The Trump Presidency - an analysis

[facthunter]

Plenty in the US and here.  I don't care who's where only when their views and rules directly affect ME  and I have no say in it. Freedom OF religion should include freedom FROM Religion. It's common to argue that any criticism of Israeli actions is anti semetic. which is patently absurd. . Nev

[old man emu]

Ahh! That much maligned term "semitic", now applied only to those of the Jewish ethnicity.  The Jews are not the only Semitic people. The Arabs are also Semitic. 

 

Identifying human races in terms of their biblical lineage, based on the Generations of Noah, has been common since antiquity. The early modern biblical division of the world's races into Semites, Hamites and Japhetites was coined at the Göttingen School of History in the late 18th century – in parallel with the color terminology for race which divided mankind into five colored races ("Caucasian or White", "Mongolian or Yellow", "Aethiopian or Black", "American or Red" and "Malayan or Brown"). 

 

The Göttingen school of history was a group of historians associated with a particular style of historiography located at the University of Göttingen in the late 18th century.[1] This group of historians played an important role in creating a "scientific" basis for historical research,[2] and were also responsible for coining two fundamental groups of terminologies in scientific racism:

1.  Blumenbach and Meiners's color terminology for race: Caucasian or white race; Mongolian or yellow race; Malayan or brown race; Ethiopian or black race; and American or red race;

2.  Gatterer, Schlözer and Eichhorn's Biblical terminology for race: Semitic, Hamitic and Japhetic.

 

Other members of the Göttingen School of History coined the separate term Caucasian in the 1780s. These terms were used and developed by numerous other scholars over the next century. In the early 20th century, the racialist classifications of Carleton S. Coon (ironic isn't it?) included the Semitic peoples in the Caucasian race, as similar in appearance to the Indo-European, Northwest Caucasian, and Kartvelian-speaking peoples. Due to the interweaving of language studies and cultural studies, the term also came to be applied to the religions (ancient Semitic and Abrahamic) and ethnicities of various cultures associated by geographic and linguistic distribution.

 

 

 

The Semitic languages, previously also named Syro-Arabian languages, are a branch of the Afroasiatic language family originating in the Middle East[2] that are spoken by more than 330 million people across much of West Asia, North Africa, the Horn of Africa, Malta, in small pockets in the Caucasus.

[Jerry_Atrick]

6 hours ago, facthunter said:

Plenty in the US and here.  I don't care who's where only when their views and rules directly affect ME  and I have no say in it. Freedom OF religion should include freedom FROM Religion. It's common to argue that any criticism of Israeli actions is anti semetic. which is patently absurd. . Nev

You're absolutely right and I have not asserted anything to the contrary.. In the same vain, someone continually criticising and making false allegations without backing them up or coutenancing evidence to debunk their claims does suggest some  negative bias. Has Israel been a saint of a nation? Of course not; from the news I see, Israel has a lot to to answer for, but to constantly align them with Hitler and accusing them of wanting to exterminate all Arabs is a bridge too far, without evidence to support it.

 

Maybe a quick look here and my subsequent responses, which haven't been debunked will provie some background. I am happy to be debunked

(Plus, I'm an argumentative SOB)

[facthunter]

You replied to a quoted para from ME. I don't recollect ever comparing Israel with Germany here or anywhere.They did however occupy Palestinian Land more or less justifying it by Scriptures as promised by God to themselves as Gods chosen People.. After the brief war with Egypt they kept the Golan Heights and the Gaza strip an act which the UN regards as unlawful as well as the.Jewish settlements increasingly occupying these areas .the Palestinian people are suffering a death by a thousand cuts  with their hopes of having their own state. ended by Trumps Great deal which  they played no part in at all.. Nev

[Yenn]

It was me that compared Israel with Germany. All you need to do is look at the history. Israel has had many chances to solve the problems with Arabs, but they have never tried. They stole the land, in exactly the same way as my forbears stole Aussie from the Aborigines. They have no desire to get a just peace, just make the Arabs go away is their desire.

Pre WW2 the jews were not liked and if they had tried to establish Israel then it would have failed, but since then they have been professional losers and most feel sorry for them. The USA saw them as a good cause and have backed them so that they have a stable ally in the middle east.

They colluded with England to raid Egypt in 1956 and for some reason the Yanks made England back down. They were not wearing their pro Jew hat that day, but probably only because they didn't realise what was happening.

[Bruce Tuncks]

I don't agree that this country was " stolen" from the aborigines. They had no concept of ownership of land. And it was either the english or the dutch or the french or spanish who would have displaced the stone-age inhabitants who were here.

Plus...  the aborigines are much better-off now than before us whitefellers arrived.

[Old Koreelah]

2 hours ago, Yenn said:

...They colluded with England to raid Egypt in 1956 and for some reason the Yanks made England back down...

Ah the good old days when the GOP could field a decent president: Eisenhower.

(The last Republican POTUS to balance the budget).

[Old Koreelah]

2 hours ago, facthunter said:

...the Palestinian people are suffering a death by a thousand cuts  with their hopes of having their own state. ended by Trumps Great deal which  they played no part in at all.. Nev

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

Nev, on reading your last post, I re-read mine because in the world of typed conversations, without body language, inflections, facial expressions, etc, sometimes the message gets missed.. So, to be clear, I agree with your post.. but maybe I should have user the term "to extend your point, if someone/anyone has an opinion which they purport where the evidence appears to the contrary - without proferring evidence to support or debunk - then that would be bias." So, no, not directly aimed at you ..

 

It was a general comment, with a slight attempt to get Yenn to back up his assetions in the other thread (which is why I included the other thread's post for context).

 

OK- getting back it ithe thread drift - For the record, I certainly am not conding Israel's later treatment of Palestinians - but - I do not know enough other that what snippets of news we get - to argue any other way

 

My point was that an assertion was made (by Yenn, but undoubetdly held by many) likening Israel to Hitler's Nazi regime (not just Germany to be accurate).. It didn't ring well with me because unlike Nazi Germany, there is no evidence of systematic attempts at extermination of a whole people. I think Yenn answers it above where he says:

4 hours ago, Yenn said:

All you need to do is look at the history. Israel has had many chances to solve the problems with Arabs, but they have never tried. They stole the land, in exactly the same way as my forbears stole Aussie from the Aborigines. They have no desire to get a just peace, just make the Arabs go away is their desire.

Not solving the problems and even wanting them to go away does not suggest aggresively wanting to exterminate a people of a specific culture, religion, or origin. Hitler aggressively sought extermination - building ghettos, concentration camps, systematic murdering of people, etc...  So, no, by your own words, they aren't like Hitler's regime. Yes, I agree that the Israelis have been brutal in their responses and maybe pre-emtpive strikes on Palestinians, but I don't believe they have wanted their systematic annhialation. We mentioned Israel offering citizenship to Palestinians, which they rightly refused; and then giving them permanent residency and illustrative that they do not want to exterminate them. But, that didn't seem to be enough, so a little digging around uncovers more evidence that the claim they want to exterminate Palestinians (after all, if they are like Hilter, they just don't want them to re-settle) can be found in this wikipedia entry: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arab_citizens_of_Israel#Representation_in_the_Knesset

 

In it, is this little snippet: "and one of Israel's Supreme Court judges is a Palestinian Arab." Umm.. Sorry, but if you want to exterminate a people, or indeed just want them to go away, why would you allow the appointment of one of those people to your highest judicial bench? Is he a puppet? Well, maybe, but there's more: "The 2015 elections included 18 Arab members of Knesset. Along with 13 members of the Joint List, there were five Arab parliamentarians representing Zionist parties". Hang on.. Do I want to allow elections of Arabs to my parliament (which is unicameral) if I want them to go away? I have no idea if there is a restriction on voting or the number of Arabs that can be elected.. But in the same article:

"Arabs who held Israeli citizenship were entitled to vote for the Israeli Knesset. Arab Knesset members have served in office since the First Knesset. The first Arab Knesset members were Amin-Salim Jarjora and Seif el-Din el-Zoubi who were members of the Democratic List of Nazareth party and Tawfik Toubi member of the Maki party.

In 1965 a radical independent Arab group called al-Ard forming the Arab Socialist List tried to run for Knesset elections. The list was banned by the Israeli Central Elections Committee.^[48]

In 1966, martial law was lifted completely, and the government set about dismantling most of the discriminatory laws, while Arab citizens were granted the same rights as Jewish citizens under law.^[49]"

 

Honestly, Arabs allowed in parliament; Arabs having the right to vote the same as the Jews; Arab on the Supreme court bench... Am I missing something? How on earth does this even come close to "just make the Arabs go away is their desire."?

 

Regarding the theft of land , Again, it appears from digging around a bit, they did NOT steal the land. They legitimately PURCHASED the land for what can only be assumed to be fair value, which apparently was sparesely populated as the land they purchased was largely sand covered and ill-suited to growing corn, a staple of the Palestinians. I provided a link to this Wikipedia entry in my response in the other thread: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_land_purchase_in_Palestine.  Although the quoted sources seem to be one-sided, no one is disputing the facts or offering anything else to contend it. So, the land appears not to have been stolen - aka Israel stealing the land is a myth. This is very different to the illegal declaration of terra-nullius allowing the UK not to be required to come to a treaty with the Aboriginals (like they had to with the Moaris). That is theft of land.

 

Of course, the mere purchase of large tracts of land in another country does not give the buyers the right to annex/colonise that land. I agree with that. However, the geopolitical landscape of the world is forever changing, and after WWII, there were plenty of changes. Like @Yenn says, pre-WWII they were not liked; in Europe, after WWII they were also not liked (actually, more like hated). So, I guess after centuries, if not, millenea of persecution, with all this land, after WWII was the time to set up a country that could provide defence and a refuge for Jews worldwide. So, they did. And the geopolitics of the region changed. Just like geopolitical changes are still happening - even this past week (though I am sure Willeedoo can provide us with erudite details of the issues). But how far do we go back? Isn't Judea the original land of the Jews - in the southern area of the West Bank they were deposed from... probably without anyone buying their land? No doubt, there was someone else before them, but how far back do we go? Interestingly, in the 1947 agreement, the West Bank, including Judea was in the hands of the Palestinians.

8 hours ago, facthunter said:

<snip> They did however occupy Palestinian Land more or less justifying it by Scriptures as promised by God to themselves as Gods chosen People.. After the brief war with Egypt they kept the Golan Heights and the Gaza strip an act which the UN regards as unlawful as well as the.Jewish settlements increasingly occupying these areas .the Palestinian people are suffering a death by a thousand cuts  with their hopes of having their own state. ended by Trumps Great deal which  they played no part in at all.. Nev

I'll defer to others re the scripture and chosen people as I have no idea (I hardly know anything of my own religion by birth, let alone someone elses). And you're right, the Golan Heights and Gaza are held despite UN resolutions. Remember, the day after Israel declared independence (based on a UN treaty) accepting the state of Palestine as well, all its Arab neghbours waged war and attacked. Well, they lost (and with no help from the USA, nor Europe as I recall reading). And in wars, there tends to be and adjustment of boarders as a result.And, you get refugees.  So, at the end of the 1948 war (no idea how long it lasted, but it was months), no doubt, the Arab and other members of the UN petitioned for Israel to hand back the land originally included in Palestine. The UN is hardly going to say months after, "er, they won a war, and as a result, took land defined by us as result fighting, so let them have it back." No, of course not. It would undermine their authority. They of course would agree for it to be handed back (BTW, not sure about absentions, etc).

 

This may sound a bit like kids in the playground being broken up from a fight, but, didn't the Arab's start the con-compliance with international law and UN resoluitions by waging war in the first place? Maybe? But does this justify Israel not handing the land back? No.

 

But, the other thing is that rarely does a geoplitical boundary change without violence. South Sudan, Crimea, and now Nagorno-Karabakh (arguable the site of another attempted genocide). Even after the agreement and formal drawing of new boundaries, and declarations of independence, etc, there tends to be ongoing violence as the people who had to give up the land are usually peeved off. This is why there are UN peacekeepers deployed all over the world. They are in Cyprus today how many years after the war there? So, if you are a country that has just been invaded by all your neighbours, who have constantly made it a known objective to wipe you off the map, are you going to give back the militarily strategic land to them because the UN wask you to? No, you're not.

 

On the map sequencing the timelines of Palestine.. Yes, in 1946, it was Palestine, but a lot more through the east and south was owned jewish land is my understanding.. may be wrong.. but the article I reference above certainly alludes to it. After the declaration of independence and the 1948 war, they took more land.. and held it as per above.. This would be the 1949 - 1967 map. What it doesn't show you is that for a while Israel held the Sinai and with great controvery at home, in return for promised peace, they handed it back to the Egyptians.. Well, I would be surprised if handing more land back would become a priority for any promised peace because that Sinai thing went well, didn't it.. In the early 70's Egypt, along with I think Saudi attacked again. That violence with geopolitical changes rears its head... and since the 70's, the Palestinians who are justifiably peeved at losing control if not ownership of large tracts of their land are still retaliating. Admittedly, it is now the jews who are the Goliaths, and their responses to wall off the Paelstinians to protect Israeli citizens. However, they are now the Goliath against the David (ironic, I guess), and when they respond to militia attacks from the Palestinians, the response is often punitive and brutal. I agree... And, maybe (although I am going of news reports I can barely remember - which is usually framed in, "in retalliation to mortar/rockets/whatever launched against Israeli settlements, the IDF responded by..." I have no doubt that individuals in the IDF acted illegally as well.. this case proves it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hebron_shooting_incident. But, Israel has to protect its citizens and it pushed further as its citizens came under fire - is the story the news presents anyway, but I am happy to hear what the real story is.

 

There is of course a better way that Israel could have done it. And the West Bank expansion and settlements are no longer about protecting its people,; it is idealogically (right) driven expansion - absolutely. There are apparently many Jews in Israel who are opposed to it. I agree this should stop..

 

My arguement is that likening Israel to Hitler and the Nazi regime seems miles off and is spreading disinformation and unfounded, as is the claim the land was originally stolen... People may not like or agree with Israel, which IMHO by itself not anti-semetic. In addition, people clearly do no like jews.. which again, if it is a simple dislike, I don't consider necessarily anti-semetic. But continual portrayals that are inaccurate or unfounded to propagate opinons does to me look like an unhealthy bias at best. I am really happy to be rebuked though..  

 

Oh yeah.. the IDF... Again.. if you want to get rid of Arabs, you don't tend to appoint them to senior military positions, either: "Arab Generals in the IDF include Major General Hussain Fares, commander of Israel's border police, and Major General Yosef Mishlav, head of the Home Front Command and current Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories.[citation needed] Both are members of the Druze community. Other high-ranking officers in the IDF include Lieutenant Colonel Amos Yarkoni (born Abd el-Majid Hidr/ عبد الماجد حيدر) from the Bedouin community, a legendary officer in the Israel Defense Forces and one of six Israeli Arabs to have received the IDF's third highest decoration, the Medal of Distinguished Service."

 

While we are discussing comparing countries to Hitler, why don't we compare some Arab naions as well? Are not those Arab nations that want Israel wiped off the map, despite not being able to, show Nazi type extermination tendencies? I would argue no, as I don't think they want Jews wiped out.. they just want the land back to the Palestinians. But what about the relentless persecution of the Kurds by the Sunis, and the Sunis by the She'ites, etc.. I think at least for the Kurds, there is a definite desire by some to see them wiped out. And, our friends, ISIS, were not exactly about living harmony with different strands of their religion, let alone any other. And I don't see too many non-Arabs in political positions nor senior military positions. BTW, I am not comparing them to Hilter, but just illustrrating there are other issues inthe Arab world

 

All this was borne from the discussion about the peace deals Trump brokered. I think the statement was they sold out the Palestinians. My question is, is it a sell-out? Whether we like it or not, Israel is here now. Using aggression and attempting to snuff it out has failed miserably when they were and were not directly supported by the USA/Europe. Demolishing Israel, at present, like pushing liquified poop uphill with a rake. Trump's peace deals I think are about enlarging the market for US Arms deals as UAE were quited as looking forward to being able to purchase F35s. But, if real and sustained peace in the Middle East is reached (which is a big ask when you think about the different issues amongst the Arab world, let alone throwing Israel into the equation), then surely this will bode better for a Palestinian state? Maybe I am too idealistic...

[Bruce Tuncks]

Well said jerry. I agree that the Kurds have been badly treated and need a homeland too. I was staggered to read of the Palestinian judge, gosh I get better info here than anywhere.

But, of all the people in the world, you would think that the Jews would appreciate the need for a homeland. Were they not without one for centuries themselves? ( I was once Shylock for a school play, and they were homeless and badly treated since before Shakespeare's time ) This makes their denial of a homeland for the Palestinians worse in my view.

But the Kurds problems go back to even before that rascal Churchill, and today they are treated badly by the nato country Turkey, among others, and Israel is not one of the others.

[Jerry_Atrick]

@

4 minutes ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

But, of all the people in the world, you would think that the Jews would appreciate the need for a homeland. Were they not without one for centuries themselves? ( I was once Shylock for a school play, and they were homeless and badly treated since before Shakespeare's time ) This makes their denial of a homeland for the Palestinians worse in my view.

I don't disagree at all... I disagree with the assertion they stole the land and that they are the same as Hitler's Nazi regime... That's all..

 

 

[old man emu]

15 hours ago, Bruce Tuncks said:

I don't agree that this country was " stolen" from the aborigines. They had no concept of ownership of land

Maybe they didn't have the concept of "ownership" that we have. Our concept implies that we can trade off that ownership as we please. Like we do with our houses and the very earth they stand on. Our concept is based on the economic value of land. That is why most of Europe and Asia has been plagued by war since time immemorial. The First Peoples certainly knew their territorial boundaries and for even one foreigner to cross the boundary in peace required a version of a visa or passport. So, while they might not have had the concept of trading off their country, they definitely had the desire to prevent others from taking it from them.

 

I think that you will find that the term "displaced" is more accurate for the most of the country. Europeans moved in and squatted down. Since the first Europeans to go to the Inland were graziers, their activities did not really disturb the First Peoples' way of life. There was still plenty of traditional food about, and who hasn't missed a "meat and two veg" dinner to try a food introduced by a newcomer to your area? So the First Peoples hunted a few of these new animals and got accused of stealing, a concept that they did not possess.

 

No doubt there were occasions when Europeans were killed, but I would imagine that if you looked into the background of the killing it could be seen as traditional punishment for breaking a taboo, like entering a sacred site, or probably more common,  luring away another man's wife.

 

I disagree with the idea of altering their spiritual and cultural beliefs. Why should they have to abandon things that served them well for even longer than the spiritual and cultural concepts of the peoples of other continents have served their inhabitants? We don't tell Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists and Atheists to abandon their beliefs in order to live here, especially since modern Australia seems to be without a strong church-going habit.

 

I would like to see most of the Federal money allocated to Aboriginal matters directed towards restoring at least the spiritual cultures of Aborigines, and where modernisation has not made too many changes, a restoration of secular culture.  We could start the process by introducing these matters to those Aborigines who form a captive audience in our prisons. Maybe that sort of education scheme would sedn these young people back to their communities with some pride and an new outlook to living in a world that is a mixture of the old and new.

 

 

 

 

[facthunter]

"No concept of the INDIVIDUAL having ownership. Bruce you missed one critical word. They shared ownership. They don't accumulate wealth individually. That to me is a virtue, not a fault.It's why they did little damage at all over 65,000 years. whereas by contrast we have degraded and poisoned it grossly in little over 200 years. as we show little or no regard for anything but short term profit of mostly overseas interests.. Nev

[Yenn]

I think you will find that the Palestinians were very much like the Aboriginals. I don't think there was a state of Palestine covering all the lands that Israel took over. Not I say took over. They may be able to say they bought it, but they terrorised the Arabs to get a good deal.

My likening to Hitler may not be 100% accurate, but Israel has never wanted to do anything except take what it wants and get rid of the Arabs who don't like it. They are the first of the modern terrorist states.

[Jerry_Atrick]

Evidence based assertions of terrorising and getting rid of Arabs who don’t like it would be appreciated

[old man emu]

2 hours ago, Yenn said:

I don't think there was a state of Palestine covering all the lands that Israel took over.

No. There wasn't a State of Palestine. Palestine referred to an area of land. Part of a larger general geographic area known as the Levant. The Levant is a term that refers to an area in the Middle East which includes the historic areas of Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Israel and Syria.

 

Throughout history, Palestine has been ruled by numerous groups, including the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Fatimids, Seljuk Turks, Crusaders, Egyptians and Mamelukes. From about 1517 to 1917, the Ottoman Empire ruled much of the region. In the Ottoman Empire, in accordance with the Muslim dhimmi system, Christians were guaranteed limited freedoms (such as the right to worship). They were forbidden to carry weapons or ride on horseback; their houses could not overlook those of Muslims, in addition to various other legal limitations. Similar guarantees were given to the Ottoman Jewish community, with similar conditions. 

 

When World War I ended in 1918, the British took control of Palestine. The League of Nations issued a British mandate for Palestine—a document that gave Britain administrative control over the region, and included provisions for establishing a Jewish national homeland in Palestine—which went into effect in 1923.

 

In 1947, after more than two decades of British rule, the United Nations proposed a plan to partition Palestine into two sections: an independent Jewish state and an independent Arab state. The city of Jerusalem, which was claimed as a capital by both Jews and Palestinian Arabs, was to be an international territory with a special status. In May 1948, less than a year after the Partition Plan for Palestine was introduced, Britain withdrew from Palestine and Israel declared itself an independent state, implying a willingness to implement the Partition Plan. Almost immediately, neighboring Arab armies moved in to prevent the establishment of the Israeli state.

 

So the Israelis didn't steal the land. They took a share to set up an independent, non-Islamic State. The Arabs did not want to share the land with anyone. They probably thought that since they had been allies of the British and French during WWI, they should have shared in the spoils of the dismantled Ottoman Empire. 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

Wow! Show's how little I know - I didn't know Palestine was not actually a nation state... Thanks for that @Yennand @old man emu. As @Bruce Tuncks says, one learns a lot on these forums (most of the diatribe I wrote yesterday, I only learned - or read - yesterday; my wife couldn't undersand what I was doing at the computer all Sunday morning).

Edited November 16, 2020 by Jerry_Atrick

[old man emu]

Scholars believe the name “Palestine” originally comes from the word “Philistia,” which refers to the Philistines who occupied part of the region in the 12th century B.C. The Philistines were an ancient people who lived on the south coast of Canaan from the 12th century BC until 604 BC, when their state, after having already been subjugated for centuries by Assyria, was finally destroyed by King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylonia, and after becoming part of his empire and its successor, the Persian Empire, they lost their distinct ethnic identity and disappeared from the historical and archaeological record by the late 5th century BC.

 

In 2016, a large Philistine cemetery was discovered near Ashkelon, containing more than 150 dead buried in oval-shaped graves. A 2019 genetic study found that, while the Ashkelon population derive most of their ancestry from the local Semitic-speaking Levantine gene pool, which would be the same pool that the Isrealites swam in.

[Yenn]

There are plenty of references to what Israel would call fake news. Villages in Palestine that would be attacked by the Israelis every night, until the Arabs agreed to sell or more often just walked off. Much as what is happening in so many places nowadays.

The real clincher to Israels terrorism in my opinion was the King David hotel. This hotel was right in the city and the Israelies managed to get into the basement and load up the supporting columns with explosives. They then went into the street and let off explosives which led to the people rushing into the hotel for a safe haven. Than the Israelies blew up the columns and brought down half of the hotel. My use of the term Israeli is not correct as there was no state of Israel at that time, but not all jews deserve to be tarred with the same brush. It was really the Stern Gang.

[kgwilson]

I'll get back to the original track. US voters have become increasingly distrustful of politicians for years especially those in the rust and bible belts. Their view and influence they felt was being steadily eroded with liberal and socialist ideals and that politicians were all self serving and failing to represent them. Many evangelical or conservative Christians felt their voice had been completely over ruled by the Californian and New York/New England views. While they were Republicans many were also more right leaning and harboured racist and very conservative gun toting views and most are white.

 

Along comes Trump, a business man, a self made billionaire (so he told them) and reality TV star. He said disgraceful things, was shown to have done disgraceful things but he struck a chord with them saying what a lot of them felt deep down but could not say publicly and he was there to drain the political swamp. They elected him. They didn't care about the lies, his dastardly deeds, he was their man.

 

Four years down the track and his malignant narcissism, dishonesty, ignorance and cons have not fazed them at all. They believe him emphatically, all 22,000 times that he has lied are irrelevant to them and several thousand turned up in Washington to support his ridiculous assertion that he really won the election. Now all the media is fake (maybe except Brietbart). These supporters have become fanatics just as those of other despots around the world are. There is no reasoning with them. It is just a bit sad that most Republican senators are still afraid to stand up & accept the facts.

 

So 73 million voted for him but 79 million voted for Biden. A lot of republicans voted for him because they are republicans not because they like Trump. He may have awakened many who were apolitical through his diviciveness and the polls showing he was headed for a landslide defeat but this also galvanised democrats and disaffected republicans to get him out. And they succeeded. Trump showed that he was prepared to do anything to stay in power. What he does after 20 January is anyones guess. He may start his own TV station or leave the country. He will be tied up in lawsuits for years. He may have a tilt at another term in 2024.

 

Meanwhile US politics will get back to something resembling normality with the Republicans running the Senate & Democrats congress so the so called swamp is still there. Biden was considered a poor choice by many but he is experienced, humble and most of all is not a complete a$$hole like Trump.

[Bruce Tuncks]

Well said kgwilson. Here's my guess... after he is no longer prez, he will be prosecuted for many things. Maybe he will keep out of jail, but it will be a risk he is facing.

[nomadpete]

After 20th January, will the extremist rust belt gun toting voters find a new Messiah, and Donny just end up looking like a wealthier Alan Bond?

[Old Koreelah]

Are there any parallels to the blind loyalty of Trump’s rusted-on supporters?

They remind me of British motorcycle fans reacting to Japanese machines swamping the market in the 60s and 70s.

 

We threw all sorts of criticisms against these new Jab bikes: poor quality metals, unreliable, crappy handling...

We found it easy to overlook the atrocious brakes, electrics, oil leaks and quality control of our cherished Beezas and Triumphs.

 

As Jap bikes rapidly improved, we die-hard supporters of Brit bikes shifted our positions, quietly abandoning one foreciously-defended line-in-the-sand after another.

Some of us migrated to other European brands. Some completely lost their way and adopted American heavy metal. Others weakened and rode the shiny new, ultra-reliable types (but always waxed lyrical about great British marques). 

 

Let’s hope Trump’s “deplorables” put their guns away and find some way to adapt.

 

[nomadpete]

The latest twist in the sad saga looks like being Trump TV vs Rupert's Fox.

Now it's "all Fox's fault" and Donny is planning to make his own 24/7 "real news" stream.....

 

Has Rupert finally met his match? Donny sure has the ability to draw the punters with his theatrics. We have reliable statistics that indicates that he has a ready audience of at least 70 million Americans.

 

Will this particular bitter mudslinging match finally leave the media directly in control of the once great democracy?

 

Or will it all wind down and end up more like an Alan Jones shockjock segment on Sky TV?

 

.

Edited November 17, 2020 by nomadpete

[nomadpete]

Sadly, I feel like I'm living to see the movie "Idiocracy" playing out in real life.