> I moved from "everyone deserves to be heard out" to "this guy is a bully and a bad person in many other ways". It was clear when he made fun of a man's disability and just grew from there.

Ok, I thought it was rather very visible earlier on, such as before he even decided to run for president.

> To be fair to the GOP, Trump basically did a hostile takeover with a plurality of the vote on the right against a very fractured field.

They did not have to nominate him.

> I'm not advocating for a pissing contest over who is more violent.

Ok

> I'm advocating for people to treat each other decently even if they disagree. I'm advocating for rational dialogue.

It's pretty hard to have a rational dialogue when one side of the dialogue discards all facts as 'fake', brings their own 'alternative facts' to the table, tacitly and openly supports violence against their opposition and in general does whatever possible to polarize the society they are nominally supposed to lead.

> I think this isn't the moment to win points for the left.

This stopped being about 'points' long ago, this is about the future of a country.

> Partly because I think the case isn't strong, but also because I don't see it solving the real problem of divisive American politics.

Agreed, that problem starts at the top and it will take a serious amount of soul searching for the GOP to decide how far they will let this slide before they will put a stop to it. Chances are that it is already past the point where it can be arrested anyway but maybe there is still an outside chance the problem can be contained before it spills over.

> The left can't "win" enough to forever banish Trumps from power. It only causes escalation, at least so far.

This is not about left versus right, if that's your frame of reference today then you really should wake up and start paying attention, the damage to the United States as an institution both at home and abroad is immense.

> Ok, I thought it was rather very visible earlier on, such as before he even decided to run for president.

Being sued for racial discrimination in 1973 was a pretty big clue. But the birther nonsense should really have tipped everyone off about what was going on.

Good point. I knew he was unqualified well before. I forgot about the birth nonsense when I wrote that lost. I guess I upgraded him from fool to dangerous fool.

Now you're going to have to figure out how to position BLM versus the Neo Nazis.

For me the one is a response to structural unequal treatment by law enforcement, the other is the vilest element in society seeking a platform and a way to spread their hateful ideology.

> Now you're going to have to figure out how to position BLM versus the Neo Nazis.

Do I? I just know people are outgrouping and arguing through violence and I'm opposed to that regardless or what policy changes they feel are appropriate.

I don't feel the need to judge that political violence is worse in one case than in another case.

So you're equating a response to violence of one group to another to a group that actively advocates reducing a whole swathe of humanity to sub-human status or to kill them outright. That's a bit of a stretch for me but if you are going to see these two as equal because they chose to resort to violence themselves then I can see your point. But that's an extremist pacifist position, the kind that says that if you are going to be attacked by someone that you should not defend yourself. As it is probably obvious by now I do not subscribe to that extreme level of pacifism, I recognize that there are times when violence can be justified.

That doesn't mean you should be happy about it, it should be a means of last resort and it should be practiced only when all other avenues have not born fruit.