2020 American Political Scene

[Double Edge]

DE, Trump should not have meddled into state's jurisdiction (I feel), i.e., law enforcement. There was no need to give the statement 'when the looting....', psychologically speaking he wants to shoot people who loot. This won't find resonance with most sane people, as lives lost due to gun violence is high in US, and the President doesn't define law & order.

When Rahul Kanwal mentions his brother from NYC feels safer in Delhi than back home that is saying something. Delhi wasn't exactly safe a few months back and NYC has not been dangerous since the 90s.

Also calling in the Nat Guards shows an abject failure of the states to contain the violence that unleashed from the protests. Now, my dislike for extreme positions is known, but see this -> Police point finger at gangs and local groups for riot damages, contradicting Trump's claims.

When the local force is overwhelmed there is no other option. See how coordinated the perps were. Everybody knew where to go. We'd snap mobile internet in this situation. They don't do that in the US.

Trump was quick to pin episodes of rioting and looting that broke out amid the protests on Antifa, a far-left anti-government movement, and on May 31, US Attorney General William Barr said the Justice Department would treat violence instigated by "Antifa and other similar groups" as acts of domestic terrorism.

While federal law enforcement officials say intelligence gathered so far in dozens of investigations shows that some of the chaos was fanned or carried out by agitators from a mix of extremists across the ideological spectrum, both left and right, federal and local officials also say that local criminal groups, including gangs and neighborhood crews known for other criminal activity, posed a major part of the disorder.

In Los Angeles, police observed a caravan of cars preparing together ahead of a looting spree. In New York, investigators believe it was "opportunist action by regular criminal groups" that led to the ransacking of blocks of ritzy SoHo stores. And in Philadelphia, three men with local criminal records have already been charged with attempting to steal from ATMs.

On Monday, Barr described rioters as a "witch's brew" of extremists, telling Fox News that there remained a number of "very focused investigations" into suspects connected to Antifa, and he suggested that allegations of explicit ties may be added into some already-public prosecutions at a later stage.

In the Los Angeles area, police watched caravans of cars travel to high-end shopping districts and dozens of people pour out to methodically target retail stores near Beverly Hills, West Hollywood and Santa Monica. Some looters then set fires. Some tried to mix in with the protests, while others didn't bother to pretend, police say.

One Los Angeles Police Department supervisor told CNN that undercover officers saw groups of vehicles arrive and then "watched them staging, putting on their gloves and masks, before going into the stores. This was on purpose. This was staged. They were using Snapchat and social media to organize this."

Reading that article and so much is familiar. A group of gangs infiltrates and takes advantage. External elements then take over. Sounds so Delhi, except there the idea was to kill people, not merely loot and get the other side to take all the blame.

Trump says AntiFa, we said radical elements infilitrated and exploited the situation and going by the press coverage scored a PR win.

And this, Donald Trump to restart election rallies on key slavery date. He divides the country with his tweets, his speeches, his actions, well everything. How can someone..............anyone insult a dead person (McCain). I might have personal enmity with someone, but that ends with my or his death. Donald Trump is not the norm, he is the exception in American multiculturalism. Once he's gone, someone who repeats him will never win, at least for another 20 years. I understand why the Republicans are not saying anything, they're power hungry politicians after all.

So that is what BBC says, now read what PBS says. Notice the difference in tone ? starts with the title.

BBC is preachy and PBS is telling you what happened. One's negative, the other positive.

Meaning if he didn't pick Juneteenth BBC'd have found some thing else to bash him on.

Why is BBC telling me what Biden thinks. Biden isn't relevant here.

BBC only quotes Trump saying Tulsa did well with Covid. PBS tells you the data.

You know the number these outlets pull on us because we don't have a leftie in charge. They're doing the exact same thing to him.

Modi and Trump cannot be compared. Just 1 example: corruption. Corruption in India is endemic, while in US people don't have to pay bribes to get a death certificate. This is my personal experience. Indians got sick of Congress, corruption, nepotism, favouritism, so many things.

Both are economic nationalists. Modi was Trump before Trump became Trump.

They just call it something else. The same deal is happening. Democracy does not come cheap or for free. If i'm going to bankroll a political campaign i expect windfall profits from the party i'm donating to. Either they make laws that help or not change ones that do. Somebody once compared us by saying in the US the corruption is in the law making and in India its in the law breaking.

[tbm3fan]

Trump's siding with the cops which you would expect given the law & order situation.

He sees it as a one off in a large number of encounters with more nefarious types

This law and order shtick has been part and parcel of the GOP since Nixon in 1968. First off Nixon was racist as many were in his early days. Nixon knew exactly what he was doing in 68 when he preached law and order to combat rising crime. Forget the fact that rising crime coincided with Baby Boomers but the incidents per 100,000 was steady. No matter and he directed his speech to the South to peel them off. Law and order in the South meant keep blacks criminals in jail like always. Just look up what Erlichman had to say about it. Clear as day.

Reagan used the same mantra of law and order but pivoted to drugs. Look up what Lee Atwater had to say about it. Cocaine became the designer drugs of the white middle class and up while crack became the drug for the lower class particularly blacks as it was cheap. So we got easy sentences for cocaine and long terms for simple crack possession. Once again when Reagan used the term those in the South understood what he was saying since that is what they always did with blacks. You do realize slavery didn't end in 1865 as it continued all the way up to 1964 when LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act. Even then the South would have none of it.

Trump is now doing the exact same things. He will vilify an unnamed group (cough, cough, blacks) and those who feel exactly the same, and there are lots, will understand the language he speaks. You don't understand it which is why it goes over your head. It's a secret code and you need an Enigma which are hard to find.

[TopHatter]

Watch how he approaches them. He is confronting them. What is that man doing there ?

This is what i saw


Tell me what the man was doing there. Has he made a statement ?

Is it advisable for anyone to do that when a phalanx of riot cops approaches.

No, it is not. Not in the US, not anywhere in the world.

Those guys are all pumped up, they are not in a talking mood.

My experience with these people was watching them in France. CRS i think they're called. They wear berets.

They come charging, screaming and hit anything that is in their path.

Only course of action, is out of their way and quick.

You're deranged.

[Double Edge]

I am looking at the words literally yes. Because that's what counts when it comes to incitement or not.

If it qualified as such people would be filing cases about it. Not complaining in the press.

[Double Edge]

This law and order shtick has been part and parcel of the GOP since Nixon in 1968. First off Nixon was racist as many were in his early days. Nixon knew exactly what he was doing in 68 when he preached law and order to combat rising crime. Forget the fact that rising crime coincided with Baby Boomers but the incidents per 100,000 was steady. No matter and he directed his speech to the South to peel them off. Law and order in the South meant keep blacks criminals in jail like always. Just look up what Erlichman had to say about it. Clear as day.

Reagan used the same mantra of law and order but pivoted to drugs. Look up what Lee Atwater had to say about it. Cocaine became the designer drugs of the white middle class and up while crack became the drug for the lower class particularly blacks as it was cheap. So we got easy sentences for cocaine and long terms for simple crack possession. Once again when Reagan used the term those in the South understood what he was saying since that is what they always did with blacks. You do realize slavery didn't end in 1865 as it continued all the way up to 1964 when LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act. Even then the South would have none of it.

Trump is now doing the exact same things. He will vilify an unnamed group (cough, cough, blacks) and those who feel exactly the same, and there are lots, will understand the language he speaks. You don't understand it which is why it goes over your head. It's a secret code and you need an Enigma which are hard to find.

I am looking at the words literally yes. Because that's what counts when it comes to incitement or not.

If it qualified as such people would be filing cases in court. Not complaining in the press.

See, that is the difference between your country and mine. What he said passes for free speech.

Not in mine. Some would say this caused offence and demand an apology be issued otherwise the legal prceedings would commence.

[DOR]

The US police need to have a look at Hong Kong. Year after year, protest march after protest march, the police are out numbered 1,000 to 1, and they know it. So, they lay back and play it cool.

Then, one year they don’t.

Hong Kong,
RIP

[tbm3fan]

I am looking at the words literally yes. Because that's what counts when it comes to incitement or not.

If it qualified as such people would be filing cases in court. Not complaining in the press.

See, that is the difference between your country and mine. What he said passes for free speech.

Not in mine. Some would say this caused offence and demand an apology be issued otherwise the legal prceedings would commence.

Your problem, and it is a big one, is that you are not native American any more than I am native Indian. Notice I do not comment on India internally as I have zero basis for any understanding given my totally different cultural upbringing. The same applies to you. You would be better served sitting back, reading and observing rather than trying to fit your unique views propagated by your background in India and try to transfer them to the United States. Doesn't work and will never work.

[tbm3fan]

The US police need to have a look at Hong Kong. Year after year, protest march after protest march, the police are out numbered 1,000 to 1, and they know it. So, they lay back and play it cool.

Then, one year they don’t.

Hong Kong,
RIP

Same up in Seattle around a police station. The more the police pushed the bigger the push back. Of course, you push me hard my reflex kicks in and I will push you hard. Anything else is secondary at that moment. The police have since backed away, took down their barricades and guess what... complete calm. So simple but beyond the reach of cavemen.

[Oracle]

This law and order shtick has been part and parcel of the GOP since Nixon in 1968. First off Nixon was racist as many were in his early days. Nixon knew exactly what he was doing in 68 when he preached law and order to combat rising crime. Forget the fact that rising crime coincided with Baby Boomers but the incidents per 100,000 was steady. No matter and he directed his speech to the South to peel them off. Law and order in the South meant keep blacks criminals in jail like always. Just look up what Erlichman had to say about it. Clear as day.

Reagan used the same mantra of law and order but pivoted to drugs. Look up what Lee Atwater had to say about it. Cocaine became the designer drugs of the white middle class and up while crack became the drug for the lower class particularly blacks as it was cheap. So we got easy sentences for cocaine and long terms for simple crack possession. Once again when Reagan used the term those in the South understood what he was saying since that is what they always did with blacks. You do realize slavery didn't end in 1865 as it continued all the way up to 1964 when LBJ signed the Civil Rights Act. Even then the South would have none of it.

Trump is now doing the exact same things. He will vilify an unnamed group (cough, cough, blacks) and those who feel exactly the same, and there are lots, will understand the language he speaks. You don't understand it which is why it goes over your head. It's a secret code and you need an Enigma which are hard to find.

Cocaine and crack (same thing in slightly different forms) both are narcotic substances, and if there are different sentences for the two, then it is plain discrimination.

[Bigfella]

If anyone doubts just how violent & authoritarian the US right has become pop on to a chat board with lots of right wing posters & observe the calls for the US army to be sent into Seattle. Plenty of people straight out calling for the US Government to commit mass murder and destruction in an American city.

Remember the good old days when the same people decided Obama was going to take over Texas under cover of a scheduled military exercise?, or when they cheered as right wing activists pointed guns at LEOs at the Bundy ranch? Now they are practically begging trump to deploy the military & kill their fellow citizens.

Personally I have little time for a bunch of entitled morons declaring a 'police free zone' in the middle of a major city, but thus far this has been mostly peaceful. Local & State authorities have all the resources they need & will likely negotiate an end to this which is either peaceful, or dramatically less violent than the wet dreams of right wing cyber warriors.

[Gun Grape]

CJCS statement.

[Bigfella]

Well done Gen. Milley for being prepared to admit error. A pretty clear message there about the use of acting service personnel for political purposes. I would love to know what sort of conversations he had & with whom about that photo op.

[Double Edge]

Over 20 odd blocks they drive though on 5th Ave and see how many stores got attacked

What were the cops doing ?

[TopHatter]

Bolton’s Bombshell Memoir: Trump Asked China’s President to Help Him Win the Election

President Trump appealed to China’s President Xi Jinping to help him win the 2020 election by increasing the Chinese government’s agricultural purchases from American farmers, former National Security Adviser John Bolton writes in his bombshell forthcoming memoir.

During a one-on-one meeting at the G20 Summit in 2019, Trump “stunningly, turned the conversation to the coming U.S. presidential election, alluding to China’s economic capability to affect the ongoing campaigns, pleading with Xi to ensure he’d win,” Bolton writes, according to an excerpt in the Wall Street Journal.

It was one of several disturbing instances Bolton outlines of Trump appealing to foreign dictators for his own gains—a pattern of behavior that he says went far beyond the Ukraine aid saga.

Trump was willing to kill off criminal probes against Turkish and Chinese companies to “in effect, give personal favors to dictators he liked,” Bolton writes, alleging that Trump was willing to intervene in probes against Turkey’s Halkbank and China’s ZTE to curry favor with either country’s leaders.

“The pattern looked like obstruction of justice as a way of life, which we couldn’t accept,” Bolton writes.

Several media outlets got their hands on an advanced copy of Bolton’s book, The Room Where It Happened, on Wednesday, ahead of its release next week—and despite the Department of Justice’s attempts to halt its publication.

In it, Bolton paints a picture of his former boss as an idiot who thought Finland was part of Russia, a megalomaniac who governs based on gut instinct, and the butt of jokes from even his most trusted aides. He joked about executing American journalists, delivered an autographed copy of Elton John’s Rocket Man to Kim Jong Un and thought invading Venezuela would be “cool,” Bolton writes.

‘He is so full of shit’
Bolton makes no qualms about throwing Secretary of State Mike Pompeo under the bus in the 592-page book.

He writes that, during Trump’s 2018 meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, Pompeo slipped Bolton a note that referred to Trump. It said: “He is so full of shit.”

Bolton says that he and Pompeo also shared their disdain for the president after Trump had a phone call with South Korea’s president in the lead up to the 2018 summit with Kim. Pompeo told Bolton he was “having a cardiac arrest” after listening in on the call. Bolton sympathized with Pompeo, describing it as a “near death experience.”

In another instance, Bolton writes that Trump once told him that former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had used a sexist obscenity to describe Nikki Haley, then the ambassador to the United Nations.

Bolton doubted it was true but found it yet another example of Trump trying to pit staff against each other. In fact, Haley was so highly regarded inside the White House that Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump floated the idea of her replacing Vice President Mike Pence in the 2020 ticket. Bolton said it would be a mistake, and Trump seemed to agree.

Other staff routinely flirted with quitting in disgust. “What if we have a real crisis like 9/11 with the way he makes decisions?” former Chief of Staff John Kelly said as he contemplated resigning one day.

“He second-guessed people’s motives, saw conspiracies behind rocks, and remained stunningly uninformed on how to run the White House, let alone the huge federal government,” Bolton writes, adding that Trump was singularly obsessed with winning a second term.

Support for internment camps and foreign interference
Some of the most damning revelations in the book, however, are Bolton’s accusations of Trump’s willingness to interfere in criminal investigations, and use foreign powers to achieve his domestic aims. In turn, foreign leaders appeared happy to appease the president as a means of manipulation.

During the same G20 meeting that he asked for Xi’s help to win the election, Trump expressed support for the Chinese government’s use of internment camps for 1 million Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang, the book says. They have repeatedly been exposed as extraordinarily inhumane to China’s ethnic minority.

“According to our interpreter,” Bolton writes, “Trump said that Xi should go ahead with building the camps, which Trump thought was exactly the right thing to do.”

When Xi said he wanted to work with Trump for another six years, Trump replied that people thought the two-term constitutional limit on presidents should be removed. Xi replied that the U.S. had too many elections, and he didn’t want Trump to lose. Trump nodded approvingly, Bolton wrote.

In another example of foreign manipulation during a 2019 phone call, Russian President Vladimir Putin compared Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaidó to failed presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. It was, Bolton writes, part of a “brilliant display of Soviet style propaganda” aimed at boosting support for Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro. It “largely persuaded Trump,” he adds.

Bolton says he was so alarmed by Trump’s willingness to do favors for dictators like Erdogan and Xi that he discussed them with Attorney General William Barr.

For example, Trump told Erdogan that Halkbank’s legal issues—related to violating the administration’s sanctions on Iran—would disappear once the “Obama people” in the Southern District of New York were “replaced by his people,” Bolton writes.

Bolton claims that Barr was also worried about Trump’s behavior—but it’s not clear what resulted from their conversation.

‘Deeply disturbing’ Ukraine allegations
Democrats and Republicans have been united in their criticism of Bolton, who refused to testify before the House during impeachment proceedings but instead took a $2 million book contract.

House impeachment manager Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said on Wednesday that Bolton “ran and hid” when it truly mattered.

“It is curious to me that he now has something to say when he could have stepped forward as a patriot when they stakes were high and the president was on trial,” he said. “He ran and hid in the other direction.”

In his book, Bolton confirms that Trump did explicitly link security aid for Ukraine to investigations involving Biden and Hillary Clinton. Trump said on August 20 that “he wasn’t in favor of sending them anything until all the Russia-investigation materials related to Clinton and Biden had been turned over,” Bolton writes, adding that Pompeo and Defense Secretary Mark Esper tried eight to 10 times to get Trump to release the aid.

He calls Trump’s decision to hold aid “deeply disturbing” but stops short of supporting impeachment. Instead, he says Democrats badly bungled the impeachment proceedings.

“I thought the whole affair was bad policy, questionable legally and unacceptable as presidential behavior,” he writes.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) tweeted on Wednesday that Bolton’s staff “showed real courage” by testifying during impeachment hearings.

“When Bolton was asked, he refused, and said he’d sue if subpoenaed,” Schiff said in a statement. “Instead, he saved it for a book. Bolton may be an author, but he’s no patriot.”

Mopping up for Jared and Ivanka
Bolton writes of his disdain for Kushner and Ivanka Trump’s constant efforts to insert themselves in foreign policy and domestic affairs.

When Bolton learned that Kushner was going to be calling the finance minister of Turkey, he briefed Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Mnuchin “on this new ‘son-in-law channel’ and they both exploded.” To Pompeo, it was yet another example of Kushner’s meddling in international negotiations, as he did with the “never quite ready Middle East peace plan.”

In late 2018, Trump came under fire for writing a bizarre defense of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman over the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. But, according to Bolton, the main goal of the exclamation point-laden statement was to draw attention away from Ivanka using her personal email for government business.

“This will divert from Ivanka,” Trump said, according to the book. “If I read the statement in person, that will take over the Ivanka thing.”

Damning books on Trump are hardly rare but Bolton’s book is the first to be written by such a high-ranking administration officials, and a lifelong conservative, who was present for some of the most consequential foreign policy decisions.

Bolton, a vocal Russia and North Korea hawk, became Trump’s third national security adviser in 2018 and had aims of withdrawing the U.S. from several international agreements, like the Iran nuclear deal.

He resigned late September after clashing with Trump over several foreign policy directives. Naturally, Trump claimed he fired him.
________________
John Bolton is a fucking coward. Not a shred of courage in his useless body.

Also, let's pretend that Bolton has conjured up fully half of this book out of thin air and his imagination: Donald Trump is STILL a fucking criminal.

[astralis]

back during the impeachment he made it clear that he was willing to testify...but only if Congress "compelled" him to do so.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opini...u-might-think/

he thought that it was a done deal because it would have only taken 4 GOP Senators to get him to testify. only 2 voted for it.

it's not a matter of him being a coward. Bolton betrayed his country for money.

as did 51 other GOP Senators.