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[Yellowtail]

Twist, it's Meta.

Also, omg:

 

[NeoXChaos]

Twist, it's Meta.

Also, omg:

John ‏@linnyitssn 7m7 minutes ago
So if Donald Trump stays in the GOP they are screwed and if he runs as an independent they're also screwed. Happy days.

I wonder what Hillary asked for Christmas this year?

 

[Black Mamba]

I wonder what Hillary asked for Christmas this year?

In the same vain:

Koch Brothers Get Each Other Same Election For Christmas

 

[NeoXChaos]

well its a criticism some people share for why Democrats lost the midterms. Could you see a bernie stan getting up and voting for someone like Edwards?

NY is one of the most liberal states in the nation which HIllary represented and yet is a DINO to some of these folks.

 

[Yellowtail]

SE Cupp: "I'll vote Hillary over Trump":

http://www.snappytv.com/tc/1112724

#republicansforhillary
#jointhemovement

 

[PBY]

Twist, it's Meta.

Also, omg:

Wow. But how?

 

[B-Dubs]

There is no God.

Also Hil doesn't post on GAF, Bill does. Just FYI.

 

[Brawndo Addict]

I am honestly flabbergasted that I have to argue about this, let alone to community staples like Pigeon.

You asked "why do we compare Trump to Hitler but don't compare FDR to Hitler?"

No I said:

You cannot just casually compare racist discourse to the Nazis, it's disgusting. You can find plenty of other historical comparisons for this behavior without implicitly invoking the Holocaust.

Why not compare Trump to them instead of Hitler unless it's just about insults?

People use Hitler comparisons because people haven't internalized the wrongs of US history in the same way (even though they are more historically relevant to our situation). It's about proportionality and appropriateness.

Well, gee, Slim, there are a few reasons for that (like, it's probably worth noting that FDR fought a world war against Hitler), but primarily we don't compare FDR to Hitler because WE NEVER TALK ABOUT FDR. Because why would we, exactly?

So did Stalin, so excuse me if I don't find it worth noting. If I wanted to talk about FDR in wartime, I'd probably mention his anti-antisemitism, his refusal to acknowledge and speak out about the Holocaust, and his inaction in trying to stop/impede it. Oh and maybe a little bit about not doing more to take in Jewish refugees in lieu of a strict quota system (The U.S. immigration system severely limited the number of German Jews admitted during the Nazi years to about 26,000 annually — but even that quota was less than 25% filled during most of the Hitler era. That alone could have saved 190,000 lives.)

Why would we talk about FDR in modern times though? Uh, I dunno, maybe for the same reason we talk about anything from the past, we ought to learn from history and all that jazz. Or maybe it's because the nature of Trump's comments is a historical analogue to that era of US history and that makes it a particularly powerful reference point.

If you wanted to talk about whether FDR was like Hitler, you probably could've just posted and asked what we thought. But instead you decided to assert that the reason we don't criticize FDR is because he's "on our team." So, yeah, that's a dumb post, man. The reason we don't criticize FDR is because this is a thread about politics and FDR isn't particularly politically relevant. It's not because we're biased to forgive his faults.

No I said that we don't compare FDR to Hitler because he's on our team, not that we don't criticize him.

Did the Southern Strategy make Nixon a Nazi? FDR for internment camps?

FDR actually did it but I don't recall Poligaf ever complaining about him being a Nazi.

Pretty big difference. I guess FDR avoids the Nazi label because he didn't use inflammatory language in public, just private.

Is this your real concern? That somebody will start committing genocide and we'll have run out of descriptors and won't be able to talk about them?

Language fascism, man.

Somebody will start committing genocide?

Bangladesh, 1971

East Timor, 1975-1999

Cambodia, 1975-1979

Guatemala, 1981-1983

Bosnia, 1992-1995

Rwanda, 1994

Darfur, Sudan, 2004 - Present

ISIS/Syria - Ongoing

Do you really not see a problem with equating Nazis to people like Donald Trump instead of reserving it for more appropriate circumstances? That it might dilute the historical significance of what occurred in favor of creating a kitschy insult?

Trump has stepped up racist and xenophobic rhetoric in an alarming way, and even more alarmingly, maintains a strong base of support.

I feel that this is bad! Specifically, I feel that it's bad in a particularly anti-American, anti-democratic way that appeals to fantasies of "populist" rule by personal power, displacement of the existing state apparatus, and blaming, scapegoating, and stigmatizing minorities for the country's problems in a manner that has worrying historical precedent, especially during the WWII period.

I feel okay saying that that's kind of fascist. If you don't like that because it's not precise enough, like, you do you, I guess, but I would like to understand why. Because I don't think my position is particularly unclear or confusing, so as far as I can tell so far the disagreement is driven by a desire to correct others? If that's the case, let me know and I'll put some grammatical errors in for you guys.

Donald Trump is not the first racist or bigot to come upon the US political scene, we've had those before and after WWII. He does seem to be the first that liberals have felt is bad enough to merit a Hitler comparison without reservation or restraint. At least Bush was president and actually did physical things you could point to when people called him Hitler, Trump is completely verbal. I find his discourse disgusting, but people have cloaked their language and used dog whistles for decades, dropping the pretense doesn't make you a Nazi. This is just your tried and true populist fear mongering, Trump is not calling for the displacement of the state apparatus or rule by personal power, those are ridiculous hyperbolic extensions. At least the Southern Strategy actually had organization and objectives behind it, I'd like to think its separation from fascism was about more than word choice.

Obama's recent speech is a good model. You don't need reductive absolutism to make a point, nor is it the most effective way to argue. You dilute your enemies to being Nazis and eventually you'll just create an echo chamber where everyone opposed to you is evil.

Because those comparisons are dumb? FDR created Japanese internment camps, and yes, those are terrible and wrong. He didn't characterize Japanese people as being responsible for American problems in general, nor did he build a political career on being willing to put Japanese people in camps. So that's meaningfully distinct. Similarly, I see very little comparison between using xenophobic rhetoric for political advantage and giving scientists immunity for war crimes. I mean, do you think those things are similar? Do you want to make the argument?

It's not about what's most similar to Trump, it's about which of these things is most morally culpable to the actual atrocities of the Nazis. Cause it seems to me you're arguing that pure rhetoric is worse than actual physical actions. So all Trump needs to do is put a polite spin on his speeches or keep it private, and then he's in the clear?

And to that point, let's explore FDR's less public comments shall we?

At one point in the discussion, FDR offered what he called "the best way to settle the Jewish question."

Vice President Henry Wallace, who noted the conversation in his diary, said Roosevelt spoke approvingly of a plan (recommended by geographer and Johns Hopkins University President Isaiah Bowman) "to spread the Jews thin all over the world."

In 1943, he told government officials in Allied-liberated North Africa that the number of local Jews in various professions "should be definitely limited" so as to "eliminate the specific and understandable complaints which the Germans bore towards the Jews in Germany." There is evidence of other troubling private remarks by FDR too, including dismissing pleas for Jewish refugees as "Jewish wailing" and "sob stuff".

In a series of articles for the Macon (Ga.) Daily Telegraph and for Asia magazine in the 1920s, he warned against granting citizenship to "non-assimilable immigrants" and opposed Japanese immigration on the grounds that "mingling Asiatic blood with European or American blood produces, in nine cases out of ten, the most unfortunate results." He recommended that future immigration should be limited to those who had "blood of the right sort.

Look, I'll post again an excerpt from an interview with Mike Godwin (yes that very Godwin) because I think it's still informative.

At what point do you think Hitler and the Nazis will no longer be the go-to comparison comparison, for horrible people, horrible governments, or whatever. I imagine that, in the year 3000, for example, people might not still be doing that.

Well, one thing I think of in comparison to this is that, when I was growing up, people often said, “He’s to the right of Attila the Hun." It doesn’t even really make sense to talk about Attila the Hun in terms of left/right politics, but when they talk about Attila the Hun — and they still do, from time to time — [they do so] without any clear sense of any historical context at all.

The thing it seemed to me worth doing was to prevent the Holocaust from turning into a cliché, or into a handy arrow in someone’s rhetorical quiver. I was entering into the online world pretty deeply in the eighties, and I was offended by how glibly these comparisons came up — almost invariably inappropriately. My feeling was that the more people got into this habit, the less likely that people remembered the historical context of all this. And as you know, one of the injunctions of Holocaust historians is that we must never forget, we have to remember. And I just thought, Well, I’m going to do a little experiment and see if I could make people remember.

Do you ever come across Nazi comparisons in discussions of American politics that you find legitimate?

You know … sure. American history has its own flirtations with fascism and racism and militarism, and people have believed in any and all of these things, so with certain individuals it has to come up from time to time. So it’s not the case that the comparison is never valid. It’s just that, when you make the comparison, think through what you’re saying, because there’s a lot of baggage there, and if you’re going to invoke a historical period with that much baggage you better be ready to carry it.

 

[PhoenixDark]

SE Cupp: "I'll vote Hillary over Trump":

http://www.snappytv.com/tc/1112724

#republicansforhillary
#jointhemovement

She's dressing like Hillary. I like this.

 

[User 406]

Wow. But how?

 

[teiresias]

SE Cupp: "I'll vote Hillary over Trump":

http://www.snappytv.com/tc/1112724

#republicansforhillary
#jointhemovement

Christ that woman second from the left has like a frozen face. It's like the only muscles that still work are her eyelids.

 

[Randolph Freelander]

This tweet

Steve Turner ‏@SteveLTurner 10h10 hours ago
Donald Trump: "The police in London are terrified for their lives"

Also included the statistic of the day

 

[teiresias]

This tweet



Also included the statistic of the day

Why is this a pie chart?

 

[Randolph Freelander]

Why is this a pie chart?

More propoganda from Big Citrus

That, and so "Americans shot by their own dog" can be the whole pie.

 

[Brawndo Addict]

I also liked this Opinion Piece about why calling Trump a Fascist/Nazi is a mistake.

This brings us to the twofold advantages of confronting the Trump movement with a well-informed historical perspective. First, it demystifies the rhetoric itself, allowing Americans to recognize that Trump isn’t some sort of trailblazer but rather a cheap imitator of political traditions so shameful that we’ve shuffled them away from our collective memory. More importantly, it helps bring the menace posed by Trump’s campaign into sharper relief.

When Trump supporters and swing voters are told that the Republican candidate is a fascist or latter-day Hitler, it’s easy for them to dismiss those concerns as partisan hyperbole, if for no other reason that they can’t really conceive of them – after all, America has never elected an outright Nazi to the presidency, so that particular threat seems more hypothetical than actual. Not so when talking about patterns of institutional discrimination that, though often overlooked by the media, were demonstrably all-too-real chapters of American history.

Trump’s political power – as well as the power of the right-wing reactionaries who will follow in his footsteps – comes from his ability to create a cult of personality for himself while effectively capitalizing off of America’s latent racism, sexism, and other forms of prejudice. Just because these things don’t make him a neo-Nazi doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be devastating for America.

That’s why we must resist the urge to characterize Trump’s racial demagoguery, cult of personality, and authoritarian policy proposals as fascist or in any other way Hitleresque. By doing this, we deny and potentially empower the brutality, oppression, and violence that has marked so much of America’s political history. Trump is certainly pandering to our nation’s worst instincts, but the sentiments into which he has tapped have been with this country for a long, long time.

 

[Yellowtail]

daveweigel

In this focus group of 29 Republicans who currently or used to back Trump, only 3 say Obama is Christian.

When focus group began, only 10 people said they were 90% or 100% set on backing him. After an hour of discussing his gaffes, it's 16.

This Trump focus group is now mostly justifying him mocking the disabled reporter. Hour 3 starting now

Two voters who came into the focus group having cooled on Trump now say they're more supportive, after 2.5 hours of negative arguments

Dear god.

 

[Aaron Strife]

Twist, it's Meta.

Also, omg:

Man do you think Hillary has time for that ish? She's better off playing Tetris on her OG Gameboy. (wonder if she still has it, I'm collecting game consoles owned by politicians starting with my Dreamcast previously owned by Rep. Tim Walz)

Also is anyone really surprised by this? Trump's entire mojo comes from the stupid comments, not in spite of them. He'll propose the final solution and he'll go above 50.

 

[Fenderputty]

Thread closed in OT, but still funny. The graffiti artists need to read il duce too.

 

[Oblivion]

Cyan's gone mad with power in the OT.

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

daveweigel





Dear god.

The more you fight him, the stronger he becomes.

 

[Oblivion]

The more you fight him, the stronger he becomes.

So he's a saiya-jin?

 

[Makai]

Cyan's gone mad with power in the OT.

There were like 30 threads lol. I can't blame him at all.

 

[noshten]

So he's a saiya-jin?

Didn't his golden locks give it away he is already SS2.0

 

[Bowdz]

There were like 30 threads lol. I can't blame him at all.

Not enough. We need to go deeper.

 

[Makai]

Alright, they put in the first post-Yorktown poll

 

[Drakeon]

daveweigel





Dear god.

Aren't there studies that show that trying to persuade someone out of a position usually backfires and only makes them more entrenched in their beliefs? Which of course, this study group perfectly demonstrates.

 

[NeoXChaos]

daveweigel ‏@daveweigel 2h2 hours ago
Focus group watches ad intended to embarrass Trump by playing his attacks on fellow Rs. By 5-1 margin they find it funny not offensive

daveweigel ‏@daveweigel 2h2 hours ago
Asked how they'd vote if Trump ran as independent and Rubio was R nominee, 19/29 say Trump. If Cruz was R nom, 14/29 Trump.

daveweigel ‏@daveweigel 2h2 hours ago
Yeah, they played clips of Trump saying he was pro-choice etc. Didn't make an impact.

daveweigel ‏@daveweigel 2h2 hours ago
The only negative ad that the group found effective was one about people who lost jobs in Trump deals. Nothing else worked.

daveweigel ‏@daveweigel 1h1 hour ago
Luntz analyzing his Trump focus group: "The intensity here is greater than anything I saw for Ross Perot."

.

 

[B-Dubs]

.

The scary thing is he had those exact same results a few months ago just after the first debate. I know it's just a focus group, but if he keeps getting the same result they should be concerned.

 

[NYCmetsfan]

I seriously don't get all the joy about trump making it easier for hilary to win.

You guys think this open racism and islamaphobia is going away when she wins?
Just like racism did when Obama won?

 

[RustyNails]

The more you fight him, the stronger he becomes.

Like one of the posters replied when I said the same thing, we need to find the mcguffin inside the game that can be used to defeat him. We just need to go back and search for it.

 

[Officerrob]

I seriously don't get all the joy about trump making it easier for hilary to win.

You guys think this open racism and islamaphobia is going away when she wins?
Just like racism did when Obama won?

At this point the racism and islamaphobia isn't going away no matter what, might as well win the White House as a result of it

 

[B-Dubs]

I seriously don't get all the joy about trump making it easier for hilary to win.

You guys think this open racism and islamaphobia is going away when she wins?
Just like racism did when Obama won?

Even if he loses it's not going away, he threw open the lid of pandora's box, Nixon and Reagan had cracked it a bit but not like this, and there's no putting it back. All we can hope for now is a rout of the GOP and that it forces them to moderate.

Like one of the posters replied when I said the same thing, we need to find the mcguffin inside the game that can be used to defeat him. We just need to go back and search for it.

Normally there'd be a clue though...

 

[Bam Bam Baklava]

Which brings me to wonder, where's Michelle Bachmann?

 

[Mario]

oh my god

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/steve-king-muslims-congress-sharia-law

"Biblical Law" is "incompatible" with the Constitution too. I wonder if he would renounce that, or even the Ten Commandments?

Wow. But how?

"Fox News Poll"

 

[Makai]

Normally there'd be a clue though...

Ivana is the key to all of this

 

[B-Dubs]

Ivana is the key to all of this

Alright, let's track her down and find out what she knows. I imagine we'll have to travel to a forest and draw a magic sword from a pedestal after we talk to her.

 

[Makai]

Somebody tell me that Trump tourism thread is overhyped.

 

[Black Mamba]

I seriously don't get all the joy about trump making it easier for hilary to win.

You guys think this open racism and islamaphobia is going away when she wins?
Just like racism did when Obama won?

I recently said that while at first I thought it was a bit funny, now it's just scary because it's like he's validating racism in the public square.

Trump could be good for Dems in 2016 but I'm very very very uncomfortable about it.

 

[sc0la]

Cyan's gone mad with power in the OT.

Be sure to ask benji for permission pedantry historical context before you call him a fascist though.

 

[RustyNails]

oh my god

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/steve-king-muslims-congress-sharia-law

I don't understand why Muslims are being singled out and individually being treated as a walking, talking Caliphate in and of itself. Muslims everywhere follow Shariah. Every single one of them. Shariah informs them how to pray, how to greet, how to perform rituals, how much charity to give, how much inheritance they get, etc. All Muslims abide by these rules. It's what makes them practicing Muslims. The legal rulings, or the Hadd, constitute minority of the Shariah framework. Like the majority of it deals with boring rituals and inheritance laws. The tiny part that deals with the penal code has nothing to do with your day to day practices. Now why would Muslims concern themselves with legal, state-level rules, codes and practices? They are not Caliphs. They don't want to implement a new penal code. It does not concern them. It concerns no one but the ruler of a state. No one asks a Jewish person or Christian to renounce the Biblical punishments.

I guess I understand, but the hate is just disgusting.

 

[B-Dubs]

I recently said that while at first I thought it was a bit funny, now it's just scary because it's like he's validating racism in the public square.

Trump could be good for Dems in 2016 but I'm very very very uncomfortable about it.

Yea, he went too far a while back and this all went from being hilarious to scary as shit.

I don't like it, but there's no fixing what he's done at this point. All we can do is take advantage and hope for the best.

 

[RustyNails]

Alright, let's track her down and find out what she knows. I imagine we'll have to travel to a forest and draw a magic sword from a pedestal after we talk to her.

Take her to Gold Saucer. She will reveal a secret.

 

[East Lake]

I seriously don't get all the joy about trump making it easier for hilary to win.

You guys think this open racism and islamaphobia is going away when she wins?
Just like racism did when Obama won?

The GOP was already racist though. Trump being slightly more explicit about it doesn't make it any less funny to me. I think you have to keep some perspective in mind. Nearly all the other candidates support a military option in Iran, even after I guess what we'd call the "moderate" establishment invaded Iraq and actually ended up killing a lot of Muslims. So on the spectrum of crimes against humanity Trump hasn't proposed anything particularly heinous, and I have zero expectations that he'll go significantly farther than other candidates despite all the Nazi comparisons, and even if he did he'd need to kill at least a million to catch up to Bill Clinton's numbers.

 

[Teggy]

Alright, they put in the first post-Yorktown poll

Undecided-mentum.

 

[Fenderputty]

I seriously don't get all the joy about trump making it easier for hilary to win.

You guys think this open racism and islamaphobia is going away when she wins?
Just like racism did when Obama won?

Honestly, I feel like it's exposing the dark underbelly of the GOP that they hide away with coded language. My hope is that he's slaughtered and some sanity is forced to rise from his campaign's ashes.

 

[RustyNails]

Undecided-mentum.

Looks like they mostly tired of Carson and Cruz's bullshit.

 

[NYCmetsfan]

Found benji's favorite subreddit

https://www.reddit.com/r/NAP/

Honestly, I feel like it's exposing the dark underbelly of the GOP that they hide away with coded language. My hope is that he's slaughtered and some sanity is forced to rise from his campaign's ashes.

Even if he loses it's not going away, he threw open the lid of pandora's box, Nixon and Reagan had cracked it a bit but not like this, and there's no putting it back. All we can hope for now is a rout of the GOP and that it forces them to moderate.



Normally there'd be a clue though...

You really think they're going to moderate?

My point is the acceptability of violence and open racism is now a thing. The Rubicon has been crossed. These people always wanted it but they never got it because politicians never were so blatent. Now they are and its what they will demand.

This existential angest about a changing america isn't dying.

I just don't think you guys understood it was to have a lead on the openness of much of this feeling.

 

[Retromelon]

Undecided-mentum.

Are you pissing on the christie surge?

I hope you don't have a bridge in jersey to get across any time soon.

 

[Aaron Strife]

Did somebody say POLLS

From St Leo's:

Florida

GOP Primary

Donald Trump 31
Marco Rubio 15
Jeb Bush 14
Ben Carson 11
Ted Cruz 10

Dem Primary

Hillary Clinton 59
Bernie Sanders 27

Presidential Race

Clinton 49 Trump 41
Clinton 49 Rubio 41
Clinton 51 Carson 39
Clinton 47 Bush 38
Clinton 53 Cruz 35
Clinton 55 Fiorina 30

Presidential Race + Trump Card

Clinton 48 Fiorina 13 Trump 31
Clinton 46 Cruz 21 Trump 26
Clinton 46 Carson 20 Trump 28
Clinton 45 Rubio 22 Trump 28
Clinton 42 Bush 19 Trump 33

National

GOP primary

Donald Trump 29
Ben Carson 14
Marco Rubio 11
Jeb Bush 11
Ted Cruz 9
Carly FiLOLina 1

Dem primary

Hillary Clinton 59
Bernie Sanders 24

Presidential Race

Clinton 51 Carson 38
Clinton 49 Rubio 38
Clinton 51 Trump 37
Clinton 52 Cruz 36
Clinton 49 Bush 35
Clinton 51 Fiorina 32

Presidential Race + Trump Card

Clinton 45 Cruz 20 Trump 26
Clinton 45 Fiorina 15 Trump 30
Clinton 44 Carson 20 Trump 26
Clinton 43 Rubio 22 Trump 26
Clinton 43 Bush 20 Trump 30

As a side note, St. Leo's reports to the decimal number. I do not. Everything is rounded up or down (.0-.4 goes down, .5-.9 goes up).

Trump beating the GOP nominee in the three-way contests will never cease being hilarious.

I must admit I've missed these gaudy Clinton leads. Seems like things have been working in her favor lately after a rocky couple of months there.

 

[adamsappel]

Here's my Donald Trump smiley. What do you think?

?:^V

Love it.

The same could be said for Obama's campaigns, and most all others. The 2008 campaign with both major parties was tinged with fascist trappings. Especially in terms of suppress the individual for the goal of better serving the state.

Not bad. It's no "Taxes are slavery," though.

Wilson was closer.

Don't you mean Mrs. Wilson?