At least he's not Hillary...

[AUChizad]

I saw pretty quickly he was going to win.  I'm for anybody over her. So I had to reconcile myself to it.  And have.

[AUJarhead]

Couldn't you paint it blue, and then change the name to Clinton, though?

[Kaos]

Cute balls.  Bet you never heard that before. 

However.... That's not how this works.  That's not how any of this works.

[Ogre]

However.... That's not how this works.  That's not how any of this works.

You're right.  So let's look at how this does work.

I think this election will come down to 8 states, 4 of which will carry the most weight.

FL - 29 electoral votes
PA - 20 electoral votes
OH - 18 electoral votes
VA - 13 electoral votes
CO - 9 electoral votes
NV - 6 electoral votes
IA - 6 electoral votes
NH - 4 electoral votes

I think it's safe to say that Clinton goes in to this election with a solid 227 electoral votes, while Trump goes in with 206.  Who has the easiest route to 270?  I know you don't believe in polling data, but I think if you take the RCP averages it does give you a good sense for how the electorate is trending.

FL - Clinton + 4% (as of 6/29)
PA - Clinton + 4% (as of 6/28)
OH - Clinton + 4% (as of 6/28)
VA - Clinton + 3% (as of 6/16)
CO - Clinton + 1% (as of 6/26)
NV - no recent polling data
IA - Clinton + 14% (as of 6/30)
NH - Clinton + 5% (as of 6/29)

Granted, most of these are close to the margin of error, but it's not a good trend to see Trump not winning one of those states.  Yes it's a long time until November and I realize the email scandal may sway these numbers (as they were mostly from the end of June).  But in looking at the data, when is Trump going to start going after Hillary like he promised?  When is he going to start actually campaigning and quit spewing off mindless blather about how great Saddam was at killing terrorists (which coincidentally took a lot of the media attention off of Hillary's email scandal). 

Inquiring minds want to know.

[Kaos]

You're right.  So let's look at how this does work.

I think this election will come down to 8 states, 4 of which will carry the most weight.

FL - 29 electoral votes
PA - 20 electoral votes
OH - 18 electoral votes
VA - 13 electoral votes
CO - 9 electoral votes
NV - 6 electoral votes
IA - 6 electoral votes
NH - 4 electoral votes

I think it's safe to say that Clinton goes in to this election with a solid 227 electoral votes, while Trump goes in with 206.  Who has the easiest route to 270?  I know you don't believe in polling data, but I think if you take the RCP averages it does give you a good sense for how the electorate is trending.

FL - Clinton + 4% (as of 6/29)
PA - Clinton + 4% (as of 6/28)
OH - Clinton + 4% (as of 6/28)
VA - Clinton + 3% (as of 6/16)
CO - Clinton + 1% (as of 6/26)
NV - no recent polling data
IA - Clinton + 14% (as of 6/30)
NH - Clinton + 5% (as of 6/29)

Granted, most of these are close to the margin of error, but it's not a good trend to see Trump not winning one of those states.  Yes it's a long time until November and I realize the email scandal may sway these numbers (as they were mostly from the end of June).  But in looking at the data, when is Trump going to start going after Hillary like he promised?  When is he going to start actually campaigning and quit spewing off mindless blather about how great Saddam was at killing terrorists (which coincidentally took a lot of the media attention off of Hillary's email scandal). 

Inquiring minds want to know.

Not disagreeing.  It's an uphill climb.  But it always was.  Nothing new there. 

Trump -- despite all his blunders -- remains within striking distance (and in most cases within the margin of error). 

He has to win Florida.  He's always been the only republican (or fake republican) candidate who had a shot there.  I think he could realistically win PA, VA and OH.  Colorado? Maybe.  Tell you who won't win Colorado. Gary Johnson.  But... Chizad's protestations aside, Johnson could take enough votes to deny Trump there. 

Trump has a chance.  He's, in my mind, the only one who ever did in that side of the board. 

[AUChizad]

You can say all day there's no overt Nazi symbolism in the meme. You can say there isn't significant Nazi support for Trump. THE NAZIS DISAGREE WITH YOU.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/david-duke-no-way-star-in-trumps-tweet-was-a-sheriffs-star

David Duke: “No Way” Star In Trump’s Tweet Was A Sheriff’s Star
“Of course later the campaign made the excuse, ‘Well, no, that’s like a sheriff’s badge.’ Well, no way, folks. Clinton, money, the most campaign corrupt person.”

posted on Jul. 5, 2016, at 4:07 p.m.
 Andrew Kaczynski
Burt Steel / AP

Prominent white nationalist and former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke on Tuesday dismissed Donald Trump’s explanation of his controversial tweet featuring Hillary Clinton next to a pile of money, a Star of David, and the words the “most corrupt candidate ever.”

A Trump staffer took the blame for the tweet on Monday evening, saying he found the image via an anti-Clinton Twitter account and believed it was a sheriff’s star, not a Star of David. Duke, however, said on his radio show it was clearly not a sheriff’s star.

“Let’s go to the tweet. The tweet again shows Clinton, it shows a Star of David. Of course later the campaign made the excuse, ‘Well, no, that’s like a sheriff’s badge.’ Well, no way, folks. Clinton, money, the most campaign corrupt person,” said Duke.

Earlier in the broadcast, Duke praised Trump for the tweet, saying his tweet was “all true.”

“We have situation right now where Trump is being absolutely pummeled for, guess what, posting a tweeting that shows Hillary Clinton with a big — in the midst of thousands of hundred-dollar bills — a big Star of David, and the words ‘the most corrupt candidate ever,’” Duke said. “And Trump tweeted this: ‘Hillary Clinton the most corrupt candidate ever.’ Now of course, the media immediately came out and said that this was ‘anti-Semitic.’ But of course, it’s all true. We’re not talking about something that’s not true.”

Duke said all the “Jewish extremists” were supporting Clinton.

“So everything in the tweet that Donald Trump retweeted, that his campaign retweeted was absolutely correct,” concluded Duke. “Absolutely right.”

He said it was important everyone vote for Trump, because even though he wasn’t “strong enough on these issues,” he was the only thing they had against Hillary Clinton.

[Snaggletiger]

David Duke, huh?  I think we found someone who rambles on incoherently more than Trump.

[Kaos]

https://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/david-duke-no-way-star-in-trumps-tweet-was-a-sheriffs-star

Who. Gives. A. Fuck? 

Fake controversy to distract from the systemic corruption that keeps the bitch whore out of prison.

[AUChizad]

Truth is, our intervention in Iraq was based off lies. And hurt the region more than it helped it. Fact. No debating that. That also doesn't mean saddam was a good guy. But it does mean between him and Iran and the other western countries over there, that there was a balance that kept itself in check for the most part. Sunnis, Shiites, Kurds. It's a delicate balance. And it was as balanced as could be circa 2001.

Yes Al Qaeda was on the loose over there in the region but that had nothing to do with the tribal balance of the sovereign countries of the Middle East. Now they are loose over there along with Hezbollah, the Muslim brotherhood, Isis not to mention all of the heads of state and govts over there crumbling now. We destabilized that entire region. And whether you paint saddam as a good or bad guy, that's the simple truth.

This is a coherent statement that any actual politician would or could have made.

That is not what Trump said.

He said that Saddam "killed terrorists. He did that so good. They didn't read them the rights. They didn't talk. They were terrorists. Over." End quote.

That is Trump in nutshell. Completely idiotic. Articulated like a retarded third grader. And completely and utterly factually inaccurate.

You tried to put words in his mouth to make him sound completely moronic.

[AUChizad]

Also, thanks to his recent doubling down on praise for Saddam, I caught this praise for him from October and December that I somehow missed.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/donald-trump-praises-saddam-hussein-s-approach-terrorism-again-n604411

This isn't the first time Trump has cast the brutal dictator in a positive light — or called Iraq an Ivy League locale for aspiring terrorists. Throughout the primaries Trump glossed over Hussein's violent history in favor of what he viewed as a more stable Middle East ruled by Saddam's viciousness.

In an October exclusive with NBC's Chuck Todd, Trump asserted that the Middle East would be better off today if Moammar Gadhafi of Libya and Saddam Hussein were still in power. "It's not even a contest," Trump told Meet the Press. Trump continued to push this idea at a rally in Franklin, Tennessee, telling the crowd that despite Hussein's "vicious" rule in Iraq "there were no terrorists in Iraq" while he ruled.

"You know what he used to do to terrorists?" Trump polled the Tennessee crowd. "A one day trial and shoot him…and the one day trial usually lasted five minutes, right? There was no terrorism then."

Trump didn't just praise Hussein for keeping terrorists at bay, but seemed to tacitly accept the dictator's use of chemical weapons. During a December rally in Hilton Head, South Carolina, Trump took a cavalier attitude toward Iraq's use of chemical weapons under Saddam.

"Saddam Hussein throws a little gas, everyone goes crazy, 'oh he's using gas!'" Trump said. Describing the way stability was maintained in the region during that time, Trump said "they go back, forth, it's the same. And they were stabilized."

Trump lamented how the United States intervened in the region during a speech in South Carolina late last year. "if you go after one or the other, in this case Iraq, you're going to destabilize the Middle East. That's what's going to happen," he said.

Praising Saddam for "one day trials" that "usually lasted five minutes" before he would "shoot him". And the attempted genocide of Kurds was "throwing a little gas, and everyone goes crazy".

 

[Snaggletiger]

I threw a little gas at my wife the other night and she went crazy.

[GH2001]

This is a coherent statement that any actual politician would or could have made.

That is not what Trump said.

He said that Saddam "killed terrorists. He did that so good. They didn't read them the rights. They didn't talk. They were terrorists. Over." End quote.

That is Trump in nutshell. Completely idiotic. Articulated like a retarded third grader. And completely and utterly factually inaccurate.

You tried to put words in his mouth to make him sound completely moronic.

I'm not disagreeing with you. Just saying that it's more complicated than what trump said. Technically on a couple of those things he is right. Was saddam a good guy? Hell no. But did he kill a lot of bad guys so that we didn't have to? Absolutely. Even though he was one himself. He was considered the lesser of 3 evils. Now the greater of those evils has reared its head without him there. And other vacuums created by our own intervention by both Bush and Obama.

Trumps biggest crime here is having no idea how to articulate what I just stated. I would like think that is what he meant. But can't say for sure.

[GH2001]

Also, thanks to his recent doubling down on praise for Saddam, I caught this praise for him from October and December that I somehow missed.

http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2016-election/donald-trump-praises-saddam-hussein-s-approach-terrorism-again-n604411
Praising Saddam for "one day trials" that "usually lasted five minutes" before he would "shoot him". And the attempted genocide of Kurds was "throwing a little gas, and everyone goes crazy".

 

Believe it or not, we created the Kurd mess and directly caused it to happen in the early 90s.

[AUChizad]

Believe it or not, we created the Kurd mess and directly caused it to happen in the early 90s.

What does that have to do what he said?

[GH2001]

What does that have to do what he said?

Because he mentioned the gassing and so did you. It rolls up to a bigger point I think he's trying to make about our intervention in the region. The Crux of what I THINK he is saying is just that. It may not be popular to say in GOP circles but going into that region like we did only fucked it up worse. Saddam being the enemy of our enemy and screwing up that dynamic and the gassing of the Kurds (which we actually caused not saddam) are just two examples of that. I know what he is trying to say. He's just really terrible at conveying his point.  Allz I'm sayin smalls.

[Snaggletiger]

You're killin' me Smallz.

[AUChizad]

Because he mentioned the gassing and so did you. It rolls up to a bigger point I think he's trying to make about our intervention in the region. The Crux of what I THINK he is saying is just that. It may not be popular to say in GOP circles but going into that region like we did only fucked it up worse. Saddam being the enemy of our enemy and screwing up that dynamic and the gassing of the Kurds (which we actually caused not saddam) are just two examples of that. I know what he is trying to say. He's just really terrible at conveying his point.  Allz I'm sayin smalls.

That's not what he said. That's what you say he's "trying to say".

[Snaggletiger]

That's not what he said. That's what you say he's "trying to say".

Come on.  Seriously.  GH is spot on.  This is a prime example of Trump's inability...or his handler's inability to get him to convey his message in a way that people won't use it against him.  He's 100% right in what he's trying to say but this is just another in the 100's of poorly worded attempts to address this or any issue. Another reason why he's not fit to be POTUS.

[GH2001]

That's not what he said. That's what you say he's "trying to say".

It's what I think he's trying to convey, yes. He just sucks at doing that.

[WiregrassTiger]

I threw a little gas at my wife the other night and she went crazy.

I know, right! She hates that. I mean....really?