There isn’t a single cabal responsible for choosing Trump.

I agree but the point I was trying to make is that there are extremist groups out there (and yes, they are sometimes reasonable business people or wealthy political backers) that often act in such a way to allow people like Trump to come into power either through their support or by simply not acting in way to stop anyone.

There will always be those people in power who are willing to allow certain things, events or people to just happen even if they know it will be terrible for others or run the risk of destroying or corroding democratic norms if it means it will serve their ends in the long run. The benefit of not overtly supporting terrible events or people up front is that you can plausibly deny ever being part of anything if it all falls apart. Either way, those with wealth and power maintain their control by either openly supporting things or just merely standing aside to allow things to happen even though they have the power to stop it.

Those with wealth and privilege win in any situation … if fascists or authoritarians gain control, they can step in line as friends who had shown some support … if authoritarians lose, they can step in anyway and say that they never supported anyone.

When you look at this way, you realize that those who are beholden to wealth, power and control only have an allegiance to one thing … maintaining their power and control at all costs … even if it means supporting those they disagree with or those they know will destroy morals and ethics.

Wow … that was beautiful … and I love Redbone … I’ve never seen this. It’s what happens when our social circles and ability to pass along content between one another becomes smaller and smaller.

That was a fun watch and like everything I ever see, read and watch these days that has Indigenous content, I had to carefully look into who made, produced and created this and it looks legit and everyone participated in good faith to make it and the Indigenous community love it.

Not only was it fun to watch, it was uplifting too. This is the thing that many non-Native people miss about Native people, we are often portrayed as serious, sour looking people who wave our hands in the air and give off some kind of magical ancient power of some kind. It couldn’t be further from the truth. I’ve known many traditional Elders in my life and they are all as silly, funny and take themselves as unseriously as anyone in these little communities of ours. They offer wisdom and knowledge but in a way where they don’t take a moral high ground over anyone. It’s a perspective where we are all standing on the same ground and no one is higher than anyone else … including the one who is speaking. Because in the end, we are all born of the ground and return to it in the end and that fact is what makes us all the same, no matter what we would like to believe or disbelieve.

That really made my day. Chi-meegwetch doodem … it means ‘thanks very much, my friend’ … kitchi-neenaskoomeetin … ‘I give my praises to you’ … and also ‘keeteesee’ … it means ‘your belly button’ (it’s a childish thing to say to a friend to have a bit of fun with them) … lol

This is the classic argument or debate I have about political figures like this in history.

They don’t appear out of a vacuum of their own will … they are not just some all powerful persuasive figure that just pushes people to do what they want. Maybe that could have happened in the distant past but not in our modern world.

Political leaders today get to their position because others with power allow them. Money is poured into them, money to promote, to advertise, to market, to manage, to manipulate … in short, the political figure of Turnip came to be because it was allowed by those with power. It didn’t have anything to do with his ability to promote, stall or politically manoeuvre around.

He came to be because he was allowed to take the lead and those with power wanted him there and kept him there.

As an Indigenous Canadian, I’m used to losing … I’ve spent my life literally losing much of the time. I was born losing.

That never meant that I would give up fighting or trying.

Mom and dad were born in terribly hard lives yet they worked like crazy to give me and my siblings everything and give us a chance.

One of my favorite hockey mentors when I was growing up was my older cousin. He was about ten years older and he had an obvious disability and spinal deformation. But when he was younger he was still able to play hockey. Everyone dismissed him but in every game, he never gave up and played every moment as hard and as much as he could, which was a lot and it surprised everyone. I saw him and I learned to play like him … just never give up even if you’re obviously losing.

Then I’ve spent my whole life fighting and trying because that is what I was taught.

Never, ever give up.

Did that stop terrorists from entering the Capital last time?

It doesn’t matter what security measures you put up if a portion of your leadership and government still support fascist movements and just open the gates to let people in.

Your explanation is a continuation of the fallacy … (please don’t take this the wrong way as a personal attack against you)

Your explanation starts off by accepting that someone like Trump is a legitimate political leader. The Democrats presented legitimate candidates, who did some minor faux pas and were ridiculed for it or the Democratic leader or politician was accused of wrong doing and then hounded for it relentlessly.

Trump was the anomaly, he said and did things that any previous politician would have been ridiculed and blasted by the public media of all sides … but for whatever reason, everyone allowed him to stay in the limelight and never called him on his deranged antics … everyone enabled his behaviour … for years.

Someone like Trump doesn’t come out of thin air or through the force of their own will … if that were the case, we’d have people like him everywhere. People like him come to power because other powerful people allow him to get that position … and then a population is conditioned to allow him to stay in the public eye through constant marketing and promotion.

The more important question is why the media and the political establishment and the public have allowed … for years … an obviously sociopathic, unintelligent, unsympathetic, unethical, immoral, convicted and openly supportive or suggestive fascist to lead and have a prominent role in their national politics.

This is like asking why there’s a fire in the kitchen after you’ve left the stove on high for the past 20 hours.

The problem is not that there is a person like Trump, the problem is a country that allowed it to happen.

She’s going to blame it on Dr. Crusher.

Free and fair elections,

Manipulated by advertising, marketing and propaganda paid by the wealthiest contributors to influence the population. Creating an environment where money and wealth get to decide who gets elected.

rule of law,

That can be side stepped, controlled or manipulated by those with wealth and used as a weapon against those with little or no money

stable governmental institutions,

That are heavily lobbied, influenced and controlled by those with wealth or corporations and seldom represent the actual will of the people

individual freedoms,

Which are constantly challenged or questioned by those with power in an effort to control and manipulate everyone into conforming into inequalitable classes of people.

and a free and independent press.

My favorite on this list … free and independent press which are all owned and controlled by the wealthiest billionaires or corporations who allow their media to speak freely as long as they don’t affect their bottom line.

What sequel is this?

This will be the template of what is to come for all of us all over the world.

Climate caused catastrophes and instead of working together, having patience with government, trying to figure out solutions, working cooperatively … we’ll all protest, fight, get angry with one another and make the situation worse for one another.

We won’t be working together to deal with the problem or admitting to one another that we are causing the climate catastrophes or doing anything significant to lessen the effects or even change our behaviour … we’ll just protest our governments for not having magical instant solutions to impossible problems.

This is what I mean … the choice is either an average politician or an old wing nut orange man … but the choices are so difficult for Americans to decide that many choose neither and never think that they are instead paving the way for the wannabe fascist.

I can’t believe that the fate of the world hinges on the deranged decisions of a completely confused people. As much as I don’t want to admit that America has so much influence, they do have literal control over much of the world and they do have the largest most powerful military at the moment. So whoever gets to be leader will set the stage for the stability or instability of the world in the next few years. And it’s all riding on ill informed choices of a very ill informed population.

It’s not so alarming what will happen if Trump gets elected

What’s more alarming for me is how dumb America could be that they are even considering electing someone like him … or to even have a choice between an average politician or a wannabe fascist and everyone is having a hard time deciding on what the sane option is.

This is a general intelligence test for America … and so far they are failing.

Like Molasses … like a thick pasty sugary burnt tar … almost like licorice but not quite there

But the modern stuff is not quite like the old original stuff from 30/40 years ago. The modern stuff is more like sugary taffy or flavourless caramel.

More like how America and the American establishment just allow idiots like this to take center stage and let them abuse the country without anyone saying or doing much about it.

I got tired of calling out lunatics a while ago … I’m more concerned about a country full of people that just allow all this stupidity to represent their government and leadership.

I’m not calling for a revolution … just for more US citizens to speak up and tell everyone how much they don’t like this or support this. All I hear are the lunatics and never the people they are supposedly representing.

You either have gigabytes of memes ready to go or you have a great imagination … either way I salute you … and no I’m not kissing that mole ass … that sexy, sexy mole ass.

Yes! Those are the ones … can’t seem to find them any more. All they sell are the cheap sugar ones that I have a feeling is just colored sugar at this point. I know molasses is just sugar too but there is certain strong bitter flavor to it. The old stuff was actual molasses, thick and hard and when frozen (which often happened in the north during Halloween) could be used as a deadly projectile.

They used to be the last candy I would eat out of my Halloween stash. Now as a middle aged man, I still eat them, I still hate them … but they always make me think of Halloween as a kid.

I kept a dozen of them this year and I eat them just for the nostalgia.

This month is too unlimited