Despite the detractors, Trump doing well

[*Nately120*]

(07-02-2018, 09:27 PM)michaelsean Wrote: Well the Nazis don’t wear short shorts and mesh tanks when they march.

Yet another reason I simply can't get on board with that party. 

[*Nately120*]

That guy was going to go nuts whether Trump said what he did or not. Now lets get back to how liberal Hollywood is making so many millennial kids gay.

[NATI BENGALS]

(07-02-2018, 09:53 PM)bfine32 Wrote: I ask folks to do one thing:

Look at the subject of the thread, look at the responses, and ask yourself: Am I being open-minded. Do not reply, just look in the mirror and answer.

Sure
And you take a look in the mirror and ask why am i asking others to be open minded about locking kids in cages, trampling on the constitution , and a message of division. And then look at the flag and say me and my president trust the russian government over American intelligence.

[*bfine32*]

(07-03-2018, 12:16 AM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: Sure
And you take a look in the mirror and ask why am i asking others to be open minded about locking kids in cages, trampling on the constitution , and a message of division. And then look at the flag and say me and my president trust the russian government over American intelligence.

Damn, that's a lot to ask myself in the mirror. I thought the one question would be simpler. 

[NATI BENGALS]

(07-03-2018, 12:20 AM)bfine32 Wrote: Damn, that's a lot to ask myself in the mirror. I thought the one question would be simpler. 

Well maybe not in the mirror because seeing yourself supporting that stuff is probably pretty hard. So maybe go easy on yourself.

 With your pro life stance. Maybe start with why you want to force the young drug addict mom to have a kid she doesnt want. Then take away kids from the mom who trekked out on a journey for a better life for her children and hersElf. 

Then jump right in to why you trust the lifelong conman and the russian gov over U.S. intel. Thats a big one. Not sure how a vet can just brush over that and defend a leader that said it. So take a good look there and let me know if we should really be open minded there

[GMDino]

(07-02-2018, 10:45 PM)michaelsean Wrote: No I’d say it if I did. It’s just these things are for the reasons they always are.

(07-02-2018, 10:48 PM)bfine32 Wrote: I'm with you. When I heard of the tragedy "It's Trump's fault" never crossed my mind until folks told me he was to blame.  

The reason you didn't think "It's Trump's fault" is because:

a) Personal responsibility 

b) You wanted to wait for the facts.

Neither of those is a bad decision/reason.

However if the constant stream of hateful rhetoric toward the media did not even cross your mind after it happened you are just delusional and/or deliberately ignoring what your own President says.

Bill O'Reilly never said to go out and kill Dr. Tillerson.  He said that abortion doctors needed handled.

Manson never told anyone to kill directly.  He said it was gong to to take something big like famous people getting killed to start the inevitable race war he saw coming.  

Trump never said to shoot reporters (that was Milo).  He said they were the enemies and were against Making America Great Again...along with his other violent speech.

So please forgive the rest of the US if we had the thought cross our mind that it wouldn't take much for one borderline nutcase to think the POTUS was right and snapped over something. 




 (BTW...that link is NSFW.  Don't listen if you don't like foul language)  We choose not to ignore what the POTUS actually says and hope that it isn't the start of something awful.  And eve with that the number of people who "blamed" Trump was miniscule and certainly not equal to the fervorous denial of his being at blame that continues to this very say when almost no one is saying "it's Trump's fault".

[GMDino]

(07-03-2018, 12:36 AM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: Well maybe not in the mirror because seeing yourself supporting that stuff is probably pretty hard. So maybe go easy on yourself.

 With your pro life stance. Maybe start with why you want to force the young drug addict mom to have a kid she doesnt want. Then take away kids from the mom who trekked out on a journey for a better life for her children and hersElf. 

Then jump right in to why you trust the lifelong conman and the russian gov over U.S. intel. Thats a big one. Not sure how a vet can just brush over that and defend a leader that said it. So take a good look there and let me know if we should really be open minded there

But his "question that NO ONE answered" is very narrow.

If the policy isn't affecting YOU why are you concerned!?!??!!?

"me" vs "us"

[GMDino]

This decision by the POTUS doesn't mean he supports the media getting killed, or thinks it is good or right.  This decision just looks like another tone-deaf moment from a "man" with an agenda to turn people against the media.

A small gesture like lowering the flags would have meant more than any "thoughts and prayers" he can tweet.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/07/02/lowering-flag-its-trumps-decision-when-order-flags-half-staff/753218002/

Quote:Of all the weighty decisions a president makes, signing a proclamation to lower flags to half staff is about symbolism.

It's done to mark national tragedies such as the passing of former presidents, the loss of service members or – increasingly – the far-too-common phenomenon of mass shootings.


So in declining to issue a proclamation lowering flags to half-staff for the victims of a newsroom shooting in Maryland last week, President Donald Trump drew criticism from those who saw a lost opportunity to unite the nation. 


"Shame, shame, Mr. President," said former Democratic National Committee chairwoman Donna Brazille on Twitter.


“Is there a cutoff for tragedy?” Annapolis Mayor Gavin Buckley told the Capital Gazette, the same newspaper where a shooter killed five staff members last week. “This was an attack on the press. It was an attack on freedom of speech. It’s just as important as any other tragedy.”


More: Capital Gazette reveals how shooting unfolded as memorial services begin in Annapolis


The White House did not respond to a request for comment.


Trump has ordered flags lowered for four previous mass shootings — all of which killed more people: Las Vegas, Nev. (58 dead), Sutherland Springs, Tex. (26 dead), Parkland, Fla. (17 dead), and Santa Fe, Tex (10 dead). Each time, flags over federal buildings and U.S. ships were lowered for four days.

But like his predecessors, Trump also faces a grim calculus: What differentiates a devastating crime from a truly national tragedy? Is it a matter of body count, or do some attacks carry with them a symbolic significance that transcends the police report? 


Brandon Rottinghaus, a University of Houston professor who studies presidential proclamations, said the Maryland shooting was not just about the number killed, but that "the crucial role of the free press in America puts their status on par with any other government official."


"This is a missed opportunity to make a truce with the press," he said. "To not lower the flag unfortunately says a lot about the president’s view of the members of the media."

But Trump isn't the first president to grapple with that dilemma. When a Kuwaiti-born Tennessee man shot and killed five service members at recruiting stations around Chattanooga in July 2015, the Obama White House struggled to explain why it took President Barack Obama five days to sign a proclamation.


"I'm glad President Obama followed my lead and lowered the flags half-staff. It's about time!" tweeted Trump, then a candidate for the White House. He had made a show of lowering the flags on Trump Tower. 


(The Chattanooga controversy spurred an Internet meme that falsely claimed Obama lowered the flag for pop singer Whitney Houston. Instead it was New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie who made that decision for state flags.)


But Obama ended up setting a presidential record for the most flag-lowering proclamations — what then-press secretary Josh Earnest called "a symbolic expression of national mourning."


More: Obama ordered flags at half-staff more than any president in history


"It certainly is a way, symbolically, to demonstrate that the country is united in our support for a community that’s mourning," he said in 2016. But he also acknowledged that the occasions marked by lowering the flag have evolved over generations.


President Dwight Eisenhower first tried to give some order to the process, signing a proclamation in 1954 governing how many days the flag should be lowered on each occasion: Presidents and former presidents would get 30 days. Vice presidents, chief justices and House speakers would get 10 — and so on down the order of protocol.


But over time, presidents also began to recognize other tragedies: The crew of a sunken nuclear submarine, passengers of downed airliners, and victims of terrorist attacks. President George W. Bush ordered flags lowered for victims of the Virginia Tech shooting, and Obama continued that trend for mass shootings under his watch.


But in those cases, there are no hard-and-fast rules for when a president should or shouldn't lower the flag. 


"Its all politics," said Charles A. Spain, a Houston attorney and director of the Flag Research Center. "What is the message that the administration wants to get out? And I would argue that one of the most powerful symbols you can use in the presidency is the flag."


"The fact that it’s not lowered is also statement," he said. "Inaction is action."


Governors and mayors, too, can order the lowering of flags of their state or city. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan gave that order Saturday. 


“With the lowering of the Maryland flag, we honor the dedicated journalists of our hometown newspaper in our state’s capital," he said. 
"Journalism is a noble profession upon which our democracy depends, and we will fight to defend it.”



But the mayor of Annapolis said that — despite his disappointment in Trump — he would not order his city's flags lowered on his own. “At this point in time, it would start to polarize people and I don’t want to make people angry,” he told the Capital Gazette.

[GMDino]

(07-03-2018, 06:18 AM)GMDino Wrote: This decision by the POTUS doesn't mean he supports the media getting killed, or thinks it is good or right.  This decision just looks like another tone-deaf moment from a "man" with an agenda to turn people against the media.

A small gesture like lowering the flags would have meant more than any "thoughts and prayers" he can tweet.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/07/02/lowering-flag-its-trumps-decision-when-order-flags-half-staff/753218002/

Annnndddd....he's changed his mind.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/395311-sarah-sanders-trump-will-lower-flags-for-victims-of-capital-gazette

Of course he did it after he tweeted another atack on the media:

Many good conversations with North Korea-it is going well! In the meantime, no Rocket Launches or Nuclear Testing in 8 months. All of Asia is thrilled. Only the Opposition Party, which includes the Fake News, is complaining. If not for me, we would now be at War with North Korea!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 3, 2018

It's like his brain works at half speed.  And then Sanders has to lie and say he made the decision as soon as he heard about it.

[*michaelsean*]

(07-03-2018, 06:18 AM)GMDino Wrote: This decision by the POTUS doesn't mean he supports the media getting killed, or thinks it is good or right.  This decision just looks like another tone-deaf moment from a "man" with an agenda to turn people against the media.

A small gesture like lowering the flags would have meant more than any "thoughts and prayers" he can tweet.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2018/07/02/lowering-flag-its-trumps-decision-when-order-flags-half-staff/753218002/

Sometimes it is hard to fathom the deafness.  This is another one where I can't figure out the thinking or lack thereof.

[Dill]

(07-02-2018, 10:27 PM)bfine32 Wrote: I think they've undermined themselves; as has been shown in recent reports, whose purpose was not to do so.

It's absolutely ironic that the left is standing up for agencies such as the FBI and CIA. I also understand that it is equally ironic that conservatives are pointing a finger at these institutions. As for me, my view has never changed: We don't need to look behind the curtain. 

People are supposed to "look behind the curtain" in a democracy. With temporally limited exceptions, there is not supposed to be a curtain. Trust in government is supposed to be founded on rule of law, which requires transparency and the people's oversight, not faith.

Comey and a couple of subordinates made some bad judgments, but that is not an institution "undermining" itself. The remedy for that is not to keep their doings behind the curtain. We don't "stand up" for institutions that are necessary like we stand up for family members or our football teams. When they are broke we fix them.

"The Left" is not standing up for the FBI and CIA.  See here the advantage of stretching that term, Fox style, to cover everyone not on the right, especially not on the far right. Political moderates and centrists--liberals mostly--have always understood the importance of trust in government institutions. If there have been bad leaders or bad behavior, they have always been behind cleaning up the mess and exercising oversight to restore public trust. The (real) Left criticized the CIA as an institution in 1973 for its role in the overthrow of Allende; political moderates criticized Nixon and Kissinger. Same deal with Hoover and the FBI. Now you claim it ironic that "the left" is standing up for the CIA/FBI when political moderates who have always supported these organizations--along with conservatives like George Will and David Frum, who haven't gone back on their principles for Trump--agree with their assessment of the continuing Russian threat to our elections and domestic politics.

It may be "ironic" that many who still call themselves conservatives are, at the direction of Fox and Trump, "pointing a finger" at the nation's premier intel and law enforcement institutions as they investigate Trump, but I would rather call that "inconsistent"--not to mention short-sighted, given Russia's effort to undermine our elections and our Commander-in-Chiefs effort to cover for them.

[GMDino]

(07-03-2018, 11:34 AM)michaelsean Wrote: Sometimes it is hard to fathom the deafness.  This is another one where I can't figure out the thinking or lack thereof.

Just as I can't understand the flipflop covered by saying he agreed right away...when he did not.

Unless we are to believe the mayor lied and not the Trump.

[Dill]

(07-03-2018, 12:16 AM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: Sure
And you take a look in the mirror and ask why am i asking others to be open minded about locking kids in cages, trampling on the constitution , and a message of division. And then look at the flag and say me and my president trust the russian government over American intelligence.

LOL, that is why "looking in the mirror" is not a very good test.  If a person is really biased, then he is just supposed to "see" that?  

The best test of, and remedy for, bias is to set your views down in writing and see what others "see" in them.  If they can find overlooked facts and logically inconsistencies, then you can grow and learn, or you can decide to call them names and protect your bias.  But unless you got that old Queen's magic mirror, looking there won't do much good.

[Dill]

(07-02-2018, 11:25 PM)Nately120 Wrote: That guy was going to go nuts whether Trump said what he did or not.  Now lets get back to how liberal Hollywood is making so many millennial kids gay.

I say it is all those movies where girly men are the heroes. They "understand" their girl friends and let their wives work outside the home.  Even Rambo learned how to be kinder and gentler in his last movie, because he listened to that missionary woman once all the killing was done. With out real man heroes anymore, what do you expect?

[BmorePat87]

(07-02-2018, 09:19 PM)bfine32 Wrote: It is why I asked you what you think as opposed to what you know. 

They are only amplified if folks want to use this tragedy for their political agendas. 

No, it's amplified because 5 people were gunned down for the fact that they work for a newspaper that reports facts while our President calls people who report facts "the enemy of the people".

But I understand that someone who'd go out of their way to lie about what others have said in this thread would also go out of their way to suggest someone cannot be even more worried about the verbal assault on the freedom of the press by the President after members of the press have been killed for reporting facts about someone, that they must rather have some political agenda they're attempting to further. 

[*bfine32*]

For the completely unhinged parent:

[GMDino]

(07-04-2018, 01:30 PM)bfine32 Wrote: For the completely unhinged parent:

Oh the Irony of Trump supporters boycotting Walmart!  

[RICHMONDBENGAL_07]

(07-02-2018, 06:20 PM)bfine32 Wrote: Folks are trying but no one has shown how their life is worse. Sure illegal immigrants are being separated from the children they have brought over here illegally, folks don't like his rhetoric, or the color of his skin, But I've asked and still waiting for: how your life is worse. If you were to read some of the constant bitching you would think America is going through 2008 type recession, instead of historic growth.

I haven't read the rest of the thread yet, so my apologies if this has already been addressed. But...

My personal life doesn't have to be affected in order to form the opinion that somebody is an asshole. I'm honestly amazed that there are people that aren't embarrassed to have him as our leader, because it is indeed embarrassing. I get the voting "R" over "D", but how you conservatives decided out of 16 candidates that this was the best choice is beyond understanding.  If I remember correctly you've stated you didn't vote for Trump, I'm curious who you voted for? because you seem to defend him a lot.

[*bfine32*]

(07-04-2018, 03:04 PM)RICHMONDBENGAL_07 Wrote: I haven't read the rest of the thread yet, so my apologies if this has already been addressed. But...

My personal life doesn't have to be affected in order to form the opinion that somebody is an asshole. I'm honestly amazed that there are people that aren't embarrassed to have him as our leader, because it is indeed embarrassing. I get the voting "R" over "D", but how you conservatives decided out of 16 candidates that this was the best choice is beyond understanding.  If I remember correctly you've stated you didn't vote for Trump, I'm curious who you voted for? because you seem to defend him a lot.

I simply defend POTUS against the unhinged on here, because they blame everything on him, simply because they don't like him. Of course your life doesn't have to be affected to suggest he's an asshole; he undoubtedly is. I simply asked an audience that is constantly bytching about him how he has affected you. I applaud the "other people before me and mine mentality" even if I do not think it is complete earnest.

As to who I voted for: it was the Independent on the ballot in KY Evan McMullin and of the 16 candidates in the GOP Trump was my 16th choice. My top 3 didn't even make the main stage (Paul, Perry, Jindal). I didn't like either main stream candidate and to be fair I knew Trump was going to roll in my state, so I didn't find it "necessary" to vote for him. IF there had only been 2 candidates on the ballot I would have voted for Trump.  

[RICHMONDBENGAL_07]

(07-04-2018, 04:10 PM)bfine32 Wrote: I simply defend POTUS against the unhinged on here, because they blame everything on him, simply because they don't like him. Of course your life doesn't have to be affected to suggest he's an asshole; he undoubtedly is. I simply asked an audience that is constantly bytching about him how he has affected you. I applaud the "other people before me and mine mentality" even if I do not think it is complete earnest.

As to who I voted for: it was the Independent on the ballot in KY Evan McMullin and of the 16 candidates in the GOP Trump was my 16th choice. My top 3 didn't even make the main stage (Paul, Perry, Jindal). I didn't like either main stream candidate and to be fair I knew Trump was going to roll in my state, so I didn't find it "necessary" to vote for him. IF there had only been 2 candidates on the ballot I would have voted for Trump.  

Fair enough...at least we agree that he's asshole.  I can deal with conservatives having control as the pendulum swings in both directions. However this guy (Trump) just behaves like a total douche bag and is an embarrassment to the country.  Now, like you, I didn't like either candidate and voted 3rd party (Kasich was moderate enough for me).  Honestly I can't blame just Reps, Dems nominated a terrible candidate as well.

If my opinion of Trump is that he's a douche bag and an idiot makes me "unhinged", I can deal with that.


Here's to praying we have better candidates in 2018 and 2020