Trump Proposes Killing Terrorist Families

In an interview on Fox & Friends the Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said that he’d like to “take out” the families of terrorists.

“I would knock the hell out of ISIS… [and] when you get these terrorists, you have to take out their families. I say ISIS is our number one threat, we have a president who doesn’t know what he is doing and all he’s worried about is climate change, he thinks climate change is something that’s going to go kill us.”

Reality

All four Geneva Conventions from 1949 contain “Common Article 3,” which applies to “armed conflict not of an international character.” What does that mean? The U.S. Supreme Court, in the 2006 case Hamdan vs. Rumsfeld, ruled that “armed conflict not of an international character” means a war that is not fought against a sovereign state. (A sovereign state simply means a country with a recognized government.) Since groups like ISIS are not considered sovereign states, that means that Common Article 3 applies to the current war on terrorism.

According to Common Article 3, people who are taking no active part in the hostilities “shall in all circumstances be treated humanely… To this end, the following acts are and shall remain prohibited at any time and in any place whatsoever … violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture.”

Experts said this language would make Trump’s approach a violation of the Geneva Conventions, assuming that the family members were not taking part in terrorist activities.

Media

Links

http://time.com/4132368/donald-trump-isis-bombing/

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/dec/17/rand-paul/rand-pauls-right-geneva-conventions-bar-donald-tru/

Trump Doubles Down on Wages Too High

Donald Trump insisted on Thursday that the U.S. must keep wages low in order to compete with other countries, one day after he dug in on his assertion that “wages are too high” in America. Speaking to Fox News Trump said:

“Whether it’s taxes or wages, if they’re too high we’re not going to be able to compete with other countries.”

Trump first said he believes wages are “too high” during Tuesday night’s Republican debate, undercutting the populist tone Trump has struck on the campaign trail as he’s called for protecting U.S. manufacturing jobs from outsourcing and immigration.

Trump’s comments about wages being “too high” came in response to a debate question about raising the minimum wage, which Trump and other GOP candidates said they oppose.

(h/t CNN)

Reality

Is anyone really surprised that a billionaire businessman wants to keep wages low?

According to the Pew Research Center, real wages are not at all high and instead have been stagnant for decades. This means we’ve seen bigger paychecks, but that paycheck goes far less than before when buying stuff.

Media

Fox and Friends

 

Trump Declares Wages Are ‘Too High’

GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump opened the 4th primetime GOP debate by suggesting that Americans’ wages are “too high” and that it’s part of a problem with the country’s competitiveness.

“Taxes too high, wages too high,” he said, responding to a question about New York state’s decision to raise the minimum wage for certain workers to $15. “We’re not going to be able to compete against the world.”

Trump rejected calls to raise the minimum wage. His rival for pole position in the Republican primary, Ben Carson, agreed.

“I would not raise it specifically because I’m interested in making sure that people are able to enter the job market and take advantage of opportunities,” he said.

Trump later doubled-down on his wage too high stance and also explained it right to the faces of auto workers.

(h/t Politico)

Reality

Is anyone really surprised that a billionaire businessman wants to keep wages low?

According to the Pew Research Center, real wages are not at all high and instead have been stagnant for decades. This means we’ve seen bigger paychecks, but that paycheck goes far less than before when buying stuff.

Media

Trump Praises Vladimir Putin

Two days after Vladimir Putin told the United Nations on Monday that it was an “enormous mistake” not to cooperate with the Syrian government in its fight against the Islamic State, Russian warplanes began hitting targets in the country — and not necessarily targets that were the location of Islamic State fighters.

The day after Putin’s speech, Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly asked Donald Trump what Putin was up to. “We spent $2 trillion, thousands of lives, wounded warriors all over, and Putin is now taking over what we started. He’s going into Syria. He frankly wants to fight ISIS, and I think that’s a wonderful thing.”

As for Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, Trump said that “maybe he’s better than the kind of people we’re supposed to be backing.”

Prior to that, Trump compared President Obama unfavorably to the Russian president.

“I will tell you, in terms of leadership, he’s getting an ‘A,’ and our president is not doing so well. They did not look good together.”

(h/t Washington Post)

Reality

This began a bromance between Trump and Putin, once saying Putin was was world leader he would “get along very well with.”

Republicans love Russian President Vladimir Putin. No surprises here because in the past, conservatives have heaped massive praise on Putin. Here are just a few examples.

Never-mind that he is a human-rights-abusing, political-enemy-killing, tyrant. Putin became the strong authoritarian model they have long desired in a president after 2 terms of “weak” Obama.

Media

Trump Rumors Megyn Kelly Took Vacation Because Of Him

Megyn Kelly announces 10 day vacation.

Donald Trump thinks Megyn Kelly‘s vacation could very well be because of his feud with her over her “inappropriate” questions at the first Republican primary debate.

Kelly asked famously tough questions of Trump during the televised debate, and several days later the real estate mogul made his infamous comment to CNN that she had “blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her… wherever.” Fox News CEO Roger Ailes and Trump eventually had a phone call to “clear the air.”

On Wednesday evening, Kelly told her Kelly File viewers that she will take a long overdue 10-day vacation to spend some time with her husband and children.

Newsmax TV host Steve Malzberg asked Trump: “Do you think there was any connection to have her go away for a while in the wake of what she did?”

The GOP candidate replied: “Well, there probably was, but I wouldn’t know anything about it.” But he added: “People were very surprised that, all the sudden, she decided to go away for 10 days… Some people make those quick decisions.”

Contrary to that, however, a Fox News representative told Mediaite that Kelly’s vacation had been planned long in advance. Nevertheless, Trump said he hopes “she is well” and that she returns to be “fair,” presumably to him.

(h/t Mediaite)

Reality

We’re not Megyn Kelly’s boss so we’re not privy to when she requested her time off. Until actual evidence is presented otherwise we should take Fox News at their word, and their response is actually pretty priceless:

“The conspiracy theories about Megyn Kelly’s vacation rank up there with UFO’s, the moon landing and Elvis being alive. Megyn is on a pre-planned, annual summer vacation with her family, which is much deserved. To imply otherwise as Donald Trump and his campaign operatives have is not only wildly irresponsible, but downright bizarre. Perhaps Mr. Trump thinks it’s advantageous to his poll numbers to keep talking about Megyn, but that doesn’t change the fact that Roger Ailes has fully supported her and her tough journalistic questioning since day one and is thrilled with the added exposure from the debate which resulted in even higher ratings of The Kelly File this week. Anyone who knows Roger is aware of how historically and consistently loyal he is to all of his talent and how he protects them at all costs. As Governor Terry Branstad said today, ‘when you’re a candidate, you’ve got to basically answer the questions. You can’t just attack the person asking the questions. That doesn’t work.’”

Media

Trump Endorses Tweet Calling Megyn Kelly a ‘Bimbo’

Twitter

Donald Trump retweeted a tweet from a follower commenting how viewers gave “bimbo” Megyn Kelly low marks.

“@timjcam: @megynkelly @FrankLuntz @realDonaldTrump Fox viewers give low marks to bimbo @MegynKelly will consider other programs!”

(h/t The Hill)

Reality

Trump has had an issue with Kelly when she moderated the Republican presidential debate. He accused her of being unfairly harsh on him by asking him valid questions about past sexist and misogynist comments. Fox News stood up for its anchor, calling the attacks on her “sexist verbal assaults.”

Trump Answers Charges of Sexism With More Sexism

Donald Trump, the Republican presidential frontrunner and not exactly friend of women, was expected to say some confrontational things at the first Republican presidential debate.

But when his machismo went up against Megyn Kelly, the Fox News personality, debate moderator and nonstop voice for women’s issues, he didn’t stand a chance. In fact, Kelly spent most of the debate grilling Jeb Bush, Scott Walker and more candidates with surprisingly tough questions over reproductive rights and beyond.

“You’ve called women you don’t like fat pigs, dogs, slobs and disgusting animals,” Kelly began her question, about as directly as you can.

“Only Rosie O’Donnell,” Trump interrupted with a sneer, earning cheers from the crowd.

Kelly wasn’t having it. Any of it.

“For the record, it was way beyond Rosie O’Donnell,” Kelly said – before launching into a laundry list Trump’s most misogynistic moments:

“Your Twitter account has several disparaging comments about women’s looks. You once told a contestant on the Celebrity Apprentice it would be a pretty picture to see her on her knees. Does that sound to you like the temperament of a man we should elect as president? And how do you answer the charge from Hillary Clinton – that you are part of the war on women?”

Trump, unchastened, responded with a misdirect: “I think the big problem this country has is being politically correct.”

Then he made a veiled threat at Kelly herself.

“What I say is what I say, and honestly, Megyn, if you don’t like it, I’m sorry. I’ve been very nice to you, although I could probably maybe not be based on the way you’ve treated me, but I wouldn’t do that.”

(h/t The Guardian)

Reality

Donald Trump responded to a question about past sexist and misogynist comments and responded with… more sexist and misogynist comments.

To try to gauge how unpresidental that was, try to imagine your favorite president publicly making comments like:

  • I just spoke with that fat pig Angela Merkel and we’re going to open up trade talks.
  • So I want to thank that dog President Park Geun-hye for our shared commitment to promoting a more peaceful world. I wonder if Huckabee was right and she eats dogs?

Furthermore Trump hid behind political correctness in his attempt to redirect the conversation. See, he’s not an sexist for making those comments, you’re what is wrong with this country for being offended by his sexist comments. There are so many inherit logical flaws with this argument. Just to name a few:

Media

Links

We’ll be tracking this under the Trump-Kelly feud tag.

1 24 25 26