Had Donald Trump been the U.S. president hosting this week’s APEC meetings, I have no doubt that the headline from the event would have been unchanged. It would have been: “He’s a dictator.”
The only difference is it would be Xi Jinping who was saying it to describe Trump.
Other than that, though, a Trump-hosted APEC meeting would likely have been unrecognizably different from the successful and productive forum hosted by President Joe Biden.
To be fair, a ham sandwich would’ve handled Xi’s visit better than Trump too.
##HamSandwich2024
#YesWeHam
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IDK depends on how old it is.
I thought we were
convictingindicting ham sandwichesNo you indict a ham sandwich, you convict criminals.
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He has the respect of roughly (or over) half of voters in this country. Don’t forget that.
Whining about how he isn’t liked when he’s currently leading polls seems pretty hollow, don’t you think?
I don’t like him, but it seems dangerous to make these characterizations when he clearly has a lot of support. Otherwise we will be in the situation again where no one can “believe” he won.
He’s winning. That’s a problem. You may not like it, and I certainly don’t, but we need to recognize the problem to solve for it. Dismissing half the voters in the United States as “degenerates” isn’t the answer. They feed on that.
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K
To be fair, skillfully is not a Trump skill
It’s a low bar. Knowing the current US president is beyond his level of coherence.
More coherent than the last 🤷♂️
This is not going to be a popular opinion on here, but when it comes to Asia, Biden’s foreign policy is almost indistinguishable from Trump’s.
Basically: aggressive ratcheting of trade and tech restrictions on China; gum up the international trading framework (e.g. WTO dispute resolution process); try to woo China’s neighbors but steadfastly ignore their requests for better trade access with the US; discourage Chinese scientists and students from coming to the US. All of these initiatives originated under Trump, and are being continued under Biden, with minor tweaks.
After the Obama administration both parties have taken hardline stances on China. Their theft of intellectual property, ignoring international law, massive subsidies of industries that target foreign economies, human rights abuses, wolf warrior diplomacy etc. etc. had proven that democracy wasn’t going to take root even when they were uplifted economically.
China has no friends in either party now and the reaction of the a potential Hillary Clinton administration in 2016 likely would have been the same.
The US has to brutalize and strangle China’s economy to bring them to the table and force change. There is no need to provide incentives to other Asian powers as China’s actions against their neighbors are enough to put them in the USA’s sphere of influence.
For different reasons though
Yeah, exactly. Next year, you’ll have a choice between an actual president or a human train wreck.
And by “skillfully” they surely mean Joe calling Xi “a dictator” shortly after their meeting, while lots of press press was around.
While it’s not ideal, had he said no to the question, the media would have spun it as, “Biden refuses to call Xi a dictator”.
He could simply deflect and avoid the question, as anyone with half a brain would have done.
“Typical politician Biden refuses to call Xi a dictator”. “Biden’s so mentally incompetent, he can’t even answer a simple yes or no question” ah yes, I can clearly see how these headlines would be so much better
Should Biden kowtow to Xi? He is a dictator and speaking truth matters.
he chose his words well
Except he’s not a dictator any more than Roosevelt was.
He was elected in free and fair elections and had opposition each time. Unfortunately people remembered the Republicans from the decade prior that allowed the economy to be fleeced and caused tremendous hardship on everyone, so they had no chance. Then a war happened.
I guess you were determined to be a troll at birth. Too bad you won’t use that energy to do some good for someone besides yourself.
Can you explain for someone not from the US?
It’s very important to the US Right to demonize Franklin Roosevelt as much as possible. His policies included public works projects that employed millions, including artists and writers. He was an advocate of racial justice and general reformer. One of the really funny things is that the Right had to wait until most of the people who’d voted for FDR were dead before they could really unload on him. He was so popular in his lifetime that he won the Presidency four times.
Thanks for explaining.
He’s an amazing figure, no matter where you’re from. He was born rich and became a champion of the poor, overcame polio, and created policies that are still in place today.
Franklin D Roosevelt was a highly popular Democratic president who served 12 years (elected 4 times and then died in office) as president of the US. Generally speaking, the US has what are called term limits of 2 terms of 4 years maximum as the president. Before FDR, only a couple of presidents even attempted to run for a 3rd term as it was seen as tacky (though not illegal at the time) to try for longer service as the country’s leader. The two term limit was a tradition set by the first president George Washington who had the opportunity to become first literally and then effectively king of the United States after the revolution but declined to serve longer than 8 consecutive years. This unwritten rule essentially went unbroken until FDR came to power with such popularity that his opposition in the elections didn’t stand a chance.
Efforts to write into law the term limit tradition were spearheaded by Republicans for obvious reasons but in the end they were right to do so. The term limits should be used to stop situations like Putin in Russia and Xi in China who effectively run unopposed out of fear for people’s lives. They are presidents as much as any dictator is president. They may be president in name but effectively, they run the country and manager to always win despite their unpopularity both locally and internationally and if they were to run a fair election, they would simply lose.
The OP was suggesting that FDR was effectively an American Dictator in the same fashion of Vladimir Putin because of the fact that he was elected so many times. But the fact of the matter is that FDR was an incredible force of popularity in the country and pushed for many changes that impact equality among Americans and his policies, while radical for the time, have influenced both ends of the American political discussion for the better.
That is nothing to say why Republicans dislike FDR having been such a popular leader. That you may want to do your own research on.
Thanks for the explanation. I never knew anything about FDR before this, but he sounds like an interesting person to learn about.
I find your commnet lucid and thoughtful.
I’d argue that term limits are actually a bad thing. They weaken a President in his second term, and make it harder for them to push long term programs. The GOP actually screwed themselves, because Reagan would certainly have won a third term, as would Ike.
Also, in Congress and the Senate. Imposing term limits without campaign finance reform would just mean that the same fat cats would have to find new stooges ever other term.
I feel the issue at hand is less about the number of years or terms leading, and instead is about how hard each party tries to revert the others progress for the sake of “my party better” even though at the end of the day, the majority of citizens all want the same things and effectively disagree on a narrow handful of topics that the media uses to divide us. If we could see past the manipulation and vote for the leaders that will unite us then we wouldn’t need lifetime appointments because all of the leaders would be working together through time to move our country and world forward.
But as long as there is money in politics and ne’er-do-wells vying for power that we might allow into our leadership positions, we can stop them from driving our nation totally into the dirt by limiting how long they are allowed to serve. I feel similarly about Congress and the judiciary. Specifically age limits for Congress and both age and term limits for executive appointment supreme court seats.
That’s not even remotely close to the idiocy of Trump:
From the top of what I immediately remember regarding Trump embarrassing both himself and the USA.
Trump embarrassing himself during meeting with the president of Japan:
https://edition.cnn.com/2017/11/06/politics/donald-trump-koi-pond-japan/index.html
Trump and the magic orb:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/22/world/middleeast/trump-glowing-orb-saudi.html
Trump bragging and then being collectively laughed at during UN speech:
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/world/watch-trumps-boast-draws-laughter-at-united-nations
Trump and his idiotic handshakes.
https://time.com/4797283/trump-handshakes-emmanuel-macron-justin-trudeau-neil-gorsuch/
Trump soiling himself because he forgot to wear his diaper:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ
Biden calls Xi a dictator because he is.
The difference is that Trump is a narcissistic moron, it’s amazing how many people can’t see that.Don’t forget him walking out in front of Queen Elizabeth, leaving her to shuffle past the press behind him. He’s a buffoon.
Thanks for the compilation. The analogy I’ve been using for years is that trying to keep up with Trump’s follies is like trying to read Lord of the Rings while listening to Game of Thrones on audio and watching Avengers Endgame while riding a rollercoaster in a hurricane.
There are attempts at making more complete lists of Trump being an absolute idiot.
Such lists tend to outright exhausting, exactly because somewhat like you say, he creates scandals faster than it’s possible to digest.
And if he said “well there are lots of different types of governments and we can all work together” or some non answer then the headlines would be “biden refuses to call him a dictator”. It’s a no win so the best course was to say it and smooth it over later because maybe it signals they can both be truthful.
Lots of good came out of this meeting overall in my opinion.
Good. Call it like he sees it. Fuck Xi and fuck his simps.
yeah exactly. not sure why i’m getting downvoted to hell for just stating this. it wasn’t by mistake, he told it to the press by choice.
Wait, did he suck his honey dick or not?
The ice may be clear and thin, but it sure is wide.
Biden did not “skillfully handle” this at all. He foolishly damaged relations with China even further by calling Xi a dictator after going to the trouble of planning this summit.
If you cowards would vote for the Green party or any other party this wouldn’t be a problem. Instead, you support the Democrats who don’t even try to repair the damage the Republicans do. They both get rich from it together.
Third party votes in a First Past the Post voting system are a protest at best and counter-productive at worst.
Your plan is to keep voting for people who don’t support ranked choice voting.
My plan is to vote for people who support ranked choice voting.
It makes perfect sense when you don’t think about it.
You don’t know my plan or my motivations.
Who are you voting for?
Sure as shit not a third party candidate.
So someone who does not support ranked choice voting. Great strategy lol.
You think throwing away your vote on a candidate who claims to support electoral reform but has no chance of winning will have any meaningful impact?
Greens support Putin, who is genociding queer Russians. No thanks.
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In what way does the Green party US support Putin?
So you have literally nothing of substance.
If this is your attempt at being convincing it doesn’t seem to be going over too well
The accusation is wild in the first place. Where is Jill Stein’s Russian oil money? Are US citizens not allowed to express democracy by running for president because they want to improve the country? No, apparently that means they’re working for another country, no logic there.
If Jill Stein was working for Putin why would she publicly show herself sitting at the same table?
If Republicans were working for Putin would they fly to Moscow on the 4th of July?
What’s hilarious is that all that nonsense caused Trump’s policy to be far tougher on Russia in terms of economic sanctions as well as escalation over Ukraine.
Notice how not one liberal replied to this because you all don’t actually study US policy.
Or we just think your claim about Trump was stupid.
Trump did in fact escalate sanctions on Russia, as well as provide addition funding to Ukraine’s military.
Oh man, what a defense!
“Your honor, if I was the murderer, why would I have been at the scene of the crime, holding the murder weapon in my hand? I mean, that would be too obvious!”
You have literally no evidence, just wild accusations
What wild accusation did I make? Show me please.
You insinuated my argument defending Jill Stein against being a russian asset was not a credible defense. The accusations against her are wild and unsubstantiated.
I made no accusation. I just mocked your absolutely bonkers comment saying that Jill Stein publicly sitting down and spending time with Putin proves that she is not affiliated with Putin. The term “wild and unsubstantiated” is something you might want to reflect deeply upon.
You can’t actually think that’s a credible defense, come on now
Where is Jill Stein Russian oil money?
Are you actually saying someone who works for Putin wouldn’t publicly show herself with Putin?
Yes she would know better than to do that.
Based on what evidence?
Her successful career as a physician shows she is capable of intelligent thought, something you struggle with.
Insulting me is not evidence. Neither is saying she’s a successful physician. That has nothing to do with why she appears with Putin.
I’m not surprised you’re resorting to insults though.
Why would i shoot myself in the dick when I could just watch you shoot yourself in the dick?
You do that every time you vote Democrat or Republican
Yes, every time I vote D, I watch you shoot yourself in the dick.
I’m glad I didn’t vote for genocide.
You did, you’re just too blind to see it.
No. I didn’t. Feel free to try and explain how I did, but you cannot.
Because I’m sure whoever you vote for has a good chance of getting into office. For sure the president in 2024 will be neither Biden nor Trump. It’ll be whoever you vote for. It’s not like we only have two viable options or anything…
Ironically the polling is showing RFK has a reasonable chace of winning. That opens up the lane for Jill Stein to compete as well.
No it doesn’t. No poll shows he has a reasonable chance of winning. That’s a lie.
20% absolutely is. He can easily gain 10% more to get to 30% and win it.
How can he ‘easily gain 10%?’ Why would it be easy? You say a lot of things without any evidence to support them.
Also, that was a telephone poll, so it was extremely inaccurate.
Lol I haven’t laughed so hard all day! Thank you, I needed that.
I laughed way harder at the title of this post
