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What in God's name are you talking about? How is a Presidential Pardon remotely connected to the investigation of the Trump campaign?
CBDunkerson wrote: I see.
So... Richard Nixon, as head of the executive branch, had "the power to decide" that the FBI should not be investigating the crimes he committed
That is correct, he does have that power.
Quote: and thus it was perfectly ok for him to start firing people in an effort to end the investigation. Perfectly ok? That is up for Congress to decide whether it is ok or not.
Quote: Welcome to fascist dictatorship America.
Fortunately, not found here on the actual Earth planet.
Because of Article I, Section 5 of the US Constitution
The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker and other Officers; and shall have the sole Power of Impeachment.
Not the key words, "sole Power" They don't share that power with the FBI.
Quote: When Obama did the same thing publicly last year in April that Trump did according to Swampey Comey's diary, it wasn't illegal or unethical.
Quote: Never happened. Obama never even suggested that the investigation in to Clinton should be ended...
Instead he told us all how the investigation should end.
Quote: let alone directly asking officials to do so. Just another lie that conservatives accept automatically. Not a lie, it is the absolute truth. Obama publicly stated his own conclusions on the Hillary investigation in April 2016 on TV, and, in doing so, directed his officials to come to the same conclusion, because that is exactly what Swampey Comey did three months later. When Comey claimed that the FBI needed to be independent of the President, what he really meant was that he wanted it to be independent from Trump.
When your boss states on TV that A is true, that is an even stronger signal to your underlings to find A to be true than stating "I hope you can see your way clear to letting A be true. I hope you can let A be true." in private.
And once again, I will reiterate that I have absolutely no problem with what Obama and Trump did. An abuse of power is when someone uses power they are not authorized to use, not when someone uses power they are authorized to use.
MMCJawa wrote: Well...clearly I don't agree with most anything NPC Dave says, but he does have a point that things have on many, many an occasion looked bad for Trump with him skating through unharmed.
As horrible as the last few weeks have been for him, so far poll numbers don't really show much of any consistent shift. People who approved of the Trump Admin back in January largely still approve of him. Granted, 538 analysis does show the number of STRONGLY approving folks is on the decline, but those folks still overall approve. I don't think we are going to see congress turn on him until post 2018 at the earliest...maybe not even then.
Trump supporters and Democrat supporters watch completely different news channels and read completely different articles. And each side believes almost nothing that the other side sources.
While Orframay's rhetoric was over the top, there was a fundamental kernel of truth in there about Trump supporters. If CNN reported that Trump had just murdered someone in cold blood, Trump's support would not drop much.
That isn't because Trump supporters want him or like him killing people in cold blood. It would be because they would never hear about it, or if they did hear about it they wouldn't believe it because it was on CNN. Barring actual video of course.
Coriat wrote: One, that story is eight or nine months old and the info has gone bad. I'm sure that the value of that guy's pesos went down significantly after the election, when the peso fell from 18.5 to the dollar to 22 to the dollar - down almost 4 - but as of this writing the peso is back up to 18.21 to the dollar - up 0.29 compared to pre-election. The article you linked suggests that the peso fall was a major contributor to the fallen balance sheet, and that has reversed itself.
The other cited factor was a drop in international stocks. I can't say what stocks this guy might own, but so far the Mexican stock market has made up all its post-election losses and more.
Addendum to the first point - after the post above I realized that there was a simpler way to go about it than looking at raw economic data. The Forbes article you linked cites a bloomberg billionaires list as its source.
I went and looked at that list, which as of this writing shows this guy at +$11.6 billion (+23%) year-to-date, suggesting that whatever tide receded for your $5.8 billion loss has rolled back in and more.
Two, so one billionaire loses money to other billionaires. At some point during a pre-election discussion I remarked to you that I thought you were mistaking a factional struggle within the elite for a struggle against the elite. This doesn't convince me otherwise.
I do remember that and I think it is time to take a step back and review that with what we knew then compared to what we know now.
At the time I decided to support Trump, I did so knowing there was a great deal of uncertainty in what he might actually do should he win office. He is unpredictable and impulsive, he will say one thing and then do another.
I suspected he had good intentions but for all I knew once he got into office he might get bored and delegate everything to Pence, or he might get cozy with the establishment and not change anything, especially if the press started feeding his ego and praising him.
But one thing I did know is that if Trump won it would upset the applecart and a lot of very rich people were going to see some serious disruption. I couldn't know for sure if Trump was really going to build a wall, but I did know that if he won some billionaires were going to be feeling some pain. So I emphasized that when I argued for Trump.
Now with Trump in office and the battle currently being waged, I have a better view of Trump's actions and his opponents. And I will say this Coriat, you are absolutely right...it IS a factional struggle within the elite, rather than a struggle against the elite.
And I am still very happy that I supported Trump, because that fractional struggle is between those elites who favor globalism, and those elites who favor nationalism. Zuckerberg confirmed this with his saying that the fight against nationalism is the struggle of our time.
That is his perspective, mine is that the fight against globalism is the struggle of our time, and if us ordinary joe shmoes want to have any hope of NOT being global production units that are shuffled from country to country without any home, culture or family to call our own, than we have to stop Zuckerberg, George Soros, Carlos Slim and Jeff Bezos, among others.
Speaking of Carlos Slim, yes he did recover from that black eye Trump gave him last November, but those two are still at war. All you have to do is check Carlos Slim's blog each day for another hysterical accusation against Trump. The title of Carlos Slim's blog is The New York Times.
There are any number of ways this fight between Trump and Slim will end, but an amicable peace is just about the least likely. Much more likely is one of them losing big time.
Quote: The billionaires I really care about right now are the ones Trump has stuffed the cabinet with. The ones I care about so far are Rex Tillerson and Wilbur Ross. Mostly I worry that they are going to be stabbed in the back by their bureaucratic underlings.
Hitdice wrote: What in God's name are you talking about? How is a Presidential Pardon remotely connected to the investigation of the Trump campaign? The presidential pardon is a major power of the executive branch and can be used to end an investigation, stop a trial, or release a prisoner. Ordering an investigation to be stopped is a lesser power of the executive branch.
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NPC Dave wrote: Hitdice wrote: What in God's name are you talking about? How is a Presidential Pardon remotely connected to the investigation of the Trump campaign? The presidential pardon is a major power of the executive branch and can be used to end an investigation, stop a trial, or release a prisoner. Ordering an investigation to be stopped is a lesser power of the executive branch. You're incorrect. Your misunderstanding of the function of the President's power to grant pardons for federal crimes is so great that I can only assume you're trolling the thread.
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Perhaps if you stop referring to Comey with a derogatory insult every time you use his name, maybe I would try to see your point.
Your choice to act in this way betrays any hope you have of gaining my sympathy. It is the behavior of a petulant child
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Specifically, Trump won about 26% of eligible voters in the popular vote, or 19% of the overall population. I feel like "some" might be a more appropriate word than "much".
(Context: Reagan's 1984 victory got 34% of eligible voters. Trump's vote numbers aren't actually that much higher or lower than Presidents have tended to get in recent times when counted as a percent of eligible voters. Raw numbers tend to go up because of population growth, of course.)
Yes, all the people who did not vote have a large responsibility.
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Did I miss the quote off?
Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.
-Oscar Wilde
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Sissyl wrote: Yes, all the people who did not vote have a large responsibility. Not all of them. A great many people who wanted to vote were denied through myriad voter suppression efforts which largely targeted the poor, the non-white, students attending college in another state, and former convicts who have served their sentences.
Indeed. Those who could not are off the hook. Those who just did not, though...
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Knight who says Meh wrote: Did I miss the quote off?
Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.
-Oscar Wilde
Very succinct. I like it.
Related:
“The cheapest sort of pride is national pride; for if a man is proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no qualities of his own of which he can be proud; otherwise he would not have recourse to those which he shares with so many millions of his fellowmen. The man who is endowed with important personal qualities will be only too ready to see clearly in what respects his own nation falls short, since their failings will be constantly before his eyes. But every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud adopts, as a last resource, pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and glad to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.”
-Arthur Schopenhauer
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Ambrosia Slaad wrote: “'Oh shut up, silly woman,' said the reptile with a grin
'You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in” ― Al Wilson , "The Snake"
On behalf of the diverse world of ophidians working hard to ensure the rodent population stays under control, the comparison is unjust.
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Ambrosia Slaad wrote: Sissyl wrote: Yes, all the people who did not vote have a large responsibility. Not all of them. A great many people who wanted to vote were denied through myriad voter suppression efforts which largely targeted the poor, the non-white, students attending college in another state, and former convicts who have served their sentences. In the context of not being able to say that "much of the country" voted for Trump, I'd say that "a great many" doesn't really work here. Certainly far fewer than actually voted for him.
And an even number than those who, for whatever reason just didn't vote.
None of this speaks well for "the integrity of the United States of America" and its opposition to Trump. Whether they supported him, couldn't be bothered to vote or had been stripped of their rights to do so - none of that speaks well of our country's integrity.
Knight who says Meh wrote: Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.
-Oscar Wilde
That is pretty great. :D
thejeff wrote: In the context of not being able to say that "much of the country" voted for Trump, I'd say that "a great many" doesn't really work here. Certainly far fewer than actually voted for him.
And an even number than those who, for whatever reason just didn't vote.
None of this speaks well for "the integrity of the United States of America" and its opposition to Trump. Whether they supported him, couldn't be bothered to vote or had been stripped of their rights to do so - none of that speaks well of our country's integrity.
Perhaps national integrity isn't measured by quantity, but by quality. ;-)
Flutter wrote: Ambrosia Slaad wrote: “'Oh shut up, silly woman,' said the reptile with a grin
'You knew damn well I was a snake before you took me in” ― Al Wilson , "The Snake"
On behalf of the diverse world of ophidians working hard to ensure the rodent population stays under control, the comparison is unjust.
Form a Rodent Munchers' Union with the mousing cats. Then you can stand against Big Canine's PR machine. Eat them up! Eat them up!
Scythia wrote: I hadn't heard that, about the coat of arms, but that's perfect, and encapsulates him. Self-promotion over integrity. Also that he had to buy a sign of prestige. Yet another reminder that one cannot buy class.
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Things have been getting worse for about forty years, which is why Trump won in the US, why Macron won France and why May's attempt to extend her party's control in Parliament backfired in the UK. It's why the forty year lock the GOP has enjoyed on Georgia's 6th district has become the most expensive Congressional race in history leading up to 20th June, with the incumbent's party polling anywhere from a tie to being behind a n00b challenger by 7 points. It's why the GOP barely held onto Minnesota's one Congressional seat despite almost no support from the opposition's national party.
People are getting tired of the constant wars, things going in whichever crapper they're seeing things go into and the "Average Joan's" household income stagnating whilst everything else skyrockets in cost.
People are lashing out at each other over political opinions in ways that until not very long ago were almost unthinkable. More and more people are fed up with being forgotten, marginalized, given a ration of [stuff] for the color of their epidermis and their personal preferences on [insert topic here].
All the while their local, state/province/[appropriate geographical mechanism here] and/or federal/national governments slather on more taxes, provide worse services, take legalized bribes so that international companies can sue governments when they don't like laws other sovereign states pass that might cost them profits, fix things that don't need fixing, break things that were working fine and dangle the carrot of supposed safety at the low, low price of kissing the remaining tatters of one's civil liberties goodbye.
People are tired of seeing things get worse so they're getting more desperate in whom they'll vote for to set things right. Or they've given up for whatever reason and are not voting at all...
Running Subtheme from Closed Thread Continued Here: Rabbits
I watched Lola, a matronly grandmother of a bulldog/terrier mutt, nosing about in the overgrown fire pit, pull something out and ecstatically start rolling around in it. I knew what that meant, and ran over to discover her gleefully squeezing the innards out of yet another dead baby bunny.
Animals are gross.
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You know, I think a lot of what you said just now, The Mad Comrade, makes sense, but I would add, from my own perspective, that it seems that the people who have power have learned how to make those of us without any power mad, mad at something (each other, the "system", government, "others" who are not each other) for their benefit. We see so many people upset and argue because the perception is that things are so horribly "wrong" (please don't get me wrong, many things are still very wrong, many things are unfair, there are many levels of injustice in America)
But it seems that it is working out to the advantage of those who have real power if most of us are critically close to imploding from our anger at "something" rather than any of us taking a deep breath, looking at what we are doing and saying as individuals, critical of the decisions we make on our own merits, and trying, peacefully and with moral and ethical distinction, to make things better
We are being trained, coerced, molded, into being those "crabs in a barrel"
We are humans, we don't have to be crabs in a barrel, we can help one another instead of opposing one another with such consternation.
We can, even with different ideologies, cultural experiences, and personal goals, work together. We have before, I hope we can once again.
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