All purpose news and politics thread part VI: This Is Not The Time For Posing

[Tami]

Trump's father kept him out of Vietnam (probably knew he wouldn't have lasted one day there), bought him that degree from the Wharton School (where one of his teachers said he was stupid) and gave him that fat chunk of money to get him started in business instead of making him earn his own way. So, it's no wonder Trump believes the world revolves around him and that consequences are for everyone else, not him.

Makes me wonder, a question I'd put to Mary Trump if I could, what would have happened to Donald if his father kicked him out after High School. Mother bird-baby bird-nest analogy. No money, no Wharton ..... I guess he might have been possibly drafted since his dad wouldn't have gotten him out.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Makes me wonder, a question I'd put to Mary Trump if I could, what would have happened to Donald if his father kicked him out after High School. Mother bird-baby bird-nest analogy. No money, no Wharton ..... I guess he might have been possibly drafted since his dad wouldn't have gotten him out.

If he didn't die in 'Nam, then he'd be in a trailer park telling everyone how he could have been someone.

[Kuro no Shinigami]

Trump's been pampered and protected from consequences all his life. How could he not be an idiot?

Donald's siblings also grew up living with the same parents in the same house. Look how they turned out when they reached adulthood. His one brother was a loser and an alcoholic who couldn't handle the family pressures so that he drank and drank to death. His other brother is a spineless worm that never amounted to anything. Donald's sisters, especially Maryanne handled the family dysfunction better than the brothers including Donald.

According to Wikipedia, Maryanne received (or earned) more degrees than Donald. She graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree from Mount Holyoke College in 1958 and a Master of Arts in public law and government from Columbia University in 1962. She later attended law school, earning her Juris Doctor from Hofstra University School of Law in 1974.

Both a master's degree and a juris doctor are more advanced than a bachelor's degree which is all Donald has got, if not earned.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_honors

For those who do not know what cum laude means, it it is Latin for "with praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 20%, top 25%, or top 30% of their class, depending on the institution.

cum laude, meaning "with praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 20%, top 25%, or top 30% of their class, depending on the institution.
magna cum laude, meaning "with great praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 10% or top 15% of their class, depending on the institution.
summa cum laude, meaning "with highest praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 1%, top 2%, or top 5% of their class, depending on the institution. Some institutions do not award the summa cum laude distinction or only award it in rare circumstances.

That means Maryanne was in the top 20 to top 30 in her class.

[The Cool Thatguy]

Donald's siblings also grew up living with the same parents in the same house. Look how they turned out when they reached adulthood. His one brother was a loser and an alcoholic who couldn't handle the family pressures so that he drank and drank to death. His other brother is a spineless worm that never amounted to anything. Donald's sisters, especially Maryanne handled the family dysfunction better than the brothers including Donald.

According to Wikipedia, Maryanne received (or earned) more degrees than Donald. She graduated cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts degree from Mount Holyoke College in 1958 and a Master of Arts in public law and government from Columbia University in 1962. She later attended law school, earning her Juris Doctor from Hofstra University School of Law in 1974.

Both a master's degree and a juris doctor are more advanced than a bachelor's degree which is all Donald has got, if not earned.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_honors

For those who do not know what cum laude means, it it is Latin for "with praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 20%, top 25%, or top 30% of their class, depending on the institution.

cum laude, meaning "with praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 20%, top 25%, or top 30% of their class, depending on the institution.
magna cum laude, meaning "with great praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 10% or top 15% of their class, depending on the institution.
summa cum laude, meaning "with highest praise". This honor is typically awarded to graduates in the top 1%, top 2%, or top 5% of their class, depending on the institution. Some institutions do not award the summa cum laude distinction or only award it in rare circumstances.

That means Maryanne was in the top 20 to top 30 in her class.

Same house, different treatment from all accounts. Fred Senior tried to make Donny his legacy after Junior drank himself to death.

And given Mary's quick resignation from her position, ending the ethics violation into the tax fraud her family committed, I have trouble beleiving that her hands are clean

[worstblogever]

Republican State Senator from Alabama goes on record saying he hopes MORE people get Covid-19.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/alabam...e-get-covid-19

To the queue with thee...

[Kuro no Shinigami]

Trump's father kept him out of Vietnam (probably knew he wouldn't have lasted one day there), bought him that degree from the Wharton School (where one of his teachers said he was stupid) and gave him that fat chunk of money to get him started in business instead of making him earn his own way. So, it's no wonder Trump believes the world revolves around him and that consequences are for everyone else, not him.

Would Trump still be a stupid sociopath and a uncaring narcissist if his father was Professor John G. Trump? Maybe he was born stupid. Or Maybe he was raised to be an idiot but Fred Trump did make Donald the man he is today.

[Mister Mets]

Cool story Sis. Like they stopped supporting him during impeachment, or when he screwed the COVID response or when he turned a blind eye to bounty on American soldiers. Yeah the GOP sure shown their backbone.

We'll have an answer one way or another within four months about how Trump will respond to the results of the election.

Are you willing to be on the record saying that if President Trump loses reelection, he will both go scorched Earth and Republicans in the congress and courts will help him?

Since "scorched Earth" is an imprecise term, we should also make sure there's a common understanding. It would have to be well beyond what the Gore campaign did in 2000, right?

Examples of "scorched Earth" would be a scenario mentioned earlier in this thread of Trump trying to get Republican legislatures in swing states to reject vote totals where Biden has a clear (above half a percentage point) lead.

I can see Mets' scenario happening if Trump loses big time. Many Republicans keep their lips pressed to his ass because they're afraid of the Republican base. The far right took over the party and they follow Trump like a messiah figure. But if the cracks start to show and he gets trounced in the election, I can imagine a number of Republicans jumping ship if it means saving their skins/political careers. After Bush left office in 2008, he was absolutely toxic. They didn't even want him to appear in person at the RNC. Trump will never be as unpopular as Bush was within his own party as he will always have a large contingent of white nationalists and conspiracy theorist on his side.

I think it will really depend on what Fox News decides to do after he leaves office. They're all in with him right now, but if he's no longer profitable they may change the narrative.

Some of us might also might be talking past one another in a few ways, so I'm curious about that.

We could very well have different definitions of scorched Earth.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2016, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” posted a profile of Robert Hurt, who served three terms in office after riding the 2010 Tea Party Wave to Congress to represent Virginia’s 5th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. Hurt fit the mold of a lot of Republicans, believing that life begins at conception (he voted consistently for anti-choice legislation, including both GOP efforts to defund Planned Parenthood), while still being "pro-life" enough to want to put criminals to death. He was counter-productive enough to our country functioning to see him vote against raising the debt ceiling, and to vote not just for the 2013 Government Shutdown, but when the time came to reopen the government, he voted to keep it closed. On immigration, he was far enough to the right to back Arizona's SB1070 law that allowed for racial profiling of "suspected illegal immigrants", and wanted marriage defined as being between one man and one woman. Perhaps his most disturbing policy stance, though, was on climate change, where Hurt expressed his belief that there was a "Climategate", and that climatologists are purposely selling the populace a false bill of goods on their studies. Of course, lying about the other side of a debate's true intent in the worst ways truly became Robert Hurt's calling card after President Obama spoke following the mass shooting in San Bernadino, California, calling for Americans to treat Muslims with respect, because two members of their faith should not be representative of our opinions of an entire religion (similar to remarks President Bush made in the wake of 9/11). Rep. Hurt, however, got on conservative talk radio to gripe about it, misrepresenting those remarks to claim that President Obama "is more concerned with the premise that America is 'racist' than fighting terrorism". He retired after three terms in office.

On this date in 2017, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled Vicki Dooling, a one-term Nevada Assemblywoman who found her way into office in the 2014 elections that were very kind to the GOP, winning an upset in a district that normally leans Democratic, near Las Vegas, making a campaign promise to “help repeal the ACA”, which showed a fundamental lack of understanding of basic civics in our country because state legislators can’t overturn a federal law. Where Vicki Dooling stood out in particular to us was her sudden interest in the issue of public bathroom usage by transgendered citizens, which led her in March of 2015 to sponsor AB 375, an attempt on limiting citizens to using the bathrooms of the “biological condition of being male or female as determined at birth based on physical differences or, if necessary, at the chromosomal level.” Dooling didn’t campaign on that, heck, she didn’t even WRITE that bill, she submitted it on behalf of an out-of-state lobbyist, one Karen England of California, who has her own long, long history of dedicated attempts at curtailing LGBTQ rights. Now, this might come as shocking, but the city of Las Vegas itself isn’t exactly the place to start picking a fight with LGBT citizens, and Dooling might have realized she bet on a losing horse, since she wouldn’t be interviewed by most media outlets about AB 375 after she dropped it on the floor of the Nevada Assembly like the putrid turd of a bill that it was. She did, however, try to rally her cause in a space friendlier to her, with reporters from the Christian Examiner, saying, "Parents are coming to me, very concerned about the safety of all students, safety from the bullying that goes on no matter how we try to stop it, safety from all issues. Every kid needs that safety. We want all kids to have the same rights." Look, the fact that Dooling not only submitted this bill, but then tried defending it because parents are concerned about “bullying”… who do you THINK is typically bullied, Vicki, if not the transgendered kids? For f***’s sake… The bill failed to advance in the Nevada Assembly on April 21st, 2015, even after Karen England herself showed up from out of state to argue in favor of it on Dooling’s behalf. Well, that and Dooling’s attempt to read into the record a letter from an “unnamed physician” who may or may not have been a doctor, and may or may not have had the same handwriting as Vicki Dooling. We’ll see if she changes her mind and makes another run for office at some point in the future, but for now, Nevada seems like they’ll be better off without her representing District 41.

[Kuro no Shinigami]

Same house, different treatment from all accounts. Fred Senior tried to make Donny his legacy after Junior drank himself to death.

Yeah, Fred Jr. could have inherited his daddy's business but instead he became an airline pilot for Trans World Airlines.

[worstblogever]

It was on this date in 2015, 2018, as well as in 2019, that “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profiled former Massachusetts Governor, 2012 presidential candidate, and now, the junior U.S. Senator from Utah, Mitt Romney. Romney’s endless wave of “clueless rich guy” gaffes in the 2012 campaign just kept coming at a rapid fire pace only equaled perhaps by his staggering ability to act like fact-checkers weren’t paying attention, and take being mendacious while running for national office to a whole new level (at least, until he got upped by the 2016 GOP standard bearer). Whether it was his comments about “the 47 percent”, that “Corporations are people, my friend”, the revelation that he and his wife took a $77,000 tax-write off on a prancing show horse named “Rafalca”, talking about going on a road trip with his dog strapped to the roof of a car in a carrier, admitting he was “not concerned about the very poor”, that Michigan’s “trees being just the right height”, feuding with British politicians about their preparations for the London Olympics, or arguing with the CEO of Jeep-Chrysler about whether or not he was closing one of his company’s own Ohio factories… Mitt was especially full of it. Trying to lie about President Obama’s remarks following the attacks in Benghazi as “an act of terror” in a debate, of course, led to the legendary, “Please proceed…” moment, to let Mitt lose the last gasp of momentum he was trying to snag going into the election. And of course, there was the legendary election night where Mitt and his family stood dumbfounded as the election results came in and they lost, because they actually had staffers “unskewing” the polls, internally, and was forced to throw together a concession speech, because he hadn’t prepared one.

Mitt Romney supposedly had retired from politics but tipped his hand that he was coming back into the fray upon the announcement that Sen. Orrin Hatch was finally going to retire when his “location” on Twitter changed back to Utah (classic carpetbagging move) in January of 2018, one of the several places around the country where Romney has a home. Six weeks later, Romney made it official and announced he was in the race. Now, we’ll note that publicly, Mitt Romney has been a vocal critic of Donald Trump as a member of the GOP, going all the way back to March of 2016. He’s not shy about saying he’s going to serve as a check on Trump’s power, and fill a much needed void in the leadership of the Republican Party standing up to Trump.

Uh huh. Mitt already tried pretending during the primary for Senate that he was more of a hawk than Donald Trump on immigration. Unless Mitt believes in not just locking asylum-seeking kids in cages, but poking them with sharp sticks through the bars, that seems like another Mitt campaign lie. And for “standing up” to Trump, Romney’s already predicted a Trump win in 2020.

We’ve already covered, at length, Mitt Romney’s willingness to tell lies. He’s going to verbally say things like that, and when the time comes to vote for Supreme Court justices who might overturn Roe v. Wade, or votes to try and make tax breaks for the richest Americans permanent, he’s still going to vote for them, no questions asked. If you think the guy who made Romneycare in Massachusetts a thing will help save the Affordable Care Act nationally, don’t be so sure, after Mitt spent the 2012 campaign pretending it didn’t exist. And, every time Romney comes in and tries to lecture Donald Trump on his immorality, YET he comes off more like Ned Flanders trying to give the business to Homer Simpson. Rather than win over Republican voters and make them wake up to Trump’s cruelty, he somehow makes them only love the bastard even more. Can Mitt stand up to a bully that he publicly got humiliated by for applying for being a member of his cabinet only to be shunned? We saw the awkward dinner photos, Mitt, you don’t exactly look like you’re making Trump squirm there, quite the opposite. At best, we expected him to talk about how disappointed he is when Trump uses foul language like “s***hole countries” and that’s something Mitt can’t take as a Mormon, no sir.

And lo, so it was that our predictions have come true. Days before being sworn in as a U.S. Senator, Mitt Romney got headlines for writing a supposedly “blistering” op-ed where he talked about how Donald Trump’s “character falls short”. OOOOH, sick burn. But we here at CSGOPOTD pay attention to voting records, and lo and behold Romney has approved every Trump appointment, from every unqualified judge, to even picking toady William Barr to be the Attorney General. We’re very concerned, however, how Romney called Democrats’ attempts at getting Trump’s tax returns to show the criminal behavior described by his lawyer Michael Cohen as “moronic”, but then again, we already knew how touchy Mitt was about the precedent his father set for releasing your full tax returns to confirm no criminal behavior.


And he is still the oddest, creepiest rich guy. Like the bizarre spectacle of seeing him celebrate his birthday by blowing out the whitest-cakelike food… Twinkies… one candle at a time. Or how about how he timed giving his wife Anne a mother’s day gift themed for Game of Thrones that compared her to Danaerys Targaryen… on the day the character committed genocide on the show.

Mitt Romney will not be up for re-election until 2024. He was the only Republican Senator to vote for the impeachment of Donald Trump, which indicates that he might be trying to position himself to become “the voice of reason” to lead the GOP out of its current disgusting incarnation as the party of Trump. This is based on the presumption that there’s anything worth redeeming left.

[Kirby101]

We'll have an answer one way or another within four months about how Trump will respond to the results of the election.

Are you willing to be on the record saying that if President Trump loses reelection, he will both go scorched Earth and Republicans in the congress and courts will help him?

Since "scorched Earth" is an imprecise term, we should also make sure there's a common understanding. It would have to be well beyond what the Gore campaign did in 2000, right?

Examples of "scorched Earth" would be a scenario mentioned earlier in this thread of Trump trying to get Republican legislatures in swing states to reject vote totals where Biden has a clear (above half a percentage point) lead.

Some of us might also might be talking past one another in a few ways, so I'm curious about that.

We could very well have different definitions of scorched Earth.

I have no idea what will happen next week, let alone in November. I'm just saying I have not seen the GOP in the Senate or House stand up to Trump on anything. You would think bounties on American soldiers and giving CIA intelligence to Putin might move them. But nothing so far. I will tell you this. If after the election a SCOTUS Justice leaves or dies, McConnell will push through a replacement before Jan 21st.

As for Trump, he'll do whatever Putin tells him to.

[Tami]

Twitter Link

[Tami]

Link

[Iron Maiden]

I have no idea what will happen next week, let alone in November. I'm just saying I have not seen the GOP in the Senate or House stand up to Trump on anything. You would think bounties on American soldiers and giving CIA intelligence to Putin might move them. But nothing so far. I will tell you this. If after the election a SCOTUS Justice leaves or dies, McConnell will push through a replacement before Jan 21st.

As for Trump, he'll do whatever Putin tells him to.

and apparently millions of GOP voters, especially Trump's intellectually challenged base, is OK with this too.

[PaulBullion]

Republican State Senator from Alabama goes on record saying he hopes MORE people get Covid-19.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/alabam...e-get-covid-19

To the queue with thee...

Pretty rich coming from a state that is way too poor to handle this.