Category Archives: Donald Trump

UPDATED: Political Tribes & The Donald Trump Jr. Contretemps

Conservatism, Democrats, Donald Trump, Individualism Vs. Collectivism, Republicans, Russia

I checked out social media before dipping the proverbial toe in the water, this morning. The Right—libertarian, conservative, Republican—is behind Trump, no matter. The Left is against him, no matter what. Tribalists all.

The reaction to Donald Trump Jr. contretemps epitomizes tribalism, if you ask me; but if you’re a tribalist, you won’t ask me.

The silver lining? Maybe we’ll finally be rid of Jared Kushner. Wife Ivanka follows him back to New York, in short order.

Fin.

AND FAT CHANCE.

The Story is Here. If you’re a member of Tribe I, you think it’s a non-story. If you’re a member of Tribe II; you’re into it. It’s your smoking gun.

UPDATE: But there is a truth here, beyond the two tribes’ positions. And the “What about when the Democrats did this or that” won’t cut it as an argument.

If Only Trump Had Russia Expert Stephen Cohen Speak For Him

Donald Trump, Foreign Policy, Media, Politics, Russia

Witnessed today, explains Stephen Cohen, professor emeritus of Russian studies at Princeton University, is “A new detente, anti-cold war partnership between Presidents Trump and Putin. Attempts to sabotage it [continue to] escalate. … [Still], this is the most fateful meeting between an American and Russian president since the wartime. The reason being that the relationship between the two countries is so dangerous right now. Trump could have been cowed by the Russia Gate attacks on him, yet he was not. Trump was politically courageous.”

Important things were decided upon. The president emerged as a statesman, contends Cohen, who had witnessed other summits with Russians under previous American presidents, including Bush I.

Professor S. Cohen is the man who ought to be speaker for the Trump Admin on Russian affairs, but he won’t be, because the president has surrounded himself with philosophical enemies, daughter included.

Did Hillary Hawk Lose Because She’s A Lot Like Chucky Krauthammer?

Donald Trump, Foreign Policy, Hillary Clinton, Middle East, Military, Neoconservatism, War

A new study makes the case that Hillary Clinton lost because the poor, largely white communities which pay for war forevermore, got sick of paying.

… professors argue that Clinton lost the battleground states of Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Michigan in last year’s presidential election because they had some of the highest casualty rates during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and voters there saw Clinton as the pro-war candidate.

By contrast, her pro-war positions did not hurt her in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and California, the study says; because those states were relatively unscathed by the Middle East wars.

The study is titled “Battlefield Casualties and Ballot Box Defeat: Did the Bush-Obama Wars Cost Clinton the White House?” Authors Francis Shen, associate professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, and Dougas Kriner, a political science professor at Boston University, strike a populist note:

I hope so. And let’s hope Trump remembers running on a plank of no more unwarranted, aggressive unconstitutional wars. (Good move today in initiating cooperation with Russia.) However, whenever I watch soldiers selected to appear on Fox News, they’re cheering loudest for war, and damning those who object.

POTUS In Poland And The Neoconservative Threat

Donald Trump, Europe, Islam, Neoconservatism, The West

The president began his address to the Polish with praise for his wife, long-overdue: “… no better ambassador for our country than our beautiful First Lady, Melania.”

Of concern is that President Trump’s powerful address to the People of Poland, on July 6, 2017, has become a repository for neoconservative fantasies of world domination.

What President Trump said is hardly a Rorschach blot: fuzzy, hazy verbal vapor, designed to absorb the listener’s projected emotions and reflect them back soothingly. The neoconservatives, however, are back. And the Never-Trumpsters have stepped into their former positions in media.

Chucky Krauthammer rides again.


The Poles Like Gen. Lee’s Battle Flag:

READ: Remarks by President Trump to the People of Poland | July 6, 2017.

See it.