to understand what’s going on in our political campaigns."
The former head of the military's Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), Flynn said he was not surprised by a foreign power's interest in the US election and he expressed curiosity about whether there might be additional revelations from the hack. Documents from the breach led to embarrassing revelations about friction within the party and prompted the resignation of DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz on the eve of the Democratic convention in August."
Flynn, the intelligence professional, accepts that the Russians likely conducted the hack; Trump does not. So, you see, we probably could not have a better example of how much advice Trump is really going to take even from his closest adviser on intelligence and military matters.
buwaya,
"The matter of doubt comes not from a judgement on the technical merits of whatever analysis was used to come to those conclusions, but on the more fundamental grounds of trust of ANY institution of the FedGov on any matter with political implications.
The FedGov simply isnt trustworthy. Its certainly not to be trusted to report accurately to the public on the findings of intelligence professionals.
Any more than it can be trusted to report the unemployment rate. Its a travesty."
Indeed, if that is truly the case, that is a great travesty. Luckily, President Trump will appoint good, smart advisers whom he will listen to when they tell him the truth... Well, except, apparently when his chief adviser on military and intelligence matters asserts something that he does not want to believe about Putin, then they won't be listened to. Lesson learned: only tell Trump what he wants to hear, and he will listen to it. Hey, maybe he won't need to clear out so many of Obama's Yes-Men, after all!
striking how poor reading comprehension, flynn says nothing of the sort, he understands having let all our secrets out like an open display, other powers would be interested in such easy pickings,
Bobby,
Its not just Trump, its you and I also who should question everything.
Trump will be walking into the most monumental nest of vipers ever assembled in the history of the world. Everyone in FedGov will be a bitter enemy from the first day. The only thing you can know for certain about anyone there is that they are your enemy and they are on the take, or would like to be.
Imagine yourself in his position.
I also wonder how he will handle this. No, I doubt he can fix it, nor anyone else.
Bobby wrote:
Regardless, I agree that it appears to be the conclusion of two of (and not all of) the 17 members of the IC. However, given the information we've received so far, we do not actually know that to be true- it is entirely possible that the other agencies were given an opportunity to provide input, although for reasons I'm not at liberty to discuss I personally doubt it is the case.
lets assume that its true that the the intelligence agencies ARE saying russia is responsible for the hack.
Doesn't this suggest true incompetence on the part of Hillary and Obama? I mean, Russia invades Crimea. They do nothing. Obama puts down a red line in Syria and they cross it, and we do nothing. Russia then steps in and becomes Syria's protector and we do nothing. We say we want a russian reset and yet let Russia get away with murder. The whole time that we are saying Russia is acting like saboteurs we have john Kerry in a back room trying to hammer out a deal with the Russians to deal with ISIS in Syria.
So we let Russia grow powerful by refusing to act while they flex their might and then we are further blindsided by the fact that they hacked us? Our intelligence agencies couldn't even get this information before we gave the whole store away to Russia?
Do we think John Kerry might feel a might bit stupid talking to the Russians as if they are an honest partner, if we know at the same time that they are hacking us? Since Hillary was saying they were responsible for the hack while he was still there.
The 80's called and they wanted their foreign policy back. Obama hung up the phone. Should have answered the call obama.
considering they had a russian mole in the nsa, after snowden, who was deep in the operational network, and they don't have one at cia or dia or oni?
jr565,
"lets assume that its true that the the intelligence agencies ARE saying russia is responsible for the hack.
Doesn't this suggest true incompetence on the part of Hillary and Obama? I mean, Russia invades Crimea. They do nothing. Obama puts down a red line in Syria and they cross it, and we do nothing. Russia then steps in and becomes Syria's protector and we do nothing. We say we want a russian reset and yet let Russia get away with murder. The whole time that we are saying Russia is acting like saboteurs we have john Kerry in a back room trying to hammer out a deal with the Russians to deal with ISIS in Syria."
I agree with you completely. At no point have I ever defended the Obama Administration's Russia policy - whether Clinton or Kerry was at the helm in Foggy Bottom, I believe their Russia policy (and indeed foreign policy across the board) could best be described as "utterly pathetic."
"So we let Russia grow powerful by refusing to act while they flex their might and then we are further blindsided by the fact that they hacked us? Our intelligence agencies couldn't even get this information before we gave the whole store away to Russia?
Do we think John Kerry might feel a might bit stupid talking to the Russians as if they are an honest partner, if we know at the same time that they are hacking us?"
Or we could just do like Trump does and decide- against the published assessment of the intelligence community and his own chief intelligence adviser- that Russia would not conduct these hacks. Or that we can mark it down that Russia is not going into the Ukraine. Problem solved! And when LTG Flynn states otherwise, we can just do like narciso and decide he said no such thing.
Hi Narciso,
Yes, based on what we know, such as the OPM leak and the NSA mole, and God knows what the public hasnt heard of, the FedGov seems to be leaking like a sieve.
Its a corrupt process bound politicized ill managed system all around, in every part I know of, so why not in security.
we're going to need a team b type reassessment, some like dr. gorka will be valuable in this
filling in the part of richard pipes, one of the best experts on the soviet union, by contrast clinton hired strobe talbott, who had gotten the main issue about arms control policy wrong, and according to one retired kgb operative, tretyakov, was an easy mark for them,
Achilles:
Ding Dong.
Or we could just do like Trump does and decide- against the published assessment of the intelligence community and his own chief intelligence adviser- that Russia would not conduct these hacks."
Bobby you are missing the forest for the trees. The question isn't who did the hacks but whether or not the released materials are real and not invented plants. Notice the Democrats haven't asserted the emails are fake.
I remember how well the Democrats carried themselves in 2000. Gore conceded, and then he didn't, and then smeared the Fla Secretary of state, and then tried to conduct a partial recount in only the counties that were heavily pro-Gore under the leadership of Bill Daley of the NOTORIOUS Chicago Daleys (who wrote the book on stealing elections), and then on December 13, 2000, five weeks after the election, finally gave a gracious concession speech. It seems to me that, at best, he kept us in suspense, and certainly he did not immediately accept the outcome.
Hillary said Bush was selected, not elected, in 2002.
"one of the prides of this country is the peaceful transition of power"
I wish you had addressed this Ann. Did you miss it? Trump said nothing about violence. He intends to challenge a corrupted outcome in the courts, just like Gore did.
But here, Chris Wallace assumes Trump intended to prevent a PEACEFUL transition of power. It's dishonest of Wallace, and exactly what Trump is talking about.
Henry said... "So as I understand it - "
This is always the preface to a Strawman argument. I see it all over facebook.
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