Well, this is an interesting read: "Unnamed White House official on implementing travel ban: ‘It really is a massive success story.’" by Jenna Johnson for The Washington Post 29 January 2017 Here is the key bit in my opinion: This shit is heinous fear mongering at best. And all signs are pointing to this being used to gin up a war against Islam. That sounds extreme, but it seems like Bannon is the one driving a lot of this bullshit. Here is an illuminating quote from Bannon. No matter what you think, reading the speech the above quote came from is...illuminating? Horrifying? Face-palming? I don't even fucking know. "This Is How Steve Bannon Sees The Entire World: The soon-to-be White House chief strategist laid out a global vision in a rare 2014 talk, one where he said racism in the far right gets “washed out” and called Vladimir Putin a kleptocrat. BuzzFeed News publishes the complete transcript for the first time." by J. Lester Feder for Buzzfeed News 15 November 2016
Thanks for the link - seems interesting, Ill have to give it a read later today. Steve Bannon is a strange guy and his position on the NSC is questionable, to say the least. But the complete over-saturation of media hysteria on literally everything is muddying the water. Seems like they are already rolling back the issue around green card holders. If anyone hasnt read Trump's book, The Art of the Deal, its an interesting perspective on how he thinks about things. So far his political strategy has been right out of the book. Make excessive demands and then settle for what you really want and make everyone think they won. He didnt invent that strategy, but he certainly lives by it I think. If you are categorically against giving him money, then just google a PDF version of it. They are all over the place.
Interesting article since Ive never really dug into Bannon's background much myself. He sounds like a much more well versed version of the Fox News "war on Christmas" believers. Illuminating is the fact that he has some very strong anti corporations leanings, you could pull some of his quotes out and think it was Bernie Sanders demanding the big banks be prosecuted for the 08 crisis. Different rules for the coprorations and the rule makers, etc. Bernie using the mechanism of government to break this up, Bannon thinking letting the banks fail would have taught them the economic lesson. I agree framing the whole global situation as Judeo Christian battle with Islam is the wrong path. Where the rubber meets the road with the realities of radical Islam is where the debate lies. Waging it as a holy battle is a losing strategy, makes radicals like ISIS that much more credible to people that might sympathize. Do you pull out of the middle east and let regional dictators control these groups? Stick it out and hope the democracy project eventually catches on enough to weed the jihadist out? Shit is really beyond me. His stance that racism in the recent populist movements will be self policed and washed out is niave at best. Ill have to see the stuff that people say he supports antisemitism because it's not in that piece. My guess is he tied international banking corprotist to the jews at some point in his career?
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/...one-new-regulation-two-must-be-revoked-234365 Not unexpected, but still disappointing that he's running the country at the level of some idiot at the end of the bar. No sign of nuance, understanding, or complexity in how our regulatory system works. No specifics on what regulations he considers onerous or why, just a child's understanding that "regulation is bad" and that "two is more than one."
Unless your entire political philosophy is "libcucks BTFO!" I don't understand how you can support this useless piece of shit.
Stay off of /r/the_donald, its going to do nothing but enrage you. Its the mirror image of /r/politics and both are awful.
Trump tweeted, "libcucks BTFO?" Thats what I was referring to, since thats a variation of the kind of shit they say there.
No, I meant that the_donald type posters are the only people who I can conceive of supporting this man at this point. Every other conservative in the country should be itching for the chance to impeach him and get Pence in.
But impeach him for what? What has he done that's illegal? I'm not a huge fan of his, but the silly hysteria over everything he does is becoming absurd. Liberals don't have to like his policies or even him personally, I know I don't, but not everything is the end of democracy and the rebirth of Nazism. The outrage energy would be far better spent on grassroots efforts for 2018 and taking reclaiming those seats that most analysts already say the Republicans will very likely win. Would you rather the left spend every minute on organizing fruitless protests or developing a plan to prevent the Republicans from passing constitutional amendments? I just think the Left is making a huge mistake with this. The constant fear mongering didnt work during the election campaigns. It got over-saturated and people were numb to it. Why would it work now?
The impeachment clause is far broader than most people realize. The issue isn't clearing the legal bar, it's clearing the political bar. His refusal to divest from his companies, his support of torture and EO to that effect, his likely ordering of DHS to ignore a federal court ruling, plus many more, are all impeachable. It's just a question of which one has the political legs to go the distance. I'm not saying that Democrats going full tilt trying to get an impeachment is a wise political strategy, you're right that they're far better served preparing for 2018, I'm saying that if Republicans had any dignity left they'd be preparing impeachment themselves.
I'm going to second the non stop apoplectic news coverage. It'll become white noise. Before Audrey can Sobibor us with the same grassroots spiel, we are aware people are mobilizing. You don't want to use your political capital up before the midterms.
As for the "fear mongering," we're not playing horseshoes here. I'm not trying to see how close the country can get to fascism without actually being fascist. If something he does benefits the country in no way, but undermines our democratic institutions, the fact that it's not literally Nazi Germany isn't a defense.
People are things: the conservative position they've been bitching about being overruled on since 1865.
But the fact that its not even close to Nazi Germany or fascism is a defense. Those claims were made about Bush too, and in retrospect, how do you consider those claims now? What did you think about the claim by Republicans that Obama was trying to impose socialism? Pretty retarded, right? Take issue with his Executive Orders until kingdom come, but claiming fascism cheapens actual fascism and discredits meaningful dissent. Surely there is enough reasonable criticism without doomsday scenarios.
I don't think he was a holocaust denier. I think he was a holocaust supporter. But, that should be an example for all of us. If Audrey can find common ground with someone like that, we should be able to work together. I mean, sure the common ground was his penis, but still it's a start.
Honestly, I think his actions with regard to the NSC is the first thing that actually worries me. It's not fascism, but to demote the Joint Chiefs and promote Bannon? What? What a stupid error in judgement. Karl Rove was specifically not put in that kind of position by Bush because of concerns like this. Who the fuck is this guy that he has those credentials? He ran Breitbart and worked at Goldman Sachs. Um okay? What's going on here? But now theyre saying its not true, so who the fuck knows? But his ban on the 7 countries certainly isn't that. Was it poorly thought out and executed? Absolutely. I mean we had a ban on visas from Cuba for 60 years. And other presidents had done similar things in the past. But a ban on visas for 7 out of 40 muslim nations is hardly a ban on muslims. And who cares what the UN thinks. 16 nations ban Israeli visas forever, and the UN doesn't say a word. They only play the finger wag game when there isn't any stakes for them.
In a vacuum I'd agree that the ban would be an incredibly poorly thought out, but ultimately correctable policy that I would expect to be walked back. I am however looking at it in a larger context, and everything the Trump team has said, done, and postulated indicates an enormous contempt for the rule of law, the legitimacy of dissent, and the importance of American pluralism.