Explaining Donald Trump

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Explaining Donald Trump

1Doug1943
Giu 26, 2022, 11:49 am

I've been trying to understand this man since he emerged onto the political stage ... without success. (I am not talking about making a moral evaluation of him, just understanding what makes him tick.)

Here is a very interesting take on him, just published. Not sure how much I agree with it ... I'll wait and see what others say.

https://twilightpatriot.substack.com/p/why-trump-succeeded-where-others

If you go to that site, leave your comments, if any, in its comment section (and then duplicate them here if you want). That will bring together, in that comment section, people coming from different places, not just LibraryThing.

Needless to say, I would be very interested in everyone's comments.

2kiparsky
Giu 27, 2022, 10:57 am

Not going to dive into that sewer to comment there, thanks, but since you seem interested, here's a few reactions:

  • Overall, my impression is that the author seems to think Trump had something to do with the selection of Goresuch, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. He did not. These judges were handed to him, he rubber-stamped them, and others saw to it that they were installed. Trump clearly had no interest in the matter, nor did he have any particular competence to take part in the process if he'd been interested.

  • The author also seems to believe that "Trump succeeded" in overturning Roe, but he seems quite unaware that Trump is pro-choice and in fact was a vigorous procurer of abortion services back when his willy still worked. At this point the question is pretty academic for him, but there's no reason to think that his basic position has changed: he believes that pregnancy is often inconvenient and that he should be allowed to terminate one at will. This is of course the position shared by the anti-choice elite, who know that they and their daughters will always be able to secure abortions and people's right to ownership of their own bodies will only be impeded in proportion to their powerlessness. Clearly, if they thought for a minute that they would be affected by the laws they impose on the populace, they would take a very different position.

  • The author's underlying diagnosis, that Trump "never grew up" seems at least partially correct. Certainly we're talking about someone who never experienced the consequences of his many and well-documented failures. This has been widely observed and was considered by many (both Democrat and Republican) as sufficient reason to oppose his candidacy. It's interesting to see someone on the right finally noticing this, and somewhat annoying that they're unwilling to acknowledge that they're repeating something that was well known and discussed in 2015.

  • When he said that he wanted to build a big, beautiful wall on the southern border, he really meant it. False. This was an ad-lib and Trump was as surprised as anyone when the audience responded to it. He pursued it because it was an applause line, not because he ever cared one way or another about building a wall. This has been widely reported in any number of books on the Trump administration, so for the author to claim ignorance of this fact suggests that they are either willfully ignorant or dishonest, and in either case not someone to be relied on.

  • But at heart, he is still a patriot I see no evidence of this. Certainly he never showed any interest in serving his country at any stage of his life, so it's hard to see what it would mean to call him a "patriot".

  • Skimming ahead to the punchline because I have a day job that wants my attention: The author wants to try to claim that Trump had something to do with the selection of judges. Anyone who actually believes this is an idiot, therefore this author is either an idiot or a liar, and I couldn't give a damn which one turns out to be the case.

3Kuiperdolin
Giu 28, 2022, 3:37 pm

Like many great men throughout history the Donald defies explanation. Such aristocrats of the soul define their circumstances more than they are defined by them, which is why any attempt to rationalise their exploits inevitably fall short. Neither the paradigm they effect not the paradigm they destroy can truly grasp them, much like a hand can't grasp itself.

4Doug1943
Giu 28, 2022, 5:08 pm

>2 kiparsky: Yes, Trump's politics were/are opportunist. He was a Democrat, finally realized that only the Republicans were really patriots any more, and just changed a bunch of his positions so that he wouldn't offend the Christian fundamentalists among them. For some reason, many of them believe that he found Jesus or something.

However, I don't see the argument that Trump is not responsible for the appointment of conservative judges. Of course he didn't have any particular knowledge of who might be qualified to serve as a judge ... the Federalist Society found these people. And of course his legal knowledge is close enough to zero to be its equivalent. But without Trump, they wouldn't have been appointed ... he appointed them, or presented them for confirmation, because he wanted conservativs in the judiciary.

Hey, if we start saying that Presidents can only take credit for their judicial appointments or nominations if they have a deep knowledge of the law ... where does that leave poor old Joe Biden????

5aspirit
Giu 28, 2022, 5:29 pm

For insight into his mind and rise in politics, I recommend reading:

Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man by Mary L. Trump, his cousin, a psychologist

Hiding in Plain Sight: The Invention of Donald Trump and the Erosion of America by Sarah Kendzior

6mikevail
Giu 28, 2022, 5:31 pm

>3 Kuiperdolin:
I'm not sure there are enough LOLs available on the World Wide Web to address this post appropriately.

7Doug1943
Giu 28, 2022, 5:32 pm

>5 aspirit: Thanks for this. I'll put these books on my list. I supported Hilary Clinton in 2016 because I feared Trump would get us into WWIII. I was wrong about that -- she was much more likely to lead us into a big war than Trump was. But he may be President again, so it's good to know what makes him tick.

8aspirit
Giu 28, 2022, 5:42 pm

>4 Doug1943: Hey, if we start saying that Presidents can only take credit for their judicial appointments or nominations if they have a deep knowledge of the law ... where does that leave poor old Joe Biden????

President Joe Biden is a former lawyer who taught law in university, served for several years as Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and had decades of first-hand experience with Supreme Court appointments.

Donald Trump probably can't even remember the names of who is currently on SCOTUS without help.

9aspirit
Modificato: Giu 28, 2022, 5:51 pm

>7 Doug1943: You're welcome.

But, I'm fairly certain Hillary Clinton as POTUS would have condemned Putin, wouldn't have approached Trump's record of bombing civilians, wouldn't have pardoned war criminals, and wouldn't have unapologetically incited a riot on Capital Hill. I mean if you're actually concerned about war, stopping the guy who has been asking violent extremists to prepare for an another Civil War and who seems to have an unrequited crush on Russia's Ukraine-bashing leader probably should be a concern, too.

10Kuiperdolin
Giu 28, 2022, 6:11 pm

>5 aspirit: neither of these books sounds very good or interesting. The Art of the Deal by Donald Trump itself makes for better, heartier reading. One of the best books of the late 20th century, which admittedly is a rather low bar.

11aspirit
Modificato: Giu 28, 2022, 6:28 pm

>10 Kuiperdolin: Journalist Tony Schwartz was the ghostwriter for The Art of the Deal (1987). I agree that book can be insightful. It's partly about Trump's priorities-- mainly, business success or reputation as a business person-- and partly his fantasy of himself.

What Schwartz later shared about the publication of the book is revealing, as well.

Article: "Donald Trump’s Ghostwriter Tells All" (New Yorker, 2016)
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/07/25/donald-trumps-ghostwriter-tells-al...

Interview: "Behind The Art Of The Deal" (NPR, 2020)
https://www.npr.org/transcripts/917908326

edited to improve formatting

12aspirit
Giu 28, 2022, 6:43 pm

Oh, I thought of another book. This one can be an interesting companion to The Art of the Deal for readers who can stomach the content.

Trump Tower (2012) is an Erotica novel that was also originally ghostwritten for Donald Trump blending fiction and nonfiction.

The book was published shortly after his brief campaigning for presidency that year.

13Limelite
Giu 28, 2022, 6:47 pm

"An Interesting Take" on DJT

The MOGUL Has No Defense

14kiparsky
Giu 28, 2022, 11:30 pm

>4 Doug1943: finally realized that only the Republicans were really patriots any more

You really think he believed that, or that that would have mattered to him? He ran as a Republican because he could see that Republicans were easy marks - and he was right.
Probably the only business decision he's ever made on which he didn't lose money.

if we start saying that Presidents can only take credit for their judicial appointments or nominations if they have a deep knowledge of the law ... where does that leave poor old Joe Biden????

Sitting pretty, I'd say. I mean, the man's fucking smart, he's spent his life doing legislation, and he was on the Judiciary committee for about two decades, part of that as chairman. It's kind of hard to think of anyone who's going to have a deeper knowledge of the law or of the nation's Federal judges than Biden. (honestly, you might want to think about the answers to these questions before you ask them)

Now if you want to give Trump credit for being in the room, that's pretty pathetic. Hope Hicks was in the room too, you might as well say she was behind it. She had about as much to do with as Trump did, and she was at least aware of what was going on.

15kiparsky
Giu 28, 2022, 11:31 pm

>10 Kuiperdolin: LOL. Do you suppose he's read it yet?

16Kuiperdolin
Giu 29, 2022, 6:27 am

>11 aspirit: people keep pushing that canard but it's fairly baseless. The Donald's talent as a wordsmith is evident throughout the Art of the Deal, while Schwartz never amounted to anything without riding greater men's coattails. Demonrats crib from Donald Trump, not the other way around.

18kiparsky
Giu 29, 2022, 10:32 am

>16 Kuiperdolin: So you're saying that you believe A Donald wrote this book because he can write, and your evidence that he can write is the text in that book?

I'm sure that people who find that a convincing argument will be convinced by it.

19aspirit
Modificato: Set 8, 2022, 5:00 pm

>16 Kuiperdolin: Trump is likely functional illiterate. I've never seen any evidence that he can comprehend more than a short paragraph of text at a time and an abundance of evidence that he can't.

As a POTUS with a severe reading disability, he needed accomodations on the job-- which would have been totally acceptable, I believe, if he had hired competent people who could help him. The problem is he also avoided the job, leaving many of the White House positions unfilled and spending something such a third of his time on the golf course or elsewhere on his business properties doing who knows what. He fell below the standards of a POTUS, a position that requires strong dedication and a focus on huge amounts of new information, in every way.

Publishing been an expectation for our presidents for a long time, but the only published book he has written the actual words for is a picture book, Our Journey Together. That itself is interesting to me, because he did ensure that it's his own words, apparently at the best of his ability. In the end, it's a stark difference of abilities, as the previous presidents allowed photojournalists to publish the visual books and wrote their own books in full-length prose.

As an aside, I'm slightly amused by the attempt to cast Democrats (you misspelled it) as plagiarists of a Trump. That brings to mind the extremely awkward time the First Lady tried to pass off the previous First Lady's words as her own. Do you remember that? Melania Trump obviously didn't know how to employ a decent writer or ensure her speeches were appropriate.

edit: corrected an important typo (after skimming through the thread to remember the book titles)

20Doug1943
Giu 29, 2022, 6:06 pm

There are several things that need to be separated out when discussing Mr Trump.

First, 'progressivism' vs 'conservatism'. Even if Trump were a combination of Albert Einstein and Mother Teresa, people on the Left would hate him, just as people on the Right would hate Joe Biden if he were the same. That's just standard politics.
Reagan, and the Bushes, were also hated by the Left. Clinton and Obama, by the Right. I personally thought they all were more or less average Americans in their character. (I did think the Republicans were total hypocrites in trying to impeach Bill Clinton, for something probably 95% of male Republican polticians did themselves. I was glad he was acquitted.)

Secondly, there is the issue of Trump's moral character. People on the Right seem to feel the necessity to defend it. That's understandable, but wrong. He happens to be the guy that history has given us. Too bad, but ... you go to war with the army you've got.

I never hear the Left complaining about Al Sharpton, an equally sleazy dishonest character.

Thirdly -- what I'm interested in -- is trying to understand what makes the man tick. Most of the Left are unable to get beyond "Ohhh...he's so wicked!" Most of the Right seem to think he was sent by an Angel.

Okay. So no one really has anything to say about TwilightPatriot's analysis. Let's move on to other things then.

21Limelite
Giu 29, 2022, 8:35 pm

Out of Trump's Mouth

"Deal" is an editorial change to the word Trump wrote himself in the title, "Con."

22prosfilaes
Giu 30, 2022, 12:02 am

>20 Doug1943: Even if Trump were a combination of Albert Einstein and Mother Teresa, people on the Left would hate him,

A man who abandoned his child and a woman who embezzled (frequently reembezzled) funds from overhyped humanitarian work to missionary work.

people on the Right would hate Joe Biden if he were the same. That's just standard politics.

No, it's not standard politics. It's politics in 2020.

I never hear the Left complaining about Al Sharpton, an equally sleazy dishonest character.

A guy who came in fifth in the 2004 Democratic Primaries? I can talk about John Kerry or Bill Clinton, and I've certainly heard liberals talk about how presidents having sex with interns is as grossly inappropriate as CEOs having sex with their interns. But Sharpton is old history, and not important history.

Most of the Left are unable to get beyond "Ohhh...he's so wicked!"

The Left, of course, has written books about what makes him tick, including those listed above. Most of the Left lacks a psychology degree and the time and energy it would take to do any half-way decent psychological analysis of someone without personal contact.

23aspirit
Modificato: Giu 30, 2022, 1:18 pm

>21 Limelite: So no one really has anything to say about TwilightPatriot's analysis.

See >2 kiparsky: someone saying something about TwilightPatriot's Substack post.

what I'm interested in -- is trying to understand what makes the man tick

That's one of our decades most popular mysteries. If the books recommended aren't enough, then there are plenty of lists containing other books by highly qualified professionals in relevant fields.

https://www.librarything.com/tag/Trump%2C+psychology

24Limelite
Lug 1, 2022, 8:26 pm

Understanding Trump Is Achievable

. . .by understanding Trumpty-Dumbpties who truly believe he was sent by God. After all, he's the only president, much less person, who's been known to have a golden effigy made of himself so that his fans can have an idol to worship when he's not around.

25Limelite
Lug 1, 2022, 9:30 pm

Remember This WaPo Trump Rally Photo?



Or this CNN capture?


Or this one?


Or the Golden Calf at CPAC?

26proximity1
Lug 2, 2022, 11:43 am


Really, Doug, for someone as astute as you are, I don't understand what you think you don't understand about Donald J. Trump. The man is just not that mysterious. He is, for better and for worse, very much what he appears to be to both his admirers and his critics.

He's wealthy, vain, has the taste of many such people in decor, food, clothes, furnishings, etc., wants to run things according to his view of how they ought to be run, has many people answering to and serving his demands and a smaller number to whom he's obliged to answer and, in various ways, serve. He's a businessman/politician and not very different in many ways from a lot of them in U.S. politics. Welcome to U.S. politics.

Trump is neither anyone's fool nor the most learned, book-educated of people--in or out of politics. And he is certainly nothing like the monster which The New York Times, CNN, CNBC and much of the rest of the so-called "mainstream media" have portrayed him. None of those personality traits are necessarily or always bad things. Much about the man is and was, indeed, very close to if not precisely what the nation so desperately needed politically--I say that as a now very much disaffected life-long more-than-leaning partisan (Left) Democrat--fan of and part of what Paul Wellstone called "the democratic wing of the Democratic party"--FDR's party, Harry Truman's party, rather than the party of that vile, disgusting bitch, Nancy Pelosi.

27Matke
Modificato: Lug 2, 2022, 12:02 pm

This is the saddest era of US politics ever. What a shame that a sitting President actively and vocally encouraged sedition, said in an interview that Pence deserved to be hanged, and yet is still defended.

28Doug1943
Lug 2, 2022, 7:53 pm

>26 proximity1: Prox. My 'domestic' politics are pretty much that of an FDR/JFK Democrat -- which was my family background, although I moved Left as I grew up. But the issues we used to fight about back in the early 60s have long been superseded by much more profound ones.

On Trump: if he were an ordinary person, I suppose I would 'understand' him. There are plenty of bar-stool conservatives who sound like him. What I don't understand is how someone who seems so stupid is a billionaire.

But youi go to war with the army you've got. As I said elsewhere, I would have voted for Hillary in 2016, out of fear Trump would get us into a nuclear war. In fact, she was more likely to do that.

But never mind, what we have, we have. I do hope he doesn't run in 2024.

What the Lefties here can't understand is his popularity. That's not too hard to figure out. It's his pedigree, the fact that he's not a tradtional Republican, a whatever-the-Chamber-of-Commerce wants Republican. He's 'sincere'.

My real concern is this: someone with his politics -- rather, the good parts of his politics, but consistent - who was not narcissitic and impulsive, could have an even broader appeal than he has. The Left is overplaying its hand --defund the police, introduce hate-America Critical Race Theory into the schools, the sexualization of children ... this is driving the broad middle towards us. But Trump repels them.

Anyway, we'll see what happens in November.

29Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 3, 2022, 4:29 pm

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-considering-early-2024-announcement-amid-...
Trump considering early 2024 announcement amid opposition from other Republicans: reports

***
Trump is seeing red because many of his former administration's enablers have decided "in the nick of time" to let the world see the loyalty-to-America cards they have kept well-hidden for several years.

30aspirit
Modificato: Set 8, 2022, 5:04 pm

I'm already sick of seeing "TRUMP 2024" around town. The people with money in this area are still using "Make America Great Again" beneath the name, no less.

There are obviously people here who think their holy leader / king will save them from the oh-so-terrifying migrant workers (who are picking our food, busy avoiding enslavers, and trying to avoid entering this overtly racist city) and other "Mexicans" (many of who aren't actually Mexican), "the Gays" (and it is a little funny how people can pronounce capitals), and Liberals. Because people like me spread, you know, demonic mind cooties.

Stop beating your children~ and learn to talk to them like people~ oooh~ cooties~

What's generally interesting to me is who's being worshipped.

In my view, Don the Con is obviously a spoiled, foul-mouthed, badly educated brat who hasn't had to challenge his sense of entitlement or attempt to heal from childhood trauma in his 70+ years. (For the record, I don't completely dislike brattiness but believe that's extremely inappropriate public behavior for a politician or any type of supervisor.) He has highly suspicious business and political connections that are exactly what's expected from someone who cares more about status as a business elite than helping people.

He doesn't care about the American people as a whole. He doesn't care about Republicans as anything as a source of lackeys. The wellbeing of his voters is unimportant except when he remembers they can die in large numbers from mutated pathogens during a major outbreak.

Yet he's adored.

To the majority of voters in my neighborhood, he's like secret royalty. It's as if he needs public support to claim his rightful throne, and his supporters are eager to see him miraculously create the ideal community from their imagination. They play the role of loyal consumers he wants them to while they daydream of being faithful subjects.

There's a certain disconnect in the worlds we live in. It's fascinating, and it's horrifying in its similarity to past trends.

edited: corrected typos

31prosfilaes
Lug 3, 2022, 4:49 pm

>28 Doug1943: What the Lefties here can't understand is his popularity.

He's a classic populist. Professor John McNeill gave him 47 out of 76 Benitos, and what worked for the classic fascists still works for him. Duh.

He's 'sincere'.

To some people, he appears sincere; I guess because he believes whatever he's saying when he's saying it.

The Left is overplaying its hand --defund the police, introduce hate-America Critical Race Theory into the schools, the sexualization of children ... this is driving the broad middle towards us.

Again, that's propaganda. "Defund the police" is about as frequent among the left as "the Jews will not replace us" is on the Right. As the Left keeps pointing out, Critical Race Theory is an idea studied at the graduate level, not the elementary schools. The sexualization of children is pure nonsense; letting kids know that Heather has two mommies is no different than letting them know that Dick and Jane have a mommy and a daddy. If accepting gender fluidity is sexualization, how much more is separating kids into two rigid groups by their genitalia? It's just dog whistles, a way of complaining about the Gays in a society where that broad middle no longer cares about them.

32Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 3, 2022, 9:45 pm

Trump is popular because his can-do scripted personality was a fixture in homes for well over a decade via the Apprentice. Viewers became very comfortable with his TV personality "joining them in their homes" on a regular basis. They are unable and/or unwilling to separate that scripted Trump from the actual man. In their minds the scripted guy is the real deal. It is an outrage that the outtakes from that show have been hidden from the general public.

33mamzel
Lug 4, 2022, 2:41 pm

I, for one, never watched The Apprentice. Even the occasional clips of him saying, "You're fired!" with that mean, smug attitude was too much for me.

342wonderY
Lug 4, 2022, 3:45 pm

>33 mamzel: Reality TV helped to make us a less thoughtful and less kind and generous society. It’s also very lazy programming.

35mamzel
Lug 5, 2022, 3:15 pm

>34 2wonderY: The only examples of this genre I have enjoyed are Project Runway and Top Chef, both of which (along with a little drama) have contestants showing generosity and becoming friends.

362wonderY
Lug 5, 2022, 3:30 pm

>35 mamzel: Yes, I too make exceptions for HGTV type shows. The cooking and gardening ones especially.

372wonderY
Modificato: Lug 7, 2022, 11:18 am

Politico revealed a two-minute trailer for the documentary about the Trump family by British filmmaker Alex Holder. With extraordinary access to the family, Holder witnessed what the trailer portrays as the attempt of the Trump family to create an American dynasty, and its determination to hold onto power even if it meant the destruction of American democracy.

https://substack.com/redirect/6ff4899a-7099-4530-9675-f3e07d6cf73b?u=56275790

38mamzel
Lug 7, 2022, 4:09 pm

.37 My question is why didn't he bring forth his info to the 1/6 Committee earlier than he did?

392wonderY
Lug 7, 2022, 4:24 pm

>38 mamzel: $$$ probably. Do documentaries make money?

40proximity1
Lug 8, 2022, 12:19 pm

>28 Doug1943:

Trump is decried by his desperate adversaries as intellectually deficient or, as "stupid" and all manner of similar terms. Ask the fifteen some other primary candidates he faced and defeated in his 2016 presidential bid if he's "stupid" and then ask them what, if so, it says about the American electorate that such a "stupid" man could be preferred over so many others in a primary race and then go on to defeat what were supposedly the most elite and experienced minds in the opposition party--and its candidate, Hillary Clinton.

"But you go ("one goes") to war with the army you've ("one has") got."

As a stock phrase, we might say that. But in democratic electoral politics, actually, it's more the case that varied groups muster an "army" of their devising, their "creation", (i.e. an electoral campaign"), not "what they've got" (i.e. what they're 'given') Those who didn't like "what they'd got" in Trump were free to--and I suppose did--"get someone else" for their candidate or, having none, stayed out of contest at the ballot box. (I've just returned a mail-in ballot for the 2020 primary federal races. I chose to write in a candidate--one who, it happens, is already assured a place (as an independent) on the November ballot--where I'll also vote for him. But nothing stopped me from preferring his name as write-in to that of the otherwise unopposed Democratic party candidate on the primary ballot for my U.S. congressional district. So, rather than fight "with that candidate" as offered to me by the erstwhile party of my natural "political home", the Democrats, I cast a primary vote against that primary candidate chosen "for" me by the county Democrats' organization--in part because he is a bog standard Democrat apparatchik of the Pelosi sort which I so despise and, even more, because he's the serving incumbent--and, as things now stand, with the Paul Wellstones of the Democratic party gone, I'd vote against virtually any incumbent Democrat candidate in a primary Congressional race.

Here, with the gutless ouster of Prime Minister Boris Johnson in an outrageous virtual coup by organized with the unrelenting year-long service of a thoroughly partisan '"Re-"mainstream media'--the bloody-minded vindictive losers of the national referendum which saw British voters decisively choose to leave membership in the European Union after having become thoroughly fed up with some forty years of insult and injury from that body, we have a most spectacular example of what can happen when democratic processes and institutions are subject to the ex-post facto veto and reversal of a partisan cadre--even one nominally the "same" party as that of its ousted victim!--of apparatchiks can decide they despise the popular vote's outcome and shall reverse it--even if that takes years of unrelenting media propaganda and a torch-and-pitchfork like cabal of officeholders bent on poisoning and undermining the body politic from their positions in parliament (what's called "the parliamentary party") and from within the Prime Minister's own cabinet membership.

Imagine Nixon's famous "Saturday Night Massacre" in reverse-- with these differences: rather than a paranoid crook with a long history of devious political undertakings as the Executive office target of the putsch, that describes the coup-makers, the plotters against Johnson. And, rather than being exposed and brought to figurative and literal justice both in the political and judicial institutions of the nation by the conscientious diligence of the profession of the national press, these latter were the instrumental hand-in-glove accomplices of the coup-makers.

For those Americans not familiar with this shameful democratic débâcle, it only superficially sprang from a distinct and tawdry trivial incident --too common here among the elected or appointed officialdom: a conservative party member of parliament who was also a deputy chief "whip"--a man whose official duties charged him with helping supervise and enforce, through the time-tested means of carrot-and-stick, the party discipline required by the party's senior operatives, in matters of voting on measures before the House of Commons--was, while thoroughly inebriated at the bar of the Conservative party's longstanding traditional private club, went so far as to, according to allegations, clumsily and openly grope two others--fellow conservative members of parliament--drinking nearby. The incident at first, as so often the case, was brushed off by those who'd suffered this indignity from their fellow member. And, except for its evident later usefulness as a bludgeon against the prime minister--who, having eventually been informed of it--did nothing beyond letting it lay where it was, between those immediately involved as groper and "grope-ee" with, at most, a private discussion with the groper and his (drunk's) word not to repeat the behavior.

That tawdry little trivial and brief drunken incident, in fine is what was supposedly so momentous as to have been the grounds deemed sufficient to send the prime minister prematurely out of office -- on the threat of a renewed vote of "no confidence"--only possible by a revision of party rules, since he'd only recently survived such a challenge and, under the party's rules as they stood, was not again subject to such a vote for another 12 months. But, for the coup plotters, that wouldn't do. So they determined to demand a change in party rules instead of having to abide by them and wait.

This whole affair is the sort of stuff which a Vladimir Putin could regard as sheer genius in a pre-arranged plan to put an adversary in an untenable position--through deft use of weak and vulnerable people who could be counted on to do something mildly scandalous--given the sordid sex-and-drinking culture of British officialdom--which could be used as an effective lever. Because the British public are actually now that childishly naive and prudish--they could be counted on to react on cue with the required media-hypped outrage.

41kiparsky
Lug 8, 2022, 1:09 pm

>40 proximity1: So, I'm getting a theme here. You've got a thing for overweight blondes with hair issues and no particular accomplishments or talents apart from recreational procreation on a pay-to-play basis who fumble their way into leadership roles and screw them up beyond belief, to nobody's surprise except their own?

That's pretty niche, but I'm sure you can hire someone to role-play that with you. It's a big old world out there.

42Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 9, 2022, 1:53 pm

https://www.mediaite.com/politics/mick-mulvaney-says-trump-white-house-source-to...
Mick Mulvaney Says Trump White House Source Told Him Mark Meadows Had a ‘Nervous Breakdown’ on Jan. 6

.....“I was talking with a friend of mine during the testimony last week and I was texting back and forth,” Mulvaney said on Friday. “And this person was in the West Wing during the Jan. 6 riots. And I said, ‘You know, if I listen to Cassidy closely, it sounds like Mark was either completely incompetent at the job or was having a nervous breakdown.'”

Mulvaney explained the source told him, “It was a little bit of both.”.....

***
Mark Meadows has always been Trump's #1 stooge. On 1/6 Mark allowed Trump to be Trump, as usual. That is THE reason Trump chose him to be his Chief-of-Staff. Dudes lacking a conscience do not have nervous breakdowns.

43Molly3028
Lug 15, 2022, 7:54 am

https://www.mediaite.com/news/trump-gets-torched-after-msnbcs-andrea-mitchell-fl...
Trump Gets TORCHED After MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Flags Fundraising Button in Ivana Trump Condolence Email: ‘What a Sh*tty Human’

***
This is his life-long MO.

One twitter post ~
Dear God, you took the wrong Trump.

44lriley
Lug 15, 2022, 12:01 pm

>43 Molly3028: Every time you think this guy hits the bottom he finds a way to go even lower.

45aspirit
Lug 15, 2022, 12:33 pm

>44 lriley: He's done much worse.

And I doubt his family was surprised in the least that the fundraising button wasn't removed from the tribute. He's certainly not expected to apologize for it.

46aspirit
Lug 15, 2022, 1:02 pm

I just now learned Ivana Trump was credited for writing a few books, including Raising Trump.

Note that the title is misleading. It's not specifically about how Donald Trump acts so childish at home, his wife feels as if the elderly man is still a boy, as Melania Trump has suggested. However, it does describe what the businessman was like as a father before his children were old enough to work for him.

https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2017/10/ivana-trump-donald-trump-jr-memoir

47Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 18, 2022, 5:43 pm

https://www.mediaite.com/entertainment/joe-rogan-calls-donald-trump-a-man-baby-t...
Joe Rogan Calls Trump a ‘Man Baby,’ Theorizes He Was on Adderall During His Presidency

Apprentice-days' clues mentioned.

48lriley
Lug 18, 2022, 5:40 pm

Rogan and Musk are going to bat for Florida's fascist governor. Trump doesn't like that. He probably really does view another candidacy as a way around his legal problems and DeSantis has a lot of crust even thinking about it before Donald makes his big announcement......so he's been throwing shade at both Elon and Ron. They're all contemptible.

49Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 21, 2022, 5:17 pm

https://www.mediaite.com/news/melania-trump-tells-fox-news-why-she-didnt-condemn...
Melania Trump Tells Fox News Why She Didn’t Condemn Jan. 6: She Had No Idea It Was Happening

***
She is the perfect wife for a DJT type. Her commitment to Trump's mindset has been bought and paid for many times over the years ~ let Trump be Trump ~ my son and I are set for life.

50Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 23, 2022, 7:24 pm

Trump has been a liberal ALL of his adult life. He is spewing conservative talking points now because that has allowed him to turn his decades of celebrity in NYC into an era of world-wide fame and fortune beyond his wildest dreams. Just thinking about his millions of clueless cult followers must be giving him a daily "fix" no drug on the planet could possibly give him ~ working stiffs willing hand him, a billionaire, their hard-earned money every day of the week.

51Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 23, 2022, 7:34 pm

Trump's present-day con game fits in perfectly with the mindset of his Christian cult followers. They see giving money to Trump as a religious duty because they believe God sent him our way to "fix" 21st Century America.

52lriley
Modificato: Lug 23, 2022, 10:37 pm

Cadet Draftdodger Bonespurs tells his Turning Point USA audience tonight that when he was President he wanted to give himself the Congressional Medal of Honor but ‘they’ wouldn’t let him do it. A novel approach to that award anyway. It’s always like some soldier/sailor doing something outrageously courageous to take a position or save other soldiers/sailors lives and about half the time they go home in a body bag if there are enough pieces left to bring home. It’s kind of like the first box you need to check even to be eligible is to serve in the military……something that we all know even Prox and Kuiper know…..that Mr. Donald refused to do when the Vietnam War was raging on. ‘What me?!?!!—that’s for the suckers’. Anyone in that crowd tonight who may have actually served in the military would know what moronic drivel that shit was. How they could listen to that…..well whatever….General Michael Fucking Flynn are you still alive? What do you think of that you shithead.

53Matke
Modificato: Lug 25, 2022, 7:29 am

>52 lriley: I yield to no one in my contempt for Mr. Trump. But he was making a joke. One can easily hear the audience laughing. It’s a stupid joke, in poor taste, and he’s not a noted raconteur, but still, a joke.

Far more telling is the clip entitled “Outtake” showing him completely unwilling, on January 7, to say that the election was over. The clip is revealing in many ways.

ETA
Here’s the link

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jul/21/trump-i-dont-want-say-election-o...

54Molly3028
Modificato: Lug 26, 2022, 8:22 am

By November 2020 a majority of voters had reached the enough-is-enough point in the Apprentice 2.0 show being played out in the White House on a daily basis. Trump, however, wanted to generate four more years of daily chaos. A coup could be a perfect way to continue the series OR end it with a never-to-be-forgotten grand finale which would be analyzed by historians for the remainder of the century.

55Molly3028
Lug 31, 2022, 11:27 am

https://www.businessinsider.com/ivana-trump-gravesite-trump-national-golf-club-t...
Ivana Trump was buried near the first hole of Trump National Golf Club. Her gravesite could offer tax breaks for the business.

Under New Jersey state tax code, any land that is dedicated to cemetery purposes is exempt from all taxes, rates, and assessments. Cemetery companies are also specifically exempt from paying any real estate taxes, rates, and assessments or personal property taxes on their lands, as well as business taxes, sales taxes, income taxes, and inheritance taxes.

562wonderY
Lug 31, 2022, 12:23 pm

>55 Molly3028: I saw a picture. Surprisingly modest and scrubby.

57aspirit
Lug 31, 2022, 6:43 pm

>55 Molly3028: Despite everything we've seen the past several years, I thought at first that was a prank title. But, no, of course not.

Several sources confirm the location, without any mention of the tax breaks. Examples...

https://theancestory.com/ivana-trump-buried/

https://www.thecut.com/2022/07/ivana-trumps-funeral-got-a-little-dark.html (last line)

The grave site itself is... interesting... especially when considering how flashy Ivana and the rest of the Trumps are in life.

https://nypost.com/2022/07/28/photos-show-ivana-trumps-grave-at-trump-national-g...

58rastaphrog
Lug 31, 2022, 10:16 pm

>55 Molly3028: The big question is, does one grave make all of the land "dedicated" to being a cemetery? And I've never heard anything about Trump having a cemetery company.

59kiparsky
Ago 1, 2022, 12:36 am

>58 rastaphrog: I suppose the question is, do the tax savings outweigh the filing fees and lawyering charges required to make this work?

I suspect they do, because I can't think of any other reason why he would have wanted to put her grave there - presumably there's an opportunity cost to dedicating this scrap of his presumably profit-making land to the perpetual housing of his dead ex-wife, and it would be cheaper and less weird to have stuck her in a regular old boneyard, so he must have had some reason for doing this, and we all know that Trump has done much more questionable things to avoid contributing a nickel to the common good of the country he hates so very much.

60lriley
Modificato: Ago 1, 2022, 7:33 am

There was an article I read yesterday in Business Insider that in 2007 Donald wanted to put a mausoleum with 4 obelisks on this same golf course but it was rejected by the community because among other issues they considered the plan too garish.

61Kuiperdolin
Ago 1, 2022, 4:52 pm

A wise precaution. Antifa scum and other liberal goons have been known to defile tombs and grave markers with the tacit encouragement of the authorities, but on private grounds the Trump clan can hire adequate security to make sure her final rest is not disturbed.

62Molly3028
Modificato: Ago 1, 2022, 5:16 pm

Someone here fell into a very deep sleep back in the "good old days." He woke up this morning in a 21st Century world he despises.

63aspirit
Modificato: Ago 1, 2022, 11:59 pm

Ivana Trump was a fascist? Is that what conservatives think? I'm so confused what's being spread around now.

Regarding location... many states allow burials on personal property. It is highly suggestive of unstated intentions that the Trumps chose existing commercial property to start a graveyard.

It's also weird that it's a golf course.

edited to correct the spelling of "conmercial"

64kiparsky
Ago 1, 2022, 11:23 pm

>61 Kuiperdolin: Antifa scum and other liberal goons have been known to defile tombs and grave markers with the tacit encouragement of the authorities

I'm not familiar with these incidents. Citations? Or are you just making stuff up again?

65John5918
Ago 1, 2022, 11:27 pm

>61 Kuiperdolin:

Since you refer to people who are against fascism as "scum", does that mean that you are in favour of fascism?

66Kuiperdolin
Ago 2, 2022, 2:20 am

Even for you that's dumb

67lriley
Modificato: Ago 2, 2022, 6:44 am

>66 Kuiperdolin: Can't answer with a simple yes or no?

FWIW a main reason for Donald seems to be tax avoidance and he is quite the tax cheat.

68John5918
Modificato: Ago 2, 2022, 7:37 am

>66 Kuiperdolin:

If it's dumb not to know everything, then maybe I am dumb. But it's not dumb to ask a question about something I don't understand, so that I will get to know - if somebody is helpful enough to answer my question.

69aspirit
Ago 2, 2022, 8:01 am

As the political f-word has come up again in context of the Trumps....

"Is Donald Trump a fascist?" (Vox.com | Jan 14, 2021)
https://www.vox.com/22225472/fascism-definition-trump-fascist-examples

Personally, I have no problem with people who want to describe Trump as a fascist in efforts to condemn him or convey the gravity of his offenses. I do, however, think people who use the term should be aware of the risks — of why it’s important we use it correctly.
— Dylan Matthews (a founder of Vox.com)

Most of the experts referenced argued that Trump isn't smart or coherent enough to be labeled fascist, which seems to me as if it's both exalting fascists of the past and ignoring how incompetence can be indistinguishable from deliberate malignancy. But like most political protestors, I'm no expert on the words for authoritarians (or CEOs who don't understand government).

Cited:
• Robert Paxton, a Columbia University historian of fascism and Vichy France
• Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a historian at NYU and author
• Sheri Berman, a professor of political science at Barnard College and SME on European politics in the 1930s
• Matthew Feldman, director of the Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right
• Robert Paxton, the Columbia professor and author of The Anatomy of Fascism
• Roger Griffin, professor of history and political theory at Oxford Brookes University
• Stanley Payne, a University of Wisconsin historian of Spain
• Richard J. Evans, the Cambridge historian and leading chronicler of the Third Reich
• Erica De Bruin, assistant professor of government at Hamilton College (commenting on what's not a coup)
• Kieran Healy, sociologist (also for the meaning of coup)
• Lawrence Britt, writer of the famous "warning signs of fascism"
• Omar Wasow, Princeton political scientist
• John Ganz, writer
• Robert Mickey, University of Michigan political scientist

70lriley
Ago 2, 2022, 12:40 pm

I think there is a little more flexibility in the term than some of these experts who want precision in their language would have it. Mussolini for sure was the head of the Italian fascists but around or near the same time there were others notably in Spain who emulated the Italian fascists but brought their own variances to the term. It was a hodgepodge of disparate groups banding together to build a movement to undermine and destroy the democratic electoral process and as in Italy they succeeded (though not for some in the way they would have envisioned when they started out). And I think that pretty much sums up what Donald and his friends tried to do. Donald is a would be dictator who attained power and tried to hold onto it through illegal means even calling on a mob of his voters (included among them people who wouldn't have an issue declaring themselves fascists) to use violence to do so. It doesn't matter how fucking smart he or his cronies or his mob was really, does it? Maybe I'm wrong but I never really looked at Mussolini as the smartest guy either.

71prosfilaes
Ago 2, 2022, 9:58 pm

How Fascist is President Trump; there's still a formula for that is the second of two articles; at the end of his administration he was awarded "47 of a possible 76 Benitos, or 62 percent."

72Molly3028
Modificato: Ago 5, 2022, 12:49 pm

https://www.mediaite.com/news/lets-sue-cnn-trump-raising-money-from-lawsuit-he-t...
‘Let’s SUE CNN!’ Trump Raising Money From Lawsuit He Totally IS Going to File Because He Says So in Email to YOU

.....I’m calling on my best and most dedicated supporters to add their names to stand with me in my impending LAWSUIT against Fake News CNN.

Stop what you’re doing RIGHT NOW and add your name to the form below or by following this link. >>

That link takes you to a donation page that subtly suggests a $250.00 donation — and includes a pre-checked box making it a recurring payment. When you try to click away, a flashing alert commands you to “FINISH YOUR DONATION!”.....

***
I wonder how many millions he will collect from his clueless cult followers this time around.

73Kuiperdolin
Ago 6, 2022, 1:25 pm

>68 John5918: it's dumb to post stupid junk and doubly so when it's in obvious bad faith. Libs on this board criticise anti-crime all the time and if I'd dare suggest it makes you pro-crime you'd squeal like a stuck pig.

74John5918
Ago 6, 2022, 2:43 pm

>73 Kuiperdolin:

There is really no point in responding to you as you are not listening, but for the record, how do you ascertain that someone who asks a question is posting in bad faith? A bit of projection there, perhaps? Assuming everyone is like you?

75Molly3028
Modificato: Ago 7, 2022, 11:50 am

Trump's summer of 22

He is the center of attention in the dog days of summer
He is happily scr*wing with the GOP
He is happily scr*wing with the media
and
He is entertaining his clueless cult followers while he continues to pick their pockets

What more could a loony, 76-year-old narcissist ex-president want out of life???

77Molly3028
Ago 8, 2022, 9:32 am

https://www.mediaite.com/trump/trump-reportedly-raged-at-his-fcking-generals-ove...
Trump Reportedly Raged at His ‘F*cking Generals’ Over Lack of Absolute Loyalty: ‘Why Can’t You Be Like’ Hitler’s Generals?

78aspirit
Modificato: Ago 8, 2022, 11:07 am

>77 Molly3028: The quote is from the upcoming book The Divider: Trump in the White House, 2017-2021 (not yet on LibraryThing) by journalist and news editor Susan Glasser. But I feel as if I've seen it before. Perhaps that's because there are Trump has been quoted comparing himself to Adolf Hitler and his staff to Nazis many times.

He's also reportedly praised Hilter.

"Well, Hitler did a lot of good things," Trump told then-White House chief of staff General John Kelly during an official visit to Europe to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the end of World War I, according to White House reporter Michael Bender in Frankly, We Did Win This Election.

Source: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/jul/06/donald-trump-hitler-michael-bend...

The "good things" were apparently economical, as President Trump showed no concern about the human lives and knowledge lost.

That 2018 trip was the one during which he refused to visit Aisne-Marne American Cemetery in Paris and was said to call the Americans who died in service "losers" and "suckers".

The Atlantic was more specific about what the "impromptu history lesson" about WWI reported in other news media. "Trump, on that same trip, asked aides, 'Who were the good guys in this war?' He also said that he didn’t understand why the United States would intervene on the side of the Allies."

This would have been scandalous with any other POTUS. With President Trump, it's often passed off as being expected for someone so ignorant and hostile to his own government for the sake of making himself money, as if that's somehow acceptable from the leader of the federal administration.

He's just expected to care only about his own personal interests with an immature understanding of himself.

The 1990 Vanity Fair "After the Gold Rush" exposé on Donald Trump after the dissolution of his high-profile marriage with (the now recently deceased) Ivana Trump strangely touched on Hitler's Germany.

Donald Trump appears to take aspects of his German background seriously. John Walter works for the Trump Organization, and when he visits Donald in his office, Ivana told a friend, he clicks his heels and says, "Heil Hitler," possibly as a family joke.

His vision of himself was different, though. Trump was again quoted as saying he wanted to be "the king of cash".

79aspirit
Ago 9, 2022, 6:03 pm

>76 Molly3028: Ah-ha! I didn't know what those images were about but figured an explanation would show up eventually.

https://www.axios.com/2022/02/10/maggie-haberman-book-trump-papers

White House correspondent Maggie Haberman shared in a forthcoming book, Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America, that while President Trump lived there, White House staff periodically discovered wads of printed paper clogging a toilet. They said they believed the president was the one who had flushed pieces of documents.

80aspirit
Ago 11, 2022, 7:42 am

What I learned today: Donald Trump has a well-known habit of tearing up official documents—"what some people described as his unofficial 'filing system.'"

"Meet the guys who tape Trump's papers back together" (Politico | 2018)
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/10/trump-papers-filing-system-635164

My child used to do this, too, when she was playing spy. The difference was that her documents were actually made of scribbles on scratch paper and didn't belong in a goverment regulated filing system.

Under the Presidential Records Act {of 1978}, the White House must preserve all memos, letters, emails and papers that the president touches, sending them to the National Archives for safekeeping as historical records.

But White House aides realized early on that they were unable to stop Trump from ripping up paper after he was done with it and throwing it in the trash or on the floor, according to people familiar with the practice. Instead, they chose to clean it up for him, in order to make sure that the president wasn’t violating the law.

81kiparsky
Ago 11, 2022, 2:50 pm

>80 aspirit: To be clear, he was definitely violating the law. I suspect that some folks would scoff at the Presidential; Records Act as a sort of bureaucratic nonsense, particularly when it's their guy who's violating it, but it's definitely a violation of the law to destroy those documents - even if your attempt to destroy them fails.

82aspirit
Ago 11, 2022, 3:37 pm

>81 kiparsky: I've been trying to imagine what would have happened if anyone I had worked with in a government office had torn documents like that. I can't. That behavior is too bizarre and counter to the way records are handled. It's risky enough in some business situations but obviously a big problem in the Oval Office.

He was definitely stretching the law if not breaking it just with that.

In a Florida city, we had to document everything that was shredded or otherwise destroyed. Almost none of what I dealt with were associated with the federal government. (Tax documents were in different departments.)

When I worked a federal job, even scratchpaper notes were considered government documents that had to be turned in depending on when and why they were made, and I was a low-level worker with low-level security clearance.

Compare that to Donald Trump's responsibility. He was POTUS!

Either he didn't comprehend his position or didn't care, actually believing he should do whatever he wanted regardless of laws or ethical standards.

83mamzel
Ago 12, 2022, 2:35 pm

In the news this morning I read that Trump asserts he declassified the documents. Does he have proof of that? It is reported that Presidents have the right to do that. Does that right extend to former Presidents, too?

84aspirit
Ago 12, 2022, 2:41 pm

>83 mamzel: If he officially declassified documents, the Archives would know. Those wouldn't be classified anymore.

Those documents would also still belong to the government, not to him. He wasn't allowed to take neither the declassifoed nor the classified documents that were supposed to be archived.

85aspirit
Ago 12, 2022, 2:48 pm

Oh, and no, former presidents do not have the same administrative rights as an acting president. He has a security detail through the Secret Service and some other retirement benefits along with whatever social reputation he maintains. That's about it. Just he's not supposed to use the presidential seal, he's not supposed to represent himself as an active president in arguments. He can't legally execute presidential powers.

It's funny that he argues on the same day that he's a regular citizen and the actual POTUS.

86mamzel
Ago 13, 2022, 2:58 pm

After I made that post yesterday I listened to an explanation about the very lengthy and involved process of declassification. It involved the participation of government departments giving their approval for the declassification. It doesn't sound probable that Trump would have done that with all of the documents he absconded with. I would also imagine we might have heard something from those departments.

He made it sound like all he had to do was wave a wand over a file and abracadabra, presto-chango, it's declassified.

87kiparsky
Modificato: Ago 14, 2022, 1:27 pm

>86 mamzel: He made it sound like all he had to do was wave a wand over a file and abracadabra, presto-chango, it's declassified.

I'm pretty sure he believes that's how it works.

What's really alarming is he probably also believes he did the magic wand thing.

88JGL53
Modificato: Ago 14, 2022, 5:08 pm

Time for a joke break:

In the FBI prosecution of the search warrant they opened and searched tRUMP's personal safe, even though it was set up with a "face recognition" feature.

No problem - in anticipation one of the FBI agents had brought along a rotten Jack o' lantern.

89prosfilaes
Ago 15, 2022, 12:20 am

>86 mamzel: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/14/us/politics/trump-classified-documents.html talks about this; I don't see any reason why the President would have to discuss with anyone when declassifying something, and it seems it has been done before. The article mocks the idea that the President could have silently declassified works, but it seems possible, if obnoxious. Fortunately, none of the statues under which they executed the search warrant mentioned classified works.

90aspirit
Modificato: Ago 15, 2022, 10:23 am

>89 prosfilaes: The possibility is tinier than your post seems to make it out to be. Trump's ridiculous advisors are making a huge reach for not only presidential powers. They're saying Trump has the right as a former president to act against other former presidents but also the current administration.

Federal officials are getting told to take Trump's word after the fact without documentation of his intentions while he was in office. Think about that. He and his private crew are saying he may legally modify and retain for his private use documents that are supposed to be accessible to the highest levels of the current federal administration.

As the NYT author said, "Can a president secretly declassify information without leaving a written record or telling anyone? That question, according to specialists in the law of government secrecy, is borderline incoherent."

Has any other president done it? I want to address the example given with one of the President Bushes but feel that's off-topic. So let's circle back around to what the latest events say about Donald Trump.

Something that's becoming increasingly clear to me is that his most frustrating traits built up his current legal situation. What do we know about him after his time in one of the highest profile positons in the world? He's ignorant of how the US goverment works, careless with information, surrounded by incompetent people he's hired, untrustworthy on security matters, and greedy. That he'll likely be remembered most for holding government documents in one of his homes after leaving office seems fitting.

(Speaking of greed, look at how this wealthy man with several houses and one of the country's more prominent business organizations is yet again asking for monetary donations from his supporters while so many Americans struggle to meet basic needs after he profited from an elected position. We need new words to describe this guy.)

edited for formatting

91kiparsky
Ago 15, 2022, 11:32 am

>89 prosfilaes: I'm interested in why you think this "seems possible". The idea that you would "declassify" a document without telling the agencies responsible seems, in the words of the document, "borderline incoherent".

What would it mean to "declassify" a document secretly, and what would be the consequences for record administration and handling, if presidents - and past presidents! - were allowed, essentially, to retroactively declassify and reclassify documents on a whim?

92prosfilaes
Ago 15, 2022, 8:21 pm

>91 kiparsky: I'm interested in why you think this "seems possible". The idea that you would "declassify" a document without telling the agencies responsible seems, in the words of the document, "borderline incoherent".

If a president has decided to release a document, why do they need anyone else's approval? The whole classification system is basically under his control. It's like the President personally giving orders to SEALs during an op; it's nuts, but as Commander-in-Chief, he can do it.

What would it mean to "declassify" a document secretly,

It would mean to make it legal to possess without a security clearance. If you want some 11-dimensional chess/Tom Clancy stuff, the President could give some data to a low-level flunky and if he got caught by the FBI as led by the evil government agents, boom, the documents are clearly marked as declassified by the President, and the evil group has to blow its cover to attack the flunky.

what would be the consequences for record administration and handling, if presidents - and past presidents! - were allowed, essentially, to retroactively declassify and reclassify documents on a whim?

I believe that most presidents have believed they had the right to declassify documents on a whim. It's not a job that should be taken by someone who can't handle that reasonably, and they reasonably have worked through the agencies. It could be argued that declassification takes some affirmative action that Trump didn't take. I just think there's enough legal questions that a prosecutor might like to walk down more clear legal lines.

93kiparsky
Modificato: Ago 16, 2022, 2:02 am

>92 prosfilaes: If a president has decided to release a document, why do they need anyone else's approval?

He may not need anyone else's approval - that is, it may be that the president can tell NARA "this document needs to be declassified" and it'll happen, I don't know how much authority the review process has - but him saying he decided it was supposed to be declassified doesn't mean it was declassified. It's sort of like issuing an executive order - it doesn't just happen because the president says "I order that such-and-such", he's actually got to formally issue the order or it didn't happen. In the same way, he might say "gosh, I'd like to declassify that document", but there is a process defined in law, and unless you take those steps, the document is still classified. (you can probably come up with other examples of process limitations on presidential power - for example, the president can order the Attorney General to fire a special prosecutor, but unless the Attorney General does so, the special prosecutor is not fired)

While I don't have the statutes in front of me, I can assure you that there is a lot of law and a lot of regulation around declassification, and declassification is a whole specialty in archiving. I won't go into how I know this stuff except to say that my partner is an archivist and I've spent a lot of time over the last ten years (er, yeah, let's say ten...) listening to archivist shop talk. The upshot of that: I promise you that "secret declassification" isn't a thing.

But don't take my word for it. If you want to find out whether the material is classified, just ask NARA for it. If it's not classified, they have to give it to you. I'll bet you a dollar you don't get it.

94prosfilaes
Ago 16, 2022, 10:21 am

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-declassification/ says that in a case under Trump the DoJ successfully argued that declassification must be explicit.

952wonderY
Ago 16, 2022, 10:38 am

>94 prosfilaes: The exact quote:
“ The Times cites no authority that stands for the proposition that the President can inadvertently declassify information and we are aware of none," wrote the Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in its decision against the Times. "Because declassification, even by the President, must follow established procedures, that argument fails."

96mikevail
Ago 16, 2022, 1:03 pm

>95 2wonderY:
It seems to be covered here:
https://www.archives.gov/isoo/policy-documents/cnsi-eo.html#three
Part 3 Sec. 3.5 states:
"(a) Except as provided in paragraph (b) of this section, all information classified under this order or predecessor orders shall be subject to a review for declassification by the originating agency if:

(1) the request for a review describes the document or material containing the information with sufficient specificity to enable the agency to locate it with a reasonable amount of effort;
(2) the document or material containing the information responsive to the request is not contained within an operational file exempted from search and review, publication, and disclosure under 5 U.S.C. 552 in accordance with law; and
(3) the information is not the subject of pending litigation"

The exceptions being:
"(b) Information originated by the incumbent President or the incumbent Vice President; the incumbent President’s White House Staff or the incumbent Vice President’s Staff; committees, commissions, or boards appointed by the incumbent President; or other entities within the Executive Office of the President that solely advise and assist the incumbent President is exempted from the provisions of paragraph (a) of this section."

If I'm reading this right, the agency or entity that originated the classified information is responsible for it's declassification. Maybe?

97aspirit
Ago 16, 2022, 1:23 pm

>96 mikevail: I read that executive order last night, which why I can respond quickly here.

Seems to me, the EO's primary purpose is to ensure government records are neither classified indefinitely nor as a way of hiding records from people who have a right to access the information. There are also instructions for classification, which emphasizes the need for communication between agencies.

This isn't the best document to look for insight into declassification. See Section 6.2(d):

"Nothing in this order limits the protection afforded any information by other provisions of law, including the Constitution, Freedom of Information Act exemptions, the Privacy Act of 1974, and the National Security Act of 1947, as amended. This order is not intended to and does not create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law by a party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person."

Though I haven't read it yet, I'm guessing what's most relevant for understanding declassification of nuclear records is the National Security Act of 1947.

We might need a separate thread to talk about declassification and presidential powers, by the way. This line of discussion doesn't help explain the person who's the topic here.

98mikevail
Ago 17, 2022, 7:21 am

>97 aspirit:
You may be right but the first sentence of the EO states:
"This order prescribes a uniform system for classifying, safeguarding, and declassifying national security information, including information relating to defense against transnational terrorism"
It seems intent on establishing standards for handling classified information. And EOs are listed in the Federal Register and are enforceable. Still, I admit I'm not clear on the meaning of "enforceable at law by a party against the United States"

99aspirit
Ott 6, 2022, 8:58 pm

Maggie Haberman has been interviewed all over the place in the past week or two for her latest biographical work, Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America. Her interview with Trevor Noah seems to be one of the best at concisely summarizing how Trump ticks.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=iV2Otmi9q98 (~15 minutes)

100Molly3028
Modificato: Dic 15, 2022, 12:44 pm

https://www.mediaite.com/trump/what-was-trumps-major-announcement-his-own-digita...
What Was Trump’s ‘Major Announcement’? His Own Digital Trading Cards…Yes, Really

***
December 2022 ~
A new con is beginning ~ a new way to get his cult followers' money into his bank account ~ and those clueless souls will jump at the opportunity to be taken advantage of in this period between election cycles.

101Molly3028
Modificato: Dic 17, 2022, 1:54 pm

The big picture

Trump has chosen a very lucrative, healthy and emotionally pleasing life-long vice. Drinking, smoking and drug usage would not afford him the life-sustaining pleasures that grifting does.

102MartyBrandon
Modificato: Gen 16, 2023, 1:43 pm

>101 Molly3028: That's an astute summary. The entire Trump phenomenon may have been caused by a well-intentioned high-school counselor who advised young Donald to follow his passion.