Can I say "I told you so" now?

Playing "devil's advocate" here - assuming I believed that Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, plus the entire DNC and "weaponized Federal agencies" worked in concert against Trump both before and after his election - why, exactly, would such a huge apparatus desire to do so? Was it simply 'politics as usual' against the opponent? Possible, I grant you. Worse things have been done in other countries and may indeed have been done in the past in America, and were done in eras when few actually knew all the "gears" as it were. Less watchdogs, more security, etc. Was it pure spite? Maybe, again, though I strongly doubt that either scenario is valid.

My guess is that the "vast left-wing conspiracy" - if such exists, bent the rules like the morally bankrupt wing of the Repubs have done for *decades*. They rejected the possibility, then reality of a third-rate excuse for a business-man holding an office he had and continues to prove, daily, that he has no talent or temperament for.

If you like him, you are welcome to him. Hooray. To me, he is accelerating the decline of the United States of America, certainly not making it great again. The rest of the free world appears to agree with me. Except the likewise morally bankrupt industries and competitors who are laughing all the way to the bank...

Rick

vast.

Thanks Doug, I needed a giggle.

To me, the real conspiracy is all the Republicans who are too chicken-***** to do anything about the man turning back the clock. There _is_ some pushback, but far too little when you consider the enormity of damage being done to this country, it's reputation, and future.

Rick

When BO gets elected in 2020 he'll straighten out the mess.

He has stick time after straightening out the mess Bush handed him.

You mean the one in his ****? The only 'mess' Bush handed him is the ones Dems in charge of the financial end of things that kept telling him everything was fine....right up until it wasn't as he was leaving office. And BO didn't 'straighten' out ANYTHING....he made things even worse and the facts are there to prove it. You just refuse to accept those facts.

about the 'cost' although it was massive....I'm talking about the total deceptive ways he 'inflated' the numbers....having his Federal Reserve print trillions of dollars to put $85B PER MONTH into Wall Street (making many more millions in the process for the top 1% he and others have been complaining about for years.....HE did that DELIBERATELY so THEY recouped their money lost but NONE of the smaller investors were able to). He could have easily paid off every single bad mortgage that was being foreclosed on and still saved the country a couple of trillion.

There is NO way to know positively that he kept the economy from sliding into a depression. He could just as easily done NOTHING and let the economy correct ITSELF like it's done in the past. He did it in order to have 'bragging rights' to build his ego and to get more and more stimulus money that was completely wasted for an agenda that wasn't sustainable. How many people do you think were going to be able to afford to buy solar panels for houses they didn't live in anymore because of people like Barney Frank and Chris Todd and Tim Geithner? Or the Cash for Clunkers? Were 'buyers' going to qualify for loans when they just lost their homes....or perhaps LIVE in those new cars? And the horrible 'deal' he cut with the auto industry while bailing them out? It cost the taxpayers billions in that deal, not to mention tens of thousands of jobs, AND their stock in the original GM company that was shut down and rebooted as a new entity that didn't allow that stock to be transferred to the new company.

And what has BUSH got to do with that 'chart'? He made the mistake of listening to Dems who set up the entire situation that he fell into just as he was leaving office.

BO did (and continues to do so with Obamacare) more damage to this country economically than any other President in history.....THOSE are FACTS that you cannot ignore, no matter how many ways you spin it or try to.

3 simple charts.

Change the name BO to the Don and you would be crowing.

BO did not want a depression on his record so he did what he was advised to do.

Whether it was the right way or the wrong way does not matter the result was the economy stopped going down and started going up.

Study the charts until you get it.

by Dems controlling the money AT THE TIME.....BUT he went into US debt to bail out the banks with TARP by only $700B compared to BO's trashing of the entire economy by ADDING to that debt by MULTIPLE TRILLIONS just so, in your own words, he wouldn't have a 'depression on HIS records'. It was ALL about HIS ego and legacy, and BOTH are trashed now at the expense of the American taxpayer for decades, if not generations.

Bush or BO were economist.

They did what they were advised to do to drive the bus.

Bush was exiting the mess and BO was starting with the mess.

Your not happy about it because of the cost.....tough.

As I recall your answer was to let the banks fail let the economy collapse open a 1000 soup kitchens and let thing sort themselves.

That's not what the bus driver is hired to do.

Of course, BO can't run any more.

wife won't let him.

put together a coherent sentence in order to reply.....

trying to figure out what enormous damage is being done to this country, its reputation, and future that you are talking about. I hear this all the time from liberals but I never get anything definitive or precise other than 'I don't like his tone or temperament'....and the only direction my mind goes to immediately is 'we've had charismatic Presidents before who were 'presidential' in their tone and temperament who were very destructive for this country with their policies and their encouragement to divide it' and wonder why it's so difficult for others to accept someone who actually speaks on the level of the common person rather than as if he's the smartest person in the room and we're just too stupid to think or decide for ourselves.

I've known you a long time, Richard, and perhaps you can finally explain this to me because others here refuse to debate anything.

Number one, it's a question of trust. As Americans we have perhaps trained ourselves to distrust politicians, and rightly so. Promises made on the campaign trail are routinely broken or watered down to resemble little of what was once envisioned. People who voted for Obama with high hopes of a bright new future (and real change) were disappointed when he compromised on many projects and turned out to be far more of a centrist than they had imagined. IMO he tried, but largely failed, to instill his vision to those across the aisle - whether that was a function of his management shortcomings or because of undue pushback from a recalcitrant opposition to all things BO depends on who does the analysis. There is evidence for both, from what I've read and seen. It's just my opinion he tried harder than most, initially, to satisfy too many segments of the population both in administration and generally. I think later he became sick of the constant rejection of any of his plans, and became hardened - way more than he ever wanted to be.

I don't see Trump as even trying to reach across the aisle - it has been his
"style" to be dictatorial and dismissive of what he regards as the "enemy". His method is to use fear of the other, spread falsehoods and generally act as a tyrant of late, decadent Rome would. When challenged with facts he rejects reality and doubles down with more lies. This is the action of a malignant narcissist - he believes he is only "winning" if other people are losing. His attitude toward women is also typical of many insecure men : trophy wives and sexual objects, at best. Strong, independent women scare him. To him, they should be "put in their place"
or ridiculed, thus restoring his supposed power. His refusal to dis-align himself from white supremacists is severely troubling to me - why? Is it because they are a part of his 'base' ? Immigrants, legal or otherwise, from Central America scare him - gee, they just might become Democrats
who vote against him, so best to label them rapists, drug-dealers, or just plain "bad hombres". Muslims and people from "----hole countries" should be excluded at all costs, too. Do I have to go on?

To me, Trump's intent, and actions, point to his rejection of justice for the greater majority of the people : the working class, the middle class. The already rich and the faceless corporations are his chosen class to receive the cream and favors. The rest of us get crumbs (maybe). Business must be allowed to proliferate, no matter the cost. Pollution is something we can worry about later, maybe. It's short-term-ism at its worst - grab all you can while the going is good, and perhaps his progeny and other "winners" will have enough to weather the inevitable results when the system finally collapses.

This is not what caring folk do - they help each other, make _more_ justice, not less. They give up some to help each other. They seek truth rationally, scientifically. They do not label journalists "enemies of the state". They do not reject reality. They work, however painfully, to right wrongs against others and improve the human condition.

I see little of this in Trump, and for that reason think him bad for America, bad for the World, and bad for humans.

Rick

rational thinking has left you.....where WERE you during BO's reign? You talk about Trump's 'white supremacist' support, when there is absolutely NO proof of it....and if you bring up the Charlottesville, VA soundbite statement that ALWAYS leaves off the part where he states 'some good on both sides' is actually referring to those SCHOLARS who were there to protect our HISTORY, your argument won't fly. Although the liberal media is trying to state that Trump is just NOW defending his position, the ORIGINAL tape of his statement shows he DID say that at the time.

And, yes.....he had it right when he referred to Mexico NOT sending over their best people. He said SOME are good, but a huge portion of what's crossing into our county ARE murderers, rapists, and thugs....and we SHOULD have control over who comes here.....and MOST DO come from ….hole countries but that doesn't mean we HAVE to take them all and support them. Their ….hole country LEADERS are already getting MILLIONS/BILLIONS from USA taxpayers to take care of their people....and they DON'T. It's not OUR fault and we shouldn't have to pay the price for that.

Our entire legal and financial systems are falling apart and it started long before Trump and even BO or Bush. Most of it began a generation or more ago, but when you have leaders who call themselves 'progressive' and their goals are actually 'socialist' (Woodrow Wilson, FDR, etc) and believe that bigger government control over the people is the answer, we've been hurting for a very long time. As for 'crossing' the aisle' and looking for compromise, BO is the one who actually refused to do so....and he had people like Harry Reid pulling all those strings on his behalf.

BO started this country on a massive downward spiral in division nearly on his first day when he began his all-out war on law enforcement beginning with Cambridge and it spread across the entire country with his encouragement. Just like he encouraged the destructive OWS riots, Ferguson, Treyvon Martin, sanctuary cities crap, Fast and Furious, Benghazi lies, denying he knew about HILL's secret server when he was actually emailing with her ON THAT SERVER, siccing his IRS on political opponents (Tea Party and other conservative groups),spying/wire tapping JOURNALISTS and calling one of them a traitor (Jim Rosen of Fox), wire tapping Rosen's PARENT'S phones, using taxpayer money and his administration to go to Israel and attempt to influence another country's legal election to stop Bibi from opposing BO's agenda, snubbing leaders when they came here who didn't agree with him, giving Russia a free hand around the world to do whatever they wanted because he was 'more flexible' after his second election, created a war on religion via Obamacare and suing NUNS for God's sake....I could go on, but it all leads up to the newest and worst scandal of them all.....involving the 2016 election that literally allowed nearly every dept/agency in his administration to try and destroy a presidential candidate and his family and provide the election outcome BO wanted Trump has DONE NONE of these things.

How can you possibly say that TRUMP is bad for this country? He's been trying to get Congress to do what they were hired by the people to do and the Dems and some Republicans are ONLY concerned with continuing the BO fight against him....even though a few short years ago they ALL voted for the exact same things Trump is asking them to vote for AGAIN today? Liberals CANNOT stand the idea that over 63 MILLION people voted for Trump and what will they do if they can't get them out of office? They will have Pence instead or they will have Trump again in 2020? You CANNOT tell 63M people that they are traitors or stupid, Richard....it will come back to bite you even harder. Too many times, the people have voted for an issue on a ballot (even State ballots) just to have some liberal group sue and have a liberal judge in the 9th Circuit in San Francisco or some other judge-shopped court go against the PEOPLE'S decision....have it make its way to SCOTUS and have THAT court overturn the lower court's decision. Many times unanimously.

I'm still having a hard time understanding the hatred some people have with Trump.....because even you didn't say much about his actual policies and instead have resorted to attacks on his personality. As I said before....I would much rather have a leader who is crass in his language but effective in his policies than a silver-tongued charismatic smiler who is deliberately destructive in so many ways.

Where ARE YOU during Trump's reign?

Rhetorical question.

Complaining about the "past" and not defending the present?

though I would consider myself part of the "centrist left" - though to some eyes that has no real meaning. Just as to some there is no such thing as a centrist Republican. More than one political commentator has remarked that is a major problem in politics today - polarization.

Anyway, I did not write that Trump supports white supremacists, just that he does not dis-align himself from them. Recently he said something along the lines of "some of them are very sick people. I guess." Which is pretty lame, to me. Other presidents have had no problem at all condemning Neo-Nazis.
Scholars protecting history is another subject entirely, and allowing statues of Confederate heroes to stand is a part of a very sensitive set of issues in the South, and North. I understand the sentiments of blacks, many descendants of former slaves, in wanting to see these edifices taken done. (As much as I, a white man, can). I also can relate to the feelings of southern people as regards the Civil War - it's part of our history, and should not be erased. However, just as in other eras, I believe the feelings of the oppressed should trump those of the oppressors, or their descendants.

As far as "big government" goes, I think we need it, to a point. Many individual States simply cannot generate enough from their resources to have a median level of prosperity. Should we just allow these states to wither and die, like many of their cities, reduced to subsistence level existence? I'd say no, in the long run it is cheaper to help them now than to try to totally rebuild them later. I guess that makes me a socialist. I've lived in the UK - many call their health system socialist, and while it does have problems, IMO it's far better than the system here in the U.S.

I look at Obama's history differently, and while he may have done the country some harm I think overall he saved our bacon. Arguing about this with you is probably pointless as you genuinely seem to hate him - exactly as you appear to think left or left-leaning people actually hate Trump. Some may indeed hate Trump, though I think most just realize he is incompetent , and worse, acting against their best interests.

63 million people were not traitors or stupid - they were tired of gridlock and subsequent inaction in Congress and the government as a whole. They 'rolled the dice' and the result? Gridlock and inaction. The solution? Try again, with someone new. It's what we as a voting public do, unless we
think our current person at the "helm" is doing OK. So, I guess we'll see in 2020. Though the past mid-terms point toward one way, you may get your wish and have DJT for another four years. It wont be _my_ wish, though. I'll have to live with either, as will we all. I just think Trump's America is a place that does not equate with _my_ America. As many others have said, it's not who we are.

Rick

toward our elections is EXACTLY who we are....a vast majority of the people ACCEPT the results of an election, even when we don't like the results. Unfortunately, for the last two Republican Presidents, the left/Dems have REFUSED to accept that they lost. Not only can they NOT accept it, they cannot accept the fact that THEY picked lousy candidates/nominees so came to the conclusion that 'SOMETHING' bad happened and now something ELSE has to happen in order to be rid of the person who DID get elected, even if they have to FABRICATE that 'something else'. The gridlock today is the result of their 'something else'....and they called for it from the day he got elected, long before he took the Oath of Office. Resist and Impeach. How many Presidential elections resulted in torching cars and smashing windows in DC riots the day of their inaugurations and Congressional members boycotting those inaugurations, Richard? Tea Party and conservative groups were targeted by BO's IRS to stop them and yet not ONE riot was recorded with them being named as the instigators.

I will never believe that BO 'saved our bacon' because the facts show otherwise. I'm not trying to sway your opinion of Trump. I just really appreciate your at least having a real conversation with me. And I stopped recognizing 'my America' when BO took office and hoped he wouldn't destroy it to the point of no return. When we were already a country hurting economically with millions of people out of jobs, you don't DELIBERATELY add to that by targeting entire INDUSTRIES and forcing closings, and he did that in order to further a PERSONAL agenda. He just didn't care that he was doing it because all those people were being put on the dole. His whole philosophy was 'create a crisis and step in and become the savior' and he lived it every day. "Never let a good crisis go to waste" was the motto of the BO administration.....

yet you expect others to believe that DJT 'saved our/America's bacon'?

Makes it all seem kinda' pointless "dontcha' think"?

RE:a vast majority of the people ACCEPT the results of an election, even when we don't like the results.

AND you are NOT one of the vast majority? Rave about Obama while in office.....Still raving about Obama?

RE: Tea Party and conservative groups were targeted by BO's IRS to stop them and yet not ONE riot was recorded with them being named as the instigators.

That claims begs the question

When is something "instigated"?

Someone holds a demonstration against something others believe in...the "others" see the demonstration as 'instigation"...violence breaks out.


NO demonstration....NO instigation.....NO violence.

**** WILL NOT REPLACE US!!!!!!

Instigation?

I, not once, ever said "he's not MY president" like so many on the left has done about Trump. I absolutely didn't like the results of those two elections, but I didn't spur riots or even protests. I complained, loudly at times, on my own. I donated money to conservative candidates and publicly supported them when possible.

No Tea Party member showed up at rallies with weapons or burned down buildings or rioted or looted or stopped OTHER people from speaking. THAT's the tactics of far left loonies and they were encouraged by the previous administration to do it on a regular basis. Tea Party members were instantly blamed by the liberal media for acts that were proven to be done by left crazies instead. Three of those liberal media 'news' stations are being sued for millions for that same crap against a high school kid......CNN, NBC/MSNBC, and another. They just can't help themselves and they should all be on medication.

You 'accepted" Obama begrudgingly?

What made Obama YOUR President?....

HE is POTUS and you're an American?

That's it?...that's how you accepted him?

I can't recall anything YOU gave HIM an atta' boy for doing, or defending any of HIS actions.

IF you can't say something nice...don't say anything at all?

THAT's how you ACCEPT someone YOU don't agree with.

I complained, loudly at times, on my own. I donated money to conservative candidates and publicly supported them when possible.

On YOUR own?....AND at the same time provided funds for others to do the "heavy lifting/demonstrating".

When I comes to inciting violence everybody isn't as sane as you are.

"When I (it) comes to inciting violence everybody isn't as sane as you are."

And the left keep proving it every day...…….

As the Tea Party/DJT sits silently on the sidelines?

Thanks, Toni. (about having a conversation). I'd imagine, though, others feel that they too are having a real conversation.

Maybe, as I've noted here many times over the years, we would all be calmer and more able to "read" each other if we were all face-to-face. How many times in history have intentions been misconstrued in written communications? It's perhaps amazing more wars were
_not_ started than they were.

As for Obama, at the time I knew many people through work and leisure who rejected him as their president - enough so that they stated they actually did not mind if the country suffered a bit, just to get rid of him! His second term win repulsed them so much that it seemed to me they had lost all perspective - almost like in a fist-fight people "see red" and go overboard.

Maybe the same thing is happening now as regards Trump - though hopefully a more measured response will prevail. Overall I think most Dems just want the country to function, rationally, and see Trump as a fundamentally non-rational person. His tantrums and spite strike many as the personality of a young boy - or worse, a toddler. Witness the UK's balloon 'effigy'.

Mostly, I think if we as a nation could have far less polarization - on both sides - real progress can be accomplished. Without that, I see no way forward, just endless ***-for-tat.

Rick

and such have often noted that irrational thinking is not the sole property of left, right, or any other 'extreme'. ("so far left", you said.)
Blanket statements can obfuscate but seldom enlighten. S. I. Hayakawa.

How about Waters, Schiff, Schumer, Clapper, HILL, the new nutcases in Congress who are anti-men (white or otherwise), anti-Semitic?

I have one phrase for you. Soundbite nation.

proven to have changed even one...….