Trump Demands Biden Remove Ad of Him Calling Dead Soldiers ‘Suckers’ and ‘Losers’ - The former president said only a “psycho” or a “very stupid person” would’ve made such statements.

  • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    The former president said only a “psycho” or a “very stupid person” would’ve made such statements.

    I mean, he’s right…

  • jordanlund@lemmy.worldM
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    6 months ago

    In fairness to Trump (there’s a sentence I never thought I’d write…)

    ““He said I stood over graves of soldiers and I said: ‘These people are suckers and losers,”

    That’s technically correct. He did not say those things in public.

    Edit I watched the ad, it does not specify that Trump said these things in public, just that he said them which is true.

    He said them privately to staff members.

    Confirmed by Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly:

    https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald-trump/john-kelly-confirms-trump-privately-disparaged-us-service-members-vete-rcna118543

    But my favorite quote out of all this is the one that barely gets mentioned:

    https://www.axios.com/2023/10/02/trump-troops-fallen-soldiers-john-kelly

    Trump saying at a 2017 Memorial Day event in Arlington National Cemetery: “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?”

    Trump is ENTIRELY transactional. The idea that good men would fight a war for their country purely because it’s the right thing to do escapes him entirely.

      • KevonLooney@lemm.ee
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        6 months ago

        He’s not. He’s just an asshole. He can read social cues, he just doesn’t care. That’s why it can be tiring to deal with people with autism. They’re not assholes, but they act similarly.

    • Venia Silente@lemm.ee
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      6 months ago

      The idea that good men would fight a war for their country purely because it’s the right thing to do

      Since when is it the right thing to do? 93% of wars, particularly ones where the US is involved, are about making rich people richer.

        • norimee@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          World War II was not what? About making rich people richer?

          You don’t think the Nazis did it for money and power? Where do you think the killed jews property, businesses, money went? Real eastate, priceless artwork, jewellery, savings, some pretty prominent businesses. Hell, they even ripped out their gold teeth.

          Ever seen pictures of the mountains of wedding rings and gold teeth ready to be melted they found in the camps?

          The leading Nazis lived in wealth and luxury. This whole war was about power and superiority over others, which only come with MONEY.

          • Sanctus@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            Do you think we’re talking about Nazi soldiers in relation to this statement? The cemetery should be your queue.

            • norimee@lemmy.world
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              6 months ago

              The people in any of these soldier/veteran cemeteries were never the ones profiting of War. That doesn’t change the fact that wars are fought because of money. Including WWII.

              • Cracks_InTheWalls@sh.itjust.works
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                6 months ago

                I’m not who you were talking to, but I think you and I can agree that war is primarily a means to increase the power of the aggressor. Money is one form of this, perhaps the main one - though I’d argue things like direct control over other territories and their populace is another (connected to money re: control of resources, sure, but that’s just one aspect).

                That said, the American WWII dead buried at Arlington, or the Canadians and Brits buried in Dieppe for that matter, or heck, even the Soviets buried in Warsaw (regardless of how you may feel about the former USSR in general) - would you say that their lives were given, primarily, in the name of money/power? Or in defence of that being stripped from others by force?

                I’m not going to pretend there isn’t an argument to be made for the former, but I am legitimately curious about your thoughts here. Is it ever just to take up arms?

                • norimee@lemmy.world
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                  6 months ago

                  There are always more than one side in any conflict and most of the time they are not as clear as in WW II, but I argue that wars are always started because of material gain besides other factors.

                  Look at the British empire, they exploited their colonies to the max taking all the resourses for themselves. They didnt invade india just to have power over it. They did so for the wealth of their own country. So did every other colonizer. The US wages wars over oil or to to keep the world as capitalist as possible. Russa is waging war in Ukraine not because Putin wants to holiday in Kiev. Israel wages war over the question who is allowed to prosper on that land.

                  Not every act of aggression is about money, but I do believe that one of the root causes for every war is material gain.

        • Venia Silente@lemm.ee
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          6 months ago

          Ballpark figure, simple statistics, basic understanding of the capitalist and corporationist mindset.

          But yeah it’s only an approximation. The real value is likely closer to 100%.

          • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
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            understanding of the capitalist and corporationist mindset.

            So, half dunning-kruger …

            “Corporationist”? Really? Who are you, a rapper in a TV interview?

            Ballpark figure

            And the other half made up.

            I love the confidence that safety and distance give people to make stuff up and argue it as fact.

      • lennivelkant@discuss.tchncs.de
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        6 months ago

        I think that’s a question of perspective. We, judging from hindisght and with access to more Information, can tell that. But the people signing up out of a misguided desire to serve probably didn’t. Their motivation - regardless of result - was probably to do the right thing, which is a sentiment that Trump evidently doesn’t just not understand, but doesn’t even seem aware of. “What’s in it for them?” betrays a fundamental ignorance of even the concept that his ilk leverage to get people fighting their wars.

      • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
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        6 months ago

        I think I’d like to see the numbers to back up your statements about the war in question, WW2. Or, sit back in your armchair because it’s still Monday morning somewhere.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      Trump is ENTIRELY transactional. The idea that good men would fight a war for their country purely because it’s the right thing to do escapes him entirely.

      In fairness, you only need a bunch of good men to fight a war purely because it’s the right thing in order to counter the bad men fighting a war in order to do a bad thing.

      Maybe if Trump’s attitude had been more common in Berlin in the 1930s, or more common in the US during the 1960s or in Israel or Russia during the 2020s, we’d have skipped a few nightmarish atrocities without having a bunch of good men perish in the process.

      • El Barto@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        You are cherry-picking and going off rails.

        But to humor you, how far back do you want to go?

        Because the U.S. was founded on atrocities committed against the people who already lived in North America.

        And the U.S. funded operations to topple legitimate governments in Central America, a time in which a lot of good people died because of it.

        So, don’t paint the U.S. as “the good guys who should listen to Trump.”

        But again, this is entirely a red-herring.

        The truth of the matter is, Trump is a piece of shit who doesn’t respect the people who sacrifice their lives for his safety.

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          So, don’t paint the U.S. as “the good guys who should listen to Trump.”

          There are plenty of good people in the US who have resisted the Trumpian brand of ethnic nationalism and the capitalist death drive. And quite a few of them died for their country (or, at least, their friends and family and neighbors). But they’re not the ones we celebrate on Memorial Day. Not officially, anyway.

          The truth of the matter is, Trump is a piece of shit who doesn’t respect the people who sacrifice their lives for his safety.

          Trump was never in any danger. His father was a fascist who idolized the Italian and German dictators running roughshod over Europe. If they’d somehow managed to marshal enough fossil fuel and methamphetamine to do a reverse D-Day and put Axis soldiers onto the Atlantic seaboard, the Trump family would have been the first in line to great them as liberators.

          Why on earth would he be celebrating the Roosevelt Democrats and Eugene Debbs Socialists who were out firing on his ideological allies and business buddies on the other side of the Atlantic?

          Trump wasn’t going to pay homage to the allies of Mao Zedong and Joseph Stalin. You think he wants to bend the knee for a bunch of tankies?

          • Crikeste@lemm.ee
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            6 months ago

            “You can never criticize bad things because good things exist, too!” ☺️

          • El Barto@lemmy.world
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            Trump is compromised. He is with the tankies. Because the tankies own him.

            Edit: downvoted by tankies.

            • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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              He is with the tankies.

              We talking about the college leftists protesting Israel or the police riding around in military surplus?

      • eran_morad@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        What kind of fucking weakass reasoning is this? “Genocidal maniacs are the moral equivalent of those who would give their lives to stop them”. The fuck?

    • masquenox@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      “What was in it for them?”

      Sounds like a perfectly reasonable question to me… far more reasonable than simply assuming the people who perpetrated the US’s colonialist mass-murder campaigns in the third world was simply “good men” (supposedly) “doing the right thing.”

      Good job making Trump sound more rational than you, hero.

      • CapeWearingAeroplane@sopuli.xyz
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        6 months ago

        This take just baffles me… you can disapprove of a war, and still respect people willing to put their life on the line for something they believe is right. Even in war, opposing sides have a long history of showing their enemy a certain amount of personal respect, even though they clearly disagree about something to the point of killing each other over it.

        Your take is just condescending and unempathetic. You can respect someone for sacrificing themselves without agreeing with them about what they’re sacrificing themselves for. Regardless, it shouldn’t be hard to see how someone fighting to depose an infamously brutal dictator (Iraq) or a fundamentalist regime that stones women for wanting a divorce (Afghanistan) can believe that they are doing something good.

          • SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works
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            6 months ago

            After reviewing their comment history, I think Masquenox has strong controversial opinions and a bellicose attitude, but is not a troll.

            • JacksonLamb@lemmy.world
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              6 months ago

              After reviewing their modlog history, I think Masquenox displays a level of emotional incontinence that is effectively the same as trolling.

              • SreudianFlip@sh.itjust.works
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                lol putting that up on the shelf with ‘verbal incontinence’, I like it.

                I do set a line between ‘cantankerous’ and ‘troll’ more leniently along the annoyance scale than others. I say let the dork be a dork, not everyone has social skills.

                • JacksonLamb@lemmy.world
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                  I do see what you mean. I think when a dork engages in repeated personal attacks they cross the line for me regardless of their intent.

                  It’s a philosophical question akin to Baudrillard’s “simulate a robbery” idea.

        • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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          This take just baffles me… you can disapprove of a war, and still respect people willing to put their life on the line for something they believe is right.

          A Toast to the Troops… All the troops. Both Sides.

          You can respect someone for sacrificing themselves without agreeing with them about what they’re sacrificing themselves for.

          RIP to Sgt. Rufus “Baby Ears” McGuffin. He died doing what he loved. Ripping the ears of babies and putting them on a big necklace that he would wear around camp.

          • CapeWearingAeroplane@sopuli.xyz
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            “All the troops, both sides” is half my point when pointing out that enemy combatants historically have often held respect for each other.

            Yes, I respect a combatant fighting for something they believe in that’s bigger than themselves, people not fighting for personal gain, but because they want to give someone else a better life. That’s regardless of what side they’re on- even if they’re on the side I’m actively trying to kill.

            • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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              6 months ago

              enemy combatants historically have often held respect for each other.

              Torturing POWs to death as a form of respect

          • masquenox@lemmy.world
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            He died doing what he loved. Ripping the ears of babies and putting them on a big necklace that he would wear around camp.

            Just another “All American Hero,” eh?

        • masquenox@lemmy.world
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          and still respect people willing to put their life on the line for something they believe is right

          Apply your bullshit logic to the Waffen-SS or the KKK, then. Go on… I’ll be waiting for you right here.

          Your take is just condescending and unempathetic.

          Really, genius? I guess this must be the first time you’ve ever confronted the idea that not all people who experience warfare are mindless zombies willing to die for whatever cause the rich people (or you) told them they should die for? You and the rest of the shitlib hive mind on here are hysterically cramming onto the jingoism train simply to own Trump without realizing what a self-own that is turning out to be.

          infamously brutal dictator (Iraq)

          Are you talking about the “infamously brutal dictator” in Iraq that the US helped into power? That the US helped to deploy chemical weapons in his war with Iran? That one?

          a fundamentalist regime that stones women for wanting

          Are you talking about the “fundamentalist regime” that only exists thanks to the massive support the US provided to these very same fundamentalists back in the 80s together with their fundamentalist allies in Pakistan? That “fundamentalist regime?”

          Good job, hero - you’ve highlighted why we should all be asking, “What was in it for them?”

              • ASeriesOfPoorChoices@lemmy.world
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                6 months ago

                lol spicy

                also: bwahaha! you think “liberal” is a put down of some kind? like caring about other people is something to be ashamed of? What kind of egocentric narcissistic psychopath are you?

                • masquenox@lemmy.world
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                  like caring about other people is something to be ashamed of?

                  Did you liberals suddenly start caring about anything except preserving your precious status quo? When?

          • CapeWearingAeroplane@sopuli.xyz
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            Ok, I’ll try to make this simple for you: I can hold respect for a combatant that puts their life on the line in an effort to do something they believe is making the world a better place, rather than for personal gain.

            The KKK is immediately excluded, because there was/is little to no sacrifice being made by those lynching others. The same goes for SS soldiers running a concentration camp. I was quite clear in pointing out that what demands respect is the act of putting your life on the line to protect or help others.

            As for who put those regimes in place: That is completely irrelevant as to whether you can have respect for an individual who sees the atrocities committed by the regime, and believes they are doing good by fighting it. I have a hard time thinking that a soldier in Afghanistan is thinking a lot about who put the Taliban in power, or what they personally stand to gain from the fight when they decide to go there.

            • masquenox@lemmy.world
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              Ok, I’ll try to make this simple for you:

              You already have - you will happily endorse some of the world’s most vilest people as long as they saluted a piece of colored fabric (preferably the one you worship) before doing so.

              There is absolutely no further simplification required.

              The same goes for SS soldiers running a concentration camp.

              So you are perfectly ok with them as long as their their victims was free-range? I wonder what excuses you will come up with to glorify your vaunted drone operators who perpetrate terrorism while drinking Starbucks or your CIA operatives who pay proxies to do all the rape, murder and torture for them?

              That is completely irrelevant

              It fucking absolutely isn’t - you want to wax lyrically about people dying (supposedly) to “defend their country” from the very same people said country created and helped into power. Asking questions like, “what’s in it for them?” is a far more rational response to that than appealing to propagandistic Hollywood Heroism tropes… as you are doing at the moment.

              • CapeWearingAeroplane@sopuli.xyz
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                Now you’re just coming off as disingenuous. So that I won’t need to repeat myself, just read my comments and try to figure out for yourself where you can find backing for what your accusing me of instead of putting words in my mouth and purposefully misinterpreting my comments or taking individual phrases out of context.

                Take your time, I won’t be waiting up.

                • masquenox@lemmy.world
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                  Now you’re just coming off as disingenuous.

                  You coming face to face with the true implications of your own beliefs does not equate to any disingenuity on my part.

                  War is not “honorable” combatants facing off against each other in a sterile environment as a lot of military historians try to purport - it’s slaughter. The vast majority of it’s victims aren’t even combatants. When you pretend that your preferred group of war criminals “respecting” the “other side” actually matters, are you including all the dead people that couldn’t fight back and therefore do not deserve any of this rarified “respect” of yours? Or are they just uninteresting externalities and “collateral damage” that doesn’t fit into the militaristic tropes your head has obviously been filled with?

      • El Barto@lemmy.world
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        The Taliban took over Afghanistan as soon as the Americans left.

        Did you know why that happened? Because the Afghan military did nothing. They didn’t fight. They retreated.

        Imagine if a foreign force invaded the U.S. and the army did nothing and the foreign forces took over the government and controlled your life. Do tell, would you feel safe in those circumstances? Do you know why that doesn’t happen? Because of the people you and your piece of shit dear leader are disparaging.

        So, fuck you.

        And fuck off, troll.

        • masquenox@lemmy.world
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          The Taliban took over Afghanistan as soon as the Americans left. ran off with their tails between their legs.

          FTFY.

          You absolutely failed to defeat the Taliban with your billion dollar drones, your billion dollar air-fuel bombs, your billion dollar cluster munitions, your billion dollar airplanes, your billion dollar satellites, your billion dollar “special forces,” your cheaply-bought death squads and your two-cents’ worth “free market capitalism” - and then you ran off and left a cardboard cutout of a puppet-state military to fix the mess that you and only you caused.

          No. Fuck you.

          The Taliban does appreciate those death squads your “special forces” created, though… those well-trained torturers, rapists and murderers will sure prove useful to a regime like the Taliban, eh?

      • 𝔼𝕩𝕦𝕤𝕚𝕒@lemmy.world
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        Trump doesn’t understand the question because he doesn’t understand doing things for the betterment of anyone but himself.

        For most of history, you didn’t ask “what’s in it for me” when the king/prime minister/ The Church/ or President came asking (country irrelevant). That’s a relatively new luxury due to perspective of the digital age and disagreements with (the US) Government due to transparency.

        For most of history “what’s in it for you” was actually getting fed and clothed better than the average peasant. Serving the king was what was in it because you didn’t have to sleep in pig shit and milk the cows every morning. You’d actually get fed for mealtimes instead of playing the barter game all summer and fall just to have enough food to store in salt barrels for winter. And even better, if you tickled enough enemy hearts with your pointy stick there WAS some land and money for you, provided you survived.

        Some countries through history also revere their veterans (with actual respect and benefits) so military service itself was the honor. While I understand it’s a dramatization -the beginning of Disney’s Mulan is a great display of it. Her father is it is '60s or '70s and has already served once and has a bad leg. The emperor sends out a call for war and the guards show up in town. When they call his name he sets aside his cane and picks up the summons because that’s what you did. It is what was expected of him and he did it without complaint.

        • JacksonLamb@lemmy.world
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          You’re arguing for both sides of the argument.

          First you argue that people obeyed rulers because they didn’t question authority.

          Then you argue people obeyed rulers for their own benefit and material gain.

        • masquenox@lemmy.world
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          Trump doesn’t understand the question because he doesn’t understand doing things for the betterment of anyone but himself.

          Perhaps so, perhaps not. But that doesn’t make the question any less valid.

          For most of history, you didn’t ask “what’s in it for me”

          Yeah… that’s not really true at all. Peasant and/or commoner soldiers in both ancient and medieval wars expected to be rewarded with loot and, of course, rapine - that’s the whole reason sackings was such a common thing in those days. Any king or emperor who didn’t provide that was gambling with his own life.

          The story of Mulan you mentioned has more to do with Confucian morality than reality - wars in China, by and large, worked on the same rules as those everywhere else. Medieval Japan is a good example - those samurai expected. One of the big reasons for the civil war that racked Japan shortly after the Mongol invasions was driven off was that there simply wasn’t any newly-conquered land to hand out to all the retainers - the war was a defensive one.

          No… the institutionalized expectation that a lowly prole should sacrifice “selflessly” for an abstract and immaterial notion such as the nation state is a pretty modern thing - it’s a product of the Enlightenment.

        • masquenox@lemmy.world
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          Oh look… Lemmy’s current “White Liberal Of The Month” is using terms again that they don’t seem to know the meaning of.

          Shouldn’t you be running interference for Israel somewhere else?

    • Neato@ttrpg.network
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      6 months ago

      Biden’s team should shoot back with that: “I like people who weren’t convicted.”

    • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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      If Hillarys people wouldn’t have pushed trump so hard, it would have been McCain vs Hillary, McCain would have easily won…

      It’s insane how much better shit would be today if Hillary wouldn’t have gambled or cared about literally anything more than being the first woman president.

        • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
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          You’re right.

          I was thinking he did but I guess it was Jeb! And Ted Cruz as the Republican establishment picks in 2016.

          • kescusay@lemmy.world
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            And Hillary Clinton didn’t push Trump. Prior to Russia making him much more likely to win via a concerted and effective propaganda effort, she was probably happy to be facing him, but that was long over by the time he became the nominee.

              • kescusay@lemmy.world
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                Bold move, citing an article that relies solely on a WikiLeaks email. One dating to April 23rd, 2015, long before it was clear that Trump would be the nominee. Or that he would be assisted by Russia. As I said. In my previous comment. Which you’re responding to.

                But y’know, it lets you keep hating Clinton. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

                Edit: Oh, and I just spotted that it’s by Ben Norton, Russia’s favorite supposedly-left-wing-but-weirdly-pro-Trump-and-pro-Putin “journalist!” You know, the guy who was with this garbage hole until 2022!

                • OBJECTION!@lemmy.ml
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                  long before it was clear that Trump would be the nominee. Or that he would be assisted by Russia.

                  How are either of those things relevant to the fact that Clinton elevated Trump? It’s possible to elevate someone and for them to still lose, it’s also possible for two different people to elevate someone, so neither of those things contradict the claim at all.

                • Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world
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                  Bold move, citing an article that relies solely on a WikiLeaks email

                  Wikileaks didn’t write the emails, they only leaked them. For all their fury about the leak, the Hillary team never once denied that they had written those emails.

                  before it was clear that Trump would be the nominee

                  Yeah, when you want to make someone the nominee, you tend to make the related plans before they succeed. At least that’s the direction I’M used to time and causality moving in.

                  Or did you think anyone was claiming that the Hillary team wanted Trump to win the GENERAL election? 🤦

      • ellieficent@reddthat.com
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        6 months ago

        Or if the popular vote mattered. She did beat trump by 2.1%… just not in the right states/areas to get the win.

  • NutWrench@lemmynsfw.com
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    Trump rejected the idea of the visit because he feared his hair would become disheveled in the rain, and because he did not believe it important to honor American war dead, according to four people with firsthand knowledge of the discussion that day. In a conversation with senior staff members on the morning of the scheduled visit, Trump said, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.” In a separate conversation on the same trip, Trump referred to the more than 1,800 marines who lost their lives at Belleau Wood as “suckers” for getting killed.

    source, The Atlantic, September 3rd 2020

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      In a conversation with senior staff members on the morning of the scheduled visit, Trump said, “Why should I go to that cemetery? It’s filled with losers.”

      Arlington was property seized from Robert E. Lee and chartered to house dead Union soldiers after the civil war.

      So it sounds like it was filled with winners, at least for a little while.

    • retrospectology@lemmy.world
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      This is pretty much how narcissists think in a nutshell. It’s essentially a mental disability that makes them incapable of understanding why they would care about people, especially people who can’t adore or praise them (i.e. dead people). Emotional one-way street.

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    6 months ago

    What did he say about John McCain? “I like people who weren’t captured.”

    Trump has never given a shit about the military or veterans. I’m surprised at how many veterans love him.

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      The military doesn’t attract the brightest minds.

      Reminds me of a joke that did the rounds shortly after Finland joined Nato.

      Finnish general: “You know, it’s difficult, we have mandatory military service, but around 15% are unfit for service”

      Other Nato generals: “That 15% is where we have to recruit from”

      • JohnnyH842@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        I don’t know I think that’s kind of a shitty thing to generalize about. Not sure where your located, but atleast here in the US there are plenty of folks who join the military at a young age to get themselves out of bad situations and try to correct the course of their life. Obviously there are a lot of people who join because of some dangerous nationalistic or racist ideals, but that structure and purpose can help some folks.

        • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca
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          I went in because it’s how poor kids go to college, here.

          My buddy went in from Montgomery AL, as his economic alternatives were terrible, and he did report a high numbers of ex-felons attempting self-reform in his Marines unit; some with success, others missing the mark. He leveraged his time to great success by the time I met him, all his boyhood chums dead or jailed by 25.

          I’ve known several members of my nation’s armed forces who enlisted as a career and were capable of many other options, but they chose this one. We do choose it like Fireman, even though here it’s thankless.

          It seems entirely environment-dependent, though. I see one guy on here who claims to be ex-military but talks as if out of an armchair, and definitely has ‘outlying’ beliefs that would draw criticism from serving members.

          I just can’t predict it.

        • NecroParagon@lemm.ee
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          Yep that’s right. I have friends who could’ve done many things with their lives but they value our armed forces and joined up instead. It’s something I hold in high regard. It’s not a washout only ensemble.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Buddy, you do calculus under fire and report back to me how well you do. By the way, if you take too long you die. If you get the wrong answer, your friend dies.

        • Taalen@lemmy.world
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          I’m a reserve officer, trust me I have some idea. Also, you’re missing the point by quite a margin.

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            I don’t think I am. If you think everyone around you is dumb then I feel sorry for the people you’re supposed to lead.

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      My family has a few people who just got out of the military.

      I explicitly pointed out that Trump called them, and their grandfather (whom they claim to love very much) suckers.

      Their response was, more or less, “Yeah but Trump is better because he has balls!”.

      The majority of people in the military are, in fact, suckers.

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        From experience, you’re not wrong. Let’s be honest, being a service member doesn’t separate them from their faults as humans. You take an undereducated kid from Mississippi and make him a Soldier, they’re still that undereducated kid with no critical reasoning skills.

        • cordlesslamp@lemmy.today
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          Please take my critical thinking away, I don’t like it very much anymore. Seem like it’s the only thing keeping me from happiness lately.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        The military actually rejected Trump pretty hard. Enough conservatives in the military refused to vote for him in 2020 that it went blue for the first time since at least the Dixie Flip in the sixties. They aren’t the group you should be worried about.

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      It’s cognitive dissonance.

      My family, in or out, are 7 shades of angry at those comments. But we aren’t in range to vote for him or an opponent.

      Our local conservative elitists may one day say the same thing, but as lifelong politicians from college they’re smarter than that. If they did, I know too many of my family (who know better) would do mental backflips to somehow make it okay to still vote for them.

      It’ll sound like “yeah, well Milhouse said we’re losers but Hairguy wore a tan jacket that one day so I’m still going with Milhouse” and I can only not invite them to Thanksgiving so hard.

      • Maggoty@lemmy.world
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        Show them Lindsay Graham saying D-Day was a failure. Next we need to set one of those idiots up to say something bad about a medal of honor winner. Shouldn’t be too hard. “Hey would you stand in front of an angry mob like Randy Shugart or Gary Gordon?”

  • Treczoks@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Always keep in mind that Trump is a person with a very weak mind. It might actually be the case that he has forgotten about many of the misdeeds he has done, and considers himself an innocent and successful man just because he does not remember about reality.

    • Katana314@lemmy.world
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      Not just a weak mind. The weakest mind. I’ve talked to everyone, and they all tell me, they say: I’ve never seen a mind so weak. You won’t find a weaker mind. (etc for 20 minutes)

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      I think you’re right but I think it goes further in that he genuinely doesn’t grasp the concept of reality. I think for him reality is whatever he wants it to be in the moment, and anyone suggesting it is anything other than that is lying, unfair, disloyal, and so on. So even if he does remember it, it doesn’t matter.

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    Veteran here. Donald Trump fucking hates ‘the troops’. The number of active duty and prior service who still (or ever) support that anti-American shit stain blows my mind.

    Here’s some light reading - this list is WAY outdated at this point, so feel free to contribute some more links in the comments. These are examples of things he’s done specifically to attack the US military / veterans:

    https://lemmy.world/post/8041636

      • Zombiepirate@lemmy.world
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        It’s so fuckin’ funny how his apologists will ignore a mile-high stack of his personal deficits to point to a solitary instance of someone in his administration making a humane decision and attributing that to the most selfish prick who has ever ascended to the presidency.

        Just ROFL.

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          I’m not an apologist. Show me, directly from the horse’s mouth what Trump said. I searched for it, but it’s all about the accusation made about Trump making a statement.

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                  There’s a difference between disrespecting a specific person, which I don’t agree with vs disrespecting dead servicemen and women.

                  If anyone can provide the proof from the horse’s mouth that’d be great. Otherwise all I’m seeing is a rumor and we’re all supposed to believe it, blindfully. I don’t roll that way.

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            They never found a direction from Hitler setting up the death camps for the final solution. By your reckoning he wasn’t responsible.

            In courts of law, a first person testimony is considered evidence. Quite a few people have heard Trump say these things.

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            The thing is, most people wouldn’t lie about this sort of thing. Or even be capable of making it up. Our minds just don’t work this way. If any of this was incongruent from what we already publicly see from him, it would be harder to believe. But it exactly follows every other “hot mic” situation he has had so far. It’s not like we’re taking it on faith that some otherwise completely upstanding citizen is rumored to have done one terrible thing behind closed doors. Even if it turns out this specific thing isn’t one of the things he said, he has said worse anyway, and not even behind closed doors. This would just pile on to an already disgusting pile of terrible things to say about people.

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              Our minds don’t work this way? LMAO I’m done. Literally Youtube will destroy this argument. So yeah, I don’t just accept everything at face value. It’s just one person’s word vs the other in this story.

      • xantoxis@lemmy.world
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        Just block, don’t argue. A person who would post this while ignoring everything he’s said in public, and then force you to debate them on whether he ever said anything in public? That’s not good faith. Block. This is not a person you want to talk to.

      • BigPotato@lemmy.world
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        Hmmm… A department of Justice press release written in 2021 praising a current administration effort. Sounds like something that must be 100% factual and not written for any other reason than pure truthiness.

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    6 months ago

    Follow up ad:

    Trump: “only a “psycho” or a “very stupid person” would’ve made such statements.”

    Trump: *insults dead troops

    Trump: “only a “psycho” or a “very stupid person” would’ve made such statements.”

    Trump: *insults POWs

    Trump: “only a “psycho” or a “very stupid person” would’ve made such statements.”

    Repeat ad nauseum for every stupid arms services quote (or any other quote) the dumb idiot has said.

    • Dasus@lemmy.world
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      Acknowledge, no.

      Pretended he didn’t do what he clearly did, saying only a psychopath would, not realising how psychopathic it is to try to deny the verified quotes? Yes.