Trump 56: He Still Loves Rallies Almost As Much As He Adores Putin

[libgirl2]

4 hours ago, Howl said:

Just to keep y'all up to date on the REAL reason Trump was targeted -- he was going to expose satanic pedophile rings...but now he can't...or something. No reason given on why he is unable to expose these satanic pedophile rings by just posting on Truth-y Social...it's mystifying. 

 

I laugh but I know people who probably believe this! Not friends, not relatives but those of a best friend. He sends her these texts all the time about stuff like this and she tells him not to. I wouldn't be so kind! 

[GreyhoundFan]

This is a good read: "Why Trump has to sell a fantasy of collective persecution"

Quote

When you watch the collection of nincompoops whose professional lives are organized around defending Donald Trump — the Fox News hosts, the backbench members of Congress, the far-right social media personalities — it’s easy to conclude that, to quote Trump himself, “they’re not sending their best.” But they know their audience, and they’re very good at identifying what that audience needs to hear, then repeating it over and over.

And right now, with investigations potentially closing in on Trump from multiple directions, they’ve homed in on a vital message: This isn’t about Trump. It’s about you.

It’s ludicrous; after all, what could be less about you than whether Trump illegally retained classified documents or lied about the value of his properties to mislead tax authorities? But the claim is absolutely vital to maintaining the Republican base’s support and passion for him.

That’s because a sense of oppression has become central to motivating conservative voters, a way of keeping them engaged, angry and feeling that they have a personal stake in the outcome of every political event, no matter how remote it might seem. So it’s being repeated over and over:

Why is it more important than ever that Trump’s very particular problems be turned into a story in which every registered Republican is at risk of having their home ransacked by jackbooted government thugs? To understand, you have to go back to 2016.

It can be hard to remember now, but when he first ran for president, Trump had an economic message with genuine appeal to a wide swath of voters, one that was based in truth even as it played on people’s resentments.

He told them that they had been victimized by a rigged system, one that gave great rewards to a sliver of the population as it left them behind. In his telling, both parties were at fault, because they had supported trade deals, including NAFTA, that allowed manufacturing jobs to go overseas, leaving communities across the country to shrink and decline.

It might have been oversimplified, and had little or nothing to do with Trump’s actual economic agenda (much of which was a standard menu of upper-income tax cuts and deregulation for corporations), but at its heart was a truth: Across the Rust Belt and throughout rural America, people are indeed suffering long-term problems that the current arrangements of wealth and power aren’t fixing.

There were millions of people who heard what Trump said in 2016 and connected to it. “The game really is rigged against people like me,” they thought, “and sure, this guy is a blowhard and a clown, but maybe he can do something about it.”

Yet today, Trump can’t say he changed any of those fundamental problems. Let’s take one vivid illustration: The New York Times recently reported on how the coal industry ravaged the land in Letcher County, Ky., leaving it vulnerable to flooding (as if the people there didn’t have enough struggles already). As the paper noted, “In 2021, not a single building permit was issued in the county,” which means nobody built a store, a warehouse, or even a home, in the entire county. Not one.

What did Trump do for the people there? In 2016, he promised to revive the coal industry, with boundless prosperity to follow, and Letcher County gave him 80 percent of its votes. But it was a lie from the beginning, as anyone with any sense could see; the coal industry kept declining, and so did Letcher County.

Trump will probably win Letcher County again if he runs in 2024; margins that high don’t just disappear. But all over, plenty of people who connected with his message in 2016 realize his obsessions don’t matter to them at all. It’s why in 2020 Joe Biden got 7 million more votes than Trump did — and sits in the White House.

It’s unlikely Trump will be able to look beyond his own petty grievances and personal preoccupations to convince a majority of the public that his victory could change their lives for the better. So for now, he and his defenders are focusing on members of their base, telling them that whatever happens to Trump this week or next could also happen to them.

They’re not just used to hearing that message; they glory in it. They are the sympathetic victims, the encircled defenders of justice, oppressed but unbowed.

This fantasy of persecution is so powerful because it turns the most mundane things — like sitting on the couch scrolling through Trump-devoted Reddit forums while Fox News plays in the background — into something dramatic, even heroic.

You’re not just an ordinary person with an ordinary job and an ordinary life. You’re a freedom fighter waging war against forces of darkness to secure liberty’s future. The more grubby and personal Trump’s misdeeds are, the more important it is to keep telling the base that story so its allegiance won’t waver.

So every absurd Trump story will have to be presented this way: He took those classified documents for you, he cheated on his taxes for you, he tried to steal the election for you, and if, heaven forbid, he should face accountability for his wrongdoing, you will be the one who pays the price.

To any reasonable person, it might sound absurd. But the MAGA devotees believe it with all their hearts.

 

[WiseGirl]

News update alert 

"Attorney General Merrick Garland to deliver remarks" 

https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/attorney-general-garland-doj-remarks/index.html

 

[GreyhoundFan]

15 minutes ago, WiseGirl said:

News update alert 

"Attorney General Merrick Garland to deliver remarks" 

https://www.cnn.com/politics/live-news/attorney-general-garland-doj-remarks/index.html

 

Good video of the remarks:

 

More:

 

[Xan]

Today I love Garland.  He's painted Donny into a corner.  

I just looked over on Truth Social.  Donald is melting down again.  "Everything was fine, better than that of most previous presidents."  B.S.  Previous presidents didn't take 27 boxes of classified materials home with them.

Spoiler

 

Edited August 11, 2022 by Xan

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

43 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Good video of the remarks:

 

More:

 

My take, for what it's worth- Garland is basically daring Trump to release the information first so that Trump can try to play the "nothing to see here otherwise I wouldn't have made it public" knowing that Trump is stupid enough to fall for it.  It gets the information out faster and while the story is still "hot".  There must be some real goodies in the search warrant and property receipts for Trump to be resistant to releasing it (if it wasn't a big deal, he would have already been showing it to everyone and claiming the whole "nothing burger"- or "nothing berder" bit).  It's also pretty significant that Garland made sure everyone knows he personally approved the decision to seek the search warrant.  He's letting Trump know that this isn't some low-level investigation but as the top guy at DOJ, he's overseeing it personally.  

With the information coming out that the Dobbs decision may really hurt the Rs in the midterms and possibly into 2024, I'm wondering (and wishing and hoping and praying) that Mitch and his posse of deplorables are regretting blocking Garland's SCOTUS approval and seating him.  He is pretty centrist so on the SCOTUS he wouldn't really do much damage; however, if this investigation pans out, he will have done serious damage to Trump.  If the rumors about the other investigations into Jan. 6 are accurate and if those investigations bear fruit, he may end up doing serious damage to several Rs (the usual suspects).  It will warm the cockles of my cold black heart if Mitch's hypocrisy of blocking Garland's nomination (claiming it was due to it being an election year) then using Trump as a puppet to get Gorsuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett-Comey (ahem, election year) seated ends up really disrupting his plan.  

[onekidanddone]

1 hour ago, Xan said:

Today I love Garland.  He's painted Donny into a corner.  

I just looked over on Truth Social.  Donald is melting down again.  "Everything was fine, better than that of most previous presidents."  B.S.  Previous presidents didn't take 27 boxes of classified materials home with them.

  Hide contents

 

Why is this the first time I’m hearing about Obama’s 33 million pages? Are they somewhere with Hunter Biden’s laptop, Hillary Clinton’s emails and Colonel Mustard’s candle stick?

 

 

 

[Ozlsn]

On 8/11/2022 at 6:04 AM, Dandruff said:

I'm wondering what they may not have found and where it could have gotten to.

9 hours ago, Howl said:

Just to keep y'all up to date on the REAL reason Trump was targeted -- he was going to expose satanic pedophile rings...but now he can't...or something. No reason given on why he is unable to expose these satanic pedophile rings by just posting on Truth-y Social...it's mystifying. 

 

It's like... the satanic rings are INSIDE the house...! 

(At this point Donny et al running satanic child pornography rings inside the White House or out of Trump Tower wouldn't surprise me, mostly on the basis that they keep turning out to be doing what they are accusing people of doing. Shock me yes, surprise me... not as much.) 

[fraurosena]

Because logic is never part of the equation…

 

[fraurosena]

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

17 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

Because logic is never part of the equation…

 

I just cannot get enough of the images of Trump and his band freaking out, running around in circles, yelling into phones, papers flying around, chaos everywhere. It’s gotta be like a Monty Python sketch minus the humor and talent! 

[fraurosena]

 

[thoughtful]

21 minutes ago, AlmostSavedAtTacoBell said:

I just cannot get enough of the images of Trump and his band freaking out, running around in circles, yelling into phones, papers flying around, chaos everywhere. It’s gotta be like a Monty Python sketch minus the humor and talent! 

However, there may be some silly walks.

[fraurosena]

Hmmm, I wonder what the answer will be… nah, who am I kidding? We all know he will absolutely object.

[AlmostSavedAtTacoBell]

https://www.newsweek.com/mick-mulvaney-says-fbi-informant-very-close-donald-trump-1732954
 

He speculates it has to be 6-8 of the people closest to him. That lets out all of his kids except daughter-wife. Darn- I was really hoping it was Barron. I figured he really likes Melania’s boyfriend and wanted Grandpa Dad out of the way so his mom can get divorced and marry the cooler, much younger guy.  
 

My bet after this article is on Ivanka. She sees the handwriting on the wall and made a deal to save herself and her Real Boy Doll husband. It would be delicious if the guy who has no loyalty got dimes out by the daughter he’s so smitten with. 

[onekidanddone]

1 hour ago, AlmostSavedAtTacoBell said:

https://www.newsweek.com/mick-mulvaney-says-fbi-informant-very-close-donald-trump-1732954
 

He speculates it has to be 6-8 of the people closest to him. That lets out all of his kids except daughter-wife. Darn- I was really hoping it was Barron. I figured he really likes Melania’s boyfriend and wanted Grandpa Dad out of the way so his mom can get divorced and marry the cooler, much younger guy.  
 

My bet after this article is on Ivanka. She sees the handwriting on the wall and made a deal to save herself and her Real Boy Doll husband. It would be delicious if the guy who has no loyalty got dimes out by the daughter he’s so smitten with. 

Could be Mikey himself, however I’m hoping for OfIvanka. Other idle speculation is Bannon taking a plea deal. 
 

 

 

 

 

[Xan]

Latest news is that some of the documents had to do with nuclear facilities.  Honestly, I'm surprised.  I had a feeling he took documents from the White House to sell but taking our nuclear secrets?  Holy shit.

[GreyhoundFan]

5 hours ago, onekidanddone said:

Why is this the first time I’m hearing about Obama’s 33 million pages? Are they somewhere with Hunter Biden’s laptop, Hillary Clinton’s emails and Colonel Mustard’s candle stick?

 

 

 

The Obama documents in question were, as per law, turned over to the National Archives, which, upon processing, sent them to a federal government facility near Chicago. They weren’t stored at the Obama residence. Of course the Mango Menace can’t grasp the facts. 

[onekidanddone]

1 hour ago, Xan said:

Latest news is that some of the documents had to do with nuclear facilities.  Honestly, I'm surprised.  I had a feeling he took documents from the White House to sell but taking our nuclear secrets?  Holy shit.

He is at heart a flim flan gagster always used to bribery and shady deals. Sell our country to the highest bidder is what he knows.  I also think he could very well be being blackmailed and owe huge debts. 

[Xan]

Trump has announced that he will not oppose the release of the warrant.  He says that he is in fact encouraging the release of all documents.  He goes on to say that they've been drawn up by "radical left Democrats" so he's trying to poison the waters.  I think he understood there was no way to block this without looking worse so now he'll say that they are doing it to attack him and his followers.

[Smash!]

 

Edited August 12, 2022 by Smash!

[fraurosena]

Good grief.

 

[fraurosena]

So this could explain Trump's recent paranoia about being tapped...

 

[fraurosena]

No surprise the Fox Propaganda network is attacking the judge who signed off on the warrant-- and being so glaringly stupid about it.

 

[47of74]

31 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

No surprise the Fox Propaganda network is attacking the judge who signed off on the warrant-- and being so glaringly stupid about it.

 

These are the same people who whined about people taking Justice Rapey McBeerBong Weenie Waver and Justice Handmaiden to task.

Here’s a tweet with the link to court listener and the docket if anyone wants to look for themselves.