Even before Vladimir Putin met with Donald Trump in Japan on Friday, the Russian president was taking a victory lap. “The liberal idea,” by which he appeared to mean democratic values, has “outlived its purpose,” Putin told the Financial Times.
And when Trump, before the meeting on the sidelines of the G-20 in Osaka, was asked if he’d tell the Russian president not to mess with next year’s election in the United States of America, Trump turned to Putin and smirked: “Don’t meddle in the election,” he said, wagging his finger a little as if he were advising Putin not to eat a piece of iffy sushi. Putin laughed. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo smiled.
Just bear in mind, in 10 or 20 years, when your children or grandchildren asked you (if we’ve survived that long) how it call came to ruin, you can tell them you got to see it happening in real time. — Wayfarer
I wonder what this will look like from the perspective of time and distance - an aberration that was limited and corrected or something that had more widespread and lost lasting consequences. — Fooloso4
I wonder whether a few decades from now, the post-war Western liberal democratic order will come to be seen as an aberration, or yet another passing phase at best, rather than "the end of history," as many saw it at the end of the last century. — SophistiCat
Say this for Donald Trump. He may be transforming American politics into a kleptocratic fascist reality show and turning our once-great country into a global laughingstock, but as least he’s humiliating John Bolton in the process.
...By taking to Fox News to kiss up to Trump, he became national security adviser, a job that no other president would have ever given to a discredited warmonger. His reward is that, after devoting his life to the expansion of American power globally, he’s a hapless party to its contraction. For a person to sell out his putative ideals for such a hollow victory would be like a Greek drama, if the Greeks had written dramas about such small men.
...It’s nightmarish to live in a country where our foreign policy has been reduced to an intramural battle between Fox News reactionaries. And there’s still a danger that Bolton could outmaneuver the isolationists. But right now there is a thin, bitter consolation in knowing that he, like so many others who’ve worked for Trump, sacrificed his principles for power and will likely end up with neither. — Michelle Goldberg
Reading of a teleprompter is so difficult. How could we assume the President of the United States to be able to clearly read out from a teleprompter a prepared speech. :razz:invoking the heroism of an army that defeated the British in the 18th century in part because “it took over the airports”. Lol: behold, the ignoramus president. — Amity
invoking the heroism of an army that defeated the British in the 18th century in part because “it took over the airports”. Lol: behold, the ignoramus president.
— Amity
Reading of a teleprompter is so difficult. How could we assume the President of the United States to be able to clearly read out from a teleprompter a prepared speech. :razz: — ssu
It seems that Trump gets away with anything.Anyway, where ever Trump stumbles on any issues or speeches doesn't matter. — ssu
The only thing would be if he would appease the Democrats and that would create perhaps a backbone for opposition of Trump in the GOP. What is really lacking is any kind of opposition to Trump in the Republican party.It seems that Trump gets away with anything.
But it still needs to be called out. — Amity
What is really lacking is any kind of opposition to Trump in the Republican party. — ssu
In fairness, Trump is capable of reading a teleprompter. In this case, we're told the teleprompter stopped working, so he had to rely on his personal knowledge of history.Reading of a teleprompter is so difficult. How could we assume the President of the United States to be able to clearly read out from a teleprompter a prepared speech. — ssu
:grin:In this case, we're told the teleprompter stopped working, so he had to rely on his personal knowledge of history. — Relativist
There's no evidence that Trump had sexual contact with underage girls. It's not his style. He likes beauty queens, showgirls, glamour girls. Look at his wives. I don't believe he directly did anything. — fishfry
Well, I'll tell you the funniest is that I’ll go backstage before a show, and everyone's getting dressed and ready and everything else, and you know, no men are anywhere. And I'm allowed to go in because I'm the owner of the pageant and therefore I'm inspecting it. You know, I'm inspecting, I want to make sure that everything is good.
You know, the dresses. ‘Is everyone okay?’ You know, they're standing there with no clothes. ‘Is everybody okay?’ And you see these incredible looking women, and so, I sort of get away with things like that. But no, I've been very good.
He’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.
In 1994, Trump went to a party with Jeffrey Epstein, a billionaire who was a notorious registered sex offender, and raped a 13-year-old girl that night in what was a "savage sexual attack," according to a lawsuit filed in June 2016 by "Jane Doe." The account was corroborated by a witness in the suit, who claimed to have watched as the child performed various sexual acts on Trump and Epstein even after the two were advised she was a minor.
"Immediately following this rape Defendant Trump threatened me that, were I ever to reveal any of the details of Defendant Trump's sexual and physical abuse of me, my family and I would be physically harmed if not killed," Jane Doe wrote in the lawsuit, filed in New York.
The lawsuit was dropped in November 2016, just four days before the election, with Jane Doe's attorneys citing "numerous threats" against her.
There's no evidence that Trump had sexual contact with underage girls. It's not his style. He likes beauty queens, showgirls, glamour girls. Look at his wives. I don't believe he directly did anything.
If he did, I will personally lead the impeachment parade. Whether it was last week or twenty years ago. He will not get a pass for acts committed before he took office. Nobody in the country will be able to defend him. — fishfry
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