If you give people no credit for admitting they were wrong or give them no chance to atone, then you give them no reason to do it and they will continue down the path they are on. To me it is preferable that she stops being toxic vs her continuing if those are the two choices.

I am not saying she should be forgiven, but if she is genuine, and that remains to be seen (she has a lot of work to do to prove that), then continuing to punish or otherwise vilify her, sends her the message that she’s damned is she does and she’s damned if she doesn’t so why not continue being toxic. Why should she try to be better?

If she continues to atone and does some very positive things in future (again doubtful) there should at least be some consideration given that she may have changed.

I didn’t actually say she was deprogramming anyone, just that she is in a position where she could.

That said, the fact that she is speaking out against him has unquestionably lead other people to doubt him.

Whether she is trying to take his place is not a point I tried to address directly, but I do believe she is behaving this way because she sees it as a way to further her own political career.

My most charitable thinking about this is that she s always just playing to win. The way she acted was just that, an act. She did it because she knew it appealed to a particular segment of society that could get her elected. Now there is a sea change she is smart enough to know MAGA is doomed and she had jumped ship early because she thinks it will be more politically advantageous in the long run.

She may be genuinely remorseful if she is good for her, but it doesn’t erase the things she had voted for, against, and the things she said that harmed people or incited violence deliberately or accidentally.

That said, she is somewhat uniquely positioned to assist in the deprogramming of MAGA members so, though I don’t trust her, the things she is doing and saying today are leading people away from Trump, and that is the most vital mission right now.

You don’t think it’s progressive that the USA has its first black president closely followed by it’s first orange president? I’d say that’s a society that is closer to saying it doesn’t see colour.

Seriously though, I think the fact America hasn’t had a female leader is strange for a country that used to claim to be the greatest nation on earth.

Well maybe I am, but I also think there is a tendancy to dismiss a lot of trump’s behaviour as delusional, or dumb when I see it as intentional malice with moments of dementia woven in.

I do think he is not very bright, but not so dumb as many want to believe. It feels good to think of him as dumb, but the fact of the matter is he convinced tens of millions of people to vote for him. He has steam rollered the USA and imposed his will. He is clever enough to have understood his to manipulate the public masterfully up to his second election, despite being a convicted felon by that point. To say he is stupid and somehow lucked his way into all of that is not impossible but improbable. I think his issue now is that he underestimated how the public would respond as he got positive reinforcement for many years even when doing harmful things because of his blind support from MAGA. He underestimated how much they would put up with.

It is entirely possible that he pulled the number out of the air but I don’t think that’s how he works. Some of what he says is rooted in a truth that he then distorts and exaggerates to serve him, which is why I think the number comes from his deliberate misunderstanding than from nowhere.

The deception doesn’t require him to accept he was wrong. It requires mental gymnastics. Something he has proven to be an Olympic gold medalist at.

Just to be clear I am not defending him I am advising caution. Writing him off as stupid means you are in some way excusing his actions as being accidental and leads to the “of its just trump being trump” rhetoric that has let him get away with so much. He is a dangerous, dangerous man. I can’t decide if he believes the things he says or simply wants you to believe the things he says. I lean towards the latter.

As I wrote this I am reminded of Boris Johnson who is someone who spent a great deal of time convincing the UK public he was a harmless, likeable idiot. He was not. He was an intelligent, deceptive man who wore his public image like a mask to hide his nefarious intent. Boris is not trump of course, but I see Boris as a cautionary tale and it makes me view Trump differently than I perhaps would if Boris had not existed.

Fully accept I may be wrong about all of this, but just want to share my opinion.

I’m not sane washing. I believe it’s how he sees it and now he’s probably been told that’s not how it works, he continues to use this method as a way to make the number bigger. So it crosses from idiocy to deliberate deception. IMO

Why is no one concerned about how unfair this is for the puppy?

When he says he’s going to reduce drugs by thousands of percent, I think he looks at the price of drug x in, for example, Germany and sees a price of $10 then he looks at the price in the USA of $160. So the USA price is 1600% of the Germany price.

He claims to reduce them to the Germany price, and then screws up on how percentages work and says he’ll reduce it by 1600%, instead of what he should say, which is reducing it by 94%.

So that’s how I understand the comments he makes. Either way he’s full of shit and won’t actually reduce them at all, but I think I get why he thinks he is correct in stating percentages in the thousands.

Cue Ted Cruz: “Nice university ya got here. Be a shame if something happened to it”

Does this not destroy his argument or betray his own lies.

Either:

A. His assertion is that the FBI under Biden’s direction or agents into the crowd to indie violence. This is demonstrably false since Biden did not control the FBI and therefore could not have done this. He could have said agents but he chose to lie that it was the FBI, and in doing so, crippled his own argument.

Or

B: There were agents in the crowds tasked with inciting violence. These agents must have been working under Trumps direction as it was his FBI. Therefore he is telling on himself. This time the lie is under whose orders the agents were acting.

I believe there were no agents there. Just a bunch of sycophants who revere trump so much they would be willing to root in jail for him and that their cause is so righteous that overruling democracy is fine.

I’m not sure that is the best idea because if they do get caught, they will never be released

Hey! This is a no logic zone. You are just supposed to be outraged, you aren’t supposed to think it through. Thank you for your attention to this matter.

I’m sure the homeless in DC are all republicans, so they undoubtedly have truth social installed on their iPhones and are patiently waiting for their orders. In fact with all the jobs created in this booming economy the homeless already left to start their new careers at the new factories, right?

Is it not simply a matter of contract anyway? The states agree to pay the federal government in exchange for the security and cooperation that the federation brings. If the federal government is no longer holding up it’s end of that agreement no matter the reason, why should the States be obligated to remain in that agreement?

Disagree, every ruling the scotus makes that overturns a lesser court judge makes their opposition to established law clearer. If cases went straight to scotus, it would appear that legal opinion was unanimous and not that scotus have a politically motivated agenda.

“It’s not the product it’s the marketing” - Dems (probably)

They can’t admit it because it’s an echo chamber. Trump tells them what they want to hear. They feel smarter for being validated by the president so they ignore the nagging voice that things aren’t going to plan because the only possible explanation is NOT that they were wrong and don’t understand these complex issues, but that even though they can’t see the full picture, they were right. Then all the other people in the same position agree that 4D chess is being played and they all voted a smart vote and the endorphins flood their brain again

I have to take him at his word. If he thinks it is going well, that means the chaos is what he wants.

He is either gaming the stock market for profit, or trying to harm the world economy.

The very slim possibility is that he is being told by others with an agenda that things are working as planned.

I’m not seeking to defend FPTP, butf the two party system is inevitable, how come the UK has 393 political parties? It’s true that one of two parties usually wins, but against that backdrop, the SNP was able to flourish in Scotland. In America you literally have Republican, Democratic parties and Independents. It is not inevitable but it certainly isn’t a good system for the modern age.

That is the attitude that proves the point. I’m not as sure as you are about the profit.

It does not cost much to make a/an _______

We tend to oversimpliy and ignore other things that need to be paid for. A short list of things that the markup has to cover that I can think of if the top of my head… IT infrastructure and support for ~80,000 employees worldwide. Rent for stores, salaries and benefits for the staff that work in them. Furnishings, signage and maintenance of stores. Shipping of product to stores. Distribution warehouses. Logistics planning and execution staff and software. Corporate level sales management staff and software. Marketing including sponsorships, TV spots, billboards, etc etc.

Each pair of shoes has to contribute to each of these things and all the others I can’t think of right now or don’t even know are needed.

I don’t mean to say that they don’t make (good) profit, but it’s probably no where near as big as you imagine.

You can argue whether or not a all of that corporate machinery is needed as well, but Nike clearly thinks it is right now or they wouldn’t spend money there for no reason because that doesn’t make the line go up unless there is a payback for that spending.

So we oversimplify and say the markup is huge, they can afford to pay more to make their product and still be profitable… But it probably means job losses in other parts of the company a good number of which are probably American jobs that Nike currently does offer.