Prelude to the Apocalypse

[BulletMagnet]

Believe me, I have no delusions about the military being completely behind Trump

Presumably they were all ecstatic to find out that the head of Marvel Entertainment and other unelected, unappointed and unaccountable plutocrats are calling shots at the VA, not to mention the whole "revealing the presence of a previously-unreported SEAL team" thing during his totally-not-yet-another-campaign-rally in Iraq (though I'm most amused that the best fig leaf I could find in response to this one is the fact that the original report used the word "covert" incorrectly ). Not to mention how safe our boys must feel knowing that their Commander-in-Chief refuses to so much as condemn the country that has done more than most any other to spread and bolster radical Islam, including most of the 9/11 hijackers, because he wants to sell them more weapons.

In any case, I'm done with my time in the service, so I'm in a better position to speak on some things now. Not that most of the people posting in this thread would understand it, but who knows, maybe someone out there is still reading this thread that appreciates the perspective.

Please do - impart more obviously non-trolling wisdom to us about how there's no such thing as income inequality, people just need to be more willing to live with their parents all their lives, and spend the money they can't afford an apartment with on hourly motel rates instead when their spouses get horny.

Or, if you'd prefer to stick to your unquestioned expertise in military and foreign affairs, feel free to expand upon your tireless insistence that Hillary's proposed no-fly zone for Syria, even though it specifically excluded Russia, would have been more than enough on its own to goad Crazy Vlad into starting World War 3, while Trump's genius launching of (totally ineffectual, but what were you expecting?) tomahawks into the country, withdrawal from the INF treaty, and Open Skies flight over Ukraine has so brilliantly placated hair-trigger Putin and pulled us all back from the very brink of fiery oblivion.

Ah, but it appears that even this timeless wisdom was but the tip of the proverbial iceberg - neither it nor anything else can apparently prepare us for the life-changing revelations to come from quash unleashed.

[BryanM]

Desmoines Register has their tracker up, in case you need to pump all this hot hard-hitting action right into your veins.

That doesn't mean that most people on the front lines are going to be wearing pussy hats any time soon.

Obviously not, they'd prefer a hammer and a sickle in hand over empty symbols on head.

(Symbolic Justice Warriors sure do love their hats. It's crazy. Crazy!)

...Yeah obviously there's gonna be tons who lean more toward Timothy McVeigh in a job code that involves personally killing people and being killed. This isn't remarkable news and means-testing your sample pool of what qualifies as "people" is definitely the liberal thing to do.

"How the hell do you means-test a sandwich?!"
"Hold my beer - I'll show you how it's done."

[Mischief Maker]

I think defending Warren and her job to help split the left and help Biden win so he can lose to Trump is less distasteful.

Lemme say first of all that I want Bernie to run and he's my #1 choice and he's better than Warren on many key issues...

...but dude, pump the brakes on the Warren hate. It is by no means certain that Bernie is even going to run in 2020. And of all the potential runner-ups who have a snowball's chance in hell of winning, NONE are more progressive than Warren. Including Tulsi Gabbard.

It's not just rhetoric either. Her creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau took back over $11 billion from Wall Street and returned it to the public. That's a hell of a lot more concrete than telling Wall Street "cut it out!" And she just recently proposed a bill for the government to manufacture generic drugs, a position to the left of Bernie! Yeah, Chapo hates her because she's not a full-blown Marxist, but neither is Bernie, and Warren's actual record show's she's by no means a Hillary clone.

And in terms of pure politics, 2018 was definitely the year of the woman electorally and there's an advantage to be had from a female candidate from the normie anti-Trump vote. Hillary came within a hair of winning and Warren not having Bill Clinton's NAFTA legacy as an albatross around her neck makes it seem fair to me that she'd beat Trump.

A lot can happen in two years but don't go scribbling over Warren's face in your yearbook just yet. The mainstream press is bashing Warren and praising Beto for a reason.

[BryanM]

...but dude, pump the brakes on the Warren hate. And of all the potential runner-ups who have a snowball's chance in hell of winning, NONE are more progressive than Warren.

What makes you think that she'd be an inverse Bill Clinton who'll transform the democratic party back into something less horrible via a purge?

Hillary came within a hair of winning

So did John Kerry... and Al Gore actually won....

[Rob]

Rob, you realize the majority of drugs that come into the US from Mexico are smuggled inside otherwise legal shipping that would not be affected by a wall, right?

Nowhere was I talking about the drug trade. My concern is the unending flow of people, demographic transformation and all related problems. The purpose of a wall is to impede the flow of the umpteen millions that have been casually crossing the border, not to be a cure-all for the drug problem that I didn't mention, though if less of Mexico was here we would have less of a problem.

For the environmentalists: Use of federal lands for illegal pot a growing concern, California officials say

The secret marijuana sites are organized, funded and operated by Mexican cartels, said US Attorney McGregor Scott. The issue is particularly stark in California, which has more than 16 million acres of national forest lands, including Yosemite, Kings Canyon and Lassen Volcanic National Park.

"This is not a bunch of people growing marijuana in the woods," Scott said in a news conference Tuesday. "This is people who are using chemicals and causing manifest environmental damage to a crown jewel of the United States -- our federal public lands."

I realize you're quivering in a puddle of fear over Los Angeles crime statistics way the hell up in Alaska,

California is the prime example of demographic change in America (due to mass immigration - legal and illegal), and Los Angeles is the largest city in California. That should make it a good indicator of what to expect as the problems radiate outwards, and unfortunately Alaska is not free from the general trends in the country (here's our mayor asking what he can do to be more accommodating to illegal aliens - we're very proud of the fact that 100+ languages are spoken in our local schools, though the results from that expensive schooling not so good).

This wall is just the "make my monster GROOOOOW!" version of a confederate memorial statue for you people.

Why do you oppose making it more challenging to unlawfully enter the country?

I like how they're using socialism and collectively paying for something they want in that GoFundMe wall.

This is an incredible observation. People will pay for things they want. It really makes you wonder why anyone would object to being forced to pay for things they don't want, are non-beneficial or even harmful. I know you're hung up on Bernie's vision of Nordic-supremacist socialism for America, but the basic requirements for effective Nordic-supremacist socialism are not here.

[quash]

Presumably they were all ecstatic to find out that the head of Marvel Entertainment and other unelected, unappointed and unaccountable plutocrats are calling shots at the VA

Not to excuse it, but Trump is far from the first president to reside over a declining VA. It speaks very much to our nations priorities that we don't care about this as much as we do... basically anything else.

not to mention the whole "revealing the presence of a previously-unreported SEAL team" thing during his totally-not-yet-another-campaign-rally in Iraq (though I'm most amused that the best fig leaf I could find in response to this one is the fact that the original report used the word "covert" incorrectly )

Yeah actually that article is completely correct. Just because something isn't reported on in the press doesn't mean it's covert, nor does the general public knowledge of something render classification of material on said subject moot. Sorry that doesn't conform to your worldview.

Not to mention how safe our boys must feel knowing that their Commander-in-Chief refuses to so much as condemn the country that has done more than most any other to spread and bolster radical Islam, including most of the 9/11 hijackers, because he wants to sell them more weapons.

Israel? I know we're supposedly pulling out of Syria and he's telling Iran to do what they please, but shoot, way to avoid the elephant in the room, Drumpf. I'm gonna be with her if he doesn't rectify this soon.

Please do - impart more obviously non-trolling wisdom to us about how there's no such thing as income inequality

I have never once said or insinuated this. In fact, if anyone has been especially vocal in bemoaning the eradication of the middle class, it's me. We have seen extreme inequality for over a decade now, that's not our disagreement. It's how we fix it, if we can fix it.

people just need to be more willing to live with their parents all their lives, and spend the money they can't afford an apartment with on hourly motel rates instead when their spouses get horny.

I mean, if our parents/grandparents weren't brainwashed consumerist slaves better known as baby boomers, things like ensuring intergenerational assets wouldn't sound crazy. Ask your nearest boomer if they took out a home equity loan, then cry yourself to sleep knowing that you were sold to the banks before you were even born.

There really shouldn't be anything wrong with intergenerational households, it's much more common in countries besides the US. If you want to fix the housing problem and help restore our prior standard of living, we can start by limiting foreign investment, outlawing subprime mortgages, and, last but not least, severely limiting immigration so boomers won't find the sons and daughters of foreign billionaires willing to buy their overvalued McMansions.

Or, if you'd prefer to stick to your unquestioned expertise in military and foreign affairs, feel free to expand upon your tireless insistence that Hillary's proposed no-fly zone for Syria, even though it specifically excluded Russia

When the Joint Chiefs of Staff decide that such an exclusion is irrelevant, it's irrelevant. Plus, what's even the point of a no fly zone over Syria if it excludes Russia?

would have been more than enough on its own to goad Crazy Vlad into starting World War 3, while Trump's genius launching of (totally ineffectual, but what were you expecting?) tomahawks into the country, withdrawal from the INF treaty, and Open Skies flight over Ukraine has so brilliantly placated hair-trigger Putin and pulled us all back from the very brink of fiery oblivion.

Old news that ultimately amounted to nothing, shedding baggage from a bygone era, and unfortunately routine aggressions with a country we just can't seem to get along with.

quash unleashed.

If this was the Dark Souls of politics threads before, get ready, because it's about to become the Demon's Souls of politics threads. Your enemies will be far more ruthless, you'll lose way more, and you'll become way more demoralized. That, and I have it on good authority we'll be seeing a guest appearance from Dante from the Devil May Cry series.

"The time has come, and so have I..."

[Rob]

Patriarchy: smashed.

[Mischief Maker]

Oh boy, libertarians! Who's excited for tonight when Trump announces he's going to use the military to unilaterally seize people's land?

[Ed Oscuro]

Trump should say "everybody's talking about the border now, that's a victory" and call it done. Reopen the government, move on to the priorities. There's plenty of space for the GOP to negotiate with the House Dems on this issue - even on fences / walls - once things are reopened. Instead, the Republicans are pretending that the best course is just to let Trump usurp the powers of the legislature. Welp, OK.

It's not like the $5 Bn, or $5.7 Bn or whatever it turns into, is a drop in the bucket compared to the $110 Bn+ wasted on the "Tax Cuts and Jobs Act" for 2017, as we are sitting pretty on 3% growth. Pretty damn bad deal if you ask me.

In other news it's worth noting: Trump's forgotten about Syria and is letting neocons, John Bolton and Mike Pompeo, call all the shots. Bolton is ready to keep soldiers there for "months or years" and Pompeo wants to hold up Saudi Arabia as a sign to the Iranians.

Meanwhile we're telling our NATO ally Turkey that an attack on the Kurds is an attack on us, while Turkey and Pakistan forge closer ties. Guess what Turkey and Pakistan have in common - funding jihadists for political purposes.

[BryanM]

We do too, so it kind of makes sense they're our allies.

Kind of vaguely reassuring that we have to manufacture our own enemies to keep the grift machine going.

[Specineff]

So... given that Mexico is already paying for the wall through NAFTA 2.0, why is he demanding 5 billion bucks? Is it because no one knows better about getting money for construction projects than him?

[ED-057]

Maybe the pres should announce he's got a bold new plan to fight climate change via carbon capture and create jobs etc. and then build a wall out of wood.

If Netanyahu and the deep state get Trump to eat his announcement about leaving Syria, it should at least put an end to questions about who wears the pants in this arrangement.

[BryanM]

There aren't any serious questions. White House staff is at the president's sole discretion. The administration is the system is the man.

[ED-057]

I wasn't referring to questions about the organizational structure. More like, which peoples' brains ideas are originating from.

Anyway, I'm going to add a disclaimer to my suggestion of building a wooden wall and say that he probably shouldn't do that because it would go over like a lead balloon and poll numbers don't support a wall. It would also be too easy to burn down. For the record.

[BulletMagnet]

If Netanyahu and the deep state get Trump to eat his announcement about leaving Syria

Totally what happened, and conveniently also explains the million other times and counting that, by sheer coincidence, he's suddenly and otherwise inexplicably changed his mind when something doesn't poll terribly well.

EDIT: ...including today!

[ED-057]

If it was just a case of Trump arbitrarily saying stuff then why did Mattis resign??

[BryanM]

He decided it was the best time to cash out and collect those tens of millions.

It can't be a good grift if you never cash out.

As to why this is a good time to cash out, we can only speculate. Maybe he was tired of having to actually do even a little PR and that made the do-nothing fake job that pays millions a year look that much better in comparison.

His replacement will be functionally identical.

[Ed Oscuro]

https://twitter.com/_AlexHirsch/status/ ... 1362048000

[Specineff]

Evil intransigent democrats cause decorated war vet president Trump* to storm out in righteous anger when they advocate lawlessness and anarchy in total detriment of the American people who are totally getting murdered by the 600,000 members of MS13 entering the country per second, as per the president's proven-accurate estimations. The following piece of fake news provides more detail:

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/09/us/p ... enate.html

*Trump is a four-time recipient of the Golden Heel Spur for his service in the Vietnam war. He's been considered for the Congressional Medal Of Honor after having saved the lives of 700,000 marines and causing two quintillion losses to the enemy during the Tiet offensive, by his own estimations.

[Rob]

If Netanyahu and the deep state get Trump to eat his announcement about leaving Syria

Totally what happened, and conveniently also explains the million other times and counting that, by sheer coincidence, he's suddenly and otherwise inexplicably changed his mind when something doesn't poll terribly well.

EDIT: ...including today!

I realize liberals have probably tilted a bit in favor of Forever War now that anchors are shilling for it on teevee

Spoiler

and because "fuck Trump", but what poll(s)? Do you think our politics is Israel-centric because it "polls well"? You think war policies in general have anything at all to do with polling of nobodies? You can't possibly be this clueless. Lastly, best to not overreact to every bit of Trump news. Wait until the dust settles.

[Rob]

Marco Rubio is all like "this anti-1A bill polls well".

[BulletMagnet]

Do you think our politics is Israel-centric because it "polls well"?

Even if you believe that any particular decision Trump makes is based on anything outside of how loud a cheer it will get when trotted out at his next campaign rally, his behavior completely undermines his supporters' continued assertion that he's "our guy", that he's one of the few that "gets it" when it comes to how vitally important isolating ourselves from immigrants, "globalist" allies, etc. is, since in his supporters' own estimation apparently all it takes is a wagging finger behind the scenes from the Israel lobby or some other malefactor to instantly turn his mighty spine to jelly.

It's truly amazing how quickly the rhetoric has gone from loud-and-proud "finally, time to cut through all the BS" to wistful "gee, the Deep State really does have tentacles everywhere" - almost as good as chalking up his secret appointment of the Marvel Entertainment CEO as shadow head of the VA to "a long decline at the department" and the fact that we as a country "don't care enough", as if brash, manly, devil-may-care Trump was somehow predestined to not only continue to disappoint on the issues his base claims to care so deeply about, but self-interestedly accelerate the disappointment, as if it's not really his fault because he just couldn't help himself. The cucks made him do it! It's telling that this is supposed to be a more plausible explanation for his behavior than "he's still exactly the same self-interested grifter taking advantage of the vulnerable and gullible that he's been his entire life, and his promise to only screw over Bad People from now on was manifest bullshit." That is the fringe theory.

The thing is, even if you're right, if what you assert about all his whiplash reversals is truly the case, the question becomes: what makes him different from his countless predecessors outside of the fact that he's a bigger asshole and openly encourages his followers to act the same? The answer, I think, speaks volumes as to why he still has any support at all.

[quash]

I've said it before and I'll say it again: if Donald Trump can't change things, that's not a cause of celebration for anyone. What that really means is that we're stuck with this horseshit until at least all the boomers die off, and even then, we're going to be living with the consequences of their decisions for generations to come. For all the things he has fallen short on, Trump has delivered on more than I expected he would. If he manages to pull out of Syria and build the wall, strap yourself in for another four years. If not, well, I guess we'll just elect the next person to run on hope and change.

"Deep state" is just a new term for an old idea, that those in power don't easily yield it. Some guy working at an alphabet agency has way more power than most people realize, and you'd be incredibly foolish to downplay the role government employees play in shaping our nation. There's even an argument to be made that judges in their current role dictate more of American policy than most elected representatives do. If your rebuttal to the existence of a "deep state" is that such a deep conspiracy doesn't or can't exist, you're missing the point. It doesn't have to. All you need is enough people either apathetic or on your side in the right positions of power to do your bidding during the off season, so to speak, to prepare for when you do come back into office.

It's funny to read what you're saying today through the lens of knowing that you actually think a Hillary Clinton presidency would have been any better. If nothing else, this administration has forced everyone to show more of their hand than they have in the past twenty years. The results have been, to those who weren't paying attention before, eye opening, to say the least. I'll be eternally grateful to Trump for exposing the media for the sham that it is and getting even the most head in the sand members of society privy to the bullshit we've been fed, even if only in small amounts. That speech he gave on the wall was cringe inducing, but ultimately it couldn't have been any other way because too many people are still plugged in or just incapable of processing more than one establishment lie at a time. At the end of the day, it's the changes in policy that count, so as long as we actually do get comprehensive immigration reform, the appeasements he's made along the way shouldn't negate the end result, assuming he doesn't cave on anything major.

But again, who knows at this point. We live in interesting times and there's no telling what news we'll wake up to tomorrow; reality has become a WWE storyline for the time being.

[BryanM]

I've said it before and I'll say it again: if Donald Trump can't change things, that's not a cause of celebration for anyone.

The word isn't "can't", quash. It's "won't".

Dracula won't stake himself. Stop being identical to those 11 dimensional chess Obama people.

[Specineff]

as if it's not really his fault because he just couldn't help himself. The cucks made him do it!

Here's another bead in the long string of disappointments, then: He never thought/said that Mexico was going to hand out a check! They are going to (probably symbolically, as opposed to how he said the country was going to issue a reimbursement) be paying through the USMCA which hasn't even been approved yet! And all he needs is 5.7 billion dollars of US taxpayer money to make it happen!

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news ... order-wall

[Ed Oscuro]

BryanM cuttin' through the BS these days. Good show.

Look folks, the basic story of Trump is the Art of the Unforseen Mild Rebuke and the Subsequent Premature Retreat. This whole #TrumpShutdown is classic Trump - make a big promise based on some nebulous, possibly mildly attractive proposition ("border security is good"), let it get turned into a literal meme by his staffers ("The Wall" was apparently literally a meme for Trump to remember the anti-immigration component of his white nationalist base), mistakenly think this calls for piling all his chips in, burn all the bridges, then flail around in disarray as mild rebukes are put in his path.

The most mind-blowing thing about these two mirror decisions are this - The Syria decision was apparently the right one, whatever his reasons. (Even a former Obama State official said it's time to get out.) But he let the "deep state" - if by deep state we mean "neocons" - walk him back, only after he fucked up his relationship with the last of My Generals, General Mattis. Long story short, Trump lost big, neocons won.

On the wall...what is the plan? Why on Earth can he not see that he has won massively in shifting the discussion towards something his base loves, and that also distracts from his mounting legal woes? It is probably for the same reason that his base thinks they love him: They cannot see the value of democratic deliberation, and they want him to just issue an order and git 'er done. Luckily for us, the House is demanding the right to set spending levels back - as it is set in the Constitution. If only he knew how to negotiate he could have parlayed this into a big "shovel-ready" story. If only the bad guys were competent. So much of the hateful, economically and environmentally disastrous neocon agenda could have hidden in the coattails of a competent Wall Shodown, and Trump could even have figured out more ways to make money for himself doing it. But Ann Coulter pricked him on both fronts, and the rest is history.

[quash]

I've said it before and I'll say it again: if Donald Trump can't change things, that's not a cause of celebration for anyone.

The word isn't "can't", quash. It's "won't".

Dracula won't stake himself. Stop being identical to those 11 dimensional chess Obama people.

Are you agreeing that the US is a ticking time bomb, waiting for an inevitable demographic crisis that will have far reaching implications for all aspects of society? Because that's what I'm reading.

Assuming that is the case, I would also have to assume that you're optimistic about how it would change the government. I would argue that optimism is largely misplaced, because ultimately it's still going to be the same group of people calling the shots. Even if your agenda will get a bone or two thrown its way, it'll only be so far as to further the goals of those in power. Kinda like right now.

[GaijinPunch]

Are you agreeing that the US is a ticking time bomb, waiting for an inevitable demographic crisis that will have far reaching implications for all aspects of society? Because that's what I'm reading.

I think the demographic crisis is pretty plain and simple and we know exactly how to fuck it up - Do exactly what Japan has done for it's 2.X lost decades, and is kinda sorta trying to fix now (but not succeeding). Or... do what Trump and the human penis Steven Miller are proposing.

Trump claims he is for legal immigration as he knows it's required for economic growth, which I don't buy for a second. Even if I did, it is not enough. It needs to be encouraged and the process streamlined. The US has the biggest idiots working in the immigration department (unless things have changed drastically in 10 years), and their job has just gotten more convoluted. My ex's green card renewal process took 10 months. Ten... fucking... months. She's had the card for like 10 years, has a child that's a citizen, pays taxes, etc. etc. Basically clogging the system keeps the numbers down as a side effect, which I assume is the intention.

[Ed Oscuro]

https://twitter.com/RyanLEllis/status/1 ... 1927482369

what a standup guy

[Domino]

https://twitter.com/RyanLEllis/status/1 ... 1927482369

what a standup guy

A cunt he is. He reminds me of a coworker at work today. He fully believes that we should care more for families who lost their love ones by illegal immigrants than the Federal Workers who won't get paid. It even gets better, he also believe that the President should build a wall since that's what people elected him to do.

Even when the Dems taken over the house.