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Thread: Die Rechnung

  1. #1
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    Die Rechnung

    When you get a bill in Germany, it is called "die Rechnung", the reckoning. I found an article about Trump that was not what I expected: a more balanced view of his term in office, with the question at the end that every person who voted for Trump needs to answer, if only for himself - was it all worth it?

    Trump was elected as a middle finger to the face of government-as-usual, of politicians who line their pockets with lobbyists’ lucre while offshoring working class jobs, of a judiciary that legislated from the bench, of a trigger-happy but blundering series of prior Commanders in Chief who endangered Americans in far-off lands, spending blood and treasure without any discernible benefit to those at home.

    So it’s shocking, if not surprising, that a president who never thought much of acting presidential, who never pivoted from verbal bomb-thrower to grown-up, would slink out of office after Congress, under siege, held him accountable for perhaps the single worst action any American President has ever taken.

    Those of us who supported Trump — or at least supported many of the actions he took — now must come to a reckoning: Was it all worth it?

    Was it worth having a mercurial, vengeful president who did good things and terrible things, as opposed to being a mediocrity like most who preceded him? Or, to paraphrase Shakespeare, will the good that he did be interred alongside a trashed Congress and a shattered Republican Party?

    The positives, from a conservative perspective, are many. Domestically, the Supreme Court; the federal courts; prison reform; tax reform; a surging stock market; lowest levels (pre-pandemic) of minority unemployment since the 60s; rapid COVID vaccine development; the return of due process to college campuses. In foreign affairs, standing up to China; the demarche with North Korea; exiting the Iranian accord and the Paris treaty; resetting North American trade and immigration; defeating ISIS (which Obama had cravenly called the “junior varsity”) and bringing new peace accords to the Middle East.

    Virtually any other incumbent would have been guaranteed a second term — but Trump defeated himself at the polls in November.

    The only fake news was the stuff that Giuliani, a disgrace to the New York bar, the inexplicable Sidney Powell, and other bizarros put forth. The assertion that the election had been stolen had so little evidence no court could support it. But the president could not countenance the idea that he was a loser — which led to the last two months of ill will, the ill-fated rally, the assault on Congress and impeachment.

    Trump has now been impeached twice, once for spite and once for cause.

    On the other side of the accounting ledger, there was the wink-and-a-nod condemning of white supremacists; the crazy uncle-style re-tweeting of racist or otherwise bigoted tropes and imagery; the name-calling; the trashing of former aides whose only crime had been to serve the president well. The swamp creatures never left. The ‘Trump revolution’ was just one more turn of the revolving door between government and K Street, between military leaders and military contractors. What changed?

    Trump leaves behind a divided America, a shattered Republican party, and an army of horribles who have crawled out from under their rocks, bearing hockey sticks and zip ties, wrapped in Kevlar and the flag. People who beat police officers with flag poles and fire extinguishers, one of them to death.

    And that’s the reckoning.

    Would a more traditional candidate like Jeb Bush (remember Jeb! ?) or Marco Rubio have accomplished half of the positives of Trump’s term? Doubtful. But would they have left the nation in shambles? Even more doubtful.

    So now it’s up to every Trump supporter to ask, in the quiet of the night, was it worth it?
    Source

  2. #2
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    I can agree with much of what was written but I also can call BS on a number of the points raised.
    OPINION....a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge.

  3. #3
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    It doesn’t matter if it was worth it or not. It happened, now its on to what it did to us.
    "Back after 5 years. I thought you had died.

    don"


    Splitting my time between the montane and the mesas

    The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
    But I have promises to keep,
    And miles to go before I sleep,
    And miles to go before I sleep.

  4. #4
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    That's a very American viewpoint. The past is unimportant. The future is what counts.

    Here's a different one:

    I'm Catholic, which means I go to Confession and I tell my sins to the priest. Why bother? God knows everything, He knows my sins. Why tell a priest? I've used this excuse many times in past to justify not going to Confession.

    As I've gotten older, I've come to realize that confessing my sins to someone forces me to look at them. I can't just gloss over them or ignore them. I confront them. This is important, because before Absolution, I say an Act of Contrition, which includes the vow to avoid that which leads me into sin. Telling someone what I did is mortifying. It is hard, embarrassing. It forces me to understand myself and my failings. That knowledge of myself, that I don't like what I did, helps me avoid sin in the future. The priest then gives me a penance and grants Absolution and I can face the world with a clean slate.

    All this is is psychological. God knows my sin, He knows my contrition, He forgives me. Involving a priest would seem to be superfluous and indeed, Protestant sects have deemed it so and dispensed with what they call "the middleman". But having to say what you did, discussing it with the priest, is important for forgiveness of yourself, something that is needed before true healing can take place in your soul.

    The analogy is not perfect. I don't mean to suggest that voting for Trump was a sin. But in many ways, his time in office hurt this country profoundly. It would be good for people to ask themselves if it was all worth it, because there is a Hawley, a Cruz, a Greene, a Boebert, Palin, Bachmann, Biggs, Gosar, Jordan, etc., all waiting in the wings to tread that same path.

  5. #5
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    Enjoy the history all you want. That wasn’t the question. The question was whether “it” was worth it. Its a dumb question because is it what it is.
    "Back after 5 years. I thought you had died.

    don"


    Splitting my time between the montane and the mesas

    The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
    But I have promises to keep,
    And miles to go before I sleep,
    And miles to go before I sleep.

  6. #6
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    Your response is a testament to the idea that those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

    And heaven forbid anyone actually examine their conscience or motivations for their actions. Or even do a cost/benefit analysis to determine if maybe the price for what was obtained was too high, so perhaps we don't go down that road again. That would be too much to ask because hey, it is what it is.

  7. #7
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    Again, the question has little to do with history and more to do with a numbskull trying to be cute.

    As proof, if the “it” in the question is the damage Trump has done to the Republic then the definitive answer is “we don’t know yet the full extent”. Might as well just speculate about whether we would be in the same place had Trump been elected (whether he would lost his mind). Of course not.

    A better question might be “what characteristics of Trump did I miss so that I am never fooled again”? Or how could a sitting President become so insulated from reality that we find ourselves here? Should we pay better attention to the swamp dwelling minions Them is surrounded by?

    No, the author was trying to ask a cute question so that all the Wokes with room temperature IQ’s can exercise their introspection. I like to wonder if my Grandmother would have really been a wagon if she had wheels.

    I’m going to stop replying to your posts unless you can start picking up what I’m laying down. It takes far too many words and is exhausting to spell everything out in the level of detail you seem to need.
    "Back after 5 years. I thought you had died.

    don"


    Splitting my time between the montane and the mesas

    The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
    But I have promises to keep,
    And miles to go before I sleep,
    And miles to go before I sleep.

  8. #8
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    Small loss to me on that score, bud.

    I think we know enough about the damage that has already been done to the Republic by Trump to reach some conclusions. We don't need to study the issue for years to come to a conclusion.

    I get it, you don't want to look too hard at perhaps your own support for Trump. Or Boebert, maybe. You got fooled and now are looking for a fig leaf. So, I'm the problem for not understanding and I'm no longer worth your time.

    Deflection and Projection 101.

  9. #9
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    You might also want to do a bit of research before proclaiming Levin to be preaching to the Wokes.

    He's pretty far right wing. He thinks whites score higher than blacks on IQ tests due to genetic differences. He is for torture in some instances. He's an opponent of feminism as it is presently constituted, believes homosexuality to be an abnormal orientation and is a libertarian in economics and politics.

    In other words, you made an assumption not borne out by facts about his audience. The Wokes revile him.

    Might want to consider that before being condescending about your superior understanding and all.

  10. #10
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    Sometimes you just have to say we agree to disagree.
    OPINION....a view or judgment formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge.

  11. #11
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    Are you sure you aren’t thinking of Mark Levin?

    And my issue is your comprehension, not my understanding. You are tone deaf.
    "Back after 5 years. I thought you had died.

    don"


    Splitting my time between the montane and the mesas

    The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
    But I have promises to keep,
    And miles to go before I sleep,
    And miles to go before I sleep.

  12. #12
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    And you are one dimensional. We done insulting each other?

    Look, we have a difference of opinion. That doesn't make me stupid. I believe that introspection after a traumatic event is a good thing. You don't.

    It is appropriate for everyone to reconsider their actions and beliefs periodically, in my view. You don't seem to find any value in that. Fine, but don't call me stupid simply because I disagree. Grown men have different ways of handling differences in opinion.

    For example, my support for gun control changed after my contact with Mike. That was 20 years ago. Things such as school shootings and the Las Vegas massacre made me revisit my maximalist position on gun control and I now support what I consider to be some reasonable restrictions.

    In the case of the article, I think that it is appropriate to consider the outcomes and weigh them to decide whether to support a candidate such as Trump in the future. Doing that sort of deliberate sifting and weighing is how many people such as myself come to decisions. So far from being stupid, that just makes me a different sort of person than you.

    The unexamined life is not worth living - Socrates, "Apology", 400 BC

    I don't think that taking one's cue from Socrates makes a person stupid or tone deaf. Just maybe, his rep for wisdom was justified.
    Last edited by Kevin; 02-14-2021 at 07:14 PM.

  13. #13
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    I don’t think you are stupid; quite the contrary. We just have different styles of communication.

    It’s not unusual. Corporations spend a fortune analyzing personality types and their impact on teams. We have both probably done it a dozen times. I won’t waste your time describing you, but rather point out that I’m pretty far on the “don’t bother me with the details” end of the spectrum.

    Think of me as Tony Soprano. My lieutenants are the guys who say “I’ll take care of it” when I say “fix this”.

    It was frustrating for my direct reports who required detailed instructions. I’m not for everyone.
    "Back after 5 years. I thought you had died.

    don"


    Splitting my time between the montane and the mesas

    The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
    But I have promises to keep,
    And miles to go before I sleep,
    And miles to go before I sleep.

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