# What happened in Sweden? (Trump campaign rally statement) **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [February 19, 2017, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219 "2017-02-19T14:13:59Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/121 "2017-02-27T17:45:23Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Some of us don’t agree. You might not agree, but I wonder what the mouse in your pocket _really_ thinks on the matter. Yes, it’s only my opinion. It’s one I got from my parents when they said “If the kid down the street jumps off a bridge, does that mean you should jump off a bridge too?” If the claim is that a person you support did something wrong, and the only defense you’ve got is vague finger-pointing, then the most you can say (at best) is that the person you support is no better than worst examples on the other side of the fence. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/122 "2017-02-27T17:46:16Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > You might not agree, but I wonder what the mouse in your pocket _really_ thinks on the matter. > Yes, it’s only my opinion. It’s one I got from my parents when they said “If the kid down the street jumps off a bridge, does that mean you should jump off a bridge too?” If the claim is that a person you support did something wrong, and the only defense you’ve got is vague finger-pointing, the the most you can say at best is that the person you support is no better than worst examples on the other side of the fence. The people I support are substantially better than the worst examples on the other side of the fence. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/123 "2017-02-27T17:50:56Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > The people I support are substantially better than the worst examples on the other side of the fence. You can’t show that by vague finger-pointing. Show it by actually defending their words and/or actions. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/124 "2017-02-27T18:12:24Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > The people I support are substantially better than the worst examples on the other side of the fence. By the way, this isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement of the people you support-You might want to start supporting people that are at least better than the _average_ examples of the people on the other side of the fence. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/125 "2017-02-27T19:38:37Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > Have women, in the past, been paid “substantially less” for the same work as performed by men? Do you deny that? If you don’t deny that, can you tell us precisely when that ceased to be true? Was it Republican virtue that tipped the balance? The same eagerness for justice and equality that has been their guiding principle for, lo, these many years? Too complicated, **Hurr**? Here, let me break it down for you. Have women, as a group, historically endured forms of discrimination that adversely affected their economic capacity? Or not? And if so, has this problem been erased? Or not. And if so, when? Do let me know if these questions confuse you, I’m here to help. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 8:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/126 "2017-02-27T20:06:48Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > By the way, this isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement of the people you support-You might want to start supporting people that are at least better than the _average_ examples of the people on the other side of the fence. Your quote (from post #121) was regarding the “worst examples on the other side of the fence.” If your quote had referred to the “_average_ examples”, mine would have done the same. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/127 "2017-02-27T21:26:17Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I don’t have a poll. It’s a sense I’ve picked up over my time here whenever the subject has come up. I’d be delighted to be wrong though. If you, or other Dopers, think that [BHO was on firm intellectual footing and a paragon of honesty when he ran a campaign ad that said “women (are) paid 77 cents on the dollar for doing the same work as men”](http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2012/jun/21/barack-obama/barack-obama-ad-says-women-are-paid-77-cents-dolla/), I’d be delighted to have that debate. I thought most of you were smarter than that though. Are you, **Czarcasm** , smarter than that? “BHO”, huh? To me, that’s a tell about the argument being put forward. ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/128 "2017-02-27T21:44:28Z")
Better than “Barack HUSSEIN! Obama”. Gotta count your blessings, these days. Most of 'em, actually. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/129 "2017-02-27T22:05:41Z")
> [@Monty](#): > > “BHO”, huh? To me, that’s a tell about the argument being put forward. I’m in the habit of using initials for all sorts of well-known people (GWB, HRC, BHO, etc). It’s actually a carry-over from my professional life. At my place of employment, we routinely use initials to refer to colleagues, at least in the written form. I don’t do it always, but if you review my posting history, I think you’ll see it frequently-enough that you’ll realize this isn’t an attempt to single out Obama or emphasize his middle name, if that’s the concern. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/130 "2017-02-27T22:33:41Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Just curious, what % of Republicans believe the Clintons were running a child sex trafficking ring out of a DC pizza shop, and what % of Democrats believe that women are being paid substantially less money for the same work? I would contend that any discussion that can place these two subjects on the same hemisphere let alone as somehow comparable is irredeemably tainted. Why should anyone even bother? > [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > I’m far more of an ideologue than a partisan, which is to say that I think of myself as a conservative first, and a Republican only nominally. That being said, I don’t “know” that, or even agree with that. And I don’t think I’ve been too big on defending Trump here so much as pointing out liberal hypocrisy. I think Obama and Hillary and the Democrats are peddling falsehood virtually every time they bring up the “wage gap” and the rationale behind the Lilly Ledbetter Act, as just one recent example. So go cast the beam out of your own party’s eye before you wax poetic on what I ought to do. As for this, I would be actually relieved if the situation even remotely approximated “both sides lie equally and as frequently as one another.” Something may possibly be done in such a world, just as reform parties were sometimes able to unseat political machines in the old days. At least both sides understood exactly how the machines functioned, and agreed upon that understanding. That’s no longer the case. Politicians have lied in the past, to be sure. I entered political adulthood when Johnson and Nixon’s administrations lied constantly about Vietnam. Nixon took that ball and ran with it, to use the kind of football analogy he loved. Trump and his surrogates are in a different league entirely, one that shocks naively cynical me. Trump lies so frequently he makes it a particle of speech. Verb, gerund, auxiliary, lie. He doesn’t merely lie about huge things, he lies about every little thing as well. What’s oddly most frightening to me is that it’s impossible to gauge whether what people hear as lies - because they have no relation to truth - come out of his head as lies. Does he lie because he really is that massively ignorant? Does he invent lies just to fellate his base and his ego? Is he literally unhinged from reality? Could it even be a mixture of all these and more? You should worry about this answer, at least one percent as much as I do. (Which would be a huge amount of worry on your side.) Someone like that is dangerous. Not just to liberals. Not just to the media. Not just to the innocents who get crushed by massive forces outside their control. The guilty - aiders and abettors like you - can get crushed by unpredictable forces. I’ve always hated Nixon more than any other president because he made war against his own countrymen. Trump has declared a similar war. This cannot end well. If you think about it you’ll be forced to agree. Nixon crushed the counterculture because the majority - which was never silent - was with him. Trump cannot crush his enemies. They are too numerous and too broadly situated and he doesn’t have a majority backing him. He cannot help his backing minority because what he says he’s going to accomplish is utter fantasy. They will not blame Trump for that failing. What conceivable positive outcome do you see that makes you want to go down this path? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2017, 11:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/131 "2017-02-27T23:04:18Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > The guilty - aiders and abettors like you - can get crushed by unpredictable forces. I’m far more concerned about these sort of histrionics - and you’re not the only Doper I’ve heard use language like this - than I am about anything Trump has done so far. > [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > I’ve always hated Nixon more than any other president because he made war against his own countrymen. Trump has declared a similar war. This cannot end well. If you think about it you’ll be forced to agree. Thinking about it, the only two Presidents that I think could rightly be accused of making “war against his own countrymen” are George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Maybe Hoover gets honorable mention for the Bonus Army. > [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > What conceivable positive outcome do you see that makes you want to go down this path? Justice Gorsuch. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/132 "2017-02-28T00:11:12Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Justice Gorsuch. Sigh. We know Trump won. (Would somebody remind him?) He doesn’t need to tell one lie to get Gorsuch on the bench. He doesn’t need one lie to get his agenda across. He doesn’t need any of the stuff he’s doing. That’s the point you’re dodging. He’s doing stuff that has the potential to be really bad when he doesn’t need to do any of it. Look up Pyrrhic victory some time. ---
**Author:** ![Chimera](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Chimera](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chimera)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/133 "2017-02-28T00:54:06Z")
Notice how he can’t prove his point or actually show the poll he claims to exist. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/134 "2017-02-28T03:04:08Z")
> [@Chimera](#): > > Notice how he can’t prove his point or actually show the poll he claims to exist. What poll did I claim existed? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/135 "2017-02-28T03:07:39Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Sigh. We know Trump won. (Would somebody remind him?) He doesn’t need to tell one lie to get Gorsuch on the bench. He doesn’t need one lie to get his agenda across. He doesn’t need any of the stuff he’s doing. That’s the point you’re dodging. He’s doing stuff that has the potential to be really bad when he doesn’t need to do any of it. > > Look up Pyrrhic victory some time. What’'s the “stuff that has the potential to be really bad” in your eyes? ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Pig](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/c57346/32.png) [@Little\_Pig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Pig)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 3:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/136 "2017-02-28T03:13:26Z")
In other news, [Fox News Distances Itself](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/27/world/europe/fox-news-sweden-national-security-adviser.html) From Controversial Swedish Guest. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/137 "2017-02-28T03:20:56Z")
> [@Little\_Pig](#): > > In other news, [Fox News Distances Itself](https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/27/world/europe/fox-news-sweden-national-security-adviser.html) From Controversial Swedish Guest. How long before Fox identifies him as a Democrat? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/138 "2017-02-28T07:44:51Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > What’'s the “stuff that has the potential to be really bad” in your eyes? Maybe just the top ten, **Exapno**. Getting late, its a school night… ---
**Author:** ![Nava](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/da6949/32.png) [@Nava](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nava)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/139 "2017-02-28T08:08:22Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > C. J. Box has a book ([Shots Fired](http://www.cjbox.net/new-page-2/)) published in 2014 with a story that takes place in Paris, which makes the same kind of accusations with respect to “no-go” zones. I don’t know the reality of Paris. C. J. Box is American and that book is a novel. Should the rest of the world believe that John Grisham’s portraits of the American justice system are perfect reflections of its reality? ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Girl](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7bcc69/32.png) [@Mighty\_Girl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Girl)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2017, 8:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219/140 "2017-02-28T08:51:56Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > C. J. Box is American and that book is a novel. Should the rest of the world believe that John Grisham’s portraits of the American justice system are perfect reflections of its reality? Let’s talk about Spain’s notoriously aggressive windmills. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-in-sweden-trump-campaign-rally-statement/780219.md?page=8)