President Trump: The NEW one and only politics thread

Very fine people think differently.

 

The only thing that's the end of the world is the end of the world. If that's the bar we're setting, and everything below that is okay, then fine. But sometimes things can also just be shitty, and they should be called shitty.

I agree with you that overreactions do us no favours. But I think sometimes you see almost any reaction as an overreaction. "Trump is a buffoon, and America is resilient, so why worry what he does?" I feel like not reacting is an underreaction. "Trump is the president, and America is fragile, so of course I care what he does."

Again, it's just two different ways of thinking.

EDIT: And as I think about it, I'm not sure which is more optimistic and which is more pessimistic.

 

No.

Five Pillars of Islam - Wikipedia

 

Carlos Beltran will skip Astros' White House visit but not to protest Trump

 

Keep working on justifying that vote, QY! If you tell yourself that the other side is worse often enough, you may actually start to believe it! It's clear you appreciate a good lie, even if it is one you tell yourself.

 

Neither do most of the people criticizing it, but you just keep telling that lie to yourself and everybody else.

 

https://pagesix.com/2018/02/05/christie-brinkley-says-trump-tried-to-woo-her-while-married-to-ivana/

“My phone rings and this guy goes, ‘Hey, Christie, it’s The Donald.’ I say, ‘Hi, Billy,’ because I was dating Billy [Joel] at the time. But the voice goes, ‘No, no. It’s The Donald! … I hear you’re leaving for Aspen tomorrow. I am too. I’d like to give you a ride on my private jet.’”

Brinkley continued, “So I reply, ‘Thank you, but I have already arranged my flights.’ I knew he was married, and there he was asking me to go on his plane. He was kind of flirty about it. He was out chasing skirts.”

She added, “I’m done being discreet. I’ve had dinner with him. I’ve always found him smarmy, as in, ‘Watch out, part the waves, the rich people are coming, everything is gold, solid 24-carat gold, the best, the greatest, nobody else has more gold on anything in their house than me. Did you bring a brush? Let’s gold-leaf it!’ ”

 

The real category error here is responding to Trump as if he were a familiar political type doing familiar political things. He is not. He is a singularity in the history of the republic.

 

But it was only fantasy
The wall wasn't too high
As you can see
No matter how he tried
He could not break free
And the bots ate into his brain

 

Problem is when every politician is viewed as shitty, or politics in general are.

That's how Trump. He's the devil, he repeatedly shows you that he is, but he's just being honest while the rest lie about being devils. Then, at the very least, he promises to be America's devil. It has a certain appeal. His voters expected him to break the good dishes. They wanted him to. That's how they worked out their cynicism for the system. That late-night comedians, actors and academics - no less cynical, just about other candidates and issues - didn't like it was even more of the appeal. I have a cousin who literally didn't know what he'd do until he gets in the booth sees the names and says "fuck it, why not?"

That's a marker of how much the American presidency had been devalued.

 

Politics and politicians are shitty. You’ll get no argument from me that Trump’s among the absolute worst in the lot, but the best of ‘em ain’t exactly angel’s wings material, either.

 

In my experience, many pols of both parties get into politics to do what they believe is right, then succumb to the frustrations of working in a system deliberately designed to make it very difficult to do anything. That is one of the genius aspects of the Constitution, but is hard on the people we hire to administer our government. It's a built-in incentive for them to eventually put self-interest first.