2024 US election: A Kennedy presidency? Trump again? Will it be rigged?

[Iain]

Did Trump strike a deal with Israel? Pulling the Israel card can offer some (temporary) protection. Elon did that too, or else he would have been liquidated.

Remember when we were befuddled by Putin's move during Covid:

I guess 4D chess involves going along with the PTB's plans... up to a point. "Fake it until you make it."

Trump probably didn't need to strike a deal with Israel.

Given the deep ties between the US and Israel, he has to at very least show support for a large proportion of the Israeli agenda. Trump has to show allegiance to Israel if he wants any chance of winning an election - whether he really believes what he is saying or not.

Iran seems like the easy target here. At least from what I have seen, there is far more support (especially among Republicans) for antagonism towards Iran than there is toward, say, Russia.

He could be being naïve and actually believing this stuff, or just going with the usual lines or rhetoric. None of it seems too out of place for a US presidential candidate as yet. Plus, who knows what he is now thinking after the assassination attempt…

Of course, if he does believe what he is saying then it does not bode too well and I guess we will be getting much the same as usual on the international front. At this point though I also tend towards the "fake it until you make it" - we can hope…

 

[Chu]

Did Trump strike a deal with Israel? Pulling the Israel card can offer some (temporary) protection. Elon did that too, or else he would have been liquidated.

I don't know, but he's always seemed like not a very well-read/highly informed person to me. Maybe it's just what he wants to believe, combined with seeing that it's in his best interests to "behave". But some of the comments he made don't sound like something he HAD to say to stay on Israel's side, and more like spontaneous BS.

Remember when we were befuddled by Putin's move during Covid:

I guess 4D chess involves going along with the PTB's plans... up to a point. "Fake it until you make it."

Yeah, but FWIW, I don't think you can compare them. Putin "went along" with the narrative and SOME of the measures, but notice for example that Russians got their own (much safer) vaccine. So, in what really matters, I think the Russian government really managed to resist. Would Trump be able to do that when it comes to Israel? I doubt it very much. He may not even wish to do so, if he's not well informed or advised, and if he's still all for the US being the greatest country on Earth, at whichever the cost.

 

[Ben]

Now Trump attends a 'stop anti-Semitism' rally and continues to say stupid stuff.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1824363316212297881

"When I’m president, we will DEPORT the foreign jihad sympathizers and Hamas supporters. If you hate America, if you want to eliminate Israel, then we don’t want you in our country."

This is in the context of the pro-Palestine University protests. It's clumsily worded, are we talking about deporting US citizens as well here? Obviously that would be ridiculous, so unlikely, but he ought to be more careful.

He also says he will "prevent refugee settlements in the terror-infested Gaza strip" which is so stupid I won't even comment further.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1824353983495864759

"15 years ago, if you said anything bad about Israel or the Jewish people, you were finished as a politician — the most powerful lobby in this country by far, was Israel and Jewish people."

So he knows the power they have, of course, but he doesn't seem to have a problem with it.

He says Chuck Schumer is 'like a Palestinian', at least the second time he has used that word in a seemingly derogatory way. If he's playing the game then he's pretty convincing as someone under the thumb of the Zionists. It's hard to watch really, I had a certain amount of respect for him despite his faults and this undermines that.