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And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

sirlynchmob wrote:

 WrentheFaceless wrote:
So..him not agreeing to accept the results of the election? Thats the scariest thing of all.

I'd say so, It's a horrible insult to america and our way of life.

We democratically elect the next president, to not accept the results could lead to a civil war. or a bunch of his supporters rioting with their guns so we can see how violent riots can get and see how peaceful the BLM riots were in comparison.

anyone who doesn't like our democracy is free to leave, I bet russia would take them all in.

Well he's egomanical unpredictable nuthose with messias complex. Wouldn't surprise me if he did try to incite civil war. Albeit his success chance would be pretty abysmal but would be pretty bad for political atmosphere in america I imagine. Civil wars are never good. Even if they are taken down quickly.

 JNAProductions wrote:
And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

Well I am not going to defend it, Trump isn't my God or Prophet, I just agree with a lot of his policies.
Trump is far from perfect, no doubt.

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

Well I am not going to defend it, Trump isn't my God or Prophet, I just agree with a lot of his policies.
Trump is far from perfect, no doubt.

Which ones in particular?

 Maniac_nmt wrote:
That's nonesense, Affirmative Action is institutionalized racism, which is generally championed by the Democratic party.

Affirmative action recognises there are known and proven negative economic impacts to minorities from the current system, and so it gives benefits explicitly determined by race to offset that. I don't like affirmative action, but it isn't racism, it is a policy aimed at minimizing the impact of racist systems.

And more to the point, while I guess it would be possible to argue that some peculiar kinds of racism might lead some people to support the policy (I'm guessing white people with a weird variation on white man's burden), it'd be straight up crazy to claim that is any more than a minority portion of the support for the policy.

In comparison, the Republican position on welfare is almost entirely dependent on racism. Because welfare in general is broadly supported, it even has majority support among the Republican base. So instead they focus on issues like welfare queens and stories about inner city kids who choose not to work. This a focus that reads like total gibberish unless you buy in to the mental image cast - those people are all black. Illegal immigration is a similar issue - the talk about border walls and focus on Mexico makes zero sense in a world where Mexican illegal immigration is in a decade long decline, and most illegal immigrants now are people choosing to overstay their visas... unless the real underlying issue is an assumption about scary, lawless Mexicans. Foreign policy is much the same - the standard Republican position swings from "leave them alone" to "bomb them" with nothing in between. It's a position that makes zero sense if you see people in other countries as actual people, with their own complexities, values etc. It only makes sense if you see them as a foreign 'other'.

The Republican party, if it could have not fallen to 'uge', could have trounced Clinton this campaign. She's the flip side of Trump with snotty smirks, a massive amount of baggage, a husband who pretty much says her feminist ideology is total bs, and was a key driver in a $20 trillion dollar deficit. So desperate for change they picked a bloviating megalomaniac. Of course, with the potential for a royal dynasty with Bush III....

Ah, yes, the great Republican 'coulda woulda shoulda'. The fantasy that the party had all these ready made candidates that could have beaten Clinton. I mean, personally I tend to keep my fantasies to things involving Jennifer Lawrence and getting a new cast for an epic scale Banelord (not necessarily at the same time), but to each their own.

Meanwhile, leaving the fantasy behind, Trump stomped the rest of the Republican field. He didn't just beat them, he made them look downright foolish. In the wake of the Republican debates, Rubio was left as a robot/corporate shill, Bush was the sad and ineffectual politician buried by his brother's feth ups, and Cruz was the lying sociopath. Meanwhile Trump left the debates with a reputation as a winner, he stomped not only the rest of the field, he also took on and beat the whole Republican establishment that was trying to keep him out.

In turn, Clinton is beating Trump very soundly, and making him look quite foolish. Trump is no longer the winner but the whiner, he's been shown to be utterly clueless on all matters policy, and has been effectively labeled as a racist and sexist. Clinton has orchestrated the collapse of Trump so thorough that his reputation isn't ruined just in this debate, but possibly for the rest of his life.

The Republican field of candidates, and the greater Republican machine couldn't land a single blow on Trump. Clinton has delivered four or five hits solid enough to have decided this election. The idea that the pack of losers that Trump slaughtered would have performed better against the lady who just slaughtered Trump is wild eyed optimism at best.

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

Well I am not going to defend it, Trump isn't my God or Prophet, I just agree with a lot of his policies.
Trump is far from perfect, no doubt.

Which ones in particular?

Well immigration, including the deal with the Syrian refugees too.
Of course the smaller government, job growth ideas. Trade deals, borders.

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

Well I am not going to defend it, Trump isn't my God or Prophet, I just agree with a lot of his policies.
Trump is far from perfect, no doubt.

Which ones in particular?

Well immigration, including the deal with the Syrian refugees too.
Of course the smaller government, job growth ideas. Trade deals, borders.

What actual policies, what do you like about them, and how do you think they will be implemented?

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
Well immigration

Care to explain a little bit more?

including the deal with the Syrian refugees too.

Could you elaborate on the "deal" with the Syrian refugees?

Of course the smaller government

What parts of Trump's policies are intended to make the government smaller? Creating a national 'stop-and-frisk' police state? Forcing business to say "Merry Christmas?" Punishing women for having abortions?

job growth ideas.

Such as?

Trade deals

Which ones?

borders.

What about them, specifically?

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

Well I am not going to defend it, Trump isn't my God or Prophet, I just agree with a lot of his policies.
Trump is far from perfect, no doubt.

Which ones in particular?

Well immigration, including the deal with the Syrian refugees too.
Of course the smaller government, job growth ideas. Trade deals, borders.

What actual policies, what do you like about them, and how do you think they will be implemented?

What do you consider an actual policy?

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

Well I am not going to defend it, Trump isn't my God or Prophet, I just agree with a lot of his policies.
Trump is far from perfect, no doubt.

Which ones in particular?

Well immigration, including the deal with the Syrian refugees too.
Of course the smaller government, job growth ideas. Trade deals, borders.

What actual policies, what do you like about them, and how do you think they will be implemented?

What do you consider an actual policy?

Something that identifies a problem, states why it is a problem, has a list of things to implement, states how implementing those things will fix the problem, lists potential consequences of that implementation on other things.

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 d-usa wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

 JNAProductions wrote:
And Trump's lying about various recorded statements?

Well I am not going to defend it, Trump isn't my God or Prophet, I just agree with a lot of his policies.
Trump is far from perfect, no doubt.

Which ones in particular?

Well immigration, including the deal with the Syrian refugees too.
Of course the smaller government, job growth ideas. Trade deals, borders.

What actual policies, what do you like about them, and how do you think they will be implemented?

What do you consider an actual policy?

You said them yourself you like the fact that he wants to build a wall that in theory would cost 17 billion dollars and the steel rebar used to make it would be enough to make 4 aircraft carriers.

I think the "I'll keep you in suspense" line actually puts Texas in play more than anything Clinton herself could have done

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
Hilary just lies for the hell of it, so much so nobody thinks she is ever telling the truth, even if she is.

Beyond just the regular lies you see in a politics I'm noticing a theme in this particular campaign, where Trump and his supporters will take some element of truth and then just run with it off in to crazy land. Almost like they want to make the attack as big as possible that they don't care how little sense their final statement makes.

The above is a pretty good example. Clinton has a fair number of lies that weigh heavily on her campaign. But those lies were all carefully chosen, in many cases carefully planned ahead of time to produce the maximum deflection with the least possible amount of actual lie. The sensible complain against Clinton is that she is a cunning liar on matters of her personal record. There's plenty of grist for the mill there for Trump and his supporters to attack Clinton.

But instead we get fantasy stuff like the above, a claim that the problem is that Clinton lies for no reason at all. It no only makes the claim sound stupid, it also leads it back on to Trump because he's the candidate with an actual record of lying and getting stuff wrong when there is absolutely no reason.

It's a weird kind of thing that I can't recall in previous elections. Misquoting and distorting is as old as politics, of course, but this particular tendency to take a kernel of truth and blow it out in to a crazy nonsense... that's new. Maybe it isn't a Trump thing, maybe it's a Breitbart/alt-right thing that both Trump and his supporters have started to pick up. I wonder if we'll see more of it or less going in to the future?

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
Well immigration

Care to explain a little bit more?

including the deal with the Syrian refugees too.

Could you elaborate on the "deal" with the Syrian refugees?

Of course the smaller government

What parts of Trump's policies are intended to make the government smaller? Creating a national 'stop-and-frisk' police state? Forcing business to say "Merry Christmas?" Punishing women for having abortions?

job growth ideas.

Such as?

Trade deals

Which ones?

borders.

What about them, specifically?

Well let me give it the old collage try.
While I think the wall is good on paper, great on paper, I understand there are flaws with it, and it doesn't solve all the problem, it helps but there needs to be more done to solve or at least do more to combat it.
I don't think illegals should be allowed to stay in any capacity, they broke the law.
The Syrian thing, I don't think any of them should be allowed in, bringing in that many people, from an area of the world the US has messed with a lot in the last 10 years is just a bad idea.
Europe is struggling heavily with it.
I don't think any businesses should be forced to serve anyone, or say Merry Christmas. I also don't think there should be punishment for women having abortions, like law punishment (I disagree with abortions, and I thought that was a dumb thing he said), and I disagree with him on those issues.
I will add though, I think it's a more republican party idea then a specifically Trump idea, for smaller government, it's a more conservative platform, generally, I'll say.
Job growth, well obviously trying to bring back some semblance of the manufacturing job market.
Trade deals with us and Mexico, though I would say they're getting a steal buying our power (we sell it to the US at a loss) lol of course Nafta, where a lot of those factories went to Mexico, (Canada lost a bunch too but that's not the issue here).
Obviously there needs to be better security at the border with Mexico, even if a wall isn't an answer there has to be one.

Well here it is
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/10/19/the-final-trump-clinton-debate-transcript-annotated/

http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2016/10/19/13340828/hillary-clinton-debate-trump-won

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3853760/The-big-freeze-big-fight-Trump-Clinton-s-final-debate-kicks-NO-handshake-Donald-brings-Hillary-s-accusers-Las-Vegas-shame-her.html

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:
Indeed, the Republican Party of Trump is scoring Steve Smith-level own goals at every chance.

That comment really confused me because the Steve Smith I know is captain of the Australian cricket team. I'm guessing there's another one

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
While I think the wall is good on paper, great on paper, I understand there are flaws with it, and it doesn't solve all the problem, it helps but there needs to be more done to solve or at least do more to combat it.

Saying "there are flaws with it" might be the understatement of the year. Aside from the obscene cost of such a massive civil engineering project it would be an environmental disaster and probably do little more than force illegal immigrants to figure out a way around it. And it would do absolutely nothing to deal with any of the illegal immigrants who come into the country legally and never leave. For example, what does a border wall do to stop someone from driving up to the gate, saying "I'm a tourist, let me go see all the cool stuff in the US", and just never leaving once their legal time is up?

I don't think illegals should be allowed to stay in any capacity, they broke the law.

That might be a nice campaign slogan but it isn't a viable policy. Deporting all of the illegal immigrants currently in the country would cost an obscene amount of money and cause massive losses to the companies that use their labor. And since those companies have a habit of writing checks to campaigns there's zero chance that a "deport them all" policy will ever be more than wishful thinking.

The Syrian thing, I don't think any of them should be allowed in, bringing in that many people, from an area of the world the US has messed with a lot in the last 10 years is just a bad idea.

And exactly what justification do you have for a complete ban on Syrian immigrants? The fact that they aren't white Christians?

I don't think any businesses should be forced to serve anyone, or say Merry Christmas.

So you support going back to the days of legal segregation and businesses being able to put up "whites only" signs?

Job growth, well obviously trying to bring back some semblance of the manufacturing job market.

Both parties promise "job growth". Could you be more specific on how Trump's policies for creating jobs are better than Clinton's?

Yeah, I'm still wondering how anyone thinks a real solution to illegal immigration is not going to involve some sort of amnesty. A mass deportation campaign of over ten million people is not going to happen. ICE running Schindler's List style raids isn't going to fly, and I'd love to see ICE try going through east LA without it turning into a Stalingrad or a Fallujah. As such, we either live with the current system of "well just ignore it indefinitely" or go ahead with some sort of amnesty and get those people on tax rolls.

Ultimately the bigger issue is that there is clearly a demand for their labor that isn't being met, otherwise they wouldn't be coming if nobody was willing to employ them. Reform the immigration process such that average Joe (or Jose) can navigate it without it taking nearly a decade, work to change or cut off the demand for their labor, and recognize that the people already here aren't going anywhere, and we'll get a whole lot farther than talking about (but never actually going ahead with) a mass deportation campaign.

Walls also aren't going to stop illegal immigration, most are coming through normal border crossings anyway, either openly or hidden, we don't have hundreds of thousands of people constantly wandering the Anza Borrego Desert to get to San Diego for instance.

I don't think a country who is at war with a section of the world should let people from there in such huge numbers, of course there will be problems, no matter where they come from.
Anyone dumb enough to put up a sign like that in this day and age would be ruined in a matter of days.
But I think, people go to places to demonize the people who don't want to make a cake, now you could say they should just make the cake, but is it up to the government to force them?
I personally would say, less regulation for smaller businesses, having my own aspirations and seeing the daunting situation here with our policies.

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
I don't think a country who is at war with a section of the world should let people from there in such huge numbers, of course there will be problems, no matter where they come from.

You do understand that the refugees are the people fleeing the bad guys, right? They aren't the people fighting the war.

Anyone dumb enough to put up a sign like that in this day and age would be ruined in a matter of days.

You have an extremely naive view of the world if you think this is the case. There are plenty of places where a "whites only" sign would be celebrated by the locals.

But I think, people go to places to demonize the people who don't want to make a cake, now you could say they should just make the cake, but is it up to the government to force them?

If you don't want to follow anti-discrimination laws then don't start a business. The government will not force you to make cakes, but if you're going to run a business selling cakes then you have to serve everyone. And, honestly? Not going to have any sympathy for the people being "demonized" by this. They're bigots and s, if their bigoted beliefs get national attention then perhaps they should try being better people.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
Anyone dumb enough to put up a sign like that in this day and age would be ruined in a matter of days.

You have an extremely naive view of the world if you think this is the case. There are plenty of places where a "whites only" sign would be celebrated by the locals.

Not "whites only", but close enough. Good old Oklahoma here.

 Peregrine wrote:

If you don't want to follow anti-discrimination laws then don't start a business. The government will not force you to make cakes, but if you're going to run a business selling cakes then you have to serve everyone. And, honestly? Not going to have any sympathy for the people being "demonized" by this. They're bigots and s, if their bigoted beliefs get national attention then perhaps they should try being better people.

The cake place in question isn't that far from me. The owners made *wayyyy* more money taking donations from fundamentalists and stoking the outrage machine than they were making from cakes.

That said, in theory I'm on the side of "their business, they can serve who they want", particularly as it'll tell me which places to avoid, but these people knew (or should have known) the law regarding operation of public businesses when they opened their doors.


As for taking in Syrians and other ME refugees, IIRC the US has only agreed to take in what, 10,000? In a nation of ~320 million people, that's a negligible number and easily screened and tracked if there's a security concern regarding any of them. It's also not like we haven't brought over gobs of people from conflict areas before, particularly after the two world wars, and nobody seemed to have a huge issue with that then. I can't seem to find any protests regarding say, Germans migrating to the US after WW2, and most people didn't seem to have anything but sympathy for many Vietnamese boat people after that conflict.

 Rainbow Dash wrote:

the people who don't want to make a cake,

They didn't just not feel like making a cake, now did they?

They didn't want to make a cake because of the the sexual orientation of the customer.

How do we know this?

Because the shop in question was stupid enough to say so. This was a monumentally idiotic move.
The fact that the ignorant shop owner actually thought that her religious convictions could be used as a reason to discriminate just made it worse.

Almost any other reason would have left no major issues.

I don't agree that Clinton has cunning orchestrated Trump into looking like a clueless racist sexist. She did it easily because Trump actually is a clueless racist sexist with poor self control backed up by a gakky useless team he hand picked.

The fact that Trump so handily beat all the other Republican hopefuls says something about the state of the modern GOP.

 sebster wrote:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:
Indeed, the Republican Party of Trump is scoring Steve Smith-level own goals at every chance.

That comment really confused me because the Steve Smith I know is captain of the Australian cricket team. I'm guessing there's another one

Steve Smith was a defenceman for the Edmonton Oilers that famously scored an own goal in the third period of a tied Game 7 in the Smythe Division Finals against their arch-rival Calgary Flames in 1986. With fourteen minutes left in the period, the Oilers were never able to overcome the one goal deficit and lost the game while the Flames went on to eventually win the Stanley Cup.

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
Well let me give it the old collage try.

Good, I was waiting with bated breath.

While I think the wall is good on paper, great on paper, I understand there are flaws with it, and it doesn't solve all the problem, it helps but there needs to be more done to solve or at least do more to combat it.

So spending billions of dollars on a plan that has "flaws" and "doesn't solve all the problem" sounds like a good idea then?

I don't think illegals should be allowed to stay in any capacity, they broke the law.

Sure, but they have to be given due process and in order for that happen, they have to be rounded up and charged.

The Syrian thing, I don't think any of them should be allowed in, bringing in that many people, from an area of the world the US has messed with a lot in the last 10 years is just a bad idea.

So we shouldn't take any responsiblity for the people in the area of the world we have "messed with" over the last ten years? It should be noted that we've had our noses in the Middle East a lot longer than ten years.

Europe is struggling heavily with it.

Then it's a good thing the United States isn't Europe.

I don't think any businesses should be forced to serve anyone, or say Merry Christmas. I also don't think there should be punishment for women having abortions, like law punishment (I disagree with abortions, and I thought that was a dumb thing he said), and I disagree with him on those issues.

That's interesting.

I will add though, I think it's a more republican party idea then a specifically Trump idea, for smaller government, it's a more conservative platform, generally, I'll say.

Then why did you list it as part of the policies of Donald Trump you agree with?

Job growth, well obviously trying to bring back some semblance of the manufacturing job market.

The United States makes lots and lots of stuff. In fact, manufacturing is the largest sector of the American economy and we have the second strongest manufacturing economy in the world, behind China (which we will probably overtake in a matter of years). Also, our manufacturing output is near record levels; US factories produce twice as much now as they did in 1984 but with one-third fewer workers.

Trade deals with us and Mexico, though I would say they're getting a steal buying our power (we sell it to the US at a loss) lol of course Nafta, where a lot of those factories went to Mexico, (Canada lost a bunch too but that's not the issue here).

What, specifically, makes NAFTA so bad for the United States?

Obviously there needs to be better security at the border with Mexico, even if a wall isn't an answer there has to be one.

Okay, so in the mean time just build that wall, right? It's only taxpayer money.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Germans migrating to the US after WW2

That's because they helped us win the Space Race.

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
Germans migrating to the US after WW2

That's because they helped us win the Space Race.

They turned is into a nation of space-immigrants

 Peregrine wrote:
Saying "there are flaws with it" might be the understatement of the year. Aside from the obscene cost of such a massive civil engineering project it would be an environmental disaster and probably do little more than force illegal immigrants to figure out a way around it. And it would do absolutely nothing to deal with any of the illegal immigrants who come into the country legally and never leave. For example, what does a border wall do to stop someone from driving up to the gate, saying "I'm a tourist, let me go see all the cool stuff in the US", and just never leaving once their legal time is up?

This is already happening. Border crossings have been in steady decline for a long time now, and while that's led to an overall decline in illegal immigration, that decline has been somewhat offset by an increase in visa overstays. About 60% of new illegal immigrants arrive on lawful visas and then stay after expiration. And Mexicans are now only a bare majority of total immigrants, 52%, and that number is declining. The trend is towards visa overstays by people from India and Asia. An issue that a wall does nothing to address.

Donald Trump's wall is the solution for the problem that existed in 1990.

That might be a nice campaign slogan but it isn't a viable policy. Deporting all of the illegal immigrants currently in the country would cost an obscene amount of money and cause massive losses to the companies that use their labor. And since those companies have a habit of writing checks to campaigns there's zero chance that a "deport them all" policy will ever be more than wishful thinking.

The scale of the operation to deport 11 million people is staggering, and then on top of that you've got the economic chaos of suddenly losing 3.5% of the population. The knock on effect as businesses lost workers and customers would be catastrophic, especially because this impact will focused on a handful of states, California, Texas, Florida, New York, New Jersey and one other I can't remember.

So you support going back to the days of legal segregation and businesses being able to put up "whites only" signs?

It is possible to build a legal framework in which basic goods offered to the public as a whole, like a drink in a bar or a packet of premade cookies, must be available to all people regardless of race, gender, sexual preference etc, while goods with any bespoke element, such as professional services, wedding cakes etc could have some right for the provider to refuse to enter the contract based on religious or ethical beliefs.

The idea that a Trump presidency could work with congress in its current state to deliver such a law with the restraint needed is more than a little unlikely, though


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Rainbow Dash wrote:
I don't think a country who is at war with a section of the world should let people from there in such huge numbers, of course there will be problems, no matter where they come from.

You've actually ended up arguing against the very idea of refugees. That's pretty amazing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Vaktathi wrote:
As for taking in Syrians and other ME refugees, IIRC the US has only agreed to take in what, 10,000? In a nation of ~320 million people, that's a negligible number and easily screened and tracked if there's a security concern regarding any of them. It's also not like we haven't brought over gobs of people from conflict areas before, particularly after the two world wars, and nobody seemed to have a huge issue with that then. I can't seem to find any protests regarding say, Germans migrating to the US after WW2, and most people didn't seem to have anything but sympathy for many Vietnamese boat people after that conflict.

Yep, and the number in this case is tiny. After Vietnam the US took about 120,000. And the vetting process on these refugees is far stricter than anything put in place before.

Interestingly enough, in 1992 Vietnamese Americans were the strongest minority voting bloc for Republicans, with a 25 point lead over Democrats. In 2012 that had shifted to a 45 point lead to Democrats. Under Trump polling shows that support has dropped even further. It isn't hard to figure out why.

The thick, thick irony is that NAFTA, by promoting legitimate Mexican businesses and generally improving Mexico's economy, has done more to reduce immigration than any of our border policies. Its funny how Trump supporters readily forget that more Mexicans left the US than came in over the course of 2014. Even if it is a dire problem (it isn't), immigration from Mexico is reducing on its own just by us continuing our current policies.

Sidenote: The Berlin Wall and hell, the Great Wall of China didn't stop people why do we think the idea will work here? A massive wall across a huge area has never been an effective means of eliminating the movement of people. Reducing it? Sure, at such a cost that it is more detrimental to the economy than the illegal immigrants would have been. It's the trickle down effect all over again; we have numerous examples of it failing and no examples of it working effectively yet it is still touted as a real option.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
I don't agree that Clinton has cunning orchestrated Trump into looking like a clueless racist sexist. She did it easily because Trump actually is a clueless racist sexist with poor self control backed up by a gakky useless team he hand picked.

The fact that Trump so handily beat all the other Republican hopefuls says something about the state of the modern GOP.

I agree that Trump's sexism and racism was there from the start. And certainly at least his racism was a bit part of his appeal to the GOP base.

But he was also defined by many other things, his business empire, his big, bragging style and freewheeling approach, his willingness to ignore political convention, both in terms of how he tackled political opponents and deviated from Republican establishment policies. By the end of these debates, almost all those things have disappeared or been turned in to weaknesses. Now his business empire is defined by his tax avoidance and $900 million loss. His big bragging style has been made to look erratic and ignorant. And I think most people have forgotten that just a few months ago Trump turned the political world on its head by promising to keep and even expand social security and took no political impact among the Republican base. He is now defined almost entirely by the way Clinton set out to define him - as a racist, sexist idiot.

Trump sure helped with some terrible strategic choices, and with also being a racist, sexist idiot. But no-one else had managed to expose Trump as he really was. Clinton did it three times in a row.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
The thick, thick irony is that NAFTA, by promoting legitimate Mexican businesses and generally improving Mexico's economy, has done more to reduce immigration than any of our border policies. Its funny how Trump supporters readily forget that more Mexicans left the US than came in over the course of 2014. Even if it is a dire problem (it isn't), immigration from Mexico is reducing on its own just by us continuing our current policies.

This is a really good point. The statements "we let them take our factories" and "they're coming here to work in our factories" are both untrue, and also mutually contradictory

There are various clusters of political beliefs that are based on faith rather than facts. Some of these seem to have occupied the high ground in the GOP; the fiction of climate change, public lavatories as danger zone of sexual predation by LGBT people, tax cuts for the rich enriching the poor through trickle down, and so on.)

This has brought a fair amount of electoral success because these issues appeal to many people's prejudices. The problem is that reality is liable to reassert itself eventually.