7 ms·

What would have to be true in order for you to feel that the media response to Trump’s presidency has been appropriate?

tetrometal 6y ago
Well, they've been presenting him as a fascist authoritarian for four years, so if that were true I'd be inclined to believe their response was appropriate.
- gwbas1c 6y ago
  Trump actively campaigned as the "law and order" president. That is, by definition, fascist and authoritarian.
  - syril 6y ago
    Facism is law and order? Hm... doesn't sound all that bad.
- matthewdgreen 6y ago
  He was repeatedly asked if he would support the peaceful transfer of power if he lost, and he repeatedly refused to do so. That’s pretty much as authoritarian as you get.
  - tetrometal 6y ago
    This is such a blatantly false framing that it's impossible for me to believe you're presenting it in good faith.
    - shadowgovt 6y ago
      It's pretty much the standard interpretation. https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/09/24/trump-transition-us-election-perilous-presidential-handoff-refuse-peaceful/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/09/24/trump-transition-us-ele...
    - mewse 6y ago
      I am very interested in seeing a “good faith” framing of his statements on the topic from you. Can you provide one?
      - svrb 6y ago
        Not GP commenter, but here's one: The "will you support a peaceful transition of power" question is designed to elicit a response which could be quoted out of context in an article inevitably headlined "Trump predicts his own election defeat; already musing about transfer of power to his Democratic challenger". For any politician to answer a question posed this way would be disaster. Trump's unique problem is that he simply refuses to answer the question rather than giving a non-answer with the appearance of substance. Whether this is by choice or because he can't pull off that common trick is perhaps debatable. (Before downvoting/flagging, please recognize that this answer is not exclusive of other explanations such as "Trump really does have dictatorial ambitions". I take no position on such non-falsifiable claims.) This is very similar to George W Bush's "fool me twice... I won't get fooled again" gaffe. Had he completed the quote properly he could never have escaped the clips of saying "shame on me" taken out of context (remember this is before the days of deepfakes; now it would matter much less). This was predictably spun as "Dubya is stupid!" but frankly to recognize mid-quip the minefield he was about to step in is a feat beyond the average person. Of course the difference is (again) that unlike Bush, Trump really leaves open the possibility that he really is incompetent as opposed to the 5-dimensional chess that anyone supporting him really hopes he's playing.
        netcraft 6y ago
        The only reason he was asked this question in the first place is because there was good reason to doubt that he would support a peaceful transition - doubt that is well founded as we now see. Maybe hes smart enough not to answer the question - the problem is that it should never have needed to be asked.
        newacct583 6y ago
        > The "will you support a peaceful transition of power" question is designed to elicit a response which could be quoted out of context in an article inevitably headlined "Trump predicts his own election defeat Then why wasn't Biden asked the same question? Or anyone else? If this was just a gaffe factory then surely it would be a staple of the presidential interview genre, no? But it's not. Only Trump got asked that. Ever, as far as I know. And the reason isn't because we were looking for a gaffe but because there was (AND REMAINS!) significant doubt as to whether he would support a peaceful transition of power. I mean, the current circumstances right now disprove the theory you just proposed. Read his twitter feed, for goodness sake.
    - rudedogg 6y ago
      > This is such a blatantly false framing that it's impossible for me to believe you're presenting it in good faith. Listen to his responses again. I don't know how you can interpret it any other way. September 2020: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR8oIitE6mI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR8oIitE6mI October 2016: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP0G4vJ5OMw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP0G4vJ5OMw Edit: Found a September 2016 one where he does say he will support the transfer of power - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRJ8TLCZdnI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRJ8TLCZdnI
    - hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
      I don't understand your position here at all. Trump is currently doing everything he can to thwart a peaceful transition of power. The fact that he is such an ineffectual buffoon is the only reason he is not succeeding. For me, Trump trying to use the Justice Dept to investigate his enemies and thwart investigations of his friends is so beyond the pale, way beyond what any president, Republican or Democrat, has ever done that I am shocked people can think this was not a big deal. I mean, that extreme abuse of power is banana republic, end of Rome-type shit. Put it another way: I firmly believe if a time traveler from, say, 2010 just showed up to see Trump's autocratic desires that they'd be horrified; we've just gotten used to Trump's extreme abuses. Heck, it's become something of a new favorite pastime of mine to look at Trump's own tweet storms circa 2012 and see how 2012 Trump would be condemning 2020 Trump in the harshest possible terms.
- wokwokwok 6y ago
  Is it appropriate now he’s declaring the democratic election invalid? That’s what fascism is, you realise? This really cuts to the heart of it; what does it take to get someone to change their views, when the facts don’t work? Even if you disagree with a democratic agenda, how can you in good conscience continue to support someone who is blatantly acting like a fascist dictator right now? I personally find it easy to distinguish Trump, who I consider an waste of air, and the GOP, who has an agenda I can appreciate. Why is that so difficult to do?
  - adnzzzzZ 6y ago
    When vote counts suddenly stop and then overnight the opponent starts surging, people tend to assume foul play is at hand. This is how it happens everywhere where an actual authoritarian cheats to stay in power, for instance: https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1186630753523818502 https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1186630753523818502. For you to not understand something like this is grounds for people to question the validity of elections all over the world means that you don't understand much about the world, let alone what's happening in your own country. And I speak about this as a non-American who's simply watching it. You're being brainwashed by your media into believing things that aren't true.
    - shadowgovt 6y ago
      The vote count turn is unsurprising since the in-person ballots could be quickly tallied while the mail-in ballots had to be hand-counted. The reason the two types of balloting had such a difference in party-support is that the President in the Republican party had been telling his supporters not to use mail-in balloting because it would be rife with fraud. People took him at his word on that side of the political divide, so there's a resulting bias in the likely candidate supported by the mail-in ballots.
      - lol2143651 6y ago
        Hand counted, in the middle of the night, with no poll watchers around...
- newacct583 6y ago
  > Well, they've been presenting him as a fascist authoritarian for four years He literally called them the "enemies of the state". He routinely calls for the prosecution of his political enemies, and has apparently directed his own Department of Justice to that effect. I mean, sure, it's true that he may not "be" a fascist authoritarian. But he sure acts like one. Is it wrong to report that?
  - qdiencdxqd 6y ago
    he said "enemies of the people"
    - arbitrary_name 6y ago
      Oh yes, that makes it ok then. Carry on...
      - somelikeithot 6y ago
        Yeah and they are, problem?
- csnover 6y ago
  Trump said he would only accept the result of an election if he wins it, way back in 2016[0]; he has a pattern of firing anyone who doesn’t do or say exactly what he wants, especially when it comes to persecuting his perceived enemies[1]; he’s used his presidential power to commute the sentences of members of his personal circle who are tried and convicted of crimes[2]; he’s called into question, without evidence, the integrity of American elections[3], since even before he was the president[4]; he constantly attacks the credibility of the free press[5][6], more recently questioning even the reporting of Fox News[7][8]; he bypasses congressional checks on his appointments[9]; he has deployed the military against peaceful protesters and threatened to violate the Posse Comitatus Act[10]; his White House is being investigated for politicising the FDA and CDC[11]; last month he authorised a new executive order that would enable him to more easily fire government employees[12]; he refused to just say that he would commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses[13]. If this is not sufficient evidence that Trump is a proto-fascist authoritarian, what more would be needed, in your mind, to meet that bar? Or, perhaps putting it another way, can you explain to me how all of this stuff is cool and normal and not a clear pattern of proto-fascist authoritarianism? I did my best here to source examples from multiple media outlets in order to try to mitigate against the paradox that your main complaint is that the media is distorting the truth. Once someone decides that, not just one source, but the entire media apparatus is lying, it’s incredibly difficult to source information in a way which is acceptable—which is why a free press is so important, and why it’s particularly dangerous that Trump and his party have been spending so much energy on undermining it. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQJzt48wXbA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQJzt48wXbA [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/all-the-presidents-disloyal-men-trump-demands-loyalty-but-inspires-very-little/2020/01/29/2d5eb2ec-4206-11ea-b503-2b077c436617_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/all-the-presidents-d... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/article/trump-pardons-commutations.html https://www.nytimes.com/article/trump-pardons-commutations.h... [3] https://nypost.com/2020/11/05/trump-to-speak-from-white-house-as-vote-count-leans-toward-biden/ https://nypost.com/2020/11/05/trump-to-speak-from-white-hous... [4] https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/world-news/rigged-election-donald-trumps-long-history-of-polls-fraud-claims/articleshow/79038530.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/worl... [5] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/lesley-stahl-donald-trump-said-attacking-press-to-discredit-negative-stories/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/lesley-stahl-donald-trump-said-... [6] https://cpj.org/reports/2020/04/trump-media-attacks-credibility-leaks/ https://cpj.org/reports/2020/04/trump-media-attacks-credibil... [7] https://www.thewrap.com/trump-attacks-fox-election-day/ https://www.thewrap.com/trump-attacks-fox-election-day/ [8] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-attacks-fox-news-reporter-after-she-backs-up-key-details-of-atlantic-story/ar-BB18JQSh https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-attacks-fox-ne... [9] https://www.npr.org/2020/03/09/813577462/how-trump-has-filled-high-level-jobs-without-senate-confirmation https://www.npr.org/2020/03/09/813577462/how-trump-has-fille... [10] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-mobilizes-military-threatens-to-use-troops-to-quell-protests-across-us/2020/06/01/10212832-a416-11ea-bb20-ebf0921f3bbd_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-mobilizes-mili... [11] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-coronavirus-cdc-fda-investigation-covid-19-b1160766.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic... [12] https://www.globalgovernmentforum.com/trump-extend-hire-fire-powers-over-civil-service/ https://www.globalgovernmentforum.com/trump-extend-hire-fire... [13] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ2AvqLSjSs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ2AvqLSjSs
- trumpaway 6y ago
  I think Trump has many character flaws (and that's putting it lightly), did many not-so-good things, etc. It is fine that this is highlighted by the mainstream media. My main problem is that the same treatment is not applied to the democrats. This means that in order to find similar stories from the other side, one needs to start (1) reading extremist-leaning news. These also contain many half-truths and outright lies, so on top of that one has to (2) try to verify themselves the veracity of those claims. Most people don't have the time to do that (obviously), so they stop at the first step.
jtdev 6y ago
Have you not been watching? They literally manufactured a Russia collusion story and then spent 4 years beating Trump over the head with it. Then they orchestrated a hijacking of the Democratic primary to prevent Bernie from being on the ticket. Trump is a despicable human, to a degree only surpassed by the folks running and representing American media.
- homero 6y ago
  I see russian bots commenting on Facebook all day every day for the last 4 years. Today one glitched and commented on a completely unrelated post under the name "hispanics for Trump" on a post for a car.
  - jtdev 6y ago
    Russian bots... the lefts favorite cop out argument of 2020. Please provide an example, otherwise your claims are nothing but rhetoric.
    - sizt 6y ago
      This is HNN.
    - homero 6y ago
      It's everywhere online https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/08/twitter-bots-use-likes-rts-for-intimidation/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/08/twitter-bots-use-likes-r...
    - tunesmith 6y ago
      You seriously believe it hasn't happened?
    - artofgo 6y ago
      Dude, there actually are Twitter bots every where. I see multiple accounts posting the same exact tweet over and over. You look at their profile and its a obvious its manufactured history. Have you even tried looking?
odessacubbage 6y ago
he would've have actually had to consolidate power in any kind of meaningful way instead of simply bumbling through the logical continuation of bush/obama policies while being undermined by the intel community/ his own generals and the the gop itself every time he tried to do anything that broke from neocon consensus. his own justices even repudiated him. ironically, an actual fascist would've used the pandemic as his own reichstag fire, seized power & curtailed liberties to effectively contain the virus instead of simply mismanaging a dysfunctional, under supplied & under funded federal health apparatus that effectively let the states just do whatever. italy had tanks in the streets, south korea and taiwan created invasive ethically dubious surveillance programs to control movement. the actual white supremacists are mad that trump didn't do exactly that. aside from the bizarre alternative-universe psychodrama that corporate media has been airing for the past years, trump in reality was basically just unremarkable and incompetent.
- sgustard 6y ago
  I agree Trump is much more of a "proof of concept" of how an actual fascist could operate. Instead, as you say, he is blisteringly incompetent and lazy. Remember he accidentally became president when all he wanted was to build a hotel in Moscow. His tweets clearly show the mindset of someone who wants to use levers of power which are massively beyond his constitutional powers (shut down the media, overthrow elections, imprison critics). But he had neither the energy or the political skill to accomplish any of that. What he did have was the ability to convince millions of people that the US government should be turned over to a TV reality clown.

Well, they've been presenting him as a fascist authoritarian for four years, so if that were true I'd be inclined to believe their response was appropriate.

gwbas1c 6y ago
Trump actively campaigned as the "law and order" president. That is, by definition, fascist and authoritarian.
- syril 6y ago
  Facism is law and order? Hm... doesn't sound all that bad.
matthewdgreen 6y ago
He was repeatedly asked if he would support the peaceful transfer of power if he lost, and he repeatedly refused to do so. That’s pretty much as authoritarian as you get.
- tetrometal 6y ago
  This is such a blatantly false framing that it's impossible for me to believe you're presenting it in good faith.
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    It's pretty much the standard interpretation. https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/09/24/trump-transition-us-election-perilous-presidential-handoff-refuse-peaceful/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/09/24/trump-transition-us-ele...
  - mewse 6y ago
    I am very interested in seeing a “good faith” framing of his statements on the topic from you. Can you provide one?
    - svrb 6y ago
      Not GP commenter, but here's one: The "will you support a peaceful transition of power" question is designed to elicit a response which could be quoted out of context in an article inevitably headlined "Trump predicts his own election defeat; already musing about transfer of power to his Democratic challenger". For any politician to answer a question posed this way would be disaster. Trump's unique problem is that he simply refuses to answer the question rather than giving a non-answer with the appearance of substance. Whether this is by choice or because he can't pull off that common trick is perhaps debatable. (Before downvoting/flagging, please recognize that this answer is not exclusive of other explanations such as "Trump really does have dictatorial ambitions". I take no position on such non-falsifiable claims.) This is very similar to George W Bush's "fool me twice... I won't get fooled again" gaffe. Had he completed the quote properly he could never have escaped the clips of saying "shame on me" taken out of context (remember this is before the days of deepfakes; now it would matter much less). This was predictably spun as "Dubya is stupid!" but frankly to recognize mid-quip the minefield he was about to step in is a feat beyond the average person. Of course the difference is (again) that unlike Bush, Trump really leaves open the possibility that he really is incompetent as opposed to the 5-dimensional chess that anyone supporting him really hopes he's playing.
      - netcraft 6y ago
        The only reason he was asked this question in the first place is because there was good reason to doubt that he would support a peaceful transition - doubt that is well founded as we now see. Maybe hes smart enough not to answer the question - the problem is that it should never have needed to be asked.
      - newacct583 6y ago
        > The "will you support a peaceful transition of power" question is designed to elicit a response which could be quoted out of context in an article inevitably headlined "Trump predicts his own election defeat Then why wasn't Biden asked the same question? Or anyone else? If this was just a gaffe factory then surely it would be a staple of the presidential interview genre, no? But it's not. Only Trump got asked that. Ever, as far as I know. And the reason isn't because we were looking for a gaffe but because there was (AND REMAINS!) significant doubt as to whether he would support a peaceful transition of power. I mean, the current circumstances right now disprove the theory you just proposed. Read his twitter feed, for goodness sake.
  - rudedogg 6y ago
    > This is such a blatantly false framing that it's impossible for me to believe you're presenting it in good faith. Listen to his responses again. I don't know how you can interpret it any other way. September 2020: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR8oIitE6mI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR8oIitE6mI October 2016: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP0G4vJ5OMw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP0G4vJ5OMw Edit: Found a September 2016 one where he does say he will support the transfer of power - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRJ8TLCZdnI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XRJ8TLCZdnI
  - hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
    I don't understand your position here at all. Trump is currently doing everything he can to thwart a peaceful transition of power. The fact that he is such an ineffectual buffoon is the only reason he is not succeeding. For me, Trump trying to use the Justice Dept to investigate his enemies and thwart investigations of his friends is so beyond the pale, way beyond what any president, Republican or Democrat, has ever done that I am shocked people can think this was not a big deal. I mean, that extreme abuse of power is banana republic, end of Rome-type shit. Put it another way: I firmly believe if a time traveler from, say, 2010 just showed up to see Trump's autocratic desires that they'd be horrified; we've just gotten used to Trump's extreme abuses. Heck, it's become something of a new favorite pastime of mine to look at Trump's own tweet storms circa 2012 and see how 2012 Trump would be condemning 2020 Trump in the harshest possible terms.
wokwokwok 6y ago
Is it appropriate now he’s declaring the democratic election invalid? That’s what fascism is, you realise? This really cuts to the heart of it; what does it take to get someone to change their views, when the facts don’t work? Even if you disagree with a democratic agenda, how can you in good conscience continue to support someone who is blatantly acting like a fascist dictator right now? I personally find it easy to distinguish Trump, who I consider an waste of air, and the GOP, who has an agenda I can appreciate. Why is that so difficult to do?
- adnzzzzZ 6y ago
  When vote counts suddenly stop and then overnight the opponent starts surging, people tend to assume foul play is at hand. This is how it happens everywhere where an actual authoritarian cheats to stay in power, for instance: https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1186630753523818502 https://twitter.com/ajplus/status/1186630753523818502. For you to not understand something like this is grounds for people to question the validity of elections all over the world means that you don't understand much about the world, let alone what's happening in your own country. And I speak about this as a non-American who's simply watching it. You're being brainwashed by your media into believing things that aren't true.
  - shadowgovt 6y ago
    The vote count turn is unsurprising since the in-person ballots could be quickly tallied while the mail-in ballots had to be hand-counted. The reason the two types of balloting had such a difference in party-support is that the President in the Republican party had been telling his supporters not to use mail-in balloting because it would be rife with fraud. People took him at his word on that side of the political divide, so there's a resulting bias in the likely candidate supported by the mail-in ballots.
    - lol2143651 6y ago
      Hand counted, in the middle of the night, with no poll watchers around...
newacct583 6y ago
> Well, they've been presenting him as a fascist authoritarian for four years He literally called them the "enemies of the state". He routinely calls for the prosecution of his political enemies, and has apparently directed his own Department of Justice to that effect. I mean, sure, it's true that he may not "be" a fascist authoritarian. But he sure acts like one. Is it wrong to report that?
- qdiencdxqd 6y ago
  he said "enemies of the people"
  - arbitrary_name 6y ago
    Oh yes, that makes it ok then. Carry on...
    - somelikeithot 6y ago
      Yeah and they are, problem?
csnover 6y ago
Trump said he would only accept the result of an election if he wins it, way back in 2016[0]; he has a pattern of firing anyone who doesn’t do or say exactly what he wants, especially when it comes to persecuting his perceived enemies[1]; he’s used his presidential power to commute the sentences of members of his personal circle who are tried and convicted of crimes[2]; he’s called into question, without evidence, the integrity of American elections[3], since even before he was the president[4]; he constantly attacks the credibility of the free press[5][6], more recently questioning even the reporting of Fox News[7][8]; he bypasses congressional checks on his appointments[9]; he has deployed the military against peaceful protesters and threatened to violate the Posse Comitatus Act[10]; his White House is being investigated for politicising the FDA and CDC[11]; last month he authorised a new executive order that would enable him to more easily fire government employees[12]; he refused to just say that he would commit to a peaceful transfer of power if he loses[13]. If this is not sufficient evidence that Trump is a proto-fascist authoritarian, what more would be needed, in your mind, to meet that bar? Or, perhaps putting it another way, can you explain to me how all of this stuff is cool and normal and not a clear pattern of proto-fascist authoritarianism? I did my best here to source examples from multiple media outlets in order to try to mitigate against the paradox that your main complaint is that the media is distorting the truth. Once someone decides that, not just one source, but the entire media apparatus is lying, it’s incredibly difficult to source information in a way which is acceptable—which is why a free press is so important, and why it’s particularly dangerous that Trump and his party have been spending so much energy on undermining it. [0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQJzt48wXbA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQJzt48wXbA [1] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/all-the-presidents-disloyal-men-trump-demands-loyalty-but-inspires-very-little/2020/01/29/2d5eb2ec-4206-11ea-b503-2b077c436617_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/all-the-presidents-d... [2] https://www.nytimes.com/article/trump-pardons-commutations.html https://www.nytimes.com/article/trump-pardons-commutations.h... [3] https://nypost.com/2020/11/05/trump-to-speak-from-white-house-as-vote-count-leans-toward-biden/ https://nypost.com/2020/11/05/trump-to-speak-from-white-hous... [4] https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/world-news/rigged-election-donald-trumps-long-history-of-polls-fraud-claims/articleshow/79038530.cms https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/international/worl... [5] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/lesley-stahl-donald-trump-said-attacking-press-to-discredit-negative-stories/ https://www.cbsnews.com/news/lesley-stahl-donald-trump-said-... [6] https://cpj.org/reports/2020/04/trump-media-attacks-credibility-leaks/ https://cpj.org/reports/2020/04/trump-media-attacks-credibil... [7] https://www.thewrap.com/trump-attacks-fox-election-day/ https://www.thewrap.com/trump-attacks-fox-election-day/ [8] https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-attacks-fox-news-reporter-after-she-backs-up-key-details-of-atlantic-story/ar-BB18JQSh https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-attacks-fox-ne... [9] https://www.npr.org/2020/03/09/813577462/how-trump-has-filled-high-level-jobs-without-senate-confirmation https://www.npr.org/2020/03/09/813577462/how-trump-has-fille... [10] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-mobilizes-military-threatens-to-use-troops-to-quell-protests-across-us/2020/06/01/10212832-a416-11ea-bb20-ebf0921f3bbd_story.html https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-mobilizes-mili... [11] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-coronavirus-cdc-fda-investigation-covid-19-b1160766.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politic... [12] https://www.globalgovernmentforum.com/trump-extend-hire-fire-powers-over-civil-service/ https://www.globalgovernmentforum.com/trump-extend-hire-fire... [13] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ2AvqLSjSs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xZ2AvqLSjSs
trumpaway 6y ago
I think Trump has many character flaws (and that's putting it lightly), did many not-so-good things, etc. It is fine that this is highlighted by the mainstream media. My main problem is that the same treatment is not applied to the democrats. This means that in order to find similar stories from the other side, one needs to start (1) reading extremist-leaning news. These also contain many half-truths and outright lies, so on top of that one has to (2) try to verify themselves the veracity of those claims. Most people don't have the time to do that (obviously), so they stop at the first step.

jtdev 6y ago

Have you not been watching? They literally manufactured a Russia collusion story and then spent 4 years beating Trump over the head with it. Then they orchestrated a hijacking of the Democratic primary to prevent Bernie from being on the ticket. Trump is a despicable human, to a degree only surpassed by the folks running and representing American media.

homero 6y ago
I see russian bots commenting on Facebook all day every day for the last 4 years. Today one glitched and commented on a completely unrelated post under the name "hispanics for Trump" on a post for a car.
- jtdev 6y ago
  Russian bots... the lefts favorite cop out argument of 2020. Please provide an example, otherwise your claims are nothing but rhetoric.
  - sizt 6y ago
    This is HNN.
  - homero 6y ago
    It's everywhere online https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/08/twitter-bots-use-likes-rts-for-intimidation/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/08/twitter-bots-use-likes-r...
  - tunesmith 6y ago
    You seriously believe it hasn't happened?
  - artofgo 6y ago
    Dude, there actually are Twitter bots every where. I see multiple accounts posting the same exact tweet over and over. You look at their profile and its a obvious its manufactured history. Have you even tried looking?

odessacubbage 6y ago

he would've have actually had to consolidate power in any kind of meaningful way instead of simply bumbling through the logical continuation of bush/obama policies while being undermined by the intel community/ his own generals and the the gop itself every time he tried to do anything that broke from neocon consensus. his own justices even repudiated him. ironically, an actual fascist would've used the pandemic as his own reichstag fire, seized power & curtailed liberties to effectively contain the virus instead of simply mismanaging a dysfunctional, under supplied & under funded federal health apparatus that effectively let the states just do whatever. italy had tanks in the streets, south korea and taiwan created invasive ethically dubious surveillance programs to control movement. the actual white supremacists are mad that trump didn't do exactly that. aside from the bizarre alternative-universe psychodrama that corporate media has been airing for the past years, trump in reality was basically just unremarkable and incompetent.

sgustard 6y ago
I agree Trump is much more of a "proof of concept" of how an actual fascist could operate. Instead, as you say, he is blisteringly incompetent and lazy. Remember he accidentally became president when all he wanted was to build a hotel in Moscow. His tweets clearly show the mindset of someone who wants to use levers of power which are massively beyond his constitutional powers (shut down the media, overthrow elections, imprison critics). But he had neither the energy or the political skill to accomplish any of that. What he did have was the ability to convince millions of people that the US government should be turned over to a TV reality clown.