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BREAKING: Brussels target of coordinated terrorist attacks [Darleen Click]

Name that religion/ideology!

As many as 31 people were killed and more than 100 injured as coordinated terrorist suicide bombings rocked the Brussels airport and subway system during rush hour Tuesday morning in the Belgian capital.

The attacks at Zaventem Airport, where 11 people were reportedly killed, and the metro station in the Maelbeek section near the European Union headquarters, where the mayor’s office said 20 were killed, were almost immediately confirmed as terrorism. The attack at the airport was reportedly accompanied by shouts in Arabic and gunfire, and an unexploded suicide belt was reportedly found in the aftermath.

“What we feared has happened, we were hit by blind attacks,” said Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel.

“We are at war,” French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said Tuesday. “We have been subjected for the last few months in Europe to acts of war.”

The attacks, which Belgian authorities said were suicide bombings, came four days after the main suspect in the November Paris attacks was arrested in Brussels, and even as Brussels was braced for new attacks.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility. A source told Fox News that a credible ISIS social media account posted the message, “Mosul revenge for the Kuffar capital Brussels,” but it was not definitive that the terror group was behind the attacks.

The bombings in the European Union capital are certain to add new fire to the raging debate over refugees from Muslim nations where terrorist groups are active.

Ya think?

131 Replies to “BREAKING: Brussels target of coordinated terrorist attacks [Darleen Click]”

  1. sdferr says:

    So even a few of the fruits of Nobel Peace Prize winner ClownDisaster’s alliance with Iran ripen in a distant European capital, with more promised to come. How about them apples?

    His peace, your war.

    Now stifle those chuckles, chuckles. It ain’t funny.

  2. The Monster says:

    Unfortunately, the only POTUS candidate who isn’t so afraid of being called “islamophobic” or “racist” is Trump, so expect his numbers to get an uptick out of this.

  3. sdferr says:

    Right, the fearless guy who called for the impeachment of George W. Bush. Figures.

  4. Ernst Schreiber says:

    So sad when these anti-Islamic man-caused disasters happen.

  5. EBL says:

    The threat from climate change is unforgiving and relentless.

  6. bgbear says:

    I bet president Obama had to put down his cigar and Mojita when he heard about this.

  7. Ernst Schreiber says:

    He couldn’t very well do the wave with his hands full now. Could he?

  8. Blake says:

    I like the “raging debate” part Darleen quoted.

    What debate?

    The masters have decided and the peons, while upset, and dying by the truckload, will not be allowed to upset their rulers.

  9. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Hillary Clinton says our response needs to be measured.

    To which I ask:

    In kilotons or megatons?

  10. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Barak Obama says we need to respond in a manner consistent with our values.

    To which I say:

    Once we valued our freedoms so much that we obliterated entire cities to protect it.

  11. Ernst Schreiber says:

    (should’nve pluralized freedom)

  12. cranky-d says:

    It happens all the time. Guys sitting around a table, and suddenly they break into song.

  13. Obama says we need to respond in a manner consistent with our values.

    We would, but McConnell would never allow an impeachment trial.

  14. guinspen says:

    In most of your better musicals, ahyup.

  15. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Interesting Kevin D. Wiiliamson piece on what divides the Republican party.

    In spite of the hyperbole sour-grapes.

    The Republican party of Abraham Lincoln, Dwight Eisenhower, and Ronald Reagan was a party of peace, prosperity, and purpose. It thrived in the California sunshine that marked Reagan’s political disposition. It was born of a country with the confidence to issue the great challenge of the latter half of the 20th century: “Tear Down This Wall!” The Republican party of Donald Trump is something else, something that grows in darker, danker places where they dream of ever-taller walls, literal and metaphorical, behind which to cower. And if that is what the Republican party intends to be, I for one want no part of it.

    (The Goldberg column Williamson cites is interesting as well. But it’s only persuasive I think to those who don’t need to be argued into agreeing with the premise.)

    So. How do you go about uniting the aspirational and the resentful?

  16. sdferr says:

    So. How do you go about uniting the aspirational and the resentful?

    [Haven’t read either Goldberg or Williamson, so big grain o’ salt for what follows.]

    It may be one doesn’t (unite). Save perhaps in the time honored sense to await events which themselves accomplish that task in one’s place.

    People are moved by some particulars, and at the top of that short list great threats under which they [presently] suffer: i.e., stark necessity. They have to figure out that they’re presently suffering, and if they lack that knowledge, they’ve little reason to move to unify. After all, it’s the realm of opinion we’re looking at here, not a powerful knowledge really.

    So a man may give warnings of what threats he sees; carefully, perspicaciously if he’s possessing the capacity; even circumscribed while with a view to being as comprehensive as reasonably possible, yet without the expectation of a unifying motion of others to follow in train — until such time as events make the need for it.

    And meantime? Educate. Best we can do, I think.

  17. missfixit says:

    the more I read the more I realize that on paper, Cruz was/is the best candidate. I was definitely thrown off by his delivery and that debate. I am sorry that we are stuck with this “short fingered vulgarian” (Abe). I am shocked Trump made it to this place. But he is the only one not afraid to say really aggressive things on terrorism so I see him getting a bump from this.
    this really sucks.

  18. sdferr says:

    And yet missfixit, Trump does appear to be afraid to face off one on one in debate with Ted Cruz. How come is that? Does he know something we don’t about the reasons for his fear?

  19. missfixit says:

    the more I read about Trump’s tight ties with the Clintons all those years, the more afraid I am.
    It does not compute though. If Trump is really just some idiot RINO looking for a power trip… he sure has a strange way of going about it. He could just harp on his business expertise and not say all this “offensive” stuff.

    At the end of the day, if we are really facing a choice between Hillary and Trump, Trump still feels like the “F U” vote. in this environment it feels like winning. (I say “feels like”.. can’t decide if that’s my intuition or my hormones.)

  20. newrouter says:

    “short fingered vulgarian”

    http://ace.mu.nu/archives/362303.php

  21. Ernst Schreiber says:

    More short fingered vulgarian:

    blockquote>A normal, well-adjusted man does not go to great lengths to prove to a random journalist that he has normal sized fingers. Some may think it was Rubio who introduced the “small hands” business, but it actually dates back to an encounter Trump had 25 years ago with journalist Graydon Carter. Carter had referred to Trump as a “short-fingered vulgarian” in Spy magazine. Trump could not let it go. Carter told Vanity Fair in 2015:

    To this day, I receive the occasional envelope from Trump. There is always a photo of him — generally a tear sheet from a magazine. On all of them he has circled his hand in gold Sharpie in a valiant effort to highlight the length of his fingers . . . The most recent offering arrived earlier this year, before his decision to go after the Republican presidential nomination. Like the other packages, this one included a circled hand and the words, also written in gold Sharpie: ‘See, not so short!’

    Notice he didn’t contest the “vulgarian” part of the insult.

  22. Ernst Schreiber says:

    [H]e is the only one not afraid to say really aggressive things on terrorism

    Makes you wonder why Cruz is catching all sorts of hell for saying we need to be policing muslim neigborhoods, and nary a whisper about Trump calling for more torture, doesn’t ir?

  23. Ernst Schreiber says:

    can’t decide if that’s my intuition or my hormones

    yes

  24. Ernst Schreiber says:

    comment from that ace thread newrouter linked:

    What you guys don’t seem to understand is that it makes no sense to even talk about how Trump would do in the general vs Cruz. There’s no way Cruz is getting to the 1237, and the estimates I have say that there’s no way Cruz has more than about 60% of what Trump has.

    The anti-establishment vote was about 70%, so if the nominee goes to someone of the establishment’s choosing (and even Cruz would be that), instead of who they picked (it’s already clear that’s Trump) they’re going to have a bigger problem than the Trump’s New Republicans walking. Only a Cruz-establishment alliance can even keep Trump from being the only one with 1237.

    Cruz would be a damaged candidate (due to his joining forces with the establishment he was against) in a severely damaged party, who is as helpless vs the media as the last two Republicans. In short, the establishment will have succeeded at snatching defeat from the jaws of victory, even against arguably the worst opponent in history (referring to her literally being under FBI investigation).

    Seems to me that the establishment is joining Cruz, not the other way around.

  25. happyfeet says:

    we were hit by blind attacks

    what the fuck does this even mean

  26. LBascom says:

    The Republican Party under Lincoln, Eisenhower, and Reagan were the party of peace? Hardly. Civil war, beginning of the Cold War, and end of the Cold War by spending more on the military than the soviet could hope to match. I remember thinking we would be lucky to make it through the eighties without a nuclear war. We were lucky, the Russians are rational. The Iranians nuking up? Not so much.

    Controlling the border is not cowering, it’s rational. Make America great again is aspirational, not resentful.

  27. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Depends on what one thinks is being aspired towards, doesn’t it? Economic protectionism, for example, is based on resentment of competition from foreign markets as much as it is on aspiring towards better conditions at home.

    Thanks for noting that aspirations and resentment are interconnected though.

  28. Ernst Schreiber says:

    we were hit by blind attacks
    what the fuck does this even mean

    I’d guess a translation error

  29. Merovign says:

    People keep saying Trump is “the only one who,” and it’s pretty much never actually true, but that’s the quote from the Trump Campaign.

    Man’s had a $2 billion dollar free press boost, probably The Rent Is Too High guy could place pretty well with that. But he’s going to take a $2 billion hit if he gets the nom (like McCain or Rombley, only much higher numbers).

    I may have “I told you so” tattooed on my forehead.

  30. Ernst Schreiber says:

    My guess is it’s only going to be a billion dollar hit because the medua didn’t create the Trump phenomenon, so they won’t be able to more than half destroy it.

    He plays them as much as they play him.

  31. newrouter says:

    Joy Division – Unknown Pleasures (1979) Full Album

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVvoQIdD80U

  32. newrouter says:

    Vaclav Havel
    “The Power of the Powerless”
    (1978)

    >Ideology is a specious way of relating to the world. It offers human beings the illusion of an identity, of dignity, and of morality while making it easier for them to part with them. As the repository of something suprapersonal and objective, it enables people to deceive their conscience and conceal their true position and their inglorious modus vivendi, both from the world and from themselves. It is a very pragmatic but, at the same time, an apparently dignified way of legitimizing what is above, below, and on either side. It is directed toward people and toward God. It is a veil behind which human beings can hide their own fallen existence, their trivialization, and their adaptation to the status quo. It is an excuse that everyone can use, from the greengrocer, who conceals his fear of losing his job behind an alleged interest in the unification of the workers of the world, to the highest functionary, whose interest in staying in power can be cloaked in phrases about service to the working class. The primary excusatory function of ideology, therefore, is to provide people, both as victims and pillars of the post-totalitarian system, with the illusion that the system is in harmony with the human order and the order of the universe. . . .

    {9}The post-totalitarian system touches people at every step, but it does so with its ideological gloves on. <

    http://history.hanover.edu/courses/excerpts/165havel.html

  33. newrouter says:

    President Ronald Reagan – Liberty State Park [Pt. 1]

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tbroTjVm8Bw

  34. palaeomerus says:

    Johnny goes where Bono can’t.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CGrR-7_OBpA

  35. He plays them as much as they play him.

    Eventually they’ll use the safe word, and he won’t honor it.

  36. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Entirely forseeable, after the way they let Obama use them.

    And to answer my previous question with a question, what if Resentment Republicans is resentful because their aspirations, when they’re not being ignored, ridiculed, mocked or scorned, are being actively thwarted?

  37. sdferr says:

    Without commenting on the “resentment republican” posit, is that the way with resentment, generally speaking?

    Or doesn’t resentment arise from the individual’s (and if shared by many individuals, then the group, community, clade, class, species, genos, whatever “type” word we choose) subjective perception of wrong done to his or her injury? Resentment arises, in other words, over our sense of injustice done (to us) and hence, suffered.

    The ancient’s suggestion (in their tri-partite schema) was our anger comes from our spirited part (thumos) — the thumotic part of our soul, as distinguished from our erotic (appetitive) aspect of soul, or our logos or (reasoning) rational aspect.

    Now that’s just one schema of human nature among many, but might it still be useful on this (cursory) examination of the genesis of these phenomena?

  38. sdferr says:

    oof, apologies for that bad italics coding there. Meant only to include as italic “erotic”, and then “logos” where that run-on occurs.

  39. guinspen says:

    *sniffle*

    Godspeed, JC.

  40. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Fine. The spirited part of Williamson’s Resentment Republican’s is rising up because of their aggrieved sense of injustice at being belittled and fucked with.

    Now the question becomes, what if anything should Williamson’s Aspirational Republicans do about it?

  41. sdferr says:

    Arrgh, I sense I’ve done some unnecessary injury to your thought Ernst. Didn’t intend to do, but hoped you’d reveal somewhat more how I’m mistaking the phenomena themselves, showing the kernel of the synthesis of these two things — resentment and aspiration — that you’ve evidently happened upon, perhaps spurred by Goldberg and Williamson. That is, I take it for granted that you’ve already seen something that moves you to inquire. I confess upfront here if it were not already apparent that I have no interest in following either Kevin Williamson or Jonah Goldberg but am happy to follow you as you unwind the argument.

  42. Ernst Schreiber says:

    The reason it matters is because Williamson seems to think it’s time for mommy & daddy to call it quits and Golderg definitely thinks it’s time for the kids to take sides.

  43. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Respectfully, sdferr, if your not going to do the assigned reading, so to speak, don’t bother showing up for the colloquium.

  44. sdferr says:

    What did we ourselves think about these same things even as many as four and five (if not longer) years ago? Seems to me we’ve had many discussions about the meaning of parties and proper purposes of parties (not least our own former) right here in pw comments. We were already there, I mean. So what’s new that the two NRers are bringing, besides the rest of the politically interested finally catching up to us?

  45. sdferr says:

    I make no defense for my distaste for Goldberg and Williamson. Don’t like either one just on a knee jerk sort of way. They’re both too frivolous to me, though I don’t insist that others take my view.

  46. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I’m going to go find Popper now, so the next time you start dropping Plato into the discussion, I can start throwing spitballs.

    For the armpit noises!

    /grin

  47. sdferr says:

    Yes, Levin does show his ass that way all too frequently. Ah well, all too human.

  48. sdferr says:

    And too, Plato only follows Homer in that respect. The primary deal being that Achilles’ spiritedness standing up for his honor injures his own erotic nature, his love for Patroclus. The dipshit did it to himself.

  49. sdferr says:

    Or possibly better, overdid it to himself. Which is where the moderation business comes in, I guess. Thing is though, how do those aspiring to be the supreme deal with lowly moderation?

  50. Ernst Schreiber says:

    What’s new is that the aspirational/resentment divide cuts across the establishment/populist divide or the conservative/moderate divide in an interesting way. If the Resentful Republicans are resentful because their apirations aren’t being acknowledged, then they’re not resentful in the way that the angry white male voter bitterly clinging to his gun and religion trope would have it. They’re Frustrated Aspirational Republicans.

    If we can recognize that, then there’s a basis for discussion on a whole range of issues that Trump’s populist campaign has complicated. Not the least of which is whether Trump is a suitable vehicle for redressing the frustrations of the Frustrated, or just a convenient a vehicle for the Resentful to act out their resentments.

  51. sdferr says:

    So if I may venture a speculation here, one case looks to the unaccomplished future (those we’re calling the frustrated aspirationals), where the other case looks to the unacknowledged past (those called bitter clingers)?

    Trump makes many a promise regarding the future. Some of us doubt he means to accomplish these things, others take him directly at his words. But these two, the doubters and the faith-placing seem at the surface to represent the obverse positions that we might expect, aspirational and resentful.

    And yet does Trump sufficiently articulate the (injured) what I call unacknowledged past? Even at a superficial (if somehow sufficient to the tastes of the bitter clingers) level?

  52. Ernst Schreiber says:

    That’s the magic of promising to make America Great Again without specifying what was great about America in the before time that isn’t so geat in the here and now.

    But as to your question, like I said, I think KDW’s resentful republicans are frustrated because they feel like they’re being fucked with rather than because they’ve been left behind by the forward looking Aspirationals. And thus Resentful is a mischaracterization. Also, populist appeals to resentment aren’t likely to be a successful longterm strategy for any Republican.

  53. sdferr says:

    Right. The promise turns on the nominally empty “again”, filled with all manner of “good” (better, best). But the good, that’s the thing. (So Plato once again: yes, I confess it. But it’s not like the guy was truly a dumbass.)

  54. Ernst Schreiber says:

    No he wasn’t. But he was no friend of an open society.

  55. sdferr says:

    What does remain at question for the purposes of any long term strategy? First the ends, right? About which, the good toward which we would aim. That’s the first thing in need of articulation, thorough articulation, so that we don’t proceed to step on it (and thereby inadvertently squashing it) in our choices of means. We don’t want what happens to Achilles to happen to us. We seek to think all of this through prior to the formulation of any strategic plan.

    Which I believe is why so much mistrust: this guy, we see, never pauses to carefully articulate all of our antecedents, our ends. He’s always speeding on to the next blither of means, without a concern in the world for the substantive ends toward which we’re to race with him.

    [an aside: does the Open Society include — and if so, how? — the private society? Thus perhaps you see that I am not now, nor have I ever been, a follower of K. Popper so honestly have no idea how those things are arranged for us in his vision.]

  56. That’s the magic of promising to make America Great Again without specifying what was great about America in the before time that isn’t so great in the here and now.

    A classic stratagem of the huckster, charlatan, and populist despot.

  57. cranky-d says:

    I would weep for our Republic, but I have no tears left.

    Let it burn.

  58. Curmudgeon says:

    Interesting Kevin D. Wiiliamson piece on what divides the Republican party.

    Wait–isn’t this the blog whose readers are disgusted with “The Establicans”? Because Kevin Williamson is their step-and-fetch-it.

    Trump isn’t a true “Classical Liberal”, but he’s definitely not their guy. Their guys were Jeb, then Rubio. Fact.

    And in spite of Mr. Trump’s unprincipled RINOness, the Establicans, as voiced by Kevin Williamson, still can’t make a truce, let alone a deal, with him.

  59. sdferr says:

    Generally speaking again, injustice comes to us from other human beings in two basic forms, nominally, force (coercion) and fraud.

    . . . force, we can see in Kelo or in the IRS conduct against the tea party organizations — the uses of the coercive instrumentalities of the government to achieve the aims of private parties on the one hand or a public political party (the Obamites) on the other. Kelo. Trump a big booster there.

    . . . and fraud.

    What have we got here? Trump University. Trump Steaks. Trump corp. bankruptcies refusing to pay the subcontractors while preserving the Trump personal wealth.

    And this is the person we’re to accept to the highest office in the land? Looks like an awful wager to me gang.

    And then come now the attacks on Heidi Cruz. To modify the old saw “handsome is as handsome does”, we can equally say that vile is as vile does or cowardice is as cowardice does.

  60. LBascom says:

    I don’t think it’s right to say Trump is a big booster of Kelo, only that he has used it. Again, he’s not a legistature, he’s a business man. If the NFL decides to change the rules and make pass interference legal, then the players are going to play the game differently. A coach isn’t going to decide the new rule is bad and keep playing by the old rules or he will lose every game, get his players hurt, and soon be out of a job.

    As for the wives thing, the Cruz camp started it, and even if Cruzz himself didn’t have anything to do with the offending ad, Cruz is really the only one that can stop it. What would you expect Trump to do when the Cruz campaign attacks his wife, let it go? I think we all know by now that ain’t going to happen.

  61. sdferr says:

    Trump is a fan of Kelo then. He likes force from government aimed at injustice toward the weaker. And fools will be fine with that. They’ll even see it as a “strength”. So clever, this guy Trump, he get’s over on the little guy. Except in that case in Atlantic City where he failed to get over of course.

    As to “the Cruz camp started it”, that’s a lie and you are a liar. Cruz cannot do anything to stop a PAC he has and cannot have (by federal law) any association with. Of course Trump as well as Trump’s sycophants out there know this. So, cease with the Trumperies already, you’re fooling no one here.

  62. palaeomerus says:

    Liz Fair set up Keep America Awesome to block Trump and was mainly a Rubio supporter. Blaming her stunts on Cruz is just total ridiculous opportunistic dishonest bullshit. Cultists chanting it will not make it so, even if the cultists are FNC personalities like Greta on twitter.

  63. palaeomerus says:

    Dealz
    by Porkrinds for Pie-holes.

    Murica & eagles are ticked off, yeah
    Union guys grit their teeth and snarl
    All those blue dog Mondale saps
    And black helicopter prphets…

    Will there be another party
    To come along and stand in the left’s way
    Maybe cyber-Buddhists could do
    Better than the cucks y’all

    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals

    My friend says he’s got the best words
    But cucks are so dumb and yolo
    And maybe racism is sort of fine or whatever

    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals

    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals
    Choo choo the train
    He’ll make great deals
    He’ll make great deals

  64. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Cruz is really the only one that can stop it.

    That would imply the independent expenditure wasn’t so independent. And collusion/coordination is a violation of the FEC regs.

    But somebody in the Cruz camp deserves to be demoted for forgetting the first rule of mud wrestling with a pig.

  65. LBascom says:

    Huh. A liar, a fool, and a sycophant.

    You know what? Fuck you.

  66. Who wouldn’t want four, maybe eight more years of me?

    C’mon proteins,
    just follow my lead.

  67. Yes, fuck us for pointing out repeatedly that the Sniveling Coward is also a liar who makes fools out of anyone who believes his lies, and that one who refuses to condemn those lies when exposed can be no other than a sycophant.

    Ironic that he purports to increase his followers’ pride in their country while robbing them of their self-respect.

  68. LBascom says:

    You Cruzbots following your preordained master seem determined to make enemies of anyone that won’t march in lockstep with you. Fine, then despite the fact I’ve been commenting here for 10 years and you know I’m on your side in all the things that matter, I’m your enemy. Because I’m going to vote for a different Republican than you.

    I feel pity for Cruzbots. I see Trump as a tool, a means to an end, you see your guy as savior of the world and anyone not bowing down are apostates and unworthy. Then you call others cultists. It’s just sad and it’ll be tragic the day ya’ll discover he’s just a man like any other.

    In the meantime you’ve become the most sanctimonious, self righteous, arrogant, mean spirited, nasty pack of pricks I’v ever been happy to call my enemy. Enjoy your circle jerk.

  69. sdferr says:

    Taking a political candidate as a means to an end? What end? An end the self-governed candidate of your choice determines? Or an end you decide — you, the dangling nether-piece of the chain your candidate of choice uses to attain to power; you, who he will disregard at the whim he grasps the next moment? Trump is your tool! You are the master of him! Hilarious. You should maybe let him know you plan to use him.

    Heck, you never know: he might react like Jesus and say, bring it on daddy, I’m ready for my sacrifice.

    Or, rather, why be ridiculous? Is it merely for the entertainment?

    Or again, who would want a man as his tool? Like, a slaver, maybe? Certainly, a slaver looks at another man as his tool, a thing to be bought and sold. But Trump funds his own campaign, says he (always with the bullshit with this guy Trump — the last thing he can tell the truth about is about himself. And the contrapositive: the first thing Trump will lie about is about himself.) That’s the way with confidence men. It’s what they do, it’s where they excel. The marks, they are aplenty.

  70. Curmudgeon says:

    I prefer Cruz, but I am amazed at all of you who drove out Mr. Bascom, who is 90 odd percent plus in agreement with you.

    Sorry, but I turn a deaf ear to the “Trump is a Fascist” Henny Penny-isms. Under the Obamunist, we have had Eight years of daily “WTF moments”. Eight years.

    It’s not that I’m sold on how wonderful Trump is or that I think Trump is the Second Coming (that’s Cruz apparently, according to the ever-stable Mr. Beck), or that such concerns are wholly without merit. They aren’t. But frankly, the ‘Stabs would fight Trump more than they ever fought the Obamunist, so whatever fascist impulses Trump has aren’t going to fly.

    And all this arm-flailing about Trump and the future of the nation is about 8 years too late. Concerned about the future of the nation? Welcome to the party! The beer’s all gone, the chips are stale and the music’s over.

    All of a sudden we’re supposed to care about all of what Trump COULD do when I’m busy reading about what Barry actually IS doing RIGHT NOW. Grossly illegal actions are being performed by the Executive RIGHT NOW, and the response is a bunch of impotent internet rage. Where are the motorcades of cars stopping King Putt’s passage to the golf course? Where is the rushing of the stage and the resulting Secret Service take-downs? Where are the protests at DNC rallies that cause shut-downs? Where are the Federal employees setting up their private servers saying “me too”? Where are the families of fallen soldiers following Hillary from stop to stop with pictures of their dead
    sons/daughters? Where is the right media hammering this like Kate Upton
    minute by minute?

    If Trump is so damn dangerous as to merit this hand-wringing response from the Right for POSSIBLE future acts, and he hasn’t even done anything yet, what do these Obamunist criminals merit for this 8 year long list of charges?

    What could Trump do that is so bad? Trade 5 terrorists for one deserter? Use the govt. to compel purchases of a product? Grab up definitional control of health insurance plans to the point of killing plans and doctor-patient relationships? Make “non-agreements” with Iran and box Congress out of it? Gin up hatred between blacks and cops by siding with “hands up, don’t shoot” liars over officers? Diminish our standing internationally with one “red line” after another? Tank the progress made in Iraq? Crush military morale?

    Hence my slogan – “Trump for President 2016 – Because he couldn’t make it any worse!” .

    Trump’s sheer presence reveals that the alternatives to Trump, the Established “Betters”, are a bunch of lunatics and incompetents that have enjoyed unearned credibility and gained way too much control for too long. And as final proof, they can’t even discredit Donald Trump. Jesus! It’s so bad that people are looking at Trump, yes, TRUMP, as a “viable” alternative to that rot, because, shudder, he actually is. That’s how bad the condition of this nation is. And again, it didn’t happen overnight.

    No, I not putting Ted in that category, but he really didn’t steal Trump’s thunder early like he should have, although he did try to maintain a bromance for a while, and I had hope for a Trump / Cruz ticket once (or ideally vice versa). But after this recent nastiness, forget it. I know Cruz does not control what PACs like this one run by the twat in Utah did to Mrs. Trump, but he can loudly disown it and urge everyone to get back to the issues.

    If Congress, the SCOTUS, the states and the people do not confront this line-stepping criminality as it happens, then it becomes established, ACCEPTED precedent. And, ah, I haven’t seen the GOP take any balls-to-the-wall action to curtail any of this, not legally and not in the press, like, not ever. So don’t be surprised when the Trumpenheimer (or anyone else, for that matter) takes office and starts running down his/her wish-list, because it wasn’t just Barry that made it possible, it was the Commiecrats, the GOP Establishment, the media, and ultimately, “us”.

  71. sdferr says:

    Oh that’s precious, two cites at the corrupt (if nevertheless well paid) breitbart Trump shilling collective. Generous too, because two.

    And yet? And yet the latter breitbart article intentionally mischaracterizes the thrust of Bedard’s piece. And as to Jeff Session’s concerns regarding American sovereignty? Well, let’s just refer to the Medellin case Cruz fought against the Bush administration and won in the Supreme Court, how’s about?

  72. sdferr says:

    There were two men in one city; the one rich, and the other poor. The rich man had exceeding many flocks and herds: But the poor man had nothing, save one little ewe lamb, which he had bought and nourished up: and it grew up together with him and his children: it did eat of his own meat, and drank of his own cup, and lay in his bosom, and was unto him as a daughter. And there came traveler unto the rich man, and he spared to take of his own flock and of his own herd, to dress for the wayfaring man that was come unto him; but took the poor man’s lamb, and dressed it for the man that was come to him.

  73. happyfeet says:

    oh my goodness ted cruz is making hot sexy luvin on the womens (not heidi) (hot ones)

    this makes me think he really put one over on them mormons

    my instincts about him sure were right

    advantage: Mr. The Donald

  74. sdferr says:

    Ha. Take that David Axelrod.

  75. happyfingers says:

    “All of a sudden we’re supposed to care about all of what [a potential President] COULD do…”

    exactly!

  76. Car in says:

    I could really use a Jeff essay right now …

  77. guinspen says:

    Ditto.

    Plus, leave it to feeter to cast the first stone.

  78. sdferr says:

    Ya’ll know Jeff writes in twitter chunks almost all day every day, though, right? Granted of course it ain’t essay form, but there’s a giant archive of those to boot alongside here. Issues aren’t much changed either, though the names associated do tend to come and go.

  79. palaeomerus says:

    “In the meantime you’ve become the most sanctimonious, self righteous, arrogant, mean spirited, nasty pack of pricks I’v ever been happy to call my enemy ”

    Who gives a fuck Trumpstain? Not me. Do you even READ your own shit? Ever? The lies? The reaching? The strange hoops you jump through to end up nowhere? The excuses? The bizarre transformations? The projection? The silly almost mindless imperative to dishonor by any means, no matter how ridiculous, anyone who notices a serious flaw of Trump’s?

    Enjoy your trump train and the brown nose that comes with it. PW is not your problem. You are your problem. Go meet your destiny.

  80. Curmudgeon says:

    Liz Fair set up Keep America Awesome to block Trump and was mainly a Rubio supporter.

    Liz Mair.

    As for Liz Phair, a song comes to mind.

  81. palaeomerus says:

    I think for the Friday 100 word story thing the picture should be a burning bi-plane spiraling towards the ground.

  82. happyfeet says:

    Who gives a fuck Trumpstain?

    i can’t belieber you said that

    you are become very vituperative

    easter is nigh and the bunny is a hoppin

    yes yes the love bunny of redemption

    and enduring symbol of love and forbearance and tasty chocolate

    what eggs will he bring for you this year

    will they be angry and bitter

    or will they be light and sweet and nourishing of the spirit

    there’s still time before Mr. Bunnypants gets here

    but you gotta get your ducks in a row

  83. happyfeet says:

    *an* enduring symbol of love and forbearance i mean

  84. Curmudgeon says:

    You know, the Pikachu is right.

    For all the nasty fighting between Trump and Cruz as of late, they are politically closer to each other than either one is to Marco the Rube (whose operatives, reports have it, may have ginned up all this wifey crap to begin with).

    Or to Jeb. Or to Kay-Suck. Or to Pansy Grahamnesty.

    And this is still true even if The Donald is a Donny-Come-Lately to his views.

    This is the blog that hates the Establicans, right? So think about this:

    The Establicans want, above all, to maintain political stasis.

    Trump = Wildcard. Loose cannon. Possibly uncontrollable. Risky. And this is true even if you believe his Donny-Come-Lately conversion is phony.

    And if his Donny-Come-Lately conversion *is* real, then he *could* be, with his populism, the biggest threat to Establican stasis.

    Cruz = the most probable to undo Establican stasis, based upon track record, or at least to sincerely try and fail, because of unlike-ability.

    Jeb = stasis maintained.

    Rubio = status maintained.

    Romney = stasis maintained.

    Kasich = stasis maintained.

    Clinton = stasis maintained, *PLUS* the excuse (an obstructionist POTUS) for Establicans to do nothing for four more years while campaigning for reelection.

    Conclusion: They want one of their Establicans to win from a brokered convention, but will settle for Hitlery Clitler.

    They want Cruz less than anyone else, and in fact will do whatever it takes to sink him.

    And the Donald is their enemy #2. Even if y0u don’t like The Donald and don’t trust him, that is still true.

  85. palaeomerus says:

    “i can’t belieber you said that”

    Insipid babble about failwhores, momo lifeydoodles, and muffins! Because lulz.

  86. missfixit says:

    And all this arm-flailing about Trump and the future of the nation is about 8 years too late.
    YES.

    Hence my slogan – “Trump for President 2016 – Because he couldn’t make it any worse!”

    exactly

    Trump = Wildcard. Loose cannon. Possibly uncontrollable. Risky. And this is true even if you believe his Donny-Come-Lately conversion is phony.

    And if his Donny-Come-Lately conversion *is* real, then he *could* be, with his populism, the biggest threat to Establican stasis

    yes! Russian roulette! what have we got to lose? Nothing really!

    I know this is depressing in a lot of ways but really. There’s no need to hate each other over it. If any of you believe in God, then you know that politics is well within the bounds of the universe and no nation prospers except by providence.

    and if you don’t celebrate Easter, then work on your bug out/bunker/zombie apocalypse plans and have a drink. I am planning my potato garden AND celebrating Easter, so I can brace myself and vote for Trump in November. :)

  87. missfixit says:

    (I will probably change my mind like 10 more times before November. I can’t be the only one. )

  88. sdferr says:

    If you’re going to take a stab at smearing Goldstein in the comments section of his own blog serr8d, the least you can do is e-mail him the link to your smear and invite his direct response. Or possibly better, take bh’s suggestion and do your freelance peddling elsewhere.

  89. serr8d says:

    He re-tweeted that, sdferr. How else could I have found it?

    Oh, and Twitter, a Brief History.

    http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/03/twitter-politics-last-decade/475131/

  90. serr8d says:

    And if you take that as a ‘smear’, you’re wrong. It *is* sad, really. And I posted that out of a sense of worry, not disdain.

    Intentionalism. Do try to understand it.

  91. serr8d says:

    Heh. The day *I* tippy-toe around *anyone* is the day I’m not the same me, bh.

  92. sdferr says:

    Tell you what, see what Goldstein thinks it is. Looks like a smear to me, given the context coming utterly out from nowhere. Who here knows this Cardillo clown, or what he believes? Who is in need of him? And yet you’ll pretend you have concern for Jeff’s mental state, but don’t choose to inform him? Get the fuck out (as the current colloquial expression of shock is put)! Or, just take that the other way if you wish.

  93. serr8d says:

    sdferr. No need for you to go all feral apparatchik. If you noticed, the Tweet I linked had Jeff’s name on it, so how do you think he missed it?

    Cardillo’s beliefs, whatever they might be, aren’t the issue. Jeff addressed Cardillo in such a way to elicit; why didn’t you ask Jeff what he thought Cardillo meant to him?

    And, why do you think it’s an issue of Jeff’s ‘mental state’? I worry more about his being RSMcCain’d out of the platform, if he doesn’t throttle back.

    And, you “get the fuck out”? Fuck You, and the molding papyrus piles you thunder from!

  94. palaeomerus says:

    I think Serr8d’s ‘one good gonzo’ twitter account got blocked by Jeff so he’s looking for rocks to toss back.

    So we get “Crazy Jeff” concern trolling.

    The tweet we are supposed to be moved by is from a radio guy who like most “I can’t find the block/mute! halp!” twitter celebs whines about being followed or stalked if anyone responds to them or answers back more than they feel is “normal”.

    Nothing to see here.

  95. sdferr says:

    There’s not much if yet something to see paleomerous: a dick move by serr8d, which is what he’s up to, or down to, is all. He made no preamble to inform people here [who do not generally watch the goings on at twitter] that Jeff had said directly to him that as he attempted to smear Amanda Carpenter, likening her in an analog to John Edwards’ sycophant that he is a disgrace. Not much, yes, rock throwing, still more than nothing.

  96. missfixit says:

    to inform people here [who do not generally watch the goings on at twitter] –

    I generally skip over the comments that consist of nothing but a link to something else. cuz ain’t nobody got time for that. also, apparently this is what boys do on twitter:

    http://tinyurl.com/hlwrafj

  97. happyfeet says:

    it is a time for choosing

  98. LBascom says:

    I’d be a bit grumpy today too if my savior got caught [un]dressing a lamb that wasn’t his own.

    Especially if I dropped money in the offerings plate only to find out it was going to pay for wining and dining a whole string of secret illicit lambs.

    Then claimed it was all the devil’s Donald’s lies.

    So sad. I’d feel conned if I donated to that campaign…

  99. LBascom says:

    On the plus side, there goes the democrats October surprise.

  100. sdferr says:

    What to make of those who willingly spread unsubstantiated smears? Are they more like Nathan or more like King David in that story? Doesn’t appear to be a difficult choice, no more than it did to King David himself so long as he thought he was looking at someone else’s injustice.

  101. LBascom says:

    “What to make of those who willingly spread unsubstantiated smears?”

    Your average Trump hater, all day every day.

  102. LBascom says:

    Also Cruz, claiming Trump was behind the stories, when he wasn’t.

  103. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Yeah that was stupid. The only response is to say that the Enquirer has mistaken him for John Edwards.

    Unless it’s true. In which case Cruz is in real trouble. Probably.

  104. happyfeet says:

    yes yes i’m hedging just cause of all those years him n Heidi lived apart

    like SEVEN years

    all you have to do is be lonely for cuddles one time and call the number one of your senate friends gave you

    then bam

    you’ve sold your soul and the next time it’s a little easier and the next time it’s even easier

    and you learn to live with hating yourself

    and you learn to live with the lies

    but you’ve lost something you can’t never get back

  105. happyfeet says:

    (blame it on the nights on Broadway)

  106. missfixit says:

    oh great.
    so .conflicted.
    i can hear dh chuckling and saying “lyin Ted” from behind his spreadsheets.

    why do they ALL have to be such douchebags. It makes it very hard to vote. what is this bs about Cruz making a 500k transfer to Carly ?

  107. Ernst Schreiber says:

    hadn’t heard but I’d guess he’s agreed to retire her campaign debt. I’d further guess Christie has a similar arrangement with Trump.

    meanwhile, the coveted Spengler endorsement:

    Ted Cruz is the a gifted outsider with unique leadership capacities. He has a brilliant grasp of Constitutional law from his service as Texas’ solicitor general, a granular understanding of business economics from his service at the Federal Trade Commission, and a clear vision of what America should and shouldn’t do in foreign policy. He was an academic superstar at Ivy League universities but never let his success flatter him into complacency. He has deep religious conviction. He also has the will to lead. It’s not surprising he isn’t popular among his Senate colleagues: if Cruz is elected president, it will shut down a corrupt and cozy game. He has the brains to understand the problem and the guts to clear the obstacles to a solution.

  108. missfixit says:

    http://www.cbsnews.com/news/why-did-ted-cruzs-pac-give-half-a-million-to-carly-fiorinas/

    this was to pay off her campaign debt? the explanation looks quite different.

  109. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Well, we’re talking about PACs here, not campaign committees, so my guess was wrong.

    The important point is that it was within the rules, and PACs can’t be faulted for playing by the rules. When they change the rules, then PACs will pay the game differently.

  110. Ernst Schreiber says:

    If Republicans are trying to find a candidate with unfavorables even higher than Hillary Clinton’s, Trump is their man. She is disliked, goodness knows deservedly, but he is radioactive. He has consistently ranged between unpopularity in the high 50s and the high 60s, which is unheard of for a presidential nominee. What’s more, he has near 100 percent name recognition, meaning there is little chance people will change their minds as they learn more about him.

    I disagree with the editorial’s assertion that there was no provocation in Trump’s attack on Cruz’s wife.

    But then, it doesn’t take much to provoke Donny Small-Fingers, does it?

  111. palaeomerus says:

    ” I’d be a bit grumpy today too if my savior got caught [un]dressing a lamb that wasn’t his own.
    Especially if I dropped money in the offerings plate only to find out it was going to pay for wining and dining a whole string of secret illicit lambs.
    Then claimed it was all the devil’s Donald’s lies.
    So sad. I’d feel conned if I donated to that campaign…”

    Then:

    ““What to make of those who willingly spread unsubstantiated smears?” Your average Trump hater, all day every day.”

  112. Ernst Schreiber says:

    if Ace knows what he’s talking about (IF) it’s the Rubio people who’ve been pushing this. Apparently for some time.

  113. happyfeet says:

    Mr. Trump will probably be a pretty gosh darn decent president especially compared to hillary

    advantage: Mr. The Donald

  114. missfixit says:

    I’m trying to figure out the level of proof needed to publish that story in the NE. Just a video of him leaving a hotel with his spokesperson? And some people willing to talk anonymously? I’m trying to remember if that’s all they had on john edwards too.
    If it’s true, the only reason it hurts him is bc he was pretending to be evangelical. Everybody hates a wolf in sheep clothing.
    If the wolf is out and about, not pretending anything, and talking about how great he is… I guess that’s acceptable. Sigh

  115. sdferr says:

    The level of proof? For the practical uses of this story, this unsubstantiated pile of charges? Yuge. Enormous. Mere existence, is all. All.

  116. sdferr says:

    “Additionally, it is ancient history,” says Hope Hicks.

    Yep. All the way back to Nathan and David.

  117. missfixit says:

    John Edwards was ruined because the story was TRUE, not because the NE said it.
    And there will always be a segment of the voting public (behind every single candidate) that are childish, disgusting, and embarrassing.

    The mainstream voters are not hanging out on twitter following every trashy conversation.

    I was just wondering if the story had any *actual* legs, the kind that intelligent people would pay attention to. And I feel bad for the women who are taking death threats and being called sluts and horrible names over this — but again, you are talking about the losers who hang out on twitter and can let their evil freak flag fly high with no consequences. I am not on twitter or facebook because I don’t want to engage with stupidity.

  118. sdferr says:

    Why are you wondering about some hypothetical “actual”, save in the presence of the unsubstantiated concoction, missfixit? That is, had the “story” of other “stories” never been published, would you be wondering that now? Would you have created the hypothetical for yourself, that is, and then be actively wondering about that? Or was it not necessary that the hypothetical had been already created for you by the National Enquirer and their “sources” in order for your current query whether some genuine adulterous liaison had taken place to have arisen?

    And this too, in the absence of any previous “story” despite many months of activity by other publications at the behest of whatever political campaign organizations attempting to “find” one, while in the event those other publications ended by rejecting the publication of every such tale that came into their possession as insufficient to their “standards” of proof?

    John Edwards’ story hasn’t anything to do with it, no more than the other stories the Enquirer has published about Hillary Clinton’s lesbianism does.

    Do not the mainstream of voters pass by grocery store checkout lines every day? Or glance at the Fox News or CNN television channels? Hell, pw isn’t twitter, and it’s here. The mere presence of the “story” sets people free to do (and concomitantly shackles them to not do) all manner of things.

    Then ask yourself what enfeebled minor portion of the party primary electorate is sufficient to prevent x and enable z, from and to respectively, the nomination of the party, regardless whether the “story” of “other stories” is true; the answer why the “story” (since the “story” is made of nothing but occasionally imaginative concoctions possibly salaciously entertaining in themselves while having nothing to do with actual events) becomes important is plain.

    Moreover, the “story” occupies minds (shackles) while other more salient issues go unaddressed or the poor addresses to those issues go unnoticed. What people call sucking up the available “oxygen”, by which they mean the limited attention available. Days go by with such stuff, none of it based in fact. Politics is still the realm of opinion, not knowledge. It’s always going to be engaging with stupidity.

    The Obamites have even given a name to their efforts on this technique as others have pointed out (Instapundit, for one), calling it “stray voltage”. It’s diverting, it’s entertaining . . . it’s deadly, and not merely deadly to political discourse when in the hands of such as the Obamites. They, for instance, have happily stood by watching as their alliance with the Islamic Republic of Iran takes its prizes in the Middle East, killing hundreds of thousands of Syrians and Iraqis in the bargain. Americans pay little attention, nor make the connections for themselves for want of that attention. And then bombers blow up an airport or subway in Belgium and people wonder how this came about.

  119. Ernst Schreiber says:

    Mr. Trump will probably be a pretty gosh darn decent president especially compared to hillary
    – See more at: https://proteinwisdom.com/?p=58353#comment-1273659

    That’s an extremely low bar.

    excelsior

  120. Ernst Schreiber says:

    I was just wondering if the story had any *actual* legs, the kind that intelligent people would pay attention to. – See more at: https://proteinwisdom.com/?p=58353#comment-1273661

    In the Edwards case, the story was true and everybody in the media knew it to be true, but only the Enquirer ran it because the respectable press and the Democratic Party are part of the same family.

    Now, maybe it’s possible that there’s some there there, and the media is holding it back for the general election.

    But I doubt they’d hold it that long.

  121. palaeomerus says:

    “Mr. Trump will probably be a pretty gosh darn decent president especially compared to hillary ”

    And if not, then failmerica sluthwhore lifedoodle muffins! Bleh bleh blah. Trump’s past and present actions show he’s political buirning garbage but angry likes shiny.

  122. missfixit says:

    no amount of “stray voltage” is confusing me on how Paris and Brussels got their own mini 9/11s. I paid attention in the 00’s. But even if I hadn’t, I doubt I would believe whatever the NE said on the subject.
    I have enough brain power to separate my hypothetical pondering from my voting, and I’m pretty average ( i hope). I still don’t think the freaks [those who feel totally comfortable calling a woman a cunt just because she criticized their favored candidate] on twitter represent most voters.

    my parents don’t know what twitter is, but they were early Cruz supporters. Since the SC primary is over, they will probably vote for the Donald. It’s all about “is there anything better than Hillary available ?”

  123. sdferr says:

    It’s good that you aren’t confused missfixit, although the point is far less about you as such and far more about those who are moved by this stuff — as I do not take it that you’re saying your own parents are, but that they too (like you) are moved by other questions.

    Still, my point concerning the existence of the story remains, regardless how little stock you or I or many others put in it. I have not said that those “freaks” by the way, represent anything like a typical or most other voters. No. They are small in number, surely. But even small numbers can carry the day on close questions betimes, and hence the problem.

    Where is the fundamental question though? Still on the form of our government I’d say, i.e., the proper interpretation of our Constitution, which in light of stories like this fake adultery story, goes by without sufficient regard. Does Donald Trump advance that theoretical ball down the field, or does he mostly ignore it for lack of interest or ignorance on his part, as having other more personal fish to fry?

    If, suppose just, he were seriously interested in that theoretical question — seriously, mind you — how on God’s green earth would he ever contribute large sums of his own wealth to people like Hillary Clinton, or Nancy Pelosi and the others, and still tell himself that he’s doing the Constitution a world of good by that? Or, for that matter, how do those who look upon this history of contributions think that advancing the cause of the Constitution was what Trump had in mind?

  124. For many years now, I’ve been trying to come to a better understanding of why The Roman Republic fell, hoping to be able, thus, to see the signs and light the warning beacon for this Republic in time to prevent History from repeating here.

    My understanding is now much more complete, so I wish to thank those on the Right who support Donald Trump and have been engaging in defending their candidate and his campaign’s actions. You have provided me with a fairly clear view into the mindset of those Roman Citizens who helped bring about the Downfall of The Roman Republic that led to the rise of the Tyrannical Empire Of Rome.

    I will now set about gathering faggots and rushes to make the beacon glow much more brightly.

    Once again: thank you Trumpkins. Hail Trump Magnus!

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