Donald Trump


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28 minutes ago, Peter said:

I have no proof for my Wisconsin theory or the one that Trump is paying journalists to plant false stories about Cruz.   

Peter,

Your second theory has some plausibility, though I've yet to be impressed with the efficacy of DDDDT.  Maybe they did eventually realize that getting Donald's golfing buddy to place some prepackaged sleaze in one of his publications wasn't nearly enough, and they have come up with an assortment stories to place in other media outlets.

It would take some close content analysis to distinguish between stories planted on Trump's behalf and stories written by those who merely want to elect Democrats and figure Cruz is close enough to endangering their pet Democrat that they'd better start softening up his position, now.   There is some convergence of interests—a little more than usual because of the Drumpfian imperative to not merely defeat, but utterly destroy opponents from the same party.

A quick look at some of the Cruz items on Yahoo today suggests more of a convergence of interests.  An unsigned piece from the Atlantic blasts Cruz for allegedly speaking contentlessly.  Many of the actually or allegedly contentless phrases could have come from the mouth of Donald Trump, who is not under indictment in the piece; perhaps the writer is trying to help Trump?  But too much of the rhetoric is giveaway hard Left (He's read Hayek! The horror, the horror!) or just blinkered Democrat (a Republican who does poorly in a Massachusetts primary will be toast in a general election—in which everyone knows the Republican will do poorly in Massachusetts).  If there's an intent to help Trump, it's only because the writer (disappointed that Bernie has fallen short) thinks Trump at the top of the ticket will be the best way to usher in the reign of Queen Evita.

Robert

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1 hour ago, Robert Campbell said:

As for Trump, how can one who is inalterably magnificent and destined to win ever be sorry for anything?

Robert,

Ha!

This reminds me of the telephone game with a story where one person calls another and tells a story, then that person calls another and tells it and so on. When you get to the end, the story doesn't sound anything like the original.

The intriguing part is this is going on in one head only.

I cop to the "magnificent" part with Trump. Easily. I said it. I meant it. I believe it.

I have never even remotely said anything close to "destined to win." I don't think that. 

That's the grapevine talking. 

I almost didn't say anything because I would like to see where this ends.

:)

Michael

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39 minutes ago, KorbenDallas said:

Hi Peter, I posted the video because I didn't know if you would or wouldn't find it interesting...

 

Thank you. It was in my newspaper clip but not highlighted like the guy in the video did. Indiana? That is the kind of expert analysis I like. Sometimes when you hear it, you remember it. Indiana, and here comes up another American Indian name, Delaware.

I thought the local channels would have cut away to Harrington, DE where Der Trumpster should be soon but they have not. The first person in line was an older lady who had been there all night. Trump was on her bucket list. It would be nice if security escorted her into the room, with her fold up chair and let Trump say hi to her. What a story! And she could sit there throughout his speech.  

Peter   

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Hotmail is still junking my OL letters. Idiots. I will keep watch. This time, instead of picking the "not junk" button I hit the "move to inbox" button. 

The press is saying a prescription drug may have been used by Prince. Nothing confirmed.

Peter

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2 hours ago, Peter said:

Hotmail is still junking my OL letters. Idiots. I will keep watch. This time, instead of picking the "not junk" button I hit the "move to inbox" button. 

Peter,

One trick is to add the OL email address found on the email notifications you receive to your list of Hotmail contacts. Nothing from the contacts list gets junked (at least as far as I know).

Michael

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5 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

I have never even remotely said anything close to "destined to win." I don't think that. 

Michael,

If every time Donald Trump wins, you say he earned the win...

and...

Every time Donald Trump loses, you say it was stolen from him...

and...

Whenever possible in the event of a loss, you blame it on institutional rules and political maneuvers to which you would have had no objection, if either Trump had employed them to win, or Trump had won in spite of them...

What other conclusion follows, but...

Donald Trump is destined to win.

Besides, there is an obvious model for such behavior.

Donald Trump constantly acts and speechifies as though he is destined to win.

Why wouldn't his followers believe that he is?

Robert

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3 hours ago, Robert Campbell said:

Every time Donald Trump loses, you say it was stolen from him...

and...

Whenever possible in the event of a loss, you blame it on institutional rules and political maneuvers to which you would have had no objection, if either Trump had employed them to win, or Trump had won in spite of them...

What other conclusion follows, but...

Donald Trump is destined to win.

Robert,

That would be a fine piece of reasoning if I happened to have said those things.

I didn't.

I have complained about Cruz abusing technicalities and trying to steal votes using sleazeball tactics like what he did with Ben Carson, etc., but I have yet to blame anyone for a Trump loss in the whining manner you are saying. It's just not something I do. On the contrary, I say I am glad the sleazy Roger Stone is acting to balance out sleazy Ted Cruz's sleazy Jeff Roe. And invite people to contemplate a crow barbecue. Go through the entire thread and this is the meaning I present over and over in all kinds of different words.

And you putting words in my mouth is precisely an example of me not being seen. This kind of stuff is what Trump supporters are bitching about, why they no longer listen to anti-Trump arguments.

Look into your own heart and see if that is what you see instead of my words when you read my words. 

Michael

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15 hours ago, Brant Gaede said:

A statistical projection of delegate count: a contested convention.

http://www.redstate.com/diary/creinstein/2016/04/20/new-york-never-mattered-ted-cruz-won-presidency/

I think this is just wishful thinking. I don't wish it were wishful thinking. I just think it is. :wink:

The latest polling shows Drumpf with a double-digit lead in California. That's not likely to change.

Also, polling shows Hillary leading Drumpf more than either Cruz or Kasich. That is not an artifact of there still being 3 candidates in the GOP race or 2 candidates in the Democrat race. The GOP doesn't want the candidate who (supposedly) has the best (or only?) chance of beating Hillary. 

The three issues Hillary will whack Drumpf with in the fall are his sexism, his "racism," and his not being enough of a redistributionist. Once she works him over with her collectivist-altruist billy club, he will be lying dazed and bleeding in the ditch, wondering what went wrong. 

"The Anatomy of Compromise" 101 is my reference for this.

And if somehow Drumpf prevails against Hillary (perhaps if she is indicted), Obama will go wink-wink-nod-nod and the Federal Reserve will pull the plug on "quantitative easing," and we will go into a huge recession, and after Drumpf is sworn in, we will hear no more talk of cutting individual and corporate taxes, and no more talk of repealing Obamacare. Instead, we will hear calls for more bailouts and relief programs not to make America "great" again, but to keep America from going completely down the drain. (When all they really need to do is keep the government the hell out of the way...)

REB

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1 hour ago, Roger Bissell said:

I think this is just wishful thinking. I don't wish it were wishful thinking. I just think it is. :wink:

The latest polling shows Drumpf with a double-digit lead in California. That's not likely to change.

Also, polling shows Hillary leading Drumpf more than either Cruz or Kasich. That is not an artifact of there still being 3 candidates in the GOP race or 2 candidates in the Democrat race. The GOP doesn't want the candidate who (supposedly) has the best (or only?) chance of beating Hillary. 

The three issues Hillary will whack Drumpf with in the fall are his sexism, his "racism," and his not being enough of a redistributionist. Once she works him over with her collectivist-altruist billy club, he will be lying dazed and bleeding in the ditch, wondering what went wrong. 

"The Anatomy of Compromise" 101 is my reference for this.

And if somehow Drumpf prevails against Hillary (perhaps if she is indicted), Obama will go wink-wink-nod-nog and the Federal Reserve will pull the plug on "quantitative easing," and we will go into a huge recession, and after Drumpf is sworn in, we will hear no more talk of cutting individual and corporate taxes, and no more talk of repealing Obamacare. Instead, we will hear calls for more bailouts and relief programs not to make America "great" again, but to keep America from going completely down the drain. (When all they really need to do is keep the government the hell out of the way...)

REB

Very realistic. The American Public just loves bailout, handouts and "programs". 

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10 hours ago, Roger Bissell said:

I think this is just wishful thinking. I don't wish it were wishful thinking. I just think it is. :wink:

The latest polling shows Drumpf with a double-digit lead in California. That's not likely to change.

Also, polling shows Hillary leading Drumpf more than either Cruz or Kasich. That is not an artifact of there still being 3 candidates in the GOP race or 2 candidates in the Democrat race. The GOP doesn't want the candidate who (supposedly) has the best (or only?) chance of beating Hillary. 

The three issues Hillary will whack Drumpf with in the fall are his sexism, his "racism," and his not being enough of a redistributionist. Once she works him over with her collectivist-altruist billy club, he will be lying dazed and bleeding in the ditch, wondering what went wrong. 

"The Anatomy of Compromise" 101 is my reference for this.

And if somehow Drumpf prevails against Hillary (perhaps if she is indicted), Obama will go wink-wink-nod-nog and the Federal Reserve will pull the plug on "quantitative easing," and we will go into a huge recession, and after Drumpf is sworn in, we will hear no more talk of cutting individual and corporate taxes, and no more talk of repealing Obamacare. Instead, we will hear calls for more bailouts and relief programs not to make America "great" again, but to keep America from going completely down the drain. (When all they really need to do is keep the government the hell out of the way...)

REB

I don't think any Department of Justice is going to indict the Democratic nominee for President. I don't think this President could make it even if he wanted to. If Holder were still there . . . , but he ain't.

The linked to projection gives Trump 120 delegates in California. It doesn't matter if Cruz gets any. If you do the author's math again and Trump gets 160, what do you get for the total of totals?

The "wishful thinking" might involve the other States. The author is adding up figures based on unspecified sources.

Trump does seem to be worried about it, however. At least he's trying to capitalize on the idea in TV ads.

I do expect Trump will fall first ballot short and Cruz will be nominated (and lose to Clinton) and Trump will formally blow up the Republican Party at the convention as he has already informally done it. I suppose Trump would be a Roark if Roark were a politician but then Roark wouldn't be Roark. Nope; he'd be a crypto-Democrat with Peter Keating ("Great Guy!") as his campaign manager with nude pictures of Dominique splattered all over the Internet.

--Brant

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That Red State prediction of a Trump failure is not based on much, though it will go to June and California.

Notes from Fox, this Saturday morning, April 23rd . The Trump campaign is saying he will go into the Convention with approximately 1400 delegates.

Pat Buchanan on Fox is saying that prediction is Psy War. Yet, Pat does see “workable” numbers. Never has a front runner taken on the Republican establishment to such a degree. No more interventionism. No cronyism. No more power for the back room elites is in the forecast. It’s almost like he’s talking about his own failed campaigns. Buchanan says Trump will not adopt any of their agenda that is not in line with his views.

The only challenge to Trump at this point is Ted Cruz. Lou Dobbs was saying hypothetically, the Party MUST not just grudgingly go with a Trump campaign if he wins but they MUST BE enthusiastic to get a Trump majority so that the Republicans keep the House and Senate, and get Scalia type appointments to The Supreme Court.     

Real Clear’s spokes lady on Cavuto this Saturday morning is saying Trump is more unlikely than likely to get to 1237 and even less likely to get to 1400 delegates. Yet as of now, Trump IS the presumptive nominee.

A Pennsylvanian delegate is saying he is unbound. He is not playing with power. He wants what is best for Pennsylvania. He wants the last man standing, the average PA voters choice, and general campaign electability to govern his vote. He says the Trump staff has been very aggressive to him and Trump met with him.   

Now they have comedian Joe Piscopo on. He is doing his Frank Sinatra impression, saying you're a cool, cool baby Trump. He has a five year old girl and he worries about her in the public bathrooms. he yells into it, "Are you OK baby?" Who knew all he needs to do is put on a dress and he could follow her in. 

Peter  

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On April 21, 2016 at 5:17 PM, KorbenDallas said:

I want to point to a wider context here of the entire post of where the first quote (the one on 4/19/2016) came from, meaning I think you're questioning (hopefully Honestly) my general understanding of micro/macroeconomics and applying that general understanding to Iowa's corn industry, ethanol mandates, etc.  I said in an earlier reply that I was grouping (corn based) ethanol into a wider group of the corn industry.  The mandates shifted the demand for corn (to the right, to get specific), which of course would mean more supply was needed.  There were existing farmers who could increase production.  There were some farmers who found efficiencies to increase production.  There is evidence farmers entered the market to meet this demand, which would be new labor.  Some existing farms hired new labor as well.  So the two questions above (I hope they were asked Honestly), no I did not imply "corn is not a function of supply and demand" or that "demand for corn to produce ethanol does not increase the total amount demanded, when added to all the demand for corn for food".  I get it, had it on both counts.

My comment that "Inflation is the primary factor in our increasing food costs" was in response to your, "Meanwhile, most of our food gets more expensive. Maybe Donald Trump doesn't care, but why should we be perpetuating policies that screw American consumers, while leading, in bad years for the worldwide crop, to tortilla riots in Honduras?"--to which you're linking that our food is getting more expensive to "policies that screw American consumers" and commodity fluctuations.  No, I do not think that these two things are the necessary and sufficient conditions of our recent increasing food costs.  I think the primary factor is inflation, starting from the point of Obama mishandling the recession.  The other factors you described contribute.

Korben,

I arrived late to this thread, and am (on some occasions) still trying to sort out the personal positions of some Trump supporters from the various positions their candidate has taken on the campaign trail.

Also, trying to distinguish your views from Michael's—as any disagreements Michael actually has with Trump, when he is not dismissing all policy discussion as gotcha-games and the product of an unhealthy interest in mere words, are being minimized for the sake of the ongoing campaign.

Meanwhile, as you may have seen by now, I disagree with Ted Cruz about what I see as unforced errors (such as his "New York values" crack), misplaced priorities, and pandering (trying to get in on Huckabee's photo op with Kim Davis, supporting the North Carolina "bathroom bill").  I don't need to hear the latest short version of Ted's message all day either; a couple of times is plenty.

I came in not knowing what your understanding of economics might be, while knowing that Trump's main campaign themes have their, errr, anti-economic elements.  

It's one thing to push for a counter to Chinese mercantilism, which the regime is obviously practicing.  Much of the "detail" on Trump's campaign site is still not very detailed, but the section on intellectual property for American (and other foreign) companies trying to operate in China reads as though someone in Trump's operation had actually thought about the issue.  And the section on Chinese export subsidies asserts that any continued operation of state enterprises in China, with any of the privileges appertaining thereto, ipso facto constitutes export subsidies.  I get the point, though I don't see that getting what is still called the Chinese Communist Party, which still puts Chairman Mao on all its currency, to pull the plug on state enterprises will ever be attained through trade negotiations.  It will take the Party's overthrow from within, or a couple of orders of magnitude more foreign troops than were brought in to stop the Boxers.

It's another to push for American mercantilism, which Trump seems to favor (as long as the beneficiary isn't oil companies, or Big Pharma).  With all due respect to a certain Trump defender, renminbi in the 2010s aren't reais in the 1980s.  The Chinese central bank manipulates renminbi the same way the ECB manipulates euros, and we don't see Trump calling for the immediate abrogation of trade deals with Europe.

Now, corn-based ethanol.

First, is there any market at all for corn-based ethanol, in the absence of Congressional ethanol mandates and EPA enforcement?  The corn ethanol lobby makes no effort to pretend otherwise.

Besides, this isn't the first go-round for Federally subsidized corn-based ethanol.  The previous wave ended abruptly in the 1980s, when oil prices took a dive.  Even with subsidies, ethanol couldn't compete.

Hence the rationale for compulsory blending into all the gasoline legally salable at the pump (compulsory blending to be amplified, soon, from 10% to 15%).  Let's add compulsory purchase of ethanol by oil companies and refineries, even if it exceeds the total volume needed to meet the blending order.  Now we have a purely contrived market for ethanol, with proof against collapse even if oil hits $5 a barrel.

Meanwhile, the compulsory blending was sold, politically, on environmental grounds that the enviros themselves no longer pretend to believe in.

We could stop right here, in the face of overwhelming evidence that corn-based ethanol is a gigantic boondoggle brought into existence by pull-peddling and perpetuated by further pull-peddling.  Therefore, exactly the kind of thing Donald Trump wants everyone to believe he is against.

Nonetheless... if you create subsidized or compulsory demand (the present system does both) for large volumes of corn-based ethanol, which on a free market no one wants 'cause no one needs, you don't just get the diversion of corn crops away from people food and livestock feed that's going to make people food.  And you don't  just get marginal land drawn into corn production.  You also get the diversion of better-quality land from, say, soybean production into corn production (there are other crops, even in Iowa).

Meanwhile, when not corroding engine parts, corn-based ethanol mandates raise energy costs (for food processors, along with everyone else).  The whole purpose of the current system is force the continued purchase of ethanol, preferably for bleeding but even after they've already hit the "blend wall," even if oil is $5 a barrel, so some increase in energy costs is practically guaranteed.

Three links:

http://www.iowacorn.org/en/ethanol/

http://www.globalwarming.org/2013/09/16/new-york-times-covers-the-ethanol-scam-ethanol-mandates-spawn-credits-that-enrich-wall-street-speculators-rip-off-consumers/

http://hotair.com/archives/2016/01/23/do-iowa-voters-really-care-about-ethanol-anymore/

The first one is from a lobbying operation.  Check the sources and you'll see that most of what the provide is advocacy statistics (i.e., they're lobbyists citing other lobbyists).  There's even a link to talking points, in case you didn't know what kind of site it was.

Still, here's a statistic that's in line with what i've been able to find elsewhere:

Quote

Ethanol is a major market for Iowa corn – 47% of Iowa corn goes into ethanol production.

47% of Iowa corn now goes into ethanol production.

Has everyone gone completely nuts?

How much would be going into ethanol production without the mandates?

It could easily be 0%.

Does this mean that the Iowa corn crop would abruptly decline by 47%?

Nope.  Decreases from taking land out of production or changing crops would amount to much less than that.

What would still be grown would basically all be going into human food and livestock feed.

How could that, in turn, not affect food prices?  (The US is by far the world's biggest corn producer.  Also grows a lot of the crops that would be substituted for corn in Iowa.)

It doesn't matter, in this context, how small a percentage of the price of the retail food product goes to the farmer.  (That, by the way, is the first excuse in any brief for perpetuating old-fashioned farm subsidies—which corn farmers are still getting.)

There is still leverage.

And ethanol mandates also increase energy costs, every step along the supply chain.

This is how payoffs to special interests in a few corn-producing states can harm consumers, both in America and abroad.

OK, inflation.  

That there has been hidden inflation during the QE era, I don't doubt for a minute.

If you can explain what makes inflation unhide itself for food items, at the same time enabling it to stay in hiding for so many other goods and services, I will be all ears.

Otherwise, in the present context your appeal to inflation looks diversionary.

The third link points to a poll taken not long before the Iowa caucuses.  It was received with some skepticism then, but Cruz ended up beating Trump.  So maybe there was something to it.  It appears to show that most Iowans have quit caring whether corn-based ethanol keeps being propped up.

Employment: It's hard to find trustworthy figures.  The ethanol lobby has everything to gain from taking jobs that are corn-related, or merely agriculture-related, and making it appear they are uniquely dependent on corn-based ethanol.  But let's assume that 36,000 jobs in Iowa are truly dependent on corn-based ethanol, so every last one would disappear the minute mandates were abolished.

Then it would come down to:

We must preserve a phony market in corn-based ethanol, by keeping or increasing fuel mandates, in perpetuity, to save 36,000 jobs in Iowa.

Has everyone gone completely nuts?

You may have noted that the same argument for perpetuating corn-based ethanol mandates could be (and actually is) used to justify perpetuating any and every other expensive boondoggle presently in operation.

Just to stay inside the energy sector, mustn't special privileges and subsidies to the solar-panel industry also be perpetuated, to avoid job losses when the subsidized solar-panel factories all shut down?  Aren't the actual past job losses, say, from Solyndra, mere proof that everyone in the country must make forced purchases of subsidized American solar panels, even if these end up gathering dust in their basements and their rented storage, to forestall any more such job losses?  (That's, in effect, what we got after there were actual job losses in corn-based ethanol.)

The argument makes just as much sense.  But so far, I haven't heard Donald Trump calling for solar-panel mandates.

Though he will be campaigning in California... and Ted Cruz won't be championing solar-panel mandates...

I'm not an Objectivist. But this is not an area of exegetical uncertainty in Objectivism.  We should further acknowledge that Ayn Rand was not in favor of going cold turkey on Social Security.  She thought it would have to be wound down so as to reduce the damage to those who thought they'd be able to rely on it, even though no one had ever had a right to benefit payments.

The Objectivist answer on corn-ethanol mandates is straight out of Frédéric Bastiat: Abolish the law, without delay.

It's my answer too.

Robert

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On April 21, 2016 at 5:17 PM, KorbenDallas said:

Trump said in the 2016 CBS Republican primary debate in South Carolina how he'd handle keeping SS and Medicare funded, and I believe other debates as well.  The sentence I used summarizes what he said.  The reforms lead to more jobs, more payers into the system.  Does it fix the system?  No, of course not.

As far as I know, Trump hasn't addressed future unfunded liabilities.

Trump has talked about his ideas about replacing Obamacare.  Might it be better to formulate a detailed plan once he gets the presidency, having access to the ideas of Congress and data that he might not have as a presidential candidate?

Korben,

George H. W. Bush once derided certain supply-side projections (for economic growth and Federal tax revenues) as "voodoo economics."

It turned out that while some of the supply-siders needed to curb their enthusiasm, they did have a point.

By contrast, I have no idea where Donald Trump is getting his projections for economic growth and Federal tax revenues.  Are they more "perfect statistics"?

He might as well be saying: more people will be paying into Social Security and Medicare, and each will be getting paid more and will be putting in more FICA tax—because I am magnificent and destined to win.  (If I catch you peeking behind the curtain, Corey and his detail will be escorting you out.)

The issues regarding Social Security and Medicare aren't that difficult to comprehend.  It's just that trying to do anything about them entails political liability.

As Robert Tracinski noted in his last installment, a Trump vs. Hillary contest will be a contest between two candidates who insist that Social Security MUST BE PRESERVED.  So either, if elected, won't do a damn thing about it.  And if not now, when?

Consequently in 2035 (give or take a couple of years), if present law is still in force, Social Security will be out of both real money and funny money, and all benefits will get a 21% chop.  (Not quite a slash, but sharp enough.)

A Trumpian economic miracle, if he can conjure one, might push that horizon out a couple more years.

And Medicare, which Tracinski did not get into, will run out a lot faster than Social Security.

Establishment politicians don't want to touch Social Security, and neither does Donald.

Cronies don't want to touch Social Security, and neither does Donald.

And yet he is their mortal enemy...

It is not that difficult to formulate plans for Social Security, Medicare, and replacing Obamacare.

In fact, the fates of Medicare and Obamacare are joined, courtesy of the $700 billion forced transfer from one to the other that was written into Obamacare (to game the CBO) and that no one believes will ever take place.

Very little of the underlying information is secret.  Plenty of think thanks that have been working on the details, some of them for years.  The Donald might overcome his aversion to non-doers, some of whom might even have associated with a despised opponent, and see what they have to offer.

Otherwise, the only prudent thing to do is to treat his schemes for Obamacare, Medicare, and Social Security as sheer vaporware.

You know, Barack Obama waited till after he was elected to decide what would actually be in Obamacare.  

How did that turn out?

Robert

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I quoted the following, seeking similarities with Trump. Is it any more relevant today?

Peter  

From Wikipedia, The Prince, by Machiavelli. Princes who rise to power through their own skill and resources (their "virtue") rather than luck tend to have a hard time rising to the top, but once they reach the top they are very secure in their position. This is because they effectively crush their opponents and earn great respect from everyone else. Because they are strong and more self-sufficient, they have to make fewer compromises with their allies.

Machiavelli writes that reforming an existing order is one of the most dangerous and difficult things a prince can do. Part of the reason is that people are naturally resistant to change and reform. Those who benefited from the old order will resist change very fiercely. By contrast, those who stand to benefit from the new order will be less fierce in their support, because the new order is unfamiliar and they are not certain it will live up to its promises. Moreover, it is impossible for the prince to satisfy everybody's expectations. Inevitably, he will disappoint some of his followers. Therefore, a prince must have the means to force his supporters to keep supporting him even when they start having second thoughts, otherwise he will lose his power. Only armed prophets, like Moses, succeed in bringing lasting change. Machiavelli claims that Moses killed uncountable numbers of his own people in order to enforce his will.

 

 

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On April 22, 2016 at 11:38 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

I'm no expert on how elections have been run. I know Romney and McCain lost. Do I need expertise to know that? :) 

I do know a little about the bond Trump has with his supporters. And I also know how anti-Trump people ignore that bond, denigrate Trump supporters and keep grasping desperately at any and all theories that can explain to them where the hell Trump came from and where the hell all these people came from.

Michael,

No one needs expertise to notice that Mitt Romney and John McCain lost.

Not after they actually did it.

Now, if you mean before the event :)

A non-expert might have noted that a Republican would have tough sledding in 2008.

And less tough sledding in 2012, but with a weak candidate against a slick one...

The bond Trump has with his supporters is presumably unaffected by their numbers.  In other words, it will be qualitatively the same whether they are 10% of those eligible to vote, or 20% or 30%... or 80%.

A generous estimate of their forces would take 100%, subtract Trump's present negatives (we'll say 65%), and assume nothing in between.

Which give us 35%

Enough to take the Republican nomination, even though Trump has still not quite hit a 40% average across his almighty primaries.

Not nearly enough to beat a Democrat.

If Trump doesn't actually beat a Democrat, no one's going to look back and judge his tactics to have been golden.

Robert

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On April 22, 2016 at 0:41 AM, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Since a little while back, Trump has been nonstop throwing a big honking spotlight on all of it--especially on the RNC. And he's keeping the pressure up. One little slip and these guys know they are headline fodder for days and not in a good way. That's profession-killing stuff.

Michael,

If Donald Trump, the man destined to win, had gotten his caucus and state convention operations together, he could be turning his victory lap as we speak.

In which case, the rules and practices would be exactly the same as they are now, but there would be no "big honking spotlight."

There would be nothing at all.

Robert

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On April 21, 2016 at 3:46 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Robert,

Baloney.

When Trump started the campaign, he moved the unfavorables numbers down a couple of times. Maybe more because I don't follow these kinds of polls too much.

Michael,

And he kept them down?

They must have been truly stupendous when he announced he was running.

Robert

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1 hour ago, Robert Campbell said:

Not nearly enough to beat a Democrat.

Robert,

Then it's a good thing Trump's not running against a Democrat in the Republican primaries, huh? It's good thing he's only running against Republicans who lose to him, huh?

:evil: 

We'll worry about the Democrats in a different context when the time comes.

:) 

Michael

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1 hour ago, Robert Campbell said:

If Donald Trump, the man destined to win, had gotten his caucus and state convention operations together, he could be turning his victory lap as we speak.

Robert,

Do you have any similar expertise advice for Cruz to get his vote count up? And number of delegates from votes? Those numbers are kinda low...

For instance, if Cruz had concentrated on a wider target than evangelicals and had not presumed he would have had the former Romney votes in the tank, more people would have voted for him and, as you say, "he could be turning his victory lap as we speak."

:evil: 

You know, that "destined to win" thing sounds so damn good, I'm tempted to adopt it. But I gotta keep it real... :) 

Michael

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On April 20, 2016 at 4:50 PM, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Robert,

And here we have the central problem with you not getting Trump's appeal. You are still in the Democrat Republican paradigm. The establishment ruling class of both are the same thing in the minds of Trump supporters.

[...]

4. In two midterm elections, typical Trump supporters (i.e., the Silent Majority) gave the Republican politicians, pundits, media people, crony capitalists, intellectuals, and others in the "ruling class" the House, then the Senate. Why? To fix this shit.

5. The ruling class repaid the favor by running games in the backrooms so that Congress kept going along with Obama's agenda, not fixing this shit, and even making the problems worse. And the ruling class ran two milquetoast presidential candidates (chosen through backroom manipulations) who lost. 

6. As gravy, the ruling class kept up a public and private attitude that people like typical Trump supporters do not need to be taken seriously, that they were stupid, the inferior hoi polloi, the cattle, the unwashed masses. They were good for votes and paying taxes and nothing else.

[...]

Donald Trump will be our next president and you and other anti-Trump people should think about something. All these Trump supporters are going to have a public voice, especially about their beefs, whereas they did not before. If you need a decoder ring, now is a good time to get started on getting one.

Michael,

You're addressing this to a guy who has voted for Libertarians about as often, lifetime, as he has voted for Republicans.  Never, for instance, have I cast a ballot for anyone named Bush.  So, two sentences and you've lost me already.  

I've all at once become indistinguishable from Reince Preibus and Haley Barbour—and from Howard Dean and Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

OK, if Establishment Republicans are exactly the same as Establishment Democrats, how did Donald Trump run against Scott Walker (twice, the second time when he wasn't on the ballot) employing Establishment Democrat talking points against a guy Trump wants us to believe is an Establishment Republican?  

It could be that they're all the same, except on the occasions when they're different. But perhaps you'll understand how it's hard to derive any guide to action from this.

If typical Trump supporters (well, those who now are typical Trump supporters) were the people who put those Republican majorities in the House in 2010 and in the House and Senate in 2014, what you are saying?  That they were the entire Republican electorate in those contests?  A vast majority of it?  What percent of it?  And everyone they allegedly voted for (allegedly, because it isn't clear what percentage of the Republican electorate you actually have in mind), everyone all the way from Mia Love to Mitch McConnell, was and is a member of the Republocratic/Demopubilcan establishment.  Jeff Sessions too (he got reelected in 2014).

Unless you are simply equating Tea Partiers (plus everyone else who's had a beef against the Republican Establishment since, I don't know, 2004) with Trump supporters, it appears you're significantly undercounting the percentage of the electorate for which Republican insiders have shown disdain.

Equating Trump supporters with a silent majority is questionable on a number of levels.  First, I haven't noticed Trump supporters being silent.  (If they were all Tea Partiers beforehand, they weren't silent then either.)  Second, the politician who claimed he had prevailed with the support of the Silent Majority was Richard Nixon (a man whom I devoutly hope you do not see as a model for Trump).  Third, you don't get to call yourself part of a majority without showing that it actually outnumbers the other side (otherwise, you're just doing the Bolshevik vs. Menshevik thing, and we know where that went).

Few other things: If you think John McCain got the nomination in 2008 through what you are calling backroom manipulations, review the primary results from that year.  If you think Mitt Romney got the nomination in 2012 by like means, review the primary results from that year.  Yes, the insiders were all for Romney in 2012, and I guess they settled pretty quickly for McCain in 2008. But none the caucus/state convention/pledged/unpledged stuff that Donald Trump is constantly complaining about made any difference at all, as both candidates sewed up the nomination long before the party convention.  (There was a spiteful gesture against Ron Paul from the Romneyites at the 2012 convention, which may have cost Romney a little in the general, but it had no effect on who was going to be nominated.) 

All I can infer from that talking point is that you weren't paying attention in 2008 (I didn't pay much, because I didn't like Huckabee or Santorum or Romney or McCain, and I figured the Republican was going to lose anyway).  Or in 2012, where I paid quite a bit of attention (Mitt Romney did not win the South Carolina primary, and I just wish a bunch of other states had given him the same treatment).  I'm not saying everyone needed to pay attention (it's disappointing to follow what's happening with a weak candidate, like Mittens, when instead of getting soundly walloped he instead contrives to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory).  But each left behind a detailed record, and you don't need Donald Trump to provide your history for you.

If you want dirty tricks, there was the Republican primary for Senate, in Mississippi in 2014.  

On the Establishment side (literally—most of the Barbour family was working for him, and the NRSC held an emergency fundraising meeting for him, from which the Republican Senators who had been invited slunk out a secondary entrance in the hope that no reporters would see them), Thad Cochran.  One of the worst, most venal Republicans the whole time he'd been in the Senate; the king of earmarks several years running; had buildings named after him all over the state.  By 2014, he was also displaying mental lapses and was widely suspected of being in early-stage Alzheimer's.

On the Tea Party side, Chris McDaniel.  In a state where the Democrats knew they'd be nominating a sacrificial lamb.

In a super-nasty primary race, McDaniel came up a little short of 50%, so it went to a runoff.

In Mississippi, the primaries are open.  But if they go to a runoff, voters are legally required to vote in the Republican runoff if they voted in the Republican primary, and vice versa.  There's a procedure called swapping the poll books that is supposed to take place in every precinct, just to make sure nobody's trying to go from the Democratic primary to the Republican runoff, or vice versa.

The Barbours and Trent Lott and Mitch McConnell and the rest of the sorry crew were now in a panic, because they knew McDaniel would be highly effective getting his supporters to show up for a runoff, and Cochran wouldn't.

So what they did was to hire Democratic operatives from out of state, the shadier the better.  So shady, some took "walking around money."  They ran radio ads encouraging voters in certain markets to turn out and oppose McDaniel because he wanted to cut welfare programs and "he disrespected our President."  It's not as though Thad Cochran had actually shown any more respect for Barack Obama than Chris McDaniel had, but we all know that wasn't the objective of this exercise.

Lo and behold, Cochran won the runoff by a hair.  It turned out that in most precincts the swapping of the poll books had never taken place.  Not that the Republican leadership knew anything about that, of course.  And by the time the McDaniel campaign, having had trouble getting access to the records, filed suit, the court said "Too late!  We weren't going to do anything anyway." Mississippi remains a highly corrupt state.

Oh, and any illusions I might still have had about the Wall Street Journal editorial board were blown away by one incredibly cynical editorial (Hey, didn't the Republicans get black voters to turn out?  Isn't this a good thing?).

Now, there are some dirty tricks for you.  And real, certifiable Establishment figures were implicated in them.

I looked for Thad Cochran's name on this site.  Nothing came up, except one post of mine from 2011.

I looked for Chris McDaniel's name on OL.  Nothing.

Meanwhile, Thad Cochran still holds important committee positions and casts votes.  But he doesn't make statements in the media.  I presume his staff has been instructed to make sure he doesn't.

Unless you came by your disgust with the Republican Establishment in the summer of 2015, this is the kind of story that might have interested you.

By the way, Donald Trump endorsed McDaniel in 2014.  In February 2016, McDaniel criticized Trump for being in favor of taking private property for private use (his piece appeared in Breitbart).  Would Trump endorse him now?

Your closing statement, taken literally, doesn't bother me.  Far as I can see, Trump supporters are making themselves heard loud and clear right now.  If their guy gets elected, they'll keep doing it (unless, of course, they're shouting because now they think he's betraying them).  He'll be shouting, they'll be shouting.  Worst that would happen is I'd have to lay in a supply of earplugs.

Not taken so literally, I'm not sure what it implies.  What kinds of reprisals are in store for those who wouldn't get on the Trump Train?

Robert

 

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2 minutes ago, Robert Campbell said:

You're addressing this to a guy who has voted for Libertarians about as often, lifetime, as he has voted for Republicans.  Never, for instance, have I cast a ballot for anyone named Bush.  So, two sentences and you've lost me already.

Robert,

Well you won that round. It took you three sentences.

If you can't see a Bush connection with Ted Cruz, even as George Bush's brother is his finance man, you have lost me...

Michael

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7 minutes ago, Robert Campbell said:

Unless you came by your disgust with the Republican Establishment in the summer of 2015, this is the kind of story that might have interested you.

. . .

What kinds of reprisals are in store for those who wouldn't get on the Trump Train?

Robert,

Your post has some interesting info for political junkies, but you really, really don't understand what the inside looks like to a Trump supporter. I don't care much about political details if the establishment is the organizing context. 

You say I have "disgust" for the establishment and that is not the correct word. Just because one has a problem he can't do anything about and has tolerated it without much fuss because he had no choice, that doesn't mean he feels disgust for it. But that doesn't make it any less of a problem, either. So when a viable solution like Donald Trump comes along, he takes it.

Don't bother trying to split hairs over what the establishment means (Democrat and Republican) or what the Silent Majority means and so on. That's the kind of rhetoric I just don't listen to anymore. Nor do Trump supporters. 

We're fixing a problem, not debating whether the problem exists, whether the history we lived actually happened, and so on. Trump supporters are not stupid.

As to reprisals, what on earth are you talking about?

Once again, you show you are in need of a decoder ring to understand the simple English of Trump supporters because I say you will need to communicate with these people--after all, they are going to occupy the public space in a manner they did not before--and you read that as a threat of reprisals.

Good Lord!

:)

ISIS and people like that have to worry about reprisals, not political opponents of Trump. The ISIS monsters chop people's heads off and that's going to stop. But free speech will not. Not in America. Not the speech of Trump critics and not the free speech of Trump. Free speech means free for all.

Donald Trump is an American in a manner you refuse to acknowledge. Ditto for Trump supporters. It's a matter of holding to and living by high moral principles.

Just because you don't believe this, that doesn't change the fact. 

If fact, it doesn't even bother me on a deep level that you don't believe it. I, like other Trump supporters, are used to not being seen in this manner, so I don't think about it. (Granted, I do run a forum where we discuss this stuff, so in my personal case, this is not applicable so much as it is for other typical Trump supporters.) Underneath, all we want to do politically is fix the problem and get back to our lives.

Believe me, if this mess did not affect our lives in damaging ways and if the people charged with fixing it had not lied and double-crossed and fucked up so much, we would not be out supporting Trump. We would be too busy with our own affairs--like you are supposed to be able to be in a free country. 

Michael

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1 hour ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

I, like other Trump supporters, are used to not being seen in this manner

Poetry in Political Rhetoric. Grandstand spotlight series premiere:

Edited by william.scherk
Resize, re-calibrate, remove snark.
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