During the October 9 debate, Donald Trump threatened to jail his political opponent should he be elected president.
This is of course ordinary, unremarkable rhetoric coming from a Republican presidential candidate. You, dear reader, will no doubt remember that John McCain and Mitt Romney both threatened to jail Barack Obama. Oh yes they did. I can’t manage to find links to the Youtube videos that show this, but it did happen. Same thing with George W. Bush: he threatened to jail Al Gore and John Kerry. And so on. I’m not exactly sure when GOP presidential candidates started issuing threats like this, but the tradition definitely goes back at least as far as 1940, when FDR ran for his third term against Wendell Willkie, who like Trump was a New York City based businessman.
The idea that Trump is somehow unusual is ridiculous.
It’s especially ridiculous given that he’s somewhat, um, unclear about exactly what the crime is. Presumably it is passing on classified info…to others in the State Dept. But I don’t delve into Trumper’s sites, so perhaps the rightwing lawyers who trade in the shit are more explicit than he.
But it should be remembered that many ordinary leftists shmoes (like me) were calling for investigations into openly reported lawbreaking by Cheney and Bush. Of course, to your point, Obama/Biden/Hillary were/are never going to go there.
In the larger picture, the American “conservative” movement, to my mind, has been pretty desirous of strongman authoritarian leaders for quite some time, and the tendency was quite pronounced in the Cheney Era. They want THEIR liberties protected, and they want a strongman—as long as it is THEIR strongman. And given the fascistic bent of the white authoritarian movement, this is no surprise. What’s different about Trump IMO is that he the first candidate to be pushed into prominence (and power) by this openly American Nazi movement and who must placate (and feed) its monstrous desires and hatreds.
And Der Trumper is likely not going to be the last strongman wannabe–this movement isn’t going anywhere. The big question is if it is indeed growing. But in any event the monster has now broken free and isn’t going back to cleaning toilets in the castle—with villainous Dr. Frankenstein professing amazement as to how it ever could have happened, and pointing the finger of blame at the harmless shepherd boy and the hapless villagers.
It not ‘crime’, but ‘crimeS’.
The first felony was Bill Clinton surviving the Clinton Derangement of the 90’s.
The second was Hillery Clinton being elected to the Senate.
The third felony was Hillery Clinton being Secretary of State.
The fourth felony was Hillery Clinton not having a penis.
It’s the same list of felonies that some around here hold against her.
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If I recall correctly, Dr. Frankenstein wound up pursued by, and locked in a battle to the death with, the monster that he created.
How about this?
Trump mentioned Blumenthal several times in the debate. He’s a fool.
H/T Ballonjuice
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Eugene Debs was a political prisoner. I guess he doesn’t count in your mind.
I wrote about your tiresome rhetorical trick HERE.
Sorry dude, logic doesn’t follow here. You are making an argument that Trump’s rhetoric is unprecedented when it’s clearly not when we have explicitly imprisoned political opponents for political reasons.
If you want to argue that Trump’s rhetoric is dangerous, and could have long term consequences for the political order, then my citation of Debs would follow your logic. However, you’re not making this argument by saying so, but rather saying how unprecedented it is.
Sorry, I forgot to write IRONY ALERT at the top of my diary.