Donald Trump

[Brant Gaede]

You don't have to like Trump to like him.

--Brant

I have to

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

For anti-Trumpers, watch the following video and be afraid, be very afraid.

 

(Not really. Trump is going to be good for everyone except the bad guys.)

A couple of men handled an aggressive protester at a Trump rally in South Carolina. Trump called them to the stage.

Watch the house come down when one of them said he was a vet. That is an audience going wild.

 

 

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Here's Obama weighing in on Trump.

Notice the smirking at the beginning. Obama is so far into his bubble, he can't imagine the reality of Trump actually winning. I mean, it's like believing in Santa Claus for him. It's just not part of his perception of reality.

So he tried to use the opportunity to score some points against the Senators running. And, like a dork, he doesn't realize that everything else he said almost sounded like an advertisement for Trump to those who don't agree with his leftist climate-change agenda.

Maybe The Donald should put Obama on the payroll for publicity.

Michael

[Selene]

Astounding...

First thought that stumbles out and the President has to step and fetch it.

FOREIGN observers are troubled....I'm sorry and we are supposed to care about the other 191 countries and whether they are

"troubled?"

Seriously?

A...

[KorbenDallas]

(embed fail )

[Selene]

1 hour ago, KorbenDallas said:

(embed fail )

 

Wow!   ED - embed dysfunction

A...

[KorbenDallas]

No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't make it work

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1. If you are embedding a video from a site that gives you a script or code that looks like HTML, you have to hit "Source" on the top left of the posting toolbar. This changes the editor to HTML mode.

2. Paste in your code where you wish. (Don't forget paragraph tags or break tags.)

3. Now this is important. Do not switch back. Click "Submit Reply" on the bottom left directly from within the editor while it is in HTML mode.

Voila!  

In other words, I generally make the post I want with the editor in WYSIWYG mode, then switch to HTML mode to enter the video code, then hit "Submit Reply" without switching back.

(Here's a tip. I put something like xxxxxxxxxxxxx where I want the video to go when I'm making a post with the editor in WYSIWYG mode. Then when I switch to HTML mode, I enter the video code in the place of xxxxxxxxxxxxx and I delete the xxxxxxxxxxxxx.)

With some embeds done this way, if you later edit the post, the code messes up. So after you change what needs changing, you have to paste in the code once again with the editor in HTML mode. Then, as before, do not switch back, but instead, click "Submit Reply" on the bottom left.

Michael

[Jules Troy]

Lol Adam! (ED)

[KorbenDallas]

"@debdew2: @brithume @megynkelly @DiamondandSilk FOX: TRUMP HATERS R SCARED BECAUSE THEY LOSE - TRUMP IS WINNING pic.twitter.com/6umGLYjWhT"

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)

February 17, 2016

[KorbenDallas]

8 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

1. If you are embedding a video from a site that gives you a script or code that looks like HTML, you have to hit "Source" on the top left of the posting toolbar. This changes the editor to HTML mode.

2. Paste in your code where you wish. (Don't forget paragraph tags or break tags.)

3. Now this is important. Do not switch back. Click "Submit Reply" on the bottom left directly from within the editor while it is in HTML mode.

Voila!  

In other words, I generally make the post I want with the editor in WYSIWYG mode, then switch to HTML mode to enter the video code, then hit "Submit Reply" without switching back.

(Here's a tip. I put something like xxxxxxxxxxxxx where I want the video to go when I'm making a post with the editor in WYSIWYG mode. Then when I switch to HTML mode, I enter the video code in the place of xxxxxxxxxxxxx and I delete the xxxxxxxxxxxxx.)

With some embeds done this way, if you later edit the post, the code messes up. So after you change what needs changing, you have to paste in the code once again with the editor in HTML mode. Then, as before, do not switch back, but instead, click "Submit Reply" on the bottom left.

Michael

MSK,

Was doing that before, and was doing embeds okay.  It was an issue with the embed code itself..  I got it to work (prev post) by getting the embed code using the latest version of Chrome, as the code from Firefox 39.0 or IE11 didn't work in this specific instance (where they worked with others).

Seems I'm cured of ED.  Glad it was temporary.

 

[turkeyfoot]

Compared to you all, Im a low information voter. Keeping up with the feed is a part time job for me. Sourcing material outside of OL makes me a full timer. I have a limit to what my butt can take and have considered standing up at my computer. No, not as a  cheerleader. )

MK. You said almost sounded like a Trump supporter. What I heard was self promoter, tv talk show host, etc. That is far from an endorsement. Hes speaking to the choir, the message is dont take any of them seriously, beckoning back to the last debate when Trump got his panties in a bunch and appeared agitated.

What would you say about O holding the cards in the FBI investigation and having input into whether HC can continue to the end. And the probabilities of Trump beating HC in the election  as she continues towards that end?

I would venture to say most voters only hear the most superficial drone. Its in the background for them way down the list from their primary endeavors, a job, family, activities.

Theres is a lot coming from this thread that is thoughtful. Might it be that my take is the reality check needed before you guys crown Trump prior to the coronation? )

 

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

36 minutes ago, turkeyfoot said:

Might it be that my take is the reality check needed before you guys crown Trump prior to the coronation? )

Geoff,

Oddly enough, I'm under the delusion I've been looking at reality.

Michael

[william.scherk]

1 hour ago, turkeyfoot said:

Theres is a lot coming from this thread that is thoughtful. Might it be that my take is the reality check needed before you guys crown Trump prior to the coronation? )

Counting chickens before they hatch.  Crowing over a future win.  Assuming that all the marbles will go into the slot. Premature TrumpGasm. Pick your analogy.  

Our fearless leader here is fully convinced that Trump is on his way to power.  He has some quite good reasons to think so at the present moment -- behind the emotion is a calculation (and one that I share).

If Mr Trump continues to gain 33% and above in  SEC primaries**, he will be on the road to a majority of delegates. Right now he has 17 delegates -- and he needs 1236 to clinch a win. The SEC primaries -- explained here at Breitbart -- are held on March 1 and have a total of 595 624 delegates to be assigned. 

These SEC primaries are not all winner-take-all, but have in most instances a minimum threshold between 15 and 20 percent. This means that a Trump win with 33% or above in each of these states will likely give him a majority of the delegates awarded -- and that the poor candidates who do not achieve the cut-off threshold will get nothing . By some calculations at wonkish places (including 538) Trump will emerge on March 2 with an almost insurmountable lead. 

So, keep up with Michael's enthusiasm and his rose-coloured view -- at this point there is no reason to think Trump will fall below the magic 33% -- even though we are not there yet. Remember that national poll numbers do not indicate the support Trump may amass in any of these heats.

1 hour ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Oddly enough, I'm under the delusion I've been looking at reality.

Of course -- this is probably what we all think, those of us who are quite interested in the GOP race.  And where someone holds a distorted or incorrect or partial view on this or that, the fine folk of OL will counter the mistaken observations and judgments.

______________________

** SEC primaries, winner take-all/most vs proportional

Delegate counts for SEC primaries March 1

	Winner take all/most	Proportional
ALABAMA	50
ALASKA		28
ARKANSAS	40
GEORGIA	76
MASSACHUSETTS		42
MINNESOTA		38
OKLAHOMA	43
TENNESSEE	58
TEXAS		155
VERMONT	16
VIRGINIA	49
WYOMING		29

 

Edited February 17, 2016 by william.scherk
Add table of SEC delegates, grammar and sense.

[turkeyfoot]

2 hours

...........

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1 hour ago, william.scherk said:

 

2 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Oddly enough, I'm under the delusion I've been looking at reality.

Of course -- this is probably what we all think, those of us who are quite interested in the GOP race.  And where someone holds a distorted or incorrect or partial view on this or that, the fine folk of OL will counter the mistaken observations and judgments.

William,

Heh.

Well here's part of my delusion:

Q poll: ‘Freight train’ Trump had 2-1 lead
By Jim Shay
February 17, 2016
CTPost

Shay said:

Donald Trump has scored his highest numbers in a Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday that found him with a 2-1 lead among Republican voters nationwide, with 39 percent.

Of course, we all know that polls are not reality.

Michael

 

[william.scherk]

16 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Here's Obama weighing in on Trump.

Notice the smirking at the beginning. Obama is so far into his bubble, he can't imagine the reality of Trump actually winning.

I saw a commentary that suggested Obama was baiting Trump supporters. In this view, he is directly challenging them ... if I were a TrumpGasmer, I would double down on my efforts to hustle Trump to the GOP primary voters, given Obama's comments at the ASEAN conclave..To my mind, his comments will have effect on the GOP race -- but only to help solidify and extend Trump support as we run up to Nevada and South Carolina.  

Obama's comments on 'climate change' issues were straightforward -- not one GOP candidate has credible opinions on this issue, from his point of view.   I have mentioned before the partisan gulf between Republicans and Democrats on the issue. It is to be expected that Obama would point to this cleavage. I do not think climate change will become an election issue of great note, but I think any attention to the issue may only deepen the divide.

[william.scherk]

13 minutes ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Of course, we all know that polls are not reality. 

I interpret the smiley as an ironic gloss.  I don't know what 'everyone' knows or what you think about polls -- and I don't believe you hold the opposite corollary to your one-liner: "We all know Polls are Reality." Maybe somewhere in between is your considered opinion. You haven't really given a one-stop-shopping comment that covers your broader views.

I might be alone in this, but I would be quite chuffed to read your particular thinking about polls -- from which polling firms you have confidence in, relatively, and which you assess as less valid samples of opinion, to what makes a poll a good poll, and which are the caveats you hold in mind when interpreting particular types of polls.  I get the feeling you get a good buzz from positive polls and kind of disregard information that might cause other Trump supporters a smidgen of concern.

Did you read into the poll  I mentioned above that broke out Trump supporter's views on various issues of policy, preferences and attitudes? Do you find yourself represented in those soundings?

Anyhow, you are probably unlikely to give us an essay on polling. There is so much more exciting stuff to share and analyze.  And I also think you may tend to 'go with the gut' in some cases of interpreting signs and soundings of support.  All of which leads to a more particular, non-polling-related question:

What does your gut tell you about South Carolina -- are we more or less on the same page (I laid out my wonk notes above)? I fully expect Trump to come close to his highest soundings there -- up to 40%.

-- one more question:  at what point will you more or less know that Trump has it in the bag? I am thinking it will not be March 1, but on Super Tuesday.

For the wonks, here is the Quinnipiac poll in full.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

1 hour ago, william.scherk said:

Anyhow, you are probably unlikely to give us an essay on polling.

William,

Boy, did you get that right. My thing is human nature, not running stats on the answers to multiple choice questions.

Here's a small look into how I see predictions, especially from a Trump supporter perspective. 

How does human communication take place? (And polling?) In the world of pundits, that's easy. Words and images. But pundits have a problem with that kind of thinking--this leads to an oversimplified overly-restricted view of what's going on.

Real communication has to start with a theory of mind and a theory of human relationships. And not even theories, if you want to know the truth. It has to start with observations about the human mind and human relationships. Then you develop your theories from those observations. Then you test with persuasion and other applications.

I don't want to get too far out into the weeds, so let's just look at a theory of mind. I use the triune brain as a virtual model for simplifying my big picture thinking.

Before I go on, though, I realize that there are neural pathways directly from the lowest part of the brain to the prefrontal neocortex and all kinds of weird wirings, that the brain looks like a fist wrapped around the thumb (with the thumb being the limbic system and the wrist the lower brain), and that all these connections look more like a plate of squashed spaghetti than a system of organized cables. But for general tendencies, we can organize the brain into a lower reptilian part, a middle mammalian part (the limbic system), and an upper cortex part.

When we speak on forums or when pundits speak to us, we all make an assumption that we are speaking only in words, that is from cortex to cortex. But in reality the communication goes from the cortex of the first person to the other person's reptilian brain, then that message goes up through his mammalian brain and finally lands in his cortex. And much more than words are being communicated. His response is processed by the first person in the same manner. And back and forth it goes.

Just for reference on how I am using these terms right now, the reptilian brain deals with the fight/flight reflex, sex, heartbeat, breathing, and very low-level things like that. The mammalian brain deals with human relationships and emotions. Now here's the rub. Neither the reptilian brain nor the mammalian brain speak in words. They communicate to the body and to the cortex through neurochemicals. The cortex handles the words (and logic, for that matter). In other words, before the cortex even kicks in, the words are already bathed in neurochemicals.

Oh, there are exceptions and it is a lot more complicated, but this is in general how the human brain works.

Here's a quick example so you know what I am talking about. When I speak to you, if you believe (for real) that I am going to hunt you down and kill you, you're not going to be too interested in my thoughts on epistemology irrespective of how interesting they may be. I have not addressed your cortex with my musings on the more esoteric sides of philosophical inquiry, but instead addressed your reptilian brain with my rage and gun way before words get to your cortex.

As we now interact on the forum, you feel low threat from me. Ditto me to you. That's our inner crocs speaking.  

As our awareness goes through the mammalian brain, we deal with just a handful of neurochemicals and most of those are pleasurable (oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin, endorphins, etc.). There is one rather painful neurochemical, cortisol. Each of these have social cues that trigger their release. (There are other triggers, but social cues are by far the strongest.) This is why, for example, approval and disapproval are such a big deal, especially when a person is in front of everybody. That is why shaming people works. Praise. And so on. 

Add this to mirror neurons, and you start getting into the beginning of understanding persuasion. Because all words transmitted from me and received by you must pass through all that stuff and glop in your brain before it gets to your cortex and you process my actual words. And vice-versa.

Trump knows how to control this neurological path with his supporters so his communications receive maximum desired effect. How does he do it so consistently? Probably because he is just like his supporters inside their brains and has figured out that all he has to do is correspond to the super-important things said by that little voice that runs nonstop in their minds and his audience will feel he knows them better than anyone else.

If you can develop good observations on how this works in specific situations, you can come up with some pretty decent predictions. Hell, you can even become a pretty good candidate who consistently thwarts all expectations.  

Now we come to polling.

How on earth can you poll something like that?

I suppose you can, but I haven't seen anything so far. (Except modern psychology experiments.) That's why I treat polls more like a score of a football game than the hard reality of what will happen if we get this election wrong. It's fun to banter. Especially when I am winning. (Nah nah... na-na-nah nah... Hey hey-ee-yay... Goo-hood-bye...  )

Polls are like cotton candy for nutrition.

This is a long, long topic and I don't have time to go into it right now. But I will over time.

Until then, I have some crows to feed. Gotta fatten them up for Marc because that man likes to eat.

 

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

My God!

Someone really came up with an excellent example of bringing mammalian brain processes to conscious awareness.

This is what I'm talking about--what our reptilian and mammalian brains process before we consider the organized words of what people are saying.

Note, this is not particularly aimed at the context of Trump supporters. It's aimed at people in general.

That, and the fact that it's funny as hell.

 

 

 

I'm gonna subscribe to this YouTube channel right now. I gotta learn from these dudes and dudesses (if there be such)...

 

Michael

[turkeyfoot]

21 hours ago, Michael Stuart Kelly said:

Edit: deleted 

Edited February 18, 2016 by turkeyfoot

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Here's a story I've known about Trump for a long time.

The daughter of the lady just appeared at his rally:

 

 

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I sometimes feel the tug to respond to Biddibob over on his Facebook page when he writes about Trump. But the current vitriol and hatred that he spews out, along with that of several of his readers, gives me great pause. 

Right now his complaint is against Rush Limbaugh. He is writing paragraph after paragraph of sheer hatred of Rush because Rush will not use his influence to stop and trash Donald Trump. He said that Rush has basically given up on the entire realm of ideas, that Rush is a shell of his former self, he's a sellout, yada yada yada.

Since I'm following Rush these days because his analyses are very good about the Trump phenomenon, I have no other word for this except that it is inaccurate. If you do not identify something correctly, you cannot judge it correctly. Biddibob is doing the judge then identify system of thinking. He has judged Trump as something to hate, and now he is seeking to identify things, including Rush, to fit his judgment. If something doesn't fit, he ignores it, distorts it or rationalizes it.

I hate to say that about Biddibob because I like him a lot. But the things he is now writing about Rush and Trump are way too inaccurate to be mere errors of identification. If I did not know what he was writing about and just now came across it, I swear I would take a deep look elsewhere to verify before I took anything in that tone seriously. I get the impression if I try to bring a Trump-positive idea over there in this climate, he will (1) take my head off, then (2) preach against me to his audience--like he did already once. I'm not eager to repeat the experience.

So let him blow off steam. Not that many people read his stuff on Facebook anyway, so he's not even influencing anyone. He's singing to his choir. I will write my thoughts here.

btw - I am not against Biddibob, nor do I wish to win an argument against him here, nor do I have contempt for him. (I admire him.) I am pretty sure he has contempt for me, though, for the single reason that I support Trump. I am writing about this here merely to analyze things that give me cognitive dissonance. And ill placed hatred that spills over to friends gives me a lot of cognitive dissonance.

There are other people on Facebook from O-Land who are having the same reaction as Biddibob. And since I don't know what it feels like to have a spiteful reaction against those who do not hate what I hate, and I didn't feel that even when Obama won two different elections, it makes me wonder if they are in a kind of true believer mentality while thinking everybody else is. It's either that, or I lack some kind of instinctive connection between passion and the ideology they preach, especially when discussing their devils. Or maybe, who knows? Maybe I am irredeemably corrupt, evil and beyond any possibility of moral rehabilitation--instead being a perfect case study for what goes wrong when you become so lapse in your moral hygiene, you become a loathsome individual who would do mankind a favor if he offed himself.  

Here's what I see.

I see that Trump does a lot of great things and sometimes he says awful things. Deed versus word. (And I go with deed.) I see the ideological pure people constantly say great things, but I've seen them make peace with the worst in statism that has taken over the American government. (Defending Iraq war and whatnot.) They rarely agree with statism in word, but in deed, they are often complacent little sheeple and beneficiaries of elite privilege. Word versus deed. (And I still go with deed, but in this case, I may like what I hear, but I don't like what I see.)

I always go with the person who does stuff right over the one who merely says the right things, but does flawed stuff.

One guy, I won't say who, flat out says that he will vote for Hillary if Trump wins the nomination and anyone who supports Trump should be ashamed of himself. He's openly saying he will choose a left-wing crony capitalist warmonger over a peace-loving builder of skyscrapers. There is such a disconnection between word and deed here that I never discussed anything about Trump with this person. And I never will.

Different strokes for different folks, I guess.

But this leads me to reflect on how wide the gap has become between ideology the abstraction, and ideology as a practical form of living. All abstractions, to be valid, should point to some kind of referent out in reality. Something that independently exists. Granted, there are imaginary abstractions like fairy tales (and they are fun), but when an abstraction is used with the claim that it represents reality and, moreover, it is the One True Guide for how people should live out in reality, there has to be referents one can point to. If there are no referents, that ideology, too, is a fairy tale. 

And, with abstract ideologies like Objectivism, libertarianism, small government constitutionalism, etc., people in our subcommunity actually do point to certain referents: Ayn Rand, The Founding Fathers, Ludwig Von Mises, documents like the Constitution, Atlas Shrugged, and things like that.

However, when the average productive American looks around at his own life these days, he can't get a job, he doesn't know what kind of world he's going to leave for his children, he's seeing his culture overrun by poor people from other countries, he's constantly hounded with accusations of racism, sexism, Islamophobia, homophobia, and all kinds of things like that, he has been desperately looking to the ideological pure gurus for some kind of guidance. But what are they doing? They're pointing to everything except his life as a referent for their ideas. Oh, they'll point to his category sometimes as a canned talking point because some text somewhere included it, but as far as his life is concerned, he's not even a zero. He and people like him are not in the equation at all. They're not even blanks to blank out. They're not seen.

Is it any wonder that a guy like this stops listening to the wise ones?

And is it any wonder that he looks to a man like Donald Trump? He sees that Trump actually builds gigantic things out in the real world. He kicks ass when he needs to, and he gets the things built. He pulled the covers off the crony game, said he was tired of playing it, that it's ridiculous for these morons to prosper while tanking the country, that nobody working for a living has to live like they are right now because morons are giving all their stuff away, and that he wants to straighten it all out, just like he has straightened out a slew of bad contracts and abandoned projects.

Is it any wonder they say that's my guy?

These people think like I do. Once again, when there is a difference between words and deeds, they look to what a person has done as the better guide to what he will do in the future. And they choose the person who has done great stuff and claims he wants to do more. It doesn't matter what politicians and intellectuals say anymore. All such talk, including ideology, leads to a bad place when people look at their own lives. It has for decades now and it keeps getting worse. So to hell with the talkers.

In other words, from what I've been able to see so far, in the minds of Trump supporters (and I admit, it crosses my mind too), the ideologically pure folks have built a sand castle out of the words of people like the Founding Fathers, Ayn Rand, libertarian thinkers, etc.--they're great abstract structures of integrated ideas, but they're floating abstractions. Maybe not to the intellectuals and politicians, but they are floating all over the place to the guy who wants to be seen. These ideologies never point to the lives of the people they are preached to (like him). Such lives are irrelevant to the big picture, imply the intellectuals. Baloney, say those with the ignored lives. If your philosophy cannot be connected to our lives in a form we can see, who needs it? 

Let's get a car mechanic to fix the broken car, not some goddam car designer who doesn't like the aesthetic curves of what we drive. The car doesn't run. That's what needs to be fixed. We'll deal with the rest later. Do you understand? The goddam car doesn't run.

And that's what happens when the only people who benefit from ideological abstract structures are the same people who preach them.

Productive people don't mind having gurus who act like that, who join elite circles and look down at them, but not when they get nothing, not even hope in terms of their actual lives, in return. So they reject the words only approach. Then they get exasterated when they listen to accusations from the ideology people that they don't think, that they are acting only on emotions, that they are sense of life driven, blah blah blah.

They tune out. They need to fix a goddam broken car, not listen to bullshit. So they get someone with a wrench and knowhow, not a bunch of abstract words in a preaching tone.

Last but not least, Trump supporters are electing a man who sees them. Who actually sees them and makes them part of his abstract equations. A man who connects his abstract ideas to them as living breathing human beings with productive life problems. He can point to them and identify them.

Those lives and those problems are Trump's referents for his ideological abstractions: living productive Americans. We can analyze the ideas that make up those abstractions later, but in my world, if you have that many referents you can point to, you don't get more philosophical than that.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

For those interested, tonight's Town Hall with Trump:

 

 

 

 

 

Michael

[turkeyfoot]

..........deleted.