What the fuck does that have to do with it? Yes, the USA is not the only imperialistic nation which seeks to dominate other countries and regularly resorts to military force.
You appear to be under the impression that I am somehow attempting to defend the Putin regime. You are mistaken.
Putin is an aggressive, imperialistic, authoritarian bigot in charge of a relatively weak military. Trump is an aggressive, imperialistic, authoritarian bigot in charge of the largest military in history.
My initial point was merely that, if you expand the definition of “enemy” to include indirect geopolitical opposition to the interests of the USA, you potentially include any country that does not always immediately acquiesce to American demands. Which is essentially everyone outside the USA.
The politically motivated support. For the time being it is convenient for them to tow the line. We need to make it inconvenient. And court findings of wrong doing would likely do so. If you look at primary votes. Approval ratings. Support rates for the policies he’s pushing most vocally (17%!). Its quite clear that his “base” the people on the ground who are actually excited by how this has all worked out. The ones who don’t see any reason to criticize. Well they’re a hell of a lot smaller than the portion of the public that voted for him in the national election. Before the field narrowed in the primaries he peaked at a little over 1/3 of GOP voters. Basically he’s being floated by partisanship at this point. So we’re looking for the point at which partisanship breaks.
Yeah. In terms of the politics and ideals involved. But I think you’re discounting how much and how well Nixon played racial and nationalist to get to the white house.
The GOP has less popular support. Less membership. Less of a share of the vote. They’ve spent decades changing the playing field to make sure they have an advantage anyway. So yeah we are seeing a period where a bunch of guys who wield patriotic pride. Bend over backwards to back some one who was elected for saying America is shit and promising to (going through with) violating every ideal this country was founded on. We’ve seen the speaker of the house claim it is not congresses job to check the power of the president (!). We’ve seen that they are willing to do pretty much anything so long as it ensures electoral returns, keeping them in power.
But there will be a point where the political liability of Trump eclipses all that. Where The results of all this are bad enough to them that doing their fucking job is the only way to salvage the situation. And we’re starting to see inklings of that already. The Russian sanctions. The healthcare clusterfuck. A few prominent anti-trump congressmen vocally pushing back the way they did during the election. The real question is where is the breaking point.
If there isn’t a breaking point I really think its more a question of how bad the damage is to the GOP rather than how bad the damage is to the country. Though that’s entirely based on us holding up better than I feared so far.
I do not expect this to come fast. Nixon was in his second term before shit caught up with him. Some aspects of Trump seem to be moving faster. And that seems to be driven by, and here is where my slight optimism comes from. Why I think the rule of law has held up for 6 months. The absolute, complete incompetence of these people. I don’t think any of these idiots are capable of not breaking the law. Nor do I think they are capable of hiding it. I also think they can’t help but implicate each other. And the current scumbag disposition of the GOP makes it all the more likely that any non-Trump adjacent GOP member is probably gonna go down with the ship.
Yeah can we stop lobbing that at people. I’ve already been (nonsensically) labeled a Russian shill a few times this week.
DUDE the US is SOOOOOO Imperialistic! Is basically stoner history 101. Overly simplified presentation of legit reactions to US foreign policy held abroad.
FWIW, the real damage to the country is happening quietly in the form of appointment of ultra-conservative judges for life terms. Merritt Garland was the tip of the iceberg, the GOP blocked dozens of appointments that are now being filled with minimal public scrutiny because the manchurian president sucks up all available press coverage.
Here’s the nightmare scenario-- that conservatives and Jesusfreaks hate liberals so very very much, and are therefore willing to discard any principle in pursuit of that vendetta.
That’s been going on since 2000. At least. It doesn’t end with Trump. And the DNC hasn’t really addressed it at all. One of my major points of complaint with them. Obama tried a bit but the unprecedented obstruction of his appointments overall minimized what he could do. “Judicial packing” is at least as much of the GOP’s long term undemocratic strategies as gerrymandering and voter suppression.
Still hope there though. The GOP packed bench has still managed to break progressive more often than not the last 5 years. Because as the man said. Reality has a liberal bias.
I would totally buy that they do.
I just increasingly think. Given the way the courts are reacting. The way they are eating themselves. That going that route would just be surrendering to failure. I have some tenuous hope that fear of the reaction. Whether its electoral or otherwise. Will see them give up on playing chicken with reality.
If not.
Have I mentioned I’ve been working on those duel citizenship papers?
I think Thatcher and Blair paid off that debt. Plus interest. And then some.
I also doubt that anyone’s memory in the Trump administration goes that far back. Given that anyone at Foggy Bottom who might remember Suez is likely to have been sent home by now, Britain should be quite safe in that respect.
