There are consequences to electing a know-nothing clown to head up the federal government. We are living them.
So are GOP elected officials, who at least richly deserve every bit of humiliation and agita they encounter as they prop up a woefully ignorant, impulsive charlatan so they can enact their pro-plutocracy agenda.
This healthcare push is revealing the scope of that difficulty as high-functioning sociopaths like McConnell and Ryan shoulder the burden of dragging their pig of a healthcare bill across the finish line while the preening narcissist who is nominally their leader constantly affirms his cluelessness, goes off script in unpredictable ways and consistently fails to live up to his “deal-maker” reputation. Via the NYT:
On Senate Health Bill, Trump Falters in the Closer’s Role
…If Republicans do manage to broker a deal — as Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, pledged to do during a lively East Room back-and-forth with the president — it is not likely to be because of Mr. Trump’s involvement. Until Tuesday afternoon, the president was largely on the sidelines as the fate of one of his most important campaign pledges played out…
A senator who supports the bill left the meeting at the White House with a sense that the president did not have a grasp of some basic elements of the Senate plan — and seemed especially confused when a moderate Republican complained that opponents of the bill would cast it as a massive tax break for the wealthy, according to an aide who received a detailed readout of the exchange. Mr. Trump said he planned to tackle tax reform later, ignoring the repeal’s tax implications, the staff member added.
After the meeting, Mr. Trump played the role of cheerleader on Twitter, encouraging his weary Republican allies to keep working. “I just finished a great meeting with the Republican Senators concerning HealthCare,” he wrote. “They really want to get it right, unlike OCare!”
Trump doesn’t know shit about healthcare or the finer points of any other foreign or domestic policy question, but he’s keenly attuned to perceptions of his own precious self, and that NYT article stung:
Some of the Fake News Media likes to say that I am not totally engaged in healthcare. Wrong, I know the subject well & want victory for U.S.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 28, 2017
Yeah right. I had a suggestion that won’t be taken up:
Then hold a televised bipartisan summit and answer detailed policy questions like President Obama did for the ACA. ?
— Betty Cracker (@bettycrackerfl) June 28, 2017
Flashback to February 2010, when President Obama held an hours-long, bipartisan healthcare summit to support passage of the ACA, in which he answered testy questions from Republicans and demonstrated extensive policy knowledge and engagement:
It won’t happen, but I wish one of the reporters at the daily briefing would raise this issue and ask why Trump doesn’t undertake a similar effort for the “healthcare” bill he claims to know so well. It would never happen, of course, and the expectation that a president should be at least minimally conversant on policies involving hundreds of millions of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars is one of those standards that ended on January 20th.
Anyhoo, it’s cold comfort at this point to recall how Obama handled a similar situation, as the blithering idiot who replaced PBO and said idiot’s congressional enablers are bent on destroying that hard-fought step we achieved in the direction of universal care. And let’s be honest — the bastards have a good chance of succeeding.
But remembering what actual leadership looks like and recalling what we once accomplished helps motivate me to make those calls to my congresscritters, etc. It’s still worth the fight.
Smiling Mortician
Jeez, that tweet is pure Fredo.
Major Major Major Major
That Times article’s descriptions of McConnell were kind of hilarious. Keeping the president at arm’s length, merely offering a tight-lipped smile after Trump blustered on, etc. Sure to infuriate Trump. And a fairly accurate portrayal of Yertle as a close-to-the-vest sociopathic snake, too.
It ended on January 20, 2001 too. I’m noticing a pattern…
Big Ole Hound
No one in Congress even attempts to be honest or civil anymore so the ability to cooperate has vanished. If the leaders would stop strutting for the press and have open dialog and not worry about their “base” support maybe something could be accomplished.
cope
Have you replied to any previous Trump Tweets? I wonder what the likelihood is that you will be unfriended or blocked or whatever form of banishment Tweeters dispense.
Keep fighting the good fight.
cope
Major Major Major Major
@Big Ole Hound: this definitely all started with what the democrats did to Bork.
Betty Cracker
@Major Major Major Major: Dubya, inarticulate, ignorant ninny that he was, was Einstein compared to Trump, IMO.
Betty Cracker
@cope: Lots of times, but I’m too insignificant to block, apparently. Sad!
Hal
@Major Major Major Major:
I think that’s the on type of smile McConnell can offer. He has no lips.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
It’s single sentences like this that continue to make this place a must-read blog. Very few people rant as eloquently as you do.
schrodingers_cat
Until the Rs suffer electoral consequences for their deeds they are not going to change.
Major Major Major Major
@Betty Cracker: while that’s true, W also wasn’t “minimally conversant on policies involving hundreds of millions of lives and hundreds of billions of dollars.” The president knowing things, in addition to being suspicious elitist snobby fancy book learnin’, is a standard only democrats are held to (and then somehow always fail to meet).
MattF
@Betty Cracker: Yeah. Dubya’s saving grace, insofar as he had one, was a degree of self-awareness. Trump is off the self-awareness scale, in some other space-time continuum.
The Dangerman
I’d rather chug sterno than watch that stream of unconsciousness bullshit.
Nina
I miss him.
nightranger
I don’t think it’s a complete waste of time but this fight is already lost. Can’t hold the line when you don’t control any branch of government. They are going to pass something and it’s going to be horrible and they are going to pat themselves on the back and that’s all there is to it.
Dems/Reid screwed up by keeping the 60vote thing. Now Repubs are streamrolling them with just over 50votes on everything. Reid should have done the same thing. Huge mistake.
The timelines of when these things kick in are really long so the real fight is trying to get back at least 2 branches of government and flipping everything back to ACA again, with improvements/fixes. This fight is going to be going on for a long time and things will probably flip flop a few times.
gvg
it’s not just Trump, and Trump wouldn’t have happened IMO without the rising number of know nothing Congressmen. We make fun of several idiots and have for years. They got away with running fools, and when I first noticed it, it seemed like the smart ones liked it because they assumed they would remain the leaders and the dumb ones were just a kind of vote multiplier. what’s happened though is that less intelligent voters started preferring the idiots over smart conservatives. now they have dumb leaders too.
I am wondering if we can shame the voters into looking for smart representatives. pointing and laughing should come naturally.
Shalimar
He wants “victory for U.S.” in the war on healthcare? I don’t want to win that war.
MattF
@Shalimar: Unclear what that even means in context. I guess one should assume, given the source, that it means “Demonstrates my greatness.”
Betty Cracker
@Major Major Major Major: I have zero desire to defend Dubya, who I had every reason to hope would be the worst POTUS in my lifetime. But he did hold press briefings and regurgitate talking points on policy questions. Badly! But he did it.
We’re in agreement about Democrats being held to a much higher standard, but I believe Trump has obliterated ALL standards. He’s in a class by himself, IMO.
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: A run-on sentence! But thanks. :)
Major Major Major Major
@gvg:
This is the fatal flaw of the southern strategy, especially as it’s spread across the whole country, and Trump is its logical conclusion.
ThresherK
The NYT headline writers are dedicated to polishing Trump’s turds, aren’t they?
Betsy
Did anyone hear the lolPOTUS clip on NPR this morning — he said something like “if this passes it will be very good — if not, well, then, we’ll be OK”
LOLz
r€nato
@Big Ole Hound: 1) they worry about their base support because they like keeping their jobs.
2) Dems and Reps are coming from two fundamentally different positions with respect to health care. Republicans think that the gummint has no place in ensuring that as many Americans as possible can afford health care. AHCA or BCRA is simply rolling back the clock to pre-ACA days, with a fat tax cut for the wealthy and slashing Medicaid as kickers, while trying to kick the blame can down the road for the inevitable collateral damage.
You might as well wish for a unicorn that farts $100 bills, that will happen sooner than these two sides putting their base supporters aside and working together on health care. Not until there is an end to GOP extreme gerrymandering, as well as a fundamental shift in the thinking of Americans away from this “fuck you I got mine” mentality, will things get any better.
satby
I’d settle for the pathetic lickspittles of the press pool just refusing to turn off their cameras on command at the daily briefings.
GregB
The shamelessness of the Republican leadership is only out-matched by the out and out moral degeneracy of Donald Trump.
This time will surely be looked back upon with marvel and horror.
r€nato
@Betsy: yeah, if I was a GOP senator asked to put my butt on the line for this bill, I’d be furious. This is the great negotiator, the guy who flat out says he’s really not that invested in the outcome?
kindness
The Trump supporters among the media and his base have settled into believing what they want to believe. Any evidence to the contrary like actual quotes or god forbid actuarial analysis is bordering on treason for these folks. I don’t really get how they pull this off in their own heads. I get believing things others don’t. We all go there on one issue or another but something as wide ranging as this man? Does not compute.
I don’t understand the end game either. A Randian paradise where the rest of us either don’t exist or are so marginalized we won’t be heard? Even if it were to ever come to that (it won’t, that is a bad soap opera) Authoritarian movements require an enemy of the moment to go after and keep followers from asking questions. After they’ve gone after all the easy ones (us) they will eventually start on ‘followers’ who aren’t pure enough. I guess that is where not believing history helps the base keep their delusions.
Hal
I still can’t get over the fact that Trump has fake Time Mag covers with him on the cover.
http://www.nj.com/sports/index.ssf/2017/06/trumps_phony_time_magazine_cover_is_hanging_in_nj.html
germy
Raw Story headline:
Law firm representing Jared Kushner has ties to Russian bankers and oil companies: report
My local newspaper headline:
Kushner lawyer seasoned in navigating Washington scandals
Many of my neighbors are drumpf voters.
Barbara
@nightranger: You can go back to hiding under the bed now that you have treated us all to your hand wringing spectacle.
O. Felix Culpa
OT, but the resistance stiffens on numerous fronts. Yesterday I posted that the Santa Fe County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to sign on to the Paris Climate Agreement (the city of Santa Fe has already done so).
Today, I got the news that Dona Ana County Board of Commissioners rejected a GOP “review” resolution in favor of strong support for the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument. Keep on fighting!
Chris
@Shalimar:
I do love how even something like a goddamn health care reform issue has to be cast in terms of a battle in which ‘merica will obliterate its enemies (whoever the fuck they are).
Barbara
@kindness: The end game, the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for a lot of actual Trump voters (as opposed to the Club for Growth or the Chamber of Commerce) is the idea that a white president can enact a kind of socialist paradise for whites, who will be assumed to be worthy of whatever social programs they rely one, whereas others might be able to establish worthiness if they pass drug tests, etc. I think a lot of people are pretty simple, and of course many will be sorely disappointed. Polls are not really going to tell the story, because party identification is fluid, so those who keep identifying as Republicans are going to continue to support Trump.
germy
@Hal:
Chris
@gvg:
This. But I don’t think it’s just the voters: the elites also like the dumbing down because it means less work for them. If you don’t even have to pretend to know anything, if you can just spew some incoherent gibberish about Jesus and America and how everything’s the Democrats’ fault and get the same result, then so much the better. Why go to the trouble of actually learning or explaining things?
I’ve definitely noticed the gradual lowering of standards over the last few decades in the GOP. You go from Reagan to Dan Quayle to George W. Bush to Sarah Palin to Donald Trump.
r€nato
@GregB: when I was a lad in school and reading about the declining years of the Roman Empire, I often thought to myself, “how could they not see this looming disaster and avoid it?”
Now I know. And I fear we’re living in much the same times, when future generations will look back and wonder to themselves how the hell the most powerful nation on Earth could possibly follow up one of the greatest presidents who was exactly who was needed at a time of great crisis, with the epically stupid and corrupt clown in the WH.
Frankensteinbeck
I think you give Ryan too much credit. He, not Trump, is the ultimate example of white male privilege*. Trump earned the presidency, not by any scheme, but by being the incoherent, woman-abusing, mean-as-shit, loud-and-proud racist that the GOP base has been waiting for. Ryan has nothing, nothing, that was not handed to him on a silver platter. He was put through college by other people, handed high paying jobs when he got out, elected by the work of others, touted as a genius by dimwits who decided randomly they needed one, and finally shoved into the speakership by Boehner when Boehner needed a replacement so he could retire. Ryan is an imbecile.
*The title might actually belong to Bush The Lesser.
schrodingers_cat
@r€nato: Caligula’s horse is ruling us right now.
r€nato
@Hal: really? Because most of us know by now that there is simply no end to the bottomless pit of his neediness for approval. If he hadn’t been born into wealth and status, he’d be a lifelong virgin living in mom’s basement. I would be embarrassed for him if it weren’t for all the damage he’s caused and will continue to cause.
O. Felix Culpa
@r€nato:
The chasmic contrast still gives me whiplash.
The Moar You Know
I wouldn’t say that. I’d say he’s not engaged in anything, too stupid to understand any issue that’s not a real estate deal, and too lazy to care about anything.
He needs to quit, haul his fat ass back to Manhattan, let Melanoma change his diaper and wait for death to relieve his sufferings (seriously, have you ever seen a rich guy so miserable and angry in your life? Not I.)
Gretchen
Trump sat the girls next to him, probably thinking he could charm them into voting his way. Ugh. Sen. Collins is leaning away as far as she can, and Sen. Murkowski scooted her chair back away from him. Almost like he tried to grab them under the table. http://www.cnn.com/2017/06/27/politics/gop-senators-seating-chart/index.html
Frankensteinbeck
@Chris:
Brown people, and brown-people enablers. Not a joke, they think we’re in the way of making America a perfect place to live, prosperous and respected by all, which can only happen when everyone else in the world kneels before the White Christian Male.
low-tech cyclist
Called Cardin’s and Van Hollen’s offices yesterday afternoon to thank them for standing firm. Called Hoyer’s office to say that, if, God forbid, the Senate bill should ultimately pass and go to the House, I wanted to go ahead and register my opposition.
Mike in DC
Shit, you could have Trump spend an hour answering questions about the border wall and trade policy, and he’d still blow it. His grasp of policy is a micrometer deep.
Shalimar
@r€nato: At least the Romans had the excuse of having hereditary leadership. The excellent mixed in with the terrible. We elect our idiots, which somehow makes it feel worse.
m0nty
The problem is that a certain percentage of American voters said last year, “Okay, we tried competency, but that didn’t fix my problems. Let’s try incompetence, who knows we may get lucky.”
Trump is the anti-technocrat. Presidency unplugged.
The Moar You Know
@ThresherK: Fox has done a better job of honestly covering Trump than the NYT has. They need to go out of business yesterday.
low-tech cyclist
@schrodingers_cat:
There are elections for governor and state legislature in VA and NJ this fall.
Barbara
@r€nato: I have also read recent books on the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, and my simple take away was that they were beset by the same kinds of problems over and over, with infighting, imperial succession, escalating inequality both within the empire as a whole and between Rome and its satellite provinces — but as they kept having the same fights, the external threats they faced kept escalating and the infighting prevented them from recognizing and/or addressing them. So when the end came, it really was something that they could have and should have handled had they applied foresight and resources. Yes, there are parallels, but it is also worth noting that the eastern empire endured for centuries after the Roman administrative infrastructure splintered.
Barbara
@Gretchen: Maybe he smells.
Amir Khalid
@germy:
And of course Trump will ignore the request. This fake TIME cover on his walls is to dem Trump what a miscellaneous assortment of ornaments on a uniform jacket is to Sheriff Clarke.
Matt McIrvin
@Betty Cracker: If the pattern holds, after the next Democratic President, there will probably be a Republican even worse than Trump. What could that be like?
The Moar You Know
@Hal: Ironclad, can’t fail defense which he won’t use: fair use – parody. Those three words are all his lawyer has to say and they can stay up forever. But he won’t do it, guaranteed.
Aleta
He wants ‘victory for U.S’ ? Is that like ‘Mission Accomplished’ ?
germy
Sarah Huckabee Sanders:
So to protest fake news she invites the country to look at some… fake news.
MattF
I’m… astonished. Marc Thiessen, who I normally think of as an apologist for torture, and a zero-conscience hack, has something to say about the Senate healthcare bill. He says
and
This is the first time I’ve ever had a positive thought about Thiessen. It also suggest, fwiw, that giving everyone time to think this thing over is not going to be a positive experience for Senator Mitch.
No link, but it’s there in the WaPo, in black and white pixels.
schrodingers_cat
@Matt McIrvin: The pattern needs to be broken. This is not a linear regression. Nothing is “written”. Democrats need to play the same hardball the Rs do.
Chris
@MattF:
Even a blind pig finds an acorn once in a while, I suppose.
schrodingers_cat
@germy: Another example of rank incompetence and nepotism. On a completely shallow note, her outfits are always hideous.
schrodingers_cat
@Frankensteinbeck: The color green does not care. If Rs continue their rank stupidity, slowly but surely the $ is going to cease being the world’s reserve currency.
different-church-lady
I suppose one silver lining to his Twitter addiction is that ordinary citizens get to take a direct shot at the asshole.
gene108
@nightranger:
The “60 vote thing” is what keeps Mitch from totally repealing the ACA.
Right now they are working on the tax and finance provisions via reconciliation, which can be done with 50 votes in the Senate.
As much as the BCRA/AHCA sucks, without “the 60 vote thing” it would be worse.
Chris
@schrodingers_cat:
Yarp.
Betty Cracker
@MattF: Whoa — when your bill is too cruel and greedy for Marc Fucking Thiessen!
gene108
@schrodingers_cat:
I think most Americans wouldn’t notice losing the dollar as the world’s reserve currency. It would limit somethings the government can do, but as the government is a hot mess right now, I think few people would notice.
What will really get people’s attention is when Republicans keep screwing up our standing in the world and the rest of the world decides not to cater to America’s refusal to adopt the metric system. When the rest of the starts shipping cars with speed only designated in kilometers per hour, scales in kilograms, etc., America will have a melt down unrivaled in human history.
schrodingers_cat
@gene108: The average T voter many not notice but the Mr. money bags who fund the Rs will definitely take notice as will Wall St.
different-church-lady
@m0nty:
Chris
@gene108:
About that name. It’s easily the least of the bill’s offenses, but “BCRA” was the acronym for the Free French intelligence agency during World War Two. As a history nerd, it irritates me to see the same name attached to an ultra-right-wing and borderline eugenicist piece of legislation.
different-church-lady
@Mike in DC:
ET
Trump is not a “do the work” kind of guy. That is what peons and suckers are for. Remember he is the deal maker and closer. Except not so much now that he is the most recent resident of 1600.
FlipYrWhig
@gene108: That’ll be the whole nine yards, but I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, so don’t hide your light under a bushel.
Major Major Major Major
@Chris: it’s also the ‘breast cancer gene’.
@schrodingers_cat: @gene108: what else would it be right now? The American dollar is the least bad currency option at the moment, the alternatives are pretty far behind.
The Moar You Know
@Betty Cracker: It’s not, but like most Republicans he’s very aware of things that make his party of choice look awful, and this is the worst I’ve seen in my lifetime.
The GOP is in a truly awful fix of their own making here. Quietly drop it, get the Koch/Mercer/Walton money spigot turned off and get primaried out by their insane base, or keep at it and drive your numbers down to the point where only 27% of Murica thinks you’re worth the hassle, lose general elections by the dozens, and force even your most ardent defenders to disown you.
Of course we all know what they’ll choose, right?
FlipYrWhig
@ET: You can tell he’s always been the guy who sits people around his desk, has them present an idea as he frowns and grumps, picks one more or less at random, and congratulates himself on a job well done.
gene108
@schrodingers_cat:
The Money Bags will notice, but I think they’ll find a way to game the new system to come out ahead. Bretton-Woods was a big shake-up in monetary policy, but folks adjusted. The U.S. going of the gold standard, in the 1970’s, was another big shake-up in monetary policy, but folks adjusted.
It’ll be a hit, but I don’t think it will be a dooms day scenario.
tesslibrarian
@Barbara: Given his diet, I assume he has a thick aura of farts around him at all times.
Frankensteinbeck
@Mike in DC:
Funny thing. A study came out tracking Trump voters in this election and in past elections. It turns out they care not a flying pig fart about trade policy! ASTONISHING. The Left assured me that was our Achilles heel!
SatanicPanic
@MattF: I was surprised at that myself. I imagine Ed Rogers is still defending it though.
Major Major Major Major
@Frankensteinbeck: yeah, Trump supporters did total 180’s on trade policy and Russia once Trump said to. Not so much other things I think, at least for now. But he could probably make them think whatever he wants.
Frankensteinbeck
@gene108:
It cannot be stressed enough that the big money bags are at least as motivated by their desire to feel powerful by grinding the poor under their heel, as they are by greed. Although it’s also worth keeping in mind they have trouble telling the two apart.
schrodingers_cat
@gene108: The 2009 bailout would have been far more expensive had the $ not been the world’s reserve currency. It won’t quite be doomsday but a steady erosion of position from being a top dog to an also ran. Everyone will feel a pinch, especially the 99%.
nightranger
@gene108: McConnell has already used the nuclear option for the Supreme court or haven’t you been paying attention? Douchebag-in-chief wants him to do the same for everything else including healtcare, tax cuts and the budget. So far TurtleBoy is resisting but this is TurtleBoy we are talking about here. Do you want all your eggs in that basket? That is were we are at now. Hoping that Republicans do the right thing…lol. Cracks me up just typing that ridiculous statement.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-04-06/mcconnell-s-nuclear-option-gets-trump-gorsuch-at-a-big-price
http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-tweet-senate-filibuster-healthcare-tax-cut-2017-5
GregB
Shirtless douchebag Putin has begun to reap his whirlwind from his Trump ratfucking.
NATO will increase their spending by billions this year.
TrumPutin will end up creating a more powerful NATO by trying to weaken it.
MisterForkbeard
@germy: Right – you have to love that. “You guys are totally wrong all the time! There’s the video I’ve watched and I don’t have any idea if it’s actually true or not, but it shows how bad the media is and how great Trump is really doing! You should all watch it and be ashamed.”
That’s amazingly hacktacular.
ETA: Fixed who I was replying to.
Lurking Canadian
@Barbara: That does seem to be what some of them want, but surely by now it ought to be clear even to them that the deal they want isn’t on the table?
Whatever Trump may have said during the campaign, the Republicans in Congress are clearly not interested in robust social programs for anybody, except possibly rich heirs/heiresses.
I’m reluctantly coming around to the point of view that stomping on Those People is all Republican voters actually want. Social Security, Medicare, jobs, etc are just perks. The stomping is what keeps them coming back.
SatanicPanic
@nightranger: I don’t anyone is hoping he does the right thing. I think he’s calculated that getting rid of it is worse than keeping it. No part of me thinks he’s doing it for moral reasons.
Kay
@Gretchen:
I noticed that too. He’s gross. The handshake thing is just horrible. I know he does it to men exclusively but it doesn’t matter. Grabbing people that way is out of line. You don’t grab someone and hang on to assert or project dominance. They’re not props for you to use.
Chris
@Lurking Canadian:
Oh yes.
Barney
I know – Trump could demonstrate his massive knowledge of health finance by publishing in JAMA. Like President Obama did. Twice. https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2016/07/13/president-obama-publishes-journal-article
catclub
@Major Major Major Major:
depends on who gets killed. Gorsuch is now on the SC
FlipYrWhig
@Frankensteinbeck: “Trade policy” is a euphemism for “companies make stuff in China now and there are more Mexicans around than I remember there used to be.” It’s always irksome when lefties get to thinking that righties use words with the same meanings _they_ do, like “elite” (which to righties means not “Davos bankers” but “college boy”) and “globalization” (which means not “multinational corporations” but “foreigners”).
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: Forget policy chops. He can’t hug, smile or shake hands like a normal person and a sizable # of voters still voted for him. That’s what bothers me the most.
rikyrah
BWA HA HA HA HA AH A
OH BC…you’re so funny.
Chyron HR
@nightranger:
Democrats couldn’t use “the nuclear option for the Supreme Court” because they literally did not have 50 seats in the senate when Scalia’s seat opened up. Garland’s confirmation wasn’t blocked by Democrats just being too darned wimpy to hold a vote.
(But that’s okay, the important thing is to propagate the meme that the Democratic party is the REAL problem.)
catclub
@Aleta:
Yes, but with more dead people.
Kay
There is no national politician who gets away with being completely full of shit as Rand Paul. Rand Paul doesn’t support any of their really unpopular ideas because “they aren’t conservative enough”, thereby completely covering his ass on the fact that no one likes conservative ideas- the ones that actually make it into bill form.
Rand Paul doesn’t actually do anything. He seems to see himself as some kind of intellectual libertarian who exists to pick apart the work of other people.
Were’s the Rand Paul Healthcare Bill? He doesn’t like the Democrats bill and he doesn’t like the Republicans bill. What’s the libertarian “solution” for healthcare? They never say because it would be even LESS popular than Trumpcare.
I notice too that as long as he’s not voting for GOP healthcare bills he assures that his actual constituents retain the social programs they all claim to hate but all rely on. It’s some scam he’s got going here, I must say.
He shouldn’t be a Senator. He should be tucked away in a libertarian think tank sneering at people.
glory b
@schrodingers_cat: Yes to both!
Someone needs to dress that girl! She’s a little overweight, she needs structured clothes, a fitted suit not those flowy things she wears.
From the BJ mean girls table.
Why, yes, i was a big fan of “What Not to Wear.”
Patricia Kayden
@schrodingers_cat: Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding. Ding.
Exactly. And so far they’ve been falling upwards. It’s amazing to me that we would have another Repub President after what Bush the Jr. did to this country (and to other countries as well). He should have been the last R President in my lifetime.
catclub
@Barbara: Also the Western Empire lasted hundreds of years longer than the US has lasted.
Patricia Kayden
@The Dangerman: No it would actually be great because it would expose Trump (once again) as the know nothing he really is. He’s all bluster, sound and fury with zero substance just like the little man behind the curtain turned out to be in the Wizard of Oz.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
I said all thru the campaign that everyone missed an opportunity. They over-thought Trump opposition. He could have been completely humiliated at one of those debates by asking him basic questions:
“What’s in NAFTA?” The same for TPP or Obamacare or anything else. Ask him which countries TPP includes. Ask him where Social Security disability comes from- which fund. Ask him what the EPA regulates, and can he contrast that with what state environmental agencies cover. He says “schools are local”. Ask him if there are federal laws that cover schools and what they cover. Romney, McCain, Hillary Clinton and Obama could all answer those questions.
He can’t define these things in his own words- he doesn’t know what they ARE.
Ask him questions about Trumpcare and don’t hand him the answer! Make him start at the beginning- “what does Medicaid cover now?” He benefited from the assumption that he knew these things, because he was treated like a normal candidate. He doesn’t know these things. I mean, Rick Perry got knocked out because he couldn’t remember an agency. Trump could have been fucking slaughtered.
Barney
@kindness: I think the Trump gang has a long list of enemies to work through before it has to cannibalise some supporters. It’s going for the media now, since they can call out his lies; any part of law enforcement, like the FBI or US attorneys, that threaten to expose their crimes are on the list, as are judges that don’t toe the line; and any part of the normal federal apparatus that wants to preserve the status quo for orderly power and control (eg sections of the CIA or military) will be demonised as “the deep state”. Then there are foreigners – NATO, Mexico, the UN, the EU, China, Canada, Australia – there’s no shortage of Emmanuel Goldsteins for Big Baby to have his Two Minute Hate about.
Patricia Kayden
@germy: And fake news by a man who has been discredited time and time again and exposed as a fraudster. But you have to be a Rightwing liar for this administration to take you seriously.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
He wants to build a wall. Ask him about state sovereignty and federal wall-building. These are real questions in immigration! The state/federal role is constantly debated. It’s important! REPUBLICANS think there’s a larger state role in immigration than is indicated in the US Constitution. They have an anti-immigrant President! They should have to reconcile that.
He was asked NOTHING.
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
Remember Hillary Clinton with the immigrant driver’s licenses in her primary debate? That’s a hard question! Trump got NONE of that and he’s never run before so he has NEVER had to figure any of that out.
They promoted him to President and he knows nothing. Straight to the top job!
nightranger
@Chyron HR: So you took some facts, combined it with stuff you pulled out of your arse, and turning it into alternative facts.
You should send your resume to the Whitehouse. I think you would fit right in.
Chris
@Kay:
Much like his dad, then. They’re both grifters who don’t actually do anything but make a lot of noise, draw a bunch of people generically unhappy with the system, get their names in the papers, get reelected a bunch of times, and never actually pass anything.
rikyrah
@Kay:
there’s Kay dropping more truth!
catclub
At Washington Monthly:
McConnell knows the US public has the attention span of a flea. This story will NEVER go front page.
TriassicSands
Nothing frustrates me more than the failure of journalists to ask pointed policy questions of Trump. Granted he’ll probably never agree to such questioning in advance, but it is the job of journalists to find ways to nail down the president and what he knows. Which is nothing!
StringOnAStick
Just a quick thanks to Alain for the pie filter. The sayings contained within the pie-process are quite entertaining!
scav
@Kay: Weren’t all those fact-based issues redefined (along with “what newspapers do you read?” ) as Gotcha! Questions and thus elitist and immaterial? This lot has “alternative facts” tucked in one side of their mouths as well, right next to their second or third tongue.
d58826
Betty – did Der Fuhrer block you for not being nice?
OT but did I miss the memo about the number of wars a sane nation should be involved in.?
Anyway
But when you are the biggest, hugestly, bestestly president of an America made great again, what is one more war.
On a serious note in my life time we have blindly stumbled into a number of places that turned into quagmires. Syria stamps your pass port with the words ‘WELCOME to the World’s leading Quagmire’. Shouldn’t that tell something? Obama is being ripped for not doing more. He has said that Syria was his biggest frustration. He should not have used the words ‘redline’ . But no one has any better policy options. Sure we can up the bombing option. Just like the air attacks after the Gulf of Tonkin ‘flying fish’ incident were to be a one off to show the world you can’t fool with Uncle Sam. That turned out well.
JUst wait till an American plane is shot down (god forbid by the Russians) and a pilot is captured and paraded thru the streets of Damacus. Does any one really think that sending in the101st airborne will make things any better. I’ve noticed that the real experts in the area and the ones with the skin closest in the game (Israel) has been in no rush to commit their military to the situation. What do they know that Der Fuhrer doesn’t (and yes that is a big fat hanging curve for all the comedians on this thread).
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/the-us-may-be-on-the-verge-of-striking-syria-%e2%80%94-heres-a-look-at-its-firepower-in-the-region/ss-BBDmerB?ocid=spartandhp
d58826
@catclub: Didn’t Yurtle or his Mrs, get some campaign money that had some Russian connections. Same with ZEGS.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@schrodingers_cat:
Actually, we’re being ruled by a Facebook profile of a beater pickup truck outfitted for rolling coal, Confederate flags flamboyantly waving from posts on each side of the tailgate (which is festooned with faded yellow ribbon magnets, bumper stickers announcing NRA membership, III% sympathies, and a crying eagle superimposed on an image of an American flag and the Twin Towers).
catclub
@d58826: I am an idiot and I could get foreign money into US politics super easy.
1. Open a US corporation.
2. Donate through said Corporation to a 501C4 ‘hide the donors’ political ‘charity’.
3. Profit!
MattF
@d58826: One of these days, R politicians will have to learn to ask questions in addition to ‘Is it green?’
Barbara
@Lurking Canadian: One would think, but a lot of people need to be punched in the mouth before they figure out that a guy they are inclined to like doesn’t like them back. In reality, it’s hard to know when support craters until it does. No one likes to admit that they made a bad deal or got snookered.
Barbara
@MattF: Not unless their voters make them.
scav
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Can FB profiles get infected? There’s evidence that one has some Russian malware or something going on.
schrodingers_cat
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Good description of Caligula’s horse for our times.
Hal
Collins is reportedly thinking of running for Gov of Maine in 2018. How is she going to vote for this mess of a bill and then expect Mainers to vote for her as Gov? Though as I’m typist this I remember Paul Lepage won twice.
bystander
@comrade scotts agenda of rage:
Betty’s mother was scared by Marcel Proust when she was pregnant with her.
d58826
@catclub: Getting the money is easy. The real trick is being aGOOPER and having control of the various oversight committees who chairperson says ‘Russia? What is a Russia’. and not having E_MAILS helps.
But from what I’ve read this goes beyond what has been the usual practice of laundering foreign money into a US election. I’d add a link but the article was a couple of months old. It’s all part of the growing scaffold of the new Trump Russian Tower Hotel being built as an addition to the GITMO vacation theme park. And it will be the biggest bestest most hughest theme park ever. .
zach
If Trump were a little clever about it and not such a coward he would do the town hall thing… just prepare him some kind of decision tree that redirects him to the right talking points in response to any predictable question, have him laugh off the Qs he doesn’t understand as fake news, and let him throw in some nonsense about how Obamacare is dead now and then. Make it bi-partisan instead of Dem only so half the questions are pre-planned softballs.
He could basically muddle through and not say anything totally insane and he’d get more credit for it than Obama did because our standards have sunk so low. If he survived the debates, he’d survive this.
The only risk is he says something stupid that everyone forgets in a few days when he says something stupider. The possible gains if the press scores it as a “win” — which would only need to clear a very low bar — are worth it.
d58826
@scav: Not an expert but if it lives in the electronic world and on an electronic device some one will find a way to infect it. .
Miss Bianca
@O. Felix Culpa: Hooray – positive developments in NM!
jl
Future history (on the optimistic assumption that there will be one) will eventually allow the country to understand the magnitude of the GOP’s bad faith, treachery and betrayal in its cynical obstructionism. Then people will look back at various Obama efforts at outreach as noble, and quaint, futile gestures.
Edit: anyway, kind of weird to watch some of the GOPers, like McCain, pretending to take the meeting seriously, in view of the future actions of the GOP.
schrodingers_cat
@Major Major Major Major: True, but will that continue with the repeated own goals of Rs? If I am a money manager in charge of a large endowment I am definitely diversifying in other currencies like Euro and Yen right now.
Mnemosyne
@MattF:
It’s the reason so many Republicans turned against W after Katrina — they don’t care what the US does overseas, but they think we should take care of our own people. Yes, even the black and brown ones. They’re xenophobes, not racists, and a few of them fall outside the Venn diagram.
Barbara
@Mnemosyne: Well, I think many of them are racists but they are institutional racists, in the sense that they want the system to be stacked in their own favor, as it was for a long time and in many ways still is. That doesn’t mean they don’t feel compassion for individuals, or that they affirmatively want to see people harmed. I think they probably also realized that anyone can be the victim of a natural disaster and expect a certain level of competence for whoever was in the way of the hurricane. What Thiessen might understand as well is that when it comes to Medicaid, while it might disproportionately help minority groups, the vast majority of people covered by Medicaid in raw numbers are white. This is especially true with the expansion population.
jonas
@The Moar You Know:
I was in a dr office last week and the TV was tuned to Shep Smith’s show and…neither he or any of his guests were carrying any water for the Trump administration whatsoever. So at least Fox viewers happening to tune in then were getting to witness some actual journalism rather than the usual Trump knob-polishing they serve up.
TenguPhule
@nightranger:
You forgot the bit where civil outrest breaks out and people start getting killed because people who lost loved ones start looking for someone to take it out on.
The Simp in the Suit
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: yeah, but she missed a comma:
“ways and”
This ain’t the flippin’ NYT!
debbie
Love your Tweet, Betty! I’d retweet if I Twittered.
Tehanu
@gvg:
I agree that Dump is, well, a large dump, but I’m starting to transfer most of the rage and hate he’s made me feel since the election to the rest of the GOP, especially the Congressional ones. Dump is an idiot con man who’ll go along with anybody who flatters him; but McConnell, Ryan, Pence, Conway, Gorsuch, Spencer, Bannon, and the rest of the endless list of vultures and vampires aren’t idiots; they’re evil, ALL of them, sociopaths and monsters of selfishness, ingratitude, bigotry, and greed; or worse, pious, hypocritical frauds preaching morality as they steal from the rest of us — stealing not just our money but our very lives and our sense of community and solidarity. Dump’s just the ugly face fronting for their even uglier souls.