Oiled and Ready posted:

My crazy tinfoil is that Webb only even did the one DNC debate to make inroads with moderate Democrats. Now he's "considering a 3rd party run" but in my mind it's always been Webb - Trump knows picking a woman or minority will be transparent pandering, but a "maverick" like Webb? That's respectable just like McCain's Lieberman pick would have been. The Palin storyline will only enforce this narrative. Consider:

-Reagan Appointee

-His wife is Vietnamese and Jim speaks it well

-he's a real battle-tested war hero...hmmm...unlike a certain war hero Trump offended

-he wrote a piece on "women can't fight" that the media will dredge up, giving Trump an easy home run by disagreeing and citing...
"Webb was later endorsed by nine military women who stated that Webb is a "man of integrity" who "recognizes the crucial role that women have in the military today."

-questioned the Iraq war and holds an incredibly nuanced and intelligent view on radical Islam, which would bolster Trump's cred

In Webb's fiction novels he writes about gross pedo stuff (but seriously, to bring up moral issues) that draws obvious easy contrast to Bernie's "woman fantasizes about being raped by 3 men simultaneously" fiction, but Webb has the dagger here:
Jim Webb to The Washington Post: "I actually saw this happen in a slum in Bangkok when I was there as a journalist.", realigning Bernie's fiction piece as pure sick fantasy by comparison

-Webb blames George Jr for his son's time in Iraq and was critical of Bush to his face

Finally, does this not sound like Trump's natural VP?

"[Webb's] piece addressed the harmful economic inequality in the U.S., with the elites on one side and American workers on the other side. The article cites the 'age of globalization and outsourcing, and with a vast underground labor pool from illegal immigration,' as well as extravagant executive compensation, the detrimental effects of free trade and globalization, iniquitous tax cuts, speedily rising health care costs, and stagnation in income as the reasons for the increasing disparity between the elites and American workers."

He was against being Obama's VP, but that was due to his active term as senator at that time.

TL;DR I'm very convinced it's Webb

Microwaves Mom posted:

This thread has convinced me to spend an hour a day getting drunk and writing trump erotic fanfiction to post on amazon.

Donald J. Trump posted:

Once we'd finished our negotiations, the final step was approval of the deal by Holiday's board of directors. In many situations, board approval of management initiatives is merely a formality. In this case, I worried that Rose [chairman of Holiday] might use the board to help him get out of the deal, or at least force changes in it.

Rose scheduled his annual board of directors meeting in Atlantic City so that the board would have an opportunity to assess our progress in construction. It was the latter that worried me, since we had yet to do much work on the site. One week before the board meeting, I got an idea.

I called in my construction supervisor and told him that I wanted him to round up every bulldozer and dump truck he could possibly find, and put them to work on the site immediately. Over the next week, I said, I wanted him to transform my two acres of nearly vacant property into the most active construction site in the history of the world. What the bulldozers and dump trucks did wasn't important, I said, so long as they did a lot of it. If they got some actual work accomplished, all the better, but if necessary, he should have bulldozers dig up dirt from one end of the site and dump it on the other. They should keep doing that, I said, until I gave them other instructions.

One week later, I accompanied top Holiday Inn executives and the entire board of directors out to the Boardwalk. It looked as if we were in the midst of building the Grand Coulee Dam. There were so many pieces of machinery on this site that they could barely maneuver around each other. These distinguished corporate leaders looked on, some of them visibly awed. I'll never forget one of them turning to me, shaking his head, and saying, "You know, it's great when you're a private guy, and you can just pull out all the stops."

The Real Paddy posted:

- The Art of the Deal, p. 214-215

The Real Paddy posted:

- The Art of the Deal, p. 214-215

Platystemon posted:

Blind Rasputin posted:

Job creation in America is going to sky rocket.

Microwaves Mom posted:

This thread has convinced me to spend an hour a day getting drunk and writing trump erotic fanfiction to post on amazon.

GreyjoyBastard posted:

Literally The Keynesian Rhetorical Example.

If it weren't for the horrible nativism and probable misogyny, I could see myself unironically supporting Trump for reasons that aren't building a preexisting record to show the goldshirts when they knock on my door at 2am.

GreyjoyBastard posted:

Literally The Keynesian Rhetorical Example.

If it weren't for the horrible nativism and probable misogyny, I could see myself unironically supporting Trump for reasons that aren't building a preexisting record to show the goldshirts when they knock on my door at 2am.

TROIKA CURES GREEK posted:

If you think the nativism is anything but a huge pander to clueless republicans you are incredibly gullible.

MrMoo posted:

There is far more than one Trump colouring book on Amazon:

MrMoo posted:

quote:

(CNN)National Review and a group of conservative thought leaders took a strong stand against Donald Trump on Friday.

In a special issue titled "Against Trump," the 65-year-old magazine founded by William F. Buckley railed against Trump's "unmoored" and "opportunistic" populism. The editors published a scathing editorial on the GOP front-runner, while 22 conservative thinkers weighed in on why they think Trump poses a threat to American conservatism.

National Review's outspoken opposition to Trump has already yielded tangible results: Late Thursday night, the Republican National Committee disinvited the magazine from participating in the February 25 GOP debate.

But whether the united front curbs Trump's popularity among the conservative base, or merely reinforces it, remains to be seen.

Here are highlights from National Review's editorial and excerpts from 10 of the participants in the latest issue:

Editorial:
Donald Trump is a menace to American conservatism who would take the work of generations and trample it underfoot in behalf of a populism as heedless and crude as the Donald himself.

Glenn Beck:
Trump's potential primary victory would provide Hillary Clinton with the easiest imaginable path to the White House. But it's far worse than that. If Donald Trump wins the Republican nomination, there will once again be no opposition to an ever-expanding government. This is a crisis for conservatism.

L. Brent Bozell:
The GOP base is clearly disgusted and looking for new leadership. Enter Donald Trump, not just with policy prescriptions that challenge the cynical GOP leadership but with an attitude of disdain for that leadership -- precisely in line with the sentiment of the base. Many conservatives are relishing this, but ah, the rub. Trump might be the greatest charlatan of them all.

Mona Charen:
Trump has made a career out of egotism, while conservatism implies a certain modesty about government. The two cannot mix.

Erick Erickson:
Like the angels in heaven who rejoice for every new believer, we should rejoice for Donald Trump's conversion to conservatism. But we should not put a new conservative in charge of conservatism or the country, so that he does not become puffed up with conceit and fall into condemnation.

William Kristol:
Isn't Trumpism a two-bit Caesarism of a kind that American conservatives have always disdained? Isn't the task of conservatives today to stand athwart Trumpism, yelling Stop?

Michael Medved:
Worst of all, Trump's brawling, blustery, mean-spirited public persona serves to associate conservatives with all the negative stereotypes that liberals have for decades attached to their opponents on the right.

Edwin Meese III:
At a time when the nation is suffering under one of the most divisive and incompetent presidents in history, our people need positive, unifying leadership, not negative, destructive political rhetoric.

Katie Pavlich:
America cannot afford to elect a man who is not rooted in conservatism. And Donald Trump, a political con man who sympathizes with hit man Vladimir Putin and "Republicans" such as Charlie Crist, manifestly is not.

John Podhoretz:
Trump is an unbalanced force. He is the politicized American id. Should his election results match his polls, he would be, unquestionably, the worst thing to happen to the American common culture in my lifetime.

Thomas Sowell:
We are entering an era when people alive at this moment may live to see a day when American cities are left in radioactive ruins. We need all the wisdom, courage, and dedication in the next president... to save us and our children from such a catastrophe. A shoot-from-the-hip, bombastic showoff is the last thing we need or can afford.

quote:

But many others have decided that Cruz is the greater of two evils. On Tuesday, Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, a popular six-term Republican, declared that “It would be a big mistake for Iowa to support [Cruz],” citing his opposition to a federal ethanol mandate. He said a Cruz caucus win would be “very damaging to our state.”

Meanwhile, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who backed Cruz in his run for Senate, formally endorsed Trump for president. Bob Dole, former Kansas Senator and 1996 Republican presidential nominee, said Wednesday that the party would endure “cataclysmic” and “wholesale” losses if Cruz is the nominee, and that he would prefer Trump.

Trent Lott, former Senate majority leader from Mississippi, was asked specifically on Wednesday who he would choose if he had to pick between the two. (He has endorsed Ohio Gov. John Kasich.) “You know, to be honest with you, I’d probably pick Trump over Cruz,” he told the Atlantic.

“I’ve watched him stand on the floor of the Senate and call the majority leader a liar,” Lott continued. “I don’t know whether he was or he wasn’t—you don’t do that where I’m from. If I’d have been in the Senate, I would have tried to have him removed from the floor of the Senate for inappropriate conduct. You just don’t do that. Are we not still gentlemen, and respectful of each other?”

quote:

A group of black Republicans endorsed Donald Trump on Friday, saying the Republican front-runner is the best candidate to "free black communities" from Democrats.

"Black Americans across America are beginning to wake up and see clearly the reality of what is happening in black neighborhoods," the National Black Republican Association said on its blog.

"We believe that Mr. Trump has demonstrated that he can push back against the mainstream media, end political correctness and free black communities from the destructive grip of socialist Democrats."

BedBuglet posted:

Trump wants you to know that he could shoot you and he'd still win the Republican nomination. Honestly... it'd probably get him the NRA's endorsement.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTACH1eVIaA

Also, not sure why anyone is surprised about Trump retweeting white supremacists. It's not as if the signs weren't always there. For crying out loud, this is Trump's spokesperson.
https://twitter.com/KatrinaPierson/status/160181303680040960
https://twitter.com/KatrinaPierson/status/308331654286565378

Oiled and Ready posted:

Why is nativism bad

Why is misogyny against certain women who clearly have an estrogen overabundance bad

Uncle Wemus posted:

Who will be his vp

katlington posted:

what like extra big ( . )( . ) or something? why does trump not big boobs

Oiled and Ready posted:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premenstrual_syndrome#Signs_and_symptoms

Sorry your education sucked this is pretty basic stuff hth

Jewel Repetition posted:

You idiot.



Estrogen is high before ovulation, not before menstruation.

Oiled and Ready posted:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Premenstrual_syndrome#Signs_and_symptoms

Sorry your education sucked this is pretty basic stuff hth

mcbexx posted:

I watched some of Trump's rallies on YouTube as background noise this past week.
It's a morbid fascination, like a trainwreck or a car pile-up with dozens of school buses.
His horrible rhetoric (well, horrible for any sane person) and the repetition of the same bits over and over and OVER is entertaining and horrifying at the same time.

Who are those people cheering this bozo on?
Are they getting paid to be there?
Are their loved ones being held hostage by the Trumpsquad?
Are they homeless people who got a quick makeover to not look like derelicts, lured by the promise of a hot meal?
There is a dude in the background of the Reno rally with literally no teeth at all.

Your country's going in the shitter. Good luck.

mcbexx posted:

I watched some of Trump's rallies on YouTube as background noise this past week.
It's a morbid fascination, like a trainwreck or a car pile-up with dozens of school buses.
His horrible rhetoric (well, horrible for any sane person) and the repetition of the same bits over and over and OVER is entertaining and horrifying at the same time.

Who are those people cheering this bozo on?
Are they getting paid to be there?
Are their loved ones being held hostage by the Trumpsquad?
Are they homeless people who got a quick makeover to not look like derelicts, lured by the promise of a hot meal?
There is a dude in the background of the Reno rally with literally no teeth at all.

Your country's going in the shitter. Good luck.

mcbexx posted:

Your country's going in the shitter. Good luck.

BedBuglet posted:

So, in the wake of Trump's "I can shoot people and you would still vote for me" comment Trump just spiked in Iowa polling.

Even Nate Silvers, who has been bearish on Trump, is saying there's a very real chance he takes Iowa. Jesus Christ on a stick.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/690889964599382016

mcbexx posted:

It's fake, but should be spread nonetheless.

mcbexx posted:

It's fake, but should be spread nonetheless.

Jewel Repetition posted:

Silver just has bad luck. He got into this metric that's extremely predictive of presidential primaries right during the cycle where it's going to fail its most spectacularly.

BedBuglet posted:

I don't even think that's true. He hasn't been actually predicting anything and he has been the first to say so. Like, that's the problem with being even remotely successful with polling. People assume everything he says is a cast in stone prediction. He hazarded a guess that Trump would be going down based on conventional metrics of endorsements and the assumption that the establishment would focus attacks on Trump. The latter did not happen and weak performances by Rubio also hasn't really given the establishment a candidate to rally around.

People act like Silver is denying Trump's leads in the polls but he's really not. He's repeatedly said that early polling is notoriously unreliable and internet polling (which is what much of this year's polls have been) are unproven. Also, personally, I'm wondering if Trump's campaign is driving his success in the polls or if his success in the polls is driving his campaign. There's a reason Trump constantly brings up his polling.

Oiled and Ready posted:

Actually generally when an authoritarian hijacks a powerful nation a ton of other countries go in the shitter (they are put there) first. So it is you who needs our well wishes of luck, friend.