I certainly hope, on behalf of the American people, and the world at large, that the new Chief of staff and impose some order on the 3 ring circus that is the Trump Whitehouse.

All this nonsense is distracting Trump from the many issues he needs to deal with, not he least of which is to improve the lot of the average American re jobs and healthcare.

Hopefully with the Whitehouse being less of a benzadrine dog and pony show, this can lead to more bipartisan respect and cooperation to achieve the above goals. I am very much with John McCaine (R) when he says to achieve improvements to Obama Care, across house cooperation is required. To massage a consensus to in reaching  this goal requires leadership from the top, and I hope Trump can be man enough to lead the way, instead of the bullsh#t macho posturing schtick he seems to prefer.

God bless America. I love the Americans and I hope this works out well for them.

Kiwi cat posted:

I certainly hope, on behalf of the American people, and the world at large, that the new Chief of staff and impose some order on the 3 ring circus that is the Trump Whitehouse.

All this nonsense is distracting Trump from the many issues he needs to deal with, not he least of which is to improve the lot of the average American re jobs and healthcare.

Hopefully with the Whitehouse being less of a benzadrine dog and pony show, this can lead to more bipartisan respect and cooperation to achieve the above goals. I am very much with John McCaine (R) when he says to achieve improvements to Obama Care, across house cooperation is required. To massage a consensus to in reaching  this goal requires leadership from the top, and I hope Trump can be man enough to lead the way, instead of the bullsh#t macho posturing schtick he seems to prefer.

God bless America. I love the Americans and I hope this works out well for them.

 

I just don't get the impression Donald Trump is a 'focus' kind of guy. I don't believe he knows all the micro details of the deals his company does, for example, he gets people to do that for him.  I get the impression from his many media interviews that this is a man with a very short attention span whose mind jumps from one topic to another with no apparent link between the subjects he's talking about leaving the listener a bit bewildered as to how he got from point A to point B.

He's an impulsive man, says things that pop up in his mind because they sound right at the time but if you follow him long enough he'll contradict himself sooner or later. 

I don't think he's a man of deep convictions of any kind, politically he's been all over the place in his life, and that leads him to contradict himself.

The chaos we see unfolding in the Whitehouse team is a reflection of the chaotic, impulsive mind of the man at the helm of that team.

Kiwi cat posted:

I certainly hope, on behalf of the American people, and the world at large, that the new Chief of staff and impose some order on the 3 ring circus that is the Trump Whitehouse.

It will all depends on Trump himself.  Curious to see if he actually empowered Kelly to get the job done.

He won't be putting up with any of these below the belt shenanigans.

Now let's get back to the trade deal with UK. What is this crud about chlorine laced chickens?

imperialline posted:

jon honeyball posted:

Innocent Bystander posted:

What has been startling, indeed shocking to me, is how extremely right wing a seemingly significant number of US contributors are, they regarding very middle of the road UK views as very left wing. I never realised how far apart our two countries are.

 

In fairness, USA is actually two countries. The central lump. And the west and east coasts.

W/E coasts are pretty much caught upI age with modern European views, although some I have seen expressed to my face in north carolina was enough to make my flesh crawl.

The middle lump is essentially 40 years behind. They will get there, but not in my lifetime.

I agreed absolutely, been to mid-west/deep south and seen it myself - absolutely places of 40 years ago mindset.

Just to tell you some funny story about we the American - not only we are behind the times, but we are also ignorant (read stupid). My wife is a teacher for a local elementary school in the San Francisco Bay Area, one day she had a conversation with the Principal (aka Head Master in the UK), he asked my wife - OK, you are from the UK, which part of the Africa is the UK? My wife was obviously taken aback by the question, so she said UK is is fact United Kingdom where England (where she is from) is part of, and then he commented England is next to France so he could not still understand why there is a nation called UK.

I was speechless , the Principal had a PhD!!!

Ignorant or stupid, whatever you want to call these people, cretins exist everywhere on earth and my experiences tell me that the US has no particular lock on it. A person can be intelligent and at the same time ignorant on any given subject. Some folks are plain stupid and that's no fault of theirs. Culture, education, religion and advantage certainly play strong roles, and still it's all relative to an outsider's perception. To say that the coastal US is pretty much caught up with modern European views is to suggest that modern European political views are some sort of paragon that should work on other continents and in foreign cultures. That, to me, is an ignorant, self-righteous presumption.

joerand posted:

Ignorant or stupid, whatever you want to call these people, cretins exist everywhere on earth and my experiences tell me that the US has no particular lock on it. A person can be intelligent and at the same time ignorant on any given subject. Some folks are plain stupid and that's no fault of theirs. Culture, education, religion and advantage certainly play strong roles, and still it's all relative to an outsider's perception. To say that the coastal US is pretty much caught up with modern European views is to suggest that modern European political views are some sort of paragon that should work on other continents and in foreign cultures. That, to me, is an ignorant, self-righteous presumption.

That's how UK used to rule the world. Or how Western civilization justified invading other countries. No?

http://newsthump.com/2017/07/3...-to-do-the-fandango/

banzai posted:

imperialline posted:

jon honeyball posted:

Innocent Bystander posted:

What has been startling, indeed shocking to me, is how extremely right wing a seemingly significant number of US contributors are, they regarding very middle of the road UK views as very left wing. I never realised how far apart our two countries are.

 

In fairness, USA is actually two countries. The central lump. And the west and east coasts.

W/E coasts are pretty much caught upI age with modern European views, although some I have seen expressed to my face in north carolina was enough to make my flesh crawl.

The middle lump is essentially 40 years behind. They will get there, but not in my lifetime.

I agreed absolutely, been to mid-west/deep south and seen it myself - absolutely places of 40 years ago mindset.

Just to tell you some funny story about we the American - not only we are behind the times, but we are also ignorant (read stupid). My wife is a teacher for a local elementary school in the San Francisco Bay Area, one day she had a conversation with the Principal (aka Head Master in the UK), he asked my wife - OK, you are from the UK, which part of the Africa is the UK? My wife was obviously taken aback by the question, so she said UK is is fact United Kingdom where England (where she is from) is part of, and then he commented England is next to France so he could not still understand why there is a nation called UK.

I was speechless , the Principal had a PhD!!!

"War is God's way of teaching Americans geography."   - Ambrose Bierce

kuma posted:

joerand posted:

Ignorant or stupid, whatever you want to call these people, cretins exist everywhere on earth and my experiences tell me that the US has no particular lock on it. A person can be intelligent and at the same time ignorant on any given subject. Some folks are plain stupid and that's no fault of theirs. Culture, education, religion and advantage certainly play strong roles, and still it's all relative to an outsider's perception. To say that the coastal US is pretty much caught up with modern European views is to suggest that modern European political views are some sort of paragon that should work on other continents and in foreign cultures. That, to me, is an ignorant, self-righteous presumption.

That's how UK used to rule the world. Or how Western civilization justified invading other countries. No?

Yes indeed, like Iraq, Afganistan...

Has US ever colonise any country in the past?

Hawaii, Alaska, most of the the continental USA after 1776 (colonised at the expense of the native population).

The trumpton thread may be gone,  but now seems its reincarnated & moves amongst us in this "thread gone" form.  

BBC News this morning:  "President Donald Trump personally dictated the statement his son gave on his talks with a Russian lawyer during the election campaign.   US report.  It said Donald Trump Jr and the lawyer had mostly discussed the adoption of Russian children in June 2016.    Mr Trump Jr later revealed he had agreed to meet her after being told he could receive damaging material on Hillary Clinton"

I can't keep up with this ........... 

kuma posted:

Has US ever colonise any country in the past?

In the modern age, colonisation is more cultural and economic in form - "Cocacolonisation" is global having reached even the remotest corners of the earth.

Even back in 1990 I was somewhat taken aback while climbing to Everest base camp and spent a night at a remote hut at around 18,000 feet to find that in spite of the very sparse and basic facilities, you could at least buy a bottle of coke for $5.00.  It was fairly horrible - flat, so probably had got there a decade or so earlier.  Impressive.

Mankind has been colonising the world since time immemorial, gradually spreading to all corners of all continents, then in our baser warlike way seeking to invade neighbouring lands when we needed or wanted more resources. Recent decades have been remarkably stable in that regard, though I think rather than being more civilised or enlightened now it has more to do with ability of others, whether alone or with wider support, being better able to defend themselves, using both physical and economic weapons. And there are and will always be those who chump at the bit to try to increase their share, whether in terms of power and posessions or in terms of land and people, greed and a lust for power driving them - whether North Korea or Islamic State or any number of other examples not always so extreme.

kuma posted:

joerand posted:

Ignorant or stupid, whatever you want to call these people, cretins exist everywhere on earth and my experiences tell me that the US has no particular lock on it. A person can be intelligent and at the same time ignorant on any given subject. Some folks are plain stupid and that's no fault of theirs. Culture, education, religion and advantage certainly play strong roles, and still it's all relative to an outsider's perception. To say that the coastal US is pretty much caught up with modern European views is to suggest that modern European political views are some sort of paragon that should work on other continents and in foreign cultures. That, to me, is an ignorant, self-righteous presumption.

That's how UK used to rule the world. Or how Western civilization justified invading other countries. No?

Kuma,

For a very long time I thought that the UK stood for Ukraine.. till our plumber pointed out to me that there was no way of so much political correctness coming out of an ex-Soviet Union state..

Haim Ronen posted:

For a very long time I thought that the UK stood for Ukraine.. till our plumber pointed out to me that there was no way of so much political correctness coming out of an ex-Soviet Union state..

(In my opinion) ... usually accusations of political correctness are just a way of keeping the right wing status quo and denying equality for all.  Just like mentions of health and safety and cutting red tape.

Eloise posted:

Haim Ronen posted:

For a very long time I thought that the UK stood for Ukraine.. till our plumber pointed out to me that there was no way of so much political correctness coming out of an ex-Soviet Union state..

(In my opinion) ... usually accusations of political correctness are just a way of keeping the right wing status quo and denying equality for all.  Just like mentions of health and safety and cutting red tape.

Different when PC is used ridiculously as in creating the meaningless term "mind shower" in place of "brainstorm", completely missing the meaning of 'storm' (as in a military attack). Then there's the, I think insulting, "vertically challenged" etc. etc....

I must say, I have tended to use the term 'UK' frequently in the - apparently mistaken - belief that it is universally known, and saves any consideration as to whether one is talking about a specific part like England. Maybe 'Britain' would be better, even though in precise terms that might not be srictly correct, it may well be more certain of correct recognition internationally.

Innocent Bystander posted:

Different when PC is used ridiculously as in creating the meaningless term "mind shower" in place of "brainstorm", completely missing the meaning of 'storm' (as in a military attack). Then there's the, I think insulting, "vertically challenged" etc. etc....

You're right there are some uses of PC which are ridiculous ... usually coming about because people misinterpret reasonable dictates about avoiding insult and being inclusive (either deliberately or because the misunderstand) or in most cases as a joke!

Perhaps we should be clear ... I'm talking about my experienced in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

And if I were to be strictly correct in including my own location I would have to say British Isles!

If I watch news it is our Public Broacast System PBS, no commercials, good discussion on topics with interviews.  Tho many times I don't watch these days because it stresses me out with all the dribble and ugliness clowning around.  I'm glad he's not getting everything he wants and just acting like a grown brat. I'd rather watch a movie or great music and whisky/water in hand.

Would love someday to see a new thread - one that uses the first and last words of this thread as its title.

Huge posted:

Hawaii, Alaska, most of the the continental USA after 1776 (colonised at the expense of the native population).

Doh!

Totally forgot Americans ( escapees from Europe ) decimated native American *Indian*'s culture.

I think we are all guilty of invading and colonising the neighboring countries one time or another.

Richard Dane posted:

kuma posted:

Has US ever colonise any country in the past?

In the modern age, colonisation is more cultural and economic in form - "Cocacolonisation" is global having reached even the remotest corners of the earth.

Richard,

Another example is the  McDonald's invasion.

Royale with Cheese, baby!

Save

US annexed Cuba in 1898. Does that count?

Hook posted:

Would love someday to see a new thread - one that uses the first and last words of this thread as its title.

So you aren't holding your breath and waiting in suspense, I'll gladly tell you what day that will be Hook - any day AFTER Monday November 4th, 2024 !!!

...then, make way for Ivanka Trump (the first 'real' woman President)