I disagree with this. Trump’s impulsiveness and unpredictability make it less likely that Putin (or anyone else) would get aggressive and put the US to the test, not more likely.
Honest means he believed what he was saying. It’s irrelevant to my point whether it was true. He didn’t censor his words, unlike Hillary who wouldn’t let a word slip out of her mouth that hadn’t been polished by scriptwriters and practiced in front of the mirror. Trump spoke as he thought and to hell with the consequences. You have to admit that’s unusual for a politician.
And, of course, to the dismay and despair of all those who thought they knew better, it actually worked. You may mock him, despise him, and I’m sure you all do but the fact is he is the most extraordinary candidate to run for President in a century at least.
And the 5 year old really believed that the dinosaur ate his homework.
It’s unusual in a politician, because most politicians act like adults, and don’t just say the first asinine and wrong thing that pops into their heads.
You find it “refreshing” for a politician to believe lots of things that are demonstrably untrue, to the point of outright delusion?
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And, of course, to the dismay and despair of all those who thought they knew better, it actually worked.
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Well, it worked on some of you.
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You may mock him, despise him, and I’m sure you all do but the fact is he is the most extraordinary candidate to run for President in a century at least.
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Actually, I think that title more properly belongs to Deez Nuts. (Who, admittedly, looks like a veritable Solon of political maturity and rationality next to Donald Trump.)
Do you think he really believed that Obama was born anywhere other than Hawaii? If so, he’s profoundly stupid, considering the mountain of evidence he was born in Hawaii, and the zero evidence he was born anywhere else.
Oh, yes. Which is why he avoids making deliberately provocative moves like invading Ukraine or shooting civilian airliners flying over Ukraine airspace out of the sky. He’s real worried about war. :rolleyes:
I don’t know what he would do. Neither does Putin, which is the point.
At the time Trump said that, he was being pressed on something that negatively impacted his campaign, so he responded off-the-cuff in a way most beneficial to him. That’s not an indicator of how he would react if there was actually a foreign policy crisis and his senior people apprised him of the situation.
At this point Trump is a lot friendlier to Putin than Clinton. But if Putin was looking to do something clearly provocative to the US and was gambling that the US wouldn’t risk all out war, he’s more likely to test Clinton than Trump. Trump is a wild card.
This is a bit of a minor quibble, and I’m not sure why I chose to bring this up on your particular post, but I’ve seen people post over and over again that there is “zero evidence” or ‘no evidence’ of Obama being born in Kenya. I present you, some evidence.
Please note: I believe he is a Hawaiian-born American citizen. I just think there’s a bit more evidence than “zero”. It turns out, it’s enough to feed wild conspiracy theories.
I get that it was a mistake, but something published in 1991 that claims he was “born in Kenya” is exactly the sort of “evidence” that contributes to a conspiracy theory about him being born in Kenya.
Imagine we were to hold a trial. The prosecution presents their evidence, the defense presents theirs, and the jury decides. One side loses, the other side wins. Do you think it’s accurate to claim that the opposing side had “zero evidence” just because they lost / their evidence wasn’t as compelling?
That wasn’t identified by any of the conspiracy theorists, including Trump, until years after they started spreading their fact free bullshit. So yes, for years, Trump pushed the birther bullshit with zero evidence.
That’s a fair point. I’m personally fuzzy on the timeline, but Wikipedia says Trump started talking about it publicly in 2011 and Breitbart didn’t publish the promotional booklet until 2012.
You really think that? I see a man who is so easily manipulated a child can do it. Witness his current Twitter spat with Meryl Streep. It’s like poking a snake with a stick: Predictably, he’s going to bite, or in Trump’s case, tweet.
But somehow you think that makes him scary to Putin – a former head of the KGB who understands dissemination of propaganda and political manipulation like few others in the world – and this is why he personally worked to get Trump elected? U.S. Intel Report: Putin directed cyber campaign to help Trump.
There’s another line of thinking that Trump is the brilliant puppet-master manipulating the press into reporting / talking about what he wants, rather than some other story that would be worse for him. I don’t know if that’s what Fotheringay-Phipps was referring to, but it’s certainly one ‘school of thought’ around Trump’s tweets. Here is an article that touches on that thinking:
That’s a curious example you’ve selected there. Most people would be very leery of poking a snake with a stick. Because they don’t want to get bitten.
Or bombed.
It’s not what I meant. He tweets like that because he’s an immature spoiled brat. Nonetheless, the practical impact of his being an immature spoiled brat who happens to control the US military would be to make others less likely to start something with him. As compared to someone else about whom they might make a calculated gamble that they would shy away from a serious MAD-type confrontation.