Trump

[Darkflame]

America politicians have been using coded fear of muslims for political gain for a while. Trumps just figured he can be more blatant and still get away with it.

The depressing thing is not that raciest politicians like that exist - not even that trump exists - its that they barely ever get called out by it. The birther movement was staggering due to the mostly silence by every other republican. They all either believed it, or more likely, were all terrified to lose the raciest vote.

Now a similar thing happens with other things - Trump says nutty stuff and most of them dont act like its reasonable because they still want those voters (ignoring the voters they lose because of it)
Cameras in places of worship! Banning a religion from entering the country! yay! all good stuff and quite obviously constitutional because its not my religion!

[pogo]

It is depressing. From time to time someone in the Republican party tries to moderate the party’s approach. On immigration in particular this means supporting immigration reform, to address the millions of people living in the US illegally but who have made it their home. Often their support is conditional on e.g. greater border enforcement but it is support.

But this all ends come election, so every two to four years, when anyone seen as soft on immigration is punished by the extremists in the party. Even Marco Rubio who is very conservative is being questioned for his previous more moderate stand, even though his moderate track record makes him the better candidate for the November election.

Trump won in Nevada last night, and with his highest share of the vote yet, almost 46%. There may be local reasons for that – he is a significant local employer with his casinos. But it means his main rivals are no closer to seriously challenging him, getting 24% and 21% of the vote. If only one or other of them would admit defeat and leave the field open to the other. But they need to do it soon. If Trump keeps winning even with less than 50% of the vote he gets most to all of the delegates, and he could within weeks have so many that he will be unstoppable.

[noodles]

When protesting employees from his own Hotel in Las Vegas are picketing over low wages, no health insurance and no union allowed in front of the entrance, what does he do ? He doesn't pretend not to see them and rush to get into his limo or goes to talk to them, he waves at them smiling like they are a crowd of fans waiting to adulate him before getting into the car. He is a supercunt.

[Little stoned kiwi]

He is a supercunt.

I believe he gets off on it. Which is part of his 'charm' to supporters.
IMHO there is usually a portion of voters who focus on people instead of issues. When Don says things that rark up their political opposition, they consider it to be correct and proper simply because it got the opposition worked up (anything they don't like must be good). That's where Donny's support is coming from and why being an agitating prick is working for him.

[pogo]

Trump is largely benefitting from the dysfunctional nature of the Republican party.

US politics works through consensus. With voters regularly putting different parties in Congress and the Whitehouse the only way anything gets done is if they can agree at least some of the time, through compromise of various sorts. Otherwise there is gridlock.

But for decades Republicans have sought to avoid compromise. Instead they have increasingly taken stands which allow no compromise, on all sorts of issues, reaching new heights of this under Obama when they regained control of Congress. So nothing gets done. This is partly ideological as they have moved more and more right, and partly tactical as they seek to deny Obama any successes.

The upshot though is that they are discrediting all Washington politicians with their antics. Republican voters have been told the problem is the Washington establishment and they believe it, and are turning to outsiders with no link to Washington, outsiders with no political record. Ben Carson was an early beneficiary until they got a good look at him, but Trump’s support has held up, despite his many flaws.

The only way to stop him now is for Cruz to drop out. Cruz has no way to win now – his support is supposed to be strongest in the South but he was well beaten in Nevada. Then perhaps Rubio can test the theory that Trump’s support is capped. But it has to happen soon. In three weeks there are a bunch of primaries which could hand Trump enough delegates he becomes unstoppable.

[Dio]

There's an argument Trump might be the least damaging of the three. He's likely to run into the same kind of issues Schwarzenegger and Ventura did, where they came in as outsiders, picked a fight with everyone, and walked away having achieved nothing much.

[merman]

It is depressing. From time to time someone in the Republican party tries to moderate the party’s approach. On immigration in particular this means supporting immigration reform, to address the millions of people living in the US illegally but who have made it their home. Often their support is conditional on e.g. greater border enforcement but it is support.

But this all ends come election, so every two to four years, when anyone seen as soft on immigration is punished by the extremists in the party. Even Marco Rubio who is very conservative is being questioned for his previous more moderate stand, even though his moderate track record makes him the better candidate for the November election.

Trump won in Nevada last night, and with his highest share of the vote yet, almost 46%. There may be local reasons for that – he is a significant local employer with his casinos. But it means his main rivals are no closer to seriously challenging him, getting 24% and 21% of the vote. If only one or other of them would admit defeat and leave the field open to the other. But they need to do it soon. If Trump keeps winning even with less than 50% of the vote he gets most to all of the delegates, and he could within weeks have so many that he will be unstoppable.

The BBC put in perspective (especially Trump's grandiose claims that the Hispanics are flocking to his campaign).

He got roughly 30,000 votes, less than 1% of the state's population.

The other thing to remember is that just because he claimed victory today in Nevada does not mean all of Nevada's delegates will vote his way at the convention...

[Deckard]

Hasn't he got a court appearance fairly shortly ? Should be interesting.

[pogo]

Another debate last night and Trump’s worst. Rubio especially got in some good attacks on him, and looked much better for it. Problem is it might be too little too late. Rubio really needed to do this a couple of debates ago. Time is running out to stop Trump amassing enough delegates that he is unstoppable. Rubio’s only real hope is if the three other candidates drop out to make it a one-on-one contest with Trump, and soon. But they have shown no sign of doing so even though their positions are all pretty hopeless.

[PFVA]

According to BBC front page Chris Christie just endorsed Trump.

[pogo]

Donald Trump: We're going to 'open up' libel laws

This one had me laughing. Not only is it likely impossible without a constitutional amendment, as the 1st Amendment guarantees everyone including newspapers the freedom to say what they want within limits, but if anyone should be slapped down and sued for libellous, slanderous statements it’s Trump himself. He more than anyone in the media today has benefitted from the 1st Amendment’s guarantees to freedom of speech and expression.

His Republican opponents have finally caught up with how to deal with him, by calling him on his nonsensical and content-free arguments. Problem is it is probably too late for Rubio etc., especially while Cruz, Kasich and Carson seem in no hurry to step aside and let him tackle Trump on his own.

But the Democrats are surely watching and learning. If Trump is the candidate they will have a wealth of content for adverts, and training videos for Clinton in the debates. Trump is going to have an especially hard time debating a woman. He came off worse in the encounters with Megan Kelly and when briefly put one-on-one with Carly Fiorina in one of the first debates.

[pogo]

[tufty]

He came off worse in the encounters with Megan Kelly and when briefly put one-on-one with Carly Fiorina in one of the first debates.

Carly Fiorina? I'd missed that she was running.

The woman who broke sanctions to Iran. Who laid off 30,000 US employees over 5 years of mismanagement of HP. Who added 3 billion dollars to HP's stock value simply by being fired. How the holy fuck did she think she had a chance?

raciest politicians

Racist politician

Spoiler: show

Raciest politician

Spoiler: show

[gumboot]

He came off worse in the encounters with Megan Kelly and when briefly put one-on-one with Carly Fiorina in one of the first debates.

Carly Fiorina? I'd missed that she was running.

You couldn't have missed her a few debates ago. She was talking over everyone like some kind of anti-Carson.

The woman who broke sanctions to Iran. Who laid off 30,000 US employees over 5 years of mismanagement of HP. Who added 3 billion dollars to HP's stock value simply by being fired. How the holy fuck did she think she had a chance?

Because it seemed to work for Trump?

[pogo]

Fiorina was one of the surprises of the early debates. I think that clip must be from the second debate as in the first she was on the “undercard”, the debate for all the candidates who did not have enough support for the main debate. But she did so well in the undercard debate that she moved up to the main debate next time.

She was like Carson and Trump an outsider, so with no political record, and that seems to be what a lot of Republican voters want. But yes she has an appalling business record, and once she was in the limelight and people started looking at it they went off her (the few that supported her – you only needed a few % support then to get in the main debate) and the outsider vote switched to Trump.