Dem Post Mortem

[bilby]

papers like the NY Times that were around for both periods hated/loved Hitler just as much and in the same way that they hate/love Trump.

We can only hope that Trump does as much for America as Hitler did for Germany.

Be careful what you wish for. Hitler set up Germany to become the most powerful and influential European nation, and it still is.

...and all it took was the total destruction of the nation's cities and factories.

When I was working in factories in the UK as a young man (1980s), we had machines that were built in the 1920s that were still in use. Most buildings were poorly laid out, having been built in the 19th century and altered to accomodate new businesses and new processes over the course of a century or more.

Knocking the whole lot down, scrapping the machines, and starting iver from scratch would have been a good long-term option; But it would always have been a disaster in the short term, so it didn't happen.

In Germany, the RAF, USAAF, the US 6th and 12th Army Groups, and the British/Canadian 12th Army Group did the job that no manager or factory owner dared to suggest. It put Germany in the box-seat; And then the Marshall Plan handed them the capital they needed to rebuild (not because Marshall, Truman and Eisenhower were great philanthropists, but because they needed a bulwark against the Soviet Union as the Cold War got underway).

If you are lucky, Trump might utterly destroy your country, and it might only take a couple of decades to rebuild and once again dominate the world.

If you are lucky.

 

[ZiprHead]

The Americans who use America as a punching bag more typically are distancing themselves from the rest of us -- they appear to imagine belonging to the group they're criticizing means they deserve credit for self-criticism even though their intent was to criticize other members of the group, never themselves. They're virtue signaling.

I can't think of anyone that criticized America more than Trump.

 

[thebeave]

Its almost never easy or inexpensive adding a bathroom after the fact. You have to tap into a hot and cold water source from somewhere nearby, and that means tearing up floors, walls and/or ceilings and patching and painting them back up again. Drains too, which can be even more of a problem, as you have to have the drain slope towards its destination at 1/4" per foot. If you're a small business having to add an extra bathroom, the cost is likely prohibitive.

A small water heater, if necessary at all, can be purchased for less than $200. And a few public restrooms would be enough; no need for every small business to have one. (There's a number-of-employees threshold for applying rules to small businesses. Perhaps some of those thresholds should be raised anyway.)

Well, sure that would work. But you will need a new electric circuit added in (possibly 220V) or a gas line, both of which could be as much, if not more, trouble than adding a hot water pipe. In a mall or airport you can have centrally located bathrooms, but that won't work for a standalone building.

These little Bosch units are great. I installed one once. 120V plug in. Perfect for just a sink. Or in a state where they route the water supply through the slab and it takes forever and a day to get any hot water out of the damn faucet.

Yeah, I've played around with one of those once. A friend bought one to add hot water to the sink for his small business in a strip mall. They are pretty cool little units. Unfortunately, it couldn't be used because it was too big to fit in the small vanity that was there, plus it needed its own new 15A circuit and there was no practical way to run a T&P discharge pipe to the outside. All of which made it too costly and inappropriate to use, so he returned it.

 

[Elixir]

Hmm, yes, Liz Cheney was totally going to vote for Trump before he laid all those terrible bad things and fun nicknames on her.

Hmm, yes, Liz DID vote for Trump before he said and did all those bad things (to and about her )
She expressed regret for that mistake later.
If your point was that Republicans don’t criticize each other like Dems do, it’s a yuuuge fail.

 

[Bomb#20]

Hmm, yes, Liz Cheney was totally going to vote for Trump before he laid all those terrible bad things and fun nicknames on her.

Hmm, yes, Liz DID vote for Trump before he said and did all those bad things (to and about her )
She expressed regret for that mistake later.
If your point was that Republicans don’t criticize each other like Dems do, it’s a yuuuge fail.

Just speculating here, but there may have been other intervening events, after she voted for him but before he said what he said about her, that may have contributed in some small way to her loss of enthusiasm for voting for him.

 

[Bomb#20]

The Americans who use America as a punching bag more typically are distancing themselves from the rest of us -- they appear to imagine belonging to the group they're criticizing means they deserve credit for self-criticism even though their intent was to criticize other members of the group, never themselves. They're virtue signaling.

I can't think of anyone that criticized America more than Trump.

And you don't take that as a sign of self-hatred, do you? You're helping make my case.

 

[Elixir]

Hmm, yes, Liz Cheney was totally going to vote for Trump before he laid all those terrible bad things and fun nicknames on her.

Hmm, yes, Liz DID vote for Trump before he said and did all those bad things (to and about her )
She expressed regret for that mistake later.
If your point was that Republicans don’t criticize each other like Dems do, it’s a yuuuge fail.

Just speculating here, but there may have been other intervening events, after she voted for him but before he said what he said about her, that may have contributed in some small way to her loss of enthusiasm for voting for him.

Hoookay then, you have a point.
Repugs never say bad things about each other unless each other has said bad things about them … I suppose. Whereas - ?

ETA : Mea Culpa that's harsh, and yeah I think Dems are more into self flagellation than Reps. Thing is, when Reps run each other down, they're way careful to "otherize" them first, so they won't be seen as eating their own. So it's not all one-sided, but you ca argue proportions.