Home » Trump, Clinton, Obama: chaos is the new normal

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Trump, Clinton, Obama: chaos is the new normal — 133 Comments

  1. This is my other grudge against Trump.

    No, I don’t think Trump’s lies are worse than Obama’s and Hillary’s, but given the “Democrats-with-bylines” character of the national media, which is no mystery to anyone on our side including Trump himself, that it is doubly, trebly, quadruply important for the Republican candidate not to crush the news cycle with his latest foot-in-mouth gaffe.

    Trump does this repeatedly and every time it’s money in the bank and votes in the ballot box for the Democrats.

    It’s crazy to blame Trump’s falling numbers on David French and Jonah Goldberg at National Review because they continue to write NeverTrump pieces.

  2. But no matter what happens there is always enough ammunition left to shoot the messengers.

  3. I think that these people, particularly Clinton and Obama, lie simply because they can. As the corrupt Senator Roark says in Sin City:

    ” Power don’t come from a badge or a gun. Power comes from lying. Lying big and gettin’ the whole damn world to play along with you. Once you’ve got everybody agreeing with what they know in their hearts ain’t true, you’ve got ’em by the balls.”

  4. I’m confused, perhaps, but Trump’s comments on Japan strike me as ruminations, not policy recommendations.

    Ruminations usually precede decisions but do not indicate what the nature of those decisions will be.

    That I verbally (and internally) ruminate about an unhappy marriage does not mean I will file for divorce, for example.

    I for one prefer ruminations out loud to the lies and prevarications that are a normal part of Democratic speech.

  5. I guess the fact that Trump is right about Japan (though admittedly poorly stated) and that Hillary’s proposals MUST raise taxes on the middle class, furthering it’s decline… is of much less importance than his fumbling the pointing out of those inconvenient truths.

  6. As to how much weight to give to ruminations, I would say that anything that a Presidential candidate says publicly during a campaign must be interpreted as potential policy. Otherwise what part of what the candidate says would you consider to be serious? Where would you draw the line?

    One can debate whether there is merit to Trump’s “ruminations”. In any case, I don’t see how anyone can defend his making them in “shot from the hip fashion” at this time. If he felt that he had to make a statement, a simple “these matters will be negotiated between friends in light of changing circumstances at the appropriate time” would suffice. There is no need to insult and alarm friends and allies. Unfortunately, this has become a trade mark. His ludicrous behavior is only defensible when compared to HRC; but, we have discussed that at length.

  7. So Donald Trump again shoots from the hip on an examined policy issue and thats somehow supposed to be a plus?

  8. I agree with Geoffrey. Japan was limited to assistance projects like building schools, water purification etc. during the Gulf
    War because the constitution imposed by General MacArthur took away Japan’s right to have a standing army. I believe that Abe is trying to change this part of the Japanese Constitution, but is opposed by Asian countries that suffered during WWII from Japanese domination. The request for an increase in Japanese monetary assistance has been an ongoing issue, not originating with Trump.

  9. So Donald Trump again shoots from the hip on an un-examined policy issue and thats somehow supposed to be a plus?

    I wish I would preview my stuff better, eitger that or we have an editing function available.

  10. Frog,
    On the world stage, it is probably better to ruminate in private and discuss your problems with other countries also privately. Then you can put some pressure on them without soundly like an ignorant bully to the rest of the world.
    Trump is used to making deals in boardrooms and making his threats with lawyers and lawsuits. He is out of his league on the world stage.A business associate may quietly settle the suit. A foreign leader may get kicked out of office and be replaced by someone far worse.

    WRT the chaos, this is a major argument for smaller government that is more accountable to the locals. You can see when your potholes aren’t fixed and your sewage system isn’t working. Compare this to Obama’s shovel ready jobs and EPA regulations that delay for years the laying of new sewer pipes. All too often, the Feds offer financial incentives for projects that locals don’t really want but go along with for the federal grants. Then five years later, the grant money is gone, the running expenses continue, and the people have something they didn’t want in the first place. Conservatives have to do a much better job of pointing out that smaller government means a much better chance of the people getting what they want and need.

  11. Trump is addicted to the one-liner, and he probably thought the one re Japan was a pretty darn good one. Which it might be if it came out of the mouth of a stand-up comic. The guy’s a regular king of comedy.

  12. “WRT the chaos, this is a major argument for smaller government that is more accountable to the locals.” – expat

    Where I’ve been for some number of years now.

    Each cycle of GOP and Dem have only added to the rules, responding to each side’s request for “there ought to be a law that (fill in the blank)”. The net effect is an “arms race” on laws and the powers that come with them to increasingly rule over our lives.

    Ultimately, the more power that gets centralized, the greater the incentive for malefactors to work their way into a position to oversee that power, and for other groups to seek influence, most often at our expense.

    Now each side cannot abide by the deliberative process anymore. They each call for executive action to “get things done”.

    If either trump or clinton gets to the WH, this will only accelerate to the point that we are only one “crisis” away from completely one man rule.

  13. I have yet to be disabused of the notion that Trump is a Democratic plant. How else would a true Democratic plant conduct his campaign.

  14. A NATO commander already agrees that NATO could pay more. How do you know that some leaders like Abe won’t. be glad to blame their actions on Trump? And Trump isn’t even elected yet.

  15. Big Mac,

    It’s not just the malefactors who work their way up the ladder. It’s also the properly credentialed who have little hands on experience. This is the type that is easily enthralled by “experts.” They have badly damaged local governments. Of course, the population that prefers to spend its time watching reality TV instead of learning how to do things votes for these types.

    The radical Trumpsters think they want to take the government back, but in fact they just want to give it to someone they think will take better care of them.

  16. It occurred to me last night near 2 AM that Trump might drop out in mid-October if it’s obvious he’ll lose in a landslide. To further the “Hillary stalking horse” theory, this is exactly the sort of move that would tempt the public into believing they’d dodged a bullet.

    In such a circumstance, it would be far too late to replace Trump on the ballot according to my understanding of election law. All the deadlines would have passed.

    What could anyone do in that case, and who could possibly replace Trump at such a late date (you can’t have an election with only one candidate and claim it’s valid)?

    It came to me: Rand Paul, as a write-in.

    I’m not a Paul-ite, but he seems acceptable to all GOP factions: conservative enough to satisfy the constitutionalists and a decent-enough, principled guy. Fiscally conservative as well. He’s not incited the establishment, and he’s even cozied up to McConnell enough to be acceptable there, too. He has libertarian appeal, especially since Johnson/Weld seem to be not very good libertarians. He’s also moderate enough to appeal to all the Dems who can’t stand Hillary.

    Finally, all the previous objections seem trivial now (isolationist, gold-standard support/auditing the Fed, etc.) compared to the ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN knowledge of what the alternative is.

    I think Cruz would even endorse him, enthusiastically.

    He seems to solve all the problems, without antagonizing people in their various camps.

    Of course, I think Trump won’t drop out. That’s a low-probability event. But still, if this all came to pass, would you vote for him? I would, in a heartbeat.
    What do you think?

  17. Rand Paul is not the person to lead us through the international turmoil we are experiencing.

  18. If you can come up with another candidate who appeals to so many factions as Paul, I’m all ears.

  19. Oldflyer offered an easy example of how Trump could speak to an issue. It’s inarguable that he suffers from a bad case of foot in mouth disease.

    That said, his willingness to thumb his nose at political correctness is exactly what is needed. However badly put and its hard to imagine worse… Trump’s frank characterization of the major issues that threaten this country is exactly what is needed. If nothing else, bringing these issues out of the PC ‘verbotten’ category has great value. Those positives far exceed his crass ignorance.

    Yet many republicans berate him as much as do democrats, while also having nothing to say positive about the man. Evidently, only serial killers are worse than Donald J. Trump…

    It is not just the left whose priorities are skewed.

  20. To Harry The Exremeist
    What I do is write my post in my word processor (MS Word). Then, when I am satisfied, I copy and paste it here.

  21. Agreed, G.B.
    Preventing or reducing chaos requires energy, lots of it. The Democrats, always well-marshalled and quick to quash dissent, chaos within their ranks, are really quite good it. I grudgingly admire them for that.

  22. How are NATO members’ obligations defined? I suppose in the treaty instrument itself? Or perhaps in ancillary agreements. It would be good to know this.

    Does Trump really know details of these?

  23. The antidotes of political correctness are not stupidity, ignorance, and inarticulate inconsistency. Those aren’t “bugs” those are “features” of the man. He’s yours, you own him, keep defending him.

  24. I’m doubtful that Trump knows the details of anything unrelated to business.

    My read of him is that he’s only interested in the big picture; NATO doesn’t fund it’s fair share, is happily prepared to let Americans die for its survival and wouldn’t lift a finger to save us. Unchecked Muslim migration portends huge problems in violence for America in the future, aka Europe. Unchecked illegal immigrants, unwilling to assimilate and happy with a nanny state, guarantee future one party rule in America. Unchecked increases in our obscene trade balance with China are an unsustainable mortgage upon America’s economic future.

    You don’t have to understand the ‘details’ to see the handwriting on the wall. You don’t have to understand the details to recognize a society flirting with civilizational suicide.

  25. I’ve never posted here before but have been reading for years because of the former quality of your thoughts. Thoughts which have suffered in the past few months.

    Your analysis of our alliance with Japan seems unusually irrational. What is so fair about a situation where someone we are obliged to help is unable and unwilling to help us? What’s wrong with asking for Japan to be more of a partner?

    It seems you suffer from some kind of Trump derangement syndrome where you reflexively reject everything he says no matter what its merits.

  26. Geoffrey Britain:

    I Concur.

    In addition, if you plan to reduce the size of the Federal government by turning over their functions to the private sector or to the states, you don’t need to have a “policy” for that area, and therefore don’t need to worry about the details. But you do have to be good at firing people.

  27. “Does Trump really know details of these?”

    I doubt it. The worst thing is he doesn’t know what he doesn’t know, AND thinks he knows everything.

    Those who find Trump “refreshing” are not thinking it through enough. Yes, of course, we want our President to look out for our interests and of course it’s not a bad idea to review agreements with other countries and push for better agreements.

    But Trump treats the countries of the world like they are competitors for his Casino businesses. He’s used to threats, lawsuits, junior-high insults, etc. – those are the weapons he knows best. I don’t know why anyone finds this refreshing. The worst things about this man is how he treats others (he treats them like cr@p, if they aren’t any use to him). This isn’t skillful. Obama, for all his faults (I’ve never supported him) is skillful at outplaying his opponents precisely because he keeps the prize in mind, and didn’t make things personal when he didn’t have to.

    Trump goes immediately to the personal. My guess is he doesn’t even know that Japan can’t have a standing military, and of course he had to throw in that little barb about staying home and watching Sony TVs. Because that’s what he is – a jerk.

    It’s ridiculous. He’s unfit to be President. His primary motivation (from what I’ve observed) is his own desire to be seen as a god-king alpha dog and his overriding (it overrides everything, including wisdom) instinct for vengeance.

    I’ve said it a number of times in this space. Someone like this, who is completely focused on his own self-aggrandizement and on vengeance, should NEVER BE GIVEN his own military, state police, and nuclear arsenal.

    Trump the real-estate mogul/Presidential candidate is fun or cathartic for some, I guess. Trump the President, given world-ending power, is a nightmarish prospect. At BEST, he would use the power only of his state police (the enforcement arms of the IRS, FBI, etc) to go after those who haven’t properly kissed his tuckus. At medium-worst, he’ll so scare our allies that we will find ourselves isolated, perhaps with the dollar no longer as the world’s currency, and with some other country (China or Russia) setting the world-agenda while we sink down into reality-show irrelevance. At worst, he’ll get a lot of us killed in a needless war that he starts because he felt insulted or something. At the very worst, we’re all dead.

    He shouldn’t be given this kind of power. He needs to lose. I love the idea of him dropping out in October because he knows he will lose (would that make Pence the nominee? I can live with that). But I doubt that will happen.

    I’m hearing that Trump’s businesses are starting to suffer because he’s alienating so much of the country. Good. Especially if this Presidential run was originally just a way to build his brand. I’m hopeful that those pundits who sold their conservative souls to jump on the Trump train never recover their audiences or credibility after he loses. I mean, seriously – we nominated a guy who would never have gotten nominated except for the fact that he has $$$ and starred in his own reality show.

    Of course, with the opponent he has, the lout could actually win . . . and I think that will be a disaster.

  28. John Smith: It seems you suffer from some kind of Trump derangement syndrome where you reflexively reject everything he says no matter what its merits.

    You can disagree with Neo, but if you’ve truly been reading her for years you haven’t been reading very carefully. She is one of the most thoughtful, fair, and intelligent bloggers out there. I may have missed something (I have been off the blogosphere for awhile) but last I heard she’s still considering voting for Trump.

    He’s just making it really freaking hard to do that, and it gets worse each week,

    But, again, I wish Trump supporters would quit assigning mental illness (Trump Derangement Syndrome, for example) to good-faith opposition to the man becoming president.

    And be nice to Neo. She’s awesome.

  29. John Smith:

    I don’t think you understood what’s the objection to what Trump said about Japan, even though several commenters in this thread have explained it rather well, and I thought I explained it too, but let me repeat what I wrote and then spell it out with even more clarity.

    I called what Trump said about Japan “trash talk.” “Trash talk” does not refer to mere criticism, or disagreements. There would have been many ways to discuss the treaty with Japan and its flaws in a diplomatic and reasonable manner. That’s what presidents are supposed to do, as well as to respect allies—that is, treat them with respect. Disagreements with allies are fine. Criticism of allies is fine. Re-negotiating treaties is fine.

    To use an analogy—let’s say you don’t like the dress your wife wore to meet you at a party with mutual friends. Take her aside privately afterwards, say that it’s not your favorite dress and you wish she’d retire it (“although, honey, of course you look good in everything, but you’d look even better in something else!”). What Trump did instead was somewhat like standing up in front of the entire party and calling her a fat pig, so that everyone can laugh at her.

    There’s a big big difference. And in international relations—much as in a marriage—it’s a different that makes a difference. And particularly with a country such as Japan, where saving face and honor are important, what Trump did is not going to sit well with anyone, nor is it likely to get him what he wants.

    I also wrote:

    Talk about encouraging chaos! I’ve written before that for Trump, everything is mutable. Apparently that includes longstanding treaties with our closest allies. Whatever you think of NATO or Japan, this is the sort of talk that makes people feel that Trump is just too risky a man to have as Commander in Chief and as president managing foreign policy and negotiations with other countries–too impulsive, too bombastic, too ignorant, and too unreliable. A little uncertainty and unpredictability may be good, but too much leads to worldwide instability and yes, to chaos.

    Predictability and trust are two of the bulwarks of world stability. Trump’s problem is not that he has some disagreements with any particular treaty with any particular ally, and no one (not me, nor probably anyone else here, nor anyone I’ve read who has written about the incident) thinks having a disagreement would necessarily be a bad thing. It’s that (and I repeat myself and bold it for emphasis): Trump’s trash talk about Japan is “the sort of talk that makes people feel that Trump is just too risky a man to have as Commander in Chief and as president managing foreign policy and negotiations with other countries–too impulsive, too bombastic, too ignorant, and too unreliable.

    In summary, Trump did NOT “ask Japan to be more of a partner.” Au contraire—he didn’t ask Japan to be more of anything. He insulted them crassly.

    What’s more, he’s in no position to ask them anything right now. He’s not president and he’s not negotiating with them. You don’t start a negotiation by publicly insulting someone. I don’t even think Trump ordinarily starts negotiations that way. When he wanted to build a golf resort in Scotland, for example, he wooed them and sweet-talked them. It was only much much later, when they didn’t like what he did and they denied him something he wanted, that he insulted them—and vice versa.

  30. Bill:

    Thanks!

    I have noticed over and over that some Trump-supporters treat nearly every criticism of Trump’s character and style as though it’s a blanket criticism of the entire package—everything he says, even each position he takes. Sometimes it IS just that: his style, his message, his facts, and/or his lack of facts. Sometimes it’s just his facts. But sometimes it’s mostly his style and in particular what it conveys to other countries (that’s what I was criticizing here). Being “presidential” isn’t just a surface thing; it actually matters, and there’s a reason for it.

    In law, lawyers often talk about “demeanor” of a witness on the stand. Juries pay attention to demeanor for a reason.

    Also, I agree very much with your comment at 10:23 PM.

  31. Hi, neo-neocon.
    I’ve been a reader for years, but this is my first post. Why are you so pro-Trump? I’ve never seen anybody so in the tank.
    I was going to keep reading your blog, but now I’m not so sure.

    Sincerely,

    Definitely not a plant.

  32. Heads up Neo…

    The current government of Japan is doing everything possible to get out of Article 9.

    Donald Trump’s “gaff” is music to their ears.

    They are ANYTHING but upset… regardless of appearances.

    Japan wants to come to the aid — not of America — but to Southeast Asia, as a whole.

    The idea that America would fight solo, is preposterous on its face, of course.

    You have to realize that Trump is not anywhere near as dumb as is style might indicate.

  33. Blert:

    As Freud said “sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.”

    So I take Neo’s analysis over your “fifth dimensional chess master” Trump spin. With friends like Trump who needs Obama.

  34. blert:

    Japan may indeed wish to be allowed to arm itself again, but (as I said in a comment above) that is not the issue here, nor is it what he’s being criticized for.

    Nor do the Japanese (or South Koreans) appreciate being shaken down for money by the Republican nominee.

    It’s not the first time he’s talked this way, either. He started it back in March, with both Japan and South Korea, and was not met with joy, to say the least [emphasis mine]:

    The front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination stunned two of America’s strongest allies with the suggestion that the U.S. military would be withdrawn from their shores, with nuclear weapons replacing them.

    …”Japan is better if it protects itself against this maniac of North Korea,” Trump told CNN’s Anderson Cooper Tuesday. “We are better off frankly if South Korea is going to start protecting itself … they have to protect themselves or they have to pay us.”

    …Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida added, “It is impossible that Japan will arm itself with nuclear weapons.”

    South Korea has a small minority who think Trump may have a point and welcome the idea of nuclear weapons…
    But [the] feeling is not mainstream.

    Trump told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer earlier this year, “South Korea is a money machine but they pay us peanuts … South Korea should pay us very substantially for protecting them.”

    Howls of inaccuracy came from the South Korean Foreign Ministry, the U.S. ambassador to South Korea, and even the White House.

    Ambassador Mark Lippert said Seoul pays for 55% of all non-personnel costs.

    And former U.S. Ambassador to South Korea Christopher Hill was more succinct. He told CNN, “I don’t know what he’s talking about but clearly neither does he.”

    …Daniel Pinkston of Troy University said it would play into North Korea’s hands.

    “The hardliners in Pyongyang would just love such an outcome because if that were to occur, it would completely justify their nuclear status … and validate Kim Jong Un’s policy line as absolutely brilliant and absolutely correct,” he said.

    Reflecting a growing concern, Pinkston added, “Whether he wins the Republican nomination or not, or whether he is elected president or not, even at this stage, he is already doing damage to the U.S. reputation internationally. And damaging U.S. security interests.”

    As I wrote in this comment earlier this evening, it’s not that every single thing Trump said is factually wrong. It’s what he says and particularly the way he says it and the forum in which he chooses to say it, plus all the things he does not know, which are considerable.

    He is a loose cannon and an unreliable person, and he’s already perceived as such in the international community. A little bit of that is okay, a la Reagan. Trump has way way way too much of it, and not enough of all the other things he needs to have.

  35. Matt_SE:

    It is indeed pretty odd how many “long time listeners, first time callers” are speaking up to tell me I have Trump Derangement Syndrome.

  36. John Smith said:

    Your analysis of our alliance with Japan seems unusually irrational. What is so fair about a situation where someone we are obliged to help is unable and unwilling to help us? What’s wrong with asking for Japan to be more of a partner?

    Unfortunately it’s your analysis, and Trump’s “ruminations” that are irrational, no doubt because it’s woefully uninformed. And in Trump’s case that makes his public “ruminations” grossly irresponsible.

    What’s wrong with asking Japan to be more of a partner? We imposed a pacifist constitution on Japan, that’s what’s wrong with it. A great many Japanese would like to change their constitution and become more of a partner but in case you haven’t noticed amending our Constitution is not an easy process, and we didn’t incorporate an easy amendment process in the constitution we imposed on Japan. We ended the occupation in 1953 and we can’t just impose another constitution on Japan. Japan is a sovereign nation and amending their constitution is an internal political question.

    One of the reasons it would be difficult is that there is also strong opposition to amending the pacifist constitution, and these opponents have many valid arguments for refusing to trust Tokyo with more military might. There is still a dwindling remnant of the WWII generation, but a larger population of people born during the war or in its immediate aftermath. They grew up in the rubble in abject poverty, they remember their parents stories, and they blame the militarists for it. Then there are minorities such as the Okinawans who were badly mistreated during the war and still suffer discrimination as the Japanese do not consider them to be Japanese. They don’t trust Tokyo. It’s hard to blame them.

    To back up a bit, at least there were a great many Japanese who wanted to change their constitution and become more of a partner to the US when I last visited Japan over ten years ago. In addition to what appears to be escalating alcohol-fueled criminality on the part of US servicemembers including murder and rape, the failure of the administration to back up the Japanese in their escalating conflict with China over the Senkaku Islands (a failure that is causing many in Japan to question the value of an alliance with the US at all, as Japan is more likely to be attacked than we are and they’re becoming convinced that we’d rather sit around and watch Sony TVs instead of meeting our treaty obligations since China is our largest creditor), as far as the Japanese are concerned we’ve never given them any credit for what they did do post 9/11. We’ve insulted their contributions although usually we forget to mention them at all. Trump’s public “ruminations” will just be another layer of insult.

    I spent seven years of my naval career in Japan, five of them as a liaison officer to the Japanese Maritime Self Defense Force, both on active duty in the early to mid-90s and when I was recalled to active duty after 9/11.

    You might look at the Japanese Self Defense Forces and conclude it’s a laughable fiction that Japan does not have an army, a navy, or an air force. But while the Japanese have very powerful warships and the personnel sailing them wear uniforms, in point of fact the JMSDF for instance really isn’t a a navy. Those personnel are civil servants and are in fact civilians. Since they’re civil servants they can resign at any time. There is nothing like our UCMJ and a military justice system; those people like all civilians are subject to civil law. The Diet or Japanese parliament places very tight limits on what actions it may take. The laws the JMSDF had to operate under never anticipated the conditions it would operate under post 9/11.

    The JMSDF looks like a navy from the outside. But when you take a look inside it’s not actually a navy.

  37. Great. Skynet auto-posted again.

    When I worked with the JMSDF during Operation Noble Eagle/Operation Iraqi Freedom they conducted their first Out Of Area deployment since WWII. Hence their need for assistance. They sent replenishment oilers escorted by destroyers into the IO to refuel and replenish our ships.

    You and Trump clearly don’t know this, but the Japanese government didn’t charge the US for all that fuel. They didn’t have to do that, so I don’t see the need to insult the Japanese as Trump did when they’ve proven to be willing and eager allies and have in the past gone above and beyond.

    They did everything the constitution we imposed on them allowed them to do and frankly they exceeded it. Until 2015 when the Diet changed the law JMSDF vessels could only fire in self defense. My tour as a liaison officer ended in 2003, so when I was there legally a Japanese skipper could only defend his own ship and not any other ship even if steaming in formation such as when conducting underway replenishment with USN vessels.

    But acting on the principle that what happens at sea stays at sea the skippers of those Japanese destroyers would position themselves on any anticipated threat axis and simply claim that they were defending their own ship even if they wcere defending the entire formation. As I understand it as of 2015 this is legal, as the Japanese pols finally figured out that by defending allied ships the JMSDF would be maintaining the alliances that defended Japan. But the state of the law in 2003 was such that it wasn’t legal, the pols having never anticipated such operations.

    There is a bilateral security treaty between the US and Japan which would have given the Japanese skippers the legal authority to do just that even in 2003 but it was never invoked. So they JMSDF operated with the USN in the IO under laws drafted by politicians who never in their wildest dreams considered that a possibility.

    The Defense Ministry challenged the Japanese National Police to arrest returning Japanese COs. The COs were aware of this. It was impossible that they hadn’t broken the law during their deployment and the Defense Ministry wanted to create a public spectacle to highlight the need to amend the constitution. Occasionally I used to go down to the pier at the JMSDF base in Yokosuka to farewell a departing ship and greet returning ships with my Japanese counterparts. I never saw a Japanese skipper led away in handcuffs. My counterparts told me the National Police Agency refused to have any part of it.

    Here’s a couple of thoughts. Don’t berate Japan if you don’t know the history or you don’t know the issues involved. When we asked the Japanese to partner with us they’ve never sat at home and watched Sony TV and they’ve even changed their laws (much easier than amending their constitution) to be closer partners. And how about somebody tell Trumpy the insult clown to shut his pie hole and quit insulting the Japanese with his public “ruminations.” He has no idea what he’s talking about, and that isn’t the way persuade them to amend their constitution. Especially since over the past 8 years Obama has all but convinced the Japanese that it’s us, not them, who is the crappy and useless member of this alliance.

  38. One other thing Trump doesn’t realize is that you can’t look at China, Japan, and South Korea as independent entities. The ability of Japan and South Korea to stand up to the NORKS and China relies on their being part of an Asian alliance that includes also Taiwan, Australia, and the Philippines. Once this alliance is broken, it becomes easier for our foes to chip away at individual countries in ways that threaten us.

    In the same way, Russia has had some ability to chip away at Eastern Europe because of their energy reliance on them. Thanks to our shale oil and LNG, we have been able to offer them some reassurance that they won’t freeze. This didn’t help Ukraine.

    You don’t have to be an expert to have read things like Blood Lands. It is necessary to understand how past events have shaped the current concerns of countries. Trump is too fixated on current bottom lines. Unfortunately, most of his rabid supporters seem equally ignorant. An intelligent curiosity and knowledge about world history is necessary to even ask the right questions of advisors. We need someone who is able to put a lot of pieces together that have been acquired over a lifetime. Taking World History 101 in an 8-hour meeting with a handful of people is not going to work.

  39. Eric,
    Don’t you wish we had Romney as president? I’m pretty sure he would not have fallen for all this propaganda. Trump will fall for anything if he thinks he can make money on it. He keeps saying he will rely on his advisors, but since he chooses these people, that’s not much of a reassurance.
    And I think Gingrich has traded any integrity he may have once had for the limelight.

  40. “NATO doesn’t fund it’s fair share” – GB

    It is not NATO’s lack of funding anything itself that is the issue.

    There is direct vs indirect contribution, under NATO obligations.

    Direct is determined by formula that all have agreed to. The US share is 22%. Just two examples: UK is 10%, but has a 1/5th the population of the US. Canada is 6.6%, but has about 1/10th the population. Doing the math, it seems other countries are over contributing relative to the US. It looks worse on us if we compare using GDP numbers instead of population.

    Indirect contribution refers to many things, but one of the key commitments is an agreement to spend 2% of GDP on defense spending in their government budgets.

    Here the US military budget is 73% of the spending that all NATO governments summed together spend on their military budgets. And this is where the argument is coming from.

    Since the US has been the biggest spender on military since WWII, it has defacto been the biggest benefactor / underwriter of NATO, fair or not.

    So, if “fairness” were the standard, what should we be expecting? 3x their current budget spending on military to match the 73% the US is doing? Can we ever get there given, the differences in views on the role of the military?

    If we cannot get there, then should that be the argument for immediate dissolution of NATO? If the answer is “yes”, then that completely ignores the value of having NATO in place to begin with.

    If those countries were to spend NOTHING, would that lessen our burden as well since we wouldn’t feel obliged to “cover” them with our military “security”? Would that reduction on our part increase OUR security?

    One could argue that we’d probably have to take our current 73% and boost it to the equivalent of 125% – 150% to keep ourselves at the same level of “security”.

    Grousing about the “unfairness” of contributions is one thing.

    Openly threatening, at the presidential level, that we ought to renege on following through on our commitments for any one member country because their contributions don’t meet our standard for “fair” is irresponsible, and, at best, comes from a very muddy conception of the issues at stake.

  41. Folks, don’t waste your time responding to the “John Smith”s who comment here if it seems they haven’t even understood Neo’s position, yet, claim to be long time readers.

    Troll comments like that are MEANT to waste everyone’s time responding to it.

  42. “the skippers of those Japanese destroyers would position themselves on any anticipated threat axis and simply claim that they were defending their own ship even if they wcere defending the entire formation” (even placing the COs themselves in precarious legal position) – Steve57

    An excellent example of how all this talk of “fair share” is beyond misguided, and trump’s statements on these issues just seem to be irresponsible.

  43. expat:
    “He keeps saying he will rely on his advisors, but since he chooses these people, that’s not much of a reassurance.”

    Trump evidently relies on his advisors. That’s not reassuring because his advisors – actual advisors as opposed to window-dressing – are Russians competing against American leadership of the free world in the Soviet style.

    Actual advisors as opposed to window-dressing has been characteristic of President Obama’s foreign affairs, whose Russian favoring trend Trump appears poised to pick up.

  44. Amend:

    Trump evidently relies on his advisors. That’s not reassuring because his advisors — actual advisors as opposed to window-dressing — are Russians Russian advocates competing against American leadership of the free world in the Soviet style.

  45. First, neither the Asian alliance that expat speaks of or NATO could stand up to either China or Russia without the full backing of the US.

    The object is NOT to end those alliances, the object is to reform them, so that we’re not the only thing standing between them and China and Russia.

    Since the NATO country’s socialistic welfare states rely upon low expenditures for defense, they aren’t going to change without sufficient pressure placed upon them. Which requires that we threaten to end NATO unless they change.

    Japan and Australia are the only countries with the wherewithal to field forces capable of giving China pause. That can’t happen without changing the Japanese constitution, which given its entrenched peace faction, isn’t going to happen without the certainty that we are not going to war with China to protect them.

    Australia needs ballistic nuclear missile subs to counter China.

    Both countries have large factions that don’t want to get into a ‘detente’ nuclear situation with China and that faction will continue to dominate until America is no longer the sheepdog they look to for protection.

    Trump suggested that our allies should consider going nuclear and got pilloried for it. But N. Korea, Iran and now Turkey are going nuclear. When the bad guys have more guns than the good guys, they see that as an invitation to aggression.

  46. That said, [Trump’s] willingness to thumb his nose at political correctness is exactly what is needed. However badly put and its hard to imagine worse… Trump’s frank characterization of the major issues that threaten this country is exactly what is needed. If nothing else, bringing these issues out of the PC ‘verbotten’ category has great value. Those positives far exceed his crass ignorance.

    Yet many republicans berate him as much as do democrats, while also having nothing to say positive about the man. Evidently, only serial killers are worse than Donald J. Trump…

    It is not just the left whose priorities are skewed.

    Geoffrey Britain: However, most Republicans who criticize Trump, including those here, will grant some validity to Trump, particularly his rejection of political correctness.

    As to serial killers, I have to wonder whether Trump supporters would vote for a serial killer, if he were rich, famous, and thumbing his nose at PC and establishment politics.

    There seems to be no limit to how degraded Trump can behave and still hold support. As the man himself said, “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.”

    I would be deeply ashamed and alarmed if my candidate said such a thing about himself and his supporters.

    Those of us who oppose Trump do so because we see disaster likely following him, win or lose. If Trump loses, as almost all polls indicate, the Hillary horror ensues. If Trump wins, based on the behavior and ignorance he has displayed, his administration will be a terrible one-term failure, which will relegate the Republican to a despised minority party for several election cycles.

    As we understand the situation, no, our priorities are not skewed.

  47. What would happen if Trump were to step down?

    I don’t know what election laws or Republican Party protocols would apply.

    As I’ve commented before, I’d be happy to see Mike Pence take Trump’s place. It would make sense because he’s currently the VP candidate and he appears to be a moderate Republican governor who could function as a compromise candidate.

  48. expat:
    “Don’t you wish we had Romney as president? I’m pretty sure he would not have fallen for all this propaganda.”

    Romney likely wouldn’t have fallen for the propaganda as President. But he was defeated by it insofar its key role in the Narrative contest for the zeitgeist of the activist game that the GOP and the conservatives of the Right have failed to compete in sufficiently.

    With the drum I beat on my hobby horse, Trump’s connection to Russian propaganda was evident the moment he stated his position on Bush’s decision for Operation Iraqi Freedom, whose paradigm manifested the principles of American leadership of the free world opposed by Russia – Trump’s view tracked with Russian propaganda based on blatant legal and factual error.

  49. As Steve57 so ably demonstrated, Trump is ignorant of the info he needs to govern responsibly. That is a recurring theme with him: ignorance.
    His supporters vary between ignorance, irresponsibility, and rationalization. Their failures of discernment gave us the weakest possible candidate against Hillary, and that’s why we’re going to lose.

  50. And now Turkey is going nuclear? With the mystery hidden Pu-production reactors and Pu processing facilities? Or the mystery super secret stash of highly enriched U? Do tell.

    Keep spinning for Trump.

  51. Matt_SE: “His supporters vary between ignorance, irresponsibility, and rationalization. Their failures of discernment gave us the weakest possible candidate against Hillary, and that’s why we’re going to lose.”

    All of the Trump supporters I know personally are non-college graduate, blue-collar people. They have not read the Great Books, they are not into deep thinking, and they are guided more by their guts than their brains. They are the people that make this economy work. They work primarily with their hands. They do plumbing, electrical wiring, maintain cars, build airplanes (Boeing employees), pour concrete, paint houses, and much, much more. All jobs that are don’t require a college degree, but rather mechanical aptitude and a good work ethic. They are the people who have seen their fortunes decline in many ways since 2008.

    I haven’t been affected nearly as much economically as they have. Although I have seen personally the horrendous effects of Obamacare on both insurance buyers and health care practitioners.

    For people like me it seems that four more years of Obama policies won’t be too disastrous on our personal situations. The Trump supporters don’t see it that way. They are plain spoken people who detest PC. Their knowledge of government and foreign policy doesn’t run very deep – much like Trump’s knowledge. What he says does not alarm them. In our opinions it should, but they don’t think the way we do.

    During the primaries I was wondering who these people that supported Trump were. Much reading and personal discussions with Trump supporters has lead me to an understanding of who they are.
    I don’t approve of the way Trump conducts himself, but I trust his supporters more than I trust Hillary’s supporters. Add to that all the bad things that will occur if Hillary is elected:
    1. Liberal Supreme Court justices.
    2. With liberal justices in place, an attempt to alter the first and second amendments.
    3. A continuation of Green Energy polices that will further beggar the country.
    4. Further pursuit of climate change policies that will strengthen government control over our lives.
    5. A continuing weak military.
    6. Further inroads into our government by the Muslim Brotherhood.
    6. Weak anti-terrorism policies.
    7. Continuing overspending and over-taxing.
    8. Open borders and continuing out of control immigration.
    And those eight are just the biggest items that I see.

    Yes, Trump is not our ideal candidate by far, but he is the alternative to Hillary. I see him as the only alternative.

  52. On paper Trump makes sense, but the characterizations of him as less than perfect or less than ideal fail to do justce to what a truly abysmal canddiate he is.

    How much worse would Trump have to be for his supporters to notice and begin to reassess their support?

    Is Trump correct that he could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot someone and he would not lose voters?

    Nothing I’ve read so far contradicts Trump’s execrable claim.

  53. J.J.,
    You are right about what we can expect from Hillary, but what can Trump do if he loses the Senate and loses seats in the House? He is on a unity kick now, but how long will it last? Does he even understand how Harry Reid put the brakes on many bills the House passed?

  54. huxley,

    “most Republicans who criticize Trump, including those here, will grant some validity to Trump, particularly his rejection of political correctness.”

    I have yet to see Ryan or McConnell have anything good to say about Trump. I can’t recall, Matt_SE, Big Maq or OM having anything good to say about Trump. The rest here who oppose Trump are like neo, approval is grudging at best. Their focus being how badly he speaks, his untrustworthiness, appalling history, etc. Rather than on the critical threats we face that he speaks to, which unaddressed, foretell the end of America. It is that to which I refer when I spoke of priorities.

    I’m in full agreement with the view of those who oppose Trump that disaster will follow. Either he’s ineffective or he trashes the constitution.

    “If Trump loses, as almost all polls indicate, the Hillary horror ensues.

    Agreed. Where we disagree is in what follows her Presidency. I foresee an inescapable slide into 1984. History demonstrates what you get with a Lenin VS a Caesar.

    “If Trump wins, based on the behavior and ignorance he has displayed, his administration will be a terrible one-term failure, which will relegate the Republican to a despised minority party for several election cycles.”

    IMO, there is a high probability of that eventuality. Which will lead back onto the path to 1984. Absent a successful Article V convention or another civil war, that eventual destination may be unavoidable.

    The republic may survive Trump, it will not survive Clinton. Too many voters want what Clinton offers, a massive network of leftist organizations back her, the MSM and schools indoctrinate ever deeper and once our national sovereignty is eviscerated with treaties in the UN and trade agreements like TPP, the only means left to stop the Left will be either an Article V convention or civil war. I’m not optimistic about either one succeeding.

  55. expat,

    I don’t foresee Trump getting any cooperation out of Congress, which would mean that the only way he could deliver on his promises is to further trash the Constitution and mortally wound the republic, resulting in a further entrenched oligarchy.

    But mortally wounding the republic is much less than what the Left has planned for us.

    Some here assert that Hillary will simply lead us further toward a socialist Europe. That’s plausible, if one assumes that the Left will be satisfied with that small gain, rather than seeing America’s fall to socialism, as the needed impetus to a Marxist world governance. George Soros, the Left’s financier, has made clear, that a world free of national borders with UN leftist governance is the Left’s goal.

    But even if some here are right, gun control and hate speech and unlimited Muslim migration, all certain under Hillary… will ensure that America either will fall to Islam, just as Europe is doing or near permanent martial law will be imposed.

  56. Trump got where he is by getting things done in the real world. The people who get things done in the real world respect that fact. Do you work in a world where excrement on the faucet handle in the air conditioned, pristine rest room is the absolute worst thing you might have to deal with? Trump was good at office (faculty lounge, etc.) politics as well as in getting things done in the real world. Ask yourself this: Are you aware of the power of this distinction versus most politicians, among people who get things done in the real world?

  57. TPP: “Fast Tracking an International EPA”

    “These treaties are “living agreements,” meaning that they can be changed without any input from Congress whatsoever. Senator Sessions explains:

    “A USTR outline of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (which TPA [Fast-Track] would expedite) notes in the “Key Features” summary that the TPP is a “living agreement.” This means the President could update the agreement “as appropriate to address trade issues that emerge in the future as well as new issues that arise with the expansion of the agreement to include new countries.” The “living agreement” provision means that participating nations could both add countries to the TPP without Congress’ approval (like China), and could also change any of the terms of the agreement, including in controversial areas such as the entry of foreign workers and foreign employees. Again: these changes would not be subject to congressional approval.”

    These regulations would be enforced by the private court system set up by TPP. The Washington Post comments:

    “[T]he Investor-State Dispute Settlement provisions [in TPP] establish a private corporate court system for foreign investors, giving them the right to sue the United States if any U.S. or state regulation… somehow infringes on future expected profits. There is no appeal. And damages — imposed on taxpayers — can reach billions of dollars.”

    This private court system is truly the most dangerous aspect of the TPP treaty. It lets injured businesses sue the U.S. Government for damages. It is much more dangerous than the toothless World Trade Organization, which relies upon member state tariff retaliation, not billion dollar fines, to enforce its decisions.”

    TPP is about trade AND about the Obama administration inflicting another mortal wound upon our national security.

  58. “The object is NOT to end those alliances, the object is to reform them” – GB

    If trump would actually say that and have a serious argument behind that, he’d have a lot more support.

    He didn’t.

    So now we are looking at his statements and trying to find a rationale, after the fact, for why he is “right” on the issue.

    Because he didn’t say “the object is to reform them”, it is not clear at all that is his thinking, or if he, instead, actually thinks what he says, that essentially we ought to abandon countries because they are not “paying their fair share”, however he defines that to be.

    And this is one of the core issues with trump we keep circling back to time and again.

    We are long past the time of goodwill and benefit of the doubt assumptions that trump really means this or that, and is excused as just terribly inept at arguing his case – especially when he has made his brand about competence, his ability to get things done, and how he is rather smart compared to other (politicians, in particular) and will hire equally very smart managers and advisors.

  59. expat, I don’t know for sure what Trump would do as far as working with the Republicans in Congress. I see many areas where they could agree and work together. Such as border enforcement, enforcement of immigration law, building the Keystone XL pipeline, opening federal lands to oil and gas exploration, allowing the export of natural gas, reducing regulations on businesses, lowering tax rates on business and on the middle class, rebuilding the military, appointing a successor to Scalia, supporting law enforcement from the Justice Department on down, reforming the IRS, etc.

    I believe Trump will look at any issue and weigh how it affects the working class people in the U.S. That is where he may not agree with Republicans who are in the tank for the Chamber of Commerce and other globalization devotees. I see conflicts as to renegotiating trade deals and levying of tariffs. Those are areas where there could be conflict. That’s where he may come across as a bully because he doesn’t like to be opposed and will be hard-nosed and resort to ad hominems, etc. Just suppositions (maybe wishful thinking) on my part, though. I admit I could be completely wrong.

  60. “Trump got where he is by getting things done in the real world. The people who get things done in the real world respect that fact. – notherbob

    Indeed we ought to respect that.

    However, bob, since we only see the results and not the process, we assume trump got where he was by “getting things done”.

    Maybe not you, but having come across several, there are, indeed, bullsh*ters who have made their way in life and look like a great success from the outside.

    It can be extremely hard to discern. Even more so if we don’t want to look for the signs.

    On first pass, trump seems to deserve that respect.

    Based on his behavior, and what we now have better insight into his history, he just rekes of the bullsh*ter class of people.

    Besides, if building a business, and getting extremely wealthy from it, even if on the most honorable of ways, is the standard for validating all their ability and policy stands, then what about Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg?

    Billionaires don’t get a pass, just because they have billions, and got things done.

  61. Steve57 and Big Maq, thanks for your contributions on the questions of Japanese naval operations and NATO finances, respectively. I found those very useful to give me an idea of the issues.

    Geoffrey B, I take your point about the urgency of the big-picture items. The thing is that the devil is in the details, and being a detail man myself, even though I think you’re right that he at least gestures (and hopefully more – he doesn’t have the kind of power yet that would enable him to do much more) in the direction of doing something meaningful about the large problems, his apparent lack of interest in details doesn’t inspire confidence in me.

    I hope that that changes at least somewhat. I’m not asking him to turn into a wonk, because that approach carries its own dangers – forest for trees, etc. I don’t believe that it’s possible any longer for this country to have a president who isn’t reasonably sharp on the details, because unfortunately, our people seem to want the President to be nowadays a combination of Einstein, Batman and Jesus, and even more unfortunately, that’s apparently what a lot of them thought His Majesty was going to be. Well, we see how that turned out. See ‘evolving American monarchy’.

  62. And furthermore, OM, thanks for that link to the speechlet from the Singapore PM. Very compelling! I really don’t know about TPP, but he made the case very well, not as I was expecting.

  63. Big Maq,

    Yes, there’s no question that if Trump handled his speaking on the issues and handled his competitors and critics more skillfully, he’d have a lot more support.

    You’re also right that we are left twisting in the wind as to where on the spectrum of positive to negative he would actually fall in handling these issues.

    That would be of far greater concern for me if we weren’t facing Clinton, the Left and how close we are (IMO) to the tipping point that I keep mentioning. Which is why, since I don’t believe a third party alternative is viable, I believe the actual choice before us is one of disaster or catastrophe.

    Philip,

    The devil is indeed in the details. Jimmy Carter lived for the details. Ronald Reagan, when asked if he had a plan for opposing the Soviets, reportedly said, “Yes, I have a plan. We win, they lose.”

    Since the alternative to Trump is Clinton, we’d best hope that Trump has at least a bit of Reagan in him.

  64. NeoNeoCon,
    I read that piece about chaos. I first thought they had struck upon something – a mania of sorts, that causes people to be attracted to the chaotic. Then, as I read further, I saw that the author basically was making a case for what has now become known as the elitist, leadership, inside the beltway type of “insider.” The author also glossed right over the topic that was put into the Constitution as a brake on this kind of problem developing: We are supposed to be a Republic – a representative democracy, NOT a democracy. The glib discarding of the checks and balances built into the Constitution ignored the specific purpose of those components. They are supposed to put a brake on the whole system doing anything unless a majority of interests – the public (House), the state legislatures (Senate), and the political establishment (electoral college) across the country were in agreement. This fell apart with the adoption and ratification of the 17th amendment.

    The chaos described in the article and witnessed by all of us in this election is caused by two things: 1) democratic election of all positions in the federal government; and the estrangement of the political base (especially among Republicans) from the establishment (the insiders). It’s not just in the Republican party, though. Bernie Sanders threw a lot of sand in the works of the Democrat party’s efforts to select Hilary Clinton. He was their populist response to that disaffection/estrangement felt by most private citizens.

  65. “we’d best hope that Trump has at least a bit of Reagan in him.”

    You will continue to “hope” in spite of the fact that Trump has no record of espousing or working to advance any of Reagan’s or conservative’s causes before 2015. Nor can you point to a miraculous “come to Jesus” moment for Donald.

    Hope is not a plan.

    Who is the we you are speaking of Kemosabe?

  66. Trump won’t drop out. He’ll announce he’ll resign after taking the oath of office, thereby promoting his VEEP to POTUS.

  67. I have yet to see Ryan or McConnell have anything good to say about Trump…

    Geoffrey Britain:

    Trump supporters and defenders keep making absolute claims about Ryan et al. with regard to Trump criticism, but it just doesn’t seem true as in Ryan’s endorsement of Trump last June:

    I feel confident [Trump] would help us turn the ideas in this agenda into laws to help improve people’s lives. That’s why I’ll be voting for him this fall.

    My bet is McConnell and commenters here also say good things about Trump as well, but Trump people refuse to acknowledge it.

    This black-and-white thinking which easily vilifies Ryan and McConnell has led to the polarized primaries which voted in Trump. I don’t think it’s a good thing.

    I believe neo has covered this a number of times.

  68. “…if building a business, and getting extremely wealthy from it, even if on the most honorable of ways, is the standard for validating all their ability and policy stands…”

    I never said that. I don’t know how much credit might be given by working class folks for his accomplishments. If my 45 year old full-time work associate (same office cubicle job) drops and gives me 20 push-ups, his completion of that task gives me information about his character. If I had only today’s media to learn anything else about him I can envision voting for him for President based on that alone. Yes, it has gotten that bad (see recent media reports of Trump ordering baby from rally). Factual information on candidates is hard to come by these days.

  69. “Trump got where he is by getting things done in the real world. The people who get things done in the real world respect that fact…. Trump was good at office (faculty lounge, etc.) politics as well as in getting things done in the real world. Ask yourself this: Are you aware of the power of this distinction versus most politicians, among people who get things done in the real world?” – notherbob

    If I’ve misinterpreted where you are going with the above, then I’m not sure what the point is that you wanted to make.

    I take it from your follow up, “If I had only today’s media to learn anything else about him I can envision voting for him for President based on that alone” that you mean you’d rather ignore what you see in the media and just base your decision on his accomplishments, which I see as consistent with my interpretation, but you tell me.

    You have consistently argued more in trump, be it campaign strategy or policy depth, than is warranted by what we are seeing during this campaign, just from his very own words and behavior – and, no, we are not merely falling for the media bias that you blame (we know that exists).

    I figured you are just arguing more of the same, and that his “getting things done” is a proof point that he is the superior choice (and something we’d respect if only we knew what it takes to “get things done – in the real world”).

    Apologies if I have read that all wrong.

  70. “Trump won’t drop out. He’ll announce he’ll resign after taking the oath of office, thereby promoting his VEEP to POTUS.” – ErisGuy

    I will come back here and credit you with predicting this, if true.

    That said, that would be one of the fastest ways to deligitimize the election and any possible “mandate” Pence might want to govern with. The result would probably be worse than GWB and Gore fighting the close call election in the courts in 2000.

  71. Geoffrey Britain:

    I am of course pessimistic about Hillary’s third term for Obama. It may well be the Republic is lost. However I don’t see that as the equivalent of 1984 or requiring a civil war.

    However, by my crystal ball a Trump presidency is double kind of disaster in the near- and far-term. Between Trump’s many faults and a rabid media intent on destroying him, his administration will be a terrible failure leading to more Democrat victories.

    Whatever we may gain from Trump’s holding actions will be lost after he is out of office and the Republican Party as a coherent, effective force standing for conservative values and the Constitution will have been destroyed for years and decades to come.

    So a Hillary victory, as grim as it will be, at least allows the possibility for GOP resistance and even victories in the future.

    Of course that doesn’t mean I’ll vote for her.

  72. huxley,

    That may be true. While I’m very skeptical of Ryan’s sincerity when making the statement you cite, I readily accept he said it. But actions speak louder than words. If Ryan, McConnell and others here have made positive comments about Trump, they are few and far between the deluge of negatives.

    Trump is certainly deserving of criticism. My point is in regard to priorities. IMO, our national survival rates far above Trump’s reprehensible personnal qualities.

    OM,

    Hope is a prayer, not a plan nor a strategy. But hope is all we have, given where the Left stands in its March through America’s Institutions, Culture and political landscape.

    Ultimately, the we to whom I refer is humanity. As America is humanity’s “last, best hope”. We are far closer to a new dark age than you are willing to face. Enjoy your denial while ye may.

  73. huxley,

    I hope you are right about the possibility of the American republic surviving a third Obama term. And I agree that a disastrous Trump Presidency may well have the consequence you fear.

    I don’t believe we have that much time. I think we are right at the precipice of the tipping point from which there is no retreat.

    What confirms that conclusion for me, among the many cultural, political and military trends we all see… is the elections of 2008, 2012 and now a ‘choice’ of disaster or catastrophe. That choice is not due to our ‘leaders’ or media propaganda or pontificating teachers. Those are reflective not causal. It is due to an electorate so depraved as to embrace one side or the other of that choice.

  74. Denial = Not agreeing with GB, one of the depraved willing to vote for one of the two, because those are the only choices. Oh the tragedy of it all. Oh, to speak for the nation. /S

  75. “an electorate so depraved as to embrace one side or the other of that choice.” – GB

    Well, that’s a change of position!?

    If that is one’s belief, why follow the “depraved” crowd?

    Ought to be arguing to one and all that there are alternatives folks ought to consider, and get them off the binary path to disaster or catastrophe.

  76. “Whatever we may gain from Trump’s holding actions will be lost after he is out of office and the Republican Party as a coherent, effective force standing for conservative values and the Constitution will have been destroyed for years and decades to come” – huxley

    While there is lots of wishful belief in any “holding action”, there is plenty from trump over the course of these 13 months to doubt even that.

    Had trump delivered on his promised pivot to being “presidential” (and all that entails) back in May, when he was the last man standing, he might have been able to mount a credible case that he could deliver on that.

    Doubt that, two weeks after the GOP convention, he can do so credibly. The “credibility bar” has risen significantly.

    So, lacking that “holding action” it is one helluva risk on several other fronts (economic/financial, diplomatic, constitutional – not just the nuclear button question) – much of which seems to be headed in a Democratic/leftist direction anyway, and perhaps more aggressively so.

    Worse than the conservative “brand” taking a hit (if it hasn’t already), he seems likely to expand executive power more aggressively than clinton.

    Hard to see that we are really in any better position.

    At some point we have to question about the value of continued differentiating / dithering between “disaster” and “catastrophe”, figuring out which of those to choose, rather than taking a look around at what other choices we can make.

  77. OM,

    If not agreeing with me is my definition of denial then how do you account for me hoping I’m wrong?

    I’ve repeatedly provided the specifics of why I’ve reached the conclusions that I have and your response boils down to; ‘you’re wrong man, you’re wrong!’ Perhaps I am, I certainly hope so. So, show me how I’m wrong.

    Big Maq,

    Hillary’s mendacity is worse because the nature of her agenda is inherently ideological and fanatical, while her ability to realize that agenda is much more likely. It is that which makes Trump the preferable choice, he simply cannot accomplish the long term damage that progressive Marxism can achieve.

  78. Big Maq,

    In a futile attempt to realize other choices, you ensure that the worst choice prevails. The futility arises for specific reasons that you have yet to refute. Not enough time, lack of name recognition, lack of adequate funding, a deeply divided and balkinized electorate, demonstrated in the primaries, etc, etc.

    Show us a resolution for those obstacles and we can have a serious discussion about other choices.

  79. Hillary’s mendacity is worse because the nature of her agenda is inherently ideological and fanatical, while her ability to realize that agenda is much more likely. It is that which makes Trump the preferable choice, he simply cannot accomplish the long term damage that progressive Marxism can achieve.

    He can absolutely destroy the Republican party, if he hasn’t already, thus relegating conservatism to a niche (kind of like Libertarianism) and ensuring leftism reigns supreme for the foreseeable. If he hasn’t already done so through his reptile-brain appeal to vengeance in the predominately white, working class electorate.

    IF she wins, it might be really bad. But at least there will be a loyal conservative opposition that “might just” (since we’re all talking in small probabilities, even Trump’s supporters talk this way about him) regain its soul and live to fight another day.

    Finally, I never, ever supported him or voted for him, but remember HRC’s husband was in the white house. We all remember the hell-hole that was the 1990s. Except it wasn’t. Is there any chance we’ll get a blend of Clintonism and Obamism? I think we can survive that.

    We won’t well survive Trumpism. He’s a New York liberal in sort-of conservative clothing. He gets less conservative each day, such as his promise to outspend HRC on infrastructure spending, his radical isolationism, his verbal cr@pping on long time allies, and his dangerous words that basically guarantee a far more dangerous (and nuclear-tipped) world.

    GB, I think anyone who has allowed themselves to be a mark for this con-man is in willful denial.

  80. When one party of an argument tries to set the rules for proof and insists that other points of view are illogical or in denial, and then claims “I hope to be wrong, but prove I am not,” well then it becomes a tedious task of dismantling the “rules” or pointing out errors in fact as they pop up.

  81. Eric Says:

    Trump’s consistency with Russian propaganda suggests a purposeful adoption of antithetical narrative and worldview, not unlike Obama’s

    I think I’ve mentioned, the alt-right has a romanticized pro-Putin stance as a reaction against the perfidy of our own leaders. I wouldn’t be surprised if Russian intelligence helps this along, but the feeling was already there.
    It the same displacement that goes on IMO with respect to Jews. We already know that Trump is partial to conspiracy theories.

    This is just garden variety kookism of an out-of-touch rich man.

  82. @J.J:

    “Yes, Trump is not our ideal candidate by far, but he is the alternative to Hillary. I see him as the only alternative.”

    When these salt-of-the-earth types chose Trump as their vehicle, our fate was sealed (for the next 4 years anyway).
    I don’t doubt that they are due the same dignity as any other person, but I don’t mistake their honesty for expertise or knowledge.
    These simple, honest people got taken in by a con man. Now we’re all going to suffer for it.

  83. MattSE:

    Some readers here (not J.J.) have essentially stated that these “simple, honest people” although taken in by a con man are incapable of governing themselves, as if they cannot learn from experience. That is a “rule” of an argument that I do not accept.

  84. @GB:

    “I can’t recall, Matt_SE, Big Maq or OM having anything good to say about Trump.”

    1) Nothing Trump says can be trusted, so it’s impossible to say if he possesses any redeeming qualities.
    2) Even if Trump turns out to be serious about certain promises, I’ve seen no evidence that he has the skills to get any of his agenda passed.
    3) Even if he’s serious and can get his agenda passed, it’s not clear that his policies are good for America. I think immigration control is, but he seems to want to start a trade war with China, at least. His views on NATO and nuclear proliferation are downright scary, and he seems disturbingly comfortable with certain Democratic platforms like raising the minimum wage.
    4) Even if all previous caveats are unfounded, Trump’s agenda is incomplete, at best. Immigration control will do nothing to rein in government, which Trump has never declared he’d cut. Quite the opposite, if you count his statements about government healthcare and education.
    5) Lastly, with all this uncertainty I tend to look at someone’s character as the best predictor of what they’ll do in unforeseen circumstances. Trump’s character is extremely low. He’s shown incuriosity, ignorance, and no willingness to learn from his mistakes. Oh, there’s also his infamous lack of self control and vindictiveness.

    With all this in mind, I’ll still vote for him. I just have little hope that he’ll win because he can’t appeal to a majority of citizens. He is a quixotic, novelty candidate like McGovern. I expect he’ll do as well as McGovern did, electorally.

    But he does hate PC, so that’s something.

  85. @OM:

    I agree, and think we’re currently in the “trying the wrong solution” phase of Churchill’s quote about Americans always doing the right thing, after trying everything else.

    For those of us who learned these lessons in 2012 and 2014, the process is excruciatingly slow. But there’s nothing to be done about it, this is our system.

  86. Unless I’m not remembering right, Trump benefitted by candidates infighting and hanging around beyond their viability to be an actual candidate. I think having so many candidates was not a good thing in this case.

    Too many cooks in the kitchen.

    Divided we fall.

  87. @GB:

    “Too many voters want what Clinton offers, a massive network of leftist organizations back her, etc.”

    Leftists can promise whatever they want. If there’s no money, their schemes won’t last long. Look at how quickly Obamacare is collapsing. The higher education establishment is in the beginning stages of collapse as well.
    The economy is treading water…stagnating, really. The stock market is still an inflated speculation bubble. And always looming in the background are the spiraling costs of the Baby Boomers retiring.

    I don’t see much hope that we’re going to be flooded with money soon.

  88. @J.J.:

    “I see many areas where they could agree and work together. Such as border enforcement…”

    Is this a joke?
    Which part of the GOP establishment do you think is eager to enforce the border? The only ones who are are conservatives like Cruz, who Trump is busy attacking and others the Chamber of Commerce is primarying, like Tim Huelskamp.

  89. Bill,

    Trump’s popularity is a reflection of an already fractured republican party. That’s what the primaries demonstrated.

    Hillary is simply one of the Left’s agents and it’s the Left that is close to taking us down the rabbit hole.

    History isn’t circular, it’s spiral. Hillary’s time will be much worse than Bill’s because the country is now much further down the left’s road, than it was back then.

    That you imagine Trump to be a greater threat than the Left, you justify by placing what you fear above… what the Left will do.

    Objectively evaluating the Left to be the greater threat is not evidence of allowing myself to fall for Trump’s con game and it’s either disingenuous or obtuse of you to suggest it. I’ve repeatedly agreed with criticism of Trump.

    OM,

    It is not “setting the rules for proof” to ask for logical, reasoned engagement on the issue. It is reasonable to suggest that denial is at play, when the other party consistently fails to address another’s objections.

    I did not say, “I hope I am wrong, prove that I am not”.

    I said, I hope that I am wrong, you say I am wrong. OK, demonstrate how I am wrong.

    And regardless of how ‘tedious’ it may be, since I extend you the courtesy of making the effort to address your objections, simple civility obliges you to do the same.

    But thank you for once again demonstrating how you twist what I say. While once again failing to address my objections to your point of view.

    Matt_SE,

    If Eric is right about Trump emulating Obama, then he is simply fighting fire with fire, using Alinsky against them. If so, I suspect it’s a visceral reaction, rather than an intellectualized strategy. Trump certainly has his kooky side but his pragmatic side dominates.

  90. ErisGuy Says:

    “Trump won’t drop out. He’ll announce he’ll resign after taking the oath of office, thereby promoting his VEEP to POTUS.”

    Could be, in which case we’ll get the open-borders promoting, free-trading, SJW-folding Mike Pence.
    Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

  91. @GB:

    “Trump certainly has his kooky side but his pragmatic side dominates.”

    Were that true, Trump wouldn’t have resumed his psychotic attacks on Cruz’ father and his supposed link to Kennedy’s assassination.
    He came out looking like a loon, and it hurt his campaign. That doesn’t seem very pragmatic to me.
    The truth is, Trump is a loudmouthed egomaniac with no self control. Any pragmatism he supposedly possesses is drowned out in the shitstorm of poo-flinging.

  92. Matt_SE,

    The Left just prints more money, kicks the can down the road and blames the evil rich. Ryan just helped Obama do the first two and Hillary is promising to make the rich “pay their fair share”. It’s the “Potomac two-step Jack”.

    Obamacare’s failure is the segway into single payer.

    The higher education establishment has been in the beginning stages of collapse since Bill Clinton’s time. But like the banks, ‘higher’ education is “too big to fail”.

    The economy will go into depression under Hillary, since she wants to raise taxes on the rich, raise the world’s highest business taxes even higher and will have to raise taxes on the middle class to pay for free college for everyone, while retroactively forgiving student debts.

    The stock market bubble will burst once again. Boom-bust sucks the money out of the middle class into the coffers of the speculators.

    The baby boomer entitlements will collapse the entire house of cards. Sovereign bankruptcy is mathematically unavoidable.

  93. Matt_SE,

    I didn’t know that about Pence. You’re saying he’s another Ryan? If so, that’s exactly what the GOP pulled with Reagan by saddling him with Bush, as the price for their support.

    When Trump’s egomanical, lack of impulse control isn’t interfering, his pragmatic side can emerge. I don’t disagree that his animus toward criticism dominates his pragmatism. It’s a hierarchy; insecure egotism, inability to take criticism, pragmatism and kookiness.

    So, I do not want this man as President. I just want a leftist democrat even less. If persuaded by reason, that a third alternative was viable, I’d be fully on board.

  94. A definition of tedium with GB; “Objectively evaluating the….” paths of history. Things only evolve one way, a fallback of Marxist determinism. It’s the march of progress after all.

    Subjective GB opinion posed as “objective”dispassionate thought, that conveniently bolsters GBs hobby horse.

  95. Soon to be released at bookstores, Kindle, eBooks for all to read:

    “Multiple Personality Disorders or The Pragmatic Trump”

    Not just your run of the mill kooky NY millionaire or is he a billionaire? Who really knows? All is revealed! Exclusive interviews with the author in this weeks National Enquirer!

    Interviews to follow with Shawn Hannity, and Rush Limbaugh!!

    /s

  96. “(2016 is) a ‘choice’ of disaster or catastrophe” – GB

    Then…

    “It is that which makes Trump the preferable choice” – GB

    And…

    “Show us a resolution for those obstacles and we can have a serious discussion about other choices. – GB

    Didn’t think you really meant “disaster” vs “catastrophe”.

    There is very little “acceptable” on either dimension, if one really, seriously holds that sentiment.

    When one knows that either choice is awful on THAT scale (the one YOU provided), rather than sit back and resigning themselves to those as “inevitable” outcomes, it seems there would be a serious and vigorous search for alternatives.

    A “Show us a resolution to those obstacles” challenge perpetuates that binary view of the world, and is placing the priority the wrong way, if your sentiment was true.

    Therefore, I have to wonder if there is any alternative solution that you would “seriously discuss”, let alone accept, if you and others like you continue to argue like trump is acceptable.

    And you wanted to make a bad analogy about how the Jews were blind to the options they had in WWII to avoid their fate.
    .

    If trump is acceptable to you, then yes it is your job to assume alternatives cannot succeed simply as a foregone conclusion, based on normal operating parameters.

    Let’s just say that under normal election cycles, trump was not viable… until he was.

    This has been a mighty strange year, and we CANNOT rule out alternatives by applying the old rules and assumptions.

    It takes a change in mindset amongst many people, but if we keep the conversation on the choice as if it were a binary one we face, we lock ourselves out of any alternative.

    This is a critical point, as both the trump and clinton campaigns want us to think there are no other choices, using our own paradigm against us. We are being herded down that path.

    Our own thinking has to change.

    If we can trust the long consistent net negatives each has in the polls, there must be enough people who recognize how awful both major party candidates are, thus there IS an opportunity for an alternative.

    Nobody is going to provide an immediately recognizable “viable” solution – we each have to move FIRST.

    Our own thinking has to change.

    It is in our hands who we find acceptable, trump, clinton, or someone else.

  97. “You have consistently argued more in trump, be it campaign strategy or policy depth, than is warranted by what we are seeing…”

    “…you are just arguing more of the same, and that his “getting things done” is a proof point that he is the superior choice (and something we’d respect if only we knew what it takes to “get things done — in the real world”).”

    I was not arguing. I was trying to answer the question of what were working class people seeing in Trump and also offering an opinion as to why some critics would be relatively less appreciative of his unique qualities due to their “sheltered” environment.

    My further explanation of my comments: Let’s say that I am working so hard at three jobs that I have literally no time to learn about an election. One candidate is a maid at the local hotel and the other is a bellhop there. I don’t live in Virginia or California so my vote will count. How do I choose? Let’s say I am a woman. Do I choose the maid? Flip a coin? I say that there is a better way to decide. They both won primaries so they have some skills. Let’s see…a maid must please only one person to prosper -the Head Housekeeper. The bellhop, however, must please many different types of people and must learn something about them in order to prosper. I’ll go with the bellhop. See?
    What I really want is the female concierge, but, dammit, she is not on the ballot.

  98. Please go to theconservativetreehouse.com and read the comments there. We are no longer the Republican and Democrat parties, we are the globalists and the nationalists. Using a social media standard rather than the polls, it looks good for Trump. Breitbart.com for Clinton Cash if you haven’T seen it already. Try googling Occidental College and Barry Soetoro, OBama’s adopted name. with Trump I give us maybe ten years as a country. With Hillary, maybe five. Am currently looking for an American-made electric range. Sorry about typing…eye surgery.

  99. Belle:

    Conservativenuthous is not held in high regard by some conservatives, Mark Levin for one, but it is a clarion for the alt_Right as is of course Trumpbart. Hope your recovery from the eye procedure is speedy and complete none the less.

  100. Hi Belle – I recently had eye surgery too and am dealing with lots of retinal problems, so God bless you on your recovery. I know how hard it is (I’m currently typing this on a monitor where I have it magnified several times and I’m having to get withing 4 or 5 inches of the screen to even see it!)

    If I can gently challenge something you wrote: “Using a social media standard rather than the polls, it looks good for Trump.”

    The lout could very well win, but pretending the polls don’t reflect reality is one of the first signs of a losing campaign. I don’t know if the Trump camp is doing that but I hear him talk about “rigged elections”, etc. That is (here comes a Trumpism) “Loser talk”.

    The right response is to try to win voters that aren’t already in his camp. Trump – to put it delicately – SUCKS at that. People like me, who are horrified at a Hillary presidency but simply can’t vote for Trump because I don’t know if he’ll acci-tweet us into a depression or world war, have heard him say, in so many words, that he doesn’t want our vote and have endured a lot of interweb taunting and threats from his supporters. That’s not winning any votes anywhere. Just makes me want him to lose all the more.

    And, by the way . . . true Trumpkins (I don’t count any of you in this camp, since most here seem to have rational reservations even if planning on voting for him) are some of the worst people I’ve ever run across on social media.

  101. Neo-Neocon,

    Great insight about how political chaos is the new normal. This is dfinitely the most chaotic campaign I’ve ever witnessed. Between the outlandish comments and defaming TV commercials, I hope the next election isn’t as aggressive.

    Thanks for the post,
    Dennis

  102. The right response is to try to win voters that aren’t already in his camp. Trump — to put it delicately — SUCKS at that. People like me, who are horrified at a Hillary presidency but simply can’t vote for Trump because I don’t know if he’ll acci-tweet us into a depression or world war, have heard him say, in so many words, that he doesn’t want our vote and have endured a lot of interweb taunting and threats from his supporters. That’s not winning any votes anywhere. Just makes me want him to lose all the more.

    And, by the way . . . true Trumpkins (I don’t count any of you in this camp, since most here seem to have rational reservations even if planning on voting for him) are some of the worst people I’ve ever run across on social media.

    Bill: Amen to that! Perhaps I’ve come on strong here against Trump and his suppporters, but Trump people, generally speaking, have been some of the nastiest I have encountered too, including Daily Kos.

    Some gracious reaching-out to those outside the Trump camp would have gone a ways to aleviating my alarms about Trump, but that’s not Trump’s style and his followers ape his meanness.

    Yes, Trump has said some things worth saying and his emergence was an important signal to the GOP establishment but his downsides — losing to Hillary and/or burning down the GOP and/or accidentally crashing international systems — make him a cure worse than the disease.

  103. “Yes, Trump has said some things worth saying and his emergence was an important signal to the GOP establishment but his downsides – losing to Hillary and/or burning down the GOP and/or accidentally crashing international systems – make him a cure worse than the disease.”

    Agreed!

    To me, one of the most defining moments of the campaign was the day after he won the Republican nomination. A normal person would have immediately worked on two fronts: unity among his own party and sharpening his attacks against his Democratic opponent. Trump made clear he’s not a normal person – his prime motivation after self-aggrandizement is Vengeance, and he immediately began talking about irrelevancies, such as Ted Cruz. He could have reached out to Cruz supporters, but instead he continued poking them in the eye. Bizarre.

    He’ll govern the same way if he wins. What’s best for America will take a distant fourth place behind 1) what’s best for Trump, 2) what’s best for Trump’s family and business, 3) who has crossed him that he needs to crush.

  104. “He’ll govern the same way if he wins. What’s best for America will take a distant fourth place behind 1) what’s best for Trump, 2) what’s best for Trump’s family and business, 3) who has crossed him that he needs to crush.”

    Now we are getting somewhere. She will govern if she wins. What’s best for America will take a distant fourth behind 1) what’s best for Bill and Hillary, 2) what’s best for the Clinton Foundation, 3) what’s best for those who have given to the Clinton Foundation, paid for speeches and given to the Democratic Party.

    Are we clear? Vote

  105. Polls can be manipulated by the manner in which the question is asked and the polling sample. On Fox, Luntz’s audience polls always came out anti-Trump, but the general public gave the debates to Trump. I. can’t remember a single election in which the Republican wa s ahead until after the votes were counted. IT is my observation that the MSM touts the weakest Republican candidate in the primaries and then turns on him when he runs for President.

    I don’t doubt that Trump disheartened a lot of people and that he lost supporters, but that was probably part of the purpose of the polls. Think how disheartened Hillary supporters would feel if they knew that only several hundred show up at her events or that they had to pay people to fill empty seats at the convention?

    We are very much following the Russian and Chinese communist playbook in which the media is controlled by the government (morning media briefings, anyone?). And those who disagree are called insane.

    Many of us who will vote for Trump much preferred other candidates. You can vote third party,but I learned my lesson. I voted for Perot and got Clinton. Whole-hearted enthusiasm for Trump is not necessary

    Thanks for your kind thoughts regarding my health and your assistance in my new quest for American-made products. Right now GE makes a single electric range that is enclosed and 75 per cent American. Tired of burners that aren’t flat.

  106. Polls can be manipulated by the manner in which the question is asked and the polling sample. On Fox, Luntz’s audience polls always came out anti-Trump, but the general public gave the debates to Trump. I. can’t remember a single election in which the Republican wa s ahead until after the votes were counted. IT is my observation that the MSM touts the weakest Republican candidate in the primaries and then turns on him when he runs for President.

    I don’t doubt that Trump disheartened a lot of people and that he lost supporters, but that was probably part of the purpose of the polls. Think how disheartened Hillary supporters would feel if they knew that only several hundred show up at her events or that they had to pay people to fill empty seats at the convention?

    We are very much following the Russian and Chinese communist playbook in which the media is controlled by the government (morning media briefings, anyone?). And those who disagree are called insane.

    Many of us who will vote for Trump much preferred other candidates. You can vote third party,but I learned my lesson. I voted for Perot and got Clinton. Whole-hearted enthusiasm for Trump is not necessary

    Thanks for your kind thoughts regarding
    ! my health and your assistance in my new quest for American-made products. Right now GE makes a single electric range that is enclosed and 75 per cent American. Tired of burners that aren’t flat.

  107. Eric comment on 7 Aug @3:45am with links to two observer articles written by John Schindler at the observer. I advise everyone to take anything Schindler writes with a large tablespoon of salt. HIs analysis is not always wrong, but it isn’t to be automatically trusted either. It’s shaky, it seems to be deliberately so, but I won’t speculate as to why that is.

    In the second article (scroll up for the link) about Trump being Putin’s guy Schindler says this:

    …Critics have countered that Morell is a Clinton operative, but the former spook boss claims to be politically independent. The only “evidence” he’s on Team Hillary is his current employment with a Washington strategic advisory firm with ties to members of the Clinton inner circle.

    Before that, Morell spent 33 years at Langley as an intelligence analyst, winding up as the CIA’s deputy director in 2010. Before retiring in 2013, he served twice as the agency’s acting director, in 2011 and again in 2012-13, enjoying a good relationship with President Obama.

    In other words, Morell is a typical high-flying mandarin in America’s secret spy empire, the 17-agency behemoth we call the Intelligence Community. These folks tend not to be partisan in a political sense, and if Morell’s a raging liberal and Republican-hater he’s been hiding it well…

    I’m sure he did have a good relationship with Obama because Morell’s false and misleading testimony before the House Intelligence Committee demonstrates that despite his denials he did tailor the intel analysis to support the administration fiction that there was a spontaneous demonstration sparked by the video.

    Morell testified before the House and Senate several times inclucing written testimony, which he presented 2 April 2014, in which Morell made several demonstrably false and highly misleading statements.

    http://intelligence.house.gov/sites/intelligence.house.gov/files/documents/morellsfr04022014.pdf

    Morell testified that the analysts he decided to depend on had no indication there had been not been a protest until 18 August 2012. Just so you know, from open source reporting I knew at least by the 13th that there had been no “spontaneous protest” and no shooting. For instance:

    http://www.wcvb.com/news/local/metro/Mass-doctor-scheduled-to-meet-with-Ambassador-day-after-Libya-attack/16605298

    …Dr. Thomas Burke and several colleagues were in Benghazi to discuss ways Massachusetts General Hospital could help the city’s medical center improve its emergency department. “The ambassador was very curious and was excited by the potential for any Americans to partner with citizens of Libya.”

    He was supposed to meet with Ambassador Stevens the day after the attack.

    Burke was in his hotel room Tuesday night as a colleague spoke with an attache for Ambassador Chris Stevens. “There was a loud explosion and the attache yelled and said, ‘something’s going on’ and hung up.”

    Mass General Hospital has a basically a “sister hospital” relationship with Benghazi Medical Center. How do I know this? Because he was blogging his experiences in Benghazi throughout his stay. He practically live blogged as an “ear witness” in real time throughout the entire attack and then the aftermath the next day. For instance although it doesn’t say so here, Dr. Burke not only heard the blast over the phone, their hotel was close enough to the compound he reported he hear it through their window.

    There had been no shooting (at least, not by embassy guards into a crowd of protesters) before the terrorists attacked the embassy. And this isn’t my only open source data point. I’m not going to present all the evidence I compiled in my “Clinton lies” folder as I’d overwhelm the system and I don’t think it’s necessary or desirable to present it all. But I have the evidence to back up every conclusion I draw.

    The State Department compound was in a residential area. There were plenty of witnesses, just as there were at the Boston Marathon bombing. This attack in Benghazi was just as public and just as unclassified as that attack, which makes open source very useful. And the foreign press wasn’t shy about talking to those witnesses either.

    But sticking with this source, had there been a protest at all, let alone had guards fired on it, that embassy staffer would not have been on the phone at all with Dr. Burke. He would have been too busy.

    But the CIA wasn’t limited to open source. Who had the best information as to what was going on at a State Dept. facility? The State Dept. which had been in constant contact with its Diplomatic Security Service personnel as soon as the terrorists assaulted the compound.

    http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2012/10/198791.htm

    As those guys attempt to secure a perimeter around Building C, they also move to the TOC, where one agent has been manning the phone. I neglected to mention from the top that that agent from the top of this incident, or the very beginning of this incident, has been on the phone. He had called the quick reaction security team, he had called the Libyan authorities, he had called the Embassy in Tripoli, and he had called Washington. He had them all going to ask for help. And he remained in the TOC.

    …And they continue far down the block toward the crowds and far down several blocks to the crowd — to another crowd where this road t-bones into a main road. There is a crowd there. They pass through the crowd and on — turn right onto this main road. This main road is completely choked with traffic, enormous traffic jam typical for, I think, that time of night in that part of town. There are shops along the road there and so on.

    Rather than get stuck in the traffic, the agents careen their car over the median — there is a median, a grassy median — and into the opposing traffic, and they go counter-flow until they emerge into a more lightly trafficked area and ultimately make their way to the annex.

    …First question is from the line of Anne Gearan with the Washington Post. Please go ahead.

    QUESTION: Hi. You said a moment ago that there was nothing unusual outside, on the street, or outside the gates of the main compound. When did the agents inside — what — excuse me, what did the agents inside think was happening when the first group of men gathered there and they first heard those explosions? Did they think it was a protest, or did they think it was something else?

    SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL TWO: The agent in the TOC heard the noise, heard the firing. Firing is not unusual in Benghazi at 9:40 at night, but he immediately reacted and looked at his cameras and saw people coming in, hit the alarm. And the rest is as I described it. Does that help?

    QUESTION: Hi, yes. You described several incidents you had with groups of men, armed men. What in all of these events that you’ve described led officials to believe for the first several days that this was prompted by protests against the video?

    SENIOR STATE DEPARTMENT OFFICIAL TWO: That is a question that you would have to ask others. That was not our conclusion. I’m not saying that we had a conclusion, but we outlined what happened. The Ambassador walked guests out around 8:30 or so, there was no one on the street at approximately 9:40, then there was the noise and then we saw on the cameras the — a large number of armed men assaulting the compound…

    Why was Morell going with open source information about what happened at a State Department facility when the agent(s) in the Tactical Operations Center (TOC) “had called Washington” i.e. the Diplomatic Security Command Center (DSCC) and the agents on watch at the DSCC were monitoring events in real time?

    Then there’s the fact that the survivors were airlifted from Benghazi in USAF transport aircraft on the morning of 12 September, flown to Ramstein in Germany and debriefed the same day.

    When Morell claims the CIA shouldn’t be found guilty of cooking the intel because the analysts didn’t have the information, that invites the question, why didn’t they? State Department had the information. CIA had the information. Why didn’t the analysts Morell chose to rely on have the information? Moreover Morell has Deputy Director of the CIA knew exactly what information the analysts he chose to rely on didn’t have. Despite his protests Morell undeniably cooked the intel. Maybe he didn’t personally withhold the information from the “analysts” (apparently the CIA is using high school interns as analysts these days who don’t know the first thing they should ask for are the debriefs) but at the very least Morell knew the testimony he provided to Congress had been cooked at the agency. And Morell knew the recipe, and he wasn’t telling.

    I just never believed any of it even at the time. I keep going back to Dr. Burke’s account. Had there been a Cairo-style protest, those people would have been out of there. Every State Department facility has an emergency action plan, this facility could not be defended, and per their EAP they would have been long gone.

    My initial impressions were backed up by the foreign press reporting, in which eye witnesses (not just Dr. Burke’s “ear witness”) confirmed there had been no protest prior to the assault. It’s why I included the accounts of the crowds, the traffic, the median the jumping, the shops in the neighborhood, etc. This was a very public event.

    Which invites the question, lest we miss the forest for the trees, why did the Obama administration hand the job of figuring out if there had been a protest or not before the attack to the CIA? Simple. For the same reason he’d have Holder at DoJ conduct a go nowhere, do nothing “investigation.” To help with the cover-up and stonewall. In Morell he had a willing stooge who would help him con the American people into thinking we needed IMINT or COMINT or ELINT to figure out what was obvious to any Libyan looking out their apartment window, or would have been obvious to any Libyan stuck in that traffic jam or frequenting those shops.

    The timeline of events simply wasn’t an intel issue. Again, it was a very public event just like the Boston Marathon bombing or the New Years Muslim grope and rape fest in Cologne. There wasn’t a need to involve the CIA to get a basic idea of what had happened. In 1982 Reagan went on TV within a week of the Beirut barracks bombings and was able to accurately tell the American people what had happened. All you had to do was to talk to the witnesses. Which State and CIA had done by evening on the 12th at the latest. The Obama administration handed it to the CIA because in Morell they had a willing stooge who would go along and pretend even sorting out the basic timeline of events and figuring out if there had been a protest at all was some mystery and eye witness testimony couldn’t help us. We needed “intel.”

    Question; did we need to consult with the CIA to figure out if there had been a protest/riot at the Cairo embassy?

    It was all BS from the start and the fact that Morell was willing to play along with any of it proves Schindler wrong when he gives that piece of fecal matter the benefit of some doubt which can’t possibly exist.

    I’ll leave you with a joke. A USN admiral is sitting around thinking to himself, “Is 2 plus 2 really equal to four or does it equal something else?”

    So he calls in his operations officer, an aviator, and asks him, “OPS, how much is 2 plus 2?”

    The aviator says, “Geez, admiral, that’s a tough one. I dunno. Now can I go to the gym and get swoll?”

    The admiral dismisses him. Then calls in his communications officer. “COMMO, how much is two plus two?” The COMMO goes to a white board and starts going through an elegant mathematical theorem to show not only does 2 plus 2 equal 4 but why. The admiral’s eye’s glaze over and he says, “Get out of here, I don’t want to see all that.”

    So he calls in his intel officer, Mike Morell. “Spy,” sez the admiral, “How much is two plus two?”

    Mike Morell holds his finger to his lips and almost inaudibly says “Shsss.” Then he goes to the windows and draws the blinds and the drapes. He goes to the door and cracks it open and peeks to see if anyone is trying to eavesdrop. Then he goes over to admiral, leans over to speak into his ear, and asks in a whisper.

    “How much do you want it be.”

    Morell is the kind of sell-out and sycophant who gives intel a bad name. If Schindler trusts him, you can’t trust Schindler.

  108. Belle Says:

    “Please go to theconservativetreehouse.com…Breitbart.com…”

    Both are websites owned by the alt-right (CT) or overrun by them (BB). Why would I go to either, unless I needed a good laugh? They have both become the home of sycophants and kooks; the kind of people who think there may be something to this “Rafael Cruz helped kill Kennedy” thing.

  109. Trump is megalomaniac in the same sense as Islam, when he thinks Japan is too stupid to read his English comments. He thinks he can translate them into Japanese and the Japanese will buy the Japanese line, the way Americans buy Muslim sweet talk in English while ignoring Muslim rape talk in Arabic.

  110. Those personnel are civil servants and are in fact civilians. Since they’re civil servants they can resign at any time. There is nothing like our UCMJ and a military justice system; those people like all civilians are subject to civil law. The Diet or Japanese parliament places very tight limits on what actions it may take. The laws the JMSDF had to operate under never anticipated the conditions it would operate under post 9/11.

    The JMSDF looks like a navy from the outside. But when you take a look inside it’s not actually a navy.

    Some of that changed with the re activation of the Ministry of Defense. From what loose sources I’ve found, the Japanese use more deniable assets, as a result of their country being a spy hub. And those assets are routed through US military training more times than not, even though they are considered “civil servants”, not soldiers.

    They weren’t going to replace their entire command chain and rank in the branches, over night, of course. But the Ministry of Defense was reactivated under Abe for 2008, I believe. Ichigara. And they did start producing officer level cadre, trained often times along US Marines and various other foreign forces, absorbing experience and SOP from larger armies.

  111. Ymarsakar commenting on August 8th, 2016 at 11:15 pm.

    I have no idea what you’re trying to say. And I respectfully suggest, neither do you. You seem for one example hellbent on confusing uniform-wearing military personnel with”deniable assets” and I just don’t get it.

  112. Matt_SE:
    Alt_Right is not a term that I’ve heard before, but obviously you mean it to be dismissive in an attempt to discourage others from judging for themselves. So who are your reliable sources and why do you believe them? Do you not agree that it is important to see Clinton Cash? (Or will you forego it because it is not on the philosophically correct website.)Many thanks to Neo for this extended and informative thread. Have loved the depth of detail from many contributors.

  113. I don’t know how I missed this. blert said:

    The current government of Japan is doing everything possible to get out of Article 9.

    Donald Trump’s “gaff” is music to their ears.

    I need to join the chorus of voices who find this assessment entirely unbelievable. It goes against reality. The last thing the Japanese elements working to get out from under Article 9 want or need is for it to look like the puppets of their masters in the United States. Which is precisely the effect of Trump’s very real gaffe. Trump didn’t help their cause; he set it back.

    The peace faction is almost if not entirely a left wing phenomenon. Those who want to rearm include rightists who see the US military presence in Japan and the what they see as the USG’s undo influence over Japanese foreign and defense policies as intolerable insults to Japan’s sovereignty. They are essentially old fashioned Japanese imperialists.

    Trump’s gaffe harms the Japanese’s government’s attempts to revise their constitution with both their opponents on the left and their supporters on the right. To succeed the Japanese government needs to make the case that revising the constitution and rearming is in the best interests of Japan. Then along comes Donald J. Trump to torpedo that argument.

    Donald Trump has savaged Japan, one of America’s closest allies, stating that if the US is attacked, all Japan would do is “sit home and watch Sony television”.

    Donald Trump has savaged Japan, one of America’s closest allies, stating that if the US is attacked, all Japan would do is “sit home and watch Sony television”.

    He expressed his frustration that the US is bound by treaty to defend the Asian nation but that if the United States is attacked, the Japanese cannot help because of Article 9, which constitutionally forbids it to send armed forces overseas.

    Which confirms the suspicions across the political spectrum that the Japanese government is simply doing the American’s bidding by trying to revise the constitution; that this has nothing to do with the best interests of Japan, and is in fact working against Japanese interests, and only is concerned with the best interests of the US. That is most definitely not music to their ears. To attempt to argue otherwise is counterfactual, in the realm of pure fantasy.

  114. https://www.amazon.com/Japan-That-Can-Say-No/dp/0671735713

    The above book was a best seller in Japan over a quarter of a century ago. The author, Shintaro Ishihara, argued in 1990 that Japan was fully the equal and not subordinate to the United States and should start acting like. That Japan needed an actual, full fledged military, not a pseudo-military Self Defense Force, and that military needed to be a strong one, to act in its own independently determined self interest. That the US needed to show Japan the respect it deserved and consult with Japan on foreign policy and military issues rather than simply issue orders with which Japan would then meekly comply.

    I mention this because I was afraid that referring to the “old fashioned Japanese imperialists” I was implying that the above sentiments were confined to some extremist fringe elements. They are far more main stream than that. After all Ishihara was governor of Tokyo and a long time member of the Diet. I wouldn’t describe Ishihara as an imperialist but as a staunch nationalist. There is a widespread notion that Japan’s constitution effectively makes it a dependency of the US and therefore a widespread reaction that Japan should remove the constitutional shackles that prevent it from being a “normal country.” They have no imperial designs. And Ishihara and those like him don’t reject an alliance with the US but that it should be an alliance of equals rather then, as they see it, a master-servant relationship.

    This isn’t something confined to some fringe political elements but is far more mainstream, to the point Ishihara survived several supposed scandals that his critics said demanded his resignation. Ironically Ishihara was something of a Japanese Donald Trump as he would run his mouth with no concern for being the least bit PC, hence his “scandals.”

    Then along comes Trumpy the insult clown who demands the Japanese rearm so they can aid in the defense of the US or else. Making the rearmament proponents look exactly like the servants of the US people like Ishihara always accused them of being. Now the Abe government looks as if it’s simply asking “how high” because their American master said “jump.”

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