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  • Originally posted by GVChamp View Post
    This is why I get uncomfortable with rhetoric like "has no place." Americans do not share the values of the KKK and do not want them to have political say. That does not mean we should actually ban them, because that's not in keeping with American values anymore than the KKK itself is. Plus, it's illegal.

    CommuNazis loyal to Cersei Lannister still have free speech and free assembly rights, the right to petition their representatives, etc. If they start raising armies, we can always arrest them.
    Largely agree. However, the "Patriots" who incidentally prefer the traitor Confederacy symbols, personalities and heroes, do have their own armies, armed to the teeth. Just go to some of their channels and check out for yourselves. TH thinks they are harmless. I humbly disagree.
    "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" ~ Epicurus

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    • Originally posted by Firestorm View Post
      Trump's latest comments didn't go down very well I suppose.

      Trump announces end to manufacturing council amid resignations




      Trump's insistence on repeatedly shooting himself in the foot is astounding. As is the ability of his supporters to forgive and defend him for anything and everything.
      and these are people he looked up to and wanted to be recognized and accepted by. They run real companies while he pretty much runs some hotel resorts and branding.

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      • Originally posted by tbm3fan View Post
        and these are people he looked up to and wanted to be recognized and accepted by. They run real companies while he pretty much runs some hotel resorts and branding.
        Say what you like, he has built up a billion dollar business by building and running his "not real" businesses. Whatever he is (racist, demagogue, stubborn, combative, ) he is no fool. He is a master marketer and self promoter and he has used that to effectively built his net worth.
        "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" ~ Epicurus

        Comment


        • Originally posted by antimony View Post
          Say what you like, he has built up a billion dollar business by building and running his "not real" businesses. Whatever he is (racist, demagogue, stubborn, combative, ) he is no fool. He is a master marketer and self promoter and he has used that to effectively built his net worth.
          Actually say what you like. He may or may not be worth a billion as no one will ever know. What we do know is that he craves attention and recognition and he wanted it from those he considers titans of the business world. No doubt because he feels that if they acknowledge him then he is also truly a titan. Strange, sick mind so who knows what bounces around inside that head including him at times.

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          • Originally posted by tbm3fan View Post
            Actually say what you like. He may or may not be worth a billion as no one will ever know. What we do know is that he craves attention and recognition and he wanted it from those he considers titans of the business world. No doubt because he feels that if they acknowledge him then he is also truly a titan. Strange, sick mind so who knows what bounces around inside that head including him at times.
            I do not deny the second part (him craving attention). But he has built up a huge personal empire, that is undeniable. Serious estimates have put his wealth at a few billion, short of what he may like to project, but still very very wealthy.
            "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" ~ Epicurus

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            • Ironically, Lee was opposed to erecting statues of himself and other civil war leaders in the belief that doing so would retard national healing and lead to destructive divisions. He was right. However, the defeated south went on to embrace the idea that it hadn't fought to retain slavery but for honor and noble constitutional reasons. That idea became known as the "Lost Cause", and many books, articles, speeches, etc were generated in support. In the process Lee's image as a great man/leader was blown up into god-like proportions. Hence all the statues erected well after the war was over and after he was long gone (died 1877). As a man, he was a great leader and tactician, but his private life was marred by cruelty to his slaves and (IMO) disloyalty to the Union. Of course, people thought differently in those days. States commanded great loyalty from their citizens. Standards were different. He believed, as many did then, the black man was better off in service to white masters, although he held that things would change in time, but only when God wanted them to. The "Lost Cause" has largely been discredited, but it still has many followers.
              To be Truly ignorant, Man requires an Education - Plato

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                Originally posted by antimony View Post
                I do not deny the second part (him craving attention). But he has built up a huge personal empire, that is undeniable. Serious estimates have put his wealth at a few billion, short of what he may like to project, but still very very wealthy.
                He built a tangible real-estate business that somewhat (not fully) collapsed in the 90s. His real genius was marketing and his ability to bounce back to a light-asset model, where he would lend his "brand".

                But what if he had invested the his seed money into stock market index. Had he done so instead of going into real-estate, his wealth would have been much bigger. But perhaps not his image and power.

                http://fortune.com/2015/08/20/donald-trump-index-funds/

                https://finance.yahoo.com/news/why-p...233020366.html

                https://www.economist.com/news/unite...rs-tower-white

                Of course, all the depends where the point of measurement was taken. Point is, he missed out at least 2 bull markets.

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                • As if to reinforce just how out of touch Trump is with what is going on, Tuesday he shared & then deleted an image of a train running over someone with a CNN logo over their face. He is making the indefensible an everyday occurrence.

                  Meanwhile, Trump has shut down the Strategic & Policy Forum, his main business council, when it became clear the members were going to disband it themselves. Earlier in the week the head of Merck quit the council saying this:

                  America’s leaders must honour our fundamental values by clearly rejecting expressions of hatred, bigotry and group supremacy, which run counter to the American ideal that all people are created equal....As CEO of Merck and as a matter of personal conscience, I feel a responsibility to take a stand against intolerance and extremism.
                  The heads of Johnson & Johnson, United Technologies, Corning, Under Armour, Intel, GE, the President of the Alliance for American Manufacturing and the AFL-CIO representative all followed suit.

                  This can't simply be dismissed as 'left wing hysteria' or blamed on 'the MSM'. These guys should be trump's natural constituency. Businessmen like himself. They know he has made himself toxic.
                  sigpic

                  Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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                  • Originally posted by antimony View Post
                    Say what you like...
                    Whatever he is (racist, demagogue, stubborn, combative, ) he is no fool. He is a master marketer and self-promotor and he has used that to effectively built his net worth.
                    He never held any public office prior and got himself elected to the highest office in the land.
                    That in itself speaks to his abilities.
                    Last edited by PeeCoffee; 17 Aug 17,, 02:56.
                    Real eyes realize real lies.

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                    • Some of the 'white nationalists' in Charlottesville took time out from their busy schedule of pretending to care about history and killing people to threaten a local synagogue. Wonder if any of the 'good people' Trump was talking about were there?

                      For half an hour, three men dressed in fatigues and armed with semi-automatic rifles stood across the street from the temple. Had they tried to enter, I don’t know what I could have done to stop them, but I couldn’t take my eyes off them, either. Perhaps the presence of our armed guard deterred them. Perhaps their presence was just a coincidence, and I’m paranoid. I don’t know.

                      Several times, parades of Nazis passed our building, shouting, “There's the synagogue!” followed by chants of “Seig Heil” and other anti-Semitic language. Some carried flags with swastikas and other Nazi symbols.

                      A guy in a white polo shirt walked by the synagogue a few times, arousing suspicion. Was he casing the building, or trying to build up courage to commit a crime? We didn’t know. Later, I noticed that the man accused in the automobile terror attack wore the same polo shirt as the man who kept walking by our synagogue; apparently it’s the uniform of a white supremacist group. Even now, that gives me a chill.

                      When services ended, my heart broke as I advised congregants that it would be safer to leave the temple through the back entrance rather than through the front, and to please go in groups.

                      This is 2017 in the United States of America.

                      Later that day, I arrived on the scene shortly after the car plowed into peaceful protesters. It was a horrific and bloody scene.

                      Soon, we learned that Nazi websites had posted a call to burn our synagogue. I sat with one of our rabbis and wondered whether we should go back to the temple to protect the building. What could I do if I were there? Fortunately, it was just talk – but we had already deemed such an attack within the realm of possibilities, taking the precautionary step of removing our Torahs, including a Holocaust scroll, from the premises.

                      Again: This is in America in 2017.

                      At the end of the day, we felt we had no choice but to cancel a Havdalah service at a congregant’s home. It had been announced on a public Facebook page, and we were fearful that Nazi elements might be aware of the event. Again, we sought police protection – not a battalion of police, just a single officer – but we were told simply to cancel the event.
                      http://reformjudaism.org/blog/2017/0...munity-presses
                      sigpic

                      Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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                      • Originally posted by antimony View Post
                        Largely agree. However, the "Patriots" who incidentally prefer the traitor Confederacy symbols, personalities and heroes, do have their own armies, armed to the teeth. Just go to some of their channels and check out for yourselves. TH thinks they are harmless. I humbly disagree.
                        I never said they were harmless. Not once. Nor did I even imply that they were harmless. Don't put words in my mouth.

                        This is in fact what I did say:

                        "They can cause trouble. They can garner headlines. They can capture the nation's attention for a few days, or weeks at the very most. They can even kill people."

                        "...there will be tragedies like Charlottesville, just as there has been for decades, centuries, really, no question about it."


                        My point was, and again what I did say, was they were incapable of an "uprising" or "civil war" or whatever other dire scare words that have been used.

                        You say they have they have "their own armies". I disagree there as well.

                        What they have is armed rabble of undisciplined punks, thugs and lowlifes, most them with a massive inferiority complex, and that lack a true cohesive unity.
                        Their only motive is hate and hate will only take you so far before you start turning on those around you, your supposed allies.
                        “He was the most prodigious personification of all human inferiorities. He was an utterly incapable, unadapted, irresponsible, psychopathic personality, full of empty, infantile fantasies, but cursed with the keen intuition of a rat or a guttersnipe. He represented the shadow, the inferior part of everybody’s personality, in an overwhelming degree, and this was another reason why they fell for him.”

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                        • Originally posted by TopHatter View Post
                          I never said they were harmless. Not once. Nor did I even imply that they were harmless. Don't put words in my mouth.

                          This is in fact what I did say:

                          "They can cause trouble. They can garner headlines. They can capture the nation's attention for a few days, or weeks at the very most. They can even kill people."

                          "...there will be tragedies like Charlottesville, just as there has been for decades, centuries, really, no question about it."


                          My point was, and again what I did say, was they were incapable of an "uprising" or "civil war" or whatever other dire scare words that have been used.

                          You say they have they have "their own armies". I disagree there as well.

                          What they have is armed rabble of undisciplined punks, thugs and lowlifes, most them with a massive inferiority complex, and that lack a true cohesive unity.
                          Their only motive is hate and hate will only take you so far before you start turning on those around you, your supposed allies.
                          Not trying to put words into your mouth, but if all they can do, as you say, is take over a nature center or whatever, they are essentially harmless in the larger scheme of things. I believe they are capable of much more than that, if they manage to mobilize.

                          Also, they are not necessarily undisciplined. Some of them are veterans , many still are ex cops and civilian contractors. Even if they are not, many of them spend a bunch of time and money training (more than they should, I must say) for SHTF, WROL, Rodney King riots and other asinine situations. These classes include the whole gamut of small arms (rifle, shotgun, pistol, sniper) and hand to hand.

                          In a pitched riot with antifa or other militant left (armed with clubs or whatever), these guys will mow down everyone else, simply because they are better armed and are trained in their arms. After any incident like that, the Democrats will continue shrieking like the headless chickens they are; the Republicans will continue hemming and hawing and sending out lame messages about "love" and "unity" without doing anything else.

                          As for Unity, I see Trump's base of 25% coalescing around him, not going away. They may split up later, for now they are focused on those threatening their "culture" as they all it.
                          "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" ~ Epicurus

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                          • If this week has showed anything its that the extreme right who support Trump are small in numbers & isolated. Look at how quickly a remarkably broad cross section of people have turned on Trump for a failure to clearly denounce extremism. That should provide a clue as to how Americans of all persuasions view that sort of extremism. There may still be a hard core of 25-30% who support Trump, but I'd argue that once you strip out the 'anti-Dems' and rusted on GOPers who are merely tolerating Trump out of that number you don't get a big figure really committed to him. Certainly not many prepared to take up arms for him.

                            If an organized group from either side perpetrates the sort of mass killing you are talking about - shooting protesters en masse, the nation will turn on them & anyone who supports them. It won't be the start of something, it will be the end of something. There are laws presently that make cracking down on these groups more difficult than on 'external' groups - which is how Muslim terrorism is defined. Watch how quickly that changes if a tooled up bunch of nutters decided to turn a protest into a bloodbath. All the 'whataboutism' in the world won't stop that.
                            sigpic

                            Win nervously lose tragically - Reds C C

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                            • Most of the people I've chatted with about Trump's press encounter yesterday have not heard or read the entire transcript. After reading it, it occurred to me that the media and Trump critics in general have overlooked the possibility that Trump was talking about two separate issues at the same time. First there is the issue about the white supremacy movement, which he condemned in the aftermath of the Charlottesville violence. Then there is the issue about how the violence started. The latter is what he focused on yesterday. Most of the MSM interpreted his criticism of counter-protesters for their part in inciting violence as repudiation of his strong condemnation the other day of the KKK, etc. I don't see that. What I see is a man bickering over who started the riot.

                              Scenes like this make you wonder, although the hapless guy in the CSA uniform wasn't part of white nationalist group.



                              http://www.dailyprogress.com/news/lo...e2637cc8d.html


                              Then there are letters to the local Charlottesville newspaper, some of which mimic Trump's view of the riot. http://www.dailyprogress.com/opinion...to_the_editor/

                              Either way, Trump erred in getting into a pissing match with the media yesterday not only because it invited MSM to pile on, but because it detracted from the real business of the day--in this case, infrastructure. This man is dangerously impulsive.
                              To be Truly ignorant, Man requires an Education - Plato

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                              • This is what I am talking about. Look at them , not just their equipment, but how they handle them. These fellows are trained, much more than whatever Antifa has. If you look closely, some of them even have US army flag and unit patches sprinkled about

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                                "Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil? Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?" ~ Epicurus

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