(checks notes) wasn’t he born in Hawaii, A US state, that makes him a US citizen, no?
Thats why its a conspiracy theory!
Sadly though given the supreme court has been packed with fruitcakes I wouldnt completely rule it out.
still getting my head around the fact that Trump is getting stronger in terms of potentially being president again,
I'm coming to the conclusion that the person I'm beginning to loath in this growing reality is Biden. Trump is a symptom, not a cause - the best analogy I can come up with is that he is America's cancer. He came around the first time because of some pretty ****ed up living and life priorities and the cancer hasn't really gone away.
No, this is all Biden's fault. Not that he's been a particularly bad president - in many ways, he's been perfectly fine. But he should have had the self awareness to appreciate that too many of the electorate will think him too old to run again. He could have made it one of his key objects to manufacture and give enough positive exposure to another Democrat to make them an obvious successor. I genuinely thought that was the plan when he nominated Harris as VP. If he could have the good grace to pop his clogs in the next few weeks and give her a run at the job we might be spared a 2nd Trump term. Otherwise they (and in turn we) are bolloxed.
I think, if memory serves, it was trump who was trying to troll him about the whole passport/birth certificate thing?
The irony is Obama, aside from having quite an illustriuous history of political education, and then teaching the same in some of the best colleges in the US...also has a track record of very compasionate community service, for want of a better phrase.
Then we have Trump, a real estate criminal who squandered his fathers inheritence, and somehow managed to open a casino that made a net loss.
A casino.
That made.
A loss.
That's got to be a world first.
Let's take a moment to reflect on that.
What’s with the having to be above 35 bit? Seems like US politics could do with a youth injection
mattyfez - your post about trump owning a casino which made a loss reminds me of Gerry Adams (yes, that one) being an unemployed barman, in Ireland.
It stretches credibility just a little.
convert - being US VP is largely ceremonial and I accept it's useful to have one if the President dies or is otherwise incapable to do the job but Harris woud not be a credible Democratic nominee.
She had her chance last time so her focus after the next election should be on building a wider and deeper base of support.
Even if she does that, my money would be on Gavin Newsom being the nominee in 2028 and if anything happens to Biden before the 2024 election I think he would be preferred to Harris as the nominee.
During the last 'primary season' my tip was Harris but she has under-performed as VP - as most/all previous
post-holders have done.
My mnain hope is that trump is not the GOP nominee but, if he is, that he is soundly defeated - and jailed or sentenced to house arrest on the back of various trials.
frankconway
Full Membermattyfez – your post about trump owning a casino which made a loss reminds me of Gerry Adams (yes, that one) being an unemployed barman, in Ireland.
It stretches credibility just a little.
He genuinely did though- it's proper business genius stuff, Trump Plaza was doing OK in the 80s til he decided to open another casino, Trump Taj Mahal, just down the road which competed directly with Plaza and sent it spiralling into bankruptcy with $250m of debt. The whole Atlantic City thing is a trip, the entire time he was there he survived entirely on fraud and by throwing away other people's money.
trump and casinos... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_Entertainment_Resorts
A substantial proportion of the US electorate see him as a successful businessman; hmmm
^^ He royally shafted a lot of your average Joe working people that he claims to represent too, when the casino went under.
You have to be some sort if idiot to believe that Trump cares about anyone else but Trump yet many of them do.
Before the plaza opened, his casino management team were killed in a helicopter crash that Trump was due to be on.
He had headhunted an experienced team and with them the Casinos may have done better.
A substantial proportion of the US electorate see him as a successful businessman; hmmm
Largely because of he was the face of the US version of The Apprentice. It did for Trump what the UK version did for Alan Sugar. Made it look like he knew what he was doing.
I think convert makes a very good point. Biden needed to serve one term and leave a viable democratic successor to folliw him. I don't think Harris is that person, she's underperformed as VP when she shuld have been moulded into that successor.
He had headhunted an experienced team and with them the Casinos may have done better.
The businesses that operated under the Trump Entertainment Resort banner were built or bought largely using junk bonds and bank loans (Trumps normal way of raising cash) They nearly all went over budget on construction and fitting, because Trump is a fantasist. When there was a recession it hit both gambling revenues and increased the loans interest rates, which is why they went bankrupt. They nearly all operated at near or better than evens some were even reasonably profitable. But the debts they had to serve were all unmanageable. What team they had at the top of TER wouldn't have made a scoobies .
If you can’t service your debt you’re not making a profit.
liz Cheney gave an interview to Rachel Maddow yesterday, politically thet are miles apart but united in despising the tango toddler
pretty powerful stuff and as Trump was telling Hannity hed 'only be a dictator on day 1'
some worrying stuff was revealed about what trumps allies in government are currently up to
Tuberville retained holds on 11 officers of the most senior rank. According to congressional reporter for Punchbowl News Andrew Desiderio, the positions left vacant are commander of Pacific Air Forces, commander of U.S. Pacific Fleet, Air Component Command for the United States Indo-Pacific Command, commander for Air Combat Command, the head of the Navy’s Nuclear Propulsion Program, the head of Northern Command (which defends the United States and coordinates defenses with Canada, Mexico, and the Bahamas), the head of the U.S. Cyber Command, vice chief of staff of the Army, vice chief of staff of the Air Force, vice chief of Space Operations, and vice chief of Naval Operations.
Last night, Cheney explained to political commentator and television host Rachel Maddow exactly what a second Trump presidency would look like, Cheney said: "He would take those people who are the most radical, the most dangerous, who had the proposals that were the most dangerous, and he will put them in positions of supreme power. That's a risk that we simply cannot take."
Id like to think that American voters wouldn't be stupid enough to vote in trump again, but if they did i could see him being more viscous & damaging this tune round
Id like to think that American voters wouldn’t be stupid enough to vote in trump again, but if they did i could see him being more viscous & damaging this tune round
He is enacting a vendetta against 'the man' and anything, absolutely anything, which can upset 'the man', injure anyone he does not like and benefit himself is to be done.
I had the pleasure of being in the US a couple of weeks ago, and despite the wise strategy of avoiding discussing religion and politics, I couldn't help but gently probe a couple of colleagues/contractors.
One despises Biden because of his energy policy, as his cost of petrol and heating oil has gone up. Totally denied that renewable energy is worthwhile. Claimed not to be a massive fan of Trump, but said that during his presidency his overall cost of living was much lower, and he would vote Republican again.
Another contractor proudly had a MAGA sticker front and centre on his hard hat, so it was fairly evident where he sat on the political spectrum.
Buckle up, it's going to be a wild ride!
Looks like the NY fraud trial might wrap up sooner than anticipated. Trump dissuaded Eric from testifying for the defence last week, which has knocked about 5 days off. Now Trump, who was supposed to be a witness for his own defence tomorrow has said he won't testify now either.
Has he, for once, followed his lawyers' advice?
That's the funny thing...
You hire lawyers to give you legal advice and they act on your instructions...if your lawyer says something along the lines of... 'don't do that, it won't end well'..
well, then... that's one thing, and if you as a client ignore that advice..
The client instructs the lawyer, it's as simple as that.
Boom!
In the election subversion case Jack Smith has just upped the ante by going direct to the Supreme Court with a request that they determine whether trump has immunity from prosecution.
https://edition.cnn.com/2023/12/11/politics/special-counsel-trump-jack-smith/index.html
Interesting - and in some ways it makes sense to get that out the way at the highest level, whichever way it goes.
Clever move as it was clear Trump was just going though all the courts as a delaying tactic. Going straight to the end of the line is quite a statement
The SC may choose to not take the case.
If they decline - and irrespective of an Appeals Court decision - it will still land with them so, please, take the case and make it a priority.
The fraud case against trump has just wrapped up - other than one day of final arguments from both sides in
mid-January and then the decision.
Here's a take on the competence and credibility of trump's final defence witness - and interesting to note that the c$900k fee he received was paid, at least in part, from trump's election campaign funds.
All the trump cases are quite confusing...probably because there are so many of them.
I was under the impression that he's already been found guilty of massive criminal fraud, and these cases are to simply to decide if he gets penalised or not?
Yeah we are only talking about a multi million (maybe billion over the years) dollar fraud and tax evasion, not serious crimes like shoplifting or being black in sight of a police officer.
All the trump cases are quite confusing…probably because there are so many of them.
I was under the impression that he’s already been found guilty of massive criminal fraud, and these cases are to simply to decide if he gets penalised or not?
The NY fraud case where he has already been found guilty is a civil case.
The four other (criminal) cases are:
2 x various attempts to overturn election result
1 x hush money
1 x stashing classified documents
Yeah we are only talking about a multi million (maybe billion over the years) dollar fraud and tax evasion, not serious crimes like shoplifting or being black in sight of a police officer.
Yep, it's amazing. Be a regular person and there really isn't much you can do against the police but be an Alex Jones with a judgement for 1.5 billion against you and the people you owe would rather settle for 6% of that than get nothing because you can stall forever. I think this has always happened but now it is so in your face that it is offensive
I guess the 3 strikes and your out policy also doesn't count for "rich man" crimes.
Has one of the election cases not decided that he is guilty of trying to overturn an election result? Or is there just more murmurings as it trickles along?
Here’s a take on the competence and credibility of trump’s final defence witness
I loved the fact that the prosecution were like "Yeah, we used this idiot as a expert witness and we lost that case, so we know he's a dummy"
The NY fraud case where he has already been found guilty is a civil case.
Not quite - it was established at the outset that there has been fraud. That is that the 'Trump Organisation' has acted fraudulently - the Organisation is Trump, some of the Trump kids and various others acting on their behalf. The trial is establishing who in the organisation perpetrated or participated in that fraud and how the organisation itself will be penalised.
I'm baffled as to what Trump is offering as a defence, but the younger Trumps are claiming that the accountants seemed to be acting on their own volition and that they just trusted that it was all fine and signed stuff.
When I said the fraud case had wrapped up - for clarity, I should have referred to it as 'a hearing' as the fraud determination has already been made by the judge; the hearing has been for both sides to present evidence to allow the judge to assess the amount of 'disgorgement'.
There has been no decision in any of the election cases as they haven't yet reached court.
pisco's list above is incomplete; here's a more comprehensive list of cases against trump... https://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-key-cases-civil-criminal-investigations-lawsuits-updates-2022-7?r=US&IR=T
The four other (criminal) cases are:
2 x various attempts to overturn election result
1 x hush money
1 x stashing classified documents
The hush money one should be a slam-dunk win for Trump, of the two election results trials I think only the Georgia State case represents a prison level threat to him, it's not Federal so he can't make himself immune, the evidence "Brad, I just need eleven thousand and one votes" seems pretty irrefutable on the face of it, and the folks that were spreading the lies about it all have all turned states witness because even they can see that otherwise they're sharing a cell with Trump.
Both of Smith's cases (the other election interference and using a toilet as storage for top secret files) are Federal, if Trump can delay them, he's home free.
The potential fly-in-the-ointment is the jury. Does anyone know whether any or all of the charges/indictments require a unanimous decision or a simple majority (or something else?)
It's gonna be next-to-impossible to select a completely non-partisan jury and jury selection (and constant appeals as is Trump's modus operandi) may stall any guilty verdicts.
trump and E Jean Carroll... https://edition.cnn.com/2023/12/13/politics/e-jean-carroll-trump-immunity/index.html
Intersting to note that the federal appeals court are of the opinion that presidential immunity is 'waivable'; if this goes to the supreme court, will they agree?
There is no way he’s going to prison. I think we all know that at heart. It is America after all. OJ Simpson didn’t go to jail FFS.
I've just had to check the date. Trump is apparently selling swatches of the suit he wore for his indictment hearing......
There is no way he’s going to prison. I think we all know that at heart. It is America after all. OJ Simpson didn’t go to jail FFS.
Don't shatter my dreams...
IMO there's no chance he goes to prison. I actually think this helps him, it plays into the narrative that the 'establishment' or 'deep state' or whatever else you might want to call it are afraid of him and out to stop him running again by whatever means necessary. I actually think this sets a dangerous precedent, there's a very good chance he'll win in 2024 and if he does he'll almost certainly try and use similar tactics against his political opponents.
