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Purgatory: Oops - your Trump presidency discussion thread.

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  • Simon Toad wrote: »
    AFZ, are the four 'countries' that constitute the United Kingdom sovereign? Is Northern Ireland a country? I bristle at that last one, like I REALLY bristle at that last one. Like, I didn't think I had an Irish Republican bone left in me but it turns out I was wrong type of bristle. How is England sovereign, as distinct from the United Kingdom? These questions suggest that the linked explanation is flawed.

    OK, so it's not perfect, but to be fair, I would argue that the problem lies more with the actual organisation of the UK rather than the YouTube video as I think the UK actually defies explanation... :wink: The nations of the UK are not sovereign. Wales is now defined as a country but until quite recently was only a Principality. I think NI is still classified as a 'province' but one could argue that these distinctions don't matter as they all have equal constitutional status in theory - they all send MPs to Parliament on an equal footing. By this, I don't mean to deny that the larger size of England means that it dominates the UK - it clearly does.

    But back to the Donald. I agree with you, with regards to the Mueller report. From what I have read there is no shortage of evidence and Mueller is a thorough and decent man as well as an effective investigator. Hence the impeachment threshold of 'High crimes or misdemeanors' will doubtless be reached.* Whether congress will act in accordance with the constitution is a slightly different question. It does seems to be a far-too political one.

    AFZ

    *For anyone interested, Cass Sunstein, Impeachment: A Citizen's Guide is an excellent, very accessible read. [Link to UK Amazon]



  • I do notice the article said Trmp claimed he was 15 minutes early. Not the case. Fact is, he was 1 minute late. It says nothing about him walking ahead of the queen in reviewing the troops.
  • stetsonstetson Shipmate
    I think the "nations" of the UK are kind of like the "cities" of New York? I once met a guy from Brooklyn who assured me that Brooklyn was indeed a city, but when I pressed him for details about how it actually exercises the rights and privileges of a city, he couldn't really tell me.
  • Sounds similar Stetson, although I am as ignorant of the organisation of New York as Trump is of Britain. Indeed, I find the whole geography of that area of the US a bit baffling - around New York and New Jersey and exactly where everything fits in I mean. Driving from New York to Washington DC helped a bit, especially with Baltimore and Philly, but it is still all a bit foggy for me. One bit that shocked me on that drive was it looked like the freeway had just ploughed through a bit of a town, with nothing but a chain fence between this massive road and ramshackle houses on both sides. I thought about the kids mostly, and how sad it must be to have to live like that, right on a freeway. We detoured through a bit of Baltimore too, and that was an eye-opener.

    (votive)
  • Brooklyn is one of the five boroughs of New York City. The others are Queens, Staten Island, The Bronx, and Manhattan. Brooklyn and Queens form the western end of Long Island (which also has two other counties that are not part of New York City). Manhattan and Staten Island are islands. The Bronx is on the mainland, just north of Manhattan. Confused yet? Each of the five boroughs is an individual county. I don't know if there is any other place on earth where a city is larger than a county and, in fact, is comprised of five counties. (The counties are Manhattan=New York County, Brooklyn=Kings County, Staten Island=Richmond County, and the Bronx and Queens have the same name for their counties as their boroughs.) Most tourists never set off out of Manhattan unless they take the ferry to Staten Island or go to a baseball game.
  • Well, whatever the timing, she did look at her watch. So, more "Dear God, when will this end?" rather than "Where's that obnoxious git?"
  • Simon Toad wrote: »
    Driving from New York to Washington DC helped a bit, especially with Baltimore and Philly, but it is still all a bit foggy for me. One bit that shocked me on that drive was it looked like the freeway had just ploughed through a bit of a town, with nothing but a chain fence between this massive road and ramshackle houses on both sides. I thought about the kids mostly, and how sad it must be to have to live like that, right on a freeway.

    A very long but highly fascinating read is historian Robert A. Caro's The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York. Moses was the mastermind behind the freeway and park system of New York City and much of Long Island, but he did it at the expense of public transportation and low-middle income housing.
  • Pigwidgeon wrote: »
    Brooklyn is one of the five boroughs of New York City.
    Originally an independent city, Brooklyn was annexed by the City of New York in 1896.
  • Cheers Amanda. That could be good.

    Also, the annexation of Brooklyn causes me to giggle like the little boy fascinated by WW2 that I once was. I'm still a little boy...
  • LydaLyda Shipmate
    Wesley J wrote: »
    Lyda wrote: »
    Ivanka was asked "Is the media the enemy of the people?" First she seemed surprised and said, "Sorry?" The question was repeated and she smiled and said, "No. I do not."
    If this is true, I am appalled that she didn't even deign to answer in a grammatically correct manner. 'No, they aren't' (or 'No, it isn't') would be much better. And 'Dad, stop that nonsense and resign now', perhaps the best.

    In related news, I've come across this, reported in Canada by CBS:
    In a divided U.S., therapists treating anxiety are hearing the same name over and over: Donald Trump - 'Trump Anxiety Disorder' may not be an official diagnosis, but therapists know the symptoms

    I find that remarkable, and it helps to put a name to it.
    Erm. Perhaps the repetition of the question was "Do you believe the media is the enemy of the people?" I'd have to go back and look, but it didn't sound strange to me when she said it, so I probably just reported it awkwardly.

  • Wesley JWesley J Circus Host
    To be frank, I'd much more prefer Ivanka to be awkward. She is part of the clan, and haven't they just shut down her very own clothes brand? Nobody was buying them anymore.

    And how I wish nobody was buying into 45's lies, half-truths and bullying anymore, either!
  • stetson wrote: »
    I once met a guy from Brooklyn who assured me that Brooklyn was indeed a city.

    Not to prolong the tangent, but part of the confusion may also stem from the fact that Manhattan is the only borough that the post office addresses as New York, NY. The other boroughs are addressed by their name: Bronx, NY, Brooklyn, NY, Staten Island, NY -- except for Queens, where each neighborhood has its own post office address: Astoria, NY, East Elmhurst, NY, Jackson Heights, NY, etc.
  • I think the only way to understand New York City is to have lived there, and even then you might not.
    :wink:
  • Anglican BratAnglican Brat Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    Kamala Harris for President,
    KarlLB wrote: »
    I've got a video on my Bookface thing feed which apparently has him totally confused over Britain, Great Britain, UK and England.. apparently we used to be called England but now we're the UK or something. The man's an idiot.

    To be fair, plenty of people I know of see England, the UK, Britain, all the same thing.

    Queen Elizabeth of course is the "Queen of England", even though England hasn't had its own monarch since 1714.

    It of course, is a long grudge by the Scottish, the Welsh and the Irish in Northern Ireland, that they are an afterthought to the English in many people's eyes.
  • King James the first of England and sixth of Scotland reigned from 1603. Wales has been ruled by the English crown since Edward 1 annexed it between 1277 and 1283 and Ireland was partially annexed much earlier than 1714. 1714 is when House of Hanover took over from the House of Stuart following the death of Queen Anne.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    Is this about the Queen of England, or is it about New York? I am a little confused>

    I do find it interesting the women of the Trmp clan are not afraid to speak their minds.
    Ivanka says separating children was cruel and inhuman. She also refuses to call the press the enemy of the people. Melina writes that she would be honored to visit LaBraun James' school after Trmp denounced James as being not too smart.

    Something tells me family get-togethers are pretty frosty.

    And the marriage bed is damn could--I think Don and Melina have separate bedrooms--- which really is not all that unusual in Presidential history.
  • If the Drumpf women speak their minds, why should anyone listen? Drumpf's actions and their inaction speak for them.
  • There are stories that Ivanka pressured her father to abandon separating children from refugees.
  • Jane RJane R Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    Queen Elizabeth of course is the "Queen of England", even though England hasn't had its own monarch since 1714.

    No, she isn't. Wikipedia has a whole list of her titles here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_titles_and_honours_of_Elizabeth_II and it varies depending on where she is, but in the UK she is the Queen of the United Kingdom [of Great Britain and Northern Ireland]. But you probably knew that.

    You're right about the grudge. Strictly speaking, in Scotland she is Elizabeth I because she's the first Scottish monarch with that name.

    I wasted several hours of my life once trying to persuade the head cataloguer of a certain university library to stop using History--Great Britain as a heading for books about English history before the seventeenth century...

    ...sorry, will stop perpetuating the tangent now.
  • LadyleftfieldloverLadyleftfieldlover Shipmate Posts: 17
    Gramps49 wrote: »
    Is this about the Queen of England, or is it about New York? I am a little confused>

    I do find it interesting the women of the Trmp clan are not afraid to speak their minds.
    Ivanka says separating children was cruel and inhuman. She also refuses to call the press the enemy of the people. Melina writes that she would be honored to visit LaBraun James' school after Trmp denounced James as being not too smart.

    Something tells me family get-togethers are pretty frosty.

    And the marriage bed is damn could--I think Don and Melina have separate bedrooms--- which really is not all that unusual in Presidential history.

    I thought only President Kennedy had a separate bedroom - something to do with his back?
  • Jane RJane R Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    On the subject of the female Trumps' (alleged) disagreements with the Odious Orange Ozymandias: why should he listen to them? He doesn't listen to anyone else (except maybe Putin). And what can they do, really? They only have as much power as he is willing to give them, and I bet he controls most of the money in the family too.
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    Is this about the Queen of England, or is it about New York? I am a little confused>

    I do find it interesting the women of the Trmp clan are not afraid to speak their minds.
    Ivanka says separating children was cruel and inhuman. She also refuses to call the press the enemy of the people. Melina writes that she would be honored to visit LaBraun James' school after Trmp denounced James as being not too smart.

    Something tells me family get-togethers are pretty frosty.

    And the marriage bed is damn could--I think Don and Melina have separate bedrooms--- which really is not all that unusual in Presidential history.

    I thought only President Kennedy had a separate bedroom - something to do with his back?

    I remember in the film Dave, Sigourney Weaver's First Lady recognised Kevin Klein's Dave as an impostor when she caught him having a sly peek at her legs.
  • I seem to recall that the Carters were the first to share a bedroom after several administrations of separate bedrooms.
  • I would suspect that FD Roosevelt and Eisenhower did not share a bed with the missuses.

    My father used to repeat a joke that went around school when he was young:

    [Said imitating FDR's speaking voice] "I hate war. Eleanor hates war. If you had to sleep with Eleanor you'd hate war too!"
  • I laugh at that joke only because of my capacity to project myself back to a time when the mores were such that it was acceptable to find it funny.
  • The tradition of separate bedrooms for the President and his wife goes back to Thomas Jefferson. The first couple to share a bedroom was the Fords. I believe the Obamas shared their bedroom and the Reagans, but as far as I know, the rest had separate rooms.
  • OhherOhher Shipmate
    With all respect, why are we discussing Presidential bedroom accommodations? First, this is a class issue holding over from European upper classes, where most couples had separate bedrooms because (a) they could afford to, and (b) where women needed separate accommodations because they were expected to change clothes umpteen times a day (requiring substantial wardrobe space as well), and the clothing they wore frequently couldn't be got into (depending on the historical period) without the assistance of maids. Also, back when birthing was done at home, it would hardly do to turf the master out of his sleeping quarters while the mistress was lying-in. Second, as the Trumps' is publicly acknowledged to be a marriage of convenience (arm-candy wife and deep-pocketed hubby), it seems unlikely that sharing a bedroom has priority in the relationship anyway.
  • Surprised to see Prez. 45 planning & promoting products for purchase relating to the USA being in charge of policing outer space. Golly, what a super duper concept. I bet he found a neat kids' show on Old Time Radio. There are quite a few. I like https://oldradioprograms.us/Space Patrol.htm
    SPACE PATROL
    It is way neato, and will give kids a new goal to shoot for. Get ready, kids, and join Space Academy. To receive a cool genuine plastic Space Academy Ray Gun, send one box top from a package of Sugar Space Pops Cereal and one thin dime. Tell Mom to buy Space Pops TODAY!
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    A good, informative, article about the challenges faced by Democrats in the Senate mid term elections
    It is particularly informative about the built in bias in favour of the GOP because of the 'Two Senators per state' rule, regardless of population.

    Looks like a hard uphill climb.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    The one seat that just might flip is Tennessee. Bob Corker is retiring. A formerly popular moderate Democrat governor is running against a staunch conservative. Polls indicate the former governor is ahead right now.

    A number of the contested Senate seats are in rural states. With the tariffs being imposed by other countries on American farm products, some people expect the farmers to start feeling the pinch as the harvest is coming in and they cannot sell their products overseas. November can be a real interested free for all if those states begin to flip Democrat. Many of the seats that lean Republican have a spread of just one percent.
  • Remains to be seen if the GOP can spin the tariffs as the fault of the Big Bad Press and the Democratic Party.
  • mousethief wrote: »
    Remains to be seen if the GOP can spin the tariffs as the fault of the Big Bad Press and the Democratic Party.

    Farmers are smarter than that. They know who started the trade war. They know who is hurting them.
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    mousethief wrote: »
    Remains to be seen if the GOP can spin the tariffs as the fault of the Big Bad Press and the Democratic Party.
    Farmers are smarter than that. They know who started the trade war. They know who is hurting them.
    Hope you're right. We shall see.
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    mousethief wrote: »
    Remains to be seen if the GOP can spin the tariffs as the fault of the Big Bad Press and the Democratic Party.

    Farmers are smarter than that. They know who started the trade war. They know who is hurting them.

    I wouldn't count on it. They've been steadfastly voting against their own interests for years because welfare / abortion / health care / sex ed / gun control / Nancy and Hillary / affirmative action / feminazis / queers / uppity you-know-what's / Mexicans / the list goes on.

    The best explanation I've heard for the tenacity of his supporters is simple: Trump hates the same people they hate.

  • When you are talking pocketbook issues, farmers are very smart. Since Soror brought up the Mexicans, farmers who have labor-intensive crops are already feeling the pinch because they cannot get enough workers to harvest them. Welfare? Farmers know that about 1/3 of their crops depend on food stamps. Cut food stamps and farm prices go down. May farm wives know their health insurance comes from the American Affordable Care Act, otherwise known as Obamacare. While the other issues are there, especially in the Deep South, when it comes to putting food on the table, those issues take a back seat.
  • edited August 2018
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    I'm guessing that since the pollsters got such a bloody nose in 2016, some effort has been put into the polling processes to try to get more accurate results in the future. So I think it will be worth keeping an eye on the polls nearer the time.

    I don't know how significant the farmer demographic will be, compared with other demographic slices (e.g. white evangelicals, women). Although it's a question of tipping two seats net, it still looks a pretty tall order (as the 538 article points out).

    There are signs that the White House want the Mueller investigations and report wrapped up in good time to avoid them affecting the mid-terms. Can't see that happening, given White House concerns about the "perjury trap" factor if Trump agrees to be interviewed.

    But I reckon the midterms are very important.

  • The best explanation I've heard for the tenacity of his supporters is simple: Trump hates the same people they hate.

    Unfortunately, I think that's correct.

  • Amanda, I have lived in rural communities for most of my life, growing up in them, being a pastor in several rural churches, later working as an insurance agent in them, and eventually retiring in one. I have a few relatives who remain farmers. When I say pocketbook issues come first, I know what I am talking about.
  • I have no doubt you do. But please don't shoot the messenger. I am merely repeating what was reported in the linked article. It jibes with all other news coverage, without exception, that I have seen on the issue.
    • Trump's rural approval rating is rising or staying the same in key farm states, according to a poll by Morning Consult provided exclusively to CNBC.
    • Farmers are absorbing business shocks, but they're still supporting Trump's agenda.
  • I have no doubt you do. But please don't shoot the messenger. I am merely repeating what was reported in the linked article. It jibes with all other news coverage, without exception, that I have seen on the issue.
    • Trump's rural approval rating is rising or staying the same in key farm states, according to a poll by Morning Consult provided exclusively to CNBC.
    • Farmers are absorbing business shocks, but they're still supporting Trump's agenda.

    It is not November yet. Most of the tariffs have yet to come into effect. The estimate is the farmers will be out 60 Billion dollars. That will have a big impact on their vote. As I pointed out in many of the rural states the spread between the Republican and Democrat nominees is only 1% whereas in many of those states Trump had won by double digits.
  • Gramps49 wrote: »
    When you are talking pocketbook issues, farmers are very smart.
    Seriously, they are not. This book is 14 years old.
  • What about the marketing strategy? How would you win the midterms for the Democrats?

    Is it dealt with as a series of local campaigns, or is there an overarching campaign with ads running nationally? They are not mutually exclusive, those options. How do the Americans do it, with such a huge and diverse electorate?
  • Last night NBC had a report on the lobster industry in Maine. Their market has all but dried up. They were selling much of their product to China. China has stopped buying the US lobsters and has entered into a defacto favorite trade situation with Canada. The US lobsterers are afraid they will never regain that market. The Chinese are also are buying Canadian wheat over US wheat. The only ones winning this trade war is Canada.
  • soybeans too. China will source alternative markets and the US farmers will never get it back.
  • Gramps49Gramps49 Shipmate
    edited August 2018
    An article about how the tariffs could reshape the Senate race in Wisconsin.
  • Barnabas62 wrote: »
    I'm guessing that since the pollsters got such a bloody nose in 2016, some effort has been put into the polling processes to try to get more accurate results in the future.

    This is one of those things that isn't really true. The polls worked. Actually pretty well. A lot of the pundits who claim to understand things they don't understand got a bloody nose.

    There's some good reports on this on fivethirtyeight. And more to the point they warned about how the polls were being misinterpreted at the time. IIRC, they had Trump as around 25% chance of winning the day before the election. The point is that the polls were pretty much spot on with the popular vote and on the state-by-states were within the recognised margin-of-error. The important thing was how many states Trump narrowly won that flipped the electoral college. The spread really was anything for HRC.

    I'm not saying there isn't room for improvement, and no-doubt the polling companies will be looking at this closely, but the 'polls are always wrong' thing is actually misleading. A more accurate summary is that pundits of all persuasions both deliberately and out-of-ignorance misrepresent what polls mean.

    This is not surprising, for lots of reasons but specifically, because polls drive news stories hence the misinterpretation can be very useful for shaping one's message...

    AFZ
  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    edited August 2018
    AFZ

    I read the 538 postmortem re 2016. Unlike both 2008 and 2012, when the 538 state by state forecasts were remarkably accurate, the state by state forecasts for 2016 were significantly out for the key marginals. I understand the margin of error argument, but it would not be expected to favour one candidate in those key states to the extent that it did.

    There is certainly an argument about the declining quality of state polls, which is significant for 538 and anyone else who is a polls aggregator.

    And of course it is the state by state predictions which matter, not the popular vote. And where it counted there was a significant underestimate of the Trump vote.

    I'm pretty sure all the psephologists have been looking critically at their methodologies since 2016.

  • Barnabas62Barnabas62 Shipmate, Host Emeritus
  • Trade wars are always bad news. Anyone who has studied history will tell you that.

    Anyone been watching Ed Balls programme on British TV about travelling in Trumpland?
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