# Donald Trump's 2016 General Election Campaign **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [May 4, 2016, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901 "2016-05-04T02:37:34Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 44
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/861 "2016-06-05T05:44:16Z")
James Fallow at The Atlantic makes the observation that the GOP is not behaving like in past presidential contests, based on recent events it seems that they are not actually **defending** Trump wile at the same time they told us they are “supporting him”. > **[Trump Time Capsule](https://www.theatlantic.com/category/the-daily-trump/)** > [@](#): > > - On June 2, Hillary Clinton gave a speech attacking Donald Trump’s qualifications to be president, in unusually blunt and dismissive terms. Right off the bat she said, “Donald Trump’s ideas are not just different, they are dangerously incoherent. They are not even really ideas, just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds, and outright lies. He is not just unprepared, he is temperamentally unfit to hold an office that requires knowledge, stability, and immense responsibility.” It went on from there. > > - In all previous happenings of the known political world, the party subject to such attacks would have been ready to respond. While Clinton was still speaking, the “Let’s set the record straight!” emails from GOP HQ would have been pouring in. As soon as the speech was over, worthy-seeming surrogates would have crowded the cable news shows to say how unfair the criticism was, how sound and thought-through Trump’s policies were, how he had the experience and judgment for the challenges ahead. > > - Trump himself put out one of his trademarked Tweets, shown above. (Which the Clinton campaign, obviously prepared for him to do so, instantly pounced on and conclusively rebutted.) And people tell me that Fox commentators have been talking about crooked Hillary — I haven’t watched. But … that’s it. > > From the party as a whole? Nothing. Crickets. > [@](#): > > Many people have attacked Hillary Clinton. But as far as I’m aware, no prominent party official has stepped up to say: She’s wrong when she says that Donald Trump is completely unfit for the job he seeks. (The Sunday shows tomorrow are still ahead, but they will be three days late — an eternity in modern news-cycle time.) > > And yet: almost all of these people are preparing to accept Trump as their nominee, and have said they “support” him. > > You could say it’s “clever” for the Republican establishment to go through the motions of supporting Trump, while making it 100% clear that they know he’s toxically unqualified. I don’t really understand why they think that’s wiser than saying: No, here I draw the line. Maybe later on they’ll explain. For now this note is just to record the state of affairs and of public knowledge, six-plus weeks before the convention. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/862 "2016-06-05T06:11:01Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > [A poll reports interesting results](http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2016/01/donald-trump-2016-authoritarian-213533): It’s even more interesting to note greater support for the left hand (authoritarian) child descriptions given that in at least two of the pairs listed, the word on the right is not significantly different from the one on the left. A child/adult can very easily be both well-behaved and considerate, and they can be both well-mannered and curious as well. One would think a more realistic way of contrasting so-called conservative/authoritarian behavior vs. liberal/anything-goes behavior would be something along the lines of: respectful or insolent obedient or rebellious well behaved or undisciplined well mannered or crude I would think a survey contrasting these more realistic behavioral opposites would garner even more ‘authoritarian’ votes. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 7:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/863 "2016-06-05T07:25:56Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > It’s even more interesting to note greater support for the left hand (authoritarian) child descriptions given that in at least two of the pairs listed, the word on the right is not significantly different from the one on the left. A child/adult can very easily be both well-behaved and considerate, and they can be both well-mannered and curious as well. One would think a more realistic way of contrasting so-called conservative/authoritarian behavior vs. liberal/anything-goes behavior would be something along the lines of: > > respectful or insolent > > obedient or rebellious > > well behaved or undisciplined > > well mannered or crude > > I would think a survey contrasting these more realistic behavioral opposites would garner even more ‘authoritarian’ votes. You wasted a lot of words to demonstrate, with examples, the difference between well-designed and poorly-designed poll questions. If my point isn’t clear, Trump would lose heavily were a poll question phrased as follows: _Who would you prefer as President: A conscientious person who strives to improve the lives of ordinary Americans? Or a pompous blowhard facing lawsuits for business fraud?_ ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 7:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/864 "2016-06-05T07:40:11Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > … _ **so-called** _ conservative/authoritarian behavior vs. liberal/_ **anything-goes** _ behavior … [my emphasis] While your comments address the efficacy of the questions, you don’t address the fact that the questions _ **obviously were efficacious: they created an indicator for likelihood of voting Trump** _. And, from the poll results and the cliché phrases I’ve highlighted in your post, it seems predictable that … you are a Trump supporter! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 8:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/865 "2016-06-05T08:10:59Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > While your comments address the efficacy of the questions, you don’t address the fact that the questions _ **obviously were efficacious…** _. Oh, but I did. I said very clearly that by phrasing the questions as I did rather than in the way the pollsters did, an even larger number would have chosen ‘authoritarian’ (i.e., Trump). In other words, it’s obvious the questions were phrased in such a way as to weight the answers in Trump’s favor, but my point was that by phrasing them in a more realistic way they could have accomplished their goal more easily and in greater numbers. > [@septimus](#): > > And, from the poll results and the cliché phrases I’ve highlighted in your post, it seems predictable that … you are a Trump supporter! 🙂 No, I like Trump as a person, and I admire his intelligence and abilities as a businessman. This is as a result of having followed him and his career fairly closely since the eighties. But I don’t support him in his run for the presidency. He’s said some things that I’ve found troubling (although who can say if he really meant them), plus he’s about ten times worse than Hillary Clinton in that we don’t really have any idea what he’d really be like or what he would do once in office. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 9:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/866 "2016-06-05T09:16:29Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > No, I like Trump as a person, and I admire his intelligence and abilities as a businessman. this is not going to surprise anyone on this board ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 11:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/867 "2016-06-05T11:07:16Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > No, I like Trump as a person, and I admire his intelligence and abilities as a businessman. This is as a result of having followed him and his career fairly closely since the eighties. Please explain how the numbers in post 845 are the work of one with the profit-making abilities of a “businessman”. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/868 "2016-06-05T12:11:17Z")
They look familiar to a banker who is in the frontier markets and is used to seeing the family founder who extracts value for the personal benefit in inflating costs and personal/family salaries, at the expense of his funders and the other partners- and the company. It is the rents extraction. This Trump, he actually reminds me of the habits of the oligarchic family businesses in my world, the rent extracting habits of course, not very wealth building - and the thin skin and the familial arrogance. These people I am very familiar with (of course they complain at excessive collateral taken but we know that they lie as they breath). ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/869 "2016-06-05T12:19:28Z")
Exactly. They aren’t the numbers of one interested in building a profitable business, but one using OPM to enrich himself. Whatever Trump is, he is not a “businessman” in the sense that Gates, Jobs, Rockefeller, Watson, et al is… he’s a huckster. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/870 "2016-06-05T12:33:06Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > It’s even more interesting to note greater support for the left hand (authoritarian) child descriptions given that in at least two of the pairs listed, the word on the right is not significantly different from the one on the left. A child/adult can very easily be both well-behaved and considerate, and they can be both well-mannered and curious as well. One would think a more realistic way of contrasting so-called conservative/authoritarian behavior vs. liberal/anything-goes behavior would be something along the lines of: > > respectful or insolent > > obedient or rebellious > > well behaved or undisciplined > > well mannered or crude > > I would think a survey contrasting these more realistic behavioral opposites would garner even more ‘authoritarian’ votes. On the contrary, it should be phrased like this, so that even less people garner “authoritian.” -Clingy or independent -Needy or self-reliant -Self-centered or considerate -Robotic or curious. See it works both ways! With the right options, I can make the other side look like assholes too! Look, there’s a reason the pollsters asked the question the way they did. It wasn’t meant to be about opposites, or to lead people to the “right” choice; it was meant to use two _different_ traits, and seeing which a person valued more. ---
**Author:** ![MacCat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/maccat/32/216_2.png) [@MacCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacCat)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/871 "2016-06-05T12:50:25Z")
Cat got your tongue Donald? Haven’t heard but a few _absolutely pathetic_ tweets since Thursday, and after a year of daily bile, the silence is deafening. He must be preparing a _yuuuge_ rebuttal, with all the best words, and no teleprompter, of course. Reality is setting in. Having to deal with an eviscerating Dem instead of the sad and tremulous GOPer competition, _and_ the humiliated Media ready to turn on the wounded and floundering huckster, I want to see and hear him as he circles the bowl, taking the GOP with him. The Emperor is naked. ---
**Author:** ![Ramira](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ramira/32/344_2.png) [@Ramira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ramira)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/872 "2016-06-05T13:01:42Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Exactly. They aren’t the numbers of one interested in building a profitable business, but one using OPM to enrich himself. Not interested or not capable of doing so by his nature. He has the habits of a rentier. > [@](#): > > Whatever Trump is, he is not a “businessman” in the sense that Gates, Jobs, Rockefeller, Watson, et al is… he’s a huckster. He is a rentier, I find him not different from the petty family oligarchic business leaders in the frontier markets who inherited assets in the decolonisation. Indeed very similar. He is in this fashion I think even worse than a Berlusconi. Berlusconi at least showed some good capability in the management of his business empire (the idea that someone following Trump over many years would have respect for his business management capabilities is astonishing - but given the american football scandale and judgement shown - contre the self-marketing capacity) and actually demonstrated a patient intelligence in the affaires of Forza Italia… And Berlusconi was an absolute disaster for the Italians over the long-run… ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/873 "2016-06-05T13:19:43Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > No, I like Trump as a person, How is it possible to like a racist piece of shit as a person? ---
**Author:** ![Euphonious\_Polemic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/euphonious_polemic/32/3002_2.png) [@Euphonious\_Polemic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Euphonious_Polemic)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 3:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/874 "2016-06-05T15:30:50Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > How is it possible to like a racist piece of shit as a person? I guess for those people who think it’s perfectly acceptable (and even shows good moral character) to call a judge born in Illinois a “Mexican” as a pejorative. To imply that he is biased against you because of his ethnic background. Someone who finds that behavior acceptable and even laudable will find Trump a likable person. ---
**Author:** ![Siam\_Sam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d78d45/32.png) [@Siam\_Sam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siam_Sam)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/875 "2016-06-05T15:37:01Z")
Can the judge give any sort of sanction to Trump for saying negative things about him while Trump is involved in a case that the judge is judging? Or have I just been in Thailand too long? (Bad-mouthing a judge or his decisions in any way, shape or form is a prison offense in Thailand even for those who have nothing to do with the case in question.) ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 3:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/876 "2016-06-05T15:42:58Z")
Trump says Muslim judges also [might not be fair to him](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-muslim-judge_us_57542cb6e4b0ed593f14ad78): > [@](#): > > Asked if he believed that he would be treated unfairly by a Muslim judge because of his call to ban all Muslims from entering the United States, Trump said, “It’s possible.” > > “It’s possible, yes,” he said. “That would be possible, absolutely.” ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/877 "2016-06-05T15:45:21Z")
> [@MacCat](#): > > Having to deal with an eviscerating Dem instead of the sad and tremulous GOPer competition, _and_ the humiliated Media ready to turn on the wounded and floundering huckster, I want to see and hear him as he circles the bowl, taking the GOP with him… It feels like the media has decided (either implicitly or explicitly in some secret conference) to take the gloves off with regards to Donald – that the stakes are too high. The tone of the coverage seems to have shifted and they have no qualms about calling him on his bullshit. Example: CNN calling him a liar in the chiron underneath his picture. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/878 "2016-06-05T15:57:31Z")
> [@Siam\_Sam](#): > > Can the judge give any sort of sanction to Trump for saying negative things about him while Trump is involved in a case that the judge is judging? Or have I just been in Thailand too long? (Bad-mouthing a judge or his decisions in any way, shape or form is a prison offense in Thailand even for those who have nothing to do with the case in question.) [Possibly.](http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-trump-judge-idUSKCN0YK0PA) > [@](#): > > Legal scholars said Trump could face consequences for slamming the judge, although many speculated that Curiel was unlikely to sanction him formally. > > “Mr. Trump’s conduct could be subject to sanction for indirect criminal contempt of court,” said Charles Geyh, a legal ethics expert at the Indiana University Maurer School of Law. I did see a mention that if Trump actually thinks there’s a bias, his lawyers could file a motion for recusal(?). ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/879 "2016-06-05T16:25:31Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Trump says Muslim judges also [might not be fair to him](http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/trump-muslim-judge_us_57542cb6e4b0ed593f14ad78): He truly is running to be president of a very specific clan in this country, to the exclusion of everyone else. His campaign is attempting to very much shrink this nation, where he really only serves and gives a shit about certain people, and divides everyone else out as “others.” ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [June 5, 2016, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901/880 "2016-06-05T17:30:32Z")
Hopefully, someone will ask him about The Jews soon. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901.md?page=43) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/donald-trumps-2016-general-election-campaign/753901.md?page=45)