The Trump era is marked by concentrating federal power in the Oval Office. “I have the right to do anything I want to do,” Trump said Monday.

Immigration Agents Arrest Firefighters in Middle of Battling Wildfire

 kurtster wrote:

The dissonance is strong on this one, Kurtster. Unlike Islander I think your lying to yourself is actually your biggest flaw. Practically everything your have written above is a 180° projection of everything the assorted opposition (not just Democrats but also a huge range of academics and international observers) have said about Trump and similar "strong-man" autocracies over the past, I dunno how long. They have a long history:

The emotion and the blind loyalty of the cult
The hollowing out of the rule of law
The politicisation of independent government institutions
The radicalisation of just about EVERYTHING
The not-so-latent violence, just itching for an uprising they can stick their boot on people's necks (ok, you're not accusing the Dems of that this time, but you're not far off)
etc. etc.  

And you have bought into it lock, stock and barrel. And you KNOW you have. Just you can't bear the thought that all those detractors just might be right. So you need to drown out your internal dissonance by noise (i.e. your incessant ranting on this thread). This is like an itch that you can't help but scratch, all because deep-down, you know you have bought into the bullshit big time. (EDIT: and everytime you post something like the one above, it's like putting some balm on that itch, letting you fool yourself temporarily into thinking that you the sane one and everyone else is nuts)

So, then, to take you at your word, if your support of Trump is purely pragmatic and practical (another oxymoron like retribution and reckoning, you're getting good!), then maybe just answer the question I posed a couple of days ago:

How is Trump helping your individual position?
Prices are up
No one is there to pick the crops
Tariffs are going to hit consumer prices big time
Medicaid has been decimated
The CDC shut down for all intents and purposes, which, surely must be of interest to you and P. in your health-compromised state?

I'm truly curious.

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote: 
You (and everyone else to be sure on this one) keep trying to say my support for Trump is based on emotions such as fear and love.  That could not be farther from the truth.  I have absolutely zero emotional attachment to Trump.  My support for Trump is pragmatic and practical.

The thing being called retribution is actually only people looking for and finding out the truth of what, how and why things happened.  And the consequences for the things done are what they are.  If there are penalties for these actions, they are based upon laws and statutes.  You and everyone else are trying to conflate simple justice with this notion of retribution. Hence my choice of calling it a reckoning.

The left, democrats, progressives or whatever you want to call the opposition are only selling emotions.  There are no plans for anything other than hate Trump.  That is all that they have.  Keep people wound up in an emotional frenzy so they stop thinking and simply react in the way intended by those without a plan other than anything other than Trump is good, because we say so.  Trust us, trust your emotions.  That is the plan, their plan, their only plan, so that you all will blindly follow them over the cliff.

Just yesterday, the most recent example of this hate is the woman in Minnesota who took her anger out on children by shooting and killing as many as she could.  This is the direct result of all the hate speech as explained above.

 NoEnzLefttoSplit wrote:
No, it's his dishonesty toward everyone else. No one cares if he lies to himself, it's when he spews it out to the world and it needs mopping up that is getting old.

 islander wrote:
Elite is a matter of perspective, and Trump not being accepted, praised, admired, loved and revered in NY, by those with power and money, drives a lot of his messaging.   

Trump is untrustworthy, dishonest, and obnoxious.  All the money in the world won't get you invited to NY social events.  This isn't just a NY thing... it's every city and town.  All of them have a social pecking order, and in NY Trump didn't make the cut.  Epstein did. But was gone the moment his first indictment happened.  Harvey Weinstein did.  He was gone when the "me too" groups went public.   But Trump was a known quantity, and nobody was going to socialize with him from the days of Studio 54.  In NY, Trump was a failure.  A joke.  A scammer.   Anything but elite. 

The one thing everyone can agree on is that Trump is driven by revenge.  Apparently, deep down, so are a LOT of Americans.  They see a world on TV that all looks like a Hollywood movie.  Last night, I was watching the US Open (tennis), and they showed a concession stand with $100 chicken nuggets.  6 of them with any sauce are $26, but you throw in some black truffle or cavier, and it's $100.  Who the hell is buying/eating this?  This is from the US Open website:

Elite isn't Trump and Asters... it's the 50,000 people in NYC who can afford to attend the US Open.   Trump is talking about Billionaires, but fly-over America sees the 2 coasts and redirects their jealousy, anger, and frustration at the what they (mostly incorrectly) perceive as elite happening in blue states.  Trump says what they feel, and even though he'd have been the first guy in line to sell "Trump Nuggets" for $100 and be seen eating them on camera, they don't see or care about the scam.  

Emotional connection.   "they don't remember what you said.... they remember how you made them feel".   It's America in a nutshell.  The irony is free.

 kurtster wrote:

Now you are just being precious again. 
You yourself claimed this was all payback. And you glorified it.
The worst thing about you is not your love of Trump, it's your dishonesty to yourself. 
You haven't even got the balls to stand up for what you really think, instead turn yourself inside out to somehow paint any of this as "normal". 
It's not normal and you know it. 

A reminder of the casual insight you gave us as to what you really think:

 kurtster wrote:

 kcar wrote: 
Sorry.  The use of the term regarding Trump originated on your side of the aisle.

I see that Trump and his flunkeys are denying that their actions are retribution not acknowledging that they are retribution.

Must be the result of a cognitive disconnect due to infection by TDS.

 kurtster wrote:

"why do you all call his actions retribution ?"

Because that's what Trump and his flunkeys are calling his actions. You certainly went on and on about payback.

You wrote this, Kurt—I don' think you've forgotten: 

"You all have tried all kinds of illegal tactics to get to Trump as noted above and let us not forget the failed real direct threat to democracy by trying to keep Trump of of ballots in many states.

You've tried to kill him when all of the above failed and even that failed, thankfully.

Yeah, no lawfare, no deep state, no attempts to defeat democracy.

Yeah. And no one here has even bothered to discuss any of this.

Yes, kcar, the Great Pumpkin is here. And he brought The Reckoning with him."


So according to your....logic, the Butler assassination attempt, the attempt to keep an insurrectionist off state ballots and "the lawfare" are all part of a grand conspiracy to *illegally* keep Trump from power. 

Never mind prosecution efforts against Trump began BEFORE he decided to run for president in 2024. Never mind that there were a number of phone calls—one recorded—in which Trump tried to subvert certified election counts. That's a crime, kitten. 

Never mind that Trump broke numerous laws in his attempt to overthrow a legal and valid presidential election.

Never mind that Trump had BOXES and BOXES and BOXES of government documents—some of them Top Secret—and tried to hide them even after the federal government ASKED HIM to return them, no penalty attached. 

Never mind that the poor crazy kid of Butler was not in cahoots with the Democrats. 


So in  your addled world, anything Trump does is legal, acceptable, wonderful. If people involved in justice and law enforcement try to hold him accountable for possible criminal or tortious behavior, they're acting in a conspiracy and are against America. 

To me, you're just a tired troll clown. I doubt you believe all the things you spout. Hell, you could be some @ZZ40|e in or from the UK  or Australia trying to yank Americans' chains. (Last time, butthead: Americans spell the word "behavior", not "behaviour." A 70+ year old American wouldn't repeatedly make that mistake). 

Have a nice night, Pendejo. 

 kurtster wrote:

He may or may not have legitimate reasons for his feelings. He does not have legitimate reasons for his actions.  Most adults are able to make the distinction. 

 kcar wrote:
I have a friend who refers to himself as 'Persian' to get fewer questions. He fled Iran in 1979, hasn't seen most of his family since. In 2017 he told me how fragile it all is, and if Americans didn't get really serious about protecting what we had, it could all go away in a flash. It wasn't long after that we started diversifying and making some 'just in case' plans. I'm not happy that we are in the situation we are in, but I'm glad I listened to that warning. I hope it can all be straightened out, but if things get uglier I don't plan on licking a boot or being crushed under one.

 steeler wrote: 
So with the exception of noenz who did leave the door open for acknowledging the possibility of “illegal tactics”, none of the rest of you here believe that there were any illegal tactics or untoward actions taken against Trump in all of his trials and investigations.  That whatever Trump is doing is totally unprovoked as in there is are no legitimate reasons for him being upset about anything.

With that being the case that "you all"* agree with, then why do you all call his actions retribution ?  Retribution for what then ?

* you all as in the collective sense

 Steely_D wrote:


It is head-scratching, Islander. But only if we look for some logic where there isn't any. 

Trump portrays himself as a maverick who fought the system and won. I think his fans are like the people watched "Lifestyles of the rich and famous"—they live vicariously through him. 

I'll grant Trump this: he's one of the few people who called BS in national politics. The rest of the GOP candidates running against him in '16 were like mannequins (Chris Christie excepted but he was too fat, too liberal and too compromised by political experience for any success at the national level). 

Clinton and Obama both called for change and a break with the establishment but did so with messages of hope and positivity. James Carville is about closest person on the left to Trump's acid commentary. 

What shocks me the most is how fragile and flimsy American democracy has turned out to be.  

 Steely_D wrote:
You can’t cure stupid. 

 islander wrote:

Yeah, we don't want an elite - we want someone that's like us. 

 kurtster wrote:

They failed, but they were not  decided on the merits, which means they are in no way exonerations of Trump, much less exposure of “illegal tactics” used against him.

 kcar wrote:
Yes. But then again with the head scratcher - so in response to "I hate the elites" they elected a guy with a GOLD TOILET. Maybe George Soros has one too, but it's not been photographed that I know of. I'm pretty sure anyone who has a gold toilet meets any tortured definition of 'elite'. 

 islander wrote:

Kurt expressed it indirectly, perhaps without realizing it: we are in a cycle of revenge politics. Supporters of both political parties believe that the "other side" cheated or egregiously broke the law. A certain group of Trump supporters believe that the system, including the ruling class of elites, is against them and disrespects them. 

Trump, like other charismatic leaders, has convinced others that he's the living embodiment of their grievances and goals. He's wreaking retribution on a government that his supporters see as bloated, corrupt and out of touch. He is pursuing revenge against those he thinks wronged him—DOJ prosecutors, John Bolten, Jim Comey.

For Trump's supporters, the narrative of their righteous victimhood justifies their seizure of power even though it contradicts facts and established political/legal norms. They believe they're right regardless of the facts. Might makes right and they can do whatever they want. 

Evidence supporting them is trumpeted and over-extended (eg Kurt's endless yawping about the FBI/CIA trying to frame Trump and Russia). Facts that dispel or dispute their claims of righteousness are ignored or explained away as part of a conspiracy against themselves or righteous leader. 

Can someone make a valid case that the left pursued unjustified, overextended or illegal prosecution of Trump? Maybe but I doubt it. Prosectors took their cases to court with lots of evidence. Biased judges like Aisleen Cannon and the right wing of SCOTUS as well as pro-Trump politicians like legislators in GA blocked the prosecutorial process without serious legal justification. 

So to Trump supporters, he can do whatever he wants like Rambo or Schwarzenegger in his payback movies. The end justifies the means. 

Unfortunately for Kurt, his lust for payback doesn't explain or jibe with the Big Beautiful Bill that's going to make him poorer and less able to get  government benefits. and medical care.  And that payback lust is going to fVCK him over when Trump's tariffs make the cost of living for Americans soar. 

But logic was never in it. That story of being a righteous victim is just too good to let go. 

 kcar wrote:
This is the part that really has me scratching my head -

"Biden is too old, he has health issues and he gets confused and talks nonsense".

"Hillary Clinton is running a child sex trafficking ring from the basement of pizza shop", well... at least there is no pizza involved with Trump, but otherwise...

"We're strong on crime", except when they aren't.

"Freedom!!!!", roll out the troops.