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[sluissa]

So, Trump is at another campaign rally. Can't stop living in his fantasy world past where he was still "winning".

Talked big about the wall, talked big about the economy, talked big about jobs. Endorsed Roy Moore. Shit all over our allies. Did a fair impression of a man who got clumsy with the crazy glue and couldn't get his fingers apart. And made a bunch of dumb claims that couldn't be backed up.

All in all, he was himself. Just the first time in a while I've listened to more than a few minutes of him at a time. Dude is really really disgusting.

[redwallzyl]

Ya, this whole situation is slowly driving me crazy.

[smjjames]

You know the whole thing with Rep. Trent Franks? Well, apparently he had propositioned a female staffer to be a surrogate for his child for 5 mil, and the staffers were unsure if he meant in vitro (if he wanted to use his wifes DNA) or naturally (if he wanted to mix his DNA with that of the staffer). Though surrogacy implies in vitro, it sort of sounds like he hit them up for it out of the blue.

I'd call that utterly inappropriate. pfft.

edit: And another part of the article makes him sound like a bit of a creep.

[sluissa]

Professional surrogacy isn't cheap... but 5 million is a ridiculous price even if you had something a "little less formal" in mind. Something really odd there.

[smjjames]

That five mil probably would have been an implied message to be quiet about it and not tell anybody.

So, yes, desperation would be behind it, and obviously the desire to spread ones seed. I don't know why they couldn't just adopt.

[smjjames]

I thought I read that it was the surrogates that rescinded the deal. Either way, desperation is certainly behind it, but it doesn't make the way he did it okay.

[bloop_bleep]

It seems like he was just desperate and didn't mean any harm.

Fake-edit: Ninja'd.

[RedKing]

Chalk it up to another rich white guy who doesn't understand how normal people work.

Also, pretty much exactly what I hypothesized earlier in the thread.

Meanwhile, I'm hopeful that if Roy Moore gets elected on Tuesday it'll be another hammerblow to GOP unity. Another wave of conservatives with some principles abandoning the party. When all that's left are the dregs, we'll see if it really is only about 30-35% of the country, or if the rot goes a lot deeper than that.

[wierd]

Dont underestimate the effectiveness of mass media at convincing otherwise sensible people to perform atrocious acts. (Yes Voltaire, I know... Sadly, people do not read your works often enough.)

Likewise, dont underestimate the willingness of corrupt status-quo operators to throw shitpiles of money at such mass media moguls to engineer positive sentiment. (See for instance, the BOOMING "reputation management" service industry on the internet. These people consider the dilution and removal of valid user reviews and complaints to be a 'normal and necessary business tactic', and these are just the small-fry.  The big vested players go bigger, and outright engineer mass public behavior through advertisers and media outlets. Just ask Rupert Murdock.)

As the more sensible old school GOP get driven out by the smell of their party's politics, expect that kind of stuff to really ramp up.

(What I am getting at, is that the people who REALLY and honestly want these kinds of rules in place are VASTLY outnumbered by sensible, but easily confused or manipulated people, who will become the political puppets of those few, highly influential groups/persons, and this will seriously skew your observed metrics.)

[martinuzz]

Trump succeeded in pouring oil on the Israel-Palestina conflict.

After his speech recognizing Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Massive protests formed when thousands of people took to the streets in Gaza, East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Dozens were injured, 2 people were killed by Israeli military forces.

Around the same time that day, Palestinian terrorists fired 3 missiles at Israel from Gaza. One was intercepted by Israeli anti-missile fire, the other were aimed at the city of Sderot but failed to hit anything important. Israel responded with an airstrike on Hamas military targets. Two people were killed, and 25 injured, amongst whom, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, were also 6 children.

Good job again, Trump, Putin is yet again proud of you.

[smjjames]

Not surprising.

Also, I thought Putin liked Israel (which is funny given that Russia is in an alliance of convenience with Iran)? Russia was one of those that slammed the decision. Then again, I wouldn't be surprised if Putin pretended to be friendly to Israel while having ulterior motives.

In FTFE news, the media has been really tripping over themselves all over the place this week. Maybe time to extend the news cycle to 48 hours? Seems like they're all rushing too fast and need to slow the heck down as they're making mistakes that only play into Trumps hands and really don't help their image at all.

[misko27]

I've heard comments that the two-state solution is dead, which, even if untrue, is an interesting potential trajectory for the near-term of middle-eastern politics.

[nenjin]

Was watching an HBO thing last night where they were asking conservatives how they could vote for Moore in good conscious. There were the usual justifications (no charges have been filed, he’s not been proven guilty, it was almost 40 years ago, etc...) But one lady laid out basically what I think most conservatives are thinking: it’s about values. If we don’t vote so our values win, our values don’t win. And all I could think was “Ok, so you sacrifice some of your values so you can win with other values. That pretty much makes all your values subjective bullshit if they can be so readily sacrificed.”

[Baffler]

In what way is it bullshit to choose partial over total defeat?

[PTTG??]

In what way is it bullshit to choose partial over total defeat?

The difference between Republicans and Democrats is smaller than the difference between a child-molesting-Republican and a non-child-molesting-Republican, right?