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

TheAirman Brightness from The vicinity of an area adjacent to a location Since: Feb, 2011 Relationship Status: Historians will say we were good friends.
Brightness
#266151: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:15:21 PM

Pelosi up

PSN ID: FateSeraph | Switch friendcode: SW-0145-8835-0610 Congratulations! She/They
MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#266152: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:16:09 PM

What? What did he say? Not all of us have had the luck of being able to tune in to his speech, whether it's because of not having actual access to the live feed for whatever reason, having forgotten to learn when it's supposed to start, simply finding his voice too grating to tolerate directly listening to, or any other possible reason.

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#266153: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:16:30 PM

Trump talking about the Vietnam War is revolting on so many levels.

Disgusted, but not surprised
TheAirman Brightness from The vicinity of an area adjacent to a location Since: Feb, 2011 Relationship Status: Historians will say we were good friends.
Brightness
#266154: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:19:14 PM

[up][up]"more Americans are going to die from drugs this year than died in the Vietnam War", and the expected Rape, Pillage, and Burn fearmongering.

Fortunately he did not declare a national emergency.

Honestly felt like vomitting during it.

Edited by TheAirman on Jan 8th 2019 at 8:21:14 AM

PSN ID: FateSeraph | Switch friendcode: SW-0145-8835-0610 Congratulations! She/They
ironballs16 Since: Jul, 2009 Relationship Status: Owner of a lonely heart
#266155: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:21:51 PM

[up]

Not to mention that that's conflating some very disparate information. The drugs found in New York likely didn't come from the Mexican border, after all, and the drugs in Iowa likely came from within the continental US. So lumping all of them into the "We need a wall!" speech is disingenuous at best, intellectually dishonest at worst. No points for realizing which is the more likely answer, though.

Edited by ironballs16 on Jan 8th 2019 at 9:23:06 AM

"Why would I inflict myself on somebody else?"
Fourthspartan56 from Georgia, US Since: Oct, 2016 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
#266156: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:22:06 PM

Ha, called it.

He'll bluster and moan and nothing will change, just like all the other times, he made public declarations during crisis.

"Einstein would turn over in his grave. Not only does God play dice, the dice are loaded." -Chairman Sheng-Ji Yang
Rationalinsanity from Halifax, Canada Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: It's complicated
#266157: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:24:05 PM

Sad to say that this was probably the best case scenario coming out of his address; more of the same rhetoric and no major escalation. No closer to ending the shutdown, but no constitutional crisis either.

Politics is the skilled use of blunt objects.
Euodiachloris Since: Oct, 2010
#266158: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:24:19 PM

Well, he's sort of right. If you squint a lot. Prescription opiates are going to keep on killing people by the thousands.

Not that those have anything much to do with border security. <_<

Edited by Euodiachloris on Jan 8th 2019 at 2:25:38 PM

MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#266159: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:41:00 PM

So lumping all of them into the "We need a wall!" speech is disingenuous at best, intellectually dishonest at worst. No points for realizing which is the more likely answer, though.
"Trump" and "intellectual" in any context that doesn't involve the latter being either qualified with "anti-" or attributed to someone else seems like an oxymoronic combination.

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
Ramidel Since: Jan, 2001
#266160: Jan 8th 2019 at 6:51:59 PM

@Marq: Deterrence doesn't work because criminals are stupid. Donald Trump is a prime example of this; you can bet that if he hadn't been born with a silver spoon in his mouth, he'd be another dumb hoodlum in jail for trying to return shoplifted goods to the store he stole them from.

The founder of deterrence theory, Cesare Beccaria, was an Enlightenment philosopher working on the assumption that human beings were rational actors, an assumption that doesn't apply to dumb thugs with no impulse control.

RainehDaze Nero Fangirl (4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
Nero Fangirl
#266161: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:00:12 PM

Sometimes, criminals are instead desperate and don't care.

Edited by RainehDaze on Jan 8th 2019 at 3:00:22 PM

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#266162: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:24:20 PM

Let's just go over the stupidity of Trumps ideas one at a time:

  • The majority of illegal immigrants "finger wag" are people who overstay normal visas.
  • They're down normally.
  • They're mostly nonviolent and more so than average Americans.
  • The crime in the country related to Mexico is due to America's powerful need for narcotics that they want.
  • When criminals do smuggle things into the country, they use tunnels or cross the border in other ways.
  • Opiods come from legal drug companies that have mislabeled the addictiveness and danger of their products.
  • Trump and the GOP refuse to allow pot as an alternative or any kind of help to treat these things or, GOD FORBID, hold the corporations responsible.
  • The 5 billion dollars for the wall could go to any number of better projects to help Americans.
  • Even if it's 20 feet tall, that's not hard to fucking cross. A rope would work. So would a ladder.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jan 8th 2019 at 7:30:24 AM

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#266163: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:26:33 PM

Historically speaking, walls have always been kind of shit at keeping people who really want into your turf out.

You'd think people would learn from the Great Wall of China, a massive waste of resources and lives which has been far more useful as a tourist trap than it ever was as a defense.

And somehow I doubt a Trump wall would get much tourism.

Edited by M84 on Jan 8th 2019 at 11:27:02 PM

Disgusted, but not surprised
DingoWalley1 Asgore Adopts Noelle Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
Asgore Adopts Noelle
#266164: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:30:46 PM

So how was the Schumer-Pelosi speech? I hope it was much better then Trump's Speech; Trump might be able to keep the Republicans in line with Fear Mongering, but that won't attract the majority of Americans (you only have to look at most Republicans that ran on Anti-Immigration Fears losing last year to see that), and a good speech from Schumer and Pelosi will help alot.

Edited by DingoWalley1 on Jan 8th 2019 at 10:32:09 AM

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#266165: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:31:34 PM

Look at the Maginot Line.

An army needs to be mobile.

Except, again, the people Trump wants to keep out are completely harmless and usually a boon to the United States.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
Parable Since: Aug, 2009
#266166: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:36:30 PM

Pelosi and Schumer more or less said what they've been saying:

Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., accused President Donald Trump on Tuesday night of using "the backdrop of the Oval Office to manufacture a crisis" in his prime-time address to the nation.

“We can secure our border without an expensive, ineffective wall. And we can welcome legal immigrants and refugees without compromising safety and security,” said Schumer during the brief official Democratic response to the president's remarks. "The symbol of America should be the Statue of Liberty, not a 30-foot wall."

“There is an obvious solution: separate the shutdown from the arguments over border security," Scumer said, standing beside Pelosi in the Capitol. "There is bipartisan legislation — supported by Democrats and Republicans — to re-open government while allowing debate over border security to continue.”

DingoWalley1 Asgore Adopts Noelle Since: Feb, 2014 Relationship Status: Can't buy me love
Asgore Adopts Noelle
#266167: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:39:02 PM

[up] That's good. Hopefully it helps keep our side, and those who are neutral on the issue, together against Trump.

In even better news, 51% of all Americans now blame Trump for the Government Shutdown, and only 54% of Republicans continue to support the Shut Down for the Wall, according to Reuters/Ipsos (from a Jan. 1-7 Survey).

The longer this drags out, the more Trump is going to be blamed and the more Republicans are going to stop supporting it, especially when it starts affecting their finances.

Parable Since: Aug, 2009
#266168: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:41:28 PM

And virtually every Democrat in office is saying the same thing on air or on social media. There's a lot of emphasis on the fact that the situation at the border and the shutdown are a Trump manufactured crisis.

tsstevens Reading tropes such as You Know What You Did from Reading tropes such as Righting Great Wrongs Since: Oct, 2010 Relationship Status: She's holding a very large knife
Reading tropes such as You Know What You Did
#266169: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:54:28 PM

So, serious question here. No shade on Trump here. His actions over the past month, how close do the experts think he is to making the world burn just so he can be king of the ashes?

Currently reading up My Rule Fu Is Stronger than Yours
CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#266170: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:58:05 PM

I think people who keep trying to make Trump the Antichrist are making themselves look like Qanon followers for trying to make him more than he is.

He's a misogynist conman with mafia and dictatorship ties who likes young women, money, and fancy houses. He hates brown people. There's nothing even that exceptional about Trump in how much of an Ugly American he is.

He's not the Big Bad.

Edited by CharlesPhipps on Jan 8th 2019 at 7:58:59 AM

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
nombretomado (Season 1) Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#266171: Jan 8th 2019 at 7:58:21 PM

That feels like a question inviting pointless speculation instead of constructive discussion, when the latter is what should be comprising the thread. Let's not encourage the former.

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#266172: Jan 8th 2019 at 8:00:29 PM

It reminds me a bit of the treatment of Nixon by Hunter S. Thompson and other counter culture figures.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
M84 Oh, bother. from Our little blue planet Since: Jun, 2010 Relationship Status: Chocolate!
Oh, bother.
#266173: Jan 8th 2019 at 8:02:54 PM

Real life is rarely so convenient as fiction to give us an overarching Big Bad.

Disgusted, but not surprised
BearyScary Since: Sep, 2010 Relationship Status: You spin me right round, baby
#266174: Jan 8th 2019 at 8:05:37 PM

I read a series of comments on an Imgur post saying that the wall would cost a hell of a lot more than just five billion overall to be built and maintained. I don't know if all of that was true, but it puts the bleating for five billion for the wall in an even worse light.

Do not obey in advance.
unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#266175: Jan 8th 2019 at 8:08:26 PM

Trump is US big bad? sure.

Problem is that he is a cartoon satudary villian who for some odd reason he won, when he shoudnt.

Like you can almost expect trump to yell in twitter "and I would have won if it wasnt for Peloski and those middling democrats!".

Is the baffling thing here: Trump is pretty much a sitcom chararter cross with capitan planet villian.

Edited by unknowing on Jan 8th 2019 at 12:09:58 PM

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"

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