Friday, April 15, 2016

Stoned AGAIN...? Plus: The Donald vs. The System

This is a follow up to our previous post, which I won't recount here.

All last night, the question has nagged at me: Who was Wayne Madsen's source for that story about Ted Cruz's father? My understanding is that Madsen does not make things up -- he naively repeats things that other people make up.

While napping just now, one name popped into my head: Roger Stone, Trump's human switchblade.

Stone has been gunning for Cruz, and Stone knows the details of the JFK assassination well. He would have an awareness of the conundrum involving Oswald's Mystery Helper in front of the International Trade Mart.

After awakening, I moderated the comments, and found that one of my readers had also fingered Stone as a likely suspect. (Stone may not have spoken to Madsen directly; an intermediary may have played a role.)

It's hard to escape the suspicion that Stone (or his buddy Robert Morrow) is also responsible for some of Madsen's previous "scoops" -- like the one about Marco Rubio being a "gay homosexual." That sounds like something the pansexually-obsessive Morrow would say.

Ultimate responsibility for these deceptions belongs to Donald Trump.

Stone has become notorious for his threat to publicize the locations of the Republican delegates. Stone may insist that he does not condone violence, but everyone with any intelligence knows the real score. The guy is sending a GO signal to a pack of maniacs.

The Miami CBS affiliate calls Roger Stone the most dangerous man in politics.
Stone said he has no official or even unofficial role with the Trump campaign. He is doing this on his own.
Riiiiiight. Stone is toiling on behalf of a billionaire simply because he likes Donald Trump's sartorial choices. No other reason.

The system. In his new Wall Street Journal article, Trump asks:
Let me ask America a question: How has the “system” been working out for you and your family?

I, for one, am not interested in defending a system that for decades has served the interest of political parties at the expense of the people.
Trump is here talking about the Republican primary rules, which (I agree) "schlonged" him in Colorado. But Trump has little right to complain about a rigged system at the same time his buddy Stone is making it easy for a horde of rage-junkies to intimidate the delegates.

Note that Trump never complains when the rigging goes in his favor. Trump's percentage of the delegates substantially exceeds his percentage of the vote. Harry Enten of FiveThirtyEight has looked into the issue: Trump has received only 36% of the primary votes, but has been gifted with more than 47% of the delegates.

Yet only now does Trump complain about the unfairness of the rules. By what right?

Trump does not truly care about the rule of law. He cares only about winning. Why else would he partner up with a conscience-free fop like Roger Stone?

Look again at Trump's wording in the above quotation. He's not just assailing the primary in one state: He's attacking the very concept of rule of law. Trump says that the American system is so corrupt that we need to replace it with...

With what?

With his own ego. That man has never had anything else to offer.

Trump is leading the American equivalent of an Eijanaika riot -- an inchoate, inarticulate expression of mass rage against the current order, with no clear idea as to what should come next. I can understand the disaffection and alienation felt by so many. But those who long to watch the world burn will hate themselves when they stand amid the ashes. Many who now claim to despise our current system will appreciate its virtues once we taste the alternative.

6 comments:

Gus said...

I despise our current "system", such as it is. However, I do NOT want someone like Trump to be the guy that reboots it or blows it away or whatever. I'm not sure if it can be fixed or salvaged, but if it can (I hope so) Trump is the last person to be able to do it.

I think you might be onto something with fingering Stone as the source (direct or indirect).

Hairy Hoodie-knee said...

Joseph, you are so close when you say; "Stone is toiling on behalf of a billionaire simply because he likes Donald Trump's sartorial choices. No other reason." I'd say that's close. But really it's because he likes Donald Trump's tonsorial choices.

Alessandro Machi said...

One of the aces that Donald Trump was holding was how he came out of nowhere at the beginning of the Republican presidential nomination process while spending the least amount of money of any of the traditional Republican candidates. Now that strategy has somewhat backfired a bit because he didn't have someone on his staff knowing about these pedantic rules months ahead of time.
Mr. Trump is losing the bragging rights to his early on frugality and "I told you so" meme the more he complains about an individual state's delegate selection process.

Ken Hoop said...

https://www.lewrockwell.com/2016/04/justin-raimondo/trump-peace-candidate/

http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/apr/16/hillary-clinton-protest-george-clooney-fundraiser-bernie-sanders


I'm not certain what the system would look like if "Gus" "fixed" it the way he wanted it fixed, but I get the impression Gus is willing to settle for much less "fixing" than it needs.

Gus said...

Ken, I'm not really sure where you get that impression, since that it not at all what I wrote. Since I said, "I'm not sure if it can be fixed or salvaged", I'd say that indicates that it needs a hell of a lot of fixing, if it can be fixed at all. My main point was that Trump is definitely not the person for the job.

Anonymous said...

But those who long to watch the world burn will hate themselves when they stand amid the ashes."

No, they won't. They will hate any survivors of the "old regime." They will hate anyone who didn't get out there and fight for the revolution. They will hate each other -- this one wasn't pure enough, that one didn't fight hard enough. They will never, under any circumstances, look to themselves for any blame, will never commit the sin of introspection. Robert Byrd couldn't possibly have repented of his racist beliefs, because people don't change, right? Well, some people don't ever change -- they remain forever proudly ignorant, forever the know-it-all smart-ass who can tell you and everybody else how you ought to do things. They have three candidates to pick from, depending on whether their personal "oughta" emphasizes gods, guns or gazillions. If you like to look at facts and think things through for yourself, I'm pretty sure you're screwed.
-tle