Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.

Text STOP to opt out of updates on war plans.

Lick the third rail, it tastes like chocolate!

The line between political reporting and fan fiction continues to blur.

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

You cannot shame the shameless.

They are not red states to be hated; they are voter suppression states to be fixed.

Relentless negativity is not a sign that you are more realistic.

Books are my comfort food!

Fight them, without becoming them!

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

Hey hey, RFK, how many kids did you kill today?

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

Our messy unity will be our strength.

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

Republicans: “Abortion is murder but you can take a bus to get one.” Easy peasy.

This country desperately needs a functioning fourth estate.

You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Don't Agonize - Organize / Monday Morning Open Thread: Once More Unto the Breach

Monday Morning Open Thread: Once More Unto the Breach

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Any readers in the DC area know about this?

Apart from #Resisting, what’s on the agenda as we start the new week?
.

Reader Interactions

119Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    Predicting what happens this week is a fool’s errand. Nobody knows.

    This guy has never read the internet.

  3. 3.

    Anya

    Is Ron Johnson the stupidest and the most callous member of the US Senate? He’s such a dirtbag (still can’t believe Wisconsin voted for him over Russ Feingold). If he’s having second thoughts maybe we have hope this thing will be defeated.

  6. 6.

    caphilldcne

    Since you asked, here is what I have heard:
    There will be numerous D.C. responses including some based in activism. Look for more from Planned Parenthood, MoveOn, SEIU, Protect Our Care, the Hub, Center for American Progress . The most accessible appear to be:
    three key moments we need to maximize turnout.
    • Tuesday, The People’s Filibuster Launches @ 2pm – Invite your members, staff, everyone to join us at 2pm in Section 9 (see map) for the kick off of the Filibuster! We’ll get a Facebook invite out soon!
    • Wednesday Hug the Senate Action – Evening (Exact time TBA) – We’ll be forming a human chain around the Senate building, holding up photos of the people whose stories have been shared over the course of the week, a moment of silence for those who will be harmed. More info coming, including a Facebook invite to circulate.
    • Thursday Rapid Response Rally 3-7pm – Hours before the bill vote is the moment to turn out in front of the capitol and we need bodies! Facebook invite coming soon.

    Also: Our friends in the faith community are organizing a vigil from Wednesday at 3pm to Thursday at 3pm and we encourage folks to come out and support this as well.

    Groups that I work with are planning to speak at Tuesday People’s Filibuster. Many people living with or affected by HIV plan to be wearing red at the Tuesday event. You can probably be kept most up to date by following planned parenthood or Move On on facebook. Please come out.

  8. 8.

    Splitting Image

    Sincerely worried by the fact that Bill Kristol thinks passing the bill is a bad idea for the Republicans….

  10. 10.

    Kay

    Ohio Gov. John Kasich delivered a harsh critique of the partisan fight over health care Sunday on CNN, telling “State of the Union” host Dana Bash: “I don’t think either party particularly cares about helping poor people.”
    “Both parties ought to be worried about poor people because I don’t think either party particularly cares about helping poor people,” said Kasich, who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican presidential nomination last year, often positioning himself as a moderate seeking bipartisan solutions. “You look at the rates of poverty, the problems in this country. We have not designed a system to get people work. Everything we’re talking about now — getting people healthy, giving them health care — is designed to get them to work. It’s designed to give them an opportunity to have a better life.”

    This nonsense flies on State of the Union. It’s meaningless babbling. I don’t know if Obama “was worried” about poor people – I’m not privy to his innermost thoughts. However. He made Medicaid available to working poor people in Ohio and Republicans are taking it away, so I don’t have to do any analysis of his feelings. He could “not care” about poor people and he would still be better for poor people than a Republican who “cares” about poor people. Their feelings aren’t the issue here.

  11. 11.

    MattF

    @Splitting Image: I agree… but, as noted, bloody Bill was the force behind Republican opposition to Clinton’s health plan. If he’s against the current Republican plan, it’s a big fckng deal.

  14. 14.

    Kay

    @Anya:

    I still think they’re going to vote for it. They have to. They need the Medicaid money to pay for the tax cuts and they want those tax cuts. It’s not a health care bill. It’s a bill to cut health care and fund tax cuts.

    They can’t do the giant tax cuts for rich people without killing some poor people. It’s harsh but it’s true. They’re now literally killing for tax cuts. People used to say this would eventually happen – now it is.

    Every time they waver they’ll end up back at tax cuts – they need the Medicaid money.

  15. 15.

    JPL

    @Kay: If he cared, he’d raise the minimum wage, since most of the lower income are the working poor. The democrats spoke a lot about affordable childcare, so maybe the governor should pay attention.

  16. 16.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    They can’t do the giant tax cuts for rich people without killing some poor people. It’s harsh but it’s true.

    Remember, no matter what they do, both parties don’t care about poor people

  18. 18.

    Kay

    @JPL:

    Ohio raised the minimum wage thru a state referendum before Kasich was elected. It was well-crafted, it adjusts for inflation. It’s bullet proof.

    It passed overwhelmingly. I helped with it. It was 100% a labor union effort. There’s a lot of ways to go around them.

    I find Kasich annoying because he makes people who make 16k a year out to be charity cases that “we” have to “help”. Who is “we”? They’re “we” too. He does it because Republicans want to think of themselves as charitable, “good people”- I hate the good people/bad people political analysis partly because it’s a self-serving lie people tell themselves. Medicaid benefits all of us. The rural hospital would close here without Medicaid. It is the second largest employer in the county.

  20. 20.

    Barbara

    @Kay: There is a whole class of health care industry grifters who sell people like Kasich on the idea that health care done “the right way” is the only thing necessary to enable people to find a job.

  21. 21.

    Baud

    GMA seems to be focused on the political drama of whether the GOP can find the votes.

  22. 22.

    JPL

    @Baud: Although millions will no longer be able to afford insurance, the true damage will be after 2025. I assume that at some point the democrats will be elected to fix it.

  23. 23.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Portman is sitting in his office weighing tax cuts for rich people versus health care for poor people. That’s actually what’s going on here. They all said it. The health care cuts have to come first because the health care cuts pay for the tax cuts. They’ll phase BOTH in over ten years but that doesn’t change the trade they’re making. It just protects their asses while it takes effect.

  26. 26.

    Kay

    @Barbara:

    Kasich is falling apart. National media still treat him like a successful governor but he has a one billion dollar budget hole because he cut taxes and relied on wacko conservative economic theory for a net gain in revenue that never appeared.

    They’re going to have to raise state taxes. They’re going broke.

  29. 29.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Portman is sitting in his office weighing tax cuts for rich people versus health care for poor people

    Even though we can’t read their minds, I think I can read their mind when it comes to what they prefer.

  31. 31.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @Splitting Image: Kristol is going back to his marxist roots. lets not forget the neo-cons, like israel itself, started out as socialists but were radicalized by black september terrorism and became militaristic.

    Trump’s naked white supremacy and antisemitism has woke them.

  33. 33.

    bystander

    I just unwittingly listened to Moanin’ Joe read from Ross Douthat’s latest oped. Forget the conservatism. His writing is lumbering, clumsy, hamhanded and dull.

    Just wanted to remind everyone!

  34. 34.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Sooner or later, you just had to know Kasich’s true self would show up. Please, cooperate and just lay down so the bus can run over you.

  35. 35.

    NotMax

    Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
    Or close the wall up with our English dead.
    In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
    As modest stillness and humility:
    But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
    Then imitate the action of the tiger;
    Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood,
    Disguise fair nature with hard-favour’d rage;
    Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;
    Let pry through the portage of the head
    Like the brass cannon; let the brow o’erwhelm it
    As fearfully as doth a galled rock
    O’erhang and jutty his confounded base,
    Swill’d with the wild and wasteful ocean.
    Now set the teeth and stretch the nostril wide,
    Hold hard the breath and bend up every spirit
    To his full height. ….

  36. 36.

    debbie

    @debbie:

    Also, if Kasich really cared, he’d let go of some of the rainy day fund to help with the opioid crisis.

  37. 37.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @JPL: Thanks, I’ll put together a set for “On the Road”. It was really a great group of photogs with a wide range of experience. One young Asian woman kept on saying “I’m not that young, I’ve used film”. (If you’re “older” you don’t protest being called young.)

  39. 39.

    Quinerly

    Nice interview with and profile of Senator Kamala Harris on Morning Edition (NPR) this AM.

  40. 40.

    Lapassionara

    This is a Lucy with the football moment. Some senators will get some air time “agonizing” over their decision, the drama will build, and at the end of the day, they will fall in line. Party uber alles. Nevertheless, I am calling Blunt’s office again today.

  41. 41.

    Linda

    @Anya: did you read his op Ed in the NYT today? He is opposed because it isn’t free market enough. He has no real plan, just choice boilerplate claptrap.

  42. 42.

    Chyron HR

    @JPL:

    Nancy Pelosi is going to be on CBS This morning, early the next hour.

    Can’t someone rid us of this uppity dago?????

  43. 43.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @Baud: He’s a fool. I can’t think of one person who ever became a congressional leader by whining on tee vee against their own side.

  53. 53.

    Patricia Kayden

    FACT: More people will lose coverage under #Trumpcare than gained it under the ACA. @92Y

    — Nancy Pelosi (@NancyPelosi) June 26, 2017

    Yep. The GOP is using the AHCA as an excuse to roll back Medicaid. This is what Ryan has dreamed about for decades. He must be ecstatic.

  56. 56.

    sherparick

    @Kay: In other words a typical Republican Governor in the Teens of the 21st century, just a little less radical then Brownback, Jindal, Pence, Snyder, and et al. The real Republican conferences this week were the Koch brothers confab in Colorado and Steve Mnuchin’s wedding to Louise Linton in DC. The billionaires outnumbered the mere millionaires, and they all want their tax cut. These are the people the Republicans listen to and they regard all those kids and old people on Medicaid as moochers.

  57. 57.

    WereBear

    I run into people all the time who talk about local fiscal crises “what can we do?” like this fell on them from a thunderstorm and seemingly don’t know it is all because very rich people are not paying taxes.

    They are free riders.

  59. 59.

    Betty Cracker

    Liar for hire Kellyanne Conway had interesting talking points for her Sunday show appearances. First, she said the $880 billion in Medicaid cuts in the AHCA aren’t cuts because shut up, that’s why. Then she said if “able bodied” people lose their healthcare coverage because of those non-existent Medicaid cuts, they can always go out and find jobs that offer employer-sponsored health benefits like herself and the Sunday show interviewer have.

    No, seriously — that’s what she said. Never mind that this unpopular tax cut for rich people masquerading as healthcare reform is written down, so the amounts it cuts from programs can be calculated. Never mind that the majority of folks whose coverage will be ripped away already have jobs — almost certainly jobs that are more difficult that repeating bald-faced lies in a simpering voice.

  61. 61.

    sherparick

    Jonathan Cohn worries about Trump turning around and trashing the Republicans for a health care bill he signs. I think Bill Kristol is closer to the mark in that after Republicans get their abolition of the ACA and Medicaid and the follow on huge tax cut for the 1%, and a replacement justice for Kennedy, they won’t need Trump anymore. I think this is one of Senator McConnell’s cynical calculations, He expects that given the favorable map for Republicans in the Senate in 2018 he can hold it even if there is a Democratic wave in 2018. And then the Medicaid cuts and repercussions will be the problems for a bunch of newly elected Democratic Governors and a Democratic House, with him in the blocking position on tax increases and assistance, and being able to offer up a Trump impeachment to be praised as an “honorable man.”

  62. 62.

    Quinerly

    @Betty Cracker:
    Just read a big piece about KAC’s new $8 million digs in DC. Lying pays well but must be rough for the looks department. She looks like a crack whore. She’s aged 10 years. In other news, just dropped Poco off for his 5th day of school. He always walks in like a champ…tail held high, a little glance over his shoulder, “I’ve got this, Mom. Don’t miss me too much today.” I’m gonna really miss him when he’s jetting around the country on the Baud/Poco 2020 ticket.?

  63. 63.

    Lurking Canadian

    @WereBear: Hereditary wealth that is exempt from taxation was the foundation of the ancien regime. July 14 is just around the corner. Is there an empty prison nearby we can storm?

  64. 64.

    MomSense

    @Betty Cracker:

    Believe it or not, the get a better job response has been one of the Republican/WSJ responses for some time now. They are just monsters.

  66. 66.

    ThresherK

    @Quinerly: Heehee.

    My sister, for many years, had a rat terrier with whom she bonded very closely. He went to obedience school and it didn’t take.

    I wanted to buy her a “My dog is an O-school dropout” bumper sticker.

  71. 71.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Head? Meet desk:

    The government view has been that culling was needed to minimise the encroachment of wolves on farmers and isolated communities, for their own protection as well as that of people.

    A hunt targeting 50 grey wolves was approved earlier this year in Finland, when the number of wild wolves was estimated at approximately 250 animals. It was justified in part as a way of cutting down on the illegal poaching of wolves.

    Cognitive dissonance… It’s not just for Republicans anymore.

  72. 72.

    Quinerly

    @ThresherK:
    I’ve been over the moon how well this 8year old ex street dog is doing. I’ve had him 3 years and the destructive behavior due to separation anxiety had reached a tipping point. We tried 11 hours a day for two days of doggie daycare first. Saw wonderful changes in him with that experience. Now we are doing 15 days of intensive training with the daycare. 11 hours a day; tomorrow the trainer works with us both for the first time. Poco doesn’t know how to play with other dogs…probably won’t ever learn that. But he is learning some socialization skills to be around other dogs. His focus is always on any people coming and going and the trainer. Really no interest in the other dogs (that’s why Friday’s pissing incidents were such shockers to the trainer.. The herbal supplement for anxiety twice a day has also been an enormous help.

  74. 74.

    Iowa Old Lady

    Electoral-vote.com has an article comparing the number of criminal indictments and convictions under Rs vs Ds since Reagan. Score: R = 120 indictments and 89 convictions; D = 3 indictments and 1 conviction. They speculate on the possible reasons for the disparities.

  76. 76.

    Quinerly

    @Laura:
    Poco is already pretty popular and well known in most of New Mexico…he made friends easily on our winter trip in Northern AZ and Utah. He’s especially adept at campaigning in small Native American villeges. The Hopi and Navajo seem drawn to him…old men at small local stores, they also like his mom.? We may have problems with the Zuni, though. He does not like the younger Zuni men trying to sell his mom stuff. AZ and Utah may be in play for us. Hope Baud! is taking notes.

  79. 79.

    Morzer

    @Anya:

    Is Ron Johnson the stupidest and the most callous member of the US Senate?

    Not while Ted Cruz and Rand Paul are slithering through the halls of power.

  80. 80.

    rikyrah

    Republicans Shamelessly Lying About Healthcare Cuts. Because They Can.
    by David Atkins
    June 25, 2017 9:05 PM

    …………………………….

    But there’s something particularly pernicious and jaw-dropping about the outright lies Republicans are telling about the Senate healthcare-tax-cut bill. For all its complexities, the bill is at its heart not terribly complicated: it slashes Medicaid by enormous margins over time, in order to pay for tax cuts for the top 5% of incomes. That’s what it does. It barely pretends to do much of anything else.

    Most Americans don’t know this yet. That’s not entirely surprising, of course: keeping the public in the dark about the realities of the bill is precisely why McConnell and crew kept the creation of the bill such a secret. But now the cat will be out of the bag for at least a week until the vote happens on the bill, right?

    …………………………………..

    So why wouldn’t conservative commentators simply start lying outright about even the most basic facts? Only a sense of shame and decency would prevent it. But this is the Trump Administration, McConnell Senate and Ryan House now. There is no shame or decency.

    Hence the sight of Kelly-Anne Conway flatly denying that the bill constitutes a Medicaid cut. She’s not alone: Republicans from Senator Toomey to Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price went all over the Sunday shows denying that people would lose coverage and that Medicaid would be stripped of funding. These are all demonstrable falsehoods: preventing a safety net program from meeting inflation and population growth is a cut, and the bill as currently written wouldn’t just take away coverage, it would actually cause seniors to be removed from nursing homes.

  81. 81.

    rikyrah

    One would think that nursing home chains would be instructing employees to call the contact numbers of their clients, telling them that Trumpcare would have Grandma and Grandpa kicked out.

  84. 84.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Morzer:

    Not while Ted Cruz and Rand Paul are slithering through the halls of power.

    Yes, the GOP is the Slytherin party. And the AHCA is truly Voldemortian.

    Good morning from New Mexico, where the sky is unusually hazy, perhaps because of forest fires. The Chinese keep upping their ante on climate change hoax.

  85. 85.

    rikyrah

    Yes, Thousands Will Die. Tell It Like It Is.
    by David Atkins
    June 25, 2017 5:49 AM

    Republican Senators have needed some smelling salts and fainting couches in the last few days as Democrats have told the honest truth about their tax cut and healthcare slashing bill. First they objected to Elizabeth Warren saying that many people would die as a result of their legislation. The Orrin Hatch whined that Bernie Sanders was accusing him of “murder” when he tweeted that thousands of people will die.

    But it’s the cold, hard truth:

    The Republican healthcare bill announced on Thursday would cause thousands of Americans to die each year, according to physicians who study government data.

    Using national health surveys, doctors and academics have tested whether a lack of health insurance increases the probability of death. Most have concluded that it does.

  86. 86.

    Quinerly

    @Kathleen:
    The fact that she was involved romantically with Fred Thompson years ago says enough for me. Gross is yet again the word…..

  89. 89.

    gene108

    @sherparick:

    I think you are on the right track regarding McConnell, but you underestimate how cynical he is. The man has one ambition and that is to be Senate Majority leader. He will do anything to get it, and he is so smooth the media does not notice how much he has broken the Senate to get what he wants.

  90. 90.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Morzer:

    It’s almost like conservatives are special snowflakes who need safe spaces…..

    Nah, they’re just soulless cynical manipulative fucks.

  93. 93.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Quinerly: Good. Although I am unsure what it could possibly add to the Civil War Museum, and indeed would prefer it be removed with 20′ of det cord, at least it’s going away and at no cost to the citizens of STL.

  94. 94.

    Kathleen

    @Laura: Quinerly will have to make cookies for press plane a la Mother Pence. NYT reporter tweeted a squee about it. If only Hillary had baked cookies for NYT she woulda won.

  98. 98.

    Quinerly

    @Kathleen:
    Older white guys do. Poco has a problem with the younger white bros. He also does well with all ages in the Hispanic communities.?

  101. 101.

    Kathleen

    Poco has good taste. Maybe you could get him a Man Bun dude bro doll for a chew toy.

  103. 103.

    rikyrah

    Trump blames Obama for Russian attack he doesn’t believe happened
    06/26/17 08:30 AM
    By Steve Benen

    The Washington Post published an extraordinary piece of reporting on Friday, documenting the Obama administration’s challenges responding to the Russian attack on the American election last year. Apparently, someone summarized the lengthy piece for Donald Trump, who responded to the reporting in a rather amazing way during one of his many Fox News interviews.

    “Well I just heard today for the first time that Obama knew about Russia a long time before the election, and he did nothing about it. But nobody wants to talk about that. The CIA gave him information on Russia a long time before they even – before the election…. It’s an amazing thing. To me – in other words, the question is, if he had the information, why didn’t he do something about it? He should have done something about it. But you don’t read that. It’s quite sad.”

    The president also had a pair of tweets on the subject over the weekend, arguing the Obama administration knew about “election meddling by Russia,” but “did nothing about it.” Trump, who now apparently refers to himself in a first-person-and-first-letter way, added, “Since the Obama Administration was told way before the 2016 Election that the Russians were meddling, why no action? Focus on them, not T!”

    Even by 2017 standards, this is astonishingly foolish.

  105. 105.

    rikyrah

    With time running out, health care advocates look for GOP ‘no’ votes
    06/26/17 09:30 AM
    By Steve Benen

    Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.) didn’t just announce his intention to vote against his party’s health care plan late last week; he also torched the legislation itself. For all intents and purposes, the Nevada Republican’s argument against the GOP bill wasn’t much different from the Senate Democrats’ case.

    But one “no” vote among Senate Republicans won’t be enough to rescue the American system from the proposal. Health care advocates will need two more GOP senators to break ranks.

    Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) hasn’t formally made an announcement, but her comments to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos yesterday suggested she isn’t exactly ready to partner with her far-right colleagues.

  108. 108.

    SFAW

    @Splitting Image:

    Sincerely worried by the fact that Bill Kristol thinks passing the bill is a bad idea for the Republicans….

    No kidding.

    If he writes that the Senate bill will be defeated, then we’re fucked. That moron has never been right, as far as I can tell.

  109. 109.

    Elizabelle

    @Cheryl Rofer: He’s still calling her “Crooked Hillary?”

    What a head case. As are his supporters. No class, either.

    I’d call them “sore winners”, but I have never thought der Trump actually won.

  110. 110.

    Elizabelle

    WaPost: ombudsman Margaret Sullivan writes about Amy Siskind, who has been performing a public service.

    Trump won, and Amy Siskind started a list of changes. Now it’s a sensation.

    … Siskind began keeping what she calls the Weekly List, tracking all the ways in which she saw America’s taken-for-granted governmental norms changing in the Trump era.

    The project started small, read by friends and with only a few items a week.

    By Week 9, though, the list had gone viral.

    ….. The idea, she said, came from her post-election reading about how authoritarian governments take hold — often with incremental changes that seem shocking at first but quickly become normalized. Each post begins with: “Experts in authoritarianism advise to keep a list of things subtly changing around you, so you’ll remember.”

    She’s not the only one to have this idea; on Twitter, for example, designer Laura Olin created @_rememberbot, where frequent tweets begin with the words “It is not normal” and catalogue the oddities of TrumpWorld. (“It is not normal for U.S. presidents to criticize federal judges.”)

    But Siskind may be the most dogged and systematic. One follower even made a searchable database of her lists.

    “It’s scary to look back on the early weeks and see what we’ve already gotten used to,” she said. Examples: a secretary of state who rarely speaks publicly, the failure to fill important positions in many agencies, a president who often eschews intelligence briefings in favor of “Fox & Friends.”

    “We forget all the things we should be outraged about,” Siskind said.

    Jay Rosen, a New York University journalism professor and author of the PressThink blog, called Siskind’s efforts “a service that is thoroughly journalistic and much needed.”

    The lists “help people experience the history that is being made and keeps them alive and alert to the dangers of eroding norms,” Rosen said.

  113. 113.

    rikyrah

    SCOTUS summarily orders Arkansas to permit names of same-sex couples on birth certificates. Three Justices dissent.
    — SCOTUSblog (@SCOTUSblog) June 26, 2017

  117. 117.

    rikyrah

    The GOP Can’t Compromise, So What Happens Next?
    by Martin Longman
    June 23, 2017 2:45 PM

    ……………….

    Per usual, the conservative members of the GOP are frustrating the reality-based members by their insistence on using magical thinking.

    Republicans are divided over whether to work with Democrats on spending measures for the 2018 fiscal year, which begins in October.

    Conservatives say Republicans should go their own way and pass a budget and spending bills that make deeper cuts to spending and reflect GOP values.

    Centrist members say that strategy is unrealistic and will increase the chances of a shutdown or, worse, a continuing resolution that would simply maintain existing funding levels. The only way to avoid that outcome, they say, is to work with Democrats.

    “If we don’t have a bipartisan budget agreement, there’s a very good chance we’ll end up with a continuing resolution,” said Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.), a House moderate.

    The debt ceiling vote won’t have the filibuster problem because the Democrats wouldn’t prevent a vote on avoiding a default of the United States’ debts. But it will be similar because the so many Republicans won’t vote for a clean debt ceiling bill that they’ll need Democrats in both houses of Congress in our order to pass it.

  118. 118.

    rikyrah

    Trump Is Obsessed With the Russia Investigation
    by Martin Longman
    June 23, 2017 11:50 AM

    Think about this for a minute:

    Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, told House investigators Thursday that President Trump seemed obsessed with the Russia probe and repeatedly asked him to say publicly there was no evidence of collusion, a U.S. official familiar with the conversation told NBC News…

    …Admiral Mike Rogers, director of the NSA, has also told associates that Trump asked him to say publicly there was no evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and the Russian election interference effort…

    …A former senior intelligence official familiar with their accounts said both Coats and Rogers [in their refusal to comply with Trump’s requests] were trying to balance their service to the country and to the president with their desire not to be seen as in an way interfering in an ongoing FBI investigation.

    Coats and Rogers were covering their own asses when they declined to fulfill the president’s wishes and clear him of any possible collusion with the Russians, but in doing so they also prevented Trump from committing one more count of “interfering in an ongoing FBI investigation.”

    The mere fact that Trump asked them to do it is a possible obstruction of justice, but if they had actually done it there would be little doubt.

  119. 119.

    Laura

    @Kathleen: Ya know Kathleen, you might be on to something, though I cannot see Quinerly joining The Ladies Against Wimmin even if it boosts the chances of Baud/Pico 2020.

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