Trump took over policing in Washington, DC this week to supposedly tackle a crime wave.
In reality, crime in Washington, DC, is falling, and at much lower levels than in the past.
There is, quite simply, no justification for what Trump is doing in Washington, any more than there was justification for his previous action in Los Angeles.
So why is he lying about crime waves, and why is he taking actions that even he must know are potentially illegal?
The answer is provided by Heather Cox Richardson in her Letters from an American email this morning, in which she says:
Trump has been frantically trying to change the subject away from his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein since July 7, when Attorney General Pam Bondi stirred up fury from Trump's MAGA base by saying the Department of Justice will not release any more information from the Epstein investigation.
But even Trump's attack on Washington, D.C., yesterday has not managed to distract attention from the possibility that the president of the United States sexually assaulted children.
It is impossible to consider anything going on in the USA now without viewing it through this lens.
The possibility that Trump is compromised by Epstein, and that this is of significance in everything that he is doing, has to be acknowledged as a factor in international diplomacy now, and not least in explaining the apparent power that Putin obviously has over him, which might have significant implications for future European security.
Quite literally, how on earth did such a vile person, who has already been found guilty of what is in straightforward parlance, rape, reach such a position of power, and why is it that so many still seem to believe in him despite the fact that he is so obviously unsuited to public office and might, like his friend Benjamin Netanyahu, be much better suited to life inside a jail?
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In a parliamentary system, they could just replace the Prime Minister. In their constitution is a long and protracted matter. It is in need IMHO of re-writing for the modern world.
Vote for 2024 Presidential Election Candidate by Ethnicity:
• White Voters: Trump (57%): Harris (42%).
• Black Voters: Trump (16%): Harris (83%).
• Hispanic Voters: Trump (45%): Harris (53%).
• Asian Voters: : Trump (37%): Harris (61%).
• Other Voters: : Trump (42%): Harris (55%).
Trump got re-elected because that’s what the majority of white voters wanted (maintenance of white economic, social and cultural dominance).
While many non- white voters who would normally vote Democrat stayed at home because of Biden’s support enablement of Israel to commit genocide and his failure to deliver on other issues that matter to the Democrat base.
Shouldn’t these be accepted as the Problems and the Issues to be addressed?
yes but there are others
the Electoral College
The states deciding their own electoral districts
Political Action Committees
The disparity between the representation of states in the Senate. In 2020 the fifty Democrat states represented 40 million more people than the 50 Republican states.
The lack of provision to call a general election in an emergency?
Presidential nomination of Supreme Court Justices
Depending which provisions of the Constitution they invoke, he could be removed quickly. His manifest combination of insanity and dementia opens him up to removal under the 25th Amendment any time the authorised parties decide enough is enough. However, he has the poison pill defence of JD Vance as automatic successor. Although Vance’s average intelligence would be a massive improvement on Trump’s astonishing stupidity, he, too, is malign and dishonest, and in his prime and good to go on being bad for decades to come. So, despite Trump being bad in every sense of the word, deposing him is not a safe escape from Amerca’s predicament
What follows is from a reliable & high level source (and did not come via e-mails etc). Trump has lost the support of the US military/intelligence complex, certainly at the officer level. Confidence in US politicians has been eroding since 2003 (most US military/intelligence people took the view “Hans Blick was right” – back in 2004). Trump is attemping to reduce intelligence monitoring of China (ref Taiwan) which is rgearded as mad – within the intel community.
On a related note, another well connected somebody reckons China takeover of Taiwan is a when not if. They also note that the old Koumintang is/may come to some “arrangement” with Xi. Could there be a bloodless takeover? Maybe.
As you can see from events in the USA, what citizens want or desire is, mostly irrelevant. In answer to the question in the last para: the rot started with the imbecile Ray-gun who kick-started the attack on ordinary people (& the orgs that represent them – unions – ref air traffic controller strike which Ray-gun crushed), accelerated under the liar/con-man Clinton and continued under the deadly duo dumbya and Obama (a neo-liberal who fooled everybody with the colour of his skin). Obama’s epitaph should be saved Wall Street not main street. Had Trump not been elected another Trump-like reaction would have come along. Trump is a symbol of massive US citizen unhappiness – they want the “good old days” – without realising that this is impossible. EU & UK need to detach asap from the USA – a fialing state.
Is it solely a matter of distraction, or has Trump installed the National Guard in Washington DC to suppress potential protest at the gates of the White House now that he has refused to release documents related to Ghislaine Maxwell’s trial and moved her out of a high security prison?
Regarding the last paragraph, to give a simple answer to me (although the actual reason(s) will be more complex, nuanced and detailed) is:-
Because those backing him see him as the way to achieve their goals of more power, more wealth and more influence and are prepared to overlook what they would call ‘mere flaws’ (although most of us would view them as pure evil, disgusting and traits that are way ‘beyond the pale’) to get them.
Craig
P.S. I presume, though, that the question in that last paragraph was rhetorical
It was, very largely
Not for the first time in my life, I am wishing that we didn’t have a ‘special relationship’ with America, which has mostly been extremely damaging for us, and beneficial to them.
The special relationship, I believe, includes our dependency for nuclear weapons and military aircraft on the USA. There are probably other things as well.
If he is implicated in the files, which seems likely, then his regular, past visits to Russia and connection to Putin might also suggest that Russian intelligence have sordid information on him. Maxwell is being allowed to work outside of her low security prison after the recent interviews with her by officials. So, what might Putin have?
Paul Krugman alluded to something very similar to Heather Cox Richardson the other day.
“The possibility that Trump is a paedophile, and that this is compromising everything about what he is doing, has to be acknowledged as a factor in international diplomacy now, and not least in explaining the apparent power that Putin obviously has over him, which might have significant implications for future European security.”
Strong words, potentially actionable if read by certain people. You might want to consider taking it down.
I said possibility.
And the evidence this might be the case is strong, but I did not say overwhelming.
And I said we have to bear the possibility in mind.
This is being said all over US media.
Your claim this is actionable is akin to saying there is a risk of a 8.0 earthquake in the uk today.
You are trolling.
“The possibility that Trump is a paedophile”
Really? There is no evidence linking him with the disorder of preference for prepubescent children – it would be the scandal of our times if this had been covered up for decades.
Why do you think he is desperate to cover u0 the Epstein files?
Do you read the news?
You appear to be doubling down. Are you really suggesting that there might be evidence in the ‘Epstein files’ that would show that Donald Trump was a paedophile?
I didn’t say he was. I did say the possibility had to be considered because it is very clear that something is motivating his fear of Epstein. That is obviously what I meant. But I have clarified the wording now to make that clearer.
There’s no evidence that Epstein or any of his associates were paedophiles. Teenage girls seems to have been his thing as it is with millions of men who exploit young women.
The term paedophilia is widely misused – it has a specific meaning* and doesn’t apply to all people who abuse young children, as the NSPCC explains.
https://learning.nspcc.org.uk/news/why-language-matters/paedophile-problematic-caution
*The tenth edition of the International Classification of Mental and Behavioural Disorders (ICD-10) classifies paedophilia as a sexual preference for children, usually of prepubertal or early pubertal age. The person diagnosed must be at least 16 years old and at least five years older than the child or children who are the focus of their sexual preference.
Very politely, there is.
You are banned for gross misinformation.
Noted.
I have changed the wording, because your wording suggests I frame it differently, and the concern is allegations of sexual impropriety, and that is what I was referring to. My purpose was very clear, I think, but if clarification helps, I will clarify.
Not a pedophile? No, just a person who views women as less than nothing, hence Trump, and the entire Republican party going their utmost to legalise teen marriage, trapping young girls into servitude and dependency. Not pedophilia, but close enough to give normal people concern. This woman puts it far better than I.
https://youtu.be/ywqJPTOf8M4?si=3fMMmCOrKg0Oo70V
There is nothing rhetorical about the question you pose at all, so let’s see it again:
‘Quite literally, how on earth did such a vile person, who has already been found guilty of what is in straightforward parlance, rape, reach such a position of power, and why is it that so many still seem to believe in him despite the fact that he is so obviously unsuited to public office and might, like his friend Benjamin Netanyahu, be much better suited to life inside a jail?’
Here are the non-rhetorical answers:
1. Because Neo-liberalism has been accepted by most, if not all political parties. There is no debate anymore. Debate, compromise – they’re just seen as ‘political’!
2. Because rinse and repeat Neo-liberalism has rendered political economy dumb and ineffective – it is failing people and they just want change – any change and are desperate to believe in something, anything.
3. Because the people who have benefited the most from Neo-liberalism – the rich – now no longer face any constraints at all when it comes to bribing and influencing politics and the political and real economy we live in. They are entrenched in your government.
4. Because we are in an epoch where we worship extreme wealth, imbue it with intelligence and other mythical properties to the point where we seem unable to question it – yet it is the source of probably all our ills.
There is is nothing rhetorical about any of these which I see as facts, and the apply to Farage here in the UK as much as Mr Agent Orange in the U.S.
Some in the US think Trump is getting people used to seeing the military on their cities’ streets this year so that they won’t complain when they’re deployed during the mid-terms next year when he has another go at stealing an election.
The question would then be – is there enough military personnel to quell dissent in all US towns and cities.
No, there is not. Less than half the army would follow orders. He would be reliant on militia and whatever loyal forces he could muster to control 350 million people. It sounds improbable.
There are many suggestions about what may be motivating Trump to cover things up.
Exactly what it is isnt as relevant as the fact that there seems to be something to hide.
Trump, as President, is the grotesque culmination of accelerating trends since the late 1950s. Eisenhower’s gave his 1961, ‘oh by the way’ as he walked out the door, warning about the power of the military-industrial complex, which by then had regained much of its WWII US budget levels. That MI-complex conjoined with the rampant Dulles/Angleton CIA ethic to subvert and bend the world to US interests, served by its own Mainstream Media (MSM).
The Israeli/Mossad influence with the US really took off under LBJ. The Project for the New American Century, with a hit list of Syria, Libya, Iraq and Iran was heavily steered by US Zionists. By the time of the Iraq war, Mossad could waltz into the Pentagon without even showing security passes. Over decades, the MI-complex served by MSM, schooled the US public with false narratives to ‘manufacture consent’ to arrive at a US paradigm that asserts 750 military bases around the world and a ‘defence’ budget of $trillion plus.
The US-Western hegemony is firmly anchored by the neoliberalism helped by the subversive alliance of the ‘5-i’s (US, UK, et al) plus Mossad whilst its democracies are pacified by distracting false narratives. But recently the ‘plucky mask’ of Israel has fallen away revealing the inherent evil therein, prompting dismaying radical and reflective response from the plebs. A Pandora’s box?
Trump comes out of MSM’s TV trash, it’s what he is. For the US public’s lower 40%, economically attrited over decades, Trump somehow became a desperate hope for the ‘MAGA’ idea. But his MAGA are disillusioned. Trump’s ONLY saving grace is that he is not ‘gung-ho’ about use of nuclear weapons. For this grotesque, money-grubbing, sociopath shackled by the Charles Koch and the Zionist agendas it may not end well. Lets hope, not ‘less well’ for us.
I think you were wise to change the original wording, Richard, not because he may or may not be but because how he’s implicated in the Epstein affair is the central issue. And despite what some of the Trump apologist commentors have said, there’s a mass of evidence that Trump is deeply implicated in the Epstein affair and it’s cover up. Trump himself admitted that when he ran the Miss Teen USA competitions he would go into the girls dressing room and “admire” them in various states of undress – he actually bragged about it and the recording of him doing so is widely available (and is not an AI fake).
Furthermore, let’s not forget that he was President when Epstein died in prison (not Obama, as he likes to imply). And his AG – Bill Barr – who initially recused himself from the Epstein investigation then, for some reason nobody knows (except Barr and presumably Trump), he then un-recused himself an took overall control of the investigation. And finally – but by no means lastly – the DoJ then sacks the prosecutor who dealt with the Maxwell case – who just happens to be the daughter of James Comey – a man Trump has never stopped hating.
I’ll also add one further piece of info of relevance. In the months running up to last year’s election a person ran a site on X called ‘Coffey Time News’ which published what they referred to as ‘The Trump Pedo Files’. Over months he and the people who worked with him unearthed lots of pictures, court transcripts, statements, etc which implicated Trump. Additionally, ‘Coffey Time News’ invited the Trump campaign on many occasions to sue them for libel for publishing what they did, because then they would have been able to depose Trump and also carry out a process of discovery – but Trump never did. Funny that, given how free Trump is with lawsuits. But anyway, here’s just one example (and very funny cartoon at that) of what those who believe Trump is put out.
https://x.com/Yam_Nivek/status/1953402718657167542
As you note, my point was about political economy and Trump potentially being compromised and this having an impact; nothing else. If better words help make that clear and clarify my intent, which I thought was obvious but some say was not, I will change the words to achieve my objective. And I nite the rest you say.
Goodness me – if I were to write a fiction story along the lines of The Manchurian Candidate, for example, with Russia playing the long game to reduce the USA to rubble metaphorically and from the inside…
Let’s not stray into absolutely ridiculous conspiracy theories (just yet).
But what a glorious plot device and perfectly typecast “villain.”
Might just get Hollywood interested but it could never be made…. could it?
I was saying months ago that this will end in civil war. Further back to mid last year I told my manager a catastrophe is coming. It won’t be long now, I just hope the planet isn’t rendered inhospitable.
An abrupt fall of the US to civil war will send ripples across the globe affecting everyone, old grudges will resurface, powers kept in check by the USA will attack, global trade will tank and we will see unrest grow as inequality keeps rising. The slow burn of climate change will spiral completely out of control as no coordination is possible further, displacing populations and sparking famines and wars.
Starmer is cooked as my generation would say.
Much can be deduced from observing the current farce in U.S. politics. Dear Leader is obviously untrustworthy, and a liar. His backers, the kingmakers of America, are fine with it, for it projects exactly the image they wish to convey: that they will rule in whatever thuggish manner they wish to; that the law of America (and the world) can be rewritten to suit their desires; and that they can weaponize disinformation at will, even coerce others into repeating lies as truth.
I would caution our transatlantic fellows not to dismiss the U.S. as a failed, or failing, state. For you too are being threatened and targeted–economically, politically, and socially. How often have outlets like the FT crowed about Europe being hollowed out and overtaken in market share by American companies? How often have they lambasted and bemoaned too much democracy? How much has the EU already been hamstrung by countries like Hungary, and how much more will they be weakened if the AfD takes hold in Germany? You cannot in the same breath say we are a failing state, and then admit our “special relationship” with the UK has turned you into a vassal state which can’t protect its own interests.
Even now we are using threats to open the EU’s purse strings to energy and defense spending. Presumably (and legitimately) to foist off Russia and China, but I’m certain our kingmakers are looking to divert “unnecessary” (social) spending directly to their coffers.
The consequences for your citizenry are potentially dire. In America, even due process – perhaps the most important right enshrined in law – is no longer sacred. They are detaining and deporting American citizens. They are creating a pipeline from protest to prison to denaturalization. They are refining their control over media and culture from the ground up, from schools and books to celebrities in music, TV, and online influencers. They are seizing control of all forms of data. Perhaps these are mere scare tactics to cow the populace. Perhaps it will get worse. But in practice, I would say we have a democracy in name only.
Dear Richard
I think Trump’s sending militia and troops under his control into Washington doesn’t require any complicaed explanation. He is working to establish a dictatorship. If you control armed and trained troops on the streets you have succeeded. There can be no Civil War (this is like saying
there is war in Gaza. War requires two sides.)
The coup is not yet established but it has made a strong start.
A fascist Unite States will be much more of a threat to the world than was fascist Germany.
I agree with you, Larry.