[Religion and Politics]

Not everything need be responded to in an extremely raw personal way when making points. I say it is indefensible to make the point about women and Islam by attacking Khan's wife. The whole point could have been made without impugning the character of the Khans. Now you have the whole internet world "outing" the Khans for basically what is because of something indefensible done by Trump. This is not genius in action IMO.

Not everything is brilliant, not everything is above reproach. Whoopee, they said Trump hasn't sacrificed. Trump stepped in it, pure and simple. And personally, I think he stepped in it because of selfishness and not being able to take as good as he gives. If this doesn't change he will lose the election.

Since I don't want Trump to lose, I think it is reasonable to let him know what his supporters think about certain things and where the boundaries are. He shouldn't assume that he can just drag me wherever he wants to go in his tweets and personal attacks and have me bring up the rear with all those I touch in my daily life. As I said before, I want to vote "for", not "against". I sure hope Trump can keep things together in a way that prevents him from being my "lesser of two evils" choice. He has me wondering though.

[FenwickBabbitt]

I still don’t see how saying that the mother should have been allowed to speak too is an attack on the mother. I’m left wondering if the rationale for the claim is that an attack on the (worse parts of the) mother’s religion is an attack on the mother too, precisely because it’s her religion and she wouldn’t want to be associated with such an attack, even though it wasn’t negative against her? Is that really the issue, not that he ever attacked her personally (if anything he defended her), but that he used her presumably against her will to attack Islam in a way that’s viewed as improper?

Or is it that Trump’s tone should have been politer and more positive, instead of a little sarcastic (even though Kahn radically misrepresented Trump’s positions on the stage of the DNC)? A question of tone hardly seems worth making a federal case over. It’s how people from Queens talk. I’m still trying to understand where all this outrage is coming from. At any rate I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree.

I will say I think it would be a good idea if Trump would do more to anticipate questions from the press and try to figure out the ways the press might distort, exaggerate, or cherry pick his words in order to avoid falling into their traps.