How Horrible is President Trump?

[lpetrich]

Boehner: Trump has been 'complete disaster' | Reuters That's former US House Speaker and fellow Republican John Boehner.

And while he praised Trump's aggressive steps to challenge the Islamic State militant group and other moves in international affairs, he was highly critical of the president's other early efforts.

"Everything else he's done has been a complete disaster," Boehner said at the energy conference in Houston on Wednesday, according to the energy publication Rigzone. "He's still learning how to be president."

...
Boehner also supported efforts to "get to the bottom" of any potential interactions between Trump associates and the Russian government. However, he described any calls to impeach Trump as the purview of "the crazy left-wing Democratic colleagues of mine."

Yet...

Germany's Top Magazine Just Called For Trump's Impeachment In A Blistering Editorial

120 days into Trump’s term, and the President of the United States has been reduced to America’s loud, obnoxious, mildly-racist and sexist uncle we avoid inviting to most big events. And when we can’t, we sit him in a dark corner, away from the bar, and just cross our fingers.

Here is that editorial: Donald Trump Is a Menace to the World: Opinion - SPIEGEL ONLINE

Donald Trump is not fit to be president of the United States. He does not possess the requisite intellect and does not understand the significance of the office he holds nor the tasks associated with it. He doesn't read. He doesn't bother to peruse important files and intelligence reports and knows little about the issues that he has identified as his priorities. His decisions are capricious and they are delivered in the form of tyrannical decrees.

He is a man free of morals. As has been demonstrated hundreds of times, he is a liar, a racist and a cheat. ...

Trump is a miserable politician. He fired the FBI director simply because he could. ...

Trump is also a miserable boss. His people invent excuses for him and lie on his behalf because they have to, but then Trump wakes up and posts tweets that contradict what they have said. ...

The U.S. elected a laughing stock to the presidency and has now made itself dependent on a joke of a man. The country is, as David Brooks wrote recently in the New York Times, dependent on a child. The Trump administration has no foreign policy because Trump has consistently promised American withdrawal while invoking America's strength. He has promised both no wars and more wars. He makes decisions according to his mood, with no strategic coherence or tactical logic. ...

Author Klaus Brinkbäumer then considered several scenarios for removing DT from office, though he concluded that all of them were very unlikely.

1. DT resigning? KB thinks that it won't happen.
2. The House and Senate Republicans impeaching him? KB thinks that they want power too much for that to happen.
3. His Cabinet invoking the 25th Amendment? KB thinks that unlikely also.
4. The Democrats win the House and Senate in 2018, enabling them to impeach DT.
5. Other nations work out ways to avoid involving the US. KB considers that the most likely possibility.

An obvious workaround is strengthening regional blocs like the European Union. This will mean less austerity, and it will also mean convincing the British leadership to reconsider leaving the EU.


I've thought of yet another scenario for getting DT out of power.

It's for his aides to insist on having the final say in making decisions and to reduce him to rubber-stamping those decisions. Something like the Mayor of the Palace in the later years of France's early-medieval Merovingian dynasty -- the later Merovingian kings were little more than rois fainéants.

That would turn him into a ceremonial or figurehead head of state, like what many nations have. Many of the world's remaining monarchies have such monarchs, and many republics have ceremonial presidents.

Making DT a président fainéant may be a difficult selling job, but it would likely involve *lots* of flattery, like assuring DT that he can have the glory of the Presidency without having to do any of its work.

 

[untermensche]

Yes he is a great uniter.

He unites the many against him.

As long as he is president he is uniting the world against the US.

 

[Cheerful Charlie]

The problem is, no matter how incompetent and sleazy Trump is, the real damage to the US and many of it's citizens will come from the GOP congress. The problem with Trump is, he wields the veto pen but won't use it wisely. We will have to see a truly disastrous political fiasco to energize enough Americans to end this farce. And that is not a sure thing.

 

[braces_for_impact]

It's pretty much been the shit show I expected, perhaps a bit worse than I imagined. It does seem that our checks and balances are working as designed. Nevertheless, he's doing an assload of damage. The only bright spots I can see is that he's revealing some weaknesses in our system that require patching if we can summon the political will. It also shows just how powerless the minority is when congress and the executive are held by the majority, which I find a little disconcerting.

What has really surprised me but probably shouldn't have as the complete and utter lack of moral courage on the right to act, and the extent to which their 10 years or so of hyperbole, misinformation, and distrust of expertise has weakened their own ability to govern.

 

[barbos]

It's pretty much been the shit show I expected, perhaps a bit worse than I imagined. It does seem that our checks and balances are working as designed. Nevertheless, he's doing an assload of damage. The only bright spots I can see is that he's revealing some weaknesses in our system that require patching if we can summon the political will. It also shows just how powerless the minority is when congress and the executive are held by the majority, which I find a little disconcerting.

What has really surprised me but probably shouldn't have as the complete and utter lack of moral courage on the right to act, and the extent to which their 10 years or so of hyperbole, misinformation, and distrust of expertise has weakened their own ability to govern.

What are these weaknesses? other than people over 70 and stupid having right to vote?

 

[T.G.G. Moogly]

Trump is a symptom. The millions who voted for him is the problem, and a sad one at that.

 

[Elixir]

It's pretty much been the shit show I expected, perhaps a bit worse than I imagined. It does seem that our checks and balances are working as designed. Nevertheless, he's doing an assload of damage. The only bright spots I can see is that he's revealing some weaknesses in our system that require patching if we can summon the political will. It also shows just how powerless the minority is when congress and the executive are held by the majority, which I find a little disconcerting.

What has really surprised me but probably shouldn't have as the complete and utter lack of moral courage on the right to act, and the extent to which their 10 years or so of hyperbole, misinformation, and distrust of expertise has weakened their own ability to govern.

What are these weaknesses? other than people over 70 and stupid having right to vote?

Vulnerability to the election of an autocratic moron by manipulation of the electoral map by an
adversary. Duh.

 

[bleubird]

Electoral college,maybe.

 

[Opoponax]

Trump is a symptom. The millions who voted for him is the problem, and a sad one at that.

I agree. That's where the real problem is. Trump is a person that should've been laughed out of the race for the Republican candidate inside 90 days. Countless people, far more qualified than Trump have been kicked to the curb for so much less. It took tens of millions of I don't know what the fuck kind of people to embrace brightly lit lies, hypocrisy, ignorance, and clearly foreshadowed incompetence and flat out sleaze to get Trump elected.

I was in 7-11 this morning. I'm pretty sure the guy could speak English, but all he did was kind of grunt. Yet, I knew what he wanted from me. Sure, it was only a transaction for two Red Bulls, but I wonder if that base level of communication is what Trump unwittingly tapped into. Allusions to primal necessity... shit, I don't know. I don't know that I'll ever get to a point where I'll understand it. Trying to make sense of it always leads back to me being reduced to saying, "Stupid motherfuckers."

 

[Opoponax]

What are these weaknesses? other than people over 70 and stupid having right to vote?

Vulnerability to the election of an autocratic moron by manipulation of the electoral map by an
adversary. Duh.

That's the systematic explanation. We all know that. But for that to be successful, people still had to vote for Trump. And the only solution, when a population of a nation becomes so utterly bereft of basic sensibilities, at last historically speaking, is massive bloodshed.

 

[Rhea]

The problem is, no matter how incompetent and sleazy Trump is, the real damage to the US and many of it's citizens will come from the GOP congress. The problem with Trump is, he wields the veto pen but won't use it wisely. We will have to see a truly disastrous political fiasco to energize enough Americans to end this farce. And that is not a sure thing.

I think the real damage is also coming from the power that Trump and his stupid family have handed on a platter to Russia.

Dangers that I see:

1. Russia able to blackmail key staffers and appointees. And Donald.
2. Unthinking Americans, trainined by the GOP and the religious right over decades to believe anything without thinking and voting this way
3. #2 being handed to the Russians with a bow on top when their goal is to destabilize America and bust up our alliances to weaken the West
4. Right wing GOP seizing the opportunity to recreate the feudal state domestically
5. Moderate GOP having no courage to stop it

I used to think Pence was worse. But now I am sure Putin is worse than Pence. And as long as we have Donald and Jared, we have Putin.

 

[braces_for_impact]

It's pretty much been the shit show I expected, perhaps a bit worse than I imagined. It does seem that our checks and balances are working as designed. Nevertheless, he's doing an assload of damage. The only bright spots I can see is that he's revealing some weaknesses in our system that require patching if we can summon the political will. It also shows just how powerless the minority is when congress and the executive are held by the majority, which I find a little disconcerting.

What has really surprised me but probably shouldn't have as the complete and utter lack of moral courage on the right to act, and the extent to which their 10 years or so of hyperbole, misinformation, and distrust of expertise has weakened their own ability to govern.

What are these weaknesses? other than people over 70 and stupid having right to vote?

I think that congress should usher in legislation to specifically 1) Have presidential candidates be required to show their tax documents. 2) If you're elected President, you must divest yourself of your assets as has been done in the past. 3) There should be more specific fleshing out of the Emoluments clause and it's requirements.

These have all been done voluntarily in the past for good reason. It should now be law.

Jokingly, or maybe not so jokingly, I think future presidential candidates should have an IQ higher than say, 80.

 

[Toni]

Trump is a symptom. The millions who voted for him is the problem, and a sad one at that.

I agree. That's where the real problem is. Trump is a person that should've been laughed out of the race for the Republican candidate inside 90 days. Countless people, far more qualified than Trump have been kicked to the curb for so much less. It took tens of millions of I don't know what the fuck kind of people to embrace brightly lit lies, hypocrisy, ignorance, and clearly foreshadowed incompetence and flat out sleaze to get Trump elected.

I was in 7-11 this morning. I'm pretty sure the guy could speak English, but all he did was kind of grunt. Yet, I knew what he wanted from me. Sure, it was only a transaction for two Red Bulls, but I wonder if that base level of communication is what Trump unwittingly tapped into. Allusions to primal necessity... shit, I don't know. I don't know that I'll ever get to a point where I'll understand it. Trying to make sense of it always leads back to me being reduced to saying, "Stupid motherfuckers."

More simple than that. Trump is a puppet easily enough manipulated but his masters are not the GOP power structure. Instead he appeals to racism, sexism, and the belief that you can sound as dumb as all fuck--be as dumb as all fuck, and still grow up to bang as many young beautiful women As you like, so long as you inherit a shit ton of cash from your crooked daddy and don't let anything silly like morals or a conscience get in your way. If you make the right friends in need of a useful idiot, you can even become president.

 

[blastula]

Yes, there are things that are done out of norms alone, because nobody thought it would be necessary to make laws about it, that Trump has trampled all over.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

However bad you think it is, the reality is worse.

 

[blastula]

To be fair it's not all Trump, though he has accelerated it, the GOP was trampling norms already, particularly with the stolen supreme court seat.

 

[Ford]

To be fair it's not all Trump, though he has accelerated it, the GOP was trampling norms already, particularly with the stolen supreme court seat.

Today Trump laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, and addressed the nation on Memorial Day, as is customary.


And the GOP and party members praised his performance, apparently forgetting the seething anger they expressed the last time a draft-dodging President did the same.

I'd say Trump has normalized hypocrisy, but his party has weaponized it.

 

[fast]

2) If you're elected President, you must divest yourself of your assets as has been done in the past.

No!

 

[rousseau]

Trump is a symptom. The millions who voted for him is the problem, and a sad one at that.

Roll the wheel back further, what caused those millions to be a problem? Arguably, it's not their fault, it's the result of the cultural and economic evolution of your country.

Hopefully the U.S. corrects and shifts left, if not extrapolation doesn't look too promising.

 

[Harry Bosch]

Trump is a symptom. The millions who voted for him is the problem, and a sad one at that.

Roll the wheel back further, what caused those millions to be a problem? Arguably, it's not their fault, it's the result of the cultural and economic evolution of your country.

Hopefully the U.S. corrects and shifts left, if not extrapolation doesn't look too promising.

The sides always shift. The republicans swept into power and have taken over every single branch of government. But they are overplaying their hand. I predict that they'll lose the house (probably not the senate). But then the dems will take the rest in 2020. Maybe they'll retake the supreme court (probably not for a generation). But at some point, the dems will overplay, then the republicans will retake. It's a pattern.