Re: Politics

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Obama Invokes Hitler in Chilling New Warning to All Americans

"We have to tend to this garden of democracy or else things could fall apart quickly."

During a Q&A at the Economic Club of Chicago, former President Obama sounded the alarm, describing America’s democracy and fragility, saying we need to “tend to this garden of democracy.” He then went on to invoke Nazi Germany and Hitler’s rise.

From Crain's:

Obama moved from that to talking about a nativist mistrust and unease that has swept around the world. He argued that such things as the speed of technical change and the uneven impact of globalization have come too quickly to be absorbed in many cultures, bringing strange new things and people to areas in which "people didn't (used to) challenge your assumptions." As a result, "nothing feels solid," he said. "Sadly, there's something in us that looks for simple answers when we're agitated."

Still, the U.S. has survived tough times before and will again, he noted, particularly mentioning the days of communist fighter Joseph McCarthy and former President Richard Nixon. But one reason the country survived is because it had a free press to ask questions, Obama added. Though he has problems with the media just like Trump has had, "what I understood was the principle that the free press was vital."

The danger is "grow(ing) complacent," Obama said. "We have to tend to this garden of democracy or else things could fall apart quickly."

That's what happened in Germany in the 1930s, which despite the democracy of the Weimar Republic and centuries of high-level cultural and scientific achievements, Adolph Hitler rose to dominate, Obama noted. "Sixty million people died. . . .So, you've got to pay attention. And vote."
“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

632
Oh, and the manufacturing unemployment rate dropped to 2.6%, which is lowest EVER recorded...

The unemployment rate for hispanics dropped to 4.7%. Again, the lowest ever recorded. I wish that bigot Trump didn't go out of his way to hurt hispanics.

Re: Politics

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Last week, I posted some warning signs on the birth of a dictator:

10 Ways to Tell if Your President Is a Dictator

1. Systematic efforts to intimidate the media.
2. Building an official pro-Trump media network. (FOX ???)
3. Politicizing the civil service, military, National Guard, or the domestic security agencies.
4. Using government surveillance against domestic political opponents.
5. Using state power to reward corporate backers and punish opponents.
6. Stacking the Supreme Court. (Or other court systems - Judicial - Unqualified nominees ??)
7. Enforcing the law for only one side.
8. Really rigging the system. (Gerrymandering ???)
9. Fearmongering.
10. Demonizing the opposition.

FOREIGN POLICY

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/11/23/ten ... -dictator/

My one desire is to let this Mueller Investigation run its course. It's obvious that we have criminals surrounding the president. This has gone from Mueller's investigation into possible collusion between Donald Trump's Presidential campaign and the Russian government, to taking down criminals. "IF" the president and his family broke the law, they are not above the law. Just like you and me, they would have to be held responsible.

MSNBC 8pm EST: Tonight -- Rachel Maddow show -- The Ex-Spy Behind the Trump-Russia Dossier
“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

635
Two dead in 'Day of Rage' over Jerusalem, Palestinian president defiant

JERUSALEM/GAZA (Reuters) -

At least two people were killed in clashes with Israeli troops on Friday when thousands of Palestinians demonstrated against U.S. President Donald Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and the Palestinian president said Washington could no longer be a peace broker.

Across the Arab and Muslim worlds, thousands more protesters took to the streets on the Muslim holy day to express solidarity with the Palestinians and outrage at Trump’s reversal of decades of U.S. policy.

Israeli soldiers shot dead a Palestinian man near the Gaza border, the first confirmed death in two days of unrest. Scores of people were wounded on the “Day of Rage”. A second person later died of their wounds, a Gaza hospital official said.

REUTERS

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa- ... SKBN1E211I
“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

636
trump knew these protests would be a real possibility. The White House were aware of the possibilities also. He should be held accountable for the dead and injured.

NIGER

I'm still trying to search for the cause behind the ambush in Niger and what the travel ban on Chad meant. After the travel ban was imposed on Chad, our staunchest ally in Niger and western Africa, the Chad forces, pulled back. They weren't available when the ambush took place. The media pressed trump on the issue, but as always, trump avoided the tough questions. To this day, trump has remained silent on the ambush in Niger (except for La David Johnson and his widow).

McCain says subpoena may be needed to get answers from White House on Niger ambush

REUTERS
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WASHINGTON – Sen. John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said that he may consider issuing a subpoena because the White House has not been forthcoming with details of an ambush in Niger in which four U.S. soldiers were killed.

[ Well! We no that has not happened !]

Soldiers' deaths in Niger trail a frightful back-story

on September 24, when the Trump administration suddenly and inexplicably added Chad to the list of countries whose citizens would be included in the latest iteration of the president's travel ban. Chad and its leaders were utterly blindsided as there was no sense whatsoever that this nation has harbored or even encouraged terrorists -- certainly no more culpable than such nations as Iraq, Pakistan, Sudan, or for that matter Chad's neighbors Mali, Niger and Nigeria, none of which were included on this list..............

Au contraire, Chad's troops have for some time served as an effective ally in the region -- the best fighting force deployed in nearby Niger and Mali, with the best intel and best-trained warriors. They were the best because they were trained by the French and its redoubtable Foreign Legion................

Chad, Mali and Niger offer a central conduit from north African nations like Libya -- quite rightly a fellow member of the Trump travel ban, and potentially the richest recruiting lode for Islamic jihad -- to the vastly populous regions of Nigeria and its neighbors. Already, Nigerian-based Boko Haram, a proto-Islamic group comprised more of heavily-armed thugs than confirmed jihadis, has made enormous inroads in this region. Now, ISIS is knocking on the door. Some determinedly anti-jihadist nations like Chad, have stepped up to block these efforts.
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And then Trump went and insulted them. In fact, the September 24 action was only the latest backhanded and ill-informed insult. It seems that US Homeland Security gave all countries 50 days to meet a "baseline" of security conditions, including producing a counterfeit-proof version of their passport to prove that they were reliable enough to allow their citizens into America. But Chad, desperately poor, had quite simply run out of passport paper.

They reportedly offered to provide a pre-existing sample of this type of passport. No dice. The next thing they knew they were on the banned list, alongside their arch enemy Libya and other clearly terrorist-driven nations.

Barely a week after the announcement of the new travel ban, the Chadian government suddenly began pulling hundreds of their fighters from Niger. There was no immediate explanation, though the nation's communications minister Madeleine Alingué condemned the Trump administration's unheralded move, observing that it "seriously undermines" the "good relations between the two countries, notably in the fight against terrorism." Hard to be more direct than that.

And then our boys died there. The backstory is frightful -- filled with mindless decisions executed with minimal knowledge and potentially catastrophic results. It's urgent that we uncover quickly just what led to this terrible disaster, the role played by any misjudgments on or off the battlefield. Mr. President, you must see it as your highest priority to find out what or who is really behind the deaths of these four heroic young men.

[ Well ! I'm still waiting !]

CNN

http://www.cnn.com/2017/10/21/opinions/ ... index.html

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“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

637
Filled with mindless decisions executed with minimal knowledge and potentially catastrophic results.

trump's legacy so far.
“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

638
Under Trump black home ownership is now at the highest rate it has ever been. And black unemployment is half what it was at the best number under Obama. Damn that bigot Trump for trying to ruin black peoples lives.

“Those Manufacturing Jobs aren't coming back,.. What is he gonna do,.. wave a magic wand??"
- Barack Obama.

What do you get when you hire a community organizer to run the country. A guy who loses 1000 manufacturing jobs a month and no clue how to get them back. That guy was such a loser. What a dope.

We have a real boss now.

Re: Politics

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Pensacola: Trump pointed out supporters with “blacks for Trump” signs.
“Look at these guys, blacks for Trump,” he said. “I love you. I love you. I love you. By the way, now that you bring it up, black home ownership just hit the highest level it’s ever been in the history of our country. Congratulations.”
New study: Black homeownership falls to 42.2 percent

New Harvard Study Finds Steep Declines in Black Homeownership in Major Cities

Charlene Crowell (NNPA Newswire Columnist) | 7/18/2017, 2:02 p.m.


For the 12th consecutive year, America’s national homeownership rate has declined, according Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies (JCHS)’ annual report, “State of the Nation’s Housing 2017.” This year’s report also found these declines vary by race and ethnicity.

As some might expect, the steepest homeownership decline occurred in Black communities, where the percentage of homeowners dropped to 42.2 percent. Among the nation’s largest metro areas, Black homeownership declined the greatest in Atlanta, Baltimore, Dallas and Detroit. By contrast, Latino-American homeownership is higher at 46 percent, but both communities of color severely lag behind the nearly 72 percent rate of White homeownership.

“The ability of most U.S. households to become homeowners,” states the report, “depends on the availability and affordability of financing.”

And therein lies the crux of the problem: access and affordability.

The lack of access to mortgage financing in Black America has a long history rooted in outright discrimination by private actors such as banks, and supported by inequitable federal housing policies that favored white communities, while intentionally disadvantaging Black communities. This discrimination hindered generations of Black families from entering and remaining among America’s middle class. These practices also resulted in lower levels of both Black wealth and homeownership.

Today, applying for a mortgage means a visit to a bank where high incomes, low debt and high credit scores are among the most favored measures for loan application success. Since the foreclosure crisis, according to the JCHS report, the median credit score for an owner-occupied home purchase origination increased from about 700 in 2005 to 732 in 2016.

Just as communities of color were wrongly targeted for predatory and high-cost mortgages that pushed them into foreclosure, these same communities are the most likely to have suffered credit score declines from foreclosures, unemployment or delinquent debt—or a combination of all three.

According to a 2017 CFED report, “A Downpayment on the Divide”, the mortgage denial rate for Blacks is more than 25 percent, near 20 percent for Latinos, but just over 10 percent for White applicants.

The issue of housing affordability is just as challenging. CFED also found that whites are three times more likely than Blacks to receive financial assistance from families to pay for down payments and other upfront costs that accompany a mortgage. The racial disparity is due to America’s history of whites being able to accumulate wealth through homeownership opportunity while Blacks were denied. As a result, Black households typically delay homeownership 8 years longer than Whites, resulting in a comparable delay in building home equity.

JCHS also found that nearly 39 million American families are financially challenged with their cost of housing.

So, is the American Dream of homeownership realistic for communities of color?

A June 29 public hearing before the U.S. Senate Banking Committee focused on how mortgage finance reform and government-sponsored enterprises, also known as GSEs, must live up to its “duty to serve” all communities.

“Homeownership is the primary way that most middle-class families build wealth and achieve economic stability,” testified Mike Calhoun, President of the Center for Responsible Lending. “Wide access to credit is critical for building family wealth, closing the racial wealth gap and for the housing market overall.”

http://amsterdamnews.com/news/2017/jul/ ... 2-percent/

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[ Blue = African Americans = Decline between 2000 and 2017 (Near 1960 Levels) ]

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Black Homeowners Struggle as Housing Market Recovers

Yul Dorn and his wife raised their son and daughter in a three-bedroom home crammed with family photos, one they bought in a historically African-American neighborhood in San Francisco more than two decades ago.

Today, the couple is living in a motel after they were evicted last year, having lost a foreclosure battle. A second home they inherited is also in default.

The Dorns expect to join the growing ranks of African-Americans who do not own their homes, a rate that was nearly 30 percentage points higher than that of whites in 2016, according to a new report.........

Experts say reasons for the lower homeownership rate range from historic underemployment and low wages to a recession-related foreclosure crisis that hit black communities particularly hard. In 2004, the pinnacle of U.S. homeownership, three-quarters of whites and nearly half of blacks owned homes, according to the Harvard study.

By 2016, the African-American homeowner rate had fallen to 42.2 percent and lagged 29.7 percentage points behind whites, nearly a percentage point higher than in 2015..................

African-Americans snapped up homes at the peak of the housing bubble, lured by generous lending and a glut of affordable properties, housing experts say. Lenders also targeted minorities, pushing riskier subprime loans even when applicants qualified for lower-interest loans.................

Dorn, the 60-year-old pastor, says Chase misapplied a payment he made in 2008 and then failed to keep proper records. He made several payments on a modified trial loan, which the bank then denied.

In 2015, the home he bought for $168,000 in 1996 was sold for $482,000. In May, the new owner sold it for $850,000.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/bla ... rs-n781311

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More Lies - I Wish This Guy Would Get His Facts Straight
“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

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I Saw the Kate Steinle Murder Trial Up Close.

The Jury Didn’t Botch It.

By PHIL VAN STOCKUM December 06, 2017


I was an alternate juror in the Kate Steinle murder trial in San Francisco. I didn’t get a vote, but I saw all of the evidence and the jury instructions, and I discussed the verdict with the jury after it was delivered. Most of the public reaction I've seen has been surprise, confusion and derision. If these were among your reactions as well, I'm writing to explain to you why the jury was right to make the decision that it did.

I’m not a lawyer, but I understood the law that was read to us in this case. Defendants in this country have the right to a presumption of innocence, which means that if there is a reasonable interpretation of the evidence that favors a defendant, the jury must accept that interpretation over any others that incriminate him. This principle is a pillar of the American justice system, and it was a significant part of our jury instructions.

Jose Ines Garcia Zarate, the undocumented immigrant who was accused of killing Steinle, was charged with first degree murder and the lesser included offenses of second degree murder and involuntary manslaughter. When the prosecution rested its case, it seemed clear to me that the evidence didn’t support the requirements of premeditation or malice aforethought (intentional recklessness or killing) for the murder charges. After having heard the evidence, I agreed with the defense’s opinion that the murder charges should not have been brought. The evidence didn't show that Garcia Zarate intended to kill anyone.

These are some of the facts that were laid out to us: Zarate had no motive and no recorded history of violence. The shot he fired from his chair hit the ground 12 feet in front of him before ricocheting a further 78 feet to hit Steinle. The damage to the bullet indicated a glancing impact during the ricochet, so it seems to have been shot from a low height. The gun, a Sig Sauer P239 pistol, is a backup emergency weapon used by law enforcement that has a light trigger mode and no safety. (The jury members asked to feel the trigger pull of the gun during deliberation, but the judge wouldn’t allow it, for reasons that aren’t clear to us.) The pixelated video footage of the incident that we were shown, taken from the adjacent pier, shows a group of six people spending half an hour at that same chair setting down and picking up objects a mere 30 minutes before Garcia Zarate arrived there.

There is a reasonable interpretation here that favors the defendant: He found the gun at the seat, picked it up out of curiosity, and accidentally caused it to fire. As a scared, homeless man wanted by immigration enforcement, he threw the gun in the water and walked away. The presumption of innocence, as stated in the jury instructions, required the jury to select this interpretation because it is reasonable and favors the defendant.

But why the manslaughter acquittal? Most of the confusion I've encountered has been over this part of the verdict, and it does seem to me personally that manslaughter is the appropriate charge for Steinle’s killing. However, given the evidence and the law presented in this trial, it is clear to me that the jury made the right decision.

The involuntary manslaughter charge that the jury was read included two key requirements: 1) A crime was committed in the act that caused death; 2) The defendant acted with "criminal negligence"—he did something that an ordinary person would have known was likely to lead to someone's death.

The jury members were not free to select the crime for part (1)—they had to use the one chosen by the prosecution, and the prosecution chose that crime to be the "brandishing," or waving with menace, of a weapon. As a juror, I found this choice puzzling, because the prosecutor presented absolutely zero evidence of brandishing during the trial. I don’t think we even heard the word “brandishing” until it was read as part of the charge during the jury instructions at the trial's end. No witnesses ever saw the defendant holding a gun, much less brandishing it. Given that baffling choice by the prosecution, the manslaughter charge was a nonstarter for the jury. Had a different precursor crime been chosen—for instance, the unlawful possession of a firearm by a felon—the outcome might have been different.

Even in that case, however, it is not clear to me that part (2) of the manslaughter charge was proved. Only a single particle of gunshot residue was found on the defendant’s hands, which seems to support his repeated claim that the gun was wrapped in some sort of fabric when he picked it up and caused it to fire. If he did not know the object was a gun, it is a stretch to claim that it was criminal negligence for him to pick it up.

The jury did convict Garcia Zarate of the separate charge of illegal possession of a firearm, which indicates that the members felt it to be an unreasonable conclusion that he didn’t know he was holding a gun. He was in the seat where he claims he found it for about 20 minutes prior to the shooting, and he made some statements during interrogation that seemed to indicate that he had known what the item was. Without the benefit of being able to re-examine the evidence during deliberation, I’m not sure that I would consider that evidence to constitute proof beyond a reasonable doubt, but knowing these jurors, I would trust them to have made an accurate judgment if the manslaughter charge had survived the first requirement.

I have come away from this experience with a strong sense of respect for the jurors and their objective handling of a sensitive case under the national spotlight. I hope that I would have acted with the same level of maturity.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story ... tch-216016

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Trump says Steinle verdict a 'travesty of justice'

dear president trump - this was democracy in action - the Justice System in its finest hour - if I were accused of a serious crime, I want this panel of jurors judging me ! Unless you were one of the jurors, shut the f**k up!
Blame someone ?!?!? - call out the prosecutors !!! Build a Wall !?!?! Build one around the WH !!! Judge: Immigration not a consideration !!!!


Washington (CNN)President Donald Trump slammed what he called a "disgraceful verdict" in the 2015 shooting death of Kate Steinle by an undocumented immigrant, a crime he seized on during his presidential campaign as part of his call for tougher immigration policies.

"The Kate Steinle killer came back and back over the weakly protected Obama border, always committing crimes and being violent, and yet this info was not used in court. His exoneration is a complete travesty of justice. BUILD THE WALL!" he tweeted Friday morning in the wake of a jury's acquittal of Jose Ines Garcia Zarate, who had been deported five times before the shooting.
“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

642
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REUTERS HEADLINE NEWS

Palestinians to snub Pence during visit over Jerusalem move

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will not meet U.S. Vice President Mike Pence during Pence's visit to the region this month in a snub over the U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital, the Palestinian Foreign Minister said on Saturday.

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German conservatives reject 'United States of Europe' ahead of coalition talks

Senior members of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives on Saturday rejected the vision for a "United States of Europe" put forward by the Social Democrats (SPD), with whom they are hoping to form a governing coalition. Germany does not support the Trump administration’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday.

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Thousands march in Tel Aviv to protest against Netanyahu, corruption

Thousands of Israelis protested in Tel Aviv on Saturday for the second consecutive week against government corruption and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is under criminal investigation over allegations of abuse of office.

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U.N. envoy told North Korea urgent need to open channels to cut conflict risk

The United Nations political affairs chief told senior North Korean officials during a visit to Pyongyang this week that there was an "urgent need to prevent miscalculations and open channels to reduce the risks of conflict," the world body said.

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Arabs should consider economic sanctions on U.S. over Jerusalem: Lebanon

Lebanon's Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil said on Saturday that Arab nations should consider imposing economic sanctions against the United States to prevent it moving its embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.

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“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

643
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Obama is right: US democracy is fragile

By Ruth Ben-Ghiat

Editor's Note: Ruth Ben-Ghiat is a frequent contributor to CNN Opinion and a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University who writes about authoritarianism and propaganda. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.

(CNN)Former President Barack Obama was right to speak out Thursday at the Economic Club of Chicago to warn Americans about the fragility of our democracy. Signs abound that our freedoms are under siege, not only from foreign enemies such as Vladimir Putin but also from forces inside our country, starting with the radicalized elements of the Republican Party.

Obama raised eyebrows for referencing the rise of Adolf Hitler in Germany in calling attention to how "things could fall apart quickly" in our country when a divided population falls prey to those offering "simple answers." The right-wing press rejected the implicit parallel Obama made between President Donald Trump and history's most famous Jew-hater, especially given the giant Hanukkah gift Trump just gave Israeli hard-liners by declaring Jerusalem Israel's capital. And it's true that Trump is not going to declare an old-fashioned dictatorship: Today's authoritarians (such as Putin) exercise repression differently.

Yet Obama likely did not make the comparison casually. He's a practiced politician and prudent speaker who not only says very little "off the cuff" in public but who also knows better than anyone else the gravity of the current threats to the integrity of our democracy -- and what it will take to wake Americans up to the dangers of being "complacent," as he puts it.

It's no secret that Trump has sought to weaken our democratic norms and discredit the very societal institutions that can act to expose the wrongdoing of him and his allies. His attacks on the press, judiciary and our country's intelligence services are right out of the authoritarian playbook, as is his cultivation of a leader cult. This was clear when the President replied with, "I'm the only one that matters," when he was asked about filling State Department positions that remain vacant.

Still, leaders need allies to destroy a democracy. The GOP fulfills that role well. The party and Trump's support for Roy Moore, accused of sexual abuse and racism, says everything about their partnership. (Moore, who has denied the allegations, recently commented that things were better in America, even during slavery, because families were more united.)

In fact, the words and actions of many GOP elected officials show a pattern of subversive behavior of the type that has always helped authoritarians come to power. Here are a few examples:

1. The execution of political opponents ranks up there on indexes of anti-democratic behaviors -- it was a favorite tactic of Hitler -- so it's notable that the GOP leadership never publicly reprimanded state lawmakers, Al Baldasaro of New Hampshire and John Bennett of Oklahoma, for calling for Trump's Democratic competition, Hillary Clinton, to be killed.

When the Secret Service began to investigate Baldasaro after he said that Clinton should be "shot for treason," Trump stepped in to praise him, shutting down any potential fallout or moral stand by his allies. Baldasaro would later blame the "liberal media" for taking his comments and running with them.

2. Calls for persecution of the press and intellectuals (both cataloged as destructive critics) are another authoritarian mainstay. Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott has been in the forefront of elected officials engaging in intimidation tactics. He received no negative public feedback from the Republican leadership when he joked about shooting journalists (even showing off his own target practice sheet while doing so) in May. And his loathing of professors is as passionate as his belief that students should be able to have guns in those professors' classrooms.

3. The GOP's ringmaster in all of this violent talk is the National Rifle Association's Wayne LaPierre, who in April called "political elites, media elites, and academic elites" America's "biggest domestic threats." Those who have lived in repressive regimes around the world will shudder at such language, since they know where it can lead. Right now, hundreds of professors and journalists sit in Turkish jails, victims of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's own purges of these sectors. It's not inconceivable to think that US prisons couldn't someday look like this, given the actions and rhetoric of GOP leaders and the fact that Trump reportedly asked then-FBI Director James Comey in February about jailing journalists who leaked classified information.

n the history of authoritarian regimes, what's most notable, beyond the noise of rallies and propaganda, is the silence of political influencers who could have prevented those leaders from acting. The window for such action is now. Obama should be applauded for speaking up, and it's high time for sitting politicians of both parties to do the same.

In the history of authoritarian regimes, what's most notable, beyond the noise of rallies and propaganda, is the silence of political influencers who could have prevented those leaders from acting. The window for such action is now. Obama should be applauded for speaking up, and it's high time for sitting politicians of both parties to do the same.

CNN

http://www.cnn.com/2017/12/09/opinions/ ... index.html

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“Every day is a new opportunity. You can build on yesterday's success or put its failures behind and start over again. That's the way life is, with a new game every day, and that's the way baseball is.”
-- Bob Feller

Re: Politics

644
Hillbilly,

You are pressing pretty hard to "prove" Trump is a hero and that up is down. There is a reason that only 32% of people think he is doing a good job and 62% disapprove of his job performance so far. Also, calling liberal press liars when they make a mistake and correct it does not prove your point. How often does Fox News actually even acknowledge inaccurate reporting much less correct it of their own accord. Like Trump and Moore, they try to create confusion by making up alternate facts and repeating them shamelessly. Listen to Sarah Huckabee give a press conference, as an example. Cripes.

Re climate change: You readily assume the Australian scientist got it right and the article they question got it wrong. Maybe. But even if that ultimately proves so, it is important to note far-to-extreme right activist and reporters are picking out only the scientific articles that can be challenged to discuss and then jump to the conclusion that questions about one study (or a relative handful) justifies denial of the overwhelming majority of actual science that indicates that human conduct is damaging the climate. You won't see Fox News or Breitbart making any effort to cover the weight of climate science in any fair and balanced way.

Here (below links) is stuff that addresses Trump's claim of credit for lower black unemployment and black home ownership. What exactly has Trump done to "cause" the continuation of trends that predated his election? Sure, he didn't screw it up (yet) and his promises of tax cut handouts made the stock market rise, but we already discussed that. You will say I don't want to give him credit, but one must be able to point to something he actually did that warrants his claim to be the cause of such things. He claims credit for all kinds of things he has little or nothing to do with and evades responsibility for everything he actually does wrong.

https://www.theroot.com/black-unemploym ... 1797665938

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... 4a4aa82601

This tax bill, for example is not of his own making in either the Senate or the House form. In fact, it does not deliver the kind of tax relief he promised middle class voters. Instead, it is the wish list of Republican orthodoxy and big business special interests that you said you are sick of. It's not surprising because Trump never had an actual plan, as I noted before, just a hodge-podge list of promises to get votes from different groups.

What about Trump's constant lies? Why does he get a pass from you on that while any lies of a Democrat and many lies of Republicans so enrage to you? You do realize that Trump is objectively the most consistent liar that we have ever seen run for President and now he is the most consistent liar as President. They actually keep track of these things, and it is not even close. His false promises, his false stories, and his excuses and defenses for prior misconduct change constantly as his previous lies are debunked and exposed.

Are you denying he is a bigot or that he at least acts like one? Is it ok to question a judge's ablility to rule fairly on a case because his father immigrated from Mexico? Is it ok to continue raising birther challenges against our first African-American president even when his birth certificate is produced (and there is no logical reason to believe his parents would have reason at the time he was born to lie about his birth place and put together a scheme to fake his birth elsewhere)? Is it ok to be anti-Muslim per se? Is it ok to support a Senate candidate that does not believe in separation of church and state and refuses to follow the law as set forth in the Constitution? Is it ok for him to sexually assault women and brag about it? To take his daughter onto the Howard Stern show and talk about her like a sex object? To discriminate against African Americans in housing? To turn the presidency into a way to increase his personal and family wealth by spending taxpayer money on his businesses? To conceal his taxes so that his personal financial stake in policies he implements cannot even be properly evaluated?
Last edited by Peter C on Thu Dec 14, 2017 7:42 pm, edited 1 time in total.