The bimbo that didn’t bark
October 14, 2016 § 99 Comments
I am not voting and cannot be convinced to vote, for reasons I’ve explained many times. That doesn’t imply that I have no opinions on the candidates, or that I consider the candidates to be in any sense equivalent.
UPDATE: SDG in the comments provides several corrections re: Trump assault allegations:
Because Ivana Trump’s testimony was given in a deposition in 1989.
Because Jill Harth sued Trump for sexual assault in 1993.
Because Mindy McGillivray’s 2003 story is backed up by a photographer who says she immediately told him Trump had grabbed her ass.
Because Trump not only admitted but BOASTED about the very behavior he is alleged to have committed. Who are you gonna believe: a man who says he gropes women without waiting, or women who say they were so groped? There’s a real “He and she both said” dilemma for you.
Because so far nine or more women have come forward with stories like these, combined with Trump’s own words. There’s never THAT much smoke without at least some fire.
Because the pattern of other women remaining silent about being abused by powerful men until the issue of a public person’s pattern of abusive behavior and the celebrity’s public denials and attacks on the women is strikingly similar to other cases, like Bill Cosby. To characterize this pattern as “only now conveniently remembered, like college girls with a hangover, that they were sexually assaulted” is the very kind of cruel abuse that keeps women who have been abused silent.
Because even if you’re agnostic about whether or not the allegations are true, slurring even possible victims of sexual assault with the word “bimbos” is a kind of judgmental cruelty I can’t imagine, certainly not from someone I have regarded as a thoughtful Catholic.
UPDATE 2: Andrew E responds here and here:
Just to be clear, Jill Harth and Ivana Trump both contradict SDG. Jill Harth, of course, contradicts herself therefore requiring her lawyer to draft a followup to the lawnewz story to avoid any federal liability.
And SDG said the photographer also witnessed the incident in the case of McGillivray. But the story says that neither Davidoff nor McGillivray actually witnessed it. SDG needs to get the facts right.
(I suppose if nothing else this post proves that I am not immune to the lazy blogger tendency to find out details about a distasteful subject by just posting on it and having commenters do the fact checking for me).
—
Hillary Clinton is a crazy criminal egomaniac who will burn down the world before even considering the possibility that there might possibly be something slightly questionable about her world view or her self image. Her one saving grace is that she might be too physically ill to accomplish anything.
Trump is basically transparent. What you see is what you get, and we’ve seen a lot of Trump over the decades because that’s just the way he likes it. It may be puerile, morally decadent, and just generally in bad taste; but it isn’t a mystery. Trump is a wealthy and successful amoral product of 80’s era America, with all that that implies.
His credibly (for versions of ‘credibly’) alleged tendency to literally grab what he wants sexually appears to be generically the same as Bill Clinton’s. Taken in itself this is enough to disqualify both men from any serious office, but is hardly the worst of either of their faults. Bill Clinton didn’t in fact start a nuclear war, and Trump almost certainly wouldn’t. Hillary Clinton just might.
I publicly retract the following paragraphs after considering SDG’s criticisms and correction of my ignorance on several particulars. I leave them in place for the record:
This is even true in terms of bimbo eruptions: the most notable thing is not all the stuff we already knew without anyone saying it. The notable thing is that not a single credible Juanita Broderick or Paula Jones has been uncovered by the Clinton machine: just zero credibility Anita Hills who have only now conveniently remembered, like college girls with a hangover, that they were sexually assaulted.
The Trump ‘scandals’ appear to be marketing initiatives designed to appeal to the fatty vote, the feminist regret-is-rape slut vote, and prudes (in the pejorative sense) who (unlike me) support Trump for president as long as what everyone already knows about him doesn’t actually come up in conversation.
Zippy Catholic 
What.
Zippy. Please tell me this is satire.
SDG,
Why?
SDG:
I am entirely serious. These are probably the two most disgusting presidential candidates to ever make it to the general election; and that is saying something. But that doesn’t make them similar, other than inasmuch as disgusting is a general category.
malcolmthecynic:
Because Ivana Trump’s testimony was given in a deposition in 1989.
Because Jill Harth sued Trump for sexual assault in 1993.
Because Mindy McGillivray’s 2003 story is backed up by a photographer who says she immediately told him Trump had grabbed her ass.
Because Trump not only admitted but BOASTED about the very behavior he is alleged to have committed. Who are you gonna believe: a man who says he gropes women without waiting, or women who say they were so groped? There’s a real “He and she both said” dilemma for you.
Because so far nine or more women have come forward with stories like these, combined with Trump’s own words. There’s never THAT much smoke without at least some fire.
Because the pattern of other women remaining silent about being abused by powerful men until the issue of a public person’s pattern of abusive behavior and the celebrity’s public denials and attacks on the women is strikingly similar to other cases, like Bill Cosby. To characterize this pattern as “only now conveniently remembered, like college girls with a hangover, that they were sexually assaulted” is the very kind of cruel abuse that keeps women who have been abused silent.
Because even if you’re agnostic about whether or not the allegations are true, slurring even possible victims of sexual assault with the word “bimbos” is a kind of judgmental cruelty I can’t imagine, certainly not from someone I have regarded as a thoughtful Catholic.
SDG:
You have corrected my inexcusable ignorance on several points.
Rather than ‘disappearing’ the post I will leave it up and will include your rebuttal in the OP.
Zippy: Thanks for your gratifying candor. My respect for you is reaffirmed.
SDG:
What matters is what is true, not things I wrote without first doing proper due diligence. Thanks for the course correction.
@SDG
All of that is true, and is terrible behavior. But remember the modern smokescreen going on: Groping is now sexual assault.
No, it’s not. It’s bad, inexcusably bad, and nobody should ever do it. But calling it sexual assault is just using scary words to try and lump groping in with actual rape.
(The Ivana Trump deposition is just ridiculous. He made her feel “violated” during sex. What? What on earth does that mean? They were MARRIED at the time.)
For your continued education.
Jill Harth:
http://lawnewz.com/high-profile/exclusive-inside-the-donald-trump-sexual-assault-lawsuit/
Mindy McGillivray:
http://gotnews.com/busted-drunken-child-abuser-hoaxer-mindymcgillivray-falsely-claims-trump-nudged-never-happened-concert/
Ivana Trump:
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/ivana-trump-denies-accusing-donald-trump-rape-daily-beast-120721
Andrew E:
I stipulate the point-counterpoint, but SDG’s basic criticism is correct: as a matter of prima facie credibility the allegations against Donald Trump and Bill Clinton are basically in the same ballpark, which isn’t a ballpark in which I am interested in playing. That refutes the central contention I made in the OP. The timing of the most recent allegations does cast a lot of suspicion on them a la Anita Hill (unlike Broderick, who had to be dragged kicking and screaming into court to affirm what she had told to five witnesses immediately after the incident).
But the further details are more a matter of wrestling with pigs than I care to get into at this point. White House interns had better watch themselves no matter who wins the election, and that state of affairs leaves my original OP in disarray.
Malcolm is also correct though that the definition of sexual assault as a criminal act has become far too expansive. If grabbing a woman unexpectedly and kissing her without waiting for her explicit approval is criminal then I am a crook, and it is probably only ex post facto or statute of limitations which protect me from charges. It helps my case I suppose that my victim eventually bore my children, mostly voluntarily.
Zippy, not sure if you saw this but Scott Alexander published what I thought was a good rebuttal to the notion that Trump’s approach to foreign policy would be much less dangerous than Clinton’s here
Scott is a liberal who gives Hillary the benefit of the doubt where he shouldn’t, and totally skates around her abysmal record as Secretary of State by claiming to be unqualified to judge it. But I think he does raise legitimate concerns about Trump that he draws straight from Trump’s transparent nature.
If Trump does defeat Hillary Clinton in the general election, I will be much happier than if he doesn’t. But I’d still be concerned about the risk of a devastating war before the turn of the decade.
One thing I should have mentioned earlier, but will now is “How come no one is blaming Putin for threatening a nuclear strike?”
As far as I know, love him or hate him, Obama made no such threat, f-ups in Syria notwithstanding.
donnie:
This might be a good open thread for folks to post different kinds of concerns about the candidates. We could divide them into concerns for pretty young women who make the mistake of being alone with the candidate and his entourage vs concerns about things like nuclear war and global economic meltdown.
The article makes some great points. I suppose it depends on whether you view Trump’s brash statements as negotiation openings with particular hard targets or as serious policy proposals. I just naturally see Trump as always negotiating as opposed to proposing policies, but if that is wrong (which it easily could be) then he certainly comes off as very dangerous. But his saving grace is that I just don’t see Trump doing anything that doesn’t serve the interests of Trump. If he started a major civilizational calamity it would be on accident.
Clinton is a pretty well established and known quantity on the foreign policy front, and that is just what I find especially dangerous about her.
But I admit that I could easily be very wrong in my own impressions.
Aethelfrith:
Obama’s central merit is basically the same as Trump’s: he doesn’t really care about anything but himself. It is the difference between a Lightbringer Who Is The One We’ve Been Waiting For and a Witch Queen Grandma Who Is Gonna School Everyone On How Things Have To Be.
as a matter of prima facie credibility the allegations against Donald Trump and Bill Clinton are basically in the same ballpark,
Just to be clear, Jill Harth and Ivana Trump both contradict SDG. Jill Harth, of course, contradicts herself therefore requiring her lawyer to draft a followup to the lawnewz story to avoid any federal liability.
And SDG said the photographer also witnessed the incident in the case of McGillivray. But the story says that neither Davidoff nor McGillivray actually witnessed it. SDG needs to get the facts right.
which isn’t a ballpark in which I am interested in playing.
Just wait until the Clinton’s try to push the fake child rape charges against Trump they’ve had filed in New York state.
Andrew E:
I’ve linked to your responses from the OP.
[…] Source: Zippy Catholic […]
Andrew E:
I would be curious to see how you would clarify and expand upon the contradictions you perceive.
Ivana Trump confirms that she gave a deposition in which, in her words, “I stated that my husband had raped me.” This is also apparently a word she used in describing the incident to close friends.
Ivana went on to say that on this occasion “Mr Trump and I had marital relations in which he behaved very differently toward me than he had during our marriage. As a woman, I felt violated, as the love and tenderness which he normally exhibited toward me, was absent. I referred to this as a ‘rape,’ but I do not want my words to be interpreted in a literal or criminal sense.” Donald’s own lawyer said Ivana “felt raped emotionally.” The same lawyer has stated, incorrectly, that “You can’t rape your own wife.”
How Ivana “wants her words to be interpreted” is one thing; what she actually described and experienced is something else. Many women who experience what is correctly and legally definable as rape or sexual assault and can accurately describe what happened to them don’t think of it as rape or sexual assault (many assailants and rapists suffer from the same problem). (As an aside, there are also potentially other reasons Ivana might want to reinterpret her own testimony after the fact, e.g., The Art of the Deal in relation to prenups, divorce settlements, nondisclosure agreements, etc.)
The deposition is not currently a matter of public record as far as I know. The only characterization we have of its contents are from the author of a book on Trump who apparently read the relevant portions of the deposition and described the event in his book. If his account is accurate, or largely accurate, the incident certainly seems to qualify as rape or sexual assault.
I submit that if a husband leaves his wife feeling “raped emotionally” or “violated,” and the incident warrants being reported in a deposition, it probably belongs on a list of incidents attesting to a man’s capacity for sexual violence.
Regarding McGillivray, I spoke imprecisely and I appreciate your correction. My point was that the photographer bears witness that Harth did not only very recently “suddenly remember” that she had been assaulted by Trump many years ago. He is evidence that this has been her story for all these years. I didn’t mean to say that he had actually witnessed the incident, only that she immediately reported to him that it had happened. Thanks for that correction.
SDG wrote:
Thanks for your virtue signal. I might have confused you as a generic dumbass rather than a vile shill.
Cane Caldo,
Yep.
SDG:
To be fair, if we can’t take the witness herself at her own word now then the most that would follow is that we can’t take the witness at her word either then or now. Allegations during divorce proceedings are notoriously acrimonious, and it sounds for all the world like she is walking back the charge while trying not to admit that she perjured herself. As you say though there are lots of possibilities here and we have no particular reason to adopt a particular one.
I definitely reject that. Allegations made during hostile divorce proceedings and later substantively and explicitly recanted should in general be considered recanted.
Doesn’t the article say that she herself did not actually witness him grabbing her? That by her own account she felt something and inferred that it was the billionaire grabbing her, while in close quarters,during a concert which never actually took place?
I don’t know how accurate the article is, but I am leaning (despite my own lack of due diligence on the details when I initially wrote the post) toward the conclusion that I wasn’t so far off. Broderick’s claims w.r.t. Bill Clinton are much more credible than any which have been advanced here w.r.t. Trump. Even Clinton’s allies admit that Broderick told five people that it happened immediately afterword, that she had a bloody lip, etc. And then tried to forget about it until she was dragged kicking and screaming into court decades later, as opposed to springing it on a presidential candidate in October before the election.
Part of the perception issue on this subject does have to do with the changing understanding of ‘sexual assault’ combined with the destruction of marriage and the sexual revolution more generally. When marriage was much stronger as an institution a great many marriages would never have come about in the first place without what people today would consider sexual assault. Men show (sometimes physical) initiative, women accept or rebuff — this is the nature of things. At some point continued physical initiative in the face of (sometimes faux) protest becomes sexual assault, but it definitely isn’t when any kind of kissing or touching begins.
The sexual revolution has turned this into a disaster. But that doesn’t make grabbing a woman and kissing her into a crime under just laws [just laws — this isn’t a point about the state of positive law in some particular jurisdiction in the Current Year].
Cane and malcolm:
Lets stick to facts and arguments, please. I am interested in neither compliments nor insults directed at either myself or commenters.
Marital rape is, actually, a possibility, at least morally. It is possible at one and the same time to be morally entitled to the generous provision of something from another person and for it to be morally wrong to take it by violent force. For example, wives are in the nature of things entitled to generous material provision by their husbands; yet they are not entitled to steal from their husbands. If marital rape is impossible then it is impossible for a wife to ever steal from her husband.
It of course is also possible, and likely far more frequent, for wives to sin grievously by withholding generous satisfaction of the marital debt.
Cane Caldo and malcolmthecynic: How nice for you to be able to arrive at such dismissive judgments so easily. I am reasonably confident of Zippy’s ability to judge me fairly, though.
Zippy: I said nothing about not taking the witness at her word. I just think it’s important to use all sources critically. I’m not aware that anything reported in the deposition has either been recanted by the witness OR disputed by The Donald. Remember, “she felt raped emotionally” is how Donald’s lawyer characterized Ivana’s experience.
You’re aware that Broaddrick signed a deposition under oath denying her whole story against Clinton, right? My point isn’t to cast aspersions on Broaddrick’s story, merely to say that such stories are often messy, a fact that sexually violent men count on to get away with their offenses.
McGillivray seems to have been quite clear what happened from the very beginning. I can think of no reason to doubt her story that does not reflect negatively on the doubter.
SDG:
I’m not even sure what ‘she felt raped emotionally’ means. People in general and women especially experience all sorts of wacky feelings. She was either raped or she wasn’t, the evidence supports that she wasn’t. I don’t know how to say this delicately, but I really couldn’t care less how she feels.
Sure. As you say, these things are messy.
Andrew E’s article is the only one I’ve read on it. It says her story has consistently been that she felt a little grab or brush against herself and Trump was [one of the people] standing behind her, at a concert which never actually took place.
Allegations during divorce proceedings are notoriously acrimonious, and it sounds for all the world like she is walking back the charge while trying not to admit that she perjured herself.
As a practicing attorney, I would take allegations and deposition testimony with large buckets of salt, in particular with the type of case at issue and the socio-economic status of persons/personalities involved.
Again, it seems this is all a well-timed distraction orchestrated by the MSMDNC to hide the quite abysmal and criminal record of Hildebeast. And it will probably work.
@Zippy
Whatever abuse it is when a husband forces himself on his wife, it’s not rape. Rape is a particular crime which SDG and those like him abuse to attempt to redefine reality into their own twisted mommie-based fantasy.
And I do assent that a wife cannot steal from her husband. Whatever abuse of property is taking place, it is not theft.
I don’t want to derail, so this will be my final word on this topic in this thread.
I used to think something along this line, but it’s obviously false. If HRC is as bad as Trump–whatever that means–then Slick Willie must be worse, as he was the perpetrator of what HRC enables, covers, etc.–as well as her co-conspirator in other crimes. Logically, then, Bill and Hill are the two most disgusting. Everyone else is way behind; as far as we know.
Trump is a clown. I don’t like him. But I think what has been revealed by Trump (and perhaps as you say to Trump) is how sick those in the political class really are.
I have personally had some small interaction with the Clintons back in my old IT days. Their carelessness literally made my heart skip a beat. Then I wondered what kind of hubris is needed to encourage such apathy. Then I wondered what twisted will powered such hubris.
Then I shut the machine off before I betrayed my employer…or got myself suicided.
Cane:
Maybe we are back to the Rorshach thing again (I’m not excepting myself).
I guess I think of Trump as being very like Bill, if Bill had been successful in business rather than politics. Hell, they are golf buddies. The (R) after the name makes sense now because today’s R is yesterday’s D.
That may be part of what so motivates Hillary. Imagine what it would be like for her to see her husband (in effect) occupying the White House all over again, having beaten her out of her last chance at The Precious.
Trump’s just spent the last 16 months fighting the entire global/globalist power structure without yielding to the incalculable pressures against him using only his own personal and financial resources on behalf of what he views as the common good. I can’t think of something more removed from Bill Clinton.
Husband pointed this out to me about the woman from the plane in 1980:
She actually SAYS she was down with all the touching Trump was doing until he put his hand up her skirt.
Classic case of post encounter regret rape. These women’s cases are nothing compared to the likes of Juanita Broderick and Kathleen Willey.
It looks to me like Trump approached this as a businessman with the goal of becoming President. He looked at Ross Perot, at Ron Paul, figured out the largest untapped and discontented segment of the electoral market he could, and set about building a product – summarized as MAGA – to serve that untapped market. The goal would never be achievable for Trump through marketing mainstream politics.
SDG:
“Because even if you’re agnostic about whether or not the allegations are true, slurring even possible victims of sexual assault with the word “bimbos” is a kind of judgmental cruelty I can’t imagine, certainly not from someone I have regarded as a thoughtful Catholic.”
Your white-knighting aside (and it is), the recognition is that they were (and possibly still are) bimbos, regardless of whether some interaction occurred between Trump or not. The recognition also is that bimbos find themselves in those situations more often, both for seeking them out, but also being more likely to make allegations (usually for personal gain). The unmerited indignation evident in your comment suggests virtue-signalling (e.g. white-knighting) more than it does a concern for the truth.
I’m going to vote for Trump, and I don’t feel the least bit conflicted about it. But I am a little sad that this had to be the election where a candidate (slightly) outside the neo-lib consensus and campaigning against invade-the-world-invite-the-world decided to show up, because it seems tailor made for drive Zippy’s argument home about what is wrong with mad democracy. I doubt we will ever see a pair more likely to drive turnout down to negligible levels.
Zippy,
I’m on an android during a break at work, so this will be (for me) short. For the first time in a good while I completely disagree. It might be morally wrong in certain situations to have sex with your wife, but marital rape defined as a category would make rapists of every man coming into his sleeping wife.
Or, what Cane said.
malcolm:
What I specifically have in mind is not sleepy or intoxicated or whatever, but violent and forcible manifestly against consent. It is true that in marriage consent is presumptive, whereas outside of marriage dissent is presumptive. But that does not make marital rape a literal impossibility, any more than marital theft is a literal impossibility.
In any case this is at best a peripheral point in the current thread. It isn’t like any of Trump’s “marriages” are valid anyway, and at a certain point the whole, uh, situation gets too deep even for knee high boots — like arguing over whether it is ‘better’ for a man with AIDS to sodomize another man with a condom or an animal without. At some point we are just negotiating different circles of Hell.
“I suppose if nothing else this post proves that I am not immune to the lazy blogger tendency to find out details about a distasteful subject by just posting on it and having commenters do the fact checking for me.”
That would be: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Cunningham%27s_Law
(My comment may qualify, as well.)
==
An overview of the allegations (minus the new witness from Britain):
The Truth About The Donald Trump Sexual Assault Allegations
Also, some of these allegations echo previous plans that the DNC had (like: https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/787060280832380928)
But that does not make marital rape a literal impossibility, any more than marital theft is a literal impossibility.
Up until theory or so years ago, the law pretty much everywhere held both of those to be definitionly impossible (marital theft may still be, idk). And this makes sense, since rape is the violent violation of a person’s chastity, and this can in no wise apply to relations between a man and his wife. So forcible sex between a man and his wife is simply a species of violence.
It isn’t like any of Trump’s “marriages” are valid anyway
His second is presumptively valid, since neither of the parties were married beforehand (his marriage to Ivana doesn’t count since she herself was already married at the time.
AR:
It is difficult to express how irrelevant I think the putative distinction between ‘violent forcible sex that we refuse to label “rape”‘ and ‘rape’ to be.
I’ll end it here since it’s your thread and your blog, but for my last comment I want to note that I do, again, disagree. I actually think the distinction is not only important, it is absolutely critical to society’s understanding of marriage.
as a matter of prima facie credibility the allegations against Donald Trump and Bill Clinton are basically in the same ballpark
On the sexual matters aspect the main question is whether one notable philanderer and alleged rapist will get into the White House, or whether another one will return.
GJ:
That sums it up correctly, which is why – whatever peripheral issues may have arisen – SDG’s central substantive criticism of my post has some validity.
I suppose I do have an implicit epistemic rule for interpreting seedy sexual allegations against a politician, and I think there is some validity to it. The rule is that the closer the timing of the release of an allegation is to the October Surprise window, the less seriously it should be taken.
Even if all these allegations against Trump are false (but SDG has a good point that where there’s that much smoke, there’s probably some fire), it does not change the fact that Trump openly boasted of attempting to seduce a married woman. That to me was the most egregious part of the tape, although of course, it was not exactly a revelation.
I resolved never to vote again immediately after the 2012 election, for reasons very similar to Zippy’s (although much more inchoately formed at that time: I thank Zippy for helping me articulate them). This election has been eye-opening for me: Christian Trump supporters seem to be falling all over themselves to defend Trump’s immoral behavior, as if to prove Zippy’s point that we end up degrading ourselves when we participate in modern democratic politics.
For example, dismissing the Trump tape as ‘mere locker room talk’, as I’ve seen a number of Christians do: I’ve been in a lot of actual locker rooms, both among rough lower-class types (some of whom I would not be surprised to learn have spent some time in prison) and among more educated white-collar types and I’ve heard some pretty vile things among both groups. But in my experience, openly boasting of actual attempted adultery is very rare, and on the few occasions I can think of where something like that was said, it was met uncomfortably by the other men, or even rebuked.
Even if my experience is not representative, and openly boasting of attempted adultery is standard fare for ‘locker-room talk’, such a state of affairs is obviously contemptible and ought to be described as such.
Andrew E.:
Really? Ok, yeah, so Clinton is a globalist liberal, while Trump is a nationalist liberal.
But they’re both still liberals.
Ian:
Adulterous locker room talk was common when I was in college. As was the reverse, that is, boasting about being seduced by married women. Listening to the Trump tape was a trip down memory lane for me, in a “duh, seen this behavior before, did people actually expect anything different?” sense.
Rorshach elections indeed.
Ian:
I could have cited this in my previous comment and I don’t have anything to add to it. But I wanted it emphasized on its own.
Zippy:
Adulterous locker room talk was common when I was in college. As was the reverse, that is, boasting about being seduced by married women.
Interesting. Was it common for them to talk about actual adulterous experiences? Or was it more about fantasizing about imagined adulterous situations? (e.g., talking about a hot married woman and saying, “I’d like to do such and such to her”).
In my experience, the latter is common, but not the former.
At any rate, I recognize that my experience may not be representative. But I would still stand by my statement that such a state of affairs is contemptible.
Ian:
The talk often reflected actual experience. Married women leaving the dance floor to perform oral sex on men they just met in the car, as an actual example. Girls boasting about their married boyfriends.
I wasn’t exactly a paragon of virtue myself in those days, but I was often quite alone in expressing disgust.
And contemptible doesn’t even begin to describe it.
By the way, there’s a pretty good post here that dovetails nicely with the point about democracy degrading us:
Subtly and often not so subtly, they find themselves defending the indefensible because forthrightly acknowledging all of Trump’s faults makes backing him so awkward. They lower their standards and cede ground to the culture in a way they never would have imagined even a year ago.
And they are doing it for a campaign that is sinking, more than anything else, from the character flaws of the candidate. It would be a perfect morality tale for the religious right—if so many of its leaders weren’t implicated in it. – Rich Lowry
Wow, Rich Lowry said something intelligent?
@Ian
Yes it is contemptible, but it ought not be pursued at all because it is a rabbit trail in a decision about:
1) Should we, or should we not, enforce our borders against Mexican and South American invaders who deteriorate our working class and enrich our corporate overlords? (Which is to ask: Should we become like Mexico? I’ve been to Mexico City. It is vile.)
2) Should we, or should we not, enforce our borders against invaders who come here to steal, kill, and destroy in the name of Allah?
3) Should we, or should we not, stop sending all our work out of the country and then wondering why there is no work in the country?
4) Should we, or should we not, continue to be antagonistic to Russia about things of which are of no material interest to Americans?
And the situation is this: The president is either going be Trump or HRC. That’s it. There’s no other possible outcome short of one or both of them dead. Do we recognize that one candidate at least says he will help, in substantive ways, Americans below the UMC, or not?
Vote or not. I don’t care. My concern is the perspective of Christians. It is ironic that Rich Lowry should talk of morality tales for the religious right.
Middle-class and below Americans are the man waylaid by robbers in Luke 10. Trump professes to be the Samaritan. (I can’t say if he is.) HRC is clearly among the robbers; as are the invaders and the corporate masters in America.
I’ll let you figure out who Rich Lowry–and those who take his arrogant view–represents. But here’s a hint: Trump claims to be the Samaritan, who were considered dirty and traitorous half-breed. The “conservative guiding lights” are falling over themselves to decry Trump as a dirty and traitorous half-conservative as they walk by oppressed Americans on their way to the piety contest.
I confess that I don’t really find the moral posturing on the part of politicians and professional pundits very moving. Of course some of the things they say some of the time will be true.
FWIW I also do think Trump would attempt to curtail immigration and foreign military adventurism, whereas Clinton would definitely expand them.
And it isn’t as if comparing Trump to Clinton is comparing a morally despicable person to a virtuous person.
The gold standard in my view is obviously to stay home and not vote at all. About this I have hopefully been very clear.
But that doesn’t reduce all other actions to moral equivalence. Voting for Romney was a different magnitude and degree of error from voting for Obama; voting for the Frog Casino King a different magnitude and degree of error from voting for Grandma Abortion Witch. Best to not play at all; but best also not to pretend moral equivalence of players.
Hi Cane,
I hold no brief for Lowry or for establishment Republicans in general.
I was as thrilled as the next guy from these parts of the interwebs to see a candidate who openly endorsed immigration restriction, a moratorium on Muslim immigration, who was anti-free trade and anti-save-the-world-for-democracy. And I loved how he gave the Republican establishment conniption fits as a result of these positions, and that he saved us from that spineless, simpering ninny Jeb Bush. And I certainly would prefer Trump over Clinton, and yes, a vote for Trump is morally better than a vote for Clinton.
But a lot of Trump supporters act as though immigration is the number one issue and that nothing else matters: but without situating immigration within a broader and transcendent moral framework, what good is it? So say Trump succeeds in restricting immigration: now whites can continue sodomizing one another, murdering their babies, and blaspheming God without Mexicans taking their jobs. Great.
I am beginning to suspect that the whole Trump phenomenon was a brilliant ploy on the part of Satan to get Christians to compromise themselves morally for the sake of a silly election. (Though of course, as we hear every four years, this is the Most Important Election in the History of Forever. Those previous times we were just joking, this time we’re really, really serious.) I am afraid that we are selling our soul for a mess of pottage of [white] [G]entiles.
Ian:
Now take a few steps back from the trees to see the forest I see: the mass marketing of Hell.
a lot of Trump supporters act as though immigration is the number one issue and that nothing else matters: but without situating immigration within a broader and transcendent moral framework, what good is it? So say Trump succeeds in restricting immigration: now whites can continue sodomizing one another, murdering their babies, and blaspheming God without Mexicans taking their jobs. Great.
I would certainly prefer it as part of a broader “return to sanity” platform. But even standalone, immigration restriction is still good because (among other things) it will protect foreigners from coming here and corrupting themselves.
@Ian
What a condescending pile of crap. Americans eat too, Ian. They need shelter, and desire a reasonable sense of security in their homes and property. They need jobs with which they can support their families without having to work every moment they aren’t asleep and therefore having to give over their children to the state prison–I mean “school” system–which indoctrinates those children to be blasphemous and murderous sodomites.
What good is it to control immigration? Let me tell you: My fellow Americans below the UMC get to continue to eat, Ian. They get to continue to have a place to live and raise their children. They get to have one or two jobs worked by one parent instead of two or three jobs worked by both.
You present us with a self-righteous argument which is damnation of all even the non-murdering and the non-sodomites. Abraham pled for the God to spare Sodom. Jesus, St. Stephen, and St. Paul all pled for God to forgive those who martyred them. Jesus fed all those sinners in the countryside. He gave celebratory wine to the drunk.
But all you can see–the people among whom the Lord has set you–is a cesspool of white sinners who merit apathy. Shame!
I suggest you get a mirror because the ploy–the work–of Satan is to take down the self-righteous all the way to Hell.
By chance, how long has it been since you relied on a blue-collar job by you supported your family?
Zippy, thanks. Great post.
ArkansasReactionary, ha, good point.
Cane,
Just want to say you’vyou’ve been killing it this thread.
Hi Cane,
I am not apathetic toward white sinners. I take the position I do precisely because I want what I think will lead (white and otherwise) sinners to repentance. I want our country to adopt policies that look out for the interests white Americans, and I want white Americans to develop a racial consciousness. I want them to have jobs, I don’t want their jobs to be taken by foreigners, etc., etc.
But what I don’t like is what appears to be the trade-off that is occurring: a good immigration policy at the expense of social conservatism. How is this going to help white sinners repent?
There’s no reason we could not have both. For instance, a Pat Buchanan holds all the same good policy positions that Trump does, but is not compromised on the moral issues that Trump is, and so Christians would not have had to downplay the moral issues in supporting a Buchanan.
But that’s not what we’re getting. And I don’t think it’s worth it.
One difference between Trump and Buchanan is the additional time that liberalism has metastacized since then. The other is Trump’s not coincidental (in my view) broader base of support.
Yet another accuser, with eyewitnesses who have been interviewed.
So he grabbed a woman and kissed her and to SDG that makes him equivalent to a serial rapist I guess, which is the whole point of saying “sexual assault” instead of “stealing a kiss” or “getting fresh,” as my grandma would have called it.
Zippy:
I agree. While I think that the traditionalist Christians who strongly support Trump because of his stance on immigration would also have supported Buchanan, I don’t think that the same is true for a large portion of Trump’s supporters. Witness, for example, the lack of support Tancredo got not so long ago. (Of course, some of this has to do with charisma or lack thereof as well).
And that says something about our population, and it’s not something good.
@Ian
1. Social conservatism, as a political force, has been dead for years. Trading a dead body for a sensible policy on immigration is a good deal. Is it a less-than-holy deal? Absolutely. It is only a good deal in the sense that we should be wise with the unrighteous wealth that we have here on earth. (Luke 16)
2. The job the gov’t plays in bringing sinners to repentance is to punish the those who do evil and praise those who do good, so that we may obey and put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. (1 Peter 2) having then put them to silence, we can witness freely. The Frog Casino King does not care about our personal piety. He has shown that by going so far as to abandon his previous position and reach the logical conclusion which the Roman Catholic bishops of Poland rejected.
Which is to say that he stands ready to punish the evil and praise the good at least insofar as abortion is concerned. I suspect he is open to all sorts of course corrections; some of which I may not approve. (I don’t think he would strongly oppose an expansion of single-payer healthcare, for example, if he got a halt on immigration in trade.)
Grandma Abortion Witch is Grandma Abortion Witch.
I get that, but here’s that thing: What you’re talking about is a fantasy. In the real world only Trump and HRC are eligible to be president.
I know. I LOL’d when I read SDG’s scoop. “Liberal God-Hating Newsrag Says Rich Guy Put Moves on More than One Woman. Film at 11.”
I suppose one benefit to membership in a hierarchical church is that no one can expect you to vote out your bishop when he turns out to be pro-choice.
My last sentence in my previous comment might lead some to think I’m against hierarchy in the Church. I’m not. My own denomination (Anglo-Catholic branch of the Anglican Church) is hierarchical.
The point is that we should not have an expectation of piety from civil government which we do not even enjoy in our churches.
There is a very strange “doesn’t everyone already know this?” quality to the revelation that Donald Trump has put the moves on lots of women, from my perspective. It is like an October Not Even A Little Bit Surprising. Like I said in some other comment, the hot mike tape wasn’t shocking or surprising — it was exactly what I would expect.
Disgusting, yes. Surprising, no.
If Hugh Hefner were the nominee would there be similar shocking ‘revelations’ and reactions to them?
Maybe most people are just less Trump-aware than I’ve suspected. He’s been a rather transparent public persona my whole adult life, and I can’t understand the sudden shock of people finding out that Donald is Donald. Or that Hillary is Hillary, for that matter.
So the thing I don’t really get is people deciding not to support Trump based on these latest things. If this is the sort of thing that would make you not support him then you probably should have decided that a long time ago, not just now.
There is a pretty basic difference between these sorts of things and rape or attempted rape charges.
Caine,
Sure, social conservatism is pretty dead and has been for a while, but I think the type of thought exhibited by many on the right has contributed to this: we’ve been insisting that we have to vote for the lesser of two evils for years now, and things have only continued to get worse. Maybe it’s time to try a different strategy?
If social conservatives were to say: “These issues (e.g., abortion, marriage) are too important: we will not support a candidate who is compromised on these issues”, that would underscore that these issues actually are important, and might get some people actually to recognize that Christianity takes these things seriously and to re-think their priorities. It would also be inspiring to the faithful. In the long run, I think this would do more for social conservatism than voting for the lesser of two evils strategy does, and would be better from a moral perspective for individual Christians. (Of course, in the long run, this strategy is not sufficient either).
And even though social conservatism has been in dire straits for years now, it does seem to me that social conservatism has indeed been hurt by the Trump phenomenon: as I stated earlier, I think that many Christians are allowing themselves to be degraded in their support of Trump, and this is not good for social conservatism. Or to give an example: I am not so sure that the GOP would have allowed a public sodomite to speak at their convention any time prior to this year’s convention.
To come back to a previous point I made: if immigration is not situated in a moral framework, what is there to constrain whatever arises out of ‘Trump-conservatism’ from becoming just as bad or worse than what we have today? Something else other than the Good will become its ultimate standard.
Ian,
Re: I think that many Christians are allowing themselves to be degraded in their support of Trump, and this is not good for social conservatism
I see a lot of angst and confusion (pointing to myself here) as people try to balance “what is the ideal government” with “what might actually happen in my lifetime such that I have relative safety, relative financial security, relatively can say and think and worship what I want, and my wife and kids aren’t are being murdered or perpetually tempted towards hell.” And that’s understandable But I think even how one attempts to balance the scales with these two options is a bit of a rorscharch. I once thought that IF heaven is the goal then the question of – unless it’s directly related to my state in life – what government I supported is of zilch consequence. Like what college team I supported. I’m not even sure of that anymore. I said in another forum that even arguing for a “Christian culture” is very likely arbitrary or anemic depending on the one arguing. Meaning it dumbs down the power of the name of Christ in order to form some coalition for some “really important greater good.” And that stinks of a hidden liberalism. That is in no way to deny the very real concerns (personal safety, putting food on the table, roof overhead) others have brought up – quite the opposite, and I’m not nearly as optimistic as others.
Voting for Romney was a different magnitude and degree of error from voting for Obama
I suppose, but I would argue that Romney was even worse.
I am beginning to suspect that the whole Trump phenomenon was a brilliant ploy on the part of Satan to get Christians to compromise themselves morally for the sake of a silly election.
Yet doesn’t this describe the American political scene since the beginning with “Christians” compromising and assenting to the advance of liberalism at every turn? We have to acknowledge there never really was a viable Christian Right here. 19th century Protestant pastors could not even succeed in passing an amendment proclaiming Jesus Christ as God in a country that is supposed to be so devout and religious! You cannot scapegoat immigrants for that.
Really, how is Trump’s personal morality any worse than Romney or even the conservative icon Reagan? The later both held office and were instrumental in the development of gay rights and abortion respectively. Reagan was divorced. It is ironic that conservatives have been crowing on about “the next Reagan” a figure that will ride in on a white horse to save the Republican party and deliver the country into another golden era of freedom and prosperity. Trump truly is the next Reagan. From the relatively superficial slogans of “Make America Great Again” to “Morning in America” and that fact that both men had careers built in part on TV, to the more substantive similarities of how both successfully out manuevered the establishment Republicans of their day. My point being that this is hardly a new phenomenon.
@Ian
This is a stunningly wrong interpretation of recent political history. Newt Gingrich isn’t just now at the end of his presidential career because he’s divorced and so “Social Conservatives” pilloried him. He’s been talking about immigration problems for years.
Trump took that idea, and now he’s winning with it.
Trump’s medical plan is also taken almost verbatim from Gingrich and he’s winning people over with it. All he had to do, to succeed where Gingrich couldn’t, was ignore the So-Con pundits when they crawled out of our screens to make faces at his divorces.
As I spoke about before: Trump tried that. He said publicly that abortion should be illegal, and that both abortionists and aborting mothers should be penalized if they break the law. Team Dumbass (Social Conservatives) uniformly ridiculed and denigrated him for it. Meanwhile, back at the Polish ranch, people charged with moral authority of an eternal consequence subverted anti-abortion legislation. Ta-dah! It must be authentic social conservatism because Team Dumbass and Team Polack agree.
If the So-Cons of today were faced with the ancient task of deposing Jezebel, the one thing you could count on was that they would disqualify as sinful any man who was once rude to a woman.
The reason immigration is becoming the single most important issue for any self-proclaimed “conservative movement” is that immigration at the scale we’re seeing is a mass migration. We have enough historic examples to know definitively where that will end, which is social and political fracturing of the polity and nation. Therefore by definition, anyone wanting to conserve the polity and nation, let alone reform it in a positive direction, must oppose what amounts to an existential threat to them.
Contrary to what many Christians think, the biggest threat to their liberties is not bathroom politics, but immigration. We are importing hordes of people who share a fundamentally different view of liberty and politics than us. Does anyone believe that Muslim and Latin American immigrants give a damn about rights that don’t exist where they come from? To the extent that they agree on the trans and homosexual issues, it will be entirely on those areas where they merely happen to agree for whatever reason is relevant to them (but it won’t be from the same principles).
We are importing some nominal and even faithful Catholics in this mix, so conservatives naturally overlook the fact that we are importing primarily Muslims and pagans in actuality. Even many Mexicans are turning to a new form of paganism (La Santa Muerte). So while a lot of conservatives and Christians can delude themselves about how these people are enriching our culture and adding to our congregations, they’re willfully ignoring the facts about the religious influence coming across the border.
But they’ll soon find that there is something a lot worse than atheist snark and derision.
Wood:
That is in no way to deny the very real concerns (personal safety, putting food on the table, roof overhead) others have brought up – quite the opposite
Yet seek first His kingdom and His righteousness…
Wood,
In my opinion, there are two aspects of rebuilding America: secular and religious. There is nothing (particularly) religious about the process of restoring America’s traditional demographics and political culture. Even those who oppose liberalism need to recognize that traditional American culture was derived from Anglo-Saxon culture that predates liberalism and losing that too would irrevocably destroy any concept of what we call “America.” In fact, it’s almost certainly the case that the reason our liberal revolution was so mild in its form of government and policies compared to the French is that Anglo-Saxon culture.
Conservatives are correct to note that we face risks with Trump on the “values issues,” but they are missing the fact that there are two fronts in this war, not one. A lot of conservatives have at the very least abandoned one; many are, in fact, actually helping the left.
For me, like a lot of Republican voters who accepted the reality of Trump’s nomination, I have deep concerns that if we lose the secular front we’ll ever win the religious front. That’s not to say the gates of Hell will triumph against the church in general, but it is entirely possible that America will be finally dechristianized and Christians rendered a powerless, second class minority.
Does anyone think that Somali or Syrian Muslims or Mexican death worshipers are going to vote your values? I don’t. Restoring our nation to God is still possible without the secular front, but it is far less likely and will be far more difficult.
There is another thing too, which is that as the country becomes more diverse and less cohesive as a polity, traditional patterns of violence are likely to set in. Christians by and large don’t take this threat seriously. All they can see is “oh my god, he grabbed her pu##% without her permission.” John Kasich is a far better man, and he basically announced he’d keep the illegals here, legalize them and condemn opponents of such a policy. Trump may drag those around him to Hell by his example, but he may prove to actually lessen the risk of millions of people being forced into a demographic scenario that drives them to Hell. Kasich is the opposite (for sake of argument), and I find that far worse.
[…] to ‘discover’ that Donald Trump is a handsy cad like Bill Clinton, because this has just now in the present hour been revealed in an October Surprise, is like someone who has just discovered that Hugh Hefner is a […]
Mike T: Few Mexican immigrants are actually demon worshippers. (Within Mexico I think Santa Muerta is worshipped by something like 5% of the population.) You don’t need to commit that sort of calumny against people to argue effectively for enforcing immigration law.
The religious problem with Mexican immigrants isn’t that they worship demons or whatever but that they either cease to attend church all together or become evangelicals after crossing the Rio Grande. Those who remain Catholic have some problems too. Just look at how few seminarians there are in LA.
The church in Mexico is relatively strong. Mexicans in Mexico are far more likely to receive the sacraments than they are in the US. Here, they are more likely to stop going to church and get an abortion. The souls of immigrants are probably better off back home.
Give us your tired, your poor, and your huddled masses; and we’ll give them an STD.
PB,
La Santa Muerte is growing in strength in Mexico, and as you say, Mexican Catholics tend to greatly reduce their religious observance once they hit our side of the border. So bottom line is that the influx of Mexicans isn’t at all a net positive for us religiously.
Mike T:
I took PB’s point to be that mass Mexican immigration is just as much a net negative for Mexican immigrants themselves, religiously, as it is for us. Redirecting back to just how awful Mexican culture is by your lights (reinforcing negative stereotypes of Americans in the process, BTW) basically just ignores his point.
Redirecting back to just how awful Mexican culture is by your lights
I never said that Mexican culture was awful. What I said is that it would have a negative influence on our goals to the extent we get a horde of immigrants from there.
We already have a horde of immigrants from there, so we know pretty well what it is like.
Cane Caldo, have you heard about Anglican Ordinariates founded upon Anglicanorum Coetibus, for Anglo-Catholics?
Zippy, please forgive me for such shameless off-topic comment 🙂
I will hold my nose, try not to vomit and vote for TRUMP.
America is finished as is Catholicism.
An abuser is better than a murderer is better than a cleric
who adores SATAN.
Karl
Karl: “Catholicism is finished because of Satan. And my plan is to go cooperate more with Satan.” Aight.
In spite of how it should be, unless a lay male, who has faced off against clerical corruption, and has the scars to show it, runs the Catholic Church, henceforth, and not a Pope nor the clerics, this Catholic will no longer support the Catholic Church. Period.
The rules must be rewritten.
Karl
Karl: “This Catholic will not submit to the divinely established authority of the Bride of Christ unless and until she submits to my authority.” OK.
Wood:
Karl has been treated despicably by the annulment mill, so if the Church needs to defend itself from Karl I’ll just leave that up to the Church.
Zippy,
I had no idea. As a new Catholic I can be overly sensitive. No offense intended at all.
Wood:
No reason you would be expected to know. I was letting you know because not knowing isn’t really fair to you. Other folks can make up their own minds whether to defend the Church against Karl expressing his frustration and anger, but I don’t consider that my duty.
Wood,
Stay the course as best you can, but know the clergy, the VAST MAJORITY OF THEM, are more than mildly corrupt and they do not care about truth even if you can demonstrate it with facts. I can no longer stomach them having fought with them to defend a valid marriage for more than 27 years.
I read with great cynicism on some blogs how wonderful it is for Arlington Diocese to be getting Bishop Burbidge from Raleigh because he seems to like the TLM.
None of the first four of our children were married in the Catholic Church. They have seen what goes on.
Our son had his wedding in the Cathedral in Raleigh, 2 1/2 years ago. In anticipation of this I wrote to Bishop Burbidge to seek his intervention in our marriage, as I have numerous others….. Our marriage is valid, a sacrament. I have defended it twice(about 20 years apart), through about four or five different tribunals. The truth stands, but the (27 year)adulterers have ALWAYS been welcomed and treated as a married couple, in the face of the FACTS! This, with Papal, local Bishops and local clergy knowledge of EVERYTHING! Yes, JPII, Benedict and Jorge the heretic! They know/knew unless their communications were intentionally blocked.
Burbidge knows the story. His Judicial Vicar knows the story. Yes, I wrote to Dolan too and to the Heretic, I believe, and others…. no reaction at all.
I attended(hesitantly) the wedding and saw my wife receive communion with her adulterous lover. I put my precious granddaughter down, who I had been holding(I do not receive communion for many reasons, but I feel that I can no longer commit a mortal sin, not even with free choice. But, I will not argue that point because I AM CERTAIN and only God Himself, after I felt his wounds and saw His tears for me, in real physical contact, would be able to convince me otherwise) and I walked out of the cathedral with tears in my eyes, but making no scene. I gathered my clothing from my daughter’s house and drove back to New York. Understand, I had been prepared to see the adulterers together at our son’s wedding but I NEVER expected what I saw!!!! I was overwhelmed.
I know what I am talking about. Others are free to have their opinions.
No one, save God Himself, will change mine.
Not even Zippy, who I deeply respect. But, I must admit, Zippy, your intellect far exceeds mine.
There are a few priests that I respect and whose opinions matter to me, but they will not change my mind. I will keep their identities to myself.
I DO NOT want to turn anyone from Catholicism. But I want you to know what you are getting into, precisely because I care and I am honest. If I have hurt you, please forgive me.
In March, I was in Raleigh visiting our kids. I saw my wife and her adulterous lover receive communion. This time I was not surprised. I stayed through the Mass and left with my son, daughter-in-law and their daughter.
I rarely go to mass now. I go more frequently to 24 hr adoration.
Karl
[…] if any legit comments got caught in King AI’s deplorable catcher. This morning I retrieved this from Elspeth and this from e. a. […]
>I rarely go to mass now. I go more frequently to 24 hr adoration.
Do you also go to restaurants just to watch people eat?
Sarcasm aside, Karl, the anathema against the Donatists and Jesus’s teaching to turn the other cheek are instructive here. If you let your bitterness stand in the way of participating in the life of Christ, you let the Enemy win.
In spite of how it should be, unless a lay male, who has faced off against clerical corruption, and has the scars to show it, runs the Catholic Church, henceforth, and not a Pope nor the clerics, this Catholic will no longer support the Catholic Church. Period.
The rules must be rewritten.
Well, a lay male could be elected Pope (vote for Pedro?) but then he’d have to immediately receive Holy Orders etc
I am sorry for what happened to you but your reaction is only, literally, hurting your own soul and you have erected an insurmountable barrier to your return to the fold.
You know you can only control yourself, not the Catholic Church which still has Jesus as its Head.
It seems that you got unjustly screwed over – just as did Jesus.
Upthread you noted your children did not get married in the church. What effect does that have on their eschatological futures?
The Bride has a relative who for some reason (unknown to most aware of the situation) was refused a burial plot in consecrated ground near Bar Harbor, Maine.
Her kids left the church and the family has been protestant ever since.
I suppose they think they punished the Catholic Church but, in reality, they only gravely wounded their own selves in abandoning the Church Jesus established for two reasons:
Salvation
Sanctification
If you leave the Faith (2 john 9) you have imperiled your immortal soul for how is one to be saved and sanctified apart from the Sacraments?
I am not saying forgive and forget. I am saying forgive, that ye may be forgiven.
Karl’s situation is a good example of how liberal Catholicism trumpets platitudes about “mercy” while contemptuously defecating on everyone who takes doctrine seriously at great cost to themselves.
It is true that if you have to sit down and eat a plate of shit before going to Mass, the Eucharist is still worth it. But that is easier said than done, and woe be to Hell’s episcopal lunch ladies.
The skulls of bishops indeed.
I have no desire to argue or fault the advice given here, especially if those giving it have their own heavier crosses. But, this is not to belittle heartfelt advice from anyone who has a lesser cross, either. It is just that I have had enough, at least for now.
View our children more mercifully than me, they were raised to believe that adultery is a sacrament, quite literally, and have seen it up close and extremely personally, to this day. Although, they have seen my faithfulness and my continuing openness to healing our marriage, which I view as living forgiveness. I will, however, not provide the knife to a person bent on stabbing me to death.
As with my wife, I do not think authentic repentance is part of the makeup of the Catholic Church, either now or in the foreseeable future. But, I believe that she would repent if the entire Catholic Church did and restored its orthodoxy. I am not holding my breath for these but if they occurred, I would welcome them and cooperate in healing wounds.
Karl