Nov 4 - This Nightmare Must End: The Trump/Pence Regime Must Go! protest

Politics & Elections
81

Other than the links posted by iiandyiii, I’d take into considering how conservatives have treated groups they didn’t like historically. Blacks, muslims or gays. Conservatives have a long, rich history of trying to take away their rights.

Also the president is a clear and present danger to both national security and the constitution. Almost every day he does something that threatens the constitution, the rule of law, balance of powers, etc. and his base could care less. The deafening silence from Trump’s voters as Trump tries to use the justice department to persecute his enemies, tries to engage in large scale voter suppression, tries to obstruct justice, collaborates with hostile foreign nations, violates the emolument clause, hostility to a free press, hostility to freedom of religion, hostility to freedom of assembly (NFL protests for example), encouragement of torture, wanting rapid justice before a trial (which he has done before in the 80s before the recent NYC terror attack), hostility to an independent judiciary, wanting to gather up data on what his critics do online, etc speaks volumes. Trump is a living, breathing threat to democracy, the constitution and the rule of law and 63 million people voted for him and the vast majority don’t care about the risk he poses.

For many of us it is virtually impossible to rectify being a Trump supporter with being someone who cares about the constitution, rule of law, western values, decorum and democracy. Trump is not just ‘another republican’, there is something deeply wrong with him legally, morally and mentally.

So yes, calling Trump and a big % of his voters a threat to the US is a valid statement. If I give a gun to a known criminal and shrug my shoulders when he goes on a killing spree, I’m guilty too even if I don’t explicitly say I support him pulling the trigger every time he did it, and only supported some of the times he did it. Same with Trump and his voters. You can’t claim Trump’s voters care about the constitution or rule of law when they elect someone who is a major threat to these things.

82

I wish more conservatives grasped this, but then some liberals have gone way overboard with maligning conservative legislators in the past, so it probably seems like a similar kind of hysteria. But as a lefty who thought the rhetoric about GW Bush was overblown and who has become considerably more moderate with age, Trump is a fucking shitstorm. It has nothing to do with policy. He is an extremely dangerous mentally unstable person who is destroying the government through sheer incompetence.

Just consider for a moment, that the current administration, with all its drama, has not suffered a single crisis (that wasn’t self-generated.) Do you know what’s going to happen when a real crisis hits? Neither do I. Neither did all of these GOP national security experts who took the unprecedented step of protesting a candidate in their own party.

The level at which people are willing to handwave away such blatant incompetence and amorality just blows my mind. The grade of self-delusion it requires for people to convince themselves that a Billionaire with Trump’s well-documented history could ever give two shits about them is something I still grapple with on a daily basis. I’ve never actually seen populism at work. It would be fascinating if it wasn’t so scary.

As far as Pence goes, I’d take him in a heartbeat. His policies are terrible but he understands the duties and responsibilities of his job and is not a complete embarrassment of a human being.

83

I wish they understood it too. Like I said, it is hard to rectify someone giving a gun to an emotionally unstable person who talks endlessly about wanting to go on a mass killing spree and then that person who gave them the gun turning around and saying ‘you should respect me as a thoughtful, moral person’. For a lot of us, that is very hard to do when you enable, make excuses for or condone something really wrong.

I would take Pence in a heartbeat too. Part of me wants to keep Trump just because I hope he will force America to reflect on how irrational, dangerous and unhinged a large and growing faction of the right has become, but I have very little faith that the public will learn anything. One of the few good things to come from Trump is that he has pulled the scab off the wound and is forcing America to confront how deranged we’ve become due to 40 years of propaganda and the southern strategy.

I remember right after the election when Pence went to a broadway show and people started booing him. Pence told his kids ‘that is what freedom sounds like’ while Trump got enraged and went on Twitter saying people shouldn’t be able to do that. I wouldn’t agree with Pence on policy but I wouldn’t feel unsafe with him as president. I live in Indiana, he was my governor for years. I never felt unsafe having him in a position of power.

Lots of us on the left would happily take George W Bush back right now.

84

Ok, Dr. Weasel. Your credentials to evaluate someone’s mental state are what, exactly?

85

She is highly trained in psychology and mental health work, if it matters. I don’t think **Spice Weasel **is a doctor, but she has done graduate work in mental health.

http://thehill.com/homenews/news/355490-psychologists-march-through-ny-to-call-for-trumps-removal

Name the last time a group of mental health experts marched demanding a president be removed from office.

Trump is used by some professors as a pretty textbook case of a narcissistic disorder (either narcissistic personality disorder or malignant narcissism). There is also serious speculation that there may be some form of dementia because of Trump’s speech patterns, inability to control his emotions, deterioration over the last few decades, etc.

If Trump wants to end all the criticism, he is free to undergo a thorough mental health exam that includes various scans and tests.

86

Is it possible for a skilled liar to wing it through an examination if he or she tries to ? Maybe a sociopath for instance.
Some successful applications for parole where the convict goes forth to slay again might be an indicator.

On the other hand your pressie might legitimately claim it is invidious to single him out, and suspicious for him to undertake it as if a confession, and therefore all people who put themselves forward for that office must equally undergo a psych exam beforehand.

87

No it won’t do anything. It’s pathetic like Occupy was.

You have to cripple things by getting 20 million or so people willing to stay home from work on weekdays as long as it takes. That would work, but things will have to get a hell of a lot worse before that ever happens. People are lazy and full of shit, and not willing to actually risk anything. They’ll mostly only do shit if you can do it on your phone.

88

I have no idea if a sociopath can lie and pretend convincingly that they aren’t a sociopath. A narcissist may not either. A full exam would probably entail also talking to the people closest to the president. When a person gets high level security clearance to work for the government their friends and family are interviewed. I’m sure people way smarter than me have figured out how to interview pathological liars with cluster B personality disorders to figure out what disorders they actually suffer from.

I’d be all in favor of making a full medical and financial exam (including releasing tax returns) mandatory for anyone who wants to become president. In the US government you have to undergo pretty heaving screening to get top secret security clearance, so I’d be in favor of the same or higher levels of screening for holding public office.

Medical scans like MRIs or CAT scans could also be used to detect neurological illnesses like dementia. Technically you can probably tell if someone is a sociopath with a PET scan. I’m not sure if you can use brain scans to detect other disorders like narcissistic personality disorder.

Edit: Yup you can.

89

There’s speculation, certainly. I don’t think I’d call it very serious, however.

If it makes you feel better, there’s similar rampant speculation about Nancy Pelosi’s brain health. I don’t consider it very responsible either. As always, YMMV.

90

I mentioned upthread I’d be fine with mandatory independent medical exams for major politicians. Seeing how you have to undergo independent medical exams to drive a semi truck, at the very least we can have those same kinds of requirements to be a major politician.

As far as speculation, why aren’t hundreds of mental health workers speaking out about Nancy Pelosi’s mental health the way they speak out against Trump? Why are’t clinicians using Pelosi as an example of a serious mental disorder the same way they do with Trump?

I’m in favor of mandatory health and financial exams for politicians, but I don’t see the evidence for Pelosi that I see for Trump. I haven’t seen a wide range of mental health experts expressing concern about Pelosi like they do for Trump.

If Trump wants to end the speculation and rumors, he should undergo legitimate medical testing by qualified, objective professionals.

91

There’s certainly a lot of truth to this from my perspective. I heard a bunch of apocalyptic language about Bush 43 coming from the left, and some about McCain and Romney too, and this just sounds like more of the same. They’ve kind of got this “boy who cried wolf” thing going, at least for me personally, so I kind of shrug and try to look past most of the (what appears to me) hysterics.

I don’t consider putting a skeptic like Rick Perry in charge of the DoE to be the same thing as “destroying the government through sheer incompetence”, but perhaps we’re just operating from different definitions. If I may ask, what, in your opinion are the critical DoE functions that you are worried will cease by 2021?

I think it’s a strange definition of “crisis” that doesn’t include North Korea launching ballistic missiles over Japan. Or is that indeed a crisis, just one that you think Trump “self-generated”?

92

My guess? Because they’re Democrats first and mental health workers second.

ETA:

Really? this doesn’t strike you as ridiculous hyperbole? Donald J. Trump is so singularly messed-in-the-head that George Simon can’t find even one better example on the entire planet? This seems more like convenient exaggeration than a calm, rational analysis to me, but again, YMMV.

93

Damn, now I have to go watch The President’s Analyst.

Kropotkin Logic is on our side: this isn’t a case of a world struggle between two divergent ideologies, of different economic systems. Every day your country becomes more socialistic, my country becomes more capitalistic. Pretty soon we will meet in the middle and join hands.

94

Is this the crazy antifa non event that is in the news?

95

**Dr. Weasel ** is my husband, a licensed clinical psychologist, and thinks it’s one of the best examples of Narcissistic Personality Disorder he’s ever seen. He is not prone to hyperbole. However, being a professional, the first thing he would tell you is that he can’t officially diagnose someone he’s never met. The best he can do – that any of us can do – is create an informed opinion based on past experience, scientific knowledge, and the very public record of Trump’s behavioral history, which stretches back decades. (Dr. Weasel would most likely view this march of professionals Wesley refers to as unethical or in the least unprofessional. He is super big on practice ethics.)

As for us laypeople, we don’t have to guess at his mental state because he demonstrates it publicly on a daily basis. My uncle routinely talked about the government poisoning his cigarettes and lacing his cassette tapes with LSD. I did not need a degree to determine he was batshit crazy. Likewise you only have to spend about ten minutes with my mother (who has Borderline Personality Disorder) to realize something is seriously off about her. To those of us who don’t have an emotional stake in Trump’s mental state, his mental illness is as obvious as my uncle’s and my mother’s. I’m truly sorry you don’t recognize that, but even if I were a mental health expert I doubt you’d give two shits about my professional opinion. The only way we can know for sure is for Trump to submit to a mental health examination by a qualified professional.

I do a lot of mental health advocacy and have accumulated a lot of knowledge through research and personal experience, but it’s actually my husband with the extensive training. Whenever a thread comes up on the topic of mental health, I usually run my thoughts by him and solicit his input. I did a short stint as a clinical mental health counselor as a graduate school intern and took all the requisite classes, but that is the extent of my training. I decided clinical work was not for me because it was too emotionally draining.

While I’m certainly not an expert, mental health is pretty much our bread and butter around here. That’s not a topic I will ever shy away from.

Fun fact: More people vote for American Idol than their President.

Did you read the article? It has nothing to do with putting a skeptic in charge. This isn’t a hypothetical. The critical DoE functions have already ceased, because nobody who works there knows how to do the work. An interview with the guy formerly running the DoE indicates that we’ve already had near-miss incidents with nukes, among other things. It’s not just the DoE. Hundreds of top-level positions at critical departments across the nation were never filled, meaning a great many of them are effectively defunct.

That should concern you. When I get upset, it’s usually about social issues, but this concerns me far more than any social issue ever has. As for the ‘‘crying wolf,’’ I was harshly critical of GW while in office, but I always pushed back on the hysterical stuff, and I would hope I come off as level-headed and fair, for the most part, so I’m just gonna have to ask you to take my word for it, that me, and a bunch of other reasonable people, have never seen anything like this.

96

When I read the name “Refuse Fascism,” all I could think was - is that going to be abbreviated as “Refufa?”

97

And I see it is the crazy ass info wars shit from HD’s first post. This is a total non-event: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/11/01/the-antifa-apocalypse-is-coming-this-weekend-if-you-believe-the-hype/

98

On the left we feel that way when the right makes any criticisms of democrats. After all the stuff that was said about Obama, it is hard to take anything they say seriously. In that regard I can see what you mean, if Cory Booker or Joe Biden runs in 2020, we will not listen to their complaints because these are the same people who said Obama was pro-terrorism and born in Kenya.

Having said that, what did the left say about Bush or Romney that was mainstream that was similar to what we say about Trump? Romney spoke out against Trump and tried to prevent him from getting elected president. Bush didn’t vote for him either. Do you question why?

How do you rectify the fact that a lot of people on the left would feel much better with someone like Pence or Bush in charge, if we are going to treat Pence or Bush the same?

There are also the hurricanes, which didn’t go so well. The one in Puerto Rico was badly mishandled, and plays into the image of Trump having white nationalist tendencies since he and his party reacted better to hurricanes on the mainland.

Let me ask you this then, why aren’t all these democrat psychologists marching about anyone else on the right or left?

Can you honestly say you can look at everything Donald Trump has said and done in the last 2 years and not question his moral, mental or emotional fitness for office?

99

Edited to get to the meaty stuff.

Very well stated. Expresses my thoughts exactly.

Unfortunately, it is not a “feel-good” feeling. And gawd do I need one.

Indeed very, very scary. I just hope it doesn’t turn tragic. Please tell me it won’t.

100

I just wanted to add a personal spin to this. The director of my department left last year, along with our CEO, so I have not had an official boss for about a year now. I have found it very challenging to do my job without supervision. While I’m pretty damned good at what I do, there are tertiary responsibilities I had to take over that I don’t have as much experience with, and nobody else at my job knows how to do those things, even a little. The lack of leadership - just two unfilled spots - has impacted every person within our department and ultimately had a negative effect on everyone’s performance.

When I look at what’s going on with the DoE, I can’t help but imagine everyone in office admin suddenly being gone. No Director of Development, no CEO, no Director of Business Operations, no Accounting Manager, no Senior Director of Programs, that is a decent analogy for what we’re currently facing across multiple state departments, including the Department of Agriculture, the CDC, etc. etc. A bunch of lower-level employees trying to hold shit together without really knowing what they are doing.

I don’t work with nukes.