Trump and the military

James D. Macdonald said:

Any time you start a war without a very clear idea of what the victory conditions are, and what comes after you win ... whatever plan you're using is a bad plan.

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I'm guessing that Trump's only "victory plan" is upping his own popularity with his base and (possibly) with conservatives who subscribe to the "always support our leader in times of war, if said leader isn't a Democrat" philosophy. Look at how George W Bush's popularity rose after the 911 attacks, and again after he started each military intervention. Crises tend to increase a sitting President's popularity, at least temporarily.

The only question he likely has is where to start. North Korea, Syria, Iran, or Afghanistan? He's like a kid in a candy store.

God help us if a major terrorist attack happens on US soil during his term.

Ambrosia said:

Can 45 actually fire the commander of that region, or does he have to go through the Joint Chiefs of Staff to do it?

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He's the Commander-in-Chief, so, yes he can.

caw

blacbird said:

He's the Commander-and-Thief, so, yes he can.

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Fixed that for ya.

Dear Mr. President: The USA hasn't won a war since 1945.

Sincerely,
History

Fingers said:

Dear Mr. President: The USA hasn't won a war since 1945.

Sincerely,
History

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War's not about winning or losing, but turning a profit from the game...

This scares me. I wish we could have a recall election. Impeachment and removal seems improbable; I do not see 67 senators ready to remove him.

I'm conflicted though. For the sake of safety when it comes to foreign policy, I would like him out. However, when it comes to domestic policy, he has been mostly ineffective. Which is fine with me because I don't like his policies.

If he were removed from office, Mike Pence seems like he would be the type of guy that would get down to business and get the Republican agenda through congress.

Pence would be worse than Trump. By far.

Prozyan said:

Pence would be worse than Trump. By far.

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I'm going to disagree here. Pence would be a horror on the domestic front, no doubt. But Trump is that same horror, and so would be a number of potential 2020 GOP Presidential candidates, like Ted Cruz and Rand Paul.=

Pence, however, is sane and predictable, two qualities Donald Trump lacks. Trump's pathological narcissism scares me more than anybody's political philosophy. It's not a long stretch to see him deciding to lauch a nuclear strike on North Korea just to deflect the continuing probe into his Russia connections, his violations of the emoluments clause, his promotion of his horrible unqualified sons and daughters and their spouses into positions of high authority, and his romance with the fascist alt-right movement.

I'll support putting Mike Pence in the White House at the earliest opportunity, as I would guess virtually all Democratic Senators and Congresspersons would do, too, at this point. The sooner, the better.

caw

It's nice to see someone say this.

I haven't researched Pence much. I wasn't going to vote for him because of Trump. He may have his fingers in many lobbyist pies that I disapprove of. You may disagree with his views, but he's reasonable. I wouldn't be particularly afraid of mushroom clouds on the horizon with him as president like I am with Trump. Trump reminds me of Hitler in more ways than any other American president we've ever had, and this roster includes some sad specimens like Buchanan.

A few nukes and all our other concerns fade. Where you might stand on abortion, immigration and the new proposed border wall, the ACA--and don't even worry about the amount of plastic in the environment anymore.

I grew up with nightmares about nuclear holocaust, and I was so grateful my children didn't have to. Do any of you old salty dogs remember the TV movie back in the eighties called The Day After? People walked around like they were shell-shocked for a couple days. In fact, I remember reading a newspaper article called, "The Day After The Day After." But people haven't had to worry about this for a long time, not like we used to.

I have too good a memory for nostalgia. I remember the bad along with the good. I grew up with nightmares that the world was going to end. In school, they actually had bomb drills, like that was going to save us somehow. When the wall came down, we all wandered around, almost afraid to believe that this could actually happen, that maybe our hopes would be dashed because this was too good to be true. The wall fell just before the Christmas season, and I remember walking around outside, looking at Christmas lights, and far more people were on the street than usually were. The talk wasn't mostly of sales or even the lights we were looking at. It was, "Is it really true? Do you know anyone who's actually seen it? Is it really over?" It took a while to believe we didn't have to be afraid anymore.

Nothing is worth going back to those days of fear, of looking at your children and praying they'll have a world to grow up in. My only "comfort" was that we lived in LA, so at least it would be quick.

To my mind, getting Trump out of the White House would be the best thing we could possibly do for this country. And I bet a lot of Republican representatives feel the same way. The man is an embarrassment to the party. Not to speak of most of the nation.

blacbird said:

I'm going to disagree here. Pence would be a horror on the domestic front, no doubt. But Trump is that same horror, and so would be a number of potential 2020 GOP Presidential candidates, like Ted Cruz and Rand Paul.=

Pence, however, is sane and predictable, two qualities Donald Trump lacks. Trump's pathological narcissism scares me more than anybody's political philosophy. It's not a long stretch to see him deciding to lauch a nuclear strike on North Korea just to deflect the continuing probe into his Russia connections, his violations of the emoluments clause, his promotion of his horrible unqualified sons and daughters and their spouses into positions of high authority, and his romance with the fascist alt-right movement.

I'll support putting Mike Pence in the White House at the earliest opportunity, as I would guess virtually all Democratic Senators and Congresspersons would do, too, at this point. The sooner, the better.

caw

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Valid points, certainly. But I see it this way: Trump is polarizing. Not just left vs. right, but to everyone. He will struggle to gain a concensus to do much of anything. He'll face resistance at every turn, from both Republicans and Democrats. He is insane and unpredictable but that will keep what he can actually accomplish in check. If you think about it, outside of being a huge embarrasment, he has not really done anything of any consequence. I suspect we'll see much the same for the next 3 years. He is even limited in the harm he can do in regards to North Korea. Without a declaration of war, his power to order strikes is limited and I don't see congress giving him a declaration unless the situation is dire.

Pence, on the other hand, would form a unified Republican force behind him. He would be able to push the Republican agenda forward, something I believe Trump will be incapable of doing. Trump will bellow and bluster and at the end of the day not really accomplish much. Pence will be quiet and dignified and at the end of the day push through a truly frightening agenda.

Cathleen T: Exactly the same here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w9mtk8sHBQs

This is something everyone from the younger generations should watch. It's a comic called "When the wind blows".

"The Day After" won't hurt either.

Dropping a nuke somewhere is the single biggest risk with an uncontrolled 70 year old toddler like Trump. It would upset the entire global balance, not just Korea, and other crazies might feel the need to do the same. Please, I've had enough of this stuff for a lifetime.

Should I think about moving to Australia, just in case?

kneedeepinthedoomed--last night I watched Thirteen Days, which would be another show I would recommend. The events took place before I (and many others on this forum) were born, but it pretty accurately shows the kind of fear we grew up with.

The Cuban Missile Crisis was very nearly Game Over for everyone. That was the war that didn't happen. But we don't have anyone like Kennedy in the White House now.

Moving anywhere won't help if a conflict goes global. That's one thing that Thirteen Days portrayed very well, how events can spiral into an out-of-hand mess, and decisions can be made hastily with terrible ramifications. Once any bomb goes up, that makes it far more likely for more to fall.

And there's, y'know, the people affected by the bomb itself, in North Korea or whatever, assuming the catastrophe stays confined to a certain area. You don't have to be American for your life to matter, which seems obvious, but some people seem to be overlooking this. Even smart bombs still kill innocents, and a nuke is a very blunt instrument. Loss of life on that type of scale far outweighs any domestic problems we might have here. For pity's sake, whatever our problems are, even something like the ACA being repealed, most of us will still live through them, and this is from someone who's only coverage is the ACA.

Although it's perhaps a hopeful note that the career politicians, as a group, didn't abolish the ACA. Trump would have, if he could, in a heartbeat.

Whatever Trump's virtues might be (another area I haven't bother to research), his liabilities are so profound that they don't matter, IMO.

It would be nice to see people be able to agree on anything, even something that seems as self-evident that nukes should be avoided at all costs. People from differing viewpoints used to work out a consensus, or at least a clear majority opinion, by finding things we can agree on.

And it seems to me that a lot of people don't even try any more. It seems more like: wait until we're in power again so we can stick it to the other side.

Really? Is it truly the case that since I'm pro-life and own a registered hunting rifle (or whatever else about my views that would annoy you), that you wouldn't want to work with me on things we can agree on, like avoiding nuclear war or safeguarding civil rights or protecting health care?

JimmyB27 said:

Should I think about moving to Australia, just in case?

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If the Mad Max films are in any way clairvoyant, you might want to reconsider that...

Pence is not reasonable. He's a right wing, ultra-religious fanatic. He won't take a meal with female co-workers, he believes in conversion therapy, he closed down clinics in Indiana and instigated an AIDS crisis. People of his home state despise him. He is not reasonable. He IS predictable. He would certainly galvanize the right into a more potent force, and I would fear less about nuclear holocaust, but our country would still wind up set back 100 years or more.

They are two shi**y options as far as I'm concerned.

I agree, Elaine--those are some potent liabilities.

But it's not like there's a whole bunch of choices here. Sometimes you're stuck with taking the one that's the least crappy. I think we should focus on achieving the good that we can for now, and try to do more later.

At that point, people who were your allies or confederates can become your adversaries. And that's okay. I'd just like to see less demonizing of the other side (regardless of which side you may be on). It makes it easier to work with people and leaves less of a trail of hurt behind it.

CathleenT said:

I grew up with nightmares about nuclear holocaust, and I was so grateful my children didn't have to. Do any of you old salty dogs remember the TV movie back in the eighties called The Day After? People walked around like they were shell-shocked for a couple days. In fact, I remember reading a newspaper article called, "The Day After The Day After." But people haven't had to worry about this for a long time, not like we used to.

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God, yes. That TV show was criticized for understating the horribleness, but it did win some hearts and minds to the anti-nuclear cause.

There was also a British miniseries called Threads, which focused on the effects of a nuclear war within Britain, and it was really horrifying too (even more gritty and disturbing than The Day After). And the movies Testament, and When the Wind Blows...

I had a lot of nightmares about nuclear war back in the 80s. Nowadays, I'm still worried about terrorists getting their hands on a bomb, but until Trump, I had less anxiety about a superpower starting a nuclear war.

He is so much like the politician in that old Christopher Walken movie called The Dead Zone, based on a Stephen King novel (spoiler--a psychic has visions of a populist politician becoming president and eventually starting a nuclear war, so he takes measures to stop it). Except you don't need to be a psychic to see Trump pushing the button, and even if he held a baby up to block an assassin's bullet, his base would still approve of him.

Pence would be a disaster as POTUS. He would do everything in his power to absolutely destroy life for anyone who isn't a white, straight, cis-gendered, fundamentalist Christian male, and he would be a disaster for the environment and destroy any hope of policies that help the working and middle classes over the ultra rich (as would any Republican). But he's probably less likely to allow a twitter tantrum to goad him into declaring war.

Though he appears to be a True Believer of a very fanatical version of Christianity (and not just one of those GOP politicians who is cynically egging the Religious Right on to get votes), and I worry that people who truly believe what the RR believes won't worry as much about making foreign policy decisions that topple civilization either.

And Pence probably would realize that a war could improve his poll numbers too.

So I still wouldn't rest easy at night.

I get you on this, Roxxsmom.

I haven't done much research myself on Pence, so I can neither refute nor confirm what you're saying. I do know, however, that you generally make an effort to be well-informed, so it would be wise to pay attention to what you're saying about him. (As is the case with Elaine.)

It's just...I would like to see the right and left try to get together to work on something. And I'm not just talking politicians here, I'm also talking about us.

I see the pattern we've fallen into as very destructive. Each party swings into power and immediately begins sabotaging the work of the other. It seems like there's no attempt to even find common ground.

And the thing is, if you can find things that both sides roughly agree on (and okay, you'll never get everyone--both extremes will have a hard core of people who won't work to make things better simply because their side isn't in power), both sides will be invested and any resulting legislation has a better chance of lasting.

Seriously, was fighting Soviets the last thing we could agree on? If so, what a tragic commentary on our society. Although you have a point about war raising approval ratings. Obama got us out of Iraq, and it seemed like no one cared. Ugh. That's because it wasn't their people dying.

As far as Trump's base goes, that seems to be shrinking, although part of my impression may be due to my own real-life circle. I'm a devout Catholic, and as a group, we're definitely looking at Trump through squinty eyes. (Like I said, you'll never get everyone. Annoying, that.) Pope Francis publicly chastising Trump has helped: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...loaded-gift-his-encyclical-on-climate-change/.

I think if anyone finds definite, actionable proof of Trump breaking the law, he'll find he has very few friends.

*sigh* It's odd to look back at Dick Nixon with anything like nostalgia, but at least all he did was flounce out. Nobody died when Dick lied, either. What an odd thing to hope for, and depressing, too.

I don't know how good the nuclear safeguards are. I don't know if it's possible to circumvent them. I don't have anything even remotely like a security clearance--I just watch the movies like everyone else.

I just know I'm scared, and I'd like to work together with other people who are, too, to try and get this loose cannon out of the White House. For the safety of the entire planet.

ETA: If Pence is a right-wing as you say he is, he'll likely have trouble pushing an extreme agenda through as well. I hope that people are for the most part somewhere in the center. And we at least want to appear to be reasonable.

CathleenT said:

I think if anyone finds definite, actionable proof of Trump breaking the law, he'll find he has very few friends.

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I don't think he has or wants friends, Cathleen. I think he wants die-hard supporters and sycophants, and these are the people least likely to be convinced by definite, actionable proof.

The GOP scares me. Pretty much to a one. I don't know if I believe that it's all down to the two-party system--Spain has four or five parties and they still couldn't elect a president for about two years and three elections--but the two-party system isn't working. I actually signed a petition for a third party I don't support to be on my district's midterm elections, just so maybe we could have another voice in the mix.

Interesting tidbit: About two presidential elections ago, I heard on NPR that during primaries candidates go further and further to the edges so that their party's die-hards will show up and vote; but during the general election they go closer and closer to the middle in the hopes that undecideds and moderates will show up and vote, because their own party will do it anyway.

Personally, I'm not a fan of how we currently decide the vice president. Voters and officials get no real say in choosing that person, and while usually the choice is unobjectionable if not inspiring, it does occasionally lead us right to this point, where the Democrats are afraid to impeach Trump because Pence is behind him. As to the president, I've been meaning to take a closer look at how the EC votes are distributed, because I don't believe the president should be decided by popular vote, but neither should he be able to lose by three million votes and still win the election.

Also, Cathleen, I want to point out: Our justice system does not require proof to be definite in order to be actionable. As of now, I believe what we have is actionable, unless I misread the articles about Mueller convening a grand jury.

I thought a grand jury was convened to decide if there was enough evidence to prosecute. Or am I in error?

CathleenT said:

I get you on this, Roxxsmom.

I haven't done much research myself on Pence, so I can neither refute nor confirm what you're saying. I do know, however, that you generally make an effort to be well-informed, so it would be wise to pay attention to what you're saying about him. (As is the case with Elaine.).

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Pence is a religious fanatic. It doesn't take a lot of research to figure that out; it's just a matter of listening to the things he says about women, LGBTQ people for starters, and looking at some of the legislation he signed off on and promoted as governor of Indiana. He's anti choice, which in my opinion is a very dangerous and controlling thing for women. As for fiscal and environmental stances, he's far from moderate or reasonable, and is as disastrous as every other member of the GOP there.

he also doesn't think cigarette smoking kills, which suggests that he's pretty stupid too.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/03/pences-gender-segregated-dinners/521286/

http://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a4494411/mike-pence-anti-abortion-views/

https://www.themarysue.com/noted-anti-woman-feminist-mike-pence/

http://people.com/politics/vice-pre...ally-in-d-c-life-is-winning-again-in-america/

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/30/us/politics/mike-pence-and-conversion-therapy-a-history.html

http://www.businessinsider.com/mike...es-on-gay-rights-abortion-and-smoking-2016-11

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/27/us/politics/climate-change-denialists-in-charge.html

http://www.ontheissues.org/2016/Mike_Pence_Budget_+_Economy.htm

https://votesmart.org/public-statem...decision-in-citizens-united-case#.WYlXeVGQyos

He is one of the country's most socially conservative and outwardly religious legislators.

https://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/21/us/politics/mike-pence-religion.html

These links might give a bit of an overview of why people who care about women's rights, LGBTQ people, the environment and about economics opportunities for people who aren't wealthy, find him anything but reasonable.

What he believes in his heart of hearts, whether or not he's someone who thinks the end of the world isn't a big deal because he and those like him will be "saved," I can't say. But religious fanatics in general make me very nervous.

CathleenT said:

I see the pattern we've fallen into as very destructive. Each party swings into power and immediately begins sabotaging the work of the other. It seems like there's no attempt to even find common ground.

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What work of the Republicans did Obama and Bill Clinton sabotage when they took office? It feels more like the Democrats pass something that attempts (at least) to make life better for a group of people, and the GOP attempts to dismantle it as soon as they get control again.

Actually, do the Republicans in congress do any "work" or have any great projects or goals in mind for government, aside from tearing it down and protecting the "right" to discriminate in the name of religion, these days?

I agree that Pence is less likely to have a snit and press the button than Trump, and that it's better to live in a non nuclear world, even with unmitigated climate change and with most of our rights and economic opportunities stripped away, but I wouldn't be surprised if he turned out to be hawkish too.

It's like choosing between rabies or cancer. Most of us would take cancer, because rabies is 100% fatal and a really nasty (if relatively fast) disease course, but cancer brings plenty of suffering and a high probability of death, and even if you survive it, you'll never be the same again.

CathleenT said:

I don't know how good the nuclear safeguards are. I don't know if it's possible to circumvent them.

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I remember reading something about this after the 2016 election. When asked about nuclear safeguards (this was back in the 70's, but nothing in American nuclear oversight has changed since then AFAIK, so this quote got trotted out again in 2016/2017) former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Maxwell D. Taylor said:

“As to dangers arising from an irrational American president, the only protection is not to elect one.”

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Basically, if POTUS wants to push the button, there's nothing in place to stop him.

We're all screwed.

CathleenT said:

ETA: If Pence is a right-wing as you say he is, he'll likely have trouble pushing an extreme agenda through as well. I hope that people are for the most part somewhere in the center. And we at least want to appear to be reasonable.

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Mike Pence is as far right as they come. Like, the fringe of the fringe. Here's an article detailing some of his anti-women, any-LGBTI, anti-everything-not-white-and-straight-and-male history. It's long, but worth a read. Or just google "Mike Pence women" and see what comes up. The man is seriously scary.

eta: Mike Pence is the kind of fundamentalist who'd watch A Handmaid's Tale and see a utopia, not a dystopian hell-world.