When the leaders of the overt racist groups say they support a particular politician, that doesn’t mean anything. They’re just trolls. Do not feed them.
What the politician himself says, though, is absolutely meaningful. Nail him to the wall for that.
He’s actually objecting to the ad. Link: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/clinton-ad-kkk-trump-227404
He has remained silent, I believe, on the speech.
Nah, he was Tweeting about it. [Edit: I thought you meant Trump, but you meant the OP… oops]
Yes, I think that is it for the most part. They attack him because
Now hold on a damn minute, there; as I understand it, Trump’s last word on the matter was that he’d sent private detectives to Hawaii, and what they’d found was absolutely incredible, and he’s going to reveal it when the time is right. So who am I to judge him until then? Could be any day now, really; don’t know why he didn’t release the stuff a year ago, or two, or three, or four – has it been five years already? – but it’d just be wrong to retract if he in fact has shocking information at his fingertips.
To be honest, while she definitely gets Trump and his politics right, i think that she lets the Republicans as a whole off far too easily. I understand that there’s a pragmatic calculation involved here—she trying to both marginalize Trump and possibly grab some non-crazy, moderate Republicans in the process—but in her speech, she went out of her way to let Republican leaders off the hook for supporting Trump, and also for doing so much to help create the toxic, racially-prejudiced atmosphere in which he and his most committed supporters thrive.
She went out of her way to contrast Trump, on the one hand, with Republican leaders like Paul Ryan and Ted Cruz on the other, despite the fact that Ryan, for example, has continued to support Trump (even if sometimes warily) through all of the candidate’s vile pronouncements. I understand that there are millions of Republican voters in the country who are horrified by Trump’s ascendancy, but they and their party have to take a lot of the blame for it.
The undertone of Hillary’s speech was, “Maybe we can get rid of Trump, push the alt-right assholes back into their caves, and get on with business as usual.” But Trump and his alt-right supporters are, in considerable measure, a product of “business as usual” in the Republican Party, from the Southern Strategy of the sixties, seventies, and eighties, through the culture wars of the nineties and early 21st century, and the more recent battles over immigration, terrorism, and Islam.
However, somehow Democratic candidates are constantly expected are constantly expected to disavow support from their less savory allies.
It seems reasonable to expect Trump to specifically say that he doesn’t want the support of the KKK or the alt-right folks, unless, of course, he really does.
Hillary Clinton is married to the man who has brought us triangulation as a political strategy. She’s framing the debate not to “destroy” anybody, but to make her positions more inclusive of the “non-Trump Republicans” thoughts and feelings, giving the Democratic party opportunity to peel off many of them.
She does NOT need to say “If you’re a Republican, you’re a racist.”
Or, she is setting an Obama level trap. She laid out all the ways Trump is a racist and not a suitable candidate, and offered an out to the Republicans - repudidate Trump and racism, like Dole, Bush, and McCain - or admit yours is the party of racists.
Exactly. If I am a life-long Republican, and Hilary comes out and says “you Republicans are all racists, and that’s why you nominated Trump”, I will say “Hell no, lady, you’re so very wrong, and I will never vote for you”
If I If I am a life-long Republican, and Hilary comes out and says “Your party has a proud history, and you’re better than this dim-wit who somehow managed to hijack your good name and good party.” I will say “You have a point there - this idiot does not represent what I believe is best for the country”
It may only be 5% of Republicans who would think along the lines I have supposed… but that’s enough.
I think she may also be setting the table for her campaign surrogates to actually call out others (and the party as a whole) by name. She’s drawing the dots for others to connect.
This is also why it’s a super effective trap. Rather than casting a super wide net, Clinton simply points out that (1) Trump is being supported by a bunch of super-sketchy dudes; and (2) Trump has been saying a bunch of crazy shit. I think that point (2) is basically indisputable, even by Trump fans who would dispute they are sketchy dudes. However, current Republican orthodoxy doesn’t allow Republicans to publicly agree with Clinton (or Obama) about anything, which means that they can’t agree with her attack. On the other hand, they can’t very well dispute point (2) either - Trump really has been saying crazy shit.
Cue the semi-embarrassed silence. A devastating attack speech like that would normally be met with Trump’s party rallying to his defense; here, they’re not.
Has there been ANY defense of Trump from party officials in the past day? (Not just pathetic Trump mouthpieces) I have heard… crickets.
The most I can find is this from Michael Steele (who has held no public or party office since 2011).
Yeah, thanks, but that’s not what i suggested.
I made quite clear my belief that millions of Republicans reject Trump and his bigotry. My argument was that she shouldn’t have let the party as a whole, and especially its leadership and its elected representatives, off so lightly.
I would have preferred a clearer statement of the actual truth: that Trump has prospered because, even while they might oppose a lot of his ideas, many Republican politicians have been willing to overlook his bigotry and offer him support because they see it as a lesser evil than letting Clinton win the election. And also, i think, that Republican obstructionism on so many basic, reasonable things that the Obama administration has tried to do (up to and including the very proper nomination of an eminently qualified Supreme Court candidate) has created an atmosphere whereby mere loud-mouthed, unthinking opposition is seen as a reasonable substitute for political dialog.
And his “defense” is nonsensical:
No, Mr. Steele. When you lob the charge back at the Democrats, everyone goes "Oh my God, you’re just obviously engaging in projection, and by the way, the word “bigot” does not mean “I don’t like your policies”. Get a freaking dictionary.
And by the way, Mr. Steele. “Out of bounds”? So that means that it’s OK for Trump to call Clinton a “bigot” in the national press, but she is supposed to do what? Just accept it? Good God, what an igoramous. No wonder others are not trying this pathetic argument.
I think that most of the people who post here would find the use of violence as a means of forwarding a political ideology antithetical to democracy. Much, if indeed most, of the “alt-right” not only don’t find it so, they actively embrace it, either by action or acquiescence.
Trump’s “second amendment people” line was directly in that wheelhouse.
“Nuclearly” is not a word. Goddess willing, it never will be.
You, of course, are correct. It’s pronounced “Nu-cu-lar-ly.”
She doesn’t want to wrap repub members of Congress into it, it hands them a ready made excuse to use after the election. Not that laying off will really make that much difference.