Roger Angell on "Most Important" Vote of His Lifetime

[BudGirl]

Ok, need a citation on that one.


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not exactly a museum, but he really didn't seem to know what he was talking about. This interview prompted my response earlier.

[Limey]

not exactly a museum, but he really didn't seem to know what he was talking about. This interview prompted my response earlier.

This terrible [checks notes] fire at the... [checks notes] Notre Dame cathedral...

He didn't call it a museum, but he likened it to a museum, which is weird.  He's from New York, liken it to St. Patrick's!

[Waldo]

"Renovations - what's that all about?"

I thought this was a joke until the last link posted in the thread.

[Limey]

Meanwhile, Bernie went on Fox News last night and ended up getting applauded off stage by the in-studio audience, following a relatively rousing - for a theoretically partisan crowd - call-and-response series of questions during his summation.  Just another reminder that the Republican strategy of labeling everything since (at least) the advent of Medicare as "socialism" has become background noise.  It didn't work against Obama, it didn't work in 2018 and here is a self-proclaimed democratic socialist getting a Fox News crowd to agree vociferously with his platform pillars.

At the same time, according to a poll published in The Hill, only 1 in 5 Americans saw lower taxes in 2018 than 2017.  About a third (including me) saw their taxes go up, about a third saw no change and about 14% didn't notice one way or the other.  That should see "you can keep your doctor" levels of backlash coming.  The working poor - who put Trump over the top - are the ones being hurt the most by Trump's fake-populism.  The trick for the Democrats will be to make sure that the country focuses on the true culprits, and is not divided against each other as we were in 2016.

More Bernie highlights.

[Limey]

A few months ago, the Senate removed sanctions on a Russian oligarch in a somewhat eyebrow-raising move.  Yesterday, that oligarch's company announced it's building a $200 million aluminum mill in McConnell's home state of Kentucky.

USA!  USA!  USA!

[Limey]

I thought this was a joke until the last link posted in the thread.

When you have to fake empathy, you can come off sounding like a boob.

[jbm]

Meanwhile, Bernie went on Fox News last night and ended up getting applauded off stage by the in-studio audience, following a relatively rousing - for a theoretically partisan crowd - call-and-response series of questions during his summation.  Just another reminder that the Republican strategy of labeling everything since (at least) the advent of Medicare as "socialism" has become background noise.  It didn't work against Obama, it didn't work in 2018 and here is a self-proclaimed democratic socialist getting a Fox News crowd to agree vociferously with his platform pillars.

I've just seen snippets, but was this really a "Fox News crowd" or was it just a Bernie crowd in a town hall covered by Fox?

[HudsonHawk]

I've just seen snippets, but was this really a "Fox News crowd" or was it just a Bernie crowd in a town hall covered by Fox?

It was a town hall organized and hosted by Fox News. There may have been Bernie plants, but Fox set it up.

[Limey]

I've just seen snippets, but was this really a "Fox News crowd" or was it just a Bernie crowd in a town hall covered by Fox?

As HH said, it was a Fox event.  No idea who controlled the crowd, but I doubt Fox would have allowed Bernie's folks to stack the audience.  It's just a fundamental truth that people love social programs, especially if it helps get your kid out of the basement and stops your mother-in-law taking their place.

[jbm]

I guess, but I view it the same way I would a debate run by Fox News: who's covering it and asking the questions is completely independent of who can get a ticket to attend.  In other words, I am not as sold that the Fox News crowd loves Bernie and his ideas.

[TeeJoe]

The town hall was in Bethlehem Pa. Take the event to Kentucky and you'll get a different take I bet.

[MRaup]

The town hall was in Bethlehem Pa. Take the event to Kentucky and you'll get a different take I bet.

Even less collective teeth in the audience?

[TeeJoe]

Even less collective teeth in the audience?

They're all related.  Even Ned who is his own grandpa.

[Waldo]

The town hall was in Bethlehem Pa. Take the event to Kentucky and you'll get a different take I bet.

Nevertheless, it's not very on-message for Fox News.  They wouldn't have run with it if they didn't think the crowd would be sympathetic to their values.

[Limey]

Nevertheless, it's not very on-message for Fox News.  They wouldn't have run with it if they didn't think the crowd would be sympathetic to their values.

I saw a great clip where the hosts tried to nail Bernie for benefiting from the tax cut.  “I voted against it,” he said.  When they said that, yeah, but, you still benefited, he just repeated the same response but slower. 

[chuck]

I saw a great clip where the hosts tried to nail Bernie for benefiting from the tax cut.  “I voted against it,” he said.  When they said that, yeah, but, you still benefited, he just repeated the same response but slower.

Laugh all you want but one of those guys will end up being the Secretary of Treasury if he's not tall enough to be the Fed Chair.

[jbm]

So, the piece of crap Barr (and Rosenstein) plans to hold a press conference tomorrow morning, presumably before the redacted "report" is issued or certainly before people could digest it.  This guy has no pretension about being America's lawyer; it's transparent that he only cares about Trump.  All his actions amount to getting up close to America and laughing in her face.

The press, being stupid and compliant, will attend this nonsensical press conference, digest his narrative-setting spin and run with it.  So instead of letting the public/press read the redacted "report" and proceed accordingly, the press will spend all day reacting to some bullshit spin laid out by Barr.

[Limey]

So, the piece of crap Barr (and Rosenstein) plans to hold a press conference tomorrow morning, presumably before the redacted "report" is issued or certainly before people could digest it.  This guy has no pretension about being America's lawyer; it's transparent that he only cares about Trump.  All his actions amount to getting up close to America and laughing in her face.

The press, being stupid and compliant, will attend this nonsensical press conference, digest his narrative-setting spin and run with it.  So instead of letting the public/press read the redacted "report" and proceed accordingly, the press will spend all day reacting to some bullshit spin laid out by Barr.

He knows his audience. 

What’s really going to chap your ass is when they give air time to Kellyanne. 

[Limey]

Well Barr's presser was a giant nothingburger.  Speaking of "giant nothingburgers", who's willing to bet that the "peripheral characters" - who had damaging information about them redacted from the Mueller report - don't include Jr and Jared?

[jbm]

I refused to watch this propaganda piece, but from reporting, it seems that the theory is similar to what I suspected: Roger Stone/Trump Campaign can't be charged with conspiracy because they and Wikileaks were not part of the GRU hacking.  I suppose this interpretation might deter a prosecutor for a criminal case, but the facts scream out what we knew all along: Trump's campaign colluded with the Russians.  They knew the Russians were behind the hack and coordinated with the Russians through Wikileaks in using the illegal goods to their advantage. 

Whether someone is happy or unhappy with the terms collusion, coordination, conspiracy or whatever, everyone knows that Trump was in bed with the Russians in an effort to affect/steal the election.  There's no need to be distracted by the legal niceties.

[Limey]

I refused to watch this propaganda piece, but from reporting, it seems that the theory is similar to what I suspected: Roger Stone/Trump Campaign can't be charged with conspiracy because they and Wikileaks were not part of the GRU hacking.  I suppose this interpretation might deter a prosecutor for a criminal case, but the facts scream out what we knew all along: Trump's campaign colluded with the Russians.  They knew the Russians were behind the hack and coordinated with the Russians through Wikileaks in using the illegal goods to their advantage. 

Whether someone is happy or unhappy with the terms collusion, coordination, conspiracy or whatever, everyone knows that Trump was in bed with the Russians in an effort to affect/steal the election.  There's no need to be distracted by the legal niceties.

It's the cyber element of the crime that seems to be obscuring everything.  This is exactly the same crime as Watergate, but instead of a bunch of heavy-shoed doofii breaking into the Democrats' office, a bunch of quick-fingered Russian hackers broke into Democrats' servers.  Anyone thereafter utilizing the product of that theft, knowing it to be stolen property, is committing a crime.  And if you want more Watergate analogies, Trump fired his was through DOJ and FBI executives until he got his people in the places he needed them to be.

The difference here is the frog-boiling effect of Trump doing everything out in the open - mostly on Twitter - so when we hear about his crimes, they don't sound so criminal.  If we'd heard him ask Russia to hack Clinton's emails on a scratchy tape - instead of it being run a couple of times an hour on the TV accompanied by the knowing eye-rolls of the grinning heads - then I think the public reaction would not have been so "meh".

[Limey]

House Democrats were so taken by Barr's "pity the foo president" narrative*, that they have asked for Mueller to testify on or before May 23rd.

* Yeah, Barr stated that Trump wasn't obstructing justice, he was just frustrated because he thought the investigation was hindering his presidency.  Voyager 2 is beyond the heliosphere and can still smell that bullshit.

[jbm]

Their entire claim to "innocence" rests on not exceeding this bar as laid out in Mueller's report:

We understood coordination to require an agreement-tacit or express-between the Trump Campaign and Russian government on election interference.  That requires more than the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests.  We applied the term coordination in that sense when stating in the report that the investigation did not establish that the Trump Campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.

A pretty high bar, and it's clearly implied that the two parties taking actions that were informed by or responsive to the other's actions or interests.  The bolded part is a common understanding of collusion. 

[Bench]

The full context of Barr's "[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

Is:

"Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

So to Reverse Barr it:

"[T]he investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts."

[MRaup]

The full context of Barr's "[T]he investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

Is:

"Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities."

So to Reverse Barr it:

"[T]he investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts."

NO COLLUSION! NO OBSTRUCTION!

Just corrupt as fuck, that's all.

[BudGirl]

NO COLLUSION! NO OBSTRUCTION!

Just corrupt as fuck, that's all.

Sounds about right to me.

[GreatBagwellsBeard]

Trump does have the mob boss mentality, so it does seem that he deliberately kept Junior and Jared at arms length so that he could plausibly say he didn't know.  He's an idiot in so. many. ways, but one doesn't get to where he is in life without knowing how not to get arrested.

[jbm]

Trump does have the mob boss mentality, so it does seem that he deliberately kept Junior and Jared at arms length so that he could plausibly say he didn't know.  He's an idiot in so. many. ways, but one doesn't get to where he is in life without knowing how not to get arrested.

In some sense I agree, but I think they said that there are 14 offshoot investigations from Mueller, only 2 of which we know about (Cohen and Craig).  So, it's not implausible that should he not be president soon, 1 of those 12 investigations might lead to his arrest.  Hell, I suppose the Cohen campaign finance case could lead to his arrest.

[Limey]

I haven’t read the report.  Some things I’ve seen reported jump out at me:

The “I’m fucked” quote is fun, but the whole utterance is in the report to show that Trump knew he had done wrong and, by saying it's “the end of my presidency”, was establishing his motive to obstruct.  That charge requires prosecutors to establish the intent behind the obstruction, and Mueller included that episode to do exactly that. 

In footnote 1991 on p390, Mueller posits that Trump could be prosecuted criminally even after impeachment.  The latter being the process to remove him from office and thus not barring (Ha!) criminal charges thereafter.  Mueller was prevented from bringing charges against Trump himself, but he seems, here, to be calling for law enforcement to take off and nuke Trump from orbit. 

[Limey]

Trump is claiming that the report - that two weeks ago he was happy for everyone to see because it exonerated him totally - is now "bullshit" made up by "19 angry democrats".

The press is picking at the wrong scab, spending time on the fact that it's now proven that Sarah Sanders lied to them.  How could she?!!

Meanwhile, Nadler has subpoenaed the full, unredacted report with all the underlying documentation.  I can see both sides of the impeach/don't impeach argument as it is likely to die in the Senate (or worse...acquittal) so why spend the political capital on the effort?  At the end of the day though, witness testimony in open session - as we have seen here with the likes of Cohen, but going back to John Dean during Watergate - can be a very powerful way to get the truth pushed into people's brains.  The argument that impeachment would die in the Senate didn't stop Democrats from passing any number of bills already this session, all of which died in the Senate.  Also, it's the right thing to do for now - do we want an ever-more lawless president in the job for another 2 years - and it's the right thing to do for historical precedent.

The only real difference I see is that McConnell will only take up House bills that he knows will fail in the Senate, and he doesn't always bother even to do that.  Should the House vote to send Trump to the Senate for a trial, McConnell is under no time constraints as to when that would take place.  He likely wouldn't get it until early 2020 at which time election campaigns for president - and for a number of his Republican colleagues - will be in full swing.  If he thinks he can get an easy acquittal, he'll try and jam in through.  But after all the public testimony from the House proceedings, he may have more than a few Republican senators - up for re-election - who don't want to have to explain their vote to acquit to the voters in their state.

I think the press are going to peel away more and more of the black bars (what happened to the color-coding?) as time goes on, and I doubt any of them will have good news for Trump underneath.  Whatever the high point (or least low point) of Trump's presidency was, it is not going to be topped from here on out.  It will be an inexorable slide down into deeper disgrace.  His base may hold, but 54% of the country already say they will not vote for Trump in 2020 and that number too is only going to get worse for Trump.

[jbm]

The House should impeach the motherfucker, simply to convey for history that these actions aren’t acceptable in our democracy. They won’t though, they’re too worried about the tribal idiots, and the honest but exhausted decent citizens. The second group should buck up.

[Lefty]

It's the cyber element of the crime that seems to be obscuring everything.  This is exactly the same crime as Watergate, but instead of a bunch of heavy-shoed doofii breaking into the Democrats' office, a bunch of quick-fingered Russian hackers broke into Democrats' servers.  Anyone thereafter utilizing the product of that theft, knowing it to be stolen property, is committing a crime.  And if you want more Watergate analogies, Trump fired his was through DOJ and FBI executives until he got his people in the places he needed them to be.

The difference here is the frog-boiling effect of Trump doing everything out in the open - mostly on Twitter - so when we hear about his crimes, they don't sound so criminal.  If we'd heard him ask Russia to hack Clinton's emails on a scratchy tape - instead of it being run a couple of times an hour on the TV accompanied by the knowing eye-rolls of the grinning heads - then I think the public reaction would not have been so "meh".

When John Oliver called this whole sorry affair "Stupid Watergate" I don't think he knew how right he was.

[chuck]

The House should impeach the motherfucker, simply to convey for history that these actions aren’t acceptable in our democracy.

People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.

[Lefty]

People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.

Our Congress has been broken for quite some time, I guess since the Gingrich "revolution".

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.

They are so bold.

[Limey]

People who should know keep telling me how smart and how tactical Pelosi is but I keep watching her refuse to embrace an obvious responsibility and when she isn't doing that she's busy being dismissive of a bold, strong, new generation of women leaders.

Harry Reid grasped the Obamacare nettle when he knew it would be the end of his political career.  He steered it through the Senate fully aware that the good citizens of Nevada would through him out of office as a result.  He did it all regardless of the personal cost.  Then he went and won re-election. 

Pelosi is gaming this out on old political algorithms that don’t apply now.

IMPEACH!

[chuck]

They are so bold.

Next time I want the opinion of a 4chan level misogynist fuckwit I'll be sure to ask yours.

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

Next time I want the opinion of a 4chan level misogynist fuckwit I'll be sure to ask yours.

What?!?!? They are bold. They are strong and bold human people. AOC and Omar are the future. So go fuck your delusional self you paranoid humorless dumbshit..

[chuck]

What?!?!? They are bold. They are strong and bold human people. AOC and Omar are the future. So go fuck your delusional self you paranoid humorless dumbshit..

Ok, ok. I thought you were doing your usual routine. My apologies.

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

Ok, ok. I thought you were doing your usual routine. My apologies.

No worries, You can never tell for sure. So with that in mind your response was almost warranted.

[Lefty]

Ok, ok. I thought you were doing your usual routine. My apologies.

Huh, and yet you were doing yours regardless.

[chuck]

I try not to break character.

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

I try not to break character.

I've always admired how you simulate such a virtually cool poker face.

[Lefty]

I try not to break character.

How can you improve on perfection?

[MRaup]

How can you improve on perfection?

Be more perfecter, duh.

[MusicMan]

How can you improve on perfection?

Ask Harvey Haddix.


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[Lefty]

Ask Harvey Haddix.


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Didn't make it that far, Harvey Korman told me to go fuck myself.

[Limey]

There is no need to wait for an unredacted report... The House only needs to have 1 hearing. Ask Mueller, Don McGahn, K. T. McFarland, Corey Lewandowski to swear under oath the information in Mueller Report is true & accurate. If answer is yes go to a vote.

This makes so much sense.  There's no need for it to be a drawn out affair as the evidence is all in the supporting documents to the report.  They just need to prove a handful of high crimes and misdemeanors in order to remove him from office, they don't need to run the table of alleged crimes.

[Limey]

Trump’s approval drops 3 points to 37% after the release of the Mueller report.  Watch for him to go full racist foghorn to get it back up to 40. 

[loganck]

Rex Tillerson says Trump ‘asked him to do illegal things’ as secretary of state

Sorry, I don't know how to hyperlink on here:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/rex-tillerson-trump-illegal-things-violate-law-secretary-state-mike-pompeo-a8673111.html

[jbm]

As expected, Pelosi punts. Probably some bullshit about gathering evidence or proof.  Fucking cowards. 

The problem, is at their core, they are just like Republicans in that they believe both that the majority of Americans are lazy and depraved and that the purpose of a political party is not to promote values but to instead accumulate power.

[Limey]

As expected, Pelosi punts. Probably some bullshit about gathering evidence or proof.  Fucking cowards. 

The problem, is at their core, they are just like Republicans in that they believe both that the majority of Americans are lazy and depraved and that the purpose of a political party is not to promote values but to instead accumulate power.

They have subpoenaed McGahn now.  That's the ticket!  Let's get some TV-news friendly sound bites of Trump asking his minions to commit crimes, and I believe we'll see public opinion shift.

Also, once they see the full, unreacted report, they may change their minds.  I am assuming that what's under the black ink is worse than what we can see currently, and they'll have that plus all the supporting evidence. 

[Waldo]

As expected, Pelosi punts. Probably some bullshit about gathering evidence or proof.  Fucking cowards. 

The problem, is at their core, they are just like Republicans in that they believe both that the majority of Americans are lazy and depraved and that the purpose of a political party is not to promote values but to instead accumulate power.

Wait, when hasn't a political party sought to accumulate political power as the vehicle for promoting(/pushing/enforcing) their values?  Not in my lifetime, I don't think.

[jbm]

Wait, when hasn't a political party sought to accumulate political power as the vehicle for promoting(/pushing/enforcing) their values?  Not in my lifetime, I don't think.

I get that.  But a theme of the last two years is that Republicans are craven because they care more about the saving their asses than they do about checking the abuses of Trump.  If Pelosi's calculus is that impeachment proceedings hurt her party, and are therefore not worth the price of checking Trump's abuses, then the Democrats are basically doing the same thing as Republicans.  Sure, it's not as repugnant, but still similar.

ETA:  And the values that this calculation promotes are antithetical to the values professed by their criticisms of Republicans.  That's the important part.

[Limey]

I get that.  But a theme of the last two years is that Republicans are craven because they care more about the saving their asses than they do about checking the abuses of Trump.  If Pelosi's calculus is that impeachment proceedings hurt her party, and are therefore not worth the price of checking Trump's abuses, then the Democrats are basically doing the same thing as Republicans.  Sure, it's not as repugnant, but still similar.

ETA:  And the values that this calculation promotes are antithetical to the values professed by their criticisms of Republicans.  That's the important part.

As Waldo said, all parties are about accumulating power.  The difference between Democrats and Republicans is that the former wants to do it by letting everyone vote and winning the majority of that vote, while the latter is trying to enshrine power through court-packing, gerrymandering (in which I include the Electoral College) and voter suppression.

Pelosi's calculus is political for sure, as is Warren's.  Impeachment is a political process.  That is not even in the same universe as the Republican interference-running to stop the wheels of justice turning in the face of a wealth of evidence of widespread criminality by the president.

[jbm]

That's BS; it's easily in the same universe.  It might be Mercury to Pluto, but it's even the same solar system. All those Democratic criticisms of Republicans (many of whom know what a piece of shit Trump is) for putting party over country ring hollow.  And I'm not persuadable by the cynical "truth" that all parties are the same.  If they choose to be, they are; if they choose not to be, they aren't. 

The Democratic punting is also going to lend some credence to a claim Trump will likely make:  "You don't think what I did was that bad.  If you did, you'd impeach me.  You just want to keep investigating me, biting at my ankles, in an effort to seize power.  You're politicians, just like me."

[Waldo]

All those Democratic criticisms of Republicans (many of whom know what a piece of shit Trump is) for putting party over country ring hollow.

I disagree.  If you are the Democratic Party and you think Trump is bad for the country, then what's good for you is ostensibly what's good for the country.  Impeachment proceedings could easily backfire on them in today's ass-backward political climate.  They're better off keeping their eye on the ball for 2020, IMO.

[jbm]

Hegar made if official today: she will run against Cornyn.  I assume the Castro brother will as well, but I expect her to win the primary.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/us/politics/mj-hegar-cornyn-senate.html

[Limey]

The Mueller Report is available as an audio book.  I got mine for free on Audible (you get one free book as a new user).

[Bench]

The Mueller Report is available as an audio book.  I got mine for free on Audible (you get one free book as a new user).

Who's the narrator?

[Limey]

All those Democratic criticisms of Republicans (many of whom know what a piece of shit Trump is) for putting party over country ring hollow.

The Democrats - fighting against a spittle-filled headwind - pushed through the ACA because it was good for the people of the country.  They got run out of Congress on a rail as a result.  Now the ACA is more popular than it's ever been such that the Republicans - even with control of both chambers of Congress and the White House - couldn't undo it because it would have been politically untenable.  That's the Democrats putting the country over politics...and of Republicans putting political survival ahead of fulfilling a near-decade long campaign promise.

If you can think of an example where Republicans leapt onto their own political swords for the greater good, then I'm all ears.

[jbm]

I'm not arguing which party I prefer, and your example had nothing to do with the statement you quoted.  It's pretty simple, if Dems don't want to impeach and remove Trump (right thing to do) because it is bad for their party, they are making the exact same calculation that a Republican who hates Trump, but refuses to investigate or criticize Trump (right thing to do), because it is bad for their party.

Besides, your example merely asserts what you (and I by the way) value.  Some right leaning Republican can make the same argument: we lost the House in 2018 because we wanted to repeal the ACA because it costs too much or is socialism or whatever.  We fell on our sword to save America.  Every side can frame an argument like that.

[Limey]

I'm not arguing which party I prefer, and your example had nothing to do with the statement you quoted.  It's pretty simple, if Dems don't want to impeach and remove Trump (right thing to do) because it is bad for their party, they are making the exact same calculation that a Republican who hates Trump, but refuses to investigate or criticize Trump (right thing to do), because it is bad for their party.

I agree completely.

Besides, your example merely asserts what you (and I by the way) value.  Some right leaning Republican can make the same argument: we lost the House in 2018 because we wanted to repeal the ACA because it costs too much or is socialism or whatever.  We fell on our sword to save America.  Every side can frame an argument like that.

They fell on their swords - most likely - to pass the "biggest tax cut in history"* too.  But while the ACA's approval rating steadily improved as people started to enjoy it's benefits, everyone and their neighbor just got a good, hard and costly look at what the tax cut did for them.  The merit of the sword-diving can only be judged over time as the results of the effort become known.

* It wasn't.

But don't just think about the ACA.  Modern Republicans have vigorously opposed so many major pieces of legislation that have definitely improved the lives of Americans, including:
- FDR's new deal
- Medicare
- Medicaid
- Civil Rights Act
- Voting Rights Act

It's not like opposing the ACA is out of character.

[TeeJoe]

The Democrats - fighting against a spittle-filled headwind - pushed through the ACA because it was good for the people of the country.  They got run out of Congress on a rail as a result.

Count me as one that was not in favor of and is still not in favor of the ACA. The health care system before the ACA had issues...all the ACA did was replace an old bucket of crap with a freshened bucket of crap.   

Now the ACA is more popular than it's ever been...

The ACA's popularity is still not that favorable...50% of all adults
https://www.kff.org/interactive/kff-health-tracking-poll-the-publics-views-on-the-aca/#?response=Favorable--Unfavorable&rMax=1549440993103.4482&rMin=1486368993103.448

...such that the Republicans - even with control of both chambers of Congress and the White House - couldn't undo it because it would have been politically untenable.  That's the Democrats putting the country over politics...and of Republicans putting political survival ahead of fulfilling a near-decade long campaign promise.

The Republicans reluctance not to touch the ACA had little to do with survival.  Republicans from Republican districts constituents wanted the ACA absolved. Although once it was passed it's now part of a system. Pulling out unwanted parts destroys the system. 

I also agree with JBM in that not proceeding with impeachment for the sake of the country because it's not the best political strategy is doing a disservice to those who elected them.  That goes for all elected officials regardless of party affiliation.

I hate this political climate that points fingers and says, "oh yea, well they did/didn't do it too".
"That old law about 'an eye for an eye' leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing."

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

Who's the narrator?

Marc Vietor, Mark Boyett, and Victor Bevine. 19 hours 3 minutes

[MRaup]

Marc Vietor, Mark Boyett, and Victor Bevine. 19 hours 3 minutes

I was SO hoping it was Gilbert Gottfried.

[TeeJoe]

I was SO hoping it was Gilbert Gottfried.

With additional commentary by Bobcat Goldthwait!

[Limey]

Count me as one that was not in favor of and is still not in favor of the ACA. The health care system before the ACA had issues...all the ACA did was replace an old bucket of crap with a freshened bucket of crap.   

If you've ever been unemployed and in need of private health insurance, as I have, then you would not call the ACA a bunch of crap.  Also, I presume from your comments that are not 26 or under and still insured on your parents' policy; a parent insuring your under-27-year-old on your policy; ever been sick enough to hit an annual or lifetime limit; have a pre-existing condition; and/or couldn't afford coverage but were ineligible for Medicaid so used the Emergency Room as your GP.  That's part of the bunch of crap that is the ACA.

It didn't replace the old system - that is a catastrophe - it layered over it regulations to protect patients while creating a funding mechanism to allow those people outside of employer-based insurance programs the ability to buy affordable coverage.  That's why it's called the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
 

The ACA's popularity is still not that favorable...50% of all adults
https://www.kff.org/interactive/kff-health-tracking-poll-the-publics-views-on-the-aca/#?response=Favorable--Unfavorable&rMax=1549440993103.4482&rMin=1486368993103.448

Yes, but look at from whence it came - change the time period on your tracking poll to "All".  It's now supported by a (bare) majority of the country, from being horribly underwater.  Also  if you poll the tenets of the ACA, rather than "Obamacare", you get far greater support for its component parts than for the entirety, that was rendered toxic by a a scorched eartcampaign against it.

The Republicans reluctance not to touch the ACA had little to do with survival.  Republicans from Republican districts constituents wanted the ACA absolved. Although once it was passed it's now part of a system. Pulling out unwanted parts destroys the system. 

The House, when under Republican control, voted to repeal the ACA over 60 times.

I also agree with JBM in that not proceeding with impeachment for the sake of the country because it's not the best political strategy is doing a disservice to those who elected them.  That goes for all elected officials regardless of party affiliation.

I hate this political climate that points fingers and says, "oh yea, well they did/didn't do it too".
"That old law about 'an eye for an eye' leaves everybody blind. The time is always right to do the right thing."

I am not sure what you're getting at here.  Mueller is legally prevented from making an impeachment referral - unlike Ken Starr who was able - because of the regulations put into place after Ken Starr.  He is also prevented from indicting a sitting president.  He wrote that it would be inappropriate to accuse someone of a crime for which you could not indict them and thus allow them a speedy trial in which they were able to present a defense.  All of this is because the responsibility for policing the president resides with Congress.

They have enough to make the accusation now, IMHO, but I can see the political strategy of holding more hearings to get live testimony from Mueller's witnesses.  The tide is already turning towards impeachment, and it's been less than a week since we were able to read the redacted version of the report.  The evidence is not all yet...umm...evident.  As it comes out, the pressure will build.

[Limey]

Also, for anyone not sure about impeachment, thinking that we can run out the clock on Trump, you need to keep an eye on his Twitter feed.  Today, for example, amongst a blizzard of tweets about him doing nothing wrong - including one in which he wrote "I DID NOTHING WRONG" - he accused the UK of spying on his campaign (the day after announcing a state visit to the UK) and threatened a shooting war with Mexico.

Assuming he loses the 2020 election - which is not a given as he now has the levers of power and is using them, in part, to hold open the yawning gaps in our security to allow the Russians in again - he has another 21 months in office.  Or, to put it another way:  TWENTY-ONE MONTHS!

[Limey]

Marc Vietor, Mark Boyett, and Victor Bevine. 19 hours 3 minutes

It's broken down into chapters.  I'm going to listen to the Executive Summaries of both volumes, and see if I want to plow on from there.  So far, the summary for Vol 1 is quite engaging.  It highlights how we are all the boiling frog, because so much of this has been made public by reporters over the last two years, so it doesn't come across as revlationary (is that a word?), even though everything so far would be a nucular bomb if we were learning it here for the first time.

[jbm]

It's broken down into chapters.  I'm going to listen to the Executive Summaries of both volumes, and see if I want to plow on from there.  So far, the summary for Vol 1 is quite engaging.  It highlights how we are all the boiling frog, because so much of this has been made public by reporters over the last two years, so it doesn't come across as revlationary (is that a word?), even though everything so far would be a nucular bomb if we were learning it here for the first time.

This highlights another one of Barr's acts of obstruction: there was no reason not to release Mueller's summaries, other than to obstruct.  If the public had a chance to read summaries, more would have done so and learned that "yes, indeed there was collusion, lots of it."  This would have totally changed the conversation prior to the release of the redacted report.  The conversation may yet get there, but it will take a lot of time and effort.

[BudGirl]

revlationary (is that a word?)

No

[Limey]

This highlights another one of Barr's acts of obstruction: there was no reason not to release Mueller's summaries, other than to obstruct.  If the public had a chance to read summaries, more would have done so and learned that "yes, indeed there was collusion, lots of it."  This would have totally changed the conversation prior to the release of the redacted report.  The conversation may yet get there, but it will take a lot of time and effort.

Exactly.  And Barr was still spreading his lies on the day of the report's release.

For example, I had a little fun above asking what was the missing lead to the "exonerating" sentence fragment Barr quoted in his letter.  Here's the full sentence with teh redacted part boldened:

Although the investigation established that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts, the investigation did not establish that members of the Trump Campaign conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.

That's incredibly damning, and would have been the blaring headline if not for Barr's interference.

[TeeJoe]

If you've ever been unemployed and in need of private health insurance, as I have, then you would not call the ACA a bunch of crap.  Also, I presume from your comments that are not 26 or under and still insured on your parents' policy; a parent insuring your under-27-year-old on your policy; ever been sick enough to hit an annual or lifetime limit; have a pre-existing condition; and/or couldn't afford coverage but were ineligible for Medicaid so used the Emergency Room as your GP.  That's part of the bunch of crap that is the ACA...

Limey,

I had typed a longer reply but lost it...

My basic gripe with the ACA is out of control rates/patient billing.  This was a problem before and has accelerated after the passing of the ACA with my own coverage. The ACA in my experience made the apparent issues worse in this case.  The people I know that have been unemployed or are self employed gripe about the plan/rates they have also. Who's right you or them? I don't know...

As far as it's popularity, changing the time period to all, still comes out with a 50% favorable vs 39% unfavorable. The low popularity began because of a horrible roll-out and Pelosi's gaffe of needing to pass the thing before we find out what was in it.  She pitched the ACA opponents a meatball down the middle on that one.

I have no idea why you brought Mueller not being able to legally make an impeachment referral.  My point is that if Democrats feel there is enough evidence to impeach then that should be done. I jumped into the conversation because it was being stated that it's not in the Democrats best interests.

[homer]

That's incredibly damning, and would have been the blaring headline if not for Barr's interference.

How is that statement damning?

[MRaup]

How is that statement damning?

...

and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts

Were it anyone other than Trump, this would be scream-it-from-the-rooftops news.

[Craig]

so it doesn't come across as revlationary (is that a word?)

I think "revelatory" is what you're looking for. Unless Republicans are censoring the dictionary now, which wouldn't surprise me at all.

[MusicMan]

I think "revelatory" is what you're looking for. Unless Republicans are censoring the dictionary now, which wouldn't surprise me at all.

Today, the Dick Van Dyke show would have some fetching their fainting couches.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Limey]

My basic gripe with the ACA is out of control rates/patient billing.  This was a problem before and has accelerated after the passing of the ACA with my own coverage. The ACA in my experience made the apparent issues worse in this case.  The people I know that have been unemployed or are self employed gripe about the plan/rates they have also. Who's right you or them? I don't know...

Me.  Because without the ACA they would not have been able to get plans that covered shit.  As for rating etc., this is the problem with trying to cover everyone in a system designed to select against the sick or likely to get sick.  There's a reason why the rest of the first world (and many others) don't do it the way we do.

As far as it's popularity, changing the time period to all, still comes out with a 50% favorable vs 39% unfavorable. The low popularity began because of a horrible roll-out and Pelosi's gaffe of needing to pass the thing before we find out what was in it.  She pitched the ACA opponents a meatball down the middle on that one.

The website roll out was effed up for sure.  Conservatives made a big song and dance about it while throwing recollections of the clusterfuck that was Bush's Medicare Part D rollout down the memory hole.

Pelosi's gaffe wasn't a gaffe at all; she made a long, legitimate statement, from which a fragment was culled and paraded as if it was tattooed on her forehead.  Also, the audience mattered; it was couched as having been spoken to Congress, when it was actually at a public-speaking engagement.

You’ve heard about the controversies within the bill, the process about the bill, one or the other.  But I don’t know if you have heard that it is legislation for the future, not just about health care for America, but about a healthier America, where preventive care is not something that you have to pay a deductible for or out of pocket.  Prevention, prevention, prevention–it’s about diet, not diabetes. It’s going to be very, very exciting.

But we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it, away from the fog of the controversy.

I have no idea why you brought Mueller not being able to legally make an impeachment referral.  My point is that if Democrats feel there is enough evidence to impeach then that should be done. I jumped into the conversation because it was being stated that it's not in the Democrats best interests.

Agreed.  The point about Mueller is that much was made of him not coming to a decision, when that is far from the truth.

[Limey]

How is that statement damning?

So, if I'm standing outside a Best Buy, and guys in wearing masks and carrying sacks marked "Swag" are climbing out of a broken window with all sorts of electronic goodies, and they give a lot of them to me, that's ok?

[Limey]

I think "revelatory" is what you're looking for. Unless Republicans are censoring the dictionary now, which wouldn't surprise me at all.

It was.  WTF was I think?

[TeeJoe]

Me.  Because without the ACA they would not have been able to get plans that covered shit.  As for rating etc., this is the problem with trying to cover everyone in a system designed to select against the sick or likely to get sick.  There's a reason why the rest of the first world (and many others) don't do it the way we do.

My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.

The website roll out was effed up for sure.  Conservatives made a big song and dance about it while throwing recollections of the clusterfuck that was Bush's Medicare Part D rollout down the memory hole.

Pelosi's gaffe wasn't a gaffe at all; she made a long, legitimate statement, from which a fragment was culled and paraded as if it was tattooed on her forehead.  Also, the audience mattered; it was couched as having been spoken to Congress, when it was actually at a public-speaking engagement.

Thanks for the greater context. First I've seen it.

Agreed.  The point about Mueller is that much was made of him not coming to a decision, when that is far from the truth.

Yes, agreed

[Waldo]

My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.

But people's crap coverage had already been getting more expensive since the 70s and especially the late 90s.  See third graph at https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/snapshots-health-care-spending-in-the-united-states-selected-oecd-countries/

So costs were already spiraling out of control (especially relative to other countries), under administrations and Congresses from both parties.  I know that the ACA itself has problems (I think it was myopic in a lot of ways, and didn't adequately plan for things like providers leaving certain markets entirely and dropping their insured) and doesn't have the teeth to directly address many of the biggest problems in the health care and health insurance industries.  And I was personally negatively affected by the ACA, when my wife's private PPO plan first got downgraded to an HMO and then canceled entirely when United left Texas, and then paying the penalty at tax time when we didn't carry insurance on her for a while afterward.   But I can respect that it's done some good, including slowing the rise of health care expenses since it's been enacted.

[Limey]

My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.

Which is pretty fucking nice, considering the crap coverage they had before didn't cover things they might actually need it for - you know, the illnesses they already had - while the "crap" coverage they have now, does.  Also, the ACA stops the insurance company from dumping you as soon as you become expensively sick, so there's that too.

[Limey]

But people's crap coverage had already been getting more expensive since the 70s and especially the late 90s.  See third graph at https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/snapshots-health-care-spending-in-the-united-states-selected-oecd-countries/

So costs were already spiraling out of control (especially relative to other countries), under administrations and Congresses from both parties.  I know that the ACA itself has problems (I think it was myopic in a lot of ways, and didn't adequately plan for things like providers leaving certain markets entirely and dropping their insured) and doesn't have the teeth to directly address many of the biggest problems in the health care and health insurance industries.  And I was personally negatively affected by the ACA, when my wife's private PPO plan first got downgraded to an HMO and then canceled entirely when United left Texas, and then paying the penalty at tax time when we didn't carry insurance on her for a while afterward.   But I can respect that it's done some good, including slowing the rise of health care expenses since it's been enacted.

Remember, in 2016, when Trump told everyone that he would provide "big, beautiful" healthcare that would be better and cheaper and cover more for everyone?  Remember how he's been on a rant for going on two years now about John McCain's vote to foil his effort to repeal the ACA and take health insurance away from tens of millions of people?  Remember that?  Recently Trump said that he has a healthcare plan that will be better and cheaper for everyone, and he will roll it out to the nation right after he's re-elected in 2020.

To capture the full lunacy/irony of this situation, it's worth remembering that this was also John McCain's election strategy around the fact that, contemporaneous to the 2008 campaign, Osama bin Laden was still walking this earth (and, as we now know, jerking off to grainy VHS porn in a creepy little room in a compound in Pakistan).  The concept that someone knows how to fix something that's bothering the entire country, but will hold it hostage for personal gain, is the antithesis of service.

[Limey]

Speaking of healthcare, North Korea, before it would release Otto Warmbier - as U.S. citizen who had been treated so horrendously in Kim's regime that he died shortly after returning to the US - demanded that someone pay his $2 million healthcare bill.  Seriously.  Trump authorized it paid (and has denied that since, or course).

Congratulations everyone!  Our tax dollars at work; funding a pudgy, crazy, nuclear-armed dictator with a stupid haircut...

...and Kim Jong-Un.

[Bench]

Speaking of healthcare, North Korea, before it would release Otto Warmbier - as U.S. citizen who had been treated so horrendously in Kim's regime that he died shortly after returning to the US - demanded that someone pay his $2 million healthcare bill.  Seriously.  Trump authorized it paid (and has denied that since, or course).

Congratulations everyone!  Our tax dollars at work; funding a pudgy, crazy, nuclear-armed dictator with a stupid haircut...

...and Kim Jong-Un.

And then Trump covered up for Kim Jong-Un absolving him of any responsibility for the treatment of death of Warmbier.

[TeeJoe]

But people's crap coverage had already been getting more expensive since the 70s and especially the late 90s.  See third graph at https://www.kff.org/health-costs/issue-brief/snapshots-health-care-spending-in-the-united-states-selected-oecd-countries/

Exactly! That was my main point in my previous post. My biggest gripe with the ACA was not addressing the out of control spending.

So costs were already spiraling out of control (especially relative to other countries), under administrations and Congresses from both parties.  I know that the ACA itself has problems (I think it was myopic in a lot of ways, and didn't adequately plan for things like providers leaving certain markets entirely and dropping their insured) and doesn't have the teeth to directly address many of the biggest problems in the health care and health insurance industries.  And I was personally negatively affected by the ACA, when my wife's private PPO plan first got downgraded to an HMO and then canceled entirely when United left Texas, and then paying the penalty at tax time when we didn't carry insurance on her for a while afterward.   But I can respect that it's done some good, including slowing the rise of health care expenses since it's been enacted.

Has it slowed the rise of expenses? I haven't seen that personally.
I've seen studies showing that expenses for hospital services are 60% higher in the US. Other areas are more expensive than other countries also, but 60% more for hospital services is obscene!

[MusicMan]

My view of the ACA is this:

A pitcher went in with shoulder pain. He was informed that he had a tear in his rotator cuff, and would need major surgery to correct it, plus he needed mechanical changes to prevent it from recurring. The pitcher said no way could he do that, so instead he got a cortisone shot for the inflammation.

Now, did the cortisone help? Sure. But did it do anything to address the underlying issues? No.


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[Limey]

Exactly! That was my main point in my previous post. My biggest gripe with the ACA was not addressing the out of control spending.
Has it slowed the rise of expenses? I haven't seen that personally.
I've seen studies showing that expenses for hospital services are 60% higher in the US. Other areas are more expensive than other countries also, but 60% more for hospital services is obscene!

The problem with healthcare in the US is that there is no alternative to the private, for-profit, providers we all have to use.  The entire system is laced with overhead and profit margin that compounds as it goes from supplier to wholesaler to provider to insurer.  There are private providers in the UK too, for example, but they are competing against the National Health Service, that takes the National Insurance to provide cost-free healthcare.  Yes the lines are long for non-emergency procedures, but have you seen Walmart on Black Friday?  And that's just for a discount, not free.

Anyway, so as costs increase for, say, surgical gloves, that increase gets exaggerated through the system as each for-profit entity that handles the gloves adds its 20%-or-so overhead and profit margin on them until they get used on you and you pay all that compounded profit.  Then your insurance rates go spiraling upward because they pay for it*.

* Maybe, depending on your deductible, but the rates go up anyway.

The 20% overhead cost is realistic, by the way.  For comparison, Medicare runs at a 3% overhead.  Amazing what happens when you remove CEO bonuses and marketing** from the cost structure.

** The pharmaceutical industry spends more money on marketing than on R&D.  That's fucked up.  Moreso, when you realise that much of their R&D is spent on creating competing products to existing medicines, instead of new products.

[TeeJoe]

Which is pretty fucking nice, considering the crap coverage they had before didn't cover things they might actually need it for - you know, the illnesses they already had - while the "crap" coverage they have now, does.  Also, the ACA stops the insurance company from dumping you as soon as you become expensively sick, so there's that too.

Yes, very much agreed on the pre-existing illness coverage!  Although, at least with the crap coverage they had before they really liked their doctor...new insurance. He gone. Doh!

[TeeJoe]

My view of the ACA is this:

A pitcher went in with shoulder pain. He was informed that he had a tear in his rotator cuff, and would need major surgery to correct it, plus he needed mechanical changes to prevent it from recurring. The pitcher said no way could he do that, so instead he got a cortisone shot for the inflammation.

Now, did the cortisone help? Sure. But did it do anything to address the underlying issues? No.


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Very fitting analogy!

[Knoxbanedoodle]

My sister and bro n law are both self employed. They had expensive crap coverage before and expensive crap coverage now. Only positive I see coming out of the ACA is preexisting illness coverage.

Thanks for the greater context. First I've seen it.

 Yes, agreed

Mrs banedoodle and I are self-employed in NC and are super happy with the ACA right now. It is immeasurably better than the private market right now for people in our bracket.

[Waldo]

My biggest gripe with the ACA was not addressing the out of control spending.

It never had the teeth to do that, and I don't think anyone - from either party - has both the guts to try to champion another law that can do it and the political capital to make it happen.

Has it slowed the rise of expenses? I haven't seen that personally.
I've seen studies showing that expenses for hospital services are 60% higher in the US. Other areas are more expensive than other countries also, but 60% more for hospital services is obscene!

The rise of health care expenses has slowed since 2010, and in 2016 we were about $300 billion (about 8%) under the 2010-baseline projections for 2016.  Obviously not due solely to ACA, but at least in part.

[Limey]

Katie, Barr the door!

AG Barr’s clear nervousness at the prospect of testifying in front of the House just went to 11.  Last time around, he told both chambers - while under oath - that Mueller had not objected to his now-debunked fake summary.  It turns out that Mueller had a big, fat fucking problem with it, and told Barr this in a letter sent weeks before Barr’s congressional testimony.  Oops!

As an historical aside, Nixon’s AG went to jail for obstruction of justice.  Another: Trump’s favorite “fixer” lawyer - Roy Cohn - died broke, disgraced, disbarred and abandoned by Trump.

Everything Trump touches, dies.  In this case, though, Barr is experiencing something more like assisted suicide. 

[Limey]

Lindsey Graham's decent from mediocrity to full-on Trump sack licker was complete this morning when his opening remarks ahead of Barr's testimony to Graham's Senate Judiciary Committee included the assertion that Mueller found no collusion - which is not true* - and then went on about Hilary's emails.  Seriously.

* Mueller was at pains in his report to explain that "collusion" isn't a crime and that he was looking for behavior that rose  to the level of criminal conspiracy which, despite all their best, incompetent efforts, the Trump campaign did not quite reach.  But they did try really, really hard.

[Limey]

Oh, and Mueller's letter to Barr has been released and it's damning.  The day after Barr's letter came out, Mueller made his concerns about the letter clear to the DOJ, and gave them  pre-redacted versions of the report's introduction, and the report's summaries of the two volumes.  He pointed out that they had been discussing for weeks how the summaries accurately summarize the SCO's work and conclusions.  He decried that Barr had now sewn confusion over critical aspects of the investigation and damn-near begged Barr to release the redacted summaries.

Barr ignored all of this, took weeks more to release the redacted report - holding back the ready-to-eat summaries in the meantime - and testifying to Congress that he had no idea why the press was reporting a dissatisfaction with Barr's letter from Mueller's team.  It will be interesting today to see if any Dems can land a punch on Barr.  It will be even more interesting if he refuses to go under the greater scrutiny of a House hearing.

[Navin R Johnson]

If every president took a citizenships test, there is zero chance the Drumpf doesn’t come in last.  He’s the fucking stupidest person we have ever elected President, by a wide margin.  And the foxnews crowd loves him for that.  We love idiots! The dumber the better!  -deplorables

[Limey]

If every president took a citizenships test, there is zero chance the Drumpf doesn’t come in last.  He’s the fucking stupidest person we have ever elected President, by a wide margin.  And the foxnews crowd loves him for that.  We love idiots! The dumber the better!  -deplorables

He's a way less cool President Camacho.

[Limey]

House Judiciary Committee will meet on Wednesday to discuss holding Barr in contempt of Congress.

Mueller hearing scheduled for May 15.

Trump tweets about escalating his trade war with China and deploys a carrier group to Iran.

This is asymmetric warfare, and the opposition to Trump needs to realize it and step up its game.

[Limey]

A recent opinion poll has a majority of Americans in favor of getting rid of the Electoral College.  That is, of course, a heavy lift as it requires a constitutional amendment.  Some states are going with the pledge that all their electors will go to the candidate winning the popular vote, but until those states amount to 270+ electors, it's moot.  It does seem that, for now, it's going to stay and it's going to continue to enshrine minority power as long as the young and the restless liberals move to cities for work and opportunity (the Big Sort, as it's become known).  The Electoral College only seems to have sway when it's close, but what if it stops only thumbing the scale in close elections?

I believe I understand the historical rationale for the EC, but we are far beyond those times.  Yes, smaller states need representation, but they get two senators each meaning that small state voters have significantly higher influence on national policy than us here in Texas, for example.  Montana merits only one House Rep. but gets two Senators.  We have already seen the concentration of conservatism in these rural states as the emptying out of young, liberal voters continues and, more frighteningly, accelerates.

The Washington Post published an essay explaining how census projections expect that, by 2040, 70% of the population will live in 16 states.  That means that 30% of the electorate - those in the 34 states that will, by then, have a median population over 65 - will get to send 68 Senators to Washington.  SIXTY-EIGHT!  And it gets worse:  Eight states are projected have just under half of the total population of the country, 49.5 percent.  That means that half the population will control 84% of the Senate.

[jbm]

The constitutional amendment will never pass, IMO, as the numbers will never work.  However, I believe the other route might work, eventually.  Last I heard, they were near 200. 

The whole democratic representation and power scenario in this country is depressing.  The system is rigged in realistic terms, or just structured to over represent rural areas in politically correct terms.  I am also growing increasingly weary about the future: the complacency of decent people and the decent press is allowing the pressure to rise.  At some point in the future, there will be a release and it likely won't be pleasant.

[HudsonHawk]

The electoral college is not functioning as designed, but not because of population shifts. Its function is specifically to prevent some unqualified, arm waving populist yahoo from stirring up enough rubes to get elected by popular vote. The founding fathers didn't fear small or big states, they feared an uneducated electorate. We've pretty much decided that the FFs didn't know what in the hell they were doing. We get the government we deserve.

[Limey]

The constitutional amendment will never pass, IMO, as the numbers will never work.  However, I believe the other route might work, eventually.  Last I heard, they were near 200. 

If Texas turns blue, then the Republicans can never again win the Presidency.  With the House being constantly re-jigged based on population, it too should - gerrymandering (and Montana) aside - be representative of the people.  The Senate, though, can be run using Mitch McConnell's playbook to completely stifle anything and everything it chooses to fuck with.  If 68 seats go to the aging, rural states, they won't even need a filibuster to shit on everything.

[Bench]

Hundreds of former federal prosecutors signed a statement agreeing "that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice."

...

We emphasize that these are not matters of close professional judgment.

[Limey]

Hundreds of former federal prosecutors signed a statement agreeing "that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice."

...

We emphasize that these are not matters of close professional judgment.

Short version:  "Du-uh!"

[MusicMan]

NO OBSTRUCTION!


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[Limey]

McConnell and Schumer are trading jabs on the Senate floor.  It's about as exciting and relevant as it sounds.

Meanwhile, the DOJ tried to head off the House contempt vote tomorrow morning, by offering a kumbaya session tomorrow afternoon.  Nadler said "nuts", and so now DOJ staffers are meeting with House Judiciary Committee staffers this afternoon, with the sword of the contempt vote hanging over their heads.

Those staffers are the soft underbelly of the DOJ, as they will have student loans, rent, car notes etc., and a career ahead of them.  Barr may walk away in the end (maybe to prison, like Nixon's AG), but they still have a life to lead.  They are who needs to be leveraged here.  The sight of Cohen skulking off to prison yesterday* must have been quite jarring; it shows just how little loyalty Trump has to even his longtime servants, so how is Barr going to fare, let alone a nameless DOJ staffer?

* While the President hung the Medal of Freedom around Tiger Woods' neck (maybe while swapping stories with him about fucking porn stars while their wives were at home with the young kids).

And Mnuchin said "nuts" to releasing Trump's tax returns based on a DOJ opinion that has not yet been written.  The reportage on this has been infuriating; headline after headline says that Mnuchin "declines Congress' request..."  Fuck that!  The IRS "shall" provide any tax return that Congress requires, and Mnuchin has inserted himself in a process in which he doesn't belong, using an argument that is fake (Congress does not need a purpose - legislative or otherwise), and relying on the DOJ who have nothing the fuck whatsoever to do with any of this.  Mnuchin was always going to do this; the press should have been ready with the correct nuance, not its usual lazy crap.

Chairman Neal is considering his options; he can subpoena the returns or sue in Federal court under the 1924 statute.  Either way it's going to be a long road, but they should start by subpoenaing the players - Mnuchin and whoever the fuck Trump minion is in charge at the IRS (he was visibly shaking last time he was questioned on this) and put them under oath and have them lie about it and then impeach the fuckers.  Barr too.  Go after the deputies and underlings, because some (maybe most) of them will crack.

This is a fucking crime syndicate, and it needs to be treated as such.  You go after the low-level players, flip them, and move on up the chain.  This government is not functional at this point, so there is little to lose and all to gain by cleaning out the Trump garbage, one floor at a time.

EOR

[HudsonHawk]

McConnell and Schumer are trading jabs on the Senate floor.  It's about as exciting and relevant as it sounds.

Meanwhile, the DOJ tried to head off the House contempt vote tomorrow morning, by offering a kumbaya session tomorrow afternoon.  Nadler said "nuts", and so now DOJ staffers are meeting with House Judiciary Committee staffers this afternoon, with the sword of the contempt vote hanging over their heads.

The problem is that "sword" is simply a wet noodle.  There is little Congress can do and even less they're willing to do.  They sold their Constitutional equality a long time ago.  They're not getting it back.  They are the President's bitch.

[jbm]

The problem is that "sword" is simply a wet noodle.  There is little Congress can do and even less they're willing to do.  They sold their Constitutional equality a long time ago.  They're not getting it back.  They are the President's bitch.

It's becoming quite evident.  I'm waiting for one of the House Dems to strenuously object.

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

It's becoming quite evident.  I'm waiting for one of the House Dems to strenuously object.

Or at least move to reconsider.

[MusicMan]

It's becoming quite evident.  I'm waiting for one of the House Dems to strenuously object.

Is that how it works? You “strenuously” object?


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[Limey]

Trump is the biggest loser, literally.   The NY Times has found that, in the decade between the mid 80s and mid 90s, Trump lost over (pinkies up) $1 billion - more than any other American tax payer. 

If you wanted to know why he’s fighting the release of his tax returns, it’s shit like this.  There’s lots of inexplicable individual numbers in there, but it completely torpedoes his business schtick. 

Oh, and NY state is voting on tomorrow, and expected to pass, a bill that will allow them to convey Trump’s state tax returns to Congress.  They aren’t mirrors of his federal returns, but they’ll be pretty fucking informative. 

The truth will out. 

[BudGirl]

Trump is the biggest loser, literally.   The NY Times has found that, in the decade between the mid 80s and mid 90s, Trump lost over (pinkies up) $1 billion - more than any other American tax payer. 

If you wanted to know why he’s fighting the release of his tax returns, it’s shit like this.  There’s lots of inexplicable individual numbers in there, but it completely torpedoes his business schtick. 

Oh, and NY state is voting on tomorrow, and expected to pass, a bill that will allow them to convey Trump’s state tax returns to Congress.  They aren’t mirrors of his federal returns, but they’ll be pretty fucking informative. 

The truth will out. 

I have no doubt the reason he doesn't want them released is because it would show he has no real assets.

[HudsonHawk]

Is that how it works? You “strenuously” object?


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He also risks being put on "double super secret probation" and possibly even on the "Enemies of Carlotta" list. 

[jbm]

I have no doubt the reason he doesn't want them released is because it would show he has no real assets.

That, and all the income will look dirty.  It's so clear: man inherits fortune, is an epically shitty businessman, goes broke, no legit banks will lend him money, yet stays afloat.  It just seems logical that we will one day learn for certain that his "wealth" is basically through the criminal enterprise of laundering.

Also, I'd assume his bullshit stock market schemes in the 80s, outlined in the NYT article, would be illegal, but I guess not.  Either that, or there are just different rules for him.

[Limey]

That, and all the income will look dirty.  It's so clear: man inherits fortune, is an epically shitty businessman, goes broke, no legit banks will lend him money, yet stays afloat.  It just seems logical that we will one day learn for certain that his "wealth" is basically through the criminal enterprise of laundering.

Also, I'd assume his bullshit stock market schemes in the 80s, outlined in the NYT article, would be illegal, but I guess not.  Either that, or there are just different rules for him.

Trump is arguing today that showing losses on taxes is smart business.  $1 billion in losses?  Meanwhile, Fred Trump only posted a loss once, when he had to eat a $15 million investment in a failed business owned by one ... checks the article ... Donald J. Trump.

The article talks about how his returns are rife with "found money", that would prohibit you or I getting a mortgage.  He was getting chunks of money injected into his finances as interest - $50 million in a single year - without there being the asset or investment base to support even a fraction of that interest.  When Fred died, Donald's deep pocket went away and so he had to look elsewhere for un-discerning cash and, hey presto!  Deutsche Bank!

It's not a stretch.  Trump is in real estate - the preferred laundromat for crooked money; Deutsche Bank has paid huge fines for laundering money; both are heavily involved with Russians who have money to launder; and Deutsche Bank kept lending Trump money despite him defaulting on hundreds of millions of dollars in loans to them.  That all stinks like Donald's adult diaper.

[Limey]

It would be comical - if it wasn't so serious - that AG Barr is threatening*, on behalf of the White House, that they will invoke executive privilege over information given to the SCO by other people.

* Twitter says this has now happened.  But the DOJ isn't coordinating with the White House over this or anything, right?

[Limey]

Hundreds of former federal prosecutors signed a statement agreeing "that the conduct of President Trump described in Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report would, in the case of any other person not covered by the Office of Legal Counsel policy against indicting a sitting President, result in multiple felony charges for obstruction of justice."

...

We emphasize that these are not matters of close professional judgment.

The count now is over 700.  How many of these guys are there?

[jbm]

It would be comical - if it wasn't so serious - that AG Barr is threatening*, on behalf of the White House, that they will invoke executive privilege over information given to the SCO by other people.

* Twitter says this has now happened.  But the DOJ isn't coordinating with the White House over this or anything, right?

Their arrogance in this matter continues to grow.  The letter from the Assistant AG was basically "We tried to negotiate in good faith, but since you are voting for contempt charges, we have to demonstrate our bad faith by now claiming privilege over the entire report."

[BudGirl]

I just don't understand why they won't release it.  No collusion.  Why not share it??

[Waldo]

I just don't understand why they won't release it.  No collusion.  Why not share it??

Because they are the football player who spikes the ball in the end zone when there were flags thrown 50 yards upfield.

[BudGirl]

Because they are the football player who spikes the ball in the end zone when there were flags thrown 50 yards upfield.

nice, i like that.  if i remember it, i'm using it.

[Limey]

Their arrogance in this matter continues to grow.  The letter from the Assistant AG was basically "We tried to negotiate in good faith, but since you are voting for contempt charges, we have to demonstrate our bad faith by now claiming privilege over the entire report."

Every negotiation involves a hostage.

[Limey]

I just don't understand why they won't release it.  No collusion.  Why not share it??

Trump's a billionaire, but we can't see his taxes.
He's a genius, but we can't see his grades.
He didn't collude, but we can't see the report.

Or, coming at it from the other angle, can you remember a single thing that he has said that has proven to be true when placed under scrutiny?  Seriously, I can't.

[jbm]

This a quote from Fox and Friends discussing the NYT article (via Politico).  Can't make this stuff up:

“If anything, you read this and you're like: ‘Wow, it's pretty impressive all the things that he's done in his life,’” “Fox & Friends” host Ainsley Earhardt said Wednesday. “It's beyond what most of us could ever achieve.”

[MusicMan]

This a quote from Fox and Friends discussing the NYT article (via Politico).  Can't make this stuff up:

Yesterday, Pompei bragged that the melting polar ice was opening new, faster shipping lanes between the US and Asia.

You know, even though global warming isn’t real.


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[Limey]

Yesterday, Pompei bragged that the melting polar ice was opening new, faster shipping lanes between the US and Asia.

You know, even though global warming isn’t real.

To be fair, Trump sold him some ocean-front real estate in Colorado.

[Limey]

Mark your calendars:  May 22 - Waters vs. Mnuchin II.  Only on PPV C-SPAN.

[subnuclear]

Let me pop in here to say, if Trump wants to pull all this shit with Iran he needs appoint a real SecDef and DHS Sec (in case of big terrorist attack) who can deal with things if they go bad. I don't know what he is trying to do (except letting the Saudis and Israelis run US foreign policy), but he needs to cut it out.

[Limey]

Let me pop in here to say, if Trump wants to pull all this shit with Iran he needs appoint a real SecDef and DHS Sec (in case of big terrorist attack) who can deal with things if they go bad. I don't know what he is trying to do (except letting the Saudis and Israelis run US foreign policy), but he needs to cut it out.

Jared's busy solving immigration.  He'll get to those other things when he's good and ready.

[Limey]

Let me pop in here to say, if Trump wants to pull all this shit with Iran he needs appoint a real SecDef and DHS Sec (in case of big terrorist attack) who can deal with things if they go bad. I don't know what he is trying to do (except letting the Saudis and Israelis run US foreign policy), but he needs to cut it out.

Seriously, though, the Acting SecDef wasn't even at the cabinet meeting today.

[subnuclear]

Seriously, though, the Acting SecDef wasn't even at the cabinet meeting today.

Exactly. Asking for all sorts of bad things to happen.

[Limey]

Exactly. Asking for all sorts of bad things to happen.

Bolton is running foreign policy.
Miller is running immigration policy.
Trump is running trade policy.

What could go wrong?

[hostros7]

Bolton is running foreign policy.
Miller is running immigration policy.
Trump is running trade policy.

What could go wrong?

You would be remiss not to mention that Trump is aided by cokehead banker* turned CNBC talking sideshow act, Larry Kudlow, who is now head of the NEC.

* a coke problem so severe it is actually notable relative to all average Wall Street coke habits during the 80s.


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[Bench]

Just recapping the day:

1. House judiciary votes to cite Barr for contempt.
2. New York moves forward with closing the loophole for pardons for state crimes and making Trump's state tax returns available to congress
3. The GOP-led Senate judiciary intelligence committee subpoenas Don Jr. regarding his prior testimony
4. Jerry Falwell Jr has some nebulous cabana boy scandal involving Cohen

Typical Wednesday.

[Limey]

Just recapping the day:

1. House judiciary votes to cite Barr for contempt.
2. New York moves forward with closing the loophole for pardons for state crimes and making Trump's state tax returns available to congress
3. The GOP-led Senate judiciary intelligence committee subpoenas Don Jr. regarding his prior testimony
4. Jerry Falwell Jr has some nebulous cabana boy scandal involving Cohen

Typical Wednesday.

Agreed on all fronts.  However, while it's notable that Jr. got subpoenaed, it's also notable that others who have been caught lying to Congress were referred for prosecution.  Jr. gets to come back to "correct the record".  It's a sideshow; there's a long list of people we need to hear from before we get to Jr, and that list starts with Mueller and McGahn.

Of course, no one in the world not called Don Jr - not even Don Sr - thinks he can go in front of Congress and not lie his ass off again.  Kamala Harris, for one, has good reason to leave a few marks on this moron.  Warner, Feinstein, King, and Wyden are no fools either.

[Limey]

Just recapping the day:

1. House judiciary votes to cite Barr for contempt.
2. New York moves forward with closing the loophole for pardons for state crimes and making Trump's state tax returns available to congress
3. The GOP-led Senate judiciary intelligence committee subpoenas Don Jr. regarding his prior testimony
4. Jerry Falwell Jr has some nebulous cabana boy scandal involving Cohen

Typical Wednesday.

Oh, and late-breaking...Trump laughs about shooting refugees at the border.

[Limey]

Trump crashing the stock market again, with the upping of tariffs on China.

Given that the NY Times reported that Trump used to try to make money by ginning up takeover talks about a company then dumping its stock when the price climbed, maybe this is something for Congress to look at.  Is he shorting stocks before he tweets?

[Limey]

Lots of elements of intrigue ongoing at the moment, but one that is playing out as I type is the Trump crime Family's efforts to prevent long-time accounting firm Mazars from complying with a Congressional subpoena to hand over - essentially - the kitchen sink of Trump world's finances.  The Trump's sued in federal court to block his accountants from releasing anything, widely seen as a clock-running measure.  The federal judge wsn't so impressed with being used in that way, so he told all the parties that they will get one go at arguing this - today - and then he will rule on the suit immediately thereafter.

Well, the Trumps weren't having that, so they filed a request for a delay because they weren't ready.  They weren't ready to argue their own lawsuit.  They were, they told the judge, caught up in lots of legal shit and they just did not have the time to get ready to do things like defend their own previously staked-out position.  The judge told the "Nuts!" and they're in court this morning.

I'm not sure what the legal precedent is for telling a third party not to comply with a lawful subpoena because you don't like the idea of that information being released, but I'll let the eleventy-one lawyers on here hash that one out (at a mere $500/hour).  Unless the Trumps can land some punches today, the judge is expected to rule before the end of the day.

[austro]

I'm not sure what the legal precedent is for telling a third party not to comply with a lawful subpoena because you don't like the idea of that information being released, but I'll let the eleventy-one lawyers on here hash that one out (at a mere $500/hour).  Unless the Trumps can land some punches today, the judge is expected to rule before the end of the day.

If I were Iran, I'd be very nervous. Hell, I'm not Iran, and I'm still nervous.

[jbm]

Not surprisingly, the two Saudi ships supposedly sabotaged by the Iranians appear to be just fine. 

No proof, but given their lack of regard for truth coupled with their ineptitude, I wonder if they botched one of their false pretexts for war.

[Limey]

Not surprisingly, the two Saudi ships supposedly sabotaged by the Iranians appear to be just fine. 

No proof, but given their lack of regard for truth coupled with their ineptitude, I wonder if they botched one of their false pretexts for war.

Less competent than the Bush administration is a low bar under which they have easily sailed.

[Limey]

The judge in the Mazars hearing has left it open until the 18th for both sides to submit additional evidence.  Says he was never going to rule today.

[Limey]

The judge in the Mazars hearing has left it open until the 18th for both sides to submit additional evidence.  Says he was never going to rule today.

It's worth noting that the main argument put forward by Team Trump is that any presidential wrongdoing is a law enforcement matter, and not one for Congress.  It's also worth noting that the judge asked them whether they believe that Watergate and Whitewater were outside of the scope of Congressional oversight, and they said yes.

So, just to be clear, law enforcement cannot indict a president because of DOJ policy (and they fact that it's now run by a Trump stooge), and Congress cannot investigate the president because that law enforcement's job, even though law enforcement cannot indict because of DOJ policy.  Got it, your Majesty.

[Limey]

Trump is on an unhinged Twitter tirade this morning, which usually means he's just been given some really, really bad news.  Right now, the thing I suspect is animating the president is Flynn.  Some of the sealed court documents in Flynn's case were unsealed, and it shows that Flynn claims to have been approached by members of the administration and Congress in order to get him to not talk  to investigators.  He even got a phone call from a White House lawyer, the transcript of which reads like a knockoff Mario Puzzo script.

The judge who unsealed these documents is the same judge who:
1) has seen all the documents, unredacted, and so knows the excrutiting detail of Flynn's crimes;
b) thereafter in court accused Flynn of treason; and
iii) pretty much threatened Flynn with immurement, such was his reaction to Flynn's crimes.

That judge has now ordered the public release - in unredacted form - of all of the elements of the Mueller Report that relate to Flynn.

As an aside, the judge told Flynn last December that he needed to do a lot more atoning in order to get any consideration in sentencing.  Apropos nothing, the White House cannot stop Flynn - a private citizen - from appearing in Congress under subpoena.  Juss sayin....

[Limey]

The appeals court judge who will hear Trump”s suit to keep his taxes from congress - and many other fights between Trump and Congress is....

Merrick Garland. 

[Limey]

Kushner was sending money to Russian individuals in 2016 and in doing so triggered Deutsche Bank's suspicious activity algorithms.  The staff took a look, thought "Yep, these stink," and referred the transactions up the chain, where they should have been referred to the DOJ and/or Treasury Dept. but in fact were quashed.  In 2017, i.e. while he was President, Trump sent millions of dollars to Russian individuals and in doing so triggered Deutsche Bank's suspicious activity algorithms blah, blah, rinse, repeat.

Seriously, how dumb (or kompromised) is Deutsche Bank?  Those suspicious activity reports would've been shredded at the DOJ or Treasury, so why sit on them and put themselves in harm's way?  They've already paid huge fines for money laundering, and they're going to take on this burden too? 

Anyway, can we start impeachment yet?  Trump is telling non-government employees to one-finger salute subpoenas and skip non-optional hearings.  Initiating impeachment would add more weight - legally - to Congress' demands, and it might focus witnesses as to the seriousness of the situation.  Of course it goes nowhere in the Senate, but the televised hearings will move the needle against Trump so fast - just like with Nixon - that Republicans will be forced to nuke him from orbit just to survive - just like with Nixon*.

* That didn't work, by the way, they got shellacked next election.

Meanwhile, released closed-door testimony from Cohen puts Ivanka right in the middle of Trump Tower Moscow.  Lock them up!

[jbm]

I can't figure out what the Democrats' plan actually is.  Do they care about oversight, I mean, really care about it, or do they just mouth the words hoping to avoid real oversight under the belief that things will just fall their way like in 2018.  Seems like the leaders, and all major candidates but Warren, favor the second approach: "oversight without heart." 

[Limey]

Oh, and speaking of Deutsche Bank, the hearing of Trump's lawsuit to stop them being forced to turn over his financial records - presumably including all those suspicious transfers to individual Russians - is tomorrow.  The hearing of his lawsuit to stop Mazars from being forced to turn over his financial records was yesterday, and the judge spiked it and then Icky-shuffled for a bit, such was the strength of the decision in favor of Congress.

TeamTrump asked for a stay pending appeal and the judge declined; Mazars now has 7 seconds days to comply.

[Limey]

I can't figure out what the Democrats' plan actually is.  Do they care about oversight, I mean, really care about it, or do they just mouth the words hoping to avoid real oversight under the belief that things will just fall their way like in 2018.  Seems like the leaders, and all major candidates but Warren, favor the second approach: "oversight without heart."

The leaders fear a blowback like the Republicans got after Clinton's impeachment*; which really didn't happen and, in any case, this is entirely different.  This is Nixon, not Clinton, where the Republicans got dragged across the line marked "The Right Thing" after a ton of damning televised testimony and once the missing tapes were released, and they still got told to get their coats after the subsequent election.

Apparently it's now basically Pelosi and Hoyer trying to hold back the tide of Democrats wanting to start impeachment hearings.  TrumpWorld's stance that Congress cannot oversee his administration is a dare to impeach; and the only remedy for now and for the future is to start the process.  He wants the fight and that's what scares some Democrats; but the fight will only solidify his base - who are with him anyway - while the process will lay bare all the things in the Mueller report and elsewhere that no one has the time or inclination to read (only about 3% of Americans have read the Mueller report).

He is already about 20 points underwater on the question "Will you vote for Trump next election?"  I can only think that some Democratic leaders think they may lose that lead by impeaching and will, in my opinion, lose that lead by not impeaching, because you give Trump the get out of jail free card of saying "Even the Democrats don't think I did anything wrong, otherwise they would have impeached me!"

* When someone spouts off that Trump couldn't have obstructed justice because there is no underlying crime, ask them what was Clinton's underlying crime.  If they say "lying", you can smugly point out that the lying was the obstruction, not the underlying crime, and ask them to try again.  And then pull up a chair and a six-pack while they twist themselves into a pretzel.

[geezerdonk]

Be sure to do it  smugly, that’s the best part. Nothing more satisfying than being smug.

[Limey]

Be sure to do it  smugly, that’s the best part. Nothing more satisfying than being smug.

It's not as good as the pantsing of those who claimed that Ted Cruz could be president but Barack Obama couldn't...but it's still entertaining.

[moriartp]

The appeals court judge who will hear Trump”s suit to keep his taxes from congress - and many other fights between Trump and Congress is....

Merrick Garland.

That’s not really true. It’s going up to the DC Circuit, but it’ll be a random panel of three judges. Garland may or may not end up being one of those three, and he has no control over who gets selected.

[geezerdonk]

It's not as good as the pantsing of those who claimed that Ted Cruz Hillary Clinton could be president but Barack Obama Donald Trump couldn't...but it's still entertaining.

[Limey]

Donald Trump is proving that Donald Trump can’t be president. 

[HudsonHawk]

I can't figure out what the Democrats' plan actually is.  Do they care about oversight, I mean, really care about it, or do they just mouth the words hoping to avoid real oversight under the belief that things will just fall their way like in 2018.  Seems like the leaders, and all major candidates but Warren, favor the second approach: "oversight without heart."

What are they going to do?  Strenuously object?  Congress abdicated oversight of the President in 1991, and they're not getting it back, especially with  a President who will tell them to go fuck themselves, and his party will fall in line behind him.  They are all spineless, and Trump knows this.  He's like a drug dealer who sells oregano instead of weed to junior high school kids...what are they going to do, complain to their parents?

[Limey]

What are they going to do?  Strenuously object?  Congress abdicated oversight of the President in 1991, and they're not getting it back, especially with  a President who will tell them to go fuck themselves, and his party will fall in line behind him.  They are all spineless, and Trump knows this.  He's like a drug dealer who sells oregano instead of weed to junior high school kids...what are they going to do, complain to their parents?

Trump just kicked out Pelosi and Schumer from their scheduled infrastructure meeting and then went into the Rose Garden to say that he won't work with Democrats while they are investigating him.  Someone needs to spank this screaming baby.

[HudsonHawk]

Trump just kicked out Pelosi and Schumer from their scheduled infrastructure meeting and then went into the Rose Garden to say that he won't work with Democrats while they are investigating him.  Someone needs to spank this screaming baby.

Someone needs to, but they won't.  He's a less accountable version of King Joffrey. 

[Limey]

Someone needs to, but they won't.  He's a less accountable version of King Joffrey.

He's making himself impossible to ignore.  It's also got to be unsustainable to be to the right of Freedom Caucus-member Justin Amash on this.

Start the inquiry now and get it over by the end of the year.

[jbm]

What are they going to do?  Strenuously object?  Congress abdicated oversight of the President in 1991, and they're not getting it back, especially with  a President who will tell them to go fuck themselves, and his party will fall in line behind him.  They are all spineless, and Trump knows this.  He's like a drug dealer who sells oregano instead of weed to junior high school kids...what are they going to do, complain to their parents?

Strenuously object is all they have been doing.  They have had numerous chances to be tougher.  They could have gone all in prior to Mueller, but they said "no, we are waiting for Mueller." 

After the report was released, they could have jumped to conclusions like Trump and announced it to the world, basically setting their narrative rather than allowing Trump to.  Those conclusions would have at least contained "The report shows he's guilty of obstruction" or "If he hadn't obstructed, Mueller would surely have found underlying crimes."  These claims would have been no less justified than Trumps "No collusion, no obstruction, complete exoneration," but Trump sure wasn't scared to proceed that way.

After all of the D bank, tax record, financial record stuff, just come out and assert:  "there's lot's of smoke that he is guilty of money laundering and that he is financially beholden to Russia and other countries.  We're going to assume he is until he proves otherwise.  He needs to come clean."

I get that these are all marginal tactics played by those with an inherently weak hand, but the "let's wait, object, then strenuously object, or threaten this that and the other" play is lame.  Basically, the Dems play by different rules, and it always hurts them.  The public doesn't give you any credit for playing fair and it's stupid for the Dems to continually act as if the public does.

[HudsonHawk]

He's making himself impossible to ignore.  It's also got to be unsustainable to be to the right of Freedom Caucus-member Justin Amash on this.

Start the inquiry now and get it over by the end of the year.

It's unsustainable in the long run, but they're enjoying the short run.  Trump owns the Republicans. They are debt to him because he's made it socially acceptable to be racist bigots again and they can't thank him enough. They are going to go down with the ship, but not until they elevate Trump to God status. In other words, after 2025.

[HudsonHawk]

Strenuously object is all they have been doing.  They have had numerous chances to be tougher.  They could have gone all in prior to Mueller, but they said "no, we are waiting for Mueller." 

After the report was released, they could have jumped to conclusions like Trump and announced it to the world, basically setting their narrative rather than allowing Trump to.  Those conclusions would have at least contained "The report shows he's guilty of obstruction" or "If he hadn't obstructed, Mueller would surely have found underlying crimes."  These claims would have been no less justified than Trumps "No collusion, no obstruction, complete exoneration," but Trump sure wasn't scared to proceed that way.

After all of the D bank, tax record, financial record stuff, just come out and assert:  "there's lot's of smoke that he is guilty of money laundering and that he is financially beholden to Russia and other countries.  We're going to assume he is until he proves otherwise.  He needs to come clean."

I get that these are all marginal tactics played by those with an inherently weak hand, but the "let's wait, object, then strenuously object, or threaten this that and the other" play is lame.  Basically, the Dems play by different rules, and it always hurts them.  The public doesn't give you any credit for playing fair and it's stupid for the Dems to continually act as if the public does.

This is my point. The Dems do not have the guts to act, and Trump knows this. He is literally above the law now.

[Limey]

The DOJ caved and is handing over the counter-intelligence elements of the Mueller report, as they should have from the beginning. 

And the federal judge hearing the sister case to Monday’s ball-stomping - this one involving Trump’s financial records at Deutschdramat - riverdanced all over TeamTrump’s arguments.

Probably explains why he was ranting in the Rose Garden, slurring and sniffing as he does when under particularly high pressure. 

[WVastro]

You know...? For an Astros forum this place has a pretty large amount of smart people. I’ve enjoyed this thread from the beginning. Thanks all.

[HudsonHawk]

You know...? For an Astros forum this place has a pretty large amount of smart people. I’ve enjoyed this thread from the beginning. Thanks all.

Smart indeed.  Why I bet if you averaged the IQs around here it’d be about 100. As opposed to a Cub forum where if you summed them you’d get about 65.

[chuck]

Smart indeed.  Why I bet if you averaged the IQs around here it’d be about 100. As opposed to a Cub forum where if you summed them you’d get about 65.

What do you suppose the respective BACs might be?

[Limey]

Inexplicably, Don Jr. has a book deal.  Naturally, therefore, the tag #DonJrBookTitles is trending on Twitter.

[HudsonHawk]

Inexplicably, Don Jr. has a book deal.  Naturally, therefore, the tag #DonJrBookTitles is trending on Twitter.

"Fun With Dickhead and Dickhead, Jr"?

[Limey]

"Fun With Dickhead and Dickhead, Jr"?

I offered “The Handjob’s Tale”.

Others include:
The Great Twatsby
Pride and White Prejudice
No Expectations
The Tax Man Cometh
Coward’s End
Triumph of the Shill
A Fail in Two Cities
Little Lord Flauntleroy
Twelve Years a Slave to Russian Banks
Malice in Blunderland
Collusion Runs Through It

and many, many more. 

[MusicMan]

Inexplicably, Don Jr. has a book deal.  Naturally, therefore, the tag #DonJrBookTitles is trending on Twitter.

I assume this is a coloring book.


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[chuck]

and many, many more.

Crime and Punishment

[Lefty]

The Brothers KaraJackOff
Gone with the Chin
A Man for all Treasons
The Boy Schmuck Club
Children of a Lesser Man
I Know Why the Caged Bird was Trophy Hunted
The Alt-Right Stuff
Mopey Dick
Hairy Trumper and the Morally Hollows

[chuck]

The Alt-Right Stuff

This one, this one's a keeper. You might be quite pleased with such an achomlishment.

[MusicMan]

The Alt-Right Stuff is up there with The Brat in the Hat.


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[MusicMan]

Crime and Punishment

Crime and Pardonment


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[chuck]

Crime and Pardonment

Of course. What is wrong with me?

[Limey]

As he walked to the podium in the Rose Garden for his on-the-fly, completely out-of-the-blue press conference yesterday - that was complete with printed handouts and a banner - Trump held his handwritten notes in such a way that photographers were able to get a snap or two of them.  The notes were just the usual list of perceived grievances and whataboutism, but the thing that stood out for me was that they included one note to remind him to say that the Dems had no accomplishments.  Hmmm.

Despite the fact that the House has passed over 100 bills that McConnell has left to rot in his office trash can, Trump spelled "accomplishments" - handwritten, don't forget - as "achomlishments".  Maybe, it was one of his staffers who can't even spell phonetically but, tellingly, it was written in thick black Sharpie...

Today , Trump described Rex Tillerson - who he picked to be his first Secretary of State - as "dumb as a rock".  Tillerson, of course, has been reported to have called Trump a "fucking moron".  The best people, amirite?

[chuck]

Today , Trump described Rex Tillerson - who he picked to be his first Secretary of State - as "dumb as a rock".

He said Tillerson was ill-equipped and ill-prepared to be Secretary of State. I wonder if he remembers that he appointed him or if he thinks he was an Obama holdover or what.

[jbm]

Theresa May is out.  Limey, I understand very little about Brexit.  What is your prediction on the final outcome, or will it just be strung along endlessly?

[MusicMan]

Theresa May is out.  Limey, I understand very little about Brexit.  What is your prediction on the final outcome, or will it just be strung along endlessly?

In the words of Mr. T, “Prediction? Pain.”


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[Limey]

Theresa May is out.  Limey, I understand very little about Brexit.  What is your prediction on the final outcome, or will it just be strung along endlessly?

I honestly have no idea how this will go.  Gun to my head, I’d say hard Brexit, i.e. falling out of the EU with no agreement in place.  The Brexit campaign was breathtakingly corrupt and based entirely on the fake premise that Britain could keep all the stuff it liked from the EU, while still getting out.  Europe was consistent in saying that this was nonsense and would never happen. 

When the Brexit vote squeaked to a narrow victory, every leader in the Brexit movement quit.  They knew it was impossible.  The PM Cameron quit, because this was his fucking mess in the first place and was replaced by May, who was anti-Brexit.  She prostituted the government to a fringe group in order to maintain a majority, and has been getting told to fuck off ever since by everyone from Aberdeen to Azerbaijan.  Every Brexit proposal put to a vote in Parliament has gone down.

So now it’s very possible that Boris Johnson - the Clown Prince of Brexit - will be the new PM.  If that happens, think of the worst thing possible, double it, and you’ll still fall short of how bad things will get. 

[Bench]

I honestly have no idea how this will go.  Gun to my head, I’d say hard Brexit, i.e. falling out of the EU with no agreement in place.  The Brexit campaign was breathtakingly corrupt and based entirely on the fake premise that Britain could keep all the stuff it liked from the EU, while still getting out.  Europe was consistent in saying that this was nonsense and would never happen. 

When the Brexit vote squeaked to a narrow victory, every leader in the Brexit movement quit.  They knew it was impossible.  The PM Cameron quit, because this was his fucking mess in the first place and was replaced by May, who was anti-Brexit.  She prostituted the government to a fringe group in order to maintain a majority, and has been getting told to fuck off ever since by everyone from Aberdeen to Azerbaijan.  Every Brexit proposal put to a vote in Parliament has gone down.

So now it’s very possible that Boris Johnson - the Clown Prince of Brexit - will be the new PM.  If that happens, think of the worst thing possible, double it, and you’ll still fall short of how bad things will get.

I think it's very likely a determined PM could force a hard Brexit in the fall, which of course would be a disaster.

[austro]

I think it's very likely a determined PM could force a hard Brexit in the fall, which of course would be a disaster.

At which point Scotland will secede.

[das]

At which point Scotland will secede.

And the Welsh contingent of secessionists counted in the 1’s will start to gain followers. 

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

And the inevitable Irish reunification.

[austro]

And the inevitable Irish reunification.

Sure to come off without a hitch.

[Limey]

That one-way Mars mission is starting to look more attractive.

[Limey]

Today Trump wish his hosts a “Happy Memorial Day”.  His hosts are the Japanese. 

At least he will be in Britain on the 4th of June. 

[Limey]

Mueller to give a statement today at 10am CDT.  No questions allowed afterwards.  I'll get excited if and when Mueller says something meaningful that's not edited for public consumption by Barr.

Oh, and Michael Wolff has a new book out that we can all ignore but the press is wanking over like they're a 13-year old with his first copy of National Geographic.

[MusicMan]

Mueller to give a statement today at 10am CDT.

/approaches podium
//taps mic

“Game of Thrones seasons 7&8 were some real bullshit.”

/leaves without questions


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[Limey]

So, if you haven''t read Justin Amash's Twitter threads about why he thinks Trump should be run out of the White House on a rail, then you should.  It's the kind of sober, point-by-point, principled without grandstanding, demolition of the arguments against impeaching while painstakingly making the arguments for impeachment that Democrats could do worse than copy and paste onto their campaign websites.  He also has another thread where he does the same to Bill Barr, stripping him to the bone marrow.

[jbm]

Mueller to give a statement today at 10am CDT. 

Are Barr's strings going to be attached to him?

[Limey]

Are Barr's strings going to be attached to him?

Not any more.

Says his work is over and he's leaving the DOJ.  As a private citizen, he can choose to do things like testify in front of Congress without requiring permission from his former bosses.

[Bench]

So, if you haven''t read Justin Amash's Twitter threads about why he thinks Trump should be run out of the White House on a rail, then you should.  It's the kind of sober, point-by-point, principled without grandstanding, demolition of the arguments against impeaching while painstakingly making the arguments for impeachment that Democrats could do worse than copy and paste onto their campaign websites.  He also has another thread where he does the same to Bill Barr, stripping him to the bone marrow.

He's clearly one of the only people on capitol hill who has actually read the Mueller report. There's no way to fairly read it and reach any other conclusion than the president first placed his (and Russia's) interest over the nation's, denied and worked to cover up the extent of Russian interference on his behalf, and then committed multiple felonies to interfere with the investigation into that interference.

[jbm]

In what little I saw, it looked like Mueller is refusing to do any more than what he's done.  To some extent I get it, but it's still disappointing. 

[Limey]

In what little I saw, it looked like Mueller is refusing to do any more than what he's done.  To some extent I get it, but it's still disappointing.

He doesn't want to be part of the shitshow on Capitol Hill.  I get that, but it is unavoidable at this point.  He wants to testify in private - it's all business and no grandstanding behind closed doors - but we need him on the evening news recounting his findings for the record.

He said today that, if called, he would not speak to anything beyond what is in the report.  Fine.  When can you be there?

[Limey]

If we had confidence that the president clearly did not commit a crime, we would have said so.

He couldn't exonerate Trump and he couldn't charge him, so he sent his report up the chain because that's all he could do.  The House needs to up its game.

[MRaup]

He couldn't exonerate Trump and he couldn't charge him, so he sent his report up the chain because that's all he could do.  The House needs to up its game.

DOJ policy says we could not charge him with any crimes.
If he had not committed any crimes, we would've said so.

It's a pretty straight forward message.

[Limey]

DOJ policy says we could not charge him with any crimes.
If he had not committed any crimes, we would've said so.

It's a pretty straight forward message.

I've seen it described as a professorial lecture admonishing students for not doing the required reading.  Seemed pretty apt.

[Navin R Johnson]

Sad!

NEW: The White House wanted the USS John McCain “out of sight” for Trump’s visit to Japan. A tarp was hung over the ship’s name ahead of the trip, and sailors—who wear caps bearing the ship’s name—were given the day off for Trump’s visit.

[Limey]

If you had a space unchecked on your Trump Federal Investigation bingo card, fear not, you can now x-out Mar-a-Lago.  The Feds are looking at whether the Rub’n’Tug lady was funneling money from China into Trump’s campaign through his club.  Subpoenas have been served. 

[Limey]

Sad!

NEW: The White House wanted the USS John McCain “out of sight” for Trump’s visit to Japan. A tarp was hung over the ship’s name ahead of the trip, and sailors—who wear caps bearing the ship’s name—were given the day off for Trump’s visit.

I have seen this and still can't believe it.  Especially as it appears to have been initiated not by Trump, but by those around him in order not to raise his snowflakey temperature by even a fraction of a degree.  If so, why the fuck didn't the DOD just tell them to fuck off?

There are reports that the crew of the John McCain weren't invited to hear the president's address (lucky them) and those that tried to go anyway were turned away at the door.  Seriously, what the fucking fuck?  It took less than three years but we're North Korea now.

[Limey]

Acting SecDef Shanahan says he doesn't know who gave the orders re: USS John McCain.  OK, so find out who and start firing people.  Also, you don't have control of the DOD, so you should be fired too.

[Limey]

I had nothing to do with Russia helping me to get elected.

At least you can now admit it.

These last two days have seen Mueller confirm that they could not find that Trump hadn't committed any crimes, and Trump admitting that Russia helped him get elected.  Hmmmm.

[jbm]

Quote from: @realDonaldTrump

   

I had nothing to do with Russia helping me to get elected.

That's a dangerous starting point as this statement will crumble under scrutiny.

[Limey]

That's a dangerous starting point as this statement will crumble under scrutiny.

Yep.  But he is admitting - as the Mueller Report lays out in 200-pages of detail - that Russia meddled in the election and helped him win in the process.  Since then, though, he has done nothing about preventing it from happening again and has actively prevented those trying to do so, from doing so.

[Limey]

And the hits keep coming today.  The non-partisan Congressional Research Service has published a report on the effects of the GOP tax cuts.  Among their findings:
- Increase in GDP was negligible;
- GDP growth was sufficient to offset only 5% of the lost tax revenue (the remaining 95% going on the US' credit cards);
- Corporations used the tax windfall (either lowered tax bills or repatriated revenue) to repurchase shares; and
- Despite the ballyhoo, very little money was used to pay increases or bonuses to workers.

Basically the opposite of what those who were selling this joke then...and now...are claiming.

[jbm]

But none of those facts will prevent them from saying the exact same things the next time they want to cut taxes.  I've been hearing it since Reagan.

[Navin R Johnson]

10 years from now everyone is gonna laugh their asses off at the Fucking morons who supported this conman.  Hopefully this site doesn’t change domains so we can dig up old threads and mock the shit out of the couple of Dotard supporters

[Navin R Johnson]

I mean, if you have ever even thumbed through a history book. And read about dipshits, and thought.....I can’t believe people were so fucking stupid to fall for that dudes BS.   That is how history will remember trumpers.  Sad!

[Waldo]

I mean, if you have ever even thumbed through a history book. And read about dipshits, and thought.....I can’t believe people were so fucking stupid to fall for that dudes BS.   That is how history will remember trumpers.  Sad!

This assumes that red states will allow history books without glowing recollections of the Trump administration to ever make it to classrooms.  Republicans don't have a great track record with textbooks.

[austro]

This assumes that red states will allow history books without glowing recollections of the Trump administration to ever make it to classrooms.  Republicans don't have a great track record with textbooks.

Just because you never rode a dinosaur doesn't mean it didn't happen.

[MusicMan]

Just because you never rode a dinosaur doesn't mean it didn't happen.

Don’t tell C4


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[Limey]

While Trump and his kids senior White House advisers are making a spectacle of themselves in London, poor little Jared was left at home which turns out to have been a bad idea.  He spent his time making a bigger fool of himself in an interview with Jeremy Swan, in which he failed to answer "yes" or "no" to whether it was racist of his father-in-law boss to engage in birtherism.  I haven't seen the whole thing, but apparently Jared had to stop multiple times to have his diaper changed.

Also back in Washington, Mitch McConnell's wife Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao is in hot water because she used her government position to get her family members included in high-level meetings with the Chinese government, and had her staff arrange travel for at least one of them.  Of course, these days, not using your position of power to financially benefit yourself and your family will make those around you nervous and suspicious. 

[Navin R Johnson]

its one thing to be hoodwinked into thinking Donald Trump would drain the swamp, but what level of  idiocy  and delusion does one have to have, to think that’s still the case.  I man, surely even folks like Mr Happy have come to  realize Trump and his cronies are the swamp.

[Limey]

Those wascally Brits are having fun with Trump's visit.  In addition to flying the Baby Trump blimp, they projected his approval numbers vs. Obama's onto the side of the Tower of London, and the projected a USS John McCain baseball cap onto Madame Tussauds.

The biggest troll of them all, though, maybe Her Majesty herself.  Buckingham Palace has over 77 state rooms and guest bedrooms, but the Trumps could not stay there - as did the Clintons, Bushes and Obamas before them - due to renovations.

[jbm]

Those wascally Brits are having fun with Trump's visit.  In addition to flying the Baby Trump blimp, they projected his approval numbers vs. Obama's onto the side of the Tower of London, and the projected a USS John McCain baseball cap onto Madame Tussauds.

That might be enough for him to cut his trip short.  His base and Fox News would eat it up.

[BudGirl]

The biggest troll of them all, though, maybe Her Majesty herself.  Buckingham Palace has over 77 state rooms and guest bedrooms, but the Trumps could not stay there - as did the Clintons, Bushes and Obamas before them - due to renovations.

She's probably worried he would pee the bed.

[Limey]

She's probably worried he would pee the bed.

[Golf clap]

[Limey]

Cracks in the wall?  More Republicans are coming out against Trump's tax on Mexican imports and the Senate - on a bi-partisan basis including even Lindsey Trump-Gorveler Graham - is planning 22 separate resolutions to try to stop Trump from selling arms to Saudi Arabia.

[HudsonHawk]

Cracks in the wall?  More Republicans are coming out against Trump's tax on Mexican imports and the Senate - on a bi-partisan basis including even Lindsey Trump-Gorveler Graham - is planning 22 separate resolutions to try to stop Trump from selling arms to Saudi Arabia.

Don't worry, Trump will smack them back in line.  They'll dip their heads, say they're sorry, and get a cookie.

[TeeJoe]

Don't worry, Trump will smack them back in line.  They'll dip their heads, say they're sorry, and get a cookie.

Yes, but what kind of cookie? Chocolate chip or oatmeal raisin? It makes a huge difference for most folks.

[BudGirl]

Yes, but what kind of cookie? Chocolate chip or oatmeal raisin? It makes a huge difference for most folks.

oh shit, you left out peanut butter.

[TeeJoe]

oh shit, you left out peanut butter.

Chocolate chip is the only option for a deal. I walk away at oatmeal raisin, PB...etc.  Walk away carrying my head high too. Sometimes you just have to take a stand for what is right.

[HudsonHawk]

Chocolate chip is the only option for a deal. I walk away at oatmeal raisin, PB...etc.  Walk away carrying my head high too. Sometimes you just have to take a stand.

you're a total loser, who's probably failing in the ratings too.  Peanut butter cookies (I've had both BudGirl's and Astrojo's, btw) are TREMENDOUS!

[TeeJoe]

you're a total loser, who's probably failing in the ratings too.  Peanut butter cookies (I've had both BudGirl's and Astrojo's, btw) are TREMENDOUS!

There is no fence to sit on between chocolate chip and PB. Wrong is wrong no matter the opinion of the majority.

[Lefty]

Yes, but what kind of cookie?

THE BEST

[Limey]

The acting SecDef is withdrawing from consideration of the position of actual SecDef - and stepping down entirely - because it turns out he’s something of a major douche.  Still going to war with Iran, though, son everything is fine. 

[Ron Brand]

The acting SecDef is withdrawing from consideration of the position of actual SecDef - and stepping down entirely - because it turns out he’s something of a major douche.  Still going to war with Iran, though, son everything is fine.

He gets to replace the acting SecDef lickspittle with another acting SecDef lickspittle, this one who was a lobbyist for Raytheon. Exciting military bona fides.

[Limey]

Biden full pike with two and a half twists and into a nuclear face plant.  Harris steps over him on the way to kicking everyone else’s ass. 

[chuck]

Biden full pike with two and a half twists and into a nuclear face plant.  Harris steps over him on the way to kicking everyone else’s ass.

What did you think about the previous debate?

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

Harris is good. She's a tough gal. She is smart and accomplished. I don't know if she has a chance in hell.

[jbm]

I watched both debates and all I took from it is that the Democrats are probably going to lose.  Lose to the crappiest opponent imaginable.  Like the Reds sweeping the Astros last week.

[hostros7]

I watched both debates and all I took from it is that the Democrats are probably going to lose.  Lose to the crappiest opponent imaginable.  Like the Reds sweeping the Astros last week.

They might also have all their candidates as beat to shit as the Astros were by the time they all show up for the proverbial big game.


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[austro]

They might also have all their candidates as beat to shit as the Astros were by the time they all show up for the proverbial big game.

I really think they need to figure out who their candidate is early so that they can spend the campaign piling on Trump rather than tearing one another apart. But at least right now that doesn't seem likely.

[Limey]

What did you think about the previous debate?

Didn’t see the first one. 

[Limey]

This foreign trip has been the worst yet.  He praised journalist serial killer Putin for not having a free press to worry about, jokes with him about election-rigging, took a closed door meeting with him and invited in only Jarvanka, the latter of whom was allowed to put out the official “read out” of the meeting as a video “book report” that was as pathetic as you’d imagine, praised Kashoggi’s murderer and war criminal MBS, embarrassed us (because he has no shame) about his complete lack of understanding of basic politics such as what is a “western liberal democracy” and sent Kim a “You up?” tweet and got an affirmative response to his booty call which ended up with his new Press Secretary being injured in an “all out brawl” between the press and North Korean security military. 

And as horrendous as all of this was, nothing quite plumbed the depths of cringe-worthiness as Ivanka trying to interject herself into a conversation between world leaders and getting blanked and side-eyed.  He really is trying to set her up as his heir to the throne (sorry Jr.).  The French delegation gave so few shits about offending Trump that they put out the video clip

And this guy is still the favorite to win in 2020.  The way the damage he’s doing is accelerating, the second 4 years will be exponentially worse than the first 4.  The third 4 will be The Road.  And then Ivanka takes over...

[Limey]

Details from what FBI found inside Epstein’s $77 Million Manhattan mansion:

- Extraordinary volume of photographs of nude underage girls

- Hundreds perhaps thousands of sexually suggestive photographs of fully or partially nude females.

- Safe containing compact disks with labels


This guy needs to be in Federal pound me in the ass jail without lube for the rest of his life.  Same goes for anyone on any of those CDs, be they royalty, former (or current) Presidents, entertainers, anyone.  Acosta can join them too as an accessory after the fact, as can any other enablers out there.

Round them all up and throw all the fucking books at them. 

[Limey]

Epstein pleaded not guilty.  Prosecutors want him held without bail.

[Bench]

Details from what FBI found inside Epstein’s $77 Million Manhattan mansion:

- Extraordinary volume of photographs of nude underage girls

- Hundreds perhaps thousands of sexually suggestive photographs of fully or partially nude females.

- Safe containing compact disks with labels


This guy needs to be in Federal pound me in the ass jail without lube for the rest of his life.  Same goes for anyone on any of those CDs, be they royalty, former (or current) Presidents, entertainers, anyone.  Acosta can join them too as an accessory after the fact, as can any other enablers out there.

Round them all up and throw all the fucking books at them.

Given that all of the right wing's bad faith attacks turn out to be projections of their own behavior, this and the Trump Kentucky campaign chair seem to put the whole pizzagate lunacy into a new perspective.

[chuck]

Given that all of the right wing's bad faith attacks turn out to be projections of their own behavior, this and the Trump Kentucky campaign chair seem to put the whole pizzagate lunacy into a new perspective.

Every accusation a confession.

Here's the part I don't get about this whole Epstein thing - if you were already a sex offender and you knew that investigators were still interested in you for a variety of reasons, wouldn't you maybe just go ahead and get rid of your child porn?

[jbm]

Every accusation a confession.

That’s a great line and fits perfectly.

[austro]

Here's the part I don't get about this whole Epstein thing - if you were already a sex offender and you knew that investigators were still interested in you for a variety of reasons, wouldn't you maybe just go ahead and get rid of your child porn?

I assume that they gradually become convinced of their invulnerability, especially when one of their own becomes grifter-in-chief.

[Limey]

I assume that they gradually become convinced of their invulnerability, especially when one of their own becomes grifter-in-chief.

...and you’d already all-but walked on far worse offenses* than child porn, with a non-prosecution agreement in your back pocket.

* If you don’t know what Epstein actually did, watch this from the Miami Herald.  You may want to step away from anything breakable first, though. 

[Limey]

Embattled Labor Secretary Alex Acosta - who is currently trying to strip 80% of the budget for the prevention of sex trafficking... just think about that for a moment - rake-stepped his way through a Trump-ordered press conference yesterday.  He claimed that the environment we are in now - presumably meaning as it relates to child rape - is different than it was all the way back in 2008.  He also claimed that he did not have the evidence available now.

Former colleagues have come out and cried "bullshit", saying there was a 53-page Federal indictment ready to go, but it was dropped.  Congress is demanding Acosta come and testify as to what the fuck he was thinking; hopefully they will subpoena that draft indictment.

In the meantime, though, Acosta struggled the most with the question that really should be burning up everyone:  why were none of Epstein's co-conspirators charged?

There are a lot of people associated with Epstein who frequented his parties.  He brought these girls to his parties.  1 + 1 = rot in jail motherfucker.  These Epstein-adjacent people include Prince Andrew (one of the girls in the Herald piece mentions servicing "royalty"), Bill Clinton, Alan Dershowitz and one Donald J. Trump, who has described Epstein as a "terrific guy", was a regular at his parties, has hosted at least one of Epstein's parties at Mar-a-Lago and is probably more adjacent to Epstein than he is to Melania.  He also has admitted to grabbing pussies without permission and of invading the dressing rooms of his Miss Teen USA pageant contestants, because he could.  Miss Teen USA is open to girls between 14 and 19.

Trump has been proved correct that he could shoot someone on 5th Ave and get away with it.  He is credibly accused of full-on raping a woman in a New York city department store, yet the media focused on Biden's inappropriate handsiness instead.  But can he rape a child - maybe children, plural - and get away with that?

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

Every accusation a confession.

Every cop is a criminal and all the sinners saints.

[HudsonHawk]

Trump has been proved correct that he could shoot someone on 5th Ave and get away with it.  He is credibly accused of full-on raping a woman in a New York city department store, yet the media focused on Biden's inappropriate handsiness instead.  But can he rape a child - maybe children, plural - and get away with that?

Of course he can.  Hillary used a private email server.  'Nuff said.

[Bench]

Embattled Labor Secretary Alex Acosta - who is currently trying to strip 80% of the budget for the prevention of sex trafficking... just think about that for a moment - rake-stepped his way through a Trump-ordered press conference yesterday.  He claimed that the environment we are in now - presumably meaning as it relates to child rape - is different than it was all the way back in 2008.  He also claimed that he did not have the evidence available now.

Former colleagues have come out and cried "bullshit", saying there was a 53-page Federal indictment ready to go, but it was dropped.  Congress is demanding Acosta come and testify as to what the fuck he was thinking; hopefully they will subpoena that draft indictment.

In the meantime, though, Acosta struggled the most with the question that really should be burning up everyone:  why were none of Epstein's co-conspirators charged?

There are a lot of people associated with Epstein who frequented his parties.  He brought these girls to his parties.  1 + 1 = rot in jail motherfucker.  These Epstein-adjacent people include Prince Andrew (one of the girls in the Herald piece mentions servicing "royalty"), Bill Clinton, Alan Dershowitz and one Donald J. Trump, who has described Epstein as a "terrific guy", was a regular at his parties, has hosted at least one of Epstein's parties at Mar-a-Lago and is probably more adjacent to Epstein than he is to Melania.  He also has admitted to grabbing pussies without permission and of invading the dressing rooms of his Miss Teen USA pageant contestants, because he could.  Miss Teen USA is open to girls between 14 and 19.

Trump has been proved correct that he could shoot someone on 5th Ave and get away with it.  He is credibly accused of full-on raping a woman in a New York city department store, yet the media focused on Biden's inappropriate handsiness instead.  But can he rape a child - maybe children, plural - and get away with that?

Trump was sued by a woman who claimed he raped her at an Epstein party when she was a child, but she dropped the lawsuit rather than lose anonymity.

[Limey]

Acosta resigns in scandal.

It's worth remembering that there has been no new information about Acosta between his nomination/confirmation to the position of Labor Secretary and now.

[Limey]

In other news, Carla Provost, the head of Border Patrol was shocked...SHOCKED...to find that there was gambling in this establishment a Facebook group of around 9,000 border patrol agents (that's got to be about all of 'em, right?) that was rife with racist and sexist commentary.

Guess who we now know was a member of that Facebook group...

[Limey]

Checks the tape:

No Labor Secretary
Acting DHS Secretary (and no Deputy)
Acting Defense Secretary (and no Deputy)
Acting White House Chief of Staff
Acting CBP Commissioner
Acting ICE Director
Acting USCIS Director
Acting UN Ambassador
Acting FDA Commissioner
Acting OMB Director
Acting Secretary of the Army
Acting Secretary of the Air Force
Acting DHS Under Secretary for Management
No DHS Under Secretary for Science & Technology
No DHS Under Secretary for Strategy
Acting FEMA Director (it’s hurricane season!)
and Ivanka acting as if she's Secretary of State.

[Limey]

In other news, Carla Provost, the head of Border Patrol was shocked...SHOCKED...to find that there was gambling in this establishment a Facebook group of around 9,000 border patrol agents (that's got to be about all of 'em, right?) that was rife with racist and sexist commentary.

Guess who we now know was a member of that Facebook group...

For the most part, people can’t help how they look.  Personally, I carry too much weight because I gain too easily, but I also lose it almost as easily so the weight I carry is mostly a lifestyle choice I make.  I was losing my hair - nothing I can do about that - so I now shave my head.  So there are things we can control about our looks and things we can’t. 

I say this as I am torn about what I’m about to say.  This is Border Patrol Chief Carla Provost.  Holy shit!

[Limey]

Uncle Ranty was in high dudgeon this morning, when he went off on a multi-tweet brazenly racist tirade aimed at four freshmen Democratic congresswomen of color.  He told them to "go back" and "fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came," calling the government of their country of birth "corrupt" and "inept".

Three of the four were born in the US so...fact check....DING!

This is only going to get worse.  The 2020 strategy is going to be the 2016 strategy if the 2016 strategy snorted Adderall on a daily basis.  All racism, all the time.  The photo op late last week with Pence, Cornyn et al at a border detention facility was on purpose; they don't care that most of America looked at this with horror, they only care that they reassure their base that they are being as racist as they can as often as they can.

[Waldo]

This is only going to get worse.  The 2020 strategy is going to be the 2016 strategy if the 2016 strategy snorted Adderall on a daily basis. 

Unfortunately, I think this is going to be true of both parties, which means four more years.

[Limey]

Unfortunately, I think this is going to be true of both parties, which means four more years.

Possibly, although Trump seemingly is doing everything in his power to unite everyone except his base against him.  This morning, he renewed his racist attacks on AOC et al, and announced a change to the rules on how assylum-seekers will be handled at the border.  Spoiler alert: it's not to make things better for them.

Don't get fooled by the press, who feel their role is to balance one side against the other.  Case in point: "Beto's ancestors owned slaves" is news currently.  This is how far the press will stretch to find a story to try to balance their coverage of Trump's racist tweets (that they refuse to call "racist").  The O'Rourke story is a non-story; but here it is high up the front page while Trump is treating human beings...right now and in our name...how Beto's ancestors once treated slaves.

[MusicMan]

“Comments some are calling racist” is like “some are calling Hank Aaron a good hitter”


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[Waldo]

Possibly, although Trump seemingly is doing everything in his power to unite everyone except his base against him.

Prepare to be underwhelmed.  In the eyes of many people I know who hate him but voted for him, he still hasn't done enough to cause them to vote D next year.  And the D candidates have plenty of time left to make the slightest of missteps and render themselves unelectable by R voters.

[Limey]

Prepare to be underwhelmed.  In the eyes of many people I know who hate him but voted for him, he still hasn't done enough to cause them to vote D next year.  And the D candidates have plenty of time left to make the slightest of missteps and render themselves unelectable by R voters.

Oh, no doubt.  At the same time, Trump has a habit of opening his trap when he should leave well alone.

Case in point, there was a potentially damaging in-fight ongoing: Pelosi vs. AOC, Tlaib, Omar and Pressley.  Shots had been fired and it had the potential to get out of control and foment a war between the pro-impeachment and con-impeachment camps in the Democratic Party.  Then came Uncle Ranty's Sunday morning poop-tweets with a bunch of racist shit aimed at AOC et al, and the potentially damaging Democratic in-fight has been in cease fire ever since.

Trump's ability to self-destruct is going to have a say in the election as much as Democrats ability to alienate moderates.  We don't know who is going to step on their genitalia the hardest of the closest to the election, but we do know that we can't yet imagine how bad it's going to get.  For a huge ass, Trump has no bottom.

[Limey]

I do my best to ignore Kellyanne Conway (the same way she ignores laws and Congressional subpoenas) but, today, at a press spray in the driveway of the fucking White House, she responded to a reporter’s question by saying “What’s your ethnicity?”

She is paid by us.  That needs to stop. 

[Limey]

PS:  The reporter being challenged about his ethnicity by a government official...is Jewish.

Nope!  Don't see any majorly disturbing historical parallels there.

[Limey]

Two huge gut-punches for Trump today.  Expectation of which, combined with the imminent testimony from Mueller, may be one of the drivers behind his attention-grabbing tweets (that, and he's an unabashed, incorrigible racist).

1.  Background documents from the Cohen trial released today show that Trump was way deeper into the Stormy Daniels hush money payments than he was her vajayjay; and

B.  Jeffrey Epstein was denied bail, meaning that he will likely never spend another day in his life not in jail, unless he rolls over and squeals like the baby he is expected to be.

With regard to 1., it implicates all those around him you would expect, including Hope Hicks, but significantly it continued beyond the election and into his time as President.

With regard to B., there are many, many, rich, powerful and famous men who are shitting themselves over this.  The collective flushing of toilets in Manhattan executive suites alone may have caused a sewer back up.  We are going to be not stunned by the identity of many of these men as they are revealed (Trump, Dershowitz etc.), but there are going to be some that will be shocking and saddening.

The UK went through this a few years back when the English equivalent of Dick Clark - Jimmy Savile - shortly after his death was found out to have been a prolific and disgusting sexual predator of children, with a penchant for somnophilia and necrophilia.  Also, he was literally adjacent to many of the killings of the Yorkshire Ripper, whom he visited repeatedly in prison after his capture; believed to be an act of altruism at the time, the unlikely friendship took on a frightening new meaning.

As the investigation delved into Savile's horrendous, life-long sex crime spree, it turned out that he, a long time BBC Radio DJ, was the king pin in a ring of paedophiles working in entertainment, particularly in BBC radio and television.  It seemed that each week a new favorite from my past as a child was outed as one of these evil men.  It got so bad that when I saw a headline that had the name of famed TV astronomer Sir Patrick Moore in it, I was relieved to find that he had died, rather than been added to the list.

However, justice is justice.  Evil men are evil men, whether or not they were entertaining or somehow important in between committing sex crimes.  It will be bad, but it's all for the greater good.

[MusicMan]

I’m assuming you’re referring to his gut as huge, not the punches.


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[chuck]

One of my favorite bands in a past life was a bunch of misfits from Dayton, OH, called Guided by Voices. They have a song called Closer You Are. The chorus goes, The closer you are, the quicker it hits you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTEcNruLS3Y

Played live, when the singer was drunk as hell, which was pretty much always, he would sometimes sing these lines instead:

The fatter you are, the smaller your dick looks.

Not sure why that suddenly occurred to me.

[jbm]

One of my favorite bands in a past life was a bunch of misfits from Dayton, OH, called Guided by Voices. They have a song called Closer You Are. The chorus goes, The closer you are, the quicker it hits you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eTEcNruLS3Y

Played live, when the singer was drunk as hell, which was pretty much always, he would sometimes sing these lines instead:

The fatter you are, the smaller your dick looks.

Not sure why that suddenly occurred to me.

Is that Bob Pollard’s band?  My buddy really liked them and him and I recall numerous stories about how much he valued beer.

[chuck]

Is that Bob Pollard’s band?  My buddy really liked them and him and I recall numerous stories about how much he valued beer.

'Value' is one way to put it.

[Ty in Tampa]

They're still out there cranking away.

A 'must-see live' band, if only for the unpredictability.

[Navin R Johnson]

Trump is the most unfit divisive President ever.   It’s amazing to think just a couple years ago Trumpkins were gnashing their teeth over Obama.   Now their cowardly fatasses sit on their hands.  Sad!

[Limey]

Congressman:  “Could you charge the President with a crime after he left office?”

Mueller:  “Yes.”

[MRaup]

Congressman:  “Could you charge the President with a crime after he left office?”

Mueller:  “Yes.”

NO COLLUSION! NO OBSTRUCTION!

[MusicMan]

But the “optics” were terrible, because this is a fucking drama production, not the state of our republic.


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[Bench]

But the “optics” were terrible, because this is a fucking drama production, not the state of our republic.

It's so fucking crazy. The report is pretty clear and should have provoked impeachment hearings the day after it was issued.

[jbm]

It's so fucking crazy. The report is pretty clear and should have provoked impeachment hearings the day after it was issued.

No doubt.  Pelosi was really gone all in on a dangerous hand. Come election time, Trump will say he did nothing, otherwise the Democrats would have impeached him.  There is some validity to that assertion, in an odd way. 

I don’t have a good idea on the election, but it looks more favorable toTrump today than it did a year ago.

[austro]

I don’t have a good idea on the election, but it looks more favorable toTrump today than it did a year ago.

I'm afraid his strategy of normalizing his appalling behavior has worked. Boiling frog and all that. I fear that absent some galvanizing event (and I shudder to think what that might be), there's going to be enough apathy on the left that he'll be able to use his gerrymandered electoral votes to squeak into another term. It's an incredibly depressing thought.

[Limey]

It's so fucking crazy. The report is pretty clear and should have provoked impeachment hearings the day after it was issued.

They should be pulling an all-nighter drafting impeachment documents right now. 

This is crazy pills time.  Mueller has said the President should be charged with the crimes for which he laid out substantial, comprehensive and damning evidence in his report and reiterated in his testimony today.  It’s Congress’ job; do that fucking job.

[BizidyDizidy]

He’s 100% getting re-elected, and today was a debacle.

[Limey]

Congressman:  “Could you charge the President with a crime after he left office?”

Mueller:  “Yes.”

I read about this exchange, but now I have seen it.  Unlike almost every written work, this is waaay better on film.  It was a question from a Republican congressman, who was incredulous at Mueller’s quick, forceful and unequivocal response.  So he asked it again, and got the same response, just better than before.  Better, stronger, faster.

[MusicMan]

I'm afraid his strategy of normalizing his appalling behavior has worked. Boiling frog and all that. I fear that absent some galvanizing event (and I shudder to think what that might be), there's going to be enough apathy on the left that he'll be able to use his gerrymandered electoral votes to squeak into another term. It's an incredibly depressing thought.

“States” is not how gerrymandering works.


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[MRaup]

“States” is not how gerrymandering works.


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Wrong term, right result.

[Limey]

Wrong term, right result.

It's entirely conceivable that Trump could get buried in the popular vote in 2020 and still win the electoral college.  Democratic enthusiasm to vote against the motherfucker could swell the vote counts in populous states like California, New York and even Texas, while making fuck-all difference to the actual result.

The Democrat needs to win the Clinton states plus Michigan, Pennsylvania and one of either Wisconsin or Arizona.  Michigan and Pennsylvania are showing signs of leaning democrat, but Wisconsin and Arizona are toss-ups at best.  It was no accident that Manafort was sharing internal Trump campaign polling data on these three rust belt states with his Russian cut-out.  It will be no accident when it happens again.

Barring shock results in Florida or Texas, this election will come down to who wins Wisconsin and Arizona.  Everyone knows it; including Uncle Vlad.

#democracy

[austro]

“States” is not how gerrymandering works.

Yeah, I understand. I was too lazy to go back and change it.

[jbm]

I recorded the debate, to watch after the Astros game. CNN is fucking atrocious. Instead of a lead in where you educate the public, then ask a question designed to ferret out differences between the candidates, they ask a stupid gotcha question on a misunderstood topic. Then, the candidates are forced to try to reframe the question in a way that might stir useful discussion, but before they can they are interrupted by the dipshit CNN morons.

Seriously, this type of debate is a disservice to all.

[Limey]

I recorded the debate, to watch after the Astros game. CNN is fucking atrocious. Instead of a lead in where you educate the public, then ask a question designed to ferret out differences between the candidates, they ask a stupid gotcha question on a misunderstood topic. Then, the candidates are forced to try to reframe the question in a way that might stir useful discussion, but before they can they are interrupted by the dipshit CNN morons.

Seriously, this type of debate is a disservice to all.

I didn’t watch, but CNN is the Trump of shitty political coverage. 

[Waldo]

In the hours after the El Paso shooting, Mitch McConnell's campaign posted a photo of gravestones at a rally, one of which is for Amy McGrath, his current campaign opponent.  You've gotta be fucking kidding me.

But hey, it's the liberals and their violent rhetoric.

[BudGirl]

In the hours after the El Paso shooting, Mitch McConnell's campaign posted a photo of gravestones at a rally, one of which is for Amy McGrath, his current campaign opponent.  You've gotta be fucking kidding me.

But hey, it's the liberals and their violent rhetoric.

Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch?? 

[Ron Brand]

Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch??

You gotta remember that these people presumably represent the views of their state, or at least those who vote in their state. There's trainloads of support for his actions and his views in Kentucky.

[Limey]

Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch??

He encourages young men to pose in his campaign t-shirts while choking a cardboard cutout of AOC. 

Eh?  Oh. 

[Lefty]

Can anyone name one redeeming quality of Moscow Mitch?? 

I like turtles.

[MusicMan]

I like turtles.

I love lamp


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[austro]

I like turtles.

alkie, is that you?

[austro]

Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.

Not.

[HudsonHawk]

Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.

Not.

Why would they not?  This pretty much secures the White House for Trump in 2020.

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.

Not.

Or like the vigor of the James McDougal death while incarcerated. Or a combination of the two.

[jbm]

Or like the vigor of the James McDougal death while incarcerated. Or a combination of the two.

Damn, some people can’t get past their Clinton paranoias. An oddity of the human species.

[Bench]

Waiting to see if Hannity et al will pursue the Epstein suicide with the same vigor as their Clinton/Foster fever dream.

Not.

In the sense that they are claiming Hillary arranged for Epstein's murder?

[austro]

In the sense that they are claiming Hillary arranged for Epstein's murder?

Well, that certainly wasn't the twist I was expecting. Once again, I have been outmaneuvered.

[MRaup]

Well, that certainly wasn't the twist I was expecting. Once again, I have been outmaneuvered.

Remember that whole "Blame the other side for all the shit we've done" game plan they've executed so well so far?

[Lefty]

Remember that whole "Blame the other side for all the shit we've done" game plan they've executed so well so far?

What was it Chuck said..."every accusation a confession"?

[HudsonHawk]

What was it Chuck said..."every accusation a confession"?

Trump already floating conspiracy theories that Clinton had Epstein killed.  You know Hannity, who worships the toilet in which Trump shits, is not going to let this go.  Ever. 

[Limey]

While complacency is and would be a terrible thing, here's the latest state polling on Trump's job approval; the state-by-state numbers being important because that's how the game is played.

Trump is underwater in:

- Michigan (by 11)
- Pennsylvania (by 12)
- Wisconsin (by 10)
- North Carolina (by 9)
- Virginia (by 17)
- Utah (by 3)
- Texas (by 1)
- New Hampshire (by 26) (not a typo)
- Iowa (by 4)
- Arizona (by 9)
- Colorado (by 18)
- Florida (by 3)
- Georgia (by 5)
- Minnesota (by 15)
- Nevada (by 23)
- New Mexico (by 9)
- Ohio (by 2)

Also with:
- Independents (by 10)
- Women (by 25)
- Every age group except over 65s
- Every ethnic group except whites

While the Democrats' path to 270 is narrow, Trump's is narrower than his baby fingers wrapped around his micropenis.  In 2016 he threaded the needle by < 80,000 votes across MI, PA & WI and, right now, his job performance is disapproved of by double-digits in each of those uber-critical states.  He's also underwater in Ohio, Florida, Arizona, Texas, Georgia and U-fucking-tah.  Job disapproval doesn't necessarily translate into votes - hence the eleventying-down on the racism - but he can't afford to lose a single state he won last time and right now he's in danger of losing a lot of them.

It's the economy, stupid.  And while the Dow is good, that isn't trickling down to the miners and car workers and many, many others for whom he promised to make things great again.  He's also chopped off farmers at the knees and is trying desperately not to fuck up holiday shopping.

"His" people are the ones taking it in the ass the most; they should be the ones to run him out of the White House on a rail - a heavily reinforced, steel rail - directly into the waiting cuffs of a NY state trooper.

[BudGirl]

While complacency is and would be a terrible thing, here's the latest state polling on Trump's job approval; the state-by-state numbers being important because that's how the game is played.

Trump is underwater in:

- Michigan (by 11)
- Pennsylvania (by 12)
- Wisconsin (by 10)
- North Carolina (by 9)
- Virginia (by 17)
- Utah (by 3)
- Texas (by 1)
- New Hampshire (by 26) (not a typo)
- Iowa (by 4)
- Arizona (by 9)
- Colorado (by 18)
- Florida (by 3)
- Georgia (by 5)
- Minnesota (by 15)
- Nevada (by 23)
- New Mexico (by 9)
- Ohio (by 2)

Also with:
- Independents (by 10)
- Women (by 25)
- Every age group except over 65s
- Every ethnic group except whites

While the Democrats' path to 270 is narrow, Trump's is narrower than his baby fingers wrapped around his micropenis.  In 2016 he threaded the needle by < 80,000 votes across MI, PA & WI and, right now, his job performance is disapproved of by double-digits in each of those uber-critical states.  He's also underwater in Ohio, Florida, Arizona, Texas, Georgia and U-fucking-tah.  Job disapproval doesn't necessarily translate into votes - hence the eleventying-down on the racism - but he can't afford to lose a single state he won last time and right now he's in danger of losing a lot of them.

It's the economy, stupid.  And while the Dow is good, that isn't trickling down to the miners and car workers and many, many others for whom he promised to make things great again.  He's also chopped off farmers at the knees and is trying desperately not to fuck up holiday shopping.

"His" people are the ones taking it in the ass the most; they should be the ones to run him out of the White House on a rail - a heavily reinforced, steel rail - directly into the waiting cuffs of a NY state trooper.

 There isn't a policy implemented that does not try to harm someone weaker than themselves.  I have no faith in the American people that vote to do the right thing to save this country.  I am just going to do what I can to try and make it better.

[HudsonHawk]

There isn't a policy implemented that does not try to harm someone weaker than themselves.  I have no faith in the American people that vote to do the right thing to save this country.  I am just going to do what I can to try and make it better.

I do not believe for a second that Trump will not win Texas, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.  He will win a second term easily.  It simply doesn't matter what ridiculous  or evil thing he does or how he hurts people.  People will believe they deserved it and God wanted them to be punished by such a godly and honorable man.  Plus, Hillary used a private server. 

[BudGirl]

I do not believe for a second that Trump will not win Texas, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin.  He will win a second term easily.  It simply doesn't matter what ridiculous  or evil thing he does or how he hurts people.  People will believe they deserved it and God wanted them to be punished by such a godly and honorable man.  Plus, Hillary used a private server. 

You are right.  My sister said this weekend that Hillary was more evil than Trump.  On what good green earth is that true?  My brother uses bible verses out of context to say the right is just and the left is foolish.  I have no doubt you are right.  As a country we are going to reap what we sow.

[HudsonHawk]

You are right.  My sister said this weekend that Hillary was more evil than Trump.  On what good green earth is that true?  My brother uses bible verses out of context to say the right is just and the left is foolish.  I have no doubt you are right.  As a country we are going to reap what we sow.

And make no mistake...2020 will be Trump v Hillary again. No matter who the Dems run, it will be a referendum on Hillary. 

[Lefty]

There isn't a policy implemented that does not try to harm someone weaker than themselves.  I have no faith in the American people that vote to do the right thing to save this country.  I am just going to do what I can to try and make it better.

"Nobody ever went broke by underestimating the intelligence of the American public."

[Mike S.]

Trump already floating conspiracy theories that Clinton had Epstein killed.  You know Hannity, who worships dines from the toilet in which Trump shits, is not going to let this go.  Ever.

FIFY

[Limey]

Trump's re-election strategy is to run 2016 again; it's a purely base-based play.  He's going to go full bore on racial and social grievance.  Of course, he's been president for 4 years and, for many of those who gave him a try in 2016, he's made life significantly worse or, at best, has not moved their situation one iota upwards.  Coal jobs are not coming back, the manufacturing jobs he'd said he'd protect are still leaving and - notably - the GOP cannot get away from its Quixotic tilting against Obamacare*.

Trump is still wildly popular with self-identified Republicans.  What that doesn't tell you is that Trump is boiling off the moderates, notably including suburban women, so that he's wildly popular with a shrinking pool of voters.  The economy isn't working for his core voter - the white, non-college educated man - and it's quite possibly going to tank worse than 2008 before we get to the election**.

While I get that it's no slam dunk, he's going to need a longer series of miracles to pull off the shock he did in 2016.  Of course, there is still the possibility that the Democrats will hand it to him on a plate or that Russian interference will evolve from Facebook brain washing to simple vote tally hacking, but he's heavily underwater in a lot of the states he cannot lose and he alone will not be able to reverse that trend.

If the Dems don't shit the bed and Trump stays the course, the only variable I see here is guns.  It's going to be a big issue, and Democratic primary candidates are going to start running hard to the left on it.  Republicans are nothing but consistent in their ability to be rallied around a single cause, and gun reform could be that issue the same way gay marriage and abortion rights have been in the past.  But then, it could go the other way if the pitch is delivered correctly, because a lot of "real Americans" are scared to go to Walmart right now, and could be moved towards reform by the right proposal.


* Lindsey Graham's being the most recent, on the record, promise to repeal Obamacare.  The lunacy of it being that they've already stripped away the unpopular stuff, so all this does is take away all the popular stuff.

** The Dow tanked 800 points today and many are predicting a recession (even 2008 didn't see us going backwards).  Because Trump has already blown stimulating moves like tax cuts, and interest rates are already low, he has absolutely no economic tools left to bring to bear on a backsliding economy, even if he had the first clue how to use them.

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

The Dems can still win in 2020. I'm looking forward to the Gabbard VS Harris cat fight. Two women that needed not to ride a president's coat tails to eminence. Seriously, Hilary Clinton?!?!?!  Oh well, it almost worked, #ANARCHISTFORANYONEBUTTRUmP

[Bench]

And in typically unremarkable news Trump today said that Jews that vote Democratic (read 80% of American Jews) are disloyal and he is cancelling a trip to Denmark because they won’t discuss selling Greenland.

[TeeJoe]

And in typically unremarkable news Trump today said that Jews that vote Democratic (read 80% of American Jews) are disloyal and he is cancelling a trip to Denmark because they won’t discuss selling Greenland.

Yes, very disloyal to the 2nd coming of God. Well he didn't actually say that himself. He was just tweeting a tweet when someone else said it.

[MusicMan]

Yes, very disloyal to the 2nd coming of God. Well he didn't actually say that himself. He was just tweeting a tweet when someone else said it.

He just walked out on the WH lawn and said “I am the chosen one.”

I wish I were joking.


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[The Spleen]

The President of the United States is decompensating right in front of us, but THIS IS FINE.

[jbm]

The President of the United States is decompensating right in front of us, but THIS IS FINE.

New day, new shit.  I found this excerpt in a WaPo article on Trump further fucking up trade.  It’s sadly funny:

”The instruction for U.S. firms to leave China was quite stunning. I’m completely surprised by it,” said Alison Acosta Winters, senior policy fellow at Americans for Prosperity, a conservative group. She said there was “tremendous concern” among lawmakers, including congressional Republicans, about the direction of the trade war, which has hogtied the world’s two most powerful economic engines for more than a year.

Rather than owning the libs, this is something new.  Their fucking monster is tearing more shit up and there will be more damage to follow.

[Lefty]

New day, new shit.  I found this excerpt in a WaPo article on Trump further fucking up trade.  It’s sadly funny:

Rather than owning the libs, this is something new.  Their fucking monster is tearing more shit up and there will be more damage to follow.

To paraphrase Alfred:  rather than admit a mistake, he'll burn it all to the ground.

[Limey]

To paraphrase Alfred:  rather than admit a mistake, he'll burn it all to the ground.

Before he took office, people who’d reported on Trump over the years, predicted exactly this. 

[Lefty]

Before he took office, people who’d reported on Trump over the years, predicted exactly this. 

Heard on the radio this morning that he was seriously asking his "cabinet" why we couldn't drop a nuke on a hurricane in the Atlantic to keep it from hitting the US.

[TeeJoe]

Heard on the radio this morning that he was seriously asking his "cabinet" why we couldn't drop a nuke on a hurricane in the Atlantic to keep it from hitting the US.

Why not just build a wall? That'll keep them out. #@Making weather great again.

[Lefty]

Why not just build a wall? That'll keep them out. #@Making weather great again.

Who's gonna pay for that wall, though?

Just in case anyone thought I was joking:  https://www.axios.com/trump-nuclear-bombs-hurricanes-97231f38-2394-4120-a3fa-8c9cf0e3f51c.html

[MusicMan]

Who's gonna pay for that wall, though?

Just in case anyone thought I was joking:  https://www.axios.com/trump-nuclear-bombs-hurricanes-97231f38-2394-4120-a3fa-8c9cf0e3f51c.html

Radiation and high winds go together like peanut butter and jelly


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[Lefty]

Radiation and high winds go together like peanut butter and jelly


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Like well done steak and ketchup

[Limey]

Sooooo much shit last week:

* He cancelled a visit to Denmark even though they tried really hard not to laugh at him for wanting to buy Greenland
* He called the Fed Chair - for whom he fired the completely competent Janet Yellen to install - an enemy of America
* He called President Xi an enemy of America
* He ordered US companies to start seeking alternative trading partners from China (while every scrap of MAGA-shit, Ivanka-shit and Lahren-shit is made in China)
* He claimed that the most frequent question he got from the other leaders at the G7 was "Why does your press hate America so much and want it to fail?"
* He skipped out on the climate session at the G7
* He claimed he missed the climate session because he was meeting with the leaders of Germany and India
* The leaders of Germany and India were at the climate session
* He proclaimed the next G7 will be at his struggling Doral resort
* He complained loudly in public and even louder in private that Putin wasn't allowed in the G-club anymore
* He claimed Obama lost a part of the Ukraine (but couldn't remember which part)
* He claimed Melania has come to know mass-murderer Kim Jong Un to be a nice guy
* Melania has never met Kim - that was his other wife, Ivanka
* He claimed he has had second thoughts about his trade war with China (which , at this point, is lost)
* He claimed he has had second thoughts about having second thoughts about his trade war with China


I left off the nuking hurricanes thing because it was mentioned above and it's story about prior statements.  It's a concept that's debunked in about 20 seconds by any expert: hurricanes put out the equivalent energy of a 10-megaton warhead about every 20 minutes, a hurricane would not even blink if hit by a nuke.  The really scary part of this story is that Trump has brought up this "option" multiple times during his presidency.

Multiple.  Times.

[Limey]

From the "you think you've got problems" file:  across the pond, Posh Trump is petitioning the Queen to suspend parliament until literally a day or two before Brexit happens.  This does two things:

1)  Removes the democratically elected representatives from the decision-making process around perhaps the most consequential and far-reaching decision the country has ever faced; and

B)  Puts the Queen in an historic, and historically untenable, position.


To wit, as the head of the government, the Queen has the ability to step in here and torpedo this anti-democratic, despotian move by Boris.  What Johnson is doing to suspending parliament so that it can't hold a vote of no confidence which, if passed, forces him to dissolve his government and hold an election.  Conceivably, an election could bring to power a government that is pro-remain and thus kill Brexit, so Johnson is suspending parliament to stop himself from being forced out of office just so he can crash through his own version of Brexit - which is just leaping of a cliff and expecting Trump to catch him.  It's breathtakingly anti-democratic (insert clapping Putin gif here).

The Queen has the power to stop him; she can dissolve the government by decree, but it's a bullet she gets to fire once for the remainder of time.  Such an exercise of monarchical power - even if for the greater good - will almost certainly mean the end of such a power.  Pretty much the last monarch to do so had his head chopped off.  The UK is in the ever-shrinking minority of countries operating without a written constitution, and calls for there to be one have been growing of late and will get even louder because of all the shit being pulled over Brexit.  In such a constitution, it's inconceivable that the monarchy will retain anything like the authority it has now (if any at all), so every monarch over the last few hundred years has kept this one bullet in the magazine with the safety catch firmly on.

But, right now, the Queen is the only person who can stop Johnson railroading through his preferred "hard" Brexit.  Will she pull the trigger?  It's all happening right now...


ETA:  She didn't.  Parliament suspended for 5 weeks.

[Limey]

The whole world is being run by cowards.

[MusicMan]

Thanks, I had just assumed Parliament tested positive for PEDs from petrol station boner pills.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Limey]

Thanks, I had just assumed Parliament tested positive for PEDs from petrol station boner pills.

That's not what's making Brexit hard...

[Limey]

Meanwhile, Deutschedramat has responded to a court order to state whether they have certain documents relating to Trump's finances, including his tax returns.  A source told Lawrence O'Donnell that the bank confirmed they had some (or some parts) of Trump's tax returns, and also that some of his loans had Russian co-signers.

By way of confirmation, Trump's lawyers are threatening O'Donnell with legal action.


The possibility that he has Russian co-signers on  loans should be a blaring, giant, off the charts scandal.  It isn't.

BTW, on this very day in 2014, Obama wore a tan suit to the White House briefing room, and conservatives proclaimed the end of civilization as we know it.

[MusicMan]

Meanwhile, Deutschedramat has responded to a court order to state whether they have certain documents relating to Trump's finances, including his tax returns.  A source told Lawrence O'Donnell that the bank confirmed they had some (or some parts) of Trump's tax returns, and also that some of his loans had Russian co-signers.

By way of confirmation, Trump's lawyers are threatening O'Donnell with legal action.


The possibility that he has Russian co-signers on  loans should be a blaring, giant, off the charts scandal.  It isn't.

BTW, on this very day in 2014, Obama wore a tan suit to the White House briefing room, and conservatives proclaimed the end of civilization as we know it.

O’Donnell acknowledged this was single-sourced and should not have been reported.


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[Limey]

O’Donnell acknowledged this was single-sourced and should not have been reported.

I just saw that, and I agree.

But we're existing in a world of asymmetric realities where the president can say made-up shit all day long, but a journalist has to apologize for reporting something - that could well be 100% true - but for which he has only one source.

[MusicMan]

I just saw that, and I agree.

But we're existing in a world of asymmetric realities where the president can say made-up shit all day long, but a journalist has to apologize for reporting something - that could well be 100% true - but for which he has only one source.

But what if that source has as casual a relationship with the truth as the President?


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[Limey]

But what if that source has as casual a relationship with the truth as the President?

True.  And it undermines the news to put out something like that too quickly so as to give Trump the ability to declare it fake news, so that if and when it gets proved out, it has far less impact or reach.  You come at the Trump...

But it's still a weird theme of these times that journalists often end up apologizing to Trump for their reportage.

[Limey]

Given what Posh Trump is up to in Limeyland, how long before Daddy Trump tweets out that he's poro...purogo...prero...firing Congress?

[Jacksonian]

True.  And it undermines the news to put out something like that too quickly so as to give Trump the ability to declare it fake news, so that if and when it gets proved out, it has far less impact or reach.  You come at the Trump...

To me this is the most important thing out there.  What might be the most brilliant decision the Founders made was guaranteeing a free press.  Complete independence from government is beyond vital.  When they do their job right they are THE most important check on government.  We the people need them and rely on them to be accurate AND complete.  When they are the service they provide is immeasurable.  When they let other things, like allowing themselves to be in bed with one of the parties, get in the way of the fullness of their job they compromise themselves and end up fucking over their own impact.

[jbm]

When they let other things, like allowing themselves to be in bed with one of the parties, get in the way of the fullness of their job they compromise themselves and end up fucking over their own impact.

It hasn’t hurt FOX’s impact.

[Jacksonian]

It hasn’t hurt FOX’s impact.

What's the most recent polling say about faith in mass media?

That's where they've hurt themselves. 

[chuck]

What's the most recent polling say about faith in mass media?

That's where they've hurt themselves.

It blows my mind that you are treating Fox News as if it were a journalistic enterprise of some sort.

[Jacksonian]

It blows my mind that you are treating Fox News as if it were a journalistic enterprise of some sort.

I didn't bring up Fox news.  I was originally thinking more about print media than tv even though it was tv that spurred the conversation I was referring to.

[Col. Sphinx Drummond]

To me this is the most important thing out there.  What might be the most brilliant decision the Founders made was guaranteeing a free press.  Complete independence from government is beyond vital.  When they do their job right they are THE most important check on government.  We the people need them and rely on them to be accurate AND complete.  When they are the service they provide is immeasurable.  When they let other things, like allowing themselves to be in bed with one of the parties, get in the way of the fullness of their job they compromise themselves and end up fucking over their own impact.

There is no "free press" anymore, and there may never have been. Journalism has always been--business first. The history of the press is filled with corruption and influence peddling on a multitude of levels. But other than that, I totally agree with you.

[Limey]

I didn't bring up Fox news.  I was originally thinking more about print media than tv even though it was tv that spurred the conversation I was referring to.

Once news departments shifted from being a public service to a for-profit venture (thank you CNN), they were destined to fall afoul of speed over accuracy.  That was O'Donnell's crime here, he wanted the scoop so much (to please his audience and thus his advertisers) that he didn't wait for it to be confirmed.

Fox News just hammers the same made-up crap 24/7.

[HudsonHawk]

So today Trump went full on crazy suggesting he be given back time as President that was "stolen" due to his many scandals.  I guess that's sort of how "injury time" works in soccer? 

[BudGirl]

So today Trump went full on crazy suggesting he be given back time as President that was "stolen" due to his many scandals.  I guess that's sort of how "injury time" works in soccer? 

So, no need for an election, just extend his term???  Yeah, that's democracy at work.

[Lefty]

So, no need for an election, just extend his term???  Yeah, that's democracy at work.

I'm sure he was "just joking".

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-cant-we-use-nuclear-weapons-against-bedbugs/2019/08/28/c5cb6b20-c9c4-11e9-a4f3-c081a126de70_story.html

[Navin R Johnson]

Cavuto crushed Trump on foxnews today. 

[Navin R Johnson]

I assume trump will have some sort of nickname for him by tomorrow.

[Limey]

Cavuto crushed Trump on foxnews today.

Appeasing the advertisers.  They’ll be back to mushroom gorveling soon enough. 

[Limey]

Just in case you bought into Trump's head fake - that he'd be spending the weekend at Camp David monitoring the plight of millions of voters citizens - he took a helicopter from there to his Virginia golf resort where he will spend the rest of the weekend golfing, verbally harassing the undocumented male workers and sexually harassing the undocumented female workers.

I truly fear for the people in the path of this storm.  Trump has, just this week, pulled nearly $300 million from FEMA - over $150 million of it from the disaster relief fund - to pay for ICE and his other border nonsense.  Also, by now, the competent staff in every government agency has been whittled down to almost nothing, so the chances of this not being a Katrina-esque horror show is slim to none.  It's mostly down to the hurricane, at this point.

[HudsonHawk]

The other day, Trump issued a tweet suggesting that Alabama could be impacted by Dorian.  The National Weather Service immediately corrected him, saying that there will no impacts to Alabama.  Today Trump called that a "phony report by a lightweight reporter" and insisted that he was correct, not the NWS.

[Bench]

Meanwhile Pence is in Ireland so he is of course staying at Trump's resort on the western side of the island and flying 180 miles to attend meetings in Dublin. He even has the gall to say that Trump "suggested" he stay there.  The corruption is banal at this point.

[HudsonHawk]

Meanwhile Pence is in Ireland so he is of course staying at Trump's resort on the western side of the island and flying 180 miles to attend meetings in Dublin. He even has the gall to say that Trump "suggested" he stay there.  The corruption is banal at this point.

Pence said he checked with Trump's people and they approved it, so it's perfectly legit.  I wish I made that up. 

Plus, he's getting an employee discount.

[Waldo]

Limey, can you decode all of the latest Brexit developments from today?

[loganck]

I'd love Limey's take too.  I thought THIS article was informative, and it's worth a click for the photo alone.  They predict a new general election.

Quote relevant to this thread:

While, from the perspective of this non-British observer, Brexit seems like a very bad idea, the arguments of many Remainers and People’s Vote proponents also often seem to boil down to: The voters did something dumb, so it shouldn’t count. As an American in 2019, I certainly sympathize with the sentiment, but whatever that argument is, it’s not “democratic.”

[Limey]

I honestly don’t know WTF is going on in great detail.  What it does seem to be, to me at least, is a continuation of the same self-serving power games that opened this Pandora’s Box in the first place.  David Cameron - who deserves to be put in the stocks for about a year - initiated the Brexit referendum to placate his far-right party faction in order to consolidate his position as Prime Minister (which was shaky at the time).  Well the lazy fuck never thought it would be close so he didn’t bother to put a minimum threshold on it (like there was to get in)..

Fast-forward 3 years and Posh Trump is a PM who is in desperate need of consolidating his position as Prime Minister etc. etc.  Yada yada yada. 

Brexit has ripped apart the country and the political system.  Johnson won’t get any Brexit plan passed just as May couldn’t before him.  His call for an election is either a Hail Mary to get a better majority but it could just as easily be a plan to get voted into the minority so that he’s off the hook and can go back to obstruction because that’s so much easier than actually fucking doing something. 

But don’t listen to me, because I really have no clue.  Here’s Jonathan Pye with another mid-report rant. 

[Bench]

I'd love Limey's take too.  I thought THIS article was informative, and it's worth a click for the photo alone.  They predict a new general election.

Quote relevant to this thread:

The initial referendum was flawed both procedurally (there should be more than a simple majority to effect such existential change) and substantively (nobody knew what specific plan they were voting for or against).

It makes sense to me that following the referendum, which was non-binding, the people would be able to vote on the various options negotiated as a result of the initial vote, with the understanding that it was a directive to explore possibilities to leave. Once they could choose amongst concrete plans, an informed vote could take place. Of course, this history could be a figment of my imagination but it’s what always made sense to me.

I don’t understand the argument that “if we knew then what we know now we would never have done that” is somehow a subversion of democracy. Let the people speak.

[Limey]

Sweary comedian Stewart Lee discusses Brexit.  Later in the same set he discussed Trump. 

[chuck]

Here’s Jonathan Pye with another mid-report rant.

Dicks!

Great.

[chuck]

I don’t understand the argument that “if we knew then what we know now we would never have done that” is somehow a subversion of democracy. Let the people speak.

Yeah, me neither. In the US if, for example, a president is elected and four years later the majority of voters say, Man, this is fucking crazy, well, you get to try it again. There is no trying it again four years after you leave the EU.

[Bench]

The other day, Trump issued a tweet suggesting that Alabama could be impacted by Dorian.  The National Weather Service immediately corrected him, saying that there will no impacts to Alabama.  Today Trump called that a "phony report by a lightweight reporter" and insisted that he was correct, not the NWS.

Now he is showing off a doctored hurricane map that retroactively includes Alabama in what appears to be crudely drawn sharpie and is insisting it is real.

[Limey]

Now he is showing off a doctored hurricane map that retroactively includes Alabama in what appears to be crudely drawn sharpie and is insisting it is real.

This is how much contempt they have for their voters.  They know they can do something as ridiculous as this, and it won’t hurt them.  Their voters will just accept the sharpie-doctored map as real and continue on without a curious synapse ever firing.

[The Spleen]

Voters will just accept the sharpie-doctored map as real and continue on without a curious synapse ever firing.

You misspelled 'elites.'

[MusicMan]

This is how much contempt they have for their voters.  They know they can do something as ridiculous as this, and it won’t hurt them.  Their voters will just accept the sharpie-doctored map as real and continue on without a curious synapse ever firing.

His belief that such a poor job of faking will fool anyone explains how he believes he’s ever given a woman an orgasm.


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[Limey]

18 U.S. Code § 2074

Whoever knowingly issues or publishes any counterfeit weather forecast or warning of weather conditions falsely representing such forecast or warning to have been issued or published by the Weather Bureau, United States Signal Service, or other branch of the Government service, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ninety days, or both.

[BudGirl]

His belief that such a poor job of faking will fool anyone explains how he believes he’s ever given a woman an orgasm.


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Like he would really care about giving a woman an orgasm.

[Mr. Appropriate]

Like he would really care about giving a woman an orgasm.

trump doesn't give orgasms. he takes them.

[Navin R Johnson]

He is mentally unfit to be President.  He has absolutely lost his mind. Amazing that there are people so blinded, they can't recognize how batshit crazy this shitbag is.

[Navin R Johnson]

Trump's new Middle East coordinator is Jared's assistant Avi Berkowitz. He's 28. He graduated from law school in 2016.

[Waldo]

He is mentally unfit to be President.  He has absolutely lost his mind. Amazing that there are people so blinded, they can't recognize how batshit crazy this shitbag is.

And now he's trotting out the Assistant Undersecretary of Whatever-the-fuck to keep digging the hole.  Amazing.

[Limey]

He is mentally unfit to be President.  He has absolutely lost his mind. Amazing that there are people so blinded, they can't recognize how batshit crazy this shitbag is.

He continues to pretend that the threat to Alabama from Dorian was ever a thing, now getting government employees to lie on his behalf.  Meanwhile, Dorian is fucking up parts of the U.S. not called Alabama, while tens of thousands of people are in desperate need of help in the Bahamas.

[Limey]

Trump's new Middle East coordinator is Jared's assistant Avi Berkowitz. He's 28. He graduated from law school in 2016.

The person he is replacing was Trump’s real estate attorney.  Seriously.

[Lefty]

Today his shitbag campaign manager is advertising for sale on the website "the official Trump marker, which is different than every other marker on the market, because this one has the special ability to drive @CNN and the rest of the fake news crazy!"

[chuck]

Today his shitbag campaign manager is advertising for sale on the website "the official Trump marker, which is different than every other marker on the market, because this one has the special ability to drive @CNN and the rest of the fake news crazy!"

Man, if I were in charge of the Trump show I would be doing this kind of shit constantly. Trump markers, an oversized Trump driver that is 100% guaranteed to hit straight every time, a Trump tie that goes down to you knees, Trump cages for your unruly kids, grandkids, more probably, decorative mushroom penis candles, those lunatics will buy anything.

One of the biggest flaws in what appears to be a hastily conceived plan is that he ran for president after he quit peddling meat, vodka, water, wine, flights, online classes, who knows what else. Now pretty much all his minions have left is a night at one of the hotels, which would probably stretch the budget of the camouflage to church crowd. I guess they could try to satisfy themselves with one of those penis candles I was mentioning.

[Waldo]

Because the stupid wasn’t already stupid enough, now NOAA has released a statement defending Trump and calling out NWS Birmingham.

Trump’s erosion of respected institutions continues.

[Limey]

A retirement community on the Rio Grande, full of Trump voters, is now stressed that Trump is going to run his ego wall right through their community. 

Also, if you thought Pence staying on the opposite side of an entire country because that was convenient for Trump’s personal revenue was a bit on the nose, Trump directed a military flight to make an unnecessary refueling stop at a commercial airport (where the fuel cost to the military is higher) so that the crew could stay at his Turnberry golf resort.  Google shows 120 cheaper hotels between the airport and the resort.

Congress has been demanding an explanation of this since April but has been completely stonewalled by both the White House and the Pentagon.  Is this a one-time thing?  We don’t know.  We do know that Turnberry has been a disaster for Trump, lost $4.5 million in 2017, but somehow increased revenue by $3 million in 2018.  It’s not like Trump properties get more popular as his presidency rolls on...

[Limey]

Prestwick is a regional airport that is the closest to Trump’s Turnberry resort   It’s 34 miles away (Glasgow International is 90 miles away).  Prestwick nearly went out of business in 2013 - which would be terrible for trade at Turnberry - but the Scottish govt bought it for £1 and have been running it ever since.

US military flights en route to/from the Middle East never stopped at Prestwick (or anywhere in Scotland) before 2017.  They stopped at military basis in Germany or elsewhere.  But since 2017, the US military (i.e. you and me) has spent $11 million on fuel at Prestwick; fuel that would be cheaper to get at a US base. 

This is how deep the corruption goes.

[geezerdonk]

There is a decades long history of US military aircraft refueling at Prestwick beginning in the 40s and continuing through at least the 70s. I don't know for sure, but I have no reason to believe that the US has ever discontinued its refueling operations there. During the 50s and 60s, Prestwick was a major refueling hub for trans-Atlantic US military flights. I have landed in Prestwick for the purpose of refueling in US military aircraft on flights both originating and terminating in Turkey. That was many, many years ago.     

[austro]

There is a decades long history of US military aircraft refueling at Prestwick beginning in the 40s and continuing through at least the 70s. I don't know for sure, but I have no reason to believe that the US has ever discontinued its refueling operations there. During the 50s and 60s, Prestwick was a major refueling hub for trans-Atlantic US military flights. I have landed in Prestwick for the purpose of refueling in US military aircraft on flights both originating and terminating in Turkey. That was many, many years ago.     

I have no doubt that corruption (witting and unwitting) in the Trump presidency is vast and deep, but the Prestwick thing seems like a stretch.

[Limey]

There is a decades long history of US military aircraft refueling at Prestwick beginning in the 40s and continuing through at least the 70s. I don't know for sure, but I have no reason to believe that the US has ever discontinued its refueling operations there. During the 50s and 60s, Prestwick was a major refueling hub for trans-Atlantic US military flights. I have landed in Prestwick for the purpose of refueling in US military aircraft on flights both originating and terminating in Turkey. That was many, many years ago.   

Did you then drive over 30 miles from Prestwick to stay at a luxury golf resort?

The fuel thing may be a red herring, but the staying at Trump properties thing - with the G7, Pence and now this - is becoming a theme.

This is all, of course, on top of Trump’s constant trips to his own properties, dragging the entire presidential entourage and apparatus with him where they pay full freight (and in one case run up a 5-figure bar tab).   Trump has spent 1 day in 3 of his presidency at one of his own resorts. 

[Navin R Johnson]

Trump has spent 290 days at Trump properties, 30% of his presidency.  And all we get from the right is crickets

[geezerdonk]

Did you then drive over 30 miles from Prestwick to stay at a luxury golf resort?

The fuel thing may be a red herring, but the staying at Trump properties thing - with the G7, Pence and now this - is becoming a theme.

This is all, of course, on top of Trump’s constant trips to his own properties, dragging the entire presidential entourage and apparatus with him where they pay full freight (and in one case run up a 5-figure bar tab).   Trump has spent 1 day in 3 of his presidency at one of his own resorts.

Never got to RON at Prestwick. Just stayed long enough to get refueled and maybe grab some chow at the flight line mess hall.

There was (and still is I think) a big refueling operation for US military aircraft in the Azores. Not sure what the hotel situation is there.

[Limey]

Never got to RON at Prestwick. Just stayed long enough to get refueled and maybe grab some chow at the flight line mess hall.

There was (and still is I think) a big refueling operation for US military aircraft in the Azores. Not sure what the hotel situation is there.

The crew had done this run about 50 times and they had refueled in the Azores, Germany and Italy; never Scotland. Their per diem for meals did not even cover the food cost at Turnberry.  They also felt completely out of place because they could not meet the dress code.  This stinks of a Trump scheme because it’s so brazen and so completely half-assed. 

[Limey]

Other news sources are following the stink, and the numbers are going up.   The number of Turnberry stays and the amount of money spent on fuel at Prestwick are climbing steeply as more sources offer more detail. 

[Limey]

Trump is currently claiming that he had secretly invited the Taliban to a meeting at Camp David, but has now canceled it (because it turns out that murderers will be murderers).  The meeting was planned for next week, being the week of 9/9 to 9/14. 

Let that sink in. 

[Limey]

The fuel thing may be a red herring, but the staying at Trump properties thing - with the G7, Pence and now this - is becoming a theme.

This is all, of course, on top of Trump’s constant trips to his own properties, dragging the entire presidential entourage and apparatus with him where they pay full freight (and in one case run up a 5-figure bar tab).   Trump has spent 1 day in 3 of his presidency at one of his own resorts.

The really concerning thing here isn't each individual grift - in true Trump style each one is kind of a small deal in the grand scheme of things, befitting the man - it's the fact that his corruption has permeated many levels of many government departments.

1)  Dorian-a-Lago: about which Trump tweeted a cat video at about midnight last night...seriously...is just ridiculous; but there are now documented reports that NWS meteorologists were admonished - by memo - not to correct Trump's incorrect tweet.  NOOA later jumped in to the fray to defend Trump publicly (but without attribution), too.

2)  Doonbeg-a-Lago: (someone please tell me this is Gaelic for "douchebag" and they renamed the town after Tump moved in) meant that Pence had to take Air Force 2 back and forth for the 180-mile commute, at significant expense to the tax payer, not just in fuel but in logistics and administration time.  The State Dept and the VPs office had to sign off on all of this, and they have since defended the move.

3)  Turnberry-a-Lago:  the DOD has (finally) commented on this, and claimed that the air crew got a discount to stay at Trump's resort.  It was $136/night.  The crew stayed there both going to and returning from the Middle East.  But think about this: the Air Force had sent this particular crew on this run over 50 times previously, each time having them refuel at US military bases in Germany or Spain - where the fuel is cheaper.  Trump takes office in 2017, and they suddenly switch to a civilian airport in Scotland that happened to be in desperate need of the business and also which happens to be Turnberry's aorta.  Then they agree to put the crew up at Trump's resort which, despite the discount, is still more expensive than military lodgings (the fact that there are cheaper hotels is irrelevant - they should've been on a military base).  And the DOD was ok with all of this, stonewalled Congress about it since April and only put out a statement - defending the choice - after the press got ahold of it.

Trump has long since completed his takeover of the Republican Party; episodes like this show that he is well on his way to taking over the organs of government.  I know I am prone to hyperbole, but I do not think I am being so when I say that, if he is not ousted in 2020, we may never see a full and free election ever again.  The Right-Wing Noise Machine is already talking of a political dynasty of Trumps, meaning that they have been planning on this for a while and are now starting to socialize it.

[Limey]

The Air Force was shocked...SHOCKED...to hear that more air crews have stayed at Turnberry when stopping over at Prestwick.  They have promised a thorough investigation, acknowledging that tax payers footing the bill for military personnel to be put up at Trump's for-profit establishments is not a good look.  Ya think?

[Limey]

Meanwhile, as Trump has been feuding on Twitter with John Legend and Chrissy Teagan (which is bringing a tiny mushroom-headed dick to a porn shoot), hurricane-stricken Bahamians looking to escape the devastation at home were kicked off ferries to the US.  In the past, visa requirements have been waived for those with valid IDs and no criminal record, but not so under this government.  The cruelty is a feature, not a bug.

[Limey]

The IG is now looking into Sharpie-a-Lago, after reports that Wilbur Ross - who is now facing calls for his resignation - threatened to fire NOAA officials of this nonsense. 

Jesus wept. 

[Limey]

Oh, and in case you missed it, the CIA had a spy deep inside the Kremlin, to the point where he was close enough to Putin to be able to photograph papers on his desk.  In 2017, they exfiltrated him in a panic that Trump would accidentally (on purpose) blurt out his identity to someone - probably a Russian - and get him killed.

The extent of the damage to the United States that Trump has done in less than 3 years will be felt for decades and some of it is irredeemable.  Will international partners ever trust us again?  Trump has reneged on so many treaties and agreements "just 'cos (Obama)" that even if future deals were being negotiated by President Hanks, they'd quite rightly be looking 4 years past him to wonder who's got next.

Meanwhile, the US lost a vastly and uniquely useful intelligence asset just because Trump is Trump.  I mean, I bet Putin wishes he had an asset that close to the Oval office!  Eh?  Oh.

[jbm]

Oh, and in case you missed it, the CIA had a spy deep inside the Kremlin, to the point where he was close enough to Putin to be able to photograph papers on his desk.  In 2017, they exfiltrated him in a panic that Trump would accidentally (on purpose) blurt out his identity to someone - probably a Russian - and get him killed.

This, and the hurricane bullshit are so fucking problematic and likely historical stories.  But he’s numbed me and most of the country so much that it’s just Monday’s story. 

Screw all those who willingly brought this upon us.

[austro]

You'll be glad to know that the FEC isn't really doing much of anything right now because they can't raise a quorum because 3 of the 6 seats are vacant and haven't been filled by His Trumpiness. Who do suppose would stand to benefit from such a state of affairs?

[Limey]

You'll be glad to know that the FEC isn't really doing much of anything right now because they can't raise a quorum because 3 of the 6 seats are vacant and haven't been filled by His Trumpiness. Who do suppose would stand to benefit from such a state of affairs?

This is all so much worse than even the most pessimistic of us could have imagined.

[Bench]

This is all so much worse than even the most pessimistic of us could have imagined.

Limey - check your PM

[MusicMan]

Limey - check your PM

Limey’s a naturalized American, Boris isn’t really “his” PM any more.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[HudsonHawk]

Limey - check your PM

He's out of control, ain't he?

[Limey]

Couple of quick hits:

Trump wants to lend Iran $15billion
His trade war with China has cost 300,000 jobs in U.S.
The Federal deficit just topped $1 billion (per year) for the first time in 7 years

[Bench]

Couple of quick hits:

Trump wants to lend Iran $15billion
His trade war with China has cost 300,000 jobs in U.S.
The Federal deficit just topped $1 billion (per year) for the first time in 7 years

Trillion.

[Waldo]

Trump wants to lend Iran $15billion

Curious to see how Republicans are tying themselves in knots to defend this.

The Federal deficit just topped $1 trillion (per year) for the first time in 7 years

And this.  Fiscal conservatism is long dead, but they sure do preach it.

[Limey]

Curious to see how Republicans are tying themselves in knots to defend this.

The same way they defend every other anti-conservative thing that Republicans have wailed about for decades - shamelessly.

[Limey]

NEWSFLASH:  Justice Kavanaugh is a rapey drunk. 

[TeeJoe]

NEWSFLASH:  Justice Kavanaugh is a rapey drunk.

As has been said already about the media jumping to be the 1st to break a story. Now the Times has revised it's story to include that the accuser originally claiming the incident declined to be interviewed and her friends say she does't recall it.

What's that about?

[MRaup]

As has been said already about the media jumping to be the 1st to break a story. Now the Times has revised it's story to include that the accuser originally claiming the incident declined to be interviewed and her friends say she does't recall it.

What's that about?

I don't really get the problem with it, personally.

If a bunch of people saw it happen, but she doesn't recall it, seems like it still probably happened.

I bet ol' Drunk Dick McSupremeCourtJustice doesn't remember it either.

[TeeJoe]

I don't really get the problem with it, personally.

If a bunch of people saw it happen, but she doesn't recall it, seems like it still probably happened.

I bet ol' Drunk Dick McSupremeCourtJustice doesn't remember it either.

I guess the problem is it plays into the "Fake News" narrative.  It's going to be called fake news by Trump supporters no matter what, but leaving out these details gave something of substance to be pointed to backing up the fake news claim.

[BudGirl]

I guess the problem is it plays into the "Fake News" narrative.  It's going to be called fake news by Trump supporters no matter what, but leaving out these details gave something of substance to be pointed to backing up the fake news claim.

They call anything and everything fake news if it does not fit their agenda.

[TeeJoe]

They call anything and everything fake news if it does not fit their agenda.

I agree.

[Lefty]

Doesn't matter if they report it early, report it late, or don't report it at all.  It will be denounced and ignored by Teflon Don and his sycophants all the same.

[MRaup]

I guess the problem is it plays into the "Fake News" narrative.  It's going to be called fake news by Trump supporters no matter what, but leaving out these details gave something of substance to be pointed to backing up the fake news claim.

I don't see how leaving that out has anything to do with it happening, but okay.

Trump's tried and true plan is to call everything a lie then quietly let the facts fall in to place that it did happen and never acknowledge it again.

This follows that pattern, just with a wrinkle in the story.

[TeeJoe]

Trump's tried and true plan is to call everything a lie then quietly let the facts fall in to place that it did happen and never acknowledge it again.

This follows that pattern, just with a wrinkle in the story.

Trump is no doubt guilty of just what you've said.

I don't see how leaving that out has anything to do with it happening, but okay

.
In the below article the authors of the book that was used for the NYT article gave some statements that the Times editors left out some details that they believed to be in their words “significant”.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyt-kavanaugh-book-skullduggery-132959100.html

From the linked article…

At the same time, Kelly and Pogrebin acknowledged there were “errors in the process” of preparing an opinion article in the Sunday paper about their book that resulted in Times editors removing “significant” information favorable to Kavanaugh’s defense from an early draft.

The article stated that, in the course of researching their book, the authors had uncovered a “previously unreported” allegation that Kavanaugh, while a freshman at Yale University, was at a drunken dorm party where “friends pushed his penis” into the hand of a female student.

The allegation in the report triggered demands — led by a half-dozen Democratic presidential candidates, including Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg — for Kavanaugh to be impeached.

But the Times article left out a key detail that is included in the book: that the woman at the party in the new allegation never spoke to the authors and, according to several of her friends, didn’t recall the event ever happening.

Much of the article about their book in Sunday’s paper involved seven witnesses who, the authors claim, corroborated aspects of a separate account by another former Yale classmate, Deborah Ramirez, that Kavanaugh exposed himself to her at another dorm party. Such corroboration would be significant given that, according to initial accounts last year, Ramirez had been initially uncertain about Kavanaugh’s role in the alleged incident

But the authors acknowledge that none of those corroborating witnesses actually were present at the dorm party. Several of them — including Ramirez’s mother — had been told about the incident but with no reference to Kavanaugh being the offender, and two others only “vaguely” recalled it without being told it involved Kavanaugh. Ken Appold, one of those who did hear that it was Kavanaugh, wasn’t present at the event and, according to the Times reporters, couldn’t remember who told him about it. Yet another of the corroborators heard that it involved Kavanaugh — but only from Appold.

Against these details, the book also includes passages boosting Kavanaugh that also were left out of the Times article. The authors report that Leland Keyser, a onetime friend of Christine Blasey Ford, came to question Ford’s account that Kavanaugh sexually assaulted her at a high school house party. Keyser had been named by Ford as one of those present at the party when the assault occurred. But Keyser — after initially saying she didn’t remember being at the party but that she believed Ford — no longer does so and told the authors that she was pressured by Ford’s allies to change her story. “I was told behind the scenes that certain things could be spread about me if I didn’t comply,” she is quoted as saying.

[MRaup]

Trump is no doubt guilty of just what you've said.
.
In the below article the authors of the book that was used for the NYT article gave some statements that the Times editors left out some details that they believed to be in their words “significant”.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/nyt-kavanaugh-book-skullduggery-132959100.html

From the linked article…

That all is certainly a bit questionable at best.

Much like everything about this story, Kavanaugh (and all the shit that has come out about him) is greasy enough that details just seems to slip and slide away enough to cast doubt.

[TeeJoe]

That all is certainly a bit questionable at best.

Much like everything about this story, Kavanaugh (and all the shit that has come out about him) is greasy enough that details just seems to slip and slide away enough to cast doubt.

After he denied being much of a drinker/partier I view everything he says with suspicion. His own best friend wrote a book about their college partying. His greasiness gives me heartburn

[Limey]

So Trump's at it again.  He promised something to Putin a foreign leader that was so concerning to staff national security experts that one of them reported it under the whistleblower statute.  That law requires that this report run up the chain all the way to the Congressional security committees; yet Trump's Director of National Security (whoever the fuck that is this week) instead parked it and requested that Trump's legal defense team the DOJ give him guidance.

This, right on the heels of Lewandowski's "fuck you" performance in his committee testimony this week, shows in yet more stark relief how lawless this administration is.

Oh, and the DOD has spent over $200,000 at Trump Turnberry since 2017, paying room rates double the local average.

Democrats in Washington are in the process of fucking up this whole thing.  Nadler letting Lewandowski wave his package at them for about 5 hours on Monday before releasing his attack dog - who fucked over Lewandowski royally and should've had the whole fucking session - was pathetic.  It confirms Pelosi's reluctance to support impeachment, because she doesn't trust these fools to do it right.  She knows that if you come at the king...

To beat Trump in 2020 - which I truly believe is the last chance to save this democracy through electoral means - Democrats will have to show that they are worthy of people's trust.  They were given the House in 2018 mostly to act as a check on Trump, and they have dick-stepped through the first 8 months since getting the gavels.  They are running out of time to show they are up to it before everyone checks out and Trumps wins a 2nd term with 40% of the vote.

[Limey]

Meanwhile, Warren seems to have pivoted to a campaign message that Trump is corruption incarnate, but that he's the end result, not the cause, of a system that has been corrupted over the years.  That seems like a winning message to me, and the best one being put forward by any candidate.

As much as I support Beto's stance on gun control, that's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona.

As much as I support Bernie's stance on medicare for all (but not his timeline for it), that's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona.

As much as I support Biden's stance on...ummm...not being Trump?  That's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona.  (Biden's going to win PA).

As much as I support Harris' stance on criminal justice reform, that's not going to win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona.

What's win you Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida or Arizona... maybe ... is stopping the gilded classes from fleecing us for our money, our health and our lives.  Warren is flat out, by far, the best person to articulate and represent that goal.

[BizidyDizidy]

Elizabeth Warren (and Bernie) saying she would ban fracking on her first day in office is crazier than anything Trump has said, which is a high fucking bar.

[Limey]

Elizabeth Warren (and Bernie) saying she would ban fracking on her first day in office is crazier than anything Trump has said, which is a high fucking bar.

It’s not something I liked hearing, and it’s a silly thing to say because she can’t do that, but Trump says dozens of crazier things every single day, so please take your false equivalence and file it with Trump’s tax returns..

[BizidyDizidy]

Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".

[Waldo]

I'm hoping Warren starts gaining ground.  I hate picking a favorite candidate this far out from an election, but I'm finding myself rooting for Warren against Bernie and Biden.

[Waldo]

Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".

NEWS FLASH: POLITICAL CANDIDATE MAKES IMPOSSIBLE CAMPAIGN PROMISE

[TeeJoe]

NEWS FLASH: POLITICAL CANDIDATE MAKES IMPOSSIBLE CAMPAIGN PROMISE

Why not just call out all lunacy for what it is? No matter if it's your party of choice or in an upcoming election your candidate of choice. What she said was stupidly impossible. I'm not going to waste my time defending someone with the dumb.

[chuck]

Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".

Next time I find myself taking a selfie with her I'll be sure to let Warren know she can kiss North Dakota goodbye.

[Limey]

Compared to saying you are just going to shut down one of the biggest growth industries in the U.S., drawing on a map with a sharpie is just "eccentric".

Right.  Because the sharpie nonsense is easily the worst thing Trump has ever said or done.

[Limey]

Speaking of crazy shit Trump says, the whistleblower scandal appears to be about multiple occasions when Trump tried to blackmail Ukraine into investigating Biden. 

[chuck]

Speaking of crazy shit Trump says, the whistleblower scandal appears to be about multiple occasions when Trump tried to blackmail Ukraine into investigating Biden.

I wouldn't worry too much about that; Rudy cleared it all right up tonight.

[Limey]

I wouldn't worry too much about that; Rudy cleared it all right up tonight.

For your reading pleasure:

Senate panel postpones Darrell Issa confirmation hearing over FBI file questions

[Limey]

Gotta love the MSM.  This morning they are chasing Trump defenders down the rabbit hole of whether Trump abusing his power to sway the election in his favor is not an intelligence concern, and thus not covered by the whistleblower law.

Look over there fellas, the story is waaaaay over there. 

[Waldo]

Why not just call out all lunacy for what it is? No matter if it's your party of choice or in an upcoming election your candidate of choice. What she said was stupidly impossible. I'm not going to waste my time defending someone with the dumb.

The point is, we live in an age when every candidate - R or D, good or bad, smart or stupid - promises dumb shit.  You have to run all of the dumb shit through a filter.  (Unless you're Trump and you actually start doing all the dumb shit you said you would do.)

Limey's point about false equivalence is a good one.

[Limey]

Speaking of crazy shit Trump says, the whistleblower scandal appears to be about multiple occasions when Trump tried to blackmail Ukraine into investigating Biden.

At least eight times, is the latest reporting.  Each one, an impeachable offense on its own. 

Anyone still think that he’s not again coordinating election interference with Putin?

At what point do Republicans decide to put country over party?

[BudGirl]

When they have all the money and start wanting it from each other?

[jbm]

At what point do Republicans decide to put country over party?

Never.  A question without an easy answer is whether Pelosi/Dems will do a damn thing about it.

[MusicMan]

Never.  A question without an easy answer is whether Pelosi/Dems will do a damn thing about it.

I’d say we have nine months worth of evidence on the very easy answer to that.


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[Limey]

Pelosi says she wants the change the law to allow indictment of a sitting president.  Ignoring the fact that no one of standing has ever ruled that it is illegal, that’s a gross abdication of duty on her part.  The constitution put the power to hold accountable a sitting president in her hands, and she’s currently screwing that pooch into an early grave. 

Her House majority is going to be running campaigns next year on needing to be re-elected as a check on Republican corruption, having done nothing about it during the two years since we elected it to do just that.

They’ve already missed the boat on impeachment.  This Ukraine thing is a gift from the Gods of politics to allow them to say, “ok, now he’s already colluding with foreign powers to influence the next election and using the power of the U.S. government to do it, we have to impeach.”   It’s right fucking there.  Just take it and run with it. 

And if you thought there was any chance of this working out ok, just look at the news today.  In between stories about Trump sending troops to Saudi Arabia in which they blow over most of the important facts, including that it’s completely illegal, they’re discussing the merits of the case against Hunter Biden and how it impacts Joe’s campaign. 

W..........T............F

This is already over.  We’re Trumplandia now and there’s no one to stop it. 

[austro]

This is already over.  We’re Trumplandia now and there’s no one to stop it. 

Welcome to the Turkey of the West.

[Limey]

I mean, what was the DNC hiding there in its Watergate offices?  Must have been something very important for Nixon to try and get it.

[HudsonHawk]

Trump said today he was deserving of Nobel Prizes for various things.  I assume peace is one, and he think his books on real estate are deserving of the prize in literature.  I'm guessing his work around hurricanes deserves the nod in physics, and there's probably his work in chemistry worthy of consideration.  I'd look for them to simply rename it the Trump Prize, or maybe make him the permanent winner of all categories in perpetuity. 

[Limey]

Trump’s repeated admission of the main facts of the Ukraine scandal has been an injection of adrenaline right to the heart of impeachment.  More and more Democrats are moving to that side of the Venn, Pelosi is having a summit with senior Democrats tomorrow, junior Democrats put out a joint op-ed and the Acting DNI is due to testify to the House on Thursday. 

Meanwhile, all of this shit that Trump dumped on his own head is looking increasingly like it’s all for nought in more ways than one.  Biden slipped to 2nd behind Warren in the latest Iowa poll, 22 to 20.  More importantly, given Iowa’s caucus process, Warrens lead over Biden grows when you combine 1st and 2nd choices, 42 to 30. 

Trump is going to have bankrupted is own presidency going after the wrong person.  That’s about as Trump as it gets. 

[Limey]

It’s now being reported that Trump ordered Acting Chief of Everything Mulvaney, days before calling Zelensky, to put the military aid to Ukraine on hold.  The guns in this circular firing squad are all smoking. 

[Waldo]

It’s now being reported that Trump ordered Acting Chief of Everything Mulvaney, days before calling Zelensky, to put the military aid to Ukraine on hold.  The guns in this circular firing squad are all smoking.

There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower.  Strange bedfellows, etc.

[jbm]

There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower.  Strange bedfellows, etc.

Well, at least we can all agree that he is a raging Democrat.

[Limey]

There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower.  Strange bedfellows, etc.

That would be AWESOME!

[MusicMan]

Pelosi has called a 5 pm press conference. Rumored to be forming a Select Committee on Impeachment.


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[Limey]

⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️⬆️

Pelosi is expected to state she is full force behind impeachment.

Meanwhile, Trump says he’ll release the transcript of the call in question soon.  Expect the full exoneration victory lap moments thereafter. 

Schumer is introducing a Senate resolution calling for the release of the whistleblower complaint; McConnell supposedly is not going to object. 

Schiff says that he is discussions with the whistleblower’s lawyer and that he may testify before the House as early as this week (I’m guessing in a closed setting). 

[Limey]

There's also speculation that John Bolton is the whistleblower.  Strange bedfellows, etc.

If it’s Bolton, for whom I have had zero respect, he will get some from me going forward for doing what none of the other current and fired administration officials have done: come forward with the truth of what they know about this dangerously corrupt president. 

[Waldo]

I should add the caveat that the Bolton speculation I saw was only on Twitter (so far), but some journalists there found it plausible.

[jbm]

I stopped listening to Pelosi’s address as she totally lacks the rhetorical power of persuasion. She is terrible, IMO: this isn’t about whistleblowing; this is about what should be a clearly understandable abuse of Presidential power. 

Don’t muddy the fucking waters.

[Waldo]

The Senate apparently unanimously passed a resolution demanding that they see the whistleblower complaint.  McConnell mentioned the need for "bipartisan oversight of intelligence matters".  Is he finally seeing which way the wind is blowing?

[austro]

They'd better make damn sure they've got a big enough gun to do the job. Nothing could be worse heading into the election than to hold impeachment proceedings and then have him skate.

[Limey]

The Senate apparently unanimously passed a resolution demanding that they see the whistleblower complaint.  McConnell mentioned the need for "bipartisan oversight of intelligence matters".  Is he finally seeing which way the wind is blowing?

Yes.   He’s seeing his gavel getting shoved up his arse next November.  Which has a number of knock on effects including him and his wife going to jail. 

[Limey]

They'd better make damn sure they've got a big enough gun to do the job. Nothing could be worse heading into the election than to hold impeachment proceedings and then have him skate.

The Senate is still highly unlikely to convict.  I fully expect them to deploy the Nixon model by which he resigns and Pence* pardons him.  I think this will happen quickly. 

* Karen “Mother” Pence has just joined Twitter and is now being “positioned” on social media.  They expect her to be First Lady sometime soon. 


The difference here is that I doubt the State of New York is going to back off and there’s nothing Pence or any of them can do about it. 

[Limey]

From Twitter:

Congrats to Trump on finally being fucked by a woman his own age.

[chuck]

From Twitter:

I saw another one that was basically Impeachment is the first thing Trump has actually earned.

[austro]

I wonder if he'll be released from prison to receive his Nobel Prize.

[jbm]

Recent history repeating itself.

Trump claims he will release the transcript of one call and the whistleblower complaint. The press jumps all over it, trying to figure out if this one “transcript” is a smoking gun.  Of course, it is likely doctored by the White House, incomplete and most importantly, one piece of what will be a lot of evidence.  The strategic release of this incomplete evidence will provide an opportunity for Trump and his minions to put out the smokescreens and build up tribal passions.

Next, they will delay the release of the complaint for bogus reasons and delay any other evidence from coming out, thereby stalling and stringing out the investigation and allowing them time to distract from the central abuse of power.

I know that the press in unable to keep their eye on any ball for long, but I sure hope Dems can.

[MusicMan]

The “transcript” is five pages long for a half hour call.

Any reporter referring to this as a “transcript” is committing journalistic malpractice.


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[Bench]

The call notes are a lot more incriminating than I expected. Everything from in response to being thanked for the promised aid, Trump says "I would like you to do us a favor though" and investigate Biden ("Biden went around bragging that he stopped the prosecution so if you can look into it...") to the Ukrainian President saying "I stayed at Trump Tower!"

I imagine the actual conversation was much more blatant.

[Bench]

And then there's the part where Trump seems to think that Hillary's server is in Ukraine and wants to Ukrainian president to find it. What the fuck.

Here's the document the white house released: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Unclassified09.2019.pdf

[Knoxbanedoodle]

And then there's the part where Trump seems to think that Hillary's server is in Ukraine and wants to Ukrainian president to find it. What the fuck.

Here's the document the white house released: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/Unclassified09.2019.pdf

Surreal.

[MusicMan]

“Nancy Pelosi is no longer Speaker of the House.”

Is mental incapacity an affirmative defense to impeachable offenses?


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[Lefty]

“Nancy Pelosi is no longer Speaker of the House.”

Is mental incapacity an affirmative defense to impeachable offenses?


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Isn't the under the purview of the 25th? amendment?

[Limey]

Schiff has now seen the whistleblower's complaint and called it "serious" and "disturbing".  I think we'll get to see it soon and/or hear from its author in open testimony.  The read-out from the call was pretty damining in and of itself, when you consider that we're not dealing with something that needs to rise to the level of criminal culpability; it's just about whether Trump used the power of his office for personal gain and that's pretty fucking glaringly obvious from what we know and what Trump has admitted to.

This has gained traction I think for a few reasons:  it's simple, its self-contained and its immune to the customary waffling and gaslighting that has withered previous scandals.  Even Trump's tactic of airing it out to make it seem innocuous hasn't worked, and his band of flying Trumpanzees have not been able to usurp the narrative.  Hillary's server?  Seriously?  Even Steve Douchey said this morning that he hopes there's something else because what there is right now is really bad.

Meanwhile, the release of the readout itself has been a diplomatic disaster, because Zelenskiy wasn't expecting his side of the conversation to be released.  This White House is just really bad at everything.

Lastly, Trump is obviously the big fish here, but it also has the potential to take down Pence, Pompisspot, Giuferatu, Barr and maybe others, who all participated in the crime and/or the cover up.

[Limey]

My Congressman, Dan Crenshaw, just tweeted this:

This impeachment inquiry seems worse for Biden than it is for Trump.

Now the Hunter Biden-Ukraine issue is on everyone’s radar AND we know that Democrats overstepped with their ”quid pro quo” accusation.

Have to wonder whether they did this to help Warren/Sanders..? 🤔

I guess he ran out of characters before he could shoehorn "emails" in there.  What a tool (PS, I told him so).

[HudsonHawk]

If Trump is impeached, he may well win all 50 states in 2020.  It will be a landslide of Reagan proportions. 

Crenshaw is an embarrassment. 

[Limey]

If Trump is impeached, he may well win all 50 states in 2020.  It will be a landslide of Reagan proportions. 

Crenshaw is an embarrassment.

Grudgingly, I have to admit that impeaching Trump for any of his many, many previous impeachable offenses had a lot of risk attached, because they were all wonky and nebulous crimes, many of which were before he took office (which shouldn't matter but it does).  This, on the other hand, is Trump threatening another country to go after his political opponent in the confines of a single phone call.  Everyone has watched the Godfather or The Sopranos, and so everyone recognizes the implicit threat in Trump's words to Zelensiy.  He's been caught red-handed and in real time.  His base won't move, but they don't matter, I don't see people who were on the fence over Trump deciding to vote for him because he was impeached.

[Limey]

Speaking of Biden, he has been hiding behind Pelosi's skirt this whole time and continues to do so.  He's not up to the task and - with Trump likely gone or severely hobbled - it's no longer about beating Trump, it's about motivating voters to go out there and run the table.  Biden is not that candidate, and neither is Bernie.

Meanwhile, Warren has been out in front of this from the get-go, has run an excellent campaign with a strong mix of policy, grievance and hope.  She is also bursting to the front in Iowa polls and moving up nationally.  It's starting to look like it's hers to lose.

[austro]

Speaking of Biden, he has been hiding behind Pelosi's skirt this whole time and continues to do so.  He's not up to the task and - with Trump likely gone or severely hobbled - it's no longer about beating Trump, it's about motivating voters to go out there and run the table.  Biden is not that candidate, and neither is Bernie.

You're a lot more optimistic about this process than I am. I think it's a huge risk, and there's the chance that it will galvanize his base and some of the fence-sitters, making sure that every single one of them votes. Combined with the usual Dem complacency, you could have a repeat of 2016, where the popular vote goes against him but he wins the EC. And then you'll *truly* see a maniac unleashed. Not to mention that RBG won't last six more years.

[jbm]

I don’t get this fear at all. Being impeached for this isn’t going to help him. Seriously, anyone who is moved toward Trump by this was already a solid Trump voter already.

Democrats need to exercise some muscles and get in the ring once in a while.

Btw, I agree that Warren benefits from this the most, both cause she has balls and because it fits neatly into her anti-corruption themes.

[Limey]

Democrats need to exercise some muscles and get in the ring once in a while.

If they do nothing, the6 have no platform on which to campaign in 2020.  People aren’t going to be enthusiastic about two more years of tutting on TV.

[HudsonHawk]

I don't see people who were on the fence over Trump deciding to vote for him because he was impeached.

Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base.  He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton.  They will do the same if Trump is impeached. 

[Knoxbanedoodle]

I don’t get this fear at all. Being impeached for this isn’t going to help him. Seriously, anyone who is moved toward Trump by this was already a solid Trump voter already.

Democrats need to exercise some muscles and get in the ring once in a while.

Btw, I agree that Warren benefits from this the most, both cause she has balls and because it fits neatly into her anti-corruption themes.

Me too.

[Knoxbanedoodle]

Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base.  He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton.  They will do the same if Trump is impeached.

He deserves to be impeached. Grow a pair and do the right thing.

ETA: I am happy the dems seem to be growing a pair. I am not impugning the testicular presence of persons here. Not yet.

[Limey]

Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base.  He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton.  They will do the same if Trump is impeached.

He won because Hillary was a bad candidate who was politically calculating to a fault.  That’s also why she lost to Obama.

[Knoxbanedoodle]

He won because Hillary was a bad candidate who was politically calculating to a fault.  That’s also why she lost to Obama.

"Politically calculating to a fault" seems to nicely encapsulate a hearty chunk of democratic voters.

[HudsonHawk]

He deserves to be impeached. Grow a pair and do the right thing.

ETA: I am happy the dems seem to be growing a pair. I am not impugning the testicular presence of persons here. Not yet.

Settle down, Beavis. I haven’t argued he doesn’t. I’m making the observation that doing so will ensure his re-election.

[Limey]

The whistleblower’s complaint has been declassified.  Keep an eye out for it being released publicly. 

[TeeJoe]

He deserves to be impeached.

This is too true...

[TeeJoe]

Trump did not win in 2016 because of his base.  He won because a huge portion of the "on the fencers" voted against Hillary Clinton.  They will do the same if Trump is impeached.

I'm not a fence sitter when it comes to Trump, but Socialism is a sticking point for me and many other independent voters out there. Democrats, at least in the debates have shifted towards embracing many socialist platforms that independent voters won't support. Not saying I can support Trumps either though...arg...

[HudsonHawk]

I'm not a fence sitter when it comes to Trump, but Socialism is a sticking point for me and many other independent voters out there. Democrats, at least in the debates have shifted towards embracing many socialist platforms that independent voters won't support. Not saying I can support Trumps either though...arg...

"Socialism" is just a dog whistle of the right to justify racism and maintain their class privilege.  The vast majority of American already embrace these socialist" planks, including things like Social Security, Medicare, and socialized health insurance.  The right uses the term to scare people by saying "vote for X, and you'll end up in Venezuela".  Unfortunately, the ignorant masses of electorate buy into it.  Fear is a powerful motivator. 

[jbm]

I just tuned in to this guy’s testimony. I realize he was in an extremely tough position, but Schiff is eating him alive, in a very sedate manner. The Dems should give all their time for questioning to him, as he’s one of their few professionals.

[Limey]

Maguire’s FIRST action upon receiving the whistleblower complaint about the White House...was to take it to the White House!!!

Also, there is a word-for-word actual transcript of the call that White House attorneys decided to deep-six in super-secret storage because it’s so bad.  There are more than just this one...

Dog One is open.  I repeat, Dog One is open.

[HudsonHawk]

Maguire’s FIRST action upon receiving the whistleblower complaint about the White House...was to take it to the White House!!!

Also, there is a word-for-word actual transcript of the call that White House attorneys decided to deep-six in super-secret storage because it’s so bad.  There are more than just this one...

Dog One is open.  I repeat, Dog One is open.

Now if Trump will just get a blowjob from a chubby intern, the Wingnuts will be ready to throw him in jail. 

[Bench]

Settle down, Beavis. I haven’t argued he doesn’t. I’m making the observation that doing so will ensure his re-election.

I just don't follow the logic. How would airing corrupt ineptitude make people vote for him who wouldn't already?

[Limey]

I just don't follow the logic. How would airing corrupt ineptitude make people vote for him who wouldn't already?

There’s a lot of misinterpretation of the aftermaths of the Nixon and Clinton impeachments.

Clinton’s was obviously politically motivated and it cost the GOP the House that they’d just won back.  Clinton was re-elected, but was left with enough stank on him that Gore pretended not to know him - despite Clinton still being a popular figure at the time - and promptly lost in that Florida shitshow that likely doesn’t happen if Gore had felt he was able to embrace Clinton. 

Republicans turning on Nixon, late in an mid-term election year, was what forced him to resign.  The GOP still got trounced that November and Carter won the White House thereafter. 

A Trump impeachment is far more akin to Nixon than Clinton, but it’s not like Clinton’s impeachment didn’t leave a mark either. 

[TeeJoe]

"Socialism" is just a dog whistle of the right to justify racism and maintain their class privilege.  The vast majority of American already embrace these socialist" planks, including things like Social Security, Medicare, and socialized health insurance.  The right uses the term to scare people by saying "vote for X, and you'll end up in Venezuela".  Unfortunately, the ignorant masses of electorate buy into it.  Fear is a powerful motivator.

You really think that Independent voters are for canceling student debt, free college, Medicare for all, UBI, reparations...etc?

[HudsonHawk]

I just don't follow the logic. How would airing corrupt ineptitude make people vote for him who wouldn't already?

The problem is you're trying to use logic.  Stop that.

Impeachment is bad.  Very bad.  It's an admission that your elected officials have betrayed you and it's a permanent black mark on democracy as a whole, so there better be a damn good reason for it.  Getting a blowjob, or little bits of corruption, do not rise to the level that would make most people accept that tradeoff.  It has to be far, far worse than simply encouraging meddling in the election.  Unless there are Russian tanks rolling down Pennsylvania Avenue, it will simply piss people off.  Their reaction is not logical. 

[HudsonHawk]

You really think that Independent voters are for canceling student debt, free college, Medicare for all, UBI, reparations...etc?

Most reasonable people are for fixing these problems.  The right refuses to acknowledge there are problems, or if they do, they blame it on people of a different skin color, immigrants or Jews/Muslims, or what have you.  They want to burn down the huts of the troublemaking poor. 

[Bench]

There’s a lot of misinterpretation of the aftermaths of the Nixon and Clinton impeachments.

Clinton’s was obviously politically motivated and it cost the GOP the House that they’d just won back.  Clinton was re-elected, but was left with enough stank on him that Gore pretended not to know him - despite Clinton still being a popular figure at the time - and promptly lost in that Florida shitshow that likely doesn’t happen if Gore had felt he was able to embrace Clinton. 

Republicans turning on Nixon, late in an mid-term election year, was what forced him to resign.  The GOP still got trounced that November and Carter won the White House thereafter. 

A Trump impeachment is far more akin to Nixon than Clinton, but it’s not like Clinton’s impeachment didn’t leave a mark either.

The Clinton impeachment was in his second term.

But I agree with you that this impeachment is much more akin to Nixon than Clinton.

[TeeJoe]

Most reasonable people are for fixing these problems.  The right refuses to acknowledge there are problems, or if they do, they blame it on people of a different skin color, immigrants or Jews/Muslims, or what have you.  They want to burn down the huts of the troublemaking poor.

Fixing and what has been put forth are 2 different animals IMO. 

You keep mentioning the right so I'm thinking you missed my point of the need for independent voters to secure the electoral vote.

The left keeps shifting further left while the right shifts further right. That's has the potential to leave a larger majority in the middle.

[jbm]

The problem is you're trying to use logic.  Stop that.

Impeachment is bad.  Very bad.  It's an admission that your elected officials have betrayed you and it's a permanent black mark on democracy as a whole, so there better be a damn good reason for it.  Getting a blowjob, or little bits of corruption, do not rise to the level that would make most people accept that tradeoff.  It has to be far, far worse than simply encouraging meddling in the election.  Unless there are Russian tanks rolling down Pennsylvania Avenue, it will simply piss people off.  Their reaction is not logical.

I agree that logic doesn’t predominate.  Thus, your conclusion may yet become true.  But, I doubt most people will see “simply encouraging meddling in the election” as insignificant. It fits neatly into populist anger that the system is unfair, and used and abused by the powerful to their advantage.

[HudsonHawk]

Fixing and what has been put forth are 2 different animals IMO. 

This is what you're being told, correct.

You keep mentioning the right so I'm thinking you missed my point of the need for independent voters to secure the electoral vote.

The left keeps shifting further left while the right shifts further right. That's has the potential to leave a larger majority in the middle.

My point is that the right preys on the independent voter by invoking fear, and it's successful strategy for them.  "Sure, healthcare is expensive, but if you try to make it available to everyone, you'll all be dying in the streets from dysentery and ingrown toenails.  If you don't build a wall, the Mexicans will be stampeding your daughters and raping your cattle.  If you try to educate everyone, some immigrant will take your job and you'll be reduced to eating dirt with no shoes on.  If you accept Muslims, you'll all be stoned to death for wearing a tshirt with the American flag on it while your women are sold into sexual slavery..."  Well who the hell wants any of that?

[HudsonHawk]

I agree that logic doesn’t predominate.  Thus, your conclusion may yet become true.  But, I doubt most people will see “simply encouraging meddling in the election” as insignificant. It fits neatly into populist anger that the system is unfair, and used and abused by the powerful to their advantage.

You're assuming people will believe it in the first place.  A bold assumption, IMO.

[TeeJoe]

This is what you're being told, correct.

Nope

My point is that the right preys on the independent voter by invoking fear, and it's successful strategy for them.  "Sure, healthcare is expensive, but if you try to make it available to everyone, you'll all be dying in the streets from dysentery and ingrown toenails.  If you don't build a wall, the Mexicans will be stampeding your daughters and raping your cattle.  If you try to educate everyone, some immigrant will take your job and you'll be reduced to eating dirt with no shoes on.  If you accept Muslims, you'll all be stoned to death for wearing a tshirt with the American flag on it while your women are sold into sexual slavery..."  Well who the hell wants any of that?
[/quote]I haven't been told any of that. Maybe I don't know any real Republicans if that's how real Republicans think.

[HudsonHawk]

I haven't been told any of that. Maybe I don't know any real Republicans if that's how real Republicans think.

We've all been told that.  Not all of us believe I=]-[0pol but a substantial majority of "independents" play the devil-I-know game. 

And so to pick a common topic...what is your objection to universal health care?

[Waldo]

I haven't been told any of that. Maybe I don't know any real Republicans if that's how real Republicans think.

You don't remember any of the "death panels" horseshit Republicans peddled during the 2008 campaign and Obama's first term?

[TeeJoe]

You don't remember any of the "death panels" horseshit Republicans peddled during the 2008 campaign and Obama's first term?

I do. It wasn't stated as funny as HH said it though.

I also remember being told “If you like your health-care plan, you’ll be able to keep your health-care plan, period. No one will take it away, no matter what.”. 

The Repubs don't have the market cornered on horseshit.

[TeeJoe]

We've all been told that.  Not all of us believe I=]-[0pol but a substantial majority of "independents" play the devil-I-know game. 

And so to pick a common topic...what is your objection to universal health care?

Ok, but in this case 2 is better than 1…How about I pick 2 of my greater objections.

Cancelling student debt & free college. I agree that the price to go to college is a problem.  I do not agree at all that cancelling student debt and free college is a good way to proceed.

1st is the cost. No one has a good plan on how to pay for this. Raising taxes for the top earners I do not believe will be enough to both cancel the existing debt and pay for free college.

2nd is that from some experience. I have 2 family members with a lot of student loan debt. Family member 1 owes +$100,000. Family member 2 owes +$20,000. Family member 1 went on to get his masters in a worthless degree that family member 1 has never worked at. Family member 2 got a 4 year degree. Neither family member has much motivation of paying off the debt…That’s bad enough but here’s where I get really torqued. Family member 1 borrowed and used student loans to pay for “living expenses”.  Some of that living expense debt used from student loans was for the coolest shoes out that everyone was wearing, eating out with friends…other non-tuition stuffs. That’s so foolish of family member 1…but then family member 2 says hold my beer! Family member 2 went and used some of the loaned money to go to the Cracklin Festival in Lafayette that family member 2 REALLY wanted to go to but didn’t have the cash. Way to go family member 2. Inventive!

Some stats I pulled from the web:

A Student Loan Hero survey found that 20% of students use their student loan funds for travel and 26% use them for clothes. Only 10% use student loan funds just for tuition.

What the heck is the other 44% going to?

Would I like them to be debt free? Sure.
Do I want to raise anyone’s taxes (even evil Mr. Burns) to pay for this? Nope

[Knoxbanedoodle]

I'm not a fence sitter when it comes to Trump, but Socialism is a sticking point for me and many other independent voters out there. Democrats, at least in the debates have shifted towards embracing many socialist platforms that independent voters won't support. Not saying I can support Trumps either though...arg...

Here's what I don't get: if you're convinced you're going to lose either way, what's wrong with a principled vote for a third party or independent candidate? There's bound to be one. 

[HudsonHawk]

Would I like them to be debt free? Sure.
Do I want to raise anyone’s taxes (even evil Mr. Burns) to pay for this? Nope

So what is your stance on this?  Do you think "they made their bed, now must lie in it", or do you think there should be some way to get them out of their mess, even though it was of their own making?  Secondly, if it's the latter, what is your proposal?

[HudsonHawk]

Some stats I pulled from the web:
What the heck is the other 44% going to?

I'm guessing a substantial portion of student loans go to pay room and board, books, misc fees, etc...the other general costs of college.  But I don't have any stats to back that up. 

[TeeJoe]

So what is your stance on this?  Do you think "they made their bed, now must lie in it", or do you think there should be some way to get them out of their mess, even though it was of their own making?  Secondly, if it's the latter, what is your proposal?

Hard work and living within your means won't kill them. Their mess and their responsibility to fix it. I'm not going to pull money out of the pocket of someone else to fix their stupid. They were adults when those decisions were made.   

[Knoxbanedoodle]

Ok, but in this case 2 is better than 1…How about I pick 2 of my greater objections.

Cancelling student debt & free college. I agree that the price to go to college is a problem.  I do not agree at all that cancelling student debt and free college is a good way to proceed.

1st is the cost. No one has a good plan on how to pay for this. Raising taxes for the top earners I do not believe will be enough to both cancel the existing debt and pay for free college.

2nd is that from some experience. I have 2 family members with a lot of student loan debt. Family member 1 owes +$100,000. Family member 2 owes +$20,000. Family member 1 went on to get his masters in a worthless degree that family member 1 has never worked at. Family member 2 got a 4 year degree. Neither family member has much motivation of paying off the debt…That’s bad enough but here’s where I get really torqued. Family member 1 borrowed and used student loans to pay for “living expenses”.  Some of that living expense debt used from student loans was for the coolest shoes out that everyone was wearing, eating out with friends…other non-tuition stuffs. That’s so foolish of family member 1…but then family member 2 says hold my beer! Family member 2 went and used some of the loaned money to go to the Cracklin Festival in Lafayette that family member 2 REALLY wanted to go to but didn’t have the cash. Way to go family member 2. Inventive!

Some stats I pulled from the web:
What the heck is the other 44% going to?

Would I like them to be debt free? Sure.
Do I want to raise anyone’s taxes (even evil Mr. Burns) to pay for this? Nope

I don't know about this, but when I got college loans for a seemingly worthless grad degree (that eventually proved quite valuable) they were federal Stafford loans and what I could spend them on was very proscribed. I couldn't buy anything that wasn't directly academic. I couldn't use them for rent, even, and we were deeply underwater trying to make ends meet on Long Island.

They are all paid off now, because we were lucky enough to have a small inheritance that enabled us to buy a house for a good price at the right time in a good market. If not for my grandparents'-in-law's foresight and munificence they'd be looming over us for the next lots and lots of years.

And also, just food for thought: people racked up a lot less student debt when college tuitions were more heavily subsidized from higher taxes. It drives me nuts, all these guys who got 100k degrees for cents on the dollar and then got out and cut their own taxes.

[TeeJoe]

I'm guessing a substantial portion of student loans go to pay room and board, books, misc fees, etc...the other general costs of college.  But I don't have any stats to back that up.

I have no idea, but found this as showing a great deal of the money is being used frivolously.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1140908.pdf

[TeeJoe]

I don't know about this, but when I got college loans for a seemingly worthless grad degree (that eventually proved quite valuable) they were federal Stafford loans and what I could spend them on was very proscribed. I couldn't buy anything that wasn't directly academic. I couldn't use them for rent, even, and we were deeply underwater trying to make ends meet on Long Island.

They are all paid off now, because we were lucky enough to have a small inheritance that enabled us to buy a house for a good price at the right time in a good market. If not for my grandparents'-in-law's foresight and munificence they'd be looming over us for the next lots and lots of years.

And also, just food for thought: people racked up a lot less student debt when college tuitions were more heavily subsidized from higher taxes. It drives me nuts, all these guys who got 100k degrees for cents on the dollar and then got out and cut their own taxes.

Glad you were able to get yours paid off!

As far as you not being able to use them for anything other than academics I have no idea.
This seems to back up that some loans aren't as regulated as what yours were.
https://studentloanhero.com/featured/what-can-i-spend-student-loans-on/

[TeeJoe]

Here's what I don't get: if you're convinced you're going to lose either way, what's wrong with a principled vote for a third party or independent candidate? There's bound to be one.

Have you read the platforms from some of the 3rd party candidates?

Guess what I'm trying to say, is that if the Democrats could run a candidate that's closer to the center, myself and many other independents would probably be in. 

[Limey]

The Clinton impeachment was in his second term.

Oops, yes.  Thanks for the correction. 

[Waldo]

I have no idea, but found this as showing a great deal of the money is being used frivolously.
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1140908.pdf

To be fair, that study finds that only 23% of students surveyed used any student loan money for any non-educational stuff.  It doesn't attempt to itemize which categories students spent their loan money on (about 1/3 of those categories are perfectly defensible), nor does it attempt to ascertain how much money students spent in each of those categories, from their loans or otherwise.

Besides, this doesn't have to be binary.  It can be possible that 1) some students use loan money frivolously, and 2) tuition is too expensive.

[TeeJoe]

To be fair, that study finds that only 23% of students surveyed used any student loan money for any non-educational stuff.  It doesn't attempt to itemize which categories students spent their loan money on (about 1/3 of those categories are perfectly defensible), nor does it attempt to ascertain how much money students spent in each of those categories, from their loans or otherwise.

I see. Thanks for pointing that out

Besides, this doesn't have to be binary.  It can be possible that 1) some students use loan money frivolously, and 2) tuition is too expensive.

I can completely agree with this.