Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

This really is a full service blog.

Spilling the end game before they can coat it in frankl luntz-approved dogwhistles.

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

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

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

Whoever he was, that guy was nuts.

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

After roe, women are no longer free.

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

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

You can’t love your country only when you win.

“Squeaker” McCarthy

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

I wonder if trump will be tried as an adult.

DeSantis transforms Florida into 1930s Germany with gators and theme parks.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

I was promised a recession.

You cannot shame the shameless.

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Quadrupling Down on Cruelty

Quadrupling Down on Cruelty

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Some additional reporting support’s Cheryl’s point downstairs that Trump is flailing, specifically on immigration. According to NBC News, it was Nielsen’s refusal to reinstate the family separation policy that led to her ouster:

President Donald Trump has for months urged his administration to reinstate large-scale separation of migrant families crossing the border, according to three U.S. officials with knowledge of meetings at the White House.

Trump’s outgoing Homeland Security secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, resisted — setting her at odds with the president.

Trump has been pushing this policy since January, the sources said, when the numbers of undocumented immigrants crossing the border began to rise.

A senior administration official said it seems Trump is convinced that family separation has been the most effective policy at deterring large numbers of asylum-seekers.

The acting secretary, Kevin McAleenan, hasn’t ruled out reinstating the policy, which is why he’s in and Nielsen is out. As for Nielsen, it will really piss me off if the Beltway bozos try to make a martyr of her. I hope Jeffrey Toobin will set the tone:

He said she deserves the lousy reputation she’ll have for the rest of her life, and he’s correct. Nobody made her take that job, implement horrendous policies and lie to defend her shitty boss.

If Nielsen could have done more to circumvent the legal protections asylum-seekers are afforded and/or hide the cruel practices of the agency she led, she would have done so. Trump will likely install another toady who will also fail.

The real problem is that Trump’s own rhetoric created a crisis at the southern border where none existed. People in desperate circumstances hear rumors of a wall going up, remittances (frequently the difference between having food or not) being shut down, etc., and they think, “Now or never.”

The New Yorker has a great three-part piece on factors driving immigration from Guatemala. It’s heartbreaking and infuriating in a thousand ways but well worth a read. The first part of the series is here.

Let’s hope our 2020 contenders are prepared for the coming shitstorm around immigration. Julián Castro was on Pod Save America last week and outlined his vision for a sane approach to immigration, as well as other issues. Even if he’s not the nominee, Castro’s ideas on immigration deserve a wider hearing within the party (and Warren’s on fighting corruption, etc.).

Buckle up, folks. It’s going to get even uglier.

Reader Interactions

233Comments

  2. 2.

    Betty

    Just saw on twitter that Congresswomen have been denied access to a children’s shelter in Florida. The cruelty goes all the way down.

  3. 3.

    rikyrah

    He said she deserves the lousy reputation she’ll have for the rest of her life, and he’s correct. Nobody made her take that job, implement horrendous policies and lie to defend her shitty boss.

    She should be shunned for the rest of her life.

  7. 7.

    Ruckus

    @Spanky:
    This is what a non violent dictatorship looks like when it starts. The problem is that there aren’t very often totally incompetent, non violent dictators. So it’s difficult to recognize what one looks like. And saying it is one does not end the reversal potential. But it does recognize the shit stain for what he is and wants to be. He obviously doesn’t give two shits about being president, he doesn’t care about the pomp and crap of being king, he wants to be a dictator. Who are his idols? Dictators. He’s such a dipshit he thought he could be elected to be one.

  9. 9.

    Brachiator

    Some additional reporting support’s Cheryl’s point downstairs that Trump is flailing, specifically on immigration.

    Trump is not flailing on immigration. He has been clear from the beginning about what he wants. His policies are racist and exclusionary. His staff, advisors, appointees and Fox News cheerleaders are all on the same page. It’s been pretty systematic.

    Trump is escalating punishment and prevention. It doesn’t matter to him that his methods may be ineffective or counter-productive or that they increase the very problems he thinks that he is solving.

    It is also pointless to try to make Trump’s people consider the “desperate circumstances” that leads immigrants to try to enter the US. To Trump they are vermin, and his solution is pest control.

    Let’s hope our 2020 contenders are prepared for the coming shitstorm around immigration.

    Trump is attempting to set the terms of the debate regarding immigration. He is inviting voters endorse his cruelty. I hope that people reject this and that the Democrats can offer a sane response to this.

  10. 10.

    gene108

    How many are undocumented immigrants? How many are legally seeking asylum?

    That distinction needs to be made by the media. I know Trump sees them all as dangerous animals, who should be thrown in cages, but there’s a serious distinction between the two groups that needs to be reported.

  11. 11.

    Kent

    There was a time in this country, not long ago, when we celebrated families who fled persecution and crossed borders illegally to claim asylum. In fact Rodgers and Hammerstein composed popular songs about illegal border crossings illegal aliens that we all grew up hearing and singing:

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

    It’s really sad how far we have fallen as a country.

  12. 12.

    Ruckus

    @Brachiator:
    I’d bet, no guarantee, that any policy forwarded by any true democrat running will be far more sane than what Trump is doing.

  13. 13.

    jackmac

    “The woman who put children in cages” — a fitting epitaph for this odious woman.

  16. 16.

    trollhattan

    @jackmac:
    Next stop: Hoover Institute and some sweet Wingnut Cash to soothe her wounds. She can play tennis with Condi and Henry the K.

  17. 17.

    Mike in NC

    Has anybody else been fired today? This might turn out to be “Night of the Long Knives: MAGA Edition”.

  18. 18.

    Ruckus

    @Kent:

    It’s really sad how far we have fallen as a country.

    I don’t believe we have fallen as a country. Portions of the country have dived head first but as a majority of the country we haven’t fallen. I do believe that many had no idea how bad republicans have become. Conservative ideals and policies for the last 6 or 7 decades (or even much longer)have been for the most part on the road to where we are. But the worst part is that many Americans had ceased fighting the battles, thinking that it was useless to do so. Many, many more are now sure that it isn’t.

  19. 19.

    VeniceRiley

    @jackmac: Those aren’t cages. They’re chain link 1 room suites in a concentration ca … um, nevermind!

    If any publisher gives her a book deal, or any organization pays her for speeches, or any academic institution of higher learning hires her … Well. I don’t know what I’ll do. I expect she’ll end up at a right wingnut “think” tank.

  23. 23.

    Kent

    I guess it’s just me. I’m working at a different HS today and I think the school’s internet filter is messing with baloon-juice. Glad the site itself isn’t glitched.

  24. 24.

    Brachiator

    @Spanky:

    We are officially in a Dictatorship.

    Bullshit.

    Enough with the alarmist shit.

    When should we start to worry?

  25. 25.

    Luthe

    @Mike in NC: The just ousted the Director of the Secret Service. I doubt Emperor Tang knows who the Praetorian Guard were, but Stephen Miller probably does and is staging a pre-emptive strike.

    Also, there’s a law about who can succeed the DHS Secretary as acting Secretary and it ain’t the head of CBP.

  29. 29.

    dr. luba

    @Kent: Not right now. But some days I do, usually during the workday when everyone is trying to access the internet through our hospital’s inadequate connection.

  30. 30.

    Adam L Silverman

    Oh goody…

  31. 31.

    Adam L Silverman

    @rikyrah: Happened a few weeks ago. This has been a constant issue. HHS claims they need two weeks notice to facilitate the fact finding visits. They’ve been doing this for over a year now.

  33. 33.

    Joe Falco

    @Brachiator:

    When should we start to worry?

    Free and fair elections being canceled by executive decree would be a pretty big tell.

  36. 36.

    Mnemosyne

    I’m honestly surprised it took this long. Her boyfriend must have kept an inside line going.

    And I’m guessing Nielsen’s “resistance” was based on knowing that SHE would be the one going to jail for following orders, not Trump, and she’s not enough of a cultist to be willing to sacrifice herself for him.

  39. 39.

    matt

    It is sweet to see all the fellow elites in the media furiously dog paddling to try to rehabilitate her reputation. Got to protect the club.

  40. 40.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Ruckus: It isn’t a dictatorship. What’s happening is that the President, at Stephen Miller’s urging, has decided that the sole focus of the Department of Homeland Security is border control and immigration. Neither either care about what the Federal laws and Senate ratified treaties and conventions say. Nor do they really care about anything else at this point. So what you’re seeing is an attempt to rejigger DHS and its constituent parts from being the Department of Homeland Security to the Department of Border Control and Immigration Enforcement. The Secret Service move, despite what is being officially reported on unofficial whispering, is most likely related to the fact that the Secret Service through the President under the bus last week by stating officially that they do not vet and, as a result, that they have no control over who has access to the President’s commercial properties. That it is outside of their purview. This made the President look bad given that we now know that the PRC’s intel community just sacrificed a piece to further suck the Trump organization into the trap they’re setting in the game of Go they are playing to infiltrate the President’s commercial properties like Mar a Lago.

  41. 41.

    germy

    I saw this at LGM:

    Some people are noting that Nielsen’s resignation letter has a lot of stylistic similarities with the anonymous NYT op-ed from last fall about the “resistance” inside the Trump administration.

    But I don’t know who “some people” are.

  45. 45.

    Martin

    @Ruckus: I agree. Almost every move the right has made has been countered in places like CA with a move to the left. Oregon, Washington, other states as well. Sometimes quietly, sometimes not. This still feels very extinction-bursty to me. Everything the GOP is doing speaks to their recognition that they’ve lost, that they need to change the rules of the game to have any hope of winning. Sometimes that works as Malcom is noting, but oftentimes it ushers in a fairly transformative moment when the old guard is swept away. Prop 187 was 20 years ago and was the extinction burst event for CA. CA was still a red state then. Now we’re as far left as any state in the country.

    Success hides many sins. Politicians know this. Sometimes when you push too far, people see you for who you really are, but usually not until you’ve failed. I think this is the reason for the leftward push by Democrats. They see that day coming, and when it does, they don’t want to be seen holding a bunch of triangulated positions. They’ll hold fully progressive ones. Public option is out, single payer is in.

  46. 46.

    Brachiator

    @Ruckus:

    I’d bet, no guarantee, that any policy forwarded by any true democrat running will be far more sane than what Trump is doing.

    Trump’s policy makes sense to him. He wants to draw a bright red line to divide who belongs and who does not belong.

    The Democrats, and the people, will have to decide whether they accept Trump’s sorting of people by his view of their value.

  47. 47.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Dorothy A. Winsor: Obama authorized that the Cuban Baseball Federation is not part of the Cuban government, which allowed MLB to seek work visas and regular immigration processes for Cuban baseball players to come to the US to play. Marco Rubio and other Cuban hardliners have been complaining about this and wanted the Cuban Baseball Federation reclassified as part of the Cuban government as part of the reinstatement of the US embargo against Cuba. That’s what this decision does. It also means that Cuban baseball players must now try to leave Cuba, get smuggled into the US through a third state like Mexico, and then formally defect in order to play professional baseball in the US. This decision is just a combination of cruelty for cruelties sake and if Obama did it, we’re going to undo it.

  48. 48.

    Ruviana

    I read a lot of things about this administration since they’re so dangerous. I just finished Team of Vipers. It will annoy most people here but it was an interesting way of understanding how the regime operates. Germaine here is that the two main areas for trump “thinking” or “policy” are trade and immigration. He is determined to enforce greater and greater restrictions on anything having to do with immigration. He is absolutely in agreement with Stephen Miller and Steve Bannon (remember that guy?). Many of the other things he does, at least according to the author–and I do recognize his biases–are spur of the moment things or a chance to “mix things up” which trump seems to find amusing. But he’s dead serious on immigration.

    ETA: Minor grammar tweaks to improve clarity.

  49. 49.

    different-church-lady

    @Joe Falco: Position of partition over affordance to barn. Equine presence. Temporal arrangement. All that all that.

  50. 50.

    TS (the original)

    If the democracy survives – trump is creating multiple disasters which will fall upon the democrat elected in 2020 – and watch the media attack (as they did to President Obama) as yet again democrats clean up a mess deliberately started by republicans. This technique is how they have continued to be elected for the past 50 years.

    trump’s war is very much closer to home than those of the Bush Presidents – it cannot end as he wants within current legal constraints so he fires anyone who mentions such things.

  51. 51.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Brachiator: When late night comedians are arrested on air for making fun of the President. When you can’t buy booze. When pregnant women are rounded up and placed under official custodial surveillance in order to ensure they don’t get an abortion. When LGBTQ who are married have their marriages forcibly annulled by the state. And when interracial and interreligious marriages are also forcibly annulled by the state.

  53. 53.

    Spanky

    @Brachiator: Worry? I’ve been worried since November 2016. But that doesn’t mean he’s a dictator. Wannabe, sure, but until elections have been cancelled and/or the military announces they’re fully behind Trump, regardless of the law, I don’t think we need take to the streets. In a Paris 1779 sort of way, anyhow. I’m happy to be taking to the streets now to remind him that we are NOT OK with what’s going on.

  55. 55.

    Cheryl Rofer

    @Adam L Silverman: I’ll add that it’s fine to “worry” now, but passive “worry” isn’t going to do anything. As was suggested on the last thread, do what you can do. Volunteer to your local Democratic Party or favorite candidate. We’ve got to start now to win the election.

    It’s not a matter of looking for particular signs. We’ve got plenty of flashing yellow lights now. But panic is counterproductive.

  56. 56.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Luthe: Correct. Congressman Thompson, the head of the House Homeland Security Committee will have something to say here. And I’m sure someone is trying to figure out if they have standing to sue to force the law to be followed and faithfully executed. My guess is that Speaker Pelosi will have her House Counsel do so. There’s no constitutional issue here. The law is clear and specific.

  58. 58.

    Brachiator

    @Martin:

    Everything the GOP is doing speaks to their recognition that they’ve lost, that they need to change the rules of the game to have any hope of winning.

    The Republicans have the presidency, the Senate and they hope to control the direction of the Supreme Court. This is not quite “losing.”

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It isn’t a dictatorship.

    No, but it is deliberately setting a group of people apart for special, exclusionary treatment. Trump’s preferred policy is that no one from a shithole country is to be allowed to set foot on US soil or to seek asylum.

  59. 59.

    Elie

    I don’t comment as much as I used to. I lurk a lot but I will repeat what I have said. We are in the fight for the life of this republic. Make no mistake. Trump may be flailing or insecure or scared, but he will be moved to ever greater extremes of actions. What will be our way to stop him? What is going to be that bridge too far? I feel that there is kind of a bottomlessness to this. When are we going to have enough? From the Mueller report to our military involvements to the abuse of families and children — what are we going to DO????

    I don’t know what I am ready to do but I want to do something. I am working local politics in my county and state but I am scared that this wont be enough and that people are starting to really normalize the radically abnormal. We must not!

  60. 60.

    Betty Cracker

    @Brachiator: He’s flailing. Trump thought the kids in cages policy would scare asylum seekers off, but it turned out to not only be a PR disaster that his admin had to walk back, it inspired even more desperate families to make the trek with children in tow. He thought he’d get money for his stupid wall, and he got his ass handed to him by Pelosi instead. He blustered about shutting down the southern border last week, and his toadies let him know it would be economic suicide, so he walked it back. Trump is a failure on immigration no matter how you slice it, and that makes him even more angry and reckless. The fact that his base and the people surrounding him are as horrible as he is doesn’t make his immigration push a well-oiled machine. It’s a gigantic failure.

  61. 61.

    Adam L Silverman

    @debit: It is not April 1936 in Germany. Just last week we got an officially unofficial leak that the Commandant of the US Marine Corps, the second highest ranking Marine in the US at this time because the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs is also a Marine four star, authorized leaks of internal emails criticizing and pushing back against the misappropriation and diversion of DOD funds by the President. Gen. Neller has not been removed, he hasn’t been arrested, he hasn’t been assassinated or executed. Nor has Gen. Dunford, who I have no doubt gave Gen. Neller approval to do this.

  65. 65.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @Martin:

    CA was still a red state then

    More of a bluish purple. While we had Republican Governors for 16 years after Chairman Jerry’s first two terms the Legislature has tended more to Democrats.

  69. 69.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Cheryl Rofer: How is that even possible outside of a secured and walled-off cyber setup? All the USB ports are deactivated on all US government computers.

  71. 71.

    Spanky

    @different-church-lady: Yes, but the fun will be finding what “too far” is. Apparently Nielsen reached “too far” and got shitcanned.

    The lynch pin for “too far” is McConnell, so yeah, there’s still plenty to worry about. But in the highly unlikely event that Republican senators start peeling away from the party line, “too far” might get here a lot sooner.

  73. 73.

    randy khan

    @randy khan:

    Too late to edit my comment above, so I’ll add that some voters – the hardliners – will be happy about this, but the Dems never were getting them anyway. Other Cuban voters who are more sane about this will recognize the human rights issues here, particularly given that horrible stories about baseball players who had to defect and come through third countries are very well known in that community.

  74. 74.

    Dorothy A. Winsor

    I try to avoid snarking about people’s appearance or bodies, but it’s occurred to me that in Trump’s physical presence, we have a metaphor or maybe a sort of living synecdoche (ie a figure of speech in which a part represents a whole) for the R party. It’s bloated and overweight, suggesting greed. And it’s sick and demented.

    Is it too early to have a glass of wine?

  78. 78.

    catclub

    @Cheryl Rofer: the optimistic view is that ‘his computer’ means ‘his computer that was firewalled and only used for testing’, rather than his personal laptop.

  79. 79.

    Brachiator

    @Adam L Silverman:

    When late night comedians are arrested on air for making fun of the President. When you can’t buy booze. When pregnant women are rounded up and placed under official custodial surveillance in order to ensure they don’t get an abortion. When LGBTQ who are married have their marriages forcibly annulled by the state. And when interracial and interreligious marriages are also forcibly annulled by the state.

    Slope, meet slippery.

    When news agencies are excluded or ignored and right wing propaganda outlets are the only ones allowed to ask questions. When a state shuts down all abortion clinics so that no woman in the state can get an abortion. When transgender people are arbitrary excluded from the military. When laws are set down defining men and women on the basis of their genitalia at birth. When a president allows and encourages death threats against Muslim members of Congress.

  84. 84.

    Betty Cracker

    @bobbo: I saw a shitty MAGA sticker-encrusted vehicle the other day with a sticker in the shape of the USA that said “FUCK OFF WE’RE FULL.”

  85. 85.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Cheryl Rofer: No arguments here. Complete agreement.

    Also, I highly recommend everyone read these:
    https://www.marxists.org/archive/giap/1961-pwpa.pdf
    Or $1.99 for Kindle! The introduction to this version, written in the early 70s by an American Special Forces guy is kind of hit or miss and clearly a product of its time and prejudices:
    https://www.amazon.com/Peoples-Insurrection-Manual-Underdeveloped-Countries-ebook-dp-B06XGLFS3R/dp/B06XGLFS3R/ref=mt_kindle?_encoding=UTF8&me=&qid=

    And people will also need this:
    https://www.marines.mil/Portals/59/Publications/FMFRP%2012-15%20%20Small%20Wars%20Manual.pdf

  86. 86.

    catclub

    @Adam L Silverman:

    All US government USB ports are deactivated on all computers.

    ummm,…. no. I have a counter example on my desk.

    I am starting to suspect irony went flying over my head.

  87. 87.

    Spanky

    @catclub: Yeah, except for the part about him having to halt the analysis to prevent further corruption. Which BTW rarely succeeds.

  88. 88.

    Mike in NC

    @bobbo: Back in the 1990s that was something Howard Stern said a lot on his radio show. Take one guess as to who was a frequent guest on Howard Stern.

  89. 89.

    chopper

    @catclub:

    i was thinking, how the fuck is my keyboard and mouse supposed to work? headset? or any of my gobs of thumb drives?

  93. 93.

    H.E.Wolf

    @Elie:

    I don’t know what I am ready to do but I want to do something. I am working local politics in my county and state but I am scared that this wont be enough

    I may be mis-remembering, but I think we are in the same part of the country – and whether or not that’s the case, I believe that involvement in local politics, at the county and state level, is going to be what saves our country.

    We’re neighbors, whether or not we’re nearby one another. Thank you for what you are doing! I’m working at the same level, so you have company. And for what it’s worth, I always read your comments with respect and appreciation.

  94. 94.

    debit

    @Adam L Silverman: I mean, I hate running around screaming hair on fire hysterics, but I am about there. You are, without a doubt, more in tune with the power dynamics at play here than I, but all I can see are the brake lines being cut while the gas pedal is pressing closer to the floor.

  95. 95.

    catclub

    @Jay:

    Yes, all the ReThugs have are festering resentment and pissing off the Libs.

    it is impressive and depressing how far you can get on just those. Just think if they also had a comfy chair and fanatical dedication to the pope!?

  96. 96.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Brachiator: From 1776 through to 1964 with the Civil Rights Act passed that year, 1965 with the Voting Rights and Immigration Acts passed that year, and 1967 when the Supreme Court ruled in Loving V. Virginia, the US had been a representative democracy that purposefully excluded Americans from representation within, by, and through that democracy. We’ve all gotten used to the imperfect, but important historical aberration of the past 50 years where the US has been a representative democracy that at least made an attempt not purposefully exclude Americans from representation within, by, and through that democracy.

  98. 98.

    TS (the original)

    @Adam L Silverman: I hope the democratic party is past the “forgive and forget” options from the past – but doubt there will be any support from the media to do anything else.

  99. 99.

    jonas

    @Brachiator:

    He is inviting voters endorse his cruelty. I hope that people reject this and that the Democrats can offer a sane response to this.

    Maybe I’m just in a pissy mood today, but I’m pessimistic on both those fronts. Trump will go balls-to-the-wall to weaponize immigration as *the* campaign issue in 2020. I wouldn’t be surprised if he redesigns the ICE uniform to feature a Totenkopf insignia.

  100. 100.

    Barry

    @Adam L Silverman: Which would come long after any opposition party has been neutralized, and long after the media has been ‘tamed’.

    In other words, long after it’s too late.

  101. 101.

    jl

    So, Trump attempting to personally order Border Patrol agents to break the law? Might deserve a front page post, if another commenter didn’t flag it in another thread

    @joshtpm
    To be specific, Trump told the agents to break the law and lie to judges. After Trump left supervisors had to explain that if they obeyed the President they’d open themselves to “personal liability.” https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/president-told-border-agents-to-break-the-law … via @TPM
    https://twitter.com/joshtpm/status/1115348228755611659

    Edit: from the linked article:
    “Last Friday, the President visited Calexico, California, where he said, “We’re full, our system’s full, our country’s full — can’t come in! Our country is full, what can you do? We can’t handle any more, our country is full. Can’t come in, I’m sorry. It’s very simple.”

    (Edit: above is the actual quote of Trump toxic nonsense that I thought was somebody’s joke on Trump when I first saw it.)

    Behind the scenes, two sources told CNN, the President told border agents to not let migrants in. Tell them we don’t have the capacity, he said. If judges give you trouble, say, “Sorry, judge, I can’t do it. We don’t have the room.”

    After the President left the room, agents sought further advice from their leaders, who told them they were not giving them that direction and if they did what the President said they would take on personal liability. You have to follow the law, they were told.”

  102. 102.

    catclub

    @Spanky: IN 1932 germany had 47% unemployment. The US had 25% unemployment and did not have a revolution. But 47% unemployment – unimaginably different – Greece had 25% unemployment within the last decade, but also some semblance of a safety net.

  103. 103.

    raf

    Stephen Miller is probably marching naked around the White House wearing Nazi boots and hat and carrying a rifle in celebration.

  105. 105.

    wjs

    I love how all the frogs I know are debating how this hot water has gotten uncomfortable.

  106. 106.

    dmsilev

    @jonas: That was the route he took last November. It was all “CARAVANS ARE COMING” all the time. I don’t want to come across as overly sanguine, but it looks like a diet of pure hate and nothing else only gets you so far.

  109. 109.

    lgerard

    We’ve reached the point where even people like Lee Francis Cissna and Ronald Vitiello who were championed by far right anti-immigration groups are now too squishy for Miller and his enablers. It is a Stalinesque purge.

  111. 111.

    Hoodie

    @Adam L Silverman: Stuff like that is what makes it more likely that all of this more evidence of Trump going off the deep end instead of some incipient dictatorship (as much as he would like the latter). He’s bunkering in like Nixon during Watergate, pushing away people who are insufficiently loyal, which opens the door for truly debased shitbirds like Miller, who has the political instincts of a garden slug. Having got most of what they want (tax cuts and FedSoc judges) out of him, the question is when GOP leadership thinks they can safely flush him without too much damage to their standing with the base. That may be a while, but the surefire way of dumping a GOP president is to turn on him when he looks like a loser (witness what happened to Shrub when Iraq went to complete shit). The mouthbreather base can tolerate a lot of things – racism, bigotry, misogyny, etc. – but they can’t stand a guy who can’t own the libs and taints them with loser stink. You’ll know when the rightwing vanguard starts calling him a democrat.

  112. 112.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Mike in NC: All you’re missing is a White Canadian woman’s reinterpretation of African American women’s history and experiences through to the end of the Jim Crow period.

  113. 113.

    Brachiator

    @Betty Cracker:

    Trump is a failure on immigration no matter how you slice it, and that makes him even more angry and reckless.

    Have immigrant children been re-united with their parents?

    The fact that his base and the people surrounding him are as horrible as he is doesn’t make his immigration push a well-oiled machine. It’s a gigantic failure.

    To be clear, I have never said that Trump’s immigration push is a well-oiled machine. The problem is that his failures do not slow him down, and even Republican opposition (the only opposition he listens to) has been spotty and inconsistent.

    He is still trying to re-allocate funds for his Wall. And he is looking for appointees to execute his cruel policies. Conservative hard liners keep approving of his methods and he is persistent in trying to make them happy.

    Trump even has Bernie Sanders idiotically parroting anti-immigration arguments.

    Trump is not entirely succeeding. But his anti-immigrant efforts are purposeful and he keeps pushing them forward.

  114. 114.

    Adam L Silverman

    @chopper: My understanding, from personal experience, is that because of just this type of potential threat, all USB ports are deactivated on US government computers. That has certainly been my experience with every computer I’ve had access to as either a mobilized civilian on appointment or a contractor. My understanding is that this is supposed to be an across the board operational security/cyber security measure.

  115. 115.

    Spanky

    @catclub: Which reminds me of the upcoming stock market slump and global economic downturn. I’m sure Trump’s Fed will be able to navigate through that unscathed.

    Where’s that cabernet ….

  116. 116.

    ruemara

    @Spanky: You guys who are relatively secure are making me wish you understood that it doesn’t have to go to full blown disaster to be one.

  118. 118.

    Ruckus

    @Joe Falco:
    As timing is everything, I’d say that when there are no elections might be just a tad late to be complaining.

    Of course you could be snarking and I just sailed on by that….

  119. 119.

    Adam L Silverman

    @catclub: Okay, must just be DOD, the Services, and the Intelligence Community. My understanding, from my annual cyber security training, is it was across all of the US government, but I sit corrected.

  120. 120.

    jl

    @Hoodie: Well, Trump tried to start his political career as a conservative Democrat decades ago. So, maybe the wingnut media brigade will call him a deep mole? Democratic Party didn’t give Trump much welcome (because… obvious long ago he i a toxic fool and ignoramus)..

  121. 121.

    Adam L Silverman

    @debit: I’m not saying things are fine. They’re not. I’m not saying there isn’t significant risk here. There is. I’ve been saying that since right after the election in 2016. Panicking, however, is not going to help anyone.

  127. 127.

    chopper

    @Adam L Silverman:

    based on my personal experience, as a federal employee for over 20 years, no. that is in no way true at all. i’m sure certain areas have tighter restrictions. but it is in no way some across-the-board policy.

  130. 130.

    Adam L Silverman

    @dmsilev: It can’t be sustained. You have to keep upping the input stimuli. Eventually it burns out those who try to be full time rageaholics.

  131. 131.

    Roger Moore

    @Adam L Silverman:
    I think you’re answering the wrong question. Your answers are for “when are we obviously in a dictatorship”. Brachiator asked when we should start to worry. I don’t think it’s time yet to panic and complain about a dictatorship, but it’s certainly long past time to start worrying about Trump’s authoritarian tendencies.

  133. 133.

    Joe Falco

    @Ruckus: It was mostly snark. I had a follow-up reply that tried to make that clearer as it was made plain to see I was too subtle on the first try.

  134. 134.

    Kent

    @chopper: That’s my experience as well, working for NMFS. Most of the stuff we used was off-the-shelf Dell desktops and laptops. USB ports were definitely not deactivated on any computer I ever used because we used a lot of USB accessories like cordless mice and I copied take-home work to flash drives all the time. Part of my job was printing EA and EIS documents for public distribution and I’d copy the .pdf files over to a flash drive and take them to kinkos for printing. Might be a different policy for law enforcement and defense agencies and things like that. But we had a very ordinary office with very ordinary off-the-shelf computer hardware.

  136. 136.

    Adam L Silverman

    @rikyrah: No one can explain Silverman. We don’t have that technology. Won’t have it for centuries if ever.//

    More seriously, this is the first I heard about it and the ACLU didn’t include any explanation. Unfortunately, the Florida lobbylature is in session, which means NO ONES rights, life, liberty, and/or property is safe until they go back into recess!

  138. 138.

    Ruviana

    Hey Adam, to go in a slightly different direction, could all this lead eventually to the break-up of “Homeland Security?” Inasmuch as it was a massive revamping of various agencies after 9/11 is there some chance it could be broken up into its earlier parts?

  140. 140.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Roger Moore: We should have started to worry in May 2015. That’s when I did. I was standing in the lounge area, between the classrooms and the offices, in the Center for Special Operations Studies and Research at SOCOM watching the campaign announcement on the TV. I looked at one of my colleagues, a retired US Air Force colonel, we both nodded, shook our heads, and went back to work.

  142. 142.

    chopper

    @Kent:

    lots of us work remotely at least a few days a week, using off-the-shelf laptops with docking stations and what-not. so we’re at the mercy of the usb port to do anything at all.

  143. 143.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Ruviana: One would hope, but I doubt it. Especially because it would mean Joe Lieberman would be on cable news 24/7 complaining that his big idea was being dismantled.

  144. 144.

    Ruckus

    @Adam L Silverman:
    A dictatorship does not have to be a violent overthrow of something else. I agree that this is not that. But what else can you really call this? It is a total repudiation of what we assume is our government. None of the leadership wants or is willing to follow the law. The person in “charge” has a total disregard for the law and it’s norms. He makes shit up on the fly. Now if you are saying that he’s not competent enough to be a dictator, I’d fully agree. But trying to minimize what is happening is not really helping. Our government is failing from the top down. How far do we have to go before we realize that this is no longer a tenable situation? It suits the people in charge, Trump, Miller and McConnell. They are bending the country to their wishes and don’t care if the law is followed. They think they are the law. That’s a dictatorship.
    My answer to Sparky was to partially show that while Trump is totally incompetent at anything what he wants IS a dictatorship. It’s possible that we are actually looking at the wrong person, Trump is the figurehead who wants to be a dictator, but Stephen Miller actually is one.
    And I’m not trying to be a scare monger either, but we are reaching a point where the road back becomes much more difficult and bloody. Can we change directions, given the situation? I don’t know, I’m hoping that we last until January 2021 and this nightmare/bullshit can be contained. But it gets worse day by day, what with the person making actual decisions/direction not being even the shitty elected guy, but the guy in the back room. That sure doesn’t describe a democracy. And while there are many people who are attempting to hold on to the concept of and workings of a democracy, the levers of power they hold are tentative at best.
    So when is the time to be worried if not now when it’s maybe still possible to affect positive change?

  146. 146.

    Rand Careaga

    @Barry:

    Which would come long after any opposition party has been neutralized, and long after the media has been ‘tamed’.

    I’m with Barry on this. I respect Adam, but I think he’s setting the metric way too high here.

  147. 147.

    Brachiator

    @Adam L Silverman:

    From 1776 through to 1964 with the Civil Rights Act passed that year, 1965 with the Voting Rights and Immigration Acts passed that year, and 1967 when the Supreme Court ruled in Loving V. Virginia, the US had been a representative democracy that purposefully excluded Americans from representation within, by, and through that democracy.

    The people who were excluded could not be said to live in a democracy. The Japanese Americans sitting in camps were not living in a democracy.

    We’ve all gotten used to the imperfect, but important historical aberration of the past 50 years where the US has been a representative democracy

    Some people know that their rights can be wiped away with the stroke of a pen. Worse, as this is the 25th anniversary of the Rwanda genocides, it is sometimes ridiculously easy to stir people to violence against people who have been defined as being unworthy of life and dignity.

    Some people keep saying, don’t worry, don’t be afraid. And yet I see Trump peeling away groups who previously counted on some protection: Dreamers, refugees, transgender people, undocumented immigrants. The message is clear. You don’t belong here. You will never be wanted.

    People who think they are on the right side of Trump’s line should not feel too comfortable.

  148. 148.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Ruckus: That isn’t a dictatorship, it is an illiberal democracy or a managed democracy overlaid upon an oligarchy with kleptocratic elements.

  149. 149.

    Cheryl Rofer

    @Ruviana: This is what I was thinking when I commented that DHS isn’t the worst agency for him to wreck. It won’t be reconstituted under Trump, of course, but the next Democrat administration will have to do something with the smoking ruin.

  152. 152.

    Roger Moore

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    More of a bluish purple. While we had Republican Governors for 16 years after Chairman Jerry’s first two terms the Legislature has tended more to Democrats.

    Also, California had just voted for Bill Clinton in 1992, the first time it had voted Democratic in the presidential election since Johnson over Goldwater. Although it’s implied by the comment about an extinction pulse, the whole reason Pete Wilson pushed Prop 187 was that he wasn’t confident he could win the gubernatorial election without a wedge issue to drive Republican turnout.

  153. 153.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    @Brachiator:
    The difference between Rwanda and 2019 America, and even much of America’s past, is that today large majorities reject that behavior. In the post Civil War South, it would’ve been unimaginable to witness white vigilantes fighting the KKK. Antifa regularly opposes and fights the so-called “alt-right”. We’re not going down without a fight

  154. 154.

    trollhattan

    @raf:

    carrying a rifle in celebration

    Am assuming that’s a reference to his “Little Stephen” because of course he would.

    And given Trump’s overruling of every security clearance denial he probably ordered the Secret Service to arm Big Stephen simply because Stevie asked him for “A fucking gun of my own!”

  157. 157.

    catclub

    @Kent:

    Might be a different policy for law enforcement and defense agencies and things like that.

    I am guessing that almost all USG computers Adam S sees handle classified material. Canceling USB rights on THOSE computers sounds about right. Not all DOD agency computers handle classified material.

  158. 158.

    Adam L Silverman

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??: Not quite. We have a lawless President and a Senate Majority Leader who, as I’ve written about here extensively, recognizes no norm, tradition, custom, and/or law unless it can be bent to his own purposes. But the House is doing what it is supposed to be doing, as are the Courts. And at least 1/2 the states.

  159. 159.

    Ruckus

    @Adam L Silverman:
    Then what?
    At that point what is the possible response? Wait for the next election, which will be what, fair and open and which the results will be followed?
    You are right though in what you are trying to do, which is lower the panic level, the extremes, the edges from falling off, the ground from turning red. And I agree with that. But I also feel that we do have to understand that our system is failing. It hasn’t failed yet, I look outside and none of this looks any different than it did six months ago, or 4 yrs ago. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t failing. So I repeat, what do we do when it hits the fan? Will we be able to communicate, to do anything at all? Will we have to start all over? We are starting to see the convergence of the incompetence, the desire to be a dictator, the desire to be the master race, the desire to have the money, the desire for none of us to count at all. What do we do and when do we do it?

  160. 160.

    Adam L Silverman

    @catclub: My unclassified desktop workstations have all been disabled in regard to using thumb drives or USB cable enabled storage media since 2009 or so. The classified systems, are, of course, even more restrictive.

  161. 161.

    Hoodie

    @Jay: That may be, but Nixon was still wildly popular after the 72 election and Commander Codpiece was riding pretty high after the invasion of Iraq. Trump may be a more antibiotic-resistant strain because of the weakening of party leadership and the ascent of FOX, but Bush did have the benefit of the latter. As long as the economy is nominally robust (not talking about maldistribution or sustainability) and we aren’t mired in a war, they probably won’t turn on him. Trump’s weaknesses are his incompetence, lack of discipline and insecurity, which is probably why he resents Obama to the depth of his soul. His advantage over Nixon is that he doesn’t show any guilt (e.g., upper lip flopsweat) and, unlike Bush, he hasn’t yet committed an overwhelming screwup.

  162. 162.

    Jay

    @Adam L Silverman:

    It’s a kakistocray,

    A kakistocracy (/ˌkækɪsˈtɒkrəsi, -ˈstɒk-/) is a system of government that is run by the worst, least qualified, or most unscrupulous citizens.[1][2] The word was coined as early as the seventeenth century.[3] It also was used by English author Thomas Love Peacock in 1829, but gained significant use in the first decades of the twenty-first century to criticize populist governments emerging in different democracies around the world.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kakistocracy

  163. 163.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    @Ruckus:

    At that point? We’ll have to fight the GOP-controlled government in the streets. No one will save us but ourselves, particularly since the US has the largest nuclear arsenal on the planet. The Allies aren’t coming to liberate us.

  164. 164.

    Steeplejack

    Best take on Nielsen I’ve seen, from Alexandra Petri in the Post: “Kirstjen Nielsen was rooting for you all along, you know.”

    Kirstjen Nielsen just wants you to know: She was rooting for you, all along. She believes in the law. A little-known fact about Kirstjen Nielsen is that whenever President Trump wanted to do something bad, she was right there, objecting in the name of the law. Not many people know this, because it was not obvious from the policy stances that the department wound up embracing, but—we know, now. Please be reassured.

    The terrible thing you saw was only the dangling, glowing protuberance on the head of the immense submerged monster you did not see. Keep that in mind going forward as you decide whether Kirstjen Nielsen should be welcome in restaurants or on cable news.

    Truly, truly there was no one more appalled by what Trump was asking the Department of Homeland Security to do than she was, which is why she only implemented the really heinous parts when she felt that a show of force was necessary to impress him and keep her job (that she might better continue to resist).

  167. 167.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Brachiator:

    Trump is not flailing on immigration. He has been clear from the beginning about what he wants. His policies are racist and exclusionary. His staff, advisors, appointees and Fox News cheerleaders are all on the same page. It’s been pretty systematic.

    Trump’s flailing on implantation, What he wants to be the head of the pre-WWII Germany were the entire government bureaucracy was trained to follow orders to the letter and without question. Instead he has the US civil service who will wait Trump out tell next election if Trump orders them to do something they don’t want to do.

  168. 168.

    TomatoQueen

    @chopper: Quite right. What’s forbidden is non gov’t issue gear, so no personal hardware or software or CDs etc. And if by chance you test these limits in any way, your IT folks will send a memo to your supervisor, your Branch Chief, and whoever handles OPM stuff, with all the details, and suggestions for punishment. First offense is a warning, next is suspension, third is out on your backside. And you are trained on this and reminded on this more than once a year, especially when it’s hot and the a/c isn’t working and you’d like to plug in a USB-pluggable fan and somebody stops you before you do something stupey-head.
    Now as to whether gov’t computer equipment works really well…I buried my wireless mouse under a rock, and have one functioning usb port on this laptop, all the others make the wire-mouse wobble.

  169. 169.

    gene108

    @rikyrah:

    She should be shunned for the rest of her life.

    We should’ve shunned Nixon, Ford for pardoning Nixon, Kissenger, G. Gordon Liddy, Elliot Abrams, Ollie North, Marc Thiesen, Condi Rice, John Yoo, etc., but they aren’t.

    I fully expect Nielsen to make a big comeback.

  171. 171.

    Martin

    @Roger Moore: Right, but Prop 187 won 59/41. It wasn’t close. Prop 184 the same year (3 strikes) passed 72/28. Hell, we passed Prop 8 in 2008.

  172. 172.

    Adam L Silverman

    @Ruckus: Register everyone you know to vote, get them to register everyone they know to vote. And then vote, get everyone you know to vote, and get everyone they know to vote. You don’t really want to know what I think the alternative solution is.

  175. 175.

    Jay

    @Hoodie:

    As the LGM article notes, a bunch of the Never Trump ReThugs are backing Trump now out of resentment and anger.

    The dynamic not being reported, is ReThugs quitting on politics, ( for now), or quitting being ReThugs.

    As the House and the Courts ramp up investigations, block legislation, the resentment will ramp up.

    The ReThug’s ethos is now, “he won, get over it, he gets to do what ever he wants to do”. They’ve gone full authotarian.

  177. 177.

    Matt McIrvin

    The Secret Service purge really worries me. Suppose he’ll try to order the Democratic nominee’s security detail to kill the candidate?

  178. 178.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Steeplejack: I think this all begs the question, so what was beyond the pale for a woman who put children in cages? That suggest she thought her wingnut welfare was in danger if she did it. So we talking death camps, Nuclear strikes on Mexico,…?

  179. 179.

    Turner Hedenkoff

    “… For the rest of her life people will look at her and think, ‘Oh, that’s the woman who put children in cages.’”
    Or as the old joke goes, “But you fuck one sheep …”

  180. 180.

    randy khan

    @Jay:

    I think the point that a lot of people who supported Republicans are becoming disengaged is important. People see things like approval ratings and don’t always dip into the deeper data.

    One problem for Trump is that he promised all sorts of things that he hasn’t done. The tax cuts turn out to be bog-standard Republican cuts that help the wealthy – in fact, they were designed entirely to help the wealthy, with a lot of the increases hitting the middle to upper-middle class. Those immigrants are still coming here. Health care keeps getting more expensive. Wages aren’t going up. Big manufacturing plants shut down, and there aren’t more coal jobs (because, as anyone who’s paid attention knows, they’re never coming back). The low-information voters who turned out for him because they were despairing (and a lot of them are) still are despairing, and that’s not good for him come November 2020. (And if he says he needs 4 more years to drain the swamp, that may not go over well.) It’s one of the problems with him having said that he was the only one who could save them.

  182. 182.

    Roger Moore

    @Martin:

    Hell, we passed Prop 8 in 2008.

    I think a big thing this shows is that ballot propositions are separate from partisan politics. There were, and still are, Democrats who are primarily interested in economic issues and are stubbornly illiberal on social issues. Look at the capital punishment ballot measures in 2016; despite its broadly liberal politics, we voted to speed up capital punishment rather than to abolish it.

  184. 184.

    Jay

    “

    Justin Ling
    @Justin_Ling
    ·
    2h
    After some back and forth with Facebook, here’s the exhaustive list of all the Canadian accounts they banned today:
    Faith Goldy
    Kevin Goudreau
    Canadian Nationalist Front
    Aryan Strikeforce
    Wolves of Odin
    Soldiers of Odin (Canadian Infidels)”

  187. 187.

    Ruckus

    @ruemara:
    Was just thinking the same thing.
    I’m in a better place than some so maybe I’m not in a position to complain but when has that stopped anyone else?
    I’m recovering from the recession, haven’t fully yet, probably won’t get there. (as are many others) And wasn’t in a grand shape before that. And am running out of time because of my age and health. I suspect that things may not be as rosy as I’d like for retirement. And my expectations were not all that high to began with. But what is worse is that there are a lot of people who are worse off than me, some lots worse off. And nothing that shit for brains is doing is making that better for anyone who need the boost, only for those without need. Our entire system was at least supposed to be to help those in need, even if the help was rock bottom minimal. Not any more, it’s fuck the bottom, reward the top and oh yeah, another round of fuck the bottom, just for the enjoyment of watching the suffering.

  188. 188.

    J R in WV

    @Wayne Marks:

    I’m surprised I don’t have vodka in my cereal.

    No, no, vodka doesn’t go with cereal very well at all. But whiskey in coffee is another story altogether.

  190. 190.

    ??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:
    Absolutely! However I was responding to Rukus’ comment that was asking what would we do if this happened:

    When late night comedians are arrested on air for making fun of the President. When you can’t buy booze. When pregnant women are rounded up and placed under official custodial surveillance in order to ensure they don’t get an abortion. When LGBTQ who are married have their marriages forcibly annulled by the state. And when interracial and interreligious marriages are also forcibly annulled by the state.

    At that point, I would assume elections are no longer an option and have been cancelled.

  191. 191.

    Kayla Rudbek

    @chopper: co-signed. And I remember hearing from a relative about a US Army computer in South Korea that was as locked down as possible, and it still got the Melissa virus.

  193. 193.

    Jay

    @Matt McIrvin:

    As Cheryl and Adam keep pointing out, the Civil Service, or as MAGAot’s call it, “The Deep State”, is holding strong.

    If Orangemandius orders “his” SS head to kill Democratic Party Cantidates, his SS head still has to pass the orders on, at which point in time, the SS head get’s arrested and goes straight to jail.

    Despite what the TV tells you, the Secret Service takes protecting people, really, really seriously.

    Despite 287 TV show and a couple of Movie plots relying on a dirty Secret Service Agent betraying the ( insert offical here), in the real world, there have been zero.

  194. 194.

    Ruckus

    @Joe Falco:
    As I was reading my comment before posting – I always do that looking for typing errors, grammatical errors, spelling fuck ups, logic snafus, head up ass, etc and it occurred to me that you might be snarking.
    I think that this is a post that is going to lend itself to a bit of overreach, I may be part of that, and yet we are I think, in what’s it might be called, a political existential crisis?

  195. 195.

    Kent

    @catclub: Right. And I was working for an ordinary science agency in a branch office in Alaska. We didn’t handle anything remotely confidential (other than personel files I suppose). It was just research reports and ordinary bureaucratic paperwork associated with commercial fishing regulations and that sort of thing. Pretty much every document we created we put on the internet for the public to read. Things may have changed since I left a few years ago but I doubt they even have the IT staff to monitor that many devices in so many far-flung branch offices. We got our stuff straight from Dell.

  196. 196.

    Jay

    @randy khan:

    Yup. One thing that bugs me about how the polling is being reported, is that the ReThugs are presented as if they are 50% of the voters, when in fact, they have been bleeding voters since 2016.

  197. 197.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    @Steeplejack: oh yes, but like all good satires, it makes you think – so what the heck is “to much” for a woman who puts children in cages? I mean you can just hear Trump shouting “Well if they just put ladders over the wall, bring out the nerve gas… no I don’t give a shit if it will kill Americans too by just getting it the border, just shut up with the complaints and do… what do you mean you resign?”

  198. 198.

    mrmoshpotato

    @ruemara:

    We need to stop rehabilitating the crooks that leave this admin.

    “Rehabilitate” them with charges and trials. (Quotation marks because we know rehabilitation isn’t possible for such evil white trash.)

    Col. Morris Davis
    @ColMorrisDavis
    There’s no statute of limitations on crimes against humanity and there’s universal jurisdiction, so my advice would be vacation domestically and pray your immoral minority retains power for as long as possible.
    Quote Tweet

    Sec. Kirstjen Nielsen
    @SecNielsen
    · 22h
    This afternoon I submitted my resignation to @POTUS and thanked him for the opportunity to serve in his administration.
    Show this thread
    7:45 PM · Apr 7, 2019

  200. 200.

    Jay

    @Enhanced Voting Techniques:

    As I said yesterday, Kelly’s girlfriend, Ilsa, She Wolf of the Nazi’s, was fine with building the Concentration Camps, the Rape Centers, filling them and selling children into slavery,

    But building and operating the Gas Chambers and Crematoria was a bridge too far.

  202. 202.

    Ruckus

    @Adam L Silverman:

    You don’t really want to know what I think the alternative solution is.

    I bet I have a reasonable idea about that. I didn’t expect you to post that at all.
    Your answer is the proper one, which is what I expected. I do feel that we are in sort of a limbo, in that the biggest impediment to shit for brains getting what he wants is that he’s totally incompetent and has progressed in his dementia to an almost obvious point, but. And it’s a big, firm, round but. McConnell and crew are using that to attempt to gain everything they can, which having lost the house, is judges. That will fuck us for a long time, unless when we take back the government from the incompetent and willfully malicious we repair the damage. And that will always be difficult and temporary.

  203. 203.

    debbie

    @rikyrah:

    I wish Nance would stop with the hyperbole. Reality is bad enough.

    @Ruckus:

    You too? This isn’t even close to a dictatorship. We’ve got a guy who wants to be an authoritarian, but has zero chance of achieving it. There are far too many reasonable people around.

    Off to respite.

  204. 204.

    Seanly

    Am I stupid or isn’t there a law that prohibits acting secretaries from running the Federal agencies forever & ever?

    Aso, am I being paranoid if I fear that Trump may try to suspend the Constitution or declare Congress and the Courts null & void? He’s a stark raving lunatic being steered by neo-Nazis and women & minority hating zealots.

    I can see the Cillizza headline now: “Trump has Congress rounded up and shot; Obama wore a tan suit once – both sides are terrible.”

  205. 205.

    Ruckus

    @??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
    Lots of countries have elections for their dictators. Funny how all the dictators win. We would still have elections, probably 100% participation as well, just the outcomes would/could be known in advance.

  206. 206.

    Repatriated

    @Jay: I’d guess that what he really wants is a pledge to not cooperate with attempts to arrest him.

    That, and he resents the Secret Service failing to fall on their swords over the recent Spy-A-Lago incident.

  207. 207.

    Ruckus

    @debbie:
    In my decades on this rock, the republicans have gotten worse and worse and wanted worse and worse government. They have made progress every chance they’ve had. They are at a point that I have to ask, “What is the limit?” All of their policies hurt a lot of people, and they keep getting worse with every maladministration. Each time the only people left to run for them is a lunatic. Fortunately he is incompetent beyond belief. But my point wasn’t so much that this is a dictatorship but that the person elected wants it to be one because he wants to be dictator of a country and the only way he could be was the one he took. And his party is going along with him and gives not two shits if it is one. What will the next republican elected president be like? And if Trump is so incompetent is it possible that he destroys too much, even if through incompetence that it can’t recover?

  208. 208.

    Roger Moore

    @Seanly:

    Aso, am I being paranoid if I fear that Trump may try to suspend the Constitution or declare Congress and the Courts null & void?

    I don’t think it’s paranoid to think he might try to do those things. I don’t think he’s likely to succeed if he does.

  209. 209.

    debbie

    @Ruckus:

    First, this period will confirm that this country cannot be led by a CEO. Second, no one will ever be worse than Trump. They don’t make people stupid like anymore. Persist!

  210. 210.

    Miss Bianca

    @Betty Cracker: I take comfort in the fact that those were Mr. Creosote’s last words before he blew up. And then wonder how the hell MAGAts are so culturally backward as not to recognize where those words came from. Then I realize that Monty Python’s “Meaning of Life” came out about 30 years ago.

  212. 212.

    Jay

    @Seanly:

    “Am I stupid or isn’t there a law that prohibits acting secretaries from running the Federal agencies forever & ever?”

    There is, but the House would have to sue via the Courts.

    Yurtle the Turtle would just ram through an unqualified Evil Minion through the Senate before the Court rendered judgement.

    At least the acting Secretaries are qualified Civil Service bureaucrats.

  213. 213.

    Miss Bianca

    @jl:

    You have to follow the law, they were told

    The fact that these supervisors actually had to *tell* their agents that they would be breaking the law if they took President Dipshit’s rantings for directives is…wow. I don’t know if I have the words to do this situation justice.

  214. 214.

    Jay

    @Ruckus:

    What Needy Amin, his Minions and Yurtle the Turtle have made clear to many, and a lot of elected Democrats, is that US Democracy needs a major tune up.

    House, Senate and Presidential “norms” that have existed for decades, up to halfway through President Obama’s First Term, need to be turned into hard and fast rules that require a supermajority to overturn.

    Democrats get that.

    Real Voting Rights need to be enshrined and enforced at the Federal Level.

    Democrats get that.

    As the LGM post I linked to, ( here it is again),

    http://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2019/04/anti-anti-trump-vote

    All the ReThugs have to get out the vote is resentment and anger that the Courts, the Democrats, the State, and some of the Media, are not rolling over and letting Hair Furour, do anything he wants.

    That and owning the Libs.

    I think that Needy Amin and Yurtle the Turtle stands a good chance of being the last ReThug Administration you might have, for a long, long time.

    You are looking at the 4th Generation of ReThugs raised in the Faux News/Drown it in the Bathtub/Laffer Curve bubble. Their idea tank is empty.

  215. 215.

    Ruckus

    @debbie:
    Stupid people are made every day. I’d agree that some of them take years to sink to his level but still, there are stupid people born every day. It’s rare that they get to play at his level though. It usually takes evil to go along with the stupidity to get to his level and while he has that in abundance as well, it’s the stupidity that may protect us. Not that much fun having to depend on someone’s stupidity to save a country, seems a bit, what’s that word……… Oh. Fucking Stupid.

  216. 216.

    cain

    @TS (the original):

    @Adam L Silverman: I hope the democratic party is past the “forgive and forget” options from the past – but doubt there will be any support from the media to do anything else.

    Fuck these centralist media figures. They should be told to shut the fuck up and move on and go self flagellate with barbed wire whip.
    We should definitely talk about unity while quietly passing laws coached in that language but also stop right wing bullshit.

  218. 218.

    bemused senior

    Dead thread, but regarding USB security: there are several threats, each calling for different mitigations. To prevent virus infections, prevent USB files from being executed on the computer. Windows has long had an “autorun” feature on removable media, and this can be turned off. That prevents automatic execution when the USB device is inserted. If the USB device can be read on the computer, files can be copied off the USB to then be executed. But if one needs to examine a USB stick, obviously the person doing the examination should be trained not to do this. Preventing data from being copied to the USB and taken off site is another concern, and this might be a motive for blocking the media from being written. Not all USB devices are interpreted as media. So the operating system can allow headphones, etc. without allowing media operations. See Wiki for device types.

  219. 219.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @soga98: I noticed that several months ago & commented to that effect here. (No luck searching for it but one of the FPers could probably dig it out of the archives.) Welcome to the club!

    ETA: Also noticed several months ago that Mike Dense looks like Warren Gamaliel Harding’s li’l bro if not love child.

  220. 220.

    Roger Moore

    @bemused senior:
    You’re right only if you’re describing garden-variety malware. There are all kinds of other tricks you can do if you’re more sophisticated. For example, a single physical USB device can contain multiple logical USB devices, including non-obvious ones. People have used this for good- some devices for maintaining your passwords have a keyboard function so they can type the password into forms- but it can also be used for evil. For example, you could make a USB stick that also functions as a mouse and keyboard and can automatically open the files it contains by typing the appropriate commands into the computer. It’s more sophisticated than your typical “put some malware on a USB stick” level hacking, but it’s within the capabilities of a sophisticated individual hacker. I’m sure a nation state could come up with something even cleverer.

  221. 221.

    bemused senior

    @Roger Moore: The complex scenarios boil down to combinations of the simple ones. The operating system must be properly configured to block what is not permitted. I don’t claim that naive users know how to do this, but it is the business of the IT/Security group to decide this and enforce the policy they settle on. Looks like SS don’t have the right policies and matching configurations in place.

  222. 222.

    Roger Moore

    @bemused senior:
    Again, it depends on how sophisticated the opponent is. It’s possible, for instance, to get a 0-day attack on the OS USB stack, in which case about the only defense is to avoid sticking anything into the USB port. Truly paranoid organizations will do exactly that; they’ll physically block the USB ports so idiots can’t plug in unauthorized devices even if they want to. The big problem right now is that all commercial software has enough holes in it that a highly sophisticated attacker (i.e. one with access to multiple 0-day exploits) will almost always be able to break in.

  224. 224.

    dimmsdale

    @Adam L Silverman: Until last June I worked for a humongous investment bank, and same applied there: any banker, junior on up, who needed to either copy from or copy to CDs, had to come to me because I had the ONLY machine in the 42-story building that had a working cd drive (and they had to have authorization from super-senior people EACH time for me even to crank up the machine). USB ports, obviously, were non-functional bank-wide as a matter of policy. They were THAT petrified of data theft and/or malware introduced via cd/USB.

  226. 226.

    Jay

    @Miss Bianca:

    It’s what you do, when somebody higher up suggest that your Staff do criming . You remind them that it’s illegal, it’s not policy, and they will go to jail.

    There’s a US Army General that had to do it as well after a Needy Amin photo op.

  227. 227.

    Dev Null

    @Adam L Silverman: FWIW, that’s what I got from my annual training too.

    But not contractors’ non-gummint laptops. My gummint laptop, yes. My SETA company laptop, no.

  229. 229.

    Dev Null

    @chopper: I’m not adding useful content here, just saying that the annual training I went through left me with the impression that the policy was gummint-wide.

  230. 230.

    Dev Null

    @JaySinWA:

    A key feature of anti-vaccine thinking is that it can only emerge in a world in which the massive public health success of vaccines makes it possible to minimize the danger of infectious diseases

    It’s an interesting and plausible observation, but it seems too broad a conjecture: it doesn’t explain the fairly common phenomenon of at-risk populations targeting clinics and medicos who are trying to prevent the spread of a disease.

    e.g. Ebola in the DRC today, or in western Africa circa 2014.

    Sonia Shah gives closer-to-home examples in her recent book Pandemic.

  231. 231.

    Dev Null

    @Roger Moore: I remember seeing a truly impressive demonstration of a USB stick that (IIRC, and I’m not sure I do – this was circa 5 years ago) inserted malware into the BIOS.

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