Here's the "most read" list alongside that opinion piece (in The Washington Post):
Remember all those years when Republicans didn't really want the majority, but enjoyed the privileges and immunities of the minority position? The subordinate role can be luxuriously rewarding. There are, quite obviously, those in the current majority who are longing for the days when they could carp about everything and take responsibility for nothing.
So what's in the opinion column at the link (which is by a Democratic Party politico named Rob Stein)? Do you care? I see so many anti-Trump headlines. I feel as though I've already seen them all. What's to read? Okay, I'll read this one (so you don't have to, not that you want to)....
Resistance is the appropriate and necessary impulse of Democrats at this strange and raucous inception of the Trump administration.This sounds like a teenager writing in her diary about her parents.
It is also woefully insufficient to address the monumental existential threats Democrats confront.Too many adjectives. In 2 short sentences: appropriate, necessary, strange, raucous, insufficient, monumental, existential.
Resistance alone will not defeat the Republicans’ stranglehold....Stein goes on to recommend effective participation in electoral politics. Develop the "machinery" at the state level.
Otherwise, our protests, however insistent and heartfelt, will be in vain.There's no exploration of the possibility that solid electoral politics should replace the resistance. What bothers me about the resistance — what deafens me to the protest — is that I actually believe in democracy. And I see a party that won an election and is now in power attempting to govern. I'm inclined to respect that, not resist it.
The protests and resistance say: We don't believe in democracy. How can you participate effectively in democracy while continually screaming that you don't accept the results of an election?
Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election?
Posts
182 comments:
KAOS is not just an "international organization of evil" .
One persons "stranglehold" is another persons "proper governance"
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election?"
Yes, but only one person. You.
Does anyone else see irony in the fact the progressives and anarchists are protesting in support of the establishment?
Trump has come to drain the swamp and the progressives are fighting hard to maintain the status quo and prop up the (liberal) establishment.
Show us what democracy looks like...
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election? "
"Support" is too strong a word for that.
I'm always willing to give the President-elect a *chance* to prove himself, even if I did not vote for him.
In 2008-2009, unlike Rush Limbaugh, I was *not* hoping that Obama would fail, even though I had voted for McCain.
Because there are several examples in American history where the failure of a President made the country significantly worse off. It's much harder to find examples where the President was failing but the country was prospering.
I did not vote for Trump. But I was willing to give Trump a chance to prove himself.
So far, unfortunately, he's not doing that.
Ann Althouse: Tank Woman.
What I [Fe]love[/Fe] are all the lefties patting themselves and each other on the back for their "courage" in "speaking out" (that is, throwing a tantrum). Yeah. courage. Go with that.
But I have to ask, what exactly are the consequences they risk? Other than looking like these kids, I mean.
"But I was willing to give Trump a chance to prove himself...."
So how much of a chance did you give him? 2 weeks? 3 weeks? And all that time he's had the press hot to destroy him. It's just crazy! We need our President. Why are we destroying him before he even starts? Because he's doing so much? Sorry, I lived through the Wisconsin protests of 2011. I saw massive resistance to Scott Walker, which came as soon as he started governing. I heard the people who LOST the election protesting with the chant "This is what democracy looks like." Democracy was, purportedly, NOT accepting the governance of the man who won the election.
Remember all the talk about the "peaceful transfer of power" about a month ago? What bullshit!
The "most read" list is bad marketing. First of all, it depends on how you pronounce the word "read".
Well, that's not really a big problem. But when you actively publicize the fact that people on your site are of the same mind, turning left like NASCAR drivers, you might as well just be democraticunderground.com or People Magazine. You're not marketing to anyone on the right or even in the middle. A list of "most important articles" would be much better.
Tank Girl
Ann Althouse said...
We need our President.
No. We don't. We are not children.
Why are we destroying him before he even starts?
Self-destructing, not being destroyed.
Meh. Leftie media portraying chaos is salve for the pee pee in their pants masses. Free speech and all. If lefties thought Trump was a fascist they'd be too scared to speak out. If Democrats in Congress can still obstruct, then they still have some power, however feeble. Big whup. I'll start to worry when financial markets begin to react negatively. (Financial markets are the metric lefties so desperately want supporting their side and they know they don't have it!)
Government employees committing crimes to undercut the administration is another matter. Root 'em out and let 'em hang.
Last night I did something I never do. When I got home I watched an hour of MSNBC. The non-stop media storm about General Flynn and "What did Trump know and when did he know it?" and the overwhelming message we're supposed to get that "Trump is working with Russian spies!!!" was astonishing! (I still haven't seen proof the Russians intervened in the election to insure Trump won.) The thing, though, that caught my eye and prompted me to keep watching more than a minute was the banner headline at the bottom that the intel agencies were not sharing intel with the President!
This is astonishing and dismaying. Trump is manifestly unfit to be President, (but then, so was Clinton and so are most of those considered "major players" in Washington), but he is the President, in just his first three weeks in office. This whole pile-on, taken in whole--the unceasing insinuations that Trump is some sort of collaborator with the "evil Russkies," and the public revelation that the Intel creeps are taking it upon themselves to withhold information from their boss--tells me that the deep state is very unhappy with Trump's propensity to go off-script and off-agenda (their agenda) and that they will not abide it. He will either play ball and be a good boy or they will destroy him.
I would consider it no tragedy if Trump were to leave office, other than that it would leave Pence in his place, but it is chilling to see how swiftly and brutally the deep state reacts when the chief executive does not seem to be following their prerogatives. This tells us that any independent person in that office, anyone who might actuall try to act for the people's benefit (not that I believe Trump will) and not for the agenda of the corporate/military/spy complex, would be similarly taken down. The deep state is showing us the truth: they are in charge.
"I actually believe in democracy." Very charming. No wonder they consider you conservative in Madison.
"How can you participate effectively in democracy while continually screaming that you don't accept the results of an election?" Faux question, right? I mean, for progs democracy is about them getting power, not about legitimacy of some process or other. Not accepting election results is part and parcel of effective participation, progressive style. Of course, for the time being, some Americans, like you!, have something to say about how effective they will really be.
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election? "
I hated the fact that Obama won - it was obvious to me that he had no appropriate experience, had a set of advisors who pushed policies that were extremely dangerous to our nation, and that he had been completely "un-vetted" by the media during the campaign.
Yet when he won the election, I supported him, hoping and praying that his policies/decisions would ultimately turn out to be the correct ones for the future of the country, even if I disagreed with them. I expect the same from those who didn't vote for Trump. So far they have failed me miserably, at least to the extent of what is visible.
I'm sure that this has been pointed out before. As far as these protests are about not accepting the election results, there are a distinct lack of Hillary signs as these protests. This was particularly true of the Women's March.
@Cook: "This is astonishing and dismaying . . . He will either play ball and be a good boy or they will destroy him . . . This tells us that any independent person in that office, anyone who might actuall try to act for the people's benefit (not that I believe Trump will) and not for the agenda of the corporate/military/spy complex, would be similarly taken down. The deep state is showing us the truth: they are in charge." Way too much honesty this early in the morning.
"But I have to ask, what exactly are the consequences they risk? Other than looking like these kids, I mean."
I don't really approve of putting photos of children up on the internet — especially when you can infer that they would not consent about that particular photograph — but that was not just very funny but very helpful to adults who are living with children and trying to maintain balance and perspective.
And you are right that the children are interesting as providing insight into adults who lose their temper.
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election?"
Yes, I think so. But they aren't Internet junkies. They quietly vote, and then continue living their lives.
The Trump supporters have to recognize, understand and accept that the Dems, media, bureaucracy, Deep State, liberal judges, GOP elite, Hollywood, Universities, public sector unions, feminists, BLM, La Raza and even the San Francisco Mayor's Office are all gunning for him.
They can't make him poor. But they can drive him out of office like they did to Nixon, particularly if he makes mis-steps.
The key is to keep the House, and stay away from foreign wars. He has allies. Israel and Japan remain close. If France elects Le Pen and Holland elects Wilders, he'll have 2 more solid allies.
The Left is loud and can create fear, uncertainty and doubt, but outside of California and NY, they aren't good at winning elections.
Well said, Cookie.
There's a difference between resistance -- which is what the Tea Party and the like did to Obama -- and delegitimizing the elected president and using violence to silence the opposition, which is what we saw at Berkley and other places. There's a difference between Congress refusing to act on the President's preferred policies, like the Republican Congress did, and members of the "deep state" leaking classified documents to get rid of someone they don't like -- no matter how much that person deserved to go (which he did if he lied to his bosses).
The left is playing with fire, but unfortunately, I think a lot more people than just them are going to get burned before this is all over (though not literally.)
Trump should make Scott Walker Chief of Staff. This is Wisconsin all over again.
The ideal of the gentry left is a society of equally humble serfs governed by a small clique of philosopher kings - namely themselves - and they thought they had just almost reached this goal when Trump got elected and shattered their dream.
No wonder they are frustrated and angry!
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election?"
-- I don't "support" Trump because he won the election. But I support our system of governance.
I think Roy Jacobsen at 7:12 a.m. is on to something. I see a lot of people on the left whose main interest is virtue signaling to one another rather than achieving real improvements in the lives of people not like them. I'm trying to think of a really unassailable example, and perhaps other commenters can do better, but....
Should "we" (a group of committed anti-trumpers) spend our time marching against trump with clever signs, or should be spend our time volunteering to tutor high school students who are falling behind and in danger of not graduating? Individually we want to do something we think of as "being good" (either of those activities) but we also want to be seen by others of our peer group as doing good, and as being among the most committed (most extreme) of our peer group in anti-trump activities.
Politically -- as a way of appealing to those outside one's peer group -- virtue signaling is not very effective; outsiders see your behavior as silly; they don't think the Russians stole the election; they don't think that "trans rights" is a terrible social problem.
The media want an audience of soap opera women; democrats are free-riding on it, though they'd like an audience of everybody but take what they can get.
And all that time he's had the press hot to destroy him. It's just crazy! We need our President. Why are we destroying him before he even starts?
So what would you have the press do? Smile and say "maybe he has a point" when he claims, without a shred of evidence, that he won the popular vote or illegal voters were bused to New Hampshire. Ignore the increasing evidence that there were significant contacts with Russia. Ignore the chaos, nepotism, and truly scary characters, not created by the press, in the White House? Ignore the conflicts of interest, insufficient separation from his business dealings (including the fact that the second he was sworn in he was violating the terms of his GSA lease)?
Democracy is not blindly following the leader.
I don't remember you criticizing McConnell for declaring the Republican's job was to ensure that Obama was a one term president or the ascendance of the Tea Party. Protest was just fine and dandy then.
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election? "
I certainly hope not. There are other countries who had democratic elections and put an entirely unsuitable dangerous man into power. Anyone with eyes and a brain should've been able to see Trump for what he was during the campaign. If people still can't see him as he is as opposed to what they would like him to be are only hurting their own country.
Trump's missteps are not the fault of the media or the 'deep state'. They are the fault of Trump and his advisors. If you are going to claim to be the grownups then take responsibility like a grownup. There were a lot of warning signs on Flynn, no one made Trump pick him.
Robert Cook at 7:27am.
That about sums it up.
I'm not Trump and will not accept responsibility for Trump's deeds.
But you lefties seem to think anyone who doesn't work to kill Trump is responsible for Trump's deeds.
You're loony.
Robert Cook, buwaya puti, and CWJ, all met at a single point of agreement. It has been a sadly predictable wonder to behold the leviathon that is the federal bureaucracy simply defy and actively undermine its putative executive. One of a couple sources of my public demoralization.
"Protest was just fine and dandy then."
-- There's a difference between the Tea Party's protests and breaking windows and threatening gay men because you disagree with them.
Every day Obama's Organizing for Action group must send out an email with talking points. First point is always chaos.
Robert Cook- I completely agree with you.
Very good, Mr Cook.
exhelodrvr1 said...
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election? "
I hated the fact that Obama won -
(snip)
Yet when he won the election, I supported him, hoping and praying that his policies/decisions would ultimately turn out to be the correct ones for the future of the country, even if I disagreed with them
I also hoped and prayed his decisions would be the right ones. That has to come as close to support as I could manage. If support means " He is the President and I will follow his lead in all things, " then no, I didn't support Mr. Obama.
"-- There's a difference between the Tea Party's protests and breaking windows and threatening gay men because you disagree with them."
The day after the election 4 Million people took to the streets nation wide in peaceful protests in opposition to a man they see as someone who will harm this country and our democracy.
I took an Uber today because we got lots of snow and the sidewalks are a mess. I enjoyed my Uber ride. I am always excited about seeing the picture that pops up of the driver. Thinking to myself, will I do him? A large majority of them are foreign and dark skinned-yum.
My Uber driver's name was Frandy. Now looking up the origins of the name Frandy. He didn't have much of an accent. He was dark skinned, but not that hot. Also, I wouldn't do someone in the morning on a work day. There was a scent of BO in the car but not necessarily in a bad way. Not totally hot though either.
Most Uber drivers listen to NPR or International Music. I immediately loved the music he was playing and asked him who it was. The musician was Fela Kuti, from Nigeria. Now Fela Kuti is on my spotify playlist. Fela Kuti is dead.
I rated Frandy 5 stars.
Have a super day.
Elections have consequences. The stuff between elections is mostly just political theater.
Trump has destabilized the leaderless Left. So they are lashing out. After the results of the midterm elections in 2018, we'll know whether Trump is succeeding or failing.
In the interim, fill the 118 Judicial vacancies, get Gorsuch confirmed on SCOTUS, start enforcing our immigration laws, and enjoy the ride!
"The day after the election 4 Million people took to the streets nation wide in peaceful protests in opposition to a man they see as someone who will harm this country and our democracy."
-- And? That's great. They have that right; the problem is that there are plenty of people in that group who also used it as a chance to commit political violence, and general violence.
Get the people who like to beat people wearing Trump hats under control.
@Cook: Way too much honesty this early in the morning.
Well said, Cookie.
Robert Cook at 7:27am.
That about sums it up.
Robert Cook, buwaya puti, and CWJ, all met at a single point of agreement.
Robert Cook- I completely agree with you.
Very good, Mr Cook.
--------------------------------------------
Well that pretty much says it all.
"The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them."
But they can drive him out of office like they did to Nixon, particularly if he makes mis-steps.
I'm not sure this is still true. We're a different place now. Certainly The Washington Post is a different place.
It is estimated that there are only 4700 Frandy's in the world. There were 133 Frandy's born in the US between 1880 and 2015.
I met a Frandy, which is a highly unusual name.
Tommy Duncan said...
Does anyone else see irony in the fact the progressives and anarchists are protesting in support of the establishment?
Trump has come to drain the swamp and the progressives are fighting hard to maintain the status quo and prop up the (liberal) establishment.
THIS!!!^^^^
Take one simple example, the one China policy. Trump said one thing to gain 'leverage' in 'negotiations' and then just flopped on the ground like an Italian soccer player when confronted with an actual Chinese official. That's not strength, that is not negotiating, it is KAOS. Not the fault of the 'deep state' or the press or his opposition.
I didn't want Obama to win and I didn't like him, but I wanted his policies to be peacefully and lawfully contested. And yeah yeah yeah I know people say the Women's March was peaceful- but there's only so much peace in people marching down streets and saying negative things and calling for overthrow and strife. There's only so much peace when there is anger.
We need stability in our lives. The protesters know this. They want us to tire of them, so that we will beg to have *their* person win office so they will stop disrupting everything. So they will stop feeding negative headlines and creating hysteria.
This has been the way recently, right? The left protested Bush and promised if Kerry won, the world would love us again and life would be peaceful. And they did the same with Obama. Although we still had Occupy and BLM. And now they want us to know from day 1 that there will be no peace while Trump is president. But they are exhausting. I don't want to be held hostage to them for 4 years.
I'm Renfro Jeffries. Nazi And Proud Of It!.
Do you get it NOW, people? Do you get it? The Government-Media-Cosmopolitan Complex will not allow its Power to be taken away by peaceful democratic means. Your Vote meant nothing, after all: you are ruled by the Unelected Elite, and they will ignore your Will if you use only words to defend it...
Do you still believe this can be changed without Violence?
Suckers.
Enjoy the Cattle Cars...
I'm Renfro Jeffries, Nazi And Proud Of It!
I am Laslo.
Jeez he's been in office for four weeks tomorrow and his full cabinet is not yet in place. Yet he is already a failure and a danger according to the MSM.
I hope, in the next 30 days, he lays the first brick for the Wall, enacts tax simplification including repatriating the alleged $2 Trillion in foreign profits the Beltway pundits claimed was out there, cuts fed workforce by 5%, and figures out a way to reform health insurance laws so we can buy catastrophic coverage again and poor people get govt coverage for same.
That would be a good month for a new president.
Matthew Sablan said...
the problem is that there are plenty of people in that group who also used it as a chance to commit political violence, and general violence.
No arrests associated with the women's march.
The day after the election 4 Million people took to the streets nation wide in peaceful protests in opposition to a man they see as someone who will harm this country and our democracy.
Here's the thing.
That isn't special.
I thought Obama would harm this country and our democracy (and I think he did!).
I thought Hillary would harm this country and our democracy.
Your feelings aren't special. Stop thinking you are so effing special.
We need the trains to run on time!
SockPuppet#55 said...
We need the trains to tun on time!
----------------------------------
Yeah — the high-speed light-rail cattle car trains!
There's a difference between the Tea Party's protests and breaking windows and threatening gay men because you disagree with them.
Yes there is. But Ann doesn't seem to think that even peaceful protest, or the press doing its job, is reasonable.
"No arrests associated with the women's march."
-- And?
That's great. But, it is also a generic, left-leaning protest of a right/right-leaning politicians. We'd have seen those no matter who was elected. It's plebeian, expected and frankly not much of a story.
The violence is a story. That's different and matters; it needs to stop. Every other normal, every day protest is immaterial when we're discussing the problems with the protests. I don't care about waving signs and shouting as long as there's also property damage and assault. Stop that, and then maybe another generic left-wing protest rally might be news worthy as anything other than a smokescreen for violent protesters to hide behind.
Titus said...
The musician was Fela Kuti,
Good pick.
Trump didn't win the election, he only won the electoral college. Even he knows that matters, which is why Trump falsely claims he really did win but for illegal votes. Congressional Republicans, on the other hand, did win. They're the ones ousting Flynn and rejecting Puzder.
"Your feelings aren't special. Stop thinking you are so effing special".
There were plenty of Tea Party people who felt "special" enough to publicly oppose Obama, Maybee. Don't be such an effing hypocrite.
"Yes there is. But Ann doesn't seem to think that even peaceful protest, or the press doing its job, is reasonable."
-- That demonstrates a stunning inability to understand what was said. So, is it intentional or did you just skim everything?
MayBee said...
We need stability in our lives.
Then you should not have voted for Trump. Trump was quite clearly not the candidate of stability.
"Trump didn't win the election, he only won the electoral college."
-- That's how the winner is chosen. He won the election. If you want to change how we decide the winners of the elections, go ahead and consult the Constitution to figure out how to change it.
I also agree that Cook nailed it.
KAOS...interesting new trend. Presumably a Greek spelling. It looks like an acronym in all caps, but I haven't found the definition.
Freder:
I think everyone can agree the liberals and the press are in 247 freakout mode which is their right but it is not a reasoned reaction.
However, I am enjoying it immensely. I figure an increased number of fatal strokes and heart attacks may decrease liberal voter roles and that is a good thing [snarc].
>>Democracy is not blindly following the leader.
I guess it's time for another chorus of "To Sir, with love".
"No. We don't. We are not children."
That makes no sense.
What do you think the President's role is? Bringing home the bacon and teaching us self-control and character?
Maybe Obama distorted your thinking and you believe the President is there to be Daddy (or even Mommy) but in my way of looking at it, he's commander in chief of the military and taking care that that the laws be faithfully executed. If you don't think you need that, then you're the one that's a child.
Also, please note the absence of a Dem leader.
DNC Chair: Keith Ellison, a Left-wing Muslim congressman from Minnesota?
Dem front-runner in 2020: Liz Warren, a Left-wing 70-year old crotchety, old woman from Mass?
Once these two take the reigns, Trump will have two easy targets to throw a few counter-punches.
There will be a lot of teeth-gnashing and chaos and political scalping - but, on the whole, Trump is doing fine. He's certainly not out of the clear though.
Left Bank of the Charles said...
Trump didn't win the election, he only won the electoral college. ... Congressional Republicans, on the other hand, did win. They're the ones ousting Flynn and rejecting Puzder.
Trump entered office without the support of either the majority of the country or his own political party. A prudent man would have carefully solidified power during his first weeks in office,. He would have prioritized the main thing that got him elected, reversing the decline in manufacturing jobs. He did not do this, because he has no clue how to approach this problem. Not one coherent policy on manufacturing has been announced and he flopped on China.
"So what would you have the press do? Smile and say "maybe he has a point" when he claims, without a shred of evidence, that he won the popular vote or illegal voters were bused to New Hampshire. Ignore the increasing evidence that there were significant contacts with Russia. Ignore the chaos, nepotism, and truly scary characters, not created by the press, in the White House? Ignore the conflicts of interest, insufficient separation from his business dealings (including the fact that the second he was sworn in he was violating the terms of his GSA lease)? Democracy is not blindly following the leader."
I know, but the resisters and protesters are not helping him adjust to the job. They are trusting him more than I do, since they think he can get his bearings and perform even with massive interference and no support.
Let's say you needed someone to drive you somewhere in a car and he's the only one who can drive that car. If you thought he was a terrible driver, would you be more likely to yell at him and harass him?
Ann Althouse said...
you believe the President is there to be Daddy
You were the one who framed this as, "We neeeed our President". I quite clearly said I didn't.
Calls for people to stop expressing their opposition to something they see as dangerous is condescending and hypocritical. We certainly didn't hear calls for stops to the Tea Party protests after Obama was elected by the same people upset over the opposition to Trump. I know turnabout is a bitch, but this is more than simply revenge or anger over losing an election. It's about defying what we see as terribly wrong and destructive to our democracy. It's like telling people who are oppressed to just shut up and accept their situation. Not gonna happen. Not in this country.
The protestors thinks that Trump WANTS to crash the car, and they think that their screaming is going to keep people from getting in the car with him.
Ann Althouse said...
Let's say you needed someone to drive you somewhere in a car and he's the only one who can drive that car. If you thought he was a terrible driver, would you be more likely to yell at him and harass him?
Let's think of the most implausible analogy possible and force that into the argument. Not relevant.
"We certainly didn't hear calls for stops to the Tea Party protests after Obama was elected by the same people upset over the opposition to Trump."
-- No. Obama just used the power of the IRS and the entire executive branch to try and silence them. It was only a few years ago; try and remember it. People telling Trump protesters: "Stop attacking people and destroying things!" is... perfectly acceptable compared to Obama turning the government against his political enemies.
"It's like telling people who are oppressed to just shut up and accept their situation."
-- Likening those who lost a legitimate election to those who are actually oppressed is asinine. Actual oppression is not "the guy who won the election did a thing I dislike."
"Does anyone support Trump simply because he won the election?"
Yes: I did not vote for him (or for Hillary), but I support him in the sense that he should get a chance to try to do his job. As Obama would say, "I won. Deal with it." Has Trump used this line yet? He definitely should --- "Our last president was fond of saying, "I won. Deal with it." So now I'm saying the same thing. I won the right to govern -- so let me do it."
Matthew Sablan said...
Likening those who lost a legitimate election to those who are actually oppressed is asinine.
This is literally insane: won election = 'oppressed.
"I know, but the resisters and protesters are not helping him adjust to the job. They are trusting him more than I do, since they think he can get his bearings and perform even with massive interference and no support.
Let's say you needed someone to drive you somewhere in a car and he's the only one who can drive that car. If you thought he was a terrible driver, would you be more likely to yell at him and harass him?"
Being President isn't like being a reality show star. If he's not capeable of doing the job without coddling, he's not Presidential material. This is a serious job, not bean bag.
AReasonableMan said, "and he flopped on China."
What would you have him do? The one-China concept is facially stupid. Yada yada yada. Trump merely said so. What policy would you prefer? We should have the PRC take over Taiwan?
Foreign policy is where imbeciles go to die.
Robert Cook: This whole pile-on, taken in whole--the unceasing insinuations that Trump is some sort of collaborator with the "evil Russkies," and the public revelation that the Intel creeps are taking it upon themselves to withhold information from their boss--tells me that the deep state is very unhappy with Trump's propensity to go off-script and off-agenda (their agenda) and that they will not abide it. He will either play ball and be a good boy or they will destroy him.
I'm not dismayed or surprised; if the PTBs and the lackey press weren't getting nasty I'd assume Trump was just going to deliver business as usual. On the bright side, the naked PTB rage to destroy does seem to indicate that Trump really is there to fight them, instead of just being the pretend "outsider" that one would expect.
This is all getting very interesting. I'm enjoying watching progs in general (and their representatives here like Freder and ARM), going full-tilt "Establishment tool" in their acceptance and defense of the most absurd and obvious propaganda.
I'd like to pinpoint exactly when serious invocation of the "Deep State" escaped from "those kinds of web sites" into the alphabet-MSM. Seems like just the last couple of weeks, but that may just indicate my personal lack of exposure.
"Let all the poisons that lurk in the mud hatch out."
ARM,
Yes, the winners of this election sound and act like the losers.
"This is literally insane: won election = 'oppressed."
-- No one said the people who won are "oppressed." Forced starvation; rape and torture rooms; murdering political dissidents; forced abortions; genital mutilation: That's oppression.
Trump wants a guy we think isn't going to forward our policy preferences is NOT oppression.
ARM, I'm not saying that Trump isn't making missteps. Hell, he's a veritable stumblebum!
However, the suddenness and intensity of the torrent around him, the talk of investigations, the certainty with which it is repeated (without proof put before us) that "Russia intervened in our election to help Trump win," (as if we aren't always sticking our dicks into other countries' political activities, overtly and covertly), the obvious intent to have us see Trump as somehow acting in concert with malignant foreign entities, that the intel agencies are withholding intel from him, (this is the real tell), is wildly disproportionate to anything that has actually known or proven to have done. This is the deep state telling him they'll cut his balls off if he doesn't shut up and do as he's told.
Angel-Dyne said...
does seem to indicate that Trump really is there to fight them, instead of just being the pretend "outsider" that one would expect.
Occam's razor suggests that incompetence should be the first hypothesis to be tested. Does not seem that we have clearly eliminated that possibility yet. Maybe we should do that before concluding that the man that selected Puzder is an 'outsider'.
Cook and I agree for maybe the second time. I remember when Jimmy Carter was elected. I was sort of embarrassed to have him as president but I thought, "Well, maybe he has been a business man enough to know something.
He didn't but he was ambushed by that leftist Congress.
When Obama was elected, I knew he was an empty suit but I was hopeful when he had that dinner with come conservatives.
"Democracy was, purportedly, NOT accepting the governance of the man who won the election."
This is cold civil war and I just hope the GOP Congress does not completely lose its nerve.
The CIA should be cleaned out. Pompeo should just clean house down to G 8. Porter Goss could not get it to work.
Time to empty that stable. After Aldrich Ames there isn't much left.
DOW opens up 20 to 20,627. That damn Trump.
In answer to your question, yes.
ARM said:
"Trump entered office without the support of either the majority of the country or his own political party. A prudent man would have carefully solidified power during his first weeks in office,. He would have prioritized the main thing that got him elected, reversing the decline in manufacturing jobs. He did not do this, because he has no clue how to approach this problem. Not one coherent policy on manufacturing has been announced and he flopped on China."
All true. He's a fuckup, no doubt. By his own actions, in his own time, he would no doubt sabotage himself beyond repair. But this is all so much so quickly. Trump talks about working with Putin and Russia. This is his real sin. This is not on their agenda. Their agenda is to reincarnate the Soviet boogieman as existential threat to America to justify the continued expansion of the corporate/military/spy complex's budget, power, and control.
No one's memory is as bad as some of you here would like. The opposition to Obama was swift and prolonged. Expect the same or even an increased level of intensity of opposition to Trump who is 10 times worse and far more dangerous than Obama ever was.
Meanwhile CIA and NYT work overtime on new narratives. They must be really afraid of Trump using Enhanced Twitter Torture disclosures on their evil game.
DOW opens up 20 to 20,627. That damn Trump.
The Dow may never reach 20,000 again!
I didn't support President Obama's policy positions or political philosophy. I believe down to my toenails that runaway Leftism (I absolutely will not use the terms "liberalism" or "progressivism" - what the American Left seems to want is neither liberal nor progressive) is bad for both individuals and societies, so it would have been both hypocritical and willfully blind for me to hope that such policies would be successful.
But I never pulled any "not my President" garbage either. He was the President of the United States, duly elected, and - in contrast to AReasonableMan's early comment that we don't need our President because we're not children - I acknowledge that our system of governance does require an executive to balance its legislative and judicial forces, even when I disagree with the Chief Executive.
Donald Trump is the duly elected President of the United States and its chief executive. Nobody has to "give him a chance"; although the press delights in painting him as thin-skinned, he has clearly had the sturdiness of dermis over the decades to come through a whole lot of personal criticism, business downturns, unpopular decisions, apparent missteps and things portrayed as missteps, the sneering of elitists, aesthetes, and effetes, and the ordinary vagaries of family life with his good cheer and confidence intact and with a business empire that is giving the Left fits. He'll do what he does; if he fails at being President, he'll be gone in four years, and if he succeeds, he'll be gone in eight.
The thing we should be concerned about is the increasing evidence (pace Freder - there actually is increasing evidence of this, unlike what you claim there's "increasing evidence" of) that the so-called "deep state" is flexing muscles it ought not to have. As Heinlein said, "in a mature society, 'civil servant' is semantically equal to 'civil master.'" I am certain that he didn't say it approvingly; read "mature" as "decadent," and then contemplate the fact that people - including sane and reasonable people, not just silly hysterics - fret over whether their favorite coffee place has almond milk.
Shoulda quit while you were ahead, Cookie.
Robert Cook, 7:27:
Terrific comment.
- "The deep state is showing us the truth: they are in charge."
Well, they seem think they are, which is alarming enough, and are trying to prove it. I'm not sure they're right. We'll see.
Robert Cook: ARM, I'm not saying that Trump isn't making missteps. Hell, he's a veritable stumblebum!
However, the suddenness and intensity of the torrent around him, the talk of investigations, the certainty with which it is repeated (without proof put before us) that "Russia intervened in our election to help Trump win," (as if we aren't always sticking our dicks into other countries' political activities, overtly and covertly), the obvious intent to have us see Trump as somehow acting in concert with malignant foreign entities...
Precisely. (And as if a host of "malignant foreign entities" weren't always sticking their dicks into our affairs, quite overtly, to the general indifference of our now outraged MSM, those stalwart national sovereignty-loving patriots, lol.)
Regardless of what one thinks of Trump, anybody who's buying the MSM hysteria right now needs to leave the adult table. (Leaving aside those who know perfectly well it's propaganda but approve of it as a means to their ends.)
I believe down to my toenails that runaway Leftism (I absolutely will not use the terms 'liberalism' or 'progressivism' - what the American Left seems to want is neither liberal nor progressive) is bad for both individuals and societies...."
Obama was the antithesis of "runaway Leftism." He was a corporate- and Wall Street-friendly centrist, a Ward Cleaver president. We needed a man with real convictions (Obama had none) and the passion to fight for them. We got someone content to serve the oligarchs and strut as a pretend people's representative. He was a mass murderer and an enthusiastic oppressor of whistle-blowers. He was a fraud.
As to the Deep State. Maybe episodes of Yes, Minister should be required watching.
I support Trump now, I supported him in the campaign (even went to a rally), and I'll likely support him through the next eight years. I am, like all Trump supporters, not blind to his weaknesses. I don't have a middle-school need for a lord and savior, unlike those who supported Obama. I support him because he fights. I like fighters. If he quits fighting, if he caves, then it would be time for me to move on. The only mistake I've seen from him so far is his handling of Flynn. That concerns me. But the story is not fully told on that one. And I do allow missteps.
But tight he must. Mock those crocodile tears of Chuck Schumer. Issue unpopular executive orders. Ignore the media. There are many ways to fight.
I am feeling confident about our President Trump. I think that our economy will grow significantly faster, and so he will be re-elected.
Meanwhile, the Democrats' strategy for fliping back Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan and other such battleground states is to establish sanctuary cities for illegal aliens.
If the Republicans hold the Presidency for eight or more years, the Supreme Court will become very conservative.
"ARM,
Yes, the winners of this election sound and act like the losers."
And the losers of this election sound and act like lunatics.
I don't think this is going to last. As has been noted, most people are just going about their lives. Among those people the adjectives I hear most to describe the protestors and the media are "insane" and "hysterical". The Left is hemorrhaging from it's wounds but is in too great a state of shock to realize it.
Democrats have reach the point of entries into a Sad Cat Diary.
Nordstrom shares devastated!
The bureaucrats, unknown, unelected and unaccountable.
ARM (8:03) -- "No arrests associated with the women's march."
Just as their were apparently no arrests (maybe 1 at most) for the incredible destruction & violence at UC Berkeley. Doesn't mean anything.
Can someone please explain to me what the point of the big protest march in Washington was (on Inauguration Day) or the women's march, for that matter? Was it just to make the point that lots of people are angry? (we already knew that). What was it supposed to accomplish... did anyone who marched feel like something was actually accomplished (other than warm fuzzy feelings about woman-power & solidarity)?
One arm of the deep state is already preparing for the future.
Trump is winning anytime the media, academics, or federal workers says he's failing.
This sounds like a teenager writing in her diary about her parents.
It is also woefully insufficient to address the monumental existential threats Democrats confront
Ann, you captured the whole movement right there. Immaturity lasting well into adulthood. Peter Pan syndrome?
I do. There will be policy moves that I don't support, of course, but I generally support the idea that an elected president should have the powers of the presidency, and an elected Congress should have the powers of the legislature, and the judiciary should have the powers of the judicial branch (but only those powers).
Otherwise, the hapless voters don't get the experimental results that are the reason for the relative success of democratic political systems. In most ways, democratic governments are constantly more inefficient than most systems of government. But, viewed over the long term, democratic/capitalist governments are startlingly more efficient than all other systems, and that's because they have built-in experimentation and a bottom-up system of setting priorities. So they work.
That's the real evil of the jaunt into "protective" judging by Robarts and the Ninth. They have essentially decided that THIS president shouldn't have the presidential powers granted by Congress, which means no one does. A tragic error.
If Democratic functionaries can't climb off this horse, they are going to get another pasting in 2018. Then what? We need opposition for the GOP to get it to function correctly. This is my main worry.
Ann Althouse said...The protests and resistance say: We don't believe in democracy. How can you participate effectively in democracy while continually screaming that you don't accept the results of an election?
Longtime Republican Bill Krisol doesn't: @BillKristol
Obviously strongly prefer normal democratic and constitutional politics. But if it comes to it, prefer the deep state to the Trump state.
That's his tweet from Tuesday. I have to shake my head at it; I almost feel like demanding to know if the rest of the #NeverTrump group agrees. My feeling is that they probably do, but that Kristol's more willing to admit it.
Trump has a funny way of confirming the worst characterizations of his opponents. Lots of us on the right have thought of the Media as an enemy or the opposition for a long time, but with Trump the Media is congratulating itself for openly acting as the opposition. Confirmation. The Trump group ran against the Republican Establishment (whatever that is) and said that they'd rather lose elections to Democrats than see the wrong kind of Republicans win (Tea Partiers, outsider populist/pseudo-Repubs like Trump, etc). The #NeverTrump people treated that like a scurrilous, unfounded charge...but here it seems like they're confirming it.
"Oh sure, my first preference is for our nation to function as it is supposed to (as a Constitutionally-constrained democratic republic) but if the choice is between the duly-elected Trump Admin and a bunch of anonymous, unaccountable, unelected people misusing their positions (including in illegal ways) to influence policy, well, I pick the latter."
That's sick, and people really ought to disown that sentiment.
"I don't remember you criticizing McConnell for declaring the Republican's job was to ensure that Obama was a one term president.."
There is noting wrong with a one-term president. A one-term president was given his due, accepted as the true leader of the Executive Branch, and vigorously competed against at the next election.
The Dems aren't calling for that.
They want Trump to be a zero-term president. They need him removed at the earliest opportunity, as each day he is in office is too terrible to bear.
Robert Cook, I remember the first time I saw Obama - speaking at the DNC in 2004. I commented to my husband, "He's telling a Republican story; what's he doing there?" And then four years later he's running for President with all the hope&change and no administrative or executive experience. In short, yeah, you're right, he didn't preside as a "runaway Leftist" - was happy to adopt whatever position was popular with the people most likely to keep him in the White House. But at that time the runaway Leftists were (or felt they were) in the ascendant, ISTM. And certainly they are very upset at the sudden change in their fortunes now...
MaxedOutMama, what you said!
Look at that WaPo sidebar and tell me that Bannon's observation that the press are the 'opposition' isn't correct.
Blogger Mike Sylwester said...
Meanwhile, the Democrats' strategy for fliping back Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan and other such battleground states is to establish sanctuary cities for illegal aliens.
Yes, how will Ellison or Perez turn things around and win Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan and Ohio? Ohio was real bell weather. I wrote Trump off long before Nov. 9 because I knew that Ohio was must win for him, Kasich refused to help Trump, and Trump had a scant ground operation in Ohio. Trump won Ohio big. His win in Ohio was broad and deep.
Ellison has a one word response to taking back the house, senate, and presidency: Turnout!
Which is kind of like saying "winning!"
Robert Cook said...
However, the suddenness and intensity of the torrent around him, the talk of investigations, the certainty with which it is repeated (without proof put before us) that "Russia intervened in our election to help Trump win," (as if we aren't always sticking our dicks into other countries' political activities, overtly and covertly), the obvious intent to have us see Trump as somehow acting in concert with malignant foreign entities, that the intel agencies are withholding intel from him, (this is the real tell), is wildly disproportionate to anything that has actually known or proven to have done. This is the deep state telling him they'll cut his balls off if he doesn't shut up and do as he's told.
You have a reasonable point in that there is tremendous inertia in large complex bureaucracies. This is not a novel observation, it has been true since the Babylonians. Bureaucratic function, organizing resources and keeping tabs on the population, is the primary concern of the first civilizations and every subsequent civilization.
Trump must have known this. The opposition to Russia has been a right wing obsession for decades and these people are deeply entrenched in the surveillance arms of the bureaucracy. Of course there would be pushback. To not anticipate this is incompetence. And, personally I don't give a fuck about Russia, I want someone to fix our fucking trade deficit, so I am not sympathetic. When the Russians figure out how to make a product that regular people might want to buy in preference to a US product then I will care.
Meade: "And the lion will lie down with the lamb, but the lamb won’t get much sleep" --Woody Allen
"Trump's missteps are not the fault of the media or the 'deep state'. They are the fault of Trump and his advisors. If you are going to claim to be the grownups then take responsibility like a grownup. There were a lot of warning signs on Flynn, no one made Trump pick him."
Were this only about "Trump's missteps", the issue would have ended with Flynn's ouster. Trump held himself accountable and fired Flynn. The story would have died there.
The Flynn leak was to keep the Russian story alive, which is to continue to undermine the legitimacy of Trump's election. If you can't see the continuing attempt to delegitimize the duly elected leader, you are missing the larger forest for today's trees.
The famous Mitchell and Limbaugh quotes about Obama, in full context, are mild in comparison to the incendiary comments floating around since the election. The Tea Party was polite in comparison to what is going on now on college campuses and at town halls. All the talk from the left about accepting the election results was a call for everyone but progressives to sit down and shut up...chaos is what democracy looks like to them. I think people who want to drain the swamp are the most reasonable people out there and Trump is willing to do it so I support his efforts. It's a near impossible task, like ripping a bandaid off a wound that needs fresh air to heal. Success would buy our country a few more years before the implosion.
When Flynn is arrested I'll start believing the hair on fire media. So far all we know is what unelected officials have leaked, a felony, to the press, Flynn told the Russian Ambassador not to overreact to the Obama sanctions, sounds like good advice in America's interest.
"I want someone to fix our fucking trade deficit, so I am not sympathetic."
Wait ... huh?
My 401k is up $17,000 since Nov.9.
Usual caveats about Wall Street apply, but . . .
Stocks are a leading indicator. Stocks are rising because (presumably) Wall Street thinks that it is looking at Trump increasing GDP growth and reducing taxes.
Wall Street doesn't think Trump is going anywhere, and Wall Street thinks Trump will govern as a Republican, and not Caligula.
Known Unknown said...
Wait ... huh?
The argument for Trump was that he was going to fix manufacturing, the thing that made America great last time. Why is he screwing around with all this other nonsense? Because he doesn't have a clue.
AReasonableMan,
Keep on saying "he doesn't have a clue". It's hilarious.
Meanwhile, the whole Flynn-Russia narrative is collapsing. Just like almost every other tempest in a teapot the MSM has stirred up in the last month. They just can't help themselves.
https://pjmedia.com/homeland-security/2017/02/15/medias-flynn-russia-narrative-quickly-collapsing-as-fbi-reportedly-clears-former-national-security-adviser/
"Trump must have known this. The opposition to Russia has been a right wing obsession for decades and these people are deeply entrenched in the surveillance arms of the bureaucracy. Of course there would be pushback. To not anticipate this is incompetence. And, personally I don't give a fuck about Russia, I want someone to fix our fucking trade deficit, so I am not sympathetic. When the Russians figure out how to make a product that regular people might want to buy in preference to a US product then I will care."
We should try to work with rather than against Russia. Continuing or increasing our belligerence toward Russia increases the potential for full-blown war between us, bringing possibly apocalyptic global devastation.
The frightening thing about this is what it tell us: if a smart, capable person actually fit for office becomes chief executive and wants to actually work to improve the lot of we, the people, (which would require that he or she make decisions and work with Congress to effect policies that would be inimical to the corporate/military/spy complex's interests), the deep state will act similarly to hamstring that person. In fact, the smarter and more capable that person seems, the more committed he or she to bring about real change, the more swiftly and brutally they will assert themselves.
Oh shit! Chuck Schumer" and Joe Scarboro's nuts just shrunk up into their stomachs, FBI clears Flynn. No collusion, was cooperative and forthright in interviews, no laws broken.
Now is the time to rat fuck the leakers, grand jury anyone? Put everyone in the evidence chain that had access to the recorded conversation on the stand. Then Scooter Libby the the liars and charge the culprits with the Espionage Act.
The argument for Trump was that he was going to fix manufacturing, the thing that made America great last time.
Do you think might be oversimplifying just a smidge there, ARM?
I thought Trump was all about rounding up illegals, making money off the presidency, and making women wear short skirts so it's easier to grab their pussies.
If Trump managed to actually formulate an industrial policy, much less implement it, he will have done more for industry than any other president in the last 50 years.
Someone please tell the former CIA director John Brennan, former director of National Intelligence Jim Clapper, and former deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes to buy heavy sweaters, it gets cold in Leavenworth Kansas.
Robert Cook said...
We should try to work with rather than against Russia. Continuing or increasing our belligerence toward Russia increases the potential for full-blown war between us, bringing possibly apocalyptic global devastation.
I know a surprising number of Russians (for the obvious reason, they all left Russia) and am very sympathetic to the Russian people. But, Putin has made dealing with Russia a nightmare. Merkel started off sympathetic to Russia, she is no longer. I agree that we should avoid being unnecessarily belligerent, but to expect comity with Russia under the current leadership is, I think, naive.
"In fact, the smarter and more capable that person seems, the more committed he or she to bring about real change, the more swiftly and brutally they will assert themselves."
This sounds a bit like buwaya, that we are dealing with supermen. I think inertia explains most of the known phenomena with incompetence accounting for the rest.
"No collusion, was cooperative and forthright in interviews, no laws broken."
-- Shame he lied about it then. If he'd been honest, maybe he could've held on.
"Oh shit! Chuck Schumer" and Joe Scarboro's nuts just shrunk up into their stomachs, FBI clears Flynn. No collusion, was cooperative and forthright in interviews, no laws broken."
Elijah Cummings hardest hit.
I'm sure Cummings will be eager for hearings to find the leaker, however.
Well done, Robert Cook. Who says Trump can't bring us together when so many conservatives find themselves agreeing with Robert Cook instead of Bill Kristol?
But possibly this "deep state" opposition from the intell community might be a little less than it seems just as "Top Management resigns at State Department" did not mean what it seemed to mean. Possibly the two cases are exactly analogous. The "Top Management" were a small group of administrators in one certain department who were deeply concerned in the Benghazi debacle and facing deep trouble from Trump. It may be that similarly within the CIA those people who have been twisting intell to suit Obama are now facing exposure. And it maybe that those exact people (who are no doubt high up) are now racing to prepare a dossier that suggests a "Russian Connection" in an "election hack" because those exact people covered up intell on a Russian connection with the Iran nuclear deal and, in fact, covered up important intell on the whole Iran deal. And Flynn perhaps was more aware than most of who they are - but anyone Trump sends in will find them out.
As has been said - find out who got Flynn and you will know who is trying to get Trump. Fire them.
I see the left retreating in increasing desperation through prepared defenses - elect Hillary, change the Electoral College, demonstrate in the streets, put a Muslim in as head of the DNC, resurrect Hillary. Then, last and most terrible, use "the CIA" to discredit Trump leading to impeachment.
This last, The Nixon Move, is what's coming next which why they now say Nixon, nor Hitler as Ann pointed out yesterday. It is so sinister sounding: An intelligence coup led by the secret police of the deep state. Yet it maybe that the truth is: use Obama's CIA lackey faction to produce a false report stamped "CIA Report" and try to stampede people into believing it by using the lackey media screech turned up to eleven before other forces can get the truth out. It must be done before Trump's people can sort out the CIA and NSA - it must be done soon.
So be careful. A lackey is a lackey is a lackey. Resist we much.
AReasonableMan said...You have a reasonable point in that there is tremendous inertia in large complex bureaucracies. This is not a novel observation, it has been true since the Babylonians. Bureaucratic function, organizing resources and keeping tabs on the population, is the primary concern of the first civilizations and every subsequent civilization.
That's not wrong, ARM, but it's incomplete--incomplete to the point of misleading. Inertia is ideologically empty--it's just the weather, man, it doesn't favor one side or another. What we're witnessing has a distinctly ideological and strongly partisan flavor. I don't think it's primarily right-wingers, ARM; at best it might be an alliance between right-wing GOP Establishment types (possibly neocons as you seem to imply) and left-wing Obama-era people.
I doubt there are many righties in the State Dept, nor in the actual bureaucracy of many of the agencies (intelligence agencies included). I admit that's mostly a feeling/assumption on my part, though.
"The argument for Trump was that he was going to fix manufacturing, the thing that made America great last time. Why is he screwing around with all this other nonsense? Because he doesn't have a clue"
And has failed to do so in four weeks. Damn him!
Where oh where are the "Democrats pounce on Trump missteps" and "Democrats Risk Backlash for Overblown Rhetoric" or "Democrats Face Possible Backlash Against Partisan Overreach" headlines? Suddenly the Media has forgotten that particular narrative, huh? Weird.
I still maintain that the democrat party is the most dangerous organization in america at the moment. They are just about openly promoting armed resistance and stopping the governance of the country. Because of their butt-hurt.
AReasonableMan said...This sounds a bit like buwaya, that we are dealing with supermen. I think inertia explains most of the known phenomena with incompetence accounting for the rest.
In the interests of agreement I propose it's a combination of: 1.)Ideological and/or partisan employees who 2.) are self-interested and want to pursue their own goals and the goals of their department (irrespective of the current Admin, etc) so they're 3.) resistant to any change they dislike or feel threatened by and as such 4.) act against those threats by failing to comply or outright resisting (#Resistance) the will of the Administration, plus even when they agree they are reluctant to change their ways due to laziness, but they are 6.) not without their own flaws/shortcomings so sometimes they just screw up.
That recognizes their ideological and/or partisan bent, puts their motivation down to something human/believable (as opposed to some dastardly cartoon villany), accounts for the institutional inertia you highlight and also includes an allowance for actual mistakes.
What do you think?
Their agenda is to reincarnate the Soviet boogieman as existential threat to America to justify the continued expansion of the corporate/military/spy complex's budget, power, and control.
Cookie, that's three times I agree with you. Cut it out !
That complex is also called "The Deep State."
The military below general is our best institution. Once they get to O-7, they are no longer trustworthy in general. A few are, like McChrystal, which is why Obama fired him. Too much truth about what a klutz Obama was.
Petraeus might have been but he seems to have gotten corrupted.
I doubt there are many righties in the State Dept,
You might look here. There aren't that many but those that are post comments there.
not without their own flaws/shortcomings so sometimes they just screw up.
Talk to someone who has gone between private industry and government. It's like downshifting gears.
"The day after the election 4 Million people took to the streets nation wide in peaceful protests in opposition to a man they see as someone who will harm this country and our democracy."
The day after the election ... an election where Trump was expected to lose, and where no one knew he had won until late Tuesday night. That very Wednesday, mere hours later, millions spontaneously took to the streets without any organization or promoting. Uh huh.
4 million people ... the equivalent of entire state of Oregon. Uh huh.
Took to the streets ... because they all had no job or there was no work to be done on a Wednesday. Uh huh.
Peaceful protests ... even the MSM won't claim anything beyond mostly peaceful protests.
When the truth doesn't fit the legend. Print the legend.
You'd think a few Dumbocrat politicians would think about their constituents and be responsive. I guess it doesn't dawn on them how they got Trump.
There were plenty of Tea Party people who felt "special" enough to publicly oppose Obama, Maybee. Don't be such an effing hypocrite.
First of all, what does "publicly oppose" even mean? You say out loud you don't like someone? You write against them? You protest?
Second, I wasn't involved in the Tea Party, so you have no grounds to call me a hypocrite.
As for the Tea Party, they were protesting a particular policy proposal. They didn't show up at Obama's inauguration, or the day after. They didn't show up at the hearings for his cabinet nominees. They didn't want Obama to screw up the insurance marketplace (which he did).
The "women's march" wasn't for or against a particular policy. It was just to let their feelings known. Whoop-di-doo.
Finally, hearing about the Tea Party is starting to sound like the Dixie Chicks. Since the Tea Party, the left has had Occupy and BLM protests. The "Women's" March. And yet the left has this one thing to point to- the Tea Party.
Hint: Things are more memorable when they are more rare. If you protest everything, you are protesting nothing.
"You'd think a few Dumbocrat politicians would think about their constituents and be responsive. I guess it doesn't dawn on them how they got Trump."
Yes! "It was the Russkies!!!"
Oh, I missed more protests! There were also the protests in California and Chicago to shut down Trump campaign rallies.
So yeah, all these people all these times feel their feelings are sooooo important they have to shut things down with their voices. It isn't working. You know why? Because your feelings are not more important than the people who disagree with you and quietly stay home.
"They are trusting him more than I do, since they think he can get his bearings and perform even with massive interference and no support." Huh? Here we are coasting along, being all reasonably analytical, not taking any BS from anybody, and then this: that "they" think he "can get his bearings and perform." What evidence is there, pray tell, that "they" think any such thing?
AReasonableMan said...
"Ann Althouse said...
We need our President.
No. We don't. We are not children."
Said the guy who went all in on Obama care and gun control.
Other than that.
Totally credible.
Thank you, Cookie.
If you're not children, stop acting like it.
The press isn't doing their job.
NBC tweeted it won't be inviting KAC on any more.
How did they treat Valerie Jarrett? A day in the life.
The left wants to wear me down? I'm a parent.
But when I'm worn down, I don't listen and have said, there's the door -- good luck. Don't let it hit you on the way out.
We have a teenager and still use go to your room.
Banished, banished, banished.
Good point Sebastian,
AA:"They are trusting him more than I do, since they think he can get his bearings and perform even with massive interference and no support."
Sebastian:"Huh? Here we are coasting along, being all reasonably analytical, not taking any BS from anybody, and then this: that "they" think he "can get his bearings and perform." What evidence is there, pray tell, that "they" think any such thing?"
That was wishful thinking. No one I know thinks he will ever be capable of doing the job of being President. No amount of support from us will make him capable of doing the job and nobody voted for a President Bannon.
Althouse: " Remember all the talk about the "peaceful transfer of power" about a month ago? What bullshit!"
No kidding!!
Why does Seeing Red put so many extra line breaks in her comment?
Let's not forget that there is no doubt whatsoever that Hillary Clinton is a grifter, a criminal and a traitor aided and abetted by Barack Obama. Therefore if any of the supposed Russian hacking is actually true and resulted in the election loss of the grifter, criminal and traitor then Vladimir Putin deserves the Medal of Freedom.
The Deep State is right to be worried. A lot of it's minions could be facing prison sentences.
But they should take comfort in the knowledge that Trump isn't an autocrat say like Stalin. Otherwise they would be sentenced to forever at a hard labor camp in the interior of Alaska. If they were lucky.
"Trump didn't win the election, he only won the electoral college."
New England didn't win the Superbowl, they only scored the most points.
Likening those who lost a legitimate election to those who are actually oppressed is asinine.
But to the Left, losing an election is oppression, and any election a Lefty loses cannot be legitimate.
No, losing an election isn't oppression. It's who sits in the seat of power and his misuse of that power that creates oppresion. Thank goodness for our Judicial branch as a check on that power.
The purpose of the Leninist vanguard party is to establish a democratic dictatorship of the proletariat. What could be more democratic than that?
Just as a mentally ill individual may be too impaired to recognize the need for treatment, a people afflicted with false consciousness aren't truly self-governing when they act upon this false consciousness and thus fail to recognize their true needs.
Isn't that what Thomas Frank found was the matter with Kansas? Well, now it's the sequel: What's the Matter With The American electorate?
Judging by the "color of his skin", deeply pessimistic.
Judging by the "content of his character", cautiously optimistic.
I guess many boys and girls want Hope and Change, abortion chambers, wage social justice, refugee crises, and redistributive change.
Revitalization. Rehabilitation. Reconciliation.
Make life, not abortion.
"What's the Matter With The American electorate?"
There are two electorates. One is California coastal counties and New York City.
The other is the rest of the country. Hillary won California by 4.8 million votes.
She lost the rest of the country by 2 million.
The opposition to Russia has been a right wing obsession for decades
Well you see there was this little thing called the Cold War and the attempt by the Communists to conqueror the world.....
Original Mike said...
"I'm sure Cummings will be eager for hearings to find the leaker, however."
It's been reported that Flynn spit in Cummings' face as he walked out the door. ;-)
"It's been reported that Flynn spit in Cummings' face as he walked out the door. ;-)"
$100,000 for anybody who has video evidence!
rehajm: "Shoulda quit while you were ahead, Cookie"
I take a back seat to no one in challenging and going after Cookie.
But we have truly reached a breaking point now and we are going to find out if it's even possible anymore for the people, thru their elected representatives, to wield power or if we have crossed a key threshold in the consolidation of power by the deep state.
It took about a hundred years to get here.
Individuals willing to confront this absolute reality cross all ideological lines as evidenced by the comments today.
ARM purposely mislabels this as bureaucratic inertia, hilariously so. This isn't inertia. It's clear and open political warfare pitting the Deep State and it's establishment allies, which are numerous, against a disruptor with flaws and some strengths.
The election should have been Sanders vs Trump and it would have been had the Dems not hacked their own electuon.
So here we are and the honest liberals and some leftists recognize the dangers along with many libertarians and conservatives.
Both parties bear responsibility for this current architecture and we will see if this new and unique populist political movement can create the enduring changes necessary for the people to reclaim power over their government.
HoodlumDoodlum: That's not wrong, ARM, but it's incomplete--incomplete to the point of misleading. Inertia is ideologically empty--it's just the weather, man, it doesn't favor one side or another. What we're witnessing has a distinctly ideological and strongly partisan flavor. I don't think it's primarily right-wingers, ARM; at best it might be an alliance between right-wing GOP Establishment types (possibly neocons as you seem to imply) and left-wing Obama-era people.
I doubt there are many righties in the State Dept, nor in the actual bureaucracy of many of the agencies (intelligence agencies included). [emphasis added]
I think "globalist vs. nationalist" covers this better than thinking in terms of some sort of GOPe/Dem alliance, since this pattern isn't U.S.-specific. There never was any difference among neo-cons, GOPe-ers, and Dems, as far as commitment to the "neoliberal world order" was concerned.
Trump wants us to cooperate militarily with Russia to fight Islamic Terrorism. Looks like Secretary Mattis thinks it's a bad idea. Thank goodness. Should we "support" Trump's desire to join with Russia in military action in Syria? No, we will not support Trump and his plans with cooperation with Putin anytime soon.
"BRUSSELS — The U.S. is not ready to collaborate militarily with Russia, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Thursday, appearing to close the door for now on any effort to work more closely with Moscow in the fight against Islamic State militants in Syria.
His blunt rejection came after Russian President Vladimir Putin called for increased intelligence cooperation with the U.S. and NATO, and it makes such coordination less likely at least in the near future. Mattis followed his dismissal with a sharp assessment of Russia's alleged election meddling, saying there is "very little doubt that they have either interfered or they have attempted to interfere in a number of elections in the democracies."
His comments raised questions about the Trump administration's policies on Russia. As a candidate, President Trump repeatedly praised Putin, saying he wanted a new era of cooperation with Moscow.
Political leaders, Mattis said, will seek "a way forward where Russia, living up to its commitments, will return to a partnership of sorts here with NATO. But Russia is going to have to prove itself first."
http://www.militarytimes.com/articles/mattis-us-not-ready-to-collaborate-militarily-with-russia
Cookie rightly observes: Their agenda is to reincarnate the Soviet boogieman as existential threat to America to justify the continued expansion of the corporate/military/spy complex's budget, power, and control.
Exactly! This is so entrenched that it will take more than an EO to dislodge it. The power players in this game will stop at nothing to maintain their positions. And so many of our congressmen are on their payroll that they won't cooperate, either.
Gahrie to Arm:
"The opposition to Russia has been a right wing obsession for decades"
Well you see there was this little thing called the Cold War and the attempt by the Communists to conqueror the world.....
But this isn't your father's Cold War, and ARM is being his usual disingenuous self by implying that this is just pushback from old-school "right-wing" Cold Warriors -- as if the MSM would be hysterically flogging the Russkies-under-the-bed narrative for the benefit of, and in alliance with, entrenched "right wing bureaucrats". Neocons, yes, but they're a different kettle of (stinking) fish, whom the rise of Trump has compelled to quit play-acting as "conservatives" and scurry back to the (Hillary supporting) neoliberal corner where they belong.
Don't get me wrong. I support beefing up our military and maximizing our security forces. But so many of these military contracts are boondoggles. At least Trump tends to look at the invoice. I don't think very many US Presidents were ever concerned with how much taxpayers were being ripped off.
I'm always willing to give the President-elect a *chance* to prove himself, even if I did not vote for him.
In 2008-2009, unlike Rush Limbaugh, I was *not* hoping that Obama would fail, even though I had voted for McCain.
Well, I certainly was hoping he would fail in making his vision of America a reality; in fact, I worked against it. I did not believe our country needed fundamental and foundational change, in particular the kind of change he was aiming for. That doesn't mean I didn't accept his legitimacy. I judged his policies, politics and ideology insupportable, not him.
I'm not sure what it means to "support" Trump "simply because he won the election." I certainly support his legitimacy. I support his right to attempt to fulfill his campaign promises and accomplish his policy goals. And when I share them, I'll support those goals as well. That's the best I can do.
ARM purposely mislabels this as bureaucratic inertia, hilariously so. This isn't inertia. It's clear and open political warfare pitting the Deep State and it's establishment allies, which are numerous, against a disruptor with flaws and some strengths.
Yes, the bureaucratic inertia is lower in the feeding order. The little people down the scale just do their jobs the way they have always done them. At about half the speed necessary in the private sector.
The top echelon has all the perks and is not about to give them up. Hence the near shooting war with Trump and Flynn.
I just read a very good book about people who really do the heavy lifting in defense.
It's called "Hunter Killer."
Those are the guys at the pointy end of the spear.
"I support beefing up our military and maximizing our security forces."
Why? For what need? We already spend more on our military budget than all or nearly all of the other countries in the world combined. If we cut our War Department expenditures in half we'd still be spending more than any other single country. And we're not even facing any great national armies! All the wars we've started in the Middle East simply kill others elsewhere and take money out of our pockets to do it.
"But so many of these military contracts are boondoggles."
This is what it's all about. By conditioning the American people to be fearful that at any minute the "terrorists" are going to kill us, (less likely by far than dying from lightning strike), they can keep asking for and receiving death-budget increases. The military becomes more important and powerful and the makers of mass murder implements grow corpulent off the death of others. Of course, people will get tired of the "terrorist" boogey-man, as it's becoming apparent people living on Main Street USA are not going to wake up with an ISIS militia outside in the town square. So...RUSSIA!
Every dollar going to the USA Death Machine is taken away from other more necessary expenditures domestically that would benefit Americans. Oh! But "we can't afford it!"
@ Robert Cook
Lightening is not trying to kill me. Lightening does not intend to increase the
We already spend more on our military budget than all or nearly all of the other countries in the world combined.
I guess this the end of our agreement. I was getting worried.
A huge chunk of the defense budget is salaries and pensions. Hardware is being starved when the people we do have can't train.
The second reason is that, like it or not, we are the world's policeman.
Just as the British Navy was before 1914 drained them.
Why are you such an autocrat? The results were the results and the minority got what they wanted. "Support" should pertain or not pertain to his actions. You seem to be against the idea of even being able to evaluate what he does or says. The fact that he's found lacking isn't something you need to be offended by. Is there something that's preventing you from trying to understand what the majority of the hiring committee isn't going for, or why? In what other job do the bosses doing the hiring (in this case, the people) decide that evaluation of the new hire is forbidden? Most jobs actually have a 90-day probation period. If private sector practices actually were allowed to apply to Trump, it appears he'd be let go for all the chaos and unnecessary conflict he's caused.
This tells us that any independent person in that office, anyone who might actuall try to act for the people's benefit (not that I believe Trump will) and not for the agenda of the corporate/military/spy complex, would be similarly taken down. The deep state is showing us the truth: they are in charge.
After 9/11? I sure fucking hope so. You honestly think one blustering idiot can re-do all our intelligence infrastructure in his own image? Or do away with it entirely, as you seem to think he should? That's how 9/11 happened.
After WWII we made a choice; we were not going to be relegated back to junior-level nation-state status. That doesn't mean that we have to fight every war - overt or covert - or approve every mission. But we made damn sure that we had the infrastructure that the protection of hundreds of millions of people required. War and peace decisions might be easier and less complex than they're made out to be. But intelligence isn't. It has rightly become, what actual conservatives used to quaintly call an "institution." Something that contributed to our safety and stability and was therefore worth preserving.
Trump has to accept that there is good advice out there to hear out, and if he had a brain he would tune out what's an overreach or doesn't work. But to shun and belittle an important institution in its entirety isn't conservative or liberal. It's Leninist, as his boss Steve Bannon rightly called it.
It you people want to dismantle our successful infrastructure of espionage, along with all the others, then what you have to admit is that it's not the 1950s you want to return to, but the 1920s. Or the 1890s. Either way, it was America as a third-rate power that couldn't adequately defend itself.
When Obama pared back the military you didn't complain. If you want a lighter state, do what he said and define your GDP percentage for government. All else is bluster because it's just a never-ending bar that you'll never reach.
And don't worry about Trump making the state less corporatist. He's got a corporatist in virtually every cabinet nomination. This will not be a pro-worker administration - except to the marginal extent that we can get Americans to pick a few more of the berries that all the Mexicans who didn't flee the country under Obama might still do so now.
Embrace rationality. Just admit that you view statelessness as an achievable utopia. You wouldn't fear government of the people however if you just bothered to fear the people less.
Michael K said...
. . .
Just as the British Navy was before 1914 drained them.
It wasn't WWI, but the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922 that killed British power on the seas, and eventually the British Empire. Though w/o WWI there wouldn't have been a Washington Naval Treaty.
Although not so simple, you see, the author of the URL below supports Trump because of the effects of the election.
http://nypost.com/2017/02/11/im-a-gay-new-yorker-and-im-coming-out-as-a-conservative/
"And we're not even facing any great national armies! "
Lincoln considered us, ourselves, a great national army did he not, at least in part?
You certainly aren't, a great national army that is, but others in combinations have differing vantages and views. As a spokesman for them all and beyond, trust in me I speak by, and I hope to conclude accurately someday through, them, those others.
Define division by 10,000 armed Americans with a Catholic circumference backgrounded and Lenin would have shit himself upon cogent sans-evil analysis, were the evil socialist shitbag capable.
Their, those foreign and indeed also not, armie's views the include with a reverence literal fecundity and are therefore superior long-term to any Robert Cook views, hence Africa will be in this century as foretold the land of the superior genes according to my misinterpretation of Chuck Darwin.
I consider all typos Freudian slips: any recognition other than my interpretation is an attack on my dignity as a human being. This is thought/type crime as modeled by the documented learning/performance distinction.
For shame.
With forever always that typed and published, or activated as you like, that last paragraph, especially, was incoherent. And unintelligible if I be using the proper meaning of the terms.
If God didn't will it, some attorney lost a huge payday.
"...like it or not, we are the world's policeman.
'Just as the British Navy was before 1914 drained them."
No, we're not the world's policeman. We're trying to be the world's overseer.
The British Navy before 1914 was manifestation of Britain's trying to be the world's overseer when they were the predominant global empire. It was all about protecting their assets and acquiring more, as it is with us. Their day ended, as they do for all empires....
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