So, Is There Enough of a Silent Majority To Stem the Tide?

[Baldanders]

All else aside, the Portland riots are enough for me to cast my vote for Trump. This lawlessness cannot be allowed to succeed.

Why does anyone think that a president who couldn't prevent the disorder we have seen recently will be effective at doing so in a lame duck second term? Particularly if he faces two D bodies in the legislature?

His use of feds recently doesn't seem to have done a thing to quiet anything down. If anything, it seems to have accelerated the whole anti-cop/anti- government sentiment which is spreading like a wildfire through young men with much time on their hands if my current experiences are anything to go by. (If those young men are voting they are voting Libertarian, I would guess, many people really don't fit the left/right spectrum at all anymore) I understand a Trump vote as "not inviting even worse disorder" (I disagree, but I understand the logic) but I don't understand why anyone thinks he will show an ability to make anything better. Which he seems helpless to do now.

Is everyone here picking up on the new vibe of many folks who are now 100% 2A supporters and also 100% despise LE? I was just reading a bit on a guy who was an anti-gun activist a few years back who is now basically a milita-type now.

Government use of force on its citizens has a hard limit with an armed citizenry. Which we all knew, but I think many folks always envisioned that only coming from citizens who shared right-of-center views. Which obviously isn't true.

"Abolishing cops" is also a de facto "abolishment of gun laws" (and all laws) and a few of the folks advocating it know it. The ones who don't are in for some hard lessons soon.

[Robert Mitchum]

I truly think Trump is going to win.
I made a bunch of money 4 years ago betting on him against Clinton.

Use to gamble very heavy years ago ..most I put one 1 game was $20,000 on a Collage football 22 years ago.
My inner gut says Trump for the win .. most incumbents have a 80% chance of getting back in Office.
I feel trump has gone down because of all the BS that is going on.
So even if he is down 25 to 30% it should be close ..

I took Connecticut over Duke
Connecticut was a 9.5-point underdog back in 1999 Championship game.
Connecticut Won 77-74 (I hate Duke)

[WDR]

In which direction? One, the other or both?

I'm more concerned with voter fraud coming from the left, than the right. It's plainly obvious that to them, the ends justify the means... almost any means. But I'm also not about to say that it can't happen going the other way.

I think if the media wasn't complicit and obviously biased, and if the law and/or the executive (in some places) wasn't inclined to side with the seditious and treasonous, there would be a lot more armed patriots in the streets, and maybe some watering of the tree of liberty. The fact that federal LE largely hasn't started really cracking skulls, despite 60-70something days of violence, in places like Portland, baffles me a bit. I understand why there has been so much restraint shown, but I have to think at some point, a limit will be reached. Both for the officers manning the riot lines,and for the public in general. If the violence ratchets up, all bets are off as to how the whole cookie crumbles, and there are lots of folks positioning themselves to take advantage of unrest and uncertainty. Full-tilt-Boogaloo wouldn't be pretty from any vantage point.

Guns and ammo are not flying off the shelves because Americans want to shoot tin cans and dirt clods... Folks are scared of the uncertainty, and I think most of them will come down on the side of law and order. They may think police brutality is real. They may think black lives matter. But they know, looking at places like the CHAZ, that at some point, help isn't coming. When folks realize they are on their own, they are inclined to be prepared. Most folks want the police to show up when they call 911, not a community outreach team. They don't want some anarchist "medic" coming to save them when the bullets start flying, they want a real EMT.

All that said... I have serious reservations about casting a vote for Trump. I'm conflicted I don't trust him on gun issues ( "take the guns first, due process later" and bumpstock executive overreach for starters). I think he's a bit of a buffoon, often putting his foot in his mouth when he speaks, and doubling down on it when he shouldn't. I do get the feeling that he really believes in American exceptionalism, business and capitalism driving our economy, and that the rest of the world needs to step up and start taking control of their own security, instead of letting the USA do all the heavy lifting. Because I believe he's a net positive for the economy and shares at least some of my world view, I'll likely cast my vote for him.

[JodyH]

The far left lunatic wing of the Democrat party (at all levels from dog catcher to Washington D.C.) needs to be booted out in November.
If that faction of the Democrat party gains actual power, it's over.

I'm optimistic there's enough people out there that are fed up with the bullshit and will vote in some actual moderates.
But I'm also prepping, working out 6 days a week and training martial arts 3 days a week because if that lunatic left does get power, shit is going to get sporty Venezuelan style real fucking fast.

[Borderland]

Trump has a decent chance to win. Hillary Clinton had a better chance to win and she lost. Sonny Liston ( 35-1 w/24 KO's) was heavily favored to beat Cassius Clay and he lost. Sometimes it just doesn't go the way it's supposed to.

Trump will probably die soon from eating too many Big Macs and Joe will probably wake up some morning real soon and wonder where he is and how he got there.

I don't see this as a real election. I see it as two political parties trying to undermine the constitution and reduce the US to a 3rd world country. All of the signs are there.

I'm not going to be a part of this insanity. If either party wants my vote they're going to have to produce a viable candidate. Until then I'm just a wrench in the gears of the now defunct political process.

May the best loser win.

[Clusterfrack]

I have a few thoughts about this.

1. Quieting things down, deescalating, etc. isn't the priority. If we think that way, Antifa has already won.

2. Enforcing the law and not allowing violent destruction to become the way we solve political difference is my priority. I don't want Antifa to succeed politically because they have used un-American and illegal means.

3. It's not the president's job to enforce laws here in Portland. However if major civil unrest or further attacks on Federal property and personnel occur after the election, the people involved will need to be dealt with.

4. At least around here, 99% of the problem is left-wing anarchists and anti-police BLM supporters. Maybe I hang out with law-abiding folks, but no one I know is anti-government, even if we have a president or governor that we don't like.

Why does anyone think that a president who couldn't prevent the disorder we have seen recently will be effective at doing so in a lame duck second term? Particularly if he faces two D bodies in the legislature?

His use of feds recently doesn't seem to have done a thing to quiet anything down. If anything, it seems to have accelerated the whole anti-cop/anti- government sentiment which is spreading like a wildfire through young men with much time on their hands if my current experiences are anything to go by. (If those young men are voting they are voting Libertarian, I would guess, many people really don't fit the left/right spectrum at all anymore) I understand a Trump vote as "not inviting even worse disorder" (I disagree, but I understand the logic) but I don't understand why anyone thinks he will show an ability to make anything better. Which he seems helpless to do now.

Is everyone here picking up on the new vibe of many folks who are now 100% 2A supporters and also 100% despise LE? I was just reading a bit on a guy who was an anti-gun activist a few years back who is now basically a milita-type now.

Government use of force on its citizens has a hard limit with an armed citizenry. Which we all knew, but I think many folks always envisioned that only coming from citizens who shared right-of-center views. Which obviously isn't true.

"Abolishing cops" is also a de facto "abolishment of gun laws" (and all laws) and a few of the folks advocating it know it. The ones who don't are in for some hard lessons soon.

[mmc45414]

I think the "Silent Majority" is just becoming a hell of a lot more silent.

I do not like DJT, I think he is an asshole, I have always thought he was an asshole, I do not like his ostentatious businesses or his blowhard personality or his contrived TV shows. I do not think the asshole ever did anything I liked until he beat HfuckingC for me, and that makes me ecstatic. He does something I do not like pretty much every day, but he ain't never done anything that made me wish HC was President.

I didn't like voting for him, but i will damn sure vote for him again. But I do not have a sign in my yard, I do not fly a No More Bullshit flag, I do not wear the red hat. But I for damn sure am going to vote for him again, I think the Russians have convinced me.

He is behind in the polls, just like last time...

ETA: Some of this is my line of work, I sell in an industry in a territory where I must assume people do not agree with me. Back to work in another week...

[Joe in PNG]

My general suspicion that that not matter who wins in Nov, a crackdown on Antifa is coming- and those useful idiots will continue to protest until the boot comes down.

Cracking down on your party's radicals is a good way to look more moderate which is a factor not lost on the Democrats. They'll use them to get votes in number, but will happily underbus them in January. The longer the useful idiots keep it up, the more support a crackdown will have.

[WDR]

Why does anyone think that a president who couldn't prevent the disorder we have seen recently will be effective at doing so in a lame duck second term? Particularly if he faces two D bodies in the legislature?

To make it simple, IMHO: It's not the Presidents job to quell a riot in Portland or Seattle. That is really on those states, and those cities, and their leadership, particularly those the let such things fester in their midst.

If Trump had sent in larger numbers of Federal LEO's, or the military, it would in the minds of some, justify greater and more violent force to further their agendas. This is a tactic that communists and marxists have used in other countries, in some cases with great success. Heavy handed government action can turn people against their government in a hurry.

I honestly don't see things changing much in PNW, even after all this. Frankly, the majority voters there WANT what is happening, at least at some level. It makes me sad, as my wife has family in the area, and I'd like to go visit again, but I am disinclined to visit places that have ceased to hold "American" values (admittedly, in my own mind), while enjoying the benefits of those same values.

Trump is powerless to protect the people against themselves. They get the government they deserve, and sometimes they get it good and hard. Unfortunately, I think we are all going to get it good and hard. I worry more about bullshit executive orders, and cruddy court appointments, than I do about what possible action the President could legally take against anarchist rioters. Being a lame duck, his give-a-shit may be broken, and we may see some really stupid shit. I don't honestly think the Democrats can take both the House and Senate, but if they do, in a veto proof majority, we, as a country will have much larger issues facing us than a few rioters in a left coast city. There will be a large push for abolishing the Electoral College, at state and federal levels, IMHO... they want "democracy" AKA: NY and LA values rule over the rest of us in the middle, and everything that entails, for starters.

[entropy]

In which direction? One, the other or both?

I grew up in Cook Co.

Is there more than one type?