The Donald Trump Thread

I actually read about the pepe, kek, meme magic thing not long after the election. I saw Hurm's post and intended to listen to the THC podcast, but I never got around to it. (And then I forgot about it -- so typical of me.)

I wonder if a thread about "meme magic" in general would be interesting?

I'll start a thread today if I have time.
 
When I was going through my own crisis (call it a spiritual one or call it identity one, I don’t care), this man’s works really resonated and inspired me. He isn’t well-known in the English-speaking world, and I have recommended him on Skeptiko before, but perhaps his status as a Christian anarchist put people off? However, his book on Propaganda is amazing, and I encourage people to read it rather than Bernays book of the same name.

(As an aside, his critique on the modern technological society is worth a read as well.)

Oh, and I almost forgot about this documentary!

Thanks for the links... getting the book!
 
What do you think the chances are that Trump will revoke Obama's pardon of Chelsea Manning??
I bet Trump will have Manning believing that he will be free in May for a while, just so he can pull the rug from under his feet and revoke his pardon in a month or so.

Why do you think this? Do you think Trump wants to take a hard line early on leaks?

I was extremely disappointed that Obama generally took a hard line on whistle blowers.
Under Obama’s administration, more people were investigated and prosecuted for leaks than under all other U.S. presidents combined.
http://time.com/4638617/chelsea-manning-commutation-obama-whistleblower-legacy/

For clarity/accuracy I understood that Obama commuted Manning's sentence, rather than pardoning.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/chelsea-mannings-commutation-what-it-means-w461542
 
I was reading the transcript from the second presidential debate between Clinton & Trump, and it's just laughable how Trump tries to deflect, and digress, with incoherent babbling. He is all over the place and his train of thoughts are just haphazard bullshit. It makes you wonder if he have ADD or something!?!

Just have a look at this following conversation, where he is asked about that audio recording, where he were caught talking about; "grabbing women's p**sy, and forcible kiss them". The first segment are Andersson-Coopers question to Trump, then followed by Trump answer. First he denies what he provably said on the tape - but in the next second he apologize for it - and then in the next second try to trivialize it - and then goes off on a tangent about totally unrelated bullshit about ISIS - and then returns to the question, and apologize again for what he just said that he didn't say - and then finish off with more unrelated babbling about ISIS.

Andersson-Cooper: "-We received a lot of questions online, Mr. Trump about the tape that was released on Friday, as you can imagine. You called what you said ‘locker room banter’. You described kissing women without consent, grabbing their genitals. That is sexual assault. You bragged that you have sexually assaulted women. Do you understand that?"

Trump: "-No, I didn’t say that at all. I don't think you understood what was said. This was locker room talk. I am not proud of it. I apologize to my family, I apologized to the American people. Certainly, I am not proud of it. But this is locker room talk. You know,....when we have a world where you have ISIS chopping off heads, where you have them, frankly, drowning people in steel cages, where you have wars and horrible, horrible sights all over,.....and you have so many bad things happening,.....this is like medieval times. [my comment; look at these following, mind-boggling, sentences and try to grasp & perceive how the hell his mind works!!]; We haven’t seen anything likes this. The carnage all over the world and they look and they see,....can you imagine the people that are frankly doing so well against us with ISIS and they look at our country and see what's going on....yes, I am very embarrassed by it and I hate it, but it's locker room talk and it’s one of those things.....I will knock the hell out of ISIS. We are going to defeat ISIS. ISIS happened a number of years ago in a vacuum that was left because of bad judgement. And I will tell you, I will take care of ISIS. We need to get on to much more important and bigger things.
Here is the so called "locker-room talk"-video, to fresh up your memory



Then, in the follow-up, he once again try to weasel out of it;

Andersson-Cooper: "- For the record, are you saying that what you said on the bus 11 years ago, that you did not actually kiss women without consent or grope women without consent?"

Trump: "- I have great respect for women. Nobody has more respect for women than I do." [LOL!!]

Andersson-Cooper: So for the record, you’re saying you never did that?

Trump: "Frankly, you hear these things. They are said. And I was am embarrassed by it. But I have respect for women--"

Andersson-Cooper: "--Have you ever done those things?"
By now it gets hilarious - how inane he is. Look at his answer to Andersson-Copper question above. You just cant make this shit up;

Trump: "-- And they have respect for me......and I will tell you, no I have not. ....and I will tell you, that I’m going to make our country safe and..and we’re going to have borders which we don't have now. People are pouring into our country and they’re coming in from the Middle East and other places. We’re gonna make America safe again, we’re gonna make America great again...but we’re gonna make America safe again and we’re gonna make America wealthy again. Because if you don't do that, it just, it sounds harsh to say, but we have to build up the wealth of our nation. Other nations are taking our job and they’re taking our wealth."
Sometimes you are just at a loss for words, and the only proper response is a face-palm!!

hy4OdWu.jpg


http://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/2016-presidential-debate-transcript-229519
 
Last edited:
Why do you think this? Do you think Trump wants to take a hard line early on leaks?
Well, since he have this stance on Snowden it's hardly a stretch to think that he would like to see Manning in prison for the next 35 years:
Donald J. Trump Verifierat konto ‏@realDonaldTrump

"Snowden is a spy who has caused great damage to the U.S. A spy in the old days, when our country was respected and strong, would be executed"

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/457314934473633792
 
I was reading the transcript from the second presidential debate between Clinton & Trump, and it's just laughable how Trump tries to deflect, and digress, with incoherent babbling. He is all over the place and his train of thoughts are just haphazard bullshit. It makes you wonder if he have ADD or something!?!

I noticed the same phenomena years before he announced his candidacy. It's why I thought there were better candidates in the Republican primaries.
 
I was reading the transcript from the second presidential debate between Clinton & Trump, and it's just laughable how Trump tries to deflect, and digress, with incoherent babbling. He is all over the place and his train of thoughts are just haphazard bullshit. It makes you wonder if he have ADD or something!?!

Just have a look at this following conversation, where he is asked about that audio recording, where he were caught talking about; "grabbing women's p**sy, and forcible kiss them". The first segment are Andersson-Coopers question to Trump, then followed by Trump answer. First he denies what he provably said on the tape - but in the next second he apologize for it - and then in the next second try to trivialize it - and then goes off on a tangent about totally unrelated bullshit about ISIS - and then returns to the question, and apologize again for what he just said that he didn't say - and then finish off with more unrelated babbling about ISIS.

Andersson-Cooper: "-We received a lot of questions online, Mr. Trump about the tape that was released on Friday, as you can imagine. You called what you said ‘locker room banter’. You described kissing women without consent, grabbing their genitals. That is sexual assault. You bragged that you have sexually assaulted women. Do you understand that?"

Trump: "-No, I didn’t say that at all. I don't think you understood what was said. This was locker room talk. I am not proud of it. I apologize to my family, I apologized to the American people. Certainly, I am not proud of it. But this is locker room talk. You know,....when we have a world where you have ISIS chopping off heads, where you have them, frankly, drowning people in steel cages, where you have wars and horrible, horrible sights all over,.....and you have so many bad things happening,.....this is like medieval times. [my comment; look at these following, mind-boggling, sentences and try to grasp & perceive how the hell his mind works!!]; We haven’t seen anything likes this. The carnage all over the world and they look and they see,....can you imagine the people that are frankly doing so well against us with ISIS and they look at our country and see what's going on....yes, I am very embarrassed by it and I hate it, but it's locker room talk and it’s one of those things.....I will knock the hell out of ISIS. We are going to defeat ISIS. ISIS happened a number of years ago in a vacuum that was left because of bad judgement. And I will tell you, I will take care of ISIS. We need to get on to much more important and bigger things.
Here is the so called "locker-room talk"-video, to fresh up your memory



Then, in the follow-up, he once again try to weasel out of it;

Andersson-Cooper: "- For the record, are you saying that what you said on the bus 11 years ago, that you did not actually kiss women without consent or grope women without consent?"

Trump: "- I have great respect for women. Nobody has more respect for women than I do." [LOL!!]

Andersson-Cooper: So for the record, you’re saying you never did that?

Trump: "Frankly, you hear these things. They are said. And I was am embarrassed by it. But I have respect for women--"

Andersson-Cooper: "--Have you ever done those things?"
By now it gets hilarious - how inane he is. Look at his answer to Andersson-Copper question above. You just cant make this shit up;

Trump: "-- And they have respect for me......and I will tell you, no I have not. ....and I will tell you, that I’m going to make our country safe and..and we’re going to have borders which we don't have now. People are pouring into our country and they’re coming in from the Middle East and other places. We’re gonna make America safe again, we’re gonna make America great again...but we’re gonna make America safe again and we’re gonna make America wealthy again. Because if you don't do that, it just, it sounds harsh to say, but we have to build up the wealth of our nation. Other nations are taking our job and they’re taking our wealth."
Sometimes you are just at a loss for words, and the only proper response is a face-palm!!

hy4OdWu.jpg


http://www.politico.com/story/2016/10/2016-presidential-debate-transcript-229519

And some posters here think he's our anti-establishment saviour - I couldn't vote for someone who disrespected women, even if I did share their political views.
 
And some posters here think he's our anti-establishment saviour - I couldn't vote for someone who disrespected women, even if I did share their political views.

That's the thing: it's not like his "questionable"character is hidden or obscure, or has been particularly over the course of the campaign, nor is it a secret that he is part of the 1%, not the 99%, yet people (including very intelligent ones on this forum) support him anyway as a wildcard. Go figure.
 
That's the thing: it's not like his "questionable"character is hidden or obscure, or has been particularly over the course of the campaign, nor is it a secret that he is part of the 1%, not the 99%, yet people (including very intelligent ones on this forum) support him anyway as a wildcard. Go figure.

I have brought this up before, but how many Americans, other than Hurm, have been Trump supporters on this forum? Roberta, and now you, have claimed this. The only other Trump sympathizers I have seen on here are British.
 
I have brought this up before, but how many Americans, other than Hurm, have been Trump supporters on this forum? Roberta, and now you, have claimed this. The only other Trump sympathizers I have seen on here are British.

I haven't claimed more Americans than one (Hurm) have supported Trump. My comment when I break it down only refers to two forum members: Hurm (obviously, and American) and (from what I understand, I hope he will correct me if I'm wrong) David Bailey (UK citizen).
 
I haven't claimed more Americans than one (Hurm) have supported Trump. My comment when I break it down only refers to two forum members: Hurm (obviously, and American) and (from what I understand, I hope he will correct me if I'm wrong) David Bailey (UK citizen).

Okay, I apologize if I mixed you up with Roberta and someone else. There just seems to be this belief that Skeptiko is infested with right-wingers and Trump supporters, and I have not seen that here.

PS Edit On reading I thought you were agreeing with Roberta, I am sorry about that. He seems to think there are a lot of American Trumpists here. :)
 
Too bad we can't all come together and have a real dialogue.

Maybe we can. This thread was started as a sort of "come at me, bro" adversarial challenge, which Hurm put out there in another thread, saying he was willing to defend his support for DT, and, apparently, Michael2 thought he'd call Hurm on it. So, all very gladiatorial. Maybe a less combative thread, started in the spirit of finding common ground amongst the left, liberal and right, and moderated on that basis, might have better luck?
 
Okay, I apologize if I mixed you up with Roberta and someone else. There just seems to be this belief that Skeptiko is infested with right-wingers and Trump supporters, and I have not seen that here.

PS Edit On reading I thought you were agreeing with Roberta, I am sorry about that. He seems to think there are a lot of American Trumpists here. :)

I must admit that there are more right-wing/conservative posters than I would have expected when I first came here (e.g. the anti-climate-change position seems to be a typically, if not exclusively, conservative one, and it's prevalent on this forum).

I didn't understand Robby to be talking about Americans alone. No need to apologise though, it was just a misunderstanding.
 
Back
Top