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Patrick Sawyer
climber
Originally California, now Ireland
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 8, 2018 - 04:41pm PT
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I would reply with witty comment, so I think, but it is late.
I have not been drinking, but if I was to reply, some who my disagree with me would claim I am drinking, which tonight, is not the case (the case of whiskey went yesterday, I wish).
So I write something another Supertopian does not like, and I am accused I have been drinking? Hmmm… should I care?
Bannon is an ass, sycophant, now kissing to his lord. Trump and Bannon deserve each other.
On another note, Trump is not the idiot some of us thought. He is no genius, as he claims, but he, or his handlers, and I think it is he, he may have some smarts. After all, he is POTUS, by hook or by crook.
Do not underestimate Trump. At the bus stop today I chatted with Bernadette, two years my junior and I have know for some time, we chat (not attraction), she is beginning to like Trump after despising him. Perhaps the first Irish person I have met that likes Trump. She feels sorry for him, "he has a tough job", she says. "And he is being picked on."
"Bernie (Bernadette), I… okay if you believe that."
Why argue? Like my sister-in-law in California (my late brother's wife), like a sister to me for some 45 years years, a die-hard Trumpite, I love her like a sister, I avoid politics with her, and her sons, the elder, Benjamin, my godson, two tours of duty with the Marines in Afghanistan (under fire as a point man, fact, "Uncle Patrick, the bullets do not sound the same as in the movies), now a junior at UC Davis (civil engineering, like my dad), he is apolitical, just wants to graduate and married his high school sweetheart and has two kids. (And they are very happy, she is a bit of a Catholic religious uh, person, and they want to home school the kids, but…) They find 'liberal' Davis a bit of a challenge (he academically, severely dyslectic and amazing, truly amazing, and she has found a lot of female/mother mates on campus {family housing} who do not care about politics. See university campuses are not that bad.)
Politics suck.
EDIT what annoys me is that, and I am only reading from stories on the BBC, New Yorker and The Atlantic, unbiased stories as far as I can tell, heaven knows what the right-wing press has to say, on many American university campuses, conservative, right-leaning students, feel ostracized. I do not know how accurate or true that is.
If so, that is not right. I am an idealist. Colleges and universities are about learning, expanding and expounding ideas, sure politics come into play, but within reason. Call me naive if you wish.
Where is the balance in America? Pendulums swing, but it could so be too easy for a pendulum to be stuck on one side if the conditions dictate it.
EDIT
"A couple of bullets whizzed by me head, I was so scared, but I gave covering fire none the less."
Why should my nephew and godson have to go through that?
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Politics do NOT suck. Politics is the alternative to "might makes right", the primary force throughout human history.
With no politics, if I want your house, your woman, your car----I take it.
Politics gives us a way (potentially) to regulate and mediate such issues, and for a community to pursue methods of accountability for actions.
NO, they do not suck, and be grateful, or you'd be writing in Russian.
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Patrick Sawyer
climber
Originally California, now Ireland
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 8, 2018 - 05:34pm PT
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Okay Ken, I get your point. I have been around, not as a doc as you have been, but some 45 years in five countries as a writer and journalist. And zoologist, sometimes.
Politics do not NECESSARILY suck, politics are part of the fabric of human society. But I hope you get my point. And as far as I can see, stinking dirty rotten politics have taken over America. As some have said, Trump is a symptom. If people, the electorate, really believed, they would not have elected a con man, but they did (Electoral College).
But the faith in the present political system is the one on trial. Hell, you all living in America should know that more than I do. I have not lived in the US for over 22 years and since 1982, only about eight years in total.
The pulse of America I feel is not the same as many of my fellow Supertopians.
EDIT
And f*#k you any of you as#@&%es who think I write by drink. I sit here alone in a house in the sticks, I miss my partner Jennie (in a nursing home) and whether I drink or not, I write what I think. I have not had a glass tonight, but I am feisty. Tear into me if your want. I am good for a battle. Though I'd rather hit the sack. Arguing is so passé.
I write what I think. And I think and research a lot. And cross research, and look at a variety of media, I would gamble, more than many of you do.
Because I am very smart, like, really smart. I am a 'Stable Genius". Hah hah
(Fake News is a term from the early 1900s, but Stable Genius, I think we can attribute that to The Donald, but will it enter the Oxford dictionary or lexicon?).
EDIT
And f*#k you any of you as#@&%es
I should 'knot' let some posts get to me. Yury, Reilly or Dwain Cosmicman get to me (congrats I'd imagine) , but… Yury I have little clue about, Reilly sprays more than a summer lawn sprinkler, and Dwain, back pain can make one ornery, I know.
EDIT
The above three have had their digs at me, so it is only fair in kind. And Dwain may post the photoshopped image of me on the beach with the dog, as he has done several times, how sad. `let's see it again cosmic face.
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Ben Harland
Gym climber
Kenora, ON
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Ken M - thanks for that perspective:) I came of age with Clinton, so I never really had to think about things quite like that -- I'm curious: if you try to categorize events where there has been a crisis of confidence in American leadership, does it go Nixon, W, Trump? When Nixon had his struggles, was it similar in severity to what's happening now?
The closest I can relate to directly is when the Czechs briefly ruled international hockey ca 2001 and I remember feeling that Canada would never come back from it.
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Gary
Social climber
Desolation Basin, Calif.
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When Nixon had his struggles, was it similar in severity to what's happening now?
According to Hunter S. Thompson Nixon was the Apocalypse. He was in every issue of Rolling Stone covering the '72 election. It was brilliant writing. The book version is Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72, well worth reading.
"Those who fail to learn from the brutal stompings visited on them in the past are doomed to be brutally stomped in the future."
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/timewarp-campaign-72-19730705
When it comes to Trump, he was way ahead of his time. He wrote this about the possibility of Nixon winning re-election: this may be the year when we finally come face to face with ourselves
finally just lay back and say it
that we are a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable
The best thing ever written about American politics:
“At the stroke of midnight in Washington, a drooling red-eyed beast with the legs of a man and a head of a giant hyena crawls out of its bedroom window in the South Wing of the White House and leaps fifty feet down to the lawn...pauses briefly to strangle the Chow watchdog, then races off into the darkness...towards the Watergate, snarling with lust, loping through the alleys behind Pennsylvania Avenue, and trying desperately to remember which one of those four hundred identical balconies is the one outside of Martha Mitchell's apartment....Ah...Nightmares, nightmares. But I was only kidding. The President of the United States would never act that weird. At least not during football season.”
I couldn't vote in '72, but I worked for the McGovern campaign. It was small band of kids, the leader was still in college. We worked out of an old house in downtown Evansville. The only support we got from the Vanderburgh County Democratic Central Committee was a case of Double Cola. We walked the black inner city districts to get out the vote. They were behind us all the way.
When McGovern lost I was disillusioned beyond belief. It affects me to this day.
BTW, Nixon campaign committee was The Committee to Re-Elect the President. Better known as CREEP.
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Ben Harland
Gym climber
Kenora, ON
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So I gather you mean the present situation is "not as bad as Nixon", Gary. (I do remember some of Hunter's writing about Nixon - especially his scathing obituary:))
I confess that I have a particular interest in this: I have a $5 bet with my dad that Trump doesn't make it through his term. Admittedly, this was partly made to recoup the money I lost when I bet him that he wouldn't be elected.
We Canadians have a situation that isn't completely dissimilar. I thought of this especially when reading what the NY Times was saying about Oprah's Golden Globes speech this morning. Our leader is also a populist with very little experience in government.
To be more serious, I'm having a hard time getting a good, objective idea on how bad Trump's behaviour is (and it's certainly bad) and how it will fit in the history books.
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WBraun
climber
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While you poor fools have your eyes distracted on the st00pid Trumpinator all sorts of heavy sh!t is going down that your st00pid main loon media is NOT reporting.
You clueless loons will soon find out ......
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Patrick Sawyer
climber
Originally California, now Ireland
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Topic Author's Reply - Jan 8, 2018 - 07:16pm PT
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Jaysus Gary, I birddogged for McGovern too, I was 16. I went from door to door. I was so turned off when the Eagleton matter hit. Like, Nixon had also psychiatric treatment as well prior to his election in 1968. Losing to Kennedy and then Pat Brown, did Nixon's head tricks.
And then the crap about Eagleton. It totally made me rethink politics as a young naive 16 year old.
Go eff off Werner, you have nothing to contribute to an honest discussion.
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Gary
Social climber
Desolation Basin, Calif.
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So I gather you mean the present situation is "not as bad as Nixon", Gary.
Ben, I don't think it is any worse. Nor any better.
Werner, Trump is just another puppet that they will indulge as long as he doesn't get too far out of line. They perfected this technique with Reagan and W.
Patrick, I was 16 as well. Working for McGovern was one of the best things I ever did.
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Happiegrrrl2
Trad climber
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There's Cosmic and his Go Tell It On the Mountain Christianity showing him for what he really is.
I'm sorry Dwain, but how would you feel if people inferred that you are addicted to painkillers and using pot for the buzz instead of the medicinal purpose you say? Difference being, those who might infer such a thing probably would not have publicly declared themself to be trying to live as Christ would, as you purport to be.
Is it really that hard to refrain, if you ask yourself WWJD, after reading "libtard" posts?
Can you really see Jesus, were he born in 1990, posting "Drunk-o-Meters on a discussion board? I can't.
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Happiegrrrl2
Trad climber
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And back to the Trumpocalypse, people who have been "on the case" have said for some time that this is legions worse than Watergate.
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Studly
Trad climber
WA
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Are you saying Jesus Christ didn't smoke pot? How would you know? I'm not saying he did, but its impossible to be definitive on the subject. It was a medicinal plant back then as well as well as the fibers being used for many purposes.
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rottingjohnny
Sport climber
Sands Motel , Las Vegas
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Nixon didn't have the Russians helping him throw the election..Trump did..Dwains a Jack Christian...Cut him some slack...
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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I am only reading from stories on the BBC, New Yorker and The Atlantic, unbiased stories as far as I can tell
I have been subscribing to the New Yorker for many years. On their daily e-mail articles they have castigated Trump relentlessly. Their approach is to belittle him, demean him, and sneer at him with virtually nothing unbiased appearing in print.
I'm not defending the Donald, but the New Yorker is hardly neutral.
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Happiegrrrl2
Trad climber
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Are you saying Jesus Christ didn't smoke pot?
I'm saying Jesus wouldn't try to minimize another person's opinions, nor take jabs at them for having an opinion that varied from his own. We can be pretty sure that the Jesus as described in the Christian religions didn't pick on people.
Nor do I think Jesus would have nodded his head in understanding to the person who repeatedly did such a thing but used the "I'm not perfect, and will fall short" excuse for continuing behavior that Jesus had already given him the stinkeye over.
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EdwardT
Trad climber
Retired
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Somebody's got her b!tch on tonight. 🙄
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Contractor
Boulder climber
CA
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I'm not defending the Donald, but the New Yorker is hardly neutral. When a President is constantly probing for weaknesses to establish an autocracy, the Free press should have the latitude to increase editorial scrutiny- the reader will
ultimately decide .
Without a critical press, who's to sound the alarm that a dictatorship is in the making? Germany knows this all to well.
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F
climber
away from the ground
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^^^ Tonight...?
Jesus was a reefer smoking black woman liberal snowflake. I thought that was common knowledge.
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Ken M - thanks for that perspective:) I came of age with Clinton, so I never really had to think about things quite like that -- I'm curious: if you try to categorize events where there has been a crisis of confidence in American leadership, does it go Nixon, W, Trump? When Nixon had his struggles, was it similar in severity to what's happening now?
I remember Watergate well. I watched the hearings daily, and found it captivating.
I would actually rate this situation worse than Nixon, although to be fair, we are only part way through this. In Nixon's case, there were competent people around him---that is not so clear this time.
In W's case, he led this country into a bogus war that we are still in, that cost thousands of American service lives, and probably hundreds of thousands of Middle Eastern lives, and destabilized the entire region, this is not small stuff.
I think it will take a few decades for this to clarify itself....but they are all very bad.
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