TRUMP is seriously dangerous

[82_28]

Cuban will take Trump to the wood shed. Perhaps it was missed and I will repeat what I saw when he was on the Colbert show in case it was missed. I know this is the third time I have written it in this thread. It will always bear repeating though.

Colbert asked Cuban if he really thought Trump was worth $10B. He said yeah, if I loaned him $9.5 billion. Sorry to repeat.

[Wombaticus Rex]

Cuban will take Trump to the wood shed. Perhaps it was missed and I will repeat what I saw when he was on the Colbert show in case it was missed. I know this is the third time I have written it in this thread. It will always bear repeating though.

Colbert asked Cuban if he really thought Trump was worth $10B. He said yeah, if I loaned him $9.5 billion. Sorry to repeat.

What does that even mean? Like Cuban is going to "Destroy" Trump, same as John Oliver does, every single fucking week, as Trump's campaign -- mysteriously -- fails to implode after being dealt a death blow?

Do you really think anyone is going to present some factual argument or rhetorical angle that actually affects this phenomenon? That there's some ace card up the sleeve of a media who are openly at war with a presidential candidate, and have been for a year straight now? That there's some further escalation that will finally wake up Trump's base?

Edit: The past few pages are a good example of the Plato's Cave effect of responding to media cycles from a naive realism (no slight intended, I do it all the time, too) POV.

Is Trump's campaign really in trouble? On fire? Imploding? Then why is everyone so afraid?

Is Trump really doomed to get stomped out by Hillary in November? Then why is everyone so afraid?

I'm especially amused by the "Iran video" angle -- Trump makes a reference to a Top Secret briefing, yet what he said is discredited based on ... what? We can't effectively resist our ruling class, or even parse reality, if we keep letting them minting facts by fiat.

You know...sources say, at least.

[Freitag]

Why the fuck would anyone else seem SO DETERMINED to go to war with Russia unless nuclear winter and depopulation was the end game.

Because NATO can actually defeat them and then the globe would finally be well and truly globalized.

It's a strategic bid for both natural resources and planetary control.

Can NATO defeat them? I think it would be a Pyrrhic victory at least, if not Mutual Assured Destruction.

[Nordic]

Why the fuck would anyone else seem SO DETERMINED to go to war with Russia unless nuclear winter and depopulation was the end game.

Because NATO can actually defeat them and then the globe would finally be well and truly globalized.

It's a strategic bid for both natural resources and planetary control.

Well yeah that's the conscious plan. On the surface. But are they really so stupid as to want a hot war with Russia and believing it wouldn't go nuclear? Or is there some underlying death wish?

These aren't people with low IQ's necessarily. But they want to risk their very existence, and everyone else's on a cliche power grab for resources and hegemony?

This is why they're so fucking dangerous. When do we claim "self defense" and dust off the guillotines?

[82_28]

Cuban will take Trump to the wood shed. Perhaps it was missed and I will repeat what I saw when he was on the Colbert show in case it was missed. I know this is the third time I have written it in this thread. It will always bear repeating though.

Colbert asked Cuban if he really thought Trump was worth $10B. He said yeah, if I loaned him $9.5 billion. Sorry to repeat.

What does that even mean? Like Cuban is going to "Destroy" Trump, same as John Oliver does, every single fucking week, as Trump's campaign -- mysteriously -- fails to implode after being dealt a death blow?

Do you really think anyone is going to present some factual argument or rhetorical angle that actually affects this phenomenon? That there's some ace card up the sleeve of a media who are openly at war with a presidential candidate, and have been for a year straight now? That there's some further escalation that will finally wake up Trump's base?

Edit: The past few pages are a good example of the Plato's Cave effect of responding to media cycles from a naive realism (no slight intended, I do it all the time, too) POV.

Is Trump's campaign really in trouble? On fire? Imploding? Then why is everyone so afraid?

Is Trump really doomed to get stomped out by Hillary in November? Then why is everyone so afraid?

I'm especially amused by the "Iran video" angle -- Trump makes a reference to a Top Secret briefing, yet what he said is discredited based on ... what? We can't effectively resist our ruling class, or even parse reality, if we keep letting them minting facts by fiat.

You know...sources say, at least.

It was just a stark and dead pan way to say Trump is full of shit. Colbert began by asking is there like some billionaire's club or something and then segued into that. I thought it was funny, even though I don't like billionaires.

[backtoiam]

Wombaticus Rex

The past few pages are a good example of the Plato's Cave effect of responding to media cycles from a naive realism (no slight intended, I do it all the time, too) POV.

This claymation version is one of my favorites.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69F7GhASOdM

[JackRiddler]

Do you really think anyone is going to present some factual argument or rhetorical angle that actually affects this phenomenon? That there's some ace card up the sleeve of a media who are openly at war with a presidential candidate, and have been for a year straight now? That there's some further escalation that will finally wake up Trump's base?

On the first bold: I certainly do not. Trump doesn't either. He's just shooting guys on Fifth Avenue and watching his supporters stick with him. Knowing surely that this doesn't win him a single new one, however.

On the second bold: No the media haven't been at war with him for a year. They have not. Absolutely not. They made him. 100%. They knew they were doing it. They chose it and they talked about it (see Moonves admission, as if you need to). If through 2015 they had covered "election news" even just conventionally as a matter of "candidates" in a "primary" process, with each entrant getting their due based entirely on "polling" (all of these concepts are illusions but powerful ones, hence the quotes), then Trump would not have emerged. They platformed him, aggressively, all the way. They gave him his Trump Against the World narrative, daily. They let him set their day's coverage agenda by calling Mika and Joe for his free morning rant, which then became what CNN and FOX and the rest played on until the evening when the dinosaur networks would do the Seniors Digest version. Let's not forget stuff that was happening a couple of months ago, okay? They gave Trump three times the Clinton coverage in 2015, and through the end of the year anywhere between 20 and 400 times the Sanders "coverage" (as if there was ever any of that other than a few occasional seconds of "by the way, some old guy on acid in Vermont is hallucinating that he's a socialist and also running against Clinton, now you'll never believe who got bit by this adorable poodle at the Podunk dog show today, after these messages"). Sanders didn't get shit on the TV before February. Your media professionals wouldn't deny this, they would just serve up a fucking justification that hey, they just followed the "story" and the market. The corporate media made Trump 2016. You know "negative" and "positive" are indistinguishable in Trump's case. He chose his role and they embraced it. Like in any standard-formula superhero movie, the villain is the real star. Now the media are also not "at war" with the professional wrestler pretending to be the Flying Mussolini, they are just delivering the second half of a kayfabe script that everyone writes together, because it's easy. The heel they built, the heel they own, is now being body-slammed. (I could show you a post I did from a million weeks ago back in which I was naive enough to think this standard story-cycle would be completed at a much earlier stage, for Bush's benefit. Which shows you why I am not a network executive. By the way, I did get the short-lived Trump poll bounce on the nose, and that it's now over. They had to rebuild him after the RNC to create maximum scare factor, and now it's pummel time. Clinton's up by 15%, even 10% in the FOX poll.)

Edit: The past few pages are a good example of the Plato's Cave effect of responding to media cycles from a naive realism (no slight intended, I do it all the time, too) POV.

Very well put. Thanks.

[Wombaticus Rex]

That's a well-put case, bud. I've taken the media coverage over the past year to be mocking and belittling him, and I didn't just get my mind changed per se, but this:

You know "negative" and "positive" are indistinguishable in Trump's case.

...makes me suspect we're perhaps saying the same thing anyway.

Question: do you think this more escalated, clearly stated, nakedly sneering approach is going to amount to much now -- or just fuel Trump even further?

[Agent Orange Cooper]

Like in any standard-formula superhero movie, the villain is the real star. Now the media are also not "at war" with the professional wrestler pretending to be the Flying Mussolini, they are just delivering the second half of a kayfabe script that everyone writes together, because it's easy. The heel they built, the heel they own, is now being body-slammed.

I don't know about body-slammed. It feels to me like he's being fed some weak-ass chops while he waits for the right moment to "go into business for himself." That's what I'm hoping for, anyway. That kind of thing almost never happens, but we are living in rare times indeed.

[JackRiddler]

That's a well-put case, bud. I've taken the media coverage over the past year to be mocking and belittling him, and I didn't just get my mind changed per se, but this:

You know "negative" and "positive" are indistinguishable in Trump's case.

...makes me suspect we're perhaps saying the same thing anyway.

Question: do you think this more escalated, clearly stated, nakedly sneering approach is going to amount to much now -- or just fuel Trump even further?

You can guess what I think but it ain't worth much, it's a fluid and unpredictable situation and I've obviously been wrong before. I think this current programming has the dual effect of a daily reinforcement to his existing support, which may be what you are tending to see, while also guaranteeing he won't break out of it. If we think of it as marketing, they are solidifying separate demographics. A majority who think he's a mentally ill con artist and an active danger (correctly, by the way) regardless of what their politics are, and a minority who will feel all the more strongly that he was shafted and therefore must have been the heroic anti-establishment strongman they imagine. The latter will be available -- indispensable -- to later iterations of the game. Since they're just going to have to keep building The Greater Evil to maintain any semblance of a two-party system. Although I think they've finally reached the untoppable and it's obviously more vulnerable than ever, probably not before November.

[Novem5er]

Another way to look at this is as a final smashing of the "outsider" candidate. It seemed in the primary season that the "outsiders" aka Bernie and Trump were gathering all the steam. In the end, though, Bernie was swept aside by Hillary (was there ever any really l doubt?) and now we are left with Trump's momentous nomination. As his campaign falls apart and, assuming he loses by big numbers to their arch-nemesis, Hillary, then the GOP will be left thinking that ANY of their insider candidates would have been better.

And Dems will be happy that Hillary won and can secure SCOTUS nominations, move forward on domestic social issues, and be free to bomb the shit out of the rest of the world like we know she is going to do. The lesson of the 2016 election will be, "Oh, you thought an outsider could take on the system? LOLZ"

[seemslikeadream]

Gaps in Melania Trump's immigration story raise questions
A racy photo shoot is prompting fresh scrutiny of the would-be first lady's early visits to the United States.
By BEN SCHRECKINGER and GABRIEL DEBENEDETTI 08/04/16 05:22 AM EDT Updated 08/04/16 12:17 PM EDT

By MATT LATIMER
Nude photographs published this week are raising fresh questions about the accuracy of a key aspect of Melania Trump’s biography: her immigration status when she first came to the United States to work as a model.

The racy photos of the would-be first lady, published in the New York Post on Sunday and Monday, inadvertently highlight inconsistencies in the various accounts she has provided over the years. And, immigration experts say, there’s even a slim chance that any years-old misrepresentations to immigration authorities could pose legal problems for her today.

While Trump and her husband, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump, have said she came to the United States legally, her own statements suggest she first came to the country on a short-term visa that would not have authorized her to work as a model. Trump has also said she came to New York in 1996, but the nude photo shoot places her in the United States in 1995, as does a biography published in February by Slovenian journalists.

The inconsistencies come on top of reports by CBS News and GQ Magazine that Trump falsely claimed to have obtained a college degree in Slovenia but could be more politically damaging because her husband has made opposition to illegal immigration the foundation of his presidential run.

Representatives of the Trump campaign and the Trump Organization did not address detailed questions about the timing and circumstances of Melania Trump’s arrival in the country, but campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks responded to the emailed questions by stating, “Melania followed all applicable laws and is now a proud citizen of the United States.”

In a statement issued hours after POLITICO published this report, Trump reiterated on Thursday that she had been “at all times in compliance with the immigration laws of this country.” But her statement conspicuously avoids addressing multiple reports and photographs that place her in the United States and working as a model in 1995, as well as her multiple past statements that she would return every few months to Europe to renew her visa. (Other news outlets, including Bloomberg View, have also noted the inconsistencies in her account.)

Melania Trump issued a statement following POLITICO's reporting that avoided the questions raised in the story.
Melania Trump statement on immigration status dodges key points
By BEN SCHRECKINGER
Although she may be a proud citizen, Trump’s own statements suggest she may not have followed all applicable laws, immigration experts say.

In a January profile in Harper’s Bazaar, Trump said she would return home from New York to renew her visa every few months. “It never crossed my mind to stay here without papers. That is just the person you are,” she said. “You follow the rules. You follow the law. Every few months you need to fly back to Europe and stamp your visa. After a few visas, I applied for a green card and got it in 2001.”

In a February interview with Mika Brzezinski of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Trump repeated that characterization of her early years in the United States. “I never thought to stay here without papers. I had visa. I travel every few months back to the country to Slovenia to stamp the visa. I came back. I applied for the green card. I applied for the citizenship later on.”

The Trump campaign and Trump Organization representatives did not address questions about the type of visa Trump first used to enter the country, but it has been widely reported that she came here on an H-1B work visa. Writer Mickey Rapkin, who interviewed Melania for a May profile in the luxury lifestyle magazine DuJour, said she confirmed as much to him. “When I interviewed Melania, I mentioned that she’d come to New York on that H-1B visa, and she nodded in agreement,” Rapkin wrote in an email to POLITICO.

Trump’s tale of returning to Europe for periodic visa renewals is inconsistent with her holding an H-1B visa at all times she was living in New York — even if it was the lesser-known H-1B visa specifically designed for models — said multiple immigration attorneys and experts. An H-1B visa can be valid for three years and can be extended up to six years — sometimes longer — and would not require renewals in Europe every few months. If, as she has said, Trump came to New York in 1996 and obtained a green card in 2001, she likely would not have had to return to Europe even once to renew an H-1B.

Instead, Trump’s description of her periodic renewals in Europe are more consistent with someone traveling on a B-1 Temporary Business Visitor or B-2 Tourist Visa, which typically last only up to six months and do not permit employment.

If someone were to enter the United States on one of those visas with the intention of working, it could constitute visa fraud, according to Andrew Greenfield, a partner at the Washington office of Fragomen, Del Rey, Bernsen & Loewy, a firm that specializes in immigration law.

“It's quintessential,” he said. “If you enter the United States with the intention of working without authorization and you present yourself to a border agent at an airport or a seaport or a manned border and request a visa, even if there is not a Q&A — knowing that you are coming to work — you are implicitly, if not explicitly, manifesting that you intend to comply with the parameters of the visa classification for which you sought entry and were granted entry."

“There are quirky exceptions to people on a B-1 visa who are able to work — certain domestic servants who are entering the country to accompany their employers who are in the country temporarily,” added Greenfield. “But I can’t imagine that would apply to models.”

“If Melania was traveling to the U.S. on a B-1 business visa, there is a potential problem,” said a Washington-based partner of a major national immigration law firm. “She would not have been authorized to work in the U.S. while on a B-1 visa. In fact, if a customs agent encounters someone entering the U.S. on a B-1 visa and they know that the individual intends to work for a U.S. employer, the individual will usually be denied admission. In order to avoid being sent back to Slovenia, she may have had to lie about the purpose of her trip.”

Visa fraud would call into question a green card application and subsequent citizenship application, said immigration lawyers — thus raising questions about Melania Trump’s legal status, even today, despite her marriage to a U.S. citizen.

Violations of U.S. visa law are hardly unusual, particularly in the modeling industry. It was a common practice in the 1990s in New York for less scrupulous agencies to bring in foreign models to work illegally on temporary business and tourist visas, according to Sara Ziff, founder of the Model Alliance, a group that advocates improved labor standards for fashion models.

The timing of Trump’s arrival in New York remains hazy, and representatives of the Trump campaign and Trump Organization did not address questions about that timing. In a previously unpublished portion of an April interview conducted for a profile in GQ, Trump told POLITICO’s Julia Ioffe that she lived with Matthew Atanian, her first known roommate in New York, only for a few weeks. “I was busy and I was traveling a lot. And then after that, after a month of two, I found my own place,” Trump said.

But in an interview for the same profile, Atanian told Ioffe that they shared the apartment for a period that spanned 1995 to 1996, and Atanian told POLITICO this week that he and Trump shared the apartment for a total of a year to a year and a half. He said he recalled Trump leaving the country to travel home for holidays during that period.

Trump has said she came to New York in 1996, but multiple reports indicate she first started doing work there in 1995. Her personal website was taken down last month in the wake of reports that its biography section falsely credited her with earning a college degree. (Trump tweeted that the website was taken down “because it does not accurately reflect my current business and professional interests.”) An archived snapshot of that bio page describes Trump as “settling in New York in 1996,” and she told Brzezinski in January, “I came to New York 1996.”

But according to “Melania Trump: The Inside Story,” a biography published in February by two Slovenian authors — journalist Bojan Požar and publicist Igor Omerza — Trump “began moving to New York in 1995.” The book also states that Trump first met a close friend, the model Edit Molnar, “in New York in the middle of 1995.”

“In 1995 she started coming to the USA according to the jobs she was getting at fashion agencies,” wrote Požar in an email to POLITICO. “We don’t know the exact dates of those before she officially settled in New York but her visits prior to that were temporary business opportunities that she had as a model.” Požar said he learned of these first jobs in America from two fashion agents, one in Italy and the other in Vienna, and that such trips abroad were common for Eastern European models but not “technically” legal.

Požar’s timing is consistent with the New York Post’s report. The nude photos were taken in New York in 1995 for the January 1996 issue of France’s now-defunct Max Magazine, according to the tabloid.

Alé de Basseville, the photographer who shot the photos, told POLITICO that the shoot took place in a private studio near Manhattan’s Union Square. He declined to name the owner of the studio and said that he encountered Trump through Metropolitan Models, a Paris-based agency with a New York office that was then representing Trump.

To carry out the 1995 New York photo shoot legally, Trump would have required a working visa, likely an H-1B, even if she were not yet living in the United States, as her native Slovenia was not part of the State Department’s visa waiver program until 1997.

Paolo Zampolli, an Italian businessman who was then a partner in Metropolitan and is credited with sponsoring Trump’s entry into the United States and introducing her to her future husband, said that he did not recall that particular shoot or the exact timing of Trump’s first arrival in New York.

Zampolli said the models he worked with would have entered the country on either an H-1B or an O-1, a visa for foreigners who possess “extraordinary ability.” O-1 visas are frequently given to star scientists, athletes and entertainers, but because Melania Knauss (her maiden name) was an obscure model who mostly posed for advertisements and catalogs in the mid-’90s, it is highly unlikely she qualified for an O-1, which comes with an initial stay period of up to three years, said immigration attorneys. An O-1 visa would also not have required her to leave the country periodically.

Zampolli said he first met Trump in Milan and that models he worked for moved across international borders legally. “Every model we represented, we did a visa,” he said. “It’s just part of the rules.”

Even Melania’s use of the H-1B program would stand in contrast to her husband’s position today. Trump, who has made his opposition to illegal immigration the centerpiece of his campaign, has also vowed to crack down on the use of H1-B visas as president. In March, he said he would “end forever the use of the H-1B as a cheap labor program, and institute an absolute requirement to hire American workers first for every visa and immigration program. No exceptions.”

Julia Ioffe contributed to this report.



Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/m ... z4GQGl8WTO

[82_28]

No real surprise here.

“When I grew up, those things weren’t called racist”: Clint Eastwood on why he’s voting for Donald Trump

"Secretly everybody's getting tired of political correctness, kissing up," he said, "we're in a pussy generation"

In an interview in September’s “Esquire,” film icon and chair-whisperer Clint Eastwood spoke frankly about how he’d like to be able speak a lot more frankly without being accused of racism or sexism.

When asked if believed Donald Trump appropriated his trademark scowl, Eastwood said “maybe,” but then launched into a detailed, if terrible, explanation of Trump’s ostensible appeal.

“He’s onto something,” he said, “because secretly everybody’s getting tired of political correctness, kissing up. That’s the kiss-ass generation we’re in right now. We’re really in a pussy generation.”

Eastwood added that “everybody’s walking on eggshells. We see people accusing people of being racist and all kinds of stuff. When I grew up, those things weren’t called racist.”

After explaining his joy upon reading the “politically incorrect” script of “Gran Torino” for the first time, Eastwood said that while he won’t be endorsing Trump, he will be voting for him.

“What Trump is onto is he’s just saying what’s on his mind. And sometimes it’s not so good. And sometimes it’s — I can understand where he’s coming from,” he said. Which is, according to the media, a racist place.

“He’s a racist now because he’s talked about this judge,” Eastwood said, “and yeah, it’s a dumb thing to say. I mean, to predicate your opinion on the fact that the guy was born to Mexican parents or something. He’s said a lot of dumb things. So have all of them. Both sides. But everybody—the press and everybody’s going, ‘Oh, well, that’s racist,’ and they’re making a big hoodoo out of it. Just fucking get over it. It’s a sad time in history.”

http://www.salon.com/2016/08/04/when_i_ ... ald_trump/

[brainpanhandler]

The Goldwater rule is the informal name for a precept of medical ethics promulgated by the American Psychiatric Association. It forbids psychiatrists from commenting on individuals' mental state without examining them personally and being authorized by the person to make such comments.[1] The rule has no official name; it is simply Section 7.3 of the APA's ethics principles.[2]

The issue arose in the 1960s when Fact magazine published the article "The Unconscious of a Conservative: A Special Issue on the Mind of Barry Goldwater." The magazine polled psychiatrists about American Senator Barry Goldwater and whether he was fit to be president.

On occasion psychiatrists are asked for an opinion about an individual who is in the light of public attention or who has disclosed information about himself/herself through public media. In such circumstances, a psychiatrist may share with the public his or her expertise about psychiatric issues in general. However, it is unethical for a psychiatrist to offer a professional opinion unless he or she has conducted an examination and has been granted proper authorization for such a statement.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goldwater_rule

[Searcher08]

That's a well-put case, bud. I've taken the media coverage over the past year to be mocking and belittling him, and I didn't just get my mind changed per se, but this:

You know "negative" and "positive" are indistinguishable in Trump's case.

...makes me suspect we're perhaps saying the same thing anyway.

Question: do you think this more escalated, clearly stated, nakedly sneering approach is going to amount to much now -- or just fuel Trump even further?

You can guess what I think but it ain't worth much, it's a fluid and unpredictable situation and I've obviously been wrong before. I think this current programming has the dual effect of a daily reinforcement to his existing support, which may be what you are tending to see, while also guaranteeing he won't break out of it. If we think of it as marketing, they are solidifying separate demographics. A majority who think he's a mentally ill con artist and an active danger (correctly, by the way) regardless of what their politics are, and a minority who will feel all the more strongly that he was shafted and therefore must have been the heroic anti-establishment strongman they imagine. The latter will be available -- indispensable -- to later iterations of the game. Since they're just going to have to keep building The Greater Evil to maintain any semblance of a two-party system. Although I think they've finally reached the untoppable and it's obviously more vulnerable than ever, probably not before November.

This is what I have been observing as well.

A few weeks ago, some of the liberals I knew would have a glimmer of mild interest in clear fact based criticism of Clinton, now? none. Absolutely NADA. I posted a link on Facebook to the 'Clinton Cash' film in a group where most people are liberals; in an ocean of anti-Trump gifs, each with lots of echo chamber 'Hi-5's - there was not a single response. It was like it was invisible to them.
There is definitely a consolidation happening, where it is not enough that people are voting Clinton, they must be *sad* and *depressed* when other people do not. The vile DNC behaviour ? outframed as 'Hey, politics is tough'. There is *zero* conversation about the two party system having issues. Zero registration of third parties (Greens / Libertarians)

Trump seems to be doing the type of marketing that has the effect of reinforcing confirmation that people have made the right choice. There is zero interest being paid to issues like Clinton's VP; banking; climate change.

The other thing I have noticed in the past couple of weeks - seeing the process of how liberals are absorbing and re-transmitting the "Trump works for Putin" and taking what sources like Daily Beast and Daily Kos say as gospel.

On a side note, it made me ponder just how different this place (RI) is from the sort of 'discourse' one sees on Facebook, where posting a link is seen as really being engaged in deep argumentation. Responding with facts that challenge a persons viewpoint (even when done with great politeness and not in a 'make wrong / you are an idiot' frame - seems to consistently reduce people to virtually infantile states. I see that in expressing concerns about Clinton's Russia policy. Many liberals are petrified that Putin is being 'appeased' and may invade the Baltics and Poland just as Russia 'invaded' Ukraine. At least here, people can dispute and engage over facts and assumptions and methods of presentation and interpretation - on Facebook is is getting more and more isomorphic to Idiocracy - less and less a metaphor, more and more what is actually present.

In terms of ways for Trump to 'cause offense', I would expect to see him and Melania firing off some heavy calibre weaponry soon, and perhaps engaging in family bricklaying....