Trump Part VIII

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god save us.
 
So South Korea isn't too happy about the armada mix-up.

We are only in month three, and I can't see us going the entire year without some blunder like the armada going to Korea screwing us over, either financially or by starting a war.

I don't think anyone on Trump's team is smart enough to dupe us like Bush and his team. Instead we'll launch a nuke because of someone didn't like dessert
 
Vlad n U 2 said:
I'm pretty excited to say the least. From what I've seen and read, his campaign has been very effective, he makes a strong effort to connect through his regular YouTube videos, he's excelled at the debates, and was willing to innovate a bit (the hologram idea was that quite brilliant in my opinion). He's got a massive chance here although even if he wins he'll be pushing shit uphill because of his being a staunch leftist. It'll mean a lot having a leftist in power of a large European country.

Also, how good was Fiscal Kombat! Such a fun little game.
Click to expand...

i hadn't heard of Fiscal Kombat, although i did see a screenshot of it on my Facebook the other day but didn't get to check it out - haha that is awesome

it's amazing he is doing so well and suddenly in the spotlight on an international level and getting endorsements from people like Naomi Klein and Noam Chomsky - that's pretty cool...

it's going to be a loooong few days/weeks haha
 
Is anyone aware of what's going on in Turkey? There was a referendum this past weekend to end the parliamentary system, and dissolve the office of the prime minister, and transition to an "executive presidency". Essentially it's a referendum to make Erdogan a de facto dictator(not that he wasn't already, but this just solidifies it). The yes vote won, but by a slim margin, 50%-48%, something like that, and there is an outcry that Erdogan and his party, AKP, cheated to win, that there were millions of votes not properly counted, etc. People in the streets.

It's not good.

And our wonderful president was the only western leader to call Erdogan to congratulate him. And apparently they're going to meet now too. Great.

I wish our media would give it more attention.
 
namkcuR said:
Is anyone aware of what's going on in Turkey? There was a referendum this past weekend to end the parliamentary system, and dissolve the office of the prime minister, and transition to an "executive presidency". Essentially it's a referendum to make Erdogan a de facto dictator(not that he wasn't already, but this just solidifies it). The yes vote won, but by a slim margin, 50%-48%, something like that, and there is an outcry that Erdogan and his party, AKP, cheated to win, that there were millions of votes not properly counted, etc. People in the streets.

It's not good.

And our wonderful president was the only western leader to call Erdogan to congratulate him. And apparently they're going to meet now too. Great.

I wish our media would give it more attention.
Click to expand...
All to do with Trumps business dealings in Turkey.

http://m.motherjones.com/politics/2017/04/trump-turkey-erdogan-conflict-interest
 
Palin showing some shoulder; maybe she's hoping Trump would be grabby today?

That group pic is by far one of the classless pics from the White House we've ever seen.

Way to go conned :up:
 
We are confident that the president will prevail on appeal and particularly in the Supreme Court, if not the Ninth Circuit. So this is a huge matter. I really am amazed that a judge sitting on an island in the Pacific can issue an order that stops the president of the United States from what appears to be clearly his statutory and Constitutional power.

--The Attorney General of the United States, referring to a federal judge in Hawaii, a state.
 
Who the fuck is Hawaii and why does it expect to be taken seriously when all it does is float there in the water all day.
 
namkcuR said:
Is anyone aware of what's going on in Turkey? There was a referendum this past weekend to end the parliamentary system, and dissolve the office of the prime minister, and transition to an "executive presidency". Essentially it's a referendum to make Erdogan a de facto dictator(not that he wasn't already, but this just solidifies it). The yes vote won, but by a slim margin, 50%-48%, something like that, and there is an outcry that Erdogan and his party, AKP, cheated to win, that there were millions of votes not properly counted, etc. People in the streets.

It's not good.

And our wonderful president was the only western leader to call Erdogan to congratulate him. And apparently they're going to meet now too. Great.

I wish our media would give it more attention.
Click to expand...

The situation has gotten terrible for the country. Erdogan is on a strong path to dictatorship.
I have been to Istanbul twice over the past six months as an international observer in the trial against the doctor and President of the Turkish Human Rights Foundation, Sebnem Korur Fincanci, who is a partner and friend. She is standing trial together with two journalists, Ahmet Nesin and Erol Onderoglu for their show of solidarity with the imprisoned editor-in-chief of the Kurdish daily newspaper Ozgur Gundem. They acted as editors-in-chief for one day last summer, and promptly were arrested over charges of aiding and spreading propaganda for terrorists. In total three charges that could land them in prison for 14 years. It's absolutely ridiculous, of course.

They were lucky, because this all happened before the coup attempt on July 15, and through international pressure they were released.
The colleagues of the Turkish Human Rights Foundation have all lived through the military dictatorships of the 1980s and 1997. Some of them had been imprisoned back then for their activities. But what they all say is: Never has the situation been this uncertain, and arbitrary. During the military dictatorships, the courts were still relatively independent, so you had a greater chance at a fair trial. Also, back then you exactly knew which kind of activities could land you in trouble, and which were safe. So you could decide whether you'd take the risk of imprisonment and torture, or not.
Even this amount of safety doesn't exist now. Any word you say, anything you publish, or your sheer associations can mean you losing your job, or even going to prison. There are still lists containing thousands of names of doctors, lawyers, journalists, attorneys, judges and any kind of civil servants. Of course, the association is, who is on the list is a Gulen supporter (or if they want to mix it up, PKK or ISIS, or all of them). These name lists are used to control, and instil fear. You don't know if you are on one of them. You don't know if they will be used for another wave of arrests or dismissals. If someone is eyeing your position, will they just try to get you on one of those lists?

Hundreds of thousands of state employees have already been sacked. Prisons are filled with journalists, judges, military personnel and other staff. At the courts, ranks of judges had to be filled quickly with completely inexperienced people. Same, of course, for the state attorneys. It goes all the way down to the court clerks. Doctors have lost their license to practise, teachers have been dismissed, and so on. The state is in total disarray. Those who have been dismissed have no chance at other employment. If both partners had been a doctor, for example, both lost their jobs (guilty by association), so the entire family’s income is gone.

The Kurdish areas in the southeast are a war zone. Several cities have been completely destroyed. They are being controlled by the Turkish military. Cities such as Cizre are cordoned off. No one is allowed inside, to see the situation and document human rights abuses, or deliver aid. Another doctor working with the Turkish Human Rights Foundation, who was in charge of their center in Cizre, got arrested last year for having treated PKK fighters, allegedly, and having broken the curfew. In February, his trial finally started in the city of Şırnak. He was only present via video, as were the four witnesses presented by the prosecutor. All four witnesses revoked their testimonies, saying these were forced under torture. To the observers at the trial, even though the persons were presented only by video, the signs of torture were readily visible. The judge completely ignored the allegations of torture, and the prosecutor asked for the hearing be postponed, since he still had a fifth, anonymous “witness” that needed to be heard.

Torture has always been one of the hallmarks of the Turkish legal system. The Turkish Human Rights Foundation, and foremost Dr. Fincanci, has initiated the development of what is now known as the “Istanbul Protocol”, guidelines for the forensic documentation of torture precisely because it was so rampant. It’s now an official UN document. During the 1990s, when Turkey was transforming, they changed the practise: less physical torture, more psychological torture. You can document scars and burns from cigarette butts, but it’s much harder to document the invisible traces that psychological torture leaves. Thus, there was a common perception outside of Turkey that torture wasn’t that much of a problem anymore. But it was. In Berlin, at the center where I work Turkey has consistently been one of the top five countries from where our patients come. Since last year, the state doesn’t seem to care anymore. There are countless reports of physical torture. Videos keep appearing on Twitter and elsewhere. It’s being practised with impunity.

Since Sunday, the situation is completely new once again. Erdogan is now going to consolidate. What that will mean in the long-run is anyone’s guess. It won’t be pretty.

This is a NATO member becoming a dictatorship (again). But there are several factors that have emboldened Erdogan, and are now allowing him to move forward with his plans. It is also a result of inaction in Syria, and the deadlock in the UN, which gave Erdogan leverage over the EU (he repeatedly threatened to walk away from the refugee deal and uses the close to three million refugees as kind of collateral).

Right now, he seems unstoppable. But he shouldn’t be too sure. Ever since summer 2015, when a suicide bomber killed more than 30 aid workers in the city of Suruc, tourism has continuously gone down. Still, there are no signs of recovery. That’s also because of frequent attacks over the years. If other parts of the Turkish economy get hit, and when people catch up to the devastating effects of the mass sacking and incarceration, the wannabe Sultan might experience backlash. Another scenario which many fear, of course, is a civil war.

Turkey, at the moment, is incredibly volatile. No one I have spoken to lately was confident. Even people who are not easily frightened and have seen a lot are feeling very uncertain about the future. And there’s little hope for a happy end.
 
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So Trump, in what I can only assume was a (childish) attempt to impress the Italian prime minister, told him that he and Pavarotti are great friends.

Pavarotti died 10 years ago.

:doh:
 
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