GOP2020: What Becomes Of The Collaborators Post-Trump?

BG9 said:
Does anyone remember this mass, major suffering at the border before Trump's presidency? I don't. 
Children locked up, children separated from their parents, etc. 

Obama administration tear gassing of immigrants at the border was only mildly reported.  Previous admins went easy enforcing immigration law.  

ETA - that's what I remember.


lord_pabulum said:


BG9 said:
Does anyone remember this mass, major suffering at the border before Trump's presidency? I don't. 
Children locked up, children separated from their parents, etc. 
Obama administration tear gassing of immigrants at the border was only mildly reported

Since you know of this I'd like it if you could give us a reputable link giving us the details? If this did occur was it due to border control troops panicking or preventing a major riot? Was it one time? Or was it a standing Obama policy?

The current suffering is due to standing Trump policies.


BG9 said:
Since you know of this I'd like it if you could give us a reputable link giving us the details? If this did occur was it due to border control troops panicking or preventing a major riot? Was it one time? Or was it a standing Obama policy?
The current suffering is due to standing Trump policies.

It is what I remember.  It was an answer to your question not an editorial comment.  

As for your request, here is a link

ETA: I think you mean Trump's executive orders not policies.  You also are probably including the Trump administration's enforcing existing immigration laws.



mtierney said:
 You will have to text me, because I made heavenly reservations decades ago!

 I just got off the phone with Gloria Vanderbilt.  Since she was right there at check in, I asked her to check on your reservation.   It seems you have more work to do.  


Continuing with the theme of “where are we when...,” where are we when our spooks withhold plans from a president because he’s a security risk?


Two administration officials said they believed Mr. Trump had not been briefed in any detail about the steps to place “implants” — software code that can be used for surveillance or attack — inside the Russian grid.

Pentagon and intelligence officials described broad hesitation to go into detail with Mr. Trump about operations against Russia for concern over his reaction — and the possibility that he might countermand it or discuss it with foreign officials, as he did in 2017when he mentioned a sensitive operation in Syria to the Russian foreign minister.

 NYT


If you told me back in the day in front of Bethesda Fountain that I would one day be cheering for the FBI, CIA and all of the spooks out there I would have asked, "What was in that punch?"



OK, I realize this is petty, but isn't anyone mentioning this use of the phrase?


"We were cocked & loaded to retaliate last night on 3 different sights (sic) when I asked, how many will die. 150 people, sir, was the answer from a General," Trump tweeted. "10 minutes before the strike I stopped it."


Cocked and loaded? Isn't it "locked and loaded?"


Looked up "cocked and loaded" but got this on Urban Dictionary:

TOP DEFINITION

cocked and loadedWhen your testicles rise into your body during sex, usually preceding ejaculation. "man I was cocked and loaded, but then her dad walked in so we had to stop." 


Also the name of a rock album.


Forget the fact that he doesn’t know sight from site. 


nohero said:


BG9 said:

Anyway, I'm sure mt made a funny. As we all know, reservations are not taken.  question 
Reservations aren't necessary.  There's plenty of room (John 14:2).   smile  

 A popular bumper sticker in certain places that puts a vernacular slant to John 14:2.


I prefer this slant:



GL2 said:
OK, I realize this is petty, but isn't anyone mentioning this use of the phrase?


"We were cocked & loaded to retaliate last night on 3 different sights (sic) when I asked, how many will die. 150 people, sir, was the answer from a General," Trump tweeted. "10 minutes before the strike I stopped it."


Cocked and loaded? Isn't it "locked and loaded?"


Looked up "cocked and loaded" but got this on Urban Dictionary:
TOP DEFINITION
cocked and loadedWhen your testicles rise into your body during sex, usually preceding ejaculation. "man I was cocked and loaded, but then her dad walked in so we had to stop." 



Also the name of a rock album.

 He probably confused the phrase with one of the titles of Stormy Daniel's films. Her version of the film G I Jane.


Morganna said:


GL2 said:
OK, I realize this is petty, but isn't anyone mentioning this use of the phrase?


"We were cocked & loaded to retaliate last night on 3 different sights (sic) when I asked, how many will die. 150 people, sir, was the answer from a General," Trump tweeted. "10 minutes before the strike I stopped it."


Cocked and loaded? Isn't it "locked and loaded?"


Looked up "cocked and loaded" but got this on Urban Dictionary:
TOP DEFINITION
cocked and loadedWhen your testicles rise into your body during sex, usually preceding ejaculation. "man I was cocked and loaded, but then her dad walked in so we had to stop." 



Also the name of a rock album.
 He probably confused the phrase with one of the titles of Stormy Daniel's films. Her version of the film G I Jane.

 Phrase-lookout-list for GL2:

1. WRONG: for all intensive purposes

 RIGHT: for all intents and purposes

This phrase originates from early legal speak. The original phrase as used in English law circa 1500s is "to all intents, constructions and purposes."


2. WRONG: pre-Madonna 

RIGHT: prima donna

Although some may argue that the Material Girl is a great example of a prima donna, she has nothing to do with this phrase. It is an Italian phrase that refers to the female lead in an opera or play and is used to refer to someone who considers themselves more important than others.


3. WRONG: nip it in the butt 

RIGHT: nip it in the bud

There's an easy way to remember this one: imagine a flower starting to sprout. You're nipping (pinching or squeezing) the bud before it has a chance to grow.


4. WRONG: on accident 

RIGHT: by accident

You can do something "on purpose", but you can't do something "on accident". Just one of the many exceptions of the English language.


5. WRONG: statue of limitations 

RIGHT: statute of limitations

There is no sculpture outside of court houses called the "Statue of Limitations." "Statute" is just another word for "law".


6. WRONG: Old timer’s disease 

RIGHT: Alzheimer’s disease

Simply a mispronunciation of "Alzheimer's".


See https://www.askmen.com/dating/dating_advice/commonly-confused-phrases.html


PS Wasn't he an English teacher at one time?


PPS Morganna's definition of "cocked and loaded" appears to be from the following site:  https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=cocked%20and%20loaded


More like “cucked and loaded” amirite?


In case anyone is feeling OK about where we are as a country, here's a real eye-opener:


Assailants Invoking Donald Trump in Criminal Defenses, Study Shows

Defendants in at least 36 criminal cases involving violence, threats of violence or assault have invoked President Donald Trump in connection with their purported crimes, according to analysis by ABC News.

"The 36 cases identified by ABC News are remarkable in that a link to the president is captured in court documents and police statements, under the penalty of perjury or contempt," according to the report.

Former presidents Barack Obama and George H.W. Bush did not appear in the networks widespread search of federal and state criminal cases.

In 10 cases, Trump's rhetoric was cited to explain a defendant's violent or menacing actions. In 10 more cases, defendants celebrated President Trump while harassing others. Nine additional cases documented assailants praising the president during or immediately after a physically violent attack.

A few cases did include instances of violence or threats where Trump was invoked in order to target his supporters in Congress.

In 2018, lawyers for a Kansas man convicted in a plot to bomb a mosque attended by Somali refugees argued that Donald Trump's rhetoric leading up to and during the 2016 presidential election should be taken into consideration during his sentencing.

Though Patrick Eugene Stein faced life in prison, his attorneys pleaded with the judge to impose a sentence of no more than 15 years, in part because he was an "early and avid supporter" of Trump. They further alleged the president's language during the campaign was a "backdrop" to Stein's case.

He was ultimately given a 30-year prison sentence.

Lawyers for Cesar Sayoc, who pleaded guilty to mailing pipe bombs to various public figures, told the judge that Sayoc had "found light in Donald J. Trump."

Newsweek


Did they also blame Grand Theft Auto and skittles?


Robert_Casotto said:

Did they also blame Grand Theft Auto and skittles?

Why would they do that?


Representative Steve King hits one out of the park!

https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/14/politics/steve-king-rape-incest-comments/index.html
Washington (CNN)Republican Rep. Steve King of Iowa questioned on Wednesday whether there would be any population left on Earth if not for rape and incest.
"What if we went back through all the family trees and just pulled those people out that were products of rape and incest? Would there be any population of the world left if we did that?" he said in Urbandale,
Iowa, according to video posted online by the Des Moines Register, which was first to report on the remarks Wednesday. "Considering  all the wars and all the rape and pillage that has taken place ... I know I can't certify that I was not a part of a product of that," King said. "I'd like to think that every one of the lives of us are as precious as any other life," he added. The remarks came as King was defending not allowing exceptions for abortion in cases of rape or incest.

drummerboy said:

Representative Steve King hits one out of the park!

https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/14/politics/steve-king-rape-incest-comments/index.html
Washington (CNN)Republican Rep. Steve King of Iowa questioned on Wednesday whether there would be any population left on Earth if not for rape and incest.
"What if we went back through all the family trees and just pulled those people out that were products of rape and incest? Would there be any population of the world left if we did that?" he said in Urbandale,
Iowa, according to video posted online by the Des Moines Register, which was first to report on the remarks Wednesday. "Considering  all the wars and all the rape and pillage that has taken place ... I know I can't certify that I was not a part of a product of that," King said. "I'd like to think that every one of the lives of us are as precious as any other life," he added. The remarks came as King was defending not allowing exceptions for abortion in cases of rape or incest.

 Picture of Commander Steve King's wife and his handmaid, Ofsteve.


Robert_Casotto said:

Did they also blame Grand Theft Auto and skittles?

 You're incorrigible.  LOL

Of course it's a lame excuse but they see an ally and comrade in the WH.


Anyone ever try to imagine Steve King's constituents? The folks who elect and re-elect him?


GL2 said:

 You're incorrigible. 
LOL

Of course it's a lame excuse but they see an ally and comrade in the WH.

 They're using the excuse because it's entirely plausible. 


This is a long post and I realize most of us don't like them, including me. But folks need to have an Atlantic subscription to read George Packer's whole article. Below is the intro that IMO really nails where we are at present and how we got here. Again, this is the intro to the essay:


The President Is Winning His War on American Institutions

How Trump is destroying the civil service and bending the government to his will

 When Donald Trump came into office, there was a sense that he would be outmatched by the vast government he had just inherited.

The new president was impetuous, bottomlessly ignorant, almost chemically inattentive, while the bureaucrats were seasoned, shrewd, protective of themselves and their institutions. They knew where the levers of power lay and how to use them or prevent the president from doing so. Trump’s White House was chaotic and vicious, unlike anything in American history, but it didn’t really matter as long as “the adults” were there to wait out the president’s impulses and deflect his worst ideas and discreetly pocket destructive orders lying around on his desk.

After three years, the adults have all left the room—saying just about nothing on their way out to alert the country to the peril—while Trump is still there.

James Baker, the former general counsel of the FBI, and a target of Trump’s rage against the state, acknowledges that many government officials, not excluding himself, went into the administration convinced “that they are either smarter than the president, or that they can hold their own against the president, or that they can protect the institution against the president because they understand the rules and regulations and how it’s supposed to work, and that they will be able to defend the institution that they love or served in previously against what they perceive to be, I will say neutrally, the inappropriate actions of the president. And I think they are fooling themselves. They’re fooling themselves. He’s light-years ahead of them.”

The adults were too sophisticated to see Trump’s special political talents—his instinct for every adversary’s weakness, his fanatical devotion to himself, his knack for imposing his will, his sheer staying power. They also failed to appreciate the advanced decay of the Republican Party, which by 2016 was far gone in a nihilistic pursuit of power at all costs. They didn’t grasp the readiness of large numbers of Americans to accept, even relish, Trump’s contempt for democratic norms and basic decency. It took the arrival of such a leader to reveal how many things that had always seemed engraved in monumental stone turned out to depend on those flimsy norms, and how much the norms depended on public opinion. Their vanishing exposed the real power of the presidency. Legal precedent could be deleted with a keystroke; law enforcement’s independence from the White House was optional; the separation of powers turned out to be a gentleman’s agreement; transparent lies were more potent than solid facts. None of this was clear to the political class until Trump became president.

But the adults’ greatest miscalculation was to overestimate themselves—particularly in believing that other Americans saw them as selfless public servants, their stature derived from a high-minded commitment to the good of the nation.

When Trump came to power, he believed that the regime was his, property he’d rightfully acquired, and that the 2 million civilians working under him, most of them in obscurity, owed him their total loyalty. He harbored a deep suspicion that some of them were plotting in secret to destroy him. He had to bring them to heel before he could be secure in his power. This wouldn’t be easy—the permanent government had defied other leaders and outlasted them. In his inexperience and rashness—the very qualities his supporters loved—he made early mistakes. He placed unreliable or inept commissars in charge of the bureaucracy, and it kept running on its own.

But a simple intuition had propelled Trump throughout his life: Human beings are weak. They have their illusions, appetites, vanities, fears. They can be cowed, corrupted, or crushed. A government is composed of human beings. This was the flaw in the brilliant design of the Framers, and Trump learned how to exploit it. The wreckage began to pile up. He needed only a few years to warp his administration into a tool for his own benefit. If he’s given a few more years, the damage to American democracy will be irreversible.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/04/how-to-destroy-a-government/606793/


"The adults were too sophisticated to see Trump’s special political talents—his instinct for every adversary’s weakness, his fanatical devotion to himself, his knack for imposing his will, his sheer staying power."

"They also failed to appreciate the advanced decay of the Republican Party, which by 2016 was far gone in a nihilistic pursuit of power at all costs."


"But the adults’ greatest miscalculation was to overestimate themselves—particularly in believing that other Americans saw them as selfless public servants, their stature derived from a high-minded commitment to the good of the nation."

"But a simple intuition had propelled Trump throughout his life: Human beings are weak. They have their illusions, appetites, vanities, fears. They can be cowed, corrupted, or crushed. A government is composed of human beings. This was the flaw in the brilliant design of the Framers, and Trump learned how to exploit it."


A young Office of Legal Counsel lawyer (Newland) mulls over what kind of Nazi she would have been in the ’30s:

''As the executive orders and other requests for the office’s approval piled up, many of them of dubious legality, one of Newland’s supervisors took to saying, “We’re just following orders.” He said it without irony, as a way of reminding everyone, “We work for the president.” He said it once to Newland, and when she gave him a look he added, “I know that’s what the Nazis said, but we’re not Nazis.” 

“The president has said that some of them are very fine people,” Newland reminded him.

“Attorney General Sessions never said that,” the supervisor replied. “Steve never said that, and I’ve never said that. We’re not Nazis.” That she could still have such an exchange with a supervisor seemed in itself like a reason not to leave.

But Newland, who is Jewish, sometimes asked herself: If she and her colleagues had been government lawyers in Germany in the 1930s, what kind of bureaucrat would each of them have been? There were the ideologues, the true believers, like one Clarence Thomas protégé. There were the opportunists who went along to get ahead. There were a handful of quiet dissenters. But many in the office just tried to survive by keeping their heads down. “I guess I know what kind I would have been,” Newland told me. “I would have stayed in the Nazi administration initially and then fled.” She thinks she would have been the kind of official who pushed for carve-outs in the Nuremberg Race Laws, preserving citizenship rights for Germans with only partial Jewish ancestry. She would have felt that this was better than nothing—that it justified having worked in the regime at the beginning.'


GL2 said:

Newland told me. “I would have stayed in the Nazi administration initially and then fled.” She thinks she would have been the kind of official who pushed for carve-outs in the Nuremberg Race Laws, preserving citizenship rights for Germans with only partial Jewish ancestry. She would have felt that this was better than nothing—that it justified having worked in the regime at the beginning.'

 So she would have been totally naive. 

But here's the difference between then and now. She knows how then turned out. 


One of the themes is that those career people who are holding out for a chance to reform various departments will jump ship if he’s re-elected. They are also concerned with their pensions. Holding on for one term but unable to stomach two.


Fight the virus - send money to Trump's spiritual adviser:

Paula White, the evangelical pastor and spiritual adviser to President Donald Trump, says her ministry is like a hospital and is asking people to send her money for it.

Except it’s not a real hospital.

“We are a hospital to the sick,” White said over piano music during an online coronavirus prayer session, quickly adding that it’s for “not necessarily the physically sick.”

“We are a hospital for those who are soul-sick, those who are spiritually sick,” she said.

White, who leads Trump’s Faith and Opportunity Initiative, then asked followers for “seed” money. For those who espouse the so-called prosperity gospel, that typically means giving money in the belief that some form of larger prosperity will then be returned to the giver.

“Maybe you’d like to send a $91 seed, and that’s just putting your faith with Psalm 91,” she said. That psalm refers to being saved from “deadly pestilence” and “plague.”

White also suggested sending $9 or “whatever God tells you to do,” adding: “Don’t forget, now is not the time to abandon your covenant with God. It’s a time that you go deeper. Stand with your pastor.”

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/paula-white-coronavirus-hospital_n_5e71a3b2c5b63c3b6486dc1a


Imagine if all of the candidates who ran or are running took unused funds and spent them on something helpful during this crisis; Masks, hand sanitizer, hell I bet if they all chipped in they could buy a respirator.

We all know who is running and who we are voting for so, lets each get a free bottle of Purell for every voter.


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