In a just-concluded press conference, President Obama slammed Donald Trump for being an ignorant, malignant fraud. Then he excoriated the Republicans who have been meeping about Trump’s behavior while continuing to support the demagogue, noting that their protestations “ring hollow” in light of their un-withdrawn endorsements of the Angry Circus Peanut:
“The Republican nominee is unfit to serve as president,” Obama said at a White House news conference with the Prime Minister of Singapore. “He keeps on proving it.”
Obama himself described his feelings as unprecedented, recalling disagreements with previous GOP presidential nominees Sen. John McCain and Mitt Romney — but never an outright sense they were unfit to serve.
“The notion that he would attack a Gold Star family that made such extraordinary sacrifices on behalf of our country, the fact that he doesn’t appear to have basic knowledge of critical issues in Europe, the Middle East, in Asia, means that he’s woefully unprepared to do this job,” Obama said.
Speaking alongside Singapore Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong in the White House East Room, Obama said there are now weekly episodes in which even Republican party leaders distance themselves from Trump.
“There has to be a point at which you say, ‘Enough,’ ” Obama said.Obama placed responsibility for Trump’s statements squarely on his fellow Republicans, many of whom denounced his statements on the slain soldier’s family but didn’t withdraw their support.
“What does this say about your party that this is your standard-bearer?” Obama asked of GOP leaders. “This isn’t a situation where you have an episodic gaffe. This is daily and weekly where they are distancing themselves from statements he’s making. There has to be a point at which you say, ‘This is not somebody I can support for president of the United States, even if he purports to be a member of my party.’ ”
Obama said that denunciations from Republicans of Trump’s remarks “ring hollow” without an accompanying withdrawal of support.
“I don’t doubt their sincerity. I don’t doubt they were outraged by some of the statements that Mr. Trump and his supporters made about the Khan family,” Obama said. “But there has to come a point in which you say, ‘Somebody who makes those kinds of statements doesn’t have the judgment, the temperament, the understanding to occupy the most powerful position in the world.’ “
Well said, Mr. President. Trump is currently holding a rally in Virginia, so I’m looking to the northern horizon for the Tang-colored mushroom cloud.
schrodinger's cat
My both-sidery friend is no longer responding to my emails. I am really disappointed in her. So there is that.
NickM
He should have concluded his remarks with a warning to Republicans not to drink bleach because it is not delicious and is in fact poisonous. It would have done more good.
Tom Levenson
Can you have negative f**ks to give?
dmsilev
@Tom Levenson: Anti-f**cks?
lamh36
y’all…
HERE is the full bit of Trump/crying baby: “Actually I was only kidding, you can get the baby out of here.”
Fester Addams
@NickM:
Shh. Don’t talk about the secret plan. Too soon.
Rosalita
Wherein we will finally know whether human spontaneous combustion is possible…
jeffreyw
Obama just tossed a fuck you bomb at the Donald, let’s watch and see if he falls on it.
BR
@lamh36:
That was the funniest bit of nonsense I’ve read in a while. Is this all really happening or are we all just having a collective hallucination?
dmsilev
@Rosalita: His Twitter feed is quiet right now; I guess he’s still at a rally or in the air or something. But, soon…
NickM
I guess Obama’s plan is to make Trump attack him instead of Hillary, and to have the Republicans embrace Trump even more? Isn’t that like normal 2-dimensional chess, though? Where are the other nine dimensions?
the Conster, la Citoyenne
I can’t wait to see him respond to Obama. What’s the over under on him using the n word?
skyweaver
@jeffreyw: Trump can’t not fall on it. Which is exactly what the president is hoping for. Along with being the right thing to say, Obama knows what he’s doing politically.
amk
kenyan yanking deadbeat’s chain while simultaneously hanging it around the rethugs’ collective necks.
nonynony
@NickM: Why would Obama break out the 11-dimensional chess when Trump fails at Tic-Tac-Toe?
Cat48
Obama just can’t hold back the truth when it comes to the Orange Blob. I spit my tea out when he blurted out his answer. Heh
ihop
i’ll leave this here then:
https://twitter.com/SopanDeb/status/760497695874252801
Culture of Truth
@lamh36: Is this real life??
Eric U.
@dmsilev: the kids are going to hire a Russian hacker to change his twitter password. Just stealing the phone apparently hasn’t been working, he must know where to get new ones
dmsilev
You know, we really should feel sorry for all these foreign leaders who come here to visit and meet with Obama and find themselves inadvertent members of the supporting cast in the ongoing performance of WTF 2016.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Arizona, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, Nevada, Missouri and Colorado?
Dadadadadadada
The crying-baby bit. I just…I can’t…what…I can’t even…who…
?
dmsilev
@Eric U.: I have this vision of the campaign hiring someone to stand just off-stage at the rally with a hypo filled with sedatives, and as soon as Donald leaves the stage he gets jabbed in the neck with the drugs.
dmsilev
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Georgia is apparently now a swing state.
rikyrah
I LOVE MY PRESIDENT!!
Trolling from the White House.
BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Culture of Truth
I would add, the Singapore PM speak English better than, and was far better informed, then the GOP nominee.
Obama didn’t just bait the Donald, he said to the GOP, if you keep endorsing this man, you are endorsing what he says and does.
Kay
@NickM:
I actually think it’s a little more complicated, because Tim Kaine is also bringing this same message. They’re isolating Trump- putting him outside the bounds of decent behavior. It’s really interesting to watch because Kaine is subtle enough to make it seamless – part of the stump- and it seems orchestrated among Democrats. I came away thinking Kaine is really bright. He knows exactly what he’s doing.
BR
@BR:
I read more of Trump’s speech in VA. He’s in Palin word salad territory. I’m not sure there’s a complete sentence longer than 8 words, and most of the sentences trail off and make no sense.
scav
@lamh36: Soldiers, dead or alive, Moms, Moms with actual babies, will he go after apple pie today or save it for Wednesday.
Brachiator
@dmsilev:
Physicists are working on equipment to detect anti fvcks.
Oh, man. I cannot wait for the Trump reaction.
The GOP will say that the president should not be engaged in politicking, and that he should not discuss US elections in front of foreign dignitaries.
SuzieC
Oh, boy. I await the Great Orange Explosion.
BR
@Kay:
Yeah, Kaine has been impressing me. He’s able to get digs in while keeping an aw shucks delivery.
Dadadadadadada
@Brachiator: Or that we need a blanket ban on foreign dignitaries “until we figure out what’s going on.” Which, in Trump’s case, would make it an indefinite, nay, eternal, ban.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@rikyrah: Obama might be quite serious – I can’t imagine him being happy at the possibility of him being followed by some chump who sells us out to the Russians.
Betty Cracker
@lamh36: Holy fuck. He actually said that?
@Culture of Truth: IKR? I keep thinking Putin spiked our water supply with LSD.
Miss Bianca
@dmsilev:
It’s Obama’s version of “The Apprentice”. Or maybe it’s “Candid Camera”. (Who’s old enough to remember *that* show?)
ETA: THe SInagpore PM probably said, “deal me in!”
scav
@Dadadadadadada: Better turn off the internet then, in case those foreign dignitaries peek. Lying broadcast media went offline first and all carrier pigeons with newspapers or broadsheets will be shot.
Villago Delenda Est
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: His base would love it. The other 73% of the country will be appalled.
He thinks the general is just like the primaries. He’ll go there.
raven
It’s sooooo “un-presidential” to do this!
Bill E Pilgrim
I don’t think multi-dimensional chess is required in this case. “I refuse to engage in a game of 11-dimensional chess with an opponent who’s barely playing “Go Fish” would be an appropriate quote at this point.
Edit: @nonynony: Or, what you said.
Cat48
@dmsilev:
Eh, we’re feeding him well tonight – Kobe beef
yellowdog
@nonynony: The Senate and House. He’s tying the cowardly down ballot dipshits to Trump. They are going down with the alleged billionaire because they cannot separate themselves from his racism, misogyny and stupidity because they all share it.
Betty Cracker
@scav: Imani G. on Twitter: “Fuck babies. what have they ever done for this country? we need to build a wall around the uterine wall and keep those babies OUT” LMAO!
Dadadadadadada
I’d like to see Obama (or even Hillary) start openly refusing to even discuss Trump. As in “That question [about Trump] is beneath my dignity, and I will not waste time answering it when there are serious issues to discuss. Now, about my proposal to…”
Miss Bianca
@jeffreyw: Now I have a vision of Trump as Wile E. Coyote holding the big Acme “fuck you bomb” with ‘?!!’ over his head.
schrodinger's cat
@raven:That’s exactly what Trump’s troll army is saying.
Eric U.
I wonder if there are enough fainting couches at the various newsrooms to handle the fallout from the President’s remarks
Tokyokie
@NickM: Pardon me, but I just finished nursing finals, and it just occurred to me that der Trumpenführer is like an autoimmune disorder in the way he’s eating at himself. Let’s just hope the condition is genetic and doesn’t affect anyone he didn’t sire.
sukabi
@Brachiator: yep, now is not the time for playing politics.
POTUS needs to add in a line the next presser to the effect that the R’s need to pull up their big girl panties, get out of the sandbox and stand up for basic common decency.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Anoniminous
@dmsilev:
I very much doubt Georgia will flip. IF, tho’, Georgia goes for Hillary then Texas will and at that point it is wave the national GOP good bye for a couple of Presidential cycles.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Betty Cracker: You know who has little hands? Babies. Ridiculous hands, terrible hands, some of them can’t even hold a pencil. Sad
Brachiator
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
The desire to see this happen is a weird fetish of some Balloon Juice commenters.
Trump’s disrespect of Obama and his outreach to bigotry says it all. Rachel Maddow even noted that Donald Jr kicked off the Trump campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, notorious in the history of US racism.
raven
@schrodinger’s cat: I’m physic!
FlipYrWhig
@Kay:
You mean we can’t dispel with that fiction?
MattF
@nonynony: In fact, Trump is yuuuge at Tic-Tac-Toe. He wins every time he plays.
FlipYrWhig
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I wonder where he’s been hearing such things…
Villago Delenda Est
@Tokyokie: No, it needs to affect the entire GOP. Let it spread and destroy the Party of Jefferson Davis. Let it go the way of the NSDAP and the CPSU.
scav
@Betty Cracker: Damn straight. They’ve never contributed to Trump coffers! Never purchased any of the steaks or wine, and they’re damn slow on the golf courses when they do show up. Not even reliable voters.
Dadadadadadada
@Anoniminous: There are wave elections that affect everything for a short time. There are landslide elections that affect specific things for a long time.
This is not either of those. We need a new term: this is shaping up to be an asteroid-strike election. Total reordering of the entire ecosystem, with effects felt literally forever. Arguably hasn’t happened since 1860, but here comes another one.
gogol's wife
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
I got annoyed that the DNC didn’t completely eject the Bernie jerks, but now I see it was a brilliant strategy. They showed they’re not afraid of a little disruption, they just kept on giving their speeches. Like professional adults.
ruemara
@Tom Levenson: I’ve run a fucks deficit since 06.
MattF
While what’s actually happening is that the Clinton/Obama GOTV machine is deploying. We don’t need to draw attention to that.
gogol's wife
@BR:
He’s so damn good at that!
I’m proud of my hometown KCMO. We tell it like it is, but with a smile.
BR
@Dadadadadadada:
I don’t know about that. If the house doesn’t change hands, it won’t be, and it’ll be really really hard to flip the house.
gogol's wife
@gogol’s wife:
Technically he grew up on the Kansas side, but still.
MattF
@dmsilev: CPTF symmetry.
Tom Levenson
@ruemara: See, that’s the problem with Democrats. They tax and f**k. Or f**k and spend. Or …. whatever…austerity in the bedroom in 2016!
hellslittlestangel
My ONLY worry wrt Trump is that he doesn’t last until November 8.
Tom Levenson
@MattF: Well played.
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
CONGRATULATIONS!
Every day. You can bet that someone has been assigned to poke that orange fucker every single day. Because he can’t help himself – he loses his shit and doubles down, embarrassing his party even more in the process, and there’s nothing save for jailing the guy that’s going to stop that.
Eric U.
@Brachiator: I suspect that Trump doesn’t use the ‘n’ word. He’s just not that uncouth. Plus with his lack of filter, he would have said it already. So it’s unlikely that he would say it in response to this. Maybe I’m just projecting. But if he does use it, there is some truth to the medical speculation about him that are common on the left blogosphere. Which I also tend to discount
Icedfire
I get the feeling Obama is advocating that Repubs reject Trump specifically so that their knee-jerk reaction will be to clutch that anchor chain like a string of pearls on the way down.
James E Powell
@Kay:
I think Trump’s doing most of the work there.
JPL
@Betty Cracker: Can they tweet?
also.. “they don’t write good” according to Trump
BR
@hellslittlestangel:
I think it’d be fine if Trump quits sometime this month. The GOP would be in disarray for a month trying to pick a new nominee, and a lot of the retrograde Trump voters would sit out the election or write him in.
gogol's wife
I am not getting any work done. I don’t think I can sustain this until Nov. 9.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Betty Cracker:
Yeah, okay, I was gonna go to the grocery, maybe get lunch somewhere, but now I think I’ll just stay home and fix a sandwich.
Dolly Llama
@lamh36: My fucking sides are aching from laughing. “No, really, the fucking baby gets the hook, OK?”
rikyrah
@Enhanced Voting Techinques:
Oh, I’m sure he’s offended. Anyone who was just an average President would be offended.
Let alone, someone who’s been as good a President as he’s been.
Villago Delenda Est
@MattF: What has to be troubling for GOP apparatchicks is that there appears to be NO Drumpf ground game at all.
Betty Cracker
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
That thought occurred to me too. The thing about Trump’s propensity for responding to every criticism with an exponential escalation is that he quickly and repeatedly outstrips the bounds of decency. And of course, PBO’s only getting started. He’s not going to leave the keys to the office to that puffed up bag of pumpkin-hued shit. And as president, his every utterance is news. Yeah, gonna be a long 98 days for Deadbeat Donald.
Quinerly
@gogol’s wife:
I’m actually concerned about myself. Trump has taken over our lives. Thankfully, I’m semi retired but I fear for my social life.
cmorenc
If Russian hackers with backing from Putin’s government are actually behind the DNC hacking in order to influence our election in Trump’s favor, don’t underestimate the possibility that the unreleased material on Hillary Clinton that Julian Assange claims he’s still sitting on may include some convincingly fabricated material specifically engineered to place Clinton in a far more damaging light than what the GOP has alleged so far. Material that will deflect the spotlight off Trump and onto Clinton and force her into serious damage control mode for a critical week to 10 days e.g. right before the last debate. However, the way Trump might be self-destructing in early August, if such material exists, the Russians / Assange may have to play that card much sooner.
Emma
@JPL: Christ on a Harley. We are surrounded by complete imbeciles.
Steeplejack (phone)
@NickM:
Why waste dimensions when they’re not needed? At this point checkers or Yahtzee is enough to pummel Trump and the Republicans.
Anoniminous
@Dadadadadadada:
Obama’s 2008 election is obviously, by now, a Change Election. The election historians will use as the marker for the end of the Reagan/Conservative Era. With the pundit-toidal objects saying a 10% Hillary victory means the House will flip and the polling looking more and more like that is likely, this election is starting to pass 1980 and looking more like a 1932 curb-stomping.
FlipYrWhig
@lamh36:
Trump is becoming Alec Baldwin in this SNL sketch from 1996.
sigaba
@Brachiator: I am sorta surprised Trump doesn’t swear more.
Soylent Green
@dmsilev:
I hope it’s Dexter Morgan.
The Thin Black Duke
@JPL: Your political party of “family values”, ladies and gentlemen.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@MattF: LOL!
Keith G
I just read in my news feed that a Trump supporter gave Donald his Purple Heart, and Donald held the medal up and said:
Considering what went down last week…….Man, he is amazing.
scav
@Steeplejack (phone): At this point, spell-checkers for Yahtzee might pose insurmountable barriers for them.
sigaba
Here we go, here’s today’s thing:
It was later reported that the vet told Trump it was genuine, but the same vet told Katy Tur it was a replica.
PaulWartenberg2016
Swear to God, I just got an online research request on Ask a Librarian about this speech. Someone wanted to know if any other sitting President ever accused a candidate of being UNFIT before.
The best I could find was stuff on LBJ slamming Goldwater for being “unfit” as an unstable mental case, but LBJ relied on third parties and attack ads for that.
I had to explain to the library patron that it will be hard to find historical examples because Trump is an oddity: a genuinely inexperienced candidate who’s never held public office before. Nearly every other candidate couldn’t be accused of “unfit” because they’d proven otherwise in public service…
BR
@cmorenc:
Yeah, I’m worried about that, and as you say, I hope Trump implodes before the leaks come out. Apparently they hacked the Clinton campaign as well, not just the DNC and DCCC. So they may have everything.
Darkrose
@rikyrah: NONE FUCKS.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@PaulWartenberg2016: Using facts to contradict incivility? What’s wrong with you?
Mezz
Betty – I think you should get the (TM) award for phrasing if Trump eventually does just totally lose his shit. What a wonderfully descriptive phrase:
Keith P.
@lamh36: Wow, I saw a comment on Redstate saying Trump kicked a crying baby out of his rally because there’s only room for one at his rallies. I thought it was entirely a joke. I didn’t realize he *actually* kicked a crying baby out. Worst…candidate…ever.
Calouste
@cmorenc: I assume that Clinton has a rapid response team at the ready that is immediately going to look for proof that whatever alleged rapist Julian Assange barfs up in support of alleged rapist Donald Trump has been tempered with.
FlipYrWhig
@sigaba: Today’s thing is throwing a baby out of a rally.
ruemara
@BR: problem isn’t that they have everything; I doubt they have anything scandalous. Problem is them fabricating something and our feckless electorate.
Anoniminous
@sigaba:
Oh good LORD!
The military types are going to go apeshit.
nonynony
@lamh36:
Hey, at least he didn’t incite the crowd to punch the baby. So that’s a step up!
Odds are the baby’s mother votes for Trump anyway.
pamelabrown53
@schrodinger’s cat:
Well, President Obama did somewhat inoculate himself against the “it’s un-presidential” meme by stating he would not have levied such a charge against past Republican candidates.
tobie
@JPL: This is what’s scary…first Sarah Palin and now Trump (and probably Fox throughout) have released the GOP id and I don’t know how the country is going to put a lid on this. The kid’s just repeating what he hears at home but it’s a common sentiment in a certain subsection of the population. Have been seeing “Hillary for Prison” bumperstickers in rural Maryland. The hate for her and by extension the Democratic party seems to know no bounds.
Anoniminous
@FlipYrWhig:
Let’s split the difference and do both:
Trump gets Purple Heart for Throwing Baby Out of Rally
low-tech cyclist
Hey, I’m just across the Potomac from Virginia. Maybe I’d better spend the afternoon in the basement, just in case.
nonynony
@ruemara:
OTOH – the Russians may be overplaying their hand here. Every release that Assange makes is one more release for security people to make the case that Russian security are the original source of the hacking. Which means that the Russians would rather have Trump in charge than Clinton. And Americans – like pretty much every other country on the planet – don’t like foreign countries messing in our elections.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@cmorenc: Maybe they’ll find the Whitey tape too.
What would constitute a Trump implosion to you? Nothing will take him out of the race, except himself. The GOP can’t, he’s already the nominee. Even if they reconvened the Convention, they weren’t able to stop him before; what makes you think they can do it now?
themann1086
@Tom Levenson: If you try to find the root of your negative fucks to give, you get my imaginary fucks to give!
Snarki, child of Loki
@NickM:
FlipYrWhig
@Anoniminous: Trump Barters Baby For Unearned Purple Heart Replica, Boasts
Woodrowfan
maybe he thought the baby was a fire marshal??+
hellslittlestangel
@Keith P.: In the old days, they would have taken that baby out of here on a stretcher.
Go ahead, knock the crap out of that baby. I’ll pay for the legal defense.
Miss Bianca
@PaulWartenberg2016: Oh, wow…Tales from the Reference Front!
ruemara
@nonynony: nah. Republicans are some unpatriotic mfers. Party over country. They do not care.
sigaba
@FlipYrWhig: It can be two things! Morning and afternoon!
pamelabrown53
@MattF: #56
He also cheats at “Solitaire” then lies about it.
MattF
So, if either Ryan or McConnell had been seriously contemplating a disavowal of Trump, that just became impossible. They’re in the dumpster, the dumpster lid has clanged shut and there’s a rhinoceros sitting on top.
Central Planning
@Dadadadadadada: Extinction-level event?
Keith G
In Trump’s defense, the female infant was totally wrapped in a blanket and Donald thought she was a Muslim instigator.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@nonynony: Plus Ecuador might get tired of being a haven for Assange, especially if enough diplomatic pressure is applied to them.
Miss Bianca
@cmorenc: I think if I were allied with the HRC campaign, I might suggest that Obama’s next target would be just that possibility: “And as for courageous accused rapist and secret-leaker Julian Assange…”
Bill E Pilgrim
@Brachiator:
Trig’s Bosun
burnspbesq
This could just as easily backfire as work. Republicans are dumb and tribal enough to respond by circling the wagons.
eric
@burnspbesq: Except Trump goes to 11; 11 is louder than 10.
sigaba
@Comrade Scrutinizer: Eh Correa, our dear President of Ecuador, loves drama and is really cut from Trump’s mold, it’d take a lot of pressure to get him to do anything and he’d much rather make a show of defiance. (Correa you may remember as being the South American strongman featured on Last Week with John Oliver who would call out people by name when they wrote angry Tweets against him.)
Also the US has stated repeatedly that while they’d love to question Assange they really can’t charge him with anything. Assange says he can’t trust their assurances and he’s absolutely certain he’ll be renditioned or drone-bombed if he leaves the embassy anyways, he’s just that important and dangerous.
p.a.
It sounds cool, but I don’t get the circus peanut reference. Are circus peanuts orange?
Craig
Typical Obama brilliance. The GOP leaders that might have been thinking about un-endorsing Trump will now be morally bound to continue endorsing him. They can’t ever allow the possibility that Obama could get a “victory”, much less allow themselves to be seen as following one of his suggestions.
Well played, Mr. President.
singfoom
This will amuse all of you if you haven’t read it.
Trump: Wind Power will kill all your birds
My favorite quote:
Won’t someone PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE think of the poor coal…..mine owners?
I keep feeling like he actually is trying to throw the election……but maybe he’s just crazy.
Taylor
@amk:
Half Kenyan.
FlipYrWhig
@p.a.: Not actual circus peanuts, but circus peanuts candy.
Craig
@p.a.: http://i.imgur.com/OEXOaqn.jpg
Grumpy Code Monkey
@Anoniminous: Texas is not going to swing for Hillary, no matter what happens in Georgia. It’ll be close, maybe, but it won’t go all the way over.
Bill E Pilgrim
@burnspbesq: I think “When your opponent is drowning, throw him an anvil” is the operative political theory here.
If Trump weren’t already crashing and burning so badly, it would be less advisable, but taking advantage of the fact that he is to try to inflict even more damage by shaming the rank and file and thereby gain some downticket advantage, might be a wise move.
Darkrose
OT Betty: I’m kind of heartbroken right now because the Giants traded Matt Duffy for Mark Moore. Leaving aside the fact that I think Bobby Evans got fleeced, please be good to the Duffman and his massive cat, okay? He’s a smart, sweet kid and a good ballplayer, so you Rays fans please treat him right.
schrodinger's cat
@p.a.: Good, so I am not the only one who didn’t get that reference.
misterpuff
@Dadadadadadada: Tsunami Election
BR
@burnspbesq:
I get the sense from reading this thread that Obama wants the GOP to stick with Trump.
I don’t know that that’s the best strategy, but Obama knows better than I do.
FlipYrWhig
@singfoom: Remember that in 2012 they thought it was genius to say that Republicans were the party of people who signed the fronts of paychecks instead of the backs. Because being paid for doing a job makes you a Democrat loser!
Villago Delenda Est
How did CPT Khan’s fellow soldiers view him? READ THIS. (Trigger it’s the old Great Orange Satan)
the Conster, la Citoyenne
Press is piling on Trump now. I think they’ve all seen enough, and finally see that he’s a psychopathic liar and most likely a lunatic, and that they don’t want to live in a country with him in charge, of well, anything. I follow a lot of media people on twitter, and they’re all struggling to characterize what they’re witnessing. The Khans are national heroes.
scav
@burnspbesq: Hard cores will harden: they may not be the point. Especially as they’re probably already well past the event horizon. Could also just be tempting the party faithful to more forcefully french kiss the explosive sinking anchor. Or, both.
misterpuff
@Keith P.: Get that baby out. Outta here! In the old days that brat would have known to shut up! The Ramones had it right.
Brachiator
@Eric U.:
You’re joking, right?
And Trump has already committed an act of psychological displacement by saying that he heard that Putin had used the N word.
The idea here is that only a white man like Trump could be respected by world leaders.
No dog whistles. Just plain racism.
Craig
@singfoom:
Wind turbines kill about 300,000 birds a year.
Buildings kill upwards of 1,000,000 birds a year
Cats kill upwards of 3,000,000 birds a year
I’m not sure what’s more shocking, that Trump is bullshitting yet again or that the relatives of my cute fluffy housecats engage in an endless holocaust.
Bobby_D
@Betty Cracker: I had WAY more fun on LSD. This is more like a Datura trip !!
Steeplejack (phone)
@JPL:
At least she said “Democratic schools” instead of “Democrat schools,” so there’s that.
Poopyman
Meanwhile, oy!
nonynony
@burnspbesq:
So they circle the wagons and embrace Trump – exactly how is this bad for Democrats?
Either they own Trump – and Democrats campaign against them as the party of Trump and try to peel off the remaining moderates who don’t want to be part of the Party of Trump – or they reject Trump and have to worry about the Trump supporters falling away. Neither of these outcomes are bad ones.
To think that this could backfire you have to believe that there are actually voters out there who were going to reject Trump but, because Obama said he was unfit for office, will now crawl over broken glass and vote for him anyway. I find that uncredible to the extreme – the kind of Republican voters who get tweaked by things Obama says are exactly the kinds of Republican voters who are going to vote for Trump no matter what.
aimai
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Well, not surprising but horrifying. Guess we now know that the Republican Party really doesn’t care what their kids see, hear, and learn from Trump. Hillary Clinton’s ad–the ones where the kids are watching Trump–seems even more genius now than when they rolled it out.
Quinerly
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
Katy Tur with MSNBC has been covering him up close for over a year. She has a different look about her today. Kinda shellshocked.
dogwood
@sigaba:
I spend a lot of time in Ecuador. Correa is Trump in many ways. He’s not as dumb as Trump, but he is equally narcissistic.
NorthLeft12
President Obama is giving everyone a class on;
a) how to take down a political opponent.
b) how to leave the job of President.
Especially b). I can’t recall a President in my lifetime who has left office in such style and popularity. His sticking it to the Republicans on a regular basis now is a thing of beauty.
I wonder if they regret making themselves a nuisance to Obama for the last seven plus years? Pres. Obama seems to be trying to even the score before February 2017.
I.LOVE.IT.
jl
Big problem for HRC is how she will answer Trump’s charge that she is the devil? I just don’t see how she can do it. Will the media split the difference and agree that she is a demon? Hard to say. Many difficult decisions in modern US journalism.
/snark, if hat is necessary.
singfoom
@Craig: Tho’ Nature, red in tooth and claw
It’s ok, estimates of total bird populations put it between 100-400 billion, so it’s not quite the holocaust for birds.
How many birds are there in the world
Joel
Related to Trump’s latest comments, here’s this from a commenter at Gawker:
Gin & Tonic
@Brachiator:
Which makes no sense at all anyway, as there isn’t a Russian word that’s equivalent, and it’s surpassingly unlikely Putin would have used the American word.
Peale
@Craig: We should tear down skyscrapers and live in tents!
schrodinger's cat
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: They enabled this monster. One of them could have been Edward Murrow of this age and do what the Khans did.
Anoniminous
@Grumpy Code Monkey:
I agree Texas isn’t likely to flip. I don’t think Georgia will flip. I do think if Georgia flips then Texas will and we’re off in Political BizarroLand.
p.a.
@FlipYrWhig: @schrodinger’s cat: waaaa haaaa haaaaa haaaaa…
BR
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
Yeah, I’m seeing that too. Even both-sides-do-it reporters are openly trashing Trump. All I hope is that they don’t get bored — they have short attention spans, and I’m sure there are new lines of attack on Clinton that could catch their attention if Trump just takes a break for a week.
sigaba
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: It’s because the general has started and now Trump finally has Democrats to hit on. The press is no longer grading Trump on the Scott Baio/Phil Robertson curve but as if he were actually running for president. Republican primary voters wanted a freak show and they got one, and they didn’t want the press spoiling the fun so the press didn’t, and the people Trump was bashing really couldn’t attack him back.
Democrats can actually attack Trump because they’re not terrified of their own voters and they know that people outside the bubble actually respect what they have to say. When Barack Obama says someone isn’t fit to be president, and this is manifestly obvious, they report it. When Mitt Romney says the same thing and everyone on his side laughs at him, the press isn’t going to go to bat for Mitt’s side of the argument.
The fundamental fact of Both Sides is that the press will only hit a candidate as hard as the opposition does.
Soylent Green
@nonynony: The outcome we want is the one that keeps their voters away from the polls, thus not voting downticket. I don’t know what will best accomplish that.
Miss Bianca
@Villago Delenda Est: Oh, I’m so glad someone linked to this diary – I was getting sniffly over it earlier today.
Peale
@Joel: Well, I have to be honest. Civil wars are destructive and I would not long for one just to prove a point. They are serious affairs. But if we WERE to have a civil war – “WERE”, I guess I’d rather have one with Trump in charge of the insurgency. I mean, I’d want my side to win and one isn’t always able to choose who would be leading the other side. Looking at Trump and the generals he’s assembled, well, I don’t think there would be a better time for my side to have a civil war.
karen marie
@Dadadadadadada: I think this is wishful thinking on the order of a belief in Peak Wingnut.
Chris
@Joel:
Although again, this did not start with Trump.
Betty Cracker
@p.a.: They are indeed.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@BR:
That’s the flaw in your argument.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@sigaba: The US isn’t Assange’s immediate problem. He’s trying to avoid the rape charge.
Cat48
I don’t think it will be a landslide. The media has let him run wild & say anything since he announced for the ratings. I think they will find a way to help him. They’re still whining about her emails daily.
Trump Camp released a statement so Obama may have made him too angry to tweet.
Comrade Scrutinizer
@burnspbesq: I think that’s the point. It ties the GOP leadership more tightly to Trump.
D58826
But all of those little babies that are out to get ‘old little hands’. The humanity!!!!!!!
Betty Cracker
@Darkrose: Deal. And y’all be good to Matt Moore too, okay? He’s a Florida boy.
burnspbesq
@jl:
She could run with it. Wear Halloween-costume horns at a campaign stop.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@jl:
When you’ve already used up the devil with the 3 months of demonization left to go, what’s next? Chthulhu? [imagines Trump supporters causing a spike in sale of HP Lovecraft]
Iowa Old Lady
@dogwood: OT, but I didn’t know anyone on here spent time in Ecuador. A friend of mine is in charge of a tourist railway line there. She keeps suggesting I come on vacation.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
Donald and Hobbes
Eerily accurate.
Betty Cracker
@Craig: You’ll need to add some more zeros to account for Fluffy’s yearly carnage: Cats kill well over three BILLION birds annually, or so they say.
Major Major Major Major
@jl: You know, it’s just indicative of the fail parade that her whole campaign has been. They had to have known that being satan would look bad, and they had to have known that somebody, sooner or later, would ask. It’s the Goldman Sachs transcripts all over again.
Jeffro
@Tom Levenson:
Word for word what went through my head when I heard about PBO’s statement…
“A man without any more elections to run in, is a Man Without Fear”
Keith P.
@Anoniminous: I’ve run into a LOT of pro-Trump people in Texas. Some are reluctant, but most are enthusiastically for him. Blows my mind that people are ditching Ted Cruz for Trump.
Villago Delenda Est
@Comrade Scrutinizer: The Dems are going for all the marbles.
sigaba
@Comrade Scrutinizer: Yeah but that’s not how he has it. He claims the entire rape charge was manufactured by the US government in order to smuggle him into a country with an extradition treaty. And Correa gives him cover for this reason — he’s not just some dude trying to avoid a rape charge, he’s a “freedom fighter” striking a blow against the eternal Gringo.
If his real problem was just the rape charge, and everybody accepted that, he’d be on the street tomorrow. The only thing that keeps him out of Swedish prison is his delusions of grandeur and the willingness of some people to use him and his celebrity to their own ends.
karen marie
@Calouste: Unfortunately, a lie gets around the world while the truth is still getting its pants on. Given that HRC has been dogged by endless lies and slanders, a new release, no matter how ridiculous, will have faster legs than any rebuttal.
Betty Cracker
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: Yep. He can’t even stop shooting himself in the dick TODAY. BabyGate, LOL!
RareSanity
Betty, you are a treasure…
One of the many times I have literally LOL’d, at work, when reading one of your posts.
FlipYrWhig
@Major Major Major Major: When you make a deal with the devil, someone always saves a copy of the paperwork.
gogol's wife
@FlipYrWhig:
I’m hearing Alec Baldwin in Notting Hill: “You can adios that baby for me now.”
gindy51
@Tokyokie: Cytokine storm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cytokine_storm
Jeffro
@BR:
It’s a nice side effect of being THAT pure…you can actually be a little evil and get away with it. =)
SFAW
@MattF:
Especially when he plays with himself.
Iowa Old Lady
scav
@Villago Delenda Est: Well, like the Morning in the Shining City on the Hill, the republicans had either lost or weren’t using what marbles they had. All the Balloons!
Darkrose
@Betty Cracker: Will do. His numbers this year make me a little nervous, but hopefully he’ll thrive at AT&T.
Duffy’s only been out of California when he was in the minors. His dad is a photographer, and has chronicled his son’s career; I don’t know what he’s going to do now that he’s on the other side of the continent.
At least I’ll always have my Duffman and Skeeter t-shirt, and the bobblehead that was delivered on Saturday.
sigaba
@Iowa Old Lady: Well that should settle it.
nonynony
@Soylent Green:
The outcome I want is to have a solid percentage of white Republican voters to have a John Cole style “Terry Schaivo Moment” about just exactly what their party stands for and stop voting for GOPers.
After that, I want all of the Trump supporters vote for Trump and leave the downballot Republican races blank in protest.
And after that I want the Republicans who can’t stand Trump but refuse to wake up and understand that their party is the party of Trump to just stay home in protest this year to express their outrage against the system.
Those are my hopes and dreams. That first one is, personally, the most important I think. It’s the smallest impact on this election but the longest long term impact and so I’m hopeful that maybe 1-2% of voters might shift from the R to a not-R column permanently. (They don’t even have to become Democrats – they can become Libertarians or something. I don’t care – just stop voting for the racist, misogynistic party if you don’t like being represented by a misogynistic racist!)
Jeffro
@yellowdog:
I think you’re right – I think that is the plan. Begin tying them to Trump just as the races are heating up and people are paying attention. (I mean normal people, not us political junkies. =)
The best thing is, the Democratic Justice League (Obama, Biden, Warren, Booker, Kaine) can turn up the heat just as often and as much as they like from here on out. Ryan and McConnell might want to jump out of that pot while they still can…
Anoniminous
@Keith P.:
Yep.
Texas went for Romney 57.17% to 41.83% in 2012, the Georgia numbers were 53.3% to 45.48%. AFAIK, the Georgia figures are actually worse since Democratic Party base and leaners voted meaning Dems pretty much max’ed out and I’ve been told that didn’t happen in Texas.
Miss Bianca
@Iowa Old Lady: Uh…OK…
nonynony
@Jeffro:
Where are they going to jump to? If there was an exit strategy to Trumpageddon, the GOP would have taken it by now.
gogol's wife
@Villago Delenda Est:
Everyone should read that.
scav
@Iowa Old Lady: So that’s where all his complete sentence allowance for the day ended up. It so clearly has his distinctive fingerprints and aura all over it.
Felonius Monk
@Craig:
And Mr. Trump owns lots of buildings, hundreds of buildings and they are all yooooooge.
nonynony
@Iowa Old Lady: I actually believe that they’re letting Trump write their official statements. Or, well, dictate them and have them lightly cleaned up by a press secretary anyway. If not whoever is writing the releases really has Trump’s “voice” down.
@gogol’s wife: I read it earlier and almost cried.
Jeffro
@ruemara:
I ran a minimal surplus from 1998-2000, and then after that it’s been a truly astronomical deficit, growing every two years or so.
Speaking of one of those ones that sent the NFLTG deficit soaring – I love how the media is pointing out Trump’s lack of service/draft-dodging now, along with his “so much easier” purple heart comments today, and dredging up the purple heart band-aids. Hey, only 12 years late – better than never, right?
ET
Trump really is the color of those old Circus Peanut candies.
gogol's wife
@sigaba:
“the worst recovery since the Great Depression” WTF does that mean?
Who created the depression we had to recover from, Donald?
Gin & Tonic
@Iowa Old Lady:
They have four hands between them. Can two people do something single-handedly?
dogwood
@Iowa Old Lady:
My daughter is married to an Ecuadorian; they live in Quito. Both grandchildren were born there, so I’m in Ecuador quite often. I have good friends there now, and always enjoy my time in Quito, and Cuenca. I can’t stress enough how spectacularly stunning Quito is. To be at 9600 ft, 15 miles from the equator is something else. Springlike weather year round. Tropical vegetation without tropical heat and humidity. Everyone should see the Andes.
FlipYrWhig
@Iowa Old Lady: What was the disastrous dangerous disaster of the email server? Who the fuck knows what they fuck they’re talking about anymore. Also not mentioned: which president destabilized Iraq.
schrodinger's cat
@Gin & Tonic: English is not his first language, it is Moron.
Just One More Canuck
@SFAW: AAAGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!
SFAW
@Iowa Old Lady:
Wow.
That statement alone is perhaps the greatest English-language refutation that a just God exists. Because if there were, Deadbeat Donnie would be smoking remains from the lightning bolt sent to incinerate a total fucking liar.
I guess we should be grateful that he didn’t blame Obama for the Great Depression, the Germans bombing Pearl Harbor, Judge Crater’s disappearance, the Tunguska meteor, and Bubonic Plague. Of course, it’s still early in the day.
sigaba
@dogwood: My father’s lived there the last few years and I’m down there once a year or so, Quito’s a pretty incredible city. Political problems though.
FlipYrWhig
@Iowa Old Lady:
By the way, what are they thinking about when they say this? What episode of Islamic terrorism was effected by a person who came to America when Obama was president?
Major Major Major Major
@gogol’s wife: Haha, I was about to post the same thing! I love it.
Keith G
@Gin & Tonic:
No.
But if one is Sarah Palin, they can be single-minded.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@nonynony: They did have that moment. They realized their party was never going stop all the abortions and send all the blacks back to Africa. So they told their party to go fuck themselves and put Trump in the driver’s seat. They’ll never stop voting for these people because they share their values and beliefs, and they love that shiny hateful new platform. Yes they do.
I know this is really hard to accept, but Trump is the choice of a lot of people, not because they’re stupid or he’s fooled ’em. It’s because they agree with every word out of his crazed mouth (or Twitter account). And he’s going to clear 40% of the vote even if he follows that baby outside the rally and rapes it and the mother. Live on TV.
ETA: you do understand that the Republicans condemning him are not doing so because they disagree with him, that they do so because he’s making them look bad in public, right?
dogwood
@sigaba:
Yup. Plenty of problems in Quito, and it isn’t as wonderful a city as Bogota. But it is spectacularily beautiful.
Punchy
Asshole.
/reaches in vain for the brain bleach
aimai
@karen marie: Its horrifying but I rather think that it just gets folded in with the rest of the crap. The people who hate hillary simply hate her more–since Trump is simply amplifying and repeating stuff they already think they learned on Fox, or from Rush Limbaugh, or on the internet. But the rest of the world, that doesn’t already believe this crap? It just starts to become like white noise. HRC and Obama are giving people a counter narrative. If they are at all open to voting democratic, they will simply take it up and use it. And they will ignore Trump.
Jeffro
@nonynony:
There’s an exit, but I don’t think it qualifies as a ‘strategy’…it’s called ‘run for your lives’
Brachiator
@Soylent Green:
The outcome you want is to make sure that as many of your voters as possible come out and confirm your candidate.
The outcome you want is to turn their voters into your voters.
Betty Cracker
@Iowa Old Lady: Now see, that’s how a competent Republican candidate is supposed to respond: with a string of focus-grouped lies that have been carefully cultivated over many months and years. If Trump could stick to that sort of rejoinder (written by others), he’d be a lot better off. But I don’t think he can, because it’s personal, and he must personally respond. He’ll get back on Twitter and say something astoundingly stupid or start babbling during a rally or interview.
Soylent Green
@SFAW: There’s nothing wrong with that statement. It’s the standard red meat serving to the base. We can’t expect them to stop feeding all those hungry mouths.
Dork
@Iowa Old Lady: That is a long, quite detailed response. And unless I’m way off, there’s not a single sentence of truth in the whole thing. It is literally all lies, unless I have my facts wrong. WOW! SAD!
Mary G
My gob, it is smacked. I can just hear the president saying quietly to Michelle, “Payback is a bitch.”
Bess
@Craig:
Based on bird kills per gigawatt hour of electricity produced.
Wind farms kill roughly 0.27 birds per GWh.
Fossil-fueled power stations kill about 9.4 birds per GWh. (34.8x wind)
The Pale Scot
@dmsilev:
.
Here’s the Video.
Jeffro
Christie just criticized Trump over his Khan remarks…(!)…
…I knew I picked a bad day to try and get any work done!
Cat48
Destabilization of the Middle East is Bush’s prize. The Saudis begged them not to invade Iraq. They told them that would happen. ,
Bess
@Bess:
Link didn’t display. Let’s try this…
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2198024
Amir Khalid
You can’t help but wonder: Is Governor Creosote speaking out of principle, or is this just payback for months of personal humiliation?
Brachiator
@Keith P.:
Trump hates more people than Cruz.
Soylent Green
This should be a high turnout election on both sides. People are agitated. Hopefully we will produce more John Coles, but most conservatives who hate Trump have CDS even worse, so I don’t think defections will move the needle very far.
Saskexpat
@Joel: The attempt to make the election illegitimate from the start has me worried too. I can easily see enough ratfvcking to potentially throw the election to the house, regardless of who won. It may not be likely, but it is very possible. I am not sure if that would count as a coup, because it is technically legal, but it is too close to a coup for my comfort.
retiredeng
@Keith G:
For a narcissist Trump has a remarkable lack of self awareness.
peach flavored shampoo
@Bess: BJ: come for the Trump stuff and Cole’s dogs updates, stay for burnsie’s legal hawt taeks and Gwh produced per bird for various energy sources.
/golf clap
Mike E
Anybody do a bunk check on srv?
cgp
@Joel:
I’m seriously upset about the remarks of Stone – he actually said there would be armed rebellion. That sort of talk should get him a visit from the authorities, hopefully federal. I’m a big fan of free speech, but it’s totally unacceptable to actively encourage social unrest. I’m pretty sure there is a law against that somewhere…
Face
God dammit, you owe me a new monitor.
BR
@Amir Khalid:
The response will be epic.
nonynony
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Sure – look at the numbers I’m talking about. I want to peel off 1-2% permanently. That’s doable – there are STILL Republican voters in the party who – up until Trump – didn’t realize what their party stood for. Trump woke them up and I want them to stay woke up.
For people who leave the GOP, there’s always a different trigger that makes you realize “holy crap – these people do not actually believe what I was raised to think they believe”. When you are in the bubble it’s hard to be objective about what is happening – it takes an event from outside the bubble to shake you and make you realize the tissue of lies that your worldview is built out of. For me it was the Clinton impeachment. For a few of my friends it was the elevation of W to the nominee for president. For John it was Terri Schaivo. For LGF’s Charles Johnson it was watching his fellow rightbloggers openly embrace white supremacists in Europe. There are going to be some people out there who have been in the bubble and none of these events have been extreme enough to pop it, but who are going to have their bubbles burst by Trump. Speaking as someone who was raised in that bubble and had it popped in the 90s, I want it to happen to them – life is much, much better once you get off the diet of daily bullshit required to be a Republican.
(I seriously do not think that Democrats really understand what being a Republican is like. Republicans and Democrats are very different. Looking back on it, and seeing how my family members who are still trapped in it react to things, it’s very much like being in a cult. And even though I’m disgusted by the depths they’ve gone by nominating him, I certainly hope that Trump’s nomination can shake a few cultists on the margins out of their stupor and help them realize that they’re being lied to and have been all their lives.)
Villago Delenda Est
@Amir Khalid: He’s trying to salvage the tattered remains of his political career.
Brachiator
@Saskexpat:
I don’t see anything like this happening, not even if the Libertarians and the Green Party did outrageously well and actually won a few electoral votes.
Frankensteinbeck
@FlipYrWhig:
They don’t have to mention it. All Republicans and most national journalists believe that the Surge worked, Iraq was being successfully wrapped up, and Obama destroyed that success by running away like a scared child. Extended from that, Obama’s refusal to treat the Middle East situation as an existential war between evil Islam and good America has resulted in utter failure and disaster on all fronts, like they knew it would.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@Mike E: Hell no, that guy throws shit through the window.
? Martin
Trump can now be baited by a tweet and heckled by a baby. That feeling is called pride.
Patricia Kayden
@lamh36: I tell ya, Trump is so classy. It’s amazing! Kicking babies out of your rallies is so presidential. At least he didn’t tell his supporters to punch the baby so there’s that.
Villago Delenda Est
@Frankensteinbeck: Obama didn’t have a choice. He was complying with terms negotiated between the deserting coward and the Iraqi government. The Iraqis wanted us GONE.
Frank Wilhoit
@nonynony: What makes you think one or two percent would make a difference? Twenty percent might.
Frankensteinbeck
@Villago Delenda Est:
Irrelevant to both the media and Republicans. The world bends to America’s will. If it isn’t bending, we just have to hit them harder. In a complex world, there are always enough excuses that they can throw up a couple that kind of sound like they justify that viewpoint (‘The Surge worked!’) and dismiss any other arguments as the meaningless whining of losers. Hell, you see that strategy play out here frequently, and even our trolls are more honest debaters than most Republicans or media figures.
Nashville_fan
The only question remaining now is who will play Donald Trump in the movie? (Gary Busey is the leader in the clubhouse at this point . . . )
Timurid
Well Amy Dacy just quit, so the MSM can snuggle-clutch their pearl-embroidered fainting couches for a day or two without having to worry about mysterious Russians and KHAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNN!!!
? Martin
Oh, I didn’t see today’s twist coming. Trumps surrogates now suggesting that Humayun Khan (the son who was killed) was a secret Al Qaeda double agent. Much safer going after the son who is allegedly dead (not ruling out the chance Trumps people claim he’s really alive and fighting for ISIS in Syria) and unlikely to show up on Meet the Press.
Iowa Old Lady
@Nashville_fan: Scott Baio?
Major Major Major Major
@Brachiator: Don’t we do worry-fantasizing about this every cycle?
@Iowa Old Lady: But then who plays Scott Baio?
Face
@Timurid: Who?
West of the Rockies (been a while)
How long before Trump busts out some “your mama” jokes? He’s just this side of the SNL Celebrity Jeopardy Sean Connery lampoon.
Timurid
The DNC CEO
Properly spelled Dacey
Betty Cracker
@nonynony: I think you’re right about Democrats (most, anyway) not being able to imagine what it’s like to be in the Republican bubble. I make an effort to understand them by reading the work of what passes for their intelligentsia and talking to conservative friends, relatives and neighbors — many of whom I consider kind, decent and intelligent people on all topics but politics. But I’ll admit I do not get it. I don’t think I ever will.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Nashville_fan: I’d like to see what Mickey Rourke does with the role.
Ultraviolet Thunder
What’s pissing me off most about Trump lately, and this is purely personal, is that he makes us all look like feckless morons. The people who back him, for supporting a racist shitheel, and the rest of us for not outnumbering them by more.
Even if he gets steamrollered in November we come off as fools for even letting him get this close.
Yeah, it’s the truth, but I’m blaming him for making me admit that we’re this dumb.
gorram
These bad eyes misread the last line as “Mr. President Trump” (sans deuxième point). I didn’t even know how much that could affect the heart!
scav
@Villago Delenda Est: You’re still thinking that coherent linear temporal order matters, let alone logical consistency and signed treaties.
jl
@nonynony: Not sure if moderate and reasonable conservative Republicans who are capable of making a constructive contribution to civic life should be accused of consciously belonging to a cult. I’ve noticed two types of reasonable people in my extended family and social circle were Republicans for a long time and left, or who are now horrified by what happened in the primary. People who kind inherited their political affiliation from family or mentor (these tend to be lower info), and those who are fighting what they see as ‘the good fight and long battle’ to salvage the party (higher info). And they had slivers of hope in the past. Romney is an example. I don’t see him as an admirable person, but he was not so messed up as to be a unique danger to civic and Constitutional fabric. Probably wouldn’t blunder into WWIII or another Iraq invasion. Some important macro and international econ policies would be very similar to moderate or corporate Democrat.
Different things push these people to leave the party. All the rational GOPers in my family left the party during the Dub years. I’m easing some rational GOPers who inherited their party ID from family through stages of horror, denial and grief right now. None of them voting for Trump, so I’m just going to talk with them and let them take their time.
Note sure what hope there is for the party now. What Ike would join them to save them from the rabid base. Another Ike would not waste his time with a politically suicide mission. What TR or even a Reagan even get started politically?
Amir Khalid
@? Martin:
So they’ve gone from suggesting Khizr Khan is a Muslim Brotherhood agent to libeling Humayun himself, the dead war hero. A desperate, despicable, and transparent lie. They have no shame at all, have they?
Timurid
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Walken would be fun, although he’d have to gain a lot of weight.
Major Major Major Major
@Amir Khalid:
Well we knew that.
Still, did not expect them to run with this one. Saw the ‘theory’ floated by, was it Stone? But didn’t expect ‘official’ up-pick.
Frankensteinbeck
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
Funny, that’s the same reason Establishment Republicans don’t like him.
Ultraviolet Thunder
@shomi:
He’ll still get 40+% of the vote, which is damning. The Electoral College count will look much better, but that’s one thing the College is good for.
Trump’s support should be miniscule. Otherwise our system is badly broken.
Betty Cracker
@Timurid: That might knock the Khan story out of the headlines, but I don’t think the Russian angle will go away given it’s an integral part of the hack story, Leaky McRapeypants’ attempts at misdirection notwithstanding.
Gin & Tonic
@Major Major Major Major: It was the next “logical” step.
Villago Delenda Est
@Amir Khalid: None. Read that link above to see what CPT Khan’s troops thought of him.
jl
@Betty Cracker: I don’t think anyone will notice. What difference did DWS resigning make? That story lasted less than half a day. No one cares about party hacks, unless some exciting scandal involved.
Nashville_fan
@Iowa Old Lady: I dunno . . . maybe Scott Baio could play “young Trump” . . . or even Donald Jr. . . . don’t know if Scott has the “chops” to go full megalomaniac . . . of course . . . he is probably somewhere proving me wrong right now . . . ;o)
Trollhattan
@the Conster, la Citoyenne:
What slays me is New Yorkers have known all about Trump–the actual human douche–for forty years and have been talking about him all this time. How/why is anybody surprised as he continuously reveals himself?
Patricia Kayden
@Mike E: HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! Too mean.
Iowa Old Lady
Someone must have told Trump about Obama’s speech. This is from 3 minutes ago.
jl
@Betty Cracker: I admit I would be happy to see Priebus resign because of some mess in the RNC, but I don’t think many would even notice. After a moment of malicious sinful joy, I’d have to worry whether someone more competent would replace him.
Nashville_fan
@West of the Rockies (been a while): Mickey Rourke could be a genius choice . . . except for the fact that he looks like a guy who has maybe been exposed to the “real world” a teensy bit more than “Mr.” Trump . . . lol
nonynony
@? Martin:
Um, going after a guy who died in the line of duty while protecting the people under his command? The stories coming out now suggest that he was highly respected AND well liked both up and down his chain of command.
Yeah – that’s not a better tactic at all. I mean, shutting up is the only tactic that makes any sense at all, but if that’s not possible smearing the dead hero strikes me as the worst possible idea. This isn’t John Kerry who is still alive and very much a “liberal” and who its easy to find some conservative assholes who worked with him in Vietnam to show up and badmouth him now that he’s rich and running for president and they’re resentful of his success. That kind of thing works on living people, but smearing a guy who died putting his life on the line for others? I don’t see how that’s better than just continuing to go after the father.
scav
@Amir Khalid: This line of attack, heaped onto the existing Khan Gold Star parents thing and the game with the easier way to get a Purple Heart — I can see some possibility of soldier v. soldier infighting developing here — mostly because it was a solder that gave him that Purple Heart and how they supposedly mostly vote placed against the tradition of not leaving fellow soldiers behind). So, yes, this sort of behavior is exactly that one wants in a possible CIC.
jl
@Nashville_fan: Sam Kinison would be a good Trump, if he were still around.
the Conster, la Citoyenne
@Trollhattan:
Don’t know – it has probably been impossible for them to imagine that he’d actually get this far, and that the rubes would lap his tacky, grifting shit up with a spoon because really, just look at him!
jl
@nonynony: Funny how pro wrestling manager bullcrap worked great in the GOP primary, but not so much in the general election campaign.
Nashville_fan
@jl: Sam Kinison could have certainly brought that “unhinged” quality that “The Donald” is so famous for . . . we might have to settle for Jack Black! ;oP
nonynony
@jl: Almost as if Republican voters aren’t representative of the electorate as a whole.
Also – almost as if having 16 candidates duke it out for a nomination is a completely different dynamic from a one-on-one election.
James E Powell
@nonynony:
I’m with you, but I’m hoping for 3-5% – The largest chunk of that would be women who I hope will stop voting for the “he’s mean but he’ll keep us safe” candidate. Bellicose speeches and racist remarks do not make anyone safe.
NickM
@nonynony:
Argentina?
Steve in the ATL
@BR:
That’s SOP in the South. Our politicians have been doing it for centuries, but it’s also a skill honed by every woman who plays tennis and/or Bunco.
Jeffro
@Iowa Old Lady:
Essentially, “I’m rubber and you’re glue!”
The guy is 70…sigh…
MCA1
@scav: Needs more metaphors! Kidding. Agree with the point, though. I take burns’s point, but, to add my own metaphor, Obama’s just bringing a couple more hammer blows down on that spike Trump planted right in the middle of the GOP, taking a turn at cleaving it in half. While standing on a comfortable moral high ground, since he knows an increasing number of Americans agree with his basic sentiment.
sukabi
@cgp: he’s been promoting that idea since before the convention… think it’s more a threat to establishment r’s …
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Ultraviolet Thunder:
If you can be feckless, can you be feckful? Personally, I’m all out of fecks to give.
Trollhattan
@Nashville_fan:
Bobcat’s available, but I agree Jack Black could give it a go. He always brings the gusto.
Phil Hartman would have owned this.
Origuy
@Gin & Tonic:
Wiktionary says that Russian has borrowed the word. I’ve heard a lot about African students and other Africans being harassed and attacked by Russian racists, even back in the Communist days.
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Timurid:
Oh, he would be… The odd speech pattern Walken already has might work quite well.
scav
@West of the Rockies (been a while): I suppose one can, but only if one drives reckfully and kills with profound ruth.
Timurid
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
One thing that makes me sad is that Walken is probably too old now to play Andrew Jackson.
In other news, Laurence Fishburne needs to get to work on that Frederick Douglass biopic yesterday…
West of the Rockies (been a while)
If you’re disgruntled, can you be regruntled?
West of the Rockies (been a while)
@Timurid: Morgan Freeman could do wonders with that part!
LosGatosCA
Trump is being separated from the herd by Obama.
Then it will be Trump’s exposed jugular that gets severed.
scav
Also, The Werd Lives!
Miss Bianca
@Betty Cracker:
I’m coming to this some conclusion about many of my left-winger friends, sadly.
@West of the Rockies (been a while): I wonder the same thing about being “gruntled”, myself.
Gin & Tonic
@Origuy: Still doesn’t make sense to me, as it’s so close to the generally inoffensive “негр.” And yes, I know that even back in Soviet times there were African students from fraternal nations studying there and being subjected to casual racism, but it’s just the etymology that doesn’t make a lot of sense. But then again I don’t hang around with skinheads or racists, so I can’t be sure.
Dork
By nature of having possessed brown/olive skin, this is unpossible.
jl
@Betty Cracker: From my experience, many people who inherit their party ID from beloved parents or aunts and uncles or whoever, are pretty low info and don’t follow politics much at all, or buy the corporate media narratives. Being misled or comforted by the media narrative could easily happen even during the Dub years. And of course, very easily happen with McCain and Romney. This election it’s more than a little different.
Shana
Did I just see a tweet on either MSNBC or CNN where Trump called Obama “Satan”?
Also flipped over to DK for a bit and got an ad for circus peanuts.
SFAW
@Soylent Green:
There’s PLENTY wrong with it. I think you may have meant “There’s nothing out of character (for any Rethug) in that statement.”
Feathers
@p.a.: @schrodinger’s cat: You obviously live in a civilized part of the world, a world without circus peanuts. Which are totally disgusting. I love candy and I think I’d eat dog food first if I were starving.
From the girl who cannot resist trivia: the Wikipedia page linked above saying that they are banana flavored. You may have noticed that things which are “banana flavored” do not taste like bananas. That is because the flavoring was developed when a now extinct variety of banana was the one commercially sold. When Cavendish bananas replaced the older variety, the flavoring known as “banana” did not change, even though the new Cavendish bananas did not taste like the old bananas. I love this kind of stuff.
evodevo
@CONGRATULATIONS!: Yes. This. This is what I hear here at ground level from all my fundie right winger co-workers/acquaintances …. they LOVE them some Trumpster because “he’ll shake things up in Washington!!11!!”. They are Fixed News viewers to a man, and suck up whatever drivel talk radio spews into their ears every day. The uninformed voter is king, down here in the trenches. Lock up Hillary is on every pickup truck, right next to that Friend of Coal bumper sticker. It’s NOT going to be a cakewalk, let me tell you.
Trollhattan
@Shana:
He called Hillary “the devil” yesterday. Maybe he called Obama “Santa” and meant Satan? Hopefully in a Church Lady voice.
jl
@Gin & Tonic: The story is from Trump, so who knows what to make of it? If Putin was speaking Russian, then Trump could have thought he heard the N word when Putin was using the inoffensive Russian word. Trump is a bigot to the bone, so would tend to assume that every white guy in the whole world thinks the same as he does on POC. And Putin if ever bothered to speak English with Trump, he is certainly informed and acute enough to use words that would have a certain effect on Trump.
And we have no idea if the very idea of Putin saying much at all in Trump’s presence is even plausible. After all, Trump has said they are pals and that they never even met, so the status of the relationship is a tad ambiguous. No reason to put much stock in the tall tales of an unstable liar like Trump.
SFAW
@West of the Rockies (been a while):
Feckin’ right.
jl
@Shana: Trump called Hillary Clinton as the devil. Maybe that was it.
Aleta
@lamh36: If a kid can’t be groomed to make Trump look good on camera, what use is it?
TOP123
@nonynony: Very well said.
1,000 Flouncing Lurkers (was fidelioscabinet)
@dmsilev:
@Anoniminous:
Look, it’s entirely possible he could lose Mississippi. There was a 12% difference between Romney and Obama in the 2012 results–about 146,000 votes. Hillary doesn’t have to pick up that many votes in Mississippi–these folks just have to fail to vote for Trump. They could vote for Gary Johnson, for Stein (she got 1,534 votes there in 2012!), for the Constitution or Reform Party Candidates, for Mickey Mouse or Marvin the Martian. They could stay home, or just leave that line blank. Given the racial demographics of the 2012 election in Mississippi, Hillary certainly has room to pick up white voters, and we’re still not sure how many white women there, currently playing their cards in close but previously voting as Republicans or self-identified as Independents, will decide they want to vote for her. But most of all, Trump has to lose the voters, and he seems to be working overtime on that.
I don’t think this calculation would work in Alabama, and I doubt it would in Louisiana, Arkansas, or Tennessee. The difference between Romney and Obama was only about 10.6% in South Carolina in 2012, so there could be a surprise there as well. Missouri is considered a swing state right now, and went for Romney by a little over 9% in 2012.
Dog Dawg Damn
Obama is making it okay for Republican voters–white suburban women specifically–to vote for Hillary. It’s brilliant.
NoraLenderbee
@Steeplejack (phone): What kind of self-respecting God-fearing Republican momma sends her kids to Democratic schools? Obviously a Hitlery plant.
Just One More Canuck
@Nashville_fan: Scott Baio doesn’t have the chops to be in a Sharknado movie
retiredeng
@Jeffro: Rats …. sinking ship.
dww44
@the Conster, la Citoyenne: Because they showed to all that the emperor is wearing no clothes? That’s the way I took your remark.
SiubhanDuinne
@Nashville_fan:
I do enjoy wordplay.
Nashville_fan
@SiubhanDuinne: Wow
– that’s spooky!
fuckwit
@NickM: How about used tires and anthrax? He could give a formal statement that they are not fit for lunching.
fuckwit
@yellowdog: Yes, this. He’s attempting to finally rid us all of these bothersome teabaggers.
This is the end of the Republican Party.
Troll is a “Terry Schiavo moment” for every single American who ever even thought about voting R.
The teabaggers in the house are finally getting their comeuppance. They share Troll’s views and attitude. Now they get to lose their office.
I sure hope the Dems have viable candidates in every Congressional race.
fuckwit
@fuckwit: urgh, Tire Rims and Anthrax.