The Stuff removed / changed / pulled relating to Trump

tstorm823

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We can't necessarily rely on the article to provide context on, or tell us the truth about, the image.
The context of an attached article being insufficient to know the truth of a picture is not the same as it being genuinely useless towards that end. By all means, seek other angles, but also read the context.
 

Houseman

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The context of an attached article being insufficient to know the truth of a picture is not the same as it being genuinely useless towards that end
That's why I said "necessarily", in that "it is not always true"
 

Dwarvenhobble

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I think the US media is generally quite deferent to its politicians - far more so than the UK.

I would suggest there's a real "no smoke without fire" aspect to Trump. The hostility to Trump is not just the media, it's the unprecedented criticism from insiders, be they Trump's own appointees (Mattis, Bolton etc. do not have kind words for him), Republican Party executive wonks or civil servants. There's a reason for this. It's not that he's an outsider, it's that he's dangerously unethical and incompetent. The media have picked that right up and run with it.

We can only imagine the insanity of him raging against media lies, whilst at the same time busily spilling his guts to journalists. And when the results roll out, all he does is rage against "lies" and invite a new journo in. Let's remember that Trump left Michael Wolff free to roam the White House in its early days, and Bob Woodward special access in the later period. Neither showed him in a good light. He wants attention so much and thinks of himself so highly that it just doesn't seem occur to him people might find fault, and therefore if they find fault it's a lie. But surely the next one's going to tell truth, right? The second aspect of the insanity is that Trump could invite in the most craven and sycophantic of pro-Trump journalists to do that puff piece, but it won't satisfy him. Because deep down he knows they're a bootlicker, and what he wants is acceptance and plaudits and admiration from the best. It's both tragic and hilarious.
I'd argue he was not quite so incompetent as Bush but very much had a way of doing things some people didn't like.

It's worth remembering Bush was seemingly far more accepted by the Republican party while Trump saw the #neverTrump republican faction emerge and refuse to vote for him, instead choosing Hillary.

Also doesn't help that the push against Trump got some media companies really boosted ratings so they didn't want to stop that ball rolling. Not to mention it being more financially lucrative to bash Trump that praise him or bash his opponents due to demographic information.
 

Dwarvenhobble

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Oh no the banks are going after that one guy with a lifetime of accruing debt, welching on contracts, failed businesses and bankruptcies.

Oh noooo, somebody stop them, oh noo.

Locking him out of his money, or reclaiming outstanding debts and bad business deals? Nah it's Trump, so they must be biased thieves, right Dwarven, Houseman?
One of the Banks was one still happily storing his money and was thought to have Millions in multiple different accounts. Also Trump isn't he first person this happened to in recent times
 

Silvanus

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When have I ever taken a speaker I don't like out of context before?
That's not what I said. You're blaming reporters for people taking parts of the articles out of the context of the article, but want to let Trump off the hook when parts of his speeches are taken out of context.


That reminds me, pictures can be misleading and taken out of context too.

So no, we can't always rely on the article to provide accurate context for the image. The image may not truly be what the article describes.
Edit: re-worded that last two sentences to avoid confusion.
Uhrm, yes, obviously. None of this addresses the point I made. Nobody ever argued that we can always rely on the article to give "accurate context"; you seem to have invented that line of argument.
 

Houseman

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That's not what I said. You're blaming reporters for people taking parts of the articles out of the context of the article, but want to let Trump off the hook when parts of his speeches are taken out of context.
If by "parts of the articles" you mean "the headline", yes, I blame them for any wrong conclusions the audience comes to, because headlines are intentionally crafted to be attention-grabbing. If you're referring to any other part in the body of the article, they are not to blame if someone takes that out of context.



Uhrm, yes, obviously. None of this addresses the point I made. Nobody ever argued that we can always rely on the article to give "accurate context"; you seem to have invented that line of argument.
You said "You may as well say that a picture used to illustrate an article shouldn't be viewed in the context of the article"

And I agree with that, the picture shouldn't necessarily be viewed in the context of the article, because it might be fake or misleading.
 

Agema

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I'd argue he was not quite so incompetent as Bush but very much had a way of doing things some people didn't like.
It's like you haven't really been paying attention to all the stuff that's come out in the last four years.

I don't think GWB had a powerful intellect by any means, but I think he was at least reasonably intelligent, diligent enough to involve himself to know what his government was doing and why, and understood governance was supposed to be for the the national interest. I don't think you can say that of Trump.

It's worth remembering Bush was seemingly far more accepted by the Republican party while Trump saw the #neverTrump republican faction emerge and refuse to vote for him, instead choosing Hillary.
At the time, the Republican Party wasn't quite so openly overrun with conspiracy theorists and extremists. One might argue that GWB may have been seminal in helping creating them as he was ultimately a disappointing president. Or maybe it's just the internet, and the increased ability of stupid chattering and echo chambers to spread bullshit: Facebook, 2004; Twitter, 2006; etc.
 

Agema

You have no authority here, Jackie Weaver
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If by "parts of the articles" you mean "the headline", yes, I blame them for any wrong conclusions the audience comes to, because headlines are intentionally crafted to be attention-grabbing. If you're referring to any other part in the body of the article, they are not to blame if someone takes that out of context.
Fundamentally, I think you're not being very consistent.

On the one hand, you want us to take headlines without context, but then demand Trump's speeches have to be taken entirely with context. Except where those speeches can be quote mined to your advantage, where we need to ignore context: for instance, Trump told his protestors to go off to the Capitol and did not explicitly advocate violence, but this would be to ignore all the context in the speech of "showing strength", "fighting" for their rights, etc., or even the violent imagery in Don Jr. and Rudi Giualiani's warm-up speeches, and even before the day with claims such as that it would be a "wild" occasion.

And we can go back further: to Trump talking up strength and violence at rallies; repeatedly equivocating and voicing approval of his supporters even when they commit assault; offering to pay the legal fees of people who assaulted his critics; repeatedly encourging the police to be more violent against suspects; continuing to condemn the various groups such as media, Muslims and immigrants even as assaults against them rose; openly encouraging violent right wing militia groups for instance to "Stand back and stand by". These are all vital context to Donald Trump's speech: anger, hate, divisiveness, strength, violence.

Secondly, you suggest it's unfair to pick on quotes, but who decides what are the important stand-out quotes in a speech? To an extent, this is a subjective decision. You think A is important and another listener thinks B is. Why should they be biased but not you? And weren't they usually there as it played out first hand, rather than you as third hand experience reading criticism of the first-hand report by a likely biased second hand analysis?

Let's apply this elsewhere: if Trump condemns violence generically and then speaks up for violent groups who are inclined to carry out vigilanteism, it's an equivocation. And what the violent groups take from it is what they subjectively want to, which is that the president approves of them rather than that violence is bad. So he hasn't condemned violence in end effect, has he?
 

Dwarvenhobble

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It's like you haven't really been paying attention to all the stuff that's come out in the last four years.

I don't think GWB had a powerful intellect by any means, but I think he was at least reasonably intelligent, diligent enough to involve himself to know what his government was doing and why, and understood governance was supposed to be for the the national interest. I don't think you can say that of Trump.
Looks at Iraq
You sure you want to go with that?
He had a team that likely kept checks on stuff and managed a lot of it that were the competent ones and some good spin doctors and political connections to keep him in power and not looking awful.

I have been paying attention. As I pointed to the Snopes article talking about framing Trump in various ways etc. If it is in the National interest what he does or he just thinks it is, that's the question a lot of the time.



At the time, the Republican Party wasn't quite so openly overrun with conspiracy theorists and extremists. One might argue that GWB may have been seminal in helping creating them as he was ultimately a disappointing president. Or maybe it's just the internet, and the increased ability of stupid chattering and echo chambers to spread bullshit: Facebook, 2004; Twitter, 2006; etc.
The war in Iraq was based on a lie about dangerous WMDs and fast deployable chemical weapons based on some students online thesis, I don't know if you want to consider that one of the biggest conspiracy theories that fooled a hell of a lot of people or not but that happened.
 

Agema

You have no authority here, Jackie Weaver
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Looks at Iraq
You sure you want to go with that?
Sure. Those guys had the competence to take a shonky case and push a massive policy off the back of it. They knew what they were doing, they could get things done, and their biggest failure was perhaps gross overconfidence.

By contrast, Trump's administration was mostly redeemed from making huge mistakes by lacking the ambition or competence to do anything that big. However, the general pattern of his presidency is continual dysfunction. For instance, failure of a signature policy to build a wall on the Mexico border, which is actually a very small task in the bigger picture. Failing to repeal the ACA. A host of executive order errors that were knocked out because they couldn't be arsed complying with simple tasks like providing justification. Tax cuts that manifestly failed to achieve their stated intent, and helped the national debt remain sky high when it could have been controlled. A ton of stupid foreign policy failures or nothingburgers. Enhancement of racial and social tensions and civil unrest. All of Trump's colossal personal deficiencies are well attested: ignorance, lack of attention and detail, self-absroption, bullying, tantrums, general cluelessness, bullshitting, corruption, cronyism, etc.

And in the end of course, they had to face a major issue... and did a typically terrible job. A Covid-19 response that has led to over 390,000 deaths (and counting) many of which were avoidable, plus another $5+ trillion on the national debt (~20% GDP to 125% total) anyway. Inaction, disinterest at the top, confusion of messaging, disjointed policy, and interference in individual state policy. Covid has cost the USA far more lives and over twice as much money than 15+ years of Afghanistan and Iraq combined.

The war in Iraq was based on a lie about dangerous WMDs and fast deployable chemical weapons based on some students online thesis, I don't know if you want to consider that one of the biggest conspiracy theories that fooled a hell of a lot of people or not but that happened.
That was not a conspiracy theory. It was bullshit carried out overtly in the full glare of public view by known, self-identified actors, pushed through by brute force PR and manipulation of public outrage over 9/11. The flaws were all publicised and there to see, such that millions protested because they could see the weakness of the case.
 

Trunkage

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Secondly, you suggest it's unfair to pick on quotes, but who decides what are the important stand-out quotes in a speech? To an extent, this is a subjective decision. You think A is important and another listener thinks B is. Why should they be biased but not you? And weren't they usually there as it played out first hand, rather than you as third hand experience reading criticism of the first-hand report by a likely biased second hand analysis?
I'd also point out that there has been a lot of complaints being made about taking quotes instead of not writing (showing in video media) the whole speech Trump made over the last four year. When you go back and watch the whole thing, 'to get that greater context', you realise half the time that Trump was being way worse during the whole speech and the media companies clip the awful rhetoric and focus on less inflammatory quotes.

The media are being nice and editing out much of his hateful, draconian and conspiratorial lines to make him more coherent.
 

ObsidianJones

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To the very idea of "Stuff Removed tied to Trump", I ask what is the actual cost? I believe in free speech. I also believe in consequences. Both don't go into a bubble with talking about one or the other. Both must co-exist at all times.

Some people tend to believe that free speech is to live without consequence. Nothing can be further from the truth. Because when you have free speech, what you are doing is attempting to create a reality. A reality based on your words or ideas. Just as I'm attempting to do now, reaching out from my perception and reasoning to hopefully make sense to someone else so they can at least put my reasoning in their minds the next time they think about a situation like this.

You have never been allowed to say whatever you want, and don't think otherwise. You can't make threats against the president or other people due to that speech being literally illegal.

By the way! Remember that "Hang Mike Pence" chant? Felony.

The question than becomes an erroneous plea of "DO YOU WANT TO HAVE LESS FREEDOM?!". No. I don't have the need to have the freedom of leading an insurrection on the government because I'm unhappy I lost. I've learned a long time ago that losing is apart of living, no matter how unfair I think it is. Others do not need to pay and change their minds so I must be spared the indignity of being subjected to not winning an election.

Fighting for your actual rights is one thing, I get that. But this party is so convinced about the wrong doing of the democrats, they turn a blind eye on or lionize people in their own party who commit voter suppression or fraud. From dumping only Democrats in states to the few republicans who were caught voting twice or hiding votes to people posing as electors to try to vote for Trump. If people were interested about a truly fair election, this would be at the forefront to.

It is not. And it's telling to who we're actually dealing with.
 
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Silvanus

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If by "parts of the articles" you mean "the headline", yes, I blame them for any wrong conclusions the audience comes to, because headlines are intentionally crafted to be attention-grabbing. If you're referring to any other part in the body of the article, they are not to blame if someone takes that out of context.

You said "You may as well say that a picture used to illustrate an article shouldn't be viewed in the context of the article"

And I agree with that, the picture shouldn't necessarily be viewed in the context of the article, because it might be fake or misleading.
This all seems tortuously crafted in order to condemn speakers you don't like, and to let speakers you like off the hook.
 

Dwarvenhobble

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Sure. Those guys had the competence to take a shonky case and push a massive policy off the back of it. They knew what they were doing, they could get things done, and their biggest failure was perhaps gross overconfidence.

By contrast, Trump's administration was mostly redeemed from making huge mistakes by lacking the ambition or competence to do anything that big. However, the general pattern of his presidency is continual dysfunction. For instance, failure of a signature policy to build a wall on the Mexico border, which is actually a very small task in the bigger picture. Failing to repeal the ACA. A host of executive order errors that were knocked out because they couldn't be arsed complying with simple tasks like providing justification. Tax cuts that manifestly failed to achieve their stated intent, and helped the national debt remain sky high when it could have been controlled. A ton of stupid foreign policy failures or nothingburgers. Enhancement of racial and social tensions and civil unrest. All of Trump's colossal personal deficiencies are well attested: ignorance, lack of attention and detail, self-absroption, bullying, tantrums, general cluelessness, bullshitting, corruption, cronyism, etc.

And in the end of course, they had to face a major issue... and did a typically terrible job. A Covid-19 response that has led to over 390,000 deaths (and counting) many of which were avoidable, plus another $5+ trillion on the national debt (~20% GDP to 125% total) anyway. Inaction, disinterest at the top, confusion of messaging, disjointed policy, and interference in individual state policy. Covid has cost the USA far more lives and over twice as much money than 15+ years of Afghanistan and Iraq combined.
It's presented as continual dysfunction because it can be presented as that. More so when a number of governors (who ultimately have more power over states) can just refuse to work with Trump and refuse whatever they like.

Hell the build a wall on the Mexico Border. well Hillary herself said she'd build a fence across the border too.

Covid-19 was a shambles not helped by the likes of various governors and mayors helping it and just refusing to act.




That was not a conspiracy theory. It was bullshit carried out overtly in the full glare of public view by known, self-identified actors, pushed through by brute force PR and manipulation of public outrage over 9/11. The flaws were all publicised and there to see, such that millions protested because they could see the weakness of the case.
So a Conspiracy theory but with better funding
 

Houseman

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Fundamentally, I think you're not being very consistent.

On the one hand, you want us to take headlines without context, but then demand Trump's speeches have to be taken entirely with context.
I believe headlines are purposefully created to stand alone. A misleading headline cannot simply be excused away with "but the article says..."
They know exactly what they're doing when they're creating that headline.

Headline: "Off-duty cop fingers teen"
Article: "...as prime suspect in burglary"

Are you saying it's okay for headlines to be misleading, as long as the article isn't?
What about all the people who never read the article, just the headline, and then go away with a misinformed opinion?

for instance, Trump told his protestors to go off to the Capitol and did not explicitly advocate violence, but this would be to ignore all the context in the speech of "showing strength", "fighting" for their rights, etc.,
Are you claiming that these are "code words" for "go commit acts of violence?"
This is a weak, subjective argument, and your bias is probably influencing your perceptions. You know that there was violence, so now you go back through the speech, and years after that, looking for any "violent-adjacent" words, actions or attitudes, and when you find them, you're convinced that it's proof that Trump told people to be violent. You're affirming your predetermined conclusion by any means necessary.

Secondly, you suggest it's unfair to pick on quotes, but who decides what are the important stand-out quotes in a speech?
The media does, by writing articles about them.

I don't remember saying anything specifically "important stand-out quotes" so I'm a little confused.

Let's apply this elsewhere: if Trump condemns violence generically and then speaks up for violent groups who are inclined to carry out vigilanteism, it's an equivocation. And what the violent groups take from it is what they subjectively want to, which is that the president approves of them rather than that violence is bad. So he hasn't condemned violence in end effect, has he?
Yes, if.
 
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Avnger

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So we're just ignoring how the Proud Boys should "stand back and stand by," how rally attendees should "knock the crap out" of anti-Trump protestors and will have their legal fees covered, and how the 'blood and soil' and 'Jews will not replace us' Charlottesville rioters contained "some very fine people"?
 

ObsidianJones

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More over, we do have a responsibility to not be myopic. Trump has been blowing whistles and people have been responding dutifully.


Gearing up for what promises to be a manic week of self-victimizing and lashing out at political opponents, the president previewed his state of mind on Twitter with a whirlwind Sunday even by his new standards. (Since the beginning of his presidency, Trump’s tweeting has increased by 43 percent.) On Sunday, Trump sent off 46 messages on the platform, including retweets.

The most notable moment came when Trump tweeted a quote from Fox News contributor and megachurch pastor Robert Jeffress:

"....If the Democrats are successful in removing the President from office (which they will never be), it will cause a Civil War like fracture in this Nation from which our Country will never heal.” Pastor Robert Jeffress, @FoxNews

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 30, 2019"

Trump left out a few words from Jeffress’s remark: “And I do want to make this prediction this morning: If the Democrats are successful in removing the president from office, I’m afraid it will cause a Civil War-like fracture in this nation from which this country will never heal.”

The tweet drew a rare rebuke from a fellow Republican. Representative Adam Kinzinger, a former Air Force veteran who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan, said the president’s tweet was “beyond repugnant.”
To which, his cult responded.


Sporting a Confederate flag shirt near a field clouded by cannon smoke, where blue- and gray-clad soldiers reenacted a Civil War battle from 155 years ago, Larry Caldwell Piercy, Jr. said he sees a new war looming in the United States - and a role for himself in any fighting.

Actors portraying Union and Confederate soldiers reenact the U.S. Civil War Battle of Cedar Creek in Middletown, Virginia, U.S. October 19, 2019. REUTERS/Julia Harte
“It would be all guerrilla warfare, not this open field-style kind of thing,” he said, gesturing at the reenactment of the 1864 Battle of Cedar Creek in Middletown, Virginia, earlier this month. “I would probably be an officer in that effort.”

Piercy, 62, is one of the motorcycle riders known as the “mechanized cavalry” of the Sons of Confederate Veterans, which has an estimated 30,000 members and describes itself as a “non-political heritage organization” that preserves the history and legacy of soldiers in the pro-slavery Confederacy in the 1861-1865 Civil War.

He is also a fierce supporter of President Donald Trump.

As Democrats push to impeach Trump and controversy rages over whether to remove monuments to Confederate generals like Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, Piercy warned a new civil war is brewing.

“You look into rural areas, and we’re not seen, but there’s a lot of us that’ll come out of these hills if it keeps getting worse. Probably every Sons of Confederate Veterans member out there.”
(cont.)
 

ObsidianJones

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It might seem tempting to dismiss this language as of a piece with President Trump’s typical Twitter rhetoric. But it is worth paying particular attention to this tweet—because among the people who read it were militia groups enthusiastic about exactly what Trump portended. And while no violence has yet resulted from the president’s tweet, it would be foolish to underestimate the power of Trump’s comments to call rogue militias to action, particularly if there is an impeachment and he continues to use this rhetoric to fan the flames. In the days after his civil war tweet, he went on to use similarly incendiary language, referring to impeachment proceedings as a “COUP.”

Consider the Oath Keepers group, a far-right armed militia. Calling on its 24,000 Twitter followers to read the president’s whole tweet thread, the Oath Keepers account posted:

"Here’s the money quote from that thread. This is the truth. This is where we are. We ARE on the verge of a HOT civil war. Like in 1859. That’s where we are. And the Right has ZERO trust or respect for anything the left is doing. We see THEM as illegitimate too.@StewartRhodesOK https://t.co/DjB8TY0vCo
— Oath Keepers (@Oathkeepers) September 30, 2019"

Before this tweet, the Oath Keepers account tweeted that, under the U.S. Constitution, “the militia (that’s us) can be called forth ‘to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions.’ ... “All he has to do is call us up. We WILL answer the call.” Other Oath Keeper tweets also hint at violence: One states that “their favorite rifle is the AR 15.”
But that's just one example. We can't forget him telling the citizens to liberate their states from... their government.


When President Donald Trump tweeted "LIBERATE MINNESOTA!" on Friday morning, some of his most fervent supporters in far-right communities — including those who have agitated for violent insurrection — heard a call to arms.

The tweet was one of three sent from the president's account, along with "LIBERATE MICHIGAN!" and "LIBERATE VIRGINIA, and save your great 2nd Amendment. It is under siege!"

Trump's tweets came after small protests by Trump supporters broke out in a handful of states, many of which were fueled by anti-vaccination and anti-government groups. Anti-government sentiment has percolated among far-right extremists in recent weeks over the stay-at-home orders governors have issued to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

Trump's tweets, however, pushed many online extremist communities to speculate whether the president was advocating for armed conflict, an event they’ve termed "the boogaloo," for which many far-right activists have been gearing up and advocating since last year.
And his individual messes.





Here's the thing. None of this is news to Donald Trump. He has a segment of his cabinet devoted to his public image and what kind of sentiment is it cultivating. like every other president. These things had to have come up on their daily searches. It was expressed to him. It was expressed to him how white nationalism was on the rise... and he had his officials alter it.

Trump acts like a man who took a pyromaniac to an abandoned lumber mill and is 'surprised' that a fire broke out.