Posted on 03/05/2016 8:18:40 AM PST by RoosterRedux
You could say politics has reached a new low with the ‘‘small hands’’ remarks from the Republican debate.
But the exchange over the size of Donald Trump’s, um, hands is merely the most recent vulgarity in American politics. The history of crude remarks goes back to the Founding Fathers.
In the 18th century, John Adams called Alexander Hamilton a ‘‘bastard brat’’ and wrote that Hamilton had ‘‘a superabundance of secretions which he could not find whores enough to draw off,’’ according to historian Ron Chernow.
One difference between then and now: ‘‘These were words written or spoken in private, not in public,’’ said Chernow, whose Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Alexander Hamilton helped inspire the hit Broadway musical ‘‘Hamilton.’’ (Chernow says the comments were quoted in letters that survived the centuries.)
In the 1880s, rumors of Grover Cleveland’s out-of-wedlock child led to a song from his Republican opponents: ‘‘Ma, ma, where’s my pa?’’ When Cleveland won the presidency, the response came: ‘‘Gone to the White House, ha ha ha!’’
‘‘Old-fashioned American politics was full of those kinds of vile comments,’’ said Arnold Shober, who teaches government at Lawrence University in Appleton, Wisconsin. ‘‘We’ve kind of lost that over the last 70 years, and I think it’s just coming back.’’
Not that 20th century politicians shied away from vulgarities. Here’s President Bill Clinton describing his 1970s El Camino pickup truck: ‘‘I had Astroturf in the back. You don’t want to know why, but I did.’’
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
Love that Adams!
This is reminiscent of Clinton’s minions trying to justify his repeated philandering by pushing the phony story about Jefferson fathering a child of one of his slaves.
Bump. AANND, ... Trump is doing it to make sure the LSM quotes him ..... otherwise, they could lie about (”interpret”) what he said.
Pure speculation.
It is just as easy to speculate that Trump knows exactly what needs to be don't to cure what ails business in this country and is running on the middle ground because he knows if he says what really needs to be done would never get him in the office to fix it.
Could you imagine Trump or anyone else proposing to end all corporate taxes?
It's a necessary step but do you think anyone would dare say it and get elected?
Harry Truman’s “salty” language shocked Americans back in his day:
In 1948, President Harry Truman was giving a train platform speech in Salida, Colorado, when someone in the crowd hollered, “Give ‘em hell, Harry!” Truman replied, “I tell the truth and those rich, son-of-a-gun bitchers think it’s hell.”
In Truman’s eyes, General Douglas MacArthur was a “dumb son of a bitch,” and Nixon was “a shifty-eyed goddamned liar.”
“I never did give them hell,” he once reminisced. “I just told the truth, and they thought it was hell.”
Ha! You really ought to study some history before posting such nonsense.
“On one occasion, Washington unleashed his inner beast during the Revolutionary War, after he discovered one of his generals, Charles Lee, was retreating from the Battle of Monmouth Courthouse in 1778. Another general, Charles Scott, later recounted Washington’s reaction: “He swore that day till the leaves shook on the trees. Charming! Delightful! Never have I enjoyed such swearing before or since. Sir, on that memorable day he swore like an angel from heaven!”
- Thomas Jefferson
Oh, but the Vice President can stand before congress and say to blacks that the Republucan party wants to put you in chains again?
Let er rip Don!
It’s the thought that counts, private or public.
And I applaud him for that.
However, it tells me he is more valuable as an attorney or a Senator then POTUS
This is the type of story that has came out to help people such as Bill Clinton and Barack Obama in the past.
It is right and ok to be crude and distasteful as the candidate’s mind that produces such tripe couldn’t possibly have morality issues? Be careful of your thoughts, for they become your words. Be careful of your words, for they become your actions. Be careful of your actions for they become your character. The words and actions of all the characters in this kabuki theater that is politics suggests they are all whorish at best, evil at worst.
You call others narcissistic while defending one of the most narcissistic candidates ever (concedingly they are all narcissists)? You chide me for listening to my “droning mind” while presumably I am to listen to yours?
Here is the hard fact of the matter; I am not foolish enough to believe that there is any significant difference among any of the candidates. A vote for the lesser of two or more evils is still a vote for evil. As someone said on this site a long time ago, we are merely deciding which form of nominal socialism we want for the next few years and the rate at which we want to get there. Why participate in such a folly? There is no single candidate that is going to significantly change or alter anything. That is the reality.
I will thank you to refrain from your insults and nasty criticism of my thoughts and comments. While it my be “right and ok” for Trump to be crude, it is not appreciated here on this site or by me. In fact, I would thank you not to respond at all.
It would have been difficult back then to go ‘public’ with much, given the state of communication and media back then. Now, lots is said in public, but IMHO much more egregious, deceitful, and vulgar activities occur in private back rooms, and that is one of the biggest problems with politics.
I know one candidate who would pledge everyone else’ life: Hillary!
No. You are right. I shouldn’t pass judgement. AS IF VOTING ISN’T PASSING JUDGEMENT!!!!???!
Trump talks like regular people. When he calls someone a pussy or says he's going to bomb the shit outta ISIS, that's how real men talk. Romney calls Trump a "vulgarian." Nobody talks like that.
Then it is the strategy to trash, defame, and demean all the great Founding Fathers, imperfect as they all were. I harp on this because this is what the liberals always resorted to when defending Clinton, Kennedy, and their kind.
$200 million is 5% of his worth. I pay more than that in taxes everyday It was no sacrifice at all for him. It was just a platform for recognition and having served its purpose was abandoned.
I don’t care for the low level of discourse but where were all the hand wringers when Marco Roboto started it with his comment about Trump’s small hands in the previous debate?
Is there anyone above the age of seven who didn’t know what he was intimating?
Everyone knows by now that Trump doesn’t let personal attacks go unanswered the way George W. Bush did.
Trump comes right back at the attacker with full force.
No. Just don’t sugar coat that they were also real men.
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