The 2020 USA POTUS election politics, the civil war, and the world war (Part 1)

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Am posting this here because I’m going to mention Trump.

Already posted on the other thread about impact on Biden. But Bernie’s situation will also, I think, give people second thoughts about a second term for President Trump.

Trump is not quite up there with Bernie, but Trump is clearly overweight. I think Bernie’s situation will cause some people to think twice about electing a person as POTUS who is “up there” and who is also a male. Senator Warren is not as old and she is a female, an advantage I think.

Bernie’s event is a shocker. I hope it does not harm Trump’s prospects. But in my view it might.

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Small modification / fact correction. Im 6’2", 234 is the Obese category cutoff(I was there a couple years ago st 235…). 2019 physical had Trump at 243, which is clearly well into the “Obese” range, not just “Overweight”. This is without debating whether the 6’2" is accurate (6’2" conveniently aligned with the first physical putting him just 1lb within the overweight range).

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“Now the press is trying to sell the fact that I wanted a Moot stuffed with alligators and snakes, with an electrified fence and sharp spikes on top, at our Southern Border,” Trump tweeted

:frowning: An alligator filled moot would have been cool. Why can’t we have nice things? I’d vote for an alligator moot.

I’d also like to put one around my house. Not sure I’d want to shoot the illegal solicitors that come to my front door in the legs though.

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My entire point was not about popular vs electoral vote count. It was about the fact that the MAJORITY of voters never liked the president. He does not represent the majority, he represents a tiny but loud faction (and fraction) of the minority. Your “civil war” will quickly be lost if it ever starts, because there are just too few angry loud-mouthed men, and the majority will oppose them.

I think you also fail to realize that the majority of people in the developed countries are in fact “liberal.” I would further argue that it is not listening to someone else’s thoughts and opinions on TV that makes a person “liberal” or “conservative” (those terms themselves are not static and change with time and location). It’s more about their circumstance and surroundings. Most colleges and cities are liberal because people of all kinds are thrown into a pot. If you are a hateful or disrespectful to those near you, you’ll have a hard time making friends. And if you make lots of friends, then being surrounded and befriended by people of different backgrounds and upbringings is pretty much guaranteed to make you more sensitive to issues they have to deal with and therefore more open to ideas that you, shinobi, consider “liberal”. There are exceptions, of course, and Fox Opinion is just as easy to get as all other broadcast stations. But their target audience is basically angry old white men who are swayed by fear mongering and propaganda. A dying breed, I hope.

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I disagree with everything you wrote. But I have to concede, in my own instance at least, your hope will soon enough be fulfilled. You and your liberal ilk so richly deserve the world you crave.

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I’m pretty sure he received far more votes than a tiny fraction.

Regardless, Trump, and Trump support, isnt about liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican. It’s primarily about “Anyone but another career politician.” Trump is there because he’s the political outsider who stepped up, even now he remains the one option who hasnt made a living out of campaigning for votes as an “insider”. His past, what he does, how he acts, none of that matters. He’s not part of the established government bureaucracy. It’s as simple as that.

And that is the primary source of all the political opposition from both parties, as well - you can argue how effective of a threat he really is (I’m not debating that), but he is a inherent threat to the status quo so many in the government feed off of.

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Sort of. 55% voted in 2016, so in the end, about 27% voted for T.

However, it’s more complicated than that with our two party system, as most of those final votes were just because of the R vs D. Im only doing a Republican example, but it’s similar for both parties.

(I am now going to intentionally oversimplify) (Turnout in 2016 primaries so far rivals 2008 record | Pew Research Center) For the Republican primary cycle in 2016, through the first 12 primaries, Republican turnout was 17% of voters. Trump received 45% of the vote in all the primaries. So, less than 7% (caucus states less numbers of people involved… also being generous here extrapolating the early states’ higher numbers because later states don’t really matter as much and/ or had only 1 candidate remaining. ) of the population is all it took to select Trump as the Republican nominee. A majority of a minority, same for the selection of Hillary Clinton. Or a plurality of a majority of people who actually voted, if you prefer.

After that point, it was more about D vs R or Mob Trump vs Crooked Hillary.

Would you call <7% a tiny fraction? For good or ill, it really doesn’t take a large % to be active to select the nominees in our two party system,. Everyone else is then stuck with one or the other.

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Sure, but you can say the same thing about virtually everyone who’s ever been elected. And you’d say the same about Clinton “winning” the popular vote, because 28% isnt all that different than 27%. It’s hard to single him out on this, let alone the implication that the vast majority was against him and he only played structural technicalities to backdoor his way into office anyways.

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That’s what I did…

It doesn’t invalidate scripta’s statement though. Vocal minority sets the nominees. No one in politics pretends they don’t. Spend some time getting elected one year as a delegate and go to your state’s convention and the process is more clear.

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Right. My point is that his true base is a small but loud minority. The implication that there will be a “civil war” is ridiculous. I’m pretty sure most pre-Tea Party and pre-Trump Republicans wouldn’t mind too much if he was removed from office. It’s not like impeachment invalidates the election or turns the executive branch over to the other party.

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I think you are confusing two different things and drawing the wrong conclusion. The two things are the “impeachment process” and the “impeachment inquiry.” There was a vote to initiate the inquiry in case of Nixon, but In case of Clinton there was no inquiry at all, so there was no vote.

I don’t know what the laws are, but my guess is that a vote is not required to initiate the “impeachment inquiry,” it’s only required to initiate the “impeachment process.”

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And some would be happier with the VP becoming P than they are with Trump. That would also scare the crap out of a lot from the other party.

P.S. I am curious about Pence with the new book about him. It seems there may be more to him than I thought.

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I didn’t mean to imply that he was slowing spending. I presume that most on this board know that Congress is supposed to control the purse strings. and regardless of who is in the majority, they don’t.

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Be careful! That could be red - flag worthy … whatever they’re calling it now. Of course, I think and hope you were joking. If that’s the case, I’m even more dumbfounded by your misunderstanding of Trump’s sense of humor. :slight_smile:

I hope not to find a bullseye as I read further. :laughing::rofl::crazy_face:

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Only if you can see through the bottom of the glass.:face_with_raised_eyebrow:

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Haven’t laughed at a video clip from a news segment for a while: https://www.cnn.com/videos/politics/2020/01/26/pompeo-ukraine-bangladesh-npr-ctn-sot-vpx.cnn

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President Bush did the same thing starting in 2001 when he took over following Clinton (remember all the "W"s having been removed from the White House typewriters?). But Trump has raised Bush’s brand of stupidity to an artform.

What Bush did back then was purposefully to retain Clinton personnel in the White House as a gesture of bipartisan goodwill. And Bush paid a high price for this insanity in terms of loyalty gaps at critical junctures as he moved forward.

But Trump’s failure has been far worse than was that of President Bush, and it commenced years prior to his election. Many people assert Trump is a better POTUS than was Reagan. That is false, and here is why:

President Reagan did his homework before even assuming our nation’s highest office. Reagan upon his election in 1980 had already completed two terms as Governor of California, one of our largest and most important states. That was significant, critical, essential, training for President Reagan. He was prepared as he took office in 1981.

Years ago smart people wanted Trump to run for Governor of New York. He refused. On January 20, 2017 Trump hit the oval office cold, not really understanding the importance of quickly populating his administration with like-minded followers. He appointed Jeff Sessions as AG, a total and complete catastrophe. He named liberals to important, high posts and then asked them to oversee implementation of conservative policies. This was nuts. He selected a Secretary of State, Mr. Tillerson, who did not share his own views of how foreign policy should be administered. I could go on. Trump’s early administrative errors were numerous and nearly endless.

Trump, before assuming office, told Rush Limbaugh he believed everyone would be respectful of his victory and cooperate with his policy decisions. This behavior he expected from hundreds of Obama holdovers he was unable quickly to replace because he had no plan or adequate preparation to do so . . . which stemmed from his lack of experience. Even today, nearly three years later, Trump continues to suffer from Obama holdovers in his own White House. Currently they are releasing large portions of Bolton’s book, submitted to the White House for pre-publication scrutiny and review, to the New York Times.

There is so much more and I’m not writing a treatise here. But the level of Trump’s political naïveté upon assuming office was off the charts. And he has paid a commensurately high price for this ever since.

I do think Trump has learned some things in the three years. It’s not enough but it is better than where he was. One thing he has learned, far too slowly, is ability to discern the difference between political friend and political enemy. When Trump gave those personal interviews, early in his administration, to the New York Times . . well . . it just drove me NUTS! Thank God that foolishness has ceased. I think he finally realizes there is such a thing as liberals, and that they do not at all like or favor the people who elected him to office. I knew that on day one. It took Trump at least two years to get a clue.

So now Trump has been impeached because he retained on his White House staff a “whistleblower” who is an Obama acolyte. How stupid is that . . . of Trump, not the “whistleblower”. When you allow poisonous snakes to share your administration, Mr. Trump, don’t act surprised or outraged when you get bit!!

Bottom line as happened with Bush, now Trump is suffering from the errors of his ways. Big shock. Republicans are such hopeless jackasses. Sure am glad I’m not one of 'em.

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The people releasing the draft, have they revealed themselves? Could it just be a real patriot, someone non-partisan or even a Trump appointee? Same goes for the whistleblower, at least until we know who it is.

And why does that even matter? Is it not more important that someone chose the truth and the law over blind loyalty? We’re not living under an all-powerful emperor whose word is the law. At least not yet.

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Unless his name is B-O. Remember, Congress doesn’t matter becuase he had a pen. :slight_smile:

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Trump was destined to be impeached as soon as the Democrats won a majority in the House. If they also held 60 seats in the Senate, The impeachment and trial would have been over a year ago.

There will continue to be leaks and rumors until they have the votes to call witnesses. Maybe the Ford waif will make a return. :slight_smile:

Are these actually portions of Bolton’s book, or, are they what people say is in his book?

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