Unfortunately for the Trump family, Intelligence is heritable

[Opoponax]

successful!=intelligent
And I am not even sure any of these people are independently successful.

Americans do seem to have this bizarre idea that rich=successful=intelligent; That somehow by inheriting a fortune from your great grandfather, your IQ is instantly raised by 80 points.

The reality that wealth is generally an indicator of good luck, that success need not include conspicuous wealth, and that intelligence might well lead one to the realization that wealth beyond a certain (rather low) bar is futile, never seems to occur to them.

Frankly, I see anyone who has more millions than he has children as either a lucky bastard who did nothing to earn it; or a fucking idiot who has wasted his life earning more than he could possibly ever sensibly spend.

My experience with people who make a lot of money is not that they're especially intelligent, but that they're good at in the way that certain people are mechanically inclined. For example, a guy who can see the husk of a 1938 Lincoln, and then turn it into an amazing recreation of its original condition isn't considered a genius, but he does possess a particular genius for that skill. And so it goes with most rich people. They have a singular genius for money and/or business. Outside of that, their opinion on anything else is no more credible than anyone else. Unfortunately, most people, American or otherwise, don't see it that way. They'll attribute whatever shit falls out of the mouth of a rich person as more informed and more worthy because they're standing atop a pile of cash.

Trump is the perversion of the American dream. An already wealthy buffoon who has abused his incredibly fortunate station in life and is not only unapologetic, but proud and boisterous of it. Of what redeeming qualities can be spoken about the man that can even begin to make up for the damage he's done?

And the further perversion is this: Barack Obama came from what many would describe as nothing to becoming a lawyer, a Senator, and a twice elected U.S. President. The whole, "You can become anything you want to in America" was actually true for him. He struggled, he had strikes against him the day he was born. He overcame tremendous odds based wholly on hard work and merit, only to be spit upon by the very people who bleat about "The American Dream" louder and longer than anyone else.

This nation is sick and I don't think we can recover from it.

 

[RavenSky]

I don't know the legal history here. But essentially, the idea is to prevent foreign states from influencing American elections. The point is, though, that now the Democrats have something concrete.

And as far as I'm concerned the only proper remedy is to void the advantage he got. Trump/Pence is voided from the ballot, Hillary wins.

For a change, I agree with you

 

[RavenSky]

I'd wager they're both more successful than anyone spending their days posting on this forum.

Depends how you measure "success". I don't know of anyone other than Trump Sr. who received a 9-digit inheritance, and still had to resort to fraud and mob connections to keep him afloat. I'd call him an utter FAIL of unpresidented proportion.

Agree bigly!

 

[RavenSky]

Americans do seem to have this bizarre idea that rich=successful=intelligent; That somehow by inheriting a fortune from your great grandfather, your IQ is instantly raised by 80 points.

The reality that wealth is generally an indicator of good luck, that success need not include conspicuous wealth, and that intelligence might well lead one to the realization that wealth beyond a certain (rather low) bar is futile, never seems to occur to them.

Frankly, I see anyone who has more millions than he has children as either a lucky bastard who did nothing to earn it; or a fucking idiot who has wasted his life earning more than he could possibly ever sensibly spend.

My experience with people who make a lot of money is not that they're especially intelligent, but that they're good at in the way that certain people are mechanically inclined. For example, a guy who can see the husk of a 1938 Lincoln, and then turn it into an amazing recreation of its original condition isn't considered a genius, but he does possess a particular genius for that skill. And so it goes with most rich people. They have a singular genius for money and/or business. Outside of that, their opinion on anything else is no more credible than anyone else. Unfortunately, most people, American or otherwise, don't see it that way. They'll attribute whatever shit falls out of the mouth of a rich person as more informed and more worthy because they're standing atop a pile of cash.

Trump is the perversion of the American dream. An already wealthy buffoon who has abused his incredibly fortunate station in life and is not only unapologetic, but proud and boisterous of it. Of what redeeming qualities can be spoken about the man that can even begin to make up for the damage he's done?

And the further perversion is this: Barack Obama came from what many would describe as nothing to becoming a lawyer, a Senator, and a twice elected U.S. President. The whole, "You can become anything you want to in America" was actually true for him. He struggled, he had strikes against him the day he was born. He overcame tremendous odds based wholly on hard work and merit, only to be spit upon by the very people who bleat about "The American Dream" louder and longer than anyone else.

This nation is sick and I don't think we can recover from it.

cr;jq Very well said.

 

[iolo]

Americans do seem to have this bizarre idea that rich=successful=intelligent; That somehow by inheriting a fortune from your great grandfather, your IQ is instantly raised by 80 points.

The reality that wealth is generally an indicator of good luck, that success need not include conspicuous wealth, and that intelligence might well lead one to the realization that wealth beyond a certain (rather low) bar is futile, never seems to occur to them.

Frankly, I see anyone who has more millions than he has children as either a lucky bastard who did nothing to earn it; or a fucking idiot who has wasted his life earning more than he could possibly ever sensibly spend.

My experience with people who make a lot of money is not that they're especially intelligent, but that they're good at in the way that certain people are mechanically inclined. For example, a guy who can see the husk of a 1938 Lincoln, and then turn it into an amazing recreation of its original condition isn't considered a genius, but he does possess a particular genius for that skill. And so it goes with most rich people. They have a singular genius for money and/or business. Outside of that, their opinion on anything else is no more credible than anyone else. Unfortunately, most people, American or otherwise, don't see it that way. They'll attribute whatever shit falls out of the mouth of a rich person as more informed and more worthy because they're standing atop a pile of cash.

Trump is the perversion of the American dream. An already wealthy buffoon who has abused his incredibly fortunate station in life and is not only unapologetic, but proud and boisterous of it. Of what redeeming qualities can be spoken about the man that can even begin to make up for the damage he's done?

And the further perversion is this: Barack Obama came from what many would describe as nothing to becoming a lawyer, a Senator, and a twice elected U.S. President. The whole, "You can become anything you want to in America" was actually true for him. He struggled, he had strikes against him the day he was born. He overcame tremendous odds based wholly on hard work and merit, only to be spit upon by the very people who bleat about "The American Dream" louder and longer than anyone else.

This nation is sick and I don't think we can recover from it.

A man respected and admired by the whole world, except for Republican racists.

 

[ZiprHead]

"One of the things with the wall is, you need transparency," Trump said. "You have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can't see through the wall—so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what's on the other side of the wall."

"And I’ll give you an example. As horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don't see them—they hit you in the head with 60 pounds of stuff? It's over," Trump said. "As crazy as that sounds, you need transparency through that wall."

Holy crap! He sounds just like Loren when he's trying to act like he knows what he's talking about.

 

[Jimmy Higgins]

"One of the things with the wall is, you need transparency," Trump said. "You have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can't see through the wall—so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what's on the other side of the wall."

"And I’ll give you an example. As horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don't see them—they hit you in the head with 60 pounds of stuff? It's over," Trump said. "As crazy as that sounds, you need transparency through that wall."

Holy crap! He sounds just like Loren when he's trying to act like he knows what he's talking about.

As crazy as that sounds... yes... that sounds very crazy. I think there is an amendment to deal with that.

 

[blastula]

He didn't delete an email that implicates him in a conspiracy to collude with foreign agents in an election. Not so bright.

I meant his father-in-law. And for Jr., how is there collusion if nothing becomes of the meeting? Wasn't the original hysteria over hacked emails? Has the desperate narrative moved on to even more flimsy conjectures?

We don't know nothing came of the meeting. But collusion just requires the intent, not the fruition. Though the emails may not be enough to show there was collusion in a crime. They do show willingness to collude with Russians.