President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

What's happening in your world? Discuss it here.
Forum rules
Play nice. We will be watching

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Aquila89 » Thu May 03, 2018 7:51 am

By the way, Trump actually announced back in 2015 that he's doing this. He tweeted: "As a presidential candidate, I have instructed my long-time doctor to issue, within two weeks, a full medical report-it will show perfection".

How would he know that his test results will be perfect before getting them? You can't know that - you can be sick but not yet feel it. But he knew the letter will show perfection because he's going to dictate it.

Crimson847 wrote:Maybe he thought he wouldn't be caught, but I can't imagine how he managed to maintain that belief while writing the words "Mr. Trump, I can state unequivocally, will be the healthiest individual ever elected to the Presidency".


Caught? But he wasn't caught. He turned himself in, so to speak - he told all this the public voluntarily, I don't really know why.
  • 4

As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being.
--Carl Jung
User avatar
Aquila89
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3442
Joined: Tue Apr 16, 2013 1:45 pm
Location: Hungary
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Crimson847 » Thu May 03, 2018 8:10 am

Aquila89 wrote:By the way, Trump actually announced back in 2015 that he's doing this. He tweeted: "As a presidential candidate, I have instructed my long-time doctor to issue, within two weeks, a full medical report-it will show perfection".

How would he know that his test results will be perfect before getting them? You can't know that - you can be sick but not yet feel it.


When athletes say before a game that they're gonna crush the other team, they don't know that. When parents tell their kids before a medical procedure that everything will be fine, they don't know that. People express unreserved confidence (whether real or feigned) in the face of uncertainty all the time; it doesn't mean they're cheating.


Caught? But he wasn't caught. He turned himself in, so to speak - he told all this the public voluntarily, I don't really know why.


I'd assumed he was under some sort of pressure to confess, whether public or private. Why change his story now otherwise, especially if it puts him at risk of professional discipline?
  • 5

"If it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them; but the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?"
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
User avatar
Crimson847
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3195
Joined: Sun Feb 01, 2015 5:18 am
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Aquila89 » Thu May 03, 2018 11:29 am

Crimson847 wrote: People express unreserved confidence (whether real or feigned) in the face of uncertainty all the time; it doesn't mean they're cheating.


I know, I wasn't really serious. But by the way I absolutely hate that and I never do it. It's like a superstition for me.
  • 3

As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being.
--Carl Jung
User avatar
Aquila89
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3442
Joined: Tue Apr 16, 2013 1:45 pm
Location: Hungary
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby blehblah » Thu May 03, 2018 12:48 pm

I wonder why Bornstein is talking about it now, when the incident was in February, 2017?

The whole thing is a typical Trump mess - petty, unnecessary, and sloppy. Bornstein doesn't seem to understand why Trump may have been a little pissed-off about Bornstein revealing Trump takes Propecia. I'm not exactly a HIPAA keener, but I'm going to guess that wasn't cool. Then Trump sends his long-time bodyguard to scoop his records, which the White House characterizes as a normal transfer of records when a new POTUS arrives. Yet, as noted in several articles, Bornstein claims a signed release from Trump wasn't included, which is a HIPAA violation. Finally, Bornstein also mentioned that folks at the White House basically told him he could forget being the White House doctor, because in some weird-ass universe (oh, wait, this weird-ass universe), that may have actually been on the table.

I can't help but to figure we haven't heard of other pre-POTUS doctors having the same issues because it has never happened before.

Did Trump think Bornstein was going to start auctioning off his records to a tabloid (because that's something Trump John Barron would probably do)? I can understand him being pissed about Bornstein revealing medication Trump was taking under Bornstein's care, but they way team-Trump handled it was like something out of a cheesy network drama, or reality sh... oh, right.

Moving-on. Giuliani, to the rescue!

Rudy Giuliani’s revelation that U.S. President Donald Trump reimbursed his personal attorney for a $130,000 payment to a porn star to keep her quiet about an alleged affair is raising new legal questions, including whether the president and his campaign violated campaign finance laws.


In that article, a few legal-types talk about the consequences of, and what may be behind, Giluliani's revelation.

It may get Cohen off the hook, at least around campaign finance violations. If Trump repaid Cohen, it's a loan, which Trump's team should have reported, rather than an unreported contribution by Cohen. That begs the question, why not leave Cohen out to dry?

The idea may be that since Cohen was raided, the information was bound to be revealed, and may already be known by investigators. It shifts the contribution violation from Cohen to Trump, and also reveals that Trump clearly did know about the payment, it was his money, and therefore denying the affair is pointless (even for a serial liar like Trump). On the other hand, if everyone was going to find-out anyway, lying about it, or avoiding correcting the previous version that Cohen and Trump put forth, could have been more damaging.

Then again...

Sol Wisenberg, a defense attorney who was a deputy independent counsel during the Starr special counsel investigation into Former U.S. President Bill Clinton, said the comment “obviously increases the president’s exposure to potential campaign finance violations, but it also makes him look terrible.”

“I don’t understand the Giuliani strategy,” he added. “Maybe it’s been too long since he’s been in the criminal justice field.”
  • 4

A quantum state of signature may or may not be here... you just ruined it.
User avatar
blehblah
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3895
Joined: Sun Apr 14, 2013 9:16 pm
Show rep
Title: Error General, Panic Colonel

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Doodle Dee. Snickers » Thu May 03, 2018 9:32 pm

I don't think anyone was surprised by the reveal that Trump's report was mocked up by him, though. When it was talking about how 'astonishingly' spectacular his health was and how 'bigly' small his waistline was and how rumors of hair implants were 'fake news', I think we all knew.

It'd be like if Keanu Reeves' health report came back and had 'woaaaaaaah' penciled in for height, weight, and BMI.

I'm more interested in Guiliani torpedoing Trump's defense about Stormy Daniels, frankly.
  • 8

Doodle Dee. Snickers
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 2730
Joined: Mon May 06, 2013 8:15 pm
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Aquila89 » Fri May 04, 2018 9:06 pm

When the story of about the hush money broke, I wrote here that I don't understand why Trump's people bothered with it. I still don't. Giuliani said: "Imagine if that came out on Oct. 15, 2016, in the middle of the, you know, last debate with Hillary Clinton. Cohen didn’t even ask. Cohen made it go away. He did his job.”

Okay, let's imagine it. The Access Hollywood tape was made public on October 7. In the following days, several women have accused Trump of sexual harassment. Trump said they're all lying. His supporters largely stood by him. Now imagine that in that context, Stormy Daniels comes forward with her story of a consensual sexual encounter with Trump. Who would have cared?
  • 8

As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being.
--Carl Jung
User avatar
Aquila89
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3442
Joined: Tue Apr 16, 2013 1:45 pm
Location: Hungary
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Crimson847 » Sat May 05, 2018 5:38 am

It does seem like the Trump team made a strategic error there...surprise surprise. A big part of the reason the story has had more impact now is that Trump essentially admitted her story was true by signing that NDA, so a lot of the same people on the right who were willing to buy his denials of all the sexual harassment and assault claims went like this when he denied the affair with Clifford/Daniels:

Image

On the other hand, one thing I remember being disappointed about at the time was that the Access Hollywood bomb and subsequent accusations happened too early to have the maximum effect on the election. After the chatter about the final debate ended and the Access Hollywood story cooled down some, there was a period of a couple weeks where not much was happening, giving the Trump campaign time to regroup. And, of course, if the Democrats had had something new to bludgeon Trump with in the final week of the election to distract from Comey's last-minute memo to Congress, that might have made the difference. Given how close the election was, it's difficult to write off the idea that a new revelation about Trump during either period (especially the latter) could have tipped the result to Hillary.
  • 7

"If it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them; but the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?"
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
User avatar
Crimson847
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3195
Joined: Sun Feb 01, 2015 5:18 am
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Aquila89 » Sat May 05, 2018 3:08 pm

Crimson847 wrote:After the chatter about the final debate ended and the Access Hollywood story cooled down some, there was a period of a couple weeks where not much was happening, giving the Trump campaign time to regroup. And, of course, if the Democrats had had something new to bludgeon Trump with in the final week of the election to distract from Comey's last-minute memo to Congress, that might have made the difference.


I have a hard time imagining this. In the context of allegations of sexual assault, a story about a consensual affair would have barely even registered. So Trump cheated on his wife with a porn star - so what? His supporters forgave him the Access Hollywood tape, they would have forgiven this too. I mean, it's just the kind of thing people already assumed he'd do. And Democrats would've seemed hypocritical if they attacked him on this, given that Bill Clinton admitted to multiple consensual affairs (with Gennifer Flowers and Monica Lewinsky) and they forgave him.
  • 5

As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being.
--Carl Jung
User avatar
Aquila89
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3442
Joined: Tue Apr 16, 2013 1:45 pm
Location: Hungary
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby iMURDAu » Sat May 05, 2018 7:54 pm

Trump is supposed to make it with porn stars. Are we ever going to stop pretending like there is any moral code he could break that would shock anyone that is already on his side? He could blow Wolf Blitzer and it would be excused as him extending an olive branch to CNN.

He could even do everything Hillary did and was ever accused of doing. It. Wouldn't. Matter.
  • 7

“This is going to become a bad meme,” Todd observed.
User avatar
iMURDAu
TCS Chomper
TCS Chomper
 
Posts: 6752
Joined: Fri Apr 19, 2013 10:08 am
Location: twitch.tv/beakstore
Show rep
Title: King of Fuh

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Kivutar » Sat May 05, 2018 8:19 pm

FWIW, the Trump supporters in my family are now admitting that Trump is "flawed" ever since this story came out. I'm not really sure how the Trump supporter mind works.
  • 10

Then the LORD said to me, "Go again, love a woman who is loved by her husband, yet an adulteress, even as the LORD loves the sons of Israel, though they turn to other gods and love raisin cakes."

Hosea 3:1
User avatar
Kivutar
Champion
Champion
 
Posts: 1425
Joined: Wed Apr 01, 2015 3:52 am
Location: Right behind you
Show rep
Title: Great Librarian

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby blehblah » Sat May 05, 2018 8:29 pm

I think at that time, they didn't know really know if Trump would make it through the Access Hollywood tape and assault charges. Not having yet another sex-type-thing pile-on was their aim. Trump supporters, that hard-core group who will seemingly never abandon Trump, weren't the primary concern. It is always the middle; those who are neither hard-core Republicans nor hard-core Democrats. Certainly, each side has to keep the base intact, but they need either a good chunk of the middle to vote for them, or not vote for the other side.

Crimson847 wrote: big part of the reason the story has had more impact now is that Trump essentially admitted her story was true by signing that NDA


Almost.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way ... at-the-xxx

President Trump's proclivity for putting his name on buildings, steaks, ties and certificates is well-known. But former adult film actress Stormy Daniels says he failed to put his name on their contra

Daniels, whose given name is Stephanie Clifford, filed a civil suit against President Trump on Tuesday alleging the nondisclosure agreement she signed just days before the 2016 election is invalid because it's missing Trump's signature.


The point stands, though, since the existence of the NDA, with its laughably transparent pseudonyms, is enough to strongly indicated that Trump had sex with Daniels, and knew about the attempt to keep it quiet.

I don't think there's any point in Trump, through Giuliani, denying it anymore. I also figure they calculated that the material seized from Cohen was enough to clearly show that Trump had repaid Cohen (and then some). I don't think Cohen needs to flip for investigators to piece it together. By shifting the campaign contribution question back to Trump, it could relieve at least some of the pressure on Cohen about this specific question, sooner rather than later.

The other thing Giuliani revealed is yet another rationalization for firing Comey. While the admission about Daniels, and how the payment worked, is simply getting ahead of the obvious, this could be something else.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/03/politics ... index.html

But Giuliani said something else in the course of that sitdown with Hannity that's also a very big deal. It was this -- in relation to the May 2017 firing of then-FBI Director James Comey:

"(Trump) fired Comey because Comey would not, among to other things, say that he wasn't a target of the investigation. He's entitled to that. Hillary Clinton got that. And he couldn't get that. So he fired him. And then he said, 'I'm free of (these) guys.'"


In other news, Trump addressed the NRA. Being Trump, he had to pepper it with his usual mix of half-reading something, and general ignorance.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... o-war-zone

“I recently read a story that, in London, which has unbelievably tough gun laws, a once very prestigious hospital -- right in the middle -- is like a war zone for horrible stabbing wounds,” Trump told the annual gathering of National Rifle Association in Dallas on Friday, without identifying the source of his information. The hospital, which he didn’t name, had “blood all over the floors” from knife crime, he said.

“They say it’s as bad as a military war-zone hospital,” Trump told the U.S. pro-gun rights’ group. “Knives, knives, knives. London hasn’t been used to that. They’re getting used to it. It’s pretty tough.”


As you can imagine, Trump's line of thought hasn't gone-over too well in Blighty.

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/d ... 32056.html

Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Sir Ed Davey said despite a rise in crime in the capital, Mr Trump's remarks are "nevertheless ridiculous".

He said: "To defend America's shocking gun laws by revealing his ignorance of Britain should alarm even his apologists in the Conservative Party."


Indeed, "should", Sir Davey, but most certainly won't. If Trump jammed a klaxon in their faces whilst loudly farting with a strangely Russian accent through several bullhorns, they wouldn't blink, because the part of their humanity which should be alarmed is dead. It's less cognitive dissonance than it is do-it-yourself lobotomies. The most they can bring themselves to do is quit Congress for a rough, perilous, life of the uncertainty of high-paying corporate/lobbyist gigs while firing a few shots of after-the-fact morality over their shoulder on the way out, or, you know, whatever Paul Ryan's process is.
  • 0

A quantum state of signature may or may not be here... you just ruined it.
User avatar
blehblah
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3895
Joined: Sun Apr 14, 2013 9:16 pm
Show rep
Title: Error General, Panic Colonel

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby gisambards » Sat May 05, 2018 8:39 pm

blehblah wrote:
He said: "To defend America's shocking gun laws by revealing his ignorance of Britain should alarm even his apologists in the Conservative Party."


Indeed, "should", Sir Davey, but most certainly won't. If Trump jammed a klaxon in their faces whilst loudly farting with a strangely Russian accent through several bullhorns, they wouldn't blink, because the part of their humanity which should be alarmed is dead. It's less cognitive dissonance than it is do-it-yourself lobotomies. The most they can bring themselves to do is quit Congress for a rough, perilous, life of the uncertainty of high-paying corporate/lobbyist gigs while firing a few shots of after-the-fact morality over their shoulder on the way out, or, you know, whatever Paul Ryan's process is.


I think he's referring to the British Conservative party, not anyone in the US Congress. And I think it's actually quite an odd comment, because there isn't really a notable amount of apologism for Trump in the Conservative Party. Not really even from the people you'd expect it from - even Boris Johnson's been more critical than not.
  • 4

User avatar
gisambards
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 2088
Joined: Sat Feb 21, 2015 11:45 pm
Show rep

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby blehblah » Sat May 05, 2018 9:05 pm

gisambards wrote:
I think he's referring to the British Conservative party, not anyone in the US Congress. And I think it's actually quite an odd comment, because there isn't really a notable amount of apologism for Trump in the Conservative Party. Not really even from the people you'd expect it from - even Boris Johnson's been more critical than not.


My bad. I see "Conservative Party" (even capitalized) and think "right".
  • 0

A quantum state of signature may or may not be here... you just ruined it.
User avatar
blehblah
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3895
Joined: Sun Apr 14, 2013 9:16 pm
Show rep
Title: Error General, Panic Colonel

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby iMURDAu » Sun May 06, 2018 1:10 am

Kivutar wrote:FWIW, the Trump supporters in my family are now admitting that Trump is "flawed" ever since this story came out. I'm not really sure how the Trump supporter mind works.


Flawed but they're still going to vote for him as long as he's got the (R) next his name. That's what I've heard. I know lots of people. I know most people. You'd be surprised how many people I know and what they tell me. Believe me, it's a lot. Nothing I can't handle of course. ;)
  • 7

“This is going to become a bad meme,” Todd observed.
User avatar
iMURDAu
TCS Chomper
TCS Chomper
 
Posts: 6752
Joined: Fri Apr 19, 2013 10:08 am
Location: twitch.tv/beakstore
Show rep
Title: King of Fuh

Re: President Trump makes himself an even BIGGER asshole

Postby Crimson847 » Sun May 06, 2018 1:48 am

Aquila89 wrote:I have a hard time imagining this. In the context of allegations of sexual assault, a story about a consensual affair would have barely even registered. So Trump cheated on his wife with a porn star - so what? His supporters forgave him the Access Hollywood tape, they would have forgiven this too. I mean, it's just the kind of thing people already assumed he'd do.


First, there's more to her story than the affair. Specifically, her account is that she slept with Trump right around the time Barron was born. Cheating on your wife is one thing; cheating on her while she's in the hospital giving birth to your baby (or near as dammit to that) is a whole other level of shittiness. Then, according to her, Trump prevented her from publishing her story by having one of his buddies at the Enquirer do a "catch-and-kill" on it, and sent someone to threaten her in front of her daughter. That's a lot more salacious than a simple affair.

Second, as I said before the main issue is timing. If she'd published her story in early October when all the other accusations were coming out, that probably wouldn't have accomplished anything. However, since she was still in the process of trying to get it published on the 15th when Cohen contacted her, odds are the story wouldn't have run until late October or perhaps even early November. That being the case, the story might have kept the Trump campaign off-balance for the last crucial weeks and/or taken some oxygen away from the Comey memo. At that point the crucial issue isn't whether holdouts would have believed it, it's whether it would have rattled the Trump campaign or successfully kicked some dirt over the fire Comey started.
  • 7

"If it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them; but the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?"
- Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
User avatar
Crimson847
TCS Junkie
TCS Junkie
 
Posts: 3195
Joined: Sun Feb 01, 2015 5:18 am
Show rep

PreviousNext

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 17 guests