Trump 18: Info to Russia, With Love

[sawasdee]

Der Spiegel has a hard hitting article (in English) that gives an international viewpoint on tRump.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/donald-trump-is-a-menace-to-the-world-opinion-a-1148471.html#pq=XwcK8R

Quote

Donald Trump is not fit to be president of the United States. He does not possess the requisite intellect and does not understand the significance of the office he holds nor the tasks associated with it. He doesn't read. He doesn't bother to peruse important files and intelligence reports and knows little about the issues that he has identified as his priorities. His decisions are capricious and they are delivered in the form of tyrannical decrees.

He is a man free of morals. As has been demonstrated hundreds of times, he is a liar, a racist and a cheat. I feel ashamed to use these words, as sharp and loud as they are. But if they apply to anyone, they apply to Trump. And one of the media's tasks is to continue telling things as they are: Trump has to be removed from the White House. Quickly. He is a danger to the world.

.............

The U.S. elected a laughing stock to the presidency and has now made itself dependent on a joke of a man. The country is, as David Brooks wrote recently in the New York Times, dependent on a child. The Trump administration has no foreign policy because Trump has consistently promised American withdrawal while invoking America's strength. He has promised both no wars and more wars. He makes decisions according to his mood, with no strategic coherence or tactical logic. Moscow and Beijing are laughing at America. Elsewhere, people are worried.

 

The whole article is worth reading. It is very direct in its criticism!

 

     

 

[fraurosena]

Apparently, things are heating up so much, that Rancid Penis has been sent home a day after leaving on the foreign trip:

And someone else is coming home early too:

 

[Howl]

2 hours ago, fraurosena said:

And someone else is coming home early too:

 

Melania?

[sawasdee]

Probably Kushner - maybe there's a sub poena waiting?

[Destiny]

So did Trump's adults finally manage to get him to shut the fucking fuck up? He hasn't tweeted abuse at anyone in nearly 76 hours! This has to be some sort of record, right?

[formergothardite]

Someone must have stolen his phone and hidden it from him. I can't imagine how hard it is to keep him focused and on script. 

[Destiny]

31 minutes ago, formergothardite said:

Someone must have stolen his phone and hidden it from him. I can't imagine how hard it is to keep him focused and on script. 

Or maybe his ancient ass phone doesn't work abroad. I mean, that's the most likely scenario. I can't believe that he is actually going to act like a president in the long term.

[sawasdee]

Apparently in his speech to assembled Islamic leaders he kept confusing 'Islamic' (in this context, good) with 'Islamicist (bad)......but he hasn't actually caused an international incident, so I suppose that's a plus.

[47of74]

1 hour ago, Destiny said:

Or maybe his ancient ass phone doesn't work abroad. I mean, that's the most likely scenario. I can't believe that he is actually going to act like a president in the long term.

Or even if it does work aboard maybe the security folks had Ivanka tell Benedict Donald not to use the goddamn thing overseas because of security concerns and he actually listened to her.  Benedict Donald is so stupid that: (a) he couldn't tell the difference between rabbit turds and rice krispies (h/t The Giant Spider Invasion); and (b) he would connect to any old wi fi network over there. 

I remember reading somewhere when President Obama visited Cuba last year the security people had warned everyone not to connect to local wi-fi networks there because of concerns over the devices being compromised.  I think they didn't even want the entourage to even connect to local cellular service while in Cuba.

[Destiny]

I hope that's true. I really do.

FWIW, I don't connect to any unknown wifi without my vpn up. Internet herpes is damned hard to get rid of. I definitely wouldn't trust Saudi wifi either.

I honestly do wonder if that's what it is. I remember reading that his twitter phone really is an ancient android device (the scary security implications of that are another conversation). If he's on a CDMA carrier his phone really won't work and one would hope that he would listen to the thou shalt not connect to strange wifi. Security isn't a thing to fuck around with, ESPECIALLY if you are president.

So how long do we think he could go? I think he will be ok til he comes home and is back to the real life of being a president. Within 48h of that he will lose his shit on twitter again.

 

[47of74]

1 hour ago, Destiny said:

I hope that's true. I really do.

FWIW, I don't connect to any unknown wifi without my vpn up. Internet herpes is damned hard to get rid of. I definitely wouldn't trust Saudi wifi either.

I honestly do wonder if that's what it is. I remember reading that his twitter phone really is an ancient android device (the scary security implications of that are another conversation). If he's on a CDMA carrier his phone really won't work and one would hope that he would listen to the thou shalt not connect to strange wifi. Security isn't a thing to fuck around with, ESPECIALLY if you are president.

So how long do we think he could go? I think he will be ok til he comes home and is back to the real life of being a president. Within 48h of that he will lose his shit on twitter again.

 

My first trip to Italy I had a Motorola Razr and I remember that was down the entire week I was there since it was strictly a CDMA device.  I powered it on a couple times to take a couple pictures so that I'd have a neat background picture for the phone, otherwise it stayed off the whole time.  My other trips there I either had devices that could use both CDMA and GSM or were GSM devices.

As hard as Internet herpes is to get rid of, it seems that GOP herpes is so much harder to get rid of.  Especially when it infects Washington in the form of an orange idiot and groupies.

[nvmbr02]

Huh. A 70 year man who eats like garbage and doesn't exercise is exhausted 2 days into an overseas trip. I get jet lag, I really do but travel comes with the job. It is a little ironic considering he blasted HRC for "low stamina".

 

 

[47of74]

52 minutes ago, nvmbr02 said:

Huh. A 70 year man who eats like garbage and doesn't exercise is exhausted 2 days into an overseas trip. I get jet lag, I really do but travel comes with the job. It is a little ironic considering he blasted HRC for "low stamina".

 

 

Jesus what a goddamn infant.

I'm really not interested in how Benedict Donald feels given how little of a giant orange shit he gives about others.  

He knew this job would involve travel and not just to his bund meetings and his golf courses when he ran.  It would involve going overseas. 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Another good one from Jennifer Rubin: "Trump’s un-American speech in Saudi Arabia"

Spoiler

The Post reports on President Trump’s speech on Sunday:

Speaking from Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam and home to several of the religion’s holiest sites, Trump implored the leaders of dozens of Muslim nations to take their own destinies in hand and, together with the United States, stop the killing of innocent people in the name of religion.

“This is not a battle between different faiths, different sects or different civilizations,” Trump said. “This is a battle between barbaric criminals who seek to obliterate human life and decent people, all in the name of religion — people that want to protect life and want to protect their religion. This is a battle between good and evil.”

Trump implicitly rejected the aspirational goals and call for democracy and human rights of former president Barack Obama, who also delivered a major speech to the Islamic world early in his presidency. “We are adopting a principled realism,” Trump said.

“We are not here to lecture,” he said. “We are not here to tell other people how to live, what to do, who to be or how to worship. Instead, we are here to offer partnership, based on shared interests and values.”

The most noteworthy aspect of Trump’s visit to Saudi Arabia was not his and his followers’ jaw-dropping hypocrisy. Sure, had President Obama received a gaudy medal, danced with the Saudis, diminished the important of human rights, called Saudi Arabia “sacred land” and lavished praised on an autocratic regime that trampled on human rights, Trump and his cultlike following would have gone bonkers. (With his newfound fondness for peaceful Muslims, will he drop his Muslim travel ban? Don’t hold your breath.) No, what was most striking and troubling was how little Trump understands about America and its long-term interests.

The speech itself was not entirely without merit. “On the positive side, he looked and sounded presidential,” said former deputy national security adviser Elliott Abrams. “The event itself was unprecedented: a president meeting with almost every head of government in the Muslim world. And many of the messages were very good, from the need to join together in this fight, to the need for them to drive extremists out of the mosques, to the critique of Iran.” The speech, however, was deficient in an important respect. Abrams observed that “there was something missing, and that was an understanding of what produces extremism.” He explained, “The president’s approach would work if terrorists were coming from outer space, and our task were solely to organize against them militarily. That is no doubt part of the task — but not all of it, because they are coming from within the societies whose leaders he was addressing. He offered no explanation of what was producing this phenomenon.” Abrams recalled, “[President George W.] Bush, relying on the Arab Human Development Report of 2002, had a theory: the freedom deficit. Trump had no theory and therefore could not suggest what might be done to prevent more extremists from rising.” Despite some pro forma language about “reform,” Trump all but condoned the lack of basic human and political rights in the Muslim world. Abrams observes that “this was a very minor theme in the speech, and he contradicted it by saying that he had not come to lecture them or tell them how to govern.”

At times Trump’s language was cringe-worthy. It is all well and good to explain we have shared “interests” — with regard to fighting Iran and the Islamic State, most clearly. To say we have shared “values” with Saudi Arabia, however, is daft, and shows how deficient is Trump’s understanding of American values and their role in American foreign policy. In so starkly diminishing the importance of human rights, he foolishly sacrificed our moral authority and risked repeating his predecessor’s foolish, unqualified support of Middle Eastern dictators.

When after the speech Trump attempted to scold Iran for its human rights policy, the flaw in this approach was evident. For both Iran and Saudi Arabia, we are not “tell[ing] other people how to live” but standing up for universal human rights. We are not “lectur[ing]” but extolling the importance of recognizing human dignity. And we give a flawed message that modernization and full inclusion in the community of nations are possible without basic rights for women, religious minorities, et al.

One tool, a critical one, the United States has against repressive regimes such as Russia, China, Iran and Cuba, is that we can undermine their legitimacy by appealing to universal values and exposing their cruelty, corruption and repression. We give hope to the oppressed and whittle away at despots’ grip on power by excoriating them for human rights abuses. When, however, we not only ignore but also give unqualified praise to autocratic allies, we leave ourselves open to charges of gross hypocrisy.

Now, though it is possible to raise human rights issues behind closed doors, there is no evidence that is being done under this administration or that close relations with the United States depend on making improvement on human rights. Trump gives the Saudis everything they want (prestige, an arms deal) without getting any commitment to make progress on human rights. That undermines our own standing (“The United States doesn’t care about Muslim people”) but also does our Arab allies no favors. Just look at the Obama policy toward Hosni Mubarak: Coddling an autocrat and playing down the need for progress on human rights led to his downfall and the rise of a Muslim Brotherhood government.

Trump and Saudi royals hit it off. They no doubt share a love of ostentatious wealth, impatience with democracy and unfamiliarity with the rule of law. That creates a creepy impression of a president more at home glad-handing authoritarians than defending American exceptionalism. Wasn’t that his complaint about Obama?

Does Agent Orange even know what "principled realism" means? Methinks not. And, "creepy impression" is an apt phrase.

[GreyhoundFan]

He will not be happy until billionaires are relieved of all taxes and the rest of America is completely down and out. "Trump to propose big cuts to safety-net in new budget, slashing Medicaid and opening door to other limits"

Spoiler

President Trump’s first major budget proposal on Tuesday will include massive cuts to Medicaid and call for changes to anti-poverty programs that would give states new power to limit a range of benefits, people familiar with the planning said, despite growing unease in Congress about cutting the safety net.

For Medicaid, the state-federal program that provides health care to low-income Americans, Trump’s budget plan would follow through on a bill passed by House Republicans to cut more than $800 billion over 10 years. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that this could cut off Medicaid benefits for about 10 million people over the next decade.

The White House also will call for giving states more flexibility to impose work requirements for people in different kinds of anti-poverty programs, people familiar with the budget plan said, potentially leading to a flood of changes in states led by conservative governors. Many anti-poverty programs have elements that are run by both the states and federal government, and a federal order allowing states to stiffen work requirements “for able-bodied Americans” could have a broad impact in terms of limiting who can access anti-poverty payments — and for how long.

Numerous social-welfare programs grew after the financial crisis, leading to complaints from many Republicans that more should be done to shift people out of these programs and back into the workforce. Shortly after he was sworn in, Trump said, “We want to get our people off welfare and back to work. . . . It’s out of control.”

Trump’s decision to include the Medicaid cuts is significant because it shows he is rejecting calls from a number of Senate Republicans not to reverse the expansion of Medicaid that President Barack Obama achieved as part of the Affordable Care Act. The House has voted to cut the Medicaid funding, but Senate Republicans have signaled they are likely to start from scratch.

The proposed changes will be a central feature of Trump’s first comprehensive budget plan, which will be the most detailed look at how he aims to change government spending and taxes over his presidency. Although Trump and his aides have discussed their vision in broad brushes, this will be the first time they attempt to put specific numbers on many aspects of those plans, shedding light on which proposals they see making the biggest difference in reshaping government. Congress must approve of most changes in the plan before it is enacted into law.

Trump offered a streamlined version of the budget plan in March, but it dealt only with the 30 percent of government spending that is appropriated each year. In that budget, he sought a big increase in military and border spending combined with major cuts to housing, environmental protection, foreign aid, research and development.

But Tuesday’s budget will be more significant, because it will seek changes to entitlements — programs that are essentially on auto­pilot and don’t need annual authorization from Congress. The people describing the proposals spoke on the condition of anonymity because the budget had not been released publicly and the White House is closely guarding details.

The proposed changes include the big cuts to Medicaid. The White House also is expected to propose changes to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, though precise details couldn’t be learned. SNAP is the modern version of food stamps, and it swelled following the financial crisis as the Obama administration eased policies to make it easier for people to qualify for benefits. As the economy has improved, enrollment in the program hasn’t changed as much as many had forecast.

An average of 44 million people received SNAP benefits in 2016, down from a peak of 47 million in 2013. Just 28 million people received the benefits in 2008.

SNAP could be one of numerous programs impacted by changes in work requirements.

Josh Archambault, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Government Accountability, a conservative think tank, said that giving states the flexibility to impose work requirements could lead to a raft of changes to programs ranging from Medicaid to public housing assistance.

“One of the encouraging things about putting this in the budget is that states will see if it works,” he said. “States will try it.”

SNAP already has a work requirement, which typically cuts benefits for most able-bodied adults who don’t have children. But states were given more flexibility during the recent economic downturn to extend the benefits for a longer period, something that split conservatives at the time.

Michael Tanner, a welfare expert at the libertarian Cato Institute, said the U.S. government spends between $680 billion and $800 billion a year on anti-poverty programs, and considering wholesale changes to many of these initiatives is worthwhile, given questions about the effectiveness of how the money is spent.

‘We’re not seeing the type of gains we should be seeing for all that spending, and that would suggest its time to reform the system,” he said.

Many critics have said work requirements can include blanket ultimatums that don’t take into account someone’s age, physical or cognitive ability, or limitations put in place by the local economy. Benefits from these programs are often low, and hardly replace the income someone would earn from a job. And critics of stricter work requirements also believe it could pave the way for states to pursue even stricter restrictions, such as drug tests, that courts have often rejected.

After The Washington Post reported some of the cuts Sunday evening, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said Trump was pulling “the rug out from so many who need help.”

“This budget continues to reveal President Trump’s true colors: His populist campaign rhetoric was just a Trojan horse to execute long-held, hard-right policies that benefit the ultra wealthy at the expense of the middle class,” he said.

The proposed changes to Medicaid and SNAP will be just some of several anti-poverty programs that the White House will look to change. In March, the White House signaled that it wanted to eliminate money for a range of other programs that are funded each year by Congress. This included federal funding for Habitat for Humanity, subsidized school lunches and the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, which coordinates the federal response to homelessness across 19 federal agencies.

Leaked budget documents, obtained by the think tank Third Way, suggested other ways the White House plans to change anti-poverty funding. These documents show a change in the funding for Social Security’s Supplemental Security Income program, which provide cash benefits for the poor and disabled. It’s unclear, though, what those changes might look like. A White House official said the Third Way document was out-of-date and would not comment on specifics in their files.

Medicaid, SNAP and the SSI program are now classified as “mandatory” spending because they are funded each year without congressional approval.

Trump has instructed his budget director, former South Carolina congressman Mick Mulvaney, that he does not want cuts to Medicare and Social Security’s retirement program in this budget, Mulvaney recently said, but the plan may call for changes to Social Security Disability Insurance, seeking ideas for ways to move people who are able out of this program and back into the workforce.

A key element of the budget plan will be the assumption that huge tax cuts will result in an unprecedented level of economic growth. Trump recently unveiled the broad principles of what he has said will be the biggest in U.S. history, and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told a Senate panel last week that these tax cuts would end up creating trillions of dollars in new revenue, something budget experts from both parties have disputed.

The tax cuts would particularly benefit the wealthiest Americans, as Trump has proposing cutting the estate tax, capital gains and business tax rates.

“The indications are strong this budget will feature Robin-Hood-in-reverse policies in an unprecedented scale,” said Robert Greenstein, president of the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a left-leaning think tank.

The White House will use its presumed new revenue from the tax cuts combined with broad spending cuts to claim that its changes would eliminate the budget deficit over 10 years. The budget deficit is the gap between government spending and tax revenue, and there has been a deficit in the United States every year since the end of the Clinton administration.

But the Trump administration on Tuesday will say its plan to cut spending, roll back regulations and cut taxes will bring the United States back to economic growth levels that represent about 3 percent of gross domestic product.

Mulvaney told the Federalist Society last week that the economic growth is needed to balance the budget, because spending cuts alone would be seen as too draconian.

“I think we’ve trained people to be immune to the true costs of government,” Mulvaney said. “People think government is cheaper than it is because we’ve allowed ourselves to borrow money for a long period of time and not worry about paying it back.”

Combined, the tax cuts and spending cuts on anti-poverty programs would signal a sharp reversal of Obama’s legacy by pursuing big tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, a large increase in military spending and major changes to anti-poverty programs.

Its premise is that the creation of more wealth will help all Americans succeed, and the Trump administration believes that some anti-poverty programs have created a culture of dependency that prevents people from re-entering the workforce.

White House budget proposals are a way for an administration to spell out its priorities and goals, setting benchmarks for Congress to work with as they decide how much spending to authorize. Trump has an advantage working with two chambers of Congress controlled by his own party, but even many Republicans have said they won’t back the severity of some of the cuts he has proposed, particularly in the areas of foreign aid.

Ron Haskins, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, who played a lead role in drafting the 1997 welfare changes in Congress, said Trump will need to find new support from Republicans in Congress if he is going to achieve the welfare-related overhauls he’s seeking.

“I don’t think the Republicans on the Hill are going to feel a strong compulsion to follow the president,” Haskins said. “They are not afraid of him.”

In addition to the myriad cuts, the budget will include some new spending.

Beyond an increase in the military budget and new money for border security, the White House is expected to call for $200 billion for infrastructure projects and an additional $25 billion over 10 years for a new program designed by Ivanka Trump that would create six weeks of parental leave benefits.

I bet Paul Lyan is dancing a jig at the thought of taking away assistance from the poor.

[onekidanddone]

17 hours ago, laPapessaGiovanna said:

When communication and travel technologies improved immensely and the US got rid of stagecoaches but failed to get rid of the electoral college.

Excellent point. The communications revolution had a profound effect. Just reading how news took weeks if not months to travel, I can't even imagine not having it. I haven't studied it enough, but I also think gettng rid of the electoral college would be a good thing.  Just will never happen with TT and company in power.

[GreyhoundFan]

Jennifer Rubin has been writing up a storm: "This is Watergate on amphetamines"

Spoiler

Average citizens, political insiders and journalists cannot keep up. In each day, three or four once-in-a-forever bombshells seem to drop regarding some aspect of the Russia and obstruction of justice scandal(s). On Friday alone we learned:

The Times reports that an official transcript of the meeting between [President] Trump and Lavrov includes Trump calling [former FBI director James B.] Comey a “nut job” and, more significantly, that he “faced great pressure because of Russia. That’s taken off,” thanks to the Comey firing. (The White House didn’t deny that report; one official claimed that Trump was simply trying to establish a better bargaining position.)

The Post followed up with a scoop of our own: The federal investigation into Russia included a focus on a senior White House official. In other words, someone working closely with Trump at the moment is currently under scrutiny.

Over at McClatchy, there was news that [Deputy Attorney General Rod J.] Rosenstein informed members of Congress that the investigation into Russian meddling now included an assessment of whether there had been a coverup.

And before the day was done, we learned from CNN: “Russian officials bragged in conversations during the presidential campaign that they had cultivated a strong relationship with former Trump adviser retired Gen. Michael Flynn and believed they could use him to influence Donald Trump and his team.” Oh, and CNN also reported that Comey “believes that President Donald Trump was trying to influence his judgment about the Russia probe.”

By a day’s end, recalling what happened just 24 hours earlier becomes challenging. You can attribute the pace of revelations to extraordinary journalism (blasted out by social media in a 24/7 news environment) and the flood of leaks that spill out faster that journalists and voters can soak them up. Moreover, uniquely in this scandal, the president himself cannot keep from spilling the beans in interviews and meetings (with the Russians, no less!).

Given the number of people potentially involved in the scandal and the legal peril in which Flynn finds himself, prosecutors may have any number of witnesses they can “flip,” allowing the investigation to surge ahead at an even faster clip. Like Lucy and Ethel on the candy conveyor belt, the news comes faster than we can grab hold of it.

Most Washington scandals (Iran-Contra, Watergate, Monica Lewinsky) evolved over many months and years. In the case of the Trump fiasco, one senses we will have a full accounting far sooner than that. Witness interviews, depositions, document requests and grand jury testimony will need to take place, but we can imagine this all coming to a head this year.

Forget the overly ambitious GOP agenda (healthcare, tax reform, trade renegotiation). It is hard to see how the White House will manage less august tasks (keeping the government open, completing a fraction of the political appointments). A chief executive who never understood the dimensions of the job will find it hard to function at all for very long under such conditions, especially when he does not trust his staff.

We face the prospect, a dangerous one, of an immobilized White House. A wounded president and paralyzed government pose a great enticement for foreign aggressors to strike. The chaos Trump creates will begin to affect markets, which abhor uncertainty. In short, Congress, the Justice Department and the FBI need to work diligently and quickly. The country requires a functioning chief executive and commander in chief. We will not have one as long as Trump remains in office.

Actually, I hope she is right and the whole truth comes out sooner, rather than, later.

[CyborgKin]

On 18/05/2017 at 5:47 AM, GreyhoundFan said:

I want to go too! I'd prefer the Enterprise or the Defiant, but I'll happily go on the Millennium Falcon.

At this rate, we might be leaving on Battlestar Galactica.

[GreyhoundFan]

This is a good editorial: "It’s time to focus — finally — on running the country"

Spoiler

PRESIDENT TRUMP HAD two responses to last week’s appointment of a special counsel to take over the Russia investigation — one unbecoming, the other somewhat reasonable.

“The entire thing has been a witch hunt,” Mr. Trump declared at a Thursday news conference, denying that there was any collusion between his campaign and Russian operatives seeking to disrupt the 2016 election. “I think it divides the country.” That is rich coming from a man who has exacerbated national divisions for political gain, and whose abrupt and unnecessary dismissal of FBI Director James B. Comey spurred the appointment of a special counsel.

But, the president later said, “we have to get back to running this country really, really well.” Putting aside that Mr. Trump has not yet run the country well, there is some wisdom there.

It will take time for special counsel Robert S. Mueller III to conduct a fair investigation, particularly if he is to be appropriately thorough, examining any financial connections Mr. Trump has to Russia and any pressure the president put on the FBI to drop its investigation. Meanwhile, the revelations of the past two weeks demand that the House and Senate intensify their own Russia investigations. Congress has a new charge: considering whether the president committed obstruction of justice, which only lawmakers are empowered to decide. Yet they, too, will require time if they are to assess the issues Congress is uniquely suited to probe — any noncriminal misjudgments and ethical lapses by Mr. Trump and his circle, not to mention how to prepare the country for future Russian cyberattacks.

The country’s business cannot stagnate in the meantime. That means Mr. Trump must stop expressing and acting on his undeserved sense of self-pity. It means that Democrats will have to talk about something other than impeachment in the coming weeks. And it means that congressional Republicans will have to face the task at which they have so far failed: governing responsibly.

The country’s health-care system is on the verge of crisis, induced in large part by Republican refusal to administer the system properly. The availability of crucial federal subsidies the government promised to health insurers remains in doubt, because of administration and congressional bungling. Meanwhile, Republicans’ ham-handed effort to rewrite federal health policy — which requires tweaking, not a destabilizing overhaul — has only stoked more uncertainty among the insurers upon which the system relies.

Meanwhile, the world waits to see whether Mr. Trump will withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement, an unthinkably irrational move that would enrage allied governments for no material benefit — but that ideologues such as Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt favor.

Come September, Congress will have to pass a new budget and raise the debt ceiling, facing the sorts of deadlines that have in the past resulted in messy, last-minute legislative fights. Tax reform that removes the underbrush of exceptions, loopholes and other complexities in the tax code would be worthwhile, but only if Republicans accept that such reform cannot come at the expense of defunding health-care programs and cannot result in higher deficits.

Abroad, North Korea continues to advance toward a capability to launch missiles with nuclear warheads that could reach the United States. Syria remains a charnel house and the Islamic State a serious threat. U.S. allies are concerned that chaos in Washington will invite Iran, Russia and other hostile powers to take advantage in ways they would not otherwise dare.

So yes, the president and Congress need to focus on running the country. And running it well, for a change.

Sadly, I can't see the TT or Repugs actually step up and run the country.

[JMarie]

6 hours ago, Destiny said:

Or maybe his ancient ass phone doesn't work abroad. I mean, that's the most likely scenario. I can't believe that he is actually going to act like a president in the long term.

If that's the case, can he stay in the Middle East forever??

[Dandruff]

7 hours ago, Destiny said:

So did Trump's adults finally manage to get him to shut the fucking fuck up? He hasn't tweeted abuse at anyone in nearly 76 hours! This has to be some sort of record, right?

Maybe it's jet lag.  He's probably at meetings at the time he's usually tweeting.  Let's see what happens in another day or two.

[GreyhoundFan]

"Twitter co-founder: I’m sorry if we made Trump’s presidency possible"

Spoiler

If anyone knows how important Twitter is to Donald Trump, it's the president.

“Without the tweets, I wouldn't be here,” he told the Financial Times last month.

To which Twitter's co-founder says: Sorry about that, world.

Evan Williams, who still sits on the company's board of directors, recently told the New York Times that he wants to repair the damage he thinks Twitter and the broader Internet have wrought on society in the form of trolls, cyberbullies, live-streamed violence, fake news and — yes — Trump.

“I thought once everybody could speak freely and exchange information and ideas, the world is automatically going to be a better place,” Williams told the Times. “I was wrong about that.”

“If it’s true that he wouldn’t be president if it weren’t for Twitter, then yeah, I’m sorry,” he said.

Is it true? Hard to say.

Since Trump became president, his incessant, aggressive and sometimes inaccurate tweets have seemed as much a liability as a political boon. His aides held a social media “intervention” a few weeks ago, according to the Wall Street Journal, trying to convince Trump that unfounded accusations like “Obama had my 'wires tapped'” could endanger him politically and legally.

Trump's Twitter account has been unusually restrained since Thursday — when he reacted to news that a special prosecutor would investigate his campaign for possible ties to Russia by complaining of “the single greatest witch hunt of a politician in American history.”

But on the whole, Twitter and Trump have been simpatico, at least in his telling.

...

“I have my own form of media,” he told Fox News's Tucker Carlson in March. “There's been nobody in history that got more dishonest media than I've gotten. … Twitter is a wonderful thing for me because I can get the word out.”

On the campaign trail, Trump once described his rapidly growing Twitter following not only as a means to get the truth out, but also as a way to get even with his enemies.

“Someone said I'm the Ernest Hemingway of 140 characters,” he told a crowd in South Carolina, air-typing into a pretend phone. “If someone says something badly about you: Bing, bing, bing! I say something really bad.”

The “really bad” things he has said have sometimes threatened to derail his campaign — like an early morning tirade against a former beauty pageant winner, in which Trump accused her without evidence of having made a sex tape.

...

Before he stepped down as Twitter's chief executive in 2010, Williams described the technology as a “force for good.”

“Twitter complements traditional media,” he said at SXSW in Austin. “I was talking last night to some guys from CNN. It's helped them change what they do. It's a win-win.”

In his new interview with the New York Times, he said he was wrong about the force-for-good stuff. The Internet was, in fact, “broken,” and the 2016 election was an example.

“It's a very bad thing, Twitter's role in that,” Williams said.

His new company, Medium.com, did not respond to questions about his apology.

Neither did the White House. And Twitter executives have both spoken out against and capitalized on the president's actions.

On the one hand, chief executive Jack Dorsey condemned Trump's executive order temporarily banning visitors from Muslim-majority countries. And the company sued the U.S. government to protect a Trump critic's identity, then dropped the suit and claimed victory a day later.

On the other hand, a research analyst told the Motley Fool that Trump's tweets are probably helping the platform gain users. The company's stock soared after it beat market expectations in its quarterly report in April — though it still lost tens of millions of dollars.

The same month, in Japan, Twitter ran subway ads with Trump's face.

...

 

Yeah, we're sorry about it too.

[47of74]

I'd tell Donald J. Putinfluffer here's something else he could say that would fit within 140 characters. 

And if he wrote one just like that it'd be right at 140 characters too.  And he could squeeze a bit more in if he did a picture of that god awful signature of his too.

 

[RoseWilder]

Louise Mensch and Claude Taylor have a new exclusive: 

https://patribotics.blog/2017/05/20/exclusive-judiciary-committee-considering-articles-of-impeachment/

Quote

Multiple sources close to the intelligence, justice and law enforcement communities say that the House Judiciary Committee is considering Articles of Impeachment against the President of the United States.

Sources further say that the Supreme Court notified Mr. Trump that the formal process of a case of impeachment against him was begun, before he departed the country on Air Force One. The notification was given, as part of the formal process of the matter, in order that Mr. Trump knew he was not able to use his powers of pardon against other suspects in Trump-Russia cases. Sources have confirmed that the Marshal of the Supreme Court spoke to Mr. Trump.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Off to bed, but a couple of good George T. tweets to close out the evening: