Charlottesville riots

[Play Angry]

In my opinion, you have to squint pretty damned hard, with intent, to find him pandering to white nationalists or the like. He has loudly condemned them and called for the driver of the car to essentially be executed as soon as possible.

Yesterday's session was good - the only thing wrong with it was that it came a couple days late IMO.

Did you watch today's presser, and not just the short clips on the news channels? It featured the most impressive pandering we've seen from a President to these groups in decades. You would think this was a conservative rally of folks who really like Robert E. Lee with just a few racists sprinkled in based on today's transcript. Stormfront folks are elated.

Below are the full transcripts and videos:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/15/us/politics/trump-press-conference-transcript.html?_r=0

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/politics-government/article167364607.html

http://wgnradio.com/2017/08/15/audio-president-trump-press-conference/

He undid all of yesterday's hard work and his surrogates' damage control IMO.

[Play Angry]

Taken from the Charlotte Observer link above:

T

RUMP: Those people – all of those people – excuse me. I've condemned neo-Nazis. I've condemned many different groups. But not all of those people were neo-Nazis, believe me. Not all of those people were White Supremacists, by any stretch. Those people were also there because they wanted to protest the taking down of a statue, Robert E. Lee.So – excuse me. And you take a look at some of the groups and you see – and you'd know it if you were honest reporters, which in many cases you're not, but many of those people were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee.
So this week it's Robert E. Lee. I noticed that Stonewall Jackson's coming down. I wonder, is it George Washington next week? And is it Thomas Jefferson the week after?
You know, you all – you really do have to ask yourself, where does it stop? But they were there to protest – excuse me. You take a look, the night before, they were there to protest the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee.

TRUMP: Excuse me, excuse me. (inaudible) themselves (inaudible) and you have some very bad people in that group. But you also had people that were very fine people, on both sides. You had people in that group – excuse me, excuse me – I saw the same pictures as you did. You had people in that group that were there to protest the taking down of, to them, a very, very important statue and the renaming of a park from Robert E. Lee to another name.

TRUMP: No, no. There were people in that rally, and I looked the night before. If you look, they were people protesting very quietly the taking down of the statue of Robert E. Lee. I'm sure in that group there were some bad ones. The following day, it looked like they had some rough, bad people – neo-Nazis, white nationalists, whatever you want to call them.

But you had a lot of people in that group that were there to innocently protest and very legally protest, because you know – I don't know if you know, they had a permit. The other group didn't have a permit.
So, I only tell you this, there are two sides to a story. I thought what took place was a horrible moment for our country, a horrible moment. But there are two sides to the country (sic).
Does anybody have a final – doesn't anybody have a – you have an infrastructure...

If Saturday's press conference was frustrating, I don't understand how today's isn't incredibly disappointing.

[Play Angry]

Richard Spencer's take on today's press conference:

Trump's statement was fair and down to earth. #Charlottesville could have been peaceful, if police did its job.

[jdshock]

He criticized the second group, I never heard him defend the Natzis.

In my opinion, you have to squint pretty damned hard, with intent, to find him pandering to white nationalists or the like. He has loudly condemned them and called for the driver of the car to essentially be executed as soon as possible.

I'm not even going to get into the discussion of why it's wrong to blame to non-nazi's for this. I'm not going to get into the discussion of his weird fascination with fake news. I'm not going to get into the fact that he said he didn't know David Duke was there despite the fact that he was watching "much more closely than [the media] watched it."

Let's just look at one of the things he said, "You also had some very fine people on both sides." With apologies to @Jamar Howard 4 President, I'm about to lump some folks together. Almost unequivocally, if you're marching with a large group of people that are chanting "Jews will not replace us!" you are not a "fine person."

As an interesting side note, it seems to me that the simplest solution would've just been to say "I obviously denounce those beliefs. Two of my closest advisers and people I love, my daughter and son-in-law, are Jewish." I'd love to pick the brain of one these folks and hear what they have to say about the fact that two of the Trump's closest advisers are Jewish.

[Play Angry]

He can't help but play to his base from the primaries when he speaks off the cuff on this, it is incredibly bizarre. Look at General Kelly as Trump is speaking yesterday - he looks like the parent watching his child do the one exact thing the parent just told him he's not allowed to do. Now the General's team is stuck with this awkward narrative.

[Awesome Sauce Malone]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P54sP0Nlngg

[pinstripers]

The thing that makes this America is the right to free speech. Those who oppose that are the worst. There is nothing that comes close to that.

[WuDrWu]

VICE is an agenda and a terrific example of what gets touted as fake news. It's not news.

[Play Angry]

The thing that makes this America is the right to free speech. Those who oppose that are the worst. There is nothing that comes close to that.

Guessing this is not intended as a forceful condemnation of Trump's proposed expansion of libel laws?

Your steadfast defense of the President's handling of this, despite being unfamiliar with the term alt-right until this weekend, is impressive in a way.

[pinstripers]

Has nothing to do with Trump.

[Play Angry]

Trump made sure that it does with yesterday's spectacle.

[pinstripers]

If you want to change the Constitution, we can discuss that, but for right now............

[Aargh]

If this was slanted because HBO has an agenda, then a lot of the people they interviewed must have been plants and part of HBO's agneda. When someone is being interviewed with cameras rolling and HBO logos on them and they say that people are going to die who don't agree with them, and that Charlottesville was just the beginning and there will be things coming to top that...how can it be claimed to be "fake news"?

Perhaps HBO interviewed many and only aired the most radical, but if HBO's agenda was to discredit the alt-right, they were really helped out by the alt-right.

[Play Angry]

If you want to change the Constitution, we can discuss that, but for right now............

I think nearly everyone in this thread who has addressed the matter has spoken out forcefully in defense of the First Amendment. Which windmill are you tilting at?

[ShockCrazy]

Hardline conservatives are really struggling to understand why moderates and those on the left look at them very side eyed about issues of race and discrimination. Here is why: One I think that many many conservatives spend more time defending the rights and freedoms of white supremacist groups than that of racial minority groups supremacists attack. Consider how conservatives talk about BLM protests or other civil rights protests versus these supremacy groups gatherings. To my eye condemnation of the first comes much quicker than the second. When it's the supremacist groups, conservatives we need to check the details and get to the truth of the matter, see who really started it, and not rush to judgement, but when it's BLM or civil rights, nope they were just inciting violence, uncontrolled looters, and it needs to be stopped. Second it seems to much more energy is spent saying, "well I'm not one of those shitty people", instead of just denouncing them and pushing them from their organizations, if you do the latter vociferously, you don't need to do the former because it's obvious and patently true. People need to be cognizant of how they are presenting themselves based on the hills they choose the die on, and the priorities they set.