When will TRUMP give up his candidacy?

There you go again Rev. Presenting facts to people who are unable to assimilate them.

Here's that article.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2016/05/02/donald-trump-master-fabulist/?utm_term=.af1df6bcc39f

And it says a lot about a person if they support the corrupt liar that is Hillary Clinton.

If I run into anyone spouting Clinton talking points I would simply walk away as you would from the Trump trumpeter. That is forbearance.

If either of us launched into diatribe about how ignorant and contemptible the persons were, we would not be exhibiting tolerance



I think I know what you mean by this even though the definition you provide is



If you meant "acceptance" as agreeing with or acknowledging as correct or normal, than I wholeheartedly agree with your statement.

Unfortunately, too many of your ideological comrades (no jibe intended) not only believe tolerance means acceptance in the way I have explained, they've moved on to defining it as embracing.

Personally, I not only tolerate homosexuality in the public sphere, I accept it. I see no reason to specifically celebrate it though, and particularly when it comes to educating children. There are ways to teach tolerance and acceptance that do not require celebration.

We can't control people's thoughts, but if someone expresses that they believe a person with certain political views is mentally deficient or unstable, sinister, sadistic, blood thirsty, a traitor, de facto corrupt or evil, they are not being tolerant of that person.

If the person is a member of an extremist group that clearly extols and calls for violence, destruction, treason, and murder, there is no need, in my opinion, to tolerate his or views, and if their rhetoric goes so far as to incite violence they should be prosecuted. No matter how disgusting we may feel the views of Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump (or the Democratic Party and GOP in general) they don't rise (or fall as the case may be) to this level.

I am not blaming only one side of the equation here. I constantly read what I consider outrageous comments about Democrats, liberals, Obama, and Clinton outside of this forum. When I challenge them I become the target of equally outrageous attacks, but the same thing happens when I challenge outrageous comments about Republicans, conservatives and Trump.

For the most part the dialogue in A2K exists at a level of civility that is much higher than elsewhere in Social Media, but even here we see example of actual intolerance of political views that roughly 40% of the US population holds.

I could be wrong, but it seems to me that this division is wider than ever before; much wider, and continuing to get wider.

Much has been made about an obstructionist GOP congress during most of Obama's presidency, but anyone being honest would have to agree that if the parties had been reversed, the degree of obstructionism would have been the same. When the Democrats held the White House and both houses of Congress, they made no attempt to engage the Republican minority, quite the opposite. This is not to say the same disregard for the minority would not have occurred had the parties been reversed, because I'm sure it would have.

As much as we read that people want Democrats and Republicans to work together, I don't buy it. In a divided government that's what it takes but neither side is ever happy with the compromises that are required and inevitably, when a showdown occurs, partisans of both parties are urging their representatives to go for it all and not back down.

I think this is unsustainable and it will become even more so as the divide widens. Perhaps I am being pessimistic, but I don't foresee the rise of candidates who will divert from this trend. They will all spout the platitudes they think are required to be elected, but once in power they will revert to true form, just as they have over the last 20 years.

Every year, fewer and fewer people fall for the platitudes, and regardless, once the person is elected, the people whose views they represent are urging them to ignore all others.

I see it as a death spiral from which we won't recover and return to a nation where opposing views are tolerated.

If, at some point, one party is able to take over control of all branches of government, at least 40% of the population is going to be delighted and they will not be, magnanimously, urging engagement with a minority that has no power. In fact, I'm sure they will express a lot of anger if the ruling party should do so on any major issue.

Because of demographics, it appears that this scenario is most likely to involve Democrats in power, but it's not outside the realm of possibility that it could be Republicans (for instance after a particularly bad four years of Democratic rule). So no one should misjudge the effect of such a future simply because they imagine they will love it if their party reigns supreme.

Large swathes of the population are going to be unhappy if their views are ignored, and they are going to be seething mad if their views and they are held in contempt by the ruling majority.

I don't see it leading to armed insurrection, and if it did the "rebellion" would soon be crushed by the federal government, but it could lead to isolated acts of terrorism.

What is most likely, in my opinion, is that given the opportunity, opposing forces will split rather than attempt to mend the nation. That opportunity will likely only rise after a major calamity so it's nothing to be wished for.

Welcome back. Long time no see.

The Administration can't call it "ransom" for numerous reasons, the foremost being that if it were it would have violated a directive signed by Obama and may have been illegal.

It doesn't matter what we call it. The Iranians are calling it ransom and all of the bad actors in the world who now have an increased incentive to take Americans as hostages know it for what it was: Ransom.

Or it could have been keeping our word and honoring the deal Ronald Reagan made after the Iranian revolution when we stopped selling military equipment (right word here?)to Iranians after they already paid for it. We owed it to them and Ronald Reagan put it to the international court and that was when the deal was reached. After the Iran nuclear deal was reached, a lot of loose ends was tied up, and the balance of the remaining money we owed Iran was paid after it was negotiated down. It is all good.

Trump refuses to disclose his bundlers. What is he hiding?

There's always a plausible counter-story.

Again, it doesn't matter what the Administration calls it if the Iranians are calling it ransom and other terrorists believe it is.

He's hiding his tax returns. I guess it takes a very long time for the IRS to audit his tax returns. They have ten auditors working on it.

How many auditors does it take to audit Donald Trump's tax return?






The whole IRS.

It's clearly a bullshit dodge. They've already admitted that some years (I think they said 2006-2009) aren't even being audited. And the IRS has said several times that being audited causes no compelling reason not to reveal his returns.

He very obviously has something in there he's loathe for the world to see.
And he's made the calculation that the harm he receives from appearing to hide something is less than the harm he'd get if he let us see those tax records.

He's such a prancing, loud mouthed phony, it's almost enough to make you forget what a bullying racist slob he is. I love it that this is who the GOP has as a representative.

I love it that Trump has divided the party. When many top republicans say they're voting for Hillary, that's a whole new ball game. I'm not sure when a similar thing has happened in the past - if ever.

http://time.com/4317643/republican-party-donald-trump-ted-cruz-hillary-clinton-indiana/

Even more interesting is that the IRS won't audit more than 3 years of tax returns unless they suspect fraud.

How many years is the IRS auditing for Trump?

https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/irs-audit-faqs

I don't think the division is any bigger than it was before. I think it's just more openly discussed and debated.

Do you think the division looked smaller in 1965? Or 1865?

It's wider than it was in 1965

I wan't alive in 1865 but considering that we had a Civil War, I guess you can say it was wider than now, for now.

Jennifer Rubin: New campaign shake-up, same old awful Trump

I guess this supports the old adage "The enemy of my enemy is my friend"

If you read the opinion section of WaPo, as I regularly do, you will have noticed that there isn't a columnist writing opinion pieces for that paper that isn't more universally loathed by liberal readers, than Jennifer Rubin.

It's funny how people who religiously call her crazy and worse suddenly view her differently because she agrees with them on this one issue.

No worries, once the election is over and she stops writing critical pieces about Trump she'll be their favorite whipping girl again as this comment to the linked piece suggests

I don't really keep up with authors unless they are well known. In other words, I have no idea who she is or what she is universally hated for in the liberal world. I simply read the news in what comes up on my news with Microsoft edge. If there is one I like, I will post it. No big deal. You seem to see something in every little thing.

For instance, just read the following, not about Trump, but I found it good news and was wondering where to put it since I so dislike starting threads. I know it does not belong here, but it is good news.

Justice Department says it will end use of private prisons

So, who is Matt Zapotosky? Liberal, right wing nut, green, libertarian where they are against everything?

He's a nitpicker Rev. It's what he does.

Accusations of nitpicking are quite common from individuals who offer nothing more than overly broad and unsubstantiated opinions, it's what they do.