Trump

[Phoebe]

I am not sure what to think. I can understand that the GOP might want him to drop out, but they had their chance to fix their problems and blew it for years. Trying to put myself in his shoes, I'm not sure whether it would be a greater injury to his narcissism to be defeated by Biden or to find some excuse to take his ball and go home and start a right wing political media network. Depending on how much you think he is actually influenced by nefarious agents, there's also the question of whether his influencers think they can manage to pull off a victory by hook or by crook, or whether the tide has turned and any funny business around the election will cause significant mass uprising in favor of Biden. If they think engineering a win for Trump is no longer possible, maybe they think they could do better with Pence or someone else. Who knows. I honestly couldn't say whether Trump calls his own shots in life at this point, or is beholden to whoever has him over a barrel. I know they're having a terrible time finding ways to attack Biden and they have absolutely no positive platform whatsoever, so how are they going to make it happen?

[Tahlvin]

Read Mary Trump's book. That is one messed up family, thanks to Fred Trump Sr.

[bralbovsky]

While the strategically best thing for him and republicans might be for him to drop out, he's doubtless aware that he's facing prison. Past crooked administrations could depend on shredders, but servers are much more stubborn.

Will the next admin have the stomach for the truth and reconciliation that would absolutely be appropriate?

Allegedly, the party establishment has given it to Labor Day (ironic, since they barely care about labor), but other than a surprise drafting of Romney, I'm not sure what will save them. Their strength has been that they all follow orders, so unity behind whatever they decide is likely, but it may be too little too late. For many of us as well.

[Phoebe]

I go back and forth between thinking Biden can win in a landslide so great that public outrage would put down any f****** that happens between November and January, and then on the other hand thinking that we are completely f***** because even after the election we cannot get the man in there till January. Will Republicans abandon him if he is defeated? Senate Republicans are almost as bad in terms of policy or actions; they would be willing to cram through a Supreme court justice on January 18th if they aren't all roundly defeated. In order to make sure nothing bad happens it's not just that these people have to lose; it's that they have to lose so hard that they fear the popular consequences in the streets if they do too much as a last-minute power grab.

[poorpete]

Trump says what happened to Floyd was terrible, but that the reaction was extreme.
No. His reaction is extreme. Creating an unwanted gestapo because people want the government to agree that black lives matter.

[FlameBlade]

Constantly bragging about that cognitive test.

Geez.

There are so many layers to this. Gestapo tactics to distract people from how bad coronavirus is in the south. Basically, too many crap going on at the same time to divide our attention amongst all the crap that is happening.

Many people in the south who got sick is going to remember this. Because of all syndromes associated with coronavirus aftermath. Pandemic is not going away, and countries are gonna ban travel to and from USA until we get it under control.

[Eliahad]

I just want Animal from the Muppets to follow him around saying, "Bad Man! Bad Man!"

[Mike]

He wishes Ghislaine Maxwell well. The people he uses those words for: Roger Stone, Paul Manafort, Michael Cohen. "I wish them well" is code for "don't flip on me and I will help you out." And it's not much of a code, because he uses the same words every time. And if you don't flip on him he actually follows through on his end of the unspoken deal.

This is disgusting.

[Tahlvin]

[poorpete]

Just speculation on my part, but I wouldn't be surprised if Ghislaine has no dirt on Trump. There's a point in Primary Colors where the candidate performs a cover-up, not because he did something wrong in that situation, but that he's done so many wrong things he can't remember if he did or didn't do something wrong that particular time. That's Trump, malevolence and incompetence, hand in hand.

[Mike]

I would be very surprised if she doesn't have something incriminating on him.

I personally believe the woman who accused him of having sex with her and another girl at one of Epstein's parties when both girls were underage. These were charges made before Epstein went to jail.

But even if that's not true, he partied with Epstein and Maxwell on so many occasions that he HAD to see things that were obviously illegal that he is now complicit in due to his silence. I mean, Trump actually said out loud, while praising Epstein as "a great guy" that Epstein loves beautiful woman almost as much as Trump himself does, although Epstein likes them "a little bit younger." Trump absolutely knew, and maybe even participated, and Ghislaine Maxwell will happily testify to those things if it benefits her.

[Stan]

Epstein had implied that he had blackmail material on many people. There are reports of damning videos. I'm hoping that it all comes out and everyone who took part goes to jail. Based on raids, NYPD and the FBI should have some of the videos - political pressure from the guilty is probably keeping these locked up when they should be generating more cases.

[poorpete]

If calling Trump fans deplorable got everyone defensive for their family and friends four years ago, wouldn't people feel the same when leaders call their BLM family and friends terrorists?

[Stan]

Just the fact that Trump was administered a cognitive test is very telling- those come out only if there are already signs. If there are concerns now, the odds that he'd be all together there in 4 years are not good, certainly not enough to bet a country on. Yet the Republican leadership have driven so far down this path, to impeach him on incompetence isn't likely as Trump represents most of the current Republican voters. So they'd rather drive off a cliff than rock the boat. (how's that for a mixed metaphor?)

It reminds me a bit of the movie Death of Stalin where all his toadies were terrified of doing anything that he might disapprove of until he was definitely dead.

[Tahlvin]

Here come the tweets and calls to delay the election...

[FlameBlade]

Can't delay election without constitution amendment. But since when constitution is going to stop them?

[Tahlvin]

Only Congress can change the election date. And even if they move the election date, the date of the next president's term starts is defined by the Constitution. I think his intention, and the bigger risk than actually moving the election, is how he's setting things up for his followers to discredit the results of the election.

[Eliahad]

This thing that Trump did with Israel and the UAE....did he do a good thing? Or is he just taking credit for something that was going to happen anyway?

[Stan]

When Trump is out of office, I really hope Biden doesn't just say "off you go" to all the Trump officials. For the long term health of the country, we need near Nuremberg level trials of all the corruption and unconstitutional acts. It could easily look like partisan punishment. But if that level of corruption goes unpunished, it will encourage it to continuously reappear in the future.
An electoral blowout would make it easier for this to happen.

[Phoebe]