Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[AlabamAlum]

[entropy]

aa.. she's just referencing the amount of cash it will take to buy her vote. Not the same thing.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Not as funny as saluting a giant Donald Trump who's making the same gesture

Now can be get back to how Trump letting Russia invade Eastern Europe with no consequences would be positively Reaganesque?

[iam416]

Cruz this morning:

Facing his home state delegation over breakfast, Cruz was met with alternating choruses of cheers and shouts of disapproval from the crowd clad in Texas flag shirts and cowboy hats.

“I recognize there are some folks here and elsewhere at the convention who are not happy with me,” Cruz said, taking the stage.

“That’s right,” yelled a woman.

Cruz, like the other Republican candidates in the primary, signed a pledge promising to support the party’s nominee, a pledge he was reminded of by a number of disapproving people at the Texas delegation breakfast, where he spoke.

“The day that was abrogated was the day this became personal,” he told the crowd. “I am not in the habit of supporting people who attack my wife and attack my father. And that pledge was not a blanket commitment that if you go and slander and attack Heidi that I’m gonna nonetheless come like a servile puppy dog and say, ‘thank you very much for maligning my wife and maligning my father,’” Cruz said.

“Get over it. This is politics!” said a man in the crowd.

“No, no this is not politics. I will tell the truth, I will not malign, I will not insult, I will not attack, I will tell the truth. This is not a game, it is not politics, right and wrong matter,” Cruz shot back, flashing anger and irritation.

In the 30 minutes Cruz addressed the delegation, first delivering a speech and then taking questions from the audience, he tried to have it both ways — at once claiming that what he’d said was not actually as explosive as it was being portrayed, while simultaneously taking overt jabs at Trump’s fitness to be the Republican presidential nominee.

“In that speech last night, I did not say a single negative word about Donald Trump,” Cruz said. “I don’t intend to say negative things about Donald Trump.” Cruz said Trump had not asked for his endorsement, and that he had told him over the phone three days earlier that he would not do so in his convention speech. At a question from the crowd, he characterized his speech as the advice he would give to Trump, if asked. “I am hopeful,” he said of the prospect of eventually supporting Trump, saying he would be “listening” carefully to what Trump and his campaign said and did for the next several months.

But at the same time as he insisted it was not a big deal, Cruz pointedly leveled barbs at Trump and his supporters.

“I have to say it was somewhat dismaying that, apparently, some of Donald’s biggest partisans right down front, when they heard that people should vote for someone you can trust to defend our freedom and defend our conscience, defend the constitution, immediately they began booing. I’m gonna say that’s a little bit troubling what they’re saying,” Cruz said.

And Cruz unpacked the implicit meaning of his much-maligned phrase: “Vote your conscience.” Cruz said he delivered this speech out of “obligation.” “Neither he nor his campaign has ever taken back a word they’ve said about my family. I promise you, I was not eager to do this,” Cruz said.

“What does it say when you stand up and say, ‘vote your conscience,’ and rabid supporters of our nominee begin screaming, ‘what a horrible thing to say!’ If we can’t make the case to the American people that voting for our party’s nominee is consistent with voting your conscience, is consistent with defending freedom and being faithful to the constitution, then we are not going to win, and we don’t deserve to win,” Cruz said.

[lineygoblue]

Laura Ingraham is of Polish descent. She's probably one of the last people on earth who would "sieg heil" anyone...

[iam416]

Jonah Goldberg:

I find it nothing short of hilarious how so many seasoned political journalists (including many of my colleagues — and betters — at Fox) are visibly shocked and appalled by what Cruz did last night. Ever since I was a kid, the political press — left, right and center — has whined that there’s no drama at conventions any more. It’s all scripted. It’s just an infomercial. It’s just such a shame.

Well here comes Ted Cruz providing exactly the sort of drama they yearned for and many of these same voices are aghast at Ted Cruz’s effrontery. The word has gone out across the land: This is an outrage! Not since Caligula appointed his horse to the Roman senate has a political figure showed such contempt for decorum and the solemnity of politics! Last night and this morning, across the news channels, I’ve watched many people I respect -– and a great many more I don’t — talk about what a sore loser Cruz is.

There are two things to say about that. First, many of these people are willingly buying into Manafort’s stagecraft. The Trump team knew about the speech beforehand. The outrage on the floor may have ended up being genuine, but it started out manufactured. I understand that Chris Christie will spew whatever fake outrage his masters instruct, like a trained seal barking for another herring. But I don’t see why so many supposedly seasoned political observers are volunteering for service.

Second, what the hell are people talking about? This is part of the corruption of Trump. He called Ted Cruz a liar every day and in every way for months (it used to be considered a breach in decorum to straight up call an opponent a liar, never mind use it as a nickname). The insults against his wife, the cavalier birtherism, the disgusting JFK-assassination theories about his dad: These things are known. And yet the big conversation of the day is Ted Cruz’s un-sportsmanlike behavior? For real? But forget Cruz for a moment. For over a year, Trump has degraded politics in some of the most vile ways. His respect for the Republican party as the home of conservatism is on par with Napoleon’s respect for churches when he converted them into stables.

But that’s okay because he’s Trump. He’s a “winner.” And now that he’s the nominee, the Smart Set and the Mob is telling me that Cruz is the outrageous violator of norms and good manners. Let’s all look down our noses at the sore loser everybody, as we bend the knee and make every apology possible for the sorest, most ungracious winner in American history. When I watch Trump’s kitchen cabinet of yes men rise from their “Thank you, sir, may I have another?” prostrations just long enough to talk about Cruz’s self-interestedness, I have to laugh. Where’s your shinebox, Governor Christie?

Ted Cruz has never been my favorite politician. And I am not so na?ve that I don’t recognize the gamble Cruz is making.

But if the choice is between forgiving Ted Cruz’s obvious political calculation to become the standard bearer of an authentic conservatism or Donald Trump’s lizard-brain narcissism where no principle or cause outranks his own glandular desire to be worshipped like a conqueror atop the carcass of conservatism, I choose Ted.

If the choice is between, say, congratulating the Boy Scoutish obedience of Mike Pence as he sells off bits and pieces of his soul like jewels from a family heirloom just to survive another day or Ted Cruz, who took the tougher road and refused to join the mewling mobs of toadies, apologists, human weathervanes, difference-splitters, and vacillators, I choose Ted.

If the choice is between suspending the rules of decorum, decency, and civility for Donald Trump as he casually badmouths his own country to the New York Times just as he secures the presidential nomination of the Republican party or accepting that we are in dark and uncharted waters and conscience must light the way, I choose Ted.

[iam416]

Yeah, the Ingraham picture is bullshit. Show the video of it, not some still screen capture.

It's so very snarky which, unfortunately, is the currency of this era's politics. Thank you, Jon Stewart.

[entropy]

It's so very snarky which, unfortunately, is the currency of this era's politics. Thank you, Jon Stewart.

Damn it!!! something I agree with... and talent wrote it.

I feel the need to take a shower.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Sorry for posting the bullshit photo and not making it more clear it was accidental and not to be taken seriously. Unfortunately it came out snarky I guess and neither snark nor sarcasm is welcome on this forum. I forgot myself.

[AlabamAlum]

Sorry for posting the bullshit photo and not making it more clear it was accidental and not to be taken seriously. Unfortunately it came out snarky I guess and neither snark nor sarcasm is welcome on this forum. I forgot myself.

Delete ur account

[Da Geezer]

And Reagan's response to the Soviet Union invading a country with which the US had a defensive treaty would have been...do nothing?

What Reagan said about the USSR was "We win. You lose." And then he proceeded to destroy the communist hold on Eastern Europe and on Russia. Doc H has mentioned several times that during the 80's, SDI was viewed as a program which would allow the US to successfully launch a first strike against the USSR. Reagan agreed to the "zero option" in Iceland, but he wanted to retain SDI, to which the USSR would not agree.

To speculate about what Reagan would do with hypothetical agression by Putin, I'd only say that Reagan only used the military in situations in which we had overwhelming force (Grenada). I don't think he would have been caught in a situation where he had to treat an attack on Latvia and the same as an attack on Louisana. Remember, he was old enough to remember WWI, and that war was all about treaty "obligations". Trump is only saying what he thinks. Are you in favor of war with Russia over Latvia?

[Dr. Strangelove]

One of Jon Stewart's early works, depicting "Boss" Tweed of New York dethroned. Its highly disrespectful, even flippant, attitude caused riots outside the offices of Harper's Weekly, the mob clamoring for a return to the civility and non-partisanship of those bygone days of yore

[Dr. Strangelove]

What Reagan said about the USSR was "We win. You lose." And then he proceeded to destroy the communist hold on Eastern Europe and on Russia. Doc H has mentioned several times that during the 80's, SDI was viewed as a program which would allow the US to successfully launch a first strike against the USSR. Reagan agreed to the "zero option" in Iceland, but he wanted to retain SDI, to which the USSR would not agree.

To speculate about what Reagan would do with hypothetical agression by Putin, I'd only say that Reagan only used the military in situations in which we had overwhelming force (Grenada). I don't think he would have been caught in a situation where he had to treat an attack on Latvia and the same as an attack on Louisana. Remember, he was old enough to remember WWI, and that war was all about treaty "obligations". Trump is only saying what he thinks. Are you in favor of war with Russia over Latvia?

I am in favor of military action if Russia (or anyone else) attacks a sovereign nation with which we have an active defense treaty, yes. Otherwise our word isn't worth anything. At a bare minimum we would have to cease all trade with that nation and freeze all assets in the US.

Trump is an idiot who knows virtually nothing about international politics other than what can make him money and he no doubt sees more money to be made in Russia than all three Baltic states combined.

[entropy]

isolationist ideas are gaining popularity. I'd even suggest BO trended towards that position much more than Bush or Clinton. I do think Hillary will reverse that trend and will be more like Bush.

[Dr. Strangelove]

And No, Reagan never faced the question "Will I risk American lives to defend Latvia?". But he did face the question of "Will I risk American lives if the USSR ever attacks its historical enemy, Turkey?". And since he didn't scrap the NATO treaty upon taking office, I'm guessing his answer to that question would've been "yes".