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Trump Adviser Steve Bannon is Leaving White House Post (nytimes.com)
President Donald Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon left his position on Friday (alternative source) as the newly minted chief of staff John Kelly sought to bring order to a White House riven by infighting and power struggles, more than a dozen news outlets report. Maggie Haberman, reporting for The New York Times: The president and senior White House officials were debating when and how to dismiss Mr. Bannon. The two administration officials cautioned that Mr. Trump is known to be averse to confrontation within his inner circle, and could decide to keep on Mr. Bannon for some time. As of Friday morning, the two men were still discussing Mr. Bannon's future, the officials said. A person close to Mr. Bannon insisted the parting of ways was his idea, and that he had submitted his resignation to the president on Aug. 7, to be announced at the start of this week, but the move was delayed after the racial unrest in Charlottesville, Va.
... as the newly minted chief of staff John Kelly sought to bring order to a White House riven by infighting and power struggles ...
As we saw on Tuesday - there's only so much discipline and order General Kelly can impose because the biggest problem in that regard is actually Trump being Trump.
#DeleteChrome
The CNBC article says both that Bannon resigned and that Trump fired him.
Looks like Time's puppet master attack worked.
Bannon represented Trump's base far better than any other person in his inner circle. Without Bannon Trump will have a far harder time keeping in sync with the people responsible for putting him in office. It wasn't the globalists like McMaster that got him elected, it was people like Bannon who helped him connect with people from the lay person to the disenfranchised (both Dem and Rep).
One Nazi gone, one to go.
With the term 'Nazi' being thrown around so casually these days I can only think of Inigo Montoya saying "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
Just a reminder. Rumor is that Bannon was fired not because of his whack-job views on race or economics but rather because he's not sufficiently bellicose toward North Korea for Trump's liking.
That is, he may have fired a snake but he did it on account of one of the snake's few redeeming qualities.
By the end of his term it will be clear that Trump is the biggest mistake America has ever made.
In this case it's true, Bannon isn't a literal Nazi. He shares some of their philosophy and views, but Nazism is just a subset of the alt-right, which Bannon is one of the most important players in.
He's an awful human being, a racist and a bigot, but not an actual Nazi. Just a friend to Nazis, an admirer of them.
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SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
And there was much rejoicing.
Ah yes, the "no true nazi" logical fallacy.
Inheritance is the sincerest form of nepotism.
I've been very lucky boss-wise, and only worked for one manager/group of managers in my career that bothered me enough to quit. However, I have many co-workers who have "escaped" from toxic environments run by terrible bosses. Some weren't exactly low-paying jobs either -- think investment banks, elite law firms, and consulting companies. Almost every one has told me that leaving and taking a pay cut was better than dreading going to work every day and dealing with their bosses screaming at them, throwing them to the wolves, or just being a total jerk. Say what you will about Bannon, but I think he's just making a rational decision and answering questions like "Can I control this guy? Is he hurting my long term aspirations? Is the access and influence I have and future untold billions I will have because of it balanced with the probability of everything going sideways?" The problem is always cost/benefit - I know some people who've worked in investment banking as devs or very high-end IT pros, and they say the bonuses are massive and salaries are great, but you have to deal with a company that's basically 100% bro-culture assholes every day in exchange for it.
My dislike of the current administration mostly stems from its apparently inability to control its emotions. I think Trump is not used to being questioned on _anything_ and people in his inner circle have given him a pass on his behavior forever because they want to keep getting paid. I obviously don't know what he's thinking, but I think he feels that international conflicts and political compromise is just like strong-arming some union boss on one of his construction sites or bribing some city official to get one of his properties expedited through the system.
One of my favorite political cartoons of late (sorry about the ) came out when Trump started signing his first executive orders and shows him sitting on Bannon's lap saying, "I'm a big boy!" I think that it's pretty obvious that no one can control him at this point, so we'll see what happens.
The real question is, "Does he use Linux?"
Trump is just a symptom and so are all these protests - for whatever reason. People are looking for the one reason for their declining standard of living, healthcare costs going out of control, food prices increasing, housing costs, and just finding it harder to live better than their parents (the American dream) - let alone as well as them.
People are pissed but unfortunately, they are blaming the wrong people.
My meds are artificially high priced. Can I go and get them from another country? Nope - it's illegal. Why? For my own safety - because I may get counterfeit drugs from a foreign pharmacy. Amazing, I don't see many deaths from counterfeit drugs in Canada.
But why are our prices so high here in the USA? Because they can, that's why. And I know who is to blame and they are ALL members of the Republican party. Free markets my ass!
And when someone is making over $15 and hour - 40 hours a week - and STILL can't afford a place to live in some southeast sub-urban town, there is something really fucked up. We're not talking about the SF Bay area - but nowhere.
The wealth and income disparity is what is causing all this and it is because the system is rigged against us peons.
A person close to Mr. Bannon insisted the parting of ways was his idea, and that he had submitted his resignation to the president on Aug. 7, to be announced at the start of this week, but the move was delayed after the racial unrest in Charlottesville, Va.
Now, why would that matter?
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
In a statement, Bannon said he wanted to spend more time with Anthony Saramucci's family.
The term 'Nazi' meant a member of the Nazi (National Socialist German Workers) Party. During the war the term Nazi was used to refer to pretty much all Germans. After the war the term was mostly used to describe members of Hitlers government and the Party paramilitary wings, the SA (brown shirts) and the SS. today I believe we can all agree that it has now a become a generic term for their core beliefs in racist nationalism although it is often used in daily speech to describe authoritarian figures.
You can be alt-right, but not a Nazi?
Yep. The alt-right is a diverse bunch - there are white supremacists who believe in ethnic superiority of anglo heritage, there are nationalists who believe in economic isolationism and are opposed to immigrants, there are religious authoritarians who want the government in our bedrooms, there are antisocial conspiracy theorists who are trying to hide out from government mind rays, and there are desperate suckers whose lives aren't going very well who will naively cling to any ideology, no matter how evil, that promises easy fixes. None of those things, on its own, makes you a Nazi. That said, if you are holding a swastika, or making excuses for someone that does, what should we conclude about you?
In many ways Trump is in a toxic environment. It's got to suck for him. I don't like the guy at all but sometimes I feel sorry for him. He's in way over his head, he not getting the adulation that he craves, and he clearly was having a lot more fun when he was outside government grandstanding, lobbing grenades, chasing women, nettling Obama, etc. I don't think Trump thought he'd be elected: it was just a game to win. All he needs is an excuse like "my family needs me" or a health problem to bail out and leave the country with Pence.
Give alternative facts instead.
He made a hard right out of the White House.
...is staggering. So much winning.
Have a look at his original staff and check who is left: http://time.com/4658499/donald... Of those who sometimes communicated their own opinions rather than simply defending Trump, there is only Kushner (family) and Pence (elected VP). Those that left include Bannon, Priebus, Flynn, McFarland, Walsh, Dubke, Spicer, Scaramucci, and more. https://www.bustle.com/p/all-t... We are looking at 3.5 more years of a delusional President who chooses divisive people for his staff and then fires anyone who gets under his thin skin. I can't see how competent people would agree to work there given what we know thus far.
He's an awful human being, a racist and a bigot, but not an actual Nazi. Just a friend to Nazis, an admirer of them.
The term I use is "Nazi sympathizer". It can certainly be applied to Bannon and, based on recent comments, could arguably be applied to DJT.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
This is entirely consistent with Trump running first his campaign, then the White House, as a reality TV show, a business he understands well.
He started off, when he had so many Republican rivals, playing the Bad Boy That Everybody Loves To Hate, which was an excellent choice, because it is dramatically necessary to have the Bad Boy That Everybody Loves To Hate around for the finals so that the winner can finally defeat them. This guaranteed him the nomination.
But once he had the nomination sewed up, he had to switch characters, because the Bad Boy That Everybody Loves To Hate cannot win (ratings, you know). So he switched to The Lone Wolf Who Is Right When Everybody Else Is Wrong, which is certainly a character that can win - Americans love underdogs. But his real genius, at that point, was to force Hillary Clinton to become the Bad Boy That Everybody Loves To Hate. In other words, he painted his opponent as the character that simply cannot ever win. That won him the election.
Once he was in the White House, he was in a job he didn't know much about, so he went with what he knows. He continued to play The Lone Wolf Who Is Right When Everybody Else Is Wrong. But in order to be The Lone Wolf Who Is Right When Everybody Else Is Wrong, you have to surround yourself with people who are wrong all the time. So any job that was advisory, and very publicly visible, was filled with someone chosen specifically to be wrong, so that Trump could be right when they were wrong. Bannon was "chief stategist," which is an advisory position, and Bannon himself was so controversial that he couldn't possibly avoid the public's eye if he tried (and he never tried). But we got Mad Dog Mattis as Defense Secretary, a job that is not purely advisory, and has considerable authority in its own right. It's not a 100% correlation, but it's pretty consistent. Those who advise are idiots, chosen to be wrong and thus ignored. Those who do things are not.
And now that Trump is settling into the job of President, he's slowly working away from being The Lone Wolf Who Is Right When Everybody Else Is Wrong, and getting rid of the advisory positions that were filled with people chosen to be wrong all the time. He's learned what areas he really needs advisors in, and is replacing them with people who can tell him what he wants to hear.
He may well be Satan incarnate, hell bent on the destruction of humanity, but he's increasingly competent at what he's doing, and what he's doing is, for the most part, what he promised to do during the campaign.
I'm not a fan of Trump or Bannon on in the slightest. That said, I'm concerned that Bannon actually pushed Trump in the right direction on certain issues - namely, the US involvement in the rest of the world. From what I can tell, Bannon pushed Trump against war and military intervention in other countries, which is a good thing because in most cases US involvement is neither beneficial to the US, nor the country/people on whose behalf we're allegedly acting. Similarly, I understand that he pushed Trump to oppose free trade with other countries. Given that many of the countries with whom we engage in free trade have much lower environmental and labor standards than us, we are at a large disadvantage. Companies will naturally produce goods for less elsewhere if they can, and such agreements facilitate them doing that, thus hurting our economy. On the other hand, Bannon is known as no friend of minorities or disadvantaged peoples. Most people here probably know he used to be in leadership at Breitbart, which courts the alt-right and bigots of many kinds with ridiculous and derogatory headlines, among other things. I'm just curious to see if Trump engages in more saber-rattling and military intervention with Bannon gone. I certainly hope not.
Um, no. If you want to see what Nazi currently means, check the clips of the Charlottesville march with people chanting "Blood and Soil" and waving, you know, fucking Nazi flags.
Motherfucker, we had people goose-stepping through Charlottesville, waving Nazi flags, wearing swastika armbands, chanting "Heil Hitler, Heil Trump", beating people with billy clubs and listening to a speech about how we need to kill all the Jews, Muslims, Blacks and Communists. There is no better word to describe them than "Nazis".
And they counted Bannon as a thought leader - someone who would make sure Trump followed through on what they perceived as promises.
In this case it's true, Bannon isn't a literal Nazi. He shares some of their philosophy and views, but Nazism is just a subset of the alt-right, which Bannon is one of the most important players in.
He's an awful human being, a racist and a bigot, but not an actual Nazi. Just a friend to Nazis, an admirer of them.
Strangely enough, the major difference between a Nazi and a regular, garden variety, classical (Italian) fascist is that the Nazi ideology has a serious racist bend to it.
Both a Nazi and Fascist believe in nationalism, enforced ideologies, control over media, totalitarianism, but a Fascist stops short of thinking, "well that black fellow, he must be subhuman and we white men are the superior race". Sure some fascists are racist by accident, but Nazism has racism baked into its very foundations.
This is why white supremacists are often (and correctly) labelled as Nazis. There are enough similarities between the two ideologies and if the jackboot fits...
Calling someone a "hater" only means you can not rationally rebut their argument.
Honestly I am not so sure about Bannon being a bigot. Trump, however, eliminated any room for doubt on that issue in his most infamous press conference on Tuesday.
Here is what I am certain about regarding Bannon: Bannon is straight out of the oldest school of political manipulators which has ever existed, the sophists. Plato founded his academy in Athens in reaction to and in opposition to the rampant sophistry, which was destroying Athenian Democracy. The sophists were the then current intellectual hired-guns of Athenian politicians. These hired-guns mastered the rhetorical art of equivocation, showing, in part at least, the originary fundamental relationship between Democracy and Demagoguery. Athenian politicians hired these men to craft their speeches, speeches designed to inflame the passions of their supporters, for short term political gain, regardless of whatever consequences followed, which ultimately led to the downfall of Democracy in Athens. Philosophy, from it's inception in the academy, correctly understood, sought to discredit sophistry in general and equivocation in particular. Remember that, for close to 2,000 years, rhetoric was held to be the highest form of intellectual art, and one wasn't considered to be educated if one wasn't trained in the rhetorical Arts.
Why do I doubt whether Bannon himself is a racist or biggot, given his work in unleashing Breitbart on the world? Simple really. Bannon never concerned himself with who his fellow travellers were. He simply designed and delivered the rhetorical argumentation which Trump, and many others, used to whip their followers into a frenzy. If modern Americans had even the remotest clue as to the origin and history of the art of rhetorics there would be no need to argue with people about "slippery-slopes", because the "slippery-slope" argument in every single on of it's incarnations is nothing other than plain-ole equivocation, sophistry for those with a somewhat larger vocabulary. So who was speaking when Trump spoke about "many, many sides" or "what's next after the statues of Robert E. Lee, are you gonna take down the statues of George Washington or Thomas Jefferson, they were both slave owners....", or the "fine people" amongst the torch bearing, swastika waiving, sieg-heiling brown shirts marching through Chralottesville who had exactly one and only one objective planned with their march- to terrorize the good people of Charlottesville and Americans in general of every color and persuasion?.
Most of 20th century American politics, and that which still dominates us today, would have been completely impossible had the majority of our citizens been trained to recognized and see through simple rhethoric, and how easily we are manipulated by those who have mastered these arts. How many people had to die in east/southeast asia by virtue of one of the, literally, oldest tricks in the book, 'slippery-slope' rhetoric? Lather, rinse, repeat, Iraq, Libya, Syria, TEH Terruhrism. Even the expression 'Alt-right' is straight up sophism, except that the semantic confusion spread by it has rendered even those who consider themselves to be Alt-Right unable to distinguish themselves from their fellow travellers the fuckin NeoNazis and the KKK. Wake up folks we are being played, and Bannon was damned good at what he did. Fuckin snake.
Now Bannon can go back to cooking meth in his bathtub (not making that up).
https://www.deathandtaxesmag.c...
You are welcome on my lawn.
Right, because if there's one thing that defines a secretary of state's job, it's micromanaging security.
She rightfully took responsibility for the decisions made for people who worked for her regarding security for the compound. The buck always stops with the boss. But the scale of the witch hunt embarked on over that incident was just ridiculous.
Snopes.
Oh yes, that reminds me, my fellow cucks and I need to get after him, our checks are late this month!
Ever since, I've been suspicious of Jesus and very careful around chlorine.
"Nazi" may be an abbreviation for "National Socialism", but as for what it means... well, remember it was the Nazis themselves who made that term up. You shouldn't take anything they said about themselves at face value because they were history's greatest bullshitters.
Naziism isn't really an ideology -- not like socialism, communism, or capitalism for that matter. It is too profoundly anti-intellectual to be one. Not that this prevented from intellectuals from joining. Goebbels was both an intelligent and educated man; he was in charge of manufacturing bullshit for the masses, but like an addict/drug cooker he was a user of his own junk.
Insofar as Nazis embrace ideology, it is never to the exclusion of any contradictory ideas. If caught in an inconsistency, a Communist will elaborate, a Nazi will simply ignore. That's why Communism as an ideology is so rococo. Nazi ideology is a slovenly, slapdash thing, constructed for the moment and then freely ignored once used.
They were obsessed with joy. And here at least they were honest, because joy differs from ordinary happiness in that it involves letting go of the past and future, of your very self. And that's what they offered their followers: torchlit rallies in which you could lose yourself and in which what happened yesterday and what was going to happen tomorrow might as well not exist -- not coincidentally an extremely useful attitude for a ruthless politician to encourage in his followers.
Naziism promises immediate gratification, regardless of obligations (except to the leader) or consequences (which were entrusted to the leader). Nazis are obsessed with virility and vitality, but what they really mean is the momentary freedom weakness of character can grant.
Now Bannon's followers fit the mold, but as for Bannon himself... well he actually sees himself more in Lenin's mold, he's said so himself. So he fancies himself as an intellectual, and sees the rabble as useful idiots -- a term Lenin actually coined. But Nazi leaders often saw their followers the same way. The question is whether he's a user as well as a dealer.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
The nazis in Germany were an extreme rightist group. The neo nazis of today in America and Europe are an extremist right group. The rally they were invited to and shared common ideology with was called "Unite the Right". There is nothing socialist about it. You either are using fake news or revisisionist history sites to get your false information from, or else you're actively engaging in spreading these lies.
I can understand the logic though. Nazis are evil, liberals are evil, you are good, your friends on the extreme right are good, therefore Nazis must be liberals. It's a comfortable view to take if you are leaning towards extreme right positions. But it's still incorrect.
I found it very telling that Bannon revealed that he wanted everyone to be embroiled in these race issues and talking about them in order to keep them misdirected from administration plans with regards to economic issues.
Nazi's stand, above all, for solving their problems with violence. That's what make them frightening. If you're calling yourself a Nazi (like those folks in Charlottesville) you're very clearly letting everyone know that as soon as you've got some real power you will be bringing violence to bear against anyone and anything you percieve an enemy.
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like "Only when an arrogant woman with 20 years of bad press and only one real skill (keeping her rivals at bay for 8 years) is the opponent.".
Seriously, they were both running against the only person they could lose to.
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His dad's association with the KKK does not seem to be a solid fact (unless I missed something).
Their company discriminating against black people is well documented, complete with an extensive court case.
but none of them passed the Sheldon Primary
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