The US Hamster Wheel

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BenThere
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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4121 Post by BenThere » Fri Jan 18, 2019 3:11 am

Just when I thought US politics couldn't get any worse, it does.
I suppose it depends on your perspective. I'm finding the current exchange between Speaker Pelosi and President Trump delicious. Nancy threw the first pitch and brushed back Donald with her unprcedented dis-invitation to present the State of the Union address, a tradition held for generations. Donald ducked that beanball with a nasty curveball which Nancy has never had to hit before. She found herself all set to go on a week long junket, leaving the government shutdown behind, but found her vacation cancelled and had to get off the bus, headed for the airport, and amble into the rain back into her capitol office, along with Rep. Schiff. She struck out.

She's not used to playing hardball, and this time it's different than when she unilaterally went to Syria to hobnob with Assad during the GWB administration. She never had consequences for that travesty. Turns out the troops and commanders in Afghanistan welcomed the cancellation. President Trump relishes this game, knowing he also has a fastball, slider, and changeup ready to go. I'm betting on Donald to win the shutdown battle, and get his wall funding one way or another. Nancy's out of her league; and the more she finds herself in front of the camera, the more people will realize the addled state of her mind.

Seenenough

Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4122 Post by Seenenough » Fri Jan 18, 2019 4:59 am

As I said before Ben,Pelosi will find that being the Speaker, without a sympathetic and compliant POTUS, will be a completely different ball game.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4123 Post by Cacophonix » Fri Jan 18, 2019 7:19 am

Seenenough wrote:
Thu Jan 17, 2019 2:30 am
Caco-Telling me that there are four candles is a bit like you trying to tell me Jody's Cosworth DFV has six cylinders or that a Robbie 44 has three blades -just saying.
It would have been a calumny worthy of Trump himself to have suggested that messieurs Costin and Duckworth's design didn't have a V configuration and 8 cylinders Seenenough. I wouldn't dare play fast and loose with such important facts! :ymblushing:

Talking of V8"s do you remember the mighty Basil Green tuned Capri Piranha's V8's that used to be hurled around Kyalami by folk like Basil Van Rooyen and Bobby Olthoff.

Van Rooyen now lives in Australia and Olthoff decamped to North Carolina where he set up a dealership. Sadly dead due to cancer some years back!

Like you I am a respector of empiricism and fact. With such an admirable mindset I find it hard to understand how you countenance Trump's covfefe Seenenough!


Caco

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4124 Post by Bob » Fri Jan 18, 2019 7:23 am

Boac wrote:
Wed Jan 16, 2019 10:15 pm
An interesting view:

"It would be rather embarrassing for Donald Trump at this point if Robert Mueller were to declare that the president isn’t an agent of Russian intelligence.

The pattern of his pro-Putin, pro-Russia, anti-FBI, anti-intelligence community actions are so one-sided, and the lies and obfuscation surrounding every single Russian meeting and conversation so consistent that if this president isn’t actually hiding a massive conspiracy, it means the alternative is worse: America elected a chief executive so oblivious to geopolitics, so self-centered and personally insecure, so naturally predisposed to undermine democratic institutions and coddle authoritarians, and so terrible a manager and leader that he cluelessly surrounded himself with crooks, grifters, and agents of foreign powers that he’s compromised the national security of the US government and undermined 75 years of critical foreign alliances, just to satiate his own ego."
I think that alternative appraisal could well be very near the truth, though to mention truth when talking about someone who has the most tenuous of connections to reality feels rather odd.
I hereby declare the U.S.A. a Pariah state.
All U.S. Citizens or persons arriving from the U.S.A. will be denied access

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4125 Post by Boac » Fri Jan 18, 2019 8:13 am

The whole US political situation is a sad reflection on the country. While the Chump plays ping-pong with Pelosi we can only sit and watch, amused butworried.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4126 Post by Boac » Fri Jan 18, 2019 8:29 am

It is to be hoped that Pelosi and team can recover the visit when the shutdown is over, since re-affirmation of US support for NATO is vital. Until then, we can't have a mere WOMAN (and a DEMOCRAT!!) visiting a war zone that the Chump is too frightened to go to, can we?

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4127 Post by Boac » Fri Jan 18, 2019 1:42 pm

Good old Faux News!
"Fox & Friends, has decided to headline on a story about a migrant caravan, instead of the allegations making global headlines that Trump ordered Cohen to lie to Congress."

Slasher

Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4128 Post by Slasher » Fri Jan 18, 2019 1:56 pm

Boac wrote:
Fri Jan 18, 2019 1:42 pm
...that Trump ordered Cohen to lie to Congress."
Bugger! I've lost the equivalent of ten bloody quid betting another member that your next post'll have in it "the Chump" somewhere.

So what do you go and do mate? 🙄

I sense a conspiracy!

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4129 Post by Boac » Fri Jan 18, 2019 2:05 pm

"I've lost the equivalent of ten bloody quid betting another member " - that seems a particularly dumb move. :O3

Glad you sense the conspiracy. There is hope, and, hopefully, not long to wait now.

PS What else did you expect on this thread, or have you not been paying attention?

Slasher

Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4130 Post by Slasher » Fri Jan 18, 2019 2:25 pm

Nope, I bet another that the next post you make will contain "the Chump" like you always do without fail. I thought it was going to be easy money. :-bd

You're expensive Boac! 💰

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4131 Post by Boac » Fri Jan 18, 2019 2:30 pm

You'll learn - if slowly :))

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4132 Post by BenThere » Fri Jan 18, 2019 2:49 pm

It is to be hoped that Pelosi and team can recover the visit when the shutdown is over, since re-affirmation of US support for NATO is vital.
Speaker Pelosi's entourage was a collection of left-wing democrats. As such they had no interest in US security or intelligence. Aborting the trip only cut off the damage that bunch would do.

Re-affirmation of US support for NATO might appear to some as vital, particularly nations that perceive their defensive nakedness absent US military muscle. As President Trump correctly perceives, the most enthusiastic US allies are not in 'old Europe' but in the former Warsaw Pact nations the Reagan and GHWB administrations liberated from the former USSR. They seem to know what's what. My lament is that significant portions of the populations our traditional Western European allies don't really like us, and they are in the process of Islamizing anyway, moving toward the point that they will one day seriously not like us.

The global geopolitical construct is constantly changing. Allies change - look at how post-WWII Germany, Japan, Russia and China changed their stripes in a very short time. Today the most enthusiastic US allies are in Eastern Europe, Japan, Australia, Israel, Taiwan, Singapore, and others, and our new found friend in Brazil, along with Colombia and Chile in South America. I think India will before long join the fleet. EU-centric globalism is on the wane, as President Trump's decision to forego Davos this year portends.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4133 Post by Boac » Fri Jan 18, 2019 2:55 pm

Ben wrote:Today the most enthusiastic US allies are in Eastern Europe, Japan, Australia, Israel, Taiwan, Singapore, and others
- you forget Russia.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4134 Post by BenThere » Fri Jan 18, 2019 3:09 pm

Only a fool would consider Russia a US ally, though it should be. Turkey isn't really either, so long as it is authoritatively ruled by an Islamist regime. Secular Turkey was different, a bulwark against the former USSR during the Cold War. As I previously stated, the global geopolitical construct is constantly changing. Hell, I can even remember when Iran was a staunch ally.

Pakistan is not, and never really was a real ally after the fall of the Soviet Union. I did, however, forget to mention South Korea and now, Italy among our key allies.

Seenenough

Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4135 Post by Seenenough » Fri Jan 18, 2019 3:27 pm

In all of the aircraft hullabaloo did anybody hear Trump's comments at the Pentagon yesterday.

I found comfort in his Statement that the USA was able to protect from any hostile missile attack from anywhere in the world.

I often wonder whether or not when the test missile failures occur that they may well not be simple failures but that deliberate interventions caused the failures.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4136 Post by llondel » Fri Jan 18, 2019 3:36 pm

Seenenough wrote:
Fri Jan 18, 2019 4:59 am
As I said before Ben,Pelosi will find that being the Speaker, without a sympathetic and compliant POTUS, will be a completely different ball game.
I think it's mutual. Trump hasn't had to deal with determined opposition either so they've both got to work out the new rules. I think he's in for a bigger shock though, the Speaker has quite a bit of power to say no to the CEO, that's how it was set up. She has at least been in the game long enough to understand the workings.

As for her trip, once he'd made it public that she was going to a war zone she would most likely have had to cancel it anyway, transport or not.

To follow on the baseball analogy, I think she did manage to hit the ball even if it was a foul, with her response about him spoiling a visit to see the troops and express support to them in person.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4137 Post by Boac » Fri Jan 18, 2019 3:41 pm

Ben wrote:Only a fool would consider Russia a US ally,
- well, Ben - it has taken you a while.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4138 Post by BenThere » Fri Jan 18, 2019 4:05 pm

Actually, Boac, I think I got there before you did. I recall the Romney-Obama debate prior to the 2012 election. Romney asserted that Russia was a major concern, a position that was widely disparaged. I agreed with Romney at the time and still do.

President Obama was caught assuring his Russian counterpart that he would be able to accommodate Russia a lot better once he won election. How things change!

And really, if you compile and assess President Trump's policy and interactions with Russia during his tenure, I don't think you can reasonably assert a tilt in favor of Russia. My perception is that the focus has always been on American interests. He has engaged Putin, along with Kim, Erdogan, and XI and cooperated where he perceived it made sense, and conversely opposed where it made sense, like when he chastised Germany for its dependence on Russia-provided energy supply and the support and arming of Ukraine in opposition to Russian imperialism in the region.

Seenenough

Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4139 Post by Seenenough » Fri Jan 18, 2019 6:29 pm

Cacophonix wrote:
Fri Jan 18, 2019 7:19 am
Seenenough wrote:
Thu Jan 17, 2019 2:30 am
Caco-Telling me that there are four candles is a bit like you trying to tell me Jody's Cosworth DFV has six cylinders or that a Robbie 44 has three blades -just saying.
It would have been a calumny worthy of Trump himself to have suggested that messieurs Costin and Duckworth's design didn't have a V configuration and 8 cylinders Seenenough. I wouldn't dare play fast and loose with such important facts! :ymblushing:

Talking of V8"s do you remember the mighty Basil Green tuned Capri Piranha's V8's that used to be hurled around Kyalami by folk like Basil Van Rooyen and Bobby Olthoff.

Van Rooyen now lives in Australia and Olthoff decamped to North Carolina where he set up a dealership. Sadly dead due to cancer some years back!

Like you I am a respector of empiricism and fact. With such an admirable mindset I find it hard to understand how you countenance Trump's covfefe Seenenough!


Caco
Caco-I happen to be quite well aquaited with Basil Green via Pete Lindenberg.

We better be careful because we will get told the BG Peranas have nothing to do with the US.

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Re: The US Hamster Wheel

#4140 Post by BenThere » Fri Jan 18, 2019 9:22 pm

Trump hasn't had to deal with determined opposition either
You're kidding, right? Right?

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