Draining The Swamp
POSTED BY: SHINYGOODGUY
UPDATED: Friday, June 13, 2025 02:56
VIEWED: 32850
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Quote:You remind me of the Jehovah's Witnesses and their complaints about government. Their faith is the wicked die in Armageddon and God shall rule perfectly forever after. That is why I quit them. I don't want perfect or even pretty good. Trump is enough if he'd make his old income tax returns public knowledge, as he promised many, many times. Just that information would keep him within the boundary of reasonable behavior. And placing his businesses into an actual blind trust, instead of his make-believe trust, would go even further. Another promise not kept, and unlike Obama, Trump has no possible way to blame Congress for Trump not keeping those promises.
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I bring this up, not to excuse Trump but to remind you that BOTH party candidates make promises that they don't keep. . . . why don't you take a realistic look at both parties and insist on something better?
Just remember, SECOND, if there was a swamp in DC, Obama was part of it. And so was Hillary.
Today, Dilbert has a comment on what Signym and second are doing:
http://dilbert.com/strip/2017-10-25
Watch me win this debate on twitter by providing facts and logic. Now we wait for everyone in the world to change their minds.
How’s the first minute going?
What is wrong with these monsters!
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Quote:huh? I'm telling you to get off your fat arse and be something other than a swamp-defender and virtue-signaller. I'm sure not advocating that you leave this to Jehovah. What the hell are you smoking?
You remind me of the Jehovah's Witnesses and their complaints about government. Their faith is the wicked die in Armageddon and God shall rule perfectly forever after. That is why I quit them.
Quote:Judging by the amount and triviality of the criticism that you've heaped on Trump on this board, NONE of that would satisfy you!
I don't want perfect or even pretty good. Trump is enough if he'd make his old income tax returns public knowledge, as he promised many, many times. Just that information would keep him within the boundary of reasonable behavior. And placing his businesses into an actual blind trust, instead of his make-believe trust, would go even further. Another promise not kept, and unlike Obama, Trump has no possible way to blame Congress for Trump not keeping those promises.
You seem to think that just because I criticize Obama, Hillary, and the DNC shills who're running the deep state's shit-show that I'm defending Trump. I'm not.
You also seem to think that if I criticize your (deep state) criticism of Trump, I'm defending Trump. I'm not. But clearly you still don't recognize how enmeshed the deep state - the swamp, if you will- is with the DNC, and the DNC is with the deep state.
Why do you still think the Dems are going to rescue you?
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake
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Quote:I'll keep it really simple for you. I'll give you a non-trivial criticism of Trump. And in this particular case, Democrats want the opposite of what Trump wants. Out of necessity, the Republicans are cleverly yet falsely claiming that their tax cut will go to higher wages for workers.
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Judging by the amount and triviality of the criticism that you've heaped on Trump on this board, NONE of that would satisfy you! . . . clearly you still don't recognize how enmeshed the deep state - the swamp, if you will- is with the DNC, and the DNC is with the dee . . .
The core of the Trump tax plan, to the extent we know what’s in it, is a huge cut in corporate taxes — about $2 trillion over the next 10 years, according to TPC’s best estimates. The administration would like you to believe that all of that tax cut will be passed on to higher wages, but this is overwhelmingly unlikely, especially in the short to medium run. In fact, the bulk of that tax cut will almost surely accrue to stockholders.
Unlike the situation in previous tax reforms, we now live in a world where investment holdings are diversified across countries. Specifically, around 35 percent of U.S. equity is owned by foreign residents. So of that $2 trillion windfall, $700 billion goes to foreigners. Make non-US investors great again!
It is Trump’s $700 Billion Foreign Aid Program. Trump can’t say that he only cares about global welfare, not U.S. parochial issues — not under an administration that has adopted America First as its slogan.
https://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2017/10/25/trumps-700-billion-foreig
n-aid-program/
To repeat: 35% of US equity is foreign owned, therefore 700 billion dollars of the 2 trillion dollar Trump tax windfall goes to foreigners. The 1,300 billion dollars of the tax cut which is staying in America will NOT raise wages, despite what Trump says, but will instead increase the wealth of the rich. That is a substantive criticism of Trump and you can't blame the Democrats for what Trump intends to do because the Democrats are opposed.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Here's a non-trivial criticism of Obama:
As banks were failing, he force-fed somewhere in the realm of $13+ trillion (that's with a "T") on them, refusing to allow "too big to fail" banks to fail. He signed onto the very first bail-in agreement with the Bank of England, which allows systemically important (international) banks to touch your account to make themselves whole, then signed on to the expanded version of "bail in" during the G20 meeting in Australia.
He refused to prosecute bankers who write fraudulent loans or sold fraudulent investment products based on subprime loans https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jan/23/untouchables-wal
l-street-prosecutions-obama https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/09/how-wall-streets-
bankers-stayed-out-of-jail/399368/ and arm-twisted the States Attorney General (including Kamala Harris [watch out for that snake] an up-and-coming Dem who sold her soul for political gain)
During his reign, at least 85% (if not more) of the "recovery" went to the top 1%. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/28/upshot/gains-from-economic-recovery
-still-limited-to-top-one-percent.html I have not found a totalized value for that gain in wealth disparity except that it is acknowledged to be in the $trillions (that's with a "T"). If I decide to pursue this research further I'll to let you know.
Do you REALLY think Saint Obama did anything for the average American? I refer you once again to the chart which shows the increasing wealth disparity to continue along the same trajectory under Obama as under GWB. I predict that the trajectory will be unchanged under Trump, too.
Yanno what your problem is, SECOND? Among other things, you focus on "feelings" and "motivations" like someone who's taken just a few too many psychology classes, leaving you incapable of analyzing anything with numbers attached, like financialism and economics.
-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake
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Signym, if you want to bring down the wealth of the top 1%, then your ideal Trump would be raising taxes on the 1%. But he's not. He seeks to lower them. What Trump is doing is the opposite of what any Democrat would do.
Signym, if you want to improve the health of the bottom 99%, then your ideal Trump would have an ideal Trumpcare plan. But he doesn't have a plan. What Trump is doing is the opposite of what any Democrat would do.
And a final generalized complaint about Trump doing what no Democrat would do. (I chose the wall only as an example; choose a better project closer to your heart):
Signym, if you want the Texas/Mexico wall built, then your ideal Trump would not have deliberately alienated Senators Flake and Corker. Flake and Corker will be in office until January 2019. That’s an eternity in politics. There could be more Republican Senators who haven't announced their antipathy to Trump because they are not resigning. Remember, Republicans only have a two-seat majority in the Senate. Your ideal Trump needs their votes in 2017 and 2018 to build that wall. If you don't care about the wall, there must be a few other things Signym might want passed that can't pass because Trump is too good at making the wrong kind of enemies.
Good luck, Signym, with your hopes for Trump.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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SECOND, you STILL don't get it, do you?
I fully acknowledge that Trump is doing some things that are horrible for the middle class. There is nothing you can tell me that would change my view of Trump. I KNOW he's bringing his swamp with him. I KNOW that he represents a segment of the elite- what I call the "national" capitalists. In fact, I will tell you .... since you're into "motivations" and "feelings" ... that like many wealthy, he probably doesn't see any difference between what benefits him and what benefits America because ... well, hell, he and people like him ARE America. L'etat. cest moi. I suspect that he truly believes in trickle-down; that once capitalists like him (national ones) are allowed a bigger piece of the pie, then the economy will blossom and everyone's boat will be lifted. Yes, I think that Trump is self-referencing and fatuous enough to actually believe that. I also thought he would be a loose cannon. And morally, I thought that he and Hillary were about on-par, altho I did give Trump a slight edge. I think I said most of this even BEFORE the election. I even said that there was no way in hell that Trump could revive the economy.
And knowing all this, I still thought Hillary was a worse choice. And looking into the future from now, I still say that the Dems would stab Americans in the back ....again ... just as badly or worse, but in a different way. Because they HAVE stabbed Americans in the back already.
So, what were you going to say about Trump that was going to change my mind?
Stop recycling your old arguments ad nauseam. Give it your best shot, hon, because so far you haven't touched me. 
-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake
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I'll hit you with one more for the day: Trump made a big show of saving jobs at Carrier in Indiana. He hasn't done that again. There are thousands of factories he could show up at to save jobs from being exported. But he hasn't done it because that's work, the work is not fun for Trump, and he never meant what he said about saving factory jobs in the first place. It was all about creating a show for Trump's amusement. Trump didn't do another Carrier because V.P. Pence, ex-governor of Indiana, did all the real work for Trump. Since Pence didn't have a second Indiana factory ready to save, Trump never saved another.
I was under the impression that factory jobs was an important part of Trump's appeal to Signym. Sorry if I remember that wrong about you, but Trump is demonstrating that his enthusiasm for creating factory jobs is no greater than Obama's was and Hillary's would have been. As far as jobs, Trump has let the country fly on automatic pilot, following the last compass heading from when Obama was the pilot.
www.nytimes.com/2017/08/04/business/economy/jobs-report-unemployment.h
tml
Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
SECOND, you STILL don't get it, do you?
I fully acknowledge that Trump is doing some things that are horrible for the middle class. There is nothing you can tell me that would change my view of Trump. I KNOW he's bringing his swamp with him. I KNOW that he represents a segment of the elite- what I call the "national" capitalists. In fact, I will tell you .... since you're into "motivations" and "feelings" ... that like many wealthy, he probably doesn't see any difference between what benefits him and what benefits America because ... well, hell, he and people like him ARE America. L'etat. cest moi. I suspect that he truly believes in trickle-down; that once capitalists like him (national ones) are allowed a bigger piece of the pie, then the economy will blossom and everyone's boat will be lifted. Yes, I think that Trump is self-referencing and fatuous enough to actually believe that. I also thought he would be a loose cannon. And morally, I thought that he and Hillary were about on-par, altho I did give Trump a slight edge. I think I said most of this even BEFORE the election. I even said that there was no way in hell that Trump could revive the economy.
And knowing all this, I still thought Hillary was a worse choice. And looking into the future from now, I still say that the Dems would stab Americans in the back ....again ... just as badly or worse, but in a different way. Because they HAVE stabbed Americans in the back already.
So, what were you going to say about Trump that was going to change my mind?
Stop recycling your old arguments ad nauseam. Give it your best shot, hon, because so far you haven't touched me.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
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Trump shows his brilliance in this quote about Chinese President Xi Jinping: "He’s a powerful man. I happen to think he’s a very good person. Now with that being said, he represents China, I represent the USA, so, you know, there’s going to always be conflict. But we have a very good relationship. People say we have the best relationship of any president-president, because he’s called president also.
Now some people might call him the king of China. But he’s called president. But we have a very good relationship and that’s a positive thing. And it would be good to have that relationship with Russia and other countries, too."
Trump is unpopular around the world. That makes it difficult for democratically elected leaders to engage in the same level of Trump flattery as the dictators in China and Russia, which may have given Trump a poor impression of the various prime ministers of Europe and the Commonwealth.
www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/10/26/16552362/lou-dobbs-trump-tr
anscript
Replacement-level Republicanism, minus competence
The truly striking thing about Trump, nine months in, is not the awe-inspiring scale of accomplishments that Dobbs claims to see.
It’s that after an extraordinarily contentious primary season in which Trump put forward many profoundly heterodox policy ideas, we have a president in the White House whose strongest performance comes when giving a decent rendition of Chamber of Commerce talking points on one aspect of a corporate income tax cut.
There’s no actual plan here to cut prescription drug prices. There isn’t even any talk any more of “terrific” health insurance programs that will “cover everyone.” Trump’s not pretending any more than he’s going to raise taxes on the rich, he’s not talking about $1 trillion infrastructure investments, and he’s certainly not burning the midnight oil coming up with a Trumpian policy agenda.
He’s just kind of bopping along with more vulgarity and corruption and less discipline and policy knowledge than a normal president.
Meanwhile, a Republican Party that’s no longer really divided on policy is tearing itself apart between a faction that can see the plain reality in front of them and a majority group that, like Dobbs, insists on pretending that their party’s unpopular and not-very-able leader is in fact a leader of world-historical proportions.
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Quote:Trump might seem to be bumbling around, but those who voted for him seem to be happier with him than they would have been with Hilliary. The far lesser of 2 evils, Trump is not even the same league of evil as her.
Originally posted by second:
Trump shows his brilliance in this quote about Chinese President Xi Jinping: "He’s a powerful man. I happen to think he’s a very good person. Now with that being said, he represents China, I represent the USA, so, you know, there’s going to always be conflict. But we have a very good relationship. People say we have the best relationship of any president-president, because he’s called president also.
Now some people might call him the king of China. But he’s called president. But we have a very good relationship and that’s a positive thing. And it would be good to have that relationship with Russia and other countries, too."
Trump is unpopular around the world. That makes it difficult for democratically elected leaders to engage in the same level of Trump flattery as the dictators in China and Russia, which may have given Trump a poor impression of the various prime ministers of Europe and the Commonwealth.
www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/10/26/16552362/lou-dobbs-trump-tr
anscript
Replacement-level Republicanism, minus competence
The truly striking thing about Trump, nine months in, is not the awe-inspiring scale of accomplishments that Dobbs claims to see.
It’s that after an extraordinarily contentious primary season in which Trump put forward many profoundly heterodox policy ideas, we have a president in the White House whose strongest performance comes when giving a decent rendition of Chamber of Commerce talking points on one aspect of a corporate income tax cut.
There’s no actual plan here to cut prescription drug prices. There isn’t even any talk any more of “terrific” health insurance programs that will “cover everyone.” Trump’s not pretending any more than he’s going to raise taxes on the rich, he’s not talking about $1 trillion infrastructure investments, and he’s certainly not burning the midnight oil coming up with a Trumpian policy agenda.
He’s just kind of bopping along with more vulgarity and corruption and less discipline and policy knowledge than a normal president.
Meanwhile, a Republican Party that’s no longer really divided on policy is tearing itself apart between a faction that can see the plain reality in front of them and a majority group that, like Dobbs, insists on pretending that their party’s unpopular and not-very-able leader is in fact a leader of world-historical proportions.
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Quote:How would you plan to raise taxes on the most wealthy 1% anyhow?
Originally posted by second:
Signym, if you want to bring down the wealth of the top 1%, then your ideal Trump would be raising taxes on the 1%. But he's not. He seeks to lower them. What Trump is doing is the opposite of what any Democrat would do.
Signym, if you want to improve the health of the bottom 99%, then your ideal Trump would have an ideal Trumpcare plan. But he doesn't have a plan. What Trump is doing is the opposite of what any Democrat would do.
And a final generalized complaint about Trump doing what no Democrat would do. (I chose the wall only as an example; choose a better project closer to your heart):
Signym, if you want the Texas/Mexico wall built, then your ideal Trump would not have deliberately alienated Senators Flake and Corker. Flake and Corker will be in office until January 2019. That’s an eternity in politics. There could be more Republican Senators who haven't announced their antipathy to Trump because they are not resigning. Remember, Republicans only have a two-seat majority in the Senate. Your ideal Trump needs their votes in 2017 and 2018 to build that wall. If you don't care about the wall, there must be a few other things Signym might want passed that can't pass because Trump is too good at making the wrong kind of enemies.
Good luck, Signym, with your hopes for Trump.
The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly
Are you a proponent of Consumption Tax?
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