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The Trump Complaint Thread

bamacpa said:
Selma, I'm dating myself, but my first two memories of politics were the shooting of George Wallace and Watergate. The Watergate hearings superseded Gilligan's Island on afternoon TV, so I immediately formed a negative opinion of politics.
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Gawd, you're old.......


bamacpa said:
And it's been steadily downhill since then until 2016, when my political hopes dropped off a cliff, weighed down by the support of this draft dodging, philandering, lying traitorous man. And for what ? A few tax breaks perhaps, or perceived protection from people of color ? As the wonderful David Byrne sings, "This is not my beautiful house", but we bought it again.
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Bill James, the baseball guru, wrote the following in 2001, and he makes a valid point about "not yet tested positive for steroids Rafael Palmeiro":

Now in his late thirties but playing the best ball of his career. In November 1999, we were in the midst of a mini-controversy, occasioned by the fact that Palmeiro, who played only 28 games at first base, was given the Gold Glove as the best defensive first baseman in the American League.
He wasn’t the best defensive first baseman in the league, obviously. He wasn’t the best defensive first baseman on his own team. Most of what is being written in this controversy seems to me to miss the central lesson. What people are writing is, in essence, that the voters don’t pay attention to the games, the voters are ignorant, the voters don’t take the vote seriously, the voters screwed up, etc. The voters who vote for the Gold Gloves are the managers and coaches from the league. I doubt that any of them are ignorant or not paying attention to the game, but… well, they did screw up, so I suppose that’s fair.
The larger point, it seems to me, is that a badly designed voting system will fail sometimes, no matter who votes. The Gold Glove is decided by what could be called an unconstrained plurality, meaning:
1. A voter can vote for anybody.
2. If the top vote-getter gets 15% of the vote, he wins, the same as if he had received 80%.
A voting structure like this is an open invitation to an eccentric outcome.


If the United States were to use a system like this to elect the President, the absolutely certain result would be that, within a few elections, someone like David Duke, Donald Trump, or Warren Beatty would be elected President. If you can win an election with 15% of the vote, sooner or later somebody will. An unconstrained plurality vote gives an opening to someone or something who has a strong appeal to a limited number of people.




The one thing Bill missed is...we already have that system in place. One need look no further than the 2016 (in particular) GOP primary to see it.

Trump lost Iowa to Ted Cruz by about 6,000 votes; he also accused Cruz of fraud and demanded he be disqualified from the race.

The following week, Trump won the New Hampshire primary thanks largely to name recognition and collaring 35% of the Republican vote. Four of his opponents split the vote and got between 30K and 45K votes each. From that moment on, all Trump had to do was let Cruz and Marco Rubio split the same voters, and he kept winning. Trump won SIX STATES by less than 5% of the vote, five of them by less than 4%. Because most GOP states have winner-take-all setups, it's impossible for any candidate to make anything resembling a comeback.


Once he was the nominee, the entire thing became a binary race. And let's be blunt, Hillary Clinton could blow Trump away back when she was First Lady on POLICY (and knowing what she actually thought about something), but she also has some of the most off putting mannerisms and approach, too. And for those who want to say "but what about Trump's off putting mannerisms" (which I don't deny), if I have to explain to someone how that narrows the gap on things like likability, I'm not sure the entreaty is coming from someone with the intelligence to process political reality. The more unlikeable she was, the less his unlikability mattered. It wasn't a popular guy (Reagan/Obama) against "guy who we don't see as bad" (Mondale/Romney), but the narrowing of that gap hurt her seriously.



Note: MY OWN PERSONAL SUSPICION has always been this: a number of people who had found Hillary distasteful for years but who also had no particular propensity for Trump listened to the press say for over a year, "There's no chance Trump can win" and stayed home, figuring, "At least this way when she does something that makes me mad, I didn't vote for her."

It would only have taken 90,000 voters in the Big Three battlegrounds (WI/PA/MI) that year for her to win. And how many folks in those states voted "for Trump as a protest" because they'd heard for months that Trump could not possibly win?
 
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92tide said:
www.the-independent.com

White House adds insulting plaques below Biden and Obama portraits

Newest additions appear to be part of the administration’s ongoing ‘troll’ campaign against former presidents and Trump’s opponents
www.the-independent.com www.the-independent.com
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This is beyond juvenile and FATHOMS below the dignity of the office of the President.

I can tell he's surrounded by worthless sycophants since nobody told him to stuff this idea in the trash can. We're so screwed.

I can't think of anything done by any President that is remotely this emotionally weak and pathetic.
 
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mdb-tpet said:
This is beyond juvenile and FATHOMS below the dignity of the office of the President.

I can tell he's surrounded by worthless sycophants since nobody told him to stuff this idea in the trash can. We're so screwed.

I can't think of anything done by any President that is remotely this emotionally weak and pathetic.
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Its infantile behavior
 
mdb-tpet said:
This is beyond juvenile and FATHOMS below the dignity of the office of the President.

I can tell he's surrounded by worthless sycophants since nobody told him to stuff this idea in the trash can. We're so screwed.

I can't think of anything done by any President that is remotely this emotionally weak and pathetic.
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It's 7th grade at its prime. Or my office... But we aren't the leaders of the free world and it stays in the office!
 
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arthurdawg said:
It's 7th grade at its prime. Or my office... But we aren't the leaders of the free world and it stays in the office!
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Not sure why I thought managing a lab would be up my alley.

Everyone's a damn 14-year-old trying to get away with stuff and act dumb and then get offended when you call out their acting dumb.
 
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The El Salvador video that CBS pulled but was apparently shown in Canada. Posted by Cory Booker yesterday.
For those who haven't viewed.

 
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Trump 'caused' Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Jack Smith testified to CongressFormer Special Counsel Jack Smith told lawmakers that President Donald Trump was responsible for the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and staunchly defended his efforts to prosecute the president, according to a newly released transcript of his testimony to the House Judiciary Committee.​

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During the deposition, Smith adamantly denied that there was any political motivation to the prosecutions, pushing back on the suggestion that he was trying to influence the 2024 election. Trump has repeatedly criticized Smith, calling him "deranged" and a "wacko" who was "used for Crooked Joe Biden’s attack on his Political Opponent."
 
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92tide said:
apnews.com

Trump administration terminates lease for Washington's 3 public golf courses

The Trump administration has ended the lease agreement for three public golf courses in Washington. It's a move that offers President Donald Trump an additional opportunity to put his stamp on another piece of the nation’s capital.
apnews.com apnews.com
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I'm reminded of the scene in "Fletch Lives" where after dangling his antebellum mansion in front of the crooked TV preacher (played by R. Lee Ermey), they're riding together through "Bible Land" on a golf cart, and the reverend says, "Ya don't think I used too many pictures of myself, do ya?"

To which Fletch says, "No. (Pause). It worked for the Ayatollah."
 
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if you don't realize you are actually being given dementia screening tests ...

Donald J. Trump

@realDonaldTrump

The White House Doctors have just reported that I am in “PERFECT HEALTH,” and that I “ACED” (Meaning, was correct on 100% of the questions asked!), for the third straight time, my Cognitive Examination, something which no other President, or previous Vice President, was willing to take. P.S., I strongly believe that anyone running for President, or Vice President, should be mandatorily forced to take a strong, meaningful, and proven Cognitive Examination. Our great Country cannot be run by “STUPID” or INCOMPETENT PEOPLE! President DJT

Jan 02, 2026, 6:56 AM
 
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