I was thinking of this as well - along with the many images shared on social media by supporters of Trump atop a tank in a cartoonish fashion, things exploding everywhere, Trump holding a bazooka or rifle. We also have neocon backers of Trump - the American Enterprise Institute is one, I believe. And then we have the Erik Prince association with the Administration through DeVos. Trump's book, Time to Get Tough, has a chapter simply entitled, "Take the Oil." I also recall a sort of to and fro "saber rattling" between Trump and North Korea. I also recall when Trump first announced his "America First" campaign in such a way that basically said something like we're steering the world order unilaterally - that's how it sounded to me at the time anyway - with the fairly ridiculous sounding sugar coating "as all nations should put their nations first" - I wondered how "peaceful" he struck the rest of the world watching. Trump kicking around the "China Virus" in concert with Pompeo reportedly encouraging the G7 to refer to it as the "Wuhan Virus" also raise an eyebrow.

Yes most definitely. He has not started any new wars.
— fishfry
Got very close with Iran. Really close. — ssu

Most definitely. Bolton was lusting for war and Trump wouldn't let him have it and fired him. Trump blusters about military strength and then avoids war. That's his style. Ignore everything Trump says, watch what he does. He's the most peace-oriented president we've had since Eisenhower, another guy who understood that you achieve peace by making your war threat credible.

In other words I disagree that Trump was ever close to war with Iran. He was never close to war with Iran. His words were not intentions, they were negotiating maneuvers in the service of peace. The actual results bear that out.

The Dems are chomping at the bit for more wars. The selection of Biden is a huge win for the war party. Don't you remember the 2016 GOP debates when Trump knocked Jeb! out of the contest by attacking him for his brother W's war?
— fishfry
He as the neocons were Republicans, as you likely know. — ssu

Yes indeed. Recall that in the 2016 GOP primaries, Trump blew Jeb! off the stage by going after 43's disastrous invasion of Iraq; an unthinkable heresy in the GOP up till then but a hugely popular position with the American people. There is an unholy alliance of GOP neocons and Dem neolibs wanting more wars. That's why you have all these generals throwing rocks at Trump in the media. A Biden win puts the war wing of the Democratic party in charge of the country. Not a pleasant thought if you value peace. Obama's foreign policy represented Bush's third and fourth terms, and those are the people hoping to get back into power.

If you look at the actual record, Trump is the peace candidate. The Dems and the left do the country a disservice by failing to see that. As far as the GOP in general, I have nothing good to say about them, if that was your point. They love the wars too. Not much of a constituency for peace in DC. That's one of the reasons Trump won. Peace is very popular with the people.

I was thinking of this as well - along with the many images shared on social media by supporters of Trump atop a tank in a cartoonish fashion, things exploding everywhere, Trump holding a bazooka or rifle. We also have neocon backers of Trump - the American Enterprise Institute is one, I believe. And then we have the Erik Prince association with the Administration through DeVos. Trump's book, Time to Get Tough, has a chapter simply entitled, "Take the Oil." I also recall a sort of to and fro "saber rattling" between Trump and North Korea. I also recall when Trump first announced his "America First" campaign in such a way that basically said something like we're steering the world order unilaterally - that's how it sounded to me at the time anyway - with the fairly ridiculous sounding sugar coating "as all nations should put their nations first" - I wondered how "peaceful" he struck the rest of the world watching. Trump kicking around the "China Virus" in concert with Pompeo reportedly encouraging the G7 to refer to it as the "Wuhan Virus" also raise an eyebrow. — Kevin

Trump: No new wars. Obama: Syria, Libya, Yemen, Somalia Niger, probably a few others we don't even know about. Trump hasn't taken anyone's oil. Watch what he does, not what he says. His words are negotiating tactics designed to keep his opponents off-balance. He has not started any new wars. That is a LOT more than you can say for the Obama/Hillary/Kerry foreign policy. And if those people return to power? It's bombs away.

If you're making it a political party association, why are you 1) ignoring Bush Admin and 2) ignoring Trump qua political party Dem/opportunist?

I also found the reports of our 'presence' in Venezuela during pandemic curious.

(I'm not trying to defend 'Obama/Hillary/Kerry' on this score. I just don't see him as a man of peace at all.)

Trump blusters about military strength and then avoids war. That's his style. Ignore everything Trump says, watch what he does. — fishfry

Yep.

And also there's the simple fact that war with Iran is useless and really a bad idea, militarily. There are so many downsides to it and many ways for Iran to make the position of the US miserable, starting from Iraq. Hence no American President has invaded Iran... just like they have not done with North Korea since the armstice.

Of course, someone would say that he simply is the classic bully.

But it's true that we should look at what Trump has done... especially when he had a majority in both houses. Well, a tax cut! Great, and the corona response wasn't the best when compared to other OECD countries. Trump showed there what a president he is during a severe crisis.

But perhaps that doesn't matter so much to the Trump voter. Those criticisms just blend with the more outrageous criticism about Trump. Speaking of Trump as Hitler is just annoying and makes the Trump supporter support his or her president even more, because Trump obviously isn't Hitler. Starting from the lack of ideology.

So really, what is a better person to be the US president? A self centered narcissist who constantly follows what is said about him in the television or a born again Christian who starts quoting the book of Revelation to the French President and really literally starts a war against another country by his own (and neocon) initiative?

Choose which Republican president you like. Perhaps it's the inability of Trump to act on the World stage is something positive. As I recall one American who voted Trump saying: "If Hillary is elected, the media will be her lapdog, whereas if Trump is elected, the media will do it's job it is supposed to do."

So perhaps it's the fear of Kamala being a newborn Hillary that takes power if Sleepy Joe is incapable for some reason or another. So....better vote Trump??? :chin:

Kamala by the way is "terrible" or "horrible" in Finnish.

Watch what he does, not what he says. — fishfry

Trump blusters about military strength and then avoids war. — fishfry

[Edit to last post: just saw your response to ssu which touched on GOP question above...]

What he says appears to me to cater to warmongering energies within his supporters (see also Nos characterizing the justification of Kyle Rittenhouse's actions as "slaying people" and "unleashing fury" for an additional example in the Trump thread) along with the campaign imagery already mentioned and "saber rattling" rhetoric.

If Trump is ignorant of this - and your assessment is true - this makes him an ignorant, ineffective 'man of peace' - and presumably also - in language he might endorse, a loser. It would be #verysad if this is the case.

If he is tacitly endorsing these energies or outright encouraging them and/or fully cognizant but ignoring them in what he says but somehow nevertheless "striving for peace in what he does" - this seems to me to lead to something like contributing to a more warmongering public in order to get votes whilst playing 11d chess as StreetlightX put it elsewhere - which is both very difficult to believe and to whatever extent accurate would make him seem to me to be even more of a sloppy disaster.

If he is tacitly endorsing these energies or outright encouraging them and/or fully cognizant but ignoring them in what he says but somehow nevertheless "striving for peace in what he does" - this seems to me to lead to something like contributing to a more warmongering public in order to get votes whilst playing 11d chess as StreetlightX put it elsewhere — Kevin

You know what. I don't think Trump plays even the two dimensional chess. Too many rules, not interesting.

Trump is really what he looks like, what all the books written about him say in uniform. What Trump understands is how present media works, how to get the limelight fixed on yourself and how a great showman takes over a show. And how to speak to your followers.

That simply isn't 11d chess.

That simply isn't 11d chess. — ssu

Agreed (the usage was sarcastic).

"... a Black woman, of South Asian descent ..."
~President-elect Biden referring to Vice President-elect Harris, January 19, 2021

↪fishfry

"... a Black woman, of South Asian descent ..."
~President-elect Biden referring to Vice President-elect Harris, January 19, 2021 — 180 Proof

You dug up a four month old thread to troll me with this? You'll have to do better.

:up:

To be fair, most of her work relates to the Mexican Mafia, as well as that she's on the Church Committee, which I am hoping to be put somehow into effect.

I didn't actually even vote in this election, though, as I was too disappointed by that the Democratic Socialists of America's campaign to elect Bernie Sanders was unsuccessful.

I think Trump might even lose a game of checkers against a girl scout.

I recall watching with great disappointment then-president Barack Obama capitulate—like other neo-liberal presidents before him and likely after him—to big money politics in the very worst way, with the Flint, Michigan drinking-water atrocity.

I call it an atrocity due to safe drinking water being the second most immediate, fundamental necessity of life (the first, of course, being clean air).

A then admirer of Obama, I muttered ‘Please say it isn’t so’ as he drank (at least what supposedly was) a glass of the Flint water; this signified that the health-hazardously lead-laden water is actually safe to drink, which he must have known is not.

It became clearer to me that U.S. presidents, and no less Canadian prime ministers, mostly serve as large corporate and power interest puppets.

The political system essentially involves two established conservative and (neo)liberal parties more or less alternating in governance while habitually kowtowing to the interests of the very wealthy but especially big business’s crippling threats (whether implied or explicit) of a loss of jobs, capital investment and/or economic stability, etcetera.

This of course fails to mention, amongst other things, the corporate-welfare-cheque subsidies doled out annually to already very profitable corporations and the forgiveness of huge loan debts owed to taxpayers.

(Not helping matters is that almost all of our information is still produced and/or shared with us by concentrated corporate-owned media.)

This corporate-political reality may be why so many low-income citizens have felt futility in voting at all, let alone waiting in a long line-up in the weather to do so.