The conspiracy theorist in me thinks that this was his plan all along. He never dreamt he'd get the nomination and has been trying to lose the election without capitulation ever since. I bet behind closed doors he's relieved he finally hit pay dirt and swung momentum against himself.
Trump is like a bully but hes more like exactly what he is, a silver-spoon CEO. He was born into wealth (no matter how he spins it) and had it his whole life. He's used to getting his way and being surrounded by people saying "yes" to him, else they get destroyed. So when goes up against someone who challenges not only his ideas, but his character, in a public forum with no real ability to punish them he lashes out like a cornered animal. He likely has no idea how to deal with criticism because its so foreign to him. He doesn't play the long game because he's never had to. Actions require an immediate reaction in his mind, even though they require poise, consideration, skepticism, and a measured response. Trump, like most of these kinds of people, is a tyrant at heart. If he were elected, we would see the elastic limits of our checks and balances to keep him from going off the rails. Hillary Clinton is the exact opposite in this way. Shes had over 30 years to understand and build this concept (whether or not she actually accepts it privately). But having lived this life her entire career, she has no idea how an average person operates or interacts with the world. Shes been in that world since pre-internet and thinks that "for the greater good" the rules do not apply her because she's above them. There is a reason why except for a small cadre supporting Bernie, the Democratic Party bowed down to her for and handed her the nomination without any real opposition. Any reasonable person can see that she and the Clinton Foundation are corrupt. Over 100 potential felonies and misdemeanors are part of the two criminal investigations she has been under in the last few years. In a vacuum with Trump, shes better. In reality, anyone who thinks shes some paragon of virtue is as delusional as anyone still supporting Trump. Shes just far better at playing the game. And if everything about Trump is some sort of actual, true conspiracy, then I sincerely hope it just stays a theory and is never proven.
Well he didn't babble on about people needing to call Sean Hannity so that's a win for him. How he simply seems to refuse to prep kills me. I mean how do you not drill some semi substantive points on a variety of topics into your head is mind boggling to me? Some sort of substance. He did do better in the second debate because he actually brought up some of Hillary's weaknesses when he needed to. This isn't a high school debate, you use substance and attack your oppenent. He basically left the second part out of the first debate. He seems to refuse the former at all cost.
I guess Trump paid Clintons accusers/victims to sit in on that debate. Not a shock, a video came out of him being a horrible person, so his response was to lash out as dramatically as he could
For myself I don't think it was even the substance part of the debate that completely killed him. He threatened to jail Clinton, which looked really bad. More importantly, that was the most haphazard way of addressing a sexual assault scandal I've ever seen. Is he so out of touch he didn't realize he needed to issue an actual apology? "I can't tell you how difficult it was to confront my daughter with these accusations blah blah blah at the time I made the comments I wasn't *insert excuse* blah blah blah now let me tell you more about my daughter and the wonderful women in my life blah blah blah". Instead he came out and pretty much admitted he didn't give a fuck. Yes, he said the word apology, but then immediately called it a distraction and tried to project the issue onto Hillary. Worst tactic of a presidential debate ever. I've only seen Rick Perry do something stupider in a debate, but that was accidental. As much of a man child as Trump acted, the blond moderator needs to never be involved in a presidential debate again. I almost never take issue with the moderators, but it was clear she was fucking pissed about his scandals, and hated his guts. Understandable to be sure, but you can't so clearly pick a side in the most important debate forum in this country.
I don't know if he paid them or not. I am sure his people helped orchestrate it. But, did you watch the press conference before the debate? It's awful. I honestly don't the facts of their claims. But, if they're true, and these women were raped and/or sexually assaulted by Bill Clinton and threatened by Hillary Clinton, what an awful position they are in, and have to live with every day. I imagine they feel they never received justice, and now they have to watch the Clintons continue to succeed. The only way they can grasp one more time at justice is to have to side with Donald Trump. Voters feel like they are having to choose between two disgusting options, I can't imagine how they feel. So, it's possible these women want to try anything they can to stop Clinton, and Trump wouldn't need to pay them to appear. (Although, I hope he paid them to cover their expenses.)
Given the things we know Bill Clinton did, I'm sure at least a good portion of the accusations toward him are true. It's less obvious than with Trump because Bill is one of the best speakers this country has ever seen, and has an empathetic disposition that would make any politician envious. Trump probably is a good father, but he makes little effort to conceal the fact that he thinks of his multiple wives as fuck toys, and when they're signing the dotted line for marriage they're going to have to put up with his cheating and piggish behavior. I generally think this country has mostly achieved equality between the genders, but what a fucking awful election for women. You have one candidate married to a raging hard on, who treats her marriage as little more than a political alliance, as well as bullying other women who are victims of her husband. Then you have the other candidate who doesn't even hide it.
Hillary up 11 points over Trump. Not at all surprising, considering all she had to do was not break the law and not have a seizure this week.
No, Trump was right, she's a fighter. He might have had some middling pop media success to get him where he is right now. She's been running an old school methodical election game and just letting him hang himself to boot. They started the, we can't tell which emails are real or faked by the rooskies, line weeks and weeks ago it's really paying off now. This along with peoples aversion to Trump means they'll write off the severity of any new leaks wholesale. She's got trump tight game.
Especially given that Trump, just last night, read a supposed email from Blumenthal to Podesta claiming that Benghazi was preventable. Except that the email was completely fabricated by a Russian government controlled website.
These days, it seems like everyone (news media or individual) will jump on anything that even remotely seems to further their narrative, without bothering to do any due diligence or taking into account the source. It's like everyone has gone full-on-retarded in a "it's on the internet so it has to be true" way.
Go ahead and tell me all the rights men have that women don't, or whatever other theory of inequality and I'll be happy to explain why its wrong. There are pockets of our society that favor one gender over the other (often going in the favor of women, this doesn't just happen to one gender) but yes, equality has basically been achieved. I don't view issues like abortion as simply belonging to women outright, they are decisions we need to make as a society. Although, women do have the right to choose anyway. The idea that women are systematically oppressed and men are gathering together to keep them out of their boys' clubs, or that every time more men want to be involved in something than women it's some Illuminati conspiracy is unmitigated horse shit. Given the fanaticism behind certain facets of the left, the whole women are oppressed thing is getting really ridiculous. What's really bad for Trump is it wasn't even the scandal that hit the numbers so hard, it was his response to it and his performance in the last debate. There is only one left and it's going to take a miracle or Hillary drowning a bag of kittens on live television for him to turn it around. I don't believe that his success in the primaries was random, or that his strategy was discombobulated, or any of that. He ran a smart campaign that brought some conventional political wisdom into serious question, but goddamn has he made some major mistakes in the general election. His usual refusal to apologize was clever, but you can't treat a sex scandal the same way you do a rude comment.
Except it wasn't fabricated by that website at all. https://theintercept.com/2016/10/11...nconvenient-truths-are-recast-as-putin-plots/
I love the idea that the Russians are the explanation behind every Hillary scandal. Fucking awesome. I don't believe it would be beneath the Russians to try to discredit an American politician, but this is just surreal. Besides, if you have been paying any attention to Hillary's career it's not like you even needed to read the wikileaks stuff. All it does is confirm what was already obvious. However, while the facts surrounding the Benghazi incident look questionable on the surface, I don't think that particular scandal amounts to anything. These sorts of requests are denied all the time. It was a minor terror incident, especially considering other attacks the US/Europe has faced and most of the anger seems more like hindsight bias rather than anything Clinton/the Obama administration did wrong. I fucking hate Hillary, but some of the scandals are just politically hyped witch hunts. Our military is constantly claiming they need more money to conduct their missions, prepare for this scenario, etc. We're already paying too much and if the response to every unfortunate incident was dumping heaps of money across the board with dubious benefit the overspending is really going to kill us. Sadly, we've seen what the public's reaction tends to be. Do all of it and then some, put it on a credit card.
http://dailycaller.com/2016/10/10/hillary-in-leaked-email-saudi-arabia-and-qatar-are-funding-isis/ All of the Hillary campaign-related email leaks aside. I think one of the more interesting pieces of information to come out of all of this is that KSA and Qatar are in fact funding ISIS. I'm surprised that nobody is paying any attention to this when you consider what is going on in Syria and looking at the U.S. response to it. I'm afraid we are really on the wrong side of history on this one. If this has gone on at least since 2014, we have been complicit with what is happening there and we are facilitating regime change for what appears to be natural gas transportation logistics. http://www.news.com.au/world/middle...t/news-story/74efcba9554c10bd35e280b63a9afb74 Goes to show you how cheap life really is.
Would it be possible to have a worse world cup host? Let's see: - terrible human rights record - playing in 100+ degree heat - played in a geographic location that will make terrorist attacks almost certain - funding the most dangerous terrorist organization on the planet - the host team has no business in the tournament and will likely lose 30-0 - stadiums built by slave labor - While they agreed to make certain exceptions for foreigner accommodations, the laws they have on the books are among the least friendly to international travelers. You would basically have to go to North Korea find worse. - a nation that has no historic connection to international soccer whatsoever I think the countries in the region funding ISIS aren't actually doing it out of any kind of ideological support. It's because they're making things so difficult for their other ideological enemies. Many middle eastern leaders have no interest in peace as long as it keeps their adversaries down. I don't know about Saudi Arabia specifically, but many leaders in the region would be happy with ISIS surviving perpetually in a state of meager expansion and contraction, since it's such a money/resources pit for the west. I hate Hillary's plan of arming the Kurds because it's going to be a disaster for our relations with Turkey. They are the most moderate Muslims in the region, and have a history of women's rights going back 100 years that is almost on par with the US. If we want to see cultural change in the middle east over the next century we should at least support the right people. Maybe it would be best to just go in for about a month, kill as many members of ISIS as we can, leave, and then let whatever's left fight it out. It's not a good plan, but I've yet to hear one. What we are going to lose in lives/money in a half committed conflict with ISIS is going to be higher in the long run. Syria would likely fall under the control of someone terrible like Assad or another dictator, but that's certainly better than letting ISIS thrive in the region indefinitely.
Oh man. Trump just came out and said Ryan dropped his support because "There's something sinister going on." Heap some dirt on that grave. It's possible that Hillary's campaign has spoken with republicans about dropping support, but you can't say that. Sexual assault scandal--> loss of support --> conspiracy theory. Yikes.
This is the scariest part of the situation. Trump is getting thrashed at the moment, and will likely lose. When that happens, he won't take it lightly and he will rally his followers to, for lack of a better word, keep on fighting. I don't expect a concession speech when he loses, I expect a call to arms, and it's honestly kinda scary.