Trump 37: Tweeting instead of Leading

[AmazonGrace]

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"Worried about Trump’s fragile ego, Republicans negotiate the terms of his surrender"

Spoiler

A delegation of House Democrats just took a tour of the stretch of southern border, where 7-year-old migrant Jakelin Caal crossed with her father before perishing of dehydration and liver failure. The Democrats reported horrible conditions at this particular Border Patrol station, with one claiming migrant children are “stacked” in tight conditions and huddled on floors.

Those conditions underscore the degree to which Central American migrations have overwhelmed the border, resulting in what the Democrats on the tour described as a humanitarian crisis. This is a complex, multifaceted problem that — according to even some members of Trump’s own administration — calls for more resources devoted to overhauling the current border infrastructure and to attacking the crisis’ root causes.

Yet even as we speak, lawmakers in Washington are devoting time and energy to finding ways to spend billions of immigration-related dollars assuaging President Trump’s bruised and tender ego.

That’s not an exaggeration. As the New York Times reports, now that Democrats have refused Trump’s demand for $5 billion in money for his border wall, Republicans are “casting about for ways to choreograph a compromise that would protect Mr. Trump’s ego and still be broadly acceptable.”

There’s no doubt that Trump’s ego is precisely what’s at the very center of this whole stalemate. Once again Trump just raged on Twitter that Democrats won’t give him his wall:

This is a bundle of distortions and misdirection. Trump conflates “border security” with “the wall,” as if they are one and the same. But they aren’t. Democrats have offered Trump border security money — $1.6 billion, provided it isn’t spent on his wall, which continues funding levels comparable with the recent past. And Democrats aren’t his only obstacle: The GOP-controlled House has refused to vote on a measure containing the $5 billion Trump wants, because many Republicans are uncertain it can pass. But Trump’s insistence that “we will win on the Wall” is a key tell that this is really just about Trump winning.

Indeed, the need to create the impression that Trump isn’t losing is driving the latest developments. Senate Republicans offered Democrats a deal in which $1 billion of border money would be treated as a “slush fund” for Trump, which presumably could maybe sort of be used toward a wall. Democrats rejected it for that reason. The White House has also vaguely said Trump will somehow find wall money elsewhere.

That latter idea is in keeping with another one of Trump’s claims — that the military will build it, funded by the renegotiated NAFTA, which is meant to show that Mexico is paying for it, after all. But this math isn’t close to credible, and it’s highly likely that Trump can’t find wall money legally without congressional approval, which Democrats won’t grant. So now Republicans are talking about trying to pass a short-term funding bill without the wall money that would kick this battle into the new year, so Trump can say he’ll pick up the fight again.

In one way or another, these ideas are all about saving face for Trump. Congressional Republicans are basically in the process of negotiating his surrender.

Addressing the problem behind Trump’s back

In another move that implicitly illustrates the folly of Trump’s wall stance, we are now learning that the State Department is moving toward committing to spending $5.8 billion on a new “Marshall Plan” for Central American countries that is being championed by the new president of Mexico to address the migrant crisis at its source. It’s unclear how much of this funding is new, and details are in short supply.

But this is a glimmer of good news. It would spend great sums on creating jobs and economic opportunity in the Central American countries that have produced the recent migration explosion. As a Post editorial on this plan explains, our best hope of discouraging these migrations is to address the “massive opportunity deficit” in those countries, which could improve matters, while Trump’s wall simply will not.

It’s unclear whether Trump supports this plan — he might end up backing it to gain Mexican cooperation in holding asylum seekers on their side of the border. But for now, it’s important to note that it cuts directly against the overarching analysis at the core of Trump’s worldview. Trump has threatened to cut off aid to Central America, precisely because these countries (he says) are allowing migrants to get to our country, as if they’re taking advantage of us, which is in keeping with his depiction of the migrants themselves as criminals looking to prey on Americans.

The wall is a monument to Trumpist delusions

That depiction of migrants and their home countries is foundational to Trumpism. In his announcement speech, he didn’t just call Mexicans “rapists.” He also accused Mexico of “sending” them to the United States, which justified his insistence that Mexico will pay for the wall. Trump is now applying this analysis to the current migrant crisis. But it completely overlooks the fact that many of these migrants are driven by desperation and terrible civil conditions at home.

In a sense, the wall itself is a monument to this whole delusion, since it’s grounded in the idea that “tough” deterrence will make the migrants stop trying to take advantage of us, when in reality, it wouldn’t stop them from coming. One can only hope Trump will openly embrace this move by the State Department, which is a step in a much saner direction.

Indeed, if you squint, you can see signs that members of Trump’s administration are trying to approach this whole problem in a saner way than Trump is. Kevin McAleenan, the commissioner of Customs and Border Protection, has testified to Congress that solving the migrant crisis requires financial support for economic development in Central America and increased regional cooperation more generally.

McAleenan has also called for increased investments in the border infrastructure — which isn’t currently equipped to handle the crush of families — to make it safer and more humane. Hopefully the incoming House Democratic majority will be able to use the oversight process to highlight the need for such solutions in a constructive way.

If there were only a way that we could get Trump to see those things as a “win” for him, we might be able to get somewhere.

 

[WiseGirl]

5 hours ago, AmazonGrace said:

Putin called in all the favors at once 

So what's coming down the pike for him to get so much of what he wants right now? Is this what happens before the rats jump or get dumped from the ship? Pay everyone back before you are indicted?

 

[Dandruff]

10 hours ago, 47of74 said:

Hey fuckhead, here's my positive reinforcement: Go fuck yourself, you low life, lying, four flushing sack of cat, cow, dog, bird, moose, mouse, rat, buffalo, turtle, human, monkey, gorilla, whale, and skunk shit that was mixed together, sat out in the sun, and allowed to ferment.

You don't like him, do you?

[47of74]

3 minutes ago, Dandruff said:

You don't like him, do you?

LOL, whatever gave you that idea?

Nah, I don't like that orange fuckstick very much.  Just his image makes me wanna hurl.

[AmazonGrace]

 

[Ozlsn]

13 hours ago, Howl said:

Remember, a narcissist is dangerous and unpredictable when running on empty and feeling cornered.  

Frankly this is what terrifies me. If he were just head of Trump Industries (or whatever it's called this incarnation) I would be less worried. But this guy is C-in-C of the world's largest military, has the right to order nuclear strikes, and basically can do a shit ton of damage on a global basis. I like to think cooler heads will prevail, particularly with this latest "we're out of Syria" move, but I wonder just how much damage will occur before he's finally moved out. 

[fraurosena]

In case there was any doubt left on who’s got the presiduncial nuts in a vice:

 

[fraurosena]

Wow. Laurence Tribe is the Carl M. Loeb University Professor at Harvard Law School, who specializes in Constitutional Law and is a cofounder of the American Constitution Society.

Did the presidunce just commit treason?

 

[47of74]

In case there was any doubt left on who’s got the presiduncial nuts in a vice:
 

Don’t you mean who has the Presiduncial toadstools in a vise?

[AmazonGrace]

Narrator: Putin was happy  

 

[fraurosena]

Wait. Yesterday you said Isis was defeated. Today you are saying others should fight Isis. Why would they need to if Isis is defeated already?

Oh, but wait again... it seems Isis is defeated after all... or ... is it? Make up your mind!

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Wow, even Fuckabee doesn't agree with Dumpy's impulsive move/attempt to distract from the multiple investigations:

 

Of course, Laura still has her lips firmly planted on the orange backside:

 

[onekidanddone]

51 minutes ago, GreyhoundFan said:

Wow, even Fuckabee doesn't agree with Dumpy's impulsive move/attempt to distract from the multiple investigations:

 

Of course, Laura still has her lips firmly planted on the orange backside:

 

Well of course he gets no credit for what he is doing because he hasn't done anything 

[fraurosena]

Add Lindsey Graham to that list of GOP dissenters...

 

[AmazonGrace]

LInds is gonna send a mean tweet and let Trump win at golf 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

Who's gonna pay for the steel slats? Mexico will pay for the steel slats 

 

[GreyhoundFan]

Either manbaby is digging in his heels because he's a toddler or he's acting on the worst-ever "reality" show:

"Trump ‘at this moment’ opposes deal to avert shutdown, wants more border funding"

Spoiler

President Trump will not commit to signing legislation that would avoid a partial government shutdown on Saturday, his press secretary said, further roiling a chaotic debate that is splintering the Republican Party.

“At this moment, the President does not want to go further without border security, which includes steel slats or a wall. The President is continuing to weigh his options,” White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Thursday in a statement.

The tumultuous turn of events has seen Trump reverse himself numerous times in recent days on the issue, first demanding $5 billion from Congress for a wall along the Mexico border, then declaring the military would pay for it, only to insist that the money come from Democrats next year.

As talks appeared to break down Thursday, senior Republicans in Congress even appeared unsure of what Trump actually wanted before he would sign legislation. The breakdown has prompted a hastily arranged meeting between Trump and House Republicans at noon Thursday.

The Senate unanimously passed a spending bill Wednesday night that would fund many federal agencies through February 8, following days of acrimony after Democrats refused to advance any new funding for a wall along the Mexico border.

House Republican leaders had hoped to advance an identical measure on Thursday morning, but they were met with an insurrection from some of their most conservative members and a blizzard of negative coverage from right-wing media outlets. That led Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to cancel a press conference and head to the White House for a meeting with Trump over how to proceed.

Last week, Trump told Democrats he would be “proud” to shut down the government if they refused to give him $5 billion for the construction of a wall along the Mexico border. Democrats held firm and prevented such a bill from advancing in Congress, leading GOP leaders to backtrack and instead pursue a short-term spending bill that would avoid a shutdown and delay further debate until February.

Trump appeared to signal he was on board with backing down, writing in a series of Twitter posts Thursday morning that he would continue to press Democrats for wall funding next year and also claiming that he had taken other steps to make the border “tight.”

A number of federal agencies, including those that govern homeland security, law enforcement, transportation, and the Treasury Department, are set to run out of money after midnight Friday.

“I think the next few days could get complicated real fast,” said Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.).

If Congress doesn’t appropriate new money by Friday night, much of the operations at these agencies would halt, and thousands of federal workers and contractors around the country would be sent home without pay.

House lawmakers had hoped to pass the spending bill by Thursday so they could leave town, but prospects for that dimmed quickly amid the confusion over Trump’s position and whether enough Republicans were on board. Republican leaders will likely need to rely on support from dozens of Democrats in order to prevent a partial shutdown before the Christmas break.

“I think our focus is tomorrow and we’ll see if the votes are there to pass it,” said Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), who attended a GOP caucus meeting on Thursday.

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) stepped out of the caucus meeting to take a call from Trump, according to two congressional aides. Moments later, Trump tweeted: “When I begrudgingly signed the Omnibus Bill, I was promised the Wall and Border Security by leadership. Would be done by end of year (NOW). It didn’t happen! We foolishly fight for Border Security for other countries - but not for our beloved U.S.A. Not good!”

This seemed to be a sharp departure from his comments earlier in the day, which mentioned fighting with Democrats on the issue next year.

He has never said concretely whether he would vote for the short-term bill to keep the government open. Adding to the confusion, Ryan and the House GOP leadership unexpectedly canceled a previously scheduled news conference with reporters.

Earlier this week, Sanders said Trump wanted to keep the government open and was looking at other ways to finance the wall’s construction that wouldn’t require congressional approval. This was a big shift from his position last week, which was that Congress must give him $5 billion for the wall or he would shut many other government operations down.

But the backpedaling this week from Sanders and others led to a torrent of criticism from conservative media outlets and members of the House Freedom Caucus, who urged Trump to hold the line, saying that prospects for a wall will only worsen next year when Democrats take control of the House of Representatives.

Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.), who has urged Trump to veto any spending bill and force a debate over the wall, even if it leads to a shutdown, pleaded with colleagues to oppose the spending bill.

“We have to fight now or America will never believe we’ll fight,” Meadows told the closed-door GOP caucus.

Many lawmakers, particularly those who lost elections last month, have left Washington and aren’t expected to come back. That makes it harder for congressional leaders to rally the votes they need for any measures.

The construction of a wall along the Mexico border was one of Trump’s top campaign promises in 2016, and he vowed that he would somehow make Mexico pay for it all. Since he won the election, he has demanded the money come from Congress, seeking between $1.6 billion and $5 billion. At one point, he even insisted Democrats give him $25 billion fo r the wall.

In his Twitter posts early Thursday, he claimed his initiatives to move more agents along the Mexican border had made it “tight” and said he would not support infrastructure legislation next year unless Democrats eventually agree to finance the construction of a wall.

“Remember the Caravans?” Trump wrote on Twitter. “Well, they didn’t get through and none are forming or on their way. Border is tight. Fake News silent!”

The government’s Department of Homeland Security painted a much different picture of the situation just a few weeks ago. It reported that the number of people arrested or detained along the Mexico border reached a new high for the Trump presidency in November, as arrests of juveniles and parents with children continued to rise. U.S. Customs and Border Protection detained 25,172 members of “family units” in November, the highest number ever recorded.

Last week, Trump said terrorists were crossing the U.S. border and he also offered the unfounded claim that people with contagious diseases were entering the country. Incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) met with Trump at the White House and managed to get Trump to say he would take responsibility if the government shut down. This upset many Republicans, who had wanted to blame Democrats for any impasse.

Trump had demanded $5 billion from Congress to pay for construction of a wall along the border, but Democrats — fresh off wins in the November midterm elections — refused. GOP congressional leaders backed down and instead are seeking to advance legislation that funds a number of government agencies through early February.

That bill passed the Senate unanimously on Wednesday night. House GOP leaders huddled Thursday morning, as passage in their chamber is seen as more complicated.

“It was presented as a fait accompli” that Trump will sign the bill, Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) said of the meeting.

But Rep. Paul Gosar (R-Ariz.) argued for a presidential veto.

“I hope the president vetoes anything we send that’s a cop-out. ... The time to fight is now. I mean this is stupid,” Gosar said.

In another Twitter post on Thursday morning, Trump tried to make clear that he would insist on wall money next year even if he didn’t obtain any during the final days of 2018.

“The Democrats, who know Steel Slats (Wall) are necessary for Border Security, are putting politics over Country,” Trump wrote. “What they are just beginning to realize is that I will not sign any of their legislation, including infrastructure, unless it has perfect Border Security. U.S.A. WINS!”

Trump is planning to go to Florida on Friday afternoon for more than two weeks, and a partial government shutdown could have drawn complaints from lawmakers and the public if he was seen as vacationing in the sunshine.

Earlier this year, Congress and the White House passed measures that fund most government operations, such as the military, through September. But a number of spending bills were left incomplete, and funding for those programs expires at midnight Friday. That’s why there has been a rush to try to reach a solution this week.

On Tuesday, White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said Trump had asked each Cabinet secretary to see whether there’s extra money that could be used to pay for the wall’s construction. On Wednesday, Trump wrote in a Twitter post that the wall would be built by the military, though neither the White House nor the military has explained how that would happen. But on Thursday, Trump was back to insisting that funding come from Congress.

[GreyhoundFan]

"Trump: Trump is never wrong"

Spoiler

Among the many odd tensions in President Trump’s Hour of Tweets™ on Thursday morning was an explicit one.

At 7:28 a.m., Trump criticized Democrats for not wanting to fund a wall on the border with Mexico despite that wall being “necessary for Border Security.” Eleven minutes later, a new claim: Despite all the talk about the wall, the Border Patrol is doing a great job securing the area.

“Border is tight,” Trump claimed — suggesting that maybe a wall ... isn’t necessary for border security? Either the border got locked down between 7:29 a.m. and 7:38 a.m., or Trump is offering contradictory arguments to make contradictory points. He wants a wall because he promised a wall, so the wall is an essential part of keeping the country safe, and Democrats are slackers. But if the wall is needed to keep the country safe, that implies that the country isn’t safe, which implies Trump isn’t doing his job — so Trump claims that he’s doing his job, and the border is secure.

What’s particularly remarkable about his claim that the border is secure is that it comes at a moment when data from Homeland Security indicate that apprehensions at the southern border have spiked. We noted this last week when Trump made a similar claim about the security of the border: After a dramatic drop in apprehensions when Trump first took office, the number of apprehensions is back where it was at the end of 2016.

Why does that matter? Because early in his administration that drop in apprehensions was *itself* a sign that Trump’s policies were working.

"t just came out that [apprehensions are] 73 percent down,” Trump told the Associated Press in April 2017. “That’s a tremendous achievement. Look at this, in 100 days, that’s down to the lowest in 17 years and it’s going lower. Now, people aren’t coming because they know they’re not going to get through, and there isn’t crime."

It stopped going lower. But, regardless, Trump claims that the border is more secure than ever. Except, of course, when it isn’t and we need a wall.

By no means is border security the only place where Trump has his cake, eats his cake, brags about his cake, disparages his cake and tweets a photo of his cake under the caption, “There is no cake."

Consider the stock market. As recently as September, Trump explicitly linked stock market growth to his policies and to the strength of the economy.

In 2017, this was a common practice. Over and over, as the Dow Jones industrial average trudged higher, Trump would tweet about the market and the economy and the United States' newfound confidence.

But that mostly stopped this year, as the Dow and the S&P 500 shuddered. The markets plunged and recovered and plunged again, and Trump had rationales. A drop in February? Investors were worried that the economy was *too* good! Stocks back up to 25,000 in July? A function of Trump’s strong hand on the economy. A plunge in November? Investors worried about Democratic control of the House.

It's never, ever Trump.

These are the big things. There are lots of little things, too.

Trump was the one who could get Republicans elected in the midterms; when they lost, it was their own fault — often because they didn’t embrace Trump enough.  There’s never any turmoil in the White House; it’s always just fake news.  Everyone Trump hires is exceptional, until they need to be fired. 

His former attorney Michael Cohen was a good man, until he pleaded guilty to criminal charges.

And so on.

The amazing thing is that most Americans are inured to it. We don’t really expect there to be consistency in what Trump says or advocates. The arguments he offers are ones that are important to the point he’s making in the moment. If they extend past that, fine. If not, the argument changes. The border can be a porous mess demanding a wall while “Fox and Friends” goes to commercial; it can be tight as a tick by the time the break ends.

Where this gets tricky is when Trump tries to spin the investigation into his campaign being conducted by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III. Trump has insisted that there was no collusion with Russia since early in 2017 — before we learned about the Trump Tower meeting (for which Trump crafted a misleading explanation) or his allies' interactions with WikiLeaks or any of the rest of it. He denied knowing about the hush-money payment to adult film actress Stormy Daniels until Cohen admitted in court that Trump knew.

A recent Suffolk University poll found that about 6 in 10 Americans had little or no trust in Trump’s assertions that there was no collusion with Russia — a position that’s hard to argue with. To some extent: Among Fox News viewers, more than half said they had “a lot of trust” in Trump’s assertions.

On Fox Thursday morning, though, even Trump’s claims about the border met with skepticism. Guest host Ed Henry claimed that the border was more secure than it was under President Barack Obama, prompting host Brian Kilmeade to reply: “I don’t know. I don’t know. It seems like chaos.”

When Kilmeade isn’t buying Trump’s latest story, that might be a problem.

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

 

[AmazonGrace]

Mattis out 

 

[Audrey2]

7 minutes ago, AmazonGrace said:

Mattis out 

 

So is anyone else humming Another One Bites the Dust in your head?

[GreyhoundFan]

Here's the resignation letter.
 

I can't quote it here, but it's worth a read.