Trump, Gabbard press Obama “treason” claims

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Mulberry Heel said:
Anything they can to deflect people's attention from the Epstein Files and Trump's obviously panicked refusal to release them. Releasing FBI files on MLK, making wild bullshit claims about Obama, any shiny object that will divert the media and especially his base from the Epstein Files.
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You know what would really divert their attention from the Epstein Files? Resignation.
 
lawtig02 said:
I hope we never find out but I think Trump wants to be a tyrant far more than Vance would. I can’t stand Vance for innumerable reasons. But I don’t think he would be as overtly and unapologetically power hungry as Trump is right now. Trump is acting like an unfiltered version of Putin or Mussolini.
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I think we've talked about this before but I really do not think Trump wants to be a "tyrant." He is an authoritarian through and through in that he wants to be the sole decision-maker, the big important boy who does everything and gets all the credit, and he doesn't want inconvenient things like Congress or laws or courts to get in his way or tell him that he can't do something. But he doesn't have any genuine desire to violently oppress people or instigate a reign of terror, for a lot of the same reasons you see all the "TACO" stuff: he's fundamentally a coward. He wants his face on Mt. Rushmore, and to be adored and worshipped as a great man and leader, and all of that stuff, but he isn't out there having his political enemies assassinated or dissidents tortured. That's why sometimes I think the Hitler/Mussolini comments miss the mark. He's not truly bent on turning our nation into an engine of conquest or destruction. He just wants to be able to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants to, and be praised for it.

Now, there are people in the Trump admin who would be fine with making him into a tyrant, with Stephen Miller certainly at the top of the list. if Miller thought he could get away with it, he would love to stage show trials worthy of Lenin or Robespierre, or create a modern brownshirts that go around beating minorities up in the streets. Miller and his ilk truly are "blood and soil" nationalists, and they've succeeded in getting trump to buy into some of their agenda, particularly in the realm of immigration. But Trump isn't really a true believer in that stuff, which is why you see Trump balk on mass immigration enforcement as soon as people he respects start telling him it's going to hurt the economy.

This is not to discount the real and immediate danger of a Trump admin. Trump's desire to be praised and his inclination to assert his authority are having real and terrible consequences, both immediate and long-term, and doing incalculable damage to critical government institutions. His administration, with the aid of the Supreme Court, could be paving the way for a real tyrant to easily seize power and do some truly awful things. And as alluded to above, there are some really nasty people in the admin who are being given a long leash to live our their personal white nationalist fantasies because their interests frequently align with Trump's and he doesn't care enough to stop them. But I just think it's a fundamental misunderstanding of Trump to think that he is interested at all in sitting on a pile of skulls or throwing liberals into concentration or extermination camps or something. He's stupid and fickle and petty enough that he could be manipulated into doing that by others - which is part of why he's such a huge danger - but it's not his plan or his goal.

Compare that to Vance, who is (1) much more intelligent than Trump is; (2) out there talking like a "blood and soil" true believer to whoever will put a microphone in front of his face; and (3) backed (maybe essentially owned) by Peter Thiel, who has some of the most extreme authoritarian desires you can imagine. I don't know for sure how he would act if suddenly became president. But personally I think there's more danger that he would actually become a true tyrant than Trump.
 
MOUNTAINH33L said:
I think they're going to try.
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I'd be really surprised if they actually try to arrest Obama. Trump's advisors are smart enough to understand that doing so would be incredibly unpopular with anyone outside of the true MAGA believers. On this subject, Trump has always been all talk, no action (another reason why I always thought the Biden end-of-term pardons were a mistake; I don't think the Biden family members who were pardoned were really in that much danger.) I think it would be a huge political error for Trump to arrest and try to prosecute Obama for this, so even thought it would personally suck a lot for Obama, I kinda hope they try to do it.
 
rodoheel said:
I think we've talked about this before but I really do not think Trump wants to be a "tyrant." He is an authoritarian through and through in that he wants to be the sole decision-maker, the big important boy who does everything and gets all the credit, and he doesn't want inconvenient things like Congress or laws or courts to get in his way or tell him that he can't do something. But he doesn't have any genuine desire to violently oppress people or instigate a reign of terror, for a lot of the same reasons you see all the "TACO" stuff: he's fundamentally a coward. He wants his face on Mt. Rushmore, and to be adored and worshipped as a great man and leader, and all of that stuff, but he isn't out there having his political enemies assassinated or dissidents tortured. That's why sometimes I think the Hitler/Mussolini comments miss the mark. He's not truly bent on turning our nation into an engine of conquest or destruction. He just wants to be able to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants to, and be praised for it.

Now, there are people in the Trump admin who would be fine with making him into a tyrant, with Stephen Miller certainly at the top of the list. if Miller thought he could get away with it, he would love to stage show trials worthy of Lenin or Robespierre, or create a modern brownshirts that go around beating minorities up in the streets. Miller and his ilk truly are "blood and soil" nationalists, and they've succeeded in getting trump to buy into some of their agenda, particularly in the realm of immigration. But Trump isn't really a true believer in that stuff, which is why you see Trump balk on mass immigration enforcement as soon as people he respects start telling him it's going to hurt the economy.

This is not to discount the real and immediate danger of a Trump admin. Trump's desire to be praised and his inclination to assert his authority are having real and terrible consequences, both immediate and long-term, and doing incalculable damage to critical government institutions. His administration, with the aid of the Supreme Court, could be paving the way for a real tyrant to easily seize power and do some truly awful things. And as alluded to above, there are some really nasty people in the admin who are being given a long leash to live our their personal white nationalist fantasies because their interests frequently align with Trump's and he doesn't care enough to stop them. But I just think it's a fundamental misunderstanding of Trump to think that he is interested at all in sitting on a pile of skulls or throwing liberals into concentration or extermination camps or something. He's stupid and fickle and petty enough that he could be manipulated into doing that by others - which is part of why he's such a huge danger - but it's not his plan or his goal.

Compare that to Vance, who is (1) much more intelligent than Trump is; (2) out there talking like a "blood and soil" true believer to whoever will put a microphone in front of his face; and (3) backed (maybe essentially owned) by Peter Thiel, who has some of the most extreme authoritarian desires you can imagine. I don't know for sure how he would act if suddenly became president. But personally I think there's more danger that he would actually become a true tyrant than Trump.
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Well said and I agree with about 98% of it. I agree the most dire threat in the Trump administration is people like Miller and Homan, not Trump himself. I just think Trump is a unique instrument for those would-be tyrants to use, as he’s willing to say anything, no matter how extreme or absurd, and he has a literally incomprehensible amount of loyalty among his base.

Where we might disagree is whether a Vance manipulated by Thiel is more of a threat than a Trump manipulated by Miller. I think not, but I may be wrong. And again, I hope we never have to find out.
 
rodoheel said:
I think we've talked about this before but I really do not think Trump wants to be a "tyrant." He is an authoritarian through and through in that he wants to be the sole decision-maker, the big important boy who does everything and gets all the credit, and he doesn't want inconvenient things like Congress or laws or courts to get in his way or tell him that he can't do something. But he doesn't have any genuine desire to violently oppress people or instigate a reign of terror, for a lot of the same reasons you see all the "TACO" stuff: he's fundamentally a coward. He wants his face on Mt. Rushmore, and to be adored and worshipped as a great man and leader, and all of that stuff, but he isn't out there having his political enemies assassinated or dissidents tortured. That's why sometimes I think the Hitler/Mussolini comments miss the mark. He's not truly bent on turning our nation into an engine of conquest or destruction. He just wants to be able to do whatever he wants, whenever he wants to, and be praised for it.

Now, there are people in the Trump admin who would be fine with making him into a tyrant, with Stephen Miller certainly at the top of the list. if Miller thought he could get away with it, he would love to stage show trials worthy of Lenin or Robespierre, or create a modern brownshirts that go around beating minorities up in the streets. Miller and his ilk truly are "blood and soil" nationalists, and they've succeeded in getting trump to buy into some of their agenda, particularly in the realm of immigration. But Trump isn't really a true believer in that stuff, which is why you see Trump balk on mass immigration enforcement as soon as people he respects start telling him it's going to hurt the economy.

This is not to discount the real and immediate danger of a Trump admin. Trump's desire to be praised and his inclination to assert his authority are having real and terrible consequences, both immediate and long-term, and doing incalculable damage to critical government institutions. His administration, with the aid of the Supreme Court, could be paving the way for a real tyrant to easily seize power and do some truly awful things. And as alluded to above, there are some really nasty people in the admin who are being given a long leash to live our their personal white nationalist fantasies because their interests frequently align with Trump's and he doesn't care enough to stop them. But I just think it's a fundamental misunderstanding of Trump to think that he is interested at all in sitting on a pile of skulls or throwing liberals into concentration or extermination camps or something. He's stupid and fickle and petty enough that he could be manipulated into doing that by others - which is part of why he's such a huge danger - but it's not his plan or his goal.

Compare that to Vance, who is (1) much more intelligent than Trump is; (2) out there talking like a "blood and soil" true believer to whoever will put a microphone in front of his face; and (3) backed (maybe essentially owned) by Peter Thiel, who has some of the most extreme authoritarian desires you can imagine. I don't know for sure how he would act if suddenly became president. But personally I think there's more danger that he would actually become a true tyrant than Trump.
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Agree with that post.

Although, you lost me a bit with “….as soon as people he respects start telling him……”
  • I doubt Trump respects anyone
  • No one “tells Trump”” anything
 
Zoo_View said:
Agree with that post.

Although, you lost me a bit with “….as soon as people he respects start telling him……”
  • I doubt Trump respects anyone
  • No one “tells Trump”” anything
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"People he listens to" would be more apt than "people he trusts" but yes, even though Trump constantly makes things up about conversations he supposedly had, people do constantly tell Trump things, which you often see reflected in his abrupt reversals of policy. Like the specific example I was referencing: Trump's abrupt about-face where he suddenly declared that farm and factory workers should be exempted from immigration enforcement absolutely happened because some conservative rich people (basically the only people Trump listens to) told him that it would hurt the economy to round those people up (read: it would hurt their own business interests).
 
Hmmm. As of last night, I can see Trump’s Truth Social feed again. That site is so damned glitchy (and the Company is really a $2 billion and growing Bitcoin piggy bank now).

Anyway

 
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