Tuesday, October 18, 2016
Even Monsters Can Have Progressive Leanings
Donald Trump says he'll do this. Donald Trump says he'll do that. And the Gullabillies cherry pick from what Donald Trump says those things that they like and just discard the rest. In this way, demagoguery flourishes.
An earlier demagogue won over his public by fear-mongering and bigotry laced with some genuinely progressive measures. He tore down slums and constructed low-income housing in their place. He got the trains running on time. He invested heavily in infrastructure, including a world class highway system, and achieved near full employment. He established a social safety net of sorts and was a relentless champion for animal welfare. He promoted environmental protections.
And then he dissolved his country's democracy; established a police state; constructed concentration camps with crematoriums; unleashed his military forces on Europe, on Africa and eventually EurAsia; pursued the hateful dream of world domination and left tens of millions of dead in his wake.
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13 comments:
Look who's back.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtW1Lq5c04E
One could equally say the hystericals are cherry picking what Trump says. Like how he says he'll order a special (independent) prosecutor to look into Hillary's shady illegal email server that has evidence of being linked to pay-for-play political favors for Clinton Foundation donations. (Hillary data-shredded 33,000 emails and smashed old smartphones with a hammer to destroy evidence AFTER an FBI subpoena.)
What does the media report? Trump is tinpot dictator who will jail Hillary for running against him!
People should realize there's a big difference between European countries like Germany and Italy, and America. For one the European countries have only been democracies for a short period of their histories. America was founded on the idea of democracy. It's something the vast majority of Americans hold sacred.
Leaders like Hitler and Mussolini, (who did a lot more than hint at racism; they incited mobs to violence and intimidation; and ran on putting an end to democracy,) had grand visions of being Roman emperors.
Since the fall of the West Roman Empire in the 5th century, many leaders tried to restore it. Charlemagne was one of the first. He was crowned Holy Roman Emperor by a pope in 800 CE. This kicked off the on-again/off-again Holy Roman Empire that was eventually put to an end by Napoleon who tried reviving the Roman Empire in his own name. (Shortly after the French Revolution.)
So Hitler considered the thousand-year Holy Roman Empire the First Reich. The 2nd Reich was related to the unification of Germany by Bismarck in 1871 that ended with Germany's defeat in WW1. The 3rd Reich was under Hitler's rule. The reason he invaded Europe was to revive the Roman Empire.
Now compare all this to Trump -- a reality TV show host. When liberals are not saying he's Hitler, they are saying he's only in the presidential race to build a media empire.
So to compare the histories, Trump is nothing at all like Hitler and Mussolini. His idea to build a wall to keep illegals from stealing jobs in the 'right-to-work' American South is not actually racism. (Hillary's Ok with the wall in Israel which is actually oppressive.) His idea to 'extreme vet' or ban Muslims will also appear extreme to many people. But the US is bombing 7 different Muslim nations. Americans are not racist for not wanting to risk terrorist attacks. (FDR put Japanese Americans in internment camps during WW2.)
If Trump had the hidden agenda of becoming emperor of America, he wouldn't get very far. He would face extreme opposition and get himself impeached in the process. America is the most anti-fascist country on Earth and has a number of safeguards built in place against tyranny, like 3 branches of government (and even the anachronistic 2nd amendment.)
Some people considered Harper a fascist in the fascist corporatism vein: giving more power to plutocrats. That isn't Trump in this election. That is Hillary.
Liberals use fascist rhetoric (perhaps they have convinced themselves of it) simply because they can't stand the man or stomach the idea of him being president (leader.)
The establishment is using this rhetoric to put Hillary in the White House because she plays ball: she is happy to accept their money and do their bidding; happy to continue outsourcing jobs; happy to continue waging war and starting a new arms race with Russia.
A Trump presidency would not be the end of the world. He would probably be a lame duck president. But if the world faces another global economic collapse, then some European nations will (again) reject democracy for fascism, then it IS the end of the world (WW3.)
So people should try and understand where the real dangers are lurking. They are all related to establishment corruption and looting: the collapse of democracy and the economy spilling over into the political realm eroding the foundations of civilization. Like the dinosaurs, we are massively over-leveraged!
"America was founded on the idea of democracy." Do you really believe that? The founding fathers were not interested in democracy but oligarchy. Read Isenberg's "White Trash" to disabuse your mind of this fantasy.
I hope you're right that the "vast majority of Americans hold" democracy sacred for that will ensure that Trump never sees the White House. Trump supporters are Messianic and plainly support authoritarian rule and, let's be honest, for white Americans. You have to have an incredible tolerance for bigotry not to recognize that.
Yes, FDR did intern Japanese Americans to America's lasting shame. Or at least decent America's lasting shame. Using that as a precedent to justify Trump's proposed excesses reveals much about you.
By the way, it is not the White House that has been corrupted. It is Congress. Read the 2014 Gilens (Princeton) and Page (Northwestern) study that demonstrated how the legislative branch of the US government has succumbed to political capture and been transformed into an oligarchy. You could have a mule in the White House or Trump or PeeWee Herman and that isn't going to change. Worse yet, Trump's advisors are all neo-cons which guarantees that the four vacancies in the Supreme Court over the next term will be filled with more corporatist judges. Trump has already pledged as much.
The thing is I'm not interested in your delusions that are only loosely connected with wobbly facts. I've given you a couple of resources to clear up your misunderstandings. Hope you consult them.
So my question from another thread has been answered.
This anonymous is just another asshole and not worth engaging.
Look, Anon, you're in my house now and I think it's time you left. You're backing a deviant who attracts support from outfits like the KKK, gun nuts, anti-semites, and all manner of bigots and degenerates. He's going to lose the election, badly, and I'm glad for that. I hope he does enough damage to the Republican brand that they make damn sure not to let another con artist into their fold.
You want to support a perv, that's your choice but it's on you. So, adios.
I'd read somewhere one should first measure leaders by their capabilities, and then intentions. Fortunately, for whatever semblance of democracy remains in the USA, Trump's a bit of an imbecile. Skeletons in his closest fell out, and he declined to protect himself from them when he had the opportunity.
I fear the next time, they won't be so lucky. There're monsters lurking out there. Real cold blooded villains, whose authoritarian tendencies would appeal to the basest of human instincts, and the longer neo-liberalism continues to eat away at the heart of democracy in the USA, the more these base instincts will grow.
There are two ways to protect a democracy: strengthen democracy, or find monsters of your own.
If nothing else this USA election has brought out the worst in people.
Two terribly flawed candidates fighting for the leadership of the worlds most ,military, powerful nation.
And yet we compete to take sides!
On a blog that I guess is visited mainly by the male of the species could it be that machismo takes over common sense?
I find nothing of merit in either candidate; both will leave a stain on humanity.
Whoever wins; the world will be the worse off.
Comparing the lesser of two evils is madness!
This is what happens when the voting public becomes disengaged from daily political decisions.
This is what happens with a consolidated media.
I was going to add that we need more females within Government; then I thought about Chrissy Clark and Margaret Thatcher.
TB
I'll say it again, TrailBlazer. I'm not fond of Hillary Clinton. That said, she's not a serial sexual predator, openly boastful of his prowess at assaulting women when he doesn't know the tape is rolling. That alone disqualifies him from the presidency. There are literally dozens of other things in his past, things he's done, things he's said, that disqualify him.
I'm not fond of Hillary but one of them has to win. I favour Clinton in large part because the next president will fill up to four vacancies on the United States Supreme Court. Those appointments will have a tremendous impact on America, and the world, for a generation, possibly two. Trump has already pledged to appoint clones of Antonin Scalia which, taken alone, is more than ample reason to back Clinton.
I doubt that Clinton will be a great president but, then again, no one thought Abe would amount to much when he was elected president.
In addition I am sick to my stomach of conspiracy theorists, people who think because some lie has been circulating long enough it must be true. These are the type who use a few facts as a skeleton on which to mount their half-truths and delusions.
I came across a poll of Germans - Spiegel, Deutsche Welle, I'm not sure - and it was telling. 10% were undecided or indifferent. Of the remaining 90% the split was 86 to 4 for Hillary. Germans, with the benefit of their dark history, seem to have little difficulty seeing Trump for the threat he is.
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