Trump’s just going all-in with this and I can’t see it ending well for anyone:
“But I protect you from outside enemies. But you know I always say, we have the outside enemies, so you can say China, you can say Russia, you can say Kim Jong Un … if you have a smart president it’s no problem,” Trump said. “It’s the enemy from within.
“All the scum we have to deal with that hate our country,” he continued. “That’s a bigger enemy than China and Russia.… Everyday Americans like Cindy are living in fear all because Kamala Harris decided to empty the slums and prison cells of Caracas, and many other places. Happening all over the world.”
< snip >
“Every country, you know, prison populations all over the world are down. Crime all over the world is down. Because they take the world’s criminals, gang members, drug dealers, and they deposit them into the United States. Bus after bus after bus,” Trump said to a cacophony of boos from the crowd of his supporters.
< snip >
“They took the criminals out of Caracas, and they put them along your border, and they said if you ever come back, we’re going to kill you,” Trump said.
“Think of that!” he continued. “We have to live with these animals. But we won’t live with them for long!”
At that, one person in the crowd shouted, “Kill them!”
The Constitution doesn’t actually say that: “Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.”
You can have enemies - we do now - and not literally be at war with them.
I cannot believe this kind of shit isn’t all over the media. There should be billboards with these quotes on them and his big, fat, ugly face. I mean I know “this is just his schtick” but hasn’t he crossed a line here?
He’s pissed me off today by naming his deportation mission Operation Aurora. Nooooooooooo!!! I don’t want my name in his mouth.
It’s actually a fucking brilliant name for it. Aurora means dawn or daybreak. The dawn of a new age. Makes me almost wonder if his team had a hand in events in Aurora CO just to use the name. You know, creating stories. But I don’t really think they are that clever.
Not a good plan. You get TFG in the news all the time and everyone is thinking about him all the time, which makes a lot of people vote for him just because his name is in their heads. Voting is supposed to be rational, but across the voting populace, it is not.
So at this point I’ve really got to ask what is his plan is regarding this rhetoric.
From most benign to malignant, I see
He just realizes that spouting red meat motivates his base, he either doesn’t realize or doesn’t care that this could lead to real violence so long as he gets them to the polls.
he his hoping the the threat of violence will keep Dems from going to the polls
He is trying to egg people into violence because the idea of motivating someone to kill on his behalf turns him on.
He’s hoping that he can motivate someone to assasinate Kamala Harris before the election.
He’s hoping to motivate his base enough that if he loses the election they will revolt and start a civil war
He actually believes what he is saying. He’s basically Hitler wants to exterminate the Untermench.
I have no doubt he is aiming for #6 and use #5 to get there but he will take whatever he can get.
I can’t imagine that man having anything but pure self-interest foremost in his mind for all things. He wants it all with the minimum amount of effort on his part and zero concern for any other consequences.
I suppose you’re right. It’s not that I was thinking his demented rhetoric is new to anyone w/ any level of cognition. Just that it dawned on me in a new way, how surreal and frightening this situation has become. Maybe we’ve all become so numb to his blathering that when he turns up the crazy we don’t notice. What’s the media’s excuse?
Me too. What really needs to happen is to have every non-right wing News broadcast break their regular programming to have an editorial session explaining that while they usually try to remain neutral reporters and simply inform the American people without taking sides, there is a point at which there is no longer two sides to an issue. One thing that all Americans should be able to agree on is that the Nazi’s were bad and the rhetoric being used candidates is downright dangerous and unAmerican. I’d hope that if enough of them did that it might be a big enough event to break the bothsiderism bubble and finally be a “have you no sense of decency sir” moment for Trump.
Unfortunately they are for the most part far to spineless but one can dream. Maybe at the very least the Lincoln project can do a long form ad parallelizing the words and actions of Trump vs those of Hitler and Mussolini, with the tag line it can happen here.
The media’s excuse is that they are a business, with ledgers and shareholder meetings and all that: the Screaming Cheeto-Faced ShitGibbon (or the Project 2025 guys at his flank) will do more to reduce corporate taxes and greenlight M&A, which makes businesses (including advertisers) happy, so they fail to resoundingly repudiate him. Reporters and editors may fourth-wall some derision, but they are not the ones running the show.
I keep hearing that the traditional media does not have control of ohe narrative this time around, but the math on that is challenging to work out.
I don’t want the media to “control the narrative”, I want them to report the facts. When someone with the potential to hold the highest office in the nation says threatening, racist, fascist things, I want it to be made known.
The traditional media is not without agenda. We want there to be some sense of honor in this country, but we have a system run by sociopaths who reject the quaint notion of honor, and the prime sociopath is leading their charge.
I agree but conservatives constantly complain about media bias and the deep state and their viewers sponge it up. MAGA has gotten people to threaten meteorologists who reported on the hurricanes. It has gotten that far.
So, most media is super cautious to not appear biased and call out the bullshit that Trump says. Heck, even Vance complained to the hosts in the VP debate that they promised to not fact check him…and they obliged.