Posted on 08/23/2015 11:54:00 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
I must admit I have enjoyed the Trump-a-palooza this summer. The truth is, I have thrown in the towel on America so I don’t think our elections mean very much. It’s just a question about how fast we intend to drive into the abyss. Being old I should be rooting for slow as that means I can reach escape velocity before it gets ugly. On the other hand, life is for living and sticking around long enough to see the collapse has its attractions.
I can go either way so the elections are just entertainment at this point.
Six months ago I was thinking the Democrats would anoint Hillary, after the usual dalliances with a true believer, who excites the fever swamp types. It’s the GOP’s turn so this is when the party hands out their lifetime achievement award. The GOP would be figuring out if they can run Bush or if they have to find someone with the same polices, but a different last name.
Now, I think something is happening here. Clinton is now immersed in what could very well be the scandal of the century. There’s no way to wriggle free of the mishandling of classified data. You can finesse financial laws and ethics rules. You can’t finesse this stuff. News reports suggest there may be dozens of people who have violated the law and conspired to hide their involvement. This is Watergate level stuff given her position.
On the GOP side, Donald Trump just gave a speech in a stadium. If you are a member of the Party leadership or an advisor to one of the candidates, you should be in a panic. Trump went from sideshow at the start of the summer to leader of a revolution at the end of the summer. In-between, the GOP took their best shots at the man and did not leave a mark. Watching Trump’s crowd last night I kept thinking, “something is happening here. What it is ain’t exactly clear.”
One thing that is clear is I was the only guy to figure out that Trump was Beppe Grillo. The other thing is the ossified and blinkered chattering classes are wholly unprepared for what’s happening to them right now. They spend their time reading each other’s tweets, promoting each other’s work and chatting with one another at play time. They are not even aware of the vast network of writers, bloggers and trouble makers out there complaining about the status quo.
The best evidence of that is the deranged ranting of Kevin Williamson at National Review with regards to Donald Trump. It’s like watching a robot whose CPU errors out and the robot goes berserk, smashing itself into walls. When it is a bunch of metal it is funny. When it is a human being having a nervous breakdown, it’s sad and pathetic. In this case it is emblematic. Conservative Inc. is cracking up over what’s happening outside the Acela corridor.
Trump may turn out to be a poor spokesman for the massive crowds mobbing his events. I’m not a big fan of his style and I don’t think he has thought much about any of these things, other than immigration. That puts him way ahead of the dreary dishrags running for office, but the leader of a revolt needs a coherent platform. Maybe that comes, maybe not, but the crowds are not going away.
That’s why the rest of the candidates should be scared. To get these crowds for Bush or Walker or Kasich, you would have to round up the people at gun point. Even then, you would probably have to lock the gates to keep the people from fleeing the arena once the dreary dullard started talking. Those people at the Trump rally are not buying what the GOP is selling, even if they may not be sold on Trump as a candidate.
I don’t know what they do at this stage. These things can burn out on their own or they can break up like the Tea Party. The trouble is the GOP had corrupted the grass roots long ago so they could tear apart the Tea Party movement without too much trouble. The trouble here is this is ad hoc and completely outside the control of the “grass roots” organizations that exploited the displeasure pver Obama. This is a revolt against those organizations, especially the GOP establishment.
I’m skeptical about Trump. I think his lack of restraint will be his undoing. But, we’re seeing a collapse of the middle. The parties and the press are now bullhorns aimed at the public and the public gets it. This is not about Trump. He’s just the flag around which the dispossessed can rally. You can take down the flag and the people may disperse, but the dispossessed are still there. Someone will come along with a new flag eventually.
People who can't must rely on their thought-leaders (sic) to tell them what to think. They obey the thought leaders and condemn Trump.
Trump is the real deal. I am amazed people can't see it.
It's that they've been conditioned SO WELL since they were little kids who were then being conditioned to buy hula hoops and like the Beatles.
Very few people are capable of thinking on their own.
That's why they follow leaders like lemmings. Good and bad leaders.
Fortunately, Trump is a good man.
Me, too.
Many see him as a sage, I see him as being on the first step of recovery of the brainwashing he has received so well.
PPS You guys on this thread who are saying the US is over with... you are nuts.
What we are going through now is eminently fixable and very small potatoes... you need to read Homer_J_Simpson's posts about WW2. Now THAT was a crisis that threatened the United States. Not the mosquito-bite problems of today. So get a grip.
ZMan that means you too.
Republican establishment insider Charlie Black was on Meet-The-Press. Charlie needed no help from Todd in embarassing himself: zero contact with reality.
I fear he truly reflects the establishment. I don’t know if they are living in denial or just ignorant. But I don’t want to be identified with the same party they are, not for reasons of ideology but for reasons of not wanting to be embarassed.
At the rate things are going, Trump could win as an independent with 40%, a plurality of the vote and winner take all 40% of the electoral college. But guess what, the R & D would gang up on Trump in the electoral college with their 60% and then we’d really be a 3rd world joke.
The railroad and industrial "robber barons" everyone loves to hate may have been unpleasant individuals, but they (mostly) built things- and much of what they built lasted past their deaths. As you point out, Donald Trump "builds things"... at least to a greater extent than any of the current banking, brokerage and trust fund plutocrats.
He also contrasts starkly with someone like Jeb!, Rubio or Kasich… so much so that I loathe the latter - and their support groups - more as time goes on.
Mr. niteowl77
No, I wrote it.
(Well, I wish I had.)
The $2-billion question to my mind is, will Trump do what he says he will? Is he merely a very clever attention whore who has heard what others ignore and/or are afraid to say and is expertly exploiting them?
Or, is he for real? And, if he is for real, can he stay the course when things get way beyond difficult and ugly?
I wish I had a better read on his character and intentions.
Well, I think Trump would look good laurel wreath around his head. It would offset the hair.
bttt
Not only that he builds things .. but he’s proud of the fact that he’s made a fortune doing it.
People are attracted to the fact that Trump thinks Americans should be wanting to be rich .. so they can do extraordinary things in America.
THAT IS HIS APPEAL: He makes people believe that it’s okay to be prosperous - to be rich - to own property - to take nice vacations with their families - to send their children to quality schools (where they don’t get taught Common Core).
Trump makes them believe in the goodness of America again.
Thanks, Zeneta! Like minds, I thought of the same song, but had no wherewithal to refresh myself on the lyrics.
Great job!
I’m not ready to throw in the towel just yet, this ain’t December 7, 1941. Trump could go all the way. I listened to his Mobile speech. Yeah, he got a little long winded but he did throw out some specifics and his views on illegal immigration are spot on. The majority of Americans, myself included , are sick and tired of seeing America being turned into an unassimilated boarding house for the Third World and having the added insult of having to fund it through onerous taxation. He knows how to negotiate and he has talked repeatedly about how China and Mexico are eating our lunch in one-sided trade deals. It’s on one hand delightful to see how the GOP and the Dems and all the talking head media bobble heads are fulminating because he has exposed all of them as nothing more than two sides of the same coin. Trump has shown what a rotten fetid swamp it all is. On the other hand it’s sad to know that any other candidate without Trumps deep pockets and saying what Trump is saying would have been buried either by their own party, the media or both. Go Trump!
Stay off da YouTube man, or you might end up dropping a paycheck on rice, beans, and water
Do you suppose that song was what the writer had in mind with his title. Anyway, we get it.
“To get these crowds for Bush or Walker or Kasich, you would have to round up the people at gun point. Even then, you would probably have to lock the gates to keep the people from fleeing the arena once the dreary dullard started talking. Those people at the Trump rally are not buying what the GOP is selling, even if they may not be sold on Trump as a candidate.”
Trump is the flag to rally around, but he is also the message because
1) he is rich and doesn’t need anything
2) he actually cares about this country and he’s old enough to know what that even means
We are onto the scam of our Presidential and other elections now. Which color jersey, blue or red, matters little. We are subjects of a statist oligarchy. We couldn’t see a way out. Now we have a glimmer of a glimmer.
The more angry the powers that be and their controlling Bulldogs in the media get, the more WE KNOW WE WERE RIGHT ABOUT THE SCAM.
Nice Job !
I just turned 60 and some how getting feed thru a tube doesn’t scare Me anymore,,,
We had a Good Run,
Let’s not be Bitter.
The decent people want bold, competent leadership. Trump may have his flaws but he has those traits the sane people are starved for in this nation for leadership.
Include Cruz.
Ain't nobody else doing it. Good enough for me right now.
Stop. Hey, what's that sound? Everybody look what's going down.
Watergate seems like child’s play compared to the corruption that is rampant now.
Good article.
Had to look up who Beppe Grillo was.
I only know Topo Gigio ~
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.