Mark Zaid, JFK and Trump

[Ty Carpenter]

1 hour ago, Douglas Caddy said:

We Are Republicans, and We Want Trump Defeated

The president and his enablers have replaced conservatism

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/opinion/lincoln-project.html

Stunts such as this only serve to strengthen support for the President. We elected Trump to change the status quo. When I see garbage like this or the impeachment attempts, it is proof positive that he is succeeding in his mission. Here's to 4 more years!

[W. Niederhut]

         I was discussing the Trump impeachment case last weekend with my nephew, who is an Assistant AG for the state of Oklahoma, and I told him that, IMO, the people who oppose Trump's impeachment seem to lack historical consciousness.  (Not rocket science, since half of Republicans in a recent poll believe that Trump is a better POTUS than Abraham Lincoln!)

        Then, voila, I saw this article this morning at the Huffington Post. * The anti-intellectual GOP mob will, of course, disparage and dismiss the opinions of these history scholars.  Like Trump, they don't need no stinkin' historians.   (Can anyone imagine Trump hiring an Arthur Schlesinger as a White House consultant?)

*More Than 750 Historians Call For Donald Trump To Be Impeached

Pulitzer Prize winners, professors and filmmakers have signed a letter urging the House to impeach the president for the Ukraine scandal.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/donald-trump-impeachment-historians-letter_n_5df884c3e4b03aed50f446b8?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuaHVmZnBvc3QuY29tLw&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAALxqfFKLfwBgIQCBKla_TLtMpPFm6DJ6uidpPDrvaKLTZcCnhwPyOpiXsTa2iKGy5LaLxhxBtTSPFoat-3i7k2wsnb6AbTVledO5QJPDhWyiXpKWNeDEB2W472bDgVwmdzdhKdSBig9cgV60HdsMoO4aiShb1lzd4kfvpYsQog8s

 

 

Edited December 17, 2019 by W. Niederhut

[Joe Bauer]

Stunts?

The amount of highest credentialed professionals in the most serious areas of federal executive branch government study and expertise signing their names to nationally published and reported petitions warning the American people of the need to remove this serial constitution violating / power abusing renegade President is unprecedented.

 

Thousands and thousands in total of highly educated experts who have worked for Republican as well as Democratic Presidents and administrations including historians, legal scholars, intel, federal prosecutors, former Senators and Congressmen and women, plus Academics, Psychiatrists and on and on and on.

 

Trumps backers and defenders would love to counter this huge movement but they can't get any similar experts willing to put their names on nationally published counter petitions refuting these that are unprecedented and growing in number.

Perhaps if the massive money behind Trump were to pay these counter experts to put their names on Trump defending petitions they could come up with something.

 

I do not recall this many highly credentialed professionals "willing to place their names and reputations on nationally published petitions" in the history of Presidential terms in my lifetime.

 

And all warning of the dangers of keeping a person like Trump in the office of President with mostly a main and uniting theme ... abuse of presidential power and authority.

 

A constant violating of constitution mandated separation and balance of power governmental branch law and authority.

 

Trump has gone over this line so often and egregiously masses of concerned Americans with careers in government services feel they must publicly speak out...in ever growing numbers. 

It is childishly irresponsible to downplay this unprecedented growing number warning movement and it's importance.

Top stories

 

Impeach Trump, 750 historians urge House

Axios·9 hours ago

 

More for 750 historians call for trump impeachment

Web results

Than 750 Historians Call For Donald Trump To Be Impeached

 

 

 

[Joe Bauer]

34 minutes ago, W. Niederhut said:

         I was discussing the Trump impeachment case last weekend with my nephew, who is an Assistant AG for the state of Oklahoma, and I told him that, IMO,

>>>  the people who oppose Trump's impeachment seem to lack historical consciousness.  (Not rocket science, since half of Republicans in a recent poll believe that Trump is a better POTUS than Abraham Lincoln!  <<<

Exactly.

        Then, voila, I saw this article this morning at the Huffington Post. * The anti-intellectual GOP mob will, of course, disparage and dismiss the opinions of these history scholars.  Like Trump, they don't need no stinkin' historians.   

"They don't need no stinkin' historians."  Love this reference.

34 minutes ago, W. Niederhut said:

*More Than 750 Historians Call For Donald Trump To Be Impeached

 

 

 

 

[W. Niederhut]

9 hours ago, Joe Bauer said:

"They don't need no stinkin' historians."  Love this reference.

 

   Can't recall where I read the story but, after JFK hired the historian Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. as a White House consultant, Schlesinger asked, "What am I supposed to do?" 

   JFK replied that Schlesinger would be, "one of the most important people in (his) administration."

[Kirk Gallaway]

The Trump base is anti legal experts, and  anti historian experts. It's anti experts in general. As the access to their bona fides is seen as elitist. And it's anti elitist. It has to do with the marginalizing  of the middle class. And a creation of an underclass who have lost access. If seen in their lights, these petition have no effect on winning over the Trump voter, in fact they might scoff with glee at them. Most are completely ignorant of policy as well. Trumps shown you can win over people with the rhetoric and in most cases will never be held to accountability. Almost every spectacle that Trump creates  is favorable to his base, he's shaking things up and draining the swamp.

 

Yes I read that. Republicans when asked in polls think Trump is greater than Lincoln. Lincoln and Washington are the meat and potatoes of American Presidents. They were the historical icons of our public schools. Not many students growing up in the American school system knew that much about them except Washington , was a General in our  Revolutionary War and the Father of our Country and  Lincoln was the President during our civil war and freed the slaves. But that's a simple story everyone can remember, and that's really the extent of the average persons understanding of them. To the Trump base, Trump is like a revolutionary figure, in some cases, their first real introduction into politics. He's seen favorably, and to them there has been nothing like Trump in their lifetime.   Everybody up to Trump is a blur, everybody was the same.  The last  certified  great President was a figure they learned in school, who they know the very basics, but they see Trump as transforming the now.

 

The other faction of the Republican Party that might think Trump is better than Lincoln is the Wall Street, and  business class, and corporate class as represented in Congress, who find themselves in a very uneasy and precarious alliance with the Trump base,  who they see as the riff raff  they've sought to economically marginalize for the last 40 years. Though in fairness, they aren't completely alone. To them Trump represents the "Perfect Storm", the greatest realization of their economic agenda in our lifetime and historically for probably 100 years.

Edited December 18, 2019 by Kirk Gallaway

[W. Niederhut]

8 hours ago, Kirk Gallaway said:

The Trump base is anti legal experts, and  anti historian experts. It's anti experts in general. As the access to their bona fides is seen as elitist. And it's anti elitist. It has to do with the marginalizing  of the middle class. And a creation of an underclass who have lost access. If seen in their lights, these petition have no effect on winning over the Trump voter, in fact they might scoff with glee at them. Most are completely ignorant of policy as well. Trumps shown you can win over people with the rhetoric and in most cases will never be held to accountability. Almost every spectacle that Trump creates  is favorable to his base, he's shaking things up and draining the swamp.

 

Yes I read that. Republicans when asked in polls think Trump is greater than Lincoln. Lincoln and Washington are the meat and potatoes of American Presidents. They were the historical icons of our public schools. Not many students growing up in the American school system knew that much about them except Washington , was a General in our  Revolutionary War and the Father of our Country and  Lincoln was the President during our civil war and freed the slaves. But that's a simple story everyone can remember, and that's really the extent of the average persons understanding of them. To the Trump base, Trump is like a revolutionary figure, in some cases, their first real introduction into politics. He's seen favorably, and to them there has been nothing like Trump in their lifetime.   Everybody up to Trump is a blur, everybody was the same.  The last  certified  great President was a figure they learned in school, who they know the very basics, but they see Trump as transforming the now.

 

The other faction of the Republican Party that might think Trump is better than Lincoln is the Wall Street, and  business class, and corporate class as represented in Congress, who find themselves in a very uneasy and precarious alliance with the Trump base,  who they see as the riff raff  they've sought to economically marginalize for the last 40 years. Though in fairness, they aren't completely alone. To them Trump represents the "Perfect Storm", the greatest realization of their economic agenda in our lifetime and historically for probably 100 years.

        Well said.  Our apprentice/reality television POTUS, a man who has never read a book in his life, (with the possible exception of Hitler's speeches, according to Ivana Trump's Vanity Fair interview back in the day) is a Robber Baron's dream-come-true.   By appealing to white racist sentiments, resentment, and xenophobia, Trump has bamboozled his delusional working class white fans into believing that he actually represents their economic interests-- while repeatedly stabbing them in the back with his Robber Baron policies.  The George Bushes had mastered this political art of posing as regular American guys while promoting the agenda of the 0.1% -- but Trump has taken the Robber Baron chicanery of Ronald Reagan and the Bushes to a whole new level. 

      The truth is that Trump is utterly contemptuous of poor people.  He even announced in January of 2017 that he wanted "only rich people" in his Cabinet!

      The delusions of the white working class Trump cult are a classic example of what Karl Marx described as "false consciousness" -- the belief that wealthy elites can be trusted to promote the best interests of the working class.   But, beyond false consciousness, Trump fans seem to have no meaningful consciousness of basic American history, or of Trump's truly unprecedented corruption (e.g., Emoluments Clause violations) and blatant mendacity.  It's astonishing.   In a Hegelian sense, Trump is the Anti-Obama, and that is all that really matters to his cult members.

     

     

     

[Joe Bauer]

1 hour ago, W. Niederhut said:

        Well said.  Our apprentice/reality television POTUS, a man who has never read a book in his life, (with the possible exception of Hitler's speeches, according to Ivana Trump's Vanity Fair interview back in the day) is a Robber Baron's dream-come-true.   By appealing to white racist sentiments, resentment, and xenophobia, Trump has bamboozled his delusional working class white fans into believing that he actually represents their economic interests-- while repeatedly stabbing them in the back with his Robber Baron policies.  The George Bushes had mastered this political art of posing as regular American guys while promoting the agenda of the 0.1% -- but Trump has taken the Robber Baron chicanery of Ronald Reagan and the Bushes to a whole new level. 

      The truth is that Trump is utterly contemptuous of poor people.  He even announced in January of 2017 that he wanted "only rich people" in his Cabinet!

      The delusions of the white working class Trump cult are a classic example of what Karl Marx described as "false consciousness" -- the belief that wealthy elites can be trusted to promote the best interests of the working class.   But, beyond false consciousness, Trump fans seem to have no meaningful consciousness of basic American history, or of Trump's truly unprecedented corruption (e.g., Emoluments Clause violations) and blatant mendacity.  It's astonishing.   In a Hegelian sense, Trump is the Anti-Obama, and that is all that really matters to his cult members.

     

     

     

The reality of who Trump is and how he has captured his cult following are becoming more clear and focused now as the two above postings show.

As well as the true power base ( 1%) behind Trump and how everything Trump does really benefits them far above the rest of our society.

And yes, Trump wouldn't allow his lowest financial class rural trailer park base to live within 50 miles of him.  

Trump is the classic "Country Club - Gated Community - Chauffeured" jet set type.

To see lowest income Americans cheering him on at rallies and such is perverse really.

 

[James DiEugenio]

You guys are writing like somehow what Trump is doing is new.  Its not.

The tactic of making an appeal to those in the middle to lower economic classes on the basis of anti elitism and/or xenophobia, this goes back in its modern form at least to the national advent of Limbaugh in 1988. It then became a staple of the GOP.

One example being Phil Gramm and his so called Dicky Flatt test. This from the guy who championed unregulated trading of derivatives and deregulation of banking, that is the elimination of Glass/Steagall.  Perhaps no person in congress did more to bring on the 2007-2008 Great Recession than Gramm, all in the guise of helping Dicky Flatt.

So to somehow state or imply that Trump is some kind of new brand in the GOP, that is not historically accurate.

[W. Niederhut]

38 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

You guys are writing like somehow what Trump is doing is new.  Its not.

The tactic of making an appeal to those in the middle to lower economic classes on the basis of anti elitism and/or xenophobia, this goes back in its modern form at least to the national advent of Limbaugh in 1988. It then became a staple of the GOP.

One example being Phil Gramm and his so called Dicky Flatt test. This from the guy who championed unregulated trading of derivatives and deregulation of banking, that is the elimination of Glass/Steagall.  Perhaps no person in congress did more to bring on the 2007-2008 Great Recession than Gramm, all in the guise of helping Dicky Flatt.

So to somehow state or imply that Trump is some kind of new brand in the GOP, that is not historically accurate.

Jim,

    I don't think of Trump's brand of Robber Baronism as "new."  It was prevalent in the Gilded Age, and was a major characteristic of the economic policies of the Reagan and Bush-Cheney administrations.

    What is "new" about Trumpism, IMO, is the brazen, pervasive mendacity (including the systematic Fox Trumpaganda) that has enabled a perverse, reverse Robin Hood like Donald Trump to be elected and supported as a faux populist-- a Koch Trojan Horse who claimed to have a "terrific healthcare plan that (would) cover everyone and cost less."

   Case in point.  During the 2016 GOP primary debates, Trump repeatedly claimed that he was the only candidate who was not beholden to the Kochs and other wealthy donors, because he was funding his own campaign.  Yet, in office, Trump has been the most corrupt, pay-to-play POTUS in history, by several orders of magnitude.  CEOs have privately joked about Trump's eagerness to do anything they request for a price, regardless of the damage to the public or the planet.

[James DiEugenio]

The whole idea of selling trickle down tax policy as something that was populist goes back to the Reagan days.  As we all know Stockman revealed this in his famous interview with Greider.

There, he revealed that the whole "populist angle" was really a Trojan Horse for trickle down.

IMO, it was those policies that galvanized the upper classes behind the GOP in a way that had not really been as systematic as before, that is the setting up of "think tanks" etc. It was the most drastic overhaul of the tax system in the last 80 years.  Since FDR.

And I do not for one second think that people like Reagan, Schultz or Donald Regan believed supply side economics would work to expand wealth for the middle and working classes , while cutting taxes and also increasing tax revenue.  It was not true then and its not true now.  But the GOP has set up such a huge and resonant Sound Machine that it sells this stuff 24/7 along with the appeal to so called cultural issues.

BTW, the reason they have this Sound Machine is again, Reagan.  It was under Ronnie Baby that the Fairness Doctrine and Equal Time provisions of FCC law were absconded with. That decision was reached in 1987.  I do not think it is a coincidence that Limbaugh went nationwide in 1988.

Edited December 18, 2019 by James DiEugenio

[Kirk Gallaway]

2 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

You guys are writing like somehow what Trump is doing is new.  Its not.

The tactic of making an appeal to those in the middle to lower economic classes on the basis of anti elitism and/or xenophobia, this goes back in its modern form at least to the national advent of Limbaugh in 1988. It then became a staple of the GOP.

One example being Phil Gramm and his so called Dicky Flatt test. This from the guy who championed unregulated trading of derivatives and deregulation of banking, that is the elimination of Glass/Steagall.  Perhaps no person in congress did more to bring on the 2007-2008 Great Recession than Gramm, all in the guise of helping Dicky Flatt.

So to somehow state or imply that Trump is some kind of new brand in the GOP, that is not historically accurate.

Jim said: So to somehow state or imply that Trump is some kind of new brand in the GOP, that is not historically accurate.

Yeah, who said that tactic was new Jim? But no one has used those tactics and  achieved the Presidency, and then been able to take advantage of  Republican sweep like Trump has done.  As you've been doing for years you're minimizing the economic effect of the Trump Presidency as about everything else.'  You cite Phil Gramm but he never became President.

Edited December 18, 2019 by Kirk Gallaway

[W. Niederhut]

4 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

The whole idea of selling trickle down tax policy as something that was populist goes back to the Reagan days.  As we all know Stockman revealed this in his famous interview with Greider.

There, he revealed that the whole "populist angle" was really a Trojan Horse for trickle down.

IMO, it was those policies that galvanized the upper classes behind the GOP in a way that had not really been as systematic as before, that is the setting up of "think tanks" etc. It was the most drastic overhaul of the tax system in the last 80 years.  Since FDR.

And I do not for one second think that people like Reagan, Schultz or Donald Regan believed supply side economics would work to expand wealth for the middle and working classes , while cutting taxes and also increasing tax revenue.  It was not true then and its not true now.  But the GOP has set up such a huge and resonant Sound Machine that it sells this stuff 24/7 along with the appeal to so called cultural issues.

BTW, the reason they have this Sound Machine is again, Reagan.  It was under Ronnie Baby that the Fairness Doctrine and Equal Time provisions of FCC law were absconded with. That decision was reached in 1987.  I do not think it is a coincidence that Limbaugh went nationwide in 1988.

And Rupert Murdoch acquiring U.S. citizenship and establishing his propaganda empire-- Fox, WSJ, NY Post, Washington Times, etc.

If the Democrats ever regain control of the White House and Congress they need to reinstate some iteration of the Fairness Doctrine, and enact legislation reversing the disastrous 5-4 Citizens United ruling, which, as Fred Wertheimer said, "erased a century of campaign finance reforms" in the U.S.A.

[Kirk Gallaway]

41 minutes ago, James DiEugenio said:

The whole idea of selling trickle down tax policy as something that was populist goes back to the Reagan days.  As we all know Stockman revealed this in his famous interview with Greider.

There, he revealed that the whole "populist angle" was really a Trojan Horse for trickle down.

IMO, it was those policies that galvanized the upper classes behind the GOP in a way that had not really been as systematic as before, that is the setting up of "think tanks" etc. It was the most drastic overhaul of the tax system in the last 80 years.  Since FDR.

And I do not for one second think that people like Reagan, Schultz or Donald Regan believed supply side economics would work to expand wealth for the middle and working classes , while cutting taxes and also increasing tax revenue.  It was not true then and its not true now.  But the GOP has set up such a huge and resonant Sound Machine that it sells this stuff 24/7 along with the appeal to so called cultural issues.

BTW, the reason they have this Sound Machine is again, Reagan.  It was under Ronnie Baby that the Fairness Doctrine and Equal Time provisions of FCC law were absconded with. That decision was reached in 1987.  I do not think it is a coincidence that Limbaugh went nationwide in 1988.

But Reagan never had a sweep, he always had to contend with Tip O'Neill. Cliff  echoed my earlier sentiments. Where were you to register your outrage at Trump's policies in 2017, which was by far his most successful year? Your first mentioning in any detail about Trump's policies was in March 2018, after Trump met with Putin in Helsinki,.  which inspired you to create the now hallmark "Trump was right" thread.  You obviously thought this was a glorious highlight, but the rest of us thought this was a better assessment (below) where we throw in a little humor. But I'm sure you thought Trump's turn around was blasphemous.

 

DTrump--"It should have been obvious.I thought it would be obvious". Yes how stupid of us to misunderstand  the President!

 

Edited December 18, 2019 by Kirk Gallaway

[Paul Brancato]

I agree with this Jim. You are not doing us any favors by seeming to underestimate the very real danger of full on fascism and permanent rule by minority.