Trump's idiocy knows no bounds.

China...told ya

LL&P

A right proper gentleman then. Very cool. :)

that's one of my favorite flying circus sketches, yet it never seemed to garner the attention of the spanish inquisition or spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam and spam... what was i on about again?

They are so funny. I heard recently that Netflix has acquired the rights to their entire catalog and will begin streaming in Canada and the UK on April 15. Fans in the United States will have to wait until a later "as yet unannounced" date sometime in 2018.

Note to CW: There is a glimmer of hope yet for Netflix.

that's one of my favorite flying circus sketches, yet it never seemed to garner the attention of the spanish inquisition or spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam spam and spam... what was i on about again?

JL

*LOL* :)

Joe Conason's refutation of Sinclair Lewis was masterful, but needs updating for the age of Trump.

Another in the same vein that I'd recommend is It's Even Worse Than It Looks by Norm Ornstein and Thomas Mann. And don't forget It's Worse Than You Think by David Kay Johnston to round out the sounded-paranoid-when-it-was-first-published trilogy.

Trump thinks of his base the way a boy thinks of his dog: loyal (to him), friendly (to him), and useful in threatening situations. And they love rolling over for a scratch on the tummy.

And he knows that going after China is like holding a bag of bacon bits in the air and shaking it. His base is gonna love it.

So what about all the nice things that were said between Trump and the Chinese last year? Well, there's no 'Trump Tower Peking' yet. Besides, if you've ever seen "A Boy and His Dog", you know where his real loyalty lies even before you ask the question.

Personally, I think it's something even more basic that's in play here. Trump is almost going out of his way to disable the GOP in the midterms later this year, he's not trying to expand his base (obviously that's a lost cause) so he's going to plan B...he's creating an environment of 'woe is me. woe is us.' Trump loves the notion of being the trodden on underdog who can't get a thing done because of the conspiracies of others, it certainly plays into his narrative of late. It's becoming more and more obvious these days that he's retreating to his default stance of 'them against little old us' Keep an eye on how Trump goes about his business in the next few months with this in mind, I think you'll be surprised at how close he sticks to this model I suggest.

"Take China as an example - for two decades China has been a low skill manufacturing powerhouse, and they have raised 100's of millions of people from abject poverty into the global middle class. So just as 100's of millions of consumers are coming into the global market for the types of goods where America dominates (iPhones, movies, financial services, etc.) some idiot comes along and fights yesterday's economic battles to lose today's real ones."

Very true. As China itself is now having to deal with competition from newer low skilled, lower wage powerhouses that are taking its place, like Vietnam, as China's economy matures.

http://ritholtz.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/top5fake.png

Four about why "Hillary is horrible" and one about the Pope endorsing Trump.

The Gullible Old Party.

My apologies if I sounded like I was blaming you for sanitizing his words; I realize it is how it is being reported by most journalists now. I remember watching Gone With the Wind on one of the local TV stations back when I was just a teenage and they changed the famous, “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a damn,” line to “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a dang.”

I just sat in front of the TV stunned by what I had heard! What did they fear might happen if people heard the word “damn”? Personally, I wish they’d changed it to, “Frankly my dear, I don’t give a HAM”, or something equally ridiculous!

This was not my intention. The truth is, that I'd heard it repeated that way so many times, that it didn't occur to me to back-check to make sure I got the quote right. mea culpa

No, you're absolutely right; the man said he's a fucking moron, and for the sake of historical accuracy, it should ever be so.

And, while I'm not a huge fan of vulgarity in the public square (although, elsewhere it can be a feature rather than a bug), I long for the day when network news stops snickering like schoolchildren over 'forbidden' words, and just tells us in complete quotes what was said, verbatim. Because you're right, it does matter that he chose to say it that way to a room full of military men.

I gotta call 'em like I sees 'em...

Me, too.

No less than his own Secretary of State famously called him a 'moron' to a room full of Generals who agreed with him. Let that sink in for a moment: in the situation room in the hub of the Pentagon, probably a room that doesn't look too much different from sets you've seen in movies, the President visits and presents his view of America's national security challenges. When he is through, he leaves, and the next thing the SoS has to say to the assembled experts and brass (perhaps to cut the tension now permeating the room) is "Well, he's a moron." This got a laugh from the assembled group, and the meeting moved on. Extraordinary. And scary.

No. I believe what Tillerson actually said was, “What a F***ING MORON!”

I know that in proper society we aren’t supposed to use profanity, but sanitizing the comment takes away the true substance of what was being expressed! There is a huge difference between being called a “moron” and being called a “F***ING moron”....HUGE difference! Trump is a “F***ING moron”, that much he has made abundantly clear. It’s dishonest to sanitize Tillerson’s true impressions of Trump; it’s something that needs to be said.

No, it was an attempt at a joke and sometimes a joke is just a joke.

a joke?

-Monty Python's Flying Circus

https://youtu.be/ijIq_-8HJo8

JL

#Ifyouwereheretoday

LL&P...If peace is given half a chance.

Here we are on international ''Jam your AR up your jacksie'' day, Thought a quick reminder of Trumpian campaign falsehoods was apropos... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvbC3JJ6Q44

Can you count the lies? the big one being the self-funding myth, now that we know the NRA were throwing this bullshit artist cash hand over fist we can easily see how the redneck army were seduced like a playboy bunny.

was that your attempt at "subliminal" solicitation? if so, it would have been a better idea not to use all caps. or are you in essence daring CW to break his streak and ban you from this blog? points for studying advertising psychology, but still annoying.

http://blog.motivemetrics.com/What-is-Priming-A-Psychological-Look-at-Priming-Consumer-Behavior

JL

Another threat is that China will block Boeing's future orders - China accounts for 20% of Boeing's order book, and Iran is another large buyer.

Ironically, aircraft manufacturing is one of the true manufacturing jobs powerhouses - and of course, potential aluminum tariffs don't exactly help.

However the real stupidity of this is the misunderstanding of the macro economic implications. Take China as an example - for two decades China has been a low skill manufacturing powerhouse, and they have raised 100's of millions of people from abject poverty into the global middle class. So just as 100's of millions of consumers are coming into the global market for the types of goods where America dominates (iPhones, movies, financial services, etc.) some idiot comes along and fights yesterday's economic battles to lose today's real ones.

"But the voters aren't that stupid."

Excuse me, but are we not talking about the same voters who Dems/Libs are claiming voted for Trump rather than Hillary, based on subliminal messages that the Russkies posted on social media!!?????

What in hell can you conceive of that is more stupid than that?

this link seems to be working at the moment:

https://vimeo.com/225299188

I tried to find Idiocracy on Netflix, but they didn't have it (NF has really gone downhill over the past decade...).

I REALLY need to see this movie, from what everyone says about it...

-CW

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/scott-walker-special-elections-special-legislative-session_us_5ab55df7e4b008c9e5f73366

But the voters aren't that stupid -- they can tell when one party is doing nothing more than outright cheating. They'll likely remember this in November...

-CW

And here I was fearing you'd hate me for the MDDOTW...

I gotta call 'em like I sees 'em, and Biden crossed a line this week. Nice jab about "without attribution" there, too...

Heh.

-CW

I've never read "It Can Happen Here," but I definitely need to soon.

What keeps popping into my head is an old sci-fi story: "The Marching Morons" by C.M. Kornbluth.

If you haven't read it, I recommend it...

-CW

Like CW, I was this far from shutting it all out and joining a Sci Fi blog, when I found...hope.

Not Hicks, who infects other sorts of dreams, I mean real hope, the sort that makes annoyance dissipate and political debate tolerable.

Like CW, I was buoyed by our string of wins in the special elections. I also saw folks come out to stop the Republicants from gutting Obamacare. Then I saw these extraordinary kids make Rick Scott roll over, and it reminded me that there is (metaphorically) still a pretty good band out there that I can jam with. And all that restores my hope.

Which might last only until a day early next November. Dunno. Hope not.

I've noted before that as far back as the 1920's H.L. Menken speculated that the relentlessly uninformed among us would one day overwhelm the system and finally elect the moron they'd been clamoring for.

Well, nearly a century later Menken's prediction appears to have come true. The evidence that this is true is plentiful, and mostly undenied, even by the White House. He's probably the least well-read president we've ever had. His attention span is famously shorter than most. He tends to agree with the last person he spoke to. And on and on.

No less than his own Secretary of State famously called him a 'moron' to a room full of Generals who agreed with him. Let that sink in for a moment: in the situation room in the hub of the Pentagon, probably a room that doesn't look too much different from sets you've seen in movies, the President visits and presents his view of America's national security challenges. When he is through, he leaves, and the next thing the SoS has to say to the assembled experts and brass (perhaps to cut the tension now permeating the room) is "Well, he's a moron." This got a laugh from the assembled group, and the meeting moved on. Extraordinary. And scary.

So far the Republican leadership has acted on this reality like a cop on the take, accepting bribes in the form of tax cuts and donor boner bills to look the other way while Trump careens from one unstable position to another.

But here's the thing: it's not Trump that they're afraid of, it's Fox News, which has maneuvered itself into being the Id of Trump's ego. Just today, a negative segment about the new spending bill on Fox's morning show prompted Trump to threaten to veto it, throwing much of Washington into a panic until advisors at the White House were able to talk him down (which reportedly included giving him a list of all the shiny new military equipment he'd be getting, a list that he partially quoted later).

So maybe we should be looking harder at Fox, and find out what their ties to Russia are. They created and nurtured this idiocracy after all. We should be asking ourselves what massive fuck-up happened that resulted in a cable news station having this sort of political sway over both the President and all of his followers. Maybe a special prosecutor should be looking into their profit stream. Because there will be a time after Trump, and if Fox has its way, the Idiocracy will persist. And persist.

there's only one way it goes from here.

Hey, hey, hey, hey! I got a couple presidential decrees to make! I got a couple presidential decrees to make! Not Sure, get your ass up here, wherever you is.
~President Dwayne Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho - idiocracy

Your choice for the MDDOTW award for this week was spot on.

And, this wasn't the first time he traveled back in time to wonder out loud about beating up Trump behind a school gym.

In other words, he was quoting himself this week, without attribution. That was a little joke. Ahem.

Biden should have learned by now that you can't beat Trump at the only game he knows and that when you stoop to his level you will be the one sporting the ugly stain of Trumpism.

JL