Meme & Quote Thread

57Brave said:
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- Phillip Roth
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Here's the full article for proper context.


[URL]http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/30/philip-roth-e-mails-on-trump[/URL]
 
jpx7 said:
I happen to believe Donald Trump is especially terrible, particularly fallen, et cetera; I think he's bad, I think his plans are mostly bad, and I think most of his reasons for doing things are bad. I believe, moreover, that I have good reasons to hold to this line of thinking—both with respect to President Trump's well-archived past, his words and actions over the course of his public-office campaign, and the policy decisions he has floated in his first few days in said office.
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I can certainly see, and oftentimes commiserate with, distaste for Trump's (and the greater Republican Party's) platform/policy positions. I can absolutely see where some might draw pause with the manner in which he often conducts his business in public. What I don't see is this unredeemable nefariousness, this unequivocal evil. Even if I look hard - at Pussygate, the purported cases of sexual assault, the unrelenting self-aggrandizement - there have been explanations provided (or psychologies explained) that, at the very least, satisfy my personal urge to pass judgement with finality. It's important to remember that a certain image must be maintained during the campaign cycle, and I do believe it's possible that we eventually see fulfillment of a long-rumored 'softening' ... hell, today he even uttered that he was an environmentalist. That's got to be measured as some sort of positive. All said, I'm a political mercenary and reserve the right to jump ship the moment I sense foul-play or overtly egregious deviation from stated goals and/or promises. I don't see why others aren't willing to extend the same contingent variety of olive branch. After all, I provided the same token of respect to former President Obama despite my own questions.

As a final entry: I don't think Donald Trump has ever once peddled a truly worthwhile product on the sordid market—whether you're judging steaks or education or television or real-estate—so you'll excuse me if I clutch my trepidations like so many pearls, and bear little faith regarding the policy promises he's peddling now.
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That may very well be true. Although, his real-estate portfolio seems mighty impressive from a layman's perspective.

Where I find Trump to have delivered consistently (witholding my belief that he's made his name synonymous with [excessive, gaudy] wealth) is in his resiliency - his refusal to take it lying down. Whether it be the bankruptcies, the failings at airlines or football teams, the merciful slaughtering of his Presidential dreams in 2012, or the drumming he took in the initial stages of this past cycle, Trump never once seemed to show blood or sigh in a miserable desperation. If the general positives which can be extracted from that attitude rub off on the public at large in any way, I can't help but view it as a collective triumph. Our populace seems to lack real ... drive.

Of course, others would likely characterize my perception of resilience as petulance.
 
Hawk said:
I can certainly see, and oftentimes commiserate with, distaste for Trump's (and the greater Republican Party's) platform/policy positions. I can absolutely see where some might draw pause with the manner in which he often conducts his business in public. What I don't see is this unredeemable nefariousness, this unequivocal evil. Even if I look hard - at Pussygate, the purported cases of sexual assault, the unrelenting self-aggrandizement - there have been explanations provided (or psychologies explained) that, at the very least, satisfy my personal urge to pass judgement with finality. It's important to remember that a certain image must be maintained during the campaign cycle, and I do believe it's possible that we eventually see fulfillment of a long-rumored 'softening' ... hell, today he even uttered that he was an environmentalist. That's got to be measured as some sort of positive. All said, I'm a political mercenary and reserve the right to jump ship the moment I sense foul-play or overtly egregious deviation from stated goals and/or promises. I don't see why others aren't willing to extend the same contingent variety of olive branch. After all, I provided the same token of respect to former President Obama despite my own questions.
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Weren't you the one just (correctly) asserting, up-thread, the importance of context? I believe the full quote was: "I am, to a large extent, an environmentalist. I believe in it, but -- it's out of control." That seems much more like softening of language than softening of stance.

As for the moral failings I perceive or allege: they're a lot less concerned with those (troubling but mostly-policy-divorced) issues you note (pussy-grabbing, self-embiggening) and much more keyed to some of the early policy returns. I think the appointment of Betsy DeVos would be a disaster; I think the promise to defund the National Endowments for Arts and Humanities (~$184-million budget, while purportedly spending upwards of $200-million on the inauguration fête) and privatize public television and radio is particularly inhumane; I think the floated proposals to sell off swaths of National Forest and BLM-managed land is downright unconscionable: a threat to us all, irrespective of party affiliations, and a fierce repudiation of Roosevelt-style conservatism (or even the etymology of the damn word); and I'm none to pleased to see the spectres of Keystone and Dakota Access revived after broad support for not moving forward on those constructions. This is not about feeling icky regarding how he's conducted his personal life, or even how he comports himself on twitter and elsewhere.

Hawk said:
That may very well be true. Although, his real-estate portfolio seems mighty impressive from a layman's perspective.
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His buildings tend to be pretty ugly or aesthetically-questionable, in my humble opinion, even if he "owns" (or posts his name on) a lot of them.
 
The thing I dont like about non-violent protest is you are expected to sit there while people use violence against you. The people with badges can beat the **** out of protesters all day long but if they fight back they automatically considered the bad guy.
 
cajunrevenge said:
The thing I dont like about non-violent protest is you are expected to sit there while people use violence against you. The people with badges can beat the **** out of protesters all day long but if they fight back they automatically considered the bad guy.
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That is the problematic asymmetry that can't simply be waived away. I don't advocate the use of violent protest or rioting, and I don't particularly like it; but I also don't like unwarranted and/or unfettered police violence, nor the sort of en masse use of carceral force we're seeing in the wake of the turbulence of the 20th.
 
country was founded on a protest that boarded private property and destroyed private property cause they were being taxed for something and is celebrated today

but yeah, "riots" are bad.
 
I agree that rioting or violence could potentially be a necessity, but is anyone going to say that there is any rationalization for violence due to government policy in our country at this time?
 
weso1 said:
I agree that rioting or violence could potentially be a necessity, but is anyone going to say that there is any rationalization for violence due to government policy in our country at this time?
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There's plenty of legitimate cause, and plenty of legitimate causes, to protest at this time—but I won't argue there's any more cause, so far, for violent protest than there was one year ago, or ten years ago.
 
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