The Khan Job & Other Trump Traps

One of our commentators, Misha, recently made headlines when he announced that he is going to vote for Hillary. The reasoning was counter-intuitive but nevertheless reasoned and sober. And for that I respect his decision and although I cannot agree with it, he may be on to something.

From my own perspective, I can’t see it. Long story short: I don’t believe Hillary has the “humility” which Misha believes she does. Being serially humiliated by her husband has not humbled her but only embittered her. Nor do I believe that Bill Clinton is as good a politician as many think he is. Anybody could be a good politician if the media continually goes to bat for you and covers up your foibles. (And let’s not forget, if it wasn’t for Perot, he would have lost in 92.)

Nonetheless, the issue is Hillary. I believe that as Commander-in-Chief, she will provoke a war with Russia. She has to, being as beholden to the globalists as she is. They, as well as Putin, have the goods on her. As for the Bill of Rights –forget it. Under Hillary, there is no doubt in my mind that America will continue to devolve into banana-republicanism. That’s the best-case scenario. The worst-case one is that we will become a ruthlessly efficient police state.

I hope I’m wrong. For now however, I want to comment on a phenomenon that I first noticed back in October. I call it the “Trump Trap.” Scott Adams, of Dilbert fame has his own variation of it called “the Master Persuader Thesis.” I didn’t know about Adam’s writings on the Trump phenomenon at the time and anyway, we are talking about two different things.

So what is the Trump Trap? Before I answer, consider the fact that every time it appears that The Donald has stepped into it, he’s always come out smelling like a rose. Why? Because in each case he’s carefully laid out a scenario in which he already knows the outcome and also in which he knows his opponents. He knows their weaknesses and how to bait them. And then he comes in and delivers the coup de grace, embarrassing them and then goes on to the next (seeming) outrage.

I knew something was afoot back in August of last year when he said something disparaging about Sen John McCain’s war record. I thought “uh oh, this is bad.” Then I asked myself why this issue died so quickly. It’s because there are serious questions about McCain’s war record. I mean Jane Fonda-like questions about McCain’s war record –i.e. serious questions. I won’t bore you with the details but you can go to Ron Unz’s blog (www.unz.com) and read it for yourself. For now let’s just say that the Establishment did not rise to Trump’s bait and decided to let that sleeping dog lie.

Other examples abounded. The Moslem ban for example. “Unconstitutional!” the Best and Brightest harrumphed. Only that it wasn’t: Jimmy Carter himself had imposed a blanket ban on an entire people back when he was president. Then he took on the media when they uncovered the “fact” that Trump had not raised the six million dollars for the veterans when in fact he had. (This was a carefully laid out trap in which he used moles in the media to bait them into going after him.)

Remember when he said that “Hillary was schlonged by Obama”? That kerfuffle lasted for all of 48 hours until a video of NPR from 2008 showed up in which that very phrase was used to describe Obama’s handling of her. Either Trump has the greatest memory or he’s got the best oppo-research team of all time.

To understand how the Trump Trap works it’s very important to understand that contrary to popular belief, Trump is not thin-skinned. That’s just part of a persona he’s carefully cultivated over several decades as a fantastically successful businessman. He only goes after particular people when it suits his broader strategy and he knows he can win. The closest analogy I can find to the Trump Trap is the Kobayashi Maru strategy employed by a young cadet at Starfleet Academy by the name of James Tiberius Kirk. (For those who don’t know, this was a no-win scenario designed to calibrate the emotions of a crew when they knew they were going to die. Kirk got into the computer ahead of time and jiggered it to his advantage.)

Consider what I called the Biased Mexican Judge meme. The howls of outrage were deafening but Trump got what he wanted: the neutering of a judge who was going to rule in the upcoming Trump University case. That was the short-term gain for him. The long-term gain was that it highlighted the La Raza ties of the judge in question. La Raza for those who don’t know, means “the Race.” It is not only a racial supremacist organization but a secessionist one. (Ring bells, anyone?) The upshot for Trump is that people are asking, why can Mexicans be racially conscious but not Americans? At the very least this neuters any racial angle that Trump’s ascendancy brings forth. As for Judge Curiel, he quietly dropped his ties to La Raza –at least on his law firm’s website. The fact that he was exposed means that his future rulings will be constrained if not outright tainted.

And now we have what I call “the Khan Job.”

Before I go into the Khan Job, we must understand what the Democrats were up to. They know that they labor under the illusion of unpatriotism, at least since 1968. Hence their feverish efforts to highlight unimpeachable victims as human shields. The parents of the late Captain Khan (US Army) were to fit that bill.

Unfortunately, the optics of a goofy-looking man hectoring Americans on why they should change their laws in a thick Paki accent while his burka-wearing wife stood meekly by were not good. That was obvious. That they castigated Trump while doing so only solidified the battle lines in the great culture war –and not to the Democrats advantage.

However Trump took the bait and attacked back. Or so we are led to believe. I’m not being a pollyanna here; I understand that the howls of outrage are even more deafening than during the Biased Mexican Judge controversy. Everyone is jumping on Trump because of his insensitivity to a Gold Star family. I’ll grant you that but the dust is starting to settle and despite Captain Khan’s sacrifice in Iraq, it appears that his father is from the ardent Constitutionalist that his supporters are trying to pawn off as.

For one thing, like most devout Moslems, Khizr Khan believes in Sharia and its precedence over the Constitution. Writings from his own law firm’s website to this effect have been scrubbed clean. He also runs a for-profit naturalization scam that is ethically questionable. Left unanswered though is the question of his son’s death at the hands of fellow Moslems in Iraq. Does anybody see the logic here? Does Khan want these same people who killed his son to come to America? This is a huge question, one that the Democrats are going to be chary of bringing up. And anyway, by what right does a son’s death in battle immunize a parent from criticism, especially when his views are wrong-headed?

Consider an analogy: Roger Watters of Pink Floyd fame lost a father in WWII and it has colored his perceptions of Israel, going right up to the doorstep of garden-variety anti-Semitism. His arguments are worthy of debate but if we used the Establishment critique of Trump in this matter, Watter’s more incendiary arguments should be applauded and not argued with. Period. Full stop. And yet people have –and do–take on Watters. Rightly so. And so we should the unconstitutional views of Khizr Khan and his wrong-headed take on immigration.

Trump thought all this through. Carefully thought this through. His oppo-research team took on Khizr Khan immediately after his speech and came up with all this information on him. And now the Democrats are quietly letting this recede into the mist. They have to. Otherwise, the take-away is going to be Unthankful Moslem Immigrants Lecturing Americans versus Trump.

The downside of course is that in our Evil Party/Stupid Party duopoly, the GOP may snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Already GOP heavyweights are taking Obama’s bait about Trump’s supposed unsuitability and running with it. Make no mistake, the fact that Obama had to insert himself into the debate shows just how scared the Dems really are of Trump. Otherwise, they’d follow Napoleon’s dictum about stepping out of the way when your enemy is in the process of committing suicide. (Either that or Trump is in Obama’s head 24/7, which itself is a story for another day.)

Trump knows that the RNC is panicking at the thought of a Goldwater-like shellacking in November. I image he’s even laying another trap, throwing out the possibility that he may drop out of the race. If so, he’s raising the stakes for the RNC, forcing them to go all-in for him knowing full well that that they have no other choice. That’s actually a brilliant ploy, especially when it’s likely that Paul Ryan is getting ready to lose his reelection battle to an unknown businessman. (Another #Nevertrump Congresscuck just lost his own primary the other day.) Believe it or not, the chips are falling his way, despite what the polls or the GOP heavyweights say.

Why?

Because Trump knows where the hearts of the great mass of the American people are. Yesterday, he attended a massive rally in Daytona Beach, Fla. The people there didn’t get the memo that Trump is losing in the polls. Nor did tens of thousands of donors who made July his most profitable fundraising month ever. ($80 million in case you didn’t know, and this from a man who’s run his operation on a shoestring free media.)

So what is Trump’s Kobayashi Maru? Within the last 72 hours, he’s indicated that if he loses, it’ll be because the election was rigged. This is not fanciful: thanks to the Wikileaks we now know to what extent the DNC tipped the scales in Hillary’s favor. For good measure, we know from the private emails of DNC operatives that they used offensive terms and racial slurs to castigate their base. We know that the BernieBros are not happy. 40 percent say they are #NeverHillary; my guess is that Trump will pick up half of them. For what it’s worth, Bernie returned to the Senate and dropped all ties to the Democrat Party.

We now know that in 2012, Romney received exactly zero vote in dozens of precincts in Philadelphia –a statistical impossibility. Talk about 8 million missing votes is permeating the atmosphere. Not only does the average Republican know that the system is rigged but more and more Democrats do as well. Trump is carefully and methodically setting up a mechanism to challenge a close election, especially if there is evidence of tampering or New Black Panthers wielding clubs or precincts in which he receives no votes.

It’ll be 2000 Bush v Gore all over again. And with a deranged Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court (who’s going to have to recuse herself), it’ll be four to three in Trump’s favor.

You read it here first, folks.

Comments

  1. I wouldn’t count on Roberts ruling in Trump’s favor.

    • George Michalopulos says

      Then it’s 3-3. Ties go to the plaintiff. That’s what happened the same day as the Brexit when SCOTUS overturned Obama’s executive amnesty.

      • Tim R. Mortiss says

        Ties don’t go to the plaintiff; they go to the winner in the lower court, be it plaintiff or defendant.

  2. Peter Millman says

    Hi George, That was a good fictitious column you have written with absolutely no basis in reality whatsoever. The truth is that Fox News latest poll says that Hillary has an insurmountable lead of ten points. All indications are that we are going to witness one of the historical defeats of a candidate in recent times. True reports have indicated that Trump asked three times during an hour long security briefing why we can’t use nuclear weapons.
    His strategy of hitting your opponent back times harder goes way beyond lex talionis; it is also a clear violation of basic human relations principles. You don’t even remember Ronald Reagan’s eleventh commandment: Thou shalt not criticise a fellow Republican. Trump’s massive ego is unseemly in a President. ” I alone can fix it.” Really? You’re reading of this campaign is so far out of touch with reality that you really should give up prognostications altogether. I think you drank too much Russia vodka on your recent trip. Unbelievable column that seems based on some alternative universe. Terrible! Just awful! One of the worst columns I’ve ever read. All the best to you, my friend.

    • George Michalopulos says

      Peter, I’ll put you down as “not a fan.”

      Seriously, I wrote two years ago an extensive response how I thought that the game was rigged in Hillary’s favor. That was before Trump. It’s very clear to me that this rigging is even more entrenched now.

      My point is that no Republican was going to be allowed to win against Hillary, especially one who is not a globalist. The purpose of the globalists in the (Jeb, Graham, Cruz, Rubio) was to maintain the charade of a real choice and at the end of the day lose gracefully, like the good little cucks all Republicans are supposed to be.

      More later.

      • George Michalopulos says

        Peter, if I didn’t know any better, I’d say your in the proglib camp. The give away is your assertion that Trump’s attacks go “way beyond the law of lex talionis.” Nothing could be further from the truth. I’m a conservative and have seen every conservative called a “bigot,” “racist,” “sexist” etc. since time began. Even squishes like the Bushes have been castigated in the most horrible light. If you were a Republican you’d know it hurts.

        The hatred towards Trump springs from one fact alone: he won’t take it. He punches back twice as hard. That’s not in the Establishment rule book and for that he has to be punished.

        As for the “insurmountable lead” that Hillary enjoys, just last week Trump had such a lead and even Nate Silver of 538 had Trump winning the election at least if it was held on that day. You know as well as I that “Landslide Lyndon’s” walloping of Goldwater was a one-off, coming as it did a year after the trauma of JFK’s assassination. Every other election in American history has always been a near-run thing in the Duke of Wellington’s words.

        Fox news? We’ve already shown that it’s job from the Aug debate of last year was to take Trump out. They failed.

        There’s something going on here. We saw it with the Brexit which was supposed to lose. The idea that the globalists are always going to win, a dread of conservatives everywhere (not cuckservatives mind you) but real conservatives is a powerful one but the Brexit proved that the hold of the globalists is not as iron as most of us believe.

        We Orthodox saw an inkling of that in Crete, where the Orthodox were to hail Bartholomew as the Eastern Pope for all time. Heck, there’s even a book that was prematurely written (IMHO) by Dn John Chryssavgis to that effect, complete with a Forward by Papa Pinko, Bart’s BFF. Bulgaria, Georgia, Athos and Russia all rained heavy water on that parade. Athos for all intents and purposes is in open rebellion against their own hegoumen. That’s unprecedented.

        And then there’s Vladimir Putin. Assad was to have fallen years ago and left Syria in permanent chaos (to Israel’s benefit). That didn’t happen. Events in Ukraine have broken Putin’s way for the most part. NATO’s overreach is causing some of our European allies to question why they are to be sacrificed on the altar of Democracy. And then, perhaps most importantly, the Archbishop of Paris the other day called Islam a death cult and compared its god to Moloch. Them’s fightin’ words. Did we just see the call to another Crusade? We’ll know one way or the other if Papa Pinko replaces him. Who knows? maybe he’s coming to his senses. (For what it’s worth, Francis was roundly booed in Poland, the most Catholic country in the world.)

        Things are not always what they seem. And Hillary has unwisely saddled herself with Obama’s mantle. Not smart. Yesterday she called for taxes to be raised on the middle class. Is she channeling Mondale?

        Instead of castigating my assertions regarding Trump’s Traps why don’t you offer a counter-argument? How do you explain that after every seeming outrage, Trump comes out smelling like a rose? Surely you have some explanation. I just gave you mine. I could be wrong but I doubt it.

        As for the things that are undeniable in my essay, I gave you two facts: July was the best month ever for Trump money-wise, this was after June, supposedly his worst month ever. And he continues to get massive crowds wherever he goes. Something doesn’t jibe. My hypothesis is that we live in two different, parallel political universes: the globalist elite with their stranglehold on the major institutions occupy one while everybody else lives in the real world where the elite’s policies have real –and unfortunate–consequences.

        Crete, Brexit, Syria, Ukraine, etc., are merely examples of what happens when the globalists overreach and lose control of events. It may very well happen again on Nov 8. In the meantime, Wikileaks will continue to shock the political system. I’m sure Assange has a back-up plan in case something should “accidentally” befall him.

        • Peter Millman says

          On the contrary, George, I respect you, and enjoy your columns; there are times that I disagree with you on some points. I consider myself neither liberal nor conservative. I can’t stand Hillary Clinton, and shudder to think what America will become under her Presidency. I just think that Donald Trump has spent nowhere near enough money to be competitive, he has not surrounded himself with any foreign policy experts to compensate for his lack of knowledge about foreign affairs. Remember, he didn’t know what our nuclear triad is? All the stupid things Trump has said are having a cumulative effect. Republicans are ashamed of him. For goodness sakes, George, he is losing his base. I want to reiterate that I respect you, I just disagree with you sometimes. All the best to you.

          • Ronda Wintheiser says

            Republicans are ashamed of him?

            I am no Trump fan.

            But who cares??? Who cares what the Republicans think?

            If there is anyone Republicans should be ashamed of, it’s themselves.

            • George Michalopulos says

              Excellent point. I could care less what the GOPe thinks anymore. They give us losers like Romney and Ryan who couldn’t/wouldn’t take on the worst president in history. And they blew it.

              And did anybody notice that GOP voting in the primaries was up by 60% while Dem participation was lower than in 2008?

          • George Michalopulos says

            Peter, I certainly respect you as well. I take you at your word that you are “neither conservative nor liberal,” though I must say that I can’t conceive as to how one orders one’s life in such a way, but that’s for you to decide. Speaking for myself, I am no longer a “conservative” if conservative means being a neocon who allows his homeland to be overtaken by Third World hordes. That’s why I am on a personal crusade to take back the word conservative and castigate the Erick Ericksons/Paul Ryans/John McCains of the world as “cuckservatives.”

            • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says

              George, Khan’s wife did NOT wear a “burka” or “burqa” at all! You should try and familiarize yourself with these various aspects of Islam, instead of risking making more of such TRUMP-like mistakes!
              A burqa is a hood covering the whole head, face included!

              • George Michalopulos says

                Burqa, niqab, hijab –I don’t give a flying flip. They all look like rucksacks to me. As far as I’m concerned they can all go the hell back to East Crapistan and wear them there for all I care.

                • Carl Kraeff says

                  Hijab is merely the Muslim version of Middle Eastern head covering that is traditionally worn also by Christians in the area. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hijab#Pre-Islamic_veiling_practices, where the opening paragraph is definitive: “Veiling did not originate with the advent of Islam. Statuettes depicting veiled priestesses precede all three Abrahamic religions (Christianity, Judaism, and Islam), dating back as far as 2500 BCE.[47] Elite women in ancient Mesopotamia and in the Byzantine, Greek, and Persian empires wore the veil as a sign of respectability and high status.[48] In ancient Mesopotamia, Assyria had explicit sumptuary laws detailing which women must veil and which women must not, depending upon the woman’s class, rank, and occupation in society. Veiling was meant to “differentiate between ‘respectable’ women and those who were publicly available”.[48] Female slaves and unchaste women were explicitly forbidden to veil and suffered harsh penalties if they did so. Veiling was thus a marker of rank and exclusive lifestyle, subtly illustrating upper-class women’s privilege over women in lower classes in the Assyrian community.”

                  It is true that in the 20th Century, Muslims and Christians alike started not to wear head coverings, but the practice has returned (with a vengeance among the Muslims). See the following article on Orthodox versions: https://theorthodoxlife.wordpress.com/2014/02/04/womens-headcoverings/

                  • It’s not really relevant though since St. Paul commanded women to cover their heads in church. Therefore, every woman who does not sins by not doing so. In many ROCOR parishes, the priest will simply not commune uncovered women, and rightly so.

                    • Misha, does ROCOR enforce the following:
                      1 Corinthians 11,14 says:”Does not the very nature of things teach you that if a man has long hair, it is a disgrace to him”.

                      “Pick and choose” is consistent with your ilk. If something supports your personal position it is Orthodox, and based on your postings, you are the only purveyor of what is authentically Orthodox.

              • Thank you, Your Beatitude. I’ve been quite ill for a week and a half, and had intended to make this clarification myself.
                Mrs. Khan was wearing a modified hijab. Given what we usually see (at least in the San Francisco Bay Area), it was quite a “liberal” hijab, more in the nature of the Hindu woman’s sari used as a head throw.

          • Cynthia mae Curran says

            Peter is right, Trump has a temperament that doesn’t suit me. I will vote for Trump mainly because of Mike Pence who is your more regular Republican. As for Gary Johnson, his folks are more left-wing libertarians and one of them called me conservative trash when I explain to him that his area in California is getting less Republican he didn’t believe the stats. Gary Johnson is out because of the insult by one of his followers that sounds more liberal than libertarian.

            • George Michalopulos says

              At this point in my life, and after seeing Gary Johnson make such a fool of himself on Morning Joe, I’d have to say that Libertarianism is dead. I say this with a heavy heart. It’s just a group of pot-heads and hippies who think marginal tax rates are too high.

              • Cynthia mae Curran says

                That’s true, a lot of the libertarians have now dumped the right-wing libertarians like the Pauls and Austin Peterson. In fact the libertarians are so silly because the left is more critical of them than the right. One of my left friends say they want to go back to the 1880’s while the right is only critical on them on social issues and sometimes drugs.

        • Michael Bauman says

          What are you trying to conserve George and what makes those things worth conserving?

          • George Michalopulos says

            At this point just the border and the fiction of the First Amendment. I’m not so worried about the Second Amendment: Obama has been the best gun salesman of all time. If Hillary wins I recommend that people buy stock in Glock, Smith & Wesson, Academy, and whoever else makes and sells firearms.

            One of the silver linings of a dystopia is that Leviathan distorts markets, often to his disadvantage. In the case of gun-grabbing, the Feds will have done nothing but create new cartels which will complicate their regulatory lives.

        • Phillip Rodokanakis says

          A friend send me the link your article. Your analysis is spot on! Do you listen to the No Agenda podcast (by Adam Cury & John Dvorak)? I heard some of the references in your piece in their last podcast. Scott Adams has been making the points about the Trump’s persuasion skills for a while now–his blog is replete with examples. For example, when Trump called her Rotten Hillary, the association is made in our brains, so every time we hear Hillary Rodham Clinton, we think Hillary Rotten Clinton. Adams provides many similar examples of Trump’s superior persuasion skills. You’ve gained another reader….

        • George, for what it’s worth, and maintaining my neutrality since I simply don’t believe in democracy at all, nonetheless, if I had to put my money on one or the other winning, I’d bet on Trump. But, hey, I could be wrong. It’s not because I like him better than her. I don’t like either one of them. That’s a fact.

          Both of them have baggage, that much is certain.

          But here’s the thing: If I believe the worst about Donald, I see a guy who is an arrogant, wannabe hyperbillionaire. Like the Saudis. He wants America to work because he lives here, wants to rule it, and intends to make money off of it. He does not want it to be blasted off the face of the Earth by Russia or China, have his (or anyone else’s) throat cut by ISIS, etc. He gets that much of it.

          Now, when I believe the worst about Hillary, I see an ideologue. She is very ambitious, refuses to take no for an answer “I will be President.” I see a trail of his “romances”, or worse; her shenanigans at Rose Law, Vince Foster, Benghazi, etc. She . . . won’t . . . deal. She won’t even read her own feedback/telemetry. Was she the one that the Democrats really wanted to be president and run against Trump? Hell, no.

          She will plow on, risk it all, and cover her booty as is necessary.

          Cluster cluck.

          Now, I’m not going to endorse anyone. But Churchill once said that the American people can be relied upon to do the right thing, once they’ve tried everything else. Hillary is not an unknown. She is Bill or further left. Totally predictable. God only knows what Trump will do next. He is a true wild card.

          They’ve already tried Hillary.

          http://nypost.com/2016/08/05/clinton-mistakenly-refers-to-trump-as-her-husband/

          • Personally, I’m still planning to vote for Johnson/Weld this November, people I am happy to support. Men with experience–each is a successful two-term governor, one in Massachusetts and the other in New Mexico–and sound mind.
            I will feel more at peace in my own self voting this way than in taking part in the shenanigans of Crazy Trump/Crooked Hillary.
            I will sleep well and will pray in peace.

            • Cynthia mae Curran says

              What turn me off from Johnson is one of his followers hated Christians, complaining that some South Koreans are conservative Christians. Also, I gave his follower several information that apart of California is less Republcian and he called me conservative trash. You may agree Johnson on economics and vote for him for other reasons but his followers tend to be ex-Republicans that hated Christians.

              • Cynthia, I’m sorry that a Libertarian representative insulted you. My dealings with Libertarians have shown me that many of them are…well…”challenged” in the department of social skills, leading with their mouths instead of their brains.
                To me, the strongest reason to vote for Johnson/Weld is that each candidate has executive experience at the level best suited for the presidency: each man has successfully completed two full terms as governor, and of the disparate states of New Mexico and Massachusetts.

    • Polls mean nothing until mid-September. And read the news, they are rigging polls to bolster Hillary. Those that are not rigged, they only write headlines about the ones where Hillary wins.

      https://www.longroom.com/polls/

      The fact that they are going all-in this early shows they are terrified.

      And I guess if Hillary still wins in spite of her crimes, we will get what we deserve. Watch Stefan Molyneux’s new presentation on the Fall of Rome for a sobering preview of coming attractions.

    • Phillip Rodokanakis says

      The “true reports” you refer to, are a meme started by Morning Joe, where he said an unnamed advisor to Trump told him that he asked three times why we can’t use nuclear weapons. This was then parroted by a biased main stream liberal media, that Trump asked this question during a security briefing. There is no evidence that this took place during a security briefing and attributing this to an unnamed consultant doesn’t make it any truer. You just can’t believe everything that’s parroted by the main stream liberal media!

      • Peter A. Papoutsis says

        True that. As far as I’m concerned, with all due respect to Edward & Co., Trump is going to win, and this redistribution of wealth to China, India and others will come to a screeching halt.

        As for the social issues don’t ever think a politician, even a so-called conservative politician, tell you (i.e. fool you) in to believing if this case is overturned (i.e. Roe v. Wade, Citizens United, etc.), or that law is passed or this politician gets elected all will be well with our people. THAT’S THE CHURCH’S JOB, NOT THEIRS. So we as the Church better get to work because the field is ripe for harvest and the workers are few.

        Let Trump deal with the economic and border issues, and we will handle the rest.

        Peter A. Papoutsis

        • George Michalopulos says

          BTW, Peter, did you notice that Hillary’s “insurmountable 15 point lead” just dwindled away to 3 points in 24 hours? Here’s a thought: maybe we’re being lied to.

  3. To solve any further grief, I will give the solution to my Kobyashi Muru, at least one of the aspects of it that are inherently unstable:

    I wrote in all capital letters that it was vital that America not go to war with Russia before it went to war with ISIS. While that is perhaps true, a thermonuclear war with anyone would be devastating. With whom is irrelevant. There may be no need to go to a full blown nuclear war with either party I mentioned.

    But that is the point. I have no way to know if Trump would get in a pissing contest with Putin, neither does Hillary. Dispassion is the key. The next leader of the United States must not be arrogant, nor impassioned. Trump is arrogant, Hillary is certainly passionate to a troubling extent. That’s the joke. Either one could fall down and go “BOOM”. We just have to pray that that doesn’t happen since they are both loose cannons by anyone’s estimation.

    So we need keep our heads and not be too provocative. This is what caused me to rethink the wisdom of posting my satire. But it is out there and may serve a purpose.

    And thus endeth the lesson.

  4. “thick Paki accent while his burka-wearing wife stood meekly by were not good”

    His wife was not wearing a burka. “Paki” is a derogatory term. And I’d like to see some evidence that Mr. Khan’s website was scrubbed. You seem to assume that since someone’s a Muslim they’re automatically a jihadist. So I’ll ask you: are all Muslims jihadists?

    You can’t even be bothered to spell Roger Waters’ last name correctly, and the idea that his father’s death is what accounts for his perceptions of Israel is just batty.

    • “So I’ll ask you: are all Muslims jihadists?”

      No, but in Islam, all good muslims are jihadists (mujahidin is the term, actually). It means “those who strive”. There is the greater jihad (the inner struggle) and the lesser jihad (the outward struggle for Islam to prevail, by conversion or sword, whatever works). Some of the classical Islamic legal scholars considered jihad to be so important as to constitute a sixth pillar of the faith, alongside things like almsgiving and the hajj.

      I kid you not.

  5. Gregory Manning says

    George,
    A “ruthlessly efficient police state”? Using “efficient” and “state” together is an oxymoron. Kind of like “Army Intelligence”. Of course, a cheaply made, rusty gun can still misfire and kill someone.

  6. It feels like Bedlam in here.

  7. Gail Sheppard says

    Misha, are you REALLY prepared to vote for a platform that supports programs that are in direct opposition to the Church’s Teachings?

    Early martyrs were often given the opportunity to prosper, if they would legitimize paganism by not insisting there was one God. It would have cost them nothing. They could still be Christian; however, they chose to DIE rather than undermine the Church.

    In your case, you’re legitimizing a platform that supports abortion and LGBTQ marriage. That’s going to be hard one to explain when you’re standing in front of the judgement seat of Christ and He wants to know why it seemed reasonable to you to vote for Hillary, in the throws of a hissy fit over Trump, rather than support the Church’s stance against murder and the perversion of marriage.

    Don’t vote.

    • I agree with Gail.

      When the Democrats put taxpayer-funded abortion in their manifesto, they cannot be supported by any serious Christian. Lots of issues are debatable among reasonable people: welfare, military policy, etc., but Church teaching on abortion is crystal clear.

      If Hillary wins, she will appoint liberal judges who will strike down bans on partial birth abortion, the murder of full grown infants who are seconds from birth. She will push the Overton Window farther into the realm of evil.

      Abortion, the Molochian celebration of blood, is the great sacrament of the Left and it cannot be supported by any means.

      Now, I’m not saying Trump is a conservative idealogue. But of the four presidential candidates who have access to 270 electoral votes (I won’t waste my vote on any candidate who cannot even theoretically win), he is the only one who says he will act to suppress abortion (and we know his VP’s good record on this). His word is all we have to go on. And if his word means nothing, I’ll take his word to oppose abortion over Hillary’s promise to expand it.

      I support many aspects of Trump’s message: the wall, strengthening police, stopping ISIS, closing various doors on immigration, nominating judges like Scalia, protectionist economic policies, and more. But if it has to come down to it, I will vote for him based on abortion and the Supreme Court alone.

      • Joseph Lipper says

        If people are against abortions, then why don’t they just stop having them? When was the last time you had an abortion?

        And if you pay your taxes, are you then supporting abortion?

        So you decide to vote for an anti-abortion platform. But the demagogue who uses that platform to gain your vote because you’re such a predictable follower of Jerry Fallwell’s Moral Majority, is then morally empowered to invade Iraq and cause mass instability in the Middle East, leading to civil war in Iraq and Syria, the rise of ISIS, the displacement of millions of people, now refugees, and basically bringing about the aborted lives of millions of innocents abroad…and all of this is morally empowered by the platform of “anti-abortionism”.

        • Joseph Lipper says

          Our money is created by our governments, and it belongs to our governments. The money we have is on loan to us from our governments.

          Our hearts are created by God, and our hearts belong to Him. The hearts we have are on loan to us from God.

          If we give our hearts to the government, the government will destroy them. If we give our hearts to God, He will preserve them for eternity.

          Have we given up our hearts to the government?

          • If our system was not so broken, I could honestly say: We ARE the government.

            The fact that it has devolved into oligarchy is OUR failure and OUR responsibility to clean up. We don’t get to just sever ourselves from the government and pretend it’s some autonomous thing outside ourselves. Caesar’s empre was, but our form of government is not.

            If the authority to govern comes from God, and our system makes the populace the electors of those who govern, then it follows that God has given each one of us a small share in the responsibility of governing.

        • “Don’t like an abortion? Don’t have one” as a justification of legal abortion is like saying “Don’t like slavery? Don’t own one” as a justification of legal slavery.

        • I can’t even begin to unravel this tangled web of non-sequitors.

        • Gail Sheppard says

          I never had an abortion, Joseph, so there is no “last one.”

          I have to pay my taxes (render unto Cesar and all that), but I do not have to support a platform that promotes abortion. I am free to vote my conscience, my conscience is shaped by my beliefs and my beliefs are shaped by the Church. Even if I COULD prevent all the calamities you mentioned with my single vote, I would choose not to do so if it meant taking an innocent life. It’s quite simple, really.

          • Joseph Lipper says

            Gail, that is beautiful, and yes, it’s a reference to our Lord’s words “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” Our money are the things that belong to our government, and our hearts are the things that belong to God.

            There is another way of voting, and it’s voting with one’s feet. For some people, that’s how they vote according to their conscience. They don’t.

            Our government’s authority, no matter how twisted it is, is given to it by God, not by Jimmy Falwell’s Moral Majority. It is God that makes our government legitimate, even if it’s President Hilary or President Donald. When we pay our taxes and try to obey the laws, we are being obedient to God.

            We all know our job as Christians is to pray for our country and our government because it’s in the Liturgy. Personally, my prayer is that our government would not seek to pass more laws, but rather that the people of our country would have a change of heart. I would hope that people would be more like you, that they would not have abortions. Not because it’s illegal, but because they simply don’t want to.

          • Joseph Lipper says

            Gail, that is beautiful. We all know that our job as Christians is to pray for our country and our government because it’s in the Liturgy. Personally my prayer is that our government would not seek to pass more laws, but that the people of our country would have a change of heart. I would hope that people would be more like you, that they would not have abortions. Not because it’s illegal, but because they simply don’t want to.

            No matter how twisted our government is, it’s authority comes from God alone, not from Jimmy Falwell’s Moral Majority. It is God that makes our country legitimate, whether its President Hillary or President Donald. When we pay our taxes and try to obey our country’s laws, we are being obedient to God.

            There is another way of voting, and it’s voting with one’s feet. For some people, that’s how they vote according to their conscience. They don’t.

            Our Lord said, “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” Our money inherently belongs to the government, and are hearts inherently belong to God.

        • Cynthia mae Curran says

          Well, the Clinton’s were involved with the bombing of Serbia, not condemned by most liberals. I know less people died in Serba by Clinton’s airstrikes but people die none the less. Also, Clinton’s bombing of Serba took placed on Pascha.

          • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says

            Cynthia, if you’ve listened to Trump at all, you surely must realize that if he had been President instead of Clinton, we’d be OCCUPYING Serbia and would have used nuclear weapons long before now!

            • Like your prediction (years ago) that Bush will impose martial law and seize power, this foolish comment confirms how out of touch and lacking in wisdom you are. That you served as a bishop in the OCA for so long is a shameful reminder of the hirelings and unqualified (and corrupt) men who were at helm of the OCA for so long. The fish rots and stinks from the head.

        • Michael Bauman says

          That is why I will vote none if the above, Joseph. The evil has become too egregious to chose one.

          • Peter A. Papoutsis says

            Vote Trump because you vote for the people. The majority of the people are still good.

            Go Trump.

            Peter

    • Gail, dear, calm down. It was satire. Read my more recent comments please.

      • Fair enough; you got us all. Perhaps the ease with which we are whipped into a frenzy tells us we have our priorities in the wrong place, if not that our civilization is in its death throes.

      • Gail Sheppard says

        OK, Misha, I’m getting there! Give me time. 🙂

    • Ronda Wintheiser says

      I was just about to say that myself, Gail.

      Thank you.

  8. Barring some sort of miracle for Trump, Clinton is going to win in a walk, and not because of voter fraud, but because Trump has run a grossly incompetent campaign in a very winnable race against the most flawed candidate in the history of the modern Democratic party (and that is saying something, given the competition). If the trend continues, the margin of Clinton’s victory is going to be so sizeable that the result will be unmistakable and beyond any fantasy of massive voter fraud.

    If losing elections were a crime, Trump would be charged, right now, with multiple counts of negligent campaign suicide. The truth is that Republicans needed somebody like Trump — not bound by political correctness; someone with his general positions on trade, immigration, and foreign wars; unconventional and unpredictable in tactics. This was necessary because American demographics and social trends make it nearly impossible for a traditional Republican to win the presidency. But he has blown it. At the end of the day, a plurality of Americans have to be able to imagine you as actually being President. I don’t see Trump being able to persuade a majority to that point of view any more.

    The most serious flaw in Trump is not his being thin-skinned — it is that he shows no evidence that he is able to take any kind of advice from anyone and incorporate it into what he does, nor does he show evidence of being able to delegate responsibility and then get out of that person’s way. I really expected him to be a canny operator who would be capable of learning and growing as a candidate, and capable of putting a top level wrecking ball of a campaign team together. I thought I would watch him become more lethal to his opposition by the week — and in all of those things I have been grossly disappointed. I don’t see any growth in political skill since he wrapped up the nomination in Indiana. Anyone who cannot do that has some very serious question marks about his ability to do the job of President.

    This election is already over, just as surely as McCain and Romney’s campaigns were as done as crispy chicken within weeks of the GOP conventions in 2008 and 2012.

    You read it here first, George.

    • Please stop trying so hard to be “first”. Or to convince everyone that you can foretell the future.

    • Words cannot adequately express how sad I am that Sen McCain selected a fruitcake, not-ready-for-prime-time VP candidate in 2008. His concession speech that November night showed me the McCain I had voted for in the 2000 California Spring Primary against Geo. W. Bush.
      The honorable and great Senator was submerged during his own 2008 campaign in favor of…well, we all know her name.
      Yeah. We could’ve–under one different circumstance–had Prez McCain. *sigh*

      • George Michalopulos says

        Leaving aside Palin’s qualifications, McCain’s only job was to take a dive for Sen Lightworker.

  9. Peter A. Papoutsis says

    I agree 100%. Trump is playing them AND he is letting the media know HE is in charge NOT THEM. The media demanded an apology and Trump said No!

    Pure power politics. The art of the deal at its finest and the art of war at its best.

    Peter A. Papoutsis

  10. I’m shocked that Misha has decided to support Hillary. Hillary champions abortion, euthanasia, Planned Parenthood, gay “marriage,” trangenderism, common core, etc. etc.

    If Hillary gets elected, the supreme court will become an extension of the progressive liberals for generations as they legislate one abomination after another from the bench!!!

    Say it ain’t so Misha!!!

    • It was a satire, folks. Get over it.

      I posted it and then thought twice since I didn’t think some people would get it. The point was that we may see Trump as arrogant (he is), but Hillary is unbalanced. You can see it in her eyes. “I WILL be president”. She will lose it totally if she doesn’t win.

      Moreover, if she did win, she would lose it totally if she didn’t prevail in any number of other little challenges that characterize the career of a president of the United States. Someone who called her husband a “stupid m*th*rf*ck*r” in front of the press and everybody when that husband happened to be the sitting president of the United States does not have a firm grip on her own reins. THAT was my point. When she loses or something goes bad, there is “Hell to Pay”.

      I, for one, don’t want to be the one to pay THAT bill.

      But, of course, I like to stay out of politics. It just encourages bad behavior.

      • “It was a satire, folks. Get over it.”

        Oops. Sorry Misha. I didn’t read your original comments.

  11. Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says

    Don’t know what a burqa is?

    • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says

      Anybody think he’ll reveal his tax returns, as others have done while under audit?

  12. George, why do you allow your opinions to be shaped by the liberal media? You are falling victim for the narrative prepared for you.

  13. With all due respect for Orthodox Christians who are Democrats in the traditional sense (those following in the footsteps of their parents and grandparents), neither the party nor its nominee bears any resemblance to the party of Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Hubert Humphrey, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, or others of earlier eras. Unlike in times past, there is a strict abortion (and now LGBT) orthodoxy to which party members must adhere absolutely if they are to qualify for high elected office in the eyes of the party. This was demonstrated once again most recently in the selection of the nominee for VP, who was once proudly pro-life – as once were the Rev. Jesse Jackson, Al Gore, and many others who found it expedient to deny the truth they knew in their hearts in order to secure the support of their party.

    Does anyone find it ironic that the party which at one time appealed (more or less truly) to our sense of human nobility, selflessness, and duty to mankind when it came to children, racial discrimination, the poor, the environment, public safety, the disabled, the disadvantaged…and even now calls on us to sacrifice our individual freedoms, our religious liberties, as well as an ever-increasing portion of our incomes, for the benefit of our neighbors cannot bring itself to ask a woman to sacrifice nine months of her life for the sake of her own child?

    The new orthodoxy has not only been imposed upon the party, it is clear that the party fully intends to impose it upon every citizen of the United States – and even the entire world – by force of law. For those who doubt this…

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yj1T1gP4Q9M

    And for those who care more about God (and His image in your fellow human beings) than your own “economic interests,” this is how the importance of your faith is now perceived by the leadership of the party.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFvIoeQhrZM

    Do not mistake this for an endorsement of the opposing party or its nominee. God only knows where it – or he – will lead our republic. We do, however, know precisely where the Democratic Party intends to lead us.

    • Thomas Barker says

      Excellent points, Brian. I bit the bullet and registered American Independent. Here are some platform points that shine in juxtaposition to the two-faced, one-party system that rules the nation:

      “The American Independent Party gratefully acknowledges God as the Creator of all and appeals to Him for help in protecting all He has graciously given us.”

      “We believe in protecting all human life however weak, defenseless, or disheartened; we endorse the family as the essential bulwark of liberty, compassion, responsibility, and industry; and declare the family’s right and responsibility to nurture, discipline, and educate its children. We maintain that all humans are persons from the beginning of their biological development and especially deserve our love and nurture when they are weakest and most dependent.”

      “We insist that marriage is between a man and a woman and assert the role of the law in establishing and reinforcing the mutual rights and obligations of that God-ordained contract.”

      It’s a pleasure to see language that doesn’t support gay marriage and child sacrifice, no?

      • George Michalopulos says

        Thomas, how do they feel about national sovereignty? If they agree with strong borders then where can I go to sign up?

        • Thomas Barker says

          The following is copied from apical.org (‘cal’ for California)

          “We oppose all illegal immigration. We support secure borders and immigration policies inviting the best of the world to join us in freedom. We emphatically demand that our borders be protected against intrusions by that most straight-forward and practical means, a fence, reinforced by all the necessary manpower and electronic surveillance. We also insist that those who violate our immigration laws, be they illegal immigrants or their employer, be punished for their crime in a way that will deter them from future offenses.”

          • George Michalopulos says

            Sign me up!!! I’d very much appreciate it if you could post their contact info for all to see. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s interested.

            • Thomas Barker says

              Sorry Mr. M. If I am reading the OK Sec. of State website correctly, your state recognizes only the Republican, Democrat and Libertarian parties. (There’s also “No Party,” ie. independent.) In California they recognize the Peace and Freedom, Green, and American Independent parties as well. As Michael Bauman commented, it appears to be a California party. *** My apologies to all for posting the wrong website: It should have read ” aipca.org (‘ca’ for California)” ***

              • Yet another reason to become active regarding ballot access in one’s own state. I personally was very active in the Libertarian Party achieving ballot access in California in….well, never mind. 😉
                For information on which parties are recognized in which states, the following site may be helpful. In any case, it contains important information on how the Powers That Be attempt to protect themselves from “lesser beasts”:
                http://ballot-access.org/

          • Michael Bauman says

            From what I see, the AIP is solely a California phenomenon and will only be on the ballot there. I would also want to know if they have disavowed the racism upon which it was founded.

            Besides all political parties have an ideology and all ideology is fundamentally a lie. At best such ideology will be discarded if the party assumes power. Obama did not do that.

            Still vote NONE OF THE ABOVE!

            • Refusing to participate is not an option, in my opinion. We have the ability to choose our leaders (however bad the options may be), and it should be unconscionable to dismiss that opportunity.

              Now, in my view, a wasted vote (for president and vice-president) is one cast for a candidate who does not have access to 270 electoral votes, and therefore cannot even hypothetically win.

              That leaves four options: Trump, Clinton, Stein, and Johnson. No other person can be elected president. This is the time when we have to be grown-ups, weigh the pros and cons and decide. We have to live in the real world and these are the only real choices. For myself, there is only one option that does not completely violate my conscience.

              Sure, fight for a party you believe in four years from now. But it’s too late for that in 2016. Ballot access deadlines are past.

              • “Refusing to participate is not an option, in my opinion. We have the ability to choose our leaders (however bad the options may be), and it should be unconscionable to dismiss that opportunity.”

                Yet that betrays a lack of faith in God. Democrats (small “d”) have more faith in the voice of the people than they do God. “Vox populi, vox Dei”.

                The problem is the two party system. As we speak, the Dems have some things right (fairly generous welfare state, for instance) and the Repubs have some things right (pro-life, for example). Yet one cannot get things done because of the competition. Monarchy goes with monotheism, Polyarchy goes with polytheism (our current system), and anarchy comes with atheism.

                If you had a Unity party that backed away from our “can-do” foreign policy, maintained a generous but solvent welfare state and embraced conservative morality (more conservative than either party does today), you would have a great, workable platform. Yet polyarchy prevents this from happening because each side is not going to cede territory on the things that work for them; i.e., which are popular. So, you have the current stalemate which is making America, and the rest of the world, bat poop crazy.

                The only real soft landing that America can hope for is a strong executive who is persuasive and is willing to make deals who has a platform like the one I described above. Yet in the longer term, the whole thing is still rigged to explode once the parties revert to form.

                Really, it’s just a mess.

                • Unfortunately, mathematics and statistics dictate that in a majority-rules system such as ours, it will always end up with only two major parties.

                  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duverger%27s_law

                  And to the rest of your post: John Adams has been proven right: “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

                  • Yes, Ages, there is some wisdom in that.

                    The only way democracy can sustain itself as a decent (not the best, just decent) form of government is if the people are religious, the closer to Orthodoxy the better. Islamic societies will eventually revert to sharia if a dictator does not rule them as secular on the Western social model, for instance.

                    America was born to die, and that is what we are witnessing now. The two party system has spent itself and resolved to the present eccentric contest between the matriarchy and the patriarchy, pseudo-liberal and pseudo-conservative, etc. Yin and Yang, so to speak. That is the problem with all duality and dualism, it perpetually polarizes. Monism is superior. However the systems of Augustine and Plotinus are also defective in ways. The real problem with Augustine is not all the errors that he eventually caught and documented about his former teachings. The key is that that process should indicate to us that he was not in possession of an accurate received tradition – i.e., Holy Tradition. To the extent he got things right, he guessed or had some access to others who knew. But he himself did not receive it directly from any other bishop or starets. The chain, in that part of the world, had already been broken when it got to him.

                    Plotinus’s system was defective in the same way that Buddhism is defective. Buddhism can get to the One, but cannot correctly discern the character of the One.

                    That is the sheer beauty of Orthodox Christianity and why it is superior to all systems of philosophy and all other religions. The character of the One is unknowable outside of direct divine revelation. And the only direct divine revelation still extant is Orthodox Christianity. There is no other place to go for the Absolute Truth.

                    Incidently, Orthodoxwiki has a good summary of Augustine and his relationship to St. Ambrose of Milan and the thought of Plotinus:

                    https://orthodoxwiki.org/Augustine_of_Hippo

                    It’s short and sweet though. But it also lays out the various views within the Church that our theologians have taken towards him. Mine is completely within the mainstream.

            • Thomas Barker says

              Mr. Bauman,

              There has been great progress since Gov. George Wallace was the 1968 American Independent presidential candidate. Are you aware that in 2008, African American Alan Keyes was the American Independent presidential candidate? So far I haven’t seen racism in the modern version of the party. As far as the party ever assuming power goes – that’s a pipe dream. At present I can’t resist the public acknowledgement of basic Christian values. I am saddened that it is not widely available as an option. And I appreciate your rejection of all political ideology.

              • Michael Bauman says

                I understand your attraction. My ultimate rejection stems from what I perceive as making a truncated form of Christianity into a political ideology.

                Such candidates would be the norm if faith in Jesus Christ was the norm. But there would also be social programs which would make many who call themselves “conservative” angry.

                If we want a Christian government, we have to be a Christian people, really a Christian people.

                Since we have never been that, we have no idea what such a government would look like.

                Now, no one running for public office represents me nor would they care to. So, I won’t vote.

                • Perhaps you should run for office? (Seriously.)

                  But I see it differently. I recognize that no one can represent me perfectly, so it is a compromise from the beginning.

                  Hopefully, there is someone who I agree with a great deal. If there isn’t, I look for the one who will (a) cause the least damage, and (b) win. Trump will cause less damage than Clinton in the areas I care most about, and I do not believe any third party can realistically win the presidency.

                  First of all, the Church. I really cannot imagine Trump trying to ram gay marriage down the throats of churches, for example. I can imagine Clinton trying that.

                  Trump may not do anything to curtail abortion, but Clinton will actively work to expand it.

                  Trump has pledged to break with Obama’s disastrous bellicose foreign policy that has destabilized a dozen countries. Clinton is running as Obama’s third term.

                  Trump’s Supreme Court nominees may end up duds like some of Reagan’s and Bush’s. Clinton will nominate the most extreme judges possible, and be open about it.

                  Trump is a non-idealogue. He’ll do what he thinks is right, regardless of where it falls on the spectrum, maybe that will be 50/50. Clinton, though, is a radical who will push left at every opportunity, to continue the slow downward spiral.

                  • Agree completely, Ages. Thank you.

                  • Michael Bauman says

                    Ages, can I count on your vote?

                    Seriously, I am unelectable. I am a grumpy old man who us a bit of a trog

                    I could be fine with significantly less than perfect representation. What I am not fine with is voting for similar things as you describe and being continually sold out.

                    Case in point: Kansas two Senators (I am a Kansan) at the time Kathleen Sebelius (Kansas Governor at the time) was appointed HHS director were Sam Brownback and Pat Roberts. Both made significant pro-life statements rather frequently and were publicly opposed to Obamacareless. Neither of them had ever said anything positive about her before.

                    Dear Kathleen never met an abortion she didn’t like including partial-birth ones even though she made reference from time to time to get Catholic upbringing. She is an unprincipled and hate filled woman.

                    Ol’ Pat and slimy Sam couldn’t wait to get to the podium with evil Kate so they could say wonderful things about her and what a great day it was for Kansas. Still makes me sick. No real conviction on the Senators part. Kathleen is far more dedicated to her beliefs than either of those two dishonorable men.

                    I no longer believe any politician who makes noises that sound good to my ears. Guaranteed they will sell me out. Tried of being Charlie Brown to Lucy and her football.

                  • Reality Checker says

                    Agesless wisdom:

                    “Trump is a non-ideologue.”

                    Yup, that’s one way to put it.

                • Cynthia mae Curran says

                  Good point, you might have some atheist like Heather McDonald, good on some issues out if we want everyone to be a christian.

        • Thomas Barker says

          *** Apologies to all: the American Independent Party website for California is aipca.org. There is no ‘L’ in the url. ***

    • Cynthia mae Curran says

      This is true, Dems can no longer be pro-life and economic liberals. Modern politics is like that.

  14. Michael Kinsey says

    BEHOLD, an Israelite, INDEED in whom there is no guile. When He asked the Christ, how He knew his name. I saw you sitting under the tree. Nathanial recognized Truthfulness, when he heard it. I would love to vote for someone like St Nathanial, but these chimps are totally the opposite of guilelessness. I ask the Holy God to bless them as enemies, because I dare not curse them. It is forbidden.

  15. Anonymous says

    Nothing too complicated. Trump has allowed himself to be too easily exorcised by others. President’s can’t.

    He could have said zero on Khan.

    If he is exorcised by an old paki n a burqa-what would a foreign leader do to him?

    He created a condition where we must ask.

    Not a HC fan, for the record.

  16. Fr. David says

    It seems clear that the majority of BOTH the Democrat and Republican office
    holders want TRUMP to lose because he is a THREAT to their amassed power.
    Both parties will sell their soul to maintain it!
    frd+

    • It is very interesting to see the coalition of ne’er-do-wells that are coalescing from both sides against Trump. If we can judge a person based on their friends, perhaps we can also judge them by their enemies.

      • Reality Checker says

        LOL

        “Ne’er-do-wells” like these guys, you mean?

        Think it might be time to get off this train boys and girls, before it plunges right off the cliff. Won’t be long now — better hurry!

      • Reality Checker says

        Ages, what sort of judgement would you like to pronounce on this enemy of Drumpf?

        LOL

        • The fun never ends.

          Thanks.

          • Reality Checker says

            Anonymous, for some reason it took George days to push the button on my post with this link, and it got buried. This is a link documenting lots of Drumpf and Co.’s ridiculous lies, more of which are rated Pants on Fire, and which are compiled here, than any of the other Republican candidates, by far, except for Cruz, who was competitive with him for a while there. Lately, Drumpf has been on a real roll, in a fraud class all by himself. Clinton has been almost a paragon of truthfulness by comparison, according to Politifact and a couple of other fact-checking organizations.

            We’ll see how long it takes to break through into the echo chamber this time.

            • George Michalopulos says

              Well, what about the tons of lies that Hill & Co have perpetrated? When all is said and done, Trump still doesn’t have blood on his hands. More importantly, he is not on the lookout for getting blood on his hands. Hillary? She has no choice. She’s a bought and paid for commodity of Neocon, Inc.

              • Reality Checker says

                The fanboy of Putin, and now Trump, speaks. I suppose Putin might not have been “on the lookout for getting blood on his hands” either. Didn’t turn out that way though. Not likely to turn out that way for a President Drumpf. Wonder where you come up with these glib silly lines.

                Who’s stumping for Mrs. Clinton?

                • George Michalopulos says

                  RC, I get it: like most liberals/neocons, your hatred of Putin is because of his style, not because he stopped Russia’s death-spiral that took place during the 90s.

              • Reality Checker says

                Some lie a lot more than others. You can certainly appreciate that.

                Check this out:

                http://mannmetrics.com

                (Nice try, George. Or whoever.)

                “Is there something wrong with saying that? Are people complaining that I said he was the founder of ISIS?” Trump said. “Look, all I do is tell the truth. I’m a truth teller. All I do is tell the truth.”
                “If at the end of 90 days I fall in short because I’m somewhat politically incorrect even though I’m supposed to be the smart one and even though I’m supposed to have a lot of good ideas, it’s okay,” he continued. “I go back to a very good way of life.” –DJD, 11 August ’16

                Some more data on Drumpf’s issues with sleazy deceit, from today’s WP:

                http://tinyurl.com/zx3xolh

                Now, I get that for some of you, Drumpf’s surreal fraudulence is a feature not a bug. You admire that in him. But one hopes that other readers favor a different perspective.

                • George Michalopulos says

                  RC, you’re about to get your hat handed to you regarding the reality of ISIS and it’s parentage. Hint: it ain’t pretty. If you want to continue kissing up to Mdme Clinton, go right ahead. As a wise man once said: “Head on, Brother! Hell ain’t half full!”

                  More to come.

                  • George Michalopulos says
                    • Who did 9/11? says

                      You do your credibility such favor by linking to a site that thinks 9/11 was an inside job by the US government. Great source! With a partner website of “Stop NATO!” I can’t imagine what their affiliations are!

                      Saying the conditions for ISIS to be created were born in the debacle of the Iraq war, and assigning a large helping of culpability to the US for its existence is uncontroversial. Saying Obama and Clinton are the founder/co-founder of ISIS stretches hyperbole to the point of ridiculousness.

                    • George Michalopulos says

                      There’s way more info from gov’t sources. This is from the #nevertrumper NRO: http://www.nationalreview.com/article/368354/how-obama-caused-isi-ira-strauss .

                    • George Michalopulos says

                      Then there’s this: http://www.darkpolitricks.com/2016/08/trump-is-right-heres-proof-hillary-obama-founded-isis/ . You know, gotta stop killing the messenger.

                    • Reality Checker says

                      George, are you going to answer this question?:

                      “. . .The monstrous regimes in Iraq, Syria and Libya were armed and diplomatically supported by Russia, Soviet or “post-“. So the reasons behind your obvious preference for its destructive meddling over the West’s destructive meddling interest me very much. Maybe you could elaborate on those.”

                      Or should we expect nothing more substantive than a continuation of you squirting squid ink out of obscure websites, which merely retail old news mixed with half-truths, distortions, grave omissions of pertinent facts, fabrications, transparent disinfo, new delusions and pants-on-fire lies?

                      There’s plenty of blame to go around in this wicked old world. Soviet and “post”-Soviet Russia very much included. So once again: Why do you prefer their destructive meddling in the ME to the West’s? Why do you favor their destructive meddling in Ukraine (for example, actively causing millions of deaths by famine, ethnic cleansing, mass deportations and importations of populations, etc.)? Why are you against allowing the vast majority of Ukrainians to get what they want: their chance to be part of the civilized, rule-of-law led European Union that Putin seems to be trying to deconstruct and disintegrate with his financial support of its enemies among the nationalists and far-right there? Where are you coming from exactly? And did you know that the RF has actively forwarded to the Levant many of the worst of the worst Chechen malefactors, whose very existence it worked so hard to create the conditions for in the first place, with its savagery in Chechnya? How does that fact fit into your ludicrous cartoon? Today they staff the top leadership of ISIL, a terrorist state the RF helped foster by goading Assad, reportedly, into perpetrating similar savagery upon at first peaceful protesters in Syria. You should avoid using big words like “reality,” as you do in your post above. It’s unseemly and inappropriate for you.

                    • George Michalopulos says

                      RC: Libya, seriously? Under Ghaddafi in the last few years it was stable, peaceful and more importantly for our perspective, wanting to join the community of nations. He unilaterally gave up his WMD. He also made sure that the hordes didn’t invade Europe. But no, we wanted on some “principle” I’m sure to take him out and turn North Africa -and now Europe–into a hell-hole.

                    • Michael Warren says

                      Actually, Galician Uniate geiropa IS NOT what the vast majority of the peoples of the Ukraine want. If that were the case, Neo NAZI banderofascist death squads wouldn’t have the country on lock down engaged in terror to prevent democratic referendums on leaving the Ukraine and accession to Russia. A civil war wouldn’t be raging so that free peoples could live in a country where Uniate banderofascist, American, colonial hell doesn’t oppress and ethnically cleanse non Galician Uniate banderofascists.

                  • Reality Checker says

                    Who’s kissing up to who here and why is clear enough. The corrupt kleptocrats and thugs you favor rule only in kakocracies. FYI, today my thinking is that I’d vote for HRC only if the polls at the time forecast the popular vote to be close. But I am torn about it. The thing I’m 100% sure of is #NeverTrump.

                    But this is out of character. I’m not really interested so much in asserting my own fallible opinions as in fact-checking some of the rampant lies and factual errors on your blog. If you don’t mind I’ll return to that.

                    • Reality Checker says

                      George, really. You’re reduced to citing websites that prominently feature videos from Alex Jones? Sad!

                      The NRO link you posted doesn’t work. As the other correspondent rightly noted, who’s going to take seriously a blogger who links to websites showcasing claims that 9/11 was an inside job? I worry about you.

                      What did they give you to drink in Russia?

                      Your question, “Libya, seriously”? was supposed to communicate what? It is known as a non sequitur.

                      Still, I’d refer you to the UN Security Council, the French and the British with respect to the origins of that recent misadventure. I merely pointed out that Qaddafi’s ugly regime was created and supported by the Soviets, then the RF. Those are just facts. My understanding is that Obama didn’t think the 2011 intervention was wise, but after our NATO allies started it, he couldn’t stay on the sidelines. But what do I know.

                      Q. had been a better boy, internationally, but unfortunately like all thugs, it seems he couldn’t resist making a big mess at home. Just something about these dictators and autocrats your sort is so fond of. Oriental tyrannies do something for you, huh? No wonder you’re such a “Russophile.” Anyway, Drumpf has repeatedly demonstrated his warm spot for tyrants, too. So one can see the attraction you’re afflicted with for these guys. Real chemistry going on, clearly. Elective affinities and all that. The heart wants what it wants. We get it.

                    • George Michalopulos says

                      Libya, a “non-sequiter”? Really? Taking out a stable regime that wants to make nice with the West? And for what? The destruction of Europe before our very eyes? The extermination of indigenous Christian communities in the land of Christianity’s birth? You might want to stop drinking the Neolib/con Kool-aid. The vodka I drank in Russia was an excellent restorative –just one shot bottom’s up really clears the head.

                      RC, instead of continuing to kill the messenger, ask yourself this question: can actions have unintended consequences?

                    • Peter A. Papoutsis says

                      Post your name or you can add your name to the long list of cowards on this board that should be ignored.

            • What you need to realize is Trump is trying to tire the electorate. And the media is playing his hand. He deserves a comedic response, but if the past is an indicator…he will get all of us very tired by November.

              • Reality Checker says

                Anonymous, now that the electronic media has turned on him decisively, he’s toast. But I confess a somewhat cynical view of the reason for that development: he’s spending $0.00 on TV ads. It looks like the abomination of his candidacy may always have been primarily about money, for both him (his “brand”) and media executives (ad revenue). Their revenge will be a vivid demonstration, directed to him and all his entourage and surrogates, of just who has the real power to say, “You’re fired!” After all, politics in the United States is just the lowest rung of show business, as Mike Murphy put it. Little talent required.

                • What makes you think that way? The media got so much mileage from The Donald they should all be paying him. I don’t see it the same way, but agree if the media execs don’t make some ad ching; they will not be as friendly to Ivanka ven she runs.

        • What is it with liberals calling him “Drumpf”?

          Is it bigotry against immigrants who actually assimilate to our culture? Or just bigotry against Germans?

          • Reality Checker says

            Neither. It’s the correct spelling of his grandfather’s name, the brothel magnate. That’s just a fact. (You know, those stubborn things to which habitués of Monomakhos seem so allergic.)
            Speaking for myself, I simply prefer the sound of it. Many people are saying it’s more suited to his personality, somehow. That it has more authenticity, more of a certain verisimilitude. Don’t you think?
            Since it is in fact the correct spelling, who’s the bigot here? Why are you so prejudiced against his paternal grandfather’s actual name? Sad!

            • George Michalopulos says

              RC, are you completely ignorant of American history? How exactly did our Founding Fathers make their fortunes? Ever heard of slavery, or smuggling? Or we can take a stroll down to the 20th century, remind me again: how exactly did Papa Joe Kennedy make his millions?

              • Reality Checker says

                One concedes your awesome gift for the raging non sequitur, George. No need to keep demonstrating it.

                But was there some additional point you wanted to make?

            • He changed his name in order to assimilate. My ancestors did the same thing. Immigrants were expected to become a part of the local fabric.

              The question is, why don’t we expect that of today’s immigrants?

              • Reality Checker says

                But since when do German immigrants change their names “to assimilate?” That seldom happened, except for replacing the Umlaut if there was one for ae, oe, or ue. So your point is poorly taken.

                • George Michalopulos says

                  RC, you really don’t know that much about German immigrants, do you? During WWI, when German-Americans were actually being lynched in Oklahoma, a whole lot of them anglicized their names.

                  Ever heard of Herbert Hoover? (Huepfer I believe was his real name.)

                  • Reality Checker says

                    Well, name-changing then would entail a much more complex motivation than simple “assimilation” in fresh-off-the-boat immigrants, wouldn’t it? I meant at the time, in 1885. Before all the trouble. I could have been more explicit.

                    I doubt many Germans were being admitted to the United States during WWI and II. So you’re talking about people who were already here, a generation later.

                  • Reality Checker says

                    Huber, nicht Hüpfer. And why would that particular ancestor (circa 1800) have fretted over a German surname? The Germans had just helped Americans win their independence, and German came close to becoming the national tongue.

                  • Yes. Very few German families left their names unchanged after WWI. Whole communities of Germans left for Canada. It was brutal.

                    • George Michalopulos says

                      And let us not forget the most famous German family of all –the Wettins of Great Britain–changed their name to Windsor during that unpleasantness.

                  • Fr. Herman Schick says

                    George is right. During WWI one of my relatives changed his family name from “Kaiser” to “King” in order to avoid harassment.

                    However, the “Schick” branch (here since before the Civil War), stubbornly stuck with their German name.

                    • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says

                      GEORGE! “The most famous German family of all” is not the Royal family of England! Why do you print such howlers? Besides, never heard of Saxe-Coburg? Battenbergs were much more famous than Wettins–they became Mountbattens. Those names stuck, but the attempt to change Sauerkraut to “Liberty Cabbage” did not! I understand, however, your notorious affection for such ethnic nonsense.

          • Liberals should be emphasizing his mittle name!

  17. Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says

    I like how this Khan Job got demoted from top billing. Does it have anything to do with CROW?

    • George Michalopulos says

      Not at all, Your Grace. It’s just that I’m finally writing about my trip to Russia. As for Mr Khan himself, more info is coming out about him, specifically how he dissembles, esp regarding whether Shariah actually exists. It appears that he’s two minds on this. Then there’s his knowledge of the inner workings of the mind of Allah vis-a-vis Mr Trump’s candidacy.

  18. Another beauty from Pat Buchanan. He nails the CFR and neocons dead to rights:

    http://buchanan.org/blog/got-us-endless-wars-125520

    • George Michalopulos says

      As usual, spot on.

    • Peter A. Papoutsis says

      Spot on. And this is why Trump will win.

      Peter

      • Reality Checker says

        It simply does not follow that neocon-inspired lunatic meddling abroad wouldn’t be succeeded by something vastly worse, only perpetrated by a grotesquely ignorant incompetent like President Drumpf. Who’s communicated nothing remotely resembling a substantive foreign policy, nor any policy advisors — aside from his loose affiliation with some gentleman recently on the payroll of Gazprom, and the implications which follow of his (and the candidate’s) pecuniary interests. Concrete details that would illuminate the latter are hidden in secrecy, due to the nominee’s arrogant and unprecedented (since 1976) refusal to reveal any tax returns whatsoever. That this sinister lack of transparency has been allowed by the public and the press to continue is genuinely shocking to many of us.

        In an extensive interview last week, a former Director of the CIA, NSA and Deputy of National Intelligence, retired 4-star General Michael Hayden, testified that he knew of not a single qualified person who was advising this unaccountable Republican nominee. When asked about his advisors, said nominee has ridiculously cited his “good brain” — and his own wise counsel.

        And yet, when asked about his few, fragmentary, incoherent foreign policy pronouncements, just about everyone of real relevance at home and abroad are on the record as regarding them — and I paraphrase — as utterly batsh*t insane. To be charitable. (Aside from his sentiments about how nice it would be to get along better with Russia, an admittedly commendable goal that most of us would warmly support. The question is how it might be pursued rationally.) Mostly, Drumpf seems to want to throw over treaties that have helped keep the peace for generations, to be replaced by arrangements most closely related to the sort of protection rackets favored by the Mob.

        For these and other reasons, I wonder about the basis for Mr. Papoutsis’s professed confidence in this charlatan of ever so many parts (of charlatanry). Maybe he could explain his thinking? I doubt I’m the only one who’d be interested in hearing something about that.

        • George Michalopulos says

          You mean Lt Gen Michael Flynn, Walid Phares, etc. are not “qualified”? Trump paid court to Henry Kissinger, he had no problems with him.

          Just because the warmongers hate him doesn’t mean that Trump is unqualified.

          So why do I trust Trump over Hillary and the Neocons? Because Trump is a nationalist and his wealth is in real estate and real estate can be wiped out in a nuclear strike. The neocons have their wealth tied up in financial instruments which are fungible. They’ll do alright if things get bad for the US, they can decamp to another country.

          • George Michalopulos says

            And no, there can be nothing “vastly worse” than “foreign interventions” and “warmongering.” Go to a VA hospital and see the young men who are maimed there. For what? I’m sorry, I’ll take Trump’s neo-isolationism over Hillary’s “experience” in the State Dept any day.

          • Reality Checker says

            Just wanna box empty air, do you? Where’s my post?

        • George Michalopulos says

          Correction: I can think of one thing worse that actual Neocon warmongering: inciting violence and rebellion and not doing anything. Syria, Yemen, Libya, Ukraine, the list is now endless.

          So we’re on the horns of a dilemma: actual warmongering by Hillary and the Neocons or active dithering by Obama. Either way, chaos is the end result. That way the globalists have both sides of the street covered. Not a bad gig if you think about it.

          The third option of course is non-interference, drawing down our presence in Europe and securing our own borders here. But that would be too patriotic. Instead, we must be the guarantor of Estonia’s borders (but not our own).

          • Reality Checker says

            When the horrific foreign interventions and warmongering in the Middle East were perpetrated by the “conservative” Reagan and Bush, I bet you and most of the other armchair diplomats here were all in for that! But now that the consequences have helped set the stage for horror, you pull up and point fingers at those trying to manage the resulting chaos. Sorry, that’s hypocrisy. You’re fooling no one.

            The point is not that Clinton is blameless. Or that she’s a good choice to lead the US in the aftermath of decades of bloody blundering and worse. It’s that passionate support for Trump is a worse one, and treasonous madness. Why not Johnson or McMullin? No blood on their hands either. You do have other options. That you choose him is deeply suspect.

            The UN Security Council sounded the alarms about what was happening in Syria and Libya well before any significant Western interventions in those countries. In Libya, France was the first to act in 2011, not the US. In Syria Putin had armed Assad and then goaded him into the savage repression against peaceful protests that led to the revolt. He then doubled-down into even worse savagery thereafter, catalyzing the growth and metastasis of ISIS. The malignant impact of the Soviet Union on Ukraine was one of the worst horror stories of the early twentieth century.

            So it’s particularly interesting that all four countries named in your Gish gallop of shallow glibness (you left out Iraq and Afghanistan for some odd reason) have been points of contention between the West and Russia. Interesting because the latter player is arguably even more ensnared in guilt over the years here than the West. Yemen is admittedly a bit of an outlier in that respect, but its relations with Russia go back to the czars. The monstrous regimes in Iraq, Syria and Libya were armed and diplomatically supported by Russia, Soviet or “post-“. So the reasons behind your obvious preference for its destructive meddling over the West’s destructive meddling interest me very much. Maybe you could elaborate on those.

            • Trumpf does not have the temperament, foreign policy experience, and intelligence to be President. His comments disparaging the handicapped person…his hurtful comments against the Khan Family…his veiled assassination talk against Mrs. Clinton…his wish to kill the families of terrorists….need I go on? It’s not a political issue, it’s a matter of who is fit to be President now; there’s no training available in the Oval Office.

            • George is spinning as bad as American foreign policy. One day we must intervene and the next day it was a mistake. DDE warned us long ago about the mic and its power.

              Trump and Hillary are both poor choices for us. Trump would not be outdone by Putin and nor would Clinton. So, we must choose between which one of them is most likely to keep the country safe. Trump lost last week with the Gang of 50. They said we don’t trust him because of his rhetoric and his unwillingness to have an advisor.

              And now its the voting machines, instead of the right realizing they have fallen for the pundits mania. After losing the last election, they said what can we do to avoid disenfranchisement from our party? Then Trump made comments about Fiorina that should have been a slap in the face on that subject. Instead, they nominated him and made him the official pundit outdoer. The manifestor of total supremacy over the border and all Mexicans (they will pay us), the Muslims, and women.

              Yeah-the voting machines must be the problem.

              Kasich would have been a fine president.

              The party on the right is going to get clobbered in the fall. Thank the pundits and guys like Ted Cruz and the great line memorizer Marco Rubio.

              There are a few Republicans rightly squirming. And poor Mitt Romney is going to need neck surgery from all the head shaking no.

              • George Michalopulos says

                Sorry, the hatchet letter by the Gang of 50 sealed it for me as far as Trump was concerned. Neocons all. If Henry Kissinger’s name was on it or some of the recent generals and admirals who have been rather conveniently cashiered for trumped up reasons, then I’d have reason to think more negatively about Trump’s foreign policy bona fides.

                At the end of the day, I need more than the sign offs of the men who brought us one foreign policy disaster after another as well as the Panopticon state.

                • How about the untidy truth the last two Republican presidents won’t endorse him.

                  It ain’t happenin…

                  • George Michalopulos says

                    I would view that as a badge of honor. For what it’s worth, Reagan only gave the most tepid endorsement to Bush the Elder when he was running for reelection.

              • Peter A. Papoutsis says

                The Gang of 50 letter made me want to vote for Trump even more. Not for the names listed but the names not listed. Where is Henry Kissinger’s name? Brzezinski? Good try elite but not good enough. HRC will have a rude awakening in November just like the elite did in Britain with the Brexit vote. Yet in that case and in our case in November even if the people win the Global elite will still win, but to do so they will have to take off their masks and reveal that they are Neo-Fascists/Neo-Fuedalists that will want to collectivize the Globe NOT for the good of the people but for themselves.

                The People of God have the Ten Commandments.

                The Globalists have the Georgia Guide-stones.

                Which one do you want to follow? I know which one I am dedicated to. It is time for all of you to make a choice. I hope you chose wisely.

                Peter

                • You can’t seriously buy what you are selling.

                  Three rip offs in bankruptcy-
                  Three marriages-
                  Five deferrments-

                  He makes Obama look like a smoking saint.

                  Sorry

                  • George Michalopulos says

                    Except for the fact that Trump has actually lived a life and done something productive. Outside of his leadership in The Choom Gang, we know next to nothing about Obama’s early life. Community organizing, Chicago bathhouses, a thin record in the State Senate, that’s about it.

                    Self-made men are not decorous men. George Washington’s early life was messy to the extreme. Give me a man who’s done something with his life –even if it’s messy–anytime over a man who has lived off of sinecures.

                    • I don’t disagree in principle. But in my book, Trump has proven his unfitness for the job through his grossly incompetent general election campaign. Either he doesn’t really want to be President, or he is just incompetent and clueless, or he is taking a fall for Clinton. Even losers like McCain, Dole, and the hapless Romney ran more disciplined and effective general election campaigns. Rule number 1 in politics is that you have to be able to read the electorate and do what it takes to win.

                      He is going to get blown out in something between a Dole and a Dukakis level loss against the worst candidate the Democrats have fielded since at least McGovern, and that tells me all I need to know without getting into specifics.

                    • Phil R. Upp says

                      The problem is that Trump is a thieve, a whoremonger, a cheat, etc. He has the moral qualifications of the devil himself. Do we really want a Pres. with the lowest qualities of character as the leader of the U.S.? Hey, why don’t we make him a priest or bishop?

              • Yet another fortune-teller.

                • We could go on…even more than a thief, whoremonger,a cheat, Trumpf has no sense of compassion (his disparaging actions and remarks about the handicapped reporter), has no sense of foreign policy complexity (his admonition that families of terrorists should be called and wonders why we don’t use nukes)….need I go on? The oval office does not provide training; we need someone prepared. Trumpf should go back to building hotels.

                • Edward, you hit the nail on the head: His entire general election campaign shows how ineffective and lacking his management style is…and this is the man who has professed his superior management skills to fix everything. Three campaign managers in less than four months says a lot about his management skills. He says his goal in changing managers is that he wants to return to being the “real” Trump…..stay tuned for more “realness”

        • Michael Bauman says

          Reality, regardless of any policy communications now whomever is annoited ruler will do pretty much what they damn well please and the devil take the hind most.

          Personally I am convinced that the electronic voting machines are already programmed with the result. At least in the major cities.

          The “winner” only needs a plurality in 12 states to be declared victor by the news media. At least with the hanging chad’s there were real ballots.

          • I’m pleased to say that, at least in California, our previous State Secretary of State (no, I’m not being redundant; his jurisdiction was the State of California) Kevin Shelley required that electronic voting machines keep a paper record of voters’ choices. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Shelley for more. Sadly, Sec. Shelley succumbed to the Disease of High Office and was persuaded to jump before being pushed out the window (metaphorically speaking).
            In any case, if your state doesn’t require a paper back-up, start agitating for one yesterday….

    • Thomas Barker says

      How does he get away with speaking the truth so boldly? Amazing.

  19. Reality Checker says

    Taking out a stable regime that wants to make nice with the West? And for what?

    Honestly, I wanted to backtrack immediately on having lumped Libya in with Baathist Iraq and Syria as “monstrous.” That wasn’t accurate. Also, ugly and monstrous are judgmental and probably hypocritical. So I recant there.

    Anyway, although my opinions don’t matter and in any case aren’t relevant to the goal of fact-checking assertions made here, I’ll just say that I’ve been increasingly horrified by American foreign policy in the ME since the Reagan Administration. Certainly not defending that. Your apparent assumptions about my views are entirely unfounded.

    And I certainly understand deep wariness about HRC, at least to the extent that it’s about her track record of compromising entanglements with that foreign policy. Aside from some fact-checking, I’m only here to try to shed light on the fact that some of you, who regard yourselves as Christian faithful, seem so positively gung-ho about Trump for President. The burden of proof to account for this arguably anomalous fervor might be thought to be rightly on you, since you do have other presumably congenial options: the Libertarian Gary Johnson, or the new independent candidate Evan McMullin. My questions: Is this support for Trump largely a vote against HRC or does it reflect genuine, positive enthusiasm for Trump. And if the latter, on what grounds? That’s really all I want to explore. I’d rather avoid contentions about various conspiracy theories and getting lured down other rabbit holes, if possible.

    Once again, I’m not a supporter or defender of post-WWII American foreign policy, except for the overarching strategy of containing the Soviet Union and the spread of the communist ideology. (I’ve often been appalled by various tactical moves in that strategy, though.) Just to clear that up. I hope my ultimate loyalty is to the Kingdom of God.

    Now, I’d like to get back to this Trump business. That’s really all I’m here for.

    • Reality Checker says

      Non sequitur means “it doesn’t follow.” It’s the name for a type of logical fallacy and for lame rhetorical devices. I didn’t follow the logic of your comment in the context of the thread, its connection with what was said before. And you often make assumptions about your correspondent’s views that don’t compute and don’t seem supported at all by what they’ve written. You read into them meanings that aren’t there. Similar puzzlement applied to your comment on my reply to Ages, about Trump’s paternal grandfather’s name. I didn’t follow the logic of your comment in the context.

      • George Michalopulos says

        RC, I see you’re still not going to answer my question regarding the inherited wealth that Papa Joe passed on to his progeny.

        It might be wise on the other hand to consider a wise aphorism his son, JFK uttered: “those who make peaceful revolution impossible make violent revolution inevitable.”

        • Reality Checker says

          George, I don’t want to encourage your often terribly loose associations by indulging them. So I’ll pass on answering that trivial, tangential question until you answer my much less trivial and more pertinent one:

          “. . . the reasons behind your obvious preference for its [Russia’s] destructive meddling over the West’s destructive meddling interest me very much. Maybe you could elaborate on those.”

          I’m sure many readers would be quite interested to hear more about that from you and other habitués of your blog. Myself, I’m mainly curious whether you support reproducing Putinist authoritarianism, nativism, cult of personality, press repression, xenophobia, the trivializing if not fomenting of violence against political and Fourth Estate opponents, u.s.w., here, in a domestic iteration of destructive meddling that targets the rule of law, balance of powers, freedom of the press, wisely regulated free enterprise, toleration of an open, pluralistic civil society and opposition to poshlost, Orwellian public discourse, along with many other good things, too. We know from Trump’s demented rhetoric that he’s fully on board with all of that. But are y’all? That is the question.

    • You can’t possibly suggest Reagan’s failure to respond to the Beirut massacre was good foreign policy?

      Go back further. American foreign policy hasn’t been right much since ww2 and even then it was slow; not really the problem now.

      • George Michalopulos says

        It’s wasn’t. Most of our foreign policy beginning with WWI has been odious. Sending American soldiers into Korea without a declaration of war by the Congress was particularly egregious.

        Reagan to his credit, adopted pretty much the same non-interventionist foreign policy as did Eisenhower. Events sometimes forced his hand but it was clear that he was no war-monger. I’ll go so far as to credit Bush the Elder for trying to continue this same type of non-interventionism. We know that he was a reluctant warrior when it came to Kuwait.

        That’s what I like about Trump. His first instincts are to make a deal. As president, I’m sure the Neocons could craft a scenario which would force a military intervention but I’d rather have a non-militarist in power from the start rather than a war-monger like Hillary. (And let’s be honest, she is completely beholden to the Interventionists.)

        • Reality Checker says

          Reagan to his credit, adopted pretty much the same non-interventionist foreign policy as did Eisenhower.

          On the Howler Scale (1-100), that’s around a 147. Your essays and comments are ever a dependably rich source of howls, so one has to choose one’s battles. Compelled to showcase an especially ripe specimen.

    • You are giving Trump, America’s one night stand, way more pen than he is worthy of….but so is the media.

  20. Reality Checker says

    Post your name or you can add your name to the long list of cowards on this board that should be ignored.

    Mr. Papoutsis, I’ll decline to post my name, not because I’m ashamed of my opinions or fear exposure for my foolishness, but because I think the opinions here expressed are mostly an embarrassment and sometimes a scandal. So there is pride involved, I admit. And anyway, when one gives alms, one should be discreet. Don’t you agree?

    I invite you to consider an hypothesis. Perhaps you’re projecting, and it’s really you who is behaving in a cowardly way? Maybe it’s prudent for you to “ignore” me and not engage my challenge, while publicly pretending to do it on account of my nom de plume? Your hypocrisy reminds me of your preferred candidate, a very accomplished bluffer. That you should be timid about venturing to articulate rational reasons for your enthusiastic support of Donald Trump is perfectly understandable. It is, however, less understandable that you would shamelessly attempt to cloak that in “principle.” But let us agree to speak no more about your bluff.

    • Peter A. Papoutsis says

      No I know a coward when I rear one and you are it. Reveal your name and have the courage of your opinions or leave. Also I don’t bluff I called you a coward and I stand by it. Until you reveal your name I do not talk to cowards nor value their opinions.

      Peter

      • Reality Checker says

        Mr. PAP, I’ll tell you what. Y’all wise up to the point of expressing yuuugely less shameful and goofball opinions. Maybe then I wouldn’t be so mortified to publicly associate with you. Deal?
        Honestly, why should I be expected to have the courage of your doofus opinions? That seems rather arrogant.

        • George Michalopulos says

          RC, what’s your peddling is moral cowardice. I don’t care whether your use your real name or not but your unwillingness to answer just one little question makes me question your bona fides. It’s a simple question: how did Joseph Kennedy Sr make his millions?

        • Peter A. Papoutsis says

          Coward said what?

        • Peter A. Papoutsis says

          Btw no one’s keeping you here. If you are so embarrassed just leave. Problem solved.

          • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says

            But yesterday, Peter, it was “Until you reveal your name I do not talk to cowards nor value their opinions..”

          • There is a good chance RC is a paid shill. There is no other way what he says makes sense.

            • Reality Checker says

              Interesting speculation. Paid by whom? Why?

              Just an amateur, pro bono. This amusing little deflection is sorta suspect, since it’s clear whose “content” most resembles that of paid shills: George, Michael Warren, and Misha. No guesswork required on who they shill for.

              Birds of a feather flock together: kleptocrats, grifters, delusional ideologues, Mammon-worshippers, anti-Semites, goofball alt-right pundit wannabes, neo-fascists and bloody-minded racists, assorted atavist deadenders, conmen, hypocrites and workers of iniquity. Busy building a tower of Babble on sand.

              • Michael Warren says

                All those people are giving money to Hillary and the Clinton Foundation. Since they have bought her and she is sponsored by Goldman Sachs, it must be hard to be an ideologically faithful liberal. Especially when you look in the mirror and all these demons you despise are staring back at you.

                Adolph Hitler’s ideological descendents and Islamist radical (Al Qaeda successor) “moderates” are people Clinton’s globalist foreign policy promotes. So I find it impossible to take such reprobate, liberal hypocrisy seriously. If you all received enough money from the Saudi monarchy, you would in a few weeks be touting the “moderating factor” of Wahabism and promoting “a caliphate solution for Middle East peace” while stating there never were Christians in the Sudan to ethnically cleanse so anti-Christian genocide is “an altright conspiracy theory.” Shameless and utterly unscrupulous.

              • Michael Warren says
              • Michael Warren says
              • Michael Warren says

                For the record, I am an Orthodox Christian Social Democrat, true left, populist who rejects the incompetence, corruption and degeneracy of liberalism. To me your political illiteracy stating I am a shill for Trump or the Right-wing is just asinine desperation. Ignorant statements like that are precisely why your failed liberalism is both obsolete and rejected by working people across the globe.

                • Reality Checker says

                  No, I meant that, essentially, the three of you are Putinistas. (I took you for an obvious Sanders sort, with respect to who you’d best line up with in this US election cycle.)

                  Contemporary politics comprise various syndromes to me, distinguishable by characteristic clusters of symptoms. I aspire to centrism myself, straying neither left nor right. Far from a “liberal” these days.

                  • George Michalopulos says

                    Guilty as charged! How I wish we in the West had leaders as resolute and as proud of their nations as Putin is of Russia.

                  • Michael Warren says

                    You are a textbook liberal.

                    My orientation is Orthodox Christian – Blue Labour – Rogozin Rodina. I would probably vote straight ticket KPR Zyuganov in the Russian election this year.

                    Bernie Sanders is the voice of the Occupy movement – I would call him a Western European Social Democrat 60 years late or a soft Trotskyite at his best: that is a criticism, not an endorsement. While he is preferable to Hillary (and so is Jill Stein), neither are quite my cup of tea because they divide working people by insisting on prolonging liberal social engineering. Donald Trump represents a political transition to reshape the American political establishment: his election would prevent social crisis in the US and the West, but essentially postpone necessary socio-economic transitions and leave the West on stand by, in an inartful, clumsy way. Trump’s ubiquitous scowls and stream of consciousness banter limit his effect. Trump and Stein are the two candidates Americans should vote for to avoid social upheavals, representing the populist emphases of American politics: they both represent correctives to the failues of Western liberalism. None of these people are ideal or have my support.

                    • Perhaps you’d like to learn more about Gary Johnson & Wm. Weld, also running for President? Experienced governors (each a two-term Repub. governor) with some solid goals. See https://www.johnsonweld.com/
                      I cannot vote for–and sleep well, and pray peacefully–for any of the other candidates offered to us this go-round. *sigh*

                    • Michael Warren says

                      I am a social democrat who has no use for candidates whose platform boils down to legalize pot, gay rights for all, trample the Second Amendment while giving Bushies and Romney Republicans a protest vote.

                    • Archpriest Alexander F. C. Webster says

                      Vesta, the two “Libertarians” promise no liberty to preborn human beings. Both of those former Republican governors of so-called blue states would, at the federal level, fully support and enforce abortion on demand. On that most fundamental of all moral and public policy issues the reprehensible views of Johnson and Weld are identical to those of Clinton and the Democrats. That makes the third party ticket of Johnson and Weld, to turn one of Barry Goldwater’s 1964 campaign slogans on its head, “An Echo, Not a Choice.”

                • Cynthia mae Curran says

                  Good point Michael Warren, not every Democratic or person on the left has to support Clinton and not everyone on the right has to support Trump. I try not to stereotype folks but I have done it too.

              • I am a monarchist. One God in Heaven, one Orthodox Christian emperor on earth, if that were possible. Since it has not been, we do the best we can. However, Orthodox history in the time of Fallen Man has been a history of Orthodox empires, plural. Would that all could get along as well as Russia and Serbia, for instance (i.e., when they have both been ruled by Orthodox leaders). But in the fallen world, perfection eludes us. Christ, or whatever vicar He chooses, will rule the New Jerusalem in the New World.

                As to Putin, I give him very high marks for revitalizing Russia and working in concert with the ROC. Very high. 5.

                With respect to other political entities, I am essentially an anarchist. God rules. I suppose it would be more accurate to say that with respect to men I am an anarchist, with respect to God a theocrat. But I have to admire Putin. In essence, he has become a sort of tsar or emperor of the Russias (with respect to the necessities of this era) and that suits me just fine.

                All that being said, I do not contemplate that it would ever be necessary for me to take actions against the United States of America. I leave that to God, if He so wills.

              • Michael Warren says
        • Michael Warren says
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  30. Cynthia mae Curran says

    Well, I ‘m not a big Trump fan but would people here say it was bad in the early 300’s to have support Constantine that did some terrible things.