Free Republic

Man, I can’t wait for Wu2K to be over

Dude, it’s a little ironic that your name is Pilgrim’s Progress. As I always understood it, all the antiquated, formalist preachers in John Bunyan’s time reacted about the same way you are now when he wrote his stuff.

I am not into populist preaching for populism’s sake either brother, but you might want leave grace a little room. I’ve never been a fan of the guy’s music in the past but he seems to be genuinely trying to turn his life around and give the glory to Whom it is due. At least leave open the possibility that God can decide to use the unlikeliest of tools, like Bunyan, for His purpose.

If Kanye West is sincere, he’ll have plenty of principalities and powers opposing him. Probably best not to pile on.

I am impressed by your candor in your post, and empathize with you. I know it is difficult to follow your conscience in a case like that, and brave. I hope you haven’t given up on faith entirely, merely because an organization twisted it. Jesus loves you!

Listen man, no need for a preemptive defense of me calling you a liar. I would have hoped that by my earlier posts here you would think it unlikely I go on such an attack.

My problem is really more about what he is talking about. The groping, that is. It really bothers me. I do think he is talking about - bragging about - predatory behavior. I guess you and I just disagree. In either case, I think this one will stick to him, whether “normal” or not.

I am certainly open to correction. I read that he was newly married to Melania at the time. I watched the whole video, and at the end he references Melania when embracing the lady he had just been saying he might kiss.

Thanks, sincerely. I can always use the help.

I understand the lesser of two evils argument. For me it has limits. I get that for others it is overwhelmingly compelling. I respect your contention.

That’s not the subject of my posts, nor in those I was responding to. The subject is that so many here are kidding themselves that Trump isn’t sinking. He most certainly is, and tragically it is under his own weight. She is an eminently beatable candidate.

Regardless of whether I am for him or not, I believe he is going down, and will continue to do so. I assure you I don’t want her as president. Unfortunately it takes more than all of us on these boards to elect any Republican candidate. And he is losing those pesky other people.

I think he got away with so much so far because he looked strong. Ridicule doesn’t easily work against a strong opponent. With his lack of preparation for the debate, he looked weak, and his eternal willingness to be baited by others made him look silly in the back-and-forth with the criminal, and his subsequent Twitter war with a former beauty-pagent contestant. Ridicule of him was more effective after that, and now the libs are layering on disclosures of things worthy of disgust. It is sticking, and I doubt the worst has come yet. He first began becoming an object of ridicule, and now is one of contempt - to the 10% or so of the voting public on the fence that need to vote “R”.

That’s what I am seeing, and I wish someone would convince him to bow out, though I doubt it will happen. In my opinion - and I could certainly be wrong - he is on track to lose... so a change to the ticket is a better path to avoiding “President Hillary” than wishes and delusional posts hoping that Trump himself released this tape as some sort of strategic masterstroke, or that he really won the debate, or that these recorded comments will help him with “macho” men. I am shocked how many of these posts I have read since yesterday.

No harm done and no hard feelings. We can talk about it again some day and laugh, on this side or the other friend.

I am reasonably confident that we would agree on the real measure of a man. I was commenting on the whole “machismo” thing, which I don’t equate with real manhood anyway. I wouldn’t ever claim that any of the things I listed made me a real man.

I was simply saying that I didn’t see Trump’s comments as simple “guy talk”, and I was trying to show some credibility as a guy.

I don’t think I demeaned myself. I am just saying that I am not silly enough to claim to be able to defeat a person I don’t know. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose.

But I assure you you would not call me a snowflake in person without feeling it in your jaw.

Not sure where you felt I was flattering you. I assure you I was doing no such thing. I was extending a courtesy to a person who appears to be a fellow believer. I was doing so, not to win you over, but because I am under orders to do so, according to what I understand of the Pauline epistles. I am not even trying to persuade you.

If you would honestly like to know my further opinion on these matters, I am happy to have a private conversation with you over the freepmail.

Nope, not perfect by a long shot. I have said things that I am not proud of, and will freely admit that I am glad they are not public knowledge.

My point was simply that this is not normal “guy talk”, or even the boasting of a narcissistic blowhard. This is a married man, talking about a married woman, and bragging about groping strangers. This is a bridge too far.

I make you this honest promise, no sarcasm. If I ever saw a woman relative of yours being groped by a stranger out of a sense of entitlement and fame, this imperfect guy would do all I could to lay him down.

I can see you know my motivations better than I do, so I will beg off from our discussion. We shall both see if this thing hurts him or not, I suppose.

And I won’t be happy about it if it does. Honestly.

Honestly, the invasion of privacy does bother me; I admit that freely. I am not gleeful over this thing, I assure you.

I just don’t like having bragging about assaulting women being equated with locker room talk. That was my entire point. My “agenda” is a pretty thin hope that someone will change the ticket at this point.

I wasn’t saying they were the “measure of a man”. The original poster was describing the comments as “machismo”. I think the qualities I described qualify as “macho”, which is really all I was going for.

By your posts I see you are a Christian. I won’t insult a brother. But for what it’s worth, I like to think I have some measure of honesty as well, and it is intellectual honesty that is making me think this is not going away.

Aren’t you a brave internet poster? If you were man enough to say such a thing to me in person (and I am not saying you aren’t) you wouldn’t think that for long. I might lose... nobody can beat everybody... but you would know I had been there.

Good day to you, tough guy.

I like to think I am a pretty masculine guy, with masculine buddies. I can bench over 300lbs., restore muscle cars and classic tractors, can do most any type of construction, and can shoot fairly well.

I have never, as a married man, discussed hitting on a married woman with a total stranger, while bragging about sexual assault, nor have any one of my “macho” guy friends. This isn’t guy talk. This is a caricature of masculinity... a rich boy who has probably never thrown a punch or swung a hammer in his life... demeaning someone’s daughter or mother. The “macho” thing to do to a guy who gropes women is to knock him out.

But that’s just one man’s opinion. Flame away.

Pence/Gingrich 2016

They won’t listen. It’s total-denial time. I don’t mind disagreeing with folks; I might be wrong in my opinions... but I hate losing respect for them. Reading these delusional posts is depressing. Folks are somehow thinking Trump has this under control. Moral folks on here are rationalizing a married man discussing a married woman with a stranger because Bill Clinton is a bad guy. The fact is, it doesn’t even matter if it was “normal” or not, it’s whether it plays in the public sphere, where the entire entertainment culture is happily and unabashedly hypocritical toward Republicans. After the debate, he was an object of ridicule, and now he is one of disdain - to the undecided and independent voter, particularly the females.

He is done.

Pence/Gingrich 2016

Thanks for the insult. I submitted my opinion, respectfully, as a conservative and a patriot, who certainly may be wrong... and knowing that I would likely get that sort of reaction. But you have your opinion as well.

I think I’ll be proven correct in November, and I will not be at all happy at all about it. Such a wasted opportunity... where so many folks I respected chose to follow an unabashedly immoral narcissist, and rationalized it because the other side had one that was worse.

This is actually an opportunity to make a change and still get an anti-establishment ticket in, if Trump folks would wake to see it... I guess thinking they might IS quite laughable, now that you mention it.

I don’t think so; if they keep Pence on the ticket I think they could make it work.

I honestly don’t think he can win now. I won’t pretend I ever liked him, but I was starting to think he would actually win before that debate. I am shocked at how poor a candidate Hillary is. If Trump had acted slightly presidential for the duration of the debate, I think he would be up by now to have perhaps weathered this, which I doubt is the last of such public disclosures. But instead he was baited like a child, and then got into a Twitter war with a former beauty queen. Then this. He is not going to win.

I hate the establishment as much as anybody... But this guy will lose. It doesn’t matter if you think that every married man talks this way to strangers about married women (which I hope is not the case). He is going under. As long as he was a formidable opponent, the media’s attempts at putting him down bounced off. After the debate, twitter war, and this, he is just going to be a buffoon. His indestructibility was fine when he was a hitman/cowboy; it will melt when he is a laughing stock and an object of disgust.

So conservatives should try to salvage the ticket, and throw another anti-establishment candidate under Pence. I think such a ticket would crush the weak Democrat candidate. But I am sure all the cult of personality around Trump won’t see that and will be in denial until she’s sworn in.