This sounds like a real winner politically:
A draft House Republican repeal bill would dismantle Obamacare subsidies and scrap its Medicaid expansion, according to a copy of the proposal obtained by POLITICO.
The legislation would take down the foundation of Obamacare, including the unpopular individual mandate, subsidies based on people’s income, and all of the law’s taxes. It would significantly roll back Medicaid spending and give states money to create high-risk pools for some people with pre-existing conditions. Some elements would be effective right away; others not until 2020.
The replacement would be paid for by limiting tax breaks on generous health plans people get at work — an idea that is similar to the Obamacare “Cadillac tax” that Republicans have fought to repeal.
Baud
Jeez does it also give all Americans scurvy?
JPL
The taxes also extend the full solvency of medicare by eleven years. Suck on that seniors, that voted for the assholes. .
I guess I’m still a tad angry.
Betty Cracker
Republicans fought the ACA tooth and nail because they understood that if it passed and became entrenched in people’s lives, they’d never be able to dismantle it. I guess they think the election of an obviously unqualified conman made all the old constraints obsolete. They must think so because they are betting their political lives on it.
Lurking Canadian
Wait. Get rid of everything people like, (okay, and one thing (the mandate) they don’t like), but KEEP the cadillac taxes? It’s like they had a party game to see who could come up with the most hated replacement. I’m cautiously optimistic that this version won’t make it through the Senate.
Kilgore Trout
@Lurking Canadian:
I’m not sure this will make it through the house, no way it gets through the Senate.
hovercraft
@JPL:
Between this post and the last one it is very clear that all of this is going to hurt their base a lot harder than the rest of us. We already knew this but they believed the lies and now they’re suddenly realizing that they are the moochers they’ve been bitching about for 6 years. Karma.
David Anderson
@Kilgore Trout: I can’t see how it gets through the Senate. I am seeing elements that knock out at least 6+ GOP Senators and universal Democratic opposition. I can’t count to 50 with this bill
Kyle
Here’s what we will wind up with: Some minimally tweaked version of Obamacare, but with the GOP saying that Obamacare was repealed and replaced its new plan.
MattF
Increase taxes on the middle class, reduce taxes on the wealthy, take healthcare insurance away from those who need it most… and any news source that documents all this is a purveyor of fake news, an enemy of the people.
trollhattan
Has anybody uncovered a provision requiring Medicaid recipients to first swallow a pint of ground glass suspended in battery acid? Pretty sure it’s in there.
Major Major Major Major
@Kyle: That’s what Boehner says will happen.
hovercraft
@Kilgore Trout:
I expect to see ads with locals like this all over the country.
pamelabrown53
@Betty Cracker: #3
I’m seeing that republicans want to MAGA by instituting a (Putin-like Christian fundamentalist kleptocracy, feudalism and the romanticized versions of the wild, wild west.
The good news, is that too many folks are helped by provisions of Obamacare/ACA for this to go down without a fight. My guess is that a lot of folks who get their insurance via employers, don’t yet understand how the bill protects and helps them.
piratedan
… sure he saved my life, rescued the economy, killed Bin Laden… but he’s black and that makes me feel slightly uneasy… I feel much safer with a guy who cheats on his wife, stiffs his contractors and is a complete asshat, HIM, I understand and know.
scottinnj
@hovercraft: “Keep the Government Out Of My Obamacare”
trollhattan
Here’s a senior care provision I bet Trump can really support! I certainly do.
pamelabrown53
@Kyle: #8.
I hope you’re correct that we’ll end up with a “tweaked version of Obamacare”, because I don’t care what they call it to con the rubes. My main concern is that there seems to be a strong strain of cruelty for it’s own sake in many elected republicans who have neither the desire nor knowledge to effect policy.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
The ACA repeal has always been income redistribution and nothing about health care. This draft plan pretty much tracks along those lines.
It’s akin to the forced birthers stance: it’s nothing more than a dog whistle since the real goal is to take away all reproductive rights for women so as to punish the sluts and keep the married ones barefoot, pregnant and chained to the bed with just enough slack to get to the kitchen.
Income redistribution upward. All the verbiage around it is simply a distraction.
Miss Bianca
@piratedan: don’t tell me, let me guess…you pitched this copy for the script and the producer threw you out of the office?
? Martin
Ignore any proposals out of the House. They’re trying to split the baby between the freedom caucus that wants to repeal everything and the more moderate Republicans that know they’ll lose their seat if that happens. Meanwhile, the reality in the Senate is 60 votes and Chuck won’t give an inch on that. The House is back to doing symbolic votes.
trollhattan
@pamelabrown53:
The more I learn of Trump’s advisers (even moreso than the actual cabinet) the more I believe this to be the case. In 2001 it was the unleashing of the neocons, now it’s the unleashing of the misanthropes–most of whom are also sociopaths.
Major Major Major Major
@? Martin: It’s a reconciliation bill.
JPL
@piratedan: This morning President Obama was in NYC for a meeting. A few hundred people waited outside until his departure, and yes he was treated with the praise he deserved.
link
Brachiator
What is this GOP obsession with high-risk pools as the solution to the health insurance issue?
JPL
@Brachiator: The GOP members of the pro-life party, seem to have a problem supporting the living. Who knows why?
Major Major Major Major
@Brachiator: Sounds like something, does nothing.
? Martin
Meanwhile in California:
1) The state legislature is moving ahead with a series of bills that will codify existing federal rules into state law so that a federal repeal won’t have a material change on the state. These include labor laws (transgender protections, overtime, etc.) environmental laws (basically shift the existing clean air and water protections to the state) and development laws – blocking private development on federal lands.
2) Cities are building infrastructure for legal representation of residents subject to deportation. We are beginning to raise funds to pay for legal fees. Starting organizers are the UC law schools, the ACLU, and the Mexican consulate. They will coordinate with city and state officials to identify individuals swept up in raids and ensure they get legal council. They will also challenge the legality of the raids.
? Martin
@Major Major Major Major: Still won’t get through the Senate.
Patricia Kayden
So Repubs are repealing the ACA after all. That’s pretty much what they’re doing by destroying it so that it doesn’t work. Good to know.
PaulW
@Baud:
yes.
Jeffro
@Kilgore Trout:
I was just gonna say…
Repubs can pass their vicious, spiteful little anti-O-bummer plans all they want…heck, why not call them “Tire Rims and Anthrax in Every Medicine Cabinet”, we’re getting close to that…but their own House members are split on this, and no way no how would the Senate go for this crap.
PaulW
@? Martin:
this is a Republican Senate. Never underestimate the wingnuts’ desire to destroy the federal gov’t at all hazards.
I’ll believe it when enough GOP Senators DO stand up and vote NO on this plan.
Peale
@Brachiator: Its nothing. Everyone pretty much knows someone from the “good old days” before Obamacare that lost insurance when they were sick or couldn’t get insurance to cover a pre-existing condition. The “High Risk Pools” are a sop that will make some voters think that republicans care about those problems.
Raven Onthill
@Kyle: that would be sensible. Given who is in charge right now, well… And remember that Tom Price is in charge of implementing the law, even if it is not repealed.
PaulW
@JPL:
Because enough of the living vote Democratic.
TenguPhule
@Baud: Too plebian.
Obviously it has to be Black Plague.
Jeffro
@Brachiator:
Get the high-risk (read: high-cost) folks into their own pool…brings down costs for everyone else…then you let time (no COL increases) and/or actual cuts to the high-risk pool subsidies help starve that group until they’re essentially paying out of pocket for their own care (meaning usually, going bankrupt). Sure a lot of people die unnecessarily, but when has that ever stopped the Randians?
Also, what Peale said a few comments back
TenguPhule
@Betty Cracker:
They’ve already done that after the Primaries. They have no choice but to double down now or die. And I don’t mean just politically.
TenguPhule
@Kilgore Trout: If it does, it means the GOP has stopped worrying about elections ever again. Which is a bad sign.
Brachiator
@Betty Cracker:
Well, yes. You kinda nailed it.
Trump himself has proudly, boastfully declared that the old constraints are obsolete. He is Donald Unbound, and the Republicans are going to march with him either into glory or their doom.
hovercraft
@Brachiator:
Because it’s cheap, it doesn’t involve a lot of revenue from the government, it shafts the people in them, because of the concentration of sick people the out of pocket expenses are astronomical, rich people will be able to take care of themselves, the rest of us not so much, oh well.
Like “dynamic scoring” and tort reform, t’s just smoke and mirrors, it solves nothing because most people cannot afford the premiums and or the deductibles, just as tort reform barley moves the needle, they have to have “policy proposals” to counter democratic solutions, but it solves nothing.
ETA: What Major 4X said
p.a.
@piratedan:
That’s who a lot of the male WWC want to be. (I’m WWC, so I’ve seen it. Also too, how ’bout callg ’em what they really are; WWWC: whiny white working class.)
Jibeaux
It’s hard to see how anything dramatic gets passed. One thing we learned from 2009, people really do not like anything threatening their coverage.
Totally off topic, I am thinking of getting my high school son a cologne for dances and nice events. Currently his best case scenario is smelling like deodorant. Someshing not overwhelming, but nice and available in small quantities. Any recommendations? I actually don’t like women’s perfume but sometimes I catch a c
ologne I like, I just don’t know any names.
Major Major Major Major
@? Martin: I was just clarifying.
germy
Is this what the gentleman meant when he talked about ‘deconstructing the administrative state’?
hovercraft
@Patricia Kayden:
They say they are, but I’d say it depends on how loud the protests get. Remember the changes would mostly be for next year, because the Freedom Caucus won’t vote for the gradual implementation, which means that they would be taking away these benefits in an election year. I don’t think so.
? Martin
People should start to take some time to read about the border adjustment tax being floated. It’s not necessarily a bad idea, but it does have some subtle complications.
Effectively it’s a one-sided VAT that shift some of the tax burden from where a good is made to where it is sold. If you make something in the US and export it, you pay no tax. If you make it outside the US and import it, you pay the tax. If you import parts and assemble it in the US and sell it in the US, you pay the tax on the value of the parts, but not on the value added within the US.
There are warnings that the WTO would reject it as a tariff, but I think those are unfounded. It’s a limited form of existing VATs found around the world so I think that can be overcome.
On its face it sounds like it would help move jobs to the US, but like most things I’ll likely have a mixed impact of wiping out roughly as many jobs as it might create. What is likely to happen is that once the BAT goes into effect, the dollar would rise against other currencies because of the resulting shift in value of goods. That will make US exports more expensive (offsetting the benefits of not paying the tax) and imports less expensive (roughly to the tune of the size of the BAT negating it’s incentive value). So, no net change to manufacturers, just a change to where the dollars are being handed. No net change to federal revenues either because the added revenue coming on imports covers the lost corporate taxes for exports. But that currency change is likely to be slow to happen, so you’ll have a near-term surge in the cost of imports (some food, clothing, steel, consumer devices, medicine, etc.) and a near-term benefit for exporters. That’s bad news for an already weak retail sector. For every manufacturing job you might gain, you’re probably going to lose a retail job. And if you look at any such shift in the industry as a capex opportunity (if you need to build or retool a local factory to shift manufacturing into it) that’s the very moment they’ll look to automate which might negate the job anyway.
LAO
I know this isn’t the “correct” thread. But this seems crazy, no?
Davis X. Machina
@? Martin: This is what the northern states did after the Compromise of 1850 strengthened the Fugitive Slave Act. Passed state personal-liberty laws,
? Martin
@Major Major Major Major: Thank you for clarifying. It’s an important detail, no question.
germy
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
OT. I guess Iceland is the new vacation place to gripe about. From Gizmodo:
? Martin
@Davis X. Machina: Yep. Like I said, Democrats are going to think the 10th amendment is the greatest thing ever for the next few years.
Davis X. Machina
@LAO: Performative. Pure symbolism.
Designed to make them look tough for the base. Freak out — maybe — cowardly C-suites of parent orgs.
As far as coverage goes, it’s just going to further incentivize the banned outlets, and identify which ones are most leakworthy, if the leakers haven’t already worked that out.
germy
@Brachiator:
EdTheRed
I said, “Jesus Christ! Where’d ya’ get that Cadillac?”
She said, “Balls to you, Daddy”
She ain’t never comin’ back.
Davis X. Machina
@germy: You could tell it wasn’t written by Bannon. He wouldn’t mention ‘blood’ without mentioning either ‘iron’ or ‘soil’,
JPL
@LAO: In the words of the elder Drumpf, that is bad, that is really bad.
Gin & Tonic
My flight is delayed, so I am enjoying a leisurely beer at the airport and looking forward t a week of ignoring the fucking news.
Major Major Major Major
@Brachiator: I saw that. Classic example of how some folks need to just shut the fuck up and let other people enjoy things.
@? Martin: Also OT: Saw this, thought of you.
The Moar You Know
@LAO: Just Trump’s administration either making the smartest move they’ll ever make, or committing suicide by press. My bet is on #2, but then again I still think Americans are decent, if very stupid, people.
Mnemosyne
@Brachiator:
@Major Major Major Major:
Also, it’s supposed to protect the people who genuinely have expensive and difficult-to-treat illnesses, but as we know from prior experience, insurance companies start blackballing anyone with a pre-existing condition, so even people like me with mild asthma that’s easily controlled with Singulair end up in those same pools.
Not to mention the economic stupidity of putting all of your most expensive patients into a single group …
Gin & Tonic
@germy: Iceland is one of four places on Earth with geysers. One may no longer be accessible. I have been to the other three.
Fester Addams
“She ain’t never coming back!”
hovercraft
@LAO:
CNN has been making noise about not attending the WHCD in addition to pressing Twitler surrogates much harder than normal on TV, NYT does not attend, so this is probably payback. I’m surprised WaPo was not excluded too. The gaggle will be reduced to just crazies if they keep this up, everyone is all over the lies and the scandals. Buckle up everyone, were about to hit even more turbulence.
LAO
@Davis X. Machina: You may be right.
The WH locked out Buzzfeed too (which sort of made me laugh and then cry because what the hell is going on with the press?)
hovercraft
@The Moar You Know:
Assumes facts not in evidence.
Am I bitter, yes, yes I am.
Citizen_X
@germy:
Good to see Trump is looking out for Vulcan-Americans, at least.
? Martin
I want to encourage everyone to go read and support Lauren Duca’s new op-ed column.
What she’s saying isn’t necessarily the important thing, rather it’s who she’s saying it to. As a father of a teenage girl, I can say with great confidence that they are have never been included in the political conversation, but they really need to be since policies regarding gender identity, abortion and women’s health, education, fair pay, health insurance, and a host of others affect them at least as much if not more than other groups. My daughter is only 16 now but she’ll be 2 years into voting before she gets to vote for a president, so she is captive to what the rest of us chose in the last election.
It’s really important that teenage girls become more politically active and Lauren is a very good and prominent pointy end of that spear. Turn her into a star.
Mnemosyne
@Jibeaux:
I would go to the Sephora website and buy one of the men’s sampler packs so he can try a bunch of different ones. It comes with a certificate so he can get the full-size of the one he likes best.
Or hit the department stores and ask the cologne counter if they have sample bottles.
LAO
@hovercraft: I’m surprised by how much this bothers me. I always assumed that a certain amount of WH press bluster was bullshit for the base and an attempt by the WH to project strength and toughness. But actually excluding members of the press, that something more.
(BTW — I don’t think the WH looked tough calling out the press but I think that they thought they did)
germy
@Citizen_X: Reference to Jeb! who is blue-blooded. And Bannon who circulates ice water.
? Martin
@LAO: I’ll keep reminding everyone of this fact: Buzzfeed has figured out how to make money as a news organization. Listicles are what allows them to have a Middle East bureau staffed with really, really good reporters.
As important as good reporting is, the ability to pay good reporters is a necessary prerequisite. Buzzfeed is one of the few organizations that has figured that formula out without resorting to just being a shill for some political group.
? Martin
@The Moar You Know:
Trump’s Razor: “Ascertain the stupidest possible scenario that can be reconciled with the available facts, and that answer is likely correct.”
Gin & Tonic
@? Martin: They also have good people in Eastern Europe.
hovercraft
@germy: @Citizen_X:
I’m thinking he thinks that different races bleed different color blood.
The fact that you thought about it for a second, well that says it all.
LAO
@? Martin: I absolutely agree — I check buzzfeed several times a day. But I’m still surprised/shocked that it has become a source of news that I personally rely on.
dr. bloor
@LAO: This should bother you as much as it is, and probably more.
germy
germy
@hovercraft:
Quite possible. I really don’t think he paid a bit of attention in school or even glanced at a single textbook. Why bother when there’s a pot of gold waiting at the end of the rainbow?
Miss Bianca
@? Martin: This sounds like what is happening with the Softwoods Lumber Agreement, which is basically the result of major butthurt from the US Lumber Coalition: basically their position is “waah, the Canadian Government owns all the forests and subsidizes their lumber production and it’s not FAAAIIIIR that American consumers want to buy cheaper lumber from Canada!” so the SLA goes into effect in 2006. it expired in October 2015, and since then the lumber industries have been operating without it. As of November 2016 the US Lumber Coalition petitioned for reinstatement of the SLA, which will impose tariffs of as-yet undetermined amount to, as the US Lumber Coalition puts it,
So, right now, prices on lumber imports are going up, up, up, in anticipation of these tariffs being immposed retroactively to February 1st. Our lumber yard is now only guaranteeing estimates for only 48 hours, instead of the usual two weeks. Contractors are freaking because jobs they bid out in October are suddenly going to cost them at least 20% more than they anticipated. I think the result will resolve not in the sudden upsurge of US timber and lumber jobs: I think ithe result will be the beginning of the tanking of the economy – around here, anyway – as the post-2012 building boom goes bust again.
tl, dr: I think protectionism is not going to work necessarily in the US economy’s favor. Or, “trade agreements – good god, y’all – what are they good for? Absolutely nothing – oh, wait.”
Doug!
@EdTheRed:
Yup!
Hungry Joe
@Brachiator: Iceland: Guilty. We were there for eight days in September and loved everything about it. My fave story, related to us by a guide (who also claimed to believe in elves, but I think that was just for the tourists): When they broke up the banks and sold off the parts, a few Icelandic bankers pocketed millions in bonuses from foreign buyers. Icelanders were outraged, but the Parliament admitted that it was perfectly legal. And then they acted: They taxed the bonuses at 98%.
In addition to the parliament they elect a president who, in order to run, must disavow all party affiliations. The job is mostly ceremonial, but it has one important function: The president can put a hold any law parliament passes. Once he or she invokes that power — it happens only rarely — there’s several weeks of debate, after which there’s a national referendum on the law.
hovercraft
@LAO:
To the sentient part of the population it made them look weak and ineffectual, who the hell gets bullied by villagers? To his fans according to his rally attendees, it was a virtuoso performance, he gave it to them, they loved it.
It was one thing to have this clown show as a thing going on in the background, but this is our government now, these people control the fucking government.
SgrAstar
@LAO: Badge of honor!
? Martin
@Major Major Major Major: There’s a lot of truth in that. It is more than fair to say that technologists (which I’ll claim) either don’t give enough thought or enough follow-through to ideas that would have such an effect. We see a problem and finding a clever solution is all the satisfaction we need. The tech industry needs to devote a bit more of their attention to solving some of these labor issues. For example, one of my intense frustrations is how great the opportunity is for technology to improve 2-year/trade/retraining education and how few resources are going towards it. I’m seriously considering retiring and doing a startup precisely toward doing that.
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
Ha! Loved it. Especially this part:
Of course, everyone will be playing VR video games and won’t even notice it when the devastation comes.
Major Major Major Major
@Hungry Joe: they believe in elves like Americans believe in Bigfoot.
Honestly that’s kind of a terrible way to run a country btw, at least countries that aren’t Iceland. Also, if you aren’t just looking at 2009+, it’s a terrible way to run Iceland.
TenguPhule
@germy: Republicans bleed green then?
Miss Bianca
@? Martin: Ah, Teen Vogue. I had heard they were actually commiting more real journalism than the NYT or other Very Serious Papers. Right on.
hovercraft
Ahh Florida, you are always at the forefront of , I guess GOP stupidity.
The Right Wants No Dissent
by Martin Longman
February 24, 2017 1:55 PM
Republican lawmakers are less fond of public protest now that it’s not the Tea Party doing the protesting. In Arizona, the Senate just passed a bill that would “would open up protests to anti-racketeering legislation, targeting protesters with the same laws used to combat organized crime syndicates.”
The same bill would “allow police to seize the assets of anyone involved in a protest that at some point becomes violent.”
A Florida Republican introduced a bill that would make it easier to run over protesters with your car without being legally liable. North Dakota and Tennessee Republicans have done the same.
In Minnesota, Republicans are pushing a bill that would allow the police to charge protesters for the cost of policing their rallies and marches.
Not to be outdone, Mississippi Republicans want to make blocking traffic a crime punishable by a $10,000 fine and five years in prison.
There are also a bunch of bills coming out of states like South Dakota, Colorado, and Oklahoma aimed at greatly stiffening penalties for interfering in the operation of pipelines.
So far, none of these bills have become law, and most of them are unconstitutional. But they indicate a certain mood.
And I know that mood is shared by our new Attorney General, Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III.
As Hunter S. Thompson might say, “that crazy f*cker is gonna come down on us like million-pound shithammer.”
Without that stolen Supreme Court seat, it’s going to be a bit harder to ease the pain.
Thru the Looking Glass...
@Lurking Canadian:
And what are the odds they’ll try to blame Obama and the Dems for that?
Peale
@Miss Bianca: So the industry has been “wiped out” since 2015? My Goodness! It really is a very weak industry.
Jibeaux
@Mnemosyne:
I forgot about Sephora, that’s a good idea.
TenguPhule
@Thru the Looking Glass…: 1:1
Miss Bianca
@Peale: We report: you decide.
TriassicSands
Baud will applaud —
Thru the Looking Glass...
@hovercraft: Yup…
And the Shitzkreig continues…
I read about that incredibly distasteful Arizona bill last night…
Bats*t insane and as unconstitutional (IMHO) as you could possibly get…
“Lawmakers say they’re targeting “paid protesters.”
Paid protesters… of whom no proof of existence is offered…
Here’s the kicker…
That is verbiage right out of the bill… they intend to prosecute PEACEFUL DEMONSTRATORS under RICO, just like the Mafia, drug dealers, or real terrorists… and a demonstration doesn’t have to turn violent to qualify…
I can only imagine what sort of insane BS they’re gonna throw against the wall over the next two years trying to derail the 2018 elections…
Somewhere George Orwell is shaking his head and saying, “I told you so…”
rikyrah
@JPL:
Me too
Thru the Looking Glass...
@TriassicSands:
This is going down the toilet far faster than I ever imagined it would…
It’s time to treat the GOP like an existential threat to the United States…
TenguPhule
Of course at the rate Donald burns through money for his weekend vacations, and ends up pocketing a good chunk of that, he might soon not need Congress for funding his own personal projects. A few hundred million here and there and pretty soon you’re talking enough money to fund a small army.
If they lose power of the purse, what can Congress at that point actually do against Trump that he can’t just sneer and ignore?
Thru the Looking Glass...
@TenguPhule: Are you saying the odds are bigly in favor?
‘Cuse me… I gotta go lay down a bet…
Ruckus
@PaulW:
This.
I don’t trust one of them. I don’t care how much pressure they get from constituents, it’s how much pressure they get from their owners that matters. And their owners don’t give a fuck about anyone but themselves.
hedgehog the occasional commenter
Gods. So the Republican “theory” of “governance” really is “Let’s kill everyone (directly or indirectly) and take their shit.” I think I always knew that but this really crystallizes it.
TenguPhule
@Thru the Looking Glass…: And it hasn’t even been 40 days.
Will America live to see the Summer of 2017? Or will we all be ashes among the glowing ruins?
TenguPhule
@hedgehog the occasional commenter:
Nominated for Balloon Juice Lexicon.
hovercraft
GOP outreach to our youth at CPAC, this is soo gonna work!
How conservatives want to break Bernie Sanders’s spell over young Americans
Mercedes Schlapp was delivering a warning about the dangers of young Americans’ support for socialism when she turned to face the thousands of conservatives in the crowd.
“Parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles — this is your responsibility,” Schlapp, a columnist at the Washington Times, told a Conservative Political Action Conference event on Thursday. “You have to take this message to your children and your nieces and nephews.”
Schlapp was moderating a panel titled “FREE-stuff vs. FREE-dom: Millennials’ love affair with Bernie Sanders.” It was both an exploration of young people’s skepticism toward capitalism and a brainstorming session for what should be done about it.
But beneath much of the enthusiasm, some conservatives here acknowledge they’re also worried that their recent victories could be undone by a generational shift toward the left.
After all, “democratic socialist” Bernie Sanders won more votes from those under 30 than any other presidential candidate in primary history. Donald Trump is wildly unpopular with people under 30 (they disapprove of his job performance by a 67-25 margin, according to Pew), and millennials will soon be the country’s biggest voting bloc. And polls show that, for the first time ever, young people are more supportive of “socialism” than “capitalism.”
Conservatives and free market adherents are well aware of the trend-lines — and wrestling with their response.
“You have to go out every day and argue about lower taxes”
……………..Other attendees cited the need to use government resources to reform American universities because the “indoctrination just starts younger and younger these days,” said Brandon Johnson, 43.
“I don’t know if it’s through cutting of use of funding or civil rights lawsuits, since a lot of these universities do engage in organized conspiracies to suppress assembly by conservative groups,” said Johnson, a lawyer who volunteered on the Trump campaign.
“If professors are saying ‘Trump is Hitler’ in class, if they want to use their teaching pulpit to bully their students, they should be willing to deal with the consequences. Change the tenure system.”
TenguPhule
@Thru the Looking Glass…: Knobby Knobs is wearing a Russian military uniform. Make of it what you will.
germy
Remember the 19 year old with the softball question?
Thru the Looking Glass...
@TenguPhule:
Isn’t DeVos related to Erik Prince (Blackwater)?
Of course, if Putin did buy Trump for a cut of Rosneft, a few hundred million will look like chump change when this is over…
hedgehog the occasional commenter
@TenguPhule: (bows)
? Martin
@hovercraft: Hate to break it to them, but their indoctrination is happening a lot earlier than college now. It used to be college was the place they were exposed to the world, but now it’s Youtube and Instagram, etc. Good luck locking them down.
? Martin
@Thru the Looking Glass…:
Siblings.
Major Major Major Major
@hovercraft: what’s funny is a sufficiently intelligent far-right populist could co-opt a nontrivial number of the Bernie kids fairly easily. Fortunately for us, none of the far right populists here are intelligent.
rikyrah
@Gin & Tonic:
Have a safe trip
clay
@Brachiator: I’m, uh, going to Iceland this summer with my family…
Brachiator
@germy:
Wow. That word is very close to the old Icelandic sagas word for “elf shit.” Who knew?
More seriously, yeah Iceland is for the most part an excellent example of a humane nation.
clay
@LAO:
I think it’s been demonstrated — time and again — that what, for ordinary Republicans, would be bullshit for the base is now the Gospel Truth for the Trump Administration.
I mean, Trump IS the Republican base. OF COURSE he believes all of the bullshit.
Redshift
@hovercraft: The one good thing that may have come out of the Great Recession and Republicans’ tooth-and-nail battle against any effective response to it is that we finally have a generation who don’t have faith they’re “temporarily embarrassed millionaires” and should therefore support low taxes on the rich.
Vhh
@piratedan: And is trying to sell us out to the Russians so he can get a trademark.
Brachiator
@TriassicSands:
The rollback of democracy is coming slowly, but with very deliberate steps. And always with an eye toward making it look “reasonable” or “acceptable” to the GOP base.
hovercraft
@Thru the Looking Glass…:
Prince is her brother. She is obviously has the best pedigree.
TenguPhule
@Brachiator: And MR. NRA is already stoking the fires at CPAC, calling for the brownshirts to be prepared for a glorious purge against the “violent left” and their “violent” resistance through the legal system.
La Pierre thinks he’s going to survive the upcoming Civil War.
Boy is he in for a surprise.
rikyrah
Trump Knows How to Make Enemies, Not Deals
by Nancy LeTourneau
February 24, 2017 3:06 PM
You would think that someone who wrote, “The Art of the Deal” would know a thing or two about how to wield the tools of both power and diplomacy. But as we saw during the campaign, whenever Donald Trump is challenged or threatened, he’s a one trick pony. All he knows how to do is demonize and belittle in an attempt to dominate.
We’ve seen the same thing from Trump since he was elected. Remember how he compared our intelligence services to Nazis? His latest target is the FBI. Here are a couple of his tweets from this morning.
If you didn’t know how our government works, you’d never guess that he is the guy in charge. He sees this as a battle for dominance between himself and the departments that are meant to be resources for his administration.
It doesn’t take much imagination to figure out how people who are proud of what they do and committed to their work are likely to respond to something like this. While it’s true that some might cower in fear and become compliant, for the most part it only fuels their anger and resistance, creating a deeper divide.
But that’s how Trump operates. And it’s why he continues to focus on demonizing those who challenge/threaten him politically – be it the media or Democrats or voters who protest. He is feeding the polarization – making any real deal-making impossible. I am reminded of what Ezra Klein wrote recently.
Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire
@? Martin: Why do you think they want to end net neutrality?
Millard Filmore
@germy: It would be great if she could somehow sneak into a townhall where the Republican bails, and she says “I’m here listening, talk to me.”
Pick a city with an announced Republican townhall, go there to MAKE SURE the guy shows up.
rikyrah
The Right Wants No Dissent
by Martin Longman
February 24, 2017 1:55 PM
Republican lawmakers are less fond of public protest now that it’s not the Tea Party doing the protesting. In Arizona, the Senate just passed a bill that would “would open up protests to anti-racketeering legislation, targeting protesters with the same laws used to combat organized crime syndicates.”
The same bill would “allow police to seize the assets of anyone involved in a protest that at some point becomes violent.”
A Florida Republican introduced a bill that would make it easier to run over protesters with your car without being legally liable. North Dakota and Tennessee Republicans have done the same.
In Minnesota, Republicans are pushing a bill that would allow the police to charge protesters for the cost of policing their rallies and marches.
Not to be outdone, Mississippi Republicans want to make blocking traffic a crime punishable by a $10,000 fine and five years in prison.
There are also a bunch of bills coming out of states like South Dakota, Colorado, and Oklahoma aimed at greatly stiffening penalties for interfering in the operation of pipelines.
So far, none of these bills have become law, and most of them are unconstitutional. But they indicate a certain mood.
And I know that mood is shared by our new Attorney General, Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III.
raven
@Brachiator: So you thought Bannon was kidding yesterday?
Redshift
@clay:
High on the list of terrifying things about this maladministration is that it’s being run on the basis that everything that’s said on Fox is absolutely true.
rikyrah
Lack of Accountability Brought Us Here
by Martin Longman
February 24, 2017 12:35 PM
……………………..
We haven’t been immune to this here at home, and similar concerns (from both right and the left) animated the movement to oppose the Trans-Pacific Partnership. But we’ve also lost the ability to vote out the representatives we still elect. In fact, in two of our last five presidential elections, the popular vote loser won the contest, and our congresspeople increasing select their voters (through gerrymandering) rather than the other way around.
When the neoconservatives were busy ginning up their invasions of Afghanistan and particularly Iraq, they didn’t anticipate that it would result in a flood of Muslim asylum seekers in Europe, nor that they’d be arriving in a stagnating economic situation where austerity was being cruelly imposed by the central bankers on the southern tier nations most impacted by the refugee crisis.
We’ve had our own immigration problem, however exaggerated its threats may be. An inability to do sensible comprehensive immigration reform left us open for a populist backlash even if a smaller backlash explained our inability to act proactively.
The left tried it’s own populist uprising against lack of accountability on Wall Street for the financial collapse of 2008, but the Occupy Movement fizzled in large part because the Democrats had a president to defend and a positive agenda to pursue. That created the opening that Trump ambled into, and it explains why the populist uprising was ultimately right-wing fascist in character.
And it is fascist.
clay
@Redshift: Actually, if Trump just listened to Fox News, it would be bad, but within the normal bounds of Republicanism (see: Bush, Dubya).
What’s really scary is that they’re assuming that everything on Breitbart and InfoWars is true.
lamh36
Ya know cheeto prez gon hate this! Folks stalking Obama!
OBAMA ALERT: The 44th President Is In NYC! http://gothamist.com/2017/02/24/obama_sighting.php via @Gothamist
Peale
I’m still trying to figure out where the military needs to be upgraded so that other countries are just afraid of us and do whatever we want. My guess is that Trump will build something that will make Putin happy – an army that doesn’t really work. Or that is too “advanced” to be effective any longer. Something like building a second Spanish Armada, or better, ships so huge that they can barely float. Or a million knights with so much armor that they can’t fight in mud and are prone to being stabbed to death by armies with pointed sticks.
Peale
@clay: Yep. By the time they’re done with the Republican party, your “conservative” relatives, even those who you can get along with, will be convinced that anyone with a passport is a globalist that needs to be exterminated.
Gravenstone
@germy: Does Trump know some Vulcans he’s not sharing with the rest of us?
TenguPhule
@Peale:
The army is nothing. Trump ruins the US navy, we’re all screwed. That branch of our military has always been the primary defense for the USA and is partially responsible for maintaining the global network of trade we enjoy and take for granted today.
Now imagine a world where our ships do not patrol the oceans and everyone has to rely on Russian and Chinese vessels to police the waters and keep the pirates at bay and the shipping lanes open.
hovercraft
@lamh36:
Ha, wish I still worked in the city, I would have stalked him like a crazy person. Sigh.
Twitler hasn’t even stepped foot in the city since his inauguration, he knows that the images will be awful, they hate him. Even without him coming there have been protests everywhere. I bet he misses his gilded tower where everyone bows and scrapes before him and pretends to love him.
liberal
@TenguPhule: Yawn. The USN is way, way, way more than is needed to do the jobs you’re talking about. It’s mainly there to enable us to destroy other countries when the desire to do so arises.
Brachiator
@TenguPhule:
More piracy. The Russian navy is pathetic. The Chinese are not (yet) interested in being the world’s policeman.
@Peale:
Entanglement. Trump and Putin try to wipe out ISIS. Trump is now in a position where he is propping up the Assad regime, sharing military information with the Russians, and in effect destroying the rationale for the continued existence of NATO.
Kelly
@scottinnj:
Oh I kinda want this Tshirt but very few would get the joke. Might end up with new good friends with anyone that did. May settle for Keep Republicans Out of My Obamacare.
hovercraft
A well oiled machine at work.
State Department memo warning against leaks quickly leaked to the media
he State Department issued a memo warning against leaks that was promptly leaked to a journalist.
The Feb. 20 memo issued by acting legal adviser Richard Visek explained how Secretary of State Rex Tillerson was authorized to protect certain types of “sensitive but unclassified” information, reported the Washington Post.
The four-page memo, which itself was marked sensitive but unclassified, argued that leaks chilled policy discussions and harmed the State Department’s reputation.
“When such information is leaked … It chills the willingness of senior government officials to seek robust and candid advice, which ultimately is to the detriment of informed policymaking and the reputation of the institution from which the leak emanated,” the memo reads, according to the Post.
“If the Department is going to be able to influence policy deliberations, we need to have a reputation for engaging responsibly in those deliberations,” the memo reads.
The memo encourages disgruntled officials to take a more active role in shaping policies and express any concerns about policy afterwards to their colleagues or higher-ups.
“The Department has also benefitted [sic] from the existence of the Dissent Channel, which is itself a confidential deliberative channel that seeks to facilitate open, creative, and uncensored dialogue on substantive foreign policy issues,” the memo says.
More than 900 State Department employees used the Dissent Channel to object to President Donald Trump’s travel ban before Tillerson was confirmed, and some of those objections were leaked to the media before they were filed.
But some experts and career officials told the Post that they’re being left out by Tillerson’s office, and some employees complained about a lack of clear communication from the secretary and the president.
Tillerson has reduced the number of officials present at his daily senior staff meeting, and detailed accounts of his meetings with foreign officials are no longer circulated widely within the State Department.
“There’s so much that’s not being communicated inside the building and it’s a huge problem that effects everybody,” one veteran State Department official told the newspaper. “Posts are calling us and asking us, ‘What are we supposed to say?’ We don’t know what to tell them.”
liberal
@? Martin: Nah. If it weren’t for all those Comp Lit Marxist profs, the young-uns would be rock-ribbed right-wingers.
liberal
@Brachiator:
That’s a good thing, given that there are only two choices now on offer: (1) Assad, (2) AQ/ISIS.
TenguPhule
@liberal: You should step outside and look at those big things called oceans sometime. And then actually count the number of ships we have in active service.
And then dopeslap yourself for being an idiot.
trollhattan
Somebody alert Trump of this outrage: Functioning government moves to address actual, ongoing problem actually affecting people and property.
Such a weird concept.
liberal
@Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire: To stuff more money in the telecomms pockets. Nothing more, nothing less.
trollhattan
@hovercraft:
Love. It.
Brachiator
@raven:
Didn’t watch much news yesterday. Being on “Trumpwatch” all the time is exhausting.
liberal
@Thru the Looking Glass…:
Uh, in case you weren’t watching, that time was circa 1994, or earlier.
tobie
Does more shit happen on Friday or is there just a crescendo of all the crap, frustration, outrage, and disbelief that’s built up at the end of the week?
The video of the Obama sightings in New York, though, brought a big smile to my face.
TenguPhule
@tobie:
Yes. SATSQ.
hovercraft
This is funny.
Petition calls on Obama to run for president in France
Amid a presidential campaign that has been marred by scandal, conspiracy theories, and the spectre of a new far-right leader, disillusioned French voters have called for an outsider to join the race: Barack Obama.
A petition launched on Monday calls on the former US president to run in this year’s French elections, which will be held in April and May. Called Obama17, the petition aims to garner 1 million signatures by March 2015, and as of Friday morning, it had already gained 30,000, according to one of the people behind the effort. But even the people who launched the website acknowledge that the chances of Obama actually ascending to the Elysée Palace are virtually zero. French law requires presidential candidates to be French, which Obama is not.
But the impossibility of the campaign is also what inspired it. In a phone interview Thursday night, one of the people behind the petition, who asked only to be identified as “Antoine,” said he and three other friends decided to create the site out of frustration with France’s leading candidates and the campaigns they’ve run so far.
“We just wanted to say that we’ve had enough of all of these guys.”
“In a campaign where we only talk about the scandals of [center-right candidate François] Fillon or the rise of [far-right candidate Marine] Le Pen, at a certain moment we told ourselves well, why not?” Antoine said. “We just wanted to say that we’ve had enough of all of these guys.”
Antoine, who is in his 30s, says that he and his friends are not activists, and he doesn’t align himself with a particular political party. But he says he has grown tired of voting for the lesser of two evils in every presidential race, rather than a candidate who inspires genuine enthusiasm. “The only guy who’s ever made me feel that way is Obama,” he says. This week, he and his friends plastered some 500 Obama posters across Paris, each carrying the slogan: “Oui on peut” (“Yes we can”).
“Oui on peut” #obama17 #yeswecan #vivelarepublique #presidentielle #barakobama
A post shared by McHautbois (@mchautbois) on Feb 22, 2017 at 12:28am PST
Antoine isn’t the first French voter to call for an Obama presidency; similarpetitions were launched last year, as NPR notes. And although Antoine realizes that it may be a long time before France changes its citizenship requirement for presidents, he thinks it’s important to at least put forth the idea of a more globalized government — particularly given the nationalist, inward-looking rhetoric that has characterized Le Pen’s campaign.
“At a time when Amazon and Facebook and Apple are richer than our country, it’s stupid to think that it’s our nationalism that will make us better governed,” he says. “We would do better to pay people who are competent to fill important positions, rather than getting stuck with the same people we’ve had for 20 years.”
“The reality, of course, is that it will never happen,” he adds. “But in another world, in 100 years or 200 years, it may not be a problem.”
tobie
@TenguPhule: Try decaf.
Ruckus
@Thru the Looking Glass…:
I bet George didn’t think he was writing an instruction manual.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@piratedan: …
Actually from talking to those people, a lot of them come accross like this
“sure Obama sure he saved my life, rescued the economy, killed Bin Laden, and wow he’s black, he’s but that damn bastard is a DEMOCRAT! THAT ARROGANT BASTARD, HOW DARE HE IMPLY I AM WRONG!!!! NO WAY IN HELL WAS I WRONG VOTING REPUBLICAN ALL THOSE TIMES!!! SHUT UP YOU DAMN SMUG LIBERTARD, OF COURSE I KNOW THAT THEY CRASHED ECONOMY!!!! I AM RIGHT, HE’S WRONG!!!”
Mel
Apologize for being off topic, but has anyone heard news from Cosima about her meeting with the powers that be at her daughter’s school? Fingers crossed that all went well and that the school will take steps to protect her kiddo from a very scary bullying/ threatening situation. Just worried about them, and hoping that the school is taking real action to keep her safe.
Brachiator
@liberal: RE: Trump is now in a position where he is propping up the Assad regime…
I disagree. There are many more options, including these. Of course, all of the options are probably bad.
glory b
@Jibeaux: My son likes ck shock (Calvin Klein).
grandpa john
@hovercraft: So now the republicans are openly going public with their push to establish our country as a Fascist state. first a president who is attempting to gain state control of the media, then next eliminate any voices of opposition and Bingo Fascism is here.
The Moar You Know
@TenguPhule: The Chinese Navy is quite competent and did great work cleaning up the Gulf of Aden/Somalia region, along with our navy, but they’re too small for the job if their area of responsibility is the entire globe. The Russian Navy is a fucking disaster, top to bottom. Moscow’s main focus was always on the land army and their air force. I doubt their navy could even defend their own waters.
Miss Bianca
@lamh36: Hey, o/t but congrats on your new job and new digs!
Taumaturgo
@Jeffro: Hey Grandma, Grandpa welcome to the Republican Deathpool.
J R in WV
@Gin & Tonic:
Where ya goin’? I missed it, or forgot already, one. Getting old, ya know. What day is it? I’m retired, so I don’t really need to know.
BE careful, HAVE FUN ! and keep in touch.
Wilson Heath
I seem to recall reading that the suddenly-essential Cadillac tax would need to have a dramatically lower threshold for the needed revenues for the plan it was attached to. So a used-Hyundai tax.
They’re gonna have fun selling that shit sandwich.
Seth Owen
@Kyle: If they were smart, that is exactly what they would do.
But they are not smart.
I think they get nothing substantive passed at all.