Trump To Throw Kurds Under Turkish Bus

[togor]

Togor- so what is it you think needs to be said?....that it's ok to abandon our allies? Maybe they are'nt world powers, but they were willing to go to the wall for us.

No quite the opposite--that we shouldn't dump them and the decision to do so is wrong.

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And one other thing....we apparently know about this because somebody leaked Trump's call with Erdogan; which is totally unacceptable and unfortunately is going to continue as lower level government functionaries try to undercut him at every turn.

The leaks aren't the problem. It's the message, the decision, not the messenger.

[Art]

No quite the opposite--that we shouldn't dump them and the decision to do so is wrong.

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The leaks aren't the problem. It's the message, the decision, not the messenger.

Sorry, the leaks are a big problem. It's gotten to where the President of the United States can't have a conversation in which a foreign head of state expects confidence unless they're in a room that's been "swept" face to face. There's plenty of embarrassing stuff in conversations by plenty of presidents or their proxies that are more "incriminating" than this Trump stuff that didn't even raise an eyebrow at the time. Especially if the President was someone the press liked or it was a person in government making foreign contacts to the detriment of a president the press didn't like. I can provide a list but at one end there is Ted Kennedy's reaching out to Leonid Breshnev for help in sabotaging a presidential run by Ronald Reagan comes to mind and that didn't come out, as I recall, until long after the fact. That was a scheme that was so disreputable Kennedy had a proxy make the actual contact so his fingerprints (or so he thought) wouldn't be on it. At the other end of the sleazy scale, Bill Clinton once asked Tony Blair to help in settling an airline dispute because it would buy him political comfort during an election year.

"Where you stand depends on where you sit." At least for most people most of the time.

[togor]

Art, you're arguing that leaks are bad for the institution? As if Trump shows any respect for the institution at all? Sorry not buying it. The leakers have a front row seat.

[Art]

Art, you're arguing that leaks are bad for the institution? As if Trump shows any respect for the institution at all? Sorry not buying it. The leakers have a front row seat.

I'm sorry to see you believe the end justifies the means. These people aren't Frank Serpico, everything they're doing is for personal or political advantage.

The list of presidents who haven't shown sufficient respect for the institution is long but not necessarily distinguished and the hypocrisy on this issue is shocking. I will remind you the move to impeach Donald Trump started before he was even inaugurated and this current garbage is actually pretty minimal on about the same level as the Clinton - Blair "collusion." The above mentioned Ted Kennedy, a moral leper guilty of at least involuntary manslaughter and a sleazebag of the first magnitude thought the same way when he "colluded" with a Commie that makes Putin look like a choirboy.

All this is said despite the fact that as a human being Donald Trump is the sort of man I could do without, but against Hillary Clinton who was, and is corrupt on a grand scale or any of the current crop of communist leaning socialists and Jacobins up now on the Dem side I'm going with "The Donald."

[togor]

It's a big leap from observing that the leakers (people actually self-selecting to work for Trump's White House BTW) have a front row seat and as such shouldn't be so quickly second-guessed, to the full-on nihilism of the end justifies the means. A lot of daylight exists between them. Nor do I find Trump-as-victim even remotely persuasive. McConnell made no secret of his desire to oppose Obama at every turn, and yet Obama just got on with the job. And the thing that puzzles me is the idea that only attacks on Trump diminish, that his own comportment in the office doesn't reduce it in any way.

[Art]

It's a big leap from observing that the leakers (people actually self-selecting to work for Trump's White House BTW) …..

Actually we don't know that. And if it is true that they self selected to work there what they're doing by acting as a "5th Column" isn't very nice either.

The big problem Trump's opponents have with him is similar to the big problem Andrew Jackson's problems had with him...he's rude, crude and obnoxious. True on both counts. But he was elected President, he won under the rules and that should be that.

Hillary Clinton talked about the dangers to "our democracy" should Trump not accept the outcome of the election. The people who have not accepted the outcome of the election are the Democrats and a sizeable number of career Republican politicians and career government types at the senior level. There are people on the left actually saying that after impeaching and convicting Donald Trump - fantasyland in itself that the vice president should be removed through the impeachment process to make Nancy Pelosi President....yes I actually heard that on the MSM tonight!!!

Opposing a president is what the opposition party is what the party out of power does. The thing that disturbs me the most isn't the nasty stuff said about Trump, I think he actually relishes the fight; it's the relentless campaign of slander and character assassination directed at anyone closely connected with him personally or professionally.

[togor]

The thing that disturbs me the most isn't the nasty stuff said about Trump, I think he actually relishes the fight; it's the relentless campaign of slander and character assassination directed at anyone closely connected with him personally or professionally.

May I assume that you find the other side of that coin, which are the epithets heaped by Trump upon his enemies great and small equally dismaying? I'm tired of it too, but I don't see it getting better until he's off the political stage. And more than simply relishing the fight, I think Trump cultivates it.

And I point out that Trump himself is known to rip former employees after their usefulness to him is exhausted. That could be considered disturbing too perhaps? Trump was elected to tear things down. That the language surrounding his enterprise should come to reflect that fact and take in a destructive mien of its own should in my opinion surprise no one. Some people fight Trump because they don't want him tearing the office down to the level of a Banana Republic El Presidente ruling by decree. Their motives are comprehensible.

I hope we can get back to normal people in the office.

[lyman]

have we ever had normal people in office


all of late have been narcissist,

[Art]

have we ever had normal people in office


all of late have been narcissist,

Boy have you got that right!!!!!

[Vern Humphrey]

Boy have you got that right!!!!!

I call it the "Age of Midgets." We need giants for leaders, and look at what we have.

[togor]

I call it the "Age of Midgets." We need giants for leaders, and look at what we have.

70 years of unprecedented prosperity and security have bred a leadership class that knows nothing of hard decisions rooted in a sound moral/ethical foundation. We are a victim of our own success.

[dryheat]

I suppose we are required to stay until there is peace in the mid-east. Not.

[Sandpebble]

I've actually enjoyed this thread due mostly to the intelligent input of both Art and Togor ... I thank you both for a remarkably clean conversation .

I may note that it was allowed to happen due to the lack of interference by some moron with his endless girlish interjections remarks and implications of Nazism ..... or intrusions by his alter ego .

Thank you Art and Togor.... keep at it.

And Art... I agree on Trump running on bringing the troops home , I've wanted them home for decades.

But we need to provide "a living" to stock holders of arms manufacturers who need a war so they can sit by the pool and sip a pina colada ...

anyway, again I thank you for the thread

[dogtag]

It could be very costly to both the Kurds and to Trump
and maybe even Turkey (hopefully they'll be kicked out of NATO)

[Vern Humphrey]

It could be very costly to both the Kurds and to Trump
and maybe even Turkey (hopefully they'll be kicked out of NATO)

Why would you want that? NATO is a military alliance and Turkey is the strongest military in the Middle East. Better to be allies than enemies!