George Will on Trump

Friday Aug 8th, George Will, who is more a Conservative than most here who usurp that title, said of the Trump administration, ”What Mr. Trump is doing happily, looking on the bright side - which I’m not inclined to do, he (Trump) has become an inadvertent educator. This term of his is going to be a long seminar on the wisdom of the Founders.”

In which he was forecasting an American people becoming educated on just how bad an “Imperial Presidency” can be and how much the founding fathers had warned us against just that.

ModernDiogenes said:

Friday Aug 8th, George Will, who is more a Conservative than most here who usurp that title, said of the Trump administration, ”What Mr. Trump is doing happily, looking in the bright side - which I’m not inclined to do, he (Trump) has become an inadvertent educator. This term of his is going to be a long seminar on the wisdom of the founders.”

I’m which he was forecasting an American people becoming educated on just how bad an “Imperial Presidency” can be and how much the founding fathers had warned us against just that.

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If any of the protections were in place against folks like trump were used as they were meant just for someone like him - from the EC to conviction in the senate - Republicans would have set the constitution on fire. They're trying to do that now because they want the whole ball of wax. They want blue state money, they just don't want us to have any power or say in the country.

George Will is a woke kommanyst who's just upset that Donald pushed out old school conservatives in favor of manly, godly, patriotic, ***** grabbing grifters.

ModernDiogenes said:

Friday Aug 8th, George Will, who is more a Conservative than most here who usurp that title, said of the Trump administration, ”What Mr. Trump is doing happily, looking on the bright side - which I’m not inclined to do, he (Trump) has become an inadvertent educator. This term of his is going to be a long seminar on the wisdom of the Founders.”

In which he was forecasting an American people becoming educated on just how bad an “Imperial Presidency” can be and how much the founding fathers had warned us against just that.

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This is part of why I think this country needs to go through this political temper tantrum. There will no doubt be a heavy price to pay in a variety of areas, but the complacency that exists among Americans that everything will always be ok needs to be threatened every so often just to remind us bad things can happen anywhere. While there's the aspect of a unitary executive and all the crap that implies, I think the bigger danger is both parties fall into the trap of using the kind of gutter politics Trump uses as the way forward.

"If you're not prepared to lose an election, you're not qualified to win an election."

Paraphrased from a Will interview post Nov. 2020.

One of my initial complaints about Trump was his lack of conservative values. His followers have no values, other that worshipping Trump.

My complaint about the old guy is his hostile takeover of the US with the intent to shape this country in his corrupt image with a group of corrupted wealthy people and supported by a group of corruptible, opportunistic wanna-be elites.

ElChupacabra said:

This is part of why I think this country needs to go through this political temper tantrum. There will no doubt be a heavy price to pay in a variety of areas, but the complacency that exists among Americans that everything will always be ok needs to be threatened every so often just to remind us bad things can happen anywhere. While there's the aspect of a unitary executive and all the crap that implies, I think the bigger danger is both parties fall into the trap of using the kind of gutter politics Trump uses as the way forward.

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Elections tell politicians what the voters want. Voters want politicians who will do whatever it takes, cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job' done. Dems need to listen or they won't be a major force in politics. The days of 'we go high, when they go low' have to be over until the voters prioritize integrety, honesty and decency over partisan concerns.

btthegreat said:

Elections tell politicians what the voters want. Voters want politicians who will do whatever it takes, cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job' done. Dems need to listen or they won't be a major force in politics. The days of 'we go high, when they go low' have to be over until the voters prioritize integrety, honesty and decency over partisan concerns.

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Yeah, I think this is unfortunately the way we're heading.

ElChupacabra said:

Yeah, I think this is unfortunately the way we're heading.

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We HAVE to. There isn't time to wait for this toxin to cycle out.

Democrats didn't lose the white house for not doing enough gutter politics. They lost because Republicans had a narrative for what people's issues were (the problem is immigrants and US getting cheated on trade) while the Democratic message was "the status quo is great, Joe Biden is the best!" Democrats are still doing 1990s politics in the era of populism.

Michael Cole said:

"If you're not prepared to lose an election, you're not qualified to win an election."

Paraphrased from a Will interview post Nov. 2020.

One of my initial complaints about Trump was his lack of conservative values. His followers have no values, other that worshipping Trump.

Click to expand...

btthegreat said:

Elections tell politicians what the voters want. Voters want politicians who will do whatever it takes, cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job' done.

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Disagree. If Americans wanted a president that cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job done, Traitor Trump’s polling numbers wouldn’t be underwater.

Traitor Trump’s plurality popular vote win of roughly 33% of all eligible voters was mostly based on apathy and disgust with both parties.

Even considering that, the race was still the Dems to lose.

Biden stayed in the race for much too long, IMO, before finally stepping aside grudgingly to Harris who, along with much of Biden’s administration, lied and attempted to cover for Biden’s obvious mental decline, which severely undermined her own credibility.

Harris did a fair, not great IMO, job with the limited time she had to campaign, but failed to earn enough trust/confidence of voters.

So now, Traitor Trump is giving Americans the shit show in a dumpster fire on steroids administration that most of us expected.

btthegreat said:

Dems need to listen or they won't be a major force in politics. The days of 'we go high, when they go low' have to be over until the voters prioritize integrety, honesty and decency over partisan concerns.

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Agree. Screw going high. Fight MAGAt Republicans on their level, but stick to the facts.

Second, and every bit as important, Dems need to pick/coalesce around a strong moderate Dem candidate with a history of working across the aisle with Republicans to take care of America’s business for all Americans, and the sooner the better.

RaleBulgarian said:

Disagree. If Americans wanted a president that cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job done, Traitor Trump’s polling numbers wouldn’t be underwater.

Traitor Trump’s plurality popular vote win of roughly 33% of all eligible voters was mostly based on apathy and disgust with both parties.

Even considering that, the race was still the Dems to lose.

Biden stayed in the race for much too long, IMO, before finally stepping aside grudgingly to Harris who, along with much of Biden’s administration, lied and attempted to cover for Biden’s obvious mental decline, which severely undermined her own credibility.

Harris did a fair, not great IMO, job with the limited time she had to campaign, but failed to earn enough trust/confidence of voters.

So now, Traitor Trump is giving Americans the shit show in a dumpster fire on steroids administration that most of us expected.

Agree. Screw going high. Fight MAGAt Republicans on their level, but stick to the facts.

Second, and every bit as important, Dems need to pick/coalesce around a strong moderate Dem candidate with a history of working across the aisle with Republicans to take care of America’s business for all Americans, and the sooner the better.

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My post was about voters, not Americans. One is a subset of the other. Pluralities is what presidential elections are all about now. I don't give a rat's ass about polling numbers.

ModernDiogenes said:

Friday Aug 8th, George Will, who is more a Conservative than most here who usurp that title, said of the Trump administration, ”What Mr. Trump is doing happily, looking on the bright side - which I’m not inclined to do, he (Trump) has become an inadvertent educator. This term of his is going to be a long seminar on the wisdom of the Founders.”

In which he was forecasting an American people becoming educated on just how bad an “Imperial Presidency” can be and how much the founding fathers had warned us against just that.

Click to expand...

OMG the usual George Will angst about ANYTHING Trump. Get over it. we don't want a bunch of foreign wars and a rich based Republican party

btthegreat said:

My post was about voters, not Americans. One is a subset of the other. I don't give a rats ass about polling numbers.

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The polling reference was just one of several valid points countering your assertion.

btthegreat said:

Elections tell politicians what the voters want. Voters want politicians who will do whatever it takes, cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job' done.

Click to expand...

RaleBulgarian said:

The polling reference was just one of several valid points countering your assertion.

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I read a lot of cheap excuses for the voters decision not 'valid points'. Its Biden's fault. Harris didn't have time. Bullshit. the voters were warned over and over, and they knew what they wanted, knew the risks and they handed the White House and both Houses of Congress to the party of MAGA. If voters made their decision based on apathy and disgust, then they need to own exactly how stupid that was Calling it a plurality of 33% does nothing to minimize voters of their responsibility.

The voters made this mess, we are all trapped for now. Dems have a duty to their constituent base to appeal to this new voter trend sufficient to regain power and a sliver of relevance.

btthegreat said:

Elections tell politicians what the voters want. Voters want politicians who will do whatever it takes, cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job' done. Dems need to listen or they won't be a major force in politics. The days of 'we go high, when they go low' have to be over until the voters prioritize integrety, honesty and decency over partisan concerns.

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If that is what the voters want, and I don’t believe it is, the voters are wrong.

Your nation is one of two things; The idea of a few forced upon the many or the idea of the many enacted by the elected few.

If this outrageously corrupted administration is the former we can rebel against it. If we are the latter we have become the outrageously corrupted ourselves and the battle is already lost as we are no longer worthy of saving.

The Populist Right said:

Democrats didn't lose the white house for not doing enough gutter politics. They lost because Republicans had a narrative for what people's issues were (the problem is immigrants and US getting cheated on trade) while the Democratic message was "the status quo is great, Joe Biden is the best!" Democrats are still doing 1990s politics in the era of populism.

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Populism leads to “strong” man leaders who are long on rhetoric and short on actual answers, except that which lines pockets of a very few and always has someone in mind to put the blame to for much of the misery that, in hindsight, everyone realizes weren’t really the problem; be it the Jews, or Serbs, whoever.

You’d figure, with all the historical evidence that points to just that, populism would have become a dirty word. Not so though. I suppose that is because humanity has never been keen on learning from past mistakes.

ModernDiogenes said:

Populism leads to “strong” men leaders who are long on rhetoric and short on actual answers, except that which lines pockets of a very few and always has someone in mind to put the blame to for much of the misery that, in hindsight, everyone realizes weren’t really the problem; be it the Jews, or Serbs, whoever.

You’d figure, with all the historical evidence that points to just that, populism would have become a dirty word. Not so though. I suppose that because humanity has never been keen on learning from past mistakes.

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Populism is the Board of Directors letting the employees pick the CEO. Which, of course, never happens.

The Founders feared populism. The EC was supposed to guard against a populist demagogue, but the Founders were idealists in attempting to solve issues with "independent" electors. Naive, even.

Can populism be tribal? That would seem oxymoronic. If MAGA "populism" supports MAGA alone, to the exclusion of minorities, women and political opponents, that's not populism.

RaleBulgarian said:

Disagree. If Americans wanted a president that cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job done, Traitor Trump’s polling numbers wouldn’t be underwater.

Traitor Trump’s plurality popular vote win of roughly 33% of all eligible voters was mostly based on apathy and disgust with both parties.

Even considering that, the race was still the Dems to lose.

Biden stayed in the race for much too long, IMO, before finally stepping aside grudgingly to Harris who, along with much of Biden’s administration, lied and attempted to cover for Biden’s obvious mental decline, which severely undermined her own credibility.

Harris did a fair, not great IMO, job with the limited time she had to campaign, but failed to earn enough trust/confidence of voters.

So now, Traitor Trump is giving Americans the shit show in a dumpster fire on steroids administration that most of us expected.

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Agreed

RaleBulgarian said:

Agree. Screw going high. Fight MAGAt Republicans on their level, but stick to the facts.

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Not precisely. Go old school. I’m talking Old Testament kind of old school on them, but secular.

Peer pressure of the first order. Tell the willing to repent that violating ethical thinking never solved anyone’s problems. The lowering of social standards of good decorum never fixed anything for anybody. It just makes all those participating unworthy and, yeah I’m going to say it, deplorable.

Those that get it will, hopefully, think better of this nonsense and find socially acceptable ways to resolve issues rather than support a reality TV fraud who steals with charitable and educational institutions and publicly humiliates others for fun and profit. A bully, cad and swindler.

The few remaining who don’t change will go back to hiding under the rocks they slithered out from under and back to whispering their corrupted thoughts in dark places between themselves, out of the earshot of decent people.

(Yes, MAGA, I went there but only because I care about most of you and know you can’t really think making a pathological case POTUS is truly the way. You’re just so scared, pissed off, or both that you got lost but you can find your way back. Those of you who truly think the swindling, cowardly, cheat who steals by fraud, molests women, punches down and bullies is a “fine person”, I can’t help you. You’re already too far gone.)

RaleBulgarian said:

Second, and every bit as important, Dems need to pick/coalesce around a strong moderate Dem candidate with a history of working across the aisle with Republicans to take care of America’s business for all Americans, and the sooner the better.

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Yes, and my former party needs to rediscover Golden Rule Ethical Thinking and realize they’ve truly placed themselves, cowering behind this truly bad human being simply to achieve political power, as casting themselves in Trump’s image.

anatta said:

OMG the usual George Will angst about ANYTHING Trump. Get over it. we don't want a bunch of foreign wars and a rich based Republican party

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???

So your answer to that is to elect a reality TV fraud of a wanna be oligarch and create of him a vehicle for actual oligarchs to run our nation?

That’s your intellectually based, rationally thought out, response to the real problems that you are concerned about?

That’s why I suggest that maybe fear and, rightfully, peeved feelings pointed you folks in a poorly thought out direction.

Trump is everything his very public record claims him to be. He has publicly humiliated three wives. He does molest women. He is a bully who punches down, never up. He does lie, cheat and swindle. He is a con artist who has used the promises of both charity and education to steal.

Trump is a DEPLORABLE human being. If you support the unethically deplorable what does that make you?

MAGA folks truly need to resolve that fair, ethically asked, question.

ElChupacabra said:

This is part of why I think this country needs to go through this political temper tantrum. There will no doubt be a heavy price to pay in a variety of areas, but the complacency that exists among Americans that everything will always be ok needs to be threatened every so often just to remind us bad things can happen anywhere. While there's the aspect of a unitary executive and all the crap that implies, I think the bigger danger is both parties fall into the trap of using the kind of gutter politics Trump uses as the way forward.

Click to expand...

I think the last 30 years taught us that gutter politics is a winning strategy. I don't see that changing.

ModernDiogenes said:

Populism leads to “strong” man leaders who are long on rhetoric and short on actual answers, except that which lines pockets of a very few and always has someone in mind to put the blame to for much of the misery that, in hindsight, everyone realizes weren’t really the problem; be it the Jews, or Serbs, whoever.

You’d figure, with all the historical evidence that points to just that, populism would have become a dirty word. Not so though. I suppose that is because humanity has never been keen on learning from past mistakes.

Click to expand...

My answer is not going to be erudite, but its the right answer. Its about branding, and advertising gimmick. 'Populism' has a really nice ring to it. It feels like it should be 'popular'. That is something that will fool the population every other generation.

RaleBulgarian said:

Disagree. If Americans wanted a president that cut any corner, lie, cheat, steal, bully, intimidate, to get 'the job done, Traitor Trump’s polling numbers wouldn’t be underwater.

Traitor Trump’s plurality popular vote win of roughly 33% of all eligible voters was mostly based on apathy and disgust with both parties.

Even considering that, the race was still the Dems to lose.

Biden stayed in the race for much too long, IMO, before finally stepping aside grudgingly to Harris who, along with much of Biden’s administration, lied and attempted to cover for Biden’s obvious mental decline, which severely undermined her own credibility.

Harris did a fair, not great IMO, job with the limited time she had to campaign, but failed to earn enough trust/confidence of voters.

So now, Traitor Trump is giving Americans the shit show in a dumpster fire on steroids administration that most of us expected.

Agree. Screw going high. Fight MAGAt Republicans on their level, but stick to the facts.

Second, and every bit as important, Dems need to pick/coalesce around a strong moderate Dem candidate with a history of working across the aisle with Republicans to take care of America’s business for all Americans, and the sooner the better.

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The only part of this I might disagree with is the very end. I'm just not sure republicans at this point are willing to work with democrats. Republicans have gotten a taste of ruling their way or the highway. How do we ever get back to a civilized legislature?

RaleBulgarian said:

Second, and every bit as important, Dems need to pick/coalesce around a strong moderate Dem candidate with a history of working across the aisle with Republicans to take care of America’s business for all Americans, and the sooner the better.

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^^ THIS ^^