Robert Reich on his facebook page was wishing for Trump’s life to fall apart due to his Presidential run. No one should wish that. It’s just the kind of thing political insiders want to keep outsiders out. “Run, and we’ll ruin you.”
That second accusation is just a talking point. You can believe that Pence is not a “pure bigot” (whatever that is) and justify supporting him, if you want, just as some folks probably console themselves by saying that Trump is not a pure bigot (or some equivalent descriptor). But that’s bullshit. If you don’t want to vote for a bigot, then don’t vote for a bigot. Pence has made it clear that he has strong homophobic views. I consider that equivalent to someone with strong white supremacist views. Both are unacceptable, whether or not they’re 100% “pure”.
Yeah, Trump is going to face a hailstorm of Federal charges after this election, for a lot of really stupid shit such as flying his jet uncertified for several months, and he’s going to scream bloody murder about how it is all political revenge. :smack:
Clinton was reasonable. Trump was not. That settled it for me.
Trump agreed with Hillary at the beginning. Bad sign. And of course, the sniffles. And the pacing, and everything else everyone mentioned.
I noticed right after, the cameras were on Trump kissing his family on the cheek. There was a blonde with a pony tail in a black dress. Could’ve been one of Trump’s daughters. He leaned in to kiss her on the cheek, and she backed away from him. That was telling.
I listened for a minute to the commentators on MSNBC and they were right: not really anything new. Mainly the same points we’ve heard again and again.
From a visual perspective, Trump lost big – slouching, fidgeting, scowling, lifting the mike to speak…it was embarrassing to watch.
On the debate, I ‘tuned in’ here to see how many posts would declare a Clinton victory in what was not one in my view, not clearly anyway.
Trump did much better than last time IMO, stuck much more to hitting Clinton as defending a failed status quo, which if he were ever to win would be the path. Now, if you think the status quo is good, you should be for Clinton (besides any superiority in character, knowledge etc, even besides left v right). But even if you think lots of things have been ‘disasters’ lately, you’d still have gotten relatively little from Trump last time beyond first few minutes. This time he spend less time meandering and defending himself and much more time hitting her. And I think the gap in level of organization and fact heaviness of her answers v his was significantly narrower also, though if score is kept just on who speaks in distinct sentences and paragraphs with a generally higher level of knowledge, it’s always going to be her.
Major caveats: no idea what the verdict of key voters will be about the opening phase dealing with the Trump tape or his counterattacks, not to mention the pre-debate theatrics. Also I don’t know if his demeanor (lurking around behind her, constant interruptions, complaint about the moderators etc.) will be viewed by key voters as detracting significantly or not.
One of the less visceral things that doesn’t resonate now but may in the next few days is that Trump did admit that he did use that 1995 $900 million plus loss (and potential other losses later) to not pay any federal income tax for the majority of the last 20 years. That will give him much less of a justification, beyond the bizarre one of being perpetually under audit, to not release his returns.
This. He looked angry, and never sat, just wandering around the stage, and looming over her. I found it really creepy. And that was aside from the whining (“mom, she got the big half!”), the complete incoherence, and the threat to jail hos opponent (he better start growing a moustache, and procuring a tricorn).
I’m biased for Clinton, but my take was probably similar to yours. I thought Trump actually got out of the gate pretty strong. I have no way to prove it but I got the feeling early on that Clinton may have underestimated Trump a little. I felt like her energy and posture communicated confidence, whereas Trump came in snarling. Initially, before the debate began, I thought it would work against Trump, but I felt like Trump went into attack mode and landed some shots and actually made Clinton visibly uncomfortable. I didn’t see the end of the debate but Trump’s strongest point was the quip about blaming honest Abe about the language of her Wall St transcripts – that was, objectively speaking, pretty fair and i thought Hillary fielded the question poorly.
But at about that same time is when Trump started coming unhinged with some of his responses. I mean he would get asked a question about tax returns and then it would somehow end up turning into discussion about Jupiter. I thought Clinton also did a better job of actually answering the questions. I don’t think Trump really, truly impressed someone who wasn’t already leaning his way before the debate. But he might have convinced some not to abandon ship, which is what he probably set as a key objective before tonight. He stopped the bleeding. But I don’t think it moves him forward. I’m guessing that the media is going to start pounding away at him. There’s probably more dirt, and I suspect they’re going to dig it up.
Watch the Republicans dismiss this. Of course, with the VP debate, they touted how well Pence did from a visual standpoint. Now, the visual standpoint will be unimportant because, well, because.
I really believe the bottom line is that visuals matter a lot. Most people don’t sit and listen to it word for word, they look at the participants. Hillary definitely presented better, clearly no contest there even if someone wants to say the message part was a tie (which I don’t believe it was.)
You supported a bigot. You admitted to supporting a bigot by saying Obama’s position on gay marriage was bigoted.
Trump lost the visuals. Not only was he looming and menacing, he looked disheveled.
It’s not wrong to wish that to people who fantasize about tearing apart a democracy.
There is a pretty strong difference between Obama’s original stance on LGBTQ rights, and the festering evil that Pence hurls at them.
It’s pretty lame to suggest that they’re equal.
Does anyone know why Hillary didn’t just jail all of her political opponents in order to reform the tax code? Seems like a simple solution to me.
Okay, so there is a certain amount of bigotry we can support. For example, we can support bigotry if it is in the service of winning an election.
His stance was far less bigoted than his opponents, and I correctly judged that his position would come to the light with time.
You’re saying you would support a bigot over someone not bigoted.
It makes sense that you would vote for the conservative, since that is close to your views on most issues. But understand that you are supporting bigotry over tolerance, and that’s a choice you’re making.
I didn’t say that. But thanks for the inept attempt at a paraphrase.
Or if you believe he’s lying, since supporting people you know are lying is also A-OK.
I’m going to bed. This should have been the death knell for Trump and it clearly wasn’t.
I’ll admit that I think bigotry is worse than dishonesty, in general. Edwin Edwards was a far better choice for governor than David Duke.