Astounding. It’s not astounding that the former President thinks this way, it’s astounding that he is so devoid of ethics alarms, self-restraint, common sense and an understanding of the justice system that he would post such smoking gun evidence that he is a dangerous bully with the instincts of a badly-raised child. Donald Trump actually and truly posted this threat yesterday, in all caps as usual, on his social media site, Truth Social:
That’s the tipping point for me, and it should be for any sane American. I believe that it is existentially crucial that the increasingly anti-democratic Democrats be punished for their unethical conduct and totalitarian aspirations over the past eight years. I would vote for almost anyone over Joe Biden after his complete capitulation to the Dark Side, but “almost anyone” does not include, for example, Putin, Dracula, Diane Feinstein, Rob Reiner, Mitch McConnell, or Cujo…or Donald Trump. Not after this. Hillary Clinton jumps in front of Trump after this. So do some others on that list.
Republican leaders are almost all fools, but if every one of them, including the leading contenders for the 2024 nomination, do not condemn Trump with one voice for this, the party is too stupid and cowardly to live, and it is already arguably brain dead already. The threat is an attack on witnesses, lawyers, judges, pundits, journalists, Federal agencies, elected officials, free speech, voters and the nation itself. The Department of Justice responded to the post by asking for a protective order from U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkan, not that it would be any protection against a President of the United States with the values of Michael Corleone and half his IQ.
Oh, I know the rationalization we’ll get from the ridiculous Trump fans: “This is what we like! He fights!” Yeah, well so does Mike Tyson and honey badgers, and they shouldn’t be President either. The United States has had many ruthless politicians in the Oval Office. Some of them could be petty, dictatorial and scary. You didn’t want to cross Andy Jackson, Andrew Johnson, the Roosevelts, Truman, Nixon, LBJ, and Clinton, among others: they knew their Machiavelli; they knew it is as important for a leader to be feared as loved. But none of them was so throbbingly reckless, childish, and stupid as to issue an all-encompassing threat like that. Even Hitler and Stalin didn’t say that out loud in public—they just did it.
In asking for the protective order, Trump’s latest prosecutors argued that his threat could portend actions that would have a “harmful chilling effect on witnesses or adversely affect the fair administration of justice in this case.”
Gee, ya think?
A Trump spokesperson on clean-up duty said in an emailed statement that the Truth Social post “is the definition of political speech.” Sure, and so is “We will bury you!” There can be no defense for this, and no excuse for it. This is signature significance: no one can trust the ethics, intentions, priorities, patriotism, or intelligence of a candidate for a powerful office who makes an announcement like that. It is signature significance exemplified.
Run away, Republicans, conservatives, voters, Americans.
Now.
Ethics Alarms 
Not a chance. This is just rhetoric. I’ll worry about it when Trump actually takes action. He is still this nation’s best hope of getting China Joe out of there next year.
Makes no sense, Steve. It’s like saying that tweeting “Kill the Niggers!” is just rhetoric. “Women are not fit for anything but fucking!” “We should bomb Russia back to the Stone Age!”Your position is essentially that nothing Trump says in public matters. If someone who has access to great power issues a public threat, it not only matters, it has to be taken seriously.
So this is the straw that broke your camel’s back? Maybe it’s a NJ thing (ask Steve) but I don’t even see the big threat. It goes without saying in NJ that if you mess with the metaphoric me, the metaphoric I will mess with you. Someone who has great power huh? I see a guy facing 750 years in jail. Some great power. By rejecting Trump you are accepting Biden or whoever is or are the pupptmasters. Ivory tower ethics will have no place in the quasi-Venezuelan future US. And btw, it’s worthy of Adam Schiff to invoke the three quotes (that no one said) in your response to Steve-O.
Yeah, I guess you need boning up on the “tipping point” concept. And also the “Hypothetical” concept: Adam Schiff lies. My comment never suggested that those were real quotes, but they were correct examples of rhetoric that would be universally regarded as indefensible, ominous and disqualifying if a Presidential candidate uttered or tweeted them…and Trump’s message, which IS real, are all three. “He doesn’t mean it” has been a standard defense of Trump’s more outrageous outbursts, and occasionally with justification, but that threat to “come after” his foes is a tell whether he means it or not. A threat from a President or possible one is by definition a serious threat.
As I have related here before, the moment I realized Bill Clinton could never be trusted was when he said, “If Thomas Jefferson were alive today, he would be shocked that we didn’t have national health care!” Most people don’t even remember that quote, but it proved to me that Clinton would lie about anything, and had no respect for the public. It was really was worse than Al Sharpton’s statement about Jefferson and Madison never trying to overthrow a government: Clinton is named after Jefferson, and knows that he believed in minimal government. Big government programs like what we have today would horrify him.
Bob in NJ wrote, “By rejecting Trump you are accepting Biden or whoever is or are the puppet masters.”
I completely and unequivocally reject that kind of thinking, it’s pure a partisan rationalization meant to manipulate others.
With respect, Steve, I think you misinterpret my line that you quoted. Maybe I can clarify. We will likely have a binary Dem-Rep choice. If one dislikes the Dem but finds the Rep so despicable that he votes for the Dem, he is certainly accepting the Dem, isn’t he? Conversely, if one dislikes the Rep but finds the Dem so despicable that he votes for the Rep, he is certainly accepting the Rep.
If one finds both despicable and votes for a third party, he is pretty much throwing his vote away, and thus accepting the result, whichever, Dem or Rep.
I see this as rational analysis rather than partisan rationalization.
This is Ethics Alarms. Who did you think I was trying to manipulate? You? Curmie? Steve-O? Jack? Come on, be real. Btw I expected a bigger slap down from Jack.
With respect, I commented on what you actually wrote not your follow up explanation.
The you in my manipulating others statement is a very generic you not you specifically, but even if I had meant you specifically the same holds true. Own it.
I should have written “The you implied in my manipulate others statement…”
Own it? Own what? What I originally wrote is included in my subsequent explanation.
Whether your “you” was generic or specific, you are trying to ascribe motives where you have no reason to do so. Feel free to respond so you can have the last word. Cheers
Bob in NJ wrote, “Own it? Own what?”
How very obtuse.
Bob in NJ wrote, “Whether your “you” was generic or specific, you are trying to ascribe motives where you have no reason to do so.”
Think whatever you like if it helps you sleep at night.
Don’t I remember the Senator from Wall Street saying something to directed toward Trump to the effect of, “Don’t mess with the FBI or the CIA. They can get you six ways to Sunday.” And of course, Chuck was spot on.
Bottom line, Dems can say anything with impunity.
I seem to remember a few threats issued toward specific justices of the SCOTUS also, which a certain jerk tried to carry out. It’s time to fight to win, not to fight fair.
What sort of tactics are you expecting to employ, and what sort of victory do you think they will purchase?
But there’s a big difference between a Senator and a President, and between saying “They’ll get you” and “I’ll get you.”
Yes, of course, Schumer’s much craftier than Trump. But personally, I think the guile makes Schumer even more creepy and threatening. He knows who to employ to get his dirty work done and maintain the appearance of having clean hands. I doubt Stalin ever did much of anything himself.
Yeah, but Bill, a Senator doesn’t have the power to do anything like that: it’s an empty threat. At worst its an encouragement to others to act on Schumer’s words. The President DOES have power to “go after” people. Remember Michael’s memorable response to Kay when she says that the President, unlike the Don, doesn’t have people killed?
As a libertarian I voted for Donald Trump because I believed Joe Biden was a bigger threat to our nation. History has proven me correct. However, Trump continues to reveal he does not have the ethics to be President — but few politicians do.
I am majorly alarmed how our government and judicial systems have been weaponized and flagrantly utilized against citizen Trump. Certainly, he can be difficult to like on a personal level, however while many are celebrating the charges Smith has filed against Trump, the implications for free speech, liberty, and freedom, are hugely chilling to all thinking citizens.
As Jonathan Turley observed, “The hatred for Trump is so all-encompassing that legal experts on the political left have ignored the chilling implications of this indictment. This complaint is based largely on statements that are protected under the First Amendment. It would eviscerate free speech and could allow the government to arrest those who are accused of spreading disinformation in elections.”
Professor Turley has not been mincing words or pussy-footing on this indictment.
This completely justifies Trump’s tweet.
Here is Michael Tracey.
Also, I am certaib that my longtime Usenet ally, Christopher Charles Morton, would agree with Trump in this context.
All true. But it should be obvious that this the Frog and the Scorpion scenario, and wishing it wasn’t, or refusing to accept that it is, can’t be justified.
Who is the frog and who is the scorpion? All I see are scorpions.
The latest indictment against Trump is a direct threat to everyone who doesn’t agree with the left. Shut up and do what we want, or we will come after you. In my opinion, actions speak louder than words, and the actions of the current government scream threat on a daily basis.
Personally, I see the government as a direct, active threat to at least 30% of the population of the country. It wouldn’t surprise me if the Biden administration started rounding conservatives and libertarians up and throwing them in internment camps while progressives cheered wildly. What is even worse is that I’m pretty sure most Republican “leaders” would simply nod and declare it to be necessary.
I don’t see any alternative to Trump.
I’ve reached that point, too, should Trump be the nominee.
Far too many Republican/conservative “leaders” failed in multiple previous iterations to address abuses by Democrats, including the targeting of Prop 8 donors, Lois Lerner targeting the tea party, the Obama DOJ tossing a filmmaker in jail over a movie trailer after they falsely claimed it caused Benghazi, Operation Chokepoint, Operation Fast & Furious, the spying on Trump’s campaign, and the actions of New York state officials against the NRA.
We’re past the point of better angels, and the only hope is that the fear of retaliation will get the Left to back down.
I wish that Vivek Ramaswamy would win the nomination next year, and he has positioned himself well in order to do so, but he may need to wait until 2028, but I have serious doubts America will be America if the Democrats win in 2024.
I commented about Maraxus, and how the Democratic Party has become the party of Maraxus.
They must be stopped at any and all costs!
It is so heartening to know we’ve already lost the 2024 election. Trump is doing what Trump does best: shooting himself in the foot, giving a gift to his foes, and alienating the people who need to be convinced to vote for him.
If he gets the Republican nomination, he doesn’t have the general support. If he doesn’t, he runs third party, and divides the Republican vote.
If he had any desire for the good of the country, he’d bow out of the presidential race and disappear from politics. It would utterly deflate the Democrats. (Many of them might simply lay down and die from the sudden drain of all their ire and purpose, like Roger Chillingworth.) It would derail all their current efforts. They might actually get the shellacking they deserve.
And Trump will not do it.
Where’s the Masked Dickhead to explain the difference between good threats made by Democrats and bad threats made by the GOP?
To some, I guess, justifying evil Democrat statements would make Trump’s statement look okay by comparison. To too many, I think. Unfortunately.
Where oh where is my Philosopher King? Or any conservative who can effectively challenge Biden and the left wing? Is there really really no one out there? I have always thought that Trump is an embarrassment to himself and our country, and somehow I also thought that someone would emerge to stop him. That no one seems available is or should be the real embarrassment.
Note: Please do not mention Hillary Clinton much in future. I get an anxiety rash the moment I see her name in anything other than a history book (which is the only place she belongs).
I know that it is an ethics blunder to go with the “It is an Emergency”, but where does it stop, if all your choices go from bad to worse. We know the goal for the Democrats, Based on the four years we had Trump, he is often a blustery blowhard???
Blustery Blowhard is tolerable. That’s not what this is. This is the mark of a dangerous bully—a grown up, sort of, Scut Farkus.
Let me add, he crossed into far more dangerous territory at the end of those four years, openly attacking the legitimacy of the election, stating as fact that it was stolen, and recklessly risking what in fact happened: that a bunch of idiots would get violent. Either he has gotten worse, or we were lucky for 3.5 years. That’s the takeaway.
Trump should go after these people because the means by which they are going after Trump, have in effect weaponize several governmental agencies against political opponents. At this point, I would argue that the President of the United States (Trump or otherwise) would be obligated to go after them, purge them from the government, and then work towards undoing the damage they cause. And the processive have no right to call foul, because Trump going after them is the standard they set, just used against them.
Furthermore, Trump supporters, including myself, argue that at this point Trump needs to because of how dangerous of a precedents the democrats/progressives setting. You can not convince us that if they succeed against Trump, they will not use these same tactics against other conservatives down the line. We find the two tier justice system that the cases against Trump represent to be far more appalling. We see that is happening to Trump will one day be applied to us, and that Trump is currently out best option to protect ourselves.
Also it’s rather disingenuous to write ” I believe that it is existentially crucial that the increasingly anti-democratic Democrats be punished for their unethical conduct and totalitarian aspirations over the past eight years.” and then follow up with “Not after this. Hillary Clinton jumps in front of Trump after this.” Hillary Clinton would be enabling these totalitarian aspirations and I’m reasonably sure that a number of the other people on your list that jump in front of Trump would also enable those totalitarians aspirations. You will never convince Trump supporters that it is more ethical for someone else to be president when you say that people who would enable the totalitarian behavior of the progressive/left/democrats that will one day come after us is a better fit for the presidency then Trump. Not to mention that, you also wrote that “believe that it is existentially crucial that the increasingly anti-democratic Democrats be punished for their unethical conduct and totalitarian aspirations over the past eight years”, by now the list of Democrats which needs to be punished includes “lawyers, judges, pundits, journalists, Federal agencies, elected officials”. Also can you explain to me how the “increasingly anti-democratic Democrats” can be properly punished unless someone like Trump goes after them?
This is an anti-ethical statement, essentially advocating a dictatorship from the Right as preferable to a dictator ship from the Left. Get rid of Trump first, and find a GOP opponent committed to democratic processes, articulate and sincere enough to make the case to the American people. “Also can you explain to me how the “increasingly anti-democratic Democrats” can be properly punished unless someone like Trump goes after them?’ is a self refuting statement. Someone like Trump won’t “punish” his enemies properly at all, except by the standards of the Corleones. That’s the point, and that’s what his statement means.
Your attitude frightens and depressed me. People who reason like this support terrorism.
“Get rid of Trump first, and find a GOP opponent…” I would argue that’s an ivory tower statement. It should be “you find a replacement first then get rid of Trump.” In fact, one of the general rules of common sense is to always have the viable replacement up and running before you get ride of anything. It’s why people are resisting the climate change activists: they are demanding we get rid of fossil fuels before a viable alternative is up and running. The fact that you wrote ” find a GOP opponent committed to democratic processes, articulate and sincere enough to make the case to the American people” means that you are currently unable to provide an alternative/solution. A bit of life experience that I have personally observed is that when you’re trying to convince people to take up your ideas, they are much more respective to being offered solutions. Take groups/companies/start-ups like Quaise and Fervo Energy, they stance is that we need to get off fossil fuels but their method of doing so is to pioneer deep drilling geothermal power to replace fossil fuel power plants and thus I respect them a-lot more than other environmental groups who just protest and lobby for the banning of fossil fuels. I would be far more respective to dropping Trump if you were providing alternative candidates/solutions that would viably address the left/progressive/democrat totalitarian aspirations.
I notice that you chose to side step my question, “Also can you explain to me how the “increasingly anti-democratic Democrats” can be properly punished unless someone like Trump goes after them?” by declaring it as a self-refuting statement instead of answering it. You also didn’t address my points about how if the progressives succeed against Trump their going to use the same tactics against anyone and everyone who does not agree with them. Fine then at the very least answer the following questions: What would proper punishment for the ” increasingly anti-democratic Democrats” for their “for their unethical conduct and totalitarian aspirations over the past eight years” look like. Who would be among the
anti-democratic democrats punished and how on earth would the list of said democrats not include “lawyers, judges, pundits, journalists, Federal agencies [that have been weaponized against the progressive/democrats political opponents], elected officials,”?
“Get rid of Trump first, and find a GOP opponent…” I would argue that’s an ivory tower statement. It should be “you find a replacement first then get rid of Trump.”
Nope. There will be no replacement until you get rid of Trump. This isn’t like quitting a job before you have an offer: there are many, many qualified people who will immediately move in to fill a void. Trump pulls all the attention, and by his very presence warps the process. The best possible result would be for him to drop out, as a respectable leader facing multiple trials would. The second best alternative would be for him to be unable to run, for any reason. There is no third good alternative. Accepting an already unacceptable option because you don’t know what the alternative is makes no sense: it is unacceptable, ergo it isn’t an option.
“Accepting an already unacceptable option because you don’t know what the alternative is makes no sense: it is unacceptable, ergo it isn’t an option.” That’s why I’m supporting Trump! I find the idea of a any canidate bowing out because the democrats/progressives are voilating multiple norms and standards, including weaponizing multiple agencies such as the DOJ in this, to get ride of said canadite to be completely unaccapatble. Not to mention dangerious as in this case, the progressives/liberals/democrates would view it as a vidicated of said tactics and use it against everyone and anyone who would replace Trump.
I also notice a disturbing trend with you avoiding questions the challenege your view point. You proclaimed one of my questions as self-defeating and have not even address my other questions: What would proper punishment for the ” increasingly anti-democratic Democrats” for their “for their unethical conduct and totalitarian aspirations over the past eight years” look like? Who would be among the anti-democratic democrats punished and how on earth would the list of said democrats not include “lawyers, judges, pundits, journalists, Federal agencies [that have been weaponized against the progressive/democrats political opponents], elected officials,”? Or address my points about how Trump stepping down would cause the embolded the democrats/liberal/progressive to use the same tactics against anyone and everyone else? I’m starting to suspect that you’re avoiding addressing these questions and concerns because doing so would force you to reevaluate your viewpoints. I also suspect that I am sticking a nerve because I am using what you write, your own words, to justify my stance.
Please answer the following questions:
What would proper punishment for the ” increasingly anti-democratic Democrats” for their “for their unethical conduct and totalitarian aspirations over the past eight years” look like?
Who would be among the anti-democratic democrats punished and how on earth would the list of said democrats not include “lawyers, judges, pundits, journalists, Federal agencies [that have been weaponized against the progressive/democrats political opponents], elected officials,”?
If Trump steps down, how do we ensure the democrats/progessives shredding of politcal norms and weaponizing of federal agencies is rewarded and we don’t enable them to use the same tactics on anyone else?
If you continue to avoid answering said questions then I think it’s reasonable to question your intregrity and committment to ethics. And don’t you dare try to claim foul because you question my intregrity by proclaiming, “People who reason like this support terrorism.” to my intinital quesiton.
You know this almost feels like a debate between the supports of Arthur Neville Chamberlain and Winston Churchill. With you supporting Chamberlian stating that we must appease the norm shredding, federal agency weaponizing agressors(progressives/democrats) in order to have “peace for our time.” while I am supporting Chruchill arguing that “You cannot reason with a tiger when your head is in its mouth!” with the tiger being the progressives/democrats. Oh, and for the record, I did add this section to see if you not just respond to if, but also how you respond to it and if you use this setion to keep ignoring the questions I keep asking;. Fair warning, depending on you proceed, it will just will further reinfoce what I am coming to suspect and beginning to question.
That said I am willing to compromise by having the situation proclaimed to be an “Ethics Zugzwang” as you put. It’s unethical for Trump to not step down for the reasons you have explains, and it’s unethical for Trump to step down for the reasons I have explained.
It’s unethical to elect, or vote for, an individual who has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt to be unethical, untrustworthy, unstable, and contemptuous of basic decency, while apparently not caring about the damage his participation is doing to the political process and American society. That’s the bottom line that you seem to be unable to process.
As for your questions:
“What would proper punishment for the ” increasingly anti-democratic Democrats” for their “for their unethical conduct and totalitarian aspirations over the past eight years” look like?”
Voting them out office everywhere. Getting a veto-proof majority in Congress. Those objectives will be far easier without Trump: His malign influence and big mouth was the primary reason the mid-terms didn’t yield the “Red wave” that Democratic policies should have made automatic.
“Who would be among the anti-democratic democrats punished and how on earth would the list of said democrats not include “lawyers, judges, pundits, journalists, Federal agencies [that have been weaponized against the progressive/democrats political opponents], elected officials,”?
I don’t understand the question. But the point is that threatening to “come after” all of those groups is pure totalitarianism by definition.
If Trump steps down, how do we ensure the democrats/progessives shredding of politcal norms and weaponizing of federal agencies is rewarded and we don’t enable them to use the same tactics on anyone else?
And you don’t warn ME on my site. I do the warning. Here’s one: don’t do that again.
The Chamberlain-Churchill analogy is horrible. There is no reason to believe that Trump is the only candidate who can defeat Biden: I suspect he may be the one GOP candidate who can’t. I don’t want a President who abuses power to “punish” individuals regardless of who’s punished. Neither should anyone with respect for the rule of law and the proper role of the executive.
Gee, I guess you have to depend on the system, the Constitution, and Democracy, rather than a revenge-minded bully with the ethics of a Columbia drug lord.
“And don’t you dare try to claim foul because you question my inegrity by proclaiming, “People who reason like this support terrorism.” to my initial question.”
Don’t tell me what I don’t dare do: I manage and write this blog as a public service. I’ll “dare” do whatever I choose to. People who reason you are DO support terrorism. And strong man dictators. If the iron boot fits, wear it.
“if you use this section to keep ignoring the questions I keep asking;. Fair warning, depending on you proceed, it will just will further reinforce what I am coming to suspect and beginning to question.”
I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about: this is the first time you posed the questions, so I haven’t “kept ignoring them,” not that they aren’t eminently ignorable. And don’t warn ME: I do the warning here, and this is one: Warn me or write “don’t you dare” again, and it will be your last comment.
FROM the Moderator: Well, it’s a shame I can’t leave this post up, because it is a wonderful example of the kind of person who thinks it makes sense to make someone like Donald Trump President again. Engineer’s previous post told me what I “don’t dare” do on my own blog, warned me of the consequences if I didn’t follow his directives, and compared me to Neville Chamberlain, which made as much sense as the rest of his creed, and demanded answers to three fatuous questions, the two coherent of which I answered in more detail than they deserved, and then he (or she) doubled down in this comment, which stated at the end that he “expected to be banned.” You know how I try to meet everyone’s expectations.
The short answer to this now deleted Comment is “Bite Me.” I assumed this post would flush out some asshats. Engineer is banned. Don’t reply if he tries to sneak back on, as asshats inevitably do.
I think it makes sense, but only because re-electing Biden makes even less sense. It’s not supposed to come to that kind of a choice, but if we get to the end of this year and no one else emerges to pick up the GOP banner, I think you should reconsider.
The Chamberlain-Churchill comparison was not really apropos of this discussion, although in a lot of ways Churchill was the Trump of his day (blunt, political maverick, the establishment couldn’t stand him), but I have a better comparison, I think. Like it or not, the US and the other Allies made a deal with the devil when they allied with Josef Stalin, who racked up a higher body count than Hitler and committed the biggest democide until Mao’s “Great Leap Forward” and “Cultural Revolution” killed many more. Not only did we ally with him, we essentially sold Eastern Europe down the river to him, thereby buying ourselves the Cold War and many future problems.
However, without the USSR on our side, and no Eastern Front, Kursk, or Stalingrad to tie down and destroy a big chunk of Hitler’s forces, there’s a very good chance things might have gone differently. Churchill said that Stalingrad and Midway together represented not the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning, if only one of those happened, would that still have been true? Even assuming the Battle of Britain and Dunkirk still played out as they did historically, if in June 1941 Hitler had launched Operation Sealion instead of Operation Barbarossa (maybe preceded by an Unterseeblitz targeting the Royal Navy’s major ships), what then?
After WW2 we also held our noses and welcomed fascist Franco and original racist Turkey, who had only declared war on Nazi Germany to avoid a Soviet invasion into NATO, realizing that the west had to stand together against the east, or else. The there was our propping up of dictatorships in Greece, Malaya, and Iran to guard our interests when they would have otherwise been lost. Syngman Rhee and Chiang Kai-Shek were also hardly beacons of democracy and human rights. And there’s something going on right now that I just can’t think of…what could it be…oh yes, we’re propping up Zelenskyy in the Ukraine, a corrupt oligarch who suppresses both political opposition and the free media. However, the alternative, letting Ukraine fall to Putin, is far worse, so we keep at it, and I pray that we aren’t just delaying the inevitable, when Russia throws a human wave assault at Ukraine or drops three or four tactical nuclear weapons on the place.
My point is sometimes you have to make a deal that doesn’t sit well with your conscience or choose the lesser of two evils because the other choice is worse, sometimes far worse. Sometimes you have to deal with someone you’d just as soon ignore because you need him inside the tent pissing out rather than outside the tent pissing in. Like it or not, Trump isn’t going away. It’s wishful thinking to hope he will, unless either his health gives out on him like Ariel Sharon (stroke), he meets with a bad accident like Muhammad Zia ul-Haq (plane crash), or he serves out his second term. The chances that he will voluntarily walk away are precisely as remote as the chances that he would shoot a “get the damn vaccine” PSA. I also happen to think that for him to withdraw now would be giving a victory to a party that does not deserve it and setting a precedent where now the Democratic party doesn’t just have the media dig up dirt on a promising GOP congressman or have BLM riots extinguish a rising star GOP governor, it has them arrested, tried, and possibly jailed. This kind of thing is why we broke with the UK, and also why the Constitution sets the bar really high for treason. We don’t want a nation in which those in power cement themselves in power by throwing those who oppose them, whether or not their opposition has a legitimate basis, into jail.
If Trump walks away now, what makes you think that DeSantis, the next most popular candidate, won’t become a target, based on Federal civil rights violations due to his anti-woke and anti-LGBT policies? Once they’re done with him, what’s to stop the targeting of the remaining candidates based on trumped-up or inflated campaign finance violations or whatever else they can stitch together? Suppose Democratic governors in swing states start getting in on the act and suddenly GOP legislators who might get in the way of policy and suburban mayors who might be challengers start getting arrested? Does this country really want to start going down this route? Do we really want to become like Venezuela, where the opposition party is reduced to meaninglessness no matter how bad things get? Do we really want to become like Iran, where the people can vote in elections, but every candidate needs the blessing of the Supreme Leader before he can run? Heck, do we even want to become like our neighbor to the north, where leaders can be elected essentially for life, disarm you by fiat, and make your life miserable if you oppose them?
I believe there are a lot higher stakes here than just the political career of one man with a big loud mouth.
FYI: Here’s Turley’s most recent take on the Trump threat: https://twitter.com/JonathanTurley/status/1687846554848088066?s=20
I’ll go along with that, he’s certainly not helping himself.
The spelling & grammar errors seemed to be increasing with each comment. That and the bluster made me believe he was getting drunk while daring or don’t daring warnings that Jack would be exposed as something he isn’t.
I have competition inside myself that sorta takes both sides of the argument. With as much legal trouble Trump is in, he should drop out. But that’s exactly what the leftist tyrants say they want; to unperson Trump. Their despicable behavior cannot be viewed as a success.
He had some upside by having no filter when it came to talking to our adversaries. He appointed three members of SCOTUS. Mostly, he just made unforced errors that the resistance seized upon. The rest of it was Executive Orders which Biden cancelled on his first day. Trump’s actions after Election Day…I don’t see how he could repeat that when he’s term limited, but there are Trump supporters of Engineer’s ilk that would support a totalitarian Trump. Remember “suspend the Constitution?”
Biden is perpetually in fear of escalation. He has under-supplied the Ukrainian effort that could’ve ended in less than six months if Biden didn’t need a year to decide to give certain arms to Ukraine. A Chinese spy balloon was allowed to transit our country & Biden hasn’t even had the balls to ask President Xi about the Wuhan virus.
But God help us if we elect Trump to an entire lame-duck term with the resistance having had so much time and practice to hone their craft. The midterms will bring the leftists back into Congressional leadership and the Impeachments will resume.
The government will be distracted again, and just like China took control of Hong Kong 23 years premature while we were dealing with the first impeachment, China will move on Taiwan. It was also during the first impeachment that the Wuhan virus began to spread. I believe we could have avoided some of the disaster of that virus if the resistance hadn’t existed and wasn’t trying to impeach Trump. The CIA knew something was up, but nothing was more important than impeachment. There’s a very dark corner of my mind in which the resistance saw the virus coming and intentionally acted to destroy Trump’s last year in office. There doesn’t seem to be anything that they won’t do.
Excellent comment, BS, and sorry it ended up in spam, why, I don’t know.
Frederick Douglass addressed this type of tyranny when he said, “Find out just what people will quietly submit to, and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed on them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress. “
Trump has had one signature significant statement after another and engaged in one signature significant action after another, I can’t rationalize supporting him. I do not support Trump’s run in this GOP primary and it would take an extraordinary turn of events for me to to even remotely consider voting for him in the 2024 general election.
“it would take an extraordinary turn of events for me to to even remotely consider voting for him in the 2024 general election.”
Lefty says: “Hold My Beer“
Paul W. Schlecht wrote, “Lefty says: ‘Hold My Beer’ “
Yup, that’s been their pattern.
Would his statement be better phrased… “WHEN I GET REELECTED, I WILL PURSUE PROSECUTION AND JUST PUNISHMENT TO THE FULLEST EXETENT OF LAW AND ORDER OF EVERY LAST INDIVIDUAL WHO ATTACKED OUR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC(MAGA) BY WITCH-HUNTING ME”
A little better, but not much.
His unfitness for office has been clear since at least 2016, and, yet, those who have pointed out his unfitness here have been reviled as being mentally defective due to TDS. It is and has been beyond me how any rational person could support him, much less vote for him. The only rationale that makes any sense at all is the obvious unfitness of his most recent and most likely future opponent.
Vote for neither and work for a sensible Congress.
That’s just not accurate. What has been reviled is the unethical assertion that because an idividual, Democrats or the resistance find him unfit, he should noy have the same rights, considerations and standards applied to him as any other elected President. The fact that he is unfit does not mean what he says is a lie when if anyone else said the same it would be shrugged off a rhetoric, humor, etc. It does not justify concocting justifications for impeachments; it does not mean he was guilty of collusion, it does not mean his policies that were correct or effective were not. It does not mean that it was ethical for the news media to be determined to destroy his administration. This was the running theme of the 2016 Post election ethics train wreck tag. I have cited Trump Derangement when commenters proved they could not examine events objectively because of antiTrump bias. And I was correct to do so.
I have to ask, do any statesmen (universal reference) exist? I don’t think so. Therefore, we must find the next best alternative. What is interesting is the one man running who is able to make good arguments, speaks without hesitation to all types of constituencies and has not made any material gaffs on the Republican side has been relegated here as an unethical distraction. In my opinion there is no perfect candidate because every candidate must appeal to the largest majority of voters in an ethically challenged nation. We have become an unethical nation because so many are only considering the short-term benefits that will accrue to them. As a result, all the youthful idealists are quite happy to get that college education financial monkey off their back and those paying the lion’s share of the taxes want their fair share of government largesse.
I wonder if the statesmen of the past we are looking for would be just as bad if they had the communication tools of today’s candidates and were jockeying for the ability to trillions in resources to voting blocks. What if Hamilton had challenged Burr to a duel on colonial twitter. Would his ideas on national banking be dismissed because he went off half-cocked on his challenger. Obviously, the results of that contest make the issue moot. But the founders were not all in lock step with each other and many of our presidents were sometimes unethical tyrants, or they were unremarkable in office. Even Lincoln suspended Habeas Corpus for expediency. It is argued that Lincoln’s act was necessary which is what many are saying about Trump’s social media post.
I understand the psychology of those wanting payback. It makes no sense to simply complain about the totalitarian tactics used by the left; something must be done to make the cost of employing such tactics too costly. It would be impossible to inflict enough political damage on the combined might of the AUC, but it does make sense to make some of those who were in the vanguard of the attacks on liberty shoulder significant personal costs. These costs must be borne entirely by the person. If the costs of the behaviors are able to be shifted to taxpayers, the behavior will continue unabated.
Maybe the way to get a high-quality candidate is to organize your neighbors to put out a list of policy issues as well as a list of behaviors that if the candidate exhibits them, they will lose the collective support of that group. Turning a blind eye to bad behaviors is no better than cheering them on. And the way most people turn a blind eye is to simply sit idly by and let others drive the candidate’s behaviors.
Trump’s behavior is a function of our own willingness to accept it.
Chris Marschner wrote, “Trump’s behavior is a function of our own willingness to accept it.”
That suggests that if we the public reject Trump’s behaviors then Trump will change his behaviors, Trump is a raving narcissist and his behavior patterns do not support that perspective.
That last sentence, BINGO.
As is the unethical behavior of his detractors.
To suggest that I am just dumping on Trump that is not the case. In the immortal words of Pogo, “we have met the enemy and it is us”.
I don’t have enough fingers to count the number of times member of Congress from the other side of suggested that Trump supporters or those working for him should be confronted and or harmed.
“The Missouri Democratic Party deleted a tweet calling for a house adorned with Trump campaign merchandise to “burn” down.”
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/missouri-democrats-delete-tweet-calling-trump-adorned-house-burn
The official Democratic Party line regarding Trump supporters seems to be “kill them”.
As the saying goes, “When someone tells you who they really are, believe them.” We have enough evidence to see with our own eyes and ears who Trump is and who he is not and that should not be relevant to who Joe Biden is and who he is not.
This entry, the previous one in the latest installment of the “Nation of Assholes” series and the one before that about Rudy Giuliani’s untrustworthy secret recorder have all coalesced in my mind this weekend as I have spent several days wearing myself out over planning for a pop-culture convention next week by following other conventions in other cities on social media to determine how the shows are accommodating the guests’ requirements under SAG-AFTRA’s strike rules and what that means for how I should approach any celebrity guest I wish to meet.
I get tired of holding the hands of new convention-goers who don’t understand the rules, ask for clarification and end up not following my advice. I get tired of veteran convention-goers who think they have the right to get around the rules. For entitled people who cut lines, who try to sweet-talk the guest into extra perks and who make little to no effort to ask polite, intelligent questions. They make everything harder on everyone else. Celebrities won’t want to attend these things if people don’t understand or respect boundaries. I have too many stories to recount of fans acting like inconsiderate asses and those stories are from before the pandemic.
We are already an entitled enough culture that treats celebrities like commodities, as if buying a movie ticket or following a TV program requires that anyone who appeared in the same owes us unlimited time, an autograph, a selfie, a kidney… One of the best things about the strike is that it’s finally becoming somewhat public knowledge that most actors aren’t millionaires.
We treat others like us even worse. Not only do we not put most of our fellow citizens on pedestals, but we don’t even afford them the basic respect of treating them the way we would want to be treated. As long as there’s something in it for us, I guess…
Somehow, qualities of character, such as honesty, integrity, patience, kindness, self-control (sorry, I think I wandered into the Fruits of the Spirit from the Bible) seem to have been lost very quickly. We are a mess as a culture and there’s a lot of blame to go around, not least because we have forgotten the Golden Rule.
Once upon a time (when I was a young college kid), there was an older man in our church named Johnnie. Johnnie’s life was upended when he was a young man the night someone broke into his home while he was away and murdered Johnnie’s father, sister and left his mother for dead. He struggled a lot until he found Christ and embraced Christianity. He even went to the prison so he could tell the murderer that he forgave him, but the officials wouldn’t let him see the inmate.
Johnnie was a neat guy. He came into McDonald’s one day, not knowing I worked there, and was standing in line. He and I spotted each other on opposite sides of the counter and waved. In church the next week, he told the class of the importance of living your faith outside the church walls. As an example, he pointed out that he ran into me at a time and place he hadn’t expected and it wouldn’t have looked good if he’d been rude to the employees or other customers. The importance of keeping your good name – your reputation – is essential if anyone is going to listen to you.
After all, Johnnie revealed that he’d only had two heroes in his life – Pete Rose and James Brown. “And, in one year, they both became embroiled in scandals.” Pick your heroes wisely. As Flaubert wrote in “Madame Bovary”, “We must not touch our idols; the gilt sticks to our fingers.” These days, you don’t even have to meet your idols to be disappointed in them.
Pete Rose, James Brown and, if he ever had one, Donald Trump lost their good names by not being mindful. The process occurred as a result of one poor decision after another. We can’t allow anyone who has treated his good name – his reputation – so shabbily to get it back just because other ball players cheated on a bigger scale, other musicians have killed women rather than just beating them and other Presidents have been more dismissive of the rule of law.
It’s easy to point out, though, that the Pete Roses, the James Browns and the Donald Trumps have feet of clay. It’s our fault for putting such people on pedestals, as if they are somehow above lesser mortals. We would do better to remember that we have the same feet of clay. Sometimes our internal alarms don’t ring or we don’t understand when they do ring or we just don’t listen to them. That’s what makes it easy for the Roses, the Browns and the Trumps of the world to mislead us with rationalizations. Culture becomes worse when we adopt those rationalizations to excuse poor behavior on our own part.
One of the best quotes I’ve read about integrity is from Rationalization #22, aka There Are Worse Things: “One’s objective is to be the best human being that we can be, not to just avoid being the worst rotter anyone has ever met.”
That there are worse people out there than you is likely true. That doesn’t give you the right to behave unethically. The pandemic, the election chicanery fights, the SCOTUS decisions, the blazing double standards or your rotten day at work doesn’t justify jettisoning respect for others.
Why do we not understand that? Have we lost the concept of how important a commodity a good name is?
Which brings me back to conventions.
I am a fan of a particular character actor with a long resume. Not an A-list movie star, he nonetheless is entertaining performer, an interesting person to listen to and seems to be a genuinely nice person. I’ve met him a few times and have always had a good experience. We’ll call him Joe Darling. I don’t know her personally, but he has a big fan I’ll call Diane. Diane is a member of multiple fan groups for one of the programs for which Joe is best known, she follows him on social media, she has left multiple comments on the posts he makes and, overall, has seemed singularly fixated on him. I wouldn’t call her comments necessarily inappropriate but they represented to me someone who perhaps needed to dial it down a notch.
There were red flags that she should’ve noticed; I certainly did. For example, she mentioned that she’d ordered a Cameo video from him and was bummed that he apparently “let it expire” without responding, commenting that she’d probably asked a question that was too personal. For better or for worse, the internet provides people with the opportunity to be more bold than they would be in person. Some people haven’t learned that there are boundaries when it comes to online interactions that need to be understood and respected. Privately, I felt it was a good thing she hadn’t had the opportunity to meet him in person.
That changed this week. Joe was a scheduled guest at a show that came to her city. She bought her tickets and arranged to finally meet her hero. She expressed anxiety online. She had a gift for him (Not my thing but some fans do that). How would it go? Several of us tried to reassure her kindly. I, however, had, in the words of Han Solo, “a bad feeling about this”. I couldn’t stop her from going and, after all, how does one politely warn someone one doesn’t even know to, “Behave yourself”? Conventions have handlers with the guests to keep the lines moving and to enforce rules so – I thought – she wouldn’t have much time to go too far.
It turns out any advice in how to behave would have been too late. She reported what had happened on a fan group. Her experience was not what she wanted it to be…not because Joe Darling isn’t a nice guy, but she admitted that she’d been making a nuisance of herself.
Unbeknownst to her fellow fans, Diane had apparently made a habit of constantly contacting Joe via his website and sending gifts to him. Suddenly, the expired Cameo order, some of the discouraging comments she’d posted and her anxious feeling before the show made a great deal of sense to me. Obviously, Joe was trying to handle an obsessed fan by not responding to her messages, acknowledging her gifts, ignoring her requests and not replying to her comments on his social media page.
At the show, he signed her autograph and took a nice smiling photo with her, which was very gracious of him under the circumstances, and then told her firmly that her behavior was borderline stalking and that it needed to end or he would take action.
She reported what had happened on a fan page and told us that she accepted blame for being overzealous. That’s a good thing. I felt compassion for both of them: for Joe to be put in a position where he had to enforce boundaries with a fan; for Diane – whose internal alarms weren’t ringing loudly enough for her to recognize that she was making poor choices – to have what should have been a neat moment turn into an embarrassing one. Behaving herself in person wouldn’t have changed a thing because she’d already developed a negative reputation that preceded her.
That there have been obsessed fans who have physically attacked and even killed their idols doesn’t make Diane’s actions acceptable. That Joe Biden has been an extraordinarily unethical President doesn’t make Trump a better choice. That Rudy Giuliani has expended all the good will given to him after 9/11 by leaps and bounds doesn’t mean it’s right to record a sexual encounter with him to bring him down. That the pandemic closed theaters that are now running with minimal staff does not make it alright to disturb other patrons now that moviegoers are used to an “anything goes” attitude while watching films at home.
I doubt Trump has learned anything from his experiences. Even if he has, at this late date, he has forfeited any trust he once held and doesn’t deserve to be President. There are consequences when you lose your good name, after all. Pete Rose won’t get into the Hall of Fame even if he’s learned his lesson (which he hasn’t). I hope Diane has learned from her experience, though she will probably have to admire Joe from afar and offline from now on.
Proverbs 22:1 tells us that “A good name is more desirable than great riches; to be esteemed is better than silver or gold.”
Whether we are acting as citizens or employees or simply fans, our reputations can open or close doors. There may have been a point at which Diane or Donald Trump could have stopped, reassessed what they were doing and thought better of it in time to avoid the consequences. We’ll never know because they didn’t.
Thanks for posting that. A lengthy story but definitely germane to the subject.
Like, I think, many Americans I really dread the prospect of a Trump v Biden election once again. People on both sides could justify their choice in 2020 for a variety of reasons. But now we pretty much know what we’d be getting from either man.
What a miserable choice this is shaping up to be.
Diego Garcia wrote, “What a miserable choice this is shaping up to be.”
BINGO!
“If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun.”
I think there’s something being overlooked here. Both the Left and the Right are bringing largely the same weapons of manipulation to bear. “Fight as hard as possible and hope we win” is going to tear the country apart further. We can do better than that.
The entire conflict is powered by fear. Almost nobody wants a fight, but everyone thinks they have no choice because they think the other side wants a fight. Tim Urban’s book What’s Our Problem? does a great job of explaining how we got here and what’s happening in people’s heads. I’m here to help humanity build its way out of the situation.
It’s easy to dissolve the fear when people start thinking about what they and others actually want instead of what they’re told they and others want. Manipulation tactics lose their strength when people know they can find win-win outcomes. People will disregard the zero-sum way their party and media frame situations. They won’t try to support the manipulation, because they won’t be afraid of what happens if they don’t. Instead, they will set and enforce ethical standards to prevent their political and intellectual leaders from damaging the trust that makes society possible.
The idea that disagreements cannot be resolved peacefully is the naive assumption of those whose only experience with conflict resolution is waiting for someone to realize they are wrong and surrender (even if that someone is themselves). Just because the idea that humans will always fight is more pessimistic than the idea that they will see the enlightened self-interest of collaboration after their fears are addressed, that doesn’t make eternal war any less of a simplistic assertion than the idea that humans are all selfless and honorable.
People support their politicians and their media in dishonesty because they think that honesty will result in unacceptable costs and risks. I will show people that ethical attributes like honor and compassion do not require surrendering what they value. On the contrary, ethics helps protect the world people want to live in, because it creates the conditions under which enemies can become allies.
Most self-help books are about helping people become great by overcoming their own fear. That’s nice and all, but it doesn’t scale. Effective leaders (including thought leaders) help other people overcome their fears, and that doesn’t happen by simply telling them they are not courageous enough. They need to see that being constructive gets them better results than the tradeoffs that stave off the object of their fear.
If you want to dissolve conflict by overcoming fear, say so here. Visionary Vocabularies is launching this year and the more people learn how it’s done, the faster it will work.
EC wrote, “The entire conflict is powered by fear. Almost nobody wants a fight, but everyone thinks they have no choice because they think the other side wants a fight.”
The left doesn’t want a fight, they want the public to completely capitulate to their will allowing them to break the political pendulum off it’s attachment point and throw it over the edge into complete totalitarianism.
Physics have shown us that to stop an oncoming force one must apply an equal and opposite force, the same is relatively true in human nature and politics. Extremism perpetuates extremism and human nature devolves from there.
You don’t stop a totalitarian political train bearing down on the freedom loving public with niceties.
Even assuming spherical humans of uniform density, what you’re saying misapplies the physics metaphor, not unlike talking about the frequency of a person’s quantum vibration energy rather than using the words for different emotions and mental states. Maybe you’re not very persuasive because you think of human nature as vectors rather than something less simplistic, like collections of optimization loops?
In physics, every interaction involves equal and opposite forces. That doesn’t mean that you as an agent have to apply a symmetrical force to change what something else is doing. Physics has concepts called simple machines, which can apply force to affect the velocity of objects without you personally having to exert force that matches the forces of those objects.
The metaphor doesn’t even work in a military context. If you tell a military tactician that an army can only be stopped with an army of equal or greater size using the same weapons, they’ll laugh at you.
As a matter of fact, simple machine imagery already shows up in social situations: leverage, inclination, wedge issues, applying spin, adding pressure with screws, and… probably pulleys. Try using some of those.
I’m not recommending we be “nice” and nothing else. I’m recommending assertiveness, firmness, incisiveness, and shrewdness to go with it. The “niceness,” the addressing of people’s fears, is just to create the conditions under which people stop doing stupid things. If they’re not able to come up with win-win outcomes, we can do it for them.
Translated for people who mainly understand politics in terms of violence: People fight because they are motivated by fear. If you can find that fear and destroy it, they lose their motivation and are powerless to fight.
That was quite an extrapolation to absurdity. EC meet edge.
Seriously EC, it’s fine that you don’t like my metaphor, I really don’t mind.
Quick question; was that you reaching into the bottom tray of your tool box and pulling out your rhetorical soft blow hammer? Try upgrading to a sledge, I can take it. 😉
“Quick question; was that you reaching into the bottom tray of your tool box and pulling out your rhetorical soft blow hammer? Try upgrading to a sledge, I can take it.”
It was, actually. I decided to try it out. I am disappointed but unsurprised that you don’t appear to have responded to my point about how to be ethical, honest, and “nice” while firmly asserting your own concerns in a situation.
That your preferred rhetorical tactic doesn’t even work on you should tell you something. I doubt you’re telling people they’re being stupid because you think it will make them realize something. I suspect you know that they, like you, will simply fire back some remark they think is clever and insightful, and the cycle repeats. I suspect you tell people they’re being stupid because it feels good to express your contempt and frustration for the feeble-minded. Believe me, I know it how good it feels. And you’re not unjustified in doing so.
The question my father taught me to ask myself is, “Would you rather be justified, or would you rather be effective?” The two aren’t necessarily mutually exclusive; you can express your frustration without showing disrespect for someone.
I don’t particularly mind if you choose not to be effective. It is a bit jarring to see people expressing repetitively unconstructive thoughts on an ethics blog, but I can just tune you out and respond to people who have nuanced ideas on a topic. However, your rhetoric does create a hostile environment for people who might otherwise be open to learning why you and other conservatives hold the opinions you do.
If we’re looking to accomplish anything here, we need to start paying attention to how we interact with each other at the very least, and being mindful of how much contempt we express for the people described in the posts as well.
Do you remember Maraxus?
http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=161693&sid=bf1e964b2d36e629e063999b4953f65a
EC wrote, “I am disappointed but unsurprised that you don’t appear to have responded to my point about how to be ethical, honest, and “nice” while firmly asserting your own concerns in a situation.”
It’s not like I respond to every point in comments that I reply to, I pick and choose. I really don’t understand why you’re disappointed, you know good and well that I think you’re an intelligent guy and you’re welcome to your opinion just like me. It’s fine that we disagree.
One little point, “I doubt you’re telling people they’re being stupid…”
I actually don’t actually use the word “stupid” very often outside the following context…
“I actually don’t actually use the word “stupid” very often outside the following context…”
That’s fair; I was trying to think of a specific example of how you have used the rhetorical hammer, but I certainly may have misremembered. I apologize for that.
If you’re here to mock people who disagree with you rather than to figure out how to lead them to change their minds, then unfortunately your comments probably won’t have much insight I can learn from. I know from experience that there are many people of progressive opinions who don’t share your attitude.
Please note that if you try to discourage me from my own efforts to promote reconciliation by telling me why you think, based on your experiences with people, that it must not be working, I’ll start openly speculating about your motives for doing so. “People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.” —Puck magazine, 1902, apparently: (https://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/01/26/doing/)
EC wrote, ” I was trying to think of a specific example of how you have used the rhetorical hammer, but I certainly may have misremembered. I apologize for that.”
Not a problem, I just thought you should know. It’s not like I’ve never ever used the word.
I’m absolutely sure there are plenty of examples around EA and other blog sites where my rhetorical hammer is plainly evident. One place where you’ll find it is when I’m confronted with what I think is obvious trolling as in posting inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community with the deliberate intent of provoking readers into an emotional response or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion to draw attention to themself and for their own amusement. I have limited tolerance for trolls, if I think someone is actively trolling me or others I’ll whip out that rhetorical hammer in a heartbeat.
EC wrote, “Please note that if you try to discourage me from my own efforts to promote reconciliation by telling me why you think, based on your experiences with people, that it must not be working, I’ll start openly speculating about your motives for doing so.”
I’m actually confused by this statement from you, it seems to be outside of your usual pattern of commentary, allow me to explain.
Isn’t me explaining why I think the way I do based on my experiences with people exactly how good faith debating should work, and aren’t opinions presented that way worth consideration instead of speculating about motives? Isn’t that exactly how you prefer to debate? I’ve given your approach consideration and I’ve openly stated where I think it works best and where I think it falls short and that’s based on real world experience; I don’t consider that to be discouragement, I consider that to be additional knowledge that can be used to help situational awareness. Explaining why one thinks the way they do, based on personal experience, is vastly different than just stating that it can’t be done without any explanation. The quote you presented, “People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it”, doesn’t seem to apply in this case.
Read my AUGUST 6, 2023 AT 8:51 AM comment below and see how what I wrote applies to this statement from you, “Please note that if you try to discourage me from my own efforts to promote reconciliation by telling me why you think, based on your experiences with people, that it must not be working, I’ll start openly speculating about your motives for doing so.”. Did you do that on purpose?
I’m an open book EC, I consider myself to be a reasonable man of integrity, I’m honest, I say what I mean, I mean what I say, I acknowledge when I think I’m wrong, there’s no false facade hiding motives.
Speculating about my motives, really EC?
“I have limited tolerance for trolls, if I think someone is actively trolling me or others I’ll whip out that rhetorical hammer in a heartbeat.”
I find it’s more interesting and effective to trip them up by finding things they believe that I can agree with and tracing those to where we disagree. Most people stop trolling me and work with me to find where the differences come from and how we can reconcile them. Those who don’t tend to be so blurry-minded that I’m surprised they can use the Internet.
“…I don’t consider that to be discouragement, I consider that to be additional knowledge that can be used to help situational awareness.”
Ah, thanks. That clears things up a bit. Sorry, I misunderstood your intent. Where I come from people don’t say, “That won’t work because X.” To signal they are offering constructive input, they say, “If you want to do it that way, you’ll have to have a plan for dealing with X problem.” I can mentally translate that in the future.
More importantly, though, in order for me to learn from what you share, I’ll need more details than, “You don’t stop a totalitarian political train bearing down on the freedom loving public with niceties.” Who were you talking with, what were you talking about, what did you say, and how did they respond? Otherwise for all we both know I’ve already overcome the particular pitfall you’re remembering.
Please note that the ability to defeat fear isn’t going to work on 100% of people, and may not work right away. It will work on the people who are interested in getting things done, and when they start getting accomplishing constructive goals then more people will see a viable alternative to the politicians they permit to deceive and use them. If you don’t look for those constructive people you’re not going to get their help.
EC wrote, “I find it’s more interesting and effective to trip them up by finding things they believe that I can agree with and tracing those to where we disagree. Most people stop trolling me and work with me to find where the differences come from and how we can reconcile them.”
The following is a rhetorical question and I really don’t expect or even want an answer here that would extend this thread any further, it’s food for thought.
Something came up in just the last couple of days and I’m curious how you would reconcile differences in open discussion on social media with N.c. Bill Gillette ?
EC wrote, “The entire conflict is powered by fear.”
Speaking of fear…
Fear Is A Hammer & We’re Nails
People can rationalize this all they want but here’s the fact…
“IF YOU GO AFTER ME, I’M COMING AFTER YOU” is an in-your-face bold promise that everyone fully expects you to follow through with. It’s a conditional threat of retaliatory action, period. It’s the rhetorical equivalent of placing signs placed on your property that says “Protected By Smith & Wesson”.
These are messages that everyone should heed unless you’re a damn fool.
And this is what we need.
I’m not so sure “need” is the word to use.
One side corrupted federal law enforcement to give the illusion of credibility to a stolen election hoax.
That side was not Trump.
Do you remember Maraxus?
Because I will never forget Maraxus. He write in defense of prosecuting Rick Perry.
http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=161693&sid=bf1e964b2d36e629e063999b4953f65a
Back in 2014, this was an extremely fringe belief. There was no way Maraxus’s ideals could become mainstream.
Now it is clear that the Democratic Party adopted Maraxus’s ideals.
The Democratic Party is the party of Maraxus, now.
As such, under these new rules, there is nothing wrong with what Trump posted.
We play by the rules as they are, not how we wish them to be.
Those like Maraxus must be stopped at any and all costs!
*appears in a puff of smoke*
All costs, you say? *steeples finger-like appendages*
Would you be willing to pay… the future of your country?
…Oh, not to me. That’s just what happens if you teach your opponents that their unethical ploys really are the true path to victory, by abandoning ethics yourself.
Ethics isn’t the end goal of a healthy society. Ethics is the means to it.
I have serious doubts about this Republican Party’s ability to run this nation. Republicans have failed to govern effectively even when they had all 3 branches. I believe they have lost the ability to govern and what we really need is a 3rd party — a Constitutional Party.
A government with the ideals of Maraxus will end the future of our country.