is it really possible that Donald trump could be president????? [Part 2]

[claig]

From now on the race becomes winner take all. If Trump wins Florida on March 15, it is probably all over.

'The Republican Party now has 14 days to stop Trump'

www.vox.com/2016/3/2/11144812/super-tuesday-results-donald-trump-wins

Discrimination by faith is unique to Trump d'you say? Look, I'm not saying Trump is a delightful man and I do not endorse many of the things he comes out with.. But this idea that he is uniquely evil is total bollocks
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Are you aware that Mosques in the US have been under heavy surveillance for years. New York City had a Muslim surveillance program, and the FBI has been entrapping Muslims in phony “terrorist” plots as a form of security theatre... ?

some of the following is cut and paste -

Trump-haters all deplore hiss proposal to discriminate against Muslim immigrants and travellers to the US, yet immigration laws have routinely singled out certain religious groups for favourable treatment, i.e. the Lautenberg Amendment, passed in 1989, which gave religious groups in the Soviet Union, including Jews, some Christians, etc., presumptive refugee status unavailable to nonbelievers or state-sanctioned religious groups that weren’t persecuted. Here the principle of singling out certain religious groups was first established, and if we apply the principle consistently then Trump’s proposal to single out Muslims for unfavourable treatment is entirely in line with this precedent.

Don't believe the hype is my advice, Trump is threatening establishment interests in the US and elsewhere that's why the media frenzy to destroy him. The realist is - he isn’t a “fascist” – at least, no more than Franklin Roosevelt ever was. Or any more than the 2 Bush's or Clinton's Nor is he especially demagogic, given the history of American politics.

Trump is the definition of a fascist. A thug whose reaction to dissenters is to beat the shit out if them. Not to mention a vulgar bully with homophobic tendencies and a despicable human being.

Who said discrimination by faith is unique to Trump?

Still, the cases you have just mentioned do not directly relate to what he's proposing. And some of the objections are that what he is proposing is unrealistic, even if not discriminatory.

Surveillance of mosques is a widely used method, as it is known that many terrorists recruit through mosques. It's not the same as preventing presumptive muslims entry in a country just by suspicion of being muslim.

Similarly,
Lautenberg Amendment, passed in 1989, which gave religious groups in the Soviet Union, including Jews, some Christians, etc., presumptive refugee status unavailable to nonbelievers or state-sanctioned religious groups that weren’t persecuted.
By definition, why would a group that isn't persecuted be granted refugee status? Do you realise what a refugee is? It's not an economic migrant, despite often being confused by the public and some media.

I don't know how well or closely you've been observing politics in the US for the past 50 or so years Lweji Not wishing to be rude, but from here you sound a tad naive..
My point is that Trump's idea of establishing a database tracking Muslims in the United States is apparently so abhorrent. But mosques in the US have been under heavy surveillance for years. You seem to think what Trump is advocating is unusual and unprecedented. How about Roosevelt’s executive order sending tens of thousands of Japanese-Americans to internment camps for the duration of World War II? His treatment of alien German,and Italian people as well. They stripped them of their naturalization proceedings.They couldn’t go five miles from their homes. They weren't allowed to use radios, or posses a torch.
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At least Trump hasn't yet instigated a bloodbath in the ME yet, Unlike H Clinton, and her role in decimating Libya? Or her key role in supporting the coup in Honduras, which led to massacres of environment protesters? Google up The Killing Of Berta Cáceres and her role in that little episode. In 2008 she announced "If I'm the president, we will attack Iran [if it attacks Israel]. In the next 10 years. We will totally obliterate them." Has Trump said anything like that?

Or of H Clinton's relationship with Egypt's former dictator, Mubarak: A Friend of the family. I don't think Trump has had the butcher of Cairo round for a barbecue .

Or, As in 2011, after it emerged that Gaddafi had been beaten, sodomised with a knife and murdered. Moments after receiving the news, Clinton laughed, commenting: 'We came, we saw, he died.'

Now perhaps you are aware of that remark? But I promise you the majority are not. Ask anyone about Trump? Oh he's a Xenophobe, a fascist a Bully etc...

My point is that Trump's idea of establishing a database tracking Muslims...

We were not talking about databases, but preventing Muslims from entering the country.
From your own post:
I assume you're referring to him saying : all travel by Muslims into this country must be ended – “until we find out what the heck is going on.”?

But if you want to change the actual issue midway the discussion to score points, be my guest...

Donald Trump is using a shock and awe campaign to destroy his opponents. Everybody knows he doesn't mean half the things he says. The off-the-record comments to the New York Times probably indicate that things are negotiable and he says things that he may not follow through with.

He knows that by saying outrageous things he will ensure publicity. Usually that type of publicity would finish a candidate off, but Trump understands the people and knows that they are sick of political correctness, sick of the Establishment, sick of the lying media, sick of the political class, sick of the spinners and therefore they don't care when he refuses to back down and apologise to the media's outraged and shocked demands and accusations that he is not Presidential. They don't care what the media and political class say because they dislike and distrust the lot of them and they like Trump's nerve in refusing to bow down to them. They think that means that Trump is on their side and won't bow down to the Establishment over anything.

"Donald Trump: A Shock and Awe Campaign

In what is sure be hailed as a shock and awe campaign, Donald Trump is at it again.

After his comments on immigration sparked controversy, Donald Trump has not backed down, and instead has run with the media firestorm taking interview after interview showing his opponents how to stay above the fold day after day."

www.politicalhype.com/elections/donaldtrumpcampaign/

Even ordinary passersby on the street in China understand what Trump is doing and how he is outsmarting the system lined up against him.

"But even 7,000 miles away, the politics of it all are pretty clear: "I think this is kind of a strategy so he can win and maybe get some more attention."

www.cbsnews.com/news/campaign-2016-chinese-weigh-in-on-donald-trumps-campaign/

The more shocked the Establishment is at Donald Trump, the more foreign dplomats and foreign governments panic and condemn him and beg US politicians to stop him, the more the American people rightly stick the middle finger up to the lot of them and the more they support Trump sticking it to the lot of them.

'Foreign diplomats voicing alarm to U.S. officials about Trump'

www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-trump-foreign-idUSMTZSAPEC37O1O8W3

Trump is running a brilliant campaign and is successful because he instinctively understands the true psychology of the people. The outsider, Trump, is outwitting all of the world's bigwigs and experts and all of the US professional political class and their support netwroks, all with a tiny team and tiny office of Corey Lewandoski, Hope Hicks, Katrina Pierson and some others, all against the biggest and most sophisticated, best funded, political machine on the planet. And if he is clevr enough and brave enough to do that, then he is clever enough and brave enough to fix America's probelms and to help the rest of the world in the process.

Hasn't his shock and awe (aka say whatever will win the most votes, thereby being exactly like other hypocrite politicians) been discussed to death yet?

I haven't seen the term "shock and awe" used and the whole point is that he doesn't really mean what he says about banning all Muslims from entering the US. He doesn't mean half the things he says and the people know it and the Establishment knows it too, but they pretend to take it all seriously because they think that political correctness will corral the people back into line, but it won't which is why Trump is outsmarting and beating them.

'aka say whatever will win the most votes, thereby being exactly like other hypocrite politicians'

The whole point is they would never dare say half the things Trump says. He said he would have liked to have punched one protestor in the face. None of them will ever say that or that the Fed should be audited or a hundred other things because they have to be politically correct because they are all "puppets" and are all "bought and paid for". Trump has dared say what the people themselves say, His twitter account is llike something ordinary Americans would say whereas Rubio's is like something the political Establishment would say. That is why Rubio lost and why Kasich will lose because people have had enough of political correctness and servants of the Establishment.

I haven't seen the term "shock and awe" used and the whole point is that he doesn't really mean what he says

I'm pretty sure you've used it before, as well as the argument that he doesn't mean what he says.
It's like mentioning elites and establishment and so on.
I think at some point you're plagiarising yourself.

I've already addressed that. See my post 2nd from last - immigration laws have routinely singled out certain religious groups for favourable treatment. It could be argued that not letting people in to the US is more humane than persecuting them once they arrive. Or adds up to the same thing if the media choose to put it under as much scrutiny, it just might..

Did you catch the recent Republican presidential debate in the US? I found it fascinating that when the subject of Social Security arose, three of the candidates pledged cuts galore, raising the retirement age, and declaring the system would very soon be bankrupt. Donald Trump was the only one to dissent. He said he would leave the system as it is. He said the reason for the economic chaos was because, (something like) America assuming the role of policemen of the world. Taking care of the entire world with a depleted military. Taking care of Germany, Saudi Arabia, Japan, and South Korea. 'Every time this maniac from North Korea does anything, we immediately send our ships. But the American people get virtually nothing in return'. Now I found that fascinating because unlike the other candidates all committed to the American project, ie changing nothing (but putting billions in the pockets of the military contractors). Trumps focused on the crisis in his own country and sees its overseas entanglements as a burden to the American taxpayer.

I agree Trump's “Islam hates us” stuff is pure hostility. And he's crude and inconsistent. But when you look at who else is on offer. Why not Trump? If I was a US citizen he'd get my vote purely for his foreign policy that puts America first.

'I'm pretty sure you've used it before, as well as the argument that he doesn't mean what he says. '

Because you keep acting shocked about his statement about banning Muslims, so I am saying that he doesn't mean it and it is part of his "shock and awe" strategy.

You addressed it badly, but at which point was monitoring Muslims introduced in the discussion? Other than by you to divert this argument?

Oh, dear.
Here we go again on a discussion about how much of a liar he is and how that doesn't matter because he's the second coming.

Btw, this would be acting shocked. my reaction to him wanting to ban Muslims from entering the US is more like this and good luck with putting it in practice.
It may sound good for the brainless and racists he's trying to reach. I get that.

'It may sound good for the brainless and racists he's trying to reach. I get that.'

He is trying to reach the American people in order to win. They are not brainless and racist.

Why not Trump?

Oh, gosh, I don't know . . . racism, xenophobia, misogyny . . .

and then there is his spectacular lack of a sense of humor and total self-absorption.

Not all are brainless or racist, but he's reaching those that are, for sure. Between the two categories, a significant minority who may help him get a nomination.

Fox have had to cancel their intended debate on Monday because Trump pulled out and now Cruz has followed and pulled out as well. Trump said "i think we have had enough debates".

Pulled out again?
He really doesn't like debating, does he?
Just throwing jibes and receiving adoring adulation.

'He really doesn't like debating, does he? '

He loves it, he has won every debate according to the polls, but he says "how many times can the same people ask the same questions?" Enough is enough.

Did he actually debate or put down people?
Or wasn't too pleased when the others suddenly started attacking him in similar ways?
I'm sure he'd enjoy having only a couple of other contenders to discuss his policies thoroughly. You know, in greater detail.

Claig - has he "debated" Humans of New York's open letter? Or is he maintaining a dignified silence (unusual). Hay CotedeAzur you helped me give up smoking when I first joined mumsnet - clean still, thank you

'Claig - has he "debated" Humans of New York's open letter? '

I haven't heard about that? What is it?

What I found strange (and it may well help Claig's argument) is that most US presidents' have a law or military background - but they have all earned their chops as a longtime servant of the state or governance. This is interesting, in this process. How on earth will Trump govern with no political experience? I feel sorry for him in his bigotry and thoughtlessness - it's almost becoming a ride he can't get off.

Claig - Humans of New York has been the most liked and shared viral post on Facebook ever - I'm amazed you you missed it :(