Ricky said yesterday that Rush doesn’t really inform us.
But he does. Rush plays lots of clips of people saying things that you never hear elsewhere.
He must have a dozen people recording all the channels for clips. All but MSNBC. Rush says there’s never anything there.
I wouldn’t know.
I remember twenty years ago when many church growth teachers favored homogeneous churches. At the time it felt ‘wrong”, but I couldn’t understand the reason. Now I have reasons:
1. The local church is here to minister and should at least seek to be open and minister to all those immediately around the church.
2. Homogeneous churches lead to the creation of “tribes’. That is one of our current problems. We have poor whites, blacks, Hispanics, rich whites, etc. This is what Charles Murray described in Coming Apart
3. A pastor of a homogeneous church is too easily tempted to tell his tribe what that tribe wants to hears. I am not being particularly hard on pastors. The problem is the pastors of homogenous churches may see Christianity only through the lens of their tribe.
There are places where the people are homogeneous. For example, 15 years ago, my son and I walked into a crowded mall in Brownsville, Texas and he touched my arm and said,”Dad! You are the only white person in this entire mall.’ I stopped and looked around and sure enough, every other face in the mall was brown and was looking up at me staring. In such a case, the church is probably going to be somewhat homogeneous, but I would still want it to include rich, poor and middle-class Mexicans.
Chas, I haven’t listened to Rush in fifteen years, so I will defer to your judgment. Fifteen years ago he was a fine comedian and all-round entertainer. However, I would have never trusted him to inform me about politicians or complex policy issues. He used to be our Michael Moore. Has he changed?
Rush, like Trump, has a weakness for flattery. I remember he was very anti-Big Bush when Big Bush was president, correctly taking the position that Bush was undoing some of Reagan’s reforms. Then Bush had him to the White House and Rush’s tune forever changed. Rush, like Hannity, is a personal friend of Trump. They are golfing buddies.
I listen to the radio when I’m in the car mostly—if I listen at all. I tune in to Rush, Hannity, Savage or Levine sometimes just to see what their topics are; but I can rarely take more than 5-10 min. of the screeching and the ego. Actually, talk radio is probably where conservatives learned to have a high tolerance for egotistical bombast.
Hannity has (or used to have) a Democratic caller(s) who would call in and discuss their positions. That part was usually interesting; and it was always civil. I would listen to that.
But Moody radio is usually a better bet. Silence is often a nice option too.
And occasionally NPR is interesting, though it’s often inane. The other day I had the choice between talk radio and NPR’s broadcast of thousands of ants walking on a microphone. I raised my hand to turn the station, and then let it drop. The snap, crackle, pop was calming…in a hypnotic sort of way. After those debates, the sound of ants doesn’t seem so bad.
On Facebook, I just shared a poster showing that Gary Johnson is polling in the double digits in a few states, with this preface from my friend David. . .
“If you’re sick and depressed because the two old parties served up candidates so loathsome as Trump and Hillary, you can still put someone else into double digits to lodge your protest of those horrible candidates.
Even if you prefer one of them slightly to the other one, the polls and oddsmakers indicate that Hillary is already leading in states that add up to more than 300 Electoral votes, so even if Trump wins everywhere else, in every state which is still up for grabs, Hillary will win regardless.
So in this election, you have a free shot to vote in protest of the two party system, to indicate that you want more parties and candidates, and better ones, to choose from.”
Then I added this. . .
“Or you might prefer Evan McMullin or Jill Stein or someone else (there’s a couple others out there I don’t know much about). Or you can write in a name of your choice. (Arnold Weaver of Texas is a good, clean candidate. Don’t let the fact that he’s a dog dissuade you. 🙂 )”
I have to say, though, that I still think it is possible that, as some have said, the polls are not accurately showing Trump’s true support, & he may end up being elected after all.
This is may be sick thinking on my part, but I almost hope he does win, out of curiosity of what he would really be like as president.
Regarding that last comment, particularly about “sick thinking”, my apologies to those of you who are intending to vote for him. For me it would be “sick thinking” since I do not support him in any way. Not implying any of you have “sick thinking”, even if I may disagree with you.
If I listen to talk radio (more likely during campaign seasons), I generally only can tolerate Dennis Prager & Michael Medved (and those in fairly short snippets, usually only on part of my commute time). The others I’ve heard are two screechy and emotional and I don’t think I’ve hardly ever heard Rush, to be honest, I wouldn’t even know what station he’d be on locally. I never watch Hannity or O’Reilly (nor have I ever heard them on the radio).
I like the quieter, more thoughtful, even-handed discussions & guests, which Prager often has — some Christian radio I also like, but there are a lot of those programs I’m not fond of either.
I generally prefer straight, no-nonsense news or music in the car.
Ricky’s discussion of church reminded me of a new pastor we had (this was 2 churches ago in my own history) who decided we needed to “target” a particular demographic to be successful in boosting our numbers. Of course, that target turned out to be his own (young, middle class).
This would have been in the era of “church growth” when that was all the rage — how to become hip and attract people who are hip.
I’ve been in reformed Presbyterian churches ever since so I’m not as current on what the latest trends are among the more “trendy” evangelical circles (if those even exist anymore), but that’s fine with me. 🙂
Karen, I also think the polls may be skewed and that this race remains somewhat unpredictable (although I’m more sure than not that Clinton will win).
We may know more after this weekend when new polls start getting released that take in the most recent outrageous events (and the 3rd debate). If Trump survives and edges up again, it could be a fairly close race at that.
Or not.
Right now I can envision either a decisive win by Clinton or a close win by her. Trump winning would still be unlikely in my view. But it’s been such an unpredictable year …
He was the person to allege that he committed multiple sexual assaults and his accusation/confession was much more graphic than the accounts of the ladies who confirmed the accuracy of the allegation.
Hubby, who used to work in News, recommends a book called, “How the News Makes us Dumb.” One thing it points out us that news organizations are not there as a public service. They are there to make money.
Peggy Noonan, more than any other conservative columnist, sympathized with Trump supporters. Here she writes about what might have happened had there been a sane Donald Trump.
I miss Peggy Noonan. The WSJ pay wall has been tightened up to the point where I can no longer get around it. I may have to pay for a digital subscription.
(My mom used to laugh at the stereotype that Republicans were somehow all “rich”)
_________________
For the first time in decades, the wealthy are set to deliver a landslide victory for a Democratic presidential candidate.
While polling data on the rich is imprecise given their small population, polls of the top-earning households favor Hillary Clinton over Donald J. Trump two to one. The July Affluent Barometer survey by Ipsos found that among voters earning more than $100,000 a year — roughly the top 25 percent of households — 45 percent said they planned to vote for Mrs. Clinton, while 28 percent planned to vote for Mr. Trump. The rest were undecided or planned to vote for another candidate. …
_____________________
Well, yes, making money — to sustain the business and make a profit; nothing sinister about that really. You also have NPR and public radio, sponsored by taxpayer/government dollars.
I’ll take the first model, thank you.
Journalists should be fairly paid and I’d rather see that coming from the private sector
Tychicus, What a bizarre football day! The Aggies, Tech, UT, Houston, and TCU all went down. The honor of Texas was upheld by my school (SMU) and my wife’s (North Texas). She only recently discovered that North Texas had a football team.
… The dangers of a Hillary Clinton presidency are more familiar than Trump’s authoritarian unknowns, because we live with them in our politics already. They’re the dangers of elite groupthink, of Beltway power worship, of a cult of presidential action in the service of dubious ideals. They’re the dangers of a recklessness and radicalism that doesn’t recognize itself as either, because it’s convinced that if an idea is mainstream and commonplace among the great and good then it cannot possibly be folly. …
… One can look at Trump himself and see too much danger of still-deeper disaster, too much temperamental risk and moral turpitude, to be an acceptable alternative to this blunder-ridden status quo … while also looking at Hillary Clinton and seeing a woman whose record embodies the tendencies that gave rise to Trumpism in the first place.
Indeed what is distinctive about Clinton, more even than Bush or Obama, is how few examples there are of her ever breaking with the elite consensus on matters of statecraft. …
The good news is that she is not a utopian; she is — or has become, across a long and grinding career — temperamentally pragmatic, self-consciously hardheaded. So she is unlikely to do anything that the cosmopolitan capitals of Europe and America would consider obviously radical or dangerous or dumb.
But in those cases where the cosmopolitan position isn’t necessarily reasonable or safe, in those instances where the Western elite can go half-mad without realizing it, Hillary Clinton shows every sign of being just as ready to march into folly as her peers.
__________________________________
Donna @ 12:03. You mean we have a choice between chaos D and chaos R?
I have known Hillary for 25 years and know nothing good about her.
I have known The Donald for 25 months. I know this:
He doesn’t think the Iranians are our friends
He doesn’t think the police are our enemies.
He ain’t Hillary.
He has some good men around him. He may listen to them, but it would be out of character.
A great article by Douthat, DJ. It might actually make a difference in my thinking if Trump, like Reagan, had an educated philosophy of government, economics and foreign policy that differed from the cosmopolitan consensus as Reagan did in 1976 and 1980.
However, Trump has even less commitment to principles than does Clinton. His policy on Iraq varied depending on what was popular at the time and to what interviewer he was speaking. His immigration harangue was pure demogaugery and modified for the general election. Even more than Clinton, Trump wants to be accepted by the elite of Manhattan. His actual policies would not stray far from the cosmopolitan consensus. The difference is that her adoption and advocacy of those policies would be clumsy and boring, but well prepared and thought out. His would be manic and scatterbrained, leading to concerns among our people and allies and much amusement among our enemies.
Noonan’s article made me think of three questions. Imagine if three years ago you were asked:
1. Would you vote for a nut for President?
2. Would your answer change if the nut’s opponent was a corrupt liberal Democrat with bad judgment and questionable health?
3. Would your answer change if the nut was a con man, had historically been a liberal Democrat and had a life history filled with financial and sexual misbehavior?
This could be a fun game. I suggest question 4 should probably have to do with Hillary’s stewardship of national security secrets.
Read the Douthat article — the problem, as Ricky points out, is he doesn’t point the possible effects of Trump which out weigh Clinton’s minuses.
Read the Noonan article — She and Douthat both point out the fallacies and problems of the ruling class. And the need for an outsider to think beyond the confines of the ruling class and their group think. However, Noonan is wrong, there is a sane Donald Trump. His name is Bernie Sanders — he’s sane, respectful of women, wants to reconsider trade deals, minimize hawkish foreign adventures, etc.
“There has been some discussion about write-in candidates and how that process works. The process is confusing. So I’ll break it down for you in case you were considering writing someone in.
7 states allow you to write in whoever you want (Oregon, Iowa, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Vermont).
9 states don’t allow any type of write in candidates (Nevada, New Mexico, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Hawaii).
The remaining 34 states require that a candidate had filed some type of paperwork to be certified as a write in candidate.
Bernie Sanders, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich have not filed that paperwork to be certified as a write in candidate.
Unless you live in one of those 7 states listed above that allow you to write in whoever you want, if you choose to write in an uncertified candidate – your vote will not count.”
HRW’s comment at 1:54 perfectly illustrates the second reason (other than sanity) that I could never vote for Trump. HRW is right. Bernie Sanders is the closest there is to a sane Donald Trump.
So I will vote for Arnold Weaver in 2016 and dream of Walker or Ryan or some other sane, charasmatic conservative in 2020.
Ha, I heard a new one today: It’s a choice between Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dishonorable.
I am still planning to leave the top slot blank but plan to vote for every Republican thereafter down ballot I can find (many of our races are, unfortunately, one Democrat vs. Another Democrat due to our changed primary rules that pits the two top “vote getters” — regardless of party — in the general election; California is essentially a one-part state now).
But …
If the GOP can retain the House & Senate, at least there will be a “stop” on her for some things. It may be the best one can hope for if you’re a conservative.
Perhaps I should explain the difference between Sanders and Trump.
The English speaking world tends to divide into political parties based on economics only which leaves the social conservatives grouped with the neoliberal economists (what some Europeans call liberal conservative or conservative liberal — just to confuse us). A grouping which is contradictory. Right wing populists have their own political parties in Europe in which social conservatives have an economic platform which includes gov’t intervention, protectionism, etc. Its based on 19th century nationalism. Society is represented by the government and the government is a tool to maintain society — law and order, nationalist ideas, and taking care of the people. This is Trumps appeal, social conservatives married to an activist government which preserves and takes care of the “people”
The left has always wondered why the Republican base votes against its interest. It doesn’t — it votes for what it sees as its social interest. For the base, social views are more important than economic policy. As Noonan points out, this shocked the Republican elite but it really shouldn’t have — countless surveys have shown this to be the case; the base favours gov’t intervention to regulate both social morals and economics. And anecdotally, signs saying “Hands off my Medicare” at anti-Obamacare rallies should have been a sign.
Sanders of course is a left wing populist. Although the economic policies sound the same, they come from a different source — instead of nationalism and the nation’s right to intervene for the “people’s” benefit, the left advocates that the workers have a greater share in the spoils of their production, an individual shouldn’t be alienated from his/her labour or even worse self – thus social liberals stress the autonomy of the individual (something they have in common with traditional liberalism). Since they stress individual access to country’s economic production they have a larger definition of people (hence less racism or tribalism than the right wing populist)
Please remember HRW, many of us won’t be voting for Trump. Christianity Today is now reporting the majority of Christians won’t be voting for him either.
I wonder if that early round of balloting in the primaries may very well have been led by opportunists who were not Repiblicans throwing the race to Trump, and while they were at it, claiming to be Christians to discredit Christians.
Michelle, I’ve suspected that myself. One of the last people Trump talked to before running was Bill Clinton. Even up to our late primary here I knew maybe one in 6 or so who said they were voting for Trump.
Michelle, You live in California where Christians don’t like Trump and probably prefer for their candidates to be sane.
Here in Texas, most Christians over 40 are for the lunatic. If my Confederate loyalties were not well known, my friends would think I had gone commie for opposing Trump. Sometimes after I post something critical of Trump, my friends will post pictures of Confederate generals on my wall to try to draw me back into the fold.
I realize that the majority of Christians probably won’t vote for Trump especially younger evangelicals. Most of my American relatives won’t vote for him. However, when Reed, Falwell, Graham, etc go on the stump, talk shows, and cable news advocating for Trump, the evangelical political “values” loses its credibility. Interestingly, Liberty University students released a statement contradicting Falwell Jr. and indicating they would not support either major candidate.
Many of those self-procalimed “evangelicals,” as it turned out, also said they almost never attended church.
People pick a label but that doesn’t mean it’s very accurate.
Our pastor has suggested he’s voting for neither — as are many of us who are in the congregation. The Christians (the actual church-member and attending kind) I know are pretty overwhelmingly disheartened by Trump.
My husband did not vote for Trump…but he did fill in a blank for the non affiliated candidate…he said he would not leave the space blank due to his suspicions that “someone” just might color in that little circle for him at the vote counting center! 🙂
A friend at church said she was going to write in Ben Carson…… 🙂
Ya’ll know I voted for Mike Pence……
Ricky, your 6:02 p.m. prompted “ooh”s of delight from my 12-year-old son — his two favorite things to see/read about are U.S. presidents and, better yet, sports cars. 🙂
Recently I learned that my Jewish congregation is providing training for college age congregants on how to deal with anti-Semitism on campus. That’s how bad things have gotten.
I wonder whether the sad irony of the situation has registered with the congregation, the vast majority of whose members are leftists.
Anti-Semitism is so rampant at America’s colleges and universities that teenage Jews need special training before entering this bastion of leftism. …
… Frankly, I suspect that it’s just a matter of time until (1) anti-Israel sentiment becomes a significant force at campuses where the level of hostility is now low and (2) open anti-Semitism replaces anti-Israel sentiment. That’s the direction in which things are moving.
Which campuses of those surveyed are the worst right now? The study identified Brooklyn College (CUNY-Brooklyn), Northwestern, Rutgers, Wisconsin, Illinois, and schools in the University of California system. …
____________________________
Wandering Views 
Ricky said yesterday that Rush doesn’t really inform us.
But he does. Rush plays lots of clips of people saying things that you never hear elsewhere.
He must have a dozen people recording all the channels for clips. All but MSNBC. Rush says there’s never anything there.
I wouldn’t know.
Welcome back Coyote Blue.
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I remember twenty years ago when many church growth teachers favored homogeneous churches. At the time it felt ‘wrong”, but I couldn’t understand the reason. Now I have reasons:
1. The local church is here to minister and should at least seek to be open and minister to all those immediately around the church.
2. Homogeneous churches lead to the creation of “tribes’. That is one of our current problems. We have poor whites, blacks, Hispanics, rich whites, etc. This is what Charles Murray described in Coming Apart
3. A pastor of a homogeneous church is too easily tempted to tell his tribe what that tribe wants to hears. I am not being particularly hard on pastors. The problem is the pastors of homogenous churches may see Christianity only through the lens of their tribe.
There are places where the people are homogeneous. For example, 15 years ago, my son and I walked into a crowded mall in Brownsville, Texas and he touched my arm and said,”Dad! You are the only white person in this entire mall.’ I stopped and looked around and sure enough, every other face in the mall was brown and was looking up at me staring. In such a case, the church is probably going to be somewhat homogeneous, but I would still want it to include rich, poor and middle-class Mexicans.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/pastors/2010/august-online-only/down-with-homogeneous-unit-principle.html
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Chas, I haven’t listened to Rush in fifteen years, so I will defer to your judgment. Fifteen years ago he was a fine comedian and all-round entertainer. However, I would have never trusted him to inform me about politicians or complex policy issues. He used to be our Michael Moore. Has he changed?
Rush, like Trump, has a weakness for flattery. I remember he was very anti-Big Bush when Big Bush was president, correctly taking the position that Bush was undoing some of Reagan’s reforms. Then Bush had him to the White House and Rush’s tune forever changed. Rush, like Hannity, is a personal friend of Trump. They are golfing buddies.
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Rush defends Trump. But he doesn’t push him the way Hannity does.
I generally turn Hannity off. He comes on after Rush in Greensboro.
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I listen to the radio when I’m in the car mostly—if I listen at all. I tune in to Rush, Hannity, Savage or Levine sometimes just to see what their topics are; but I can rarely take more than 5-10 min. of the screeching and the ego. Actually, talk radio is probably where conservatives learned to have a high tolerance for egotistical bombast.
Hannity has (or used to have) a Democratic caller(s) who would call in and discuss their positions. That part was usually interesting; and it was always civil. I would listen to that.
But Moody radio is usually a better bet. Silence is often a nice option too.
And occasionally NPR is interesting, though it’s often inane. The other day I had the choice between talk radio and NPR’s broadcast of thousands of ants walking on a microphone. I raised my hand to turn the station, and then let it drop. The snap, crackle, pop was calming…in a hypnotic sort of way. After those debates, the sound of ants doesn’t seem so bad.
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Cue: “The ants go marching one by one, hurrah! Hurrah!.”
First laugh of the morning, Debra. Thanks.
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On Facebook, I just shared a poster showing that Gary Johnson is polling in the double digits in a few states, with this preface from my friend David. . .
“If you’re sick and depressed because the two old parties served up candidates so loathsome as Trump and Hillary, you can still put someone else into double digits to lodge your protest of those horrible candidates.
Even if you prefer one of them slightly to the other one, the polls and oddsmakers indicate that Hillary is already leading in states that add up to more than 300 Electoral votes, so even if Trump wins everywhere else, in every state which is still up for grabs, Hillary will win regardless.
So in this election, you have a free shot to vote in protest of the two party system, to indicate that you want more parties and candidates, and better ones, to choose from.”
Then I added this. . .
“Or you might prefer Evan McMullin or Jill Stein or someone else (there’s a couple others out there I don’t know much about). Or you can write in a name of your choice. (Arnold Weaver of Texas is a good, clean candidate. Don’t let the fact that he’s a dog dissuade you. 🙂 )”
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I have to say, though, that I still think it is possible that, as some have said, the polls are not accurately showing Trump’s true support, & he may end up being elected after all.
This is may be sick thinking on my part, but I almost hope he does win, out of curiosity of what he would really be like as president.
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Regarding that last comment, particularly about “sick thinking”, my apologies to those of you who are intending to vote for him. For me it would be “sick thinking” since I do not support him in any way. Not implying any of you have “sick thinking”, even if I may disagree with you.
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If I listen to talk radio (more likely during campaign seasons), I generally only can tolerate Dennis Prager & Michael Medved (and those in fairly short snippets, usually only on part of my commute time). The others I’ve heard are two screechy and emotional and I don’t think I’ve hardly ever heard Rush, to be honest, I wouldn’t even know what station he’d be on locally. I never watch Hannity or O’Reilly (nor have I ever heard them on the radio).
I like the quieter, more thoughtful, even-handed discussions & guests, which Prager often has — some Christian radio I also like, but there are a lot of those programs I’m not fond of either.
I generally prefer straight, no-nonsense news or music in the car.
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Ricky’s discussion of church reminded me of a new pastor we had (this was 2 churches ago in my own history) who decided we needed to “target” a particular demographic to be successful in boosting our numbers. Of course, that target turned out to be his own (young, middle class).
This would have been in the era of “church growth” when that was all the rage — how to become hip and attract people who are hip.
I’ve been in reformed Presbyterian churches ever since so I’m not as current on what the latest trends are among the more “trendy” evangelical circles (if those even exist anymore), but that’s fine with me. 🙂
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Karen, I also think the polls may be skewed and that this race remains somewhat unpredictable (although I’m more sure than not that Clinton will win).
We may know more after this weekend when new polls start getting released that take in the most recent outrageous events (and the 3rd debate). If Trump survives and edges up again, it could be a fairly close race at that.
Or not.
Right now I can envision either a decisive win by Clinton or a close win by her. Trump winning would still be unlikely in my view. But it’s been such an unpredictable year …
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I, for one, am waiting for God’s October surprise. 🙂
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I found this somewhat inspiring.
I’m still supporting Arnold the Dog, but I hope Mr. McMullin wins Utah.
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Is Trump going to sue himself?
http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/news/a49887/trump-sue-accusers/
He was the person to allege that he committed multiple sexual assaults and his accusation/confession was much more graphic than the accounts of the ladies who confirmed the accuracy of the allegation.
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Hubby, who used to work in News, recommends a book called, “How the News Makes us Dumb.” One thing it points out us that news organizations are not there as a public service. They are there to make money.
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Peggy Noonan, more than any other conservative columnist, sympathized with Trump supporters. Here she writes about what might have happened had there been a sane Donald Trump.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/imagine-a-sane-donald-trump-1477004871?tesla=y
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I miss Peggy Noonan. The WSJ pay wall has been tightened up to the point where I can no longer get around it. I may have to pay for a digital subscription.
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(My mom used to laugh at the stereotype that Republicans were somehow all “rich”)
_________________
For the first time in decades, the wealthy are set to deliver a landslide victory for a Democratic presidential candidate.
While polling data on the rich is imprecise given their small population, polls of the top-earning households favor Hillary Clinton over Donald J. Trump two to one. The July Affluent Barometer survey by Ipsos found that among voters earning more than $100,000 a year — roughly the top 25 percent of households — 45 percent said they planned to vote for Mrs. Clinton, while 28 percent planned to vote for Mr. Trump. The rest were undecided or planned to vote for another candidate. …
_____________________
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DJ, It’s the Charles Murray split.
The WSJ is too rich for me.
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So Ricky, how to you get behind the paywall??
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Well, yes, making money — to sustain the business and make a profit; nothing sinister about that really. You also have NPR and public radio, sponsored by taxpayer/government dollars.
I’ll take the first model, thank you.
Journalists should be fairly paid and I’d rather see that coming from the private sector
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DJ, I got the Noonan column on a 12 hr. free trial from the WSJ.
It is now old enough to be available for free.
https://patriotpost.us/opinion/45499
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DJ: You should be able to get the article on your mobile phone.
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Tychicus, What a bizarre football day! The Aggies, Tech, UT, Houston, and TCU all went down. The honor of Texas was upheld by my school (SMU) and my wife’s (North Texas). She only recently discovered that North Texas had a football team.
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A Clinton presidency
_________________________________
… The dangers of a Hillary Clinton presidency are more familiar than Trump’s authoritarian unknowns, because we live with them in our politics already. They’re the dangers of elite groupthink, of Beltway power worship, of a cult of presidential action in the service of dubious ideals. They’re the dangers of a recklessness and radicalism that doesn’t recognize itself as either, because it’s convinced that if an idea is mainstream and commonplace among the great and good then it cannot possibly be folly. …
… One can look at Trump himself and see too much danger of still-deeper disaster, too much temperamental risk and moral turpitude, to be an acceptable alternative to this blunder-ridden status quo … while also looking at Hillary Clinton and seeing a woman whose record embodies the tendencies that gave rise to Trumpism in the first place.
Indeed what is distinctive about Clinton, more even than Bush or Obama, is how few examples there are of her ever breaking with the elite consensus on matters of statecraft. …
The good news is that she is not a utopian; she is — or has become, across a long and grinding career — temperamentally pragmatic, self-consciously hardheaded. So she is unlikely to do anything that the cosmopolitan capitals of Europe and America would consider obviously radical or dangerous or dumb.
But in those cases where the cosmopolitan position isn’t necessarily reasonable or safe, in those instances where the Western elite can go half-mad without realizing it, Hillary Clinton shows every sign of being just as ready to march into folly as her peers.
__________________________________
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Donna @ 12:03. You mean we have a choice between chaos D and chaos R?
I have known Hillary for 25 years and know nothing good about her.
I have known The Donald for 25 months. I know this:
He doesn’t think the Iranians are our friends
He doesn’t think the police are our enemies.
He ain’t Hillary.
He has some good men around him. He may listen to them, but it would be out of character.
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A great article by Douthat, DJ. It might actually make a difference in my thinking if Trump, like Reagan, had an educated philosophy of government, economics and foreign policy that differed from the cosmopolitan consensus as Reagan did in 1976 and 1980.
However, Trump has even less commitment to principles than does Clinton. His policy on Iraq varied depending on what was popular at the time and to what interviewer he was speaking. His immigration harangue was pure demogaugery and modified for the general election. Even more than Clinton, Trump wants to be accepted by the elite of Manhattan. His actual policies would not stray far from the cosmopolitan consensus. The difference is that her adoption and advocacy of those policies would be clumsy and boring, but well prepared and thought out. His would be manic and scatterbrained, leading to concerns among our people and allies and much amusement among our enemies.
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Noonan’s article made me think of three questions. Imagine if three years ago you were asked:
1. Would you vote for a nut for President?
2. Would your answer change if the nut’s opponent was a corrupt liberal Democrat with bad judgment and questionable health?
3. Would your answer change if the nut was a con man, had historically been a liberal Democrat and had a life history filled with financial and sexual misbehavior?
This could be a fun game. I suggest question 4 should probably have to do with Hillary’s stewardship of national security secrets.
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Read the Douthat article — the problem, as Ricky points out, is he doesn’t point the possible effects of Trump which out weigh Clinton’s minuses.
Read the Noonan article — She and Douthat both point out the fallacies and problems of the ruling class. And the need for an outsider to think beyond the confines of the ruling class and their group think. However, Noonan is wrong, there is a sane Donald Trump. His name is Bernie Sanders — he’s sane, respectful of women, wants to reconsider trade deals, minimize hawkish foreign adventures, etc.
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Seen on Facebook. . .
“There has been some discussion about write-in candidates and how that process works. The process is confusing. So I’ll break it down for you in case you were considering writing someone in.
7 states allow you to write in whoever you want (Oregon, Iowa, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Vermont).
9 states don’t allow any type of write in candidates (Nevada, New Mexico, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Hawaii).
The remaining 34 states require that a candidate had filed some type of paperwork to be certified as a write in candidate.
Bernie Sanders, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and John Kasich have not filed that paperwork to be certified as a write in candidate.
Unless you live in one of those 7 states listed above that allow you to write in whoever you want, if you choose to write in an uncertified candidate – your vote will not count.”
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A column which may be of interest.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/editorials/2016/10/14/how-religious-right-embraced-donald-trump-and-lost-its-moral-authority/zmnffYc0elZ5cdGHbLrBVL/story.html
Apparently the author is conservative and Jewish.
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HRW’s comment at 1:54 perfectly illustrates the second reason (other than sanity) that I could never vote for Trump. HRW is right. Bernie Sanders is the closest there is to a sane Donald Trump.
So I will vote for Arnold Weaver in 2016 and dream of Walker or Ryan or some other sane, charasmatic conservative in 2020.
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Ha, I heard a new one today: It’s a choice between Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dishonorable.
I am still planning to leave the top slot blank but plan to vote for every Republican thereafter down ballot I can find (many of our races are, unfortunately, one Democrat vs. Another Democrat due to our changed primary rules that pits the two top “vote getters” — regardless of party — in the general election; California is essentially a one-part state now).
But …
If the GOP can retain the House & Senate, at least there will be a “stop” on her for some things. It may be the best one can hope for if you’re a conservative.
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Perhaps I should explain the difference between Sanders and Trump.
The English speaking world tends to divide into political parties based on economics only which leaves the social conservatives grouped with the neoliberal economists (what some Europeans call liberal conservative or conservative liberal — just to confuse us). A grouping which is contradictory. Right wing populists have their own political parties in Europe in which social conservatives have an economic platform which includes gov’t intervention, protectionism, etc. Its based on 19th century nationalism. Society is represented by the government and the government is a tool to maintain society — law and order, nationalist ideas, and taking care of the people. This is Trumps appeal, social conservatives married to an activist government which preserves and takes care of the “people”
The left has always wondered why the Republican base votes against its interest. It doesn’t — it votes for what it sees as its social interest. For the base, social views are more important than economic policy. As Noonan points out, this shocked the Republican elite but it really shouldn’t have — countless surveys have shown this to be the case; the base favours gov’t intervention to regulate both social morals and economics. And anecdotally, signs saying “Hands off my Medicare” at anti-Obamacare rallies should have been a sign.
Sanders of course is a left wing populist. Although the economic policies sound the same, they come from a different source — instead of nationalism and the nation’s right to intervene for the “people’s” benefit, the left advocates that the workers have a greater share in the spoils of their production, an individual shouldn’t be alienated from his/her labour or even worse self – thus social liberals stress the autonomy of the individual (something they have in common with traditional liberalism). Since they stress individual access to country’s economic production they have a larger definition of people (hence less racism or tribalism than the right wing populist)
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Call me old fashioned, but I actually put a high value on sanity when I remember the weapons available for use by the US president.
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Please remember HRW, many of us won’t be voting for Trump. Christianity Today is now reporting the majority of Christians won’t be voting for him either.
I wonder if that early round of balloting in the primaries may very well have been led by opportunists who were not Repiblicans throwing the race to Trump, and while they were at it, claiming to be Christians to discredit Christians.
I could be wrong, of course. 🙂
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Michelle, I’ve suspected that myself. One of the last people Trump talked to before running was Bill Clinton. Even up to our late primary here I knew maybe one in 6 or so who said they were voting for Trump.
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Michelle, You live in California where Christians don’t like Trump and probably prefer for their candidates to be sane.
Here in Texas, most Christians over 40 are for the lunatic. If my Confederate loyalties were not well known, my friends would think I had gone commie for opposing Trump. Sometimes after I post something critical of Trump, my friends will post pictures of Confederate generals on my wall to try to draw me back into the fold.
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I realize that the majority of Christians probably won’t vote for Trump especially younger evangelicals. Most of my American relatives won’t vote for him. However, when Reed, Falwell, Graham, etc go on the stump, talk shows, and cable news advocating for Trump, the evangelical political “values” loses its credibility. Interestingly, Liberty University students released a statement contradicting Falwell Jr. and indicating they would not support either major candidate.
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Many of those self-procalimed “evangelicals,” as it turned out, also said they almost never attended church.
People pick a label but that doesn’t mean it’s very accurate.
Our pastor has suggested he’s voting for neither — as are many of us who are in the congregation. The Christians (the actual church-member and attending kind) I know are pretty overwhelmingly disheartened by Trump.
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My husband did not vote for Trump…but he did fill in a blank for the non affiliated candidate…he said he would not leave the space blank due to his suspicions that “someone” just might color in that little circle for him at the vote counting center! 🙂
A friend at church said she was going to write in Ben Carson…… 🙂
Ya’ll know I voted for Mike Pence……
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Ricky, your 6:02 p.m. prompted “ooh”s of delight from my 12-year-old son — his two favorite things to see/read about are U.S. presidents and, better yet, sports cars. 🙂
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It’s come to this
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2016/10/liberal-jews-teach-their-kids-how-to-deal-with-anti-semitism-on-liberal-campuses.php
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Recently I learned that my Jewish congregation is providing training for college age congregants on how to deal with anti-Semitism on campus. That’s how bad things have gotten.
I wonder whether the sad irony of the situation has registered with the congregation, the vast majority of whose members are leftists.
Anti-Semitism is so rampant at America’s colleges and universities that teenage Jews need special training before entering this bastion of leftism. …
… Frankly, I suspect that it’s just a matter of time until (1) anti-Israel sentiment becomes a significant force at campuses where the level of hostility is now low and (2) open anti-Semitism replaces anti-Israel sentiment. That’s the direction in which things are moving.
Which campuses of those surveyed are the worst right now? The study identified Brooklyn College (CUNY-Brooklyn), Northwestern, Rutgers, Wisconsin, Illinois, and schools in the University of California system. …
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