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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM

JBC31187 Since: Jan, 2015
#178551: Mar 19th 2017 at 8:51:10 AM

I don't think Putin is dumb enough to turn down decent advice, as long as it conforms to his goals/worldview. There was a time when Sean Hannity actually said we should invest in green technology- not because climate change is a real threat, but so we're not wasting money in the Middle East.

TheWanderer Student of Story from Somewhere in New England (Time Abyss) Relationship Status: Wishfully thinking
Student of Story
#178552: Mar 19th 2017 at 9:00:59 AM

Fair point, and as I certainly no expert on either Putin or Russia, I won't speculate further.

In other news, I think this picture may make some people's day

For those who don't want to or are unable to click, it's a picture of a former Trump supporter outside a building where Trump was giving a speech. He's holding a gigantic sign saying "I've made a huge mistake." Only way it could have been better is if he spelled it yuge. tongue

| Wandering, but not lost. | If people bring so much courage to this world...◊ |
CenturyEye Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign? from I don't know where the Yith sent me this time... Since: Jan, 2017 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign?
#178553: Mar 19th 2017 at 9:24:15 AM

Authoritarianism—or just tyrannical bosses—in general have a chilling effect on good advice as employees become more risk averse.
That said, I'm sure the Russian leadership know this. Oil fluctuations have been used against them for at least half a century when the Saudis tried to undercut Soviet production. They're likely moving as best as the Russian state apparatus can accomplish.

Stateside, the GOP is arguing about who would do the best job of licking Trump's boots: Gray hires rival’s staff, defends Trump credentials in Georgia special election

Republican Bob Gray hired the staffers who quit a rival campaign’s staff en masse after complaining she couldn’t pay their campaign bills, the latest move in an increasingly bitter race to represent a suburban Atlanta district.

Jack Melton, the former campaign manager for tea party activist Amy Kremer, said the Republican side of the April 18 special election appears to be between Gray and former Secretary of State Karen Handel – and that Gray was his pick “as the only conservative outsider in this race.”

Many Republican analysts now see Democrat Jon Ossoff, who has become a fundraising dynamo for national Democrats, as a shoo-in to lock up one of the spots in a likely June 20 runoff to win the seat, which stretches from east Cobb to north De Kalb. That’s prompted the 11 Republicans in the 18-candidate field scrambling for a slice of the electorate to sharpen their attacks on each other and Ossoff in the final month before the vote.

Gray, a former Johns Creek city councilman, has faced his own questions about the depth of his support for Donald Trump, who he has put at the center of his campaign. Other Trump loyalists have accused him of papering over his past support for Trump’s rivals in the 2016 primary, pointing to social media posts purported to be from Gray critical of the president.

“The Republicans cannot afford to lose this seat to the liberal Democrat Ossoff by putting forward a fatally flawed candidate, who now appears to have not only been lying throughout the campaign about not being a politician but has been lying about his support for Donald Trump in an effort to try and further his political career,” said former state Sen. Judson Hill, another GOP contender.

Gray spokesman Joash Thomas on Saturday called the allegations “simply fake and untrue” and pointed to Gray’s work at Trump’s Georgia campaign office during the campaign as “something that can’t be photo-shopped.”

“Failing campaigns always attack first,” he said. “It’s not surprising that we’re a target.”


Funny that führerprinzip should come up

Look with century eyes... With our backs to the arch And the wreck of our kind We will stare straight ahead For the rest of our lives
DingoWalley1 Asgore Adopts Noelle Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
Asgore Adopts Noelle
#178554: Mar 19th 2017 at 9:31:23 AM

[up] It'd be so funny if Bob Gray loses to Jon Ossoff because the Tea Partiers and Alt-Right members think he was a RINO, and refuse to vote for him.

MorningStar1337 The Encounter that ended the Dogma from 🤔 Since: Nov, 2012
The Encounter that ended the Dogma
#178555: Mar 19th 2017 at 12:36:14 PM

Intelligence Chairman (R-CA for those interested) and a Ranking Democrat on the House Committee both didn't find any proof on the "Obama Wiretapping Trump" claims. Meaning that Trump's accusations are still unsubstantiated.

edited 19th Mar '17 12:38:22 PM by MorningStar1337

HextarVigar That guy from The Big House Since: Feb, 2015
That guy
#178556: Mar 19th 2017 at 12:42:46 PM

Well duh.

edited 19th Mar '17 12:42:56 PM by HextarVigar

Your momma's so dumb she thinks oral sex means talking dirty.
MarkVonLewis Since: Jun, 2010
#178557: Mar 19th 2017 at 12:52:34 PM

Just read an interesting article where the author made a point that Hunter S Thompson predicted the rise of "Trumpism" in his book about the Hell's Angels. It was an interesting read, the main point being that a lot of Trumpists likely voted out of a sense of "total retaliation". I can get the link if anyone is interested.

BearyScary Since: Sep, 2010 Relationship Status: You spin me right round, baby
#178558: Mar 19th 2017 at 12:53:57 PM

I've seen that picture of the man who said "I Made a Huge Mistake" in voting for Trump. Is this a sign that his supporters are starting to turn on him?

Do not obey in advance.
SeptimusHeap from Switzerland (Edited uphill both ways) Relationship Status: Mu
#178559: Mar 19th 2017 at 12:55:46 PM

One or two people, probably.

"For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled." - Richard Feynman
MarkVonLewis Since: Jun, 2010
#178560: Mar 19th 2017 at 12:55:57 PM

It's possible. Trump is just a sleazy, second hand car salesman that sells you a car that has a transmission break when it gets home.

Zendervai Since: Oct, 2009
#178561: Mar 19th 2017 at 12:58:22 PM

Maybe not his core supporters, but the ones who voted for him because they thought Clinton would be worse. And then Trump proceeded to literally do almost everything he accused her of.

Also, the "America needs respect" people because it's dawning on them that Trump's a laughingstock and no one in the world respects him. People don't even fear him right for these people. People don't fear Trump for his power. They fear him for his stupidity.

DingoWalley1 Asgore Adopts Noelle Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
Asgore Adopts Noelle
#178562: Mar 19th 2017 at 1:07:56 PM

[up] Yeah, what the guy above me says: The Moderates/Centrists/Independence that thought Trump could bring back Jobs and MAGA (I refuse to say it at this point) are the ones turning on him, not his core base of Alt-Righters and Teapublicans.

CenturyEye Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign? from I don't know where the Yith sent me this time... Since: Jan, 2017 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign?
#178563: Mar 19th 2017 at 1:08:33 PM

More people weigh in: Claims GCHQ wiretapped Trump 'nonsense' - NSA's Ledgett

The claim that GCHQ carried out surveillance on Donald Trump during the election campaign is "arrant nonsense", Rick Ledgett, the number two at the US National Security Agency (NSA) has told the BBC in an exclusive interview.

A commentator on Fox News had claimed that GCHQ had carried out the activity on America's behalf, but Mr Ledgett said the claim showed "a complete lack of understanding in how the relationship works".

Each side, he said, was prohibited from asking the other partner to carry out acts that they were prohibited from doing.

He also said the huge risks to the UK in carrying out such an act would completely outweigh any benefits.

"Of course they wouldn't do it. It would be epically stupid," he told me.

GCHQ had also dismissed the allegation as nonsense.


The same article, slightly different topic
"It's a truism that the more things you connect to a network, the more vulnerabilities you introduce," Mr Ledgett argued, adding that he did not have what are called "Internet of Things" devices in his own home.

Last week there were claims that the CIA - along with Britain's MI 5 - had found vulnerabilities in some "smart" TV sets which allowed them to be turned into bugging devices.

Mr Ledgett emphasised that the mission of the NSA was to focus on foreign intelligence and not domestic.

He said that 90% of vulnerabilities in systems that the NSA spotted were reported to companies so they could fix them. And any vulnerabilities that the agency sought to leave in place to exploit for intelligence gathering needed to be approved by other government agencies.

"There's a fringe narrative out there that the US and UK and all these other governments are willy-nilly just exploiting every vulnerability in every device they can in order to gather information into a big pile and then root through it for interesting things. That's not what we do at all."

He acknowledged that the debate around the NSA's power was healthy, but said the way it came about was bad, referring to the Edward Snowden revelations.

He said that while he would not point to specific terrorist attacks or deaths as a result of disclosures, the NSA had seen one thousand "entities" (such as terrorist groups or foreign military units) which had tried to change behaviour to avoid surveillance.

Look with century eyes... With our backs to the arch And the wreck of our kind We will stare straight ahead For the rest of our lives
Gilphon (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#178564: Mar 19th 2017 at 1:09:45 PM

I wouldn't expect the Tea Party to stick with him indefinitely, though- an dedicated anti-establish ethos can't stand with the current president for all that long without pivoting.

Bat178 Since: May, 2011
#178565: Mar 19th 2017 at 1:11:02 PM

This feels like the transition from the 70's to the 80's all over again. Democrats reacted pretty much the same way back then and had the same worries (Particularly about a environmental apocalypse), too.

CenturyEye Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign? from I don't know where the Yith sent me this time... Since: Jan, 2017 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
Tell Me, Have You Seen the Yellow Sign?
#178566: Mar 19th 2017 at 1:18:40 PM

It looked more like the tea partiers were a reaction to President Obama than "the establishment," and, going off the earlier White Socialism article, a reaction to the expansion of civil and economic rights. They may end up being Trump's staunchest supporters no matter how they dress it up with "fiscal responsibility." And they wouldn't be the first apparently odd couple. The evangelicals—of moral guardianship and all—went for Trump over Cruz by a landslide.

Look with century eyes... With our backs to the arch And the wreck of our kind We will stare straight ahead For the rest of our lives
Proglottid Since: Mar, 2010
#178567: Mar 19th 2017 at 1:44:53 PM

[up] People so buttmad over having a black president they didn't have a problem throwing their country and everyone in it to the wolves if it meant they could go back to mayo

edited 19th Mar '17 1:45:08 PM by Proglottid

sgamer82 Since: Jan, 2001
#178568: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:33:07 PM

Of course, the only mayo choice was a woman so they had to settle for the all American cheeto

Falrinn Since: Dec, 2014
#178569: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:37:21 PM

Well according to Gallup his approval rating is at an all-time low of 37%.

It's dipped below 40% twice before, but only for a single day on both occasions. If it stays below 40% for the next few days it could be a sign that his support base is starting to crack.

sgamer82 Since: Jan, 2001
#178570: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:47:48 PM

Dumb question: It isn't normal for Presidents to see such huge drops in approval within the first 100 days? If/when it does happen, how easily/quickly do they bounce back?

Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#178571: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:52:06 PM

Large drops? Sure. Numbers below 50%? That's rare.

It took Bush five or six years to get that low.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
Gilphon (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
#178572: Mar 19th 2017 at 3:07:14 PM

Normally new presidents go through a 'honeymoon period' for the first few months after the election, and drop off to whatever their baseline is after that. So, if that held true this time, mid 40s is what Trump's approval ceiling looks like.

His approval ratings for the first month, are, be to clear, the worst on record. note 

edited 19th Mar '17 3:07:56 PM by Gilphon

Wyldchyld (Old as dirt)
#178573: Mar 19th 2017 at 3:14:36 PM

Anyone know anything more about this CNN report?

Trump may move GOP health care bill to the right, dooming it in the Senate

The Trump administration, under pressure from conservative lawmakers, appears increasingly open to changing legislation repealing and replacing Obamacare in order to placate the right — but that may guarantee at least this version of the bill is as good as dead in the Senate.

The political calculation is setting off a domino effect on Capitol Hill.

Just days to go before a Thursday vote on the House GOP bill, moderate Republicans have already expressed deep reservations about making drastic reforms to the current health care system. Making additional changes to satisfy conservatives is certain to strengthen opposition among centrist Republicans.

But moving the bill to the right dooms the proposal in the Senate, where the GOP has a razor-thin majority.

If my post doesn't mention a giant flying sperm whale with oversized teeth and lionfish fins for flippers, it just isn't worth reading.
Falrinn Since: Dec, 2014
#178574: Mar 19th 2017 at 3:15:31 PM

[up][up][up]

In Bush's case the main reason it took so long for his approval rating to drop before 50% is because it took so long for the patriotic fervor caused by the 9/11 terrorist attacks to completely fade. His approval rating spiked all the way up to 90% in the immediate aftermath of the attacks when it had previously been in the 50-60% range.

Because of this, he shouldn't be seen as a "typical case" when it comes to the trends Presidential approval ratings follow.

CrimsonZephyr Would that it were so simple. from Massachusetts Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
Would that it were so simple.
#178575: Mar 19th 2017 at 3:18:40 PM

Pretty much every president will have moments where they're pretty much hated. Even George Washington had a period in like 1793 where there were effigies of him burning in every American city. Trump is unprecedented in that he started off deeply unpopular and pretty much stayed that way.

"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."

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