So, the Big, Hideous New Story That Computer Problems Have So Far Allowed Me to Avoid Commenting On

Several women have come forward -- four so far -- claiming that Trump made inappropriate advances on them, ranging from a surprise tongue-in-the-mouth kiss, to grabbing a buttock, to being "groped" as if his hands were the tentacles of an octopus.

There are various objections one can lodge at any of the claims. The woman who claimed an unwanted, forcible tongue kiss was actually doing a puff piece for People about Trump's one year anniversary of his marriage to Melania; as Trump points out himself -- why not include that huge, explosive charge in the article itself? Why pass that up? Why not tell the truth that would get you big attention, rather than churning out the Trump-loves-his-new-wife puff piece drivel that was published?

Objections to the others are mostly about timing. Why wait until just before a political election to lodge these claims?

Now it is true that one accuser can put the courage into another to come forward. However, it's also true that when people are doing a hit, they attempt to stampede public opinion by not giving the target time to rebut the charges. Charges like this take a while to work out -- we'd have to check the aggrieved women's claims and details against the record (was Trump flying commercial in 1995, for example).

The stampede-of-charges seems specifically designed to not permit that sort of informed, rational investigation.

I really hate Twitter, and I hate Twitter Lovers, because what they're always trying to do is stampede people into adopting a position without thinking about it. They fire their Twitter Pistols to get the herd stampeding in whatever direction they like, and count on the first few moving cows to get the rest of the cows moving in the same direction.

I object to this on basic heuristic grounds: Anyone trying to get me to adopt their position while deliberately trying to keep me from thinking about the position's veracity first is essentially a home invader of the mind, and not to be trusted.

With anything.

I happen to have a special disgust for "writers" who do not write any kind of longer-form, let's-think-about-this sort of pieces, but instead just "write" panicky, let's-take-this-viral emotive farts on Twitter.

Pro-Tip: You're not "writers." As Truman Capote observed, That's not writing, that's just typing.

At the very best you're very low level freelance junior advertising account managers, writing tuneless and thoughtless political jingles you hope will stick in the target's mind through dint of repetition.

I similarly dislike the current Democratic Media/Republican Establishment Revanchists' demand that we all make critical decisions that will affect this country for four or probably eight years right now, knowing very little at all about the situation, because we're demanding you decide now.

If you have fact, logic, and truth on your side -- why are you so committed to forcing me to agree with you before I've had a moment to think about the facts, logic, and truth for myself?

Pardon me for suspecting an agenda that doesn't have much to fact, logic, or truth.

I know nothing about the women making these charges -- nothing. Neither, I suspect, do most.

Now I do have to say that my initial belief that this was all about "talk" is shakier at this point. When you have accusers making accusations of actions, rather than talk, well, you can't dismiss that. I can't say that each of these women is on the level; but knowing nothing about them, neither can I claim them to be liars.

Trump can say that -- he knows if they're lying or not. (I'm not saying that he'd be honest in saying it, I'm saying he could say so either way.)

But I can't. Certainly I do have to acknowledge the very real possibility that what these women claim is completely true.

But here's the problem: even if I were to believe these women, then what is this election about? It's about a serial groper/masher versus an enabler of groper/masher/actual rapist, and when I say "enabler," I don't just mean a woman standin' by her man, I mean a woman who ran the war room and the detectives harassing and smearing Bill Clinton's victims.

So even if these things about Trump are true -- and they very well may be; I have no evidence the charges are false; I have only hope that they are false -- we are left with a choice between one serial victimizer of women who is a man and another serial victimizer of women who is herself a woman.

And so my ultimate conclusion would still be: Vote Trump. If we're to have a serial victimizer in the White House, I'd prefer it be one who would fire James Comey (or ask for his resignation, if he has no power to fire him) and appoint a special prosecutor to take an unbiased look at Hillary's crimes.

NeverTrumpers are childlike in their utter unwillingess to treat a binary choice in an election as a binary choice: this is a comparison between two deeply flawed people, not a straight question about whether one of them meets your minimum threshold of acceptability.

Even assuming the charges against Trump are true, you don't keep a victimizer of women out of the White House by agitating for Hillary; no, you just reward another victimizer of women.

NeverTrumpers spend a lot of time making the case that it would be immoral and contrary to principle to reward Trump by giving him the White House.

I can't disagree -- and this is a worthy point.

How little time, however, they spend on considering that it is equally or more immoral and contrary to principle to reward Hillary Clinton by giving her the White House.

That, apparently, is something they just don't like to think about too much.

The NeverTrump crew clings to this bizarre claim that while most of us make conflicted decisions about which candidate to support, comparing each against the other, they are somehow holier by supporting Hillary Clinton. They have this idea that simply because they are Republican supporters of Hillary Clinton, they do not "own" her own pathologies and crimes, that they are somehow immunized against any kind of moral or practical responsibility for her simply because she's not (they claim) their cup of tea either.

Well Trump isn't a cup of tea for many Trump supporters, either -- do we similarly have a free pass?

Or is it just the NeverTrump crew that can conspire to bring about the election of a victimizer of women (while claiming they're doing no such thing, of course) while claiming to not have any of the mud of the pig they're supporting soiling their tightly-creased pants?

Either way -- no matter who you support, or who you passively (or passive-aggressively) support in all but name -- you're getting the mud of your own preferred pig on your pant-leg.

Trump always was a muddy pig and these latest disclosures suggest he may be muddier than I ever previously thought.

But meanwhile, this man, despised by the Republican establishment (the actual power center of the party), the media, and the Democrat party, not to mention the federal bureaucracy which is now almost wholly captured by the Democrat Party, is up against a woman has already corrupted the DoJ and FBI with the full approval of the Democrat party and media and the winking indulgence of the Republican Establishment, which cheers a Republican loss as part of their internal palace purge power-play.

And she did this when she had no formal governmental power -- just a shadow government whose upkeep are maintained by her sham "charity."

I think about what she can actually do as President and I shudder.

Not the NeverTrumpers, though.

I guess they'll worry about that later. You know, when she's provoking a constitutional crisis by committing further crimes from the Oval Office.

So both are bad actors. The question which remains is: Which bad actor will be more restrained by the political establishment of Washington DC?

You can't judge a predator's ability to ravish an environment without looking at the environment in which that predator operates.

Trump, if these allegations are true (and even if they're not -- he's still shady and megalomaniacal) is a jackal being released into a swamp full of alligators looking to devour him.

Do I fear the jackal abroad in the swamp full of alligators? Well -- no. No I don't.

I almost pity him.

This jackal, being megalomaniacal, may think he can bully and beat up the alligators.

The rest of us know better, and know this particular jackal will be a warm, full feeling in someone's belly by the dawn of the third day.

Clinton, meanwhile, is a jackal being set loose in a field full of sheep with no defenses (any Republican or Christian unprotected by the elite power structure) and a pack of ravening jackal minions who will gladly join her in hunting and tearing apart the sheep.

So you tell me which is more dangerous.

And stop telling me you're noble for choosing the more dangerous jackal over the weaker jackal.

I'm sure the jackal's coming victims will be as unmoved by your claims of nobility of purpose and purity of spirit as I am now.

posted by Ace at 05:33 PM

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