Get real, nobody votes for virtue.
People vote for virtuous reasons all the time. Farmers who have been decimated by Trump’s tariff policy vote for him anyway, billionaires who stand to lose many millions over democrats tax policies vote for democrats anyway. It happens all the time. Just because you can’t possibly understand how anyone could vote for anything other then selfish interests does not mean that’s all there is. That’s called projection.
you have said the crowd was willing to assault anyone who showed up because they were angry in general and not logical. Is that not demonizing them?
Well, first of all, assessing someone as being emotionally rather than logically driven is not demonizing.
Second, I never referred to “the crowd” as if what I’m saying applies to everyone. This is about a basic understanding of human nature and how it shows up with regards to statistics. A large group full of angry people are extremely likely to include at least a few individuals who would do things that anyone in a level headed rational state of mind would not. This is common sense.
Applying to this situation would mean, brandishing an AK style rifle in this context will almost certainly lead to confrontation, which will almost certainly result in him having to use that gun, which will almost certainly lead to someone being killed.
It’s hardly any different from doing 120 on the freeway. Your intent wasn’t to hurt anyone, but you clearly did not think about nor give much weight to the consequences if things don’t go the way you hoped. And for that you are responsible.
Just cause they're ready to attack people doesn't mean they are more likely to attack someone who could defend themselves.
Again, you fail to understand the situation on a very basic level. By brandishing his rifle, Kyle didn’t just make himself another person in the crowd, he made himself a target. Why? Because he stood out. And in so doing he sent a very clear signal to the protesters/rioters that he was there to stop them. And his means of doing so was to use deadly force, the very same thing those people were out there protesting in the first place. Again, that’s not going to deter, that’s going to inflame, which is exactly what happened.
If they just want to cause chaos or steal things, the path of least resistance is to avoid attacking someone armed with a deadly weapon
But they didn’t “just want to cause chaos or steal things”. Again, they were there because they’re sick and tired of a system that they believed does not value human life if that life is wrapped in dark skin. Their actions were not goal oriented, they were there out of deep seated anger, frustration, and resentment. Those emotions do not mix when you show up brandishing a rifle in front of their faces. The failure to account for that is just reckless.
Now we know that going there with a gun meant Kyle would be attacked, but at the time it was understandable for him not to know that.
It really wasn’t. Anyone paying the slightest bit attention to what was going on and why people were rioting in the first place would have understood, at least on a basic level, that this was not a risk averse situation. The failure to foresee what would eventually occur is a direct result of a news feed that is totally uninterested in understanding “the other side” because you get much more clicks by just demonizing them instead.
I stand by my statement, TDS
But your statement is meaningless, because you have no facts or logic to support it, because it’s not a rational position, it’s just a thing you and all the Trump supporters collectively say to make yourselves feel better.
Trump is a narcissistic, petulant, vile, ignorant, child, and all of those traits in the extreme. That is not normal and certainly not virtuous. Pretending it is, especially when you would never do so in any other instance with anyone else, is the true derangement taking place.
They might think twice before committing a crime though. Guards/superior force can and do deter attacks in many cases.
Statistically, most people will. But when you’re talking about large crowds of people who are already showing a disregard for life and property because they are fed up with a system that they believe do not care about their lives… it’s frankly stupid to think they will all react that way. That’s not how human emotion works.
You say you blame him for putting himself in that situation, but also that his showing up to defend property was admirable. I'm not sure how those can both be true.
Because intent and actions are two different things.
I find his intent admirable, although based on a deeply flawed understanding of both the situation he was walking into and how human nature works.
How he decided to go about it is the problem, which is the natural result of a deeply flawed understanding.
If you walk into a riot armed with an AK, there’s a very real chance someone will push you into using it. That is or at least should have been common sense. Failure to account for that does not make him morally evil, but also does not absolve him of being culpable for the result. Even at 17, he should have known better.
Why? Why not just make the move that benefits them the most instead?
That’s exactly what they’re doing, which is the point. Their historical dependency on is grounded in the trust we have built up for decades that we will be a reliable, reasonable, and dependable ally. Thanks to Donald Trump, that trust has been broken, so our allies now look to China and see a stable and predictable partner for which they can do business, which is more than we can offer given the fact of who we elected and what we continue to tolerate from him.
This is the cost of acting like your shit don’t stink and like no one else can live without you. Turns out they can, and now they will, at our expense.
The alternative was supporting the time using lawfare against political opponents which is something that should never ever be done.
This is a case study in how propaganda works, and how you get people to follow you into their own graves.
There was no lawfare in the last administration. Trump committed serious and obvious crimes. The evidence is not rationally disputable, and the public interest in prosecuting them is clear. But propaganda doesn’t care about any of that. Just focus on the fact that he was a former president, and if a former president gets prosecuted then it’s lawfare. Logic be dammed. Facts be dammed.
Then, once you clear that hurdle of convincing people of the absurd, you no longer need to appeal to people by offering them a worthwhile vision. Just paint yourself as being better than the monster you concocted, and you’re home free to do all of the things you just finished convincing them was bad cause the other guy did it.
the comparison you're trying to draw between him and Rittenhouse just doesn't work. Even the Wikipedia article for Kenosha reads like an almost comically open and shut case of self defense.
See last paragraph of post 16 (should be right before this one).
I think it would be reasonable that carrying a large gun should make people less likely to attack you.
Not in that context, which is the point. Once civil unrest has gotten out of hand and people are looking for a reason to start trouble, showing up with an AK style rifle around your neck is not going to intimidate, it’s going to inflame. That should have been common sense. Sure, no one would think that people would actually go up to him and start a fight, but there’s no argument that in that situation it would be reasonable to think people in that state of mind would see the gun and think “oh this is too dangerous, let’s go home”.
I also don't think you can blame someone for a fight they didn't instigate just because they went somewhere a fight might happen and someone else attacked them.
I don’t blame him for the split decision he made in the moment he was being attacked. At that point his natural human response to either shot or expect to be shot was probably right. What I blame him for was putting himself in that situation in the first place.
Like you said, his intention was to deter destruction of property, that’s fine and even admirable. But you don’t get to voluntarily walk into that situation brandishing a fully loaded rifle and then act like you’re totally innocent when someone loses their life at the hands of it. He created that situation and the result was entirely foreseeable. That’s the issue.
There’s a reason police officers train for months before we hand them a gun and send them out into the streets. An 18 year old kid has no business being out there.
The comparison is relevant in that, insofar as there are differences between Pretti and Rittenhouse, I don't think those differences are big enough to make either of them the aggressor.
My point isn’t about painting Rittenhouse as the aggressor, it’s about the fact that to the extent you can paint either of them as the aggressor, Rittenhouse was clearly the more fitting example. So for those who are trying to argue that Pretti was the aggressor, if they don’t take that same position towards Rittenhouse they’re just fundamentally unserious.
Yet again, thank you for agreeing with me.
—>The reporters question wasn’t loaded
Great, glad that’s settled.
Mostly agree with everything you’ve had to say. I will just point out a few things about the Rittenhouse example. Unlike Pretti, he carried an AK style rifle around his chest while Pretti’s was either mostly or entirely concealed. Also the state line thing is relevant, not because crossing some imaginary line matters but to emphasize the fact that he traveled a long distance to engage in these protests. The point to all this being that in his example, his behavior signaled a much greater interest in being directly involved in the confrontation even when it wasn’t his neighborhood. In other words, he went to the fight, it didn’t come to him.
I think these distinctions matter because it makes the hypocrisy and absurdity all the more clear. If you believe bringing a gun to a protest warrants your death, then Rittenhouse would be a villain, but he isn’t, because they don’t really believe that. This is what being in a cult looks like, follow the leader until you’re all falling off the cliff. Reality be dammed. Logic and reason be dammed. Fundamental values be dammed. All that matters is the jersey.
You just answered a loaded question
Yeah, this is the part where the discussion descends into total stupidity.
You can’t address that your argument has been dismantled. The reporters question wasn’t loaded in any reasonable sense, so you turn to little games and gotchas.
I accept your concession.
Again, thank you for agreeing with me. Why even ask the loaded question if the reporter was ultimately getting paid to ragebait for clicks?
Because… yet again… it wasn’t a loaded question.
I’ve already explained to you what a loaded question is. Why is this so hard for you?
You indicated that a non-answer is an implication of guilt, which is the textbook definition of a loaded question.
Wrong. A loaded question is one in which the premises built into it are either false are at the very least disputed. That’s not what happened here.
The implication of guilt is not a product of the reporters assumptions, it’s the result of the objective facts surrounding the very thing she was questioning him about.
Trump does have full and complete authority to release the Epstein files on his own without any laws being passed by Congress. Fact.
Donald Trump has had numerous and well documented ties over the years to Jeffery Epstein. Fact.
The question the reporter asked to which you are calling a loaded question was a follow up. The original question was “is there anything incriminating in the Epstein files”. Trump answered “no”. That’s what prompted the follow up.
So Trump already stated there was nothing incriminating, therefore that’s not an assumption. Trump can release the files himself but wouldn’t, that’s not an assumption. Trump did have known ties to Epstein, that’s not an assumption. Thus, there’s already a reasonable inference that Trump is covering something up. So when the reporter asks why not release them and he can’t offer anything but deflection… that’s why the lack of an answer implies guilt. Not because of a loaded question, but because of logic 101.
I didn’t agree with you genius. I pointed out that it wasn’t the question that presumed that, it was the combination of Trump being asked the question and his refusal or unwillingness to answer for it that would lead any rationally thinking person to that conclusion, thereby undercutting your entire argument.
So is Norway more likely to budge if they think it's somebody who actually cares about the novel prize that much or are they more likely to budge against a reasonable negotiater?
What they’re more likely to do is to stop trusting the US and start taking measures to reign in on their dependency on us, which China or Russia will likely benefit from.
When it comes to this madman theory argument, you can’t have it both ways. Either Trump is a measured calculating negotiator, in which case no one would be afraid of what he might do, or he is a legitimate madman in which case there is no way you can rationally justify supporting him.
I love TDS. Its fun to watch.
I don’t think it’s is that fun. TDS is watching the president of the United States spell out in writing to another foreign leader that he feels entitled to take their sovereign land because he didn’t get the peace prize he wanted and then think “yeah, that’s the guy who should be holding our nuclear codes”.
The level to which one’s mind has to be warped in total derangement to believe that is beyond words.
it assumes Donald Trump is basically a king
No, it doesn’t. releasing the files was well within Trump’s presidential authority, there was nothing about the law Congress passed that gave him any additional powers. All the law did was require the DOJ to release them and set a timeline.
Second, it assumes that following the legal process is an admission of guilt.
No, it didn’t. The question was very simple. “why not release them” doesn’t assume any of the nonsense you are alleging, but Trump’s refusal to both release the files and also provide a sensible and consistent reason for not doing so despite heavy public backlash together absolutely implies guilt.
Third, it assumes no victims or third parties could be harmed by dumping everything.
Again, just nonsense. The question didn’t imply any of that. The fact that releasing them could potentially harm innocent people is a point that Trump could have simply made in answering the question, but instead he did what he always does; attack the reporter.
This isn’t rocket science. If someone asks you “why not just do X” the way to respond is “here’s why…”. That is as basic a question as it can get.
So the example of a "tough question" you pointed out was "quiet piggy?"
No, I just finished explaining to you how that was not a tough question at all. I wrote a whole paragraph correcting my original assertion that these were tough questions, feel free to read it.
Why would a reporter ask that question, tough or not?
Because it was a very simple and very relevant question that the entire country is talking about, that’s why, because it’s literally the whole point of having a press pool.
The question she was asking was why if there’s nothing incriminating in the Epstein files would he not just release them. This is as basic a question as a president can get. If he can’t handle that question he has no business being president.
So victim blaming. At least that's a logical reason for your behavior.
Nothing I said or implied there in any way amounts to victim blaming. Try again.
Why do you find joy in causing suffering?
What a stupid question.
I don’t find joy in causing suffering, but that’s actually kind of funny cause you’re implying that people are suffering as a result of my awesome logic, so that would seem to be a compliment.
What you are seeing is me not giving a shit about being cordial and respectful with people who don’t deserve it. Fauxlaw literally argued that when masses of people do not understand what he’s really saying because they failed to properly “decode” him, that’s their fault and not the fault of the president of the United States for being clear. That’s beyond stupid, and fundamentally unserious. I don’t come here for flame wars, I want to have productive conversation, but Trump supporters seem largely incapable of that and honestly, that’s the problem with defending the absurd, there’s kind of no where else to go.
I would like to see some examples of these so-called "tough questions."
You know what… you got me. I don’t have any examples of Trump doing that after being asked tough questions, because the questions he gets asked are simple and relevant questions.
But if you want examples, start with quiet piggy.
If you really need more examples, you again, are not being serious. This is what Trump does. Every. Single. Time. He is asked a question he does not like he turns his attention to the reporter. He always starts by asking them who they’re with, which is always totally irrelevant. He then uses whoever they’re with to talk about them and not the question. It’s stupid and pathetic but again, that’s what he does every time. If you don’t know that perhaps you should start paying attention and stop pretending that people who do have TDS.
If so, that’s not journalism. That’s performative chaos masquerading as information-seeking.
It is the natural result of having a moron man baby in the White House. He does and says the stupidest things on a daily basis, of course the questions he gets asked are insane and impossible to answer. That’s not the reporters fault, it starts and ends with him.
@fauxlaw
Blocked? lol!!! Wow you are so pathetic
What’s telling about you is what you choose to respond to vs what you ignore. I said a few things in that last post that rationally and substantively refute positions you’ve expressed in this thread, but the only parts you thought worthy of typing words in response to were the insults.
You come onto this thread with literally nothing other than sarcasm and condescension, which is why you got the kind of response that you did, but you can’t take any insults. It’s pathetic.
And why wouldn't I respond that your claim above isn't just woke cultist mindless defense? Well, maybe because neither argument really expresses a direct rebuttal, but rather, is merely personal attack, and that is a losing argument. I have said this before and I tire of the repetition.
The difference between you and I is that my insults are attached to actual substance. Yours, like your post 15, lacks a single thought worthy of utilizing any brain power to contemplate.
quote from the cited reference:
Yeah, nice try. Your claim wasn’t that Iran’s development facilities were destroyed, it was that the Iranian government believed Trump was exaggerating, implying that Trump’s chaotic style of foreign relations is some kind of strength. Total nonsense and of course you would have nothing to back it up.
Those are also true statements. Yes
Then you’re just an idiot and fundamentally unserious. Everything is everyone else’s fault but Trump’s. Ok bud, nothing MAGA cultish about that.
understanding what any other person says is our responsibility to interpret correctly, if we bother to understand at all. Would understanding belong to no one?
Understanding is a responsibility of everyone involved, but it always begins with the speaker, and when assessing how clearly the speaker communicates includes looking at their track record. With Trump even his own supporters can’t agree on what he’s saying, and they certainly cannot point to any consistent standard to figure it out. With him everything is rhetoric, until it is not. Joking, until it is not. Serious talk, until it’s not. The only standard with him is to judge his words in retrospect after he does or doesn’t do what he says, that’s how we find out for sure, and it’s the opposite of a clear communicator.
What part in particular makes you consider Trump a bad leader or a child?
The fact that he has nicknames for all of his political opponents, the fact that he speaks with the vocabulary of a third grader, the fact that he attacks reporters by calling them stupid every time he gets asked a tough question, the fact that he will say someone is a wonderful person then immediately do a 180 the moment they say something about him he didn’t like, the fact that he can’t ever admit to losing anything, the fact that he cannot tell the difference between someone disagreeing with him and someone rejecting him as a person, the fact that he sits up all night on social media throwing temper tantrums…
Is that enough?
I can't tell if Trump has a plan of not.
If you can’t tell, then he has clearly given no reason to believe he has one and every reason to believe he doesn’t. So why do you frame it like it’s a toss up? That defies logic and common sense.
I doubt Trump truly wants Greenland because he didn't receive a noble peace prize, It is just sarcasm, meanness, deflection, perhaps attempt at confusing, bamboozling.
Again, this is all just made up. Trump has been obsessing over the Nobel Peace prize for years, expressed clear frustration at Greenland after he didn’t win it, and has now said in writing that this is a contributing factor to why he’s taken the position he has towards acquiring it. To claim he’s just being sarcastic or that this is some grand strategy isn’t rational thinking, you’re just inventing reasons out of thin air to avoid taking any reasonable position.
Not familiar with sarcasm?
Very familiar with sarcasm, and absolutely nothing about Trump’s words, delivery, or context suggests that’s what this was. That’s just MAGA cultist mindless defense.
Problem is, Iran thought Trump was being sarcastic.
Any evidence for that claim? No, of course not. And even if you did, how exactly does sarcasm help resolve tense international conflicts? I suspect no answer to that either.
Got to know how to read the man.
Yeah, my personal favorite. It’s not the responsibility of the President of the United States to speak clearly, it’s everyone else’s responsibility to figure out how to decode him.
And when other nations misread him, whatever conflict ensues is their fault.
When businesses misread him, whatever havoc is wreaked upon the stock market is their fault.
When US agencies misread him, whatever misconduct they engage in is their fault.
When pissed off supporters misread him, whatever damage they cause to the US Capitol and whoever dies as a result is their fault.
You say you’re not a MAGA cultist but you engage in all the classic nonsensical BS to defend him that they do. There is no excuse for allowing a narcissistic petulant child who has now put in writing for entire world that US foreign policy under him will be dictated by whether other countries sufficiently kiss his ass by giving him little prizes, to remain in office. And you’re absolutely pathetic for even pretending to not see that.
I think Double R owes children an apology for the thread title.
Looks like I do.
So sorry to the children of this country, didn’t mean to put you all on the level of the president of the United States, you don’t deserve that disrespect.
America, what a wonderful nation.
In a story that will surprise no one who has been paying attention, Trump actually told Norwegian leadership that him not getting the Nobel peace prize is a big contributing factor to his decision to threaten military action to take Greenland.
“According to both Bloomberg and Reuters, in his letter to the Norwegian leader, Trump wrote: “Considering your Country decided not to give me the Nobel Peace Prize for having stopped 8 wars PLUS, I no longer feel an obligation to think purely of Peace.”
Trump suggested peace “will always be predominant,” but added he “can now think about what is good and proper for the United States of America,” according to the letter.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2026/01/19/trump-links-greenland-threats-to-nobel-peace-prize-snub-in-letter-to-norways-leader/
I know it’s futile to expect anything better of Trump supporters, but seriously, are you guys still going to pretend this moron is who we need leading our country?
You might say that "the fish rots from the head" but this was not behavior they learned from Trump.
I’m really not sure what your point is. Sometimes people, even journalists, get things wrong. And sometimes other people rely on information someone else who provided it got wrong. Getting something wrong =/= dishonesty. You would need to demonstrate intent, and you don’t seem to even be trying there.
There is no parallel between the level is untruths you can cherry pick out of the millions of articles written everyday in this country vs having a President who can’t even tell the truth about who won a presidential election. If you’re going to talk about living in a post truth society, start with the latter.
It would just be someone who claims to have a lot of expertise in a field but doesn't.
Yes but the phrase was presented in the context of prominent figures on the left whom the left turns to for information, implying that we prop them up not because of their credentials but because they are telling us what we want to hear.
I would love to hear your examples of fake experts from your opposing religion.
That’s the difference between today’s political right and the left (aka broader society). On “the left” an expert is someone with actual credentials earned through years of experience and proven results. There is, by definition, no such thing as a “fake expert”.
But on the MAGA right, a person’s expertise is evaluated against whatever the dear leader and the right wing podcast sphere says. Agree, and you’re an expert. Disagree and you have Trump derangement syndrome.
So yeah, that’s how my religion works. it’s called critical thinking, and I am a devout follower.
We are truly living in a post-truth world.
Agreed. But kind of odd that you find this point to be best illustrated by citing a poorly researched article while ignoring that we have a president right now holding rallies where he claims we have the greatest economy in history and that his tariffs are in fact being paid for by other countries while right wing media stays almost entirely silent.
