The media and the political establishment plays checkers. It’s a perfectly honorable game, with well-established rules that haven’t changed in generations. There’s only one way to play checkers.
Trump plays…
… Well, not chess. To say that would be to claim he plays a similar, more sophisticated game than the establishment and media.
Trump plays poker. He may play it well, he may not, it may vary from hand to hand in situation to situation. He may bluff while holding fours over deuces with all the grace of a German jazz band, and he may drop a straight flush on you while you’re doing the “I’ve got a full house!” dance…
… but whether he’s playing it well or like an amateur after 12 cocktails, it’s a completely different game, with different rules, goals and expectations, than checkers. .
And the media – or at least the “elite“ media that the establishment does business with – Watch his hand after hand of poker, good or bad, and keeps yapping about how bad Trump is at checkers, and how much better off we’d all be if he played checkers as well as Andrea Merkel does…
I’ve liked the Trump plays poker poker analogy since I first heard it. His positions can be inconsistent from one “hand” to another because he’s always trying to win each “hand.”
Professional politicians spend their lives acquiring power, which means clawing up the ladder in the bureaucracy or fighting to get re-elected. Say or do whatever it takes to convince people to give you power.
Trump spent his life putting together real estate deals. Say or do whatever it takes to convince people to sign on the dotted line.
To ordinary wage earners, they are entirely foreign. We believe in straight-shooting, speaking the Truth, keeping your word. Those are handicaps to politicians and real estate developers.
The two groups look similar – say or do whatever it takes to achieve the objective – but the objectives are entirely different.
Trump’s objectives are less damaging because they are limited in scope to any one particular deal, not to remaking society as a whole. Even if his deal fails, it only takes down the players in the deal, not the entire structure of the nation.
I vastly prefer Trump to the others.
I cant believe you gave Trump the closet thing to a compliment I have seen in his 2+ years as President Mitch. Did you hit your head?
It’s the ol’ 80/20 rule with Trump. I was a NeverTrumper because I assumed he was a fraud, but once he was actually elected it didn’t make sense to remain an implacable foe. 2+ years on, he’s been better than I expected. I am more than happy to blast him when he’s stupid, but he does give us 80% of what we need. And since every Democrat on the national stage is unhinged, it would be perverse to wish for Trump’s political demise at this point. The Dems are committed to giving us Venezuela on the installment plan.
Trump is buying time for the left to gather their forces for the Big Offensive.
When Trump #wins, the neo-cons high five each other, and order steak and lobster. The reprobates are out in the alley, eating rice packs and pulling the plug on society as we know it.
Trump has delivered some good things, but none of it is built to last. The reprobates will reopen the border as soon as they can, and get to the serious work of disarming us.
The core of the leftist agenda is the abnegation of a community of like minded people, bonded in history and tradition, in favor of the state.
Trump has done nothing to drain that swamp, and the snakes are breeding.
I’m beginning to wonder if it wouldn’t have been better to let Memaw win, and meet in the alley ourselves.
The one thing of Trump’s that is indeed going to last a while is called “judges”, which is some bulwark against expanded gun control. No? Otherwise, agreed that the swamp does not appear much diminished at this point.
Not so sure BB.
Gorsuch has shown signs of being Pozzed, as has Roberts. I think all of them save Kavanaugh are anti-Trumpers.
We will know fer sure when RvW gets an encore appearance, IMO.
Trump is an idiot. He starts a fight, doesn’t know how, gets help by cheating then screams for the referee when he starts to lose. He plays checkers while his opposite number — from Abe to Xi Jinping — play chess.
The only world leader who is dumber is Bolsonaro in Brazil — brought to power by the same forces as Trump: A few rich guys and a mob.
once again Emery elevates the discussion with his usual trenchant analysis
Swiftee; perhaps they’re not as good as hoped, but they’re also at least not as bad as Ginsburg. No?
Emery; seems to me that Trump is having some success evening the playing field in terms of trade, success that the “far smarter” Obama did not. You can make your potshots all day, but there is something to be said for using one’s influence when it’s appropriate. Nice change from the past few Presidents, to put it mildly.
Fun fact: Trump doesn’t have a single ratified deal under his belt. He’s only destroying existing deals & agreements.
As an aside: The federal government’s deficit typically shrinks during strong economic times, but the deficit is up nearly 40% so far this fiscal year.
Shouldn’t you be too busy scouring the Mueller report to comment, Emery?
Or I can just tell you that it came up bupkis. Now that we know what Mueller knows, we know Trump didn’t collude with the Russians. Mueller actually knew this a few months after he started his investigation. I suppose he was kept going just to tease you.
I feel that these four sentences from Volume II of the Mueller report have not gotten anything like the attention they deserve.
/“As described in Volume I, the evidence uncovered in the investigation did not establish that the President or those close to him were involved in the charged Russian computer-hacking or active-measure conspiracies, or that the President otherwise had an unlawful relationship with any Russian official. But the evidence does indicate that a thorough FBI investigation would uncover facts about the campaign and the President personally that the President could have understood to be crimes or that would give rise to personal and political concerns.
If we had confidence after a thorough investigation of the facts that the President clearly did not commit obstruction of justice, we would so state. Based on facts and the applicable legal standards, however, we are unable to reach that judgement.”/ ~ Mueller Report Volume II, p76