# The Trump era - what's surprised you the most? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [June 17, 2018, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246 "2018-06-17T03:38:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 1:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/201 "2018-06-22T01:10:50Z")
> [@Silver\_lining](#): > > 4 ) How do you know how it’s going to play out? Well, how did it play out last time we had a denuclearization agreement with North Korea? ---
**Author:** ![ThelmaLou](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thelmalou/32/390_2.png) [@ThelmaLou](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ThelmaLou)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/202 "2018-06-22T02:44:27Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > Those tax changes are going to balloon the federal debt by over 2 trillion dollars, increase the debt ratio, and possibly lead to inflation and recession. And remember, it’s [del]okay[/del] Very Good when Republicans do it. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/203 "2018-06-22T04:51:59Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > “built” (well “building” anyways) was the word chosen by **Evil Economist**. > > As for your quote, (“Prior to the Trump administration, there was no policy requiring all illegal entry cases to be criminally prosecuted, thus causing the separation of all families caught crossing the border.”) the two uses of the word “all” there seem … conspicuous. I assume it means that the Obama administration separated families as well, but at a lower rate than the Trump administration. Is that a correct understanding? A much lower rate, apparently. > [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > This was refreshing to read. Thank you. > > I think your broad point (“Wrong is wrong even if your rival also does it”) is a good one to keep in mind. I tend to revert to “but Obama did it too” arguments because all the threads on this topic seem to have recurring claims of how extra-special super-duper evil Trump and Trump alone is for having done this (where “this” = separating families in detention centers). The obvious retort is that he’s not the only one who has done it. If someone wants to have a discussion about what an appropriate and humane immigration policy should look like, I’d be up for it, but it seems that most posters just want to reiterate how extra-special super-duper evil they think Trump and Trump alone is. Well, people have an anger toward Trump much as they had an anger toward Dubya. But no, from what I hear this policy is to be blamed on Jeff Sessions and maybe Stephen Miller. Trump bears some responsibility as the chief executive, but this was probably Sessions’s call. ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/204 "2018-06-22T04:59:46Z")
It’s getting a lot of press, because[ul] [li]it is a sudden change in policy,[/li][li]it’s an emotional issue for a lot of people,[/li][li]some of us have an idea what being a neglected child is like,[/li][li]we’re finding out that there are actual concentration camps in the system,[/li][li]and some children are being taken from their families long-term.[/li][/ul] Trump and Hannity are now trying to hold these kids hostage to get Congress to approve the Great Wall of Trump. I think that’s about to backfire. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/205 "2018-06-22T05:30:23Z")
> [@foolsguinea](#): > > A much lower rate, apparently. … Do you know what the numbers are? I don’t, but I’d like to. Does anyone know? Obama separated X families, and Trump separated Y families. What are the values for X and Y? ---
**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 22, 2018, 5:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/206 "2018-06-22T05:54:02Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Do you know what the numbers are? I don’t, but I’d like to. Does anyone know? > > Obama separated X families, and Trump separated Y families. What are the values for X and Y? Numbers are hard to get because it is a bit like comparing apples and oranges. > **[Family separation was new, but Trump’s new border policy is an Obama throwback](https://www.vox.com/2018/6/21/17488458/obama-immigration-policy-family-separation-border)** > > Trump hopes the courts will let him detain families like Obama did. > [@](#): > > We don’t know how many families were separated under the Obama administration, but there’s no reason to believe that it numbered in the thousands even over the eight years that Obama was president. Because it simply wasn’t standard practice. Under Trump, it was. > > Both presidents housed “unaccompanied” minors in temporary facilities — but under Obama, they’d pretty much all arrived in the US unaccompanied > > The 2014 border “surge” was driven partly by an increase in families attempting to cross into the US from Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador. But it was primarily driven by an increase in “unaccompanied alien children” — people under 18, coming to the US without parents or guardians — from those same countries. > > The federal government had a system to deal with unaccompanied kids, but it was underfunded and overloaded even before the 2014 “surge” — and quickly got backed up. As a result, Border Patrol ended up holding kids for days beyond the 72 hours they were legally supposed to, and the government had to spin up temporary holding shelters for children that looked a lot like jails. > > Some of the pictures of these sites went viral again in 2018, with people either misidentifying them as pictures of children separated from their parents under Trump or as proof that Trump’s policy was identical to Obama’s. Neither is true. > > The system for dealing with unaccompanied migrant kids is overwhelmed again now. Most of the children in its custody — about 10,000 — are minors, generally teenagers, who crossed into the US alone. But with the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy in effect, the system has also had to absorb more than 2,000 children separated from their parents — who are often young children or even infants. > > The temporary shelters that the government started constructing last week — which government officials call “soft-sided shelters” and the media has called “tent cities” — are one result of that overflow. The rise in “tender age” facilities, designed to hold children under 5 (as young as infancy), is another. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/207 "2018-06-22T16:33:51Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Do you know what the numbers are? I don’t, but I’d like to. Does anyone know? > > Obama separated X families, and Trump separated Y families. What are the values for X and Y? FYI, \*\*GIGObuster’s \*\*link was the first result on Google if you search for “Obama separated X families, and Trump separated Y families. What are the values for X and Y”. So although you said you’d like to know, apparently it wasn’t really a high priority for you. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/208 "2018-06-22T17:44:39Z")
> [@Evil\_Economist](#): > > FYI, \*\*GIGObuster’s \*\*link was the first result on Google if you search for “Obama separated X families, and Trump separated Y families. What are the values for X and Y”. So although you said you’d like to know, apparently it wasn’t really a high priority for you. While I appreciate GIGObuster’s efforts, the answer he got, apparently, was “We don’t know how many families were separated under the Obama administration…”, so I’m not sure telling me I should have Googled it, when Googling it apparently failed to provide an answer, is very useful advice. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Economist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c89c15/32.png) [@Evil\_Economist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Economist)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 7:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/209 "2018-06-22T19:15:08Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > While I appreciate GIGObuster’s efforts, the answer he got, apparently, was “We don’t know how many families were separated under the Obama administration…”, so I’m not sure telling me I should have Googled it, when Googling it apparently failed to provide an answer, is very useful advice. At what time did you become aware that the information wasn’t available by Googling it, relative to when you said you were interested in knowing more about it? ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2018, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/210 "2018-06-26T13:31:20Z")
What surprised me the most about the Trump era is the extent to which people are simply impervious to facts. Hillary has been investigated and re-investigated over and over. And yet I’ll still hear people making the same claims and conspiracies (Murder! Benghazi! Pedophilia!) Long after they have been disproven. I still see people, even now, making these same discredited claims. It is pathetic beyond all belief. The other thing that surprised me is the overt racism. I was one of the poor fools who thought that racism was inherently and self-evidently wrong, and that it was all but expired in America. How wrong I was. I’m consistently astonished to see people saying racist things - often repeating Trump verbatim - and simultaneously blaming OBAMA as if he is somehow responsible for their racism. I didn’t know how evil America really was until the Trump gave people a license to go public with their hate. ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2018, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/211 "2018-06-26T13:46:08Z")
But the worst part - I mean the single worst part - is the refusal to separate the party from the individual. Every complaint is illegitimate because I’m “against Trump.” It doesn’t matter what they say or do, no matter how abhorrent. My criticism is automatically invalid because “you don’t really think that,” or “you’re just mad because of X…” Turns out, there are no legitimate criticisms of Trump. If I say I disagree with Trump, that just means I’m biased against him. There is no possible way to make a legitimate and fact-based criticism of Trump without automatically and reflexively being accused of “bias,” which in turn automatically invalidates my criticism. It ends with me just wanting to scream because there is no way to speak and be heard on my own merits. So it becomes an inescapable Catch-22. Me: “Trump did X terrible thing…” Conservative: “Well, you just don’t like Trump.” Me: “Yes. I don’t like Trump BECAUSE he did X. That’s how it works.” Conservative: “No, you’re just biased and you’re mad your side lost.” It’s the most infuriating and intellectually dishonest thing on Earth. Trying to have a discussion with a Consecutive is impossible when they refuse to acknowledge actual facts and reason, and impugn your motives instead of actually responding to the criticism. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [June 26, 2018, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/212 "2018-06-26T22:11:56Z")
I think that’s really well put, JB99 - and welcome to the Dope. ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2018, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/213 "2018-06-28T04:22:29Z")
> [@JB99](#): > > What surprised me the most about the Trump era is the extent to which people are simply impervious to facts. > > Hillary has been investigated and re-investigated over and over. And yet I’ll still hear people making the same claims and conspiracies (Murder! Benghazi! Pedophilia!) Long after they have been disproven. I still see people, even now, making these same discredited claims. It is pathetic beyond all belief. > > The other thing that surprised me is the overt racism. I was one of the poor fools who thought that racism was inherently and self-evidently wrong, and that it was all but expired in America. How wrong I was. I’m consistently astonished to see people saying racist things - often repeating Trump verbatim - and simultaneously blaming OBAMA as if he is somehow responsible for their racism. I didn’t know how evil America really was until the Trump gave people a license to go public with their hate. You said what I’ve been thinking. Spot on. ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2018, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/214 "2018-06-28T04:24:06Z")
> [@JKellyMap](#): > > I think that’s really well put, JB99 - and welcome to the Dope. I second that emotion. ---
**Author:** ![VinylTurnip](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/b2d939/32.png) [@VinylTurnip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/VinylTurnip)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2018, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/215 "2018-06-28T17:47:15Z")
> [@JB99](#): > > Trying to have a discussion with a Consecutive is impossible While this was probably a typo, it’s surprisingly apt. _One right after the other_. ---
**Author:** ![That\_Don\_Guy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/that_don_guy/32/538_2.png) [@That\_Don\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/That_Don_Guy)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2018, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/216 "2018-06-28T18:33:48Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > That it happened at all. Agreed - even 18 months later, the biggest surprise was on 11/8/2016. Ask me again in December, and the answer may become, “The fact that it seems that a lot of women who heard the calls to run for office not only took it seriously, but won.” > [@Quartz](#): > > That he’s still there. Of course, the Republicans may be waiting for November. Which flavor of “still there” do you mean? “Still there” in the Andrew Johnson / Bill Clinton sort of way? “Still there” in the Richard Nixon sort of way? Or “still there” in the Abraham Lincoln / JFK sort of way? I usually don’t like saying things like this, but one of the things that surprised me about Obama’s presidency was, in eight years, if there were even any seriously planned assassination attempts, none were anywhere near close enough to gain any level of attention - and the same can be said of Trump as well, especially with all of the enemies he is making. However, assuming you mean leaving through “peaceful” means, if it happens, it won’t be before January 21, in order to give Pence a chance at two full terms. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2018, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/217 "2018-06-28T18:53:35Z")
Black man who called the cops “nazis and gestapo” after being arrested was charged with [ethnic intimidation](https://theappeal.org/a-black-man-called-the-cops-nazis-and-was-charged-with-a-hate-crime/). This has been going on in Pennsylvania since at least 2016. ---
**Author:** ![survinga](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cab0a1/32.png) [@survinga](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/survinga)\ **Post date:** [July 5, 2018, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/218 "2018-07-05T15:36:42Z")
> [@Chad\_Sudan](#): > > It’s been eighteen months since Trump took office. > > We’ve seen the shattering of a lot of political norms. Many of these were predictable, given what we saw in the 2016 campaign - the tweets, the corruption, and so on. > > But many others have been unexpected. > > I never would have predicted all the staff dismissals at the White House. I especially thought that Steve Bannon, who got his million-to-one shot at real power, would make sure to hold onto it. > > Conversely, one thing I expected has not happened. I thought there was likely to be a major terrorist attack on the U.S., designed to provoke Trump into a new Middle East war. > > What developments have most surprised you? The election itself was the most surprising. I thought that America would reject a Demagogue, when the chips were down, even though Hillary has her issues. But I was terribly wrong. The disdain and rage in America was underestimated by punditry and polling. Since Trump was elected, nothing has surprised me. He’s every bit as bad as I thought he would be. And the Republicans are every bit the doormats that I thought they would be. They have completely tossed their fake principles out the window, in support of this president. He effectively has no one to put the brakes on his power, except for the courts. It’s more crucial than ever for the Democrats to get a majority in at least one of the houses of Congress. After all of this, the main question I have is, “How can the Dems reverse their electoral slide?” This applies not just for POTUS elections, but congressional and also state and local elections. It’s amazing to me how much of an advantage Republicans have at all levels of government right now, and they’re not even a majority of the voters. ---
**Author:** ![JB99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/439d5e/32.png) [@JB99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JB99)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2018, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/219 "2018-07-09T01:37:22Z")
> [@Silver\_lining](#): > > 3 ) Stolen seat? Hilarious. There is nothing hilarious about it. The stolen Obama nomination was absolutely unprecedented in the nation’s history, and their motives for doing it were unconstitutional. ([https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/06/14/us/politics/obama-supreme-court-merrick-garland.html](https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/06/14/us/politics/obama-supreme-court-merrick-garland.html)) If they had debated in good faith and voted against the nominee based on his own merits, the system would have worked as intended. This did not happen. The Republicans instead explicitly stated that Obama would not be permitted to choose the next justice and refused to even consider any Obama nominee. Let me repeat that: The Republicans told Obama he could not exercise a power granted to him by the Constitution. This is not just a stolen nominee. This was essentially a statement that the opposing party does not have the right to govern America. The Republicans have abandoned any pretense of caring about democracy or the Constitution. Their sole purpose is to win elections or - failing that - prevent the opposing party from exercising any actual power. It was Mitch McConnell himself who set the Republican goal of obstructing every single thing Obama ever did. And that’s why our democracy.is dysfunctional. The Republicans absolutely refuse to consider a problem on its own merits and instead resort to obstructing anything that does not please the rabid fat-right base. Meanwhile, they actively attack the remaining 50-60% of Americans as enemies. It is contemptible. And if we are enumerating Trump’s so-called successes (As if nominating a Supreme Court Justice is so damned hard when your party controls the entire government…) let’s also talk about his failures: The Republicans control all three branches of government and STILL failed to reform health care and STILL failed to reform immigration. They’re so goddamned stupid they can’t even get out of their own way long enough to pass THEIR OWN DAMNED LAWS. I mean, does it not click when you see them vote to repeal Obamacare over and over - when they know it cannot pass - but then when they DO have the power to pass it they suddenly implode on themselves and give up? And where was that wonderful healthcare Trump promised me? Someone - anyone - please explain that to me. Trump promised us great health care reforms that would cover everybody. Where is it? Hmm? Where? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [July 9, 2018, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246/220 "2018-07-09T02:07:51Z")
> [@JB99](#): > > There is nothing hilarious about it. > > The stolen Obama nomination was absolutely unprecedented in the nation’s history, and their motives for doing it were unconstitutional. ([https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/06/14/us/politics/obama-supreme-court-merrick-garland.html](https://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/06/14/us/politics/obama-supreme-court-merrick-garland.html)) > > If they had debated in good faith and voted against the nominee based on his own merits, the system would have worked as intended. This did not happen. The Republicans instead explicitly stated that Obama would not be permitted to choose the next justice and refused to even consider any Obama nominee. > > Let me repeat that: The Republicans told Obama he could not exercise a power granted to him by the Constitution. I genuinely don’t see the relevance. You say: if they’d so voted ‘no’, then the system would’ve worked as intended; the president would’ve exercised a power to nominate a guy — and if the nominee then didn’t get consent from enough senators, then, hey, the system worked! I can picture a world where that happens again and again: the president exercises that nominate-some-guy power in the wake of a ‘no’ vote, after which the second nominee fails to get consent from enough senators and then a third nominee fails to get consent from enough senators and, _well, the system worked!_ Imagine that playing out as many times as you like: the president exercises his power to nominate someone; each nominee then fails to get on the Supreme Court upon failing to get consent from enough senators; system worked! What changes if you get that exact same result, except somebody takes the time to clue in the president that, _uh, look, you get that it’ll always be ‘no’, right?_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-trump-era-whats-surprised-you-the-most/816246.md?page=12)