Here is my question: How many ridiculous gaffes is one candidate allowed to make before they must quit?
Tag: politics
An important reminder from Theodore Roosevelt
Trump, who cannot stand criticism, and his sycophantic lackeys like to claim that criticizing the president (when that president is Trump) is unpatriotic, even treasonous. This is of course, bullshit.
Theodore Roosevelt was the 26th president of the United States. In an editorial, this is what he had to say about criticizing the president:
The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the Nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else.
— The Kansas City Star, 7 May 1918
This is just one example of why TR is regarded as one of our greatest presidents, and Trump will be seen as one of, if not the, worst.
Trump’s racism spreading faster than flesh-eating bacteria
Today Trump held another white-nationalist pep rally in North Carolina and ended up with a crowd chanting “send her back” as he ranted against The Squad. This is only going to get uglier.
How long until we start seeing hundreds of pointy white hats in the stands?
Of course it can get worse.
I mean, we’re talking Donald Trump here. There is no limit to how low he will go with his racist, white-nationalist rhetoric. If the House of Representatives actually gets around to passing a resolution condemning his latest attacks against the Congresswomen he hates so much, he will only turn up the volume and throw more verbal red meat to his base.
At this rate, we are likely only days (if not hours) away from Trump openly stating that he wants all non-whites to “go back where they came from.” And Tim Scott will probably applaud.
Trump and his toadies think it is OK to ignore the U.S. Supreme Court
Please see the linked article. Trump and Barr don’t like a Supreme Court ruling, so they propose to simply ignore it. This cannot be allowed to stand.
What would be worse than 8 years of Trump as President?
How about even more years? So, the would-be dictator for life has again dropped a hint (threat?) about his potential endgame. As reported by multiple news outlets, Trump said this on his Twitter feed: “at the end of 6 years, after America has been made GREAT again and I leave the beautiful White House (do you think the people would demand that I stay longer? KEEP AMERICA GREAT)”
That was certainly not his first hint at wanting to stay beyond the two terms allowed by the Constitution. In March, 2018 Trump, at a Republican fund-raising lunch, while commenting on Chinese President Xi Jinping’s recent consolidation of power he said, “He’s now president for life. President for life. And he’s great.” Adding, “I think it’s great. Maybe we’ll give that a shot someday.”
Now famously, former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen, testified to the House oversight committee earlier this year that he believes “there will never be a peaceful transition of power” if Trump loses in 2020.
If Mike Pence thinks being Vice President will be a stepping stone to his own turn as President, he has another think coming. Trump is likely to only reliquish power to Don Jr. or to his incest-fantasy daughter Ivanka.
Getting in on the ground floor of the slow-moving coup
On May 1, 2019, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff appeared on the MSNBC program The Last Word discussing Attorney General William Barr and mused, “Why someone at this point in their career would be willing to sacrifice his integrity, his reputation, everything in the service of this unethical president will forever be a mystery to me. But he’s not alone. Obviously, there are many others around Trump who are doing the same thing.”
Hmmm. With all due respect to Congressman Schiff, I don’t find it a mystery. But the subject he brings up is important. Don’t wander off, let me mention something else.
Over the last couple years Bill Maher has entertained and frightened us with his Dictator Checklist and all the boxes Trump checks. Since 2016 Maher has also been talking about what he sees as a slow-moving coup d’état being perpetrated by Trump and his gang of cronies and sycophants. There is a lot to be said for Maher’s theory. Especially in light of the afore-mentioned checklist and the actions and appointments of his administration.
So what if Maher and others are right, that Trump and his enablers are in fact deliberately undermining the U.S. system of government? Let’s be honest here, there is no shortage of people who would welcome, embrace, and help enforce the kind of intolerant, racist, misogynistic, trample-on-the-99% world Trump inhabits in his head. So, if you’re a Giuliani, or a Barr, or a Kushner, or anybody else who seeks to have power over the masses; and if you also are comfortable in the idea of a Trumpist homeland; why wouldn’t you want to be part of the power-grab. Of course you would want to be in on the ground floor. You don’t need to be part of a name-brand alt-right organization to want to be running the show in the kind of future they espouse.
If you are a Trumpist and you believe an authoritarian regime is going to take over, you will want to run the equivalent of the Stasi or the Gestapo or the FSB or the State Security Department rather than be a target of such an organization. You will want to run the War Department or the State Department so you can be an extension of the great leader’s will. It’s either join the regime or be crushed by it. And so, the Trump True Believers™ gather around their shining leader; excusing, defending, enabling, and empowering him; so that they can share in the exercise of that power over those they disdain and despise.
And that, to me, is the essential answer to Schiff’s mystery. Not a mystery at all. Just Trumpist assholes looking out for themselves and their ticket to giving the rest of us our marching orders.
