Dear Foxy
How I take my hat off to you. You always, with great patience and courtesy, try to examine both sides of a situation as you see it and arrive at a position. What a shame that others on these forums are so hostile and closed minded when you reach a different conclusion to them. Such people are obviously confronted when they encounter someone not part of their ‘tribe’ and resort to well-trodden, but ultimately inaccurate cliches.

Personally, I don’t have your tolerance (or manners) when confronted by people so fearful that they cling onto someone like the 47th president of the USA to save them. My fingers are trembling as I type this – Kudos to you

Dear Aries54,

Thank you for your kind words.

I try to actively share knowledge and dodge the spitballs.
But it does get a bit much at times. I'm uneasy about looking
at the worst bits of people so I try to understand why and
where they're coming from. But it's not always easy. I also
habe to watch my own biases as well.

Thanks again.

I would like to understand a lot more about what
is driving how you're feeling about me and learn what
values you have that you think I don't.
Foxy,
Easy, just read your posts !

.

Dear ttbn,

.

I understand where you are coming from. However, I cross-checked all the information before posting it.

But naturally, if you have any evidence to the contrary, ttbn, I would be very grateful if you would kindly share it with me.

To tell you the truth, I’m not so sure that Trump would deny much of it himself. He seems to think that everything he does is fully justified.

As I see it, the Americans knowingly elected a “bad guy”, a convicted criminal, to be their president – simply because they had the impression that he knew better than anyone else what was wrong and considered that he was the only one capable of fixing it.

Many of his fans I saw interviewed on television declared : “He’s just like us !”. Most appeared to be from the Midwest and it was obvious that none were billionaires like Trump, nor even millionaires.

As we have seen, Trump is already hard at work, and already reaping the benefits of the deal. According to Forbes, “Donald Trump has presided over the most lucrative post-presidency in American history, selling his supporters NFTs, coffee-table books and, most importantly, shares of a money-losing social-media venture. His net worth to date is US $5.5 billion.”

And that’s not all. The best (or should I say the worst) is yet to come. The ‘hired gun” has hit the jackpot, and he will probably not leave this time until he has broken the bank. It could even cost his American benefactors much of their individual rights.

They have handed him the keys to American democracy and he'll probably make good use of them.

.

"bear the marks of populism, authoritarianism, illiberalism, and imperialism."

Wow someone found a use for his thesaurus.

Populism? When we have one side describing t'other as deplorables, or clingers "to guns and religion", or asserting that EVERYONE who attended a Trump rally were Nazis, well I'd have thought anyone aspiring to free-thinking would see where the true populists are. OTOH, if you have someone who suggests that there are fine people on both sides or who goes into bat for Californians who voted against him, ....well no populism there.

Authoritarian? Oh he's doing things I don't agree with.

Illiberal? Yeah the other side are liberals and he should follow their policies. Struth.

Imperial? He has no imperial ambitions against Canada or Panama despite what the enemedia might tell you.

During the Trump first term, the civil service, which is supposed to be there to implement the president's policies and serves at the pleasure of the president, openly and proudly sought to undemocratically thwart his policies. And they succeeded to a degree.

This new Trump term is determined to not allow that undemocratic practice to replicate. We've already seen civil servants asserting that they have instituted measures to defeat or significantly delay MAGA policies. DEI was banned so they just renamed it. Generals who lied to Trump in the first term, are asserting they'll do it again. And the civil service is inundated with pro-Democrat operatives who spent years covering up for the corrupt Biden regime.

Any wonder therefore that Trump and MAGA are determined to remove these uncivil civil servants and replace them with people who will do what the electorate voted for.

Trump's landslide via a majority of voters shows how pathetic and pointless criticism of the man is. So, you don't like him. He doesn't give a stuff, nor do the majority of American voters who do like him. That's why he is now, once again, the President of the United States of America and leader of the Free World. Not some wan ker on OLO.

Bleatings from an anonymous, foreign bunch of wan kers are totally dumb-arsed and pathetic.

Someone calling herself Sophia Efthimiatu believes that there is comfort and freedom in having ‘nothing to say’. She describes silence as a “humbling awareness of self, acquired painfully for the most part.

“To have nothing to say is liberating. For one, you immediately notice that everyone around you has yet to reach that conclusion”.

We forget that we have the option to remain quiet, and succumb to “numbing feeds” populated mostly by ego and narcissism. We have lost the art of ‘recipience’. We don't just hear something and let it go.

People who have no part in American elections, but choose to insult American voters (as they insult Australian voters when things don't go their - the wan kers’ - way), should take notice and shut TFU.