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Thursday, March 24, 2016

Truffles And Trump


 Rupert Murdoch and FOX Sniffing Out Dangers to the Republic



Half of the Republican Party thinks Mr. Trump is the horn which Gabriel blows at midnight, the other half thinks he's not all that bad.
Ditto the media. I mean, FOX News has trash-canned that whole business of "Fair and Balanced" as of the first attack on one of their blonde anchorpersons. The Huffington Post Real Estate section runs a disturbing little denial at the end of any news articles that mentions Chicago's Trump Tower stating that Mr. Trump is a fascist scoundrel.

I think that is taking journalism to the bridge too far, to the narcissistic road not [hitherto] taken. I mean, because of Mr. Trump, journalists of all stripes have laid aside their differences and agreed upon one thing: they - the journalists - are much smarter than the rest of us, and they have the uncanny ability to sniff out the rotted truffles of fascism!

Is he a demagogue?
And why - exactly - is demagoguery so evil?
Huey Long was a demagogue, and he accomplished things for the people of Louisiana which would have taken regular politicians a couple of centuries to get around to. It seems that if you think it is possible that the deck is stacked against us and in favor of the rich and powerful, then it stands to reason that you are going to back a guy who will be very "innovative" when it comes to getting things done.

It is a dream, and even if Mr. Trump were elected, he would find the deck stacked against him.

Furthermore....

The 3rd Party Wheeze is going to be the long term effect of all this anyway.
Hitherto, all the disaffected members of the GOP and Independents and Democrats who like their politics with some real spice that gives them heat, and not just to the rich, will have a national face around which to cluster.
They did not have a spokesman before... or a "bespokes-man" either.

The Fiscal Times
Forget Trump: Here's Who's Really Destroying the Republican Party
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Columns/2016/03/18/Forget-Trump-Heres-Whos-Really-Destroying-Republican-Party
The seminal event in the crackup of the Republican Party is not the rise of Donald Trump as their presidential nominee, contrary to popular opinion. It was the overthrow of John Boehner as Speaker of the House. That showed the power of the forty-odd members of the House Freedom Caucus, and their incompatibility with the GOP establishment and the compromises required by divided government (or for that matter, math).

The change in leadership at the top has not bridged this divide. Despite months of happy talk, the Freedom Caucus rejected Paul Ryan’s budget resolution, likely leaving the Republicans with no budget this year, after they made returning to regular order a campaign promise in 2014. The lack of a budget is just a sidelight to the continuing irreconcilable differences between conservative factions. Trump will not be able to fix this either; only a purge of one side of the party or the other would.

The Freedom Caucus essentially wants to control government from a base of 40 members of the House, with only a few allies in the Senate and no president willing to agree to their demands. They want to defund Planned Parenthood, balance the budget through massive spending cuts, dismantle government healthcare programs, and overturn every executive order of the past eight years, regardless of not having the two-thirds support in Congress that would be required currently to override Obama vetoes and make that happen...
(emphasis mine)
 I wrote 2 weeks ago about getting 50 seats in the House. See? It is feasible.

Just remember the famous quote of Santayana:

"The truffle slicing mandolins of the gods slice slowly... but they slice very thin!!"

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