[Youngian]

Because on the one hand he has a hardcore of people who know he’s lying but either don’t care or care more about what he can do/enable for them. And on the other, a lot of people who think that the checks and balances will get him in the end.

Boris tried the same here, and if anything I think it showed ours are more robust, if anything.

A pleasant surprise. US checks and balances are more robust than most presidential systems but when you have a bad faith actor with their own mandate it gets tough. The main difference is that Trump still looked a winner for Republicans in Congress but Johnson soon became toxic once Corbyn resigned.

[Philip Marlow]

I’m glad the rights of these horrible journals are guaranteed under the First Amendment, but I don’t think they ‘keep the mainstream honest.’ To the contrary, these are exactly the magazines that have helped corrupt the mass media and instruct them in the art of telling lies. These magazines have not widened debate, they have narrowed it to leather-lunged condoning of reaction, both in politics and culture.

-Alexander Cockburn

Mercifully, I missed Robert Kaplan’s Kissinger obit, which includes a defence of Pinochet into the bargain:

Kaplan admits that Pinochet was a mass torturer and that people “were killed” “during” the coup. But he says that Nixon and Kissinger were “right” to usher this homicidal dictator into power, ousting the elected president and ending Chilean democracy for a generation. They were “right” because the government of democratic socialist president Salvador Allende was “anarchic and incompetent” and a right-wing dictatorship was “better for Chile” as well as being “in the best interests of the United States.” This is proven, Kaplan claims, by the fact that Pinochet privatized state-owned companies, reduced poverty and infant mortality, and created a “social and economic miracle.”

There’s a lot more, if you’re sufficiently nerdy about journalism and its discontents.

[Andy McDandy]

The modern right wing - equal parts bullying anyone showing any sort of weakness or vulnerability; and arse kissing of corporate culture.

[The Weeping Angel]

I’m glad the rights of these horrible journals are guaranteed under the First Amendment, but I don’t think they ‘keep the mainstream honest.’ To the contrary, these are exactly the magazines that have helped corrupt the mass media and instruct them in the art of telling lies. These magazines have not widened debate, they have narrowed it to leather-lunged condoning of reaction, both in politics and culture.

-Alexander Cockburn

Mercifully, I missed Robert Kaplan’s Kissinger obit, which includes a defence of Pinochet into the bargain:

Kaplan admits that Pinochet was a mass torturer and that people “were killed” “during” the coup. But he says that Nixon and Kissinger were “right” to usher this homicidal dictator into power, ousting the elected president and ending Chilean democracy for a generation. They were “right” because the government of democratic socialist president Salvador Allende was “anarchic and incompetent” and a right-wing dictatorship was “better for Chile” as well as being “in the best interests of the United States.” This is proven, Kaplan claims, by the fact that Pinochet privatized state-owned companies, reduced poverty and infant mortality, and created a “social and economic miracle.”

There’s a lot more, if you’re sufficiently nerdy about journalism and its discontents.

I subscribe to the Atlantic and I find it very useful do I agree with everything wriiten there no. Certainly I find it better than Current Affairs whose editir Havard educated socialist sacked his workforce when they tried to form a union.

[Youngian]

Don't find the Atlantic as objectionable as the author accuses it of being. But I'm from a country where the Telegraph, Spectator and Spiked are leading organs of intellectual discussion for the right.

[Abernathy]

I should fucking well hope so.

[Bones McCoy]

I doubt he's run in two decades.

Trundling about in golf buggies is more his scene.

[mattomac]

He’s senile enough now.

[Malcolm Armsteen]

[Youngian]

I should fucking well hope so.

Would he be vain enough to run again and the GOP nutty enough to nominate him? Hell yeh.

[satnav]

He is only standing this time so he can pardon himself and settle some old scores. There would be no point standing in 2028 unless he wanted to set a new record for losing presidential elections.

[Abernathy]

He is only standing this time so he can pardon himself and settle some old scores. There would be no point standing in 2028 unless he wanted to set a new record for losing presidential elections.

I’ll allow that if/when he loses in November, my hope is that he will quickly fuck off and die.

[Rosvanian]

As a permanently glass half empty person, I think he's going to win.

[Abernathy]

Anybody heard of Laura Loomer before ? I hadn’t, until yesterday. A batshit crazy right-wing, nasty conspiracy theorist whom Trump has apparently hired as part of his campaign team. She was apparently responsible for Trump’s peddling of the nonsense that Kamala Harris has “just decided to be black” and the utter crap about immigrants eating cats and dogs. A loathsome woman in the Marjorie Taylor-Greene mould.

And as if that weren’t enough, there is a rumour about that Trump is currently engaged in an adulterous affair with Loomer (ewww).


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laura_Loomer

[Youngian]

Trump's polling well in swing states. The latest wheeze from the man who doesn't pay his debts is a promise to cancel interest rates on everyone's credit cards. If he did do that, which he won't, the consequences to the financial system are mind boggling. But would you care if you're in a debt cycle you couldn't escape from?

[Tubby Isaacs]

I doubt this stuff does him any good at all. The Right always has an advantage on the economy except when it says mad stuff. He'd be better off just making up stuff bout Harris and talking about the border.

[The Weeping Angel]

This is more encouraging from Wisconsin

[Youngian]

I doubt this stuff does him any good at all. The Right always has an advantage on the economy except when it says mad stuff. He'd be better off just making up stuff bout Harris and talking about the border.

Number crunchers are estimating the cost of Trump's giveaway promises at $11 trillion and he has more to come.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... t=business

[Watchman]

Trump's polling well in swing states. The latest wheeze from the man who doesn't pay his debts is a promise to cancel interest rates on everyone's credit cards. If he did do that, which he won't, the consequences to the financial system are mind boggling. But would you care if you're in a debt cycle you couldn't escape from?

I wonder how many card he, and his family have maxed out

[Tubby Isaacs]

He's bringing back the local taxes (SALT) deduction which he restricted in his tax reform. There's a political logic in terms of the House- the Democrats won lots of affliuent seats in affluent states on the back of it- but not in terms of the presidency, because he's losing those states by miles anyway. No idea what it costs, but surely not the best way to spend a lot of money. Or it wouldn't be if he was keeping count.