Trump vs Elijah Cummings – Is Baltimore worse than the border?


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Guest Mores
3 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

But the thing about wars is, it’s better to have not fought and endured a difficult status quo until a more opportune moment arrived; than to have fought and been utterly destroyed in the sort of war you were never equipped to fight in the first place.  The American South, the Third Reich, and the Imperial Japanese all learned that the hard way (notwithstanding the fact that all three enjoyed breathtaking tactical successes in the short run).  It’s not just about whether you’re right; it’s about the world you’re creating for yourself, your allies and your loved ones through your decision to escalate the conflict.

I did not, and do not, think that in the long run conservatism can win the sort of open war that Trump has embraced.  At least, not if we want to maintain the current United States as a single political entity.  

I agree with your philosophy of the first paragraph.

The second paragraph is not something we can predict.  That is exactly why historical parties failed.  The South actually had tremendous military advantage during the civil war.  There was every reason to believe they could win.  Just look at how many battles in the early war, they DID win, and how many were stalemates.

The Germans would have won if they didn't go after the Russians and the Japanese never attacked Pearl Harbor.  I know that is not conclusively agreed upon.  But that is the conclusion I lean towards.  These were LATER decisions that had nothing to do with the war they originally waged.  Bad decisions.

As far as Trump, he's staying with the same original war and principles.  Whether the American people are ready for it or not is something history will tell us.  I honestly don't know.

Edited by Mores
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4 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

1.  Really?  No way conservatism—either as an ideology or a movement—would have survived?  At all?  

That’s an awfully careless statement.

It is of course possible that, given enough time, conservatives could have eventually degenerated into a rump-of-a-rump or even gone the way of the Whigs or Prohibitionists under a timeline that doesn’t include Trump—though not terribly likely; unless or until the left felt comfortable enough doing a sort of latter-day Kristallnacht (which they’re much closer to now than they were three years ago).  

No way.  At all.  You would've gone the way of Britain and Australia and Canada... on the brightest outcome.  

You think a Republican win in any of the branches of government constitute a Conservative win?  REALLY?  You had all 3 branches of government under the Republican side not too long ago.  How did Conservatism fare then?

 

 

4 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

2.  That was (extremely) useful for the sake of middle America, but didn’t tell most right-wingers anything they didn’t already know.  And again, taking a cold war hot doesn’t help if you can’t win the hot war.  

I also note that for all this talk of Trump saving conservatism, we didn’t exactly hold onto the House in 2018; and Senate gains were below what they should have been given the map we had that year.  

You had the TEA party uprising.  How did that fare?  Who were the TEA party fighting against?  THE REPUBLICANS.

 

4 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

3.  We always knew Pelosi was a sort of ideological gateway to harder stuff.  We do owe Trump a debt for getting the guerrillas to come into the open—if we can beat them.

Well, as Trump said in the campaign... "the Republicans (you can apply that to Conservatives as well) don't know how to win.  I will teach them."

 

4 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

4.  Sure; though some of this has crossed the line into conspiracy-theory histrionics.  (Romney, in the take from the Russians?  Puh-leeze.  As if the guy isn’t perfectly capable of eel-like behavior on his own . . .)

 

 

Interesting thoughts.  Where does—you know—Christ fit into your doom-and-gloom view of Trumpless Christianity?

 

The way of irreligious Australia, Britain, Canada, Germany, et. al. before the age of Trump.

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3 hours ago, Traveler said:

I agree with what you are saying but I have a question or perhaps just a statement concerning the last part of your post.  Deliberately registering illegals to vote, I believe is a violation of Federal statutes that involves prison terms.  If the DNC can be shown to be deliberately involved in breaking federal laws - those perpetrators could be charged with a crime and I think Republicans would be happy to do it if they had the proof.  

 

The Traveler

Ohhh... you would think.  BUT... the law actually has a loophole.  Any undocumented immigrant who believed they were citizens of the USA at the time of the vote are exempt from the consequences of the law.  And that's why Democrats have been trying to tell undocumented immigrants that they can do what citizens can do - collect welfare, get healthcare, etc. etc.  When they come with the buses to take voters to precincts they're already conditioned to think they're citizens.

Now... do you really believe that a politician's refusal to institute Voter ID laws is because of undue burden to the African-American community?  And the refusal of the same politicians to put the citizenship question on the census is to avoid marginalization?

Edited by anatess2
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1 hour ago, Mores said:

I agree with your philosophy of the first paragraph.

The second paragraph is not something we can predict.  That is exactly why historical parties failed.  The South actually had tremendous military advantage during the civil war.  There was every reason to believe they could win.  Just look at how many battles in the early war, they DID win, and how many were stalemates.

The Germans would have won if they didn't go after the Russians and the Japanese never attacked Pearl Harbor.  I know that is not conclusively agreed upon.  But that is the conclusion I lean towards.  These were LATER decisions that had nothing to do with the war they originally waged.  Bad decisions.

As far as Trump, he's staying with the same original war and principles.  Whether the American people are ready for it or not is something history will tell us.  I honestly don't know.

As a youth I joined the army.  Not because I wanted to learn how to fight battles and win wars but because I wanted to learn how to survive a war and whatever battles.  I would like to tell everyone that there are sure fire ways to go about winning conflicts but there is no such thing.  What I learned is that no one wins a war but eventually someone loses more than the other.  I learned that more lives are lost to friendly fire than from enemy fire.  There are some exceptions but they are few and despite Hollywood, Marvel and DC almost no one acts intelligently in a fire fight.

Sadly the worse incompetence I have encountered in my life was in the military.  I use to tell the joke - do you know the difference between the Boy Scouts and the Army?  Answer - The Boy Scouts has adult leadership.  Unfortunately that is not as dramatic a difference now as then.  There is a reason most in the military can't say 3 words without 2 being vulgar swear words and most smoke.  They lack the intelligence to make better decisions.  Swearing and smoking is likely the least of intellectual problems - but are easily seen.

There are some (a few) captain Moroni types but most in the military with an IQ above room temperature are too frustrated by the politics of the organization to make a career of the military.  However, I have decided that anyone coming out of high school that does not know what to do with their life - ought to join the military.  I am also of the mind that close to 90% of the problems of our society are because very few have military experience - especially in politics.  The thought of going into battle gives one a different perspective of both leadership and the competence of those around you.  Perhaps I can give another example.  Our family for over 30 years organized an annual white water rafter expedition.  There were years when we had 60 are so with us.  You want to know what was the most difficult thing to overcome?  Teaching 10 people in a raft to all put their paddles in the water and paddle together.  You would think that would not require an abundance of intelligence - especially if the rapids offered some danger.  Sometimes simple things are the more difficult.  It is amazing how stupid otherwise intelligent people become when excited.

 

The Traveler

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Guest Mores
1 hour ago, Traveler said:

As a youth I joined the army....

You appear to have a gift for expressing highly informed, very fascinating, insightful exposition that is completely irrelevant to the topic you're responding to.

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10 hours ago, anatess2 said:

This particular case may be a Canadian case but the US 6th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that the word "sex" in the Civil Rights Act is synonymous to gender identity thus making transwomen synonymous to women.  It is headed to the SCOTUS so we're gonna find out soon if Yaniv would win her case in the USA if it was litigated here.

Always good to test these things in Canadians before applying them to real people. 

10 hours ago, estradling75 said:

This statement matches my expectation that we are going to follow the Nephi path as given in the Book of Mormon... (ie the government will be destroyed and we will break down into tribal organizations)

I'm still holding out hope for the super predator. 

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"Hey guys, know what we need? Somebody who actually lives in Maryland and has spent a lot of time in Baltimore... Where, oh where can we...  "

@Godless's info is over 40 years old.  Well I've lived here my whole life.  Let's talk about Maryland in 2019.

I live in a suburban area almost exactly halfway between Baltimore and Washington, DC.  Don't let that fool you, I ain't far from either.  if I jumped into my car right this second I could be in either city within 20 minutes.  Not long ago I worked at Johns Hopkins University.  Most days, my route to work took me right through the neighborhood where Freddie Gray was picked up.  That would be West Baltimore.  There's a rat problem, friends, and the citizens of Baltimore are not oblivious to it.  It's so bad you can buy one of those oval bumper stickers here that's got a picture of a rat on it, and it's pretty popular. 

92be66_63dd596089fd41e0b5af13c2bed6cd18.

When Democrat politicos complain about the rat problem, everybody nods solemnly.  When Trump calls it out he's a racist.  Well, call me racist for agreeing with him but I'm not the one who apparently associates rats with black people.  That would be Mr. Cummings.

West Baltimore is a disgrace and you could be forgiven for thinking that you were in a war torn city if you drove through it.  Many of the famous row houses are empty, abandoned and boarded up.  As of now, more of them are vacant than occupied.  They've also been collapsing.  Drink when you see a row house that's caved in and has buttress timbers supporting the walls of the adjacent rowhouses.  You'll be passed out drunk before you reach I-95.  By night, the blue lights of the Baltimore PD crime cameras provide plenty of light but they only exist on the larger streets.  The backstreets and alleys are filled with drug dealers, prostitutes and... rats.  Count the rats you see on Wilkens between South Carey Street and Camden.  Go ahead.  You may need a piece of paper to keep from losing count.  

East Baltimore is only marginally better, but that's because the people who live around the park tend to be more middle class affluent but as you go further eastward toward 695 the houses get smaller, poorer, and it starts looking like the West side.  The roads are crazy bumpy (or maybe that was a rat) but hey, at least the income from the strip clubs keeps the area ever so slightly nicer.  (fewer boarded up rowhouses.)  

Donald Trump is exactly right and the feigned outrage is coming from Democrats who are just mad that somebody is shining a light on their failed economic policies that have left more than one U.S. city as a devastated ruin.  (Baltimore is the sequel.  Detroit is the first.) "Charm City" stops being charming about 3 blocks form the Inner Harbor and everybody knows it but heaven forbid we say so because Democrats can do no wrong, baby.  Of course, things will only get worse now that we have casinos.  There's a big one, the Horseshoe, right on the place where 295 goes into the city past Camden Yards and M&T Bank Stadium (where the Ravens play).  Oh boy, now we have a region in economic distress with yet another pointless money sponge.  I guess the heroin dealers needed SOME kind of competition.  Think the taxes the state collects from those casinos is gonna help?  Keep dreamin'.  Not when there's votes to buy. 

Again, Trump wasn't wrong.  Maybe it was bad form for him to say it the way he did, but to be honest, I don't see any other way to get attention on the issue.  The people of Baltimore have been trying to get help with this for years.  Trump didn't create the problem, but to hear the media tell it, you'd think he rolled up to Baltimore with an 18 wheeler full of rats and released them into the city. 

Oh, and a quick note about why Dems are okay with illegals... Think it's about drug money?  Are you kidding me?  Remind me again which party is pushing for legislation to allow non-citizens to vote?

Edited by unixknight
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Guest Godless
59 minutes ago, unixknight said:

"Hey guys, know what we need? Somebody who actually lives in Maryland and has spent a lot of time in Baltimore... Where, oh where can we...  "

@Godless's info is over 40 years old.  Well I've lived here my whole life.  Let's talk about Maryland in 2019.

Closer to 15, but point taken. 😉

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Guest Mores
3 hours ago, unixknight said:

You see that all over Maryland.  It's a way for youth to earn some extra coin.  I'm actually okay with it other than the possible safety issues.

The main reason I don't like that is that they often use rags that are not exactly clean.  And they try to wash my window when it was perfectly clean as it was.

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On 8/6/2019 at 8:50 PM, Mores said:

The main reason I don't like that is that they often use rags that are not exactly clean.  And they try to wash my window when it was perfectly clean as it was.

I just found out that one can actually get sued for cleaning the trash out of someone else's property - even abandoned ones.

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