With whatever else might be true, trump conceives of himself as a deal maker. There's a meter running in the back of his mind calculating where his best position is. He is ALWAYS angling for something. There is a curve analysis going on projecting upswings in power/leverage balanced against threats and downward pressure. In the past, when he has gotten close to the top (but not quite there), he has sold out: converted his leverage into money and influence. It's not a plan, really, just an instinctive probing of the path of least resistance to see how far he can get. One question might be: What is he angling for? Can't see him really wanting to limit himself to the restrictive duties of a President: too small. I think that to start with he just wanted to prove (not to himself, but to everyone else) that he COULD do it if he wanted to. Wonder what he is willing to trade for?

Hello. First time poster on this site. Gerrit, you did ask for opinions about
this, so here goes: I think this is a very, very BAD idea. Apparently we
learned NOTHING from the way Occupy was taken apart by the Corporate media. If
you give them a non-stop choice between possible violence, screaming and
yelling, and on the other hand, polite laying out of Bernie's message, guess
which message will fill the bloody airwaves. We needed to concentrate that
message, not dilute it with this new Nazis VS. Commies reality show. This
weekend could have added a few sound bites to the positive case for Bernie, and
instead, it was taken up with him having to defend himself against charges of
communism, and supporting violence. Sure, he did it well. BUT IT KEPT HIM FROM
STAYING ON-MESSAGE, and reaching more voters, THAT HE COULD REALLY USE ON
TUESDAY, if he doesn't want to drop further behind HRC's delegate count.

I'm suspicious by nature, but I have to wonder if these demonstrations were
encouraged more by our camp, or HRC's camp, or Trump's camp. If we spend the
rest of the election cycle screaming on camera, it DOES give HRC a chance to pit
both her rivals against each other, both looking out of control. OTOH, it has
to appeal to Trump's truly bloated narcissism. Now it's all about HIM, and the
media fawning over him will increase. So, way to go with those protests. Has
everybody forgotten what the fruit of the Chicago riots in 68 was? That's
right. Nixon. The Conservative, Law and Order candidate. Plus DECADES of
hippy-punching denigration of the Left. The slide to the Right of the Dems,
too. So, double score! Scare strangers and alienate people, because that's
what Bernie's message is about. At his rally, I only heard about uniting and
caring for each other, but apparently I missed something.

Oh, and BTW, lose the "peace warrior" label. Anybody with English as a first
language will feel embarrassed FOR you, if you keep it. That oxymoron will
supply the RW propaganda machine with hours and hours of snark, pointing out
that it conforms to the first law of Orwellian "Double-Speak": "War is Peace".
Seriously??? -Invent a word. Borrow one from another language. Find a slang
term. Call yourselves after some animal. Anything. Please? That word is
one more reason to suspect opposition plants in our midst.

I worked for a day on the Michigan campaign, and I only heard of one probable
conversion, and it was a Trump supporter, who had never had Bernie's message
laid out calmly, and politely, sans media filters, one human being to another.
-Or did you think the Left was the only portion of this country tired of the
status quo? Tactics like these protests deprive us of possible converts, and
alienate the great American middle, in case you've forgotten about the General
Election.

These protests are also doing a fine job of playing into the Oligarchy's scaly
paws on another front: when you make it any variant of US vs. THEM, you open the
door to dehumanizing both sides. You close the lines of communication. What
Bernie has been talking himself hoarse for is a lot closer to an inclusive,
FDR-style Socialism, not the virulently stupid variants of socialism on the Far
Left and Far Right that FDR had to deal with on the world stage. But here's the
part you REALLY won't want to hear: Trump is no Hitler. Not even close.
Two-thirds of his supporters stated jobs and the economy as their main reasons
to support him. I work with a Black Trump supporter. When we finally get to
that discussion, I had hoped to peel him away from Trump with polite arguments,
and the longer he's being called a white racist Nazi, all over the news, the
more likely he is to just close up and laugh at me.

Yeah, Trump is a demagogue. Yeah, I have been wishing for DECADES now that he
would just lose his voice. But he's not even disciplined enough to be a Hitler.
Hitler had a Messianic Crusader breed of psychosis. He actually WANTED the job
of saving all of western Europe from the forces of barbarism, as determined by
him. Trump just wants attention, and he will get it any way he can, including
poking that big, red "Anti-Fascist" button so many of you are wearing on your
foreheads. As long as you bring the hate, you weld his followers together into
something coherent. As long as you're screaming at him, he's the center of
attention, and the media that already approach him on bended knee will increase
their toadying.

-And Bernie's message will get further buried. A young
campaign worker from New England said it best: "When we get Bernie's message
out, we win." You are making that harder with these protests. Every time these
protests can be used to exclude Bernie from air time, they will be. Our camp's
coffers are not essentially limitless, like those of the Oligarchy. Bernie has
been running a polite and positive campaign, up to now. Why can't you take that
example?

Yeah, yeah, I know -- "We have to stop Fascists from taking over! We have to
stop Racists, NOW!" I have a secret for all of you that think that, and I know
you don't know this, based on your targeting of Trump-ville: You already live
in a Fascist nation. Has been for decades. We never purged ourselves of
Fascism after WW2. We have had both the son, and the grandson of a Nazi
sympathizer and collaborator, as President. Search for "Businessmen's Plot".

Benito Mussolinni famously stated that "Fascism should more properly be called
Corporatism, because it is the union of State and Corporate power." And what do
we have here, folks? We have elections that usually devolve into a "choice"
between one wealthy, ostensibly Christian, war-mongering, tool of the oligarchs
and corporations, and another one, with nicer hair. We have Government
bailouts of failed and incompetent banks. Wealthy corporations that pay no
taxes, while the lower classes still pay theirs. A GIGANTIC Military, the
equipping of which makes a very few people a MOUNTAIN of taxpayer money. A
high-tech police-state, in the making, and mostly completed. Privatized
prisons, making money off of incarcerating black people at insanely imbalanced
levels. Sharing of our personal information between corporations and the
Government. And for that distinctly Nazi touch, we are scapegoating the
entirety of global Islam, and largely for the benefit of fossil fuel interests,
too.

Corporatism. The union of State and Corporate power.

-All the things that Bernie wants to change!

If you want to stop Fascism, stop worrying about a small bunch of desperate
bigots showing you antique symbols of oppression. Stop worrying about one
stinking demagogue. That whole camp is only a single-digit part of the population,
the hard-core bigots a fraction of that, and he's already alienated much of the
military. The Trump-ites aren't going to take over. He's not a Nazi, he's not
Hitler, but he is definitely punching your buttons. -And he will keep doing it,
as long as you react, because it's more attention for him. More chances to
fill the airwaves with his babbling. PLEASE STOP GIVING HIM MORE AIR TIME.
It's what he wants. Please, stop giving the Corporatist media an excuse to
further smother Bernie's message. Demonizing Trump, and his supporters, may
weld them into a coherent force. Picking off the ones that want a better,
longer-lasting, rational solution to this country's problems, may drive a wedge.
Ignoring him gives Trump the gold-plated opportunity to self-destruct from the
weight of his own ego. It gives him a chance to split the Republican party in
two, possibly creating fallout for them all down the ticket. Please let him get
on with that. Please let me watch him self-destruct.

With the energy expended on just one of these protests, you could have all got
on the Bernie dialer, and done the phone equivalent of carpet-bombing an entire
state that votes on Tuesday with Bernie's message. I understand the urge to
confront. I have it too. It's hard-wired into us apes; screaming and
chest-pounding. I'm begging you all, do the harder thing instead. Use your
head. Use your heart. Roll up your sleeves, volunteer for Bernie, and call
people, or go door-to-door. Talk, in person, one human being to another, and
get Bernie's message out. Be polite, even if they're rude to you. Remind
our supporters to vote, make sure they know where their polling place is, and
make sure that they can get there. That's what wins elections.

Because, yeah, Fascism is bad. And I'm tired of living under it.

-In Solidarity,

AnotherPeasant