John Wayne Gacy and Ted Bundy were well liked and believed to be normal. You have to look at the total package.

Take a look at every bit of public footage of Trump from day one, he has displayed signs of confusion overseas and at home wandering about with total unawareness of his surroundings until he is approached and/ or guided. His recent insulting demeanor when listening to criticism from the meeting with American Governors across the country and a host of other such documented insults.

You cannot separate Trump from his tweets, they are part of the record and part of how he communicates. And I strongly recommend every Trump supporter to look at the way he states some kind of insult or support on every side of every issue. There is nothing consistent with his communications.

Everything Trump trashed Hillary and Obama for there is a newer tweet where he contradicts himself or even a previous tweet where he supports them. This is his pattern of behavior on every single issue. He was once a Democrat, stated if he ever ran for President he would run as a Republican because the Republican base would be dumb enough to vote for him. He was once pro-choice, he has flip flopped on dozens of issues just since he was elected.

Quit trying to make this total package of behavior normal because there is nothing normal here.

There is nothing consistent with his communications.

Freepress, I have to disagree with you here.  He consistently makes some people cringe.

Also....

He was once a Democrat, stated if he ever ran for President he would run as a Republican because the Republican base would be dumb enough to vote for him.

Well, you're correct about one thing.  He was once a Democrat and as far as I can see, he hasn't changed much in that respect, although he has pushed Conservative ideas, such as Supreme Court Justices more than any Republican in years.

Now the last part of you sentence is incorrect unless you can actually produce something to verify its validity.

Fact Check: Did Trump say in '98 Republicans are dumb?

rgj

You have to look at the total package.

Absolutely and that's what I have done. Has he done all of the above? Yes....Has he done what I want? Yes.  I'm tilting to the latter. The country needs those things done right now.

Now to that article: The writer's premise about the media striving to promote conditions of excellence after Trump is gone is false. The media has given up all it's journalistic standards in it's hate of Trump. When a reporter falsely claims that the MLK statue was removed from the White House on day 1 of the Trump Presidency - the media has lost all it's credibility.

Don't bother trying to defend him - he later claimed "sorry, didn't see it, somebody was standing in front of it". Emblematic of media coverage of this President.

Yes, Trump is the perfect subject for a social media site.  He either keeps them laughing, embarrassed or cringing.

My shoulders ache from all the cringing I've been doing....

But that is not as bad as what some are going through...

Donald Rump 'I say what everyone else is smart enough not to say.'

More like this......"I say and do what everyone has been afraid to say and do."  I'm not a fake.  I don't take away the court's ability to punish people for screwing the people out of millions......

But when Obama was faced with a similar moment of calamity and possibility, he opted instead for the avenues of brokerage and appeasement. He chose not to push for criminal prosecutions of financial executives whose greed and negligence caused the 2008 economic crash. In 1999, Obama’s Attorney General, Eric Holder, had proposed the concept of “collateral consequences” (colloquially known as “too big to jail”), whereby “the state could pursue non-criminal alternatives for companies if they believed prosecuting them might result in too much ‘collateral’ damage” to the economy. Thus, when banking giant HSBC was revealed to be laundering billions of dollars for Mexican drug cartels and groups linked to al-Qaeda, Obama’s Justice Department allowed the bank to escape with a fine and no criminal charges, on the grounds that a prosecution might damage HSBC too much and have wider effects on the economy. Top prosecutors had evidence of serious wrongdoing by HSBC, but Holder prevented them from proceeding. A report prepared for the House Financial Services Committee concluded that Holder “overruled an internal recommendation by DOJ’s Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section to prosecute HSBC because of DOJ leadership’s concern that prosecuting the bank would have serious adverse consequences on the financial system.” Yet Holder later falsely suggested that the decision was made by the prosecutors rather than himself. (“Do you think that these very aggressive US attorneys I was proud to serve with would have not brought these cases if they had the ability?”) One should note just how unjust the “collateral consequences” idea is: it explicitly creates separate systems of justice for rich and poor, because there will always be more economic consequences to prosecuting major banking institutions than individual poor people. The same crime will therefore carry two different sets of consequences depending on how much you matter to the economy.

Holder also institutionalized the practice of extrajudicial settlements , under which “there was no longer any opportunity for judges or anyone else to check the power of the executive branch to hand out financial indulgences” to corporate offenders. Thus even as guilty pleas were extracted from banks and financiers for crimes ranging from fraud, manipulation, and bribery to money laundering and tax evasion, not a single malefactor from Wall Street ended up behind bars. (Meanwhile, America’s prisons remained full of less economically consequential people who had been convicted of the same crimes.)

'More like this......"I say and do what everyone has been afraid to say and do."  I'm not a fake.  I don't take away the court's ability to punish people for screwing the people out of millions......'

I don't take away the court's ability to punish people for screwing the people out of millions......

Said the guy who has continually not paid his contractors for work done and the bankruptsies which paid pennies on the dollar to those he owed.

LOL you didn't expect BO to prosecute his own piggy bank did you?

Everything diminishes over time, unless and until it is given a bump. 

"Anti-Trumpism" will be worn down, simply because Trump still exists in the office.  He hasn't changed, he's still an ignoramus, serial liar, and immoral bully. But the very existence of his administration conveys a sheen of normalcy. 

Anti-Trumpism will continue until he is gone, because we have no other choice. 

He hasn't changed

That's the "IMPORTANT" thing. Too many times the one one votes for....."CHANGES" for "Political save-MY job" reasons!

We don't want this "Panty-waste Political Correctness Cry baby" CRAP anymore. We want an "In-your-face Blunt" talk from now on.

Trump is a PROVEN constant liar, bully and ignoramus.  The fact that you can say you WANT these qualities in high office does not speak well of you. 

You just don't like that decades of "Lefty" CRAP are being reversed.....and in a Good way ! 

Actually, the right wing nut jobs who appreciated Trump's efforts to smear Obama over the birther issue are the ones who created Trump the politician. 

BF - John will NEVER, NEVER, NEVER agree with the facts of who started the "Birther" stuff.  Facts and John are oxymorons.

Still luv you John - mean it.

That is very true Apollo.  They haven't come to terms with that and I doubt they ever will.  Obama duped them for 8 years and they haven't even come to terms or realize how true that is as well.  I didn't agree with Obama on most everything he did, but he didn't dupe me.  Trump isn't duping me either.  Nothing has changed.  The government is still not run by the people as the Constitutional Republic it was intended to be and hasn't in years or maybe decades.

Actually, the right wing nut jobs who appreciated Trump's efforts to smear Obama over the birther issue are the ones who created Trump the politician.

Like I said, still hasn't come to terms with the truth and probably never will. 

The Obama of 2008 was to be this century’s FDR, signifying a moment of lasting realignment and transcendent progress — rather than one of growing alienation and despair culminating in the election of Donald Trump. But the liberalism of 21st century America, it turns out, is ill-equipped to achieve the transformative change it once so loftily promised: not because it made a noble attempt and failed but because it never really sought this change to begin with.

While Obama may not have been sincere, a great many of his voters were, and the millions who embraced his message revealed a genuine hunger for transformative change.

You are way out of your depth when you try to discuss these things 1st. 

You are way out of your depth when you try to discuss these things 1st.

Sophomania anyone?

Cool it.

Cool it.

Facts and John are oxymorons.

That's not true, 1st.  As much as I want to tell John to kiss my ass every five minutes, I can state without hesitation that he would never knowingly post untrue data.  If you feel that he has, you only have to provide valid proof any factual errors, and he will retract immediately.

Thank you Sister Mary. 1st is just frustrated because I have so often proven him wrong in the past. 

He's a good guy. He just needs to break free from his conservative leanings. 

Sister - it may not seem like it, but I truly do like and respect John.  Granted, he and I may not agree on a lot of things, specifically in the political realm, but I do like what he sez.

I just like "picking" on him - truly, it's nothing personal.

Gary Johnson, John - Gary Johnson.

EVEN if we were to concede that someone associated with Clinton started the birther rumors (which is NOT true by the way) it would still not excuse or rationalize what Trump did in 2011 and onward to 2016.

Nor would it excuse the fact that the overwhelming majority of Republicans believed that racist nonsense, that 72% of them still believe it , or that they voted for the racist King of the Birthers.

So are they just really dumb and gullible or extremely racist?

He's the guy that couldn't spell Aleppo, wasn't he?

Didn't even know where it was - BUT - he was elected twice as Gov of NM and left the state with a 7.2$B surplus which Richardson quickly evaporated and racked up a $3.1B deficit.

Off topic [ph]

That's why I voted for him.  If he had no idea where Aleppo was, then we probably wouldn't be in Iraq/Afghanistan or any other foreign country either - great cut-back in military extension, eh?

. 

I love most of what Trump has done so far.  It seems that the fears I had about him were misplaced ones.  

It seems that the fears I had about him were misplaced ones.

The only thing that has happened to me since he became President....IS GOOD ! 

But GOOD in some minds actually means BAD ! 

I just can't get the hang of this "Reading Between the lines" thing Liberals do. 

Please bring back Gunny and Colt too.  We miss them. 

Thank you Six!

I don't miss Colt. I'm glad he left

I  don't miss gunny either.  

he was elected twice as Gov of NM and left the state with a 7.2$B surplus which Richardson quickly evaporated and racked up a $3.1B deficit.

So, deficits only matter if they (allegedly) occur when Dems hold office.  Thanks for the reminder, as if any were needed, what hypocrites rightwingers are.  Now, to examine your actual claim:  Not sure where you got your numbers (although I have my suspicions) since I was able to find specific deficit numbers for either governor,  but I did find the following information that suggests your numbers up there are (surprise!) false.

NM state debt 1995-2008 (so Johnson's last 6 years and Richardson's full two terms)

Note how there is a rising debt every year, so it seems to contradict the claim Johnson left a surplus, doesn't it?

Here's a different way of looking at the state's financial health:

Those are the Standard&Poors credit rating from 2001-2014 through 2014 (reading R to L).  AA+ would suggest that the state's financials have been strong all through Richardson's terms as governor. 

But let's see your sources. 

The idea that Obama was the radical reformer was mostly a rightwing invention aimed at trying to scare voters away.  In both of his wins he won because moderate voters.  And he governed as a pragmatic moderate. 

I don't remember him

How 'bout linking your sources also - please.

True, the information I based my comment on came from the Gary Johnson Presidential Playbook for his campaign -

• Left office with New Mexico as one of the only four states in the country with a balanced budget
• Left New Mexico with a budget surplus
• Used Line Item Veto thousands of times to trim the budget
• Vetoed 750 bills during his time in office; more than all other governors combined
• Cut over 1,200 government jobs without firing anyone
• Created more than 20,000 new jobs
• First New Mexico Governor to challenge education status quo and propose statewide voucher program
• Restored State General Fund reserves to more than $222 million from a low of $28.1 million
• Limited annual state budget growth to 5.0% during eight years in office
• Cut taxes 14 times while never raising them—a first for New Mexico
• Vetoed 32% of the total number of bills submitted for his signature

Now that the election is way over, other sites have surgically tore his playbook to pieces and are stating much of what Johnson's Campaign crew said was false/exaggerated.

thelibertarianrepublic

Well, thanks for the honesty by providing proof from you link that your original comment contained false claims about Johnson's fiscal accomplishments.

I apologize for forgetting to link to my sources.  The graph comes from Christopher Chantrill's excellent website on all things fiscal about government:

usgovernmentspending

The Standard&Poors data is here:

pewtrusts

Will you feel the same when the cost of anything you purchase in the way of aluminum  goes way up in price?

Will you feel the same when the cost of anything you purchase in the way of aluminum

That's been happening for years.

Look at the price of cars now. They cost as much as I paid for my entire house and property back in the 90's.

So what's the beef ? Liberals always tell us, what's a few more tax dollars to fund.......whatever. Keep adding those pennies on and things have gotten expensive there too.

Evan McMullin!!!

Republicans falling in line?  Unsurprising.

I think more of them are now.  Early on, I believe quite a few of them believed he may have been colluding with Russia, but now I think they realize the only colluding with Russia has been from the other side.  And now, investigations are starting to move in a different direction away from Trump because of overwhelming evidence who the real crooks were, you are probably right.

off topic [ph]

Nah, Conservatism rewards authoritarian personalities.

A little educating is at hand Unchained.  Who wants Presidential elections by Popular vote as in a Democracy?  Who wants more and more government?  Who wants their President to do what they want in spite of it not adhering to the Constitution?

A little educating is at hand Unchained.

Agreed; let's get started.  The topic is the correlation between Conservatism and deference to authority and authoritarianism.

Conservatives care about those things, too, but for them fairness means proportionality—that people should get what they deserve based on the amount of effort they have put in. Conservatives also emphasize loyalty and authority>, values helpful for maintaining a stable society.

scientificamerican

Psychologists have repeatedly reported that self-described conservatives tend to place a higher value than those to their left on deference to tradition and authority. They are more likely to value stability, conformity, and order, and have more difficulty tolerating novelty and ambiguity and uncertainty.

slate

Here are some words and phrases used over and over in conservative discourse: character, virtue, discipline, tough it out, get tough, tough love, strong, self-reliance, individual responsibility, backbone, standards, authority, heritage, competition, earn, hard work, enterprise, property rights, reward, freedom, intrusion, interference, meddling, punishment, human nature, traditional, common sense, dependency, self-indulgent, elite, quotas, breakdown, corrupt, decay, rot, degenerate, deviant, lifestyle.

press.uchicago

Scarcity seems to play to the psychological and competitive strengths of conservatives, reinforcing their hierarchical and authoritarian preferences

...

conservatives talk about virtues and policies based on the in-group/loyalty, authority/respect, and purity/sanctity foundations

theatlantic

There are various different related concepts to that of authoritarianism.  These include conservatism, dogmatism, and ethnocentrism.

...

So conservatives and authoritarians get obsessed by ordering and controlling their internal world and external world.  They like simplistic, rigid and inflexible duties, laws, morals, obligation and rules.  This affects everything from their choice of art to how they vote.

psychologytoday

Any questions?

Conservatives do like their rules....

Early on, I believe quite a few of them believed he may have been colluding with Russia, but now I think they realize the only colluding with Russia has been from the other side.

Every time I read or hear this from a winger or his Shitbag® it just makes me .   Yep, HRC colluded with Putin to lose the election.  Makes "perfect" sense in the rightwing mind. 

Conservatives do like their rules....

As long as they only apply to everyone but them.

So conservatives and authoritarians get obsessed by ordering and controlling their internal world and external world.  They like simplistic, rigid and inflexible duties, laws, morals, obligation and rules.  This affects everything from their choice of art to how they vote.

One of the best explanations I've seen for that was " The Authoritarians " which is the culmination of several decades of research into conservative thought patterns by an American emeritus professor of psychology who worked at the University of Manitoba,    While it was written during Dubya's second term it explains a lot about the motivations of the tea party extremists and about why anyone would ever vote for a vile sociopath like Trump, and why even a true psychopath like Duterte receives broad support for his policies supporting extra-judicial murders and death squads.

theauthoritarians

Who wants their President to do what they want in spite of it not adhering to the Constitution?

It's always good for a big when rightwingers play Constitution whisperers.

You gotta admit, it was/still is HILARIOUS that your former President actually "CLAIMED" to be a Constitutional Scholar and still had the audacity to have SCOTUS slam many of his "actions" as unconstitutional, eh?

No questions, but an answer Unchained.

All your sites are left wing, which I don't blame you for that.  I wouldn't expect you to do anything different than that.  I put two Left Wing articles up today and the Left hated both of them because they basically told the truth, accurate assessment of Obama from a pretty Left wing site and an article from the NYT, I believe it was, who basically said the Anti-Trump saga is failing, just like the fake Anti-NRA will backfire just like the Chick fil A did.

Now back to your education to me.  You see, it's all government or no government.  That's what it amounts to.  In that video they put Anarchy on the right, but it could have been on the left where Totalitarianism is.  It wouldn't matter.  It's basically total government or no government. 

Whichever group of people who love government to tell them how to live their lives may not be Authoritarian, because they become the sheep and are the people who are most likely to become the sheep in a Totalitarian government they unwittingly seem to strive for.  They think collectivism is the way to go, not individualism as you find conservatives to be in favor of.  That's why our government is set up the way it is.  Only the amount of government that is necessary for individuals to have Liberty and not too little, so we won't have Anarchy.  Can we agree on that?

I bet you would be in favor of electing the President by Popular vote.  Is that true?  I may be wrong.  Just curious.

Now one more item here...

Study from 2012 now corrected to show liberals, not conservatives, more authoritarian

A correction to a frequently cited 2012 study has been issued, after researchers discovered they mixed up results purporting to show conservatives are more likely than liberals to exhibit behaviors linked to psychoticism, such as authoritarianism and tough-mindedness.

In fact, the correction says, the opposite is true.

washingtontimes

Now it doesn't matter to me anyway.  I like the government like it is for the most part.  I like the people to have the ability to make their own way.  In fact my philosophy is 'Help those who can't help themselves and help those who can to do it.'  Do you see anything wrong with that philosophy?

We will resist the secular progressive blue notions as to how we will be governed in our states and regions within them come what may.  They have no right to compel compliance with their vision and we will resist them to the point that force is the only way they can rule over us and dare them to try to resort to that or be sensible and back down to a live and let live true Federalism standard for all Americans.  

Nope; you're not going to just wave away objective facts by implying that since my sources lean to the left, they're invalid. 

My sources are reputable, well-sourced, and support my points multiple times over.  Your one source with one minor retraction does not overshadow my multiple sources with multiple studies from multiple experts.

The rest of your post is your personal commentary, rather than points backed up by empirical research like mine.

There you go again with the oxymoron of liberal fascism.

Please provide a historical example of a liberal fascist and not run away like you did the last time I requested that information.

Also, please provide examples of left-wing terrorism in recent history.  Let's go with the year 2000 and up.

Since you keep attempting to imply the sanctity of the electoral college, please give this article a read:

theatlantic

Before you try to wave it off as an unreliable source due to its left-center bias, read the following:

mediabiasfactcheck

The Atlantic   is an American magazine, founded in 1857 as The Atlantic Monthly in Boston, Massachusetts. Since 2006, the magazine is based in Washington, D.C. Created as a literary and cultural commentary magazine, it has grown to achieve a national reputation as a high-quality review organ with a moderate worldview. The periodical has won more National Magazine Awards than any other monthly magazine. Has a slightly liberal bias in reporting coverage, put produces exceptional journalism that is sourced and factual.

The least incriminating review you could find still calls it biased.   This is supposed to SUPPORT your argument?

You say that as if you think there is none.

On Wednesday morning, a gunman attacked congressional Republicans practicing baseball, injuring five people including House Majority Whip Steve Scalise. The man identified as the shooter, 66-year-old James T. Hodgkinson III, was taken into custody and later died.

since you like the Atlantic so much...

theatlantic

The violence is not directed only at avowed racists like Spencer: In June of last year, demonstrators—at least some of whom were associated with antifa—punched and threw eggs at people exiting a Trump rally in San Jose, California. An article in It’s Going Down celebrated the “righteous beatings.”

In February, masked antifascists broke store windows and hurled Molotov cocktails and rocks at police during a rally against the planned speech by Yiannopoulos.

Now, in the Trump era, Portland has become a bastion of antifascist militancy. Masked protesters smashed store windows during multiday demonstrations following Trump’s election. In early April, antifa activists threw smoke bombs into a “Rally for Trump and Freedom” in the Portland suburb of Vancouver, Washington. A local paper said the ensuing melee resembled a mosh pit.

It goes on and on...

I'm not saying the right is clean either.  Just trying to point out that one-upmanship of who is the worst is a terrible way to debate.

It won't take long for more evidence condemning the true perpetrators.

The least incriminating review you could find still calls it biased.   This is supposed to SUPPORT your argument?

Did you not actually read what I posted?  I'll break it down for you.

Has a slightly liberal bias in reporting coverage, but produces exceptional journalism that is sourced and factual.

Why did you only focus on the former and ignore the latter?

Just trying to point out that one-upmanship of who is the worst is a terrible way to debate.

No it's not.  Attempting to label both sides as equally-guilty and that they're the same is a logical fallacy.  The most you could provide is one shooting and some Antifa members breaking the law.  I can provide far more than that regarding recent right-wing terror attacks.

Trump is what I call a useful fool. You get someone in the white house who has no idea about what he really wants {other than the massaging of his ego and the consolidation of power}, surround him with toadies who represent the views of puppet masters of the political party that put him into power, allow limited access to that president, and then use him as a distraction for the real work at hand.

When the Trump presidency is over, historians are going to look at the compendium of tweets, statements, and second/third person pronouncements from the president and realize that they were primarily diversions for what the conservative wing of the right wing Republican party are trying to push through congress. Nobody takes arming 20% of teachers seriously, but it will provide cover for congressional inaction on gun control, or even worse, a rider to a bill that will allow concealed carry reciprocity. No one believed that all parties in Charlottesville were equal, but it provided cover for the alt-right. We are paying attention to the monkey on the leash and forgetting about the monkey masters that are behind him. It is the reason why the 2018 elections are so important.

Yes, they'll probably say that guy erased almost all the Liberals had accomplished in 40 years in their efforts to take our individual freedoms away from us and without using any PC at all.  Grew the economy as much in one year as the President before him did in 8.  Well, O never did have a year with 3% GDP during the entire 8 years he was in office.  0 was President for 4 or 5 months before the recession was declared over.  It took him several more years before he got back what was lost and it took him 4 years to do what Trump did in one year.  Yep, Trump will go down in history as one big asshole who saved us from the Left.

I may say all this, but we still don't have what we need, but we didn't have it when 0 was President.  He duped all the Liberals and they still haven't realized it, it seems.

Good points.  I agree.  Trump was not the best GOP choice in 2016.  He was far better than Hillary and is fixing the obama fiasco.  

Sorry,  but I must lock this up until I'm able to babysit it.

The article is unlocked.