Donald Trump and his Coterie of the Craven (part 16)

[JMarie]

2 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

I'm assuming one or more of Agent Orange's sycophants are busily digging up dirt on individual members of Congress, so they can be pressured.

 

"President Trump’s first 100 days: The fact check tally"

The interactive graphic is great, though horrifying.

Do they want to pressure Congress, or... blackmail them? (said in the SNL's Church Lady's voice)

[Audrey2]

Well, folks, Trump's delusions just reached a new level.

I'm on my phone, so quoting is difficult, but here is the link.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-civil-war-one-not-worked-135135760.html

Quote

People don’t realize, you know, the Civil War, if you think about it, why?” Trump said during an interview with the Washington Examiner set to air on Sirius XM Radio Monday afternoon. “People don’t ask that question, but why was there a Civil War? Why could that one not have been worked out?”

Trump expressed praise for President Andrew Jackson, a slaveholding plantation owner, as a “swashbuckler.” Trump suggested that Jackson could have brokered peace between the North and South — sides that held irreconcilable views on slavery.

“I mean, had Andrew Jackson been a little later you wouldn’t have had the Civil War,” Trump said. “He was a very tough person, but he had a big heart. He was really angry that he saw what was happening with regard to the Civil War. He said, ‘There’s no reason for this.'”

So, the gist is, Trump really thinks we could have worked out the issues instead of having the Civil War. This is Trump, the same man who is trying to goad North Korea into an armed conflict. The same man who fired missles into Syria.

 

To paraphrase Ozzy Osbourne, "He's going off the rails on a crazy train!"

 

[47of74]

3 minutes ago, Audrey2 said:

Well, folks, Trump's delusions just reached a new level.

I'm on my phone, so quoting is difficult, but here is the link.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-civil-war-one-not-worked-135135760.html

 

So, the gist is, Trump really thinks we could have worked out the issues instead of having the Civil War. This is Trump, the same man who is trying to goad North Korea into an armed conflict. The same man who fired missles into Syria.

 

God, the stupid, it burns.  Time to get this out once again.  Now if you'll excuse me., I'm going to use this.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"Trump’s Degradation of the Language"

Quote

One of the more pernicious and insidious effects of the Donald Trump regime may well be the damage he does to language itself.

Trumpian language is a thing unto itself: some manner of sophistry peppered with superlatives. It is a way of speech that defies the Reed-Kellogg sentence diagram. It is a jumble of incomplete thoughts stitched together with arrogance and ignorance.

America is suffering under the tyranny of gibberish spouted by the lord of his faithful 46 percent.

As researchers at Carnegie Mellon pointed out last spring, presidential candidates in general use “words and grammar typical of students in grades 6-8, though Donald Trump tends to lag behind the others.” Indeed, among the presidents in the university’s analysis, Trump’s vocabulary usage was the lowest and his grammatical usage was only better than one president: George W. Bush.

Trump’s employment of reduced rhetoric is not without precedent and is in fact a well-documented tool of history’s strongmen.

As New York Times C.E.O. Mark Thompson noted about one of Trump’s speeches in his 2016 book, “Enough Said: What’s Gone Wrong with the Language of Politics?”: “The super-short sentences emphasize certainty and determination, build up layer upon layer, like bricks in a wall themselves, toward a conclusion and an emotional climax. It’s a style that students of rhetoric call parataxis. This is the way generals and dictators have always spoken to distinguish themselves from the caviling civilians they mean to sweep aside.”

Thompson also notes that “Trump’s appeal as a presidential candidate depends significantly on the belief that he is a truth-teller who will have nothing to do with the conventional language of politics,” warning that:

“We shouldn’t confuse anti-rhetorical ‘truth telling’ with actually telling the truth. One of the advantages of this positioning is that once listeners are convinced that you’re not trying to deceive them in the manner of a regular politician, they may switch off the critical faculties they usually apply to political speech and forgive you any amount of exaggeration, contradiction, or offensiveness. And if establishment rivals or the media criticize you, your supporters may dismiss that as spin.”

Here is the great danger: Many people expect a political lie to sound slick, to be delivered by intellectual elites spouting $5 words. A clumsy, folksy lie delivered by a shyster using broken English reads as truth.

...

Trump has the intellectual depth of a coat of paint.

At no time is this more devastatingly obvious than when he grants interviews to print reporters, when he is not protected by the comfort of a script and is not animated by the dazzling glare of television lights. In these moments, all he has is language, and his absolute ineptitude and possibly even lack of comprehension is enormously obvious.

In the last month, Trump has given interviews to print reporters at The Times, The Associated Press, Reuters and The Wall Street Journal. Read together, the transcripts paint a terrifying portrait of a man who is simultaneously unintelligible in his delivery, self-assured in his ignorance and consciously bathing in his narcissism.

In Trump world, facts don’t matter, truth doesn’t matter, language doesn’t matter. Passionate performance is the only ideal. A lie forcefully told and often repeated is better than truth — it is accepted as an act of faith, which is better than a point of fact.

This is one of the most heinous acts of this man: the mugging of the meaning, the disassembling of rhetoric until certainty is stripped away from truth like flesh from a carcass.

Degradation of the language is one of Trump’s most grievous sins.

How very true. The manboy speaks at a sub-kindergarten level. Also, I'm sure he reads at about the same level. I love the line: "Trump has the intellectual depth of a coat of paint." However, I think paint is probably deeper than the tangerine toddler.

[47of74]

6 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

"Trump’s Degradation of the Language"

How very true. The manboy speaks at a sub-kindergarten level. Also, I'm sure he reads at about the same level. I love the line: "Trump has the intellectual depth of a coat of paint." However, I think paint is probably deeper than the tangerine toddler.

Yeah, and the tapeworm is as toxic as a coat of lead paint.   And his behavior is like that of a five year old who has never been told NO and thinks he should get his way on everything.  Of course Congress is full of enablers such as Mitch McFuckstick who give him a pass all the fucking time.

[GreyhoundFan]

1 minute ago, 47of74 said:

Yeah, and the tapeworm is as toxic as a coat of lead paint.   And his behavior is like that of a five year old who has never been told NO and thinks he should get his way on everything.  Of course Congress is full of enablers such as Mitch McFuckstick who give him a pass all the fucking time.

Exactly. He's rusty lead paint!

 

I love this headline. It's so freaking true: "Trump on Obama surveillance claims: 'I don't stand by anything'"

Quote

President Donald Trump said his allegation that he was illegally surveilled by former President Barack Obama has “been proven very strongly” and that that surveillance has negated the relatively warm relationship that the two presidents developed in the weeks following Trump’s victory last year.

“Well, he was very nice to me. But after that, we've had some difficulties. So it doesn't matter,” Trump said in an interview taped over the weekend that aired Monday on “CBS This Morning.” “You know, words are less important to me than deeds. And you saw what happened with surveillance. And everybody saw what happened with surveillance.”

After campaigning hard for Democrat Hillary Clinton during the 2016 campaign, Obama was quick to extend his congratulations to Trump following his unexpected victory, inviting the Manhattan billionaire to the White House just two days after Election Day. The two men held an extended meeting in the Oval Office and Trump, who railed against Obama on the campaign trail and was the most prominent voice behind the so-called birther movement that baselessly questioned whether Obama was born in the U.S., spoke warmly of the man he would succeed in the White House.

Over the following weeks, the two men spoke again via telephone multiple times and Trump said in an interview that he had sought Obama’s counsel on some Cabinet appointments, although he declined to say which ones. Trump, who had not met Obama personally before their Oval Office meeting in the immediate aftermath of the election, said last December that “I really like him as a person” and that the two presidents “have a really good chemistry together.”

But in early March, Trump wrote on Twitter that Obama had illegally ordered surveillance of Trump Tower in the days and weeks leading up to last year’s election, an allegation for which neither the president nor any White House staff member has been able to offer definitive proof. Trump raised the allegation in his interview without prompting, but then appeared unwilling to discuss it further when CBS anchor John Dickerson asked him whether he stood by the accusation.

“I don't stand by anything. I just — you can take it the way you want. I think our side's been proven very strongly. And everybody's talking about it. And frankly, it should be discussed,” Trump said. “That is a very big surveillance of our citizens. I think it's a very big topic. And it's a topic that should be No. 1. And we should find out what the hell is going on.”

When Dickerson pressed Trump for further details, the president replied that “you don’t have to ask me” because “I have my own opinions. You can have your own opinions.” Dickerson followed up that he wanted Trump’s opinion as president, prompting Trump to say “OK, it's enough. Thank you,” and abruptly end the interview.

Um, yeah, everybody's talking about it because you making these dumbass allegations makes you look more stupid than usual.

[GreyhoundFan]

This is an interesting analysis: "Why did Trump win? New research by Democrats offers a worrisome answer."

Quote

As the Democratic Party rebuilds itself for the 2018 and 2020 elections, Democratic strategists have been preoccupied with a pressing question: Why did so many voters who backed Barack Obama in 2012 switch to Donald Trump four years later, and what can be done to win them back?

Top Democratic pollsters have conducted private focus groups and polling in an effort to answer that question, and they shared the results with me.

One finding from the polling stands out: A shockingly large percentage of these Obama-Trump voters said Democrats’ economic policies will favor the wealthy — twice the percentage that said the same about Trump. I was also permitted to view video of some focus group activity, which showed Obama-Trump voters offering sharp criticism of Democrats on the economy.

Priorities USA, the super PAC that is working to restore Democrats to power, conducted focus groups of Obama-Trump voters in Wisconsin and Michigan — two states that Trump snatched from Democrats — in late January and polled some 800 Obama-Trump voters nationally at around the same time. The pollsters also conducted focus groups with so-called drop-off voters — people who voted for Obama in 2012 but didn’t vote in 2016 — in the same states and polled 800 drop-off voters nationally.

“[Hillary] Clinton and Democrats’ economic message did not break through to drop-off or Obama-Trump voters, even though drop-off voters are decidedly anti-Trump,” Priorities USA concluded in a presentation of its polling data and focus group findings, which has been shown to party officials in recent days.

...

Some of the numbers and conclusions from those numbers are interesting. I hope the Dems can get it together and show that the Dems aren't favoring the wealthy, the tangerine toddler does.

[GreyhoundFan]

I loved this article that outlines how the "best dealmaker" rolled over: "The Daily 202: Eight ways Trump got rolled in his first budget negotiation"

Quote

THE BIG IDEA: Perhaps the best negotiators are not the people who tell everyone that they are the best negotiators.

A spending agreement was reached last night that will keep the government funded through the end of September. This will be the first significant bipartisan measure passed by Congress since Donald Trump took office.

-- The White House agreed to punt on a lot of the president’s top priorities until this fall to avert a shutdown on Friday and to clear the deck so that the House can pass a health care bill. “This is going to be a great week,” Gary Cohn, Trump’s chief economic adviser, said on CBS this morning. “We're going to get health care down to the floor of the House. We're convinced we've got the votes, and we're going to keep moving on with our agenda.”

-- But Democrats are surprised by just how many concessions they extracted in the trillion-dollar deal, considering that Republicans have unified control of government.

Trump’s longtime lawyer Michal Cohen bragged during the campaign: “He’s an amazing negotiator, probably the best in this world.”

On Sunday, the president acknowledged he has a lot to learn. “I think the rules in Congress and, in particular the rules in the Senate, are unbelievably archaic and slow moving and, in many cases, unfair,” Trump said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.” “In many cases, you're forced to make deals that are not the deal you'd make. You'd make a much different kind of a deal. You're forced into situations that you hate to be forced into.”

-- You can read the 1,665-page bill here. The House Appropriations Committee posted a department-by-department breakdown here.

The last paragraph has links that are worth a look.

Quote

-- Now that the language has posted, here are the eight most notable areas Trump caved in his first big spending negotiation:

1. There are explicit restrictions to block the border wall. We knew last week there would be no money to start construction on a project that the president says is more important to his base than anything else. But the final agreement goes further, putting strict limitations on how Trump can use new money for border security (e.g. to invest in new technology and repair existing fencing). Administration officials have insisted they already have the statutory authority to start building the wall under a 2006 law. This prevents such an end run.

The $1.5 billion for border security is also half as much as the White House requested. Additionally, there are no cuts in funding to sanctuary cities, something a federal judge said last week would be required for the Justice Department to follow through on its threats. And there is also no money for a deportation force.

...

LOL -- no wall yet!

Quote

2. Non-defense domestic spending will go up, despite the Trump team’s insistence he wouldn’t let that happen. The president called for $18 billion in cuts. Instead, he’s going to sign a budget with lots of sweeteners that grow the size of government. Mitch McConnell made sure $4.6 billion got put aside to permanently extend health benefits to 22,000 retired Appalachian coal miners and their families. Nancy Pelosi made sure $295 million was included to shore up Medicaid in Puerto Rico. Chuck Schumer got $61 million to reimburse local law enforcement agencies for the cost of protecting Trump when he travels to his residences in Florida and New York. There is also another $2 billion in disaster relief money for states, which bought a couple votes. (Kelsey Snell, our lead budget reporter, has more examples.)

3. Barack Obama’s cancer moonshot is generously funded. The administration asked to slash spending at the National Institutes of Health by $1.2 billion for the rest of this fiscal year. Instead, the NIH will get a $2 billion boost – on top of the huge increase it got last year. Republican appropriators who care about biomedical research, including Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) and Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), delivered.

Trump also failed in his efforts to cut money for other kinds of scientific inquiry. For example, he proposed defunding the Advanced Research Projects Agency–Energy. Instead, it is getting a $15 million increase.

4. Trump fought to cut the Environmental Protection Agency by a third. The final deal trims its budget by just 1 percent, with no staff cuts. As part of a compromise, the EPA gets $80 million less than last year, but the budget is $8 billion.

I'm not complaining -- let's keep funding the EPA!

Quote

5. He didn’t defund Planned Parenthood. Despite the best efforts of social conservatives, the group will continue to receive funding at current levels.

Hooray! Unfortunately, it will be a fight in September.

Quote

6. The president got less than half as much for the military as he said was necessary. Trump repeatedly prodded Congress to increase military spending by $30 billion. He’s getting $12.5 billion, with an additional $2.5 billion if/when he delivers a detailed plan on how to defeat the Islamic State. Many Democrats from states with bases and manufacturers, especially those up for reelection in 2018, wanted this too. Like Trump, they will tout the increased spending as a victory. The White House plans to call this a down payment on a much bigger investment down the road.

7. Democrats say they forced Republicans to withdraw more than 160 riders. These unrelated policy measures, which each could have been a poison pill, would have done things like get rid of the fiduciary rule and water down environmental regulations. On the other side of the ledger, this budget blocks the Justice Department from restricting the dispensing of medical marijuana in states where it has been legalized.

I bet Forest Gump Sessions is unhappy, since he's so anti-marijuana.

Quote

8. To keep negotiations moving, the White House already agreed last week to continue paying Obamacare subsidies. This money, which goes to insurance companies, reduces out-of-pocket expenses for low income people who get coverage under the Affordable Care Act. The Trump administration justifies giving up on this because of the potential to resolve the bigger issue by repealing Obamacare.

I'm so hopeful about this, even though Ryan is pushing the teabaggers' deathcare plan this week.

Quote

...

-- The bigger picture: “Trump is a nightmare negotiating partner,” writes USA Today commentary editor Jill Lawrence, who wrote a book called “The Art of the Political Deal.” “The only constants with Trump are unpredictability and expediency. These are not, suffice it to say, the traditional cornerstones of getting to yes in politics.”

Yup, nightmare...

[Destiny]

1 hour ago, Audrey2 said:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-civil-war-one-not-worked-135135760.html

I was just coming here to post this. Seriously, WHAT THE FUCK DID I JUST READ? HOW IS THIS OUR PRESIDENT WHEN HE DOESN'T KNOW BASIC AMERICAN HISTORY? 

[JMarie]

2 hours ago, Audrey2 said:

Well, folks, Trump's delusions just reached a new level.

I'm on my phone, so quoting is difficult, but here is the link.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-civil-war-one-not-worked-135135760.html

So, the gist is, Trump really thinks we could have worked out the issues instead of having the Civil War. This is Trump, the same man who is trying to goad North Korea into an armed conflict. The same man who fired missles into Syria.

 

To paraphrase Ozzy Osbourne, "He's going off the rails on a crazy train!"

 

 

2 hours ago, Audrey2 said:

Trump expressed praise for President Andrew Jackson, a slaveholding plantation owner, as a “swashbuckler.” Trump suggested that Jackson could have brokered peace between the North and South — sides that held irreconcilable views on slavery.

"Swashbuckler" is a fun word, he thought to himself.  I can work that into a speech, interview, or tweet.  it shouldn't be hard, he thought, since I'm talking about stuff every day.

[onekidanddone]

15 minutes ago, Destiny said:

I was just coming here to post this. Seriously, WHAT THE FUCK DID I JUST READ? HOW IS THIS OUR PRESIDENT WHEN HE DOESN'T KNOW BASIC AMERICAN HISTORY? 

Read that, and  had to read it again. What the FUCK? Andrew Jackson just should have used his time machine to negotiate the Civil War.

[GreyhoundFan]

"Trump suspends disbelief — on most everything"

Quote

...

President Trump’s lies (the extent of crime, the effect of trade deals, the risk of terrorists masquerading as refugees) and failures (on the wall, health care, travel ban) matter to Americans in the “politics as problem-solving” group. These voters measure politicians by what they do. It matters very much that the American Health Care Act would hurt poorer, more rural Americans and that Trump’s tax plan is a jaw-dropping give-away to the rich. He is supposed to be fixing health care and reforming our tax code, right? These Americans cannot fathom how Trump’s base convinces itself he has been a huge success any more than they can comprehend why his base ignores easily obtainable evidence on crime, immigration, the economy, etc. Frustrated, they stack layers and layers of evidence in front of Trump fans only to receive blank stares in return.

The Trump electorate, many more men than women, is whiter, older and has less education. But Trump also carried a number of high-information, angry cynics. As to the latter, it’s hard to count the times an educated conservative has said to me, “I know he’s saying junk but I just love when he goes after [the media/the Muslims/the illegal immigrants].” It’s a guilty pleasure for them, I suppose, like watching crappy TV. If only the country were not at risk, I wouldn’t begrudge them their entertainment.

Trump fans think he is winning because he yells at the press, vilifies cities run by Democrats, denies climate change and demonizes immigrants. He talks and acts like they wish they could — demeaning women, stereotyping minorities, telling off experts. (According to polling, Trump’s voters really are more amenable to racial stereotypes than non-Trump voters.) It does not matter to Trump fans if the executive orders are struck down or are mere window dressing (authorizing an agency to study something it already has the power to study). He makes them feel as if they’re winning, as if they are now more important than the experts with the facts and the courts with the laws on their side. Trump fans, the quintessential Fox News viewers, revel in the know-nothingism of a hero who reflects their anger, grievances, frustration and, yes, prejudice. (Granted, there also are certainly Trump voters of good faith who genuinely — and very wrongly — think the trade deficit is a problem, China is “stealing” our jobs and Russia can be our friend; however, they may be awfully resistant when their Fox News-induced misconceptions are rattled.)

Politics for Trump and his ilk is a tribal-identity exercise. People on “their side” don’t believe in climate change or facts on crime or illegal immigration. It’s odd to affix one’s identity to whether one accepts or rejects demonstrable evidence, but that’s how partisans have come to behave. If you believe that climate change is real, that immigration benefits our economy and that America is not getting ripped off by the rest of the world then, in the Trump mind-set, you’re on the other side. (What’s more, you’re not respecting their right to be irrational. Hence they claim perpetual victimhood.) Trump affirms their tribal identity and tells them they are right to hold their views. He reverses the tag of “low-information voter” by assuring them everyone else is lying or fake.

No wonder Trump keeps bringing up the election results, which the elite media didn’t see coming. The winning he loves, but what really delights him is recalling that everyone he and his followers detest got it wrong. This is, when you get right down to it, still the boy from Queens who never got respect from the Manhattan upper crust. “Winning” is the equivalent of “showing those people.” White working-class men without college degrees who feel they’ve declined in status at least have Trump (and Fox News) telling them day in and day out that they are right and those people are wrong.

Onlookers who do not share Trump’s resentments or the angst over the decline of manufacturing centers may understandably be puzzled. It may confuse them when Trump voters claim the moral superiority of victims for situations that, while difficult, can be ameliorated (e.g. learn new skills, move to where the jobs are, resist opioids). As victims, you see, the Trump die-hards cannot be responsible for their own situation or derided as uniformed. They claim the high ground as they blame immigrants or elites for their problems.

The group that author Robert Jones identifies as “white Christian America” — in essence, the evangelicals in the heartland — feels social, cultural and economic resentment the most acutely, and therefore embraces Trump the most tightly. Recent polling shows that evangelicals are his strongest supporters. (“Three-quarters of white evangelical Protestants approve of the way Trump is handling his job as president, according to a new analysis of Pew Research Center surveys conducted in February and April. This is nearly twice as high as the president’s approval rating with the general public (39%).”) Religion per se has nothing to do with it. (In fact Trump is an encyclopedia of sins and character flaws, was pro-choice until he wasn’t and never shared his fans’ aversion to gay marriage.) Tribalism has everything to do with it.

Saying he’s the most successful president in the first 100 days ever may sound nuts to people who look at what he’s done; it makes perfect sense to the people whom Trump makes feel better. At some point, one wonders when it will dawn on Trump’s fans that they’ve been bamboozled.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

WTDH? "Trump takes admiration for tyrants to next level, says he would be ‘honored’ to meet with Kim Jong Un"

Quote

If you didn't know better, you'd swear President Trump actually likes Kim Jong Un.

At least, that's the impression he's leaving — and apparently deliberately so. Over the past week, Trump has made comments about the North Korean dictator that occupy the middle of the Venn diagram between empathy and flattery.

But Trump has now taken things a step further — much further — saying he would be “honored” to meet with Kim.

First Trump told Reuters on Friday: “He's 27 years old. His father dies, took over a regime. So say what you want, but that is not easy — especially at that age.” Trump then clarified: “I'm not giving him credit or not giving him credit; I'm just saying that's a very hard thing to do.” (Side note: This is the very definition of giving credit.)

Then Trump added to CBS News this weekend: “At a very young age, he was able to assume power. A lot of people, I'm sure, tried to take that power away, whether it was his uncle or anybody else. And he was able to do it. So obviously, he's a pretty smart cookie.” (Side note: Kim Jong Un had his uncle Jang Song Thaek executed, which is certainly one way to retain power.)

And finally, in a just-published interview with Bloomberg, Trump cuts to the chase: He wants to talk — if the conditions are right.

“If it would be appropriate for me to meet with him, I would absolutely,” Trump said, adding: “I would be honored to do it.”

He added: “Most political people would never say that, but I’m telling you under the right circumstances I would meet with him. We have breaking news.”

Breaking news indeed. And now we know the real reason Trump has been saying all those nice things. Combined with Secretary of State Rex Tillerson floating the idea of diplomacy last week, it's clear what Trump is getting at here: He wants to cut a deal.

...

Trump's own history of comments about authoritarian leaders make this less than shocking, of course. He has praised the late Iraqi president Saddam Hussein for killing terrorists without worrying about due process. He said the world would be "100 percent” better with Moammar Gaddafi in charge of Libya. He has of course praised Russian President Vladimir Putin. He retweeted a Mussolini quote. He congratulated Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently on growing his presidential powers. And he gave Egyptian President President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi the thumbs-up in a shift in U.S. policy.

Trump's recent comments about Kim actually echo what he said in Iowa in January 2016 , when he pointed more directly to the North Korean leader killing his political opponents.

“It's incredible,” Trump said. “He wiped out the uncle, he wiped out this one, that one. I mean this guy doesn't play games. And we can't play games with him.”

In other words, it's clear Trump knows how Kim has stayed in power. And even considering his past praise of authoritarians, his decision to say Kim is worthy of “honor” and is a “smart cookie” suggests Trump has more admiration for authoritarians even than he lets on.

I think the idea of the two toddlers in a room together is terrifying.

[onekidanddone]

5 hours ago, Audrey2 said:

Well, folks, Trump's delusions just reached a new level.

I'm on my phone, so quoting is difficult, but here is the link.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-civil-war-one-not-worked-135135760.html

So, the gist is, Trump really thinks we could have worked out the issues instead of having the Civil War. This is Trump, the same man who is trying to goad North Korea into an armed conflict. The same man who fired missles into Syria.

 

To paraphrase Ozzy Osbourne, "He's going off the rails on a crazy train!"

 

The article in the WoPo quoted Toddler said Lincoln was "low energy".  Where the fuck does  he come off insulting a great man like that?

...our president-historian posits that the war might not have happened if only Andrew Jackson had still been around. The whole thing apparently could have been avoided if only we had a bona fide negotiator — someone more up to the task than Low Energy Abe Lincoln.

He did that during the election cycle pontificating how much energy he had compared to his opponents. I read it as if he were implying that if he was President, he would have had more energy and could have made a "deal" to prevent the war. Would somebody please send him back to 6th grade history.  What a shit.  A complete and total shit stain. 

[fraurosena]

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you your daily dose of "Wut". 

Trump Campaign Donors Still Paying Bigly For Trump Tower Digs

Quote

President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign has sent $274,000 in rent to Trump’s office building during the first three months of this year, even though fewer than two dozen employees are on the payroll for an election more than three years away.

That total works out to a monthly average of $91,000, which is more than half of what Trump’s campaign was paying Trump Tower each month at the height of the presidential race last year. Back then, though, the campaign had 168 employees with a New York City address on the payroll, compared with just 20 now, according to a HuffPost analysis of Federal Election Commission filings. [...]

The total paid to Trump Tower Commercial LLC, in fact, is only a few thousand dollars more than the salaries of all 20 employees in that period, combined. That includes the $15,538 in salary to Brad Parscale, based in San Antonio, Texas, who received more than $1.5 million in that time period for digital campaign work.[...]

The smaller number of employees now means the campaign has paid an average of $4,567 per person in rent over the first three months of 2017. Last fall, the campaign was paying an average of $1,012 per employee in rent.[...]

Trump in the early part of his campaign in 2015 and the first months of 2016, when he was paying most of the costs himself, was paying only $35,458 a month for rent at Trump Tower. That figure nearly quintupled last summer, when Republican donors began paying for most of the campaign’s costs.

Trump began his re-election campaign earlier than any president in the era of modern campaigns. Former President Barack Obama officially filed his re-election paperwork a year and a half before the 2012 election date. Trump filed that paperwork the same day he was inaugurated, Jan. 20. The campaign on Monday said it will be spending $1.5 million to distribute a television and digital ad extolling Trump’s first 100 days in office ― a period roundly panned for its lack of accomplishments.

Of course, Trump, unlike previous presidents, also has for-profit businesses that received millions in payments during his successful run last year, and which continue to receive payments now from his re-election campaign.

In the first three months of this year, for example, the Trump International Hotel and Tower in New York received $1,936 from the campaign. His hotel in Washington received $4,401, his hotel in Las Vegas received $13,928, and his restaurants received $8,707. Even Trump’s bottled water company, Trump ICE LLC, was paid $1,768.

“We haven’t had a president who tried to profit from the presidency while he was president,” Weissman said. “The campaign, the presidency, the next campaign, they’re all self-enrichment opportunities. Does he understand that this is wrong?”

Of course he understands that it is wrong. He just doesn't care. 

[onekidanddone]

13 minutes ago, fraurosena said:

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you your daily dose of "Wut". 

Trump Campaign Donors Still Paying Bigly For Trump Tower Digs

Of course he understands that it is wrong. He just doesn't care. 

Ii am sick of being patient.  The Honorable Maxine Waters has had the fortitude to  use the word "Impeachment". She is the only Democrat I know of t he stand up and say it.  Sorry Jamie (Raskin) Ms. Waters is now my Congressional crush.. Oh and Nancy.. it is time to step down.. 

Asked to respond to Waters’s call for impeachment in February, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Trump “has acted in a way that is strategically incoherent, that is incompetent and that is reckless. And that is not grounds for impeachment.”

Not even taking Russia into account the benefiting financially like this is reason enough.  Right?

[HarryPotterFan]

3 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

SWTDH? "Trump takes admiration for tyrants to next level, says he would be ‘honored’ to meet with Kim Jong Un"

I think the idea of the two toddlers in a room together is terrifying.

So he admires the way Kim Jong Un deals with opponents? That's terrifying.

[GreyhoundFan]

1 hour ago, onekidanddone said:

Ii am sick of being patient.  The Honorable Maxine Waters has had the fortitude to  use the word "Impeachment". She is the only Democrat I know of t he stand up and say it.  Sorry Jamie (Raskin) Ms. Waters is now my Congressional crush.. Oh and Nancy.. it is time to step down.. 

Asked to respond to Waters’s call for impeachment in February, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said Trump “has acted in a way that is strategically incoherent, that is incompetent and that is reckless. And that is not grounds for impeachment.”

Not even taking Russia into account the benefiting financially like this is reason enough.  Right?

The WaPo just had an article about Maxine: "‘Auntie Maxine’ and the quest for impeachment"

Quote

The overflow crowd at Busboys and Poets was black and white and shades in between, yuppies in chinos and activists in message T-shirts, bubbling with excitement to hear from the special guest at the restaurant’s open mic night.

Instead of a poet or a musician, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) stepped onto the stage, showered with applause and cheers. Not many members of Congress could draw this kind of crowd — diverse and yet united behind a single goal. After taking a moment to thank the crowd for its greeting, Waters got right to the point.

“Donald Trump is someone that found his way to the presidency of the United States of America — I still don’t know how,” she said, drawing boos at the mention of the president’s name. “But he’s someone that I’m committed to getting impeached!”

The crowd exploded.

“He’s a liar! He’s a cheat! He’s a con man!” she said, each declaration punctuated by cheers. “We’ve got to stop his ass!”

Waters has become the voice of a new generation of restless citizens. At age 78, the congresswoman’s political career is older than many of her new admirers. Her decades of forceful confrontation of institutional discrimination, inside and outside the political arena, has attracted fans far beyond the boundaries of her Los Angeles congressional district.

But much of her newfound celebrity can be credited to one word: impeachment.

...

“I’ve been criticized because people said, ‘Oh, you shouldn’t use the impeachment word.’ But I have a deep and strong feeling about what I’m hearing and what I’m seeing and what I’m learning,” Waters said in an interview with The Washington Post. That day, The Post reported a secret meeting between a major Trump supporter and a Russian with close ties to President Vladimir Putin, and BuzzFeed reported that former Trump adviser Carter Page had communicated in the past with a Russian intelligence agent.

“This involvement with so many of the people in his Cabinet with the Kremlin, with Putin . . . worries me and it bothers me,” she said.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House principal deputy press secretary, said of Waters: “Her calls for impeachment are baseless and ridiculous.”

Waters has nothing to lose. Her congressional seat is safe — she has received no less than 70 percent of the vote since her first congressional campaign in 1990. And among Democrats, the idea of impeaching Trump is appealing. Although only 30 percent of adults in a February Public Religion Research Institute poll said Trump should be impeached, 58 percent of Democrats supported the idea.

Still, neither Waters nor any of her Democratic House colleagues has put forth a resolution to begin the impeachment process. She acknowledges that there is not enough solid evidence that Trump colluded with the Russians.

“The investigations are very important. I think all of the signs are there, and when they connect the dots, when they have all the facts, you will see a change in the Congress,” said Waters, who is the ranking Democrat of the House Financial Services Committee. “Not only will Democrats be anxious to impeach, but Republicans as well.”

Removing a president from office is difficult, both practically and politically, says Michael J. Gerhardt, a constitutional law professor at the University of North Carolina’s School of Law. The Constitution sets a high bar: The House can call for an investigation if a president is suspected of “treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” The House Judiciary Committee decides whether there is sufficient evidence; if so, it draws up articles of impeachment. If the full House passes them, the Senate considers the charges and decides whether to convict the accused.

...

Nichole Christian heard Waters speak at an event in Detroit last month — “every fifth word was ‘impeachment’ ” — and came away invigorated.

Christian called the actions of Trump’s presidency “a daily slap in the face” to immigrants, women and African Americans. Waters, she said, was “somebody who has taken a principled stand. . . . She’s a politician doing an apolitical thing: speaking truth to power.”

As much as Waters is celebrated by progressives, she is castigated by conservative commentators and activists who point to an ethics investigation of her to undermine her arguments against Trump. Several years ago, Waters was investigated for — and cleared of — violating House conflict-of-interest rules after she sought federal aid for a bank in which her husband owned hundreds of thousands of dollars in stock.

...

R. Eric Thomas of Elle.com helped fuel Waters’s popularity with a column in January on how Waters doesn’t just go in on Trump, she does so with style, employing dramatic eye rolls during interviews and a taunting moniker for Trump and his advisers who have ties to Russia — “the Kremin Klan.”

Thomas likened her to that certain aunt in the family who will set you straight when you are out of line. As he put it: “Honey, Maxine Waters is not the one. . . . She would like to cordially invite you to not come for her unless she sends for you.”

Like the time Waters dissed FBI Director James B. Comey. She emerged from a closed-door intelligence briefing with the air of someone who was not pleased to have wasted her time. When a reporter asked about the meeting she said simply: “The FBI director has no credibility!” And then walked away.

“Auntie! Auntie! Auntie!” the crowd at Busboys chanted as Waters wrapped up her talk.

“I did not know that an auntie could be loved by so many people!” she said. “I’m having the time of my life.”

 

[Destiny]

3 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

WTDH? "Trump takes admiration for tyrants to next level, says he would be ‘honored’ to meet with Kim Jong Un"

I think the idea of the two toddlers in a room together is terrifying.

Fucking hell, between this and him bagging on Lincoln, I despair for our future. </3

[GreyhoundFan]

For a much needed laugh (or is it laugh or cry?): "‘Donald Trump’s Civil War’ by Ken Burns". I can't quote it, you have to read the whole thing. Alexandra Petri definitely can snark.

 

@Destiny -- I agree. I can't believe he's slamming on Lincoln, whose little finger was probably more intelligent than the whole of Agent Orange.

 

[HarryPotterFan]

First on CNN: Trump administration ending Michelle Obama's girls education program

I'm on my phone so I'm having issues with quoting.

"Washington (CNN)The Trump administration is discontinuing a signature girls education initiative championed by former first lady Michelle Obama, according to officials.

The "Let Girls Learn" program, which she and President Barack Obama started in 2015 to facilitate educational opportunities for adolescent girls in developing countries, will cease operation immediately, according to an internal document obtained by CNN.

While aspects of the initiative's programming will continue, employees have been told to stop using the "Let Girls Learn" name and were told that, as a program unto itself, "Let Girls Learn" was ending."

Assholes.

[onekidanddone]

8 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

The WaPo just had an article about Maxine: "‘Auntie Maxine’ and the quest for impeachment"

 

Yup.  That is were I found the the scoop.

2 minutes ago, HarryPotterFan said:

First on CNN: Trump administration ending Michelle Obama's girls education program

I'm on my phone so I'm having issues with quoting.

"Washington (CNN)The Trump administration is discontinuing a signature girls education initiative championed by former first lady Michelle Obama, according to officials.

The "Let Girls Learn" program, which she and President Barack Obama started in 2015 to facilitate educational opportunities for adolescent girls in developing countries, will cease operation immediately, according to an internal document obtained by CNN.

While aspects of the initiative's programming will continue, employees have been told to stop using the "Let Girls Learn" name and were told that, as a program unto itself, "Let Girls Learn" was ending."

Assholes.

Keep girls uneducated.  His new moto.

[Destiny]

3 minutes ago, HarryPotterFan said:

The "Let Girls Learn" program, which she and President Barack Obama started in 2015 to facilitate educational opportunities for adolescent girls in developing countries, will cease operation immediately, according to an internal document obtained by CNN.

Dear Trump assholes, The Handmaid's Tale is not a god damned motherfucking INSTRUCTION MANUAL. FUCK YOU! </3

[GreyhoundFan]

Yeah, this won't happen: "Trump could save big bucks following report’s recommendations"

Quote

If the Trump administration wants to save Uncle Sam big bucks, it doesn’t have to plan the “deconstruction of the administrative state,” as White House aide Stephen K. Bannon wants.

Instead, it could do something much less dramatic and much more effective — follow the advice of the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

Every year since 2011, GAO number-crunchers have looked at federal programs that overlap, are fragmented or are duplicative. It found dozens for the 2017 annual report.

The GAO doesn’t get much ink or airtime, but Congress recognizes the value of the agency’s work. It received bipartisan praise when the report was released at a Senate hearing last week.

Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said the reports have “resulted in $75 billion worth of savings over seven years, which is pretty remarkable. Based on the amount of budget authority that the GAO has, $3.8 billion over that same time frame, that’s a 20-to-1 return on investment, which is pretty good.”

That is very good, even without counting the $61 billion in estimated savings that remain in the pipeline. Better yet is the 112-to-1 return on investment that the GAO said its 2016 recommendations would generate.

Rather than cutting needed programs like those at the Environmental Protection Agency, whose budget is targeted for a 31 percent reduction under President Trump’s spending plan, he should focus on implementing GAO suggestions to make government more cost-effective.

Sen. Claire McCaskill (Mo.), the top Democrat on the panel, said, “From 2011 to 2016, the federal government has saved American taxpayers approximately $136 billion by carrying out GAO’s recommendations,” though “nearly half of the actions GAO recommended in the past reports have not been implemented.”

That’s a road map for Trump.

...

He wouldn't want to do anything that was sensible.

[47of74]

3 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

WTDH? "Trump takes admiration for tyrants to next level, says he would be ‘honored’ to meet with Kim Jong Un"

I think the idea of the two toddlers in a room together is terrifying.

I was having lunch with the maternal unit today and they mentioned it on the radio that President Fuckman is open to the idea of meeting with his fellow toddler in North Korea.  I almost blurted out something about the two wanting to get together so they could have a penis measuring contest.