General Chat

{A reply from a distant relation in America to my posting earlier.}

'That’s a great question. The American people are fiercely independent. We were kicked out of every decent country in the world. Frankly, I doubt any of the American people really gave a rat’s ass what he thought' .

That says it all!

“Americans are the people who describe their use of alcohol and tobacco as vices”

GKC

100th Anniversary of G.K. Chesterton’s first visit to America

It was exactly one hundred years ago, January 10, 1921, that G.K. Chesterton first set foot on the American continent. His much anticipated arrival from England was a very big event.

What would he have thought of the current USA uncertainties?

nameslessone .......

so was I.

He must have removed it himself, because I only saw that it had gone, not any RR request.

maggie .........

that has always been scary with Trump, only it's much worse no.

I wonder what the military would do if he did press them??

Nancy Pelosi asked yesterday, but didn't report what she had been told.

There HAS to be an over-ride precaution!

His aides have been describing him like "mad King George" :-0 :-0

Pleased to see the post about dictators is no longer here.

It gets a bit scary when they have to ensure this psycho can't get access to the nuclear buttons :-S :-0

Bob ..

"How does anyone with no previous experience of politics become POTUS? Is it just money? How is a presidential candidate chosen?"

Put it down to the US Constitution in which basically it is the individual who counts, not the "for the good of everyone" that is the standard in the Canadian Constitution, or in the UK ethos.

In that idea, everyone has the right to run for President.

Hence the voting for the president and his nominated person for Vice-President separately from all other political races ............. quite unlike the Westminster system where the leader of the party that gets the most votes becomes PM, having been previously chosen by the members of that party.

It is theoretically possible for the President and VP to be from a party different from the one that has most seats in the House of Representatives and Senate (ie, Congress). For example, Trump was a Republican, the House had a Democrat majority while the Senate was Republican.

The two parts of Congress basically control what a President can achieve. They can send back any bills they don't want ................ the President does have some veto powers so that he can sign a law into power, but limited.

so, checks and balances.

But when it comes down to how does a person get chosen to be the Presidential Nominee for the party .......... that comes down to money, money, money, and, as we saw with Trump, dirty fighting.

Think back to the Primary Race in 2016 and the insults that Trump threw around at the people running against him, then all the insults thrown at Hillary Clinton during the Presidential race that followed.

He was a really dirty fighter, throwing insults, allegations and lies around at everyone.

But he spent an incredible amount of money to do it, much more than any other candidate was able to do. Most of that was apparently his own money (allegedly), although money-men raise money for the Party and there was lots of that as well.

A sitting president does not usually have to go through a primary race to get the nomination of his party, and that happened last year .........no-one ran against Trump and he was automatically nominated as the nominee for the Presidential election.

This time though he had problems in the race, which can be put down to the Democrats getting really organised in getting the vote out in large numbers especially among Black groups, a section of Republicans not voting for Trump (whether they voted for Biden or just did not vote is immaterial), and being able to raise much more money than Trump could do ............. seemingly many of the Republican money-bags kept the bags locked up this year, which basically meant that they no longer supported Trump.

Plus Biden was a much better candidate than Hillary Clinton ................ he was not a woman, he did not have the baggage that she carried, and he could out debate Trump, as well as getting his points across in speeches clearly.

How does anyone with no previous experience of politics become POTUS? Is it just money? How is a presidential candidate chosen?

Brian ...........

that worries me also.

I really do hope that they do not allow Biden and Harris + spouses to walk down that long avenue from the Capitol to the White House after the Inauguration.

Go back to the drive there in armoured cars. ie The Beast.

Trump fanatics should remember that taking care of Biden would result in Harris.

At the start of Trump's term in office I thought that he was a good candidate to be the next President to be assassinated.

Now I am even more worried that one of his fanatic supporters will consider it their patriotic duty to bump off Biden.

From my hilarious and oft-vivid imagination:

Trump flying in on his private jet and trying to sneak under the radar - just to prove he can beat Scotland's lockdown rules. He is, after all, still the real president of the 'world's greatest democracy' - ;-)

Nicola and company chasing him up the highlands and down the lowlands, skirts-a-twirling, bagpipes going like the clappers, skean dhus at the ready.

Gawd, I have gone over the top. It must be lockdown fever! :-D

(It really must be lockdown, folks, because I can imagine Melania kicking him out of the door half-way over the Atlantic too.)

"Unto that Power he doth belong Which only doeth Right while ever willing Wrong"

Goethe

namelessone .......

yes, that was what she said, that golf was not an "essential" journey, but she added that he was the same as anyone else ............. it was not an "essential" journey and he would not be allowed into Scotland.

Latest news here was that Trump has posted on Twitter, via an aide*, that there will be an orderly transfer of power in 2 weeks time .................... BUT he still won the election and it was stolen from him :-(

* via an aide because Twitter and another social media banned him from posting for 12 hours, and Facebook banned him for 24 hours.

I thought it was more on the lines of ‘Golf is not an essential journey’.

I’m sure lots of ‘golf widows’ now think it is ;-) ;-)

Good old Nicola! :-D :-D :-D

Trump announced the other day that he was going to come to Scotland and play golf!

Nicola Sturgeon's immediate reaction was "Oh no you're not. If other people can't fly in from America, why should you?"

A few never progressed from barbarism to civilisation.