Bannon emerges from White House to appeal for conservatives to unite behind Trump

[webfact]

Bannon emerges from White House to appeal for conservatives to unite behind Trump

By Richard Cowan and Andy Sullivan

REUTERS

 

White House Chief Strategist Stephen Bannon speaks at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Maryland, U.S., February 23, 2017. REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump's chief strategist Steve Bannon, known as a forceful influence in the White House, made a rare public appearance on Thursday to appeal to conservatives to unite behind the Republican president as he presses his agenda.

 

Bannon took to the stage along with White House chief of staff Reince Priebus at the four-day Conservative Political Action Conference, telling the gathering, "We want you to have our back" in upcoming battles, and denouncing media criticism of Trump.

 

The early days of the administration have been marked by deep post-election divisions between Trump backers and liberals over the new president's travel ban on refugees and people from seven Muslim-majority countries, as well as moves to increase deportations of illegal immigrants and to build a wall on the southwestern border with Mexico.

 

While conservatives are celebrating Trump's role in delivering them a victory in November's election, his agenda veers from traditional right-wing principles like limited government and open trade.

 

Republicans who control the White House and Congress also are arguing over how to dismantle and replace former Democratic President Barack Obama's landmark healthcare law.

 

Bannon and Priebus both sought to dispel a sense of disorder in the White House portrayed in media accounts.

 

Referring to media criticism of Trump and echoing the president's attacks on the media, Bannon warned, "It's going to get worse every day" as Trump presses forward with his 2016 campaign promises.

 

"If you think they're going to give you your country back without a fight you are sadly mistaken," said Bannon, who formerly ran the confrontational right-wing website Breitbart News. He blamed the "corporatist, globalist media that are adamantly opposed to an economic nationalist agenda" under Trump.

 

The CPAC conference, once a fringe event but is now decidedly in the Republican mainstream, is being held in suburban Maryland, attended by an estimated 10,000 activists.

 

White House adviser Kellyanne Conway, in remarks to the group, credited Trump with revitalizing the Republican Party's right wing.

"Every great movement ends up being a little bit sclerotic and dusty after a time, and I think they (conservatives) need an infusion of energy," Conway said.

 

Referring to Trump's expected attendance at the conference on Friday, she said, "I think by tomorrow this will be TPAC, this year. No doubt.”

 

CPAC organizers are trying to steer clear of controversy over the alt-right movement, a loose grouping that includes neo-Nazis, white supremacists and anti-Semites whom Trump has been slow to denounce. Breitbart has a following among some of these groups and in the past Bannon had called the media organization a platform for the movement.

 

Some Breitbart staffers were scheduled to participate in CPAC panel discussions.

 

"We don't think there's any role for the alt-right in the conservative movement," Matt Schlapp, head of the American Conservative Union, which organizes CPAC, said in a phone interview.

 

REAGAN COMPARISONS

 

Just a month into his presidency, Trump is already being compared by some conservatives to their hero, President Ronald Reagan. He swept to power in 1981 with a small-government, free-trade, tax-cutting agenda that energized the Republican right-wing and molded the views of many of the CPAC faithful.

 

Trump so far has been "pitch-perfect with conservatives as he starts his administration," said Schlapp.

 

Even so, some conservatives, including some at CPAC, are nervously watching Trump.

 

Trump has proposed a major expansion of government to police immigration. He has already canceled a trade deal with Asia-Pacific neighbors, and he has sharply criticized one between the United States, Mexico and Canada.

 

"I always worry any discussion about trade competition and tariffs ... misdirects the focus," said CPAC stalwart Grover Norquist, a powerful advocate of low taxes and small government.

 

On taxes, Trump has backed cuts in rates, but his position on a Republican tax package under debate in Congress is unclear.

 

Whether Republicans and Trump can come to terms over such issues will help determine how much real change they can effect in Washington, and how the voters treat them in 2018 in the mid-term elections, when ruling parties normally lose ground.

 

Some Republicans have expressed disappointment that Trump has not moved faster on tax reform and on repealing Obamacare, Obama's law on health insurance. Trump has issued a flurry of executive orders but has not yet publicly proposed legislation of any kind, unlike recent first-term presidents.

 

Schlapp credited Trump with naming the most conservative Cabinet in a half-century and nominating a Supreme Court justice, Neil Gorsuch, who has conservatives' blessings.

 

Trump has also thrilled conservatives by working hand-in-glove with congressional Republicans on overturning or gutting a handful of Obama-era regulations, including one that prevented coal companies from dumping waste into rivers and streams.

 

(Additional reporting by John Whitesides, Susan Heavey and Doina Chiacu; Editing by Leslie Adler, Cynthia Osterman and Frances Kerry)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2017-02-24

[craigt3365]

He's a nut.  Sad he's got the president's ear.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Bannon

Quote

 

Bannon was a founding member of the board of Breitbart News,^[50] an online far-right news, opinion and commentary website which, according to Philip Elliott and Zeke J. Miller of Time, has "pushed racist, sexist, xenophobic and anti-Semitic material into the vein of the alternative right".^[14]

 

Ronald Radosh claimed in The Daily Beast that Bannon had told him, in a book party on November 12, 2013, that he was a Leninist, in that "Lenin wanted to destroy the state, and that's my goal too. I want to bring everything crashing down, and destroy all of today's establishment".^[58]Snopes considers this claim unproven,^[59] although other media like Time magazine and The Guardian have also reported or discussed it.^[60][61]

 

 

[Slip]

Quote

Trump has also thrilled conservatives by working hand-in-glove with congressional Republicans on overturning or gutting a handful of Obama-era regulations, including one that prevented coal companies from dumping waste into rivers and streams.

Such a forward looking president this one...

[lannarebirth]

2 hours ago, craigt3365 said:

He's a nut.  Sad he's got the president's ear.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Bannon

 

Bearing in mind that the author strongly disagreed with everyone he spoke with and had editorial license to exclude points of view that bested his own, I thought this was pretty good article.

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/sam-altman-interview-trump-supporters-2017-2

[humqdpf]

Here is a way of getting conservatives to unite behind Trump - get rid of Bannon!

 

The real truth about Republicans is that they tend not to be really ideological and their views are informed by their experience. What they really don't like is an ideologue of either the left or right telling them what they ought to do or think.

[Credo]

1 minute ago, humqdpf said:

Here is a way of getting conservatives to unite behind Trump - get rid of Bannon!

 

The real truth about Republicans is that they tend not to be really ideological and their views are informed by their experience. What they really don't like is an ideologue of either the left or right telling them what they ought to do or think.

Well, they certainly didn't get an ideologue with Trump.   He's much more a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants sort of guy.   

[lannarebirth]

2 minutes ago, humqdpf said:

Here is a way of getting conservatives to unite behind Trump - get rid of Bannon!

 

 

I don't follow the news as closely as many of you do. Can you list for me please all of the reasons Trump should "get rid of Bannon".  Is he corrupt? A traitor? Does he beat his wife? What has he done specifically that is so egregious?  TIA

[craigt3365]

10 minutes ago, lannarebirth said:

 

I don't follow the news as closely as many of you do. Can you list for me please all of the reasons Trump should "get rid of Bannon".  Is he corrupt? A traitor? Does he beat his wife? What has he done specifically that is so egregious?  TIA

Read this. He's a very strange individual.  Also look at my link above. 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/23/steve-bannon-cpac-rare-public-address-west-wing-power-trump-adviser

[lannarebirth]

28 minutes ago, craigt3365 said:

Read this. He's a very strange individual.  Also look at my link above. 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/23/steve-bannon-cpac-rare-public-address-west-wing-power-trump-adviser

 

I didn't see anything strange in there at all. I happen to agree with him about the media, which for the most part are displaying a cognitive bias. They were wrong. Terribly wrong, and rather than come to terms with that which they denigrate, rather than seek to understand the thing they were wrong about they castigate widely,  :

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_bias

 

because what they expected and predicted to happen did not happen. They must deride the thing that did happen because it went against their bias. You see it all over this website as well. People don't want to see things the way other people see them. They need to villify them instead. I mean, that's all pretty obvious isn't it? Doesn't matter if it's left vs right or vice versa. People (and the media) are loathe to accept a viewpoint other than their own these days.

 

It may have a lot to do with personalized algorithmic driven "filter bubbles".

 

http://siliconangle.com/blog/2017/02/22/bill-gates-hopes-technology-education-will-break-us-filter-bubbles/

 

 

Edited February 24, 2017 by lannarebirth

[derator01]

Several off topic and troll posts have been removed from view.  Please stick to the topic.  If you feel a link is fake news, please use the report button and let the moderators sort it out.

[Chicog]

Thank you for your words of reassurance, President Bannon.

[dunroaming]

Difficult for the conservatives to unite behind Trump when Trump keeps changing his position and his opinions.  Latest is that he thinks that the EU is wonderful and he is totally in favour of it!  Another spectacular U-turn?  I would say so.

[mike324]

Trump can say a turd is gold and people would buy it

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

2 minutes ago, mike324 said:

Trump can say a turd is gold and people would buy it

I would say some people. Some people would buy it, and then eat it too!

[Grubster]

16 hours ago, Slip said:

Such a forward looking president this one...

But you sure don't mind that China does this polluting ten fold so you can have a cheap shirt.

[modafinil]

I was skimming the headlines, and misread this one as "Baboon emerges from White House", sadly the actual story was not about a primate with a big red arse.

[Chicog]

2 hours ago, Grubster said:

But you sure don't mind that China does this polluting ten fold so you can have a cheap shirt.

Or an expensive Trump one.

[Chicog]

1 hour ago, modafinil said:

I was skimming the headlines, and misread this one as "Baboon emerges from White House", sadly the actual story was not about a primate with a big red arse.

 

I don't know...

[craigt3365]

5 hours ago, Grubster said:

But you sure don't mind that China does this polluting ten fold so you can have a cheap shirt.

Of course we mind.  How about the Chinese do more to protect their (and our) environment.  They are the top polluter right now.

 

Many Americans are OK with paying more if it helps workers and helps the environment.  It's a no brainer.  Look at the work done with coffee plantations.  It can happen.

[lannarebirth]

29 minutes ago, craigt3365 said:

Of course we mind.  How about the Chinese do more to protect their (and our) environment.  They are the top polluter right now.

 

Many Americans are OK with paying more if it helps workers and helps the environment.  It's a no brainer.  Look at the work done with coffee plantations.  It can happen.

 

I think tariffs in general are a bad idea. I think the new "border tax" idea isn't very well thought out and will be DOA. I have no problems however with establishing indexes to measure pollution or working conditions, or egalitarian values at the country of origin of imported products and then levying a surcharge or tax as a way to either change detrimental behaviours or to inspire local manufacture of these same goods.

[Grubster]

4 hours ago, craigt3365 said:

Of course we mind.  How about the Chinese do more to protect their (and our) environment.  They are the top polluter right now.

 

Many Americans are OK with paying more if it helps workers and helps the environment.  It's a no brainer.  Look at the work done with coffee plantations.  It can happen.

Yes and the fact that the Chinese worker can produce our goods at a much lower price than our workers can is hinged on that pollution, lack of worker rights etc. etc.  Some here think its because the american worker is greedy and lazy.  I haven't seen any workers that can compete one on one with the american worker.   Big business does not care about any of that, its bottom line only and its time they get punished for that.

[craigt3365]

15 minutes ago, Grubster said:

Yes and the fact that the Chinese worker can produce our goods at a much lower price than our workers can is hinged on that pollution, lack of worker rights etc. etc.  Some here think its because the american worker is greedy and lazy.  I haven't seen any workers that can compete one on one with the american worker.   Big business does not care about any of that, its bottom line only and its time they get punished for that.

Chinese workers can produce goods at a lower price because their wages are LOW!  Pollution, etc, does have an impact.  But not like the low wages.  And yes, many Americans are now lazy.  Low end jobs like this just don't work there any more.  High end ones, absolutely, but that requires education.  Something Trump hasn't attacked yet.  Oh right...he put in that lady with a vast knowledge of education in charge of things.  LOL!

[Grubster]

6 hours ago, craigt3365 said:

Chinese workers can produce goods at a lower price because their wages are LOW!  Pollution, etc, does have an impact.  But not like the low wages.  And yes, many Americans are now lazy.  Low end jobs like this just don't work there any more.  High end ones, absolutely, but that requires education.  Something Trump hasn't attacked yet.  Oh right...he put in that lady with a vast knowledge of education in charge of things.  LOL!

So I guess you think that all people with a below average IQ should live in poverty huh.

[craigt3365]

17 minutes ago, Grubster said:

So I guess you think that all people with a below average IQ should live in poverty huh.

Never said that.  Maybe their government can do something about this?

[Grubster]

1 minute ago, craigt3365 said:

Never said that.  Maybe their government can do something about this?

I'm talking about our "lazy workers".

[whatawonderfulday]

20 hours ago, mike324 said:

Trump can say a turd is gold and people would buy it

Mentality challenged republican Trump supporters maybe

[craigt3365]

1 minute ago, Grubster said:

I'm talking about our "lazy workers".

Again, never said that either.  Perhaps Trump should focus on this rather than a wall or increasing the military spending?  Educational reform would be great.  Sadly, his pick, DeVos, is not the one to do this.

[Grubster]

6 hours ago, craigt3365 said:

And yes, many Americans are now lazy.  Low end jobs like this just don't work there any more.  High end ones, absolutely, but that requires education.

And I guess you know how to educate the millions of americans with low IQs to do high end jobs eh.

[IMA_FARANG]

[craigt3365]

1 minute ago, Grubster said:

And I guess you know how to educate the millions of americans with low IQs to do high end jobs eh.

Absolutely not.  No easy answers here.  Just like saying we only manufacture in China because there are no pollution laws.  That's not entirely the case.

 

No easy answers.  Sadly, the POTUS is not aggressively going after this.  Education is a key for improving our society.