Well, for once, the rich white man is in control!
February 5, 2018 6:32 AM   Subscribe

This is the latest chapter in the US Politics megathread. POTUS says memo vindicates him. Members of both parties in Congress say it doesn't. Several Eagles players are declining the White House celebratory trip after winning SuperBowl. Release the memohounds!
posted by darkstar (1837 comments total) 101 users marked this as a favorite
 


I hope that T.D. Strange does not mind me reposting, from the end of the old thread, this very important article, documenting the actual reaction within the FBI to Comey's firing, and refuting the President's lies.
posted by thelonius at 6:37 AM on February 5, 2018 [52 favorites]


Mod note: aaand, quick reminder: As per this MetaTalk discussion, please keep the thread focused, readable, useful and manageable. Thanks!
posted by taz (staff) at 6:39 AM on February 5, 2018 [19 favorites]


I've been practicing my arguments on this. "Of course the FBI is biased against Trump. They're the FBI. They know things."

Then of course, I'd have to explain that that bias against Trump is not the same as bias against conservatives or republicans. The FBI has been going after leftists for a century now, but it's not corruption until it personally bites you in the butt.
posted by Miss Cellania at 6:43 AM on February 5, 2018 [31 favorites]


As a representative of the United Kingdom I can assure you that this tweet does not accurately represent the views of ANY of the people marching.

In fact even the guy trying to sell the whole thing off doesn't agree with it.
posted by Just this guy, y'know at 6:48 AM on February 5, 2018 [23 favorites]


postmodern politics in which all political factions get their own reality - the only problem is - what is it the in the beltway drama of the nunes memo and the collusion theories is supposed to distract us from? - a crashing economy? the creeping realization that we are at a dead end as a society and need to turn around? the awful truth that a substantial portion of our electorate is no longer sane and often led by bots?

are we staring at the clowns in disbelief while the big top is burning above our heads? who is going to prove this emperor has no clothes? is the self-appointed resistance going to resist harder or just go on as they have been?

i'm getting pretty disgusted by this whole show and very concerned that we are missing some real problems - not the least of which is the country is slowly falling apart while the beltway battles continue
posted by pyramid termite at 6:48 AM on February 5, 2018 [30 favorites]


I'm enjoying the "yo memo" disses that have been appearing over the weekend.


Yo memo so misleading, it was hired as a guide by the Donner Party.

Yo memo so overconfident, it told Lt. Col. Custer that they shouldn't expect any trouble from one little village.

Yo memo so polarizing, my optometrist keeps trying to upsell me on it.

Yo memo so transparent, Trump used it to view a solar eclipse.

Yo memo so antagonizing, Lars von Trier just called it "a bold and provocative new voice in cinema."

Yo memo so equivocating, it was accused of being a Jesuit by Robert Dudley.

Yo memo so bombastic, John Philip Sousa called it "a bit much."


posted by TheWhiteSkull at 6:52 AM on February 5, 2018 [206 favorites]


Re this comment from the previous thread about the governor's race in Illinois:

I'm more worried about Jeanne Ives, who's trying to primary Governor Bruce Rauner from the right. She's a state rep who's been running this truly vile commercial (fyi: transphobia) but she sounds relatively sane in interviews and Rauner is so unpopular she might have a shot. If she wins she's likely to face off against JB Pritzker, a gazillionaire establishment Dem nobody is really excited about, so it could get weird.

One note of interest about JB Pritzker. His first cousin is Jennifer Pritzker, who transitioned in 2013. So if he does end up facing off against Ives, I wonder if there will be substantive discussion about trans issues.
posted by kimdog at 7:04 AM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


As as the House [is] planning vote to keep government open until March 22 (Phil Mattingly, Lauren Fox and Tal Kopan for CNN, February 1, 2018), here's a few reminders of why it's a terrible idea to fund the national government a few weeks at a time:

While there's always a lot of attention to how Budget Impasse, Continuing Resolutions Pose Problems for DoD (Jim Garamone for DoD News, Defense Media Activity, Jan. 30, 2018), here are 6 more general hidden costs of continuing resolutions (Adam Mazmanian for Federal Computer Week [FCW], Aug 19, 2015)
1. OMB gets in your face
Relationships between agencies and the Office of Management and Budget can be strained in the best of times. But during a continuing resolution, OMB handles the tricky business of apportionment – doling out funds to agencies in a way consistent with the length and terms of the CR. During that time, OMB can "take on an aura of the trustees role in a corporate bankruptcy," Criscitello said. Do you have an expense that is outside the ordinary? OMB has to approve it.
...
2. Lost productivity
From a compliance point of view, agencies have to spin up a lot of activity for each short-term CR. "From a management perspective, it's a lot of paperwork," said John Palguta, a longtime government human resource manager, and currently vice president for policy at the Partnership for Public Service. "That's certainly a big headache for CFOs and others. You feel like you're spinning your wheels sometimes."
...
3. De facto hiring freeze
The hiring cycle for college and grad students begins in the fall, as major recruiters make the rounds of career fairs, targeting promising job candidates. Agencies have a harder time with candidates, Palguta said, when their funding is mired in a series of short-term spending bills. By the time an agency gets its full-year funding, "some of the best talent is already taken," Palguta said.
...
4. Delayed procurement and training
Under a CR, IT upgrades, training, and other optional expenditures can often get kicked to the curb. Agencies have already adjusted in some ways to the inevitable funding delays by trying to push spending to later in the fiscal year. "The first quarter is a terrible time to plan conferences and training," Criscitello said. The constraints also take a toll on acquisition, because program managers don't know what they'll end up having to spend for the full year.
...
5. The mad dash once funding comes
Once a real appropriation or full-year CR is in place, activity really ramps up. The frenetic pace to finish agency work on a compressed schedule can result in sub-optimal performance.
...
6. Morale
Careering from short-term CR to short-term CR takes a toll on personnel. "The psychic costs are probably higher than the actual costs," Criscitello said. The cycle of responding to CRs and then ramping up activity once funding comes through can be dispiriting, and it certainly doesn't resemble the image of government service that drew employees to federal careers.
Then at the state level, here's a snapshot of how CRs hamper Federally-funded programs from operating in any way that resembles efficiency: Latest Stopgap Funding Bill Leaves State DOTs Short While Planning 2018 Projects (AASHTO Journal, no author(s) listed, January 26, 2018)
With the federal government again operating on a short-term, stopgap measure, some state departments of transportation are drawing up highway project bid lists for the spring construction season without being able to count on federal funds when they need them.

After a three-day agency shutdown that began Jan. 20, Congress extended funding for most government operations through Feb. 8 in its latest stopgap "continuing resolution" instead of passing appropriations for all of the 2018 fiscal year that began Oct. 1.

For state DOTs, that means they will be able to tap just three more weeks of their federal highway allocations at 2017 levels, once the Federal Highway Administration issues a formal notice for the additional obligation authority.

Jim Tymon, chief operating officer of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, said state DOT's "continue to struggle" without a full year's funding.

Tymon said it is difficult for states to award project bids because they are only receiving their federal funds a few weeks at a time. As a result, he said, some transportation projects that should be awarded to contractors in December through February may be delayed and might not commence on time this spring.
And as noted in the FCW summary, the rush to get projects out is bad business on various fronts. So much for that focus on the importance on infrastructure. Thanks, Trump!
posted by filthy light thief at 7:08 AM on February 5, 2018 [40 favorites]


enjoying a slight bit of schadenfreude as the Republican nominee for Illinois's 3rd is loud and proud actual Nazi who stands no chance of winning but is already becoming a stain on the Grand ol' Party

even better is the fact that the overtly white supremacist organization he currently organizes for is called America First, coincidentally Trump's anti-immigration and isolationist policy, something that has been pointed out before but with not much reception except by people on the left. but now we have a Nazi in the mix, people who will vote for him, and possibly campaign ads that will resemble some of the stances on the right so hopefully more people will start making that connection
posted by runt at 7:12 AM on February 5, 2018 [16 favorites]


From the previous thread:

[Trump] The Democrats are pushing for Universal HealthCare while thousands of people are marching in the UK because their U system is going broke and not working.

[Comment] There was indeed a big demonstration in London this weekend, but it was entirely in support of the NHS and UHC.

Between this and the "Women's March, awesome!" tweet a few weeks ago, I'm getting pretty creeped out by the unabashed 2+2=5 stuff we're seeing more and more of. When it was just stuff like inauguration crowd sizes I chalked it up to garden variety dipshits-trying-to-gaslight-us posturing. Now I feel like somebody (I'm looking at you, Miller) is getting bolder with messaging that's just straight-up Orwellian, ass-backwards opposite-day lying through the loudspeakers at the masses.

As always, it's working on their base (which is the point, natch). We had the pleasure of sitting next to a guy in a diner the other day who was warning our server that under the new "Democrat law," her employers would soon be confiscating her tips. There was no point, of course, in advising the guy that it was actually his beloved Trump's proposal—I knew something so trifling as actual facts were no match for the source of his alternative narrative.
posted by Rykey at 7:15 AM on February 5, 2018 [106 favorites]


It was not that long ago (in fact, less than two years) since actually being an open Nazi would have been beyond the pale for the Republican Party. Are there really no procedures by which the Republican Party could take him off the ballot, or expel him from the party on character grounds? Or is this a calculation that a significant proportion of the base are objectively Nazi, and banning the swastika from Republican campaigns would result in being called “cucks” by them, so better to back the Nazi to the (swastika-festooned) hilt and cry a few crocodile tears about the regrettable inflexibility of administrative procedures if the mainstream media come calling?
posted by acb at 7:19 AM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


what is it the in the beltway drama of the nunes memo and the collusion theories is supposed to distract us from?

Well, in general, everything you mentioned and then some, but, I think, mostly the idea of the memo was to distract and derail the Russia investigation.

The whole MemoGate is an example of why it makes me bonkers when various people (here and elsewhere) claim that Trump's tweeting and etc are "distractions" meant to get everyone worked up and not notice other nefarious things.

No. Trump's tweets are his gibbering id - Nunes' Memo is an example of what was supposed to be Operation Distraction, and like everything the administration and its Republican cronies do, it was done entirely half-assed and may have hurt more than helped. It's a stupid person's idea of manipulating the narrative.

Hat-tip to everyone in the previous thread who put forth the idea that Nunes never intended the memo to go public, because it fits perfectly. Nunes "wrote" this memo "based on" classified intelligence that "proves" there were problems with FISA warrants, which supposedly invalidates all sorts of evidence collected by Mueller and the other Russian investigations. (Which is intrinsically bullshit, and the MSM should have called that out from the start - I could write a memo "based on" Moby Dick that "proves" the white whale was really an alien spaceship, and so fucking what? Show us the actual proof and data, or GTFO.) Nunes figured his claims about what was in the memo would rile up the base and conservative media and other hard-right Congresspeople, make Trump happy, send the MSM and the investigations off on a wild goose chase trying to figure out what sort of proof he really had, and if anyone ever wanted to see what the memo actually said, he could just " ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ - sorry, classified."

Only he got everyone SO worked up about the memo that they loopholed a way to actually get the thing released, and now even a bunch of conservatives are forced to point out that it proves nothing. OTOH, the ploy at least half-worked, because "What about the Memo?" has been all over the supposedly reality-based news, which not only legitimizes it, but is going to lead to a whole bunch of low-info Americans who don't pay nearly enough attention to sort of vaguely remember that there is maybe some kind of problem with the Mueller investigation.
posted by soundguy99 at 7:22 AM on February 5, 2018 [48 favorites]


Trump and the Nazis came to that slogan in the exact same way

sure, nation-states (all of them) are built on ethnic conflict and identification. the Ottoman Empire kept things in the Middle East shipshape for centuries - the colonial rise of the nation state pretty much obliterated that equation

and Trump would absolutely agree with their positions

in private, possibly but it's important to point out that the post-Southern Strategy era of Republican politics has worked hard to keep white supremacy covert. it's possibly helpful for overt white supremacists to be in the mix of the Republican party because, at the very least, most Americans aren't able to stomach blatant racism. Republicans don't want anybody realizing that their ointment has been rotten this entire time just because some opportunistic flies happened to land in it
posted by runt at 7:31 AM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


Well, in general, everything you mentioned and then some, but, I think, mostly the idea of the memo was to distract and derail the Russia investigation.

It's to discredit it
posted by thelonius at 7:34 AM on February 5, 2018 [9 favorites]


[Trump] The Democrats are pushing for Universal HealthCare while thousands of people are marching in the UK because their U system is going broke and not working.

Every once in a while a story comes out about Canadians and their displeasure with our semi-universal care system. There's usually an anecdote or two of rich Canadians going international to get surgeries done they have to wait for in Canada.

No matter where on the spectrum they are politically (minus the ultra-rich, I know a couple and they're a monolith against anything that they can't buy their way into), Canadians seem to say the same thing - there are some things about this system that really piss us off and make us feel like our health care system abandons us (particularly if you're a woman or a PoC), but you slimey corporate bastards keep your hands off our fucking health care system.
posted by notorious medium at 7:34 AM on February 5, 2018 [66 favorites]


It's beyond the capability of some people to understand that you can be unhappy with a system and still think an alternative is worse. To those people, the fact that anyone in a universal healthcare country is unhappy is proof positive that US healthcare is better.
posted by srt19170 at 7:38 AM on February 5, 2018 [61 favorites]


I noted a political commentator remarking upon the recent protests in Iran. They said that one reason for the protests which was different from those in 2009 had to do with the lifting of sanctions, and their complete lack of economic impact. From the Iranian perspective, they got an awful deal. The uncertainty around Trump's position, or lack of, on the nuclear deal means de facto sanctions, because no foreign money will invest in Iran while sanctions are still in question. Why start doing business with Iran when Trump is so unpredictable?

In this sense the deal is a failure, and it's largely thanks to Trump. The effects of his blowhard ranting about the BAD DEAL (actually it's a great deal for the west) has negated any positive attitudes towards it within Iran, and given weight to the arguments that you can't trust Americans. That's just his talk, he hasn't broken the deal yet, and Trump breaks a dozen deals before breakfast.
posted by adept256 at 7:40 AM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


There's usually an anecdote or two of rich Canadians going international to get surgeries done they have to wait for in Canada.

There was an actual study done on this that ended up with the title "Phantoms in the Snow." It showed that about 80 percent of [US border] facilities saw, on average, fewer than one Canadian per month; about 40 percent had seen none in the preceding year.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 7:44 AM on February 5, 2018 [36 favorites]


acb It was not that long ago (in fact, less than two years) since actually being an open Nazi would have been beyond the pale for the Republican Party. Are there really no procedures by which the Republican Party could take him off the ballot, or expel him from the party on character grounds? Or is this a calculation that a significant proportion of the base are objectively Nazi, and banning the swastika from Republican campaigns would result in being called “cucks” by them, so better to back the Nazi to the (swastika-festooned) hilt and cry a few crocodile tears about the regrettable inflexibility of administrative procedures if the mainstream media come calling?

As a general rule, no the Party can't actually remove a candidate from the ballot once they've filed and so on.

And, much as I love schadenfreude and painting the Republicans as cacklingly evil and/or bumblingly incompetent, this sort of thing actually happens fairly often to both parties.

When you've got a district that Party A has no chance at all of winning, especially in a state that's a stronghold of the Party B so there's no real Party A organization to pay attention to everything, it's remarkably easy for any rando to become the candidate for Party A. Mostly it takes filling out a few forms, maybe showing up to a meeting without visible bats flying out of your ears.

A few years back the Democrats got a similar problem with a horribly bigoted person (I don't think an actual Nazi in that case) down in the Deep South who had become the Democratic candidate by similar means. Basically showing up and there not being an active Democratic Party apparatus to notice that he was a vile person.

The Democrats, IIRC, took out ads against "their" candidate in support of the Republican but by state law they couldn't actually get him off the ballot.

Much as I loathe the Republicans, I doubt they're ready to openly endorse an actual, literal, no fooling, open, Nazi.

What I'm not sure about is whether they'll do the honorable thing and actively endorse the Democrat running against him. Pre-Trump I'd have said that of course they would, but post-Trump I'm not so sure. Not because they're afraid of being called cucks, but I think mostly because they're in such disarray that they don't have the focus or attention to spare to realize that they need to. And, of course, because they'd have to try to explain why they were disavowing this guy but not Trump.
posted by sotonohito at 7:45 AM on February 5, 2018 [14 favorites]


I hate Illinois Nazis.
posted by SansPoint at 7:46 AM on February 5, 2018 [13 favorites]


We complain about public healthcare in Australia too. But we still hear stories about American healthcare, where a single visit to the ER can lead to bankruptcy, and we quite unanimously agree that's completely fucked and inhumane.

There should be no profit motive for healthcare. I see a lot of your problems begin with that.
posted by adept256 at 7:47 AM on February 5, 2018 [112 favorites]


Our slow slide into tyranny

arguably, the state was always already tyrannical towards its oppressed populations (ex queer, black, undocumented, etc) especially for the folks at those intersections of oppression. it's just that it happens to be one of the first times that white, relatively well-off liberals (especially women) and millenials out of a decent job are feeling like their views are becoming oppressed so the general awareness of inequality has grown

because, from my point of view, people who look like me have only had the right to vote or naturalize for less than a century and y'all have been murdering us for racist reasons this whole time

that y'all are adopting some moral fiber in reaction to politics finally is great - but don't preach as if it only very recently got really fucking terrible. it's been persistently really fucking terrible for a very long time for a lot of people so do us a favor and work on decentering yourself in this struggle
posted by runt at 7:47 AM on February 5, 2018 [94 favorites]


To not abuse the edit window: Mostly when a rando files for the party that has no chance of winning, they're either just after seeing their name in the papers or getting some publicity for their business or something. Most such events pass without any real notice because the rando in question is just kind of there, not a Nazi or other very bad person.

Every now and then though, you get the Illinois Nazi.
posted by sotonohito at 7:47 AM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


Much as I loathe the Republicans, I doubt they're ready to openly endorse an actual, literal, no fooling, open, Nazi.

I think you might need to back that up with cake.
posted by Dashy at 7:48 AM on February 5, 2018 [25 favorites]


Much as I loathe the Republicans, I doubt they're ready to openly endorse an actual, literal, no fooling, open, Nazi.

Why? Serious question, not trying to be combative. What in their behavior in the past two years gives anyone any confidence that they'll do the right thing here?
posted by holborne at 7:49 AM on February 5, 2018 [47 favorites]


nation-states (all of them) are built on ethnic conflict and identification.
This. As most recently Pankaj Mishra's Age of Anger has historically pointed out , democracies are traditionally recent historical ways to channel and direct populist anger (as well as occasionally a few other wonderful, progressive purposes). The 'nation-state' ere we live in, is probably in the long run just a couple hundred year blip in human history, which for the most part has been dictatorial and war-mongering.
posted by rc3spencer at 7:51 AM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


Much as I loathe the Republicans, I doubt they're ready to openly endorse an actual, literal, no fooling, open, Nazi.

I dunno. David Duke is doing well in the party still.
posted by 80 Cats in a Dog Suit at 7:52 AM on February 5, 2018 [19 favorites]


There is a difference between endorsing an actual card-carrying Nazi and endorsing an actual card-carrying Nazi sympathizer.

This is how Steve King continues in Congress.
posted by delfin at 7:55 AM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


Just to recap, February 8th is the next CR deadline. There's nothing on the horizon for a DACA deal, Ryan doesn't know if he can't get it past the house, while McConnell thinks the Democrats will fold like Superman on laundry day.

Then we have the debt ceiling shitfight coming up right after. Thanks to the brand new looting of the treasury tax reform, receipts are down and the drop dead date has moved up a month to somewhere around the first couple of weeks of March. Yields for T-bills through the end of March are up almost a quarter point so the bond markets aren't treating this shitfight as a nothingburger.

So yeah. Good luck to the Republic over the next two months. I'm keeping my passport close at hand just in case.
posted by Talez at 7:56 AM on February 5, 2018 [13 favorites]


When half the government sides with the FSB over the FBI, do nazi sympathizers really surprise you?
posted by adept256 at 7:56 AM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


Much as I loathe the Republicans, I doubt they're ready to openly endorse an actual, literal, no fooling, open, Nazi.

David Duke is doing well in the party still.


Duke was the GOP candidate for the LA governorship in 1991. Republicans have been there, done that, bought the god damned t-shirt on the whole nazi thing.
posted by Talez at 7:58 AM on February 5, 2018 [21 favorites]


Meanwhile, the NYT is yet again giving front page space to a white supremacist. Their explanation on Twitter is 'By investigating an emerging leader in an extremist movement, we hope to offer Times viewers a deeper understanding of the people and forces behind these groups'

Of course you are...
posted by fluttering hellfire at 7:58 AM on February 5, 2018 [34 favorites]


My assumption is there was no memo. The mention of one was nothing more than a hint of conspiracy seasoning to keep the right-wing paranoid pot boiling. Unfortunately the biggest turnip in that pot is the POTUS and he wanted the damn thing released NOW. I smile at the notion of a late night cut-and-paste session to produce something, ANYTHING they can release without looking like complete gibbering idiots. And of course they failed...
posted by jim in austin at 7:59 AM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


I think you might need to back that up with cake.

the article I linked to showed that the Illinois Republicans tried to dispute the legitimacy of his registration but failed to provide evidence towards the fact. they've also openly denounced him

like I said, Republicans want to keep their white supremacist views secret so they love coming out and denouncing racism. Bush's inaction on Katrina leading to what we'd call human rights abuses in other nation states and his open criticism of Trump is an example. plus Bush's resurgence in popularity just because he happens to be the Right Kind of Republican (TM) who denounces overt racism and bigotry while having helped pass laws that subversively coded in racism and bigotry and also started wars that led to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of 'military aged males' (and the subsequent traumatization of their entire social networks) is even more evidence to the fact that most people just don't really get systemic racism or systemic anything for that matter. they only know to be mad if it's overt. covert things, well, that's just life, right
posted by runt at 8:00 AM on February 5, 2018 [13 favorites]


Surely to heavens we can't be satisfied with an "explanation" of the Nunes memo as just being about one thing. Sure, it seeks to discredit the Russia investigation. But the smokescreen serves many other, loosely aligned forces, who are looting the treasury (tax bill), poisoning the fabric of a pluralist society, and installing personnel who will outlive the entire wretched crew of the current administration. With the money from Koch/Mercer etc pushing, this kind of frenetic activity fuels a preposterous amount of malfeasance.
posted by stonepharisee at 8:03 AM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


Nunes' Memo is an example of what was supposed to be Operation Distraction, and like everything the administration and its Republican cronies do, it was done entirely half-assed and may have hurt more than helped.

On the other hand, Nunes's Memo has provided Team Trump with a short-term diversion from significant recent events:

The Hill: Lost In Memo Frenzy, White House Passed On Punishing Russia For 2016 Meddling

Independent nat sec journalist Marcy Wheeler of Empty Wheel: Under Cover of the Nunes Memo, Russian Spooks Sneak Openly Into Meetings With Trump’s Administration

MotherJones admonishes the media: While You Are Tweeting About the Nunes Memo, Russia Is Plotting Its Midterms Attack: The point is distraction. And it’s working dangerously well.
posted by Doktor Zed at 8:16 AM on February 5, 2018 [62 favorites]


Much as I loathe the Republicans, I doubt they're ready to openly endorse an actual, literal, no fooling, open, Nazi.

I wonder about this. Breitbart et al. have devoted a ton of energy over the last few years to instilling in their viewers some kind of perverted sense of Godwin's Law: any comparison between a Republican candidate and actual, no-fooling Nazis gets you branded an extremist who couldn't possibly know what they're talking about because everybody knows Nazis are just cartoon villains in video games, no one ACTUALLY thinks like that any more.

This is a useful exercise by a large media outlet, when the political party it backs is starting to stray into advocating for things that look an awful lot like race war. I wonder what the tack on the right will be once it's confronted by Nazism in its own ranks that can't be handwaved away as leftist extremism. They'll either have to back down on the equivocations, or they'll have to double down and try to convince their viewers that actually, no, the Holocaust is no different from creationism or global warming, we have to give equal airtime to both sides of the argument. History suggests they'll do the latter. That would make them Holocaust deniers, of course, which would brand them as so loathsome and uncredible that no civilized person would give them the time of day... but they're already loathsome and uncredible, so what do they have to lose?

I guess what I'm saying is, it's not at all difficult to envision a path where the GOP establishment and their captive media outlets would be totally fine backing a real, literal, no-fooling Nazi.
posted by Mayor West at 8:17 AM on February 5, 2018 [17 favorites]


Nunes claims there's no evidence Papadopoulos ever met Trump despite photo

“If Papadopoulos was such a major figure, you had nothing on him, you know, the guy lied,” Nunes told “Fox & Friends.” “As far as we can tell, Papadopoulos never even knew who — never even had met with the president.”

Papadopoulos, a former foreign policy adviser to the Trump campaign, is included in a photo that shows then-candidate Trump and then-Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) sitting at opposite heads of a table.


Nunes next month: Donald Trump does not exist
Nunes in 2 months: I do not exist

"The greatest trick the Devin ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist."
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:18 AM on February 5, 2018 [81 favorites]


Patrick Rucker, Reuters: Exclusive: U.S. consumer protection official puts Equifax probe on ice - sources
Mick Mulvaney, head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, has pulled back from a full-scale probe of how Equifax Inc failed to protect the personal data of millions of consumers, according to people familiar with the matter.

Equifax (EFX.N) said in September that hackers stole personal data it had collected on some 143 million Americans. Richard Cordray, then the CFPB director, authorized an investigation that month, said former officials familiar with the probe.

But Cordray resigned in November and was replaced by Mulvaney, President Donald Trump’s budget chief. The CFPB effort against Equifax has sputtered since then, said several government and industry sources, raising questions about how Mulvaney will police a data-warehousing industry that has enormous sway over how much consumers pay to borrow money.
Ask me again why Mulvaney remains atop my Most-Punchable Faces list.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 8:19 AM on February 5, 2018 [103 favorites]


> Mick Mulvaney, head of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, has pulled back from a full-scale probe of how Equifax Inc failed to protect the personal data of millions of consumers

It's OK, the Republicans are working hard to make sure that American consumers will be so deep in debt that stealing our identities will be worthless. So you could say that they're addressing the problem at a deeper level here. Thanks, Mick.
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:23 AM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


Representative Tom Garrett (R-VA, Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs Committees) on CNN asks us to imagine how we'd feel if there was a partisan investigation into Obama's birthplace, because "this Russia investigation is birtherism". But in fact, I don't remember anyone being charged and pleading guilty to felonies in order to cover up Obama's birthplace.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 8:23 AM on February 5, 2018 [56 favorites]


Come to think of it I remember some bloviating asshole claiming to launch his own investigation into Obama's birthplace with a team of detectives. Whatever happened to that guy?
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 8:25 AM on February 5, 2018 [55 favorites]


"this Russia investigation is birtherism"

He must have a VERY different memory of the republican primaries if he thinks "this is birtherism" is logically followed by "so therefor it should be dropped for its meritelessness"
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 8:26 AM on February 5, 2018 [22 favorites]


Representative Tom Garrett (R-VA, Homeland Security and Foreign Affairs Committees) on CNN asks us to imagine how we'd feel if there was a partisan investigation into Obama's birthplace, because "this Russia investigation is birtherism".

Translation: "I, Virginia elected official Tom Garrett, have received a great deal of Russian money, presumably laundered through the RNC."
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:29 AM on February 5, 2018 [34 favorites]


Translation: "I, Virginia elected official Tom Garrett, have received a great deal of Russian money, presumably laundered through the RNC."

You don't launder foreign money through party committees. JFC things may look lawless but doing something so blatant? Do you want to get arrested? You launder foreign money through 501(c)(4) and 501(c)(6) organizations.
posted by Talez at 8:37 AM on February 5, 2018 [16 favorites]


Much as I loathe the Republicans, I doubt they're ready to openly endorse an actual, literal, no fooling, open, Nazi.

"Very fine people."
posted by dirigibleman at 8:37 AM on February 5, 2018 [33 favorites]


They backed an actual, literal pedophile recently, and that person nearly won. There's nothing "good" about a (public, open) Nazi getting closer to public office like this, regardless of what it means for tactics or optics.

As an American, I used to feel pretty smug about how the two party system kept extremists out of the legislature, unlike European countries that were regularly embarassed by these types making it to Parliament, if never to the governing coalition.

2016 has wiped that smug smile off my face. Deplorables don't deserve representation in the legislature, but when they have enough numbers to bring them in, better that it be some minor party out in the open, than a southern-strategy type coalition inside a major party.
posted by ocschwar at 8:39 AM on February 5, 2018 [20 favorites]


Nunes claims there's no evidence Papadopoulos ever met Trump despite photo..
If we can't get Nunes removed as its chairperson, can we at least get it renamed to something besides the Intelligence Committee?
posted by Nerd of the North at 8:40 AM on February 5, 2018 [72 favorites]


I'm really really hoping Mueller has some indictments in his back pocket ready to drop soon. It would be a good thing if the Russia investigation were thrust back into the spotlight like that. Who knows how Trump will react (especially if it's Jr.) but people need to be reminded that this investigation is not a nothingburger.
posted by azpenguin at 8:44 AM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


2016 has wiped that smug smile off my face. Deplorables don't deserve representation in the legislature, but when they have enough numbers to bring them in, better that it be some minor party out in the open, than a southern-strategy type coalition inside a major party.

It's six of one, half a dozen the other. The biggest problem with coalition governments in parliamentary systems is that sometimes you need to get confidence and supply votes from complete fucking nutjobs. Recent examples include May making a deal with the devil DUP, religious conservative nutjob Steven Fielding held the balance of power in the Australian Senate from 2008 to 2011 and winding the clock back luddite advocate Brian Harradine held the balance of power in the Senate from '94-96. Hell, Harradine single handedly blocked RU486 from being imported into Australia for over a decade.

So yeah, parliamentry systems aren't a panacea.
posted by Talez at 8:49 AM on February 5, 2018 [11 favorites]


Talez, imagine the Liberal party adopting the DUP platform, plank by plank, AFTER the elections, because some nihilistic analyst with spreadsheets full of polling data told them that they have won the DUP-symp vote and need to do this to retain it. Meanwhile, there is no actual DUP out in the open to confront.

That's America right now.
posted by ocschwar at 8:51 AM on February 5, 2018 [17 favorites]


David Broooks writes that in the glowing future where Roe is overturned:
There’s a good chance that a lot of states would hammer out the sort of compromise the European nations have — legal in the first months, difficult after that. That’s what most Americans support.
I almost screamed at my monitor, because this is the single most pernicious lie that the forced birth advocates have. The lie that current US law is one of "abortion on demand". They've told this lie so often that not only do the forced birth advocates believe it, even some people who are pro-choice believe it.

As I'm sure everyone here knows, what Brooks describes there as a possible post-Roe compromise in some states is literally, exactly, current US law as defined by Roe. It **IS** Roe.

And yet the New York Times chose to give me yet another vindication for never supporting them financially, by paying Brooks to write about current US law as if it were some sort of amazing and hitherto undreamt vision of compromise that he has invented if only we foolish liberal were able to accept it.

It's symptomatic of the larger problem that the Republicans are increasingly living in a world divorced from reality and based on outright, deliberate, lies.

The Republican President tells us simultaneously that Mexico will pay for his fucking wall, and also that we must pay for it to save America from the slavering horde of brown people who will destroy America.

The Republican Party tells us that paying for tax cuts given to the ultra elite by adding $1.5 trillion to the debit is fine because the debt doesn't matter, and at the same time they tell us that we must make deep cuts to Social Security and Medicare because the debt is destroying America.

The Republican Party and Republican President tell us that global warming is a Chinese hoax invented to destroy America. And simultaneously the Republican President applies for global warming defense funds for his golf courses in the UK.

The Republican Party tells America that the forced birth position is reasonable because the US permits abortion at a whim right up until birth.

Differences in opinion are one thing, but belief in "alternate facts" is another. How can we possibly exist as a singular nation when close to half of the population believes important things that are factually, objectively, empirically, not true or which their own politicians contradict themselves on?

The Republicans have discovered that lying, blatantly and openly and about things where the truth is obvious, is a shockingly successful election tactic. And I have no idea how it can be countered because their voters flatly do not want to know the truth and will not acknowledge the truth.
posted by sotonohito at 8:55 AM on February 5, 2018 [181 favorites]


imagine the Liberal party adopting the DUP platform

Wait, is the Brexit plan now that Northern Ireland will join Australia?

I mean that makes as much sense as anything else in 2018
posted by tivalasvegas at 8:56 AM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


The FBI was investigating Trump campaign personnel for illegal Russian connections and didn’t breathe a word to anyone. In the meantime, Comey makes big public statements about Clinton’s lax email security twice, once right before the election. And now the GOP is pretending there’s a pernicious anti-Trump bias.

I want to light something on fire.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 9:01 AM on February 5, 2018 [149 favorites]


Traditionally in a situation where right wing media hasn't whipped up the electorate into a "compromise = traitor" frenzy we'd have bills passed with Democratic and Republicans split on votes. As far as I can see there's two major turning points which have put us into this situation:

1) The defeat of Eric Cantor by Dave Brat in the 2014 primaries for VA-7.

This one put the fear of god into any remaining Republicans who thought that tea party insurgency was anything more than an idle threat. If the House Majority Leader could be dethroned by a raving lunatic upstart insurgent, ANYONE could be dethroned.

2) Mark Meadows filing a motion to vacate against John Boehner.

This was the big one. The House Freedom Caucus held the balance of the power in the Republican House Caucus and they were willing to burn it all down to get their way. Normally a low ranking member of the caucus would be insane to go against the party but with the nutjobs on primary patrol, Meadows could go after Boehner from the right. Boehner called their bluff thinking they surely Meadows wouldn't do it, he wouldn't send the party into civil war, and Meadows promptly went and burnt it all down.

Now Meadows firmly has his hand tightly gripped around Ryan's balls and only needs the occasional squeeze to remind Ryan. Only stuff that meets the House Freedom Caucus's extreme agenda gets to the floor and nobody will vote with Democrats to keep Ryan in place (if the Democrats even wanted to) because they'd get primaried by the nutjobs in their districts whipped into a "TREASON!" warcry.

So now we sit over the next eight weeks and hope the country doesn't sink because Ryan is trying to save his own skin.

Talez, imagine the Liberal party adopting the DUP platform

FYI, that would be the Conservatives.
posted by Talez at 9:02 AM on February 5, 2018 [14 favorites]


Relevant to our interests: Mueller prayer candle (via reddit, available on etsy)
posted by Jacqueline at 9:02 AM on February 5, 2018 [9 favorites]


Ezra Klein, Vox: The problems in America run far deeper than Trump ( a review of Daniel Ziblatt and Steven Levitsky's How Democracies Die).
How Democracies Die is being read as a commentary on Donald Trump, but the analysis of Trump is the book’s least interesting, and least important, contribution. Trump is a symptom, not the cause, of the problems bedeviling American democracy...

...Then in the the Civil War’s aftermath, the pursuit of equality fell before the pursuit of stability — in Reconstruction and continuing up through the mid-20th century, the Democratic and Republican parties permitted the South to construct an apartheid state atop a foundation of legal discrimination and racial terrorism, and it was in this environment that American politics saw its so-called golden era, in which the two parties worked together smoothly and routinely. [my emphasis]
Trump, in other words, is the big gob of orange snot that the flu of racism/colonialism has spewed forth. The "golden age of interparty comity" where Republicans and Democrats worked hand-in-hand to pass laws and serve our nation etc. etc. papered over the fact that this "golden age" was by and for white Christians only:
As the political scientist Alan Abramowitz points out, in the 1950s, married white Christians were the overwhelming majority — nearly 80 percent — of American voters, divided more or less equally between the two parties. By the 2000s, married white Christians constituted barely 40 percent of the electorate, and they were now concentrated in the Republican Party.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 9:14 AM on February 5, 2018 [66 favorites]


DACA negotiation update from WaPo:

New bipartisan immigration plan to be introduced in the Senate

I don't really understand how McCain is so involved in this while hospitalized in Arizona, but ok.

I recently saw some polling that a majority of the country doesn't want a government shutdown over DACA, so those of us with Dem reps need to be loud in order to maintain pressure.
posted by Emmy Rae at 9:17 AM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


New bipartisan immigration plan to be introduced in the Senate

Meadows said this morning that the McCain-Coons plan was "dead on arrival" and "worse than Durbin-Graham". So I can't see how this serves anything other than McCain's need to McCain one more time before he checks out. Meadows is still the shadow-Speaker, and he's not going to let Paul Ryan pass anything with Democrats, not that Ryan wants to anyway.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:25 AM on February 5, 2018 [7 favorites]


what Brooks describes there as a possible post-Roe compromise in some states is literally, exactly, current US law as defined by Roe. It **IS** Roe.

It's of a piece with "why oh why won't Obama drop the partisan posturing and adopt $BROOKS_FAVORED_POSITION," which would just happen to be the position that Obama was actually advocating.

Brooks is not speaking these falsehoods because he's stupid. He's doing so because he's a liar, and because the NYT pays him to lie in its op-ed page.
posted by Gelatin at 9:35 AM on February 5, 2018 [37 favorites]


David Brooks is a pretty well worn topic here on the blue. Can we drop it?

Haven't seen this here yet ... Janet Yelen says 'Bad Wells Fargo!' with a smack on the wrist on her way out the door
posted by thebotanyofsouls at 9:39 AM on February 5, 2018 [7 favorites]


Meadows is still the shadow-Speaker, and he's not going to let Paul Ryan pass anything with Democrats, not that Ryan wants to anyway.

That's true, but introducing it in the Senate means
1. opening for people (maybe even reporters??) to ask Ryan "why won't you let a bill with bipartisan sponsorship and support come up for a vote?"
2. make it clear, again, that Trump has no plan and is just saying no because he's a racist scumbag
3. give people something concrete to call their senators/reps and ask them to promote and pass (rather than "please save DACA somehow!" which I'm sure Amy Klobuchar's office is fond of hearing from me)

There's no reason not to use this opportunity to try and push for something. We've made noise before, we ought to again.

Anyway, I would love for someone to ask Paul Ryan on camera if he feels good about using guidance made up by a child molester (Dennis Hastert) for his "leadership" in the House (Hastert Rule). Must be embarrassing to be that bad at your job right in front of Nancy Pelosi who was a total fucking pro.
posted by Emmy Rae at 9:42 AM on February 5, 2018 [14 favorites]


Breitbart has deleted a tweet from last night that did not meet its "editorial standards". The tweet in question fantasized about a Muslim takeover of the U.S. which ends the Superbowl. It's not the first time.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:42 AM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


CNN is reporting today that back in December a CNN employee found documents critiquing the response to a simulated anthrax attack on Super Bowl Sunday that were marked "For Official Use Only" and "important for national security." Super Bowl anti-terrorism documents left on plane:
CNN decided to withhold publication of this article until after the Super Bowl after government officials voiced concerns that publishing it prior to the game could jeopardize security for the event.
Heck of a job, somebody.
posted by peeedro at 9:45 AM on February 5, 2018 [20 favorites]


Simple solution for Scarnati's intransigence: 72 hours to comply in handing over the information or appear before the Court to show cause why there shouldn't be contempt charges.
posted by darkstar at 9:51 AM on February 5, 2018 [19 favorites]


Ezra Klein, Vox: The problems in America run far deeper than Trump ( a review of Daniel Ziblatt and Steven Levitsky's How Democracies Die).

David Runciman, Guardian: How Democracies Die review – Trump and the shredding of norms
Levitsky and Ziblatt want to get away from the idea that so long as the constitutional order is intact, democracy will be OK. They are deeply suspicious of any naive faith that deviant politicians can be “contained” by the right institutions, and not just because it didn’t work out for Weimar Germany with Hitler. ...

The two primary norms that Levitsky and Ziblatt think underpin democracy are “mutual toleration” and “institutional forbearance”. They amount to the same thing: resisting the temptation to take every cheap shot going. ...

We won’t find the norms to stabilise democracy in this changed world by looking for them in the world it has supplanted. Levitsky and Ziblatt say that political parties and other gatekeepers are essential to ensure democracy stays the course. They lament the demise of the smoke-filled rooms of political insiders that kept the rabble-rousers at bay. But the smoke-filled rooms are long gone, seen off by smartphones and social media, not to mention 21st-century standards of health and safety. It’s no good asking what will replicate them. We need to know how to get by without them.
Christian Caryl, WaPo: Can American democracy withstand its latest assault?
[Levitsky and Ziblatt note that] the United States has never been immune to democratic breakdown: “Writing this book has reminded us that American democracy is not as exceptional as we sometimes believe.” The Founding Fathers themselves indulged in emphatically zero-sum politics. The country’s first two political parties, the Federalists of Alexander Hamilton and the Democratic-Republicans of Thomas Jefferson, wanted to annihilate each other.
posted by ZeusHumms at 10:07 AM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


sotonohito: The Republicans have discovered that lying, blatantly and openly and about things where the truth is obvious, is a shockingly successful election tactic. And I have no idea how it can be countered because their voters flatly do not want to know the truth and will not acknowledge the truth.

Why Facts Don’t Change Our Minds -- New discoveries about the human mind show the limitations of reason. (Elizabeth Kolbert for The New Yorker, Feb. 2017) -- tl; dr: people change their minds because of emotions, and then find the facts to back up their feelings. That's why the GOP's emotional, unfactual campaigns work, where Dems shout "THAT'S NOT EVEN REAL!" but no one changes their mind.
posted by filthy light thief at 10:10 AM on February 5, 2018 [26 favorites]


Meanwhile, the NYT is yet again giving front page space to a white supremacist. Their explanation on Twitter is 'By investigating an emerging leader in an extremist movement, we hope to offer Times viewers a deeper understanding of the people and forces behind these groups'

Of course you are...


I was fairly angry when the NYT gave space to Horvator from the TWP without treading any new ground or analyzing his BS. (There was a much better article and video put out by Yahoo recently that showed how all of the outreach programs that the TWP bragged about in the NYT article were BS. That was more like what the NYT should have done in the first article.)

However, I came across this article initially in an anti-fascist forum where people seemed to dig it, and I concur with their belief that this it is different and fairly decent. The article (and video) make it clear that the subject lied about his military record, something that will cause dissension amongst the people in his movement. In addition, the video posits that the people attracted to that sort of movement are largely likely cowardly liars like the subject, and that what appears to be a massive action on social media is rather just 30 whiny losers popping up for 5 minutes with Tiki torches and then running away.

These people exist and we ignore them at our own peril. So, when we pay attention to them, we should do it in ways that minimize them and mess with them, which I feel that the article and video accomplished.
posted by bootlegpop at 10:12 AM on February 5, 2018 [7 favorites]


And the scariest thing for me about the Facts Not Changing Our Minds thing, is that this is Katamari-esque. How many people do you know get out of the cult? Who changes their minds and becomes less extreme? It might happen (and I really like the @trumpregrets twitter for finding people who do) but its scary that we can't defeat it
posted by Brainy at 10:15 AM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


Lawfare has a comprehensive chronology of Devin Nunes's post-election activities as part of the Trump-Russia scandal that's worth it for the subtitle's pun alone: A Timeline of the House Intelligence Committee Chairman: All the Nunes That’s Fit to Print

It gathers so many instances of Nunes acting in bad faith or lying that it's impossible to deny hje has been covering for Trump from the beginning. Their first item of 2017 tells us everything we need to know about Nunes's attitude to the congressional committee investigation he's supposed to be leading:
Feb. 27, 2017: The Guardian reports on evidence that Michael Flynn had communicated with Russian ambassador to the United States Sergey Kislyak. In response, Nunes gives a statement to reporters, saying:
As of right now, I don’t have any evidence of any phone calls … That doesn’t mean they don’t exist, but I don’t have that. And what I’ve been told by many folks is that there’s nothing there ... I want to be very careful that we can’t just go on a witch-hunt against Americans because they appear in news stories.
In response to Nunes’s statement, Schiff gives a counter-press conference criticizing Nunes for disclosing information: “When you begin an investigation, you don’t begin by stating what you believe to be the conclusion.”
And giving his lapdog an encouraging pat on the head, Trump tweeted this morning that Nunes was "a man of tremendous courage and grit" and "may someday be recognized as a Great American Hero".
posted by Doktor Zed at 10:27 AM on February 5, 2018 [27 favorites]


If you can believe it, it was Alito who (unilaterally) denied the PA GOP's request, not the whole of the SCOTUS (!):

Justice Samuel Alito, who handles emergency appeals from Pennsylvania, rejected the request from the GOP leaders and voters that the court put on hold an order from the state Supreme Court that could now produce new congressional districts in the coming two weeks.
posted by un petit cadeau at 10:29 AM on February 5, 2018 [42 favorites]


the GOP's emotional, unfactual campaigns work

And not just any emotions. The GOP plays on common selfishness and fear. "The Democrats and their friends are coming to get you. They want your money, they want your jobs, they want your schools, they want your children, ..."

I suspect you'll just have to play the same game and frame Democratic issues in those terms. "The Republicans and their friends, foreign and domestic, are coming to get you. They want to take your pensions. They want to take your health care. They want to take your farms. They want your air and your water. They would let your children and grandchildren live in a terrible world if it meant a quick buck for Republicans today. They want to hand American sovereignty to the Russians, vote by stolen vote. They want America to blunder into nuclear war on the borders of China and Russia. If there's anything left of America, you won't own any of it. You will be owned by the richest Americans and their rich foreign friends." You can go way over the top and still base it all on facts. No need to make up bullshit like child slavery and satanic rituals in the nonexistent basement of a pizzeria.
posted by pracowity at 10:41 AM on February 5, 2018 [87 favorites]


Alito may be terrible but he knows that there's no way that the US court has any standing to rule on the Pennsylvania constitution.
posted by octothorpe at 10:43 AM on February 5, 2018 [7 favorites]




Another worthwhile response to review of Ziblatt and Levitsky's How Democracies Die is from James Fallows, Calling the Trump Era by Its Proper Name:
Why does the naming matter? In reading Riemen’s book [To Fight Against This Age], I thought frequently of two works by The Atlantic’s Ta-Nehisi Coates that appear in his new book We Were Eight Years in Power. One was “Case for Reparations”; the other, his article about Trump as “The First White President.” Each of them powerfully argued that calling things by their explicit, deliberately undiplomatic names was a crucial intellectual and political step. He was not writing about America’s “racial problems.” He was forcing attention on state-sponsored white racial supremacy. If you don’t like that term, or the idea of Trump as “first white president,” then, Ta-Nehisi is saying, you should examine the realities he is presenting.
In thinking about useful responses to Trump, the explicit, deliberately undiplomatic name Fallows suggests is fascism.
posted by peeedro at 10:57 AM on February 5, 2018 [36 favorites]


The alt-right is killing people
In the past four years, the Southern Poverty Law Center has documented a string of violent acts involving the racist “alt-right” which has resulted in 43 people dead and more than 60 injured.
posted by Artw at 11:06 AM on February 5, 2018 [63 favorites]


Let's also remember that suburban Illinois Nazis stoned MLK Jr. (of Dodge-driving fame, apparently?)
posted by tivalasvegas at 11:16 AM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


ELECTIONS NEWS NEWS -- Hi, I am back, and will have news tonight, once I finish reading the old thread, and see if there was anything you didn't already hit on. Also hopefully tonight, March special elections write-up.

And a reminder that we have four Missouri special elections tomorrow.

(of course, I was thinking of you all on vacation)
posted by Chrysostom at 11:18 AM on February 5, 2018 [72 favorites]


In thinking about useful responses to Trump, the explicit, deliberately undiplomatic name Fallows suggests is fascism.

I suggest "Trumpian fascism." Describes the political system, and the particular flavor it took on at a specific time in American history.
posted by Rykey at 11:21 AM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


I've mainly been using "neo-fascism" but Trumpian or Trumpist fascism is also fine by me.
posted by tivalasvegas at 11:25 AM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


I would prefer neo-fascism; potus45 loooooves hearing his name, on absolutely anything, and he wants it remembered. If needed, call it "Republican fascism" and don't give him the credit for running it just because he's starring in the posters.
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 11:57 AM on February 5, 2018 [17 favorites]


Simple solution for Scarnati's intransigence: 72 hours to comply in handing over the information or appear before the Court to show cause why there shouldn't be contempt charges.

Even simpler -- and more importantly, satisfying to me -- would be to order a sheriff to go get the required information without Scarnati's consent.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:58 AM on February 5, 2018


Just call it fascism. Neo- or alt- anything makes it sound fresh and cool. It's the same type of plain old fascism our grandparents and parents died fighting in WWII.
posted by medusa at 12:08 PM on February 5, 2018 [80 favorites]


Just call it fascism. Neo- or alt- anything makes it sound fresh and cool. It's the same type of plain old fascism our grandparents and parents died fighting in WWII.

Yeah. When Jonah Goldberg wrote his silly book trying to claim fascism was liberalism and vice versa, he didn't cutesy it us with prefixies; he just called it Liberal Fascism.

If memory serves me correctly, Goldberg said at the time he wrote it because he was tired of liberals comparing conservatives to fascists. Well, here we are.
posted by Gelatin at 12:14 PM on February 5, 2018 [9 favorites]


Hey, speaking of fascism:

President Trump calls Democrats “un-American” for not standing and applauding during his State of the Union address. Adds: “Somebody said treasonous. Yea, why not? Can we call that treason? Why not?"--@MViser
posted by Horace Rumpole at 12:15 PM on February 5, 2018 [41 favorites]


> thelonius:
"Well, in general, everything you mentioned and then some, but, I think, mostly the idea of the memo was to distract and derail the Russia investigation.

It's to discredit it"


Which it epically failed to do, IMO. It just came off as another whiny Trump temper tantrum. Again, IMO.
posted by Samizdata at 12:17 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]


First they win the Superbowl, then they refuse to meet with Trump. The Eagles make me very, very proud.
posted by grumpybear69 at 12:18 PM on February 5, 2018 [51 favorites]


anya32: ‘Please keep kids safe from guns’: How Trump replied to a 7-year-old’s anguished letter
The note made her feel better, at least for a few days, before she started to think more about it.

“He didn’t say how he could keep kids safe,” Ava told her mom. So on Jan. 8, she sat down to write another letter.
At 8 years old, she realized the response letter from the President was empty. At least they didn't write about how more would guns keep kids safe.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:19 PM on February 5, 2018 [56 favorites]


So, I don't know where it'll end up at closing time, but it looks like the Dow is currently down over 1,000 points. Thanks, Obama!
posted by uosuaq at 12:19 PM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


> Yea, why not? Can we call that treason? Why not?"

*points at shelf full of history books that explain why not*
posted by tonycpsu at 12:19 PM on February 5, 2018 [43 favorites]


On the one hand: ow, my 403(b).

On the other hand, at least cryptocurrency is also crashing, so I can point and laugh at the crypto-dickwads. Well, point and laugh even more.
posted by SansPoint at 12:25 PM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


So, I don't know where it'll end up at closing time, but it looks like the Dow is currently down over 1,000 points. Thanks, Obama!

The turbulence on Wall Street comes at an especially bad time for a president who loves to brag about the stock market. (Matt Egan for CNN, January 30, 2018)
The Dow plunged 363 points on Tuesday, one of its worst days since the 2016 election -- hours before President Trump's first State of the Union address.

Unlike his predecessors, Trump has obsessed over the market. He frequently tweets about market milestones, pointing to the monstrous gains as evidence that his policies are working.

"The stock market is smashing one record after another," Trump told the elite crowd at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week. The president even mentioned the exact number of record highs -- 84 -- that the S&P 500 had notched since his election.

But becoming Wall Street's cheerleader-in-chief has risks, as Trump is being reminded this week. The Dow just posted its worst two-day percentage decline of his presidency.

The problem with bragging about the Dow's day-to-day moves is that every president eventually encounters a market storm. Attaching yourself too closely to the good days can make it harder to detach from the bad ones.

"If you live by the sword, then you die by the sword," said Sam Stovall, chief investment strategist at CFRA Research.

Stovall said that while the party in power "always wants to take credit" for what happens on its watch, Trump may face questions about blame for market drops.
Unfortunately, there's a good chance that Trump will tweet about something or sign some awful executive order on the days before and during the next market rebound and ta-da! He sees himself as the market's savior again!
posted by filthy light thief at 12:25 PM on February 5, 2018 [10 favorites]


(Side rail to a pet peeve) Quit talking about the Dow. The S&P 500 is the index that matters.
posted by ocschwar at 12:30 PM on February 5, 2018 [7 favorites]


Trump tweeted this morning that Nunes was "a man of tremendous courage and grit" and "may someday be recognized as a Great American Hero".

Ah yes, recognized alongside other such Great American Heroes as Scooter Libby, Oliver North, and G. Gordon Liddy.
posted by eclectist at 12:33 PM on February 5, 2018 [18 favorites]


(Side rail to a pet peeve) Quit talking about the Dow. The S&P 500 is the index that matters.

Also down a whole bunch!
posted by notyou at 12:33 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


"Treason? Why not?"
-Donald J. Trump
posted by contraption at 12:35 PM on February 5, 2018 [41 favorites]


For those struggling, like I was, to contextualize contraptions quote above, CNN is reporting that during remarks at a manufacturing plant in Cincinnati earlier, while discussing Democratic reactions to his SOTU speech, said:

"They were like death and un-American. Somebody said, 'Treasonous.' I mean, yeah, I guess, why not," he said to laughter.

"Can we call that treason? Why not." he added.

Law and Order presidency, indeed.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 12:43 PM on February 5, 2018 [14 favorites]


(Side rail to a pet peeve) Quit talking about the Dow. The S&P 500 is the index that matters.

The Dow that can be named is not the eternal Dow.
posted by Strange Interlude at 12:44 PM on February 5, 2018 [99 favorites]


He who brags will not endure.
According to followers of the Dow,
"These are extra food and unnecessary luggage."
posted by Coventry at 12:50 PM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


Mod note: Not to pooh-pooh the tao jokes but let's maybe rein it in a bit.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:53 PM on February 5, 2018 [32 favorites]


Michele Bachmann won't run for Franken's seat.
It became very clear to me that I wasn't hearing any call from God to do this
posted by paper chromatographologist at 1:05 PM on February 5, 2018 [35 favorites]


here are 6 more general hidden costs of continuing resolutions (Adam Mazmanian for Federal Computer Week [FCW], Aug 19, 2015)

This is why the struggle between liberals and conservatives is asymmetric warfare. These are all positives to conservatives because they further degrade the functioning of government, which feeds into their narrative of government incompetence. It's like trying to make war with conventional weapons against aliens who find being bombed and shot pleasurable.
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:07 PM on February 5, 2018 [21 favorites]


Meanwhile, the NYT is yet again giving front page space to a white supremacist. Their explanation on Twitter is 'By investigating an emerging leader in an extremist movement, we hope to offer Times viewers a deeper understanding of the people and forces behind these groups'

Of course you are...
posted by fluttering hellfire at 7:58 AM on February 5 [23 favorites +] [!]


Hey, NYT, how about doing one on the white supremacists in the White House? You know, the consequential ones?
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:20 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


Or hey NYT how about doing profiles of people who are doing meaningful good in the world and directly and indirectly working against the closed and narrow minded fearmongers and hatespreaders?
posted by kokaku at 1:28 PM on February 5, 2018 [34 favorites]


David Brooks writes that in the glowing future where Roe is overturned:

There’s a good chance that a lot of states would hammer out the sort of compromise the European nations have — legal in the first months, difficult after that. That’s what most Americans support.


Proving that my initial impression of David Brooks as a blithering idiot was correct.
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:29 PM on February 5, 2018 [9 favorites]


I'm wondering if the massive stock market crash we are experiencing will make Cheetoh take action on something related to government this week - given that his wallet will no doubt be impacted for once.
posted by Toddles at 1:29 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


By investigating an emerging leader in an extremist movement, we hope to offer Times viewers a deeper understanding of the people and forces behind these groups

JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, THEY'RE NAZIS--- WHAT MORE DOES ONE NEED TO KNOW BEYOND "THESE PEOPLE ARE A THREAT AND MUST BE ROOTED OUT"
posted by entropicamericana at 1:30 PM on February 5, 2018 [83 favorites]


Note that while centrists like Klein and Fallows strongly approve of the message in How Democracies Die, it is getting a more skeptical welcome from the left. The Guardian review quoted above touches on this in a mild way at the end:
Levitsky and Ziblatt criticise the great 18th-century French political thinker Montesquieu for insisting that good constitutional design was enough to constrain “overreaching power” – and for neglecting the importance of norms in making any political system work. But they neglect the thing that Montesquieu never forgot: that politics is also made by the social, cultural, economic and even climactic circumstances in which it happens. This book has remarkably little to say about the conditions that might be driving current popular discontent with democratic norms, including the impact of digital technology, the changing nature of work, the threat of rising inequality and the reconfiguring of gender relations, however far we still have to go.

We won’t find the norms to stabilise democracy in this changed world by looking for them in the world it has supplanted. Levitsky and Ziblatt say that political parties and other gatekeepers are essential to ensure democracy stays the course. They lament the demise of the smoke-filled rooms of political insiders that kept the rabble-rousers at bay. But the smoke-filled rooms are long gone, seen off by smartphones and social media, not to mention 21st-century standards of health and safety. It’s no good asking what will replicate them. We need to know how to get by without them.
"Norms" are not just abstract principles, they are social practices; and those practices -- men in literal smoke-filled rooms making deals -- are dead or should be. Parties cannot exercise the same control they once did, and leaders cannot shape public opinion with the power they once had. Fallows et al. argue correctly that what we are seeing today should be called fascism, not "populism," and they are right. But it is also populism in the sense that these are movements from outside the norm-loving establishment, and that the left should acknowledge that it too cannot go back to the old elite system (the norms, after all, were only ever shared by the elites).

Corey Robin puts the point more sharply, focusing on two quotes from Levitsky and Ziblatt's recent NYT op-ed in which they express the scope of their fears about norm erosion:
[L&Z:] Could it happen here? It already has. During the 1850s, polarization over slavery undermined America’s democratic norms. Southern Democrats viewed the antislavery position of the emerging Republican Party as an existential threat. They assailed Republicans as “traitors to the Constitution” and vowed to “never permit this federal government to pass into the traitorous hands of the Black Republican Party.”
...
Democrats are beginning to respond in kind. Their recent filibuster triggering a government shutdown took a page out of the Gingrich playbook. And if they retake the Senate in 2018, there is talk of denying President Trump the opportunity to fill any Supreme Court vacancy. This is a dangerous spiral.
...
[CR:] As Jim Oakes has shown, the Southern Democrats were right to be terrified of the Republican Party, to see that party as an existential threat. The Republicans did want to destroy slavery, they did want to break the back of the slaveocracy, to gut a long-standing way of life. They wanted to do it peacefully, but they also understood that if war came, it would offer an opportunity to do it violently, an opportunity that they would not fail to seize. The Republicans were norm-breakers: they didn’t just want to limit the expansion of slavery into the territories (and whether limiting expansion of slavery was a norm in antebellum America is very unclear; in fact, we might say that the argument over that question was more the norm than any settlement of it; see Mark Graber’s book on Dred Scott); they wanted to limit that expansion as prelude to destroying the institution everywhere. Freedom national.

Levitsky and Ziblatt know that norm erosion and polarization were afoot during the 1850s. Only they want to put the onus entirely on the slaveholders. That way, they can take a stand against norm erosion without endorsing slavery; that way, they can pin the polarization of the era entirely on the Southern Democrats; that way, they can have their discourse of norm erosion and eat it, too. That’s politically understandable, in some sense, but wildly off the mark, historically.
...
To press the point a little further: Let’s take one of the cases that Levitsky and Ziblatt mention — the recent shutdown. Now, one of the strongest arguments in favor of the notion that Trump is an authoritarian is the treatment of immigrants. The Democrats shut down the government in order to secure some sort of deal that would allow hundreds of thousands of Dreamers to live in the country where they have lived most of their lives. The question is: assuming a shutdown would secure that outcome, is a shutdown democracy-enhancing or norm eroding? Arguably, it’s both, and not in an unrelated way: arguably the latter is necessary to the former. Arguably, norm erosion is not antithetical to democracy but an ally of it.

If your highest value is the preservation of American institutions, the avoidance of “dysfunction,” the discourse of norm erosion makes sense. If it’s democracy, not so much. Sometimes democracy requires the shattering of norms and institutions.

I fully recognize that the devil is in that “sometimes.” Some norms should be shattered, some should not. Some norm erosion undermines democracy, some enhances it. But that’s the real discussion we need to have: not a general toxin against norm erosion as somehow the bane of democracy — which may set us up for a centrist politics but not for a democratic one — but a more normatively informed discussion of what democracy requires.
TL;DR: Some of us old lefties still hate the FBI even during this marriage of convenience.
posted by chortly at 1:37 PM on February 5, 2018 [46 favorites]


JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, THEY'RE NAZIS--- WHAT MORE DOES ONE NEED TO KNOW

For people insulated enough by wealth and power to have never felt any threat from state-sanctioned violence, Nazis in their neighborhood will always be a charming curiosity. A dirty and distasteful curiosity, sure, but always an intriguing spectacle. This will only change if they join them or are destroyed by them.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:39 PM on February 5, 2018 [10 favorites]


HuffPo: Supreme Court Won’t Let Pennsylvania Republicans Delay Drawing New Congressional Map[...]

Pennsylvania Senate President Pro Tempore Joseph Scarnati (R) has indicated he won’t comply with a court order to hand over information to assist the court in drawing the map because he believes it’s unlawful.


Further complications for the PA GOP, Mother Jones reports: Republicans Fighting to Protect Gerrymandering in Pennsylvania Have an Ethics Problem
Last week, after the Pennsylvania state Supreme Court invalidated the state’s GOP-friendly congressional map, top Republicans in the state Legislature asked the state Supreme Court to throw out the decision. One of the Democratic justices, they argued, should have recused himself from the case because of comments he made in 2015 opposing gerrymandering.

But one of these Republicans, Senate President Pro Tempore Joseph Scarnati, did not disclose a more serious conflict of interest: Scarnati donated $25,000 to a different state Supreme Court justice, Republican Sallie Mundy, in April 2017. The donation came through his political action committee.
Mundy also received, but did not disclose, donations from two other Republican congressmen, Charlie Dent and Brian Fitzpatrick, whose districts are likewise affected by the gerrymandering case before the court.
posted by Doktor Zed at 1:43 PM on February 5, 2018 [26 favorites]


So, how does one go about reporting a bot on Twitter? There's no "this is a bot" option in the "report this account" questionnaire. (I have this terribad habit of following MAGAhats that turn up in Twitter comments back to where they live and sometimes it turns into a rabbit hole of real actual bananapants and sometimes it's just like hey THIS IS SO CLEARLY THE BOTTIEST BOT THAT EVER BOTTED ARE THEY EVEN TRYING ANYMORE???)
posted by soren_lorensen at 1:45 PM on February 5, 2018 [16 favorites]


> Republicans Fighting to Protect Gerrymandering in Pennsylvania Have an Ethics Problem

I like how that's both a title and an axiomatically true statement.
posted by Freon at 1:46 PM on February 5, 2018 [22 favorites]


AFAIK, bots on twitter aren't officially acknowledged - they're all presumed to be real posts by whoever set up the account. So the only reporting is standard "broke the TOS" complaints. The hope is that there's nobody around to argue the other side of things; unfortunately, there's a chance that the botwriter could say "hey it's just a bot" and Twitter staff would think that it's somehow *more okay* to spew hate by algorithm than by conscious design, as if "intent of the writer" were more important than "words published on the screen."
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 1:48 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]


The Association of Health Care Journalists reports the federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) is threatening to bar a reporter (Virgil Dickson, Washington bureau chief for Modern Healthcare) from its regular telephone news conferences because he refused to remove three lines from a story about one official's sudden resignation that CMS's director didn't like. The threat came from a contractor now doing communications work for CMS:
O’Donnell, the consultant who threatened to blackball Modern Healthcare, is not a member of the media affairs offices for CMS or for HHS.

He is a Republican strategist who has helped GOP candidates in their political campaigns. In 2015, O’Donnell pleaded guilty to lying to U.S. House ethics investigators about how much campaign work he did with money that came from office accounts rather campaign accounts.
posted by adamg at 1:54 PM on February 5, 2018 [26 favorites]


For people insulated enough by wealth and power to have never felt any threat from state-sanctioned violence, Nazis in their neighborhood will always be a charming curiosity.

IIRC one of the only murders in Georgetown (DC) last decade was done by a Nazi LARPer, it was regarded as sorta a novelty more than anything else.
posted by aspersioncast at 2:02 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


Mod note: Feel what you like about TPM paywalling some of their content, but just idly unpaywalling it doesn't seem like a great way to go.
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:12 PM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


IIRC one of the only murders in Georgetown (DC) last decade was done by a Nazi LARPer

Which one was this?
posted by orrnyereg at 2:17 PM on February 5, 2018


Apologies for the aside, but the rest of the Twitter feed of Shaun Usher, the guy that posted the fake "Dow Joans" tweet is pretty funny. viz: @Stefinatrix: "Just wait until he sends in the Maureens to invade North Korea.."
posted by mosk at 2:20 PM on February 5, 2018 [10 favorites]


cjelli: (a) Fascist argle-blargle about how failing to clap is treason (per above), (b) again talking about Her Emails, (c) preëmptively suggesting that a Republican loss in the 2018 election will be because everyone is too happy with tax cuts (???)

Regarding (a), has anyone called Trump's Mirror on his claims that the actions of others are treasonous?

And regarding (c), I offer the following: Paul Ryan tweeted (archived view), then deleted, the following:
A secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, PA, said she was pleasantly surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week ... she said [that] will more than cover her Costco membership for the year.
Which got this (IMO) apt reply from LOLGOP (screencaps via conservativememes.com):
Charles, a Koch brother in Wichita, said he was pleasantly surprised that his pay went up $26,923,076 a week... he said [that] will more than cover the cost of buying several more Paul Ryans.
That's funny, but the sad thing is that if the tax cut was distributed evenly, each person would see an extra $446 per year, which is less than GWB offered back in 2008. Bonus guffaws: a Paul Ryan fanboy cited the Congressman's record at that time, which included "he has never voted for an unbalanced budget."
posted by filthy light thief at 2:39 PM on February 5, 2018 [20 favorites]


I have a question: the Memo and all the discussion lately cites Papodope's mouthiness revealing the link between the Trump campaign and Her Emails as July 2016 (ie, peri- or after The Meeting).

Didn't we just learn in was May 2016? Why is no one correcting that fact?
posted by Dashy at 2:42 PM on February 5, 2018


The Australian government didn't pass it on to the US until July. The NYT article says the reason for the delay was unclear.
posted by melissasaurus at 3:01 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]


People online and on the TeeVee keep referring to what happened today as a crash. We still haven't absorbed that huge point moves happen much more frequently the higher the DOW and S&P climb. Today's loss isn't even a blip compared to a true crash. For example a drop equivalent to Black Monday would have been almost 6000 points. 6000.

We're not even in "pullback" territory yet much less bear market. I think we may be headed there and, frankly, the market has been way overvalued for some time. It's overvalued after today. It'd be overvalued if we drop another 1000 points tomorrow. But we need to get used to 1000 point moves because they will become more common as time goes on.
posted by Justinian at 3:06 PM on February 5, 2018 [38 favorites]


Not to pooh-pooh the tao jokes

I see what you did there.
posted by adamgreenfield at 3:17 PM on February 5, 2018 [47 favorites]


The nice thing about Trump saying not applauding at the SOTU is treason is it kinda ends the debate with Trumpettes on whether colluding with Russia should be called treason.
posted by chris24 at 3:24 PM on February 5, 2018 [25 favorites]


NYT breaking news: The House Intelligence Committee voted unanimously on Monday to make public a classified Democratic memorandum rebutting Republican claims that the F.B.I. and the Justice Department had abused their powers to wiretap a former Trump campaign official, setting up a possible clash with President Trump.

The vote gives Mr. Trump five days to review the Democratic memo and determine whether he will try to block its release. A decision to stop it could lead to an ugly standoff between the president, his top law enforcement and intelligence advisers and Democrats on Capitol Hill.

posted by RedOrGreen at 3:25 PM on February 5, 2018 [20 favorites]


JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, THEY'RE NAZIS--- WHAT MORE DOES ONE NEED TO KNOW BEYOND "THESE PEOPLE ARE A THREAT AND MUST BE ROOTED OUT"

Watch the entire twenty minutes. I did.

As has been pointed out here already, the Times goes and does actual investigative journalism on Kline, which reveals him to have lied about having been deployed overseas. The reporter confronts him directly with his lie, and his baffled and inarticulate mumbles in response leave him sounding like anything but the capable, competent, trust- and adulation-worthy leader every fascist both craves and wants to be. It is astonishingly undermining.

Similarly, the juxtaposition of Kline — a notably ineffectual public speaker — and his two rows of sycophants with archival footage of the BUF's Oswald Mosley at a rally of thousands of supporters kind of puts the lie to any notion of a mass mobilization.

If nothing else, the video is revealing for the moment it depicts Kline clearly pronouncing the "v" in Identity Evropa.

I agree, the Times has stumbled before in their coverage of the right, and it's unconscionable that they continue to lend jackbags like Douthat and Brooks a platform. But in this, at least, they appear to have learned one or two lessons.
posted by adamgreenfield at 3:31 PM on February 5, 2018 [24 favorites]


A decision to stop it could lead to an ugly standoff between the president, his top law enforcement and intelligence advisers and Democrats on Capitol Hill.
posted by RedOrGreen at 3:25 PM on February 5 [3 favorites +] [!]


But the fact that it passed unanimously means that some Republicans voted to release it as well, so why would the standoff be just with Democrats?
posted by Mental Wimp at 3:32 PM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


A decision to stop it could lead to an ugly standoff between the president, his top law enforcement and intelligence advisers and Democrats on Capitol Hill.

Stopping its publication might lead to an ugly standoff, you say? Call me Nostradamus, but based on past experience w/this guy I have a prediction to make...
posted by mosk at 3:34 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]


what is it the in the beltway drama of the nunes memo and the collusion theories is supposed to distract us from? - a crashing economy?

Is the economy crashing? I thought part of the problem was that the economy seemed to not be too bothered about the lack of leadership.

But we still hear stories about American healthcare, where a single visit to the ER can lead to bankruptcy, and we quite unanimously agree that's completely fucked and inhumane.

Let's be honest, I hear about people having to pay to have a child in the US and think that's fucked and inhumane. What are poor people supposed to do? Die in childbirth?
posted by Merus at 3:34 PM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


God I wish the Democrats would just let the stupid memo thing go already. Why lend credibility to that Nunes mess of self-ownage by responding to it? Why perpetuate this idiocy into some tit-for-tat "battle of memos"? It totally feeds into the same old tired both sides gridlock Bickering Pols narrative.
posted by FelliniBlank at 3:40 PM on February 5, 2018 [13 favorites]


The House Intelligence Committee voted unanimously

er... does this mean Nunes voted yes on the Democratic memo, too?
posted by scaryblackdeath at 3:41 PM on February 5, 2018 [14 favorites]


It's six of one, half a dozen the other. The biggest problem with coalition governments in parliamentary systems is that sometimes you need to get confidence and supply votes from complete fucking nutjobs. Recent examples include May making a deal with the devil DUP, religious conservative nutjob Steven Fielding held the balance of power in the Australian Senate from 2008 to 2011 and winding the clock back luddite advocate Brian Harradine held the balance of power in the Senate from '94-96. Hell, Harradine single handedly blocked RU486 from being imported into Australia for over a decade.

I think the common denominator between those three cases and the US is Rupert Murdoch.
posted by acb at 3:41 PM on February 5, 2018 [10 favorites]


Lost productivity? Lost productivity? A group of government/university people organized a meeting for our stakeholders in late February, obtaining a venue, a nearby hotel, and food options. Because of the possible shut-down, we just spent the last week finding an alternative venue, alternative food, and alternative speakers and moderators, since some of us would be arrested if we came to the meeting during a shut-down.
posted by acrasis at 3:50 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


Mod note: A few deleted, let's not veer off into costs of childbirth in the US, yes it is bad.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 3:51 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]




Pennsylvania Senate President Pro Tempore Joseph Scarnati (R) has indicated he won’t comply with a court order to hand over information to assist the court in drawing the map because he believes it’s unlawful.

won’t comply with a court order

because he believes it’s unlawful

DUDE IT IS THE STATE SUPREME COURT RULING ON THE STATE CONSTITUTION.
IF THEY SAY IT'S LAWFUL, IT'S THE GODDAMN LAW.
posted by murphy slaw at 4:18 PM on February 5, 2018 [92 favorites]


Doktor Zed: "And giving his lapdog an encouraging pat on the head, Trump tweeted this morning that Nunes was "a man of tremendous courage and grit" and "may someday be recognized as a Great American Hero"."
A bumbling nobody, assisted by a mediocre and insubordinate member of the FBI, who despite only minimal understanding of the powers granted to him achieves what results he does more by blindly stumbling around than by skill, ultimately at the bidding of an alien power?
posted by Pinback at 4:20 PM on February 5, 2018 [24 favorites]


DUDE IT IS THE STATE SUPREME COURT RULING ON THE STATE CONSTITUTION.
IF THEY SAY IT'S LAWFUL, IT'S THE GODDAMN LAW.

Trump's favorite president is Andrew Jackson. This is just an early trial balloon for a bunch of "Mr. Marshall has made his decision, now let him enforce it" from Republicans all over the place.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 4:23 PM on February 5, 2018 [28 favorites]


But the fact that it passed unanimously means that some Republicans voted to release it as well, so why would the standoff be just with Democrats?

Call me cynical, but I expect the Repubs who voted for release did so as theatre, with the full expectation that Trump will never agree. Then they get to shrug and say "we voted yes, but its the President's decision. Nothing we can do."

They might be concerned, though. Possibly very concerned. Or maybe upset or frustrated. But the shrugs - the shrugs will be epic.
posted by nubs at 4:24 PM on February 5, 2018 [24 favorites]


The Australian government didn't pass it on to the US until July. The NYT article says the reason for the delay was unclear.

If you had a solid understanding of Australian politics from 1994-2008 I'd say "because it's Alexander Downer" and you'd probably understand exactly why.
posted by Talez at 4:38 PM on February 5, 2018 [11 favorites]


Phil Mattingly: House GOP CR proposal, as it currently stands:
-Funds government to March 23
-Full year defense approps
-2 year funding for community health centers

Chris Hayes:
This only makes sense as a way of running the government if you want to continually reserve the right to create a crisis or bankrupt a program.

Republicans could've funded community health centers two weeks ago along with CHIP, but that would've left them without a hostage this time.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:43 PM on February 5, 2018 [30 favorites]


One PA state legislator -- from Punxsutawney, because this is the stupidest timeline -- wants cosponsors to impeach and remove the state supreme court justices who issued the ruling, which is absolutely possible because the state senate is gerrymandered to give Republicans a two-thirds majority.

Might go nowhere, might go somewhere, but it's a reminder that "checks and balances" ultimately depend upon those in power choosing to accept checks and balances.
posted by holgate at 4:44 PM on February 5, 2018 [33 favorites]


-Full year defense approps

Why would the GOP want to fire this bullet instead of leaving it in the chamber? Every time the Democrats try to grow a spine on playing this game the GOP beats them over the head with "they don't want to fund the army because they hate the troops".
posted by Talez at 4:46 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]


How many people do you know get out of the cult? Who changes their minds and becomes less extreme? It might happen (and I really like the @trumpregrets twitter for finding people who do) but its scary that we can't defeat it

It happens sometimes. But the thing is - a lot of the current alt-right or those embracing fascism, as noted, didn't exactly reason themselves into that position.

The number one thing fueling terrorism, or fascism, or any shitty ism that involves dehumanizing and/or killing a lot of people, is angry young (usually single) men who do not see themselves attaining their personal life goals, and are looking for a sense of community and purpose. I've seen a few studies, such as this British one, that suggest extremism may be these young men's refuge against mental illness, but the majority seem to agree that young men between the ages of 18 and 35 are vulnerable to these kinds of intensely held emotional beliefs oriented around identity.

I do not know how to stop this. I know that economic growth tends to ease off these tensions, but I kind of bristle at the idea that we need to buy men off to avoid them being monsters. But I think we need to start seriously analyzing nativist domestic extremism, and taking a hard look at the structures that allow it to continue and spread.
posted by corb at 4:47 PM on February 5, 2018 [32 favorites]


On the News app built in to Windows 10, one of the preview thumbnail headlines right now is:

"Trump tags Democrats as "treasonous" for muted SOTU reaction"

Speculation: someday someone's going to write a history book showing a timeline of the Citizens United verdict, the influx of Russian money into the NRA and Republican PACs, and the escalation, over the past few years, of the GOP calling anything and everything Democrats do (or don't do, in this case) "treasonous" until the word has no meaning-- because the GOP really needs that word to lose all meaning in case their Russian cash infusion is exposed.
posted by wiremommy at 4:48 PM on February 5, 2018 [64 favorites]


Why would the GOP want to fire this bullet instead of leaving it in the chamber?

I mean isn't that what theyre going to do again? They know Democrats aren't going to agree to fully funding the military while leaving the domestic government programs to fuck right off, it's a stupid ask to begin with, they just want to bang the drum on "liberals hate the troops" every time.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:48 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


In today's installment of You're (About to Be) Fired:

@kylegriffin1: White House principal deputy press secretary Raj Shah called Trump “a deplorable” and referred to the release of the Access Hollywood tape as “some justice,” according to private messages independently obtained and verified by New York Magazine.

@Olivianuzzi: [. . .] and, while at the RNC, requested oppo on [Trump] that was used by Jeb Bush in an attack ad 3 days later.
posted by FelliniBlank at 4:50 PM on February 5, 2018 [10 favorites]


I mean isn't that what theyre going to do again? They know Democrats aren't going to agree to fully funding the military while leaving the domestic government programs to fuck right off, it's a stupid ask to begin with, they've just want to bang the drum on "liberals hate the troops" every time.

Yes but after the smoke clears they're only full funding the government until the 23rd of March. After that if the Democrats shut the government down again, what do they beat them over the head with? The first thing that comes to mind to fund defense for a year in advance would be if they were planning to let all the other stuff fall into a heap come March 23rd. Start demanding deep cuts or they just let the hostages get shot.
posted by Talez at 4:51 PM on February 5, 2018


The number one thing fueling terrorism, or fascism, or any shitty ism that involves dehumanizing and/or killing a lot of people, is angry young (usually single) men who do not see themselves attaining their personal life goals, and are looking for a sense of community and purpose. I've seen a few studies, such as this British one, that suggest extremism may be these young men's refuge against mental illness, but the majority seem to agree that young men between the ages of 18 and 35 are vulnerable to these kinds of intensely held emotional beliefs oriented around identity.

I do not know how to stop this. I know that economic growth tends to ease off these tensions, but I kind of bristle at the idea that we need to buy men off to avoid them being monsters.


Fully funded Works Progress Administration 2.0 that includes on the job training for things like tech jobs in addition to the stuff it used to include would keep a lot of them busy and fulfilled before the extremists could get their hooks in and would be awesome for everyone else too, helping mitigate domestic extremism as basically a side effect of helping everyone find fulfilling work and on the job training where corporations have thrown away the idea of apprenticeships and abuse the hell out of internships. Not necessarily a huge help to change those who are already under the sway of extremism, but a way to help head it off going forward.
posted by jason_steakums at 5:15 PM on February 5, 2018 [45 favorites]


Breaking: Trump’s Lawyers Want Him to Refuse an Interview in Russia Inquiry (NYT)
Lawyers for President Trump have advised him against sitting down for a wide-ranging interview with the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, according to four people briefed on the matter, raising the specter of a monthslong court battle over whether the president must answer questions under oath.

His lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators. Their stance puts them at odds with Mr. Trump, who has said publicly and privately that he is eager to speak with Mr. Mueller as part of the investigation into possible ties between his associates and Russia’s election interference, and whether he obstructed justice.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 5:15 PM on February 5, 2018 [34 favorites]


-Full year defense approps

Why would the GOP want to fire this bullet instead of leaving it in the chamber? Every time the Democrats try to grow a spine on playing this game the GOP beats them over the head with "they don't want to fund the army because they hate the troops".


I'm a little confused on this myself. From a defense budget standpoint, every CR really is like lighting a shitload of money on fire. It makes planning insanely difficult, makes everyone's lives stressful and frustrating, etc. And it leaves all those people hating everyone involved for those same reasons. So for pure "let's not light money on fire" practicality, getting the DoD budget done makes sense.

But the thing is, that's true for every aspect of the government, defense or no.

This CR only goes to March 23, so if it flies then we're back to a possible CR or shutdown fight again only it won't affect the DoD or community health centers or CHIP... so I'm not sure how that helps Republicans? Unless they're planning to say "We protected those aspects of gov't while Democrats irresponsibly shut down the government again" [because they believe DACA people are, y'know, people] or something on those lines...?
posted by scaryblackdeath at 5:18 PM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


His lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators

If not the best, from this we know Trump has hired some minimally-competent lawyers. I mean, "hell yeah they're concerned."
posted by rhizome at 5:22 PM on February 5, 2018 [7 favorites]


Also the Republicans are trying to lock in a defense budget number at something like 770billion, that's about 80billion higher than than what would be allowed under the 2011 Budget Control Act aka The Sequester (Thanks, Obama!) that requires defense and domestic to be equal. Republicans want to drastically increase defense, while of course drastically slashing domestic. They're trying to split off the defense portion and hit Democrats for hating the troops, so they can divorce the two pieces and then come back and force Democrats to agree to even more draconian domestic cuts.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:23 PM on February 5, 2018 [12 favorites]


There is always a tweet.

@realDonaldTrump:
The stock market and US dollar are both plunging today. Welcome to @BarackObama’s second term.
posted by chris24 at 5:24 PM on February 5, 2018 [29 favorites]


His lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators

If not the best, from this we know Trump has hired some minimally-competent lawyers. I mean, "hell yeah they're concerned."


I mean, I'm not sure if you need to even be minimally-competent... or just have seen a season of How to Get Away with Murder to have figured this one out.
posted by TwoStride at 5:25 PM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


Breaking: Trump’s Lawyers Want Him to Refuse an Interview in Russia Inquiry (NYT)

Wow, for once, they give halfway decent legal advice. And we know JUST how Trump reacts to rational suggestions from people who know a fucking thing.
posted by FelliniBlank at 5:27 PM on February 5, 2018 [13 favorites]


They're trying to split off the defense portion and hit Democrats for hating the troops, so they can divorce the two pieces and then come back and force Democrats to agree to even more draconian domestic cuts.

This is what I'm putting my betting money on.

Plus I expect that come the 8th, Schumer will sign onto the whole thing on the promise of an up or down on DACA vote the second that the CR passes. Then, should it pass, they kick it to the house where Ryan promptly dumps the whole thing in the trash can. Pragmatic centrism at work.

Next CR, Schumer comes back with "ok McConnell, this time we make a deal including the House or it's staying shut down" and the GOP caucus just laughs as they don't even lift a finger and manage to shut down Medicaid, Obamacare, TANF, and SNAP while the military funding is left intact.
posted by Talez at 5:32 PM on February 5, 2018 [9 favorites]


Or hey NYT how about doing profiles of people who are doing meaningful good in the world and directly and indirectly working against the closed and narrow minded fearmongers and hatespreaders?

Wouldn't that just paint giant targets on their backs?
posted by Jacqueline at 5:33 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


Wow, for once, they give halfway decent legal advice. And we know JUST how Trump reacts to rational suggestions from people who know a fucking thing.

It goes a little something like this.
posted by jason_steakums at 5:36 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


Wow, for once, they give halfway decent legal advice. And we know JUST how Trump reacts to rational suggestions from people who know a fucking thing.

My first thought when I saw the push headline from NYT was, "Well, now he's going to do the interview for sure. He's probably on the blower with Sessions right now like HOKAY LET'S DO THIS THING WOOOO!!!"
posted by soren_lorensen at 5:47 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


Trump Goes Quiet as the Stock Market Slumps (John Cassidy | The New Yorker)
That was quick! In the course of two days, the “Trump Bump” in the stock market has turned into the “Trump Slump,” with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling more than seven per cent. At one point, on Monday afternoon, it looked as if we might be witnessing not merely a slump but an outright crash. In less than ten minutes, the Dow fell nearly a thousand points before quickly rebounding. It closed the day down “just” 1,175 points, or about 4.6 per cent, at 24,345.80.
Obviously, this was a big fall: in absolute terms, it was the largest points drop ever.

But it needs to be placed in the perspective of stock-market history—on Black Monday, October 19, 1987, the Dow fell twenty-two per cent—and also of the record-breaking run-up that preceded the past few days of declines. Between December 29th and January 29th, small investors piled into the market, and the Dow tacked on close to nineteen hundred points, racing past twenty-five thousand, and then twenty-six thousand. On January 29th, the index closed at 26,616.70. The slump during the past week has wiped out the January run-up, and the market is now down a bit on the year. But people who looked at their 401(k) accounts on Monday night won’t have noticed much of a difference from the end of 2017.

For investors, that’s the good news. More worrying is the fact that there is no way to know whether the correction will end here. The market has been looking frothy for a good while now, and a substantial fall was inevitable at some point. Just as upward movements in stock prices can be self-reinforcing, drawing more people into the market, so can falls in prices. Much will depend on how ordinary investors react to the dramatic movements on Friday and Monday. If they decide to cash out some of the gains they’ve made in the past nine years, there will be further falls.

During the Dow’s recent rapid rise, a more responsible President than Donald Trump might have pointed out the dangers of the market overheating, or even kept silent. But that’s not Trump. As stocks soared, he gloated, and insinuated that his policies were responsible. “Stock Market at an all time high. That doesn’t just happen!” he tweeted in August. Only last week, in his State of the Union speech, he said, “The stock market has smashed one record after another, gaining eight trillion dollars in value. That is great news for Americans’ 401(k), retirement, pension, and college-savings accounts.”

Having boasted as the Dow was rising, Trump can hardly complain if people now associate him with it as it falls. Indeed, a fear of being held responsible for a downturn on Wall Street was one of the reasons that Barack Obama didn’t boast much about the market’s rise, which began way back in March, 2009. If “you claim the rise, you own the fall,” Jay Carney, Obama’s former spokesman, said on Twitter on Monday.

In actual fact, the link between Presidential policies and the stock market is indirect, and often tenuous. On this occasion, the trigger for the market sell-off wasn’t anything Trump did: it was last Friday’s employment report from the Labor Department, which said that strong job growth is continuing and wages are finally picking up a bit. (In December, hourly wages rose at an annualized rate of 2.9 per cent.) For the majority of Americans who don’t own any stocks, that was excellent (and long overdue) news. But it raised fears that the Federal Reserve might raise interest rates more rapidly, which could, in turn, choke off the economy. And that’s what spooked investors. ...

But don’t expect Trump to look at things in this way. He lives in the moment, and, even during his darkest days in the Oval Office, the stock market has given him something to crow about. For some reason, he didn’t mention it on Monday.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 5:47 PM on February 5, 2018 [22 favorites]


I was curious if the defense department had finally agreed to an audit due to the spending increase attempt, and haven't really been paying attention to the matter for a while. Yep, they finally announced an audit! Good news, right? Maybe the only good thing Trump has done?
"Beginning in 2018, our audits will occur annually, with reports issued Nov. 15," the Defense Department's comptroller, David L. Norquist, said.
Who is David L. Norquist? Of course, Grover Norquist's brother, surely a man to root out dark money funneling to the Republicans.
posted by benzenedream at 6:08 PM on February 5, 2018 [12 favorites]


Trump To Plead the De Facto 5th (Josh Marshall | TPM)
The Times is reporting that the President’s personal lawyers are recommending that he refuse to be interviewed or questioned by Robert Mueller’s investigators under any circumstances. Let’s be candid about what this means. The President is pleading the 5th while trying to avoid saying that’s what he’s doing. Let’s call it the de facto 5th. The constitutional law is clear cut. It’s not at all hypothetical. A sitting President has no blanket right to refuse to cooperate with a criminal investigation. Different dimensions of this question were litigated under Presidents Nixon and Clinton. The Courts were clear each time. The President has to comply with the law and with criminal investigations just like everyone else, though there may be certain areas of privilege. Presidents have been interviewed by special prosecutors, special counsels and independent counsels in numerous cases. The President is obviously guilty of obstruction of justice. He’s likely guilty of criminal conspiracy with a foreign power, though what if any statutes this would implicate is not clear to me. It makes perfect sense to refuse to talk. Perps do that all the time. It’s their right.

There are two notable points in the Times write-up of the story. First, the President’s lawyers’ argument appears to be that the President is innocent of any crimes but that he is also a pathological liar. That could leave him vulnerable to a perjury charge. This isn’t my gloss. According to the Times, that’s their argument: “His lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators.”

The other notable claim is that Trump’s lawyers and advisors believe that if Trump refuses a voluntary request for an interview, which is his right, Mueller might lack the nerve to subpoena him. “The lawyers and aides believe the special counsel might be unwilling to subpoena the president and set off a showdown with the White House that Mr. Mueller could lose in court.”

I think it’s very possible that Mueller would not indict the President, even if he believes he has clear and convincing evidence that he committed a crime. (While I don’t have entirely settled views on the matter myself, I actually think there are decent prudential, even not narrowly legal, reasons why a sitting President should be impeached before being indicted.) But I have a very hard time believing that if Robert Mueller believes questioning the President is necessary for his investigation that he won’t subpoena him. That seems quite out of character for the man and inconsistent with what we know about the investigation.

Really this shouldn’t surprise us. The President has gone to war with whole sections of the federal government to undermine the criminal probe which appears to be gathering vast evidence of his guilt. It’s total war. We lose track of how many things the President has done just in the last few weeks which were heretofore unimaginable and which all would be credible and robust grounds for removal from office.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 6:22 PM on February 5, 2018 [50 favorites]


The House Freedom Caucus is all in on the March 23rd CR.

Now I'm definitely suspicious about what they're up to.
posted by Talez at 6:23 PM on February 5, 2018 [19 favorites]


Full year defense approps

Keep in mind an important distinction here. Claire McCaskill in the last showdown proposed funding for troop paychecks, not full defense appropriations, to take the "starving the troops" argument off the table. Appropriations, on the other hand, include big payouts to the giant defense contractors which Republicans are loath to displease. So Republicans would love to lock in government funds for their biggest contributors. Democrats would be nuts to sign that kind of deal without something substantial on immigration.
posted by JackFlash at 6:24 PM on February 5, 2018 [12 favorites]


The real question is will the Freedom Fuckers support the CR after the Senate strips out full year military funding because it won't get 60 votes from Democrats. They're all playing hot potato.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:26 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


Now I'm definitely suspicious about what they're up to.

My thought: they'll hold the debt ceiling to ransom.
posted by carsondial at 6:36 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


And if they retake the Senate in 2018, there is talk of denying President Trump the opportunity to fill any Supreme Court vacancy. This is a dangerous spiral.

I've thought a lot about this. We're in tricky territory. If the GOP sets records for obstructionism and the Dems don't respond in kind, then they've learned they can get away with blowing up democratic norms without penalty--the electorate certainly didn't punish them. But if the Democrats do respond in kind, then we have two parties using every tool available to tear down the possibility of healthy, functioning government--and that's potentially catastrophic. I want the Dems to behave in ways that bolster good government, but we have to get the GOP to do that as well.

The only solution I see is that if the Democrats hold the Senate, the let it be known publicly and firmly that the only SCOTUS nomination they will consider is Merrick Garland. Trump can appoint Garland, they will confirm him immediately, and things are as they should have been. Anyone else but Garland, and they hold that seat open as long as it takes.

Once Garland is seated, if Trump or a future Republican president is presented with a SCOTUS vacancy, the Democrats pledge to consider each nominee on the merits, and move to a vote in the full Senate if there is not a catastrophic reason to withhold such consideration.

If a Justice dies or resigns in the final year of a Trump term, it will be tempting--and understandable--to pull a McConnell and refuse to consider that nominee. If Garland hasn't been seated, that's probably the best choice--but again the Democrats must make clear that they are only working to restore norms, not to punish the GOP. If there's a Justice Garland and Trump is presented with an opening in February 2020, I think the Dems have to take the high ground and consider it. It would suck in the short term, but it would be the right thing for national stability long-term.

(Realistically--would Trump agree to Garland? I suspect not. And then the Democrats have to hold the line as long as possible, saying emphatically that they are acting not out of a desire to obstruct Trump, but to restore Constitutional norms.)
posted by Pater Aletheias at 6:56 PM on February 5, 2018 [72 favorites]


The plot of the 5 more Nunes memos is going to be "But Hilary was the real Russia collusion". Seriously:

Gabriel Sherman: Nunes [on Hannity] says the “clear link to Russia” is Hillary Clinton’s campaign. He says FBI should investigate Hillary for funding Steele dossier.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:08 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]


He says FBI should investigate Hillary for funding Steele dossier.

"hey did you fund oppo research on your opponent" "yep" "ok cool have a nice day"
posted by jason_steakums at 7:13 PM on February 5, 2018 [60 favorites]


Do they really want to go down that road, though? What if the FBI's finding is that Hillary didn't collude with Russia, but Trump did? What if they find out that Hillary did collude with Russia, and so did Trump? It's not like FBI investigations get one shot to find one party guilty or the other, and then they pack up and go home. The FBI can sort of... be interested in a bunch of crimes at once.
posted by Rykey at 7:17 PM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


If a Justice dies or resigns in the final year of a Trump term, it will be tempting--and understandable--to pull a McConnell and refuse to consider that nominee. If Garland hasn't been seated, that's probably the best choice--but again the Democrats must make clear that they are only working to restore norms, not to punish the GOP. If there's a Justice Garland and Trump is presented with an opening in February 2020, I think the Dems have to take the high ground and consider it.

Even if Mueller comes back with a damning report but Republicans refuse to vote for impeachment? I agree with the idea of moving back to a more normal environment if Republicans cooperate with a Garland appointment (spoiler: they won't) just as I think the Democrats should offer compromise on non-partisan districting even while they gerrymander the hell out of everything they control until Republicans accept the deal. But if it turns out the Trump Presidency is fundamentally illegitimate and Republicans don't move on that I think the only just response is to block every attempt he makes to do anything including a Supreme Court appointment no matter how long is left in his term.

It's kinda academic though, Trump would never nominate Garland.
posted by Justinian at 7:18 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


So as not to abuse Edit...

To be clear, I don't think there's anything to the Hillary accusations, and I definitely think there's something to the Trump accusations. But who the hell thinks investigating Hillary necessarily means not investigating Trump?
posted by Rykey at 7:21 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


If the Dems take the Senate and do anything other than refuse to confirm anyone conservative they are guilty of fucking criminal malpractice. As of now the court is conservative and another Gorsuch replacing a liberal or even Kennedy would lock in an extremely conservative court for decades. Roe would be gone. A million other things, voting rights, civil rights, environmental regulations etc. would be at risk or gone. Millions of people are at risk as is our democracy and the world.

Dems already did this on blue slips. Rs got rid of them and Ds put it back when in power. And what did it do? Allow McConnell the ability to hold noms and give Trump the ability to change the judicial system for decades with the most judgeships in modern history. Rs pulled the trigger, not us. We’re just playing by rules they established. Fuck any Trump nominee. I hope we win both and think we have a better chance at the House, but given a choice I’d take the Senate solely for the ability to limit Trump’s damage to the judicial branch. That shit will last decades.
posted by chris24 at 7:28 PM on February 5, 2018 [62 favorites]


After watching Frau Laura Ingraham's interview with Carter Page I feel like I'm 15 IQ points dumber. This must be how people start believing shit that's on Fox News.
posted by Talez at 7:34 PM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


The McConnell rule is enshrined in stone now. No President gets to appoint a SCOTUS seat without control of the Senate again. Anything less is unilateral disarmament. If a Republican President wants to change that rule, we get to extra an absolute metric fuckload of concessions, AND pick the nominee. Like actual luxury gay space communism, and Justice Obama.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:42 PM on February 5, 2018 [20 favorites]


Justice Malia Obama thanks
posted by theodolite at 7:45 PM on February 5, 2018 [45 favorites]


(Realistically--would Trump agree to Garland? I suspect not.

I don 't have to suspect. Of course he wouldn't, it's a restriction on his freedom of choice, his freedom to do do whatever the hell he wants at any given moment. That's what a narcissist treasures most. He'd sooner give up one of his own arms than let someone else dictate his actions.
posted by scalefree at 8:06 PM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


The fundamental flaw with your argument that I see, TWF, is that the electorate didn't attempt to punish the GOP for violating norms by electing Dems. They rewarded the GOP for violating norms by electing more GOP members. The Democratic party's loss of seats both nationwide and on a state level during the Obama years was unprecedented in nature.
posted by Justinian at 8:14 PM on February 5, 2018 [29 favorites]


If the electorate attempts to punish the GOP for violating norms by electing Dems, and the Dems then violate those same norms, the Dems have betrayed the electorate and should, themselves, be similarly punished.

The electorate will (hopefully) not elect Democrats just to punish the Republicans for violating norms, but because they've proven themselves dangerous to the people and country. The norms were predicated on a general agreement that both sides had the best interest of the whole at heart, even if there was vehament disagreement on what that was. It's clear that is no longer true, so the old norms have to go. Unilaterally disarming is suicide.
posted by Candleman at 8:23 PM on February 5, 2018 [5 favorites]


Perhaps. If that holds true, then the Dems will never again be in a position to violate the norms, I guess.

Well, people could vote Democrats back into power for policy reasons rather than because of the Republican violation of norms. But I understand your main point.
posted by Justinian at 8:23 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


FWIW, I worked on the GOP side on the Hill, and my colleagues were generally unpersuaded by my argument, as they contended that the Dems were entirely driven by an ideology that held that the ideological ends always justified the means, and were wholly without moral compass. My colleagues contended that, because of the moral bankruptcy they saw in the Dems and their willingness to violate norms, the GOP, whose cause was the truly just one and warranted victory at all costs, was obligated to race to the bottom.

Hilariously they thought this as Democrats were slavishly reinstating the norms that Republicans broke first, to their own immediate electoral and policy deficit.

Trump's mirror was never just Trump's mirror, the same theory has applied, to exactly the same degree, to Republicans broadly for decades.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:26 PM on February 5, 2018 [12 favorites]


if Republicans cooperate with a Garland appointment

Didn’t this come up in the Gorsuch-fight era and Garland said he had no interest in being involved in this process again?
posted by corb at 8:43 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


The conversation might connect better if people talked specifically about what time periods they were referring to, which norms were being torn down/reinstated/whatever, etc.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 8:45 PM on February 5, 2018 [10 favorites]


Thr Trump Slump is touring Asia right now. Stock indices are diving,
posted by ocschwar at 9:17 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


Nunes [on Hannity] says the “clear link to Russia” is Hillary Clinton’s campaign. He says FBI should investigate Hillary for funding Steele dossier.

The Steele dossier, according to the Fusion GPS testimony, was funded by "the wing of the Republican party that was concerned about... Donald Trump."
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 9:52 PM on February 5, 2018 [23 favorites]


> Barack Spinoza:
"Breaking: Trump’s Lawyers Want Him to Refuse an Interview in Russia Inquiry (NYT)
Lawyers for President Trump have advised him against sitting down for a wide-ranging interview with the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, according to four people briefed on the matter, raising the specter of a monthslong court battle over whether the president must answer questions under oath.

His lawyers are concerned that the president, who has a history of making false statements and contradicting himself, could be charged with lying to investigators. Their stance puts them at odds with Mr. Trump, who has said publicly and privately that he is eager to speak with Mr. Mueller as part of the investigation into possible ties between his associates and Russia’s election interference, and whether he obstructed justice."


I don't even understand how he or that craggy-faced idiot Bannon even get an option to even DELAY such things. You don't show up? BAM! Contempt! You keep delaying showing up? BAM! Contempt! You don't answer truthfully or reliably (or coherently)? Well, you sing the chorus this time. You know where I am going with this.
posted by Samizdata at 10:24 PM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


If we can't get Nunes removed as its chairperson, can we at least get it renamed to something besides the Intelligence Committee?

The Stupidity Committee, surely.

This tweet by our Honorable Pres (by way of this excellent article on Talking Points Memo about the Democratic response memo) got me thinking about appropriate epithets for various office holders:
Little Adam Schiff, who is desperate to run for higher office, . . .
Our President loves these little epithets, and loves to bestow them on others. So definitely he needs one himself. The question is, what should it be?

At this point with the much-hyped Memo showing its true colors as a complete dud, and Mr. Pres priming himself to completely refuse any kind of interview with Mueller, I think there is only one that really fits:
Desperate Donald
He's in a corner in several different ways, and really is getting more and more desperate. Watch out . . .
posted by flug at 10:27 PM on February 5, 2018 [6 favorites]


> The World Famous:
"The Times is reporting that the President’s personal lawyers are recommending that he refuse to be interviewed or questioned by Robert Mueller’s investigators under any circumstances. Let’s be candid about what this means. The President is pleading the 5th while trying to avoid saying that’s what he’s doing.

Oh, come on. If the President does, in fact, refuse to be interviewed or questioned by Mueller's investigators under any circumstances, then it will be true to say he is pleading the 5th while trying to avoid saying that's what he's doing. But he hasn't done that yet, and all we have at this point is NYT reporting about legal advice the Times alleges Trump's lawyers have given him.

The President's lawyers have allegedly recommended something."


At some level, say, upper government, we need to limit or remove Fifth rights. The stakes get to a certain point, then, you know, we need to exempt them from wiggling out of the stakes of wrongdoing.
posted by Samizdata at 10:29 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


From the South Carolina governor's race:

Catherine Templeton touts Confederate roots and outsider status at Bob Jones University
“I think it’s important to note that my family didn’t fight because we had slaves,” Templeton said to a room mostly filled with university students. “My family fought because the federal government was trying to tell us how to live.”
...

Now, she told the crowd, you’ll find her grandfather’s .38-caliber pistol in her purse next to Chick-fil-A coupons and car keys.
posted by Rykey at 10:33 PM on February 5, 2018 [12 favorites]


It's hard to imagine a good outcome for Trump in meeting with Mueller.

Past depositions have shown that when under oath he talks a different game than his public persona - he admits to lying in the past, fails to remember tons of stuff, and generally doesn't incriminate himself. If he testifies like this, he'll look like a liar, a fool, or both. On the other hand if he openly lies when talking with the FBI, he'll undoubtedly be caught by the FBI in those lies and will be committing a crime of obstruction.

"At some level, say, upper government, we need to limit or remove Fifth rights. The stakes get to a certain point, then, you know, we need to exempt them from wiggling out of the stakes of wrongdoing."

Yeah, I'm a big fan of the 5th amendment. But it's sort of interesting in that if you are granted immunity, you no longer have 5th amendment rights (the amendment is against self-incrimination). In some ways the President is sort of immune to the criminal justice system (as he has to be removed from office via the political system). It's possible if Mueller explicate gives the president formal immunity from criminal prosecution, he would have no 5th amendment rights anymore, but still be open to impeachment and removal from office.*

*I'm seriously not a lawyer, this legal musing is not based in any sort of reality, I do not pretend I'm a lawyer. I do read legal blogs occasionally, and absolutely haven't seen this sort of analysis before, so it's super-suspect.
posted by el io at 10:33 PM on February 5, 2018 [4 favorites]


That's such a bad reason to weaken fifth amendment protections. The rich and powerful get prosecuted less often because we, as a society, don't bother. Not because they take the fifth. Weakening the fifth won't fix it.
posted by ryanrs at 10:39 PM on February 5, 2018 [21 favorites]


@flug, that’s the nickname my friends and I have been using for him.
posted by gucci mane at 10:42 PM on February 5, 2018 [1 favorite]


The President is pleading the 5th while trying to avoid saying that’s what he’s doing.

There are two interesting points here.

First is that this is an issue that has been litigated extensively (ie, by the Nixon administration) and it is very clear that the President must submit to these interviews and answer questions. So Trump can fight this--and it will be a big, public fight that will make him look guilty as sin every step of the way and then in the end he will lose in humiliating fashion.

So actually fighting it to the bitter end seems unproductive and unlikely (though with Trump, who knows?) while negotiating for some concessions from Mueller seems likely and productive.

Second, there is the 5th Amendment protecting you from responding to questions related to your own illegal acts or guilt.

But what protects you from questions about someone else's illegal acts or guilt?

Answer: Nothing.

The President can and should be compelled to answer all such questions about acts by his subordinates and staff.

When it comes to questions about his own behavior, he's welcome to take the 5th if he's dumb enough to think that will help . . .
posted by flug at 10:45 PM on February 5, 2018 [8 favorites]


Besides, if you can't nail Trump, of all people, without his personal testimony, then you are a terrible prosecutor and should just fuck off in shame.
posted by ryanrs at 10:50 PM on February 5, 2018 [11 favorites]


But what protects you from questions about someone else's illegal acts or guilt?

Answer: Nothing.


You can (and should) decline to answer so much as verifying your name. Asking about someone else's crime isn't One Weird Trick to get around the 5th amendment.
posted by Justinian at 10:56 PM on February 5, 2018 [9 favorites]


But what protects you from questions about someone else's illegal acts or guilt?

The issue is you cannot be compelled to be a witness at your own trial. So it's not whose acts you are testifying about, but at whose trial.
posted by ryanrs at 11:03 PM on February 5, 2018 [2 favorites]


First is that this is an issue that has been litigated extensively (ie, by the Nixon administration) and it is very clear that the President must submit to these interviews and answer questions.

Independent counsel Ken Starr served President Bill Clinton with a subpoena in late July 1998. On July 30, 1998, Clinton agreed to submit to questioning at the White House by Federal prosecutors and Starr withdrew the subpoena to compel his testimony.

We have a precedent; let's follow it.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:05 PM on February 5, 2018 [17 favorites]


It's not about whose trial, either. If it were you could be forced to give testimony in one trial which could then be used to prosecute you in your own.
posted by Justinian at 11:09 PM on February 5, 2018 [3 favorites]


would lock in an extremely conservative court for decades

Impeach Clarence Thomas
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:33 PM on February 5, 2018 [30 favorites]


Preet Bharara and Christine Todd Whitman heading up new task force at NYU to help identify what norms we need to be codifying into law.
posted by Chrysostom at 11:58 PM on February 5, 2018 [53 favorites]


I mean, I'm not sure if you need to even be minimally-competent... or just have seen a season of How to Get Away with Murder to have figured this one out.

You might be surprised at the number of people who think they can talk their way out of these kinds of problems. "I'll just tell my side." *clink*.

At some level, say, upper government, we need to limit or remove Fifth rights.

Ew, no. We can legislate higher standards of behavior, but they're still people.
posted by rhizome at 12:31 AM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


Yup. Even if you intellectually know the cops aren't your friends, there is so much social conditioning to be cooperative that most everyone fucks it up. It's something you actually need to practice, but most people don't have the opportunity before doing it for real.
posted by ryanrs at 12:39 AM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


Mueller doesn't need to demand to question the president about his own activities; he can subpoena him in the Manafort case, asking for details about when-where-with whom Manafort was involved. You can't take the 5th to protect someone else.

He could take the 5th to imply, "telling you what I know about Manafort might incriminate me." This doesn't even count as admission of guilt; it could be that he thinks something has a chance of getting him charged with something even though he "knows" he's innocent - or that he parked illegally during one of his meetings. The fifth is broad.

But mostly - he's not likely to be smart enough to agree to be questioned and take the fifth, and his lawyers know it. His lawyers will continue to insist that he absolutely not go under oath voluntarily, because he's not capable of telling the truth.

Also, we've seen that he's actually a terrible negotiator. He's lonely and desperate to be liked, and has an urgent need to tell his version of what happened. A polite and friendly approach, with a touch of, "oh please, mr president, give me the real truth," would have him singing, even under oath.
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 12:47 AM on February 6, 2018 [8 favorites]


Yeah, I mean, dude bragged on national TV that he does not pay his taxes. He's that special brand of dim that thinks he's the smartest guy in the room.
posted by DoctorFedora at 1:33 AM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


ELECTIONS NEWS

** PA gerrymandering litigation -- Mentioned earlier, in bits and pieces. The short version is: Justice Alito denied the PA GOP request for a stay of the PA Supreme Court's order to produce new congressional maps. The GOP only has until Friday to do so, and given that they were playing chicken with the court last week, probably will not be able to do so. In that case, a court-appointed special master will draw up the new districts. (I am eliding a lot of nonsense going on here, as I find it highly likely we end up with new maps).

** PA-18:
-- GOP considerably outspending Dems so far.

-- GOP candidate Saccone seems to have been living well off of his state rep expense account, which could be an easy target for the Lamb campaign.

-- Polling looks to be a single digit Saccone lead.
** 2018 House:
-- Just to recap, last week's retirements were:
  • Frelinghuysen [NJ-11] Trump 49-48, district went for Murphy for governor.
  • Brady [PA-01] Clinton 79-18
  • Gowdy [SC-04] Trump 60-35
-- Speaking of Gowdy, initial thoughts were that he was angling at a newly opened judgeship in the 4th Circuit, but he says he's not interested.

-- Dems look like they might have a good candidate in PA-07 in state rep Greg Vitali. This is the district where Pat Meehan is leaving in disgrace for sexual harassment reasons. The best Dem candidate had also been implicated in harassment stuff, though, so Dems weren't in a good spot. In any case, this district is likely to be drastically changed by the new map, so who knows what things will look like.

-- Former GOP rep Tom Davis thinks Dems could pick up as many as 40 seats.

-- Generic ballot has narrowed a bit, but Charlie Cook thinks GOP's position is actually worsening. Related: Ballot gap narrowing is normal for this far out, usually rebounds.

-- That WP/ABC generic ballot poll that has Dems +14 is less interesting for the headline - it's almost certainly an outlier - than for the crosstabs. Dems are running 4 points ahead of Clinton in D districts. They're running *15* ahead in R districts. This is not normal - usually you see a fairly uniform swing. If accurate, it could mean larger than expected gains for a given overall lead level. Bears watching.

-- 538: House retirements at historic pace (with nice charts). Plus related NYT piece.

-- Politico: Dems outraising Republicans in many key districts, and the gap isn't narrowing.

-- 538: States that may hold the balance of House control. (Spoilers: NJ, CA, VA, IL, NY)

-- Conservative Dem Dan Lipinski [IL-03] looking increasingly threatened by primary from the left. Opponent Marie Newman picking all kinds of endorsements, including the SEIU.

-- Duncan Hunter [CA-50] raising almost no cash, and what he has is going to his legal issues. Reasonable to suspect he may be retiring.
** 2018 Senate:
-- TX: O'Rourke outraised Cruz in 4Q17, $2.4M to $1.9M. O'Rourke had won 3Q17 fundraising, as well. On the other hand, don't get too confident from those Gallup Trump disapproval numbers, Texas tends to have a big gap between adult population and the electorate.

-- MO: Josh Hawley, who had been considered a strong GOP candidate, is off to a lackluster start. His 4Q fundraising lagged McCaskill's $2.9M to $1.0M. His website is basically just a splash page. GOP getting nervous.

-- NJ: DOJ has dropped the corruption case against Bob Menendez. Menendez has been losing popularity, but would still be pretty safe for re-election.

-- FL: Gov Scott, who has been waffling about getting into this race, is now looking more certain. He says he'll decide within the month. He'd be the strongest GOP candidate against Nelson, who is fairly popular.

-- MS: Gov Bryant has been pressured to be the appointed replacement for Thad Cochran, if he retires shortly, as is expected. But Bryant says he's passing. Both MS seats would be up in the fall, if Cochran leaves.

-- AZ: State GOP worried about Arpaio candidacy. Interesting note that gov Ducey doesn't want to appoint McSally to the McCain seat, lest the Flake seat primary be Arpaio and Kelli Ward.
** Odds & ends:
-- Eight states have pulled out of the error prone Crosscheck program for purging voter registrations, with ongoing efforts to do so in three more.

-- ACLU/NAACP/League of Women Voters attempting to get initiative on ballot in Michigan that would allow no-reason absentee voting and same-day registration.

-- Koch Brother targets for 2018: Senate [IN, FL, MO, WI]; Governor [WI, IL, NV, MI, FL]. Useful in who the bad guys think are vulnerable.

-- Georgia modifying voter registration purge procedures in settlement of ACLU lawsuit.

-- In addition to his other legal issues, Missouri gov Greitens is being sued over use of a Signal-like text app that appears to violate state records laws.

-- For obsessives: DKE Primaries to Watch spreadsheet.

-- Court blocks North Carolina move to abolish primaries in judicial elections, which was part of the ongoing shenanigans by the NC GOP.

-- Four states (TX, IL, KY, WV) have passed their filing deadlines for state legislature races; GOP retirements outpace Dem 52-27, and uncontested seats favor the Dems 105-58.

-- Republicans fleeing for the exits in the PA legislature, too. Related: PA GOP leaders concerned that hard right Lou Barletta as gov nominee could cost a bunch of statehouse seats.

-- NYT: ‘They Can’t Wait to Vote’: Energized Democrats Target Dominant G.O.P. in Statehouses

-- Gallup: Democrats improving in reported party preference.

-- Nate Cohn skeptical that new Puerto Rican residents plus felon enfranchisement will turn Florida reliably blue. Related: PR voter registrations below estimate, so far.

-- Maine ranked choice voting initiative will be back on the ballot. Too much legal back and forth to quickly summarize here, but Maine could end with RCV after all.

-- Reuters: Seattle’s election authority said on Monday that Facebook Inc is in violation of a city law that requires disclosure of who buys election ads, the first attempt of its kind to regulate U.S. political ads on the internet.
----
Reminder that we have four Missouri House special elections tonight. All quite red districts, but we seem to have gotten good candidates, so there's an outside shot.
posted by Chrysostom at 1:47 AM on February 6, 2018 [71 favorites]


AJC:
Over the objections of the bail-bond industry, the Atlanta City Council unanimously adopted a proposal designed to ensure that impoverished suspects accused of mostly nuisance offenses — such as urinating in public or trespassing — are not left in jail while their cases are pending simply because they can’t afford bail.

The change, approved Monday, was Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms’ first initiative to ensure that low-level offenders would not sit in jail for days, weeks or months because they cannot afford bail amounts as low as $100.
posted by Chrysostom at 1:49 AM on February 6, 2018 [79 favorites]


The only solution I see is that if the Democrats hold the Senate, the let it be known publicly and firmly that the only SCOTUS nomination they will consider is Merrick Garland. Trump can appoint Garland, they will confirm him immediately, and things are as they should have been. Anyone else but Garland, and they hold that seat open as long as it takes.

Democrats should point out that even then the offer may be a Republican win, especially if Garland turns out to replace, say, Ruth Bader Ginsberg instead of Antonin Scalia.

If Senate Democrats meekly acquiesce to whatever Federalist Society monster Trump puts forward after 2018, they will have completely validated Mitch McConnell's strategy. They must not do so. They must make absolutely clear that McConnell is responsible for the current situation, and propose a compromise -- to take effect after Trump's term -- either expanding the Court, stipulating that refusal to hold hearings a la McConnell is implied consent, or some combination of those and other clever proposals.
posted by Gelatin at 3:25 AM on February 6, 2018 [10 favorites]


They must make absolutely clear that McConnell is responsible for the current situation, and propose a compromise -- to take effect after Trump's term -- either expanding the Court, stipulating that refusal to hold hearings a la McConnell is implied consent, or some combination of those and other clever proposals.
posted by Gelatin at 7:25 PM on February 6 [+] [!]


I seriously have no idea how feasible this is, but what I'd really like to see as part of any such compromise is requiring that McConnell step down. Seriously, pin the blame right. on. him. and make it a clear statement that at least one party in the US has zero tolerance for norm-violating BS, and the other party will force you to leave in disgrace if you try it. After the midterms, nothing would make me happier than to see McConnell ushered out the very policy backdoor he created.

Precedent? Look at how we sanction Russia. We target individual oligarchs where it hurts, in the wallet, with national legislation. I'm not saying the US needs to pass a law against Mitch McConnell (which probably wouldn't work), but there's certainly precedent for policy platforms that name individuals. If they call it a witch hunt, the answer is: McConnell is actually a witch.
posted by saysthis at 4:00 AM on February 6, 2018 [10 favorites]


I'd like to skip ahead to the part of the story where a judge is finding Trump in contempt of court for defying the subpoena to testify, please. Time Lords, hit me up.
posted by angrycat at 4:14 AM on February 6, 2018 [23 favorites]




The conversation might connect better if people talked specifically about what time periods they were referring to, which norms were being torn down/reinstated/whatever, etc.

Everything that Republicans have done on judicial nominations goes back to Robert Bork who received an up or down vote.:

That four-year period from 1987 to 1991 dominates the way Republicans think about the Supreme Court. It represents two things to them: that Democrats have no qualms about waging scorched-earth campaigns of utter ruthlessness, and that Republicans need to be unceasingly alert to weak-kneed betrayal from allegedly conservative court nominees.


Ever since Republicans stonewalled Clinton's appointments, then nearly denied Obama the ability to appoint any justices at all, then we got Gorsuch*.

Yes, Democrats blocked some Bush judges, and eliminated the judicial filibuster in response to Republicans denying the legitimacy of Democratic appointments and denying even a vote to nominees that would certainly be confirmed. Again, Bork got a vote, and six Republicans thought he was so extreme to vote against him.

So yes, it was all Republicans doing the escalating, the entire time. They forced Democrats hands, or Trump would've had 400+ vacancies instead of the 170ish they stole for him.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:52 AM on February 6, 2018 [46 favorites]


I just want to say that two of the markers of competent government action, Amtrak safety and the flu season safety have taken recent hits.

It is possible that due to cutbacks essential management/maintenance of Amtrak is not taking place.

And in a typical epidemic flu year, the public outreach would be higher. The last equivalent flu year was the swine flu outbreak. Remember the publicity? Trump who is anti-vax is certainly not one to promote vaccination.

As the above-linked article states, influenza is epidemic when 7.2% of deaths for a particular time period are caused by the flu. In the latest monitored week, the number was 9.7%.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 5:31 AM on February 6, 2018 [38 favorites]


Its also worth noting that Bork only ever got the nomination because he was promised a spot on the Supreme Court by Nixon in exchange for firing Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox after the Saturday Night Massacre.

For that reason alone, even if he'd been just a normal run of the mill conservative Justice candidate I'd have argued the Democrats (and the non-evil Republicans if any exist) had an obligation to deny him a seat on the Court. No way, no how, nothing doing, should the US government have given Robert Bork the bribe he was promised by Nixon for his role in trying to cover up the Watergate crimes.

But the Republicans can't admit that Bork was only nominated as his payoff, because that would require them to admit that Watergate happened and they don't want to do that. So instead they had to invent this false narrative of the judicial superman Robert Bork brought low by evil Democratic meanies who just hated him for no reason.

It's staggering how much the scars Watergate left on the Republican psyche still influence modern politics.
posted by sotonohito at 5:45 AM on February 6, 2018 [77 favorites]


The recent Amtrak incident in South Carolina seems extremely likely that it's a CSX / FRA issue. The Amtrak train was routed onto the wrong track by a CSX dispatcher, where it struck a CSX freight train.

The NTSB thankfully still appear to be funded, and will assuredly come up with a more comprehensive set of findings, as well as an analysis of whether additional FRA oversight or technology upgrades could have prevented the accident. However, what we've seen so far seems to clearly indicate that Amtrak had nothing to do with the conditions that led to the accident.
posted by schmod at 5:45 AM on February 6, 2018 [8 favorites]


Reuters: Bannon will not testify before House committee on Tuesday: sources
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former White House senior strategist Steve Bannon will not testify before the Intelligence Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday, two sources said on Monday, despite a subpoena requiring him to appear.

The panel wants Bannon to testify as part of its investigation of allegations that Russia sought to influence the 2016 presidential election in the United States, following up on his Jan. 16 appearance that failed to satisfy some members of the committee.

Representative Mike Conaway, a senior Republican committee member, told reporters on Monday he expected Bannon to comply with a subpoena and answer questions on Tuesday.

But two sources familiar with the situation said he would not appear, which could leave Bannon facing a charge of contempt of Congress.

Bannon could not immediately be reached for comment.
posted by murphy slaw at 5:54 AM on February 6, 2018 [22 favorites]


which could leave Bannon facing a charge of contempt of Congress

There will be so much concern and so many furrowed brows over this.
posted by uncleozzy at 6:17 AM on February 6, 2018 [33 favorites]


Does Mueller have the legal authority, or legal-strategy interest in compelling Bannon (or Flynn, or Manafort) to NOT testify to a Congressional hearing?

I can easily imagine that Mueller has evidence that one or more members of the Intelligence Committee of the US House has been compromised by Russia or is otherwise likely to face criminal charges. Would he really want a cooperative witness to go before such a panel, and risk revealing what the witness has told him?

"Here's the deal, Bannon. Reduced charges for you. But not if you talk to Congress."

I mean, if the prosecutor has treason-level charges ready in his back pocket, contempt of Congress might not look too threatening.
posted by yesster at 6:31 AM on February 6, 2018 [3 favorites]


Politico: White House counselor Kellyanne Conway has taken control of the opioids agenda, quietly freezing out drug policy professionals and relying instead on political staff to address a lethal crisis claiming about 175 lives a day. The main response so far has been to call for a border wall and to promise a ‘just say no’ campaign.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:37 AM on February 6, 2018 [49 favorites]


How the Republicans rigged Congress — new documents reveal an untold story

Now new court documents, previously unrevealed emails, and once-secret internal documents — most revealed here for the first time — uncover how early the Republican planning began, how comprehensive the redistricting strategy was, and how determined conservative operatives were to dye America red from the ground up. It’s the story of how strategists wooed deep-pocketed donors to contribute hundreds of thousands of dollars (often in untraceable dark money) and convinced them that winning state legislative seats offered the best opportunity for enduring GOP control at a bargain-basement price.

It’s the behind-the-scenes narrative of how Republicans set their sights on 107 state legislative seats in 16 states, with the goal of pushing dozens of U.S. House seats into their column for a decade or longer. It captures their glee as 2010 turned into a big red wave year, and GOP strategists defended all their state chambers, expanded their push deep into Democratic country and caught the other side flat-footed in a deeply consequential year.

posted by T.D. Strange at 6:47 AM on February 6, 2018 [51 favorites]


She's the best at saying awful, obvious lies with a straight face. Who else would you pick to promote "just say no" and tout the benefits of a US/Mexico wall, when the US opioid epidemic (and it's almost exclusive a US issue) is fueled by legitimate companies (as of April 2016), not carried north from Mexico. They're prescription drugs, after all.
posted by filthy light thief at 7:03 AM on February 6, 2018 [41 favorites]


And in today's examples of GOP taking credit for Obama era actions: Here’s Ajit Pai’s “proof” that killing net neutrality created more broadband -- Pai's FCC takes credit for broadband deployments that began under Obama. (Jon Brodkin for Ars Technica, Feb. 5, 2018)
During the Obama presidency, the FCC regularly found that broadband deployment wasn't happening quickly enough. But in the first deployment report since Pai became chairman, the FCC "conclude[s] that advanced telecommunications capability is being deployed to all Americans in a reasonable and timely fashion."

"[T]his finding does not mean that all Americans now have broadband access. Rather, it means that we are back on the right track when it comes to deployment," the report continues. An FCC press release (PDF) says that "agency actions have restored progress," and describes the net neutrality repeal as the primary driver of new broadband deployment.
Except
the FCC's actual data ... only covers broadband deployments through December 2016. Pai wasn't elevated from commissioner to chairman until January 2017, and he didn't lead the vote to repeal the net neutrality rules until December 2017. And, technically, those rules are still on the books because the repeal won't take effect for at least another two months.
Another rousing GOP success, thanks to Democrats of the past!

Meanwhile, ISPs must follow net neutrality in New Jersey, governor declares -- ISPs can’t block or throttle traffic if they sell broadband to state agencies. (Jon Brodkin for Ars Technica, Feb. 5, 2018)
The executive order (PDF) announced today by Governor Phil Murphy is similar to ones previously signed by the governors of New York and Montana. States are taking action because the Federal Communications Commission repealed federal net neutrality rules.
I look forward to the next FCC report to announce that the Federal end to net neutrality has bolstered broadband deployment in all states, while failing to mention that the majority of states have net neutrality requirements in place (I know this isn't true yet, but remember that Pai killed net neutrality in December of last year, so you have to give the states some time to pass new regulations).
posted by filthy light thief at 7:14 AM on February 6, 2018 [35 favorites]


How the Republicans rigged Congress — new documents reveal an untold story

This had been told, but it is well worth re-telling. Dems need to spend less energy focus-grouping policy talking points, and more on sweating the details on the mechanics of securing seats and influence at the micro level. None of which has to be through skullduggery and dirty tricks, but the gloves need to come off on this stuff, and not just in the choice of words in Congress or the campaign trail. And it can't just be the courts pushing back on gerrymandering and voter purges.
posted by jetsetsc at 7:23 AM on February 6, 2018 [26 favorites]


Senator Duckworth is doubling down on "Cadet Bone Spurs." I love this woman and want to vote for her.
posted by Faint of Butt at 7:28 AM on February 6, 2018 [54 favorites]


filthy light thief - Online purchases from China are also a major factor in the opioid crisis.
posted by sutureselves at 7:35 AM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


Mod note: A few deleted; don't post "omg huge news coming" tweets -- just wait and post the news when it actually comes. Otherwise we get a ton of back-and-forth over who's this person, let's guess about the news, etc, which is all noise until something actually happens.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 7:36 AM on February 6, 2018 [30 favorites]


Horrible story underlining the opioid epidemic from 2016, still relevant and being republished each month, most recently by NPR (WestVAGazette piece)
"The unfettered shipments amount to 433 pain pills for every man, woman and child in West Virginia."
posted by rc3spencer at 7:54 AM on February 6, 2018 [7 favorites]


address a lethal crisis claiming about 175 lives a day

Lives the Trumpists are not unhappy to lose.
posted by jgirl at 7:55 AM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


Lives the Trumpists are not unhappy to lose.

That, to me, is the particularly nonsense part of all of this -these ARE the lives they nominally haven't written off out of overt racial animus - these are not, to quote a NYS Democratic senator who needs to gtfo of our legislature - "ghetto" drugs. It baffles me still that this administration can make racist distinctions between opiods and prior drug crises and even then still do fuck all for the people they claim to be deserving of their assistance.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 7:58 AM on February 6, 2018 [4 favorites]



That, to me, is the particularly nonsense part of all of this -these ARE the lives they nominally haven't written off out of overt racial animus -


No, but 175 white opioid addicts a day dying in rural areas aren't going to turn any election blue. It's not animus, just indifference.
posted by ocschwar at 8:03 AM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


Michael Kranz and Skye Gould, Business Insider: Counties where opioid deaths were high tended to vote for Trump in 2016.
Out of the 82 counties with exceptionally high opioid death rates, 77 voted for President Donald Trump in 2016, and most were in rural parts of the country.

Economic regression, unemployment, and the associated social decline are correlated with high rates of drug use in white counties.
It seems like Trump and his minions don't give a shit about their voters unless they are big money donors. ("Seems like?" Who am I kidding?) Still, a normal, humane administration would think, "Americans are dying in droves. Looks like a public health crisis to me! Let's throw some money, time, energy and people power at rehab and treatment!"
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 8:04 AM on February 6, 2018 [8 favorites]


Following up on Paul Ryan's earlier tweeted then deleted celebration of a $1.50 per week GOP Tax Scam payout for a secretary in Lancaster, PA, his spokeswoman, AshLee Strong, doubled down (tweet) where he backed down:
Weird trend: successful NYC/DC dwellers mocking an extra $1K in Americans’ pockets.
Except $1.50 x 52 = $78. And on top of that, that secretary was pretty upset for being singled out (Twitter video) of an AP story with the glowing headline Tax bill beginning to deliver bigger paychecks to workers. She notes that the paragraphs before and after hers recount the stories of people who are getting much more than her:
Wayne Love, who works in managed care in Spring Hill, Florida, got an extra $200 in his paycheck last week, which he said will help offset a $300 increase in the cost of his health insurance.

“I have heard time and again that the middle class is getting crumbs, but I’ll take it!” Love said by email.

Julia Ketchum, a secretary at a public high school in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, said she was pleasantly surprised her pay went up $1.50 a week. She didn’t think her pay would go up at all, let alone this soon. That adds up to $78 a year, which she said will more than cover her Costco membership for the year.

And Todd Anderson of Texas and his fiance, who are both educators, got an extra $200 in their paychecks combined that they plan to use to cover the costs of a second baby on its way.
Hey, will you look at that -- the $78 figure is in the original story, so it's no like Strong had to figure out how much Ketchum was taking home per year. Weird trend: GOP cherry-picking stories of lower income women and then misrepresenting what they said, after deleting the original comment (which was archived and copied far and wide).
posted by filthy light thief at 8:05 AM on February 6, 2018 [32 favorites]


My wife, a public school librarian, is getting about $50 more a month. We don't need it and don't like the politics behind it, so we've resolved to donate the equivalent amount to a variety of causes over the course of the year.
posted by schoolgirl report at 8:10 AM on February 6, 2018 [23 favorites]


And one last punch in the gut from the opioid crisis: These Pharmaceutical Companies Are Making a Killing Off the Opioid Crisis -- Why do the manufacturers of naloxone, the life-saving overdose antidote, keep hiking the price? (Daniel Denvir for The Nation, December 15, 2017)
Amphastar Pharmaceuticals, for instance, raised the average wholesale price of its naloxone, which can be injected or outfitted off-label with an atomizer for intranasal use, from $20.34 to $39.60, according to a December 2016 paper in The New England Journal of Medicine. The price of the popular Narcan nasal spray, manufactured by Adapt Pharma and approved in 2015, has not been raised, but it came on the market in 2015 at a high average wholesale price of $150. The largest price hike was for Evzio, an auto-injector device designed for easy use by laypersons. In 2014, a two-dose package of Evzio, manufactured by kaléo, cost $690. As of 2016, it cost $4,500. That’s more than a 500 percent increase.
Chaos/ death/ misery/ war profiteers, the fucking lot of 'em.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:10 AM on February 6, 2018 [44 favorites]


“I have heard time and again that the middle class is getting crumbs, but I’ll take it!” Love said by email.

If crumbs are all you ever expect, it's all you'll ever get.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:11 AM on February 6, 2018 [20 favorites]


I'm getting about $50 more a paycheck - and the sad thing is, I DO need it. Badly. But I'm too scared to keep it that way, because I know that I'll be screwed the next tax year. So when they eventually get those W-4s going, I'll have to make an adjustment to lower my paycheck again, in the hopes I can get a tax return in 2019. Thanks, Trump. I love making these kind of decisions.
posted by agregoli at 8:14 AM on February 6, 2018 [12 favorites]


And another GOP seat could open up: Trump taps Joe Gruters for Amtrak board -- The freshman representative in the Florida House was co-chairman of the president's Florida campaign. (Alex Leary for Tampa Bay Times, Feb. 2, 2018)
WASHINGTON – State Rep. Joe Gruters, who was co-chairman of Donald Trump's winning Florida campaign, has been named by the president to the Amtrak board of directors.

The White House made the announcement Thursday evening. Here's the official text:

Joseph Ryan Gruters of Florida, to be a Member of the Amtrak Board of Directors for the remainder of a five-year term expiring October 4, 2022. Mr. Gruters currently works as a Certified Public Accountant and owns Paoli & Gruters Certified Public Accountants. He has been active in political and community organizations during the last 20 years and has been the appointed twice by Governor Rick Scott of Florida to serve as a member of the Florida State University Board of Trustees, where he has chaired the Finance and Audit Committee.
And it goes on, detailing exactly ZERO experience in transportation, transit, or trains. But hey, he supported Trump, so that counts for something everything.

Enotrans has more information:
Gruters is being nominated to fill the seat on the Amtrak Board vacated by Derek Kan, who quit shortly into a five-year term last fall to become Under Secretary of Transportation.
...
As a CPA and as chairman of the Finance and Audit Committee of the Florida State University Board of Trustees (overseeing a budget of $1.7 billion per year), Gruters qualifies under the “financial experience” criterion.
...
President Trump also announced that he intents to nominate Alan Cobb, an attorney from Kansas and head of the Kansas Chamber of Commerce, to be one of the three Presidentially-appointed members of the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority (MWAA) Board of Directors.
...
Cobb does not appear to have an aviation background, except for what everyone near Wichita picks up from being around the General Aviation Capital of Planet Earth. He worked for Americans for Prosperity (Koch Brothers) from 2004-2012 but has a long history in political campaigns, from Bob Dole for President in 1996 through a variety of other House and Senate campaigns in Kansas. He joined the Trump for President campaign extremely early on – March 2015 – and eventually rose to “director of coalitions” for the campaign in summer 2016.
Emphasis mine, but the following snark is all original.

Drain what again? Best people?
posted by filthy light thief at 8:20 AM on February 6, 2018 [9 favorites]


A quick note: 2018 federal withholding tables were just released 3 weeks ago and aren't required to be used until 2/15. States haven't updated their laws yet to incorporate or break from federal changes, and thus haven't updated withholding tables accordingly either. Don't count your chickens etc.
posted by melissasaurus at 8:23 AM on February 6, 2018 [9 favorites]


Nick Confessore, NYT: After Maria, @fema gave a $156m contract for 30 *million* emergency meals for Puerto Ricans to a one-woman company with no large-scale disaster experience. She hired a wedding caterer and delivered only 50,000. (NYT story)
posted by bluecore at 8:29 AM on February 6, 2018 [77 favorites]




@DanaHoule:
Iowa Dems off-year caucus attendance:

2010 (w no snow)=5,000

2014 (w no snow)=6,500

2018 (despite 6-8 inches of snow)=9,000

#wave

https://iowastartingline.com/2018/02/05/the-great-blizzard-caucus/
posted by chris24 at 8:39 AM on February 6, 2018 [51 favorites]


Or they were worried that the WH Chief of Staff would someday say that they are "not a priority for deportation"
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 8:39 AM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


Speaking of caucuses, it is caucus night in Minnesota! It's been a few days since it snowed so we have no excuse for not showing up.
posted by Emmy Rae at 8:42 AM on February 6, 2018 [8 favorites]


Nick Confessore, NYT: After Maria, @fema gave a $156m contract for 30 *million* emergency meals for Puerto Ricans to a one-woman company with no large-scale disaster experience. She hired a wedding caterer and delivered only 50,000. (NYT story)

FTA:
For this huge task, FEMA tapped Tiffany Brown, an Atlanta entrepreneur with no experience in large-scale disaster relief and at least five canceled government contracts in her past. FEMA awarded her $156 million for the job, and Ms. Brown, who is the sole owner and employee of her company, Tribute Contracting LLC, set out to find some help.
So would one say she did...a heckuva job?
posted by zombieflanders at 8:42 AM on February 6, 2018 [43 favorites]


“I have heard time and again that the middle class is getting crumbs, but I’ll take it!” Love said by email.

If crumbs are all you ever expect, it's all you'll ever get.


Wayne Love doesn't get that that right-wing policies are eating even his crumbs. He's in the hole by $100: "Wayne Love, who works in managed care in Spring Hill, Florida, got an extra $200 in his paycheck last week, which he said will help offset a $300 increase in the cost of his health insurance." He doesn't connect rising health care costs to Republican policies.
posted by gladly at 8:53 AM on February 6, 2018 [56 favorites]


Not only did she do a heckuva job this time, her company has had at least five contracts cancelled by the government in the past, and "the Government Publishing Office prohibited the award of any contracts over $35,000 to Tribute until January 2019. But that exclusion applied only to that office, not to any other federal agency." Now she's disputing the termination of this contract and seeking a settlement of at least $70 million.

Ms. Brown said she had no doubt she could have provided the 30 million meals, though she estimated she would have needed until at least Nov. 7 — two weeks past FEMA’s deadline, and still an unlikely completion date, given Tribute’s pace of delivery by the time the contract was canceled.

Yeah, 50,000 is *pretty close* to 30 million.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:53 AM on February 6, 2018 [13 favorites]


Ms. Brown said she had no doubt she could have provided the 30 million meals

I guaran-damn-tee you that she believes that because of the "Law Of Attraction" or some similar metaphysical bromide
posted by thelonius at 8:56 AM on February 6, 2018 [19 favorites]


> He doesn't connect rising health care costs to Republican policies.

That's the power of Fox News, talk radio, Drudge, Breitbart and the rest of the right-wing propaganda machine. It will never cease to amaze me how cause and effect exit the minds of voters like this without making any imprint beyond "It's the Democrats' fault."
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:57 AM on February 6, 2018 [7 favorites]


In other Fuck Poor People news, Trump's HHS is considering lifetime limits on Medicaid for childless adults.

Arizona and Utah both want a 5-year lifetime limit on coverage. Utah’s would apply only to childless adults and would come “with the expectation that they do everything they can to help themselves before they lose coverage,” according to the state’s waiver application.

In Arizona, time-limited coverage would only accrue during months when enrollees don’t meet their work requirements, which the state is also seeking in their waiver application. Wisconsin wants to limit lifetime coverage for childless adults to 48 months. Kansas would limit coverage to 36 months.

In Utah, Wisconsin and Kansas, the time-limited coverage would apply even to Medicaid enrollees who meet employment and work requirements.

posted by chaoticgood at 8:58 AM on February 6, 2018 [18 favorites]


Somebody said treasonous. Yea, why not? Can we call that treason? Why not?
The President is merely the most important among a large number of public servants. He should be supported or opposed exactly to the degree which is warranted by his good conduct or bad conduct, his efficiency or inefficiency in rendering loyal, able, and disinterested service to the nation as a whole. Therefore it is absolutely necessary that there should be full liberty to tell the truth about his acts, and this means that it is exactly as necessary to blame him when he does wrong as to praise him when he does right. Any other attitude in an American citizen is both base and servile. To announce that there must be no criticism of the President, or that we are to stand by the President, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public. Nothing but the truth should be spoken about him or any one else. But it is even more important to tell the truth, pleasant or unpleasant, about him than about any one else.
-- Teddy Roosevelt
posted by kirkaracha at 9:04 AM on February 6, 2018 [133 favorites]


Utah’s would apply only to childless adults and would come “with the expectation that they do everything they can to help themselves before they lose coverage,” according to the state’s waiver application.

Because Jesus had bureaucrats that interviewed the lepers to make sure they had done everything they could to avoid leprosy.
posted by Talez at 9:06 AM on February 6, 2018 [31 favorites]


It will never cease to amaze me how cause and effect exit the minds of voters like this without making any imprint beyond "It's the Democrats' fault."

A FB friend of mine reported that the other day she heard another restaurant customer telling the server about the "new Democrat law that says your employer can take your tips."
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:06 AM on February 6, 2018 [9 favorites]


Now we wait for another inqury: Carson calls for HUD inspector general to review his family’s role at the department (Juliet Eilperin for Washington Post, February 2, 2018)
This week, my family and I have been under attack by the media questioning our integrity and ethics. I have openly asked for an Independent Investigation to put to rest these unfounded biases.
Exodus 14:14

— Ben & Candy Carson (@RealBenCarson) February 2, 2018
Darryl Madden, a spokesman for the HUD inspector general, confirmed in a phone interview Friday that a request had been received but declined to elaborate on whether the office was launching either a review or a more formal inquiry.

“We have received the secretary’s request for review,” Madden said.
Let's just quietly side-step that cozy merger of church and state (after all, The LORD shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.) and say OF COURSE HE THOUGHT IT WAS OK - HIS BOSS DOES IT ALL THE TIME.

(This inquiry is in regards to the fact that despite warnings, Carson thought it was a good idea to give his son Ben Carson Jr. and daughter-in-law Merlynn Carson a no-bid contract for $485,000, but don't worry -- there were "oral presentations are similar to 'Shark Tank' presentations," which "require preparation, hard work, and tenacity" ... but don't offer that transparency in process we expect with the usual process.)
posted by filthy light thief at 9:09 AM on February 6, 2018 [8 favorites]




Paul Ryan Walks Away When Pressed on Whether Trump ‘Vindicated’ by Nunes Memo

Manu Raju: Last week, you made the case that the Nunes memo was separate from the Mueller investigation, and yet over the weekend, the president claimed ‘total vindication’ from the Nunes memo. Was he vindicated in any way?”

Paul Ryan (paraphrased): I have to go now. My planet needs me.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:22 AM on February 6, 2018 [33 favorites]


Americans are manipulated by fake news because religion has infected our politics: Peabody-winning journalist Kurt Anderson.
posted by adamvasco at 9:33 AM on February 6, 2018 [41 favorites]


I'm glad Steve King has a challenger!

In case anyone missed it at the time, this is what happened to Steve King's previous challenger (she dropped out of the race due to death threats).
posted by Emmy Rae at 9:34 AM on February 6, 2018 [14 favorites]


From the sidebar of the Rawstory link: Maxine Waters once again lights up Steve Mnuchin.
posted by orrnyereg at 9:37 AM on February 6, 2018 [10 favorites]


Emmy Rae: In case anyone missed it at the time, this is what happened to Steve King's previous challenger (she dropped out of the race due to death threats).

Kim Weaver, King's former challenger, mentioned lack of affordable health care as an issue as well. She'd have to go without when campaigning. There are several issues here as I see it, that disproportionately affect Democrats in red states:

- I bet you anything that Democratic women challengers to Republicans face far more threats than men would. Just ask Hillary Clinton.

- Then there's the issue of affordability - when it takes so much money and time that a person with a day job is going to have a harder time campaigning, not to mention possibly losing insurance, then only wealthy and/or really charismatic individuals will be able to campaign for office, and I think it is so important to have all incomes and backgrounds represented in office.

I'm glad Steve King (how I hate his racist guts, and I'm not even from Iowa!) has a challenger. I want Republicans everywhere to be forced to spend money, time and energy defending their seats even if they're allegedly super-safe.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 9:45 AM on February 6, 2018 [36 favorites]


Let's just quietly side-step that cozy merger of church and state (after all, The LORD shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.) and say OF COURSE HE THOUGHT IT WAS OK - HIS BOSS DOES IT ALL THE TIME.
I would narrow this to specify that he doesn't think it was "OK" in the sense of being morally and legally correct, like his boss is, but rather it was "OK" in the sense that he would get away with it, like his boss does.

The bible stuff is just more snake oil, plausible denial flim flammary, thrown in to distract from the rapacious looting.
posted by Horkus at 10:21 AM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


How the Republicans rigged Congress — new documents reveal an untold story

They're evil, but decidedly not stupid. This is the problem. We have to be ever vigilant if we want to be sure that democracy thrives in the US.
posted by Mental Wimp at 10:29 AM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


A progressive Democrat is challenging the racist, authoritarian Steve King for his Iowa Congressional seat

Heck yeah Scholten! He's really putting in the work too, I'm pumped to see this campaign in action. (Also I'm a little biased because he follows my Instagram and if the person who finally beats Steve King is also someone who liked some random posts of mine that'll make my year.)
posted by jason_steakums at 10:33 AM on February 6, 2018 [12 favorites]


adamvasco: "Americans are manipulated by fake news because religion has infected our politics: Peabody-winning journalist Kurt Anderson."

In another episode of "Journalists Blame Everything But Journalists"?
posted by TypographicalError at 10:41 AM on February 6, 2018 [12 favorites]


My wife, a public school librarian, is getting about $50 more a month. We don't need it and don't like the politics behind it, so we've resolved to donate the equivalent amount to a variety of causes over the course of the year.

posted by schoolgirl report at 8:10 AM on February 6 [10 favorites +] [!]


The worst part about the glee that some mid-range taxpayers express is that they are unaware that this is borrowing from their and their children's future and that they will be the ones who have to pay it back through increased taxation, with interest. Trumpists will insist growth will take care of the hole they've blown in the federal budget, but you and I know that it won't be the corporations and the rest of the 0.1% who will fill that hole.
posted by Mental Wimp at 10:51 AM on February 6, 2018 [15 favorites]


Fake news sharing in US is a rightwing thing, says study

Kind of weird seeing it out plain with no "both sides" framing.
posted by Artw at 10:53 AM on February 6, 2018 [63 favorites]


The worst part about the glee that some mid-range taxpayers express is that they are unaware that this is borrowing from their and their children's future and that they will be the ones who have to pay it back through increased taxation, with interest.

To say nothing of (as alluded to in a previous comment) increased health care costs, increased college costs, and increased costs of other goods and services normally provided by, or subsidized by, a functioning government.
posted by Gelatin at 10:55 AM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


I just got an email from the Ed Stack, CEO & president of Dick's Sporting Goods, pointing out their big national ad buy today that encourages every American to come behind the Olympic athletes.

Now, I love the Olympics for the athletes (despite all the stupid trick-skiing events). And I am glad to hear that a big money guy thinks that the divisions in America are problematic.

I have to admit though, that I immediately recoiled, thinking it was just jingoism and a new way to politicize sports. So then I went to Google to research the guy's politics, and...I can't tell.

Instead of the ad bringing us together, I am kind of sad now.
posted by wenestvedt at 10:56 AM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


Trumpists will insist growth will take care of the hole they've blown in the federal budget

...except frauds like Ryan are already insisting that the ballooning deficits demand a cut in social services and entitlements.
posted by Gelatin at 10:57 AM on February 6, 2018 [6 favorites]


> The worst part about the glee that some mid-range taxpayers express is that they are unaware that this is borrowing from their and their children's future and that they will be the ones who have to pay it back through increased taxation, with interest.

Well, my generation's kids will just pass the problem along to their kids, as the Boomers did for us. Repeat as necessary until the problem is solved just goes away!
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:57 AM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


filthy light thief: "And another GOP seat could open up: Trump taps Joe Gruters for Amtrak board"

Just to note that Gruters is a state rep, not a Congressman. He sits in Florida House 73, which went Trump 61-36.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:57 AM on February 6, 2018 [4 favorites]


Well, my generation's kids will just pass the problem along to their kids, as the Boomers did for us. Repeat as necessary until the problem is solved just goes away!
posted by The Card Cheat at 10:57 AM on February 6 [+] [!]


I believe the last administration to balance the budget was headed by a Boomer, but your point is well taken.
posted by Mental Wimp at 11:05 AM on February 6, 2018 [4 favorites]


>Repeat as necessary until the problem is solved just goes away becomes someone else's problem!

That's the entire basis of Republican governance. Kick the can down the road until they personally are no longer in office, then find a new non-Republican enemy to pin it on.
posted by lydhre at 11:06 AM on February 6, 2018 [12 favorites]


Americans are manipulated by fake news because religion has infected our politics: Peabody-winning journalist Kurt Anderson.

More accurately, he's asserting that Americans are more susceptible to fake news because "extreme Protestant Christianity" "...became more magical and supernatural in its beliefs in America than it has for hundreds of years or for any other place in the world." Which may well be true. But it is not an all-compassing problem with all sects of all religions. An extreme brand of Christianity (Evangelicals and Pentecostals, for example) has embraced a delusional view of the world. They also support Trump.

Mainstream Islam, Buddhism and Judaism are generally not anti-science. Mainstream Judaism (non-Orthodoxy) in particular encourages skepticism and questioning. And yes, their followers are mostly anti-Trump and anti-GOP. The two positions are most definitely related.
posted by zarq at 11:06 AM on February 6, 2018 [51 favorites]


I don’t think magical extreme religious thinking is new Or unusual. Instead we should realize this is a common occurrence in societies, and study them to see what has previously worked. As I commented before, I think we should be highly critical of this thesis.
posted by wobumingbai at 11:21 AM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


The worst part about the glee that some mid-range taxpayers express is that they are unaware that this is borrowing from their and their children's future and that they will be the ones who have to pay it back through increased taxation, with interest.

I know I said this before, but I always like quoting Patercallipygos, so:

Sometime over Christmas, we were hanging around the house and listening to the news and they were discussing the new tax plan. "So, I realized that the tax plan is actually going to give both me and your mother, and the family cranberry farm, a lot of money," Dad said. Then after a beat, he added: "And it kills me, because I can't stand that fucker."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:22 AM on February 6, 2018 [27 favorites]


I don’t think magical extreme religious thinking is new Or unusual. Instead we should realize this is a common occurrence in societies, and study them to see what has previously worked. As I commented before, I think we should be highly critical of this thesis.

The situation in the US, where a huge part of the middle class believes in creationism and and rejects basic scientific principles is really unusual compared to the rest of the world right now. Which one can see expressed in the fact that the US is the only nation to not acknowledge climate change and sign the Paris Accord. Obviously, millions of people all over the world believe in really strange things and have little understanding of how science works. That isn't the issue. The issue is that in the US, it is a relatively mainstream position that underpins a whole political movement, the one which is currently in power.
posted by mumimor at 11:35 AM on February 6, 2018 [61 favorites]


Just so we're clear about the numbers:

NYT, How Americans Think About Climate Change, in Six Maps: "Americans overwhelmingly believe that global warming is happening, and that carbon emissions should be scaled back. But fewer are sure that the changes will harm them personally. New data released by the Yale Program on Climate Communication gives the most detailed view yet of public opinion on global warming." (March 2017)

Slate, 2015: Evolution Is Finally Winning Out Over Creationism. "A majority of young people endorse the scientific explanation of how humans evolved."
While the majority of people in Europe and in many other parts of the world accept evolution, the United States lags behind. Today, 4 in 10 adults in America believe that humans have existed in our present form since the beginning of time, and in many religious groups, that number is even higher. This is woeful.

Now, at long last, there seems to be hope: National polls show that creationism is beginning to falter, and Americans are finally starting to move in favor of evolution. After decades of legal battles, resistance to science education, and a deeply rooted cultural divide, evolution may be poised to win out once and for all.

The people responsible for this shift are the young. According to a recent Pew Research Center report, 73 percent of American adults younger than 30 expressed some sort of belief in evolution, a jump from 61 percent in 2009, the first year in which the question was asked. The number who believed in purely secular evolution (that is, not directed by any divine power) jumped from 40 percent to a majority of 51 percent. In other words, if you ask a younger American how humans arose, you’re likely to get an answer that has nothing to do with God.

The increase in younger people embracing evolution is “quite striking,” says Kenneth R. Miller, a biologist at Brown University and an expert witness the landmark court case Kitzmiller v. Dover, which kicked “intelligent design” out of public school classrooms in 2005. “We’re moving in the right direction.”

posted by zarq at 11:41 AM on February 6, 2018 [24 favorites]


ICE arrests Kansas professor and father of three who has been in the U.S. for 30 years

Syed Ahmed Jamal, who is from Bangladesh, was about to take his daughter to school on Jan. 24 when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials showed up on his front lawn in Lawrence, a suburb of Kansas City, and arrested him [...] When Jamal's stunned wife tried to hug her husband goodbye, ICE agents stopped her, telling her "that they would arrest her for interference" if she didn't let them take him immediately [...] Jamal, 55, is a chemistry instructor who entered the U.S. lawfully on an international student visa in the 1980s, according to a lawyer for the family, Jeffrey Y. Bennett. He has three children — ages 7, 12, and 14 — all of whom are U.S. citizens, and he has no record other than a couple of speeding tickets that have long been resolved, Bennett said.

ICE is a criminal organization that must be destroyed.
posted by Rust Moranis at 11:45 AM on February 6, 2018 [133 favorites]


File under "to be handled in 2 to 4 years": How Lax Regulations Make It Easy For Politicians To Run 'Zombie' Campaigns (NPR, Feb. 5, 2018) -- An investigation has uncovered dozens of old, seemingly delinquent political campaigns spending money long after the actual campaigning is over. Christopher O'Donnell of the Tampa Bay Times talks with NPR's Ailsa Chang about how lax regulations make it easy for former politicians to tap into campaign funds.

‘We need to fix it’: Watchdogs, lawmakers try to halt Zombie Campaign spending -- A Tampa Bay Times/10News WTSP investigation found ex-politicians’ campaign donations being spent decades after they left office — and in some cases, after the politician was dead. (Christopher O'Donnell and Noah Pransky, Feb. 5, 2018)

Full investigation report: Zombie Campaigns: The campaign is over. The candidate might be dead. But the spending never stops.
Times/WTSP reporters analyzed more than 1 million records detailing the spending of former U.S. lawmakers and federal candidates. They found roughly 100 of these zombie campaigns , still spending even though their candidate’s political career had been laid to rest.
And unlike fake news, there are politicians on both sides of the isle who keep spending political donations after their campaigns are (long) done.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:46 AM on February 6, 2018 [13 favorites]


I just got an email from the Ed Stack, CEO & president of Dick's Sporting Goods, pointing out their big national ad buy today that encourages every American to come behind the Olympic athletes.

Now, I love the Olympics for the athletes (despite all the stupid trick-skiing events). And I am glad to hear that a big money guy thinks that the divisions in America are problematic.


Dick's is a major employer of Olympic athletes. They'll often employ athletes who struggle to balance full time jobs with the training regimen required at the Olympic level, especially if they play a sport that can not support professional competition.
posted by PenDevil at 11:49 AM on February 6, 2018 [20 favorites]


@HallieJackson: .@POTUS is being emphatic: “I’d love to see a shutdown” if we can’t get immigration deal figured out. “Shut it down.” 👀

Now all we have to do is wait and see how Democrats manage to turn this giant golden egg into a big pile of goose shit.
posted by zombieflanders at 11:54 AM on February 6, 2018 [47 favorites]


Trump went on a rant just now calling for a government shutdown if he doesn't get everything he wants. His exact words were "let's have a shutdown" and "I'd love to see a shutdown." He even interrupted a GOP congresswoman (Comstock) who was trying to say nobody wanted a shutdown to say he was all in for shutting it down.
posted by Justinian at 11:55 AM on February 6, 2018 [26 favorites]


I don’t think magical extreme religious thinking is new Or unusual. Instead we should realize this is a common occurrence in societies, and study them to see what has previously worked

Lol America has always been uniquely bugfuck looney tunes when it comes to religion, though. I mean literally the puritans were like, “oh hey, you don’t think we should be able to take people who don’t agree with our particular brand of religious fucknuttery and burn them at the stake for heresy? THEN YOU’RE OPRRESSING US, WE’RE GOING SOMEWHERE ELSE.”

For real, not being allowed to persecute others was, to them, a form of oppression

Sound familiar?
posted by schadenfrau at 11:57 AM on February 6, 2018 [38 favorites]


Mod note: A few deleted. Samizdata: please stop using whatever quoting method you're using, that quotes entire long comments into your own, when you're just replying with a short thing. I've mentioned this before, it creates a problematic level of visual clutter when you do this -- please stop.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 12:06 PM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


The situation in the US, where a huge part of the middle class believes in creationism and and rejects basic scientific principles is really unusual compared to the rest of the world right now.

Unfortunately, it's not as unusual as it might seem from a WEIRD perspective. Creationists have been making in-roads in Europe, for instance. And according to a 2011 survey of 23 countries for Reuters, Saudi Arabia leads the world in evolution denial. More recently, the Erdogan government is making way for creationism in Turkey: Turkish Schools to Stop Teaching Evolution, Official Says (Guardian).

For a silver lining to the America of Mike Pence, Ben Carson, and Betsy DeVos, however, this 2017 Gallup poll suggests US creationists are switching to Intelligent Design over strict creationism, with overall belief in creationism at a new low and support for evolution among other Americans increasing.
posted by Doktor Zed at 12:15 PM on February 6, 2018 [8 favorites]


Mnuchin says he doesn't want to force marijuana money out of the banking system.
During the hearing, Mnuchin also appeared to confirm a Reuters report that FinCEN was not consulted in advance about Sessions’s decision to change federal marijuana enforcement policy.

"I did not participate in the attorney general's decision and what he did, but we are consulting with them now," he said. "We do want to find a solution to make sure that businesses that have large access to cash have a way to get them into a depository institution for it to be safe."

The FinCEN policy, which requires financial institutions to regularly file reports on their cannabis customers, was intended to provide clarity and assurances to banks, but many have remained reluctant to work with marijuana businesses because of overarching federal prohibition laws.
posted by Coventry at 12:24 PM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


Democrats should offer a compromise where Trump is allowed to use 100% of the surplus funds he gets from Mexico toward building the wall.
posted by 0xFCAF at 12:26 PM on February 6, 2018 [32 favorites]


> Politico: White House counselor Kellyanne Conway has taken control of the opioids agenda, quietly freezing out drug policy professionals and relying instead on political staff to address a lethal crisis claiming about 175 lives a day.

Clearly, Jared's plate was just too full, what with all the peace he's been creating in the Middle East and all the great care he's been delivering to veterans.

And, lest you think Ms. Conway might be a bit overmatched on dealing with the opioid issue, never fear (from the Politico piece):
Among the people working on the public education campaign that Trump promised is Andrew Giuliani, Rudy Giuliani’s 32-year-old son, who is a White House public liaison and has no background in drug policy, multiple administration sources told POLITICO.
This post goes into a bit of detail about Giuliani's credentials, which appear to be (a) the last name Giuliani, and (b) organizing a visit by the New England Patriots for their meeting with Trump. Mostly (a), I think.
posted by tonycpsu at 12:33 PM on February 6, 2018 [14 favorites]


I wouldn't go as far as yesster, but Bannon's apparent desire to talk to Mueller's team ahead of the House committee (with its direct line to the White House) suggests that he or his lawyer want a chat with the special prosecutor without having previous testimony on the record and probably passed on to his old boss.
posted by holgate at 12:37 PM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


Fake news sharing in US is a rightwing thing, says study

Kind of weird seeing it out plain with no "both sides" framing.


OTOH, it is in the Guardian, which is a left-wing publication. Rightwingers one shows this to could reply with a piece in the National Enquirer or RT.com proving that fake news is a left-wing thing (undoubtedly originating in the Frankfurt School and funded by Soros), and we'd be back to square one.
posted by acb at 12:37 PM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


ICE arrests Kansas professor and father of three who has been in the U.S. for 30 years

Some more reporting from the Journal-World, which has done a pair of stories on this. There's a second man, also Bangladeshi, who ICE recently targeted as well.

Lawrence, a suburb of Kansas City

That is just the oddest way to refer to Lawrence I've ever heard.
posted by god hates math at 12:40 PM on February 6, 2018 [17 favorites]


Creationists have been making in-roads in Europe
That article is pretty alarmist — and has no facts to support it. Yes, there are fringe groups all over Europe and some terrible things happening in Turkey and Russia, but I've never heard of anything outside of those two countries that can be remotely compared to the situation in the US. Schools in Europe are tightly regulated, and more so in the South than in the North. Religious schools can't avoid teaching science.

That countries where large parts of the populations have little education have large parts of the population with no understanding of science is a given. The strange thing about the US is that people who have gone to high school and even university believe in crazy stuff. That happens in other places too, but not at all on the scale it does in the USA.
It's great to see that young people aren't having anymore.
posted by mumimor at 12:58 PM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


Sarah Huckabee Sanders is here to walk back (or in this case outright 180 contradict) the Boss's statements:

"The president is encouraging people to do their jobs . . . We are not advocating for a shutdown."

[reminder from half an hour ago, his exact words, which im sure we were not to take literally, were "id LOVE to see a shutdown"]
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 12:59 PM on February 6, 2018 [47 favorites]


This is what we're up against.

Republicans are trying to hash out a deal to increase spending more now, after a massive tax cut for the wealthy, at a time of near full employment and already rising interest rates, than Obama was allowed to raise spending to combat the biggest economic disaster since the Great Depression.

In essence the Republicans deliberately forced an economic policy in 2009 which they knew was not the right policy because they also knew that Obama and Democrats would get the blame for a slow recovery which would put Repubs back in power. And they were right. And now that they're in power they're turning the gas up as fast and as hard as possible in an attempt to stay in power. When it collapses the Democrats will probably somehow get the blame again and Republicans will revert to the deficit hawk bullshit to prevent Dems from fixing things.

This makes me so angry. Imagine what Obama could have done if the Republican shackles had been absent.
posted by Justinian at 1:09 PM on February 6, 2018 [106 favorites]


"The president is encouraging people to do their jobs..."

You first, Donnie.
posted by Coventry at 1:11 PM on February 6, 2018 [31 favorites]


The Democrats need to learn some friggin' game theory.

So if increased spending is a good thing and necessary for a long-term stable economy and both parties know it, but Congressional Republicans refuse to let Democrats who control the White House spend properly while Congressional Democrats go along with the spending when Republicans control the White House...

do I need to elaborate on the implications?
posted by Justinian at 1:28 PM on February 6, 2018 [6 favorites]


Republicans and Democrats agree that increased spending is necessary, but what Republicans call "spending" is what everyone else calls "looting."
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:35 PM on February 6, 2018 [22 favorites]


The GOP can't be thinking far enough ahead that they're actually trying to bring about a recession right? That just seem too far out even for Republicans and I'm not really sure they actually understand economics well enough to try to engineer something like that.

But everything they've done that doesn't directly support the racist bit of their agenda seems custom tailored to cause a big recession.

Like maybe the idea is that by the time 2020 rolls around the economy will be complete shit so that if/when the Dems take control they can only really deal with all the problems the recession caused and won't be able to accomplish anything else.

I keep telling myself that I should take things more-or-less at face value and if it seems like they're idiots that don't know what they're doing, it's because they're idiots that don't know what they're doing. It's too far-fetched to think that somehow a HUGE chunk of the GOP is on board with a secret conspiracy to tank the economy for political gain and everyone who is in on it has managed to keep it from leaking out. It seems like some full-on conspiracy theory crank stuff. But it's like getting every question wrong on a multiple choice test, idiots will accidentally get some questions right randomly. You have to know all the right answers in order to get every single one wrong and that's what the GOP is doing with their economic policy.

I suppose that if your platform is basically "opposite of Dems" and the dems have good economic policy based on reality, data, research, expert advice, etc. that's what you get. If you peak at the smartest kid's test and then make sure none of your answers match theirs, you consistently get them all wrong, I guess.
posted by VTX at 1:47 PM on February 6, 2018 [6 favorites]


Well the US has had for about thirty or so years now a two-tiered economy. Traditionally you want to bring the two economies back in line by slowing one down through taxation and bringing the other back up to speed by spending or tax cuts.

So in the case of the United States where corporations and the rich are fine, this would involve raising taxes, keeping interest rates low, raising minimum wages, and generally stuffing money into the poor and middle classes wherever they can keep spending it.

But what are the chances of that happening? Slim to none. It's basically a redistribution of wealth which the Republicans will go into convulsions about.

I don't know if they'll be able to blow out inflation either through malice or stupidity. There's been so much buffer between the top 1% and the rest of the country for so long any gains over the past 30 years have basically been adding zeroes on the ends of the bank accounts of the super rich rather than recycling through the economy. They've gone through how many phases of QE trying to stop the economy from deflating? The rich will take every dollar they can like some greedy greenback hoover.
posted by Talez at 1:52 PM on February 6, 2018 [11 favorites]




I wonder who the Tea Party caucus would listen to - their constituents practically frothing at the mouth to tear it all down, or their corporate overlords who, least of all, want a debt ceiling breach. You would think the paymasters, of course, but, as we keep repeating here 'These are not very bright guys, and things got out of hand..."
posted by eclectist at 1:55 PM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


Before drop, Trump boasted about the stock market once every 35 hours
President Donald Trump has yet to address the swings in the stock market since Monday’s plunge, the largest single-day point drop in the Dow.

That’s a big change for a president who, throughout his time in office, has cited a rising stock market as proof that his administration’s economic policies are working. He closed 2017 bragging on Twitter that “If the Dems (Crooked Hillary) got elected, your stocks would be down 50% from values on Election Day. Now they have a great future - and just beginning!”
Trade 'disaster' worsens under Trump
President Donald Trump came into office promising to reduce the U.S. trade deficit — and by that measure, his first year might be considered a dud.

The U.S. trade deficit increased more than 12 percent in 2017, to $566 billion — its highest level since 2008, according to figures released on Tuesday by the Commerce Department.
posted by kirkaracha at 1:59 PM on February 6, 2018 [15 favorites]


People need to stop hewing to Republican framing of the trade deficit. I run a "trade deficit" with the local grocery store. That doesn't mean I'm in shambles, it just means that the grocery store has a net decrease in goods and a net increase in currency, whereas I have the reverse.

The coincidence that it's commonly called a "trade deficit" rather than a "goods surplus" makes people think it's inherently bad. "China, on net, shipped the United States billions of dollars of goods" isn't a headline that would surprise anyone, but "US runs multi-billion dollar trade deficit with China" is somehow very scary.

Even Milton Friedman thought the supposed negative impacts of trade deficits were overblown.
posted by 0xFCAF at 2:21 PM on February 6, 2018 [27 favorites]


To come full circle on yesterday's "treason" comments from the president, his spokespeople have said he was "clearly joking" and "obviously joking". The WaPo has their round up of reactions to it Why Trump flippantly accusing Democrats of ‘treason’ is not a laughing matter. It contains two things worth pointing out, "Obama used the word “treason” only twice during his eight years in office. Not coincidentally, he was discussing the rise of Trump both times." His full quotations are included so you can see the context was how republicans have become very comfortable using that word to question motive and character of their opposition.

Also, Senator Kaine tweeted a dad joke that made my day, @timkaine- I clapped in his general direction.
posted by peeedro at 2:26 PM on February 6, 2018 [18 favorites]


The ‘Deep State’ Conspiracy Is How Fascists Discredit Democracy – former CIA officer Glenn Carle writing in Daily Beast.
The idea of the “Deep State” opposing elected leaders and the rule of law is—I will be blunt here—a fascist concept, which is intended to discredit the institutions of democracy. It is done, precisely, so that a “Leader” can represent the “people” without the encumbrance of law or representative institutions.

Most CIA and FBI officers share my alarm that such a distorting and harmful term has even entered American political discussions. Those who use the term “Deep State” frankly disqualify themselves from public life in a democracy.
posted by StrawberryPie at 2:27 PM on February 6, 2018 [67 favorites]


I'd love for a reporter to follow up a "he was just kidding" assertion with, "when he says something, what's a good way to know whether he's joking or not?"
posted by rhizome at 2:29 PM on February 6, 2018 [67 favorites]


People need to stop hewing to Republican framing of the trade deficit. I run a "trade deficit" with the local grocery store. That doesn't mean I'm in shambles, it just means that the grocery store has a net decrease in goods and a net increase in currency, whereas I have the reverse.

Another term for "trade deficit" is "investment surplus."
posted by Justinian at 2:34 PM on February 6, 2018 [9 favorites]


'The idea of the “Deep State” opposing elected leaders and the rule of law'

Emphasis added. I don't think it's a stretch that the intelligence community may be conspiring* to enforce laws that were broken by elected leaders. Mark Felt was 2nd in command at the FBI & leaked to Bob Woodward to help bring down Nixon. The things that the press found out helped bring pressure to expand the investigation beyond the original 5+2 plumbers. Though W&B & their bosses were concerned about accusations that they were doing it to help McGovern, the press + intelligence didn't have to be Democrats to be anti-Republican when the R.'s were breaking the law.

*not actually talking to each other, but aligned by responding to the same forces the way that business + govt. do to "manufacture consent."
posted by ASCII Costanza head at 2:54 PM on February 6, 2018 [3 favorites]


The idea of the “Deep State” opposing elected leaders and the rule of law is—I will be blunt here—a fascist concept

Hannah Arendt wrote in The origins of Totalitarianism that,
If it had been only a question of getting rid of the Jews, Fritsch's proposal, at one of the early antisemitic congresses, not to create a new party but rather to disseminate antisemitism until finally all existing parties were hostile to Jews, would have brought much quicker results. As it was, Fritsch's proposal went unheeded because antisemitism was then already an instrument for the liquidation not only of the Jews but of the body politic of the nation-state as well.

[...] They could pretend to fight the Jews exactly as the workers were fighting the bourgeoisie. Their advantage was that by attacking the Jews, who were believed to be the secret power behind governments, they could openly attack the state itself.
posted by galaxy rise at 3:12 PM on February 6, 2018 [20 favorites]


Apparently Trump wants a "grand military parade".

Because the Nazi comparisons weren't easy enough yet, I guess.
posted by thefoxgod at 3:13 PM on February 6, 2018 [44 favorites]


An important point in an editorial cartoon, with the footnote February 1, 2018. Fox’s Geraldo Rivera tells Sean Hannity “Nixon never would have been forced to resign if you existed in your current state back in 1972, ’73, ’74.”
posted by oneswellfoop at 3:15 PM on February 6, 2018 [10 favorites]


Two Scoops calling his political opponents treasonous and wanting a military parade on the back of wishing for a shutdown. I'm not sure where the Fourth Estate is right now. I assume drunk and asleep at the wheel.

Welcome to an idle fucking Tuesday in America, folks.
posted by Talez at 3:23 PM on February 6, 2018 [55 favorites]


Apparently Trump wants a "grand military parade".

It's OK everybody, the "adults in the room" are on the job:
Surrounded by the military’s highest ranking officials, including Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Joe Dunford, Trump’s seemingly abstract desire for a parade was suddenly heard as a presidential directive, the officials said.
[...]
Several administration officials said the parade planning began in recent weeks and involves White House chief of staff John F. Kelly, but cautioned that it is in the preliminary stages. D.C. officials said they have not been notified of parade plans.
Cool, cool. It's great that a bloodthirsty war criminal with a deranged cult following and the guy known for one of the most racist law enforcement policies for a major metropolitan area are 100% ready, willing, and able to give a wannabe dictator a chance to engage in a dick-measuring contest. Especially since it involves overriding the wishes of 95% of a city's residents, trashes their infrastructure, and will almost assuredly end up with them paying for it.
posted by zombieflanders at 3:38 PM on February 6, 2018 [33 favorites]


Somehow I missed this one yesterday, from the "Oops, all treasonberries!" dept.:

Republicans concede key FBI 'footnote' in Carter Page warrant
Republican leaders are acknowledging that the FBI disclosed the political origins of a private dossier the bureau cited in an application to surveil former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, undermining a controversial GOP memo released Friday and fueling Democratic demands to declassify more information about the bureau’s actions.

At issue is whether the federal probe into the Trump campaign's Russia ties is infected with political bias, as Republicans say — or whether the GOP is using deceitful tactics to quash the probe, as Democrats insist.

Democrats pounced on public comments over the past day by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and intelligence committee member Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), arguing that the GOP memo's failure to mention a key footnote in the FBI application shows how the party has cherry-picked classified facts to protect President Donald Trump.

To provide a fuller picture, intelligence committee Democrats insist, House Republicans must vote on Monday to release a classified 11-page rebuttal they wrote to the GOP memo.

While Republicans say their memo, orchestrated by Nunes and released with President Donald Trump’s backing, demonstrates anti-Trump bias at the FBI and Justice Department that calls into question the entire Russia investigation, Democrats say Republicans committed the very sin — omitting crucial facts — of which they accuse the FBI.
posted by murphy slaw at 3:41 PM on February 6, 2018 [23 favorites]


Re Kurt Andersen: if you want to read his theory of the last 500 years of American History, you can read his book Fantasyland. His theory is that something about the "New World" attracted people who did not strictly follow logic. On one hand, he does not include a control continent, such as Australia. On the other hand, it's always a treat to visit Puritan times, and Andersen unsurprisingly has lots of opinions about Richard Nixon. This is not a bad way to spend some time, but unfortunately, when you finish you'll still be in this timeline.
posted by acrasis at 3:48 PM on February 6, 2018 [10 favorites]


House votes aye to the March 23rd CR + 1 year DOD on party lines.
posted by Talez at 3:54 PM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'm not sure where the Fourth Estate is right now. I assume drunk and asleep at the wheel.

I think it's pretty obvious that a lot of them have made the calculation that merely reprinting the propaganda of a single-party authoritarian dictatorship world be as much "news" as actual reporting, abs cheaper.

After all, it's just like doing "He said / She said", except simpler.
posted by happyroach at 3:56 PM on February 6, 2018 [4 favorites]


Two Scoops calling his political opponents treasonous and wanting a military parade on the back of wishing for a shutdown. I'm not sure where the Fourth Estate is right now. I assume drunk and asleep at the wheel.

What do you expect the press to do about it? Trump is being compared to Kim Jong Un and the parade to something from North Korea. It's being called unamerican. He's being reamed for the treason comments. They're all over this and being quite clear.

But they can't force your ignorant relatives to turn off Fox News. They aren't the ones that need to take to the streets if this continues on. It's entirely outside the fourth estate's ability to stop Trump. Only the people can do that, and 40% of the people are racist, ignorant, stupid, or a combination of the three. I guess half a percent might just be greedy oligarchs or aspiring to join those ranks.

The press is doing what they can do. Instead decide when you're willing to take to the streets and stay there even if it costs you your job or being arrested.
posted by Justinian at 3:56 PM on February 6, 2018 [61 favorites]


Its also worth noting that Bork only ever got the nomination because he was promised a spot on the Supreme Court by Nixon in exchange for firing Watergate Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox after the Saturday Night Massacre.

Nixon promised that AFTER the firings, and we know that only because Bork told us that in his memoirs.

Eliot Richardson testified in Robert Bork's favor during his Supreme Court confirmation process. There are perfectly reasonable ways to construe his decision (Nixon was just going to fire his way down until he had Cox gone) that don't imply he was dirty. And I say that as someone who is definitely not a fan of Bork.
posted by leotrotsky at 4:03 PM on February 6, 2018 [3 favorites]


His theory is that something about the "New World" attracted people who did not strictly follow logic.

If you're talking about the New England Puritans, sure, there's a case for that, I guess? Although if you look at the history of the Separatists, some of them were executed for sedition, and all of them were subject to fines and imprisonment for failure to attend Church of England services. Same thing goes for the Pennsylvania Quakers, Maryland Catholics, the French Huguenot refugees who ended up in colonial America, etc. "If I don't leave I'm going to be imprisoned/tortured/subjected to onerous fines/killed, so I'm leaving" sounds an awful lot like logic, to me? (Although I think there's probably a case to be made that the roots of American individualism and a general anti-government sentiment probably come out of that, as well.)
posted by Pseudonymous Cognomen at 4:16 PM on February 6, 2018 [7 favorites]


Russia pushes more “deep state” hashtags (Politico)
After the success of the viral #ReleaseTheMemo campaign, Russian-influenced Twitter accounts are test-running other hashtags designed to stoke anger, particularly among supporters of President Donald Trump, against “deep state” forces, according to analysts at Hamilton 68, a website that tracks Russian influenced Twitter accounts.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 4:19 PM on February 6, 2018 [16 favorites]


I'm just thinking about how Republicans are going to run around screaming about the budget and how only they care about the troops... while Cheeto Mussolini is about to put God knows how many servicepeople through week after week of aggravating-as-fuck practices, tedious uniform inspections, more practices, and incalculable amounts of wasted time and useless grief for a fucking parade. And that's to say nothing of the pointless stress and wastes of time and money this will inflict upon DC residents and city authorities.

"Dear Soldiers: The president cares about you SO MUCH he wants you to spend the next month reliving basic training so he can feel like a real grown-up despot."
posted by scaryblackdeath at 4:21 PM on February 6, 2018 [11 favorites]


If not clapping for the President's speech is treason, what does shouting "You lie!" at the President count as?
posted by Jacqueline at 4:22 PM on February 6, 2018 [72 favorites]


trump must be bummed that the US arsenal doesn't include any land-based vehicle-launched nukes like the old soviet SS-20 that he can roll down pennsylvania avenue in the tradition of eastern bloc may day parades.
posted by murphy slaw at 4:28 PM on February 6, 2018 [15 favorites]


If not clapping for the President's speech is treason, what does shouting "You lie!" at the President count as?

I don't know, but if present trends continue I think asking that question is soon going to be a thought crime.
posted by mosk at 4:32 PM on February 6, 2018 [15 favorites]


General Kelly listened for a moment and went white as a sheet. “Oh, my God!” he cried as the phone fell from his fingers. “Do you know what he wants? He wants us to march. He wants everybody to march!
posted by delfin at 4:33 PM on February 6, 2018 [12 favorites]


I mean if letting him have a parade and play with the big boy trucks again keeps him from striking North Korea, let's give him the damn parade.

But they're going to have to bus in MAGAhats to line the route, because absolutely no one in D.C. is going to watch that.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:47 PM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


The most goddamn American, pro-military thing Trump could do would be to support veterans with better insurance and actual housing. He can have a fucking parade after he gets that done. FUCK YOU, CADET BONE SPURS.
posted by fluffy battle kitten at 4:53 PM on February 6, 2018 [69 favorites]


republicans love to wave the "support our troops" flag but they really mean "support General Dynamics and Raytheon"
posted by murphy slaw at 4:56 PM on February 6, 2018 [34 favorites]


I guess I'd rather see the military waste money getting Trump off than killing Afghans and Koreans. Still, does the existing military budget cover this, or is it going to require a special appropriation?
posted by Coventry at 5:07 PM on February 6, 2018


> The number one thing fueling terrorism, or fascism, or any shitty ism that involves dehumanizing and/or killing a lot of people, is angry young (usually single) men who do not see themselves attaining their personal life goals, and are looking for a sense of community and purpose.

2fast4me, but...

Oh, boy. I'll probably sound like a broken record and won't be able to unpack all of the potential offenses of the following theory, so forgive the use of existing language, but could this at least partially be some form of running amok?

It goes by many names, from temper tantrums to killing sprees, but the common threads are eerily similar: the "default" or unmarked member of society (usually young males from the cultural/ethnic majority) doesn't feel like they've received the just desserts society has promised them, so they indiscriminately take it out on said society. Eight years of a Black president and the spectre of a competent and powerful woman is fertile ground for grievances based on misperceptions and ignorance.

Obviously it's not that simple. For one, it isn't indiscriminate because that rage is being channelled to specific target groups instead. For two, it isn't just young white men, but also older and established white men who may have loftier expectations of those just desserts. And no one is drawing knives (yet), but they certainly are attempting to harm anyone within reach by using more abstract weapons like levers of institutional power and concepts of authority (e.g., why some people yell "Tr*mp!" as an insult).

Not typically treatable, but possibly preventable by building a just, rewarding, and egalitarian society... I'm going to meditate on this some more, but the rhetorical question is: is this some kind of attempt to weaponize the mentality of running amok?

Don't answer that.
posted by Johann Georg Faust at 5:17 PM on February 6, 2018 [6 favorites]


The most goddamn American, pro-military thing Trump could do would be to support veterans with better insurance and actual housing. He can have a fucking parade after he gets that done. FUCK YOU, CADET BONE SPURS.

republicans love to wave the "support our troops" flag but they really mean "support General Dynamics and Raytheon"


And yet, "the troops" are and have been pretty solidly Republican for many presidential elections in a row, and overwhelmingly supported Trump over Clinton.
posted by cell divide at 5:17 PM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


Mod note: Folks, let's dial down the chatter again. Thanks.
posted by restless_nomad (staff) at 5:26 PM on February 6, 2018 [4 favorites]


General Kelly listened for a moment and went white as a sheet. “Oh, my God!” he cried as the phone fell from his fingers. “Do you know what he wants? He wants us to march. He wants everybody to march!”


I recognize my stupidity here, there, and everywhere, but I honestly don't know whether or not this is real.
posted by A Terrible Llama at 5:37 PM on February 6, 2018 [8 favorites]


I recognize my stupidity here, there, and everywhere, but I honestly don't know whether or not this is real.

It's from Catch-22

posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 5:40 PM on February 6, 2018 [18 favorites]


ELECTION RESULT

GOP HOLD in Missouri House 129, 69-31. This is a Dem overperformance of about 26 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:20 PM on February 6, 2018 [37 favorites]


ELECTION RESULT

Dem GAIN in Missouri House 97, 52-48. This is a Dem overperformance of about 32 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.

GOP margin in the Missouri House is cut to 113-47 (3 vacancies).
posted by Chrysostom at 6:40 PM on February 6, 2018 [88 favorites]


ELECTION RESULT

GOP HOLD in Missouri House 39, 64-36. This is a Dem overperformance of about 19 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:50 PM on February 6, 2018 [31 favorites]


Thanks Chrysostom. Nice looking performance spread on the entire Dem side. In Missouri, no less. And here I thought generic Republicans were clawing their way back into America's heart.
posted by weed donkey at 6:58 PM on February 6, 2018 [5 favorites]


End of an era.

I sure hope so.
posted by leotrotsky at 7:12 PM on February 6, 2018 [25 favorites]


WOW Steve Wynn, former RNC finance chair and Trump buddy is OUT at Wynn Resorts.

Everybody loses their jobs over this shit except the fucking President.
posted by leotrotsky at 7:14 PM on February 6, 2018 [69 favorites]


WOW Steve Wynn, former RNC finance chair and Trump buddy is OUT at Wynn Resorts.

#wynning.
posted by Talez at 7:47 PM on February 6, 2018 [9 favorites]


ELECTION RESULT

GOP HOLD in Missouri House 144, 53-47. This is a Dem overperformance of about 53 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:48 PM on February 6, 2018 [33 favorites]


None of these specials were in my part of MO, but I'm really encouraged about the dem performance.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 7:52 PM on February 6, 2018


GOP HOLD in Missouri House 144, 53-47. This is a Dem overperformance of about 53 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.

Wait. What? MO-144 is one of the whitest seats in MO. How in the hell did a Democrat win white rural MO by 10 points?!?
posted by Talez at 7:53 PM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


GOP HOLD in Missouri House 144, 53-47. This is a Dem overperformance of about 53 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.

Is that 53 points a typo, doesn't that imply a -6 in the 2016 results?
posted by Marticus at 7:55 PM on February 6, 2018 [2 favorites]


Well, he's the county commissioner in one of the counties in HD-144 (he won that county about 55-45, I think). The other factor is probably Greitens.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:56 PM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


Is that 53 points a typo, doesn't that imply a -6 in the 2016 results?

No. Trump margin was 59 points (78-19). GOP margin today was 6 points (53-47). 53 point difference on the margin. Dem performance proper is +28 points.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:57 PM on February 6, 2018 [26 favorites]


Is that 53 points a typo

It would mean 76-23 or something ridiculously lopsided.
posted by Talez at 7:58 PM on February 6, 2018


That point swing is so high its mother is afraid it might hurt itself.
posted by Marticus at 8:00 PM on February 6, 2018 [68 favorites]


chris24: "Iowa Dems off-year caucus attendance:"

Speaking of which, Minnesota caucuses were tonight for both parties, and Dem attendance (well, DFL, because Minnesota) is way, way outpacing GOP attendance.

DFL: 12,747 with 39% reporting
GOP: 10,206 with 92% reporting
posted by Chrysostom at 8:01 PM on February 6, 2018 [25 favorites]


I'm glad Steve King has a challenger!
Oh, there are four people running in the Democratic primary to challenge him, plus he's got a Republican primary challenger (who is running on a platform of being not-unhinged and is not a serious threat to him.) It's a conservative district, and King is strangely popular, but there are a lot of people who would love to see him gone. And I have a good feeling about Scholten, who is definitely emerging as the frontrunner to get the Democratic nomination. Not so good that I expect him to beat King, but he seems like a good egg who will play well in the district.

Incidentally, the Des Moines Register did a poll this week that suggests that King is pretty out of step with his district when it comes to immigration. For instance, 62% of people from his district (and 65% of all Iowans) thought there should be a path to citizenship that was open to all undocumented immigrants, not just Dreamers.

Elle has a thing about Abby Finkenauer, the 26-year-old state representative who is the frontrunner to be the Democratic challenger to nightmare bazillionaire asshole Rod Blum in Iowa's 1st Congressional District.

And yeah, I think everyone was surprised by how good the caucus turnout last night, given how bad the weather was.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 8:06 PM on February 6, 2018 [4 favorites]


chaoticgood: "In other Fuck Poor People news, Trump's HHS is considering lifetime limits on Medicaid for childless adults.
"

The flames ...

murphy slaw: "trump must be bummed that the US arsenal doesn't include any land-based vehicle-launched nukes like the old soviet SS-20 that he can roll down pennsylvania avenue in the tradition of eastern bloc may day parades."

This is Trump we are talking about. Loading some nuclear bombs on to the trucks that transport them is going to be close enough. And they seem to be bat shit insane enough to actually parade nuclear weapons in front of the Capital building/Whitehouse.
posted by Mitheral at 8:36 PM on February 6, 2018 [3 favorites]


"We're sorry you have to do this for him" in ~420pt font (sized to sorry) should do I think at the protest.
posted by Slackermagee at 8:40 PM on February 6, 2018 [6 favorites]


Speaking of which, Minnesota caucuses were tonight for both parties, and Dem attendance (well, DFL, because Minnesota) is way, way outpacing GOP attendance.

I caucused today, as a resident of the 6th district (the district formerly represented, as it were, by Michele Bachmann). First time caucusing. I was one of only 6 people for my precinct, and no wonder because trying to actually find the caucus was absurdly difficult—it was held in a large educational complex with multiple buildings, and there were no signs directing anyone to the correct entrance, and one guy stationed well inside the main entrance who was utterly terrible at giving directions. “The caucus is being held in the east building.” I’ve never been here before, where is that? “Well, it’s over by the hockey arena.” Where the fuck is that? “Well, you have to cross the parking lot and then go over by the hockey arena and it’s in the east building.” Oh, that clears it up. I basically had to just drive around until I saw the small “Caucus here ->” taped next to an out-of-the-way side entrance. How the fuck are people supposed to see that in the dark?

If you want new blood to participate in our democracy, put some fucking signs up! Holy cow.

The Republican caucus was held in an elementary school a few blocks from my house. First thing I noticed when I turned into the main entrance to my neighborhood: a nice big sign right on the corner. “Republican Caucus Ahead ->” This is why they win.
posted by Autumnheart at 8:44 PM on February 6, 2018 [41 favorites]


That Dem gain seat in Missouri was a Postcards to Voters target and he won by 108 votes. Every little bit counts.

[Edit to correct vote count.]
posted by threeturtles at 9:10 PM on February 6, 2018 [74 favorites]


ELECTIONS NEWS

** Special elections -- Summary of Dem margin improvements in tonight's Missouri House races:
  • HD-39: +19
  • HD-97: +32 (Dems flip seat)
  • HD-129: +26
  • HD-144: +53
Overall margin shift towards Dems in special elections vs 2016 (2012) results:

2017 elections: 10% (7%)
2018 elections: 27% (12%)

Five specials next week, including a great pickup opportunity in Florida HD-72.

** 2018 House:
-- Berkeley poll looks bad for CA-25 (Knight) and CA-48 (Rohrabacher), showing both with negative re-elect numbers (38/56 and 41/51, respectively). Both districts went for Clinton.

-- Vice: Dem primaries to watch.

-- Crosstab: Recent moves in generic poll average not yet having material affect on midterm forecast. Not time to worry yet.
** Odds & ends:
-- The Ohio legislature easily passed a ballot proposal that would make some reforms to the redistricting process to be more bipartisan. There's been some criticism that this is a weak measure designed to head off a more rigorous effort. The measure is expected to be approved by voters in November.

-- 538: Gubernatorial polling this early tends to be not great, but Dems have the advantage in governor races.

-- The Whelk Alert: At least 17 DSA members running for office in Texas.

-- SCOTUS today issued a mixed response to a request for stay in the North Carolina racial gerrymander case for state legislative districts. If I'm reading this right, four districts are still getting re-drawn, but some others are not.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:16 PM on February 6, 2018 [43 favorites]


The special election results posted today are a bit of a relief as they are still showing similar margin improvement as those from mid-to-late last year despite Trump's approval creeping up over 40 and the Dem Congressional ballot advantage falling to about 6 points. The squishy idiots middle may be flip flopping around on Trump (on the one hand he's a dangerous narcissistic racist asshole but on the other hand I'm getting $24 in tax cuts!) but they apparently aren't voting much and the enthusiasm gap is holding.
posted by Justinian at 9:18 PM on February 6, 2018 [11 favorites]


Interesting political scenario from economist Ken Rogoff:
But let me tell you — if the stock market falls 20% — and I'm not saying it's going to — but it wouldn't take much to have it fall. It just, you know, went up a lot, so it could fall. And if there's inflation this year — and I think there will be with the output gap closing; with the fiscal stimulus — and the Fed's going to say, "I'm sorry. We don't look at the stock market. We look at prices. They're going up. We have to start raising interest rates." And then if Trump starts undermining the independence of the Federal Reserve — and I don't know if he could keep his hands off in that situation — I think that would really scare the daylights out of investors. And you might see a very big movement in that case.
posted by Coventry at 9:46 PM on February 6, 2018 [11 favorites]


covfefe explained?
posted by Coventry at 9:49 PM on February 6, 2018 [1 favorite]


Interest rates are going up regardless of inflation; the Fed is desperate to get up off the floor and unwind its balance sheet before the next crisis.
posted by notyou at 9:56 PM on February 6, 2018 [7 favorites]




Loony Left horn tooting: My illustrations appeared in the NYC-DSA Tenant Organizing Guide which hopes to codifiy and spread the information and methods gained by helping a building in East Harlem organize and fight back against exploitative landlords
posted by The Whelk at 10:21 PM on February 6, 2018 [44 favorites]


I went to our Minnesota DFL caucus last night and was pleasantly surprised to find out that I'm not the only progressive in town. It was heartening to meet neighbors who are passionate about trying to change things. We elected ourselves to be delegates so DFL county convention, here we come! (The whole process of caucus-district convention-other convention-state convention is so convoluted that they used a big chart to explain it.)
posted by a fish out of water at 3:28 AM on February 7, 2018 [19 favorites]


Attorney General Sessions Installs “Religious Freedom” Czars in Every US Attorney’s Office

Without any substantive public announcement, the administration made changes to the policy manuals for U.S. Attorneys’ offices and Department of Justice (DOJ) litigation offices. These offices are now required to assign a staff member to monitor all litigation and immediately inform high-ranking political appointees at DOJ whenever the offices are subject to a lawsuit involving religious liberty, when religious liberty is used as a defense in litigation, or when the offices file a suit involving religious issues.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:02 AM on February 7, 2018 [37 favorites]


Jeremy Newberger satires Matt Lauer and Lara Trump commentating a Trump military parade.

Some highlights:
LARA TRUMP: Look a balloon!
MATT LAUER: I believe that's parade delegate Gov. Mike Huckabee.

MATT LAUER: Oh folks this is a treat, by horseback are some trusted Trump advisors, VP Mike Pence on a white horse, Fox News Sean Hannity on a red horse, Rep Devin Nunes on a black horse, and Newt Gingrich on a pale horse.
LARA TRUMP: Eric!
MATT LAUER: No that's a horse Lara.

posted by Talez at 5:13 AM on February 7, 2018 [28 favorites]


George Papadopoulos’ fiancée goes on tweetstorm to prove he wasn’t just a coffee boy to Trump

Turns out she's not a fan of the campaign throwing him under the bus.
posted by Talez at 5:16 AM on February 7, 2018 [15 favorites]


Don't the military parade in Washington DC during the 4th of July?
posted by PenDevil at 5:16 AM on February 7, 2018


These offices are now required to assign a staff member to monitor all litigation and immediately inform high-ranking political appointees at DOJ whenever the offices are subject to a lawsuit involving religious liberty, when religious liberty is used as a defense in litigation, or when the offices file a suit involving religious issues.
Welcome to the Republic of Gilead, everyone! Blessed Be the Fruit.
posted by rc3spencer at 5:41 AM on February 7, 2018 [22 favorites]


These offices are now required to assign a staff member to monitor all litigation and immediately inform high-ranking political appointees at DOJ whenever the offices are subject to a lawsuit involving religious liberty, when religious liberty is used as a defense in litigation, or when the offices file a suit involving religious issues.

I'm sure the Church of Satan could have some fun with this one.
posted by snortasprocket at 5:43 AM on February 7, 2018 [38 favorites]


It's entirely outside the fourth estate's ability to stop Trump.

I'd say I disagree with my liege here, but it's a fine example of something being both true and false.

Technically, the NYT cannot vote. That is our job as an angry mob. But the power of omnipresent propaganda is such that it's almost irrelevant: the corporate media is the authority in many, many respects. That's why everyone wants to control them.

The fourth estate created Trump, surely.
posted by petebest at 5:47 AM on February 7, 2018 [24 favorites]




apparently things are getting boring at the white house and trump needs to push the chaos button again:

Vanity Fair: "HE WANTS A KILLER”: POST-BANNON, POST-NUNES, POST-KELLY FRICTION, A FRUSTRATED TRUMP SEARCHES FOR A WEST WING RESET
After the much-hyped Nunes memo failed to deliver the narrative reset that the White House hoped for, Donald Trump is discussing a shake-up to his West Wing, three sources familiar with the president’s thinking told me. These people say the president is increasingly frustrated that members of his administration aren’t going to war for him, and he’s being encouraged by his daughter Ivanka to bring in new blood. “The president’s view is that allies on the outside are doing a better job defending him than his political shop,” one Republican close to the White House told me. Another outside adviser who regularly speaks with Trump said that the president is regretting some of his Cabinet choices. “He’s saying he should have put Rudy [Giuliani] at State and Chris Christie at Justice.”
you can't unserve the meatloaf, don.
Without a close confidant on the inside with whom he can plot strategy, Trump has turned to outside advisers for counsel. According to sources, Trump speaks regularly by phone with a braintrust that includes Sean Hannity, Jason Miller, Corey Lewandowski, Reince Priebus, and R.N.C. Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel. According to sources, Miller has advised Trump to push for an immigration deal that shows real progress towards building the Wall, the theory being that getting a win on immigration will mobilize the base in November. Instead, they want him to sign an extension for DACA so that immigration is a midterm election issue (the theory being that putting immigration on the ballot will mobilize the base). Miller also has told Trump that he performs best when he can draw a stark contrast with his opponent. Miller wants Trump to make the midterms a choice between the Trump agenda and Nancy Pelosi, a race that mirrors the 2016 campaign against Hillary Clinton.
CAN WE GET A SCARY WOMAN UP THERE? I LIKE FIGHTING WOMEN.
posted by murphy slaw at 6:09 AM on February 7, 2018 [46 favorites]


> Trump has recently told advisers he wants a “killer” to steer the White House’s response to Robert Mueller’s investigation and craft a midterm election message for him to stump on this fall

Are they sure he was speaking metaphorically, here?

> Ivanka, who’s been frustrated with Chief of Staff John Kelly, has told her father that he needs people around him that will put his interests above their own.

If the Trumps had even a quarter of an ounce of self-awareness they might ask themselves why anyone in their right mind would consider putting Donnie Two Scoops' interests above their own.
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:18 AM on February 7, 2018 [18 favorites]


Trump’s desire for a military parade reveals him as a would-be despot - Jonathan Freedland, Guardian Op Ed
The trouble with [both mocking and sober responses], is that they fail to take account of the fact that many millions of Americans might well like such a show. While progressives might complain about the banana republic militarism, while fiscal conservatives will worry about the huge cost of diverting all that kit to the capital and while the city itself frets about the damage 70-tonne tanks are liable to do to its roads, a large chunk of US society will want to rise to its feet and applaud.
...
It means opponents will have to be canny. A counter-demonstration could easily be cast as unpatriotic, hostile to those in uniform, rather than to the commander-in-chief (who, of course, dodged military service himself, later claiming his battle to avoid contracting a sexually transmitted disease despite intense promiscuity was his “personal Vietnam”). But there is an opening here nonetheless.
posted by ZeusHumms at 6:18 AM on February 7, 2018 [25 favorites]


And now that I think about it, any parade for Trump should also contain balloons and floats chosen for sarcastic symbolism.
posted by ZeusHumms at 6:22 AM on February 7, 2018


sarcasm doesn't work on narcissists.
posted by murphy slaw at 6:24 AM on February 7, 2018 [27 favorites]




Political appointees being installed to overrule law enforcement officials on religious grounds? Military parades to glorify Dear Leader? Hell of a track you're on, the United States.
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:29 AM on February 7, 2018 [32 favorites]


After the much-hyped Nunes memo failed to deliver the narrative reset that the White House hoped for, Donald Trump is discussing a shake-up to his West Wing, three sources familiar with the president’s thinking told me.

I believe we've been hearing this same story over and over again with something different in the "Nunes memo" spot since pretty much day one.
posted by jason_steakums at 6:30 AM on February 7, 2018 [17 favorites]


sarcasm doesn't work on narcissists.

True. Not much seems to get through. (Random sarcastic thought: have a parade of military vehicles sold to police departments around the country.)
posted by ZeusHumms at 6:33 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


A braintrust? "braintrust" surely?
posted by glasseyes at 6:36 AM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


Trump speaks regularly by phone with a braintrust that includes Sean Hannity, Jason Miller, Corey Lewandowski, Reince Priebus, and R.N.C. Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel.

Literally the Best and the Brightest. God what I would give for one of the 20 foreign intelligence services that have these people's phones compromised to drop a few recordings of conversations between Trump and these chuds on soundcloud.
posted by dis_integration at 6:43 AM on February 7, 2018 [42 favorites]


Anyone who watches Hannity and regards him as some sort of bomb-throwing truth-teller and thinks Trump is...anything other than what he so plainly is would similarly not hear what you or I would hear if we all listened to those tapes.
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:53 AM on February 7, 2018 [7 favorites]


Trump speaks regularly by phone with a braintrust that includes Sean Hannity, Jason Miller, Corey Lewandowski, Reince Priebus, and R.N.C. Chairwoman Ronna Romney McDaniel.

One brain shared out among the five of them.

This fucker is going to get us into a war because he gets bored when his ass is not being kissed with sufficient fervor.
posted by GrammarMoses at 7:06 AM on February 7, 2018 [10 favorites]


I've been nonplussed about this military parade business, thinking something along the lines of, well, let the man-boy play with his toys as long as he's not using them.

And then I thought: Well, why does this man-boy want to play with his toys? And what message does he think it sends to his base? And I thought, the message is, 'I have big weapons and I want to use them.'

And, you know, it's true, Trump is so hard to figure out as a person but as a kind of predictor of future actions it's the chaos element that's hard to predict what actual choice he'll make but when it comes to his drive, he's actually kind of very simple. Fuck shit up to prove I'm not a loser.

So in the context of his raison d'etre being to fuck shit up to prove he's not his loser, I find, upon further contemplation, this military parade bullshit to be terrifying.

Thanks, my stupid brain, I was just drinking espresso and writing a story about a woman who becomes possessed by a cat and now this apocalyptic shit.
posted by angrycat at 7:06 AM on February 7, 2018 [11 favorites]


Vanity Fair: "HE WANTS A KILLER”
Trump had wanted [Jason] Miller to join the administration during the transition, but Miller withdrew after it was revealed he had an extramarital affair during the campaign with former Trump aide A.J. Delgado.
...
Miller has so far been reluctant to take a White House job because he’s told people he needs to earn a private-sector income to make child support payments to Delgado, who gave birth to Miller’s son last July. (Miller, who remains married to his wife, declined to comment. A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.)

If Miller doesn’t go to the White House, another scenario being discussed is that Trump could fill the strategist role with Lewandowski and former deputy campaign manager Dave Bossie.
So Trump's top strategist picks are a guy who cheated on his wife (like Trump!) and a guy who was fired from the campaign for roughing up a reporter and was recently accused of sexual assault (like Trump!). He is in tune with the zeitgeist.
posted by kirkaracha at 7:09 AM on February 7, 2018 [10 favorites]


The fourth estate created Trump, surely.

Something something Walter Cronkite "The Democratic convention is about to begin in a police state" something something
posted by Melismata at 7:11 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


the theory being that getting a win on immigration will mobilize the base in November.

Trump's political advisors are ostensibly admitting that the key to victory is turning out white supremacists; it's not even a dog whistle. I think they're right. Fine, Trumpists turn out their 30% of white supremacists. If the left stands behind not just DACA but refusing to roll back family reunification immigration, then it's still winnable.
posted by gladly at 7:14 AM on February 7, 2018 [7 favorites]


Maybe at the military parade, they can have regiments from different parts of the US marching behind banners listing their town/state, beneath a golden eagle in the form of a letter T. That's probably closer to what Cadet Bone Spurs had in mind.
posted by acb at 7:14 AM on February 7, 2018


Well, sure, why not? Let's storm the prisons and let out all the political prisoners and then guillotine the landlords and then have a huge parade about it, why the hell not? I can't see why Trump would be in favor of that, but whatevs.
posted by Don Pepino at 7:17 AM on February 7, 2018 [20 favorites]


Especially since it involves overriding the wishes of 95% of a city's residents, trashes their infrastructure, and will almost assuredly end up with them paying for it.
posted by zombieflanders at 6:38 PM on February 6 [26 favorites +] [!]


I just wanted to echo this; Washington, DC doesn't have voting representation in Congress (Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton can vote in committee but not in the full House and DC has no one in the Senate) and is more directly affected by congressional decisions than anywhere else in the country because Congress has the ability to overrule the democratically expressed will of DC voters. Virtually no one in DC will want this. It will fuck up the city physically. It will fuck up people's abilities to live their lives by going to work or seeing friends or accessing childcare and healthcare. It will be extremely expensive. It will bring a high risk of violence. It will embolden the city's MANY law enforcement agencies (DC has an especially high number of law enforcement agencies/officers because there are so many jurisdictions because of federal land and the White house and stuff so there's the Metropolitan Police Department/MPD and also Park Police and Secret Service and a few others -- you can read more here if you're interested).

Fascists will come flooding into the city, many of them very likely violating, perhaps openly, DC's gun laws. They will talk about how parts of the city are too dangerous to visit even though people have their homes there. They will take up space on the Metro while being distrustful and rude and will say it's dirty or dangerous or too crowded or full of the wrong kind of people. People who live here and don't want this will have their lives at a minimum disrupted and possibly threatened or even ended because this horrible, disgusting, pathetic man wants to use a city that hates him and doesn't belong to him as a backdrop for a sickening display of the militaristic might of a country in whose armed forces he failed to serve. I have lots of issues with the military anyway, but this isn't about the country's military and it's certainly not about servicepeople, it's about Donald Trump's ego and he is perfectly happy to invite a bunch of dangerously unhinged authoritarian sycophants into a city full of liberals and people of color so that the human equivalent of the hyenas from The Lion King can tell him how great he is.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 7:18 AM on February 7, 2018 [146 favorites]


A parade of racist sheriffs in their military vehicles would probably make both Trump and the sheriffs very happy.
posted by Artw at 7:26 AM on February 7, 2018


Fine, Trumpists turn out their 30% of white supremacists. If the left stands behind not just DACA but refusing to roll back family reunification immigration, then it's still winnable

Yup, can’t wait to see how Russian trolls convince “the left” to stay home or vote third party now that they don’t have the easy misogyny play at their disposal

It’s like waiting to see what new horror is revealed as having been there all along
posted by schadenfrau at 7:30 AM on February 7, 2018 [14 favorites]


Introducing GovTrack’s Congressional Misconduct Database
So what is in the database? Lots. It is remarkably educational in that you see trends in investigated misconduct that reflect both larger societal concerns of the time and the efforts of Congress to define misconduct. We’ll be discussing what we’ve noticed in the database in a series of posts, starting with sexual harassment.
posted by phearlez at 7:45 AM on February 7, 2018 [16 favorites]


^ the message is, 'I have big weapons and I want to use them.'
a brief rundown of the first year of his presidency in war terms.
By the Air Force’s own count, 4,361 weapons were “released” in Afghanistan in 2017 compared to 1,337 in 2016.
U.S.-led coalition forces have launched more than 10,000 airstrikes in Iraq and Syria since Donald Trump became president, unleashing 39,577 weapons in 2017. (The figure for 2016 was 30,743.)
Yemen, witnessed a sixfold increase in U.S. airstrikes against al-Qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula (from 21 in 2016 to more than 131 in 2017.
In Somalia, U.S. forces on the ground have reached numbers not seen since the Black Hawk Down incident of 1993.
posted by adamvasco at 7:47 AM on February 7, 2018 [13 favorites]


Something something Walter Cronkite "The Democratic convention is about to begin in a police state" something something

That was a half-century ago. (It boggles my mind to write that, because I watched it live.) Talking today about the integrity of Uncle Walter and his colleagues is about on par with discussing the behavior of Republicans during Reconstruction.
posted by Longtime Listener at 7:59 AM on February 7, 2018 [16 favorites]


Trump adviser says ignore flu shots and 'inoculate yourself with the word of God':
A Texas-based evangelist with ties to President Donald Trump came under fire this week after video re-surfaced of her telling followers that they don't need to get a flu shot because "Jesus himself gave us the flu shot."
posted by dirigibleman at 8:16 AM on February 7, 2018 [10 favorites]


Congress near deal to avoid shutdown NYT

Pelosi is making some noise but apparently they are separating budget talks from DACA and well I guess the budget won.
posted by angrycat at 8:20 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]



Buzzfeed: Russian Trolls Ran Wild On Tumblr And The Company Refuses To Say Anything About It


Honestly my tinfoil hat has been vibrating for a while about why it seems that all the black-males-getting-shot-by-cops stories seemed to have stopped the instant after Trump won? I mean we know that cops are still shooting, but it's like the media just completely lost interest.
posted by xigxag at 8:35 AM on February 7, 2018 [17 favorites]


ZeusHumms: Trump’s desire for a military parade reveals him as a would-be despot

Let me fix that for you -- Trump's desire for a military parade IS JUST ANOTHER HUGE FUCKING SIGN that he wants to be a despot. This is not the first sign - here's an expert on fascism enumerating the ways that Trump might be guilty of light treason fascism (tl;dr: he's not a fascist because he's not intelligent to plan that far ahead). Counterpoint: Donald Trump is actually a fascist
The game has several names: “Corporate statism” is one. In Europe, they call it “dirigisme.” Those two other words for it — “Nazism” and “fascism” — are now beyond all respectability. It means, roughly, combining the power of the state with the power of corporations. At its mildest, it is intrusive regulations on business about parental leave and such. At its most toxic, it is concentration camps. In the 1930s, a few Americans (including a few liberals) bought into it. Pearl Harbor ended that argument. Even for Trump, “fascism” itself now is a dirty word, not just a policy choice. Even Trump would not use it — least of all about himself.
Oh sorry, you said "would-be despot." He has that covered, too -- Trump is following in the path of despots, noted back on July 22, 2016, when he was a mere presidential nominee:
Without understanding a word of German, it wasn’t difficult to translate Hitler’s message. The ferocious shouts of thousands of citizens, inflamed by and enamored of this strange little man, merged into a solid note — a deafening roar freighted with the fears and furies of mankind’s primeval past.

“Lock her up” sounds a lot like “To the stockades.”

We affirm that such a thing could never happen here. Our Constitution and our system of checks and balances protect against totalitarianism. I share the faith that America yet remains too good and too strong for a complete breakdown of our ordered liberty.

However.

There are reasons for the comparisons between tyrants and Trump that transcend mere politics. There is also good reason that so many have accepted Trump as their leader. As one Republican loyalist explained to me: “He’s a tough guy. They think he’s going to punch (bad) people in the face.”

Indeed, Trump promised to end the Islamic State and to protect the LGBTQ community from “the violence and oppression of a hateful foreign ideology,” just as he has promised to bring back jobs and renegotiate trade deals. The how of these several vows remains a mystery.

More pressing, meanwhile: What will be required of the United States in the process? How much freedom does law and order cost? We don’t know because Trump probably doesn’t know. What I do know is that the sound and fury I recall from my father’s records are similar to what I heard in Cleveland from decent people who would recoil at the comparison.
The military parades are just an icing on the despotic cake.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:35 AM on February 7, 2018 [42 favorites]


murphy slaw: CAN WE GET A SCARY WOMAN UP THERE? I LIKE FIGHTING WOMEN.

Yes, yes we can: Women Line Up to Run for Office, Harnessing Their Outrage at Trump (Michael Tackett for New York Times, Dec. 4, 2017)
None of the women had seriously contemplated entering politics before. They had no money or organization. But they were dismayed with the direction of the country, they said, starting with the election of President Trump, and finally decided to act.

They have been joined by hundreds of other women across the nation, with the number seeking elective office rising at every level, according to the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers. They were angered by Mr. Trump’s election and energized by the Women’s March in Washington the day after his inauguration, and are now even more driven to get involved after the flood of sexual harassment allegations against powerful men.
More information from Election Watch at the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:41 AM on February 7, 2018 [13 favorites]


At its mildest, it is intrusive regulations on business about parental leave and such.

i don’t see the straight line between reasonable labor regulations and the fourth reich they’re trying to draw here?
posted by murphy slaw at 8:45 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


> Congress near deal to avoid shutdown – NYT

That article headline is being rewritten as we go (not surprising). Here's where we are now on the front page:

NYT Breaking News: Senate Close to Deal on 2-Year Spending Bill, Ignoring Trump
Senate leaders, disregarding President Trump’s blustery threats to shut down the government, neared a far-reaching agreement on Wednesday to set spending levels on military and domestic spending for the next two years, breaking the cycle of fiscal crises that have bedeviled the Capitol since last summer.
Hey, he said he was a great dealmaker, right?
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:48 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


Trump on the stock market: A 'big mistake'

trump tweets that the stock market going down is a "big mistake". He's actually calling the stock market mistaken, like it's a person who didn't do what he wants. Hey, maybe he should just pass an executive order that says it's going up! I'm sure that'll work.
posted by mrgoat at 8:54 AM on February 7, 2018 [66 favorites]


does a senate deal matter if the freedom caucus is still willing to hold the country hostage?
posted by murphy slaw at 8:55 AM on February 7, 2018


Oh, and sarcasm watch:
The deal also makes for another lonely day for lawmakers concerned about the federal budget deficit, which was already expected to reach $1 trillion in the next fiscal year, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a fiscal watchdog group.
No Democrat should ever - ever - stand for another finger-wagging pundit yapping about liberals being irresponsible with the budget. The ACA could have included massive subsidies as a down payment on the glorious future FAGSLC, and it would have been twenty points more popular, if Democrats hadn't tried so hard to be responsible adults.
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:55 AM on February 7, 2018 [28 favorites]


It’s like waiting to see what new horror is revealed as having been there all along

I'm sure the "both parties are bad" and "smartest, most cynical contrarian in the room" wells are full and ready to go.
posted by Talez at 8:56 AM on February 7, 2018 [8 favorites]


does a senate deal matter if the freedom caucus is still willing to hold the country hostage?

Not really. Anything substantial the House Freedom Caucus won't approve won't make it to the floor. You'd need a discharge petition and moderate House Rs aren't biting.
posted by Talez at 8:59 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


Don't the military parade in Washington DC during the 4th of July?

I mean, that’s the hilarious thing about this whole thing. The military parade all the goddamn time. They parade in DC for memorial day, they parade for Veterans Day, they parade for literally every holiday that has a parade, because they’re good at marching, and it costs a unit actually nothing in order to send a bunch of Joes out with uniforms on.

Trump would know this if he’d ever attended one, If he had even a cursory interest in respect for the military or solemnity or national holidays. The fact that he doesn’t, and thinks that the military parade is just something the French do and not us, is indicative of just how fucking clueless he is.
posted by corb at 9:07 AM on February 7, 2018 [71 favorites]


i think trump wants to show putin that he can throw a bigger military parade than russia can

that's it - how pathetic
posted by pyramid termite at 9:11 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


You know, I've been in a very onward-and-upward political mood overall - no point dwelling on 2016, that's what the first half of 2017 was for - but god DAMN does this currently-ubiquitous-on-Hulu Volvo ad piss me off.

"One of the things we admire most about the United States is anyone can be president with enough heart and determination. No matter their race, class, or gender."

No. No, they can't. Demonstrably. How incredibly fucking tone-deaf.
posted by showbiz_liz at 9:18 AM on February 7, 2018 [73 favorites]


I can't wait for all the puff pieces on Ivanka lovingly picking out Trump's epaulettes.

With this parade-charade we are bypassing banana republics and heading straight to The Great Dictator.
posted by lydhre at 9:18 AM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


Trump would know this if he’d ever attended one, If he had even a cursory interest in respect for the military or solemnity or national holidays. The fact that he doesn’t, and thinks that the military parade is just something the French do and not us, is indicative of just how fucking clueless he is.

It's not that he likes parades, per se. He can't enjoy the experience of being in an audience, because he has no appreciation for being part of anything larger than himself. All he wants is the power rush of seeing the tough, fancy military men march around because he told them to. So it might be best to just give him his damn parade if it will keep him from sending more servicemembers to their deaths in actual war zones. My sympathies are with the people who have to take part in this farce and the innocent citizens of DC whose lives will be disrupted.
posted by Faint of Butt at 9:20 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]




The US has held military parades before. This is what they looked like. Including self-propelled howitzers in a World War II victory parade in New York, tanks and an 85-ton atomic cannon at both of Eisenhower's inaugurations, a Nike Zeus missile during JFK's inauguration, and armored vehicles and missile systems in the 1991 Gulf War Victory Parade.
posted by kirkaracha at 9:29 AM on February 7, 2018 [20 favorites]


"One of the things we admire most about the United States is anyone can be president with enough heart and determination. No matter their race, class, or gender."

I saw that last night and was left so confused. Surely that was left over from mid-2016, and no one actually got paid to write that phrase in the last year, right? Yes, the constitution says anyone over 35, and women should be president, and I'd sure like to live in a world where that phrase is true, but I'm pretty sure I don't right now and it was just such a strange commercial.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 9:30 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


MetaFilter: I stand corrected and continue to hate everything.
posted by Faint of Butt at 9:31 AM on February 7, 2018 [173 favorites]


The main goal here for Chancellor Scheisskopf isn't a parade, per se. It's to set up a made-for-tv moment, the likes of which has been shown on television as long as he can probably remember.

Namely, that as the great might of the military is arrayed before him, with the tanks and howitzers and row upon row upon row of trained, obedient soldiers prepared to kill or die at his command, the tv pans up to the reviewing stand at the gathering of dignitaries there. And lingers, lovingly, on the face of the Great Leader, looking down approvingly at all he surveys.

It's not because the French do it. It's because very mighty men - men who command legions - have done it for all of known history. And it's one of the most powerful, Riefenstahl-esque, cinematic moments that can be used to propagandize to the world that leader's unassailable might.
posted by darkstar at 9:33 AM on February 7, 2018 [45 favorites]


I mean, that’s the hilarious thing about this whole thing. The military parade all the goddamn time. They parade in DC for memorial day, they parade for Veterans Day, they parade for literally every holiday that has a parade, because they’re good at marching, and it costs a unit actually nothing in order to send a bunch of Joes out with uniforms on.

Just be clear: no, the military themselves do not throw parades "all the goddamn time." Veteran's groups, non-profits, and other private organizations, sure. Even then it's really only on Memorial Day, not Veteran's Day or July 4. And the thing is that, for the most part, DC residents can (and for the large part, do) avoid the parades because they're limited in both size and length. And apart from the fascist asshole parade that is Rolling Thunder, the city isn't flooded with thousands of belligerent bigots who get off on disrupting the lives of residents.

What Trump is doing is ordering the military to throw him this parade, with tanks and flyovers and all the other trappings of dictatorships. These will cause massive disruptions not just city-wide, but across the entire metro area. We can't avoid several dozen military caravans fucking with every aspect transportation, or dozens of jets flying directly overhead with ear-splitting noise. The damage to roads and public transportation and the likely property damage from the above belligerent bigots here to pay homage to Dear Leader will fall entirely on us, too. Many of whom, as Mrs. Pterodactyl points out, will come to directly disrespect the city, its people, and its laws.

So let's not just pretend this is something that is anywhere approaching normal for DC. It has happened very rarely in the past [on preview: what kirkaracha said), and only once in the last 50 years. If you're cool with that, that's you. We're not, and we don't need people trying to minimize what this means for the major city where barely four percent of people voted for the man who wants to destroy them.
posted by zombieflanders at 9:33 AM on February 7, 2018 [53 favorites]


an 85-ton atomic cannon

Jesus Christ on a stick, nobody tell Trump that there ever was such a thing as an atomic cannon. He'll want atomic cannons and nuclear tanks and plutonium bullets and adamantium claw soldiers and a custom-built Iron Man suit with a protruding codpiece.
posted by delfin at 9:34 AM on February 7, 2018 [39 favorites]


Sorry, odinsdream, didn't mean to seem like I was calling you out.

Other than the Gulf War parade we haven't held military parades in my lifetime, and I am an old. We only do them when we win a war or during a presidential inaugurations (which I guess could be seen as acknowledging civilian control of the military).
posted by kirkaracha at 9:35 AM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


I understand the “fine, let him do the parade so he doesn’t start a war” sentiment, but fuck that. Letting an autocrat get away with awful/ridiculous/fascist things because you’re afraid they’ll do worse things is how this shit gets normalized and how they expand their power. We have to fight them on the beach so to speak because once they’re ashore, it’s much harder to defeat them.
posted by chris24 at 9:37 AM on February 7, 2018 [106 favorites]


Beyond the ego-fluff of a Trump of the Will display of military might and international dominance, the parade more importantly serves as a display of internal dominance. "I can roll tanks through the streets of a city in which 90% of the population hates my guts and there's nothing that they or the rest of you can do about it. So why resist me at all?"

I hope some of us are brave enough to stand in front of those tanks.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:41 AM on February 7, 2018 [65 favorites]


I hope some of us are brave enough to stand in front of those tanks.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:41 AM on February 7


A friend sent me the article on the parade last night via text message. My immediate reaction to her was "What street to I need to go lay down in and when?" and I then passed it along via text to a number of friends with the question "Will you join me in Washington for this protest?" I don't want to stand, too easy for them to move me. Laying down, I am dead weight. Middle aged pudgy white guys are quite heavy when they are dead weight. Hmmm...didn't mean to metaphor the Prez, but, well, the world is feeling the pressure of the dead weight of an old pudgy white guy, no?
posted by W Grant at 9:46 AM on February 7, 2018 [35 favorites]


Bart: I just think our veterans deserve a little recognition.
Lisa: That's what Veterans Day is for, Bart.
Bart: But is that really enough to honor our brave soldiers?
Lisa: They also have Memorial Day!
Bart: Oh, Lisa, maybe you're right, maybe you're wrong, the important thing is that veterans deserve a day to honor them!
Lisa: They have two!
Bart: Well, maybe they should have three. I'm Bart Simpson.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:50 AM on February 7, 2018 [39 favorites]


I mean, I have studied 20th century history a lot, over the course of decades. This is MY line in the sand. I was heartened when the Pentagon said NO to the ban of transgendered people in the military, I thought, great, he doesn't have the armed forces. But this, no, this is MY line. No more national focal points for White Supremacy Evangelical Christian Fascists. NONE. And FFS, NO MILITARY SUPPORT FOR THEM!!!
posted by W Grant at 9:51 AM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]


Sounds a little like the prelude to a military coup. Kind of risky on Trump's part, if you ask me.
posted by Slinga at 9:54 AM on February 7, 2018


If you introduce a military parade in Act I, you have to use it in the big, apocalyptic finale in Act OMG.
posted by mosk at 10:00 AM on February 7, 2018 [26 favorites]


Looks like Schumer got played again.

Quelle fucking surprise.
posted by zombieflanders at 10:00 AM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]


> Quelle fucking surprise.

Yes, but you see, now Democrats have EXPOSED McConnell as a LIAR who can't be trusted to engage in good faith. Armed with this brand new information, the press will surely EVISCERATE the GOP and force them to accede to Democrats' demands for fully-automated luxury gay space communism.
posted by tonycpsu at 10:04 AM on February 7, 2018 [25 favorites]


I don't think I've seen these links here yet:

Alayna Treene, Axios -- White House: Trump lawyers in favor of appointing second special counsel
Deputy Press Secretary Raj Shah told reporters on Air Force One Monday that President Trump's attorneys have already approved the idea of appointing a second special counsel to investigate the FBI and Justice Department's actions during the 2016 presidential campaign, according to White House pool reports.
Jonanna Walter, The Guardian -- Trump University: court upholds $25m settlement to give students' money back
The three-judge panel in San Francisco ruled unanimously that US district judge Gonzalo Curiel had ample reason to approve the settlement.
Jeff Stein and Andrew Van Dam, WaPo -- "Trump immigration plan could keep whites in U.S. majority for up to five more years"
If Trump's plan is not implemented, the white share of the population is expected to fall from more than 60 percent in 2018 to less than 45 percent in 2060 [and are no longer a majority as of 2044], as the light green lines in the chart below show. The teal lines show The Post's lower estimates of the impact of Trump's proposal, in which whites stay the majority group until 2046. The brown lines show the upper bound of the potential impact of Trump's proposal [in which whites stay the majority group until 2049].
Fox News Exclusive interview with Rex Tillerson --
EXCLUSIVE – Secretary of State Rex Tillerson on Tuesday warned the United States is ill-prepared to prevent Russian interference in the upcoming midterms, as it was in the 2016 general election.

“I don't know that I would say we are better prepared, because the Russians will adapt as well,” Tillerson said in an exclusive interview with Fox News in Bogota, Colombia. “The point is, if it's their intention to interfere, they are going to find ways to do that. We can take steps we can take but this is something that, once they decide they are going to do it, it's very difficult to preempt it.”

Russia is already attempting to interfere “in the U.S. in 2018” ahead of congressional midterm elections as it did in the 2016 general election, he said.
Sam Thielman, Talking Points Memo -- "Exclusive: Russian Gun Group With Ties To NRA Backed By Right-Wing Extremists"
A Russian pro-gun group with ties to the National Rifle Association boasted an “honorary members” list that’s a who’s-who of far-right and nationalist Russian political figures.

The group, The Right To Bear Arms, is run by Alexander Torshin, the Russian central bank official and Putin ally at the center of an FBI investigation into whether the NRA received illegal Russian money to boost Donald Trump in 2016.
posted by OnceUponATime at 10:04 AM on February 7, 2018 [21 favorites]


McConnell says the base Dreamer bill he brings up in the Senate "will not have underlying immigration text" but will allow for amendments in a fair process.

Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this a problem? If there are 60 votes for a DACA bill it will be amended to become a DACA bill, correct?
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 10:16 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


Wait a minute: are random people in Russia allowed to carry personal assault rifles as in America, or is this one of those rhetorical rights that exists only at the whim of the Czar? In other words, is The Right To Bear Arms' narrative one of defending a time-honoured Russian freedom of personal firearms, or are they officially a protest group demanding that the government allows Russians to pack heat freely (though in practice not actually bothering government officials)?

I'm curious as to the actual structure and dimensionality of this Potemkin village.
posted by acb at 10:17 AM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]


Raj Shah is the most regal name ever. It literally means King King.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:20 AM on February 7, 2018 [15 favorites]


It is the name Reince Priebus aspires to be.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 10:23 AM on February 7, 2018 [41 favorites]


Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this a problem? If there are 60 votes for a DACA bill it will be amended to become a DACA bill, correct?

Off the top of my head, any anti-immigrant Republican -- which is to say, any Republican, McConnell included -- could offer poison pill amendments, which will make the bill impossible for Senate Democrats to support, and so it won't get to the House of Representatives to be (inevitably) voted down.
posted by Gelatin at 10:25 AM on February 7, 2018


Raj Shah is the most regal name ever. It literally means King King.

Well, Donald Trump means Ruler of the World who Defeats Everyone so maybe we should ignore the names
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 10:26 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


METAFILTER: demands for fully-automated luxury gay space communism
posted by philip-random at 10:27 AM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]




any anti-immigrant Republican -- which is to say, any Republican, McConnell included -- could offer poison pill amendments

That seems unavoidable in any scenario that allows free amendment. What I'm saying is, the initial text of the bill doesn't matter, because it can immediately be changed as long as the votes are there.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 10:28 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


are random people in Russia allowed to carry personal assault rifles as in America?

According to this link to own a gun in Russia...
The following documents must be submitted to a local police department, together with the application for a gun license:

-Statement that an individual has no medical contraindications for possession of guns
-Statements issued by boards monitoring psychiatric and substance abuse services within the administrative area where an applicant permanently resides that the applicant was not treated for mental illnesses or drug abuse
-Proof of Russian citizenship
-Two photographs
-Statement from a territorial police officer that weapons can be safely kept at the applicant’s residence
-Hunter’s card
-License fee
-Proof of no less than five-year possession of smooth-bore barrel guns if applying for a license to purchase rifled-bore barreled guns
Also...
All weapons must be registered within two weeks after their acquisition. Registration must be conducted by the same police department that issued the license for acquisition. According to article 22 of the Law on Weapons, it is the gun owner’s responsibility to make sure that his/her weapons are stored safely. The local police inspector is obligated under the Law to visit a gun owner’s residence at least once a year and review the safety of weapons
posted by OnceUponATime at 10:29 AM on February 7, 2018 [8 favorites]


I just got an email from Nancy Pelosi about her "filibuster" in the House to get a vote for Dreamers. Go Nancy!
posted by kristi at 10:30 AM on February 7, 2018 [27 favorites]


Yes, I was going to say that while it DOES seem like Schumer got played here, its also possible that he's just letting Nancy play bad cop for the day . . .

but im not sure what the long game is, once shutdowns are off the table how do the Dems even enter the conversation, when they will face a take-our-terms-or-let-it-expire offer?
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 10:33 AM on February 7, 2018


If you missed the beginning of the latest performance of Schumer-Pelosi Theater, do you still get a chance to sneak in during intermission? Or should you just go home cuz the show's over for you?
posted by rc3spencer at 10:33 AM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


A Russian pro-gun group, ...The Right to Bear Arms

jesus the writers are getting sloppier every day
posted by delfin at 10:36 AM on February 7, 2018 [26 favorites]


Trump University: court upholds $25m settlement to give students' money back

Note that this is a victory for Trump. He gets off cheap and doesn't have to testify in a public jury trial. The person who was fighting the settlement was not Trump but one of the people who was cheated by Trump and doesn't think the settlement was sufficient. This ruling lets Trump off the hook without any embarrassing public testimony.

Also, note that the plaintiffs only get $21 million of the settlement. $4 million goes to the NY Attorney General's office, which is one of the reasons they are fighting so hard for the settlement.
posted by JackFlash at 10:43 AM on February 7, 2018 [12 favorites]


A White House official said senior officials were trying to convince Porter “to stay and fight.”

Perhaps not the most felicitous turn of phrase.
posted by orrnyereg at 10:44 AM on February 7, 2018 [34 favorites]


Hey everybody, "Mad Dog" Mattis is on the electric teevee screen! Will this finally be the time that he proves he's totally a moderating influence and not a fascist enabler? Let's see what he has to say...
@ddale8: Mattis when asked about why it's a good idea for military leaders to spend time and money on a parade: "The president's respect, his fondness for the military, I think is reflected in him asking for these options."
Noooooop, still a piece of shit.
posted by zombieflanders at 10:48 AM on February 7, 2018 [45 favorites]


From the article ZeusHumms posted above:

The trouble with [both mocking and sober responses], is that they fail to take account of the fact that many millions of Americans might well like such a show [...] a large chunk of US society will want to rise to its feet and applaud [...]
It means opponents will have to be canny. A counter-demonstration could easily be cast as unpatriotic, hostile to those in uniform, rather than to the commander-in-chief


I think this is absolutely right and important. The right wing in the US has spent decades painting itself as the one true party for America-lovers, and painting the left as haters of the true America, and this narrative has been extremely effective.

The author goes on to suggest holding an alternative parade ridiculing Trump personally, which I think misses the point remarkably. Trump holding a parade is him, once again, trying to claim the mantle of true patriotism and strength, and holding alternative events just reinforces the right's narrative about how the left hates a strong America.

I'd really want to see a protest take this head-on and insist on reclaiming the patriot mantle. Protesters all along the parade route with signs saying "Our Soldiers are Black". "Our Soldiers are Hispanic." "Our Soldiers are Women, Gay, Trans, Muslim, Jewish". "Our Soldiers are First-Generation Citizens." "Our Soldiers are Dreamers". Signs linking patriotism to fighting for our children's lives (#CHIP), fighting for our elders (#MEDICARE), protecting one another (#HEALTHCARE), checks and balances, rule of law.

Every photograph taken of the parade should be full of signs coopting it and defining real patriotism and real American values. It should be inescapable.
posted by trig at 10:49 AM on February 7, 2018 [88 favorites]


Politico:
One year into the Trump presidency, the nation’s 22 Democratic state attorneys general — including ambitious up-and-comers like New York’s Eric Schneiderman, California’s Xavier Becerra and Massachusetts’ Maura Healey — have emerged as the shock troops of the Democratic resistance.

Democratic state attorneys general are bringing a growing string of lawsuits, complaints and other actions against the Trump administration on immigration, education policy, net neutrality, marijuana enforcement, offshore oil and gas drilling and more — and there’s no end in sight.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:51 AM on February 7, 2018 [27 favorites]


So last night on NPR, the framing was "Most Americans say there should be some path to legal status for DACA recipients. President Trump also wants this, but demands increased border security in exchange".

I realize it's kind of subtle, but... if you say you want X but need Y "in exchange" for it... you don't really want X.

"We both want this puppy to live, but in exchange for not shooting it, I'm going to need $100"
posted by 0xFCAF at 10:52 AM on February 7, 2018 [78 favorites]


Sooooooo Scott Pruitt on global warming: Pruitt claims humans have flourished most during periods of warming (Axios)

Okay Scott Pruitt. Let's see if I can put this in terms a conservative can understand.

Greenlanders' right to bear arms is melting.
posted by saysthis at 10:57 AM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


Right, so we add that to the list of things to write into law once we get a majority and the Presidency again then?

A federal law prohibiting the President from ordering military parades, and ideally one prohibiting parades involving military hardware (tanks, self propelled artillery, stuff like that).
posted by sotonohito at 10:57 AM on February 7, 2018


I don't like to get into these "what should the Democratic/resistance strategy be" debates -- at least, not on the Trump threads, I feel like they belong elsewhere -- but I think the best counter-march would be one lead by, and mostly consisting of, veterans.
posted by uosuaq at 10:59 AM on February 7, 2018 [14 favorites]


trig: Flagged your comment as fantastic - I know many on the left are deeply suspicious of patriotism for some good reasons, but we Democrats really do have to take back the mantle of True American (tm) from the right. (And just because I want a pony, I would like to see the Confederate flag well and truly framed as the symbol of treason that it is.)

I'd really want to see a protest take this head-on and insist on reclaiming the patriot mantle. Protesters all along the parade route with signs saying "Our Soldiers are Black". "Our Soldiers are Hispanic." "Our Soldiers are Women, Gay, Trans, Muslim, Jewish". "Our Soldiers are First-Generation Citizens."
Tammy Duckworth, Asian-American disabled woman veteran and Democratic Senator, exemplifies this.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 10:59 AM on February 7, 2018 [15 favorites]


Looks like Schumer got played again.

So not only did he fold, he folded for next to nothing. McConnell has moved the goalposts to the next fucking county and Schumer is sitting on his own 5-yard line thinking he has a chance.

Get rid of this fucking buffoon.
posted by Talez at 11:05 AM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


"One of the things we admire most about the United States is anyone can be president with enough heart and determination. No matter their race, class, or gender."

No. No, they can't. Demonstrably. How incredibly fucking tone-deaf.


Without seeing the ad, I'd take it as a sick joke. Of course anyone can be president - look at the jackass in power now! What are his credentials again? "Heart and determination," sure, we'll go with that.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:06 AM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]


Not to beat a dead horse but I think parade protests are exactly what Trump wants. Then he can twitter blast all the "unamerican" jerks who hate freedom or something. I just wonder why people in the military wouldn't feel like they are being used as a political prop yet again by Cadet Bone Spurs? Let him have it. Make it cheesy. Make people ashamed to be in any way connected with it.
posted by lumnar at 11:12 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


At this point, it would be surprising to find a social media network that *wasn't* being used to push government-created propaganda.

Yes. Social media.
/shifty_look
posted by petebest at 11:14 AM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


The most direct sign to carry at a military parade foisted upon the public by Trump: "I'm with our military, but AGAINST TRUMP"

Trump built his own “deep state.” Now he needs the GOP to save him from it. -- Trump hired the people he now believes are out to get him. (Jane Coaston for Vox, Feb 7, 2018)
Before Trump appointed Rod Rosenstein to his role as deputy attorney general and the Senate approved his nomination by a vote of 94-6, former Attorney General Eric Holder tasked him with investigating a member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And before that, President George W. Bush nominated him to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. In fact, Trump is the fifth president Rosenstein has served under. Rosenstein’s career has been largely constructed on a reputation for being intensely dedicated to stopping crime — and intensely apolitical. But that was then.
...
So, in short, a Trump appointee became a “controversial” enemy of the Trump administration, in danger of losing his job, because the Trump administration lied about the reasoning behind Comey’s firing and Rosenstein refused to go along.

A pattern of poor decisions and aggressive defense

This isn’t the first time that a onetime Trump ally became a danger to the administration. Again and again, from Manafort to Page to Michael Flynn, every obstacle to Donald Trump’s political and societal agenda was put in place by Trump himself.
So ... the best people?
posted by filthy light thief at 11:16 AM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]


Y'all that want to let him have the parade, let it happen in your backyard.
posted by zombieflanders at 11:20 AM on February 7, 2018 [7 favorites]


I don't like to get into these "what should the Democratic/resistance strategy be" debates -- at least, not on the Trump threads, I feel like they belong elsewhere -- but I think the best counter-march would be one lead by, and mostly consisting of, veterans.

Some of the most notable protests against the Vietnam War were led by veterans, and they were still painted as hippie-commie-traitors.

Conservative accusations of treason and claims of patriotism are not, and never have been, based on good faith or consistent values -- witness the current conservative tenet that it's A-OK for the Russians to have interfered with our election since Trump ascended to the presidency as a result.

Which is why I completely agree that we need to claim the mantle of patriotism for ourselves. Bigotry is un-American. Plutocracy is un-American. Selling out one's country to a foreign power is un-American.

Fair play is American. Immigration is American. Supporting the middle class is American. Supporting families is American. And liberals do all those things, while Republican policies oppose them. Say it, and more importantly, repeat it. The Republicans didn't create the myth of the liberal media by making a single good argument, because when was the last time they were capable of doing that?
posted by Gelatin at 11:21 AM on February 7, 2018 [46 favorites]


More proof that Trump is bad for the country -- Feds: Sleep Apnea Testing Could Have Prevented NJ TRANSIT, LIRR Crashes (CBS Broadcasting Inc./Associated Press, February 6, 2018)
A lack of required testing for a pernicious sleep disorder was the primary cause of a NJ TRANSIT crash and a Long Island Rail Road crash, federal investigators concluded in a report Tuesday.

The crashes involved a NJ TRANSIT train at the Hoboken Terminal in September 2016 and a LIRR train at Atlantic Terminal in Brooklyn in January 2017.

NTSB member Dr. Nicholas Webster said the engineers of both trains suffered from extreme sleep apnea, 1010 WINS’ Glenn Schuck reported.

The NTSB blamed NJ TRANSIT and the LIRR for not having required testing in place.

“The public deserves alert operators. That’s not too much to ask,” NTSB Chairman Robert Sumwalt said.

The NTSB also blamed the Federal Railroad Administration for not making sleep apnea testing mandatory.
...
In August, President Donald Trump decided to allow individual railroads to decide whether to conduct sleep apnea testing, scrapping a proposal from Barack Obama’s administration requiring it.
Emphasis mine -- and the regulations were for train engineers and truck drivers (Curtis Tate for North Jersey.com/USA Today, Aug. 5, 2017)
The Trump administration has withdrawn a proposed requirement for railroads and trucking companies to test employees for obstructive sleep apnea, a disorder believed to be a factor in last year's fatal train crash at Hoboken Terminal.

In their announcement withdrawing the proposal Friday, the Federal Railroad Administration and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration said they'd encourage trucking and rail companies to voluntarily screen employees involved in safety-sensitive work, such as truck drivers and train engineers, for sleep apnea.
...
Since January, President Donald Trump has canceled hundreds of Obama-era proposed regulations, including those involving worker safety and environmental protection.

The proposed sleep apnea testing requirement stemmed from a December 2013 derailment of a Metro-North commuter train in Spuyten Duyvil, N.Y. Four people were killed when the train jumped the tracks at 82 mph on a curve limited to 30 mph.
Mind you, this is a bit of blaming Trump for something that happened before he was president, but he made that decision months after two more fatal crashes. It's like saying "nah, let's not require seatbelts, let's give people the option of surviving a crash" after another major roadway fatality made national news.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:26 AM on February 7, 2018 [48 favorites]


I mean I live here and protest all the time so my first thought was "If this happens, what should I put on a sign?" and right now I think it's "I support servicepeople but this is disgusting".

I notice, though, both in this thread and with people with whom I'm discussing this in real life, that there's a tacit assumption that it's going to happen? Like the responses are largely focused on "how will we protest this?" and "how much will this cost?" and not "how can we stop this from happening?" but I think we should try to stop it from happening. Of course I will protest if it does, this isn't okay and I want that awful man's sickening public display to be as bad as possible and I'd like marginalized people to see that others are willing to fight for them, but I also think it would be best if this didn't happen and people talking about what it will be like is kind of surreal to me. Don't accept that this awful man's directives are inevitable. THIS SHOULD NOT HAPPEN.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 11:41 AM on February 7, 2018 [16 favorites]


I don't have it all worked out, but I think the best angle for protest is something along the lines of, "Parades are for high school marching bands and baton twirlers. It's insulting to our fighters who risk their lives to make them march down streets for the President's pleasure."
posted by msalt at 11:41 AM on February 7, 2018 [14 favorites]


> "The president's respect, his fondness for the military, I think is reflected in him asking for these options."

I wonder how he'd feel if Trump asked for a parade of every White House, Congressional and Senate Republican, their staff, volunteers, etc.? You know, as a way of reflecting his respect and fondness for them, as they marched past their beloved Leader.
posted by The Card Cheat at 11:42 AM on February 7, 2018 [17 favorites]



I notice, though, both in this thread and with people with whom I'm discussing this in real life, that there's a tacit assumption that it's going to happen? Like the responses are largely focused on "how will we protest this?" and "how much will this cost?" and not "how can we stop this from happening?" but I think we should try to stop it from happening.


Civillians can just quit their jobs if their CEO makes them participate in asshat stuff like this. People in the military will go to jail if they refuse to perform this stupidity. Trumpito knows this.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 11:47 AM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


Maybe enough about the parade? It's the same crap he's been spewing for months. I think we'll all have time to discuss what signs will have the most impact when it's a little closer to being an actual thing?
posted by neroli at 11:48 AM on February 7, 2018 [12 favorites]


While I have no hope that this is really what a parade protest would look like in largest part, I think the best use of parade protest messaging is "here's how you can actually support our troops". Messages about protecting (or even just honoring) soldiers' benefits, etc. It seems likely that these messages will be present but dwarfed (at least in the final coverage) by messages more easily twisted as anti-troops.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 11:49 AM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


Hero or hired gun? How a British former spy became a flash point in the Russia investigation. - WaPo: Tom Hamburger and Rosalind S. Helderman, with a timeline of the Steele Dossier. If you've read the Simpson/Fusion GPS testimony, this might be a retread for you, but I needed this kind of synthesis.
posted by gladly at 11:49 AM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]


And don't think he isn't itching for someone to be court martialled, either...
posted by fluttering hellfire at 11:49 AM on February 7, 2018


The left needs to reclaim the mantle of patriotism, and they need to do it in a way that does not equate patriotism to the military. A patriot takes care of their community. A patriot makes the nation a better place. A patriot isn't just a soldier. It's a teacher that puts in that extra effort to try to reach that one hard case of a student. It's a mom who makes sure that their neighbors don't have to worry because she'll make sure their kids are taken care of when she's around. A patriot helps a stranger clean out their house after a flood. Patriots are not America's might. They are America. And this casts no aspersions on the military. But we need to be as proud, or more so, of what the military is there to defend as much as the military itself.
posted by azpenguin at 11:50 AM on February 7, 2018 [60 favorites]


New Fucking Fuck thread in MeTa. For venting & jabberosity so the mods don't have to stop the car in here & take us back home.
posted by yoga at 11:54 AM on February 7, 2018 [12 favorites]


Also, the Russians are going to be all over organizing counterproductive/unpopular ways of protesting this parade. This is going to be their jam.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 11:55 AM on February 7, 2018 [7 favorites]


Let him have it. Make it cheesy. Make people ashamed to be in any way connected with it.

On top of the unallocated multi-million-dollar price tag on this Potemkin exercise, Trump's vanity parade would be miserable for the rank-and-file under orders to participate in it. This veteran on Reddit tallies up the human costs:
Imagine the amount of time spent cleaning, painting, transporting and maintaining all the equipment for the parade. The hours and hours of pass & review practice. The time spent polishing and shining all the bits. The inspections. The re-inspections. The re-re-inspections. Everyone putting equipment on trains to get to DC, cramming into busses, sleeping on cots in some gymnasium while waiting for the trains to arrive.
Then you unload, clean the equipment again, re-polish everything, get inspected, inspected again, practice more and then, finally, it’s time For the parade.
It’s hot, everything is a total cluster-fuck at the initial point of the parade route, you march, you get to the rally point and now you have to move all this shit back to base.
Back to the railhead, back on the busses, back to base and stand in line to turn in weapons. Wait a couple days and offload your equipment from the railhead, get it back to the motor pool and finally, you’re done.
Oh yeah, you got to do this all on a holiday weekend you’d normally have off and one day after the parade, the news cycle will move on and no one will remember it.
Meanwhile, the timing of this leaked news makes me wonder if Team Trump is trying to distract from the Bannon news or if there's some new scandal about to emerge. This state of constant dismay and uncertainty fits the experience of living in an authoritarian regime to a discomfitting degree.
posted by Doktor Zed at 11:56 AM on February 7, 2018 [41 favorites]


The left needs to reclaim the mantle of patriotism, and they need to do it in a way that does not equate patriotism to the military. A patriot takes care of their community. A patriot makes the nation a better place. A patriot isn't just a soldier.

This sounds like a great PSA for the Dems. "Beth is a patriot - she has dedicated her life to her community as a firefighter. Javier is a patriot - he has taught at the same elementary school for the past 20 years, helping young minds grow. Malia is a patriot - she is in the army national reserve, .... Beth: 'I am a patriot.' Javier: 'I am a patriot.' Malia: 'I am a patriot.' All: 'we put our country, and our communities first. We make this country great.' Sponsored by the DNC."
posted by filthy light thief at 11:58 AM on February 7, 2018 [41 favorites]


Don't accept that this awful man's directives are inevitable.

That was basically my response. I mean, I work walking distance from the National Mall, so I'll be out there on Constitution with everyone else if anything actually happens. But the president is not very good at following through with anything.
posted by aspersioncast at 12:01 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


Doktor Zed: Meanwhile, the timing of this leaked news makes me wonder if Team Trump is trying to distract from the Bannon news or if there's some new scandal about to emerge.

Exactly. If there's one thing I've learned from 2017, it's never think a leak is just a leak -- it's a tailored message by a certain party, and generally used to shape the narrative while distracting from other news. Otherwise, we'd get a full, public report, or a hearing, or some presentation in a public forum with more information and the chance to verify and question the whole of the thing.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:02 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


What Trump is doing is ordering the military to throw him this parade, with tanks and flyovers and all the other trappings of dictatorships.

Military parades don't always turn out as planned.
posted by kirkaracha at 12:05 PM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


It's unendingly frustrating to me that Democratic politicians are looking at the least popular president in history, with a policy agenda that is, if anything, even less popular than he is personally, and still find themselves getting cold feet about running directly against it. The tax bill is a travesty that will assuredly cause people to die so that billionaires can sit on even larger piles of money. If you don't seriously oppose that as a Democrat, what point do you even have? If you can't sell that to voters, why on Earth did you think you should become a professional politician?
posted by Copronymus at 12:07 PM on February 7, 2018 [56 favorites]


I just got an email from Nancy Pelosi about her "filibuster" in the House to get a vote for Dreamers. Go Nancy!

Keep in mind that if Pelosi wanted to torpedo the budget deal because it doesn't contain anything about DACA, she could torpedo the budget deal. It'll pass because she's okay with it passing.

I am not taking a position on whether that's the correct call here. But this is happening because she has made the calculation that the social spending increases are either more important than the DACA leverage or that there is no way to exert enough leverage on DACA to be successful and this is the best deal they can get. But make no mistake, this spending deal will only pass (if it does) because Speaker Pelosi releases her troops to vote for it regardless of how she herself votes.
posted by Justinian at 12:21 PM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]




In other words: the White House knew for an entire year that there were domestic abuse allegations against Porter sufficient to prevent him from obtaining a full security clearance, and actively chose to keep him on staff.

It's even worse than knowing about the "allegations" -- John ("women used to be sacred" "[Porter] is a man of integrity and honor") Kelly knew there was a restraining order against the guy, per Politico.
posted by melissasaurus at 12:27 PM on February 7, 2018 [25 favorites]


The last time Trump got a parade he had to settle for tractors
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 12:48 PM on February 7, 2018


If this idiocy does go through, maybe a good protest sign would be "Real presidents don't need parades."
posted by Faint of Butt at 12:50 PM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


What is Ajit Pai hiding? There are Ajit Pai “Verizon puppet” jokes that the FCC doesn’t want you to read -- FCC won't release emails about joke "collusion" video, says they would harm agency. (Jon Brodkin for Ars Technica, Feb. 7, 2018)
Gizmodo subsequently filed a Freedom of Information Act (FoIA) request for "any communications records from within the chairman's office referencing the event or the Verizon executive," the news site wrote yesterday.

"Nearly a dozen pages worth of emails were located, including draft versions of the video's script and various edits," Gizmodo wrote. "The agency is refusing to release them, however; it is 'reasonably foreseeable,' it said, that doing so would injure the 'quality of agency decisions.'"
...
Gizmodo talked to FoIA experts who scoffed at the FCC's reason for denying the records request.

"To argue that this video amounts to the same kind of deliberative process that goes on behind the scenes in terms of an agency deciding an official policy on a topic, or what actions it's going to take, is absurd," said Adam Marshall, an attorney at the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. "The deliberative process is frequently used to withhold embarrassing information or inconvenient information. I have no idea how a draft of a skit that was supposed to be funny would impair the FCC's decision-making process on anything, except on, I guess, maybe future skits."
Top comment: "So, here is a thought. If you do something that could be seen as harming an agency, maybe you shouldn't do it."

Also, I don't think it's a version of the puppet skit that they're hiding, but other commentary that would be more divisive and harmful to the FCC than the final version of the skit.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:58 PM on February 7, 2018 [13 favorites]


So he says he wants this to be like the Bastille Day parades in France but you'd think someone would clue him in that the events commemorated by Bastille Day started something that did not turn out well for people like him or his Cabinet members.
posted by dilettante at 1:00 PM on February 7, 2018 [39 favorites]


SEN JOHN KENNEDY (R-LA):
Q: Do you think a military parade is a good idea?
KENNEDY: No.
Q: Why not?
KENNEDY: "| think confidence is silent and insecurity is loud. America is the most powerful country in all of human history, everybody knows it, and we don't need to show it off."
"We're not North Korea, we're not Russia, and
we're not China and I don't want to be. And for
that reason I would be against flaunting our
strength. We don't need to, everybody knows we
have it."
posted by chris24 at 1:07 PM on February 7, 2018 [108 favorites]


NT Alexandra Petri, WaPo: Donald Trump loves a parade
This desire for parades is a quirk, nothing more, and there is nothing particularly bizarre about it. Trump loves a military parade; that is simply a fact about Trump that is known. What is the point of a military if no one gets to see how big and impressive it is and watch you wielding it? In life, there is the joy of possessing and the joy of being seen to possess. Has Trump ever known the first joy? Has he ever entirely severed it from the second? If no one sees you having something, is it even worth having?

Theoretically we have a military not because we want to parade it around, but so we can protect the actual things we really like (freedom, oil, in some order). But never mind. Trump wants a parade.

The parade will not end when the jets fly over, for the void a parade is ordered to fill will never be filled by a simple military parade, lasting no more than two hours.

It will continue. It must continue. All the most beautiful women in the world will march by in sashes and be ranked. All the self-proclaimed experts in their white coats will march with lowered eyes and accept chastening. And anyone who has marched elsewhere for any reason will doff their pink hat and accept discommendation. […]

Wait, Trump will say, in a whisper, as Melania moves to rise. Do you not see it is still going?

Everyone will freeze where they are, for nothing coming down the parade route will be visible to their eyes. But Trump will see it. Names will form on his lips that have not alighted there in decades. A teacher who never recognized his genius. Someone at Wharton who had said something just out of earshot and everyone around him had laughed, and then Trump had approached and the laughter had stopped. Roy. The pope, not this one or the last one, but the one before. Frederick Douglass. Women, nameless and faceless and apologetic. People of all kinds, begging forgiveness. And he will give it (what is the point in forgiving if you cannot be seen doing it?) — he will forgive them all.

The parade will go on for days. Maybe it will go on for weeks. Maybe it will go on for years. Maybe you will march too. But at the end, when it stops, it will be enough. It will finally be enough.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 1:09 PM on February 7, 2018 [41 favorites]


Protesters all along the parade route with signs saying "Our Soldiers are Black". "Our Soldiers are Hispanic." "Our Soldiers are Women, Gay, Trans, Muslim, Jewish". "Our Soldiers are First-Generation Citizens.

All true, and all proud to be serving. The military is the melting pot that Trump fears most - and he can make them parade, but that doesn’t mean they belong to him.
posted by corb at 1:16 PM on February 7, 2018 [13 favorites]


I think this has some more details than has been posted yet: Senators Reach Two-Year Budget Deal (Susan Davis and Kelsey Snell for NPR, Feb. 7, 2018)
Senate leaders have reached a bipartisan budget agreement to increase military and domestic spending levels for two years, paving the way for the first long-term spending pact since President Trump took office.

According to congressional sources briefed on the deal, the plan eliminates mandatory spending cuts for two years and increases Pentagon spending by $80 billion and domestic spending by $63 billion for the 2018 fiscal year. In the 2019 fiscal year, defense spending would rise by $85 billion and domestic spending by $68 billion.

The agreement, negotiated by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, marks a major breakthrough for a Congress still reeling from a partial government shutdown last month.
...
The deal also suspends the debt ceiling, which the federal government had been due to reach within the next month, until March 2019.
...
A final vote on the budget deal is likely by Friday, which means lawmakers would have to pass a one- or two-day spending bill to keep the government open past the Thursday funding deadline.

The bill will also include at least $80 billion in disaster relief spending for victims of hurricanes and wildfires in Texas, California, Florida and Puerto Rico.

All told, the Republican-controlled Congress is on track to approve about $400 billion in new spending over next two years, just months after enacting a nearly $1.5 trillion tax cut. The agreement would create bicameral commissions on budget reform and pension reform to report back to Congress by the end of the year.

The next challenge will be for McConnell and Schumer to persuade a majority of House members to back the same proposal in the next few days.

They got crucial support from House Speaker Paul Ryan, who laid out the terms of the deal to House Republicans in a closed-door meeting. In a statement, Ryan said, "This agreement delivers on our commitment to fully fund our national defense — no more short-term ploys and patches."
...
In addition, House Democrats, led by Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., are staging a protest of the budget deal on the House floor Wednesday because there has been no progress on an immigration deal.
Same gist, more quotes from Washington Post in their general coverage of this, but then there's this: Nancy Pelosi’s filibuster-style speech tops six hours in bid to force immigration votes (Ed O'Keefe, David Weigel and Paul Kane for WaPo, February 7, 2018)
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi took the rare step Wednesday of giving a marathon speech supporting Democrats’ attempts to legalize the status of young immigrant “dreamers,” in a bid to pressure Republicans to act.

Pelosi (D-Calif.) began talking shortly after 10 a.m., using her right as minority leader to speak for as long as she wants. She began by saying that she would lead opposition to a broad two-year budget agreement that includes several Democratic priorities but does not address immigration — the topic that has prolonged the spending debate for several months.

“I have no intention of yielding back,” Pelosi said at 3:41 p.m. Eastern as she neared the six-hour mark of her ongoing remarks.
...
Pelosi decided to give her remarks late Tuesday night and gave a heads up to Schumer, aides said.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:19 PM on February 7, 2018 [22 favorites]


Bob Vulfov, McSweeny's: Our Administration Could Spend $5 Million on Mental Health Programs for Veterans, but We Think What Veterans Really Want Is a Big, Expensive Military Parade
Go down to your local Veterans Affairs office and you’ll hear our country’s military veterans all bemoaning the same issue about their lives post-war. The issue is not the harsh reality of post-traumatic stress disorder. Nor is it the difficulty of adapting to the simple monotony of life outside of combat zones. No, what every single brave United States veteran would like our government to fund is an extremely costly parade of soldiers and military weaponry along the boulevards of Washington, D.C. A big, expensive military parade would fix everything.

How can we claim to support the Americans who serve this country if we don’t spend a significant chunk of taxpayer dollars on a cavalcade of tanks and high-tech military hardware? We’re doing this for our veterans. It’s only a coincidence that our president happens to have a four-year-old child’s obsession with seeing big green trucks roll down the street. Although President Trump grins from ear to ear anytime he gets near the wheel of a large vehicle, this parade has absolutely nothing to do with indulging his obsession with shiny army planes. The parade will be exclusively for the benefit of our soldiers, who prefer this over a comprehensive package of healthcare and benefits.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 1:26 PM on February 7, 2018 [30 favorites]


A little ways upthread, Talez wondered what the the "both parties are bad" and "smartest, most cynical contrarian in the room" might bring out. Y'all might be interested to read what Jonathan Rauch and Benjamin Wittes just published in The Atlantic: Boycott the Republican Party:

"This, then, is the article we thought we would never write: a frank statement that a certain form of partisanship is now a moral necessity. The Republican Party, as an institution, has become a danger to the rule of law and the integrity of our democracy. The problem is not just Donald Trump; it’s the larger political apparatus that made a conscious decision to enable him. In a two-party system, nonpartisanship works only if both parties are consistent democratic actors. If one of them is not predictably so, the space for nonpartisans evaporates. We’re thus driven to believe that the best hope of defending the country from Trump’s Republican enablers, and of saving the Republican Party from itself, is to do as Toren Beasley did: vote mindlessly and mechanically against Republicans at every opportunity, until the party either rights itself or implodes (very preferably the former)."
posted by Sublimity at 1:32 PM on February 7, 2018 [93 favorites]


Orrin Hatch is calling Porter's ex-wives "morally bankrupt character assassins"

Hatch's dignity wraith status is just so perplexing to me.
posted by angrycat at 1:37 PM on February 7, 2018 [23 favorites]


Porter was Hatch's chief of staff until he went to work for Trump. Hatch has walked back his defamation to a "I'm shocked SHOCKED to find misogyny going on in here!" now that Porter resigned:
But following Porter's resignation and new reporting on abuse allegations, Hatch issued a new statement Wednesday. An aide to the senator told CNN that the original Tuesday statement, which the White House sent to reporters on Wednesday along with other statements of support for Porter, no longer applied.

"I am heartbroken by today's allegations. In every interaction I've had with Rob, he has been courteous, professional and respectful. My staff loved him and he was a trusted adviser. I do not know the details of Rob's personal life. Domestic violence in any form is abhorrent. I am praying for Rob and those involved," Hatch said.
[CNN, autoplay]
posted by melissasaurus at 1:47 PM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


Something else to consider in why Trump wants this stupid parade: People care about the military more than they care about him. He is undoubtedly still aching over the shitty turnout for his shitty inauguration, but people will (unfortunately, I think) turn out for a parade for the military. In his mind, they'll be turning out for a parade he started, so they'll be turning out fro him.

I have seconded the "fantastic" on trig's comment. Totally agreed. Don't try to disrupt it; that plays into the divisive tactics already in play. But peacefully ruining the giant photo op with inescapable signs about how unpatriotic this government is and what really matters would be beautiful.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 1:51 PM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


“The evidence we've collected shows a highly engaged and far-reaching Tumblr propaganda-op targeting mostly teenage and twenty-something African Americans. This appears to have been part of an ongoing campaign since early 2015,” said Albright

Fomenting racial resentment is a tactic lifted directly from Alexander Dugin's Foundations of Geopolitics. And it's a canny tactic, because teenage and twenty-something African Americans have every fucking right to be angry. I was in DC over the holidays, where the bluegrass station was bought out last year by Sputnik Radio*, and I heard Dugin actually being interviewed on one of that station's shows. It was a bizarre and frightening moment: I was listening to an eschatologically fascist political philosopher (no, really, he actually wants to bring about the Apocalypse) being interviewed in the nation's capital on a radio station that sells itself as the gritty, uncompromising voice of the far-left resistance.

*(DC is now also where Ed Schultz leers at you from posters advertising RT at bus stops close to the Capitol. They're really not trying to hide it.)
posted by Vic Morrow's Personal Vietnam at 1:53 PM on February 7, 2018 [15 favorites]


In every interaction I've had with Rob, he has been courteous, professional and respectful

Guy accused of beating women is nice to men, film at 11.
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 1:53 PM on February 7, 2018 [113 favorites]


Don't try to disrupt it; that plays into the divisive tactics already in play. But peacefully ruining the giant photo op with inescapable signs about how unpatriotic this government is and what really matters would be beautiful.

Signs declaring the goverment unpatriotic that ruin a military parade photo-op will be seen by the right-wing and "centrist" media and personalities as equally disruptive. To expect Fox News (or hell, probably the NYT) to say anything other than "these people waving their divisive signs are disrespecting and dishonoring our proud troops" is to assume nonexistent good faith on their part.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:58 PM on February 7, 2018 [10 favorites]


I would attend a "counterprotest" that was really just a rally/parade honoring the service of all of the veterans we have deported (we, because Obama did this too).

Just a big empty area with a sign saying "reserved for deported veterans"
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 2:00 PM on February 7, 2018 [7 favorites]


I think this has some more details than has been posted yet: Senators Reach Two-Year Budget Deal (Susan Davis and Kelsey Snell for NPR, Feb. 7, 2018)

Also would fund CHIP for 10 years.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:00 PM on February 7, 2018 [7 favorites]


Koch Brothers are not happy with the Senate budget deal.

They aren't ever happy. Nothing will ever be enough for them.
posted by Talez at 2:01 PM on February 7, 2018 [16 favorites]




There is something about the way Alexandra Petri writes about Trump's fundamental brokenness that makes me sob. Not out of any sort of sympathy for him, but in grief and rage that in spite of it, he's still the president.
posted by danielleh at 2:02 PM on February 7, 2018 [20 favorites]


Batman sez: Draft Dodgers Don't Deserve a Military Parade
posted by mosk at 2:04 PM on February 7, 2018 [17 favorites]


To expect Fox News (or hell, probably the NYT) to say anything other than "these people waving their divisive signs are disrespecting and dishonoring our proud troops" is to assume nonexistent good faith on their part.

Yeah, but we've gone over that ground a million times on the blue already. There's no swaying that chunk of the populace. No protest action, regardless of how it's handled, is going to get through there. It's not for them in the first place.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 2:05 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


Wait, people are arguing about how to properly react to the imagined Fox coverage of the imagined protest signs at the still-imaginary military parade? We're really in the realm of fan fiction now.
posted by neroli at 2:08 PM on February 7, 2018 [40 favorites]


trump must be bummed that the US arsenal doesn't include any land-based vehicle-launched nukes like the old soviet SS-20 that he can roll down pennsylvania avenue in the tradition of eastern bloc may day parades.

Not just the eastern bloc may day parades, tweet thread here shows the history of (unarmed) nuclear delivery systems at US inaugural parades. There was an atomic howitzer for Ike in '53, a nuclear cruise missile and a ballistic missile for Ike in '57, and four different ballistic missile systems for Kennedy in '61.
posted by peeedro at 2:15 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


House conservatives in revolt over budget deal:
House conservatives on Wednesday revolted against a massive bipartisan deal to raise the debt ceiling and bust spending caps, complaining that the GOP could no longer lay claim to being the party of fiscal responsibility.

“I’m not only a ‘no.’ I’m a ‘hell no,’” quipped Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), one of many members of the Tea Party-aligned Freedom Caucus who left a closed-door meeting of Republicans saying they would vote against the deal.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:20 PM on February 7, 2018 [11 favorites]


There's a concept in relationships called "trickle truthing" where you present a situation that is very bad for you in small increments, each a bit worse than the previous one. Usually in regards to cheating. (Sure I know her but we're just friends... ok we got drunk and kissed one time... ok we made out for a while... ok we had sex one time but that's it... ok we've been having an affair for months but it's over...) you get the idea.

The Russian hacking of the election reads like that to me. First there was no hacking. Then there was hacking but it wasn't the Russians. Then it was the Russians but they didn't succeed at penetrating the databases. Now it's, ok, they succeeded but they didn't change anything.

Will anyone be surprised if it turns out they were deleting Democratic voters off the voter rolls in battleground states?
posted by Justinian at 2:21 PM on February 7, 2018 [104 favorites]


This era of brinksmanship over continuing resolutions and debt limits needs to end. This is no way to run a country.
posted by thelonius at 2:23 PM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


If we're in agreement that absolutely any act of protest will be spun by the right as evil anti-American troop hating, then why limit ourselves to weaksauce milquetoast "we luv the troops too, see we're super pro-military too!" crap?

This is time for an American to match the courage of Tank Man in Tienanmen square and shut down the whole fucking awful dictatorial thing.

Anything we do, no matter how craven and military worshiping, will be seen as evil anti-troop, so fine. Let's do the right thing and actually **PROTEST** this instead of getting into a military adulation competition we're guaranteed to lose no matter what.

I'm also not even slightly convinced that there is any value in Democrats and liberals trying to pretend that patriotism has value and is a value we can reclaim. Patriotism is just nationalism dressed up in fancy language, it is not a good thing, it is not something we need or want. Same with the flag worship and the fucking flag pens. We don't want that shit. It's not us. It is theirs, not ours. I reject it wholeheartedly and unreservedly.

We don't need people on the sidelines holding up posters about how much liberals love the military industrial complex. We need people stopping the barbaric show of Fascism by putting their bodies in the way of the tanks. We saw how to do it in China.
posted by sotonohito at 2:25 PM on February 7, 2018 [36 favorites]


In the Trump said, ‘I alone can fix it.’ How wrong he was. WP OP linked above:
I alone can fix it. There are two ways of reading this slightly ambiguous sentence. First, in the way that Trump presumably meant it, that he is the one uniquely capable of fixing what is broken in Washington and politics. Second, that he could fix it alone, that is, without allies and alliances. Either of these meanings is false, dangerously so, and each has helped to land us in the present mess.
This is wrong, and it really makes me wonder if journalists are more stupid than those white working class workers they spend so much time examining. When Trump said that he knew the system better than anyone, and therefore he alone could fix it, he was saying directly to everyone that he is a corrupt real estate dealer and that he knew how to deal with corrupt officials because he did that all the time. The basic assumption was/is that the whole system was/is corrupt, with no exceptions, and that there is no repair for that. That was how it was meant to be understood, not even with a wink. And the way Trump would fix it was never to end the corruption, but exactly to "fix it", in a manner that suits his base better. Like a mobster fixes a job.
As it turns out, there are elements of the system that are less corrupt or maybe not corrupt at all, and that is confusing for Trump and the Trumpists at all levels, from his adoring daughter to the plumber i Ohio. It doesn't make sense. There must be some other underlying layer of corruption that they haven't figured out yet. This is why they want an investigator to investigate the investigation. This is why Trump clashes again and again with DOJ and FBI officials. And this is also why they want a parade. The parade is to show that they are in control. There may be some noise and confusion out there, but they have the tanks and the cannons. They can fix it. They have the power.
And the job at hand it to make America white again. There is no other job. Part of that job is to show women their place, but that has always been part of white supremacy. So as long as they are appointing conservative judges and as long as ICE are terrorizing innocent people, Trump is fixing it, the way he promised he would.
All those pundits and journalists who are trying to rationalize the Trump administration as if it were anything else than a bunch of criminals need to take a long hike and meet reality. They are a bunch of criminals, they said it loud and clear, and they were elected because of it. I can actually get why they find it strange to understand the resistance they meet.
There will be no government in the USA until they and their ilk are ousted.
posted by mumimor at 2:25 PM on February 7, 2018 [23 favorites]




Not to mention, she did it while walking backwards (and forwards) in heels!
posted by Atom Eyes at 2:28 PM on February 7, 2018 [26 favorites]


Justinian Will anyone be surprised if it turns out they were deleting Democratic voters off the voter rolls in battleground states?

We already know for a fact that they did exactly that: 1, 2
posted by sotonohito at 2:29 PM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]


Jonathan Allen: Luis Gutierrez to @chucktodd on Pelosi: if she doesn’t whip Democrats against the caps deal tomorrow, then marathon speech “was a nice gesture.”

I'm sure the DACA recipients will take comfort in Pelosi's record as they're being deported in a month.
posted by T.D. Strange at 2:29 PM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]




What Trump’s Speech Says About His Mental Fitness Linguist John McWhorter in the NYTimes. A different take from the usual one.
posted by mumimor at 2:30 PM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]


My suggestion for a response to a military parade is that we have a nationwide voter registration drive, fundraiser for Dem candidates and assistance to people who need to obtain IDs to vote. They want to play with their tanks? Ok. Fine. Meanwhile we take to the streets doing the work to kick them the fuck out of office.
posted by mcduff at 2:34 PM on February 7, 2018 [14 favorites]


Joe Kennedy: "Biden would have beaten Trump"

Women took that well, considering.

Beyond the usual manifestation of patriarchy, I think there's a subtle message to the Democratic base here. I've said it's going to be another three decades before a women will get a Democratic nomination for president, and this is confirmation.

The fact that the up and coming star of the Democrats supports an elderly two-time loser, well that's a message to women pols: go ahead and run, but don't be too ambitious. " It also gives us an idea of what to expect for the nominee in 2018.
posted by happyroach at 2:35 PM on February 7, 2018 [35 favorites]


rick gates's attorneys reasons for wanting to divorce him have been made public:
The attorneys seeking to withdraw from their representation for ex-Trump campaign aide Rick Gates said that “that irreconcilable differences have developed with” Gates “which make our effective representation of the client impossible,” according to a court document that was filed last week, but only made public on Wednesday.

Prior to their move, CNN reported that Gates had quietly hired a new lawyer, Tom Green, a move the outlet took as a sign that Gates may be negotiating with Mueller’s team. Green was not present at Wednesday’s hearing. Coming out of the court room, Wu indicated that he was still under the gag order the judge put on the case and would not be able to answer reporters’ questions.
posted by murphy slaw at 2:46 PM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


Fuck Joe Kennedy. Fuck everyone ...

The fuckity-fucking-fuck thread is over here.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 2:49 PM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


Russians penetrated U.S. voter systems, says top U.S. official

. . .Jeh Johnson, who was DHS secretary during the Russian intrusions, said, "2016 was a wake-up call and now it's incumbent upon states and the Feds to do something about it before our democracy is attacked again."

"We were able to determine that the scanning and probing of voter registration databases was coming from the Russian government."

. . . In a new NBC News/SurveyMonkey poll, 79 percent of the respondents said they were somewhat or very concerned that the country's voting system might be vulnerable to computer hackers.


So 21% were Meh/Nah.
posted by petebest at 2:49 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


Public lands news: You may recall that not long ago a public comment period was recently open on proposed entrance fee increases for many parks across the west. That comment period is now closed. A fee increase for Saguaro National Park (outside Tucson) is being considered separately, and a separate public comment period is now open for it. You have two more days to comment on that fee increase.
posted by compartment at 2:50 PM on February 7, 2018 [8 favorites]


“I’m not only a ‘no.’ I’m a ‘hell no,’” quipped Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), one of many members of the Tea Party-aligned Freedom Caucus who left a closed-door meeting of Republicans saying they would vote against the deal.

Mo Brooks would vote against allowing air anywhere in the United States if he was aware that an undocumented immigrant was breathing it.

That said, Mo, you got your ass kicked by Roy Fucking Moore in an Alabama primary. You have all the electoral credibility of a ham sandwich that an owl shat upon.
posted by delfin at 2:55 PM on February 7, 2018 [20 favorites]


That said, Mo, you got your ass kicked by Roy Fucking Moore in an Alabama primary. You have all the electoral credibility of a ham sandwich that an owl shat upon.

is there any talk of moore making a primary challenge to brooks for his seat in the house?
posted by murphy slaw at 3:00 PM on February 7, 2018


To be more detailed on the story about Russians hacking voter roll computers:
-- while Jeh Johnson (Obama's guy) is quoted, his opinions are not the news
-- this news is from Jeanette Manfra, Trump's head of Cybersecurity
-- "There is no evidence that any of the registration rolls were altered in any fashion, according to U.S. officials."
-- 21 states were ID'd as trageted by Russia
-- 5 of them says they weren't attacked at all, incl. California and Texas
-- "Many of the states" comlain that they have no details, because "that information was classified and state officials did not have proper clearances." Manfra says they're working on it.
posted by msalt at 3:07 PM on February 7, 2018 [13 favorites]


Marco Rubio has a new plan for "paid family leave" working with noted policy wonk Ivanka, except not really. It's actually just cutting Social Security.

The idea comes from an astroturf fake women's group and long time anti-Social Security crusader Andrew Biggs, and it works like this:
In return for receiving parental benefits, new parents would agree to defer their collection of Social Security benefits upon retirement for the period of time necessary to offset the cost of their parental benefits. Participation in the program would be strictly voluntary; new parents who do not need parental benefits or who do not wish to defer their retirement benefits would not be required to participate.
So no, Ivanka isn't proposing paid family leave, she and Little Marco are proposing raising the retirement age to punish new parents for having children.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:12 PM on February 7, 2018 [80 favorites]


A lot depends on how Brooks's health goes. He had surgery a couple of months ago for prostate cancer and, while he spoke of it going well, it's hard to say if he will run for reelection yet.

I could absolutely see Moore targeting that seat or another Alabama House seat, however. The Trumpoid base is clearly revved up to support the craziest man in the room, which Moore clearly is, and he's attacked Congressman Byrne before while running against him for Governor. He could pretty much pick any of the districts without all those pesky urban black people in it and stand a good chance.

And if that's not an indictment of America I don't know what is.
posted by delfin at 3:20 PM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


I'm a bit confused over what's news in NBC story, since it lines up nicely with WaPost from Sept.
" DHS left it to individual states to decide whether to make public whether they had been targeted.
In only a handful of states, including Illinois, did hackers actually penetrate computer systems, according to U.S. officials, and there is no evidence that hackers tampered with any voting machines."
posted by rc3spencer at 3:35 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


The NTSB also blamed the Federal Railroad Administration for not making sleep apnea testing mandatory.

This is nonsense. They don't have mandatory sleep apnea testing for airline pilots. What they have is a requirement that there be two pilots on duty in the cockpit.

Having a single person in the cab of trains carrying hundreds of people is the result of union busting efforts to reduce costs for both passenger and freight trains.
posted by JackFlash at 3:51 PM on February 7, 2018 [74 favorites]


Matthew Dowd: A guy with five military draft deferments wanting a military parade to honor himself, is a bit like Cruella De Vil wanting an award from the humane society for her treatment of Dalmatians.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:01 PM on February 7, 2018 [70 favorites]


I know a lot of us won't be around in 25 years, and it's cold comfort for those who are suffering now, but it's making me feel a little better today to consider the big picture and remember that the era of old white men in America is coming to an end. By next year, racial and ethnic minority kids in America should be the majority for the first time, and by 2043 we should see America flip to majority-minority. (This is per 2013 Census numbers, hopefully the next census will show the trend continuing or accelerating.)

Obviously they're not going out without a bitter fight to hold onto control and ownership of absolutely everything, and they're going to trash the place and steal everything worth stealing before they go. That's what we're seeing now. But one way or another, they're on the way out, and all their scheming and blathering and posturing and whining won't grant them an extra second on the stage of history.

I don't know what comes next and I won't be here to see it, but it can't help but be better for everyone who's not an old white man. If you're not an old white man, I hope you can help us fight the battles we have today and tomorrow, but just as important, remember that some change is inevitable and that time is on your side.
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 4:09 PM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]


So no, Ivanka isn't proposing paid family leave, she and Little Marco are proposing raising the retirement age to punish new parents for having children.

Such a hateful idea deserves a hateful name. Baby Debt Bondage, perhaps.
posted by puddledork at 4:31 PM on February 7, 2018 [13 favorites]


by 2043 we should see America flip to majority-minority.

As we saw earlier in the thread, if Trump's immigration plan is implemented, that will no longer be true. There's no telling what will happen to immigration to the US as a result of the Armageddon that white supremacists have declared. The Republicans have decided that instead of trying to appeal to racial minority voters, they will simply eliminate them.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 4:44 PM on February 7, 2018 [23 favorites]


Yep, the plan is to eliminate and minimize the non-white influence in America to defeat demographics.
posted by benzenedream at 4:47 PM on February 7, 2018


Yep, the plan is to eliminate and minimize the non-white influence in America to defeat demographics.

Specifically the plan is to reverse demographic trends in three distinct stages: (1) Stop nonwhite immigration. (2) Enact policies to "promote the white birthrate." (3) Begin "incentivizing" nonwhite citizens to leave the country.

This is the strategy openly promoted by the Richard Spencer clan at the heart of the alt-right. It's also Stephen Miller's opinion (remember, Spencer was Miller's mentor at Duke), although he won't quite come out and say it. Currently they're making great headway on stage 1.
posted by Rust Moranis at 4:55 PM on February 7, 2018 [22 favorites]


Yep, the plan is to eliminate and minimize the non-white influence in America to defeat demographics
I think I've seen that movie, was it Brannagh? < Conspiracy trailer
posted by rc3spencer at 4:56 PM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


If you're not an old white man, I hope you can help us fight the battles we have today and tomorrow,

I didn't see a lot of old guys in Charlottesville. Generation blaming won't save you.
posted by thelonius at 5:02 PM on February 7, 2018 [33 favorites]


Specifically the plan is to reverse demographic trends in three distinct stages: (1) Stop nonwhite immigration. (2) Enact policies to "promote the white birthrate." (3) Begin "incentivizing" nonwhite citizens to leave the country.

This is the strategy openly promoted by the Richard Spencer clan at the heart of the alt-right. It's also Stephen Miller's opinion (remember, Spencer was Miller's mentor at Duke), although he won't quite come out and say it. Currently they're making great headway on stage 1.


They basically read Handmaid's Tale and, instead of thinking "Wow, what a shitty place to live and everyone's miserable!" thought, "What a nifty idea! Let's implement it, maybe a bit more secular-like because uniforms are a drag."

I'm very glad I'm a) post-menopausal and b) live in California. Lots of luck turning Cali white - read: it's not going to happen. We're multiracial and that's here to stay. And, you can get birth control and abortions here, though the rural areas have less access (mostly because they're rural).

What is going to be tough, and I think might be more likely to "save us" (for a certain value of saving us) is that blue states are more prosperous. The Midwest, for one, is suffering from a rural brain drain as educated young people are beating feet to quality-of-life blue cities and states where the Ebil, Ebil Tax Man helps insure that quality.

It's true that there are, alas, young racists and Nazi types, and the Nazi movement is targeting disaffected young leftist men to fill their ranks. But, rural America and small-town America are both dying off. Maybe this will redden cities but it might dilute the power of large swaths of red states.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 5:15 PM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


I didn't see a lot of old guys in Charlottesville. Generation blaming won't save you.

Young people do most of the marching, old people do most of the voting. I know which has done more harm in the last 50 years.

But I think the only category that particularly matters at this point is "people who voted for Donald Trump" and "people who didn't vote for Donald Trump." All people in the second category are basically on the same side.
posted by Justinian at 5:16 PM on February 7, 2018 [24 favorites]


Still, "generation blaming won't save you" is my pick for Metafilterest judgment of the day, with only a few hours left to go.
posted by uosuaq at 5:20 PM on February 7, 2018 [16 favorites]


Maybe this will redden cities but it might dilute the power of large swaths of red states.

Actually it's the exact opposite, as rural regions lose population to cities, our racist electoral system and legacy constitution dilutes the power of actual people and increases the relative electoral power of empty land area almost entirely owned by old, white, racists.

If you thought the electoral college was bullshit in 2016, wait till 2044 when 30% of the popular vote will be worth 70% of the Senate seats and 67% of electoral votes.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:20 PM on February 7, 2018 [53 favorites]


Actually it's the exact opposite, as rural regions lose population to cities, our racist electoral system and legacy constitution dilutes the power of actual people and increases the relative electoral power of empty land area almsot entirely owned by old, white, racists.

That is true, but once they die off, will anyone - white, racist, or whatever - want to live in the red states where there are no jobs and no quality of life? Richard Spencer and his Nazis can yammer on about reproducing the white race, they can even, sadly, help implement anti-woman, anti-choice policies, but can they force people to live in red states? People - including single women - have been flocking to cities since there have been cities, even in very patriarchal eras with no reliable birth control. There would need to be a kind of hukou policy to keep people tied to the land, or actual serfdom.

Even if the American Nazis succeed in keeping America whiter for longer, I don't know how they will keep America rural for longer, because even white babies grow up and move away.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 5:35 PM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]


That is true, but once they die off, will anyone - white, racist, or whatever - want to live in the red states where there are no jobs and no quality of life?

That's the point. It doesn't matter how few people still live there, they still get two senators and at least 3 EVs.
posted by Talez at 5:38 PM on February 7, 2018 [41 favorites]


From Diplopundit: Trump Orders the Establishment of a National Vetting Center to “Identify Individuals Who Present a Threat”.

"The Presidential Memorandum is titled “Optimizing the Use of Federal Government Information in Support of the National Vetting Enterprise”. On February 6, Trump ordered the establishment of an interagency National Vetting Center “to identify individuals who present a threat to national security, border security, homeland security, or public safety.”"
posted by MonkeyToes at 5:41 PM on February 7, 2018 [18 favorites]


And lo! Trump's name led all the rest.
posted by uosuaq at 5:43 PM on February 7, 2018 [9 favorites]


That is true, but once they die off, will anyone - white, racist, or whatever - want to live in the red states where there are no jobs and no quality of life?

Of course they will - the problem won't be that there's no jobs in the state, it'll be that all the jobs and quality of life is in the cities, as you yourself note. That's already the problem, and partly how we got fucked in 2010 with the gerrymandering and just general rearranging of districts after the census. If in 2024 40% of Georgia's population lives in and around Atlanta, and Atlanta gets 2 Congressional districts while the rest of the state gets 10 (note: I am totally making these numbers up), then Georgia is a "red state" no matter how many Democrats vote.
posted by soundguy99 at 5:54 PM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]


identify individuals who present a threat to national security, border security, homeland security, or public safety

Isn't that what they're already (supposed to be) doing? That's literally already their job. This looks more like an empty propaganda exercise to make the viewers at home cheer and Trump feel like a big boy.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 5:59 PM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


From the new "Vetting" executive order: "To the extent permitted by law, details or assignments to the Center should be without reimbursement." So how's it going to be funded? Does this mean he's ordering the subject agencies to carve the Vetting Center out of their existing budgets?
posted by Coventry at 6:01 PM on February 7, 2018


Yeah, this reads to me like what they've been doing since taking office, which is seeding the bureaucracy with Trumpist observers
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 6:03 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


An Obama-era idea, finally employed apparently National Vetting, Politico
"Seth Stodder, a former DHS assistant secretary for border, immigration and trade policy from 2016 to 2017, said the vetting center idea surfaced in the Obama administration but that Trump had changed it to focus more on immigration."
posted by rc3spencer at 6:05 PM on February 7, 2018


Do the phrases "in accordance with applicable law" and "to the extent permitted by law" and so forth, peppered throughout the document have any legal meaning, or are they just emphasizing "trust us, we want to do everything by the book this time, please don't treat this order like the Muslim ban?"
posted by Coventry at 6:08 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


If in 2024 40% of Georgia's population lives in and around Atlanta, and Atlanta gets 2 Congressional districts while the rest of the state gets 10 (note: I am totally making these numbers up), then Georgia is a "red state" no matter how many Democrats vote.

This is an impossible gerrymander because it's unconstitutional to have uneven districts. You could, however, split voters in Atlanta with rural Republican voters 40-60 for as many seats as possible and then let Atlanta have the rest of the seats. This does work. Virginia for example the Democrats won by two fifths of a point in the statewide US House popular vote yet Democrats pulled 4 seats and the Republicans pulled 7. Michigan is also set up this way as is Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Texas, and Ohio.

The FPTP system is really shitty for exacerbating political dominance too. People like to point to MD as a D gerrymandered state but the Democrats win 60-35. Mass for instance is 80-16 and doesn't send a single R in their delegation. In the same vein you could technically call LA, UT, AK gerrymandered but they're so insignificant in the number of seats and the Republican vote is so dominant you'd effectively have to pack Democrats to make them competitive.
posted by Talez at 6:08 PM on February 7, 2018 [4 favorites]


This is reassuring, I guess?
To ensure that the activities of the Board and the Center comply with applicable law and appropriately protect individuals’ privacy, civil rights, and civil liberties, the Board shall establish a standing Legal Working Group and a separate standing Privacy, Civil Rights, and Civil Liberties Working Group, both of which shall routinely review the activities of the Center and advise the Board. These working groups shall also review the implementation plan described in subsection (g) of this section prior to its submission to the President.
posted by Coventry at 6:15 PM on February 7, 2018


Do you mean Arkansas [AR]? AK is Alaska, which only has one at-large rep (the seemingly immortal Don Young).
posted by Chrysostom at 6:16 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


And the population problem of self-sorting is really more of an issue in the Senate. You could imagine a scenario one day where California has 70 reps, New York has 38ish, and Florida and Texas turn blue and Democrats are still relatively competitive with red states.

The Senate is unfixable. Wyoming still gets two senators even if only 19 billionaires live there, and California still only gets 2 senators if its population crosses 100 million.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:16 PM on February 7, 2018 [17 favorites]


Yes. My bad, AR.
posted by Talez at 6:17 PM on February 7, 2018


Why is it that only Pelosi has used this "magic minute" feature in recent times?
posted by acrasis at 6:34 PM on February 7, 2018


Why is it that only Pelosi has used this "magic minute" feature in recent times?

Because only the leader of the parties can use it.
posted by Talez at 6:45 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'm also not even slightly convinced that there is any value in Democrats and liberals trying to pretend that patriotism has value and is a value we can reclaim. Patriotism is just nationalism dressed up in fancy language, it is not a good thing, it is not something we need or want. Same with the flag worship and the fucking flag pens. We don't want that shit. It's not us. It is theirs, not ours. I reject it wholeheartedly and unreservedly.

I am a Democrat and a patriot.

There are many senses that people use the word "love". When I say I love America, I'm not talking about admiring America (although we shouldn't pretend there is nothing admirable about America). When I say I love America, I'm not even talking about liking America. I'm talking about a sort of dedication or duty to helping America become what it could be.

I think that "patriotism" that is grounded in a notion of a sort of "natural goodness" of America is fallacious, in almost exactly the same way that the Just World Hypothesis is fallacious. It is up to us to create justice. It is up to us to help America be as good as it aspires to be.

But I also have no use for the Greenwaldian view that reflexively imputes evil on whatever America does. That doesn't help anyone who is actually concerned with making America better, any more than reflexive self-hatred helps anyone behave more kindly or productively.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 7:30 PM on February 7, 2018 [53 favorites]


There are other kinds of patriotism than the nationalistic kind.
posted by Merus at 7:35 PM on February 7, 2018 [19 favorites]


The Trump administration has certainly evolved since the Muslim ban. The Vetting Center order is probably going to achieve the same result, along with a much greater centralization of surveillance power, and hardly anyone is freaking out about it.

Maybe this is that normalization thing people warned us about. Or maybe we're all just tired. But I think also the memo is written in a more placatory way, and people are buying it.
posted by Coventry at 7:35 PM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


Speaking of the Vetting Center, in what I can't help but feel is related and certainly not-at-all profoundly disturbing news -- Daily Beast: ICE Wants to Be an Intelligence Agency Under Trump.
The official added that joining the IC could also be useful for the agency’s immigration enforcement work––in particular, their efforts to find and arrest undocumented immigrants with criminal arrest warrants (known in ICE as fugitive aliens).
...............
“The idea that ICE could potentially get access to warrantless surveillance is frankly terrifying,” Jake Laperruque, senior counsel at the Project on Government Oversight, told The Daily Beast.
posted by FelliniBlank at 7:42 PM on February 7, 2018 [23 favorites]


“It’s Trump and uneducated rednecks. Trump is just telling them what they want to hear. I used to hang out with him. He’s a crazy motherfucker. Limited mentally — a megalomaniac, narcissistic. I can’t stand him. I used to date Ivanka, you know.”

— Quincy Jones, in an interview with Vulture, on what has stirred up racism in the United States.


via PoliticalWire.com
posted by petebest at 7:52 PM on February 7, 2018 [21 favorites]


UPCOMING SPECIAL ELECTIONS - MARCH

Boilerplate: Lots of law comes out of state legislatures, plenty of it bad. These elections don't get much attention, doubly so for special elections. Because of the small scope, a small amount of your money or time could help elect these folks! Please pitch in, if you can!
====

March 6 - Oklahoma House 51 - Charles Murdock [no website]

HD-51 is currently an R seat (the incumbent resigned to take a federal job); R won 78-22 in 2016, was unopposed in 2014, R won 64-36 in 2012. The rural district southwest of Oklahoma City was won by by Trump 80-15 and by Romney 78-22. The Rs control the Oklahoma House by about 40 seats.

=> Dem candidate is the same person who lost in 2016. He doesn't seem to be a real serious candidate, but we have seen big swings in OK specials.

====

March 6 - Massachusetts Senate Third Essex - Brendan Crighton

SD-Third Essex is currently a D seat (the incumbent resigned to become mayor of Lynn Lynn, Lynn, city of sin); D ran unopposed in 2016, 2014, and 2012. The Lynn-based district was won by by Clinton 67-28 and by Obama 59-39. The Ds control the Massachusetts Senate by about 25 seats.

=> Unopposed races are pretty easy to win.

====

March 13 - Tennessee Senate 14 - Gayle Jordan

SD-14 is currently an R seat (the incumbent took a job in the federal government); R won 74-26 in 2016 and was unopposed in 2012. The exurban Nashville district was won by Trump 70-26 and by Romney 67-32. The Rs control the Tennessee Senate by about 20 seats.

=>Dem is the 2016 candidate again. This one will be a reach.

====

March 13 - US House Pennsylvania 18 - Conor Lamb

PA-18 is currently an R seat (the incumbent resigned in disgrace after a combination sex and office harassment scandal); R was unopposed in 2016 and 2014, R won 64-36 in 2012. The southwestern PA district was won by Trump 58-39 and Romney 58-41.

=> We've talked about this one a good bit. Lamb is a strong candidate, but the GOP is dumping a lot of resources into the race.

====

March 27 - Alabama House 21 - Terry Jones

HD-21 is currently an R seat (the incumbent passed away); R won 67-33 in 2014. No presidential results, sorry. The Rs control the Alabama House by about 40 seats.

=>Could be interesting test of whether we can get big swings in non Midwestern districts.

====
There's also an all Dem race Louisiana House 93 (first round Mar 24).
posted by Chrysostom at 7:58 PM on February 7, 2018 [27 favorites]


When I say I love America, I'm not talking about admiring America (although we shouldn't pretend there is nothing admirable about America). When I say I love America, I'm not even talking about liking America. I'm talking about a sort of dedication or duty to helping America become what it could be.

This.

My parents aren't perfect. They're flawed, and they've screwed up. But they've been there for me, even when they're not there in the ways that I would have liked them to be, and they've done a lot for me. And, ultimately, there's no one else who has that relationship to me.

Patriotism, to me, isn't about believing the US is perfect. It's about believing America has potential, and it's about believing that America is worth the investment necessary to make it better than it is now. Ceding love of country to the right is a way of ceding the higher ground, and that's something we can't afford -- now or ever.
posted by steady-state strawberry at 8:22 PM on February 7, 2018 [18 favorites]


The Senate is unfixable.

Literally! It can't even be fixed by Constitutional Amendment.
posted by Justinian at 8:28 PM on February 7, 2018 [1 favorite]


I suppose it's more accurate to say the two senators even if your state has only two people in it part of the Senate can't be fixed. The Senate could be rendered into a vestigial body like the House of Lords I guess... still containing 2 Senators per state.
posted by Justinian at 8:30 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


Yeah, I love America too. And I'm not just saying that because the Vetting Center will be scrutinizing me in 6 months. :-)
posted by Coventry at 8:30 PM on February 7, 2018 [2 favorites]


I think the Vetting Center is really about going after journalists. Check back on this comment in 6 months.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 8:34 PM on February 7, 2018 [6 favorites]


Oh wow, it looks like they may be positioning Kelly to go down over the Porter thing -- claiming that he didn't tell Trump about Porter's history. Right, because Trump would have cared whether Porter was a brute.
posted by FelliniBlank at 8:44 PM on February 7, 2018 [12 favorites]


I don't know what comes next and I won't be here to see it, but it can't help but be better for everyone who's not an old white man.

I appreciate the sentiment, but there's bad news. While we're busy fighting tooth and nail to hold on to every piece of social and political progress we've made in the last hundred years, we're not fighting tooth and nail to solve all of the problems we've created with climate change, overpopulation, wealth inequality, and so on, let alone doing the necessary work to continue advancing social justice and equality. The window for addressing climate change in particular is closing, and while we know we need to act, we can't, because we have to fight all of the Trump and GOP bullshit. We have to save the Republic before we can solve climate change, but by the time we save the Republic, it will be too late to solve climate change.

Maybe the future will be better in terms of the particular crop of know-nothing racists we're fighting right now being dead, but we're going to be living with the scars of this battle for the rest of our lives.
posted by biogeo at 8:49 PM on February 7, 2018 [16 favorites]


Oh wow, it looks like they may be positioning Kelly to go down over the Porter thing -- claiming that he didn't tell Trump about Porter's history. Right, because Trump would have cared whether Porter was a brute.

I had to fire General Flynn Kelly because he lied to the Vice President and the FBI.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 8:58 PM on February 7, 2018 [5 favorites]


It’s probably just Javanka leaking to try and force Donny’s hand, but regardless I hope Kelly gets canned. The next COS will be as awful I’m sure, but less effective. I prefer fascist fucks to be incompetent.
posted by chris24 at 9:06 PM on February 7, 2018 [30 favorites]


Some heartening news out of Arizona: "In 2016, Democrats fielded candidates for either the Arizona Senate or the Arizona House of Representatives in each legislative district. This year, for the first time in at least a decade, there will be Democrats running for both those positions in every single legislative district."

My LD is super blue--we have six people running for our two House seats this year, and I'm not sure the Republicans are fielding anyone at all--but there are, of course, deep red areas in the state. It can be a thankless and exhausting task to run in those districts, so I applaud the folks who are willing to get out there and do it, regardless.
posted by Superplin at 9:07 PM on February 7, 2018 [30 favorites]


One of the political cartoonists at TheNib may have noticed our frequent references here to "the writers". And I say he's welcome to it and should make it a recurring series.
posted by oneswellfoop at 9:17 PM on February 7, 2018 [20 favorites]


Raining on Trump’s Parade (Adam Gopnik | The New Yorker)
What Trump seems to have been responding to, when he saw the military parade in France, was, at the atavistic level at which he responds to everything, exactly the glow of that underlying insecurity. A parade seems to compensate for insecurity by bloat, show, and trophy. That, after all, is the whole of Trump’s character: insecurity compensated for by bloat, show and trophy.

The good reason to oppose the parade is simply that it is not—in the old-fashioned sense—the American way. It is not just that a big military parade runs counter to our ceremonial traditions; it runs against our military traditions, in which the military is painlessly and unceremoniously seconded to the civilian. Our generals, in the tradition of Grant and Eisenhower (and Bradley and, for that matter, Colin Powell) don’t like showing off, because they are not there to look impressive. They are there to be professional. Professionalism is the ethic of the American military, and professionals do not parade their expertise. They project their expertise.

The traditions that make the Bastille Day parade appropriate to France are completely absent here. The French officer showily salutes the Republic; the American one has no need to. An American officer is proud of getting the job done, not of looking cool when not actually doing it. It would be a source of pain for American soldiers to be turned into an ornament for a would-be strong man—to be used as his trophies.

The negative response of retired generals to the idea of a military parade makes this feeling plain. General Mark Kirby said, to the Washington Examiner, “You could get past all of those arguments and just say one thing: It’s not who we are as a military. The United States has a different military culture. We do not portray ourselves walking down the streets. Instead, we do the parades on main street in the middle of Idaho during the Fourth of July with flags taped to kids’ handlebars. That’s the kind of parades we have.”

Does it matter? A good case can be made that it is not worth investing a lot of emotion or energy on this issue. Almost the only ideological consistency that Trump and Trumpism have, after all, is the urge to troll liberals, and, the argument goes, liberals should not take the bait and allow themselves to be so trolled.

But the symbolic dimension of democracy is hugely important to its perpetuation—that was one of the lessons of Reaganism that liberals on the whole failed to understand. Nothing is more important for liberals than to reclaim patriotism, and love of country, for their own. People want patriotism. If they are given only bad nationalism in its place, they will swallow that instead, and come to make it part of their diet. Opposing the wrong parades, and planning the right ones, is part of the task of a patriotic progressivism as it marches—or meanders—forward.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 9:17 PM on February 7, 2018 [24 favorites]


Gotta say, it's beautifully absurd, and so so so utterly Trump in its flailing cluelessness and irony, that his idea of the ultimate massive overwhelming show of toughguy strongman strength and alphadog dominance is a French military parade.
posted by FelliniBlank at 9:27 PM on February 7, 2018 [20 favorites]


France saved our ass in the American Revolution so let's be careful there.
posted by kirkaracha at 9:30 PM on February 7, 2018 [20 favorites]


I'm not casting aspersions on the French or the French military -- they're just the antithesis of the particular sort of gross, vulgar, bullying, self-parody, steroid-stuffed John Wayne yata yata images of military might Trump would appreciate.

I mean, America's favorite fighting Frenchman had a powdered wig and ruffled shirt!
posted by FelliniBlank at 9:36 PM on February 7, 2018 [10 favorites]


Inside the Planning of Trump's Very Chill Military Parade
The Pentagon, apparently, is "looking into" planning a parade for the President the good of the nation. So... I guess we're doing this. That should be the new motto of the country: America—I guess we're doing this. One does wonder, however, how a fever dream in the mind of a megalomaniac that will be used to great metaphorical effect in future dramas about the present became literal marching orders for an army. Here's how I imagine it went down.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:19 PM on February 7, 2018 [10 favorites]


It looks like my pet senator, @SenRonJohnson (R-WI), is going full obstruction:

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/02/ron-johnson-is-very-bad-at-mccarthyism.html
posted by sebastienbailard at 11:38 PM on February 7, 2018 [3 favorites]


At what point does this become actionable? @NRATV: Fight their Violence of Lies, with the Fire of Truth.
posted by scalefree at 12:17 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


Gotta say, it's beautifully absurd, and so so so utterly Trump in its flailing cluelessness and irony, that his idea of the ultimate massive overwhelming show of toughguy strongman strength and alphadog dominance is a French military parade.

That's just it. Parades are the tool of fading, pompous armies (France, Russia, North Korea) or desperately social-climbing armies (China) -- a salve against insecurity. It is precisely the mark of our strength that we have felt no desire for them, except to celebrate the winning of a war. And that is certainly no happening right now.
posted by msalt at 12:27 AM on February 8, 2018 [5 favorites]


fading, pompous...desperately social-climbing...a salve against insecurity

Donald Trump? Surely not
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 12:41 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


To be fair to the French military, they had a pretty good run prior to World War 2 and they knew when to GTFO of Viet Nam.

The Bastille Day parade isn't some new invention ginned up to soothe Macron's ego, it's been happening since the late 1800s, it's about as much a cultural institution as the Eiffel tower.
posted by PenDevil at 2:05 AM on February 8, 2018 [18 favorites]


There would need to be a kind of hukou policy to keep people tied to the land, or actual serfdom.

If actual serfdom is implemented in America, the most obvious way would be as an extension of health insurance being tied to employment and non-portable; perhaps through housing, food or clean water becoming unaffordable except through employer-linked subsidies or rations. (Of course, the rhetoric would be that nothing is deliberately engineered; it's just the invisible hand of the free market that, unfortunately, has increased the price of unleaded water as wages have fallen, but your employer can help you out.)
posted by acb at 2:57 AM on February 8, 2018 [11 favorites]


I fucked up as a teacher, although I don't understand the nature of the fuck up entirely.

I had this grammar exercise where I asked students to write sentences for each of ten nouns. One of the nouns was Trump. I honestly wasn't trying to be provocative: I'd dashed off the list by just scanning my brain for things, like 'my cat' and 'the scissors.'

I'm white, my students are all PoC from low-income/working-class neighborhoods. I've kept the convo non-political for now.

All of my students skipped the Trump one. Nobody wanted to do a grammar thing about Trump.

I apologized and squeaked out something flustered and inappropriate about my dislike of Trump because my first thought was fuck they think I might have voted for the man because I'm white

I wish I'd thought for a second and not put that putrid heap on a grammar list. I feel like I hurt my students. But I also, thinking back to my own privileged upbringing as a white person in an affluent small town, I was surprised: why not take the opportunity of a grammar exercise to make fun of the man? We were all about making fun of Reagan in the eighties.

I mean, I get the difference, I know the difference. I don't know how frightened to be about it. But I'm sorry and sad about it.
posted by angrycat at 4:11 AM on February 8, 2018 [37 favorites]


Metafilter: I guess we're doing this.
posted by murphy slaw at 4:12 AM on February 8, 2018 [14 favorites]


Re: the "writers" thing. Yeah, that shows up a lot in MeFi commentary. As someone who is not steeped in the culture of fandom, I do not find this gloss on current events to be witty or cute.

It's a frame that trivializes current events, even though they are actually happening in the real world. And I see it as a way that popular culture gives an acceptable out for people to just throw up their hands and not participate in democracy--as a juvenile, jokey way to relinquish responsibility to engage, because "the writers" are the ones who make things happen anyway.

As I think about this and articulate it further, I realize that resonates a lot with privilege, in the sense that privilege can choose to mock at a disengaged distance.

In the spirit of respectful discourse, when I see comments along these lines, I do sit on my hands rather than snarl with a suggestion to stop acting like a goddamn entitled teenager. Usually. So perhaps I'll just gently point out its disempowering aspect and suggest we get over it and find another coping mechanism, or whatever.
posted by Sublimity at 4:21 AM on February 8, 2018 [19 favorites]


And now, there's a transcript. It went about exactly as well as you might expect it to go.

I advise everyone to read it as it is instructive in how the Court does not tolerate the kind of bullshit which is all these guys ever really have. I know I must be patient, and that investigations take time, but it's hard when Mueller has so much ground to cover in terms of years of financial misconduct, then every time one of these nitwits opens their mouth, you need to call staples for a new bulletin board, thumbtacks, and colored string for ANOTHER investigation.
posted by mikelieman at 4:25 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


It's a frame that trivializes current events, even though they are actually happening in the real world. And I see it as a way that popular culture gives an acceptable out for people to just throw up their hands and not participate in democracy--as a juvenile, jokey way to relinquish responsibility to engage, because "the writers" are the ones who make things happen anyway.


I don't see it this way at all - it's a way to express how astoundingly absurd the current political situation has become.

The conceit isn't about the writers running things, it's about how things have become so ridiculous that they are playing out like such a stupid, obvious script that even the most undemanding television audience would feel like their intelligence was being insulted.
posted by murphy slaw at 4:26 AM on February 8, 2018 [83 favorites]


Everyone in this photo has been fired or forced to resign. Trump only hires the best.
posted by PenDevil at 4:30 AM on February 8, 2018 [19 favorites]


In the spirit of respectful discourse, when I see comments along these lines, I do sit on my hands rather than snarl with a suggestion to stop acting like a goddamn entitled teenager. Usually. So perhaps I'll just gently point out its disempowering aspect and suggest we get over it and find another coping mechanism, or whatever.

In the spirit of respectful discourse, you don’t know me or (likely) many (any?) of the other posters here. You don’t know the level of our privilege or the extent of our political engagement.

In the spirit of respectful discourse, I’ll just gently point out your concern trolling and — how’d you put it? — “suggest you get over it.”
posted by Barack Spinoza at 4:34 AM on February 8, 2018 [28 favorites]


The words nuclear or nuke don’t appear in that NYT article mentioned a few comments back. Israel does five times. The absence of references to nuclear weapons indicates that the article isn’t about any country’s nuclear capabilities. It’s just about missiles.
posted by emelenjr at 4:38 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


I mean, America's favorite fighting Frenchman had a powdered wig and ruffled shirt!

Trump doesn't wear his ruffled shirt very often. No joie de chemise.
posted by petebest at 4:56 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]




He's more into joie del la Trumperie.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:03 AM on February 8, 2018


PenDevil: "To be fair to the French military, they had a pretty good run prior to World War 2 and they knew when to GTFO of Viet Nam."

Also I don't believe they've ever invaded Afghanistan.
posted by Mitheral at 5:06 AM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


America's favorite fighting Frenchman had a powdered wig and ruffled shirt!

So did George Washington. Right there on the $1 bill.

Someone should tell the 3%'ers they're cosplaying wrong.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:17 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


"I used to date Ivanka, you know." — Quincy Jones

Judging by the lack of tweets about this, I assume nobody has read this interview to Donald yet. Because ... 🎆
posted by uncleozzy at 5:17 AM on February 8, 2018 [14 favorites]


Its a good interview, btw. My favorite part was,

Interviewer: I'm sorry to be jumping around [topics] like this
Q: Be a Pisces. Jam.
posted by petebest at 5:25 AM on February 8, 2018 [21 favorites]


The French soldiers died in the hundreds of thousands in the Great War as the German army rolled across their country. The Battle of Verdun was a meat grinder that went on for nearly a year. An entire generation of Frenchmen were virtually obliterated.

I beg you all, don't fucking joke about the French army. I'm sitting here nearly in tears about it. They earned their parades.
posted by winna at 5:29 AM on February 8, 2018 [75 favorites]


^ Chilling: ICE Wants to Be an Intelligence Agency Under Trump.
ICE Director Spouts Anti-Immigrant Trumpisms at San Antonio Border Conference.
Acting ICE director Thomas Homan is quickly becoming one of the most dangerous men in America.
Papers Please.
posted by adamvasco at 5:39 AM on February 8, 2018 [17 favorites]


Wars in which the French worked with the Americans.
Revolutionary War.
World War I
World War II
First Iraq War.

Wars in which the French sat out.
Vietnam War.
Second Iraq War.

(but... let's end the derail)
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 5:40 AM on February 8, 2018 [17 favorites]


The French soldiers died in the hundreds of thousands in the Great War as the German army rolled across their country

This is true. It's also true that lots of other people died in the hundreds of thousands when French armies rolled across their countries.

Giant military equipment parades ought to be distasteful for any modern democracy.

Also, we don't have these because they're supposed beneath our station. In an almost literal sense: if the US wants to deliver a pointed reminder it will conduct a large joint exercise in theater.
posted by snuffleupagus at 5:43 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


OK, I abjectly apologize for seeming like I was mocking the French when I was trying (badly, apparently) to mock Trump. Meanwhile, if Trump enjoys Bastille Day so much that he wants to re-enact French history, I support that and will happily bring the tumbrels and knitting needles.
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:09 AM on February 8, 2018 [13 favorites]


An alternative way to mock Trump, if you'd like - a meme I've seen on Twitter is to take a photo from the Charlottesville Tiki Torch march thing and caption it with "Trump has already had a parade, though" or suchlike.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:16 AM on February 8, 2018 [33 favorites]


Alexei Navalny (Russian opposition leader) released today a half-hour video [Russian, with English subtitles available, h/t @parfitt_tom (Times of London)] detailing a meeting between Russian Oligarch Oleg Deripaska and Deputy Prime Minister Prikhodka on a yacht trip through Norway in August 2016. All of the information comes from a tell-all book by an escort, together with her own Instagram photos and video of the trip.

The meeting highlights corruption within the Russian government, but could also have implications for the Russia-gate story. August 2016 was obviously a key moment: Paul Manafort had just been forced out of the Trump campaign, and was simultaneously trying to repair his relations with Deripaska.

Not sure what this means, other than the US political focus of their discussion, but at one point in the video (5:25 in the youtube link, above), the two men are heard saying:

We've got bad relations with America because the friend of Sergei Eduardovich [Prikhodka], [US Assistant Secretary of State, Victoria] Nuland. When she was your age, she spent a month on a Russian whaling boat. She hates our country after this.

posted by pjenks at 6:20 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


Sorry to be late to the game, but what is he referring to with this all caps screed? (tweet from yesterday).

"NEW FBI TEXTS ARE BOMBSHELLS!"
posted by AwkwardPause at 6:24 AM on February 8, 2018


Perhaps this story from three days ago (Susan Glasser, Politico) is not unrelated:
By the summer of 2016, Victoria Nuland’s “Spidey sense” told her something was very wrong.

That spring, Nuland, the top State Department official charged with overseeing U.S. policy toward Russia, was one of those who had “first rung the alarm bell” inside the Obama administration, warning that Russia appeared to be trying to “discredit the democratic process” in the United States as part of a concerted 2016 strategy.
posted by pjenks at 6:25 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


"NEW FBI TEXTS ARE BOMBSHELLS!"

The FBI agents from the previous text non-scandal discussed Obama asking to be kept up to date with his daily intel briefings. You know like a competent leader.
posted by PenDevil at 6:30 AM on February 8, 2018 [26 favorites]


The FBI agents from the previous text non-scandal discussed Obama asking to be kept up to date with his daily intel briefings. You know like a competent leader.

And more specifically, he wanted to be kept up to date on the Russian election meddling. Fancy that!
posted by diogenes at 6:33 AM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


Chilling: ICE Wants to Be an Intelligence Agency Under Trump.
ICE Director Spouts Anti-Immigrant Trumpisms at San Antonio Border Conference.
Acting ICE director Thomas Homan is quickly becoming one of the most dangerous men in America.


Serious question: while I personally would like to completely disband ICE and actually prosecute whoever we can possibly prosecute, I also know that disbanding a rogue law enforcement agency is how you get armed guerilla rebellions or just armed, trained gangs.

So.

What the fuck do we do about ICE, assuming we get over this terrifying fascist hump?
posted by schadenfrau at 6:34 AM on February 8, 2018 [17 favorites]


As dumb as it sounds, I would say give them duties that actually help the nation, whatever that may be, and give them a raise to keep them from being butthurt that they don't get to hunt people anymore. Basically, try to do what you can to keep them off the streets and out of Eric Prince's hands.
posted by bootlegpop at 6:44 AM on February 8, 2018 [8 favorites]


The Hannities of the world are playing the clip of Obama saying "I will never interfere in active investigations, full stop" and screaming that THESE TEXTS ARE PROOF THAT OBAMA WAS CORRUPT AND PERSONALLY ORDERED HILLARY'S EMAIL FELONIES EXPUNGED AND ILLEGAL WIRETAPPING OF TRUMP instead of, y'know, wanting to know precisely what was going on with Russian manipulation of American elections three days before he warned Putin against electronic manipulation of American elections.

It's a wild concept, I know.
posted by delfin at 6:50 AM on February 8, 2018 [10 favorites]


MetaFilter: I do not find this gloss on current events to be witty or cute.
posted by Mental Wimp at 7:03 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


What the fuck do we do about ICE, assuming we get over this terrifying fascist hump?

I think that's a good question. It's probably more feasible to curb their power (at least right now) than outright disband them, or make them into another kind of more humanitarian outfit as bootlegpop said (though that would be a shiny pony!).

It would be an outright very bad sign, IMO, if there were lots of young men flocking to join ICE, but, at least as of 2017, they were having trouble hiring: More than 40% of CBP applicants failed to either schedule or show up for their entrance exams, which is only step two of the process.

The polygraph tests are also a sticking point. In 2010, CBP found that 60% of applicants who took a polygraph exam failed, according to congressional testimony by assistant commissioner James Tomsheck. Most flunked because they didn't disclose prior drug use or criminal history, he said, which knocks them out of the running.
If ICE starts lowering its requirements - waiving the drug use/criminal history requirements, that would be extremely ominous, so maybe keeping an eye open for reports that ICE is lowering/waiving requirements in order to fill ranks.

ICE can't do much without the cooperation of local law enforcement, so, I think the immediate practical thing that can be done about ICE now is turn as many local offices blue as we can. California is a sanctuary state, and cities like Denver and Seattle are sanctuary cities because of local Democratic power. Without local cooperation, ICE can't do nearly as much as it wants to.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 7:03 AM on February 8, 2018 [27 favorites]


What the fuck do we do about ICE, assuming we get over this terrifying fascist hump?

Hadn't that ship already sailed when soldiers with police duties in occupied Iraq / Afghanistan came home and started joining domestic security services?

How did America dodge this after Vietnam?
posted by Coventry at 7:05 AM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


The Hannities of the world...

I wish they would at least have the decency to make their propaganda and lies internally consistent. These 1+1=3 stories are particularly crazy making.
posted by diogenes at 7:05 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


How did America dodge this after Vietnam?

It didn't. Back then we just didn't have the media and pervasive citizen surveillance to cover every black person who had the shit beaten out of them by war weary cops.
posted by Talez at 7:07 AM on February 8, 2018 [8 favorites]


What the fuck do we do about ICE

The root of their issues seems to be largely that they have become de-facto race police. So a start would be to have a mandatory percentage of the membership drawn from the community/culture they are policing. (This is also just common sense).

That and making membership or association with members of white supremacist or other extremist orgs grounds for instant dismissal. (Ditto all LE agencies).
posted by Buntix at 7:07 AM on February 8, 2018 [23 favorites]


Hadn't that ship already sailed when soldiers with police duties in occupied Iraq / Afghanistan came home and started joining domestic security services?

If only.

Soldiers in Iraq were under more restrained rules of engagement than badged police officers in the US.

ICE's problem is the soldier wannabes, not the returning vets.
posted by ocschwar at 7:07 AM on February 8, 2018 [49 favorites]


twitter thread re: somebody at Montana DOL quitting because of ICE activity
posted by angrycat at 5:01 AM on February 8 [8 favorites −] Favorite added! [!]


I also want to point out angrycat's link above. The gentleman in the tweet is quitting his job at Department of Labor in Montana because he was asked to put together lists of names of undocumented immigrants. He is refusing to comply. This is also how we circumvent ICE. By ordinary Americans refusing to comply.
posted by Sophie1 at 7:08 AM on February 8, 2018 [83 favorites]


Honestly, the bigger problem is the various militia/prepper/etc movements full of law enforcement and military personnel, both active-duty and veteran who are just itching for blood in the name of thinly-veiled (if at all) bigotry. The Oathkeepers, for instance, set up webinars on how to create kill zones and engage in warfare in residential areas before the 2016 election, and they have no shortage of defenders and apologists.
posted by zombieflanders at 7:12 AM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


How did America dodge this after Vietnam?

There was a draft for Vietnam. ICE is a voluntary force composed of people who really want to hunt brown people. Not the same.

I think the larger point of purging — ugh, that word, but...it’s the right word — purging all law enforcement agencies of anyone with ties to hate groups, or with an established record of racism or violence while on the job...

I mean, yes, we should obviously do that, and we should prevent it from happening ever again. But I think that ends up with the same problem: a bunch of angry, armed, violent, racist, patriarchal men who think they’re entitled to supreme authority, and now they’re all unemployed at the same time.

I don’t know, is there an asteroid that needs mining or something?
posted by schadenfrau at 7:14 AM on February 8, 2018 [8 favorites]


Does Trump know about Nixon’s Palace Guard? They would be a lot cheaper and faster to implement than a big parade. Among other ceremonial occasions, they could line up when he boards and disembarks Air Force One, and stand guard during press briefings.
posted by cenoxo at 7:16 AM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


Not to belabor "the writers" topic, but I find it humorous in a wry way because we stopped watching House of Cards (before the Spacey ick became known) when reality started being so much more ridiculous. House of Cards was effective because everything on the show was scandalous in comparison to the scandal-free Obama years.

So yeah, "the writers" are really smoking something nowadays.
posted by Fleebnork at 7:16 AM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


I find "the writers" stuff annoying not for any principled reason but just because it's lame, unfunny, and played-out. Same goes for the "Ron Howard voice" stuff and calling Trump "Donnie Two Scoops", or "he who shall not be named", or whatever other kitschy nickname. It doesn't bring anything to the discussion. It's noise at best, and confusing to read at worst.
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 7:25 AM on February 8, 2018 [23 favorites]


In the "after a left Democratic victory" sense, one part of an ICE strategy would be attrition - let people leave or retire and don't replace, with an overall goal of a slow but substantial reduction in force. I don't know exactly what the churn is in ICE, but it's got to be 15% a year or so.

Another part would probably be to change what happens to people after they are detained - no more detention centers, full hearings with lawyers, etc etc. In fact, probably stopping actual detentions and just having a citation with a court date TBD. Slow the whole deportation process and provide more appeals and more hardship waivers. If you remove the thrill of throwing people in a detention center and abusing them, you won't attract people who think that's fun. if you say to people "you overstayed your visa, you have 12 calendar months to get your act together and leave" rather than "we are throwing you on a plane tomorrow", you're going to attract different people.

Also, change the name back to "Immigration and Naturalization". You know that trash people at every level of government think "ICE" sounds really badass, and that's why they picked that dumbshit acronym. I remember when it happened and it was as embarrassing as it was despair-inducing.

I mean, if this were me, I basically support open borders and think immigration stuff is bullshit, but if you don't have the political capital to get rid of it, you can slow the roll.
posted by Frowner at 7:28 AM on February 8, 2018 [18 favorites]


Mod note: Folks, in the absence of actual specific things happening to link to substantively maybe let's just drop the space-filling chatter about ICE hypotheticals and The Writers metacommentary.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:28 AM on February 8, 2018 [10 favorites]


I find "the writers" stuff annoying not for any principled reason but just because it's lame, unfunny, and played-out. Same goes for the "Ron Howard voice" stuff and calling Trump "Donnie Two Scoops", or "he who shall not be named", or whatever other kitschy nickname. It doesn't bring anything to the discussion. It's noise at best, and confusing to read at worst.

I don’t entirely disagree, but MeTa commentary and kvetching belong in MeTa.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 7:28 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


Greg Jaffe and Missy Ryan, WaPo: Trump’s favorite general: Can Mattis check an impulsive president and still retain his trust?
Throughout his 40-year career as a Marine, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis built a reputation as an aggressive warrior, leading a blitz on Baghdad and pushing a reluctant Obama administration to hit back against Iran.

Over the past year, he has learned to play a different role: acting as a check on an impulsive president.

The big question is how long Mattis can continue to act as a force for continuity and caution and still retain influence with a president impatient to hit back at America’s enemies and swiftly win wars.

These days, Mattis’s influence radiates across the government. In places such as Afghanistan and Somalia, he has been a force for stability, resisting the president’s instincts to withdraw. In Iran and North Korea, he has curbed Trump’s desire for a show of military strength.

One tense moment came last May as officials grew increasingly concerned about aggressive Iranian behavior.

For weeks, Mattis had been resisting requests from the White House to provide military options for Iran. Now Trump made clear that he wanted the Pentagon to deliver a range of plans that included striking Iranian ballistic missile factories or hitting Iranian speedboats that routinely harassed U.S. Navy vessels.

“Why can’t we sink them?” Trump would sometimes ask about the boats.

National security adviser H.R. McMaster and his staff laid out the president’s request for Mattis in a conference call, but the defense secretary refused, according to several U.S. officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal deliberations. At that point, McMaster took Mattis off speakerphone, cleared his staff from the room and continued the conversation.

“It was clear that the call was not going well,” one official said. In the weeks that followed, the options never arrived.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:29 AM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


I really admire the guy that quit rather than issue ICE the info they were using for subpoenas

People have asked why am I doing this if I have a child.

I’m doing this because I have a child.

I want to be able to look my child in eye
.


The rest of his tweets make total sense as well. If we all don't start doing our part every time, going above and beyond a la Anne Frank.... shit. Here we are.
posted by RolandOfEld at 7:30 AM on February 8, 2018 [69 favorites]


On the texts, not only was it Obama checking status of the Russian interference, it was two days before he met and confronted Putin about it. So logical preparation. As confirmed and reported by that liberal rag the Wall Street Journal.
posted by chris24 at 7:31 AM on February 8, 2018 [19 favorites]


I am adding this after the mod note because I think it is genuinely important to remember.

Regarding funny, kitschy, corny humor: one of the reasons ACT UP was so successful in the 80s and 90s was not just the artistic and outrageous, but that most of the time (like 90% of the time) we kept our senses of humor. We were DYING. Actively dropping like flies, but we kept our sense of humor. We made gallows humor a part of our resistance. We had to. It was the only thing keeping us going. I'm not encouraging the threads to get out of control AT ALL, but what I am trying to remind people is that we need to remember who we are in this and being entirely serious will get us all massively burnt out before we burn it all down.
posted by Sophie1 at 7:33 AM on February 8, 2018 [99 favorites]


The WaPo's Mattis article is worth reading, they also have one on Ben Carson showing how he's lost at HUD and the agency is waiting for leadership, instead they get this: Ben Carson, or the tale of the disappearing Cabinet secretary:
“There’s never been a time in the history of the world where a society became divided like this and did well,” Carson said as a crowd — including an off-duty New York Times reporter, D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser, a slew of representatives from housing nonprofit organizations and old friends from his presidential campaign — circled him. “And we don’t really have a reason to be fighting each other. There was a movie some years ago, a Will Smith movie called ‘Independence Day’ . . .”

With his soothing, story-time cadences and heavy-lidded gaze, Carson proceeded to hold forth on how Earth’s near-annihilation laid bare the superficiality of all the world’s strife. If only, he argued, people realized that the fate of humanity hung in the balance, then Palestinians and Jews, or even the United States and Russia, could be “like best friends.”
posted by peeedro at 7:33 AM on February 8, 2018 [19 favorites]


Olivia Victoria Gazis, CBS: House Intel Republicans plan to wall off their aides from Democratic staffers
In a sign of increasing partisan hostilities, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee plan to construct a wall – a physical partition – separating Republican and Democratic staff members in the committee's secure spaces, according to multiple committee sources. It's expected to happen this spring.

For now, some Republican committee members deny knowing anything about it, while strongly suggesting the division is the brainchild of the committee's chairman, Devin Nunes, R-California.

"I'm not part of that decision," said Rep. Mike Conaway, R-Texas. "You've got to talk to Devin. I don't know what they're trying to do one way or the other."

"I swear to God I didn't know that," said Rep. Tom Rooney, R-Florida, when asked about the plan. While acknowledging a wall might not be constructive for the committee's work, he said, "The level of trust and the level of everything down there is – it's poison. It's absolute poison down there."

Rooney said one reason for the tension is an erosion of trust, exacerbated by an ongoing ethics investigation into the "entire Republican staff," including "the woman up front that answers the phone" for alleged leaks. He later added that the matter was being handled by the Office of Congressional Ethics.

Bipartisanship, he said, "is gone. It's gone from that committee."
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:38 AM on February 8, 2018 [48 favorites]


I wish they would at least have the decency to make their propaganda and lies internally consistent. These 1+1=3 stories are particularly crazy making.

It is exhausting to listen to not only because Hannity is a broken record repeating the same accusations over and over again, but also because he skips from one "scandal" to the next in the same breath. The token liberal strawmen that he brings on the air to berate have no chance at responding with any kind of intellectual consistency because the moment they get a breath out of a rebuttal, he's off to a different-but-somehow-related-because-all-Dem-scandals-are-related angle.

The checklist goes: [ ] No evidence for Trump - Russia collusion exists [ ] Comey exonerated Hillary before even beginning the investigation [ ] Peter Strzok is behind everything [ ] The Steele Dossier has been completely debunked and is nothing but salacious lies [ ] Hillary must go to jail for deleting subpoenaed emails and destroying devices [ ] The Steele Dossier was the only evidence used to get the illegal FISA warrant [ ] Obama, Hillary, Comey, Lynch, Strzok, Page, the Ohrs, everyone at Fusion GPS are all culpable conspirators [ ] Mueller's investigation would not have taken place without all this illegal fishing leading up to it and there's nothing for him to find anyway [ ] This is proof of Hillary colluding with the Russians by buying and paying for their election-influencing propaganda and lies [ ] Using BleachBit and AcidWash to clean the email server hard drives was a criminal act [ ] Institutional bias and sheer hatred of President Trump and all he represents [ ] Rosenstein should be fired immediately and it's criminal that Sessions refuses to act [ ] Hillary knowingly deleted evidence of foreign entities hacking her server and obtaining top secret, classified, special access information [ ] It's all an attempted coup [ ] Tune in tonight/tomorrow for more evidence of Democratic corruption that will SHOCK THE CONSCIENCE!

Seriously. Tune in sometime and watch his narrative bounce like a superball. But this is the GOP media method in a nutshell; flood the airwaves with obvious and compelling and overwhelming Dem corruption but spread it out so that you don't stop to think too long about any individual piece.
posted by delfin at 7:38 AM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


From the "ICE Director Spouts Anti-Immigrant Trumpisms" article linked above:

"It irritates me that a politician who’s never carried a badge and a gun who doesn’t understand what we do everyday makes a decision of putting their own political career above the health and safety of our law enforcement officers," Homan said Wednesday. "Shame!"

I hear you, Mr. Homan, I hear you. Since we're talking about our feelings, may I take a turn?

It irritates the SHIT out of me that the director of an organization that's champing at the bit to become our nation's version of the brownshirts frames the issue of immigration as one best addressed by people who carry badges and guns. Shame!
posted by Rykey at 7:40 AM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


In a sign of increasing partisan hostilities, Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee plan to construct a wall – a physical partition – separating Republican and Democratic staff members in the committee's secure spaces, according to multiple committee sources. It's expected to happen this spring.

Stealing this from the SA Trump thread because I love it:

haveblue: Democrats should demand that the wall be 30 feet high and transparent. What if someone tries to throw a bag of subpoenas over it?
posted by delfin at 7:47 AM on February 8, 2018 [33 favorites]


Democrats expand battleground, target 101 GOP seats (Alex Seitz-Wald | NBC News)
House Democrats are stepping on the gas, with plans to target over 100 Republican-held congressional districts in the November midterm elections.

At House Democrats' annual conference Thursday, Rep. Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, is expected to tell colleagues the committee is expanding the battleground to include 101 Republicans — the largest in a decade, a Democratic source familiar with the matter told NBC News.

The seven new targets push Democrats even deeper into Republican territory in South Carolina, Wisconsin and Texas. And they include the Ohio seat held by the man charged with defending the GOP's majority, National Republican Congressional Committee Chair Rep. Steve Stivers, R-Ohio. (Republicans are also targeting Lujan.)

The DCCC's own polling of key districts has been more promising than national trends, showing President Donald Trump underwater not just in the 23 GOP-held districts Clinton won, but also in the more than 60 districts Trump won, and the 11 where retirements have left the seat open.

Democrats are now fielding candidates in all but 12 of the 238 districts held by Republicans, according to Lujan, including in places like Alabama, where Democrats are competing in every single district for the first time in years The idea is to expand the map as much as possible and hope to ride the potential wave.

"They should do some reevaluating," Lujan said of Republicans.

Other new DCCC targets include South Carolina’s 5th Congressional District, where Democrat Archie Parnell outperformed expectations in a special election last year and is running again; New Jersey’s 4th Congressional District, represented by veteran GOP Rep. Chris Smith; Wisconsin’s 7th Congressional District, held by Rep. Sean Duffy; and Maryland’s 1st Congressional District, which includes the state’s conservative Eastern Shore, where Democrats had planned to have their retreat.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 7:54 AM on February 8, 2018 [31 favorites]


With his soothing, story-time cadences and heavy-lidded gaze, Carson proceeded to hold forth on how Earth’s near-annihilation laid bare the superficiality of all the world’s strife. If only, he argued, people realized that the fate of humanity hung in the balance, then Palestinians and Jews, or even the United States and Russia, could be “like best friends.”

What's left of us all after the radioactive dust settles, sure.

The primary concern that sane people should have with armagedon fetishists is that the latter group will spark an apocalypse to try and prove their beliefs.
posted by zarq at 7:59 AM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


Josh Robin, WaPo: The United States and South Korea now openly disagree on North Korea
Speaking before his bilateral meeting with Vice President Pence on Thursday, South Korean President Moon Jae-in stated his clear desire for the upcoming meetings between South and North Korean officials to serve as a path to real negotiations over Pyongyang’s nuclear program and ultimately a deal to end the tensions that have roiled the Korean peninsula for decades.

“We certainly hope to utilize this opportunity to the maximum so that the Pyeongchang Winter Olympic Games can become a venue that leads to dialogue for the denuclearization of the Korean peninsula as well as to establishing peace on the Korean peninsula,” Moon said.

Pence, speaking after Moon, said nothing about the senior-level North-South interactions scheduled for Friday in Pyeongchang. Rather, the vice president reiterated his desire to continue the American-led campaign of “maximum pressure” on the Kim Jong Un regime.

A readout of the meeting provided by Pence’s staff also mentioned nothing about North Korea dialogue. “The two leaders discussed the importance of intensifying the global maximum pressure campaign on North Korea until it abandons its nuclear and ballistic missile programs once and for all,” the readout said. […]

Inside the Trump administration, there’s another policy break. The White House message is consistent: Now is not the time for engagement with Pyongyang, and the North Korean charm offensive cannot be allowed to succeed. Pence and President Trump have spoken several times during his Asia trip.

Meanwhile, the State Department has been trying to find an opening for dialogue, and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has repeatedly contradicted the White House by saying that talks with Pyongyang can begin anytime with no preconditions. Ambassador Joseph Yun, who has been leading that effort, was also in Seoul this week.
Fine. Tuned. Machine.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 8:02 AM on February 8, 2018 [16 favorites]


Cook Political out with new ratings, moves 21 seats towards the Democrats:

AR-02: Hill (R) Solid R => Likely R
CA-04: McClintock (R) Solid R => Likely R
CA-10: Denham (R) Lean R => Toss Up
FL-07: Murphy (D) Lean D => Likely D
FL-16: Buchanan (R) Solid R => Likely R
FL-18: Mast (R) Likely R => Lean R
IL-12: Bost (R) Lean R => Toss Up
IN-02: Walorski (R) Solid R => Likely R
MI-06: Upton (R) Solid R => Likely R
MN-03: Paulsen (R) Lean R => Toss Up
MO-02: Wagner (R) Solid R => Likely R
NC-13: Budd (R) Likely R => Lean R
NH-01: OPEN (Shea-Porter) (D) => Toss Up Lean D
NJ-02: OPEN (LoBiondo) (R) => Toss Up Lean D
NY-11: Donovan (R) Likely R => Lean R
NY-22: Tenney (R) Lean R => Toss Up
OR-05: Schrader (D) Likely D => Solid D
PA-07: OPEN (Meehan) (R) Toss Up => Lean D
TX-21: OPEN (Smith) (R) Solid R => Likely R
VA-02: Taylor (R) Likely R => Lean R
VA-07: Brat (R) Likely R => Lean R
posted by Chrysostom at 8:05 AM on February 8, 2018 [44 favorites]


Tracking Shows Russian Meddling Efforts Evolving Ahead Of 2018 Midterms (NPR, Feb. 8, 2018)
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson sounded an alarm this week: The Russians are already meddling in the 2018 midterm elections.

"The point is that if their intention is to interfere, they're going to find ways to do that," Tillerson told Fox News. "I think it's important we just continue to say to Russia, look, you think we don't see what you're doing. We do see it, and you need to stop."
But Big Daddy Trump has that covered, we don't need more sanctions Congress, but thanks for trying. Back to NPR:
A new poll shows that a clear majority of Americans believe Russia will try to meddle in the next U.S. election. But Tillerson also noted that Russia's tactics for interfering in U.S. politics are constantly changing. A bipartisan effort is shedding new light on how Russian methods evolve.
Except the poll shows that Republicans aren't buying it, with 64% saying it's not likely that Russia will attempt the 2018 midterm elections, versus 34% who say it is likely.

More on the Russian bots:
There has also been a massive increase in the amount of chatter that promotes mistrust of American institutions, especially the idea of an American "deep state," the idea that there is a conspiracy of government officials working to undercut the president.

The deep state narrative was the focus of between five to ten percent of the weekly content on the Russia-linked influence network in October, when Hamilton 68 began its tracking. Last week, it represented 38 percent of the articles linked to by those accounts.

"That's gone from being a sort-of ripple beneath the surface, to now that's risen up to where it's typically the top thing we're seeing week-to-week," said Bret Schafer, the analyst for the project who updates the dashboard each day.
I'd like to see a poll of who's falling for this Deep State story now. Last April, there was a poll (CNN, autoplaying video) that showed an aggregated 48% believed that there is a Deep State in the U.S., but I didn't see any party breakdown.

Meanwhile, there's a Big Russian delegation anticipated for prayer breakfast in Washington, with Trump, today (Lister, Mary Ilyushina and Frederik Pleitgen for CNN, Feb. 8, 2018 - note: autoplaying video is an unrelated clip on Russian TV support for the Nunes memo, supporting Trump's belief that there's a conspiracy against him)
President Donald Trump will attend the National Prayer Breakfast Thursday, a prime networking opportunity for Beltway insiders. But this year's event is also an opportunity for dozens of Russians. As many as 60 representatives from Russia's religious and political elite are expected to attend, more than three times last year's number, according to Russian officials.
This is fine.
posted by filthy light thief at 8:07 AM on February 8, 2018 [28 favorites]


There are many senses that people use the word "love". When I say I love America, I'm not talking about admiring America (although we shouldn't pretend there is nothing admirable about America). When I say I love America, I'm not even talking about liking America. I'm talking about a sort of dedication or duty to helping America become what it could be.

I love America like I love my kids. I support them like crazy, but I've also got higher expectations for them, and hold them to a higher standard. I work hard to help them get better, and to meet the better version of themselves that I know that they can be. I'll always love them, but if they do something wrong, or worse cruel, I am deeply deeply disappointed in them.

But I will never ever give up on them.
posted by leotrotsky at 8:07 AM on February 8, 2018 [43 favorites]


New Sabato Senate ratings, two races move towards Ds:

Smith [D-MN] Leans Dem => Likely Dem
Kaine [D-VA] Likely Dem => Safe Dem
posted by Chrysostom at 8:09 AM on February 8, 2018 [12 favorites]


“America’s their home,” the 43rd American president said.

Trump is so awful that he makes me miss Bush. And that is not something I could have ever predicted.
posted by Jacqueline at 8:15 AM on February 8, 2018 [39 favorites]


Kaine [D-VA] Likely Dem => Safe Dem

Since the early challenger talk is from folks who are batshit crazy a la Corey Stewart this seems likely accurate, particularly if we see a repeat of the Governor's race where the batshit loses by a narrow margin and the winner picks up the nutter banner, further energizing the left opposition.
posted by phearlez at 8:30 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


It looks like the VA GOP candidate will either be Corey Stewart or equally nutball E.W. Jackson, who got destroyed in the 2013 LG race.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:38 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


Talking about Battlefields;
US-led coalition in Syria attacks pro-Assad fighters, 100 dead.
posted by adamvasco at 8:42 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


"It looks like the VA GOP candidate will either be Corey Stewart or equally nutball E.W. Jackson, who got destroyed in the 2013 LG race."

The presumptive LP nominee for VA Senate is a conspiracy theorist whackadoodle (sigh) and is running on issues that should pull more votes from the right than from the left. So we're helping lol.
posted by Jacqueline at 8:46 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


I love America like I love my kids. I support them like crazy, but I've also got higher expectations for them, and hold them to a higher standard. I work hard to help them get better, and to meet the better version of themselves that I know that they can be. I'll always love them, but if they do something wrong, or worse cruel, I am deeply deeply disappointed in them.

But I will never ever give up on them.


But...there might be a point that there's just nothing I can do anymore. When America is so drunk on it's own bullshit and continues to spiral down a path that everyone around it can see leads to dying in a gutter, but it refuses to admit it has a problem. I'm not saying I'd give up on it, I'm just saying that there may be a point where there's nothing left for a rational person to do to save it. We aren't there yet, but I'm really close to saying, "Look. I love you, but I don't like you when you are this way. Get your ass into some sort of program, lay off the hate crack pipe, put down the bottle of greed, and stop acting like a hateful moron or we are done." I mean, intellectually, I know that tough love rarely works, but if there's a second Trump term, I've got to put on my air mask and then I'll try to save the kid. If it can even be saved.
posted by teleri025 at 8:47 AM on February 8, 2018 [8 favorites]


> Trump is so awful that he makes me miss Bush. And that is not something I could have ever predicted.

Same here. And I really resent that.

I was a grad student with only a vague awareness of US politics when the Bill Clinton impeachment came along, and I was hooked. Then the Florida recount and Bush v Gore ("not a precedent") left me rabid and frothing at the mouth. I hated W, shared my share of Idiot memes, had the "Bushisms" calendar. The Iraq war and Katrina left me heartbroken and furious and relieved to move to Australia.

To have that Bush - that war criminal - now appear like a sane rational elder statesman in comparison... Wow.
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:48 AM on February 8, 2018 [36 favorites]


I continue to continue to be amazed at nodding along in agreement with Bush.

>>>Trump is so awful that he makes me miss Bush. And that is not something I could have ever predicted.


I understand and agree, but it is important to remember that Dubz & Co successfully trashed the future of America for the rest of our natural lives and those of everyone we hold dear.

9/11 was a pivotal time that went south immediately due to their premeditated evil going unchecked. Yeah, yeah, by Hillary too. And Obama looked forward not back, it's true.

But just because the current puppet dictator can't remember who he had lunch with yesterday doesn't mean Cheney et. al. should be pardoned for war crimes and treason. Gee-Dubz's bumbling frat boy act ain't gonna get it.
posted by petebest at 8:49 AM on February 8, 2018 [37 favorites]


So CNN had actual Illinois Nazi and GOP congressional candidate Arthur Jones on for an interview because a racist shouting for five minutes makes for good tv. CNN Decides Giving a Nazi a National TV Platform Is a Great Idea:
Anchor Alisyn Camerota gamely hammered Jones—a former leader of the American Nazi Party—over his overt anti-Semitism, Holocaust denial, and assorted crackpot theories.“Your website is filled with the most vile, rancid rhetoric I think I’ve ever read,” Camerota exclaimed at one point. “It’s one man, myself, that’s standing for the truth,” Jones shot back. He also ranted about Jews a lot.

But by the end of the segment, all that viewers had learned that a Nazi was indeed a Nazi. And now, thanks to CNN, this Nazi got to shout racist shit into millions of homes. Nice work.
Why is CNN inviting Nazis on its shows?
What did we learn from this enlightening exchange? Not much, unless you weren’t quite sure that the leader of the American Nazi Party is, well, a Nazi.

Journalists covering the extreme right have to walk a careful line. Their activities are newsworthy, but they shouldn’t simply be handed a megaphone to spread hate. Though Camerota challenged Jones, the entire segment has the feel of performance, designed to make Camerota look like a hard-hitting journalist. There are several ways to cover Jones’s candidacy, and this is just about the stupidest one.
posted by peeedro at 8:58 AM on February 8, 2018 [39 favorites]


Joe Kennedy: "Biden would have beaten Trump"

Beyond the usual manifestation of patriarchy, I think there's a subtle message to the Democratic base here. I've said it's going to be another three decades before a women will get a Democratic nomination for president, and this is confirmation.

The fact that the up and coming star of the Democrats supports an elderly two-time loser, well that's a message to women pols: go ahead and run, but don't be too ambitious. " It also gives us an idea of what to expect for the nominee in 2018.


"I think of misogyny and sexism as working hand-in-hand to uphold those social relations. Sexism is an ideology that says, “These arrangements just make sense. Women are just more caring, or nurturing, or empathetic,” which is only true if you prime people by getting them to identify with their gender.

So, sexism is the ideology that supports patriarchal social relations, but misogyny enforces it when there’s a threat of that system going away." Kate Manne discussing her book Down Girl The Logic of Misogyny

Joe Kennedy (D MA 4th District) is a misogynistic enforcer. (scribbles note to self to never vote for him)
posted by jointhedance at 9:07 AM on February 8, 2018 [21 favorites]


Though Camerota challenged Jones, the entire segment has the feel of performance, designed to make Camerota look like a hard-hitting journalist.

The segment is primarily an ancient Nazi shouting Nazism with Camerota trying to get a word in edgewise to gently scold him for being a Nazi. Mostly she fails to do so, and most of the audible dialogue is his message. The product that makes it to a channel-flipping viewer is substantively no different than if CNN had given a few minutes of free airtime to the Daily Stormer. Heckuva job, CNN.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:12 AM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


There's another rising young congressman in Mass., not named Kennedy.
posted by adamg at 9:13 AM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


Omarosa dishes/playacts about her time in the White House on Celebrity Big Brother, proving again that we need to schedule a well-care visit with the writers of 2018 and maybe see what empty bottles are in their recycling.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:16 AM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


Since the early challenger talk is from folks who are batshit crazy a la Corey Stewart this seems likely accurate, particularly if we see a repeat of the Governor's race where the batshit loses by a narrow margin and the winner picks up the nutter banner, further energizing the left opposition.

Which one is the batshit candidate between Corey Stewart and EW Jackson? The only other declared candidate is a no name libertarian state rep, and all the main brand names have pretty much bowed out already.

Also since Kaine doesn’t look like he’s going to have a primary challenger...which insane nutbag should I vote for him to face in my first ever Republican primary?
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:16 AM on February 8, 2018


"which insane nutbag should I vote for him to face in my first ever Republican primary?"

NOT Corey Stewart, please. He might be easy for Kaine to beat but his candidacies just encourage the white supremacists. :(
posted by Jacqueline at 9:20 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


Also since Kaine doesn’t look like he’s going to have a primary challenger...

It's time for you to start collecting those signatures, candidate.
posted by Faint of Butt at 9:23 AM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


The Coming Democratic Wave May Be Smaller Than Expected
It’s hard to generalize short-term polling trends, if only because the leading aggregators (FiveThirtyEight and RealClearPolitics are the two I regularly consult) don’t necessarily use the same polls. But it’s now quite clear that the numbers have moved pretty strongly in the GOP’s direction since Christmas.

FiveThirtyEight’s polling averages gave Democrats a 12.8 percent advantage (50.1/37.3) on December 24. Today it’s down to 6.5 percent (46.7/40.2). RealClearPolitics had Democrats up by 13 points on December 24 (49.1/36.1). Now it’s a 6 point advantage (44.4/38.4). So we are talking generally about that “wave” that looked so apparent at the end of 2016 being roughly halved.
...
So are Democratic dreams of a big midterm sure to be dashed? Of course not. Aside from the great distance at which we stand from the 2018 general election, there are counter-indicators of any pro-GOP trend, most recently in yesterday’s special state legislative elections in Missouri. As New York’s Eric Levitz argues, polls may be missing an especially intense Democratic determination to vote that make existing turnout models obsolete.
posted by kirkaracha at 9:25 AM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


Nicole Lafond, TPM: Report: House Intel GOP Plans To Build Wall To Separate Dem And GOP Staffers

Is that sound of the entire Onion staff quitting?
posted by Mental Wimp at 9:29 AM on February 8, 2018 [52 favorites]


"polls may be missing an especially intense Dem byocratic determination to vote that make existing turnout models obsolete."

If y'all could just GOTV as consistently as the Rs do, it would be over for the GOP. Please keep doing whatever y'all did in Virginia last year because that was amazing.
posted by Jacqueline at 9:31 AM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


Remember this guy?
One of the most thoroughgoing unpunished scandals of the second Bush Administration was its unconscionable politicization of the Department of Justice—an unprecedented malfeasance in office unmatched until this present bunch came to Washington. The most famous consequence of what the Bush DOJ did was the firing for political reasons of a number of U.S. Attorneys, at least partly because they declined to investigate phony claims of “voter fraud.”
[...]
One of the people involved in the rigged screening process—and, therefore, one of the people Fine wished would be permanently disqualified from any federal employment—was a lawyer named Howard Nielson. Nielson did, in fact, vanish from the scene for a bit, but he later surfaced as one of the lawyers defending California’s Proposition 8, the law that would have eliminated the right of same-sex couples to marry in that state.

One of Nielson’s arguments in appellate court was that the original federal district judge who’d struck down the law should be reversed because he was gay and might want to get married one day.
[...]
There are, of course, more reasons why putting this jamoke on the federal bench is a dubious proposition, and the Alliance For Justice has a nice list of them, of which this is the most disturbing.
On yet another front, the use of torture, Nielson appears inclined to reinforce the worst impulses of President Trump. Trump has questioned the Geneva Conventions and supported waterboarding, saying, “The problem is we have the Geneva Conventions, all sorts of rules and regulations, so the soldiers are afraid to fight.” He has said he wants to “bring back a hell of a lot worse than waterboarding.” Significantly, Nielson worked in the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) in the George W. Bush Administration when the notorious “torture memos” were issued. He defended them. In addition, he authored a memorandum that gutted protections for persons in custody under the Geneva Conventions, a memorandum one expert said was based on such “erroneous legal reasoning and conclusions” that it should be “add[ed] . . . to the Legal Scrapheap.”
Guess which useless fucksticks from the Oh-So-Brave NeverTrumpers Who Make Very Concerned Noises A Lot Caucus just voted to advance his nomination and therefore confirmation to a lifetime federal judgeship?

If you said "Jeff Flake and Ben Sasse" then come on down and collect your prize!
posted by zombieflanders at 9:34 AM on February 8, 2018 [36 favorites]


Omarosa dishes/playacts about her time in the White House on Celebrity Big Brother

Did somebody forget to bow down?
Every critic, every detractor will have to bow down to President Trump. It’s everyone who’s ever doubted Donald, who ever disagreed, who ever challenged him. It is the ultimate revenge to become the most powerful man in the universe.
Bye, Felicia.
posted by kirkaracha at 9:44 AM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


Re: Guy who quit his job at DOL. Do we have any verification that any of this is true, and not a security blanket story for lefties who will give him attention and money? Maybe I'm just a cynic, but I don't believe a word of this guy's story. I think it's a troll.

Re: Quincy Jones article. Wow. I want to sit down for a drink with that man, and just let him talk.

Re: Federal judges, unqualified, I'm beginning to worry that we're not going to be able to fix this mess without a reboot of the entire system.
posted by SecretAgentSockpuppet at 9:47 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


Mod note: A few things deleted. There is a venting thread on the grey where a lot of soul-searching or metacommentary stuff could go that we need to not just keep doing over and over again in the catch-all threads. Or if you have something that is a MetaFilter community issue (and not just a general world/politics issue that applies to MeFites only insofar as they are people who live in the world and its politics) you could consider a dedicated MeTa. But having an nth argument in here about whether and how people are existing/resisting/participating correctly or incorrectly in the face of All This Shit is not gonna be helpful.
posted by cortex (staff) at 10:20 AM on February 8, 2018 [37 favorites]


Re: Guy who quit his job at DOL. Do we have any verification that any of this is true, and not a security blanket story for lefties who will give him attention and money? Maybe I'm just a cynic, but I don't believe a word of this guy's story. I think it's a troll.

A quick Google search turns up his bona fides at the Montana Department of Labor. He's taking PayPal donations, but his Twitter history looks like it belongs to someone who's been legitimately angered about Trump for a while than a scam artist preparing a long con.
posted by Doktor Zed at 10:23 AM on February 8, 2018 [20 favorites]


Senate Budget Deal Would Give A Boost To Health Programs (Julie Rovner and Shefali Luthra for NPR, February 8, 2018)
The deal does appear to include almost every other health priority Democrats have been pushing the past several months, including two years of renewed funding for community health centers and a series of other health programs Congress failed to provide for before they technically expired last year.

"I believe we have reached a budget deal that neither side loves but both sides can be proud of," said Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., on the Senate floor. "That's compromise. That's governing."

McConnell said, "This bill represents a significant bipartisan step forward."

Senate leaders are still negotiating details of the accord, including the size of a cut to the Prevention and Public Health Fund [which covers 16 activities or programs, ranging from Alzheimer's Disease Prevention Education and Outreach to Hospitals Promoting Breastfeeding, and totaled $931 million], which would help offset the costs of this legislation.

According to documents circulating on Capitol Hill, the deal includes $6 billion in funding for treatment of mental health issues and opioid addiction, $2 billion in extra funding for the National Institutes of Health, and an additional four-year extension of the Children's Health Insurance Program, which builds on the six years approved by Congress last month.

In the Medicare program, the deal would accelerate the closing of the "doughnut hole" in Medicare drug coverage that requires seniors to pay thousands of dollars out-of-pocket before catastrophic coverage kicks in. It would also repeal the controversial Medicare Independent Payment Advisory Board, which is charged with holding down Medicare spending for the federal government if it exceeds a certain level.

Members have never been appointed to the IPAB, however, and its use hasn't so far been triggered by Medicare spending. Both the closure of the doughnut hole and creation of the IPAB were part of the Affordable Care Act.
...
Lawmakers would also forestall cuts mandated by the ACA to reduce the payments made to what are called Disproportionate Share Hospitals, which serve high rates of low-income patients. Those cuts have been delayed continuously since the law's 2010 passage.
This looks more like broad gains with some losses to "balance" the overall impact, which doesn't sound like Schumer and the Dems folding, but rather bargaining, and that'll mean some losses. Yes, we're starting from a losing position because the Tax Scam means we "have to make cuts" to "balance the budget."
posted by filthy light thief at 10:53 AM on February 8, 2018 [10 favorites]


> the Tax Scam means we "have to make cuts" to "balance the budget."

Is there a German word for "predictable flames of rage down the side of my face, because something that I knew with certainty was going to come has in fact now arrived, and is making me just as angry as I predicted it would"?
posted by RedOrGreen at 11:08 AM on February 8, 2018 [10 favorites]


This looks more like broad gains with some losses to "balance" the overall impact, which doesn't sound like Schumer and the Dems folding, but rather bargaining, and that'll mean some losses. Yes, we're starting from a losing position because the Tax Scam means we "have to make cuts" to "balance the budget."

If this was in a vacuum it'd certainly be a victory. The problem is that it removes all leverage that the Democrats have to force something to happen on the Dream Act and effectively throws the DACA kids under the bus.
posted by Talez at 11:09 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


Bush was a terrible, terrible president, who had no business holding that office and who did tremendous harm to the country over the eight years he was there. He was such a bad president that he managed to make his father, and even to some extent Ronald Reagan, look good by comparison.

Bush was a tremendous statesman by comparison to Trump, because as much harm as he did, he at least had some good qualities. He kept a good relationship with Mexico, and was relatively friendly towards Latino/a immigrants. He was very firm about making a distinction between jihadi terrorism on the one hand and Islam, a religion of peace, on the other, in his rhetoric at least, even if his policies and actions often showed less regard for Muslim lives than for Christians. He (or at least his puppeteers Cheney and Rumsfeld) seized 9/11 as an opportunity to invade Iraq for profiteering purposes, and used absurd, inflammatory rhetoric like the "axis of evil" speech which destroyed the possibility of diplomatic solutions to international problems, but he never made us live in fear that he would start wars without regard for consequences simply in response to real or perceived personal slights.

The bar of comparison that Trump has set is now so pathetically low that even George W. Bush soars like an eagle over it.

Now imagine what the next Republican president will do that makes Trump look good by comparison.
posted by biogeo at 11:10 AM on February 8, 2018 [41 favorites]


he at least had some good qualities

PEPFAR was an amazing accomplishment and though it had faults and I will always think of Bush Jr. as a war criminal, this was a major point for him and changed the HIV epidemic worldwide.
posted by Sophie1 at 11:15 AM on February 8, 2018 [18 favorites]


> PEPFAR was an amazing accomplishment

PEPFAR and the post-9/11 "We are not at war with Islam" are two legitimately statesmanlike things that I give W. credit for. Even in a sea of greed, incompetence ("Heckuva job!"), malapropisms, and outright criminality, those are two good things. (And with that I'll stop on the Bush nostalgia tour.)
posted by RedOrGreen at 11:19 AM on February 8, 2018 [14 favorites]


Re: Big Russian delegation anticipated for prayer breakfast in Washington -- that was this morning, where At Prayer Breakfast, Trump Says Faith Central To American Life
President Trump praised God and country Thursday, calling the U.S. "a nation of believers" and saying faith is central to "American life and to liberty."

The president spoke at the National Prayer Breakfast, an annual gathering of faith and political leaders. Sticking largely to his script, Trump said that he came to "praise God, for how truly blessed we are to be American."

Trump said the nations' founders "invoked our creator four times in the Declaration of Independence," and that "our currency declares 'In God We Trust.'"
...
Calling America "a tireless force for justice and peace," Trump said the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS has liberated almost all of the territory recently held "by these killers" in Iraq and Syria. "We will never rest until that job is "completely done," Trump said, adding "and we are really doing it like never before."

He said America stands "with all people suffering oppression and religious persecution" naming Iran, Cuba, Venezuela and North Korea.

Evangelical Christians, who made up a large part of Thursdays' audience, are a key part of Trump's base of support, many of whom have said they are able to overlook the president's three marriages and sometimes crude sexual boasting as he has promoted policies and judges who support their agenda.
The motto IN GOD WE TRUST was placed on United States coins largely because of the increased religious sentiment existing during the Civil War, and way back in the beginning of this great nation, its founding fathers were against forming a Christian nation, having some strong words to those ideas.

Missing from NPR's coverage, he also said "we place our hands on our hearts as we recite the Pledge of Allegiance and proclaim that we are 'One Nation Under God," except that was also a later addition, back in the 1950s.

On the up side, he actually mentioned other religions when talking about ISIS -- "For years, ISIS had brutally tortured and murdered Christians, Jews, religious minorities, and countless Muslims."

But what is missing from many stories, besides calling him out for his revisionist history of this country's connection with religion, is the fact that More than 50 people from Russia’s religious and political elite are attending the National Prayer Breakfast along with President Donald Trump on Thursday, according to organizers. The number is three times higher than last year’s quota of Russians to attend the high-profile event. And that association with evangelicals wasn't so odd, given How US Evangelicals Helped Create Russia’s Anti-Gay Movement (Mother Jones, Feb. 2014).
posted by filthy light thief at 11:19 AM on February 8, 2018 [25 favorites]


...many of whom have said they are able to overlook the president's three marriages and sometimes crude sexual boasting...

And nearly two dozen women who accuse him of actual sexual assault. Please, reporters, do not bury this fact.
posted by Mental Wimp at 11:24 AM on February 8, 2018 [57 favorites]


Whip notice for House Democrats.

Nancy Pelosi, unlike Schumer, knows exactly what's going on and the Republicans aren't stalling because they want good faith gestures from Democrats before they'll engage in good faith negotiations over DACA. She knows this whole thing is a fucking sham.

The House Freedom Caucus are 100% out on this Senate budget deal so they need 11 D votes to pass it. Hopefully she can keep the House Democrats in line because Schumer appears to have managed to insert his entire head into his asshole.
posted by Talez at 11:30 AM on February 8, 2018 [26 favorites]


As an agnostic and First Amendment supporter, I'm not comfortable with a National Prayer Breakfast, particularly since it's sponsored by a Christian organization with an explicitly Hitlerrific leadership model:
Hitler, Goebbels and Himmler were three men. Think of the immense power these three men had... But they bound themselves together in an agreement... Jesus said, 'You have to put me before other people. And you have to put me before yourself.' Hitler, that was the demand to be in the Nazi party. You have to put the Nazi party and its objectives ahead of your own life and ahead of other people.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:34 AM on February 8, 2018 [14 favorites]


The Senate is unfixable.

>>Literally! It can't even be fixed by Constitutional Amendment.

>>I suppose it's more accurate to say the two senators even if your state has only two people in it part of the Senate can't be fixed. The Senate could be rendered into a vestigial body like the House of Lords I guess... still containing 2 Senators per state.


I'm not sure what you mean by that. You could absolutely fix the senate with a constitutional amendment. We've already amended the Constitution to allow direct election of senators, but there's no theoretical limit to what an amendment can do. We could dissolve the Senate and transfer its powers and responsibilities to the House if we wanted. The problem is any amendment needs to be ratified by three-quarters of the states, and anything that messes with the senate or the electoral college is going to be opposed by all the low-population red states, as it will give them less power. We had a chance to get this right during the Civil War, or in its immediate aftermath, but we didn't take it. Now it's hard to imagine what it would take to get 3/4 of states on board. The founders didn't anticipate our current situation where so many rural states deeply enmeshed with one political party could radically alter the healthy functioning of our government, and it's going to be the fatal flaw in the constitution that kills democracy in America. The rural states have too much power in the Senate and too much power in electing the president, and you can't diminish that power without their consent. We're stuck.

Well--mainly stuck. One thing that would help with the electoral college is drastically increasing the number of representatives. The constitution says there is at least one per state and no more than one for every 30,000 people. Other than that, the number is determine by law. If Democrats ever hold the House and Senate again, the first thing I'd do is pass a law setting the number of representatives at the maximum. 1 for every 30,000 people. That would give us just over 10,000 Representatives. That might seem unwieldy, but we would be a boon for democracy in several ways. For one, the House would be much more diverse. I wouldn't think of running now--it's too expensive and I'd have to travel all over to cover my district. But in small districts with 30,000 people, suddenly you'd have a lot of folks willing to give it a shot. You could campaign without endless fundraisers or bankrupting yourself. It would be nearly impossible to gerrymander so many districts. The outcomes would be much more in line with the voters' wishes. Texas would have 966 congressional districts. Try rigging that. And it would pretty much fix the electoral college. Wyoming with have two senators, but they'll also have 19 representatives. Their influence will be basically in line with the population.

So, yeah, running committees and taking votes and doing debates with 10,000 representatives will be a challenge. But it makes running for Congress much more accessible, severely dilutes the endless fundraising, makes representatives much more accessible and responsive to their constituents, ends gerrymandering and fixes the electoral college.

Please join me in my 1:30k in campaign. It's worth it.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 11:37 AM on February 8, 2018 [61 favorites]


Pelosi's letter to House Democrats.
However, we cannot allow our success in one part of the discussion to diminish our leverage in another.
And there it is. All we need is for House Democrats to have a spine...
posted by Talez at 11:40 AM on February 8, 2018 [22 favorites]


You could absolutely fix the senate with a constitutional amendment.

Except for that pesky little "no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate" in Article V, sure.
posted by Talez at 11:41 AM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


You could absolutely fix the senate with a constitutional amendment.

Except for that pesky little "no State, without its Consent, shall be deprived of its equal Suffrage in the Senate" in Article V, sure.
posted by Talez at 11:41 AM on February 8 [+] [!]


Is there some hidden reason why that couldn't be amended?
posted by Mental Wimp at 11:44 AM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


The Apportionment Act of 1911 and the Reapportionment Act of 1929 set the number of members of Representatives at 435. Good backgrounder.

Please join me in my 1:30k in campaign. It's worth it.

You're not alone.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:47 AM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


Mod note: String of comments removed. Somebody wants to link to a nice definitive writeup on the question of constitutional amendments to the structure of the Senate, go for it, but lets skip this nuh-uh, yuh-huh thing.
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:02 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


There are many modest proposals to fix the Senate, some more modest than others, but the ones I like the best involve splitting larger states into multiple smaller states.

Something like, "No state shall have more residents than a multiple M of the lowest state population, and if it does, it will split into two or more states of its own choosing such that each state has at least a multiple N of the lowest state population." Start with M=20, N=5, and Wyoming for reference, and off we go: Cascadia, Pacifica, Empire State...

But really, just statehood for DC and Puerto Rico would be enough to start with.
posted by RedOrGreen at 12:03 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


A History of the Seventeenth Amendment.
From the Cleveland State Law Review on matters Senat-ish and amendment-ish, historically.
posted by rc3spencer at 12:12 PM on February 8, 2018


Statehood for DC and Puerto Rico. For territories with less than 100,000 persons, they should be given a voting representative and vote with a state for Senate representation, e.g., Virgin Islands / Florida; Guam / Hawaii. (Edited to add that Guam and the Virgin Islands have over 100,000.)
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 12:18 PM on February 8, 2018 [9 favorites]


but he never made us live in fear that he would start wars without regard for consequences

Seeing as I view Dubya's first term as literally nothing but that, I'm not looking forward to the inevitable "yeah but Trump at least didn't"'s. I mean, the bar's underground it's so low.
posted by petebest at 12:19 PM on February 8, 2018 [17 favorites]


Lawmakers would also forestall cuts mandated by the ACA to reduce the payments made to what are called Disproportionate Share Hospitals, which serve high rates of low-income patients. Those cuts have been delayed continuously since the law's 2010 passage.

This is a big loss for poor people unfortunate enough to live in a red state.

Disportionate share payments were the old system of paying hospitals to compensate them for uninsured people who couldn't afford to pay. Under Obamacare's Medicaid expansion, these payments are supposed to go away since everyone is mandated to be covered by Medicaid. There should be no uninsured.

But by forestalling these cuts, they just give red states an excuse to continue to refuse Medicaid expansion. Poor people are forced to wait until they have a medical emergency and then go to an emergency room. It's using taxpayer money to allow Republicans to be heartless jerks.
posted by JackFlash at 12:32 PM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


cjelli: "Capping refugees at 45,000 was itself a terrible decision -- we owe it to each to do what we can for one another, and the US can sure as heck handle more than 45,000 refugees"

EG: Canada (1/10 the population) accepted 32K in the first nine months last year.
posted by Mitheral at 12:39 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


There are many modest proposals to fix the Senate, some more modest than others, but the ones I like the best involve splitting larger states into multiple smaller states.

Something like, "No state shall have more residents than a multiple M of the lowest state population, and if it does, it will split into two or more states of its own choosing such that each state has at least a multiple N of the lowest state population." Start with M=20, N=5, and Wyoming for reference, and off we go: Cascadia, Pacifica, Empire State...


Or combining low population states. Which may be something that some of the lower population states would be amenable to in this future where even more population drain to urban areas leaves them without a pot to piss in, revenue-wise. Ooor they'll throw their senatorial weight into trying to use more federal funds collected mostly from populous states to keep afloat and that's a situation where it would really come in handy to have a larger House (with accompanying Electoral College effect) to maybe force the issue of a constitutional amendment to change the Senate in exchange for floating those states their preferred standards of living.
posted by jason_steakums at 12:47 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]




Rand Paul has gone rogue this afternoon. Oh the drama!
posted by rc3spencer at 1:08 PM on February 8, 2018




New Conor Lamb ad opens up on Paul Ryan. Seems smart.
posted by Chrysostom at 1:34 PM on February 8, 2018 [9 favorites]


The Bastille Day parade isn't some new invention ginned up to soothe Macron's ego, it's been happening since the late 1800s, it's about as much a cultural institution as the Eiffel tower.

True, but it wasn't militarized until 1880, 91 years later, at the beginning of the Third Republic (1870-1940), which not coincidentally featured several wars (Franco-Prussian, WW1, WW2) that destroyed France as a world power.

Which is kind of exactly the point.
posted by msalt at 1:37 PM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


1880 is the late 1800s.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 1:41 PM on February 8, 2018 [16 favorites]


Seeing as I view Dubya's first term as literally nothing but that,

Oh, come on. There was the willful ignorance leading to worldwide economic crisis, the crippling tax cuts, demonstrating to "the axis of evil" that nuclear deterence is the only reliable path to preserving sovereignty, willful ignorance of the counter-terrorism apparatus prior to 9/11, Enron, ... His leadership gave us so much!
posted by Coventry at 1:43 PM on February 8, 2018 [9 favorites]


Trump plans to nominate Charles P. Rettig, a Beverly Hills tax attorney, for IRS commissioner. Beverly Hills tax attorney to lead IRS as it implements Republican tax overhaul (LATimes):
Unlike the last several IRS heads, Rettig has a tax background, rather than business management expertise. In his law practice, Rettig has represented clients before the IRS, the Justice Department's Tax Division, state tax authorities and in federal and state courts, according to a biography on his law firm's website. Rettig additionally has represented scores of U.S. taxpayers seeking to disclose their unreported offshore bank accounts to the IRS.
To Lead I.R.S., Trump Nominates Lawyer Who Battled It (NYTimes):
Mr. Rettig has deep experience with disputes over the amount of taxes paid. He has defended clients against the I.R.S. in tax fraud investigations. He has twice led negotiations that resulted in settlements between the I.R.S. and Americans who had been improperly sheltering money overseas.

Last year, he sued the I.R.S. on behalf of a California bank holding company over a $1.5 million corporate tax bill that the company said was wrongly assessed. In 2014, he filed a similar suit on behalf of a California couple over $644,000 in tax penalties and interest that the couple said the I.R.S. had wrongly assessed.
He is a longtime contributor to Forbes and wrote in Feb, 2016 that he'd advise candidate Trump not to disclose his tax returns while under audit, which, hopefully will lead to some interesting questions during his confirmation hearings.
posted by peeedro at 2:02 PM on February 8, 2018 [22 favorites]


From NYT: The Republican Fiscal Stimulus Could Be Bigger Than Obama’s.

Chris Hayes: If this spending bill passes today, the Donald Trump Stimulus, passed in into an economy at full employment, will be larger than the Barack Obama Stimulus, passed at the most precarious moment in American economic history since the Great Depression.

Let's be clear. The Republican Party's unofficial policy is to sabotage the economy when Democrats are in power and unwisely supercharge it in unsustainable fashion when Republicans are in power. Why the Democrats are going along with this is something I do not understand.
posted by Justinian at 2:18 PM on February 8, 2018 [76 favorites]


"Why the Democrats are going along with this is something I do not understand."

Those crumbling bridges etc aren't going to fix themselves.

As an outside observer who is on neither team, Democrats seem to be more mature about doing what they think is best for the country whereas Republicans seem to be more focused on winning political points. I've had Rs tell me that's because they're playing an ideological long game in which destroying the left by any means necessary is worth it, but Rs' tendency to run huge deficits whenever they're in power undermines their credibility that they have any foresight whatsoever.
posted by Jacqueline at 2:36 PM on February 8, 2018 [9 favorites]


Amanda Carpenter, a former staffer for Jim DeMint and Ted Cruz, lays into the WH's protection of Rob Porter on Jake Tapper's show.

Here's a transcript of her remarks:
The bottom line is this: They protected an abuser, and guess what. It's a job qualification to work in this White House--[it is] to protect someone who talked favorably about sexually assault on the Access Hollywood tape. That is a job qualification in this White House. There is a pattern of behavior--they kept Corey Lewandowski on staff as a campaign manager after he bruised a reporter...

This is the same President who laughs along with Howard Stern when he says disgusting things about his [own] daughter. I don't know how the people in the White House let [Rob Porter] date Hope Hicks--get alone in a car with him...knowing that this was in his file. They protect abusers. There's no way around it, and I guess people will say, "Well, it doesn't matter, you can still be a good president, you can still do your job. No. If you are willing to defend someone who hurts somebody in this fashion, you have no boundaries, you have no restraint, you have no respect for the law, and if you tolerate people who do this to people they say they love, what will they do to the people they don't know? And that's why I think this matters to a normal person. These people don't have restraint, and it is disgusting to watch. My heart is pounding; it's infuriating to see people go to the White House and defend this, as a conservative, as a woman, as an American, as anyone.
posted by Excommunicated Cardinal at 2:36 PM on February 8, 2018 [60 favorites]


Why the Democrats are going along with this is something I do not understand.

What exactly are Democrats "going along with"? Every Democrat voted against the Trump tax cuts. Now they are supporting a bill that increases spending for domestic and welfare programs that they would have supported regardless. Are you suggesting that the alternative is to cut discretionary spending for Democratic programs to offset Republican tax cuts?
posted by JackFlash at 2:37 PM on February 8, 2018 [10 favorites]


> but he never made us live in fear that he would start wars without regard for consequences

Seeing as I view Dubya's first term as literally nothing but that, I'm not looking forward


Please don't quote subsections of sentences to make them say something other than what they clearly said in context. It's dishonest.
posted by biogeo at 2:38 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


Omarosa’s thousand-yard stare over Trump’s tweets is a little tew much for me to handle right now.
posted by BeginAgain at 2:43 PM on February 8, 2018


What exactly are Democrats "going along with"?

Democrats are voting in favor of a spending increase with Republicans in power. Moreover, they're giving Republicans the cover of "bipartisanship" by doing so. Domestic spending increases are good for the country. But right now, it's really bad game theory and really bad politics.
posted by Jonathan Livengood at 2:52 PM on February 8, 2018 [5 favorites]


That's what I'm saying! The Republicans defect when the Ds are in power and cooperate when the Rs are in power. If Ds always cooperate the long term outcome is obvious. They need to learn how to tit-for-tat.
posted by Justinian at 3:02 PM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


1880 is the late 1800s.

Yeah but Basille Day celebrations began, well, in 1789 with ebbs and flows over the years. 1880 is when it was permanently harnessed to the military and bad things began to happen.

Trump would undoubtedly schedule his parade for July 4th, which is very analogous. He won't have invented the 4th of July, either, but militarizing it would be a consequential and very bad thing.
posted by msalt at 3:11 PM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


Domestic spending increases are good for the country. But right now, it's really bad game theory and really bad politics.

What?! Democrats should cut domestic spending because Republicans passed tax cuts? That's the craziest thing ever. That's exactly the Republican game plan -- pass tax cuts for the rich then claim there's no money left for Democratic programs. That's the program you are advocating?

It makes more sense for Democrats to continue domestic spending as planned regardless of what Republicans do. Note that discretionary spending has been sequestered since 2013. We haven't had a real raise for domestic programs for years resulting in hiring freezes and salary freezes for federal employees. This bill is the first major change to those policies.
posted by JackFlash at 3:15 PM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


No, they shouldn't cut anything if they can help it. But they also shouldn't work with the Republicans. And especially they shouldn't help the Republicans to do something that will make the Republicans look really good right after the Republicans have spent nearly a decade preventing Democrats from doing exactly those same things.

The fact that this bill is the first major change to a problem that Republicans created is exactly why the Democrats should not help them.

It makes most long-term sense for Democrats to oppose EVERY. SINGLE. THING. that Republicans attempt to do until the Republicans make a serious move to moderate. The current spending bill is not serious in that respect.
posted by Jonathan Livengood at 3:23 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


Please don't quote subsections of sentences to make them say something other than what they clearly said in context. It's dishonest.

Or misread, but yes, honest folk can read the original here. We regret the error.
posted by petebest at 3:24 PM on February 8, 2018


The original sin was was Democrats buying in en mass to the Republican framing of austerity budgets beginning in 2010, and continuing through 2016. Remember when Obama tried for three years to hand Republicans a grand bargain to cut Social Security and Medicare in exchange for paltry tax increases because the deficit mattered? Remember when Democrats took Simpson-Bowles seriously? Acting like Republicans were ever bargaining in good faith back then let Republicans play serious deficit warriors for 8 years, then take all the credit for spending increases now, while Democrats have no real arguments to make, because for years they acted like they were against spending any money on anything exactly like Republicans - when that was never true. They were just too chickenshit to actually explain to the public why spending money (responsibly even!) on doing things people like was good policy.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:24 PM on February 8, 2018 [25 favorites]


There are a lot of people out there who think politics is just a sports game where we've all arbitrarily picked sides and are rooting for "our team" and that there aren't meaningful policy outcomes that affect real human lives. Disabusing people of this notion (so that they actually get out and vote instead of sitting at home because "hurf durf both sides") is difficult and tiresome work. Changing people's minds about the actual efficacy of one party's policies is impossible if Democrats reflexively switch sides when Republicans are willing to work toward a positive goal.

"Democrats shouldn't do X now that Republicans are in favor of it" is the worst possible take.

"Democrats should escalate until the Republicans de-escalate" is the second-worst possible take. You can't end a war by refusing to even a temporary cease-fire.
posted by 0xFCAF at 3:26 PM on February 8, 2018 [14 favorites]


Andrew Kaczynski and Chris Massie, CNN: North Dakota GOP Senate candidate blasted a 'bunch of Arabs' in 2014 Facebook post
A Republican candidate for US Senate in North Dakota shared a story on Facebook in 2014 about anti-Israel protesters clashing with riot police, adding the comment, "Bunch of Arabs... what do you expect?"

The comment is just one of several inflammatory posts Gary Emineth, the former North Dakota Republican Party chairman, shared on social media, a CNN KFile review shows. In other posts, Emineth called former President Barack Obama a "POS" (an acronym for piece of shit) and retweeted an image that called for no more mosques in America.

Emineth is one of two declared candidates in this year's GOP primary to determine who will challenge incumbent Democratic Sen. Heidi Heitkamp in what is anticipated to be one of the competitive races in the 2018 midterm elections. Emineth joined the primary race at the end of January after Rep. Kevin Cramer, reportedly resisting an entreaty from President Donald Trump, announced he would not seek the seat. Emineth's sole GOP opponent is state Sen. Tom Campbell, a potato farmer who has been spending his own money on advertising to gain more name recognition.

Shortly after launching his campaign, Emineth's personal Facebook posts became inaccessible. KFile was able to screenshot some of Emineth's posts before his page was locked down.
Another Fine Republican™️
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 3:27 PM on February 8, 2018 [8 favorites]


The original sin was was Democrats buying in en mass to the Republican framing of austerity budgets beginning in 2010

I'd start the clock at Clinton's emphasis on balancing the budget in the 90s, but maybe that's just because that's when I started paying attention.
posted by Coventry at 3:28 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


My comment here excludes the DACA issue, which is unfair, because its tactics are tied up with the overall spending bill tactics.

That said: continuing resolutions require 60 votes in the Senate. To categorically obstruct all spending bills during a Republican majority will shut the government down until next year. They are getting the cancellation of the dumb sequestration caps they never should have agreed to. These are pretty good spending levels. Funding the government is better than not funding it. Funding it adequately is even better.

At some point they need to take “yes” for an answer.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 3:29 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


Current Federal Government status: Rand Paul is holding up the budget deal vote and is on the Senate floor complaining that the Federal Government spent money to spend Pakistani kids to Space Camp and Dollywood, when they should have spent that money to send American kids to Space Camp and Dollywood
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 3:30 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


Update: Syed Ahmed Jamal (one of the two Lawrence, Kansas men recently targeted by ICE for deportation) has been granted a temporary stay of removal.
posted by god hates math at 3:30 PM on February 8, 2018 [25 favorites]


It makes most long-term sense for Democrats to oppose EVERY. SINGLE. THING. that Republicans attempt to do until the Republicans make a serious move to moderate.

That sounds like a "burn it all down" attitude. Quite a privileged attitude I might say. Talk to the millions of children who now have healthcare because the Democrats cooperated with Republicans in a deal for CHIP funding.
posted by JackFlash at 3:30 PM on February 8, 2018 [18 favorites]


Dear Rand: if you want to send my kid to Space Camp or Dollywood, MeMail me.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 3:31 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'd start the clock at Clinton's emphasis on balancing the budget in the 90s

And you would think they would've learned the lesson from that! Clinton left a budget surplus! A surplus! And Bush immediately blew it all on tax cuts, refund checks and two illegal wars. But Democrats STILL pretended like Republicans cared about deficits, and like them putting aside all other parts of their agenda to indulge deficit hysteria would somehow win them brownie points and elections. It's was mindboggling malpractice of the type that only Democrats are capable of doing to themselves at the time, and only looks worse in hindsight as Republicans are doing it again, and Democrats will be left holding the fallout again if they manage to retake power.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:33 PM on February 8, 2018 [39 favorites]


While we debate the game theory implications of voting for or against the budget deal here, I just wanted to mention:

WaPo: Senate budget delay raises possibility of brief shutdown at midnight, while House leaders scramble for votes

Because of course that's how we should run the country, by shutting down the government for a few hours every few weeks, as we stagger from crisis to crisis.

I understand the game theory point of view which says "Oppose everything", but it's not tenable - Democrats care about people, and so, yes, they will ultimately have to give in to the hostage takers, but the solution is not to shoot the hostages, it is to make sure the kidnappers are never back in power again.

And if you want to point and laugh, there's always the reliable Tea Party caucus:
The massive spending bill, coming less than two months after Republicans pushed through a tax cut that stands to slash federal revenue by a trillion dollars or more over a decade, has given plenty of Republicans heartburn. “We did a great thing with the tax cut bill, and it will ultimately make revenue go up dramatically, but we’re dramatically increasing spending before we even get the benefits of the tax cuts, so it’s a bit depressing, actually,” said Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Tex.), a member of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus, which took an official position against the bill Wednesday.
"It will ultimately make revenue go up dramatically", of course, because the corpse of Arthur Laffer[*] spinning in his grave will produce plentiful free energy and enable a technological solution to every problem we face.

[*] Sorry, I assume he's dead but can't be bothered to check.
posted by RedOrGreen at 3:34 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


"Democrats should escalate until the Republicans de-escalate" is the second-worst possible take. You can't end a war by refusing to even a temporary cease-fire.

Depends on how you want the war to end. Right now, the Democrats are voting in a way that helps people in the short run but puts Republicans in a better position to hurt a whole lot more people a whole lot worse in the medium-to-long run.

That sounds like a "burn it all down" attitude.

Definitely not. The Republicans are (and have been for a long time) holding many, many of the worst-off people in the United States hostage. I don't want to see the hostages hurt any more than you do or than the Democrats in the Senate do. But at some point, we're going to have to accept some amount of short-term pain for the hostages if we're going to break the power of the Republicans. And if we don't break the power of the Republicans, it's going to be much worse -- or same-level worse for much longer.
posted by Jonathan Livengood at 3:37 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


but Rs' tendency to run huge deficits whenever they're in power undermines their credibility that they have any foresight whatsoever.

The voters have richly rewarded them thus far. They may be clinging into some of their power through gerrymandering but they rode into that control after several waves of deficit spending.
posted by Candleman at 3:37 PM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


Sorry, I assume he's dead but can't be bothered to check.

Not only is he still alive, he was a top advisor to the Trump campaign.
posted by zombieflanders at 3:50 PM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


But at some point, we're going to have to accept some amount of short-term pain for the hostages if we're going to break the power of the Republicans.

The only way you are going to break the power of Republicans is at the ballot box. You aren't going to do it by shaming them because they don't care about the hostages. That you are so willing to sacrifice the hostages in a futile attempt to "break the power of the Republicans" sounds rather callous. You break their power by voting.

Meanwhile you take what good stuff you can get. You don't refuse just because being reasonable might make the Republicans look good on issues you care about.

I don't want to see the hostages hurt any more than you do

I think your first statement belies that claim.
posted by JackFlash at 3:50 PM on February 8, 2018 [17 favorites]


If Rand Paul keeps talking till midnight there’s going to be a shutdown day simply because of time issues voting on the bill. He’s going to cost the government millions and make a lot of people have to fill out a shitload of pointless paperwork instead of working.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:53 PM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


Also, on the "burn it down" accusation. A burn-it-down attitude says, "Let the Republicans do what they want so that people will see how bad they are." But that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying the Democrats should not cooperate with the Republicans. They shouldn't make it easy for the Republicans to enact their agenda. Supporting a two-year budget that the Republicans like is not a good idea right now. Not unless we're getting something really, really important back from the deal, such as a permanent fix for the Dreamers. And we're not getting that. The Republicans are not serious about bi-partisanship, they just want the political trappings of bi-partisanship. They want to be able to say, "Look, this bill is bi-partisan: we're working across the aisle!" It looks good. It looks normal. And it makes them better off for the next election. Democrats shouldn't go along with this because taken as a whole, what the Republicans are doing is not good and not normal.

I think your first statement belies that claim.

I can't really reply to this in a calm, civil way. I'll let you imagine what I want to say and sign off for a while.
posted by Jonathan Livengood at 3:54 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


at this point I strongly feel that any political strategy aimed at capturing the fickle hearts and minds (?) of swing voters ought to be launched straight into the sun
posted by prize bull octorok at 3:58 PM on February 8, 2018 [67 favorites]


What does it mean that during the catastrophic Bush administration we had the West Wing, and during the peaceful and prosperous Obama administration we had House of Cards and Veep? What are those scriptwriters and producers going for? And what are the consequences?
Maybe this should become a FPP in itself, but that would have to be by someone who understands this better than me.
It's important because fiction in our time influences reality. The small-time crooks I've been dealing with for the last decade absolutely misinterpreted House of Cards (in the sense that they didn't realize that the lead characters were the bad guys). They learnt from Trump's intuitive understanding that the drama of reality television could be transferred to politics.
posted by mumimor at 4:06 PM on February 8, 2018 [10 favorites]


Chris Hayes: If this spending bill passes today, the Donald Trump Stimulus, passed in into an economy at full employment, will be larger than the Barack Obama Stimulus, passed at the most precarious moment in American economic history since the Great Depression.

I can already hear the few Republicans I can still talk to (i.e., didn't vote for Trump) saying this is, in fact, the way it should be done, because something about risking money when the economy is bad and something about stimulating it when it's good and also if anything goes wrong it's because Obama left us in a bad situation anyway.

Let's be clear. The Republican Party's unofficial policy is to sabotage the economy when Democrats are in power and unwisely supercharge it in unsustainable fashion when Republicans are in power.

...except said Republicans will never cop to that part, because anything critical of Republicans is partisan and unfair. Except Trump, who is clearly an embarrassing aberration and not, y'know, the result of decades of right-wing bullshit.

Despite Trump and his garbage, we're not going to sway Republican voters on any of this. The path forward is in getting out the Democratic vote and pulling non-voters off the sidelines.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 4:07 PM on February 8, 2018 [12 favorites]


But, if the Dems force the government into shutdown, will the Republican response just be full brutal austerity on a party line vote with "moderate" R's caving to pressure and possibly the Senate changing the filibuster rules to get it through. Full on Paul Ryan debauchery on social program cuts. And what worries me further about that possibility is that they might not pay for it at the ballot box, because they've got a track record of getting away with awful shit.
posted by jason_steakums at 4:10 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


The only way you are going to break the power of Republicans is at the ballot box. You aren't going to do it by shaming them because they don't care about the hostages. That you are so willing to sacrifice the hostages in a futile attempt to "break the power of the Republicans" sounds rather callous. You break their power by voting.

IAWTC. (Though I don't think "swing voters" exist in large numbers or should be catered to. The Reagan Democrat is dead, buried, and gone.) If we want the Democrats of our dreams, we are going to have to elect them. We are the minority party now, and that means we are in the we find ourselves in the Sophie's Choice position - DREAMers, government workers, parents of poor children, all vote Democratic in large numbers. And the chickens of neglecting/underfunding local Democratic races, and abandoning the 50-state strategy, have come home to roost.

(And let's acknowledge that Nancy Pelosi is doing a great job, certainly the best she can under the circumstances. I know she needs to plan her succession because she's 77, but, if anyone mentions "San Francisco" or "we need to move more to the center" they can cram it.)

Vote. Run candidates. Mike Konczal, Vox: What Democrats can learn from the DSA about rebuilding the left (talks about their Stamp Out Slumlords campaign). When we get our majority back and our local power back then we can throw our weight around. Elections, consequences, etc. (Or rather, neglect, consequences, apathy, consequences, etc.)
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 4:27 PM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


But Democrats STILL pretended like Republicans cared about deficits

C'mon now, that not fair. As soon as Bush turned Clinton's record surplus into a record deficit in 2002 the Tea Party got mad! Eventually! It just took them seven years to get organized!

Oh, OK, it was really an "old-fashioned" racist reaction to a black guy getting elected. My bad.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:30 PM on February 8, 2018 [12 favorites]


He’s going to cost the government millions and make a lot of people have to fill out a shitload of pointless paperwork instead of working.

Right, which in his deranged libertarian mind is just another day ending in 'y'.
posted by tivalasvegas at 4:43 PM on February 8, 2018


absurd, inflammatory rhetoric like the "axis of evil" speech

Before Trump came along and blew the curve, "axis of evil" was the most irresponsible thing a US president had ever said.

The World War II Axis was a formal military alliance, with treaties and everything.

Not only did Iran, Iraq, and North Korea not have any real or imagined military alliance, the use of chemical weapons that Bush cited as a reason to invade Iraq was its use of them against Iran, which we sold to Iraq and helped them use.

Conflating the two was a cynical attempt to wrap Bush's phony war with "the Good War."
posted by kirkaracha at 5:10 PM on February 8, 2018 [21 favorites]


If the Dems can get the House, Senate and presidency in 2020... the more I think about it, the more I think they should go nuclear and change congressional apportionment. Can’t fix the Senate, obviously, but you fix what you can fix and the House is something that can be fixed. Get the House back to its original aim, proportional representation for the larger states.

Do I care what the conservatives think? No, because if they were in this position they’d do it in a red fucking second.
posted by azpenguin at 5:12 PM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


I think that's a pipe dream. Even if you could get Democratic House members to go along with something that would cost some of them their jobs and give their states less power you'd need considerably more than 60 votes in the Senate. 60 to pass a filibuster, but you'd lose a bunch of Ds from small states.

I'm having trouble coming up with a scenario under which this is plausible.
posted by Justinian at 5:14 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


For the first time, Democrats can win the House just by winning the closest races (Philip Bump | WaPo)
... As Cook Political’s David Wasserman noted on Twitter, the Democrats don’t need to win any of those seats that are leaning Republican or likely Republican to take control of the House. If they just hold their own contested seats and win all of the Republican toss-ups, they win the House — by a one-seat margin.

... The generic congressional ballot has narrowed recently, which is good news for the Republicans. But Cook’s analysis goes deeper than that. While the Democrats will have a tough fight to try and win the Senate, the path to retaking the House is the clearest it’s been so far this cycle.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 5:30 PM on February 8, 2018 [17 favorites]


We have got to make more of a concentrated focus on the ballot box and getting out the vote. I mean, there is an actual Nazi running for Congress, and he is running unopposed.

For the Dems to not even be able to pull it together enough to put up an opponent to a Nazi is the height of....I don't know, either laziness or fear or something.

This would not be a difficult race to win. This is a congressional race in a blue state, and the opponent is a Nazi. And yet the DNC couldn't be arsed to get an opposing candidate.

This is why we are where we are, becuase the Dems can't even be organized enough for the obvious wins like that. It's at the ballot box. Get voters to the polls.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:31 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


I mean there is an actual Nazi running for Congress, and he is running unopposed.

He's running unopposed in the GOP primary, not the general. The district itself is safely blue, albeit represented by one of the worst of the Blue Dogs.
posted by zombieflanders at 5:36 PM on February 8, 2018 [40 favorites]


Who himself is facing a very serious primary threat from the left.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:38 PM on February 8, 2018 [12 favorites]


Yeah, he's running unopposed in the Republican primary for a seat that no other Republican wants to run for, because it was specifically gerrymandered to be safe for a particular (garbage) machine Democrat whose father happens to be a muckity muck in Illinois politics. He's not actually going to win, although the fact that he's the Republican nominee is horrifying enough.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 5:38 PM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


This is why we are where we are, becuase the Dems can't even be organized enough for the obvious wins like that. It's at the ballot box. Get voters to the polls.

If you read either the headline or the article you’ve linked, you’ll see the Nazi in question is running unopposed in the Republican primary.

Several of us have been sharing links in this very thread about the Dems contesting a record number of seats this year. Your ire is misplaced.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 5:39 PM on February 8, 2018 [13 favorites]


I think the list of districts with no declared Dem challenger is down to about a dozen. It was 28 in 2016, by comparison.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:42 PM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


Rand Paul is blasting his party for no longer caring about the debt now that they're in the White House.

"I want people to feel uncomfortable," he says. "How come you were against President Obama's deficits and how come you're for Republican deficits?"
Oh, Rand. You still believe that the GOP is about small-c conservatism?

Looks like Rand is all cool to cause a shutdown, btw. Unless there's a vote before midnight we're going for another round.
posted by Talez at 5:44 PM on February 8, 2018 [20 favorites]


More about the challenger Dan Lipinski 100% deserves to be thoroughly whupped by:
Lipinski’s opponent in the March 20 primary, Marie Newman, has the backing of an array of national progressive organizations, including NARAL Pro-Choice America, EMILY’s List, the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, and the Service Employees International Union. And in an unusual break with Congress’s clubby norms, she’s won endorsements from Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of New York and two of Lipinski’s long-serving Democratic colleagues in the Illinois delegation: Representatives Jan Schakowsky and Luís Gutierrez.
posted by zombieflanders at 5:44 PM on February 8, 2018 [13 favorites]


Oh, Rand. You still believe that the GOP is about small-c conservatism?

I respect him for at least calling it out, because that's a real hypocrisy that never gets addressed because years go by between opportunities and the news is all about Short Attention Span Theater..
posted by rhizome at 5:52 PM on February 8, 2018 [18 favorites]


Call your representatives and ask them to support H.R. 4980, the Preventing the Allocation of Resources for Absurd Defense Expenditures (PARADE) Act.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:53 PM on February 8, 2018 [36 favorites]


Scalise says there won't be a House vote until 3-6am. So we're going to breach, but there might be millions of government workers who wake up tomorrow morning furloughed.
posted by Talez at 6:05 PM on February 8, 2018


You know what’s not exciting? To be a federal employee on international travel right now. There’s a wicked time difference, though, so I guess there’s a very small chance that this will all be over by the time I wake up tomorrow.
posted by wintermind at 6:12 PM on February 8, 2018 [19 favorites]


Is there any legitimate reasoning behind the whole "Democrat wave not a wave after all" panic a few days ago? Or the polls claiming so?
posted by gucci mane at 6:15 PM on February 8, 2018


Preventing the Allocation of Resources for Absurd Defense Expenditures (PARADE) Act.

This is a great idea. Where would the funds come from, anyway? Does the military have a discretionary budget for showboating?
posted by Coventry at 6:15 PM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


Good Luck, Wintermind. You know what else is not exciting? To have set up an experiment today that absolutely has to be rated tomorrow.
posted by acrasis at 6:15 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


Is there any legitimate reasoning behind the whole "Democrat wave not a wave after all" panic a few days ago? Or the polls claiming so?

Tightening job market and trending polls. I wouldn't say it was a panic, though.
posted by Coventry at 6:16 PM on February 8, 2018


If a few million for a parade is a waste of money on a small penis compensation stunt, what do you call $25 billion for a border wall?
posted by Miss Cellania at 6:17 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


The concern over the "wave" is a matter of data. Trump's approval ratings have improved from 36-37 to 42ish and the generic ballot advantage for the Dems has fallen from around 11-12 to around 6. So it's an empirical concern not one based on logical deduction or something.

The special elections this week had fairly consistent results with what we saw before the tightening, though, so for now the general consensus is "something to keep an eye on" rather than "OH MY GOD WHY".
posted by Justinian at 6:21 PM on February 8, 2018 [8 favorites]


Rand of course also voted for the budget-destroying tax cuts...but apparently that was different?
posted by rockindata at 6:25 PM on February 8, 2018 [10 favorites]


Basically, the media was slow to react to wide Dem leads in the generic congressional ballot, and then over-reacted to some narrowing of that lead.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:28 PM on February 8, 2018 [4 favorites]


Rand of course also voted for the budget-destroying tax cuts...but apparently that was different?

He actually believes that supply-side and trickle down economics shit works.
posted by Talez at 6:32 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


It’s elementary Aqua Buddhanomics, really.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 6:33 PM on February 8, 2018 [9 favorites]


And also that all taxation is slavery.
posted by Coventry at 6:34 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


In the Rob Porter saga, the NYTimes story about how the White House "could have done better over the few hours or last few days in dealing with this situation" points out the contradiction between the White House statement and their reporting:
Among the questions he left behind was whether Mr. Kelly and other members of Mr. Trump’s inner circle had been willing to ignore serious allegations of domestic violence to protect a trusted aide. Raj Shah, the deputy White House, said that Mr. Kelly had not been made “fully aware” of them until this week. But two people close to the White House said that Mr. Kelly and Joe Hagin, the deputy chief of staff for operations, as well as Donald F. McGahn II, the White House counsel, had known of the issues since late fall.
The WaPo hints at why they may have mishandled the response to his departure:
But the White House decided to, instead, provide Porter a ringing endorsement. It opted to provide the kind of statements you would expect if they were convinced of Porter's innocence.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was just as effusive.

“I have worked directly with Rob Porter nearly every day for the last year, and the person I know is someone of the highest integrity and exemplary character,” Sanders said. “Those of us who have the privilege of knowing him are better people because of it.”

Exactly how these statements found their way into the public domain is something we're likely to see reporters dig into Thursday. Could it have been steered by communications director Hope Hicks, who is reportedly dating Porter?
posted by peeedro at 6:38 PM on February 8, 2018 [12 favorites]


He's not actually going to win, although the fact that he's the Republican nominee is horrifying enough.

Too soon.
posted by petebest at 6:41 PM on February 8, 2018 [60 favorites]


What does it mean that during the catastrophic Bush administration we had the West Wing, and during the peaceful and prosperous Obama administration we had House of Cards and Veep? What are those scriptwriters and producers going for? And what are the consequences?

West Wing started in 1999. And television in general is about the recent past, not the present. I mean, they want to catch the Zeitgeist, but the production process for a new series takes nearly a year, so.

Political tv shows in particular I think should be understood as a retrospective processing of our history. So the president on Scandal, for example, is the most obvious, he's like a Republican Bill Clinton. The prez on West Wing is like a cross between Clinton and the older Bush. The House of Cards guy, from what I've read, is like a Democratic Dick Cheney. And I have to imagine that Veep is partially inspired by the walking meme Joe Biden.

As for consequences, though, I think it's important to note that - television production is almost always reactive. They're trying to catch the zeitgeist, not create it. It's a very rare show that looks forward, to try to shape people's minds and opinions. Usually they pick a segment of the market and cater to those opinions.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 6:42 PM on February 8, 2018 [9 favorites]


It looks like the White House duped Hatch into making a statement of support for Porter
The White House officials told Hatch’s office that the story was the product of a “smear campaign” being orchestrated against Porter by his political enemies. Among those they pinpointed was former Trump campaign manager (and current outside adviser to the president) Corey Lewandowski, according to two sources familiar with the conversations. Multiple White House staffers told Hatch himself that Lewandowski “was digging into Rob’s previous marriages,” recalled one source, who said Porter himself was among the officials who fingered Lewandowski.
posted by Talez at 6:46 PM on February 8, 2018 [11 favorites]


I just read the Intercept story on Porter. It is way beyond the pale, and unimaginable that anyone would try to defend him. And the people whose job it is to know the details should quit in shame.

Wait, those words also apply to ...
posted by Dashy at 6:53 PM on February 8, 2018 [13 favorites]


There's an interesting little deception in the Republican budget deal. Instead of actually raising the debt ceiling according to law, they are simply suspending the law for one year. So Treasury can borrow more money to keep government operating as needed but Republicans don't have to explicitly own up to the amount of new debt they are incurring if they were to actually raise the debt ceiling by a couple of trillion dollars.

This isn't going to fool anybody who actually cares about these details and most of the rest of the public doesn't know the difference as long as the government stays open, so is of little real consequence. Democrats would just as soon suspend the debt ceiling law forever. But it illustrates extremes that Republicans can go to deal with the cognitive dissonance they are feeling regarding deficits.
posted by JackFlash at 7:07 PM on February 8, 2018 [11 favorites]


If John Kelly was still an active duty general he could be court martialed himself for covering up domestic abuse by his direct subordinate.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:08 PM on February 8, 2018 [67 favorites]


Porter himself was among the officials who fingered Lewandowski.

That explains why Lewandoski quit, certainly.

As for strategy in the mid-terms, how about an effort to make sure every (old, young, minority) voter meets the voter-exclusion-law standards in each state? Offer a service to check everyone's registration and make sure it is up to date, make sure they have the photo ID required and start the process to get one if they don't, etc.

I would give money tonight to such an effort.
posted by msalt at 7:10 PM on February 8, 2018 [12 favorites]


Re: "game theory," referenced above in this thread and in several previous incarnations of the Our Collective Nightmare Thread

Game theory is a branch of mathematics concerned with finding the optimal strategies by two individuals interacting whose goals do not necessarily align. It does not simply mean "whatever I think the smart strategy is." If you're not making at least some attempt to analyze and understand strategies explicitly in terms of the payoff functions over the outcome space for the two parties, you're not making a game theory argument. Without context, references to game theory and certain specific strategies like "tit for tat" are meaningless -- tit for tat is a successful strategy only in the context of the very specific construction of the iterated prisoner's dilemma game, and without an analysis of why and how the current political situation resembles that game in terms of its payoff matrix and restrictions, bringing it up is a non sequitur. I would argue the current situation is very unlike the iterated prisoner's dilemma, as IPD is a symmetric game, with each player's payoff function the same, while I think the Republicans and Democrats have very dissimilar payoff functions.

This isn't to say that a game theory-based analysis of the interactions of the House and Senate Democrats and Republicans would be worthless; I think it would be fascinating. But I haven't seen anyone who's referenced "game theory" so far do anything that even gestures at such an analysis. Instead there mostly seem to be references as to how obviously stupid the Democrats are from a "game theory" perspective, stated as a bald assertion. The reality is, the "game" (in the game-theoretic sense) that the Democrats and Republicans are playing is extremely complex compared to the standard model systems, and I don't think it's obvious what anyone's complete payoff function really is, even to the individuals in the "game."
posted by biogeo at 7:11 PM on February 8, 2018 [47 favorites]


The White House officials told Hatch’s office that the story was the product of a “smear campaign” being orchestrated against Porter by his political enemies. Among those they pinpointed was former Trump campaign manager (and current outside adviser to the president) Corey Lewandowski, according to two sources familiar with the conversations. Multiple White House staffers told Hatch himself that Lewandowski “was digging into Rob’s previous marriages,” recalled one source, who said Porter himself was among the officials who fingered Lewandowski.

Because the White House is a junior high school, now
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:14 PM on February 8, 2018 [5 favorites]


Because the White House is a junior high school, now

Pretty much, Kellyanne Conway’s cousin and Mike Pence’s nephew, both Trump staffers, are dating (WaPo neglects to include the word "nepotism" in their reporting).
posted by peeedro at 7:16 PM on February 8, 2018 [13 favorites]


Pretty much, Kellyanne Conway’s cousin and Mike Pence’s nephew, both Trump staffers, are dating

All part of the centuries-long breeding program to produce a GOP Kwisatz Haderach.
posted by Rust Moranis at 7:21 PM on February 8, 2018 [43 favorites]


acrasis, you have my deep sympathy. These will never be called the best of times.
posted by wintermind at 7:22 PM on February 8, 2018


msalt: "As for strategy in the mid-terms, how about an effort to make sure every (old, young, minority) voter meets the voter-exclusion-law standards in each state? Offer a service to check everyone's registration and make sure it is up to date, make sure they have the photo ID required and start the process to get one if they don't, etc.

I would give money tonight to such an effort.
"

You want to give to Spread The Vote.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:33 PM on February 8, 2018 [15 favorites]


"IL-12: Bost (R) Lean R => Toss Up"

This is kind-of a big deal that's been getting a lot of coverage. The challenger is really good -- county prosecutor, Navy vet, Notre Dame grad, spent a lot of time attacking the opiod epidemic as prosecutor. There's not much room for Bost to attack him on being soft on crime, soft on drugs, irreligious, or unpatriotic. Bost has been frequently underestimated as a politician, but he's definitely in trouble and has a very strong opponent.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:42 PM on February 8, 2018 [7 favorites]


75 minutes until we know whether the government shuts down again.
posted by suelac at 7:46 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]




@frankthorp: The Senate is now ADJOURNED until 12:01am Friday. The shutdown will happen.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 7:56 PM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


Kellyanne Conway’s cousin and Mike Pence’s nephew, both Trump staffers, are dating

Is stomach acid harmful to an LED monitor if quickly wiped off? Asking for a friend.
posted by uosuaq at 7:57 PM on February 8, 2018 [11 favorites]


75 minutes until we know whether the government shuts down again.

There's already going to be a lapse of at least a few hours, Rand Paul assured that. The Senate will start a new legislative day at midnight, and vote on the budget caps/CR deal. The House is expected to vote "between 3 and 6am", but that vote is still uncertain. The Freedom Fucks are apparently not backing it, and the informal twitter count I saw earlier had "less than 40" Democrats who would cross over. That's cutting it close.

The government day for many workers starts at 6am
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:58 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


This is great for the Dems, right? Gives them leverage while making it much harder to paint them as the irresponsible ones.
posted by Coventry at 7:59 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


If a few million for a parade is a waste of money on a small penis compensation stunt, what do you call $25 billion for a border wall?

I call it a huge new graft opportunity for the Trump family. Seriously, has anyone checked who owns the companies that will be given the contracts for the wall?
posted by happyroach at 8:13 PM on February 8, 2018 [5 favorites]


Surprising exactly no one, anywhere, WaPo: Top White House officials knew of abuse allegations against top aide for months
In January 2017, when McGahn learned of the allegations, he wanted Porter to stay put because he saw the Harvard Law-trained Capitol Hill veteran as a steadying, professional voice in the White House, according to people familiar with the matter. His view didn’t change in June, when the FBI flagged some of its findings to the White House. Nor did he act in September, when he learned the domestic violence claims were delaying Porter’s security clearance, or in November, when Porter’s former girlfriend contacted him about the allegations, according to these people.

A White House spokesman said that McGahn — who had access to detailed FBI interviews conducted for Porter’s security clearance — and Kelly feel misled by Porter, saying he downplayed his ex-wives’ accusations in conversations with them.

When McGahn informed Kelly this fall about the reason for the security clearance holdup, he agreed that Porter should remain and said he was surprised to learn that the 40-year-old had ex-wives.
posted by FelliniBlank at 8:15 PM on February 8, 2018 [25 favorites]


If you're not making at least some attempt to analyze and understand strategies explicitly in terms of the payoff functions over the outcome space for the two parties, you're not making a game theory argument.

Time for some Game Theory.

How Game Theory Explains Washington's Horrible Gridlock.

We Asked a Game Theorist How Democrats Should Fight Trump.
posted by scalefree at 8:37 PM on February 8, 2018 [12 favorites]


While I found those interesting note the bottom line super duper advice from the game theorist for Democrats is, literally and I quote, "I would say, consider major changes in the electoral system".

Thanks, chief.
posted by Justinian at 8:47 PM on February 8, 2018 [19 favorites]


Seriously, has anyone checked who owns the companies that will be given the contracts for the wall?

I don't think that will be determined until there's an appropriation for it. I agree it will almost certainly be a vast boondoggle, though.
posted by Coventry at 8:48 PM on February 8, 2018


Thanks, scalefree, those are interesting links.
posted by biogeo at 8:48 PM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


While I found those interesting note the bottom line super duper advice from the game theorist for Democrats is, literally and I quote, "I would say, consider major changes in the electoral system".

Buddy of mine wrote a book on Game Theory, I'll run them past him & see what he says.
posted by scalefree at 8:51 PM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


This negotiation process is much too complex and informal for game theory to provide useful insight. It doesn't even have precise objective functions or terminal conditions, unlike, say, nuclear deterrence theory, where the application of game theory was basically math-envy bullshit.
posted by Coventry at 8:57 PM on February 8, 2018 [3 favorites]


The government is now officially shut down. 17 days after it was also shut down.

This is no way to run a country.
posted by Justinian at 9:01 PM on February 8, 2018 [31 favorites]


Here we go again. If this is going to keep happening, they need to come up with better contingency plans. My husband has to commute an hour to work tomorrow to be informed verbally, face to face, that he should drive another hour and go back home.
posted by booksherpa at 9:06 PM on February 8, 2018 [6 favorites]


Chad Pergram (FOX Congressional reporter): After the Senate clears the budget pact, it will ship the bill over to the House. Hse Rules Cmte must meet overnight to tee up debate of for flr debate, likely between 5-7 am et

The House bill needs a blend of approximately 150 Republicans and about 70 Democrats to pass. But the vote counting is a little tenuous in the House and some sources express skepticism to Fox that the bill will pass.

The last whip count I saw had Democratic votes at "under 40". The official Freedom Caucus is 31, but there will be more defections than just those. Technically only 11 Democrats would have to vote yes if Ryan only lost 31, but there's a lot of room for error.

No one has put forth any idea on what happens if the house vote fails.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:08 PM on February 8, 2018 [1 favorite]


This should be rather entertaining. Nunes: We've 'grappled' with approaching Chief Justice Roberts. I'm sure Roberts will really appreciate being drawn into Nunes's conspiracy theories & be urged (can't force, Separation of Powers) to take a stand on them.
posted by scalefree at 9:27 PM on February 8, 2018 [2 favorites]


I'm sure Roberts will really appreciate being drawn into Nunes's conspiracy theories

Do you think that Nunes is even aware that Chief Justice Roberts personally selected and appointed all 11 FISA court judges? Do you think Roberts will appreciate Nunes questioning the integrity of him and his appointments?
posted by JackFlash at 9:42 PM on February 8, 2018 [27 favorites]


The AP lede is fire - "The last time Sen. Rand Paul was in the news for a scuffle, it involved a neighbor who allegedly tackled him in his yard over a lawn dispute. Thursday night, the Kentucky Republican took on the entire U.S. Senate”
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:46 PM on February 8, 2018 [24 favorites]




It all passes. And with that the Democrats throw away any leverage they have and DACA will just get continually punted. I'm sure when the Republicans refuse to consider the Dream Act in both houses we'll have some wonderful stirring speeches.
posted by Talez at 4:27 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


"How dare those negotiators only save half of the people the bank robbers took hostage and started executing. They should have blown up the whole bank, killing everyone instead!"
posted by Freon at 5:08 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


And now back to GOP: Trump

Porter himself was among the officials who fingered Lewandowski.

Corey dated Hope before Rob dated Hope and omg you guys, like, I think Hope is super sweet and everything but I worry she's not making good life choices okay?

Not to mention those dudes are both, like, totally grody. And I wish they'd just bury that Newt guy, he like, keeps showing up in all these scenes he's not supposed to be in, it's, like, stupid.
posted by petebest at 5:10 AM on February 9, 2018 [13 favorites]


having seen Rex Tillerson's interview where he "aw shucks, the Russians are going to still keep interfering and there's nothing we can do but let them know we are watching...." I was really mystified that 1. he would admit that since it is Trump's position that they are not

and 2. he seems so unconcerned...hmm


But see, if there's a huge Blue wave in November you could just as easily attribute such a dramatic swing to ......you got it.....Russia interfeared BUT NOW WE MUST REVERSE THEIR MEDDLING...

same as the different treatment of the Memos but better...
posted by Wilder at 5:19 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


I would give money tonight to such an effort."

>>>You want to give to Spread The Vote.


Spread the Vote looks perfect, although there are only three states so far, FL, GA, and TN. Here's Tennessee to see what they're looking for. Maybe some intrepid MeFites want to save the voting world for their state?

As an aside, this was interesting:
In Georgia, you can vote with your student ID if you go to a public or technical college or university, but not if you attend a private college (for instance, Spelman, Morehouse, and Clark Atlanta, three of the biggest and most prestigious Historically Black colleges in the country. All private. All in Georgia. Those students can't vote with their student ID).
Huh. How odd.
posted by petebest at 5:21 AM on February 9, 2018 [48 favorites]


David Weigel in the WaPo:
Eight months after Democrats began to release their “Better Deal” agenda, they are on the cusp of passing some of it into law — by tucking it into this week’s must-pass spending bill.

“This budget agreement shows that the Better Deal agenda is more than a set of ideas; now, it’s going to be real policies,” said Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) in a statement. “It delivers on exactly what we laid out last year: rural broadband, child care and assistance with college tuition.”

In negotiations, Democrats checked off several items in the Better Deal, a compendium of policies backed by Democrats in the past and brainstormed in meetings last spring and summer. The new items include $5.8 billion for the Child Care Development Block Grant program; $20 billion in infrastructure spending, including rural broadband funds, with no corresponding cuts; and a special joint committee on fulfilling pension obligations, with the results to be voted on by the end of the year.
I guess the Dems weren’t as feckless as we feared?
posted by GrammarMoses at 5:21 AM on February 9, 2018 [15 favorites]


I guess one way you could avoid the elections getting hacked would be to have on-site registration, pen-and-paper ballots and counting votes by hand. I realize that's hugely impractical for a nation of like 350 million people but I'm drawing a blank as to what the other options are.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 5:23 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


I realize that's hugely impractical for a nation of like 350 million people but I'm drawing a blank as to what the other options are.
Why is it more impractical in a country of 350 million than in a country of 300.000? It all happens at the local level anyway: local organizers set the whole thing up, control the voters and count the votes, then send the results to the next level, who send it on to the next. It can in principle be scaled up to any population size, you just need to determine the optimal largest size of the smallest entity — maybe 5.000?
posted by mumimor at 5:30 AM on February 9, 2018 [17 favorites]


Yeah that's my thoughts on it, too. Was just anticipating a lot of pushback against the idea.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 5:34 AM on February 9, 2018


I guess one way you could avoid the elections getting hacked would be to have on-site registration, pen-and-paper ballots and counting votes by hand.

Also some kind of federal law mandating minimum safeguards on voting, vote counting and best practice ballot design. That would mitigate that every county in the USA has their own way of doing things and they're continually changing with whatever decision the local county clerk came up with that morning.
posted by PenDevil at 5:36 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]




Note that the votes weren't even close, especially in the Senate. We have to face the possibility that, at least in the Senate, the leader of the caucus has lost control over conservative members. And whatever positive results came out of this bill can be reversed. You can't have a blue wave when you're demoralizing your base left and right because Manchin et al decide that it's vitally important for them to show "bipartisanship" by signing on for slashing the safety net and supporting white supremacist attacks on civil rights and immigration. A Minority Leader who doesn't seem particularly jazzed about standing up for what's right and who almost seems willing to be steamrolled by his right flank doesn't give me hope that whatever gains they made today are anything but fleeting and ephemeral. If the Democrats fail to take either chamber because they kept on voting against the interests of their constituents, especially the next generation of potential voters, all of this supposed good news will be for naught. It's crumbs that can easily be swept away by another two years of unified GOP control, let alone four to eight. It won't matter that CHIP is extended when the GOP finally decides that the US government is a two-party system in name only and decides to do away with it altogether.

Joke all you want, but the hubris and lack of foresight I'm seeing is terrifying. All this belief in the polling, that being "not those guys" is enough, that somehow centrist Republicans will find morals and ethics...it seems ridiculous to constantly be defending the behavior of the Congressional Democrats right now. It's been, what, three days since Trump was on live TV repeatedly saying he wants a shutdown? So where was the constant hammering of this on every channel by leadership? All we got was mush about bipartisanship and how they totally trust GOP leadership and we'll do something at some point that in all likelihood won't even work. Schumer was handed a fucking fully-dressed turkey on a platter and not only did he do nothing, he started giving the GOP hand-wrapped gifts for no reason. Not only did he not even bother getting a coherent message out before crumpling, he didn't bother to see if there was messaging that worked. That's what activists and potential voters and the base are seeing, and who can really blame them for believing that there's almost no Democrats willing to fight for them?
posted by zombieflanders at 5:58 AM on February 9, 2018 [14 favorites]


The Rob Porter debacle becomes the Rob Porter scandal (Aaron Blake | WaPo)
White House spokesman Raj Shah wouldn't elaborate Thursday on when Chief of Staff John F. Kelly and others became aware of allegations of spousal abuse by now-former staff secretary Rob Porter. And now we know why: It's pretty damning.

The Washington Post's Josh Dawsey and Beth Reinhard report that White House counsel Donald McGahn knew for a year about allegations Porter's ex-wives made against him to the FBI and that Kelly learned about them this fall, as they were holding up Porter's full security clearance. And yet Porter kept rising in the White House.

It's really difficult not to call this a scandal now.

It's not clear that either McGahn or Kelly knew the full extent of the allegations or that they included spousal abuse, but the best possible explanation is that they seemed to have a real lack of curiosity. It also raises the question of who else in the White House knew, including the president himself.

... They seemed to try their hardest not to find out whether someone they respected as a colleague might have done something truly awful, and when they did, they were prepared to defend him until they could no longer do so, because of either hubris or incompetence. And now they have a full-blown scandal on their hands.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 6:13 AM on February 9, 2018 [34 favorites]


Rob Porter’s Ex-Wife Warns Hope Hicks: He’ll Abuse You Next
This was the first thing I thought when I read the extremely triggering Intercept article. I've been in exactly that type of abusive relationship, and we are a whole "ex-wives club" of victims of the same man.
posted by mumimor at 6:15 AM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


Jesus, Democrats can't even see Lucy getting ready to pull the ball even when someone is showing the previous plays on rewind and slow-mo:
I asked Kentucky Rep. John Yarmouth, another Democrat who voted for the budget, why he thought the pressure on House Republicans to accept a Senate compromise would work this time when the same strategy didn’t work for the 2013 comprehensive immigration reform bill.

“Going into an election year,” he said, “I don’t think Paul Ryan wants to see, every night on the news, Dreamers being torn away from their families.”
That's a quote that'll fit nicely on the headstone for a Dem majority.
posted by zombieflanders at 6:18 AM on February 9, 2018 [13 favorites]


“Going into an election year,” he said, “I don’t think Paul Ryan wants to see, every night on the news, Dreamers being torn away from their families.”

THAT’S EXACTLY WHAT HE WANTS TO SEE BECAUSE THAT’S HIS BASE.
posted by Talez at 6:23 AM on February 9, 2018 [68 favorites]


I realize that's hugely impractical for a nation of like 350 million people

That part's not the issue.

I guess one way you could avoid the elections getting hacked would be to have on-site registration,

Several states do this already and extending it would be relatively simple.

pen-and-paper ballots

This is already the most common way of voting in the US.

and counting votes by hand.

Hand-counting is error-prone on ballots with lots of races, like American ballots. Parliamentary systems get away with hand-counting because their national elections generally have only one race on the ballot instead of 25 to 100 or more. You really want a scanner (which doesn't need to be networked) doing this.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 6:24 AM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Yes, that would be my main point: make voting offline again.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 6:26 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Democrats' 'Resistance' to Trump Is Eroding, and So Are Their Poll Numbers - Will Stancil, The Atlantic.
The notion that the president “constitutes a crisis in American governance,” is waning among party leaders, jeopardizing their mid-term advantage.
posted by ZeusHumms at 6:33 AM on February 9, 2018 [19 favorites]


Here (Canada) we vote on paper ballots. Some polling stations use optical scanners to enter the data, some use manual counting. The ballots are kept for audit purposes.

I think though focusing on that is misguided. The election is getting hacked by gerrymandering, voter suppression, disenfranchisement and information hacking (leaked emails, fake news, etc). Those are extremely effective tools; not as obvious or straightforward, but also much harder to fix.
posted by Bovine Love at 6:52 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


It feels to me like the Dems are reading all the polls wrong (eg Democrats' 'Resistance' to Trump Is Eroding, and So Are Their Poll Numbers - Will Stancil, The Atlantic).

They're seeing those numbers slip and thinking, oh, god, find me a way to capitulate more, I've gotta get my belly closer to the ground, when it seems more or less obvious to me that sacking up and winning one of these fights would see those numbers turn around.

Of course they haven't won a fight since the Great Society, so they've got no experience to work from
posted by TheProfessor at 6:52 AM on February 9, 2018 [9 favorites]


The election is getting hacked by gerrymandering, voter suppression, disenfranchisement and information hacking (leaked emails, fake news, etc). Those are extremely effective tools; not as obvious or straightforward, but also much harder to fix.

I am totally on board with fixing these things, too.
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 6:59 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


They're seeing those numbers slip and thinking, oh, god, find me a way to capitulate more, I've gotta get my belly closer to the ground, when it seems more or less obvious to me that sacking up and winning one of these fights would see those numbers turn around.

Well, Dems are empirically responsive to their margin of victory in a way that Republicans are not. It doesn't seem like *too* much of a stretch to say that this might apply to polls as well: the more popular they perceive themselves to be, the more progressive they let themselves be.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 7:02 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Democrats' 'Resistance' to Trump Is Eroding, and So Are Their Poll Numbers - Will Stancil, The Atlantic.

It is? I'm in Indiana, where organized resistance is gaining momentum like I've never seen, and—

OH. You meant resistance is eroding among—how did you put it?—"the highest circles of Democratic party politics." Pardon me, but that's not who I think of when I think of "Democrats." Actual people who vote Democratic are pissed off, and we're motivated, and we're organizing, and we'll be rattling the cages of those "highest circles" as soon as we leverage enough power to.
posted by Rykey at 7:03 AM on February 9, 2018 [74 favorites]


Hand-counting is error-prone on ballots with lots of races, like American ballots

Mexico (a nation of 111 million) uses paper ballots and hand counting. The election is organized by an independent election board that hands out free voter id. On the day of the vote, each ballot is counted by a the polling station chief, a secretary and representatives of each of the parties.
posted by Omon Ra at 7:04 AM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


Of course they haven't won a fight since the Great Society,

I'll have to refresh my memory on exactly when Lyndon Johnson passed Obamacare, Lily Ledbetter, and the ARRA. Do you have a link, or are you maybe going a little too far with the hyperbole?
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 7:07 AM on February 9, 2018 [30 favorites]


The Dems may be fluttering about at high levels right now. But, while we need anything we can get out of them, these aren’t the people who are going to save us. That’s going to be done at the grassroots and local levels. Look at how many people have signed up to run. Look at the projects like Postcards to Voters. Look at the women who have finally said “enough” and who are working like hell to do something about it. Look at the primary challenges that are starting to pop up.

If you want to put the fear of god into the established Dems, losing more elections won’t do that. Winning elections without their help, on the other hand, would. The message there is “we don’t need you if you’re not going to work for us and we can replace you.” If there’s a blue wave this fall, methinks the credit isn’t going to go to the DNC. It will go to Indivisible and the Women’s March and countless other groups. So don’t try to read election results based on what’s going on at the top levels. This ain’t their game to win anymore.
posted by azpenguin at 7:10 AM on February 9, 2018 [49 favorites]


So, the Senate floor schedule has HR 2579 on the floor starting Monday. This is a tangentially-health-care related bill that has passed the House, but which will serve as the vehicle for the immigration legislation in the Senate. (The entire text of the bill will be replaced by whatever the Senate can come up with.)

I’m not sure what the pros and cons are for taking a previously-passed House bill, but the Senate does this fairly regularly, especially on spending bills. My understanding is that as a stand-alone bill, a discharge petition could get it to the House floor. If the Senate can pass something.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 7:10 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Omon Ra: "Mexico (a nation of 111 million) uses paper ballots and hand counting"

Does Mexico have upwards of 100 races on each ballot though? Remember that in some places Americans elect things like tax collector. That is what makes hand counting difficult and error prone.
posted by Mitheral at 7:12 AM on February 9, 2018


So is the Hastert rule effectively dead as of today? Ryan needed Dem votes to pass the budget deal this morning in spite of the HFC's opposition.
posted by susuman at 7:14 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Of course they haven't won a fight since the Great Society,

I'll have to refresh my memory on exactly when Lyndon Johnson passed Obamacare, Lily Ledbetter, and the ARRA. Do you have a link, or are you maybe going a little too far with the hyperbole?
posted by Jpfed at 9:07 AM on February 9 [3 favorites +] [!]


I'm going too far.

But if I were gonna try to defend my own hyperbole, or to redefine "winning" as really blowing the other guys out of the water, I'd point out that we got the ACA passed, but without a public option, that we got Ledbetter but not the ERA, and that we got the ARRA, but not real sanctions/restrictions on Wall Street to the tune of Glass-Steagal and not any widespread convictions of the dudes who made 2008 happen.

I mean you're right tho

(edited for quote italics)
posted by TheProfessor at 7:14 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


Also....

Mexico (a nation of 111 million)

123 million. 83.5 million registered voters.

The US has a population of 323 million, 235 million of whom are eligible to vote. 200 million registered to vote in 2016.
posted by zarq at 7:28 AM on February 9, 2018


It occurs to me that with the exception of George HW Bush, the Republican Party has had successively dumber, more corrupt, and more authoritarian Presidents for my entire life.

The first President I was ever aware of was Reagan. And a great many people seemed to think that the Republicans had hit the bottom of the barrel when it came to sheer stupidity in a politician. Surely no one dumber than Reagan will ever be elected we said, and laughed at his stupidity and general dunderheadedness.

Reagan was also the first blatantly senile President in my lifetime, and again we on the left were sure the Republicans would never elect anyone suffering from age related mental degeneration again (though we also joked that since Reagan was so dumb it was hard to tell when he'd started going senile).

Reagan also set a mark for foolish corruption. Unlike the directed criminality of Nixon, Reagan's presidency was a vague cloud of people breaking the law for their own ends (much like his Presidency was a vague cloud of people promoting their own agendas without any actual President running things).

Then we got a respite with Bush Sr, who was wishy washy, mean mouthed, milquetoast, and medium evil, but not stupid or diabolical.

Following Clinton we got Bush Jr, who yet again inspired comments that the Republicans had finally reached the rock bottom in terms of stupidity among Presidents and no President could ever be dumber than Junior.

Junior also set new lows in attacks on civil liberties. This, we assured ourselves as entirely due to the "War on Terror" and no future President could go any further...

And now we have Trump. Dumber than Junior and Reagan, meaner than Junior and Reagan, and he's ahead of Reagan in that Reagan's Alzheimer's only really kicked in during his last two or three years in office, while as far as can be guessed Trump entered office with Alzheimer's about as far advanced as Reagan's was when he left office.

The attacks on civil liberties are worse than ever (and, Obama never really did anything to fix the situation Junior had left). Looking back on Junior it seems almost quaint to recall that we said he was ushering in Fascism, now that we have literal white supremacists stomping around the White House.

I can no longer cling to the illusion that this is as bad as it can get, and I see no reason to suppose the Republicans will reverse course now. Assuming Trump is booted from office in 2020 (far from assured) I feel confident that in 2024 the Republicans will manage to nominate someone who will make Donald J Trump look like a thoughtful, restrained, intelligent person.

I'm not sure how they'll achieve that, but I'm sure they'll manage somehow, the Republicans seem to have an endless ability to find ever worse candidates and, for reasons that are utterly baffling to me, to love those candidates.

I suppose the reasons boil down, basically, to racism, misogyny, and tax cuts, but yeesh. Couldn't the Republicans nominate someone smarter and less corrupt to implement their evil agenda?
posted by sotonohito at 7:32 AM on February 9, 2018 [35 favorites]


So is the Hastert rule effectively dead as of today? Ryan needed Dem votes to pass the budget deal this morning in spite of the HFC's opposition.

No. The pedophile rule is a majority of the majority not that the majority needed to come from the majority.
posted by Talez at 7:32 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


So is the Hastert rule effectively dead as of today? Ryan needed Dem votes to pass the budget deal this morning in spite of the HFC's opposition.

No. A majority of Republicans still voted for the budget deal. And practically too, Ryan is still giving the HFC a veto over any potential DACA deal, he's not going to allow a vote on something like the Durbin bill if it passes the Senate.
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:33 AM on February 9, 2018


The higher "if we can't pass it by ourselves we won't bring it to the floor" standard was violated, but even most of the House Freedom Kooks get the idea that _something_ had to pass even while they grumble about it.

DACA, on the other hand, is a hard stop for them; if Ryan puts a DACA bill giving any path to citizenship to Dreamers on the floor for any reason, there will be an immediate no-confidence vote on Ryan's Speakership. Which is why if you happen to know any Dreamers, don't put them on your bowling team's long-term roster.
posted by delfin at 7:36 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


Then we got a respite with Bush Sr, who was wishy washy, mean mouthed, milquetoast, and medium evil, but not stupid or diabolical.

If you haven't already, I highly recommend reading the Jon Meacham biography of HW, Destiny and Power. Bush I had a group that named themselves "The Vulcans": Cheney, Scowcroft, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld and Rice. They were war hawks who pushed the first Iraq war, and were hyper-aggressive regarding foreign policy.

The problem with both Bushes is that they were, as you noted, milquetoast and wishy washy. This is one of the dangers that Trump represents as well. Presidents who surround themselves with experts but are not strong in their leadership tend to get over-run by their advisors and cabinet -- all of whom have their own agendas. With Trump, his advisors have reportedly been at each others' throats. But Bush I bequeathed his to his son, who have them free rein and allowed them to run wild. Cheney and Rumsfeld in particular.

It's not enough for a President to not be diabolical or overtly evil. They have to also not surround themselves with those who are, and to make sure they're held on short leashes.
posted by zarq at 7:43 AM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


Either the Congressional Democratic leadership knows something we don't, or they're a bunch of spineless cowards and dumb as a bag of hammers to boot.

I'm hoping it's the former, but I feel fairly confident that it's the latter.

Maybe there's some super duper double top secret reason they can't explain to us plebes that they think now all their leverage is gone the Republicans will not only hold a vote on DACA, but enough Republicans will defect from the Party line to allow it to pass. But I can't imagine what that would be.

I'm reminded not so much of Lucy and the football, as Obama and the unemployment benefits. Remember how, back in the darkness of the recession, Junior's tax cuts were set to expire and in exchange for continuing them forever, Obama took extending unemployment benefits by six months. He got a tiny gain in exchange for every bit of leverage he had.

Why would the Republicans ever let there be a DACA vote? Ryan would be out of the speakership in a fetal heartbeat if he allowed there to be a DACA vote, and while McConnell's position in the Senate isn't so precarious, there's no benefit for him in holding a vote and some downside.

Besides, if they don't hold a vote at all they get to crow to their constituents about how they played the Democrats and gave them more libural tears to drink.

So I'm at a loss to explain the actions of the Democrats. Are they really such cowards lacking all principle, or is there some deep thing I'm missing here?
posted by sotonohito at 7:44 AM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


My understanding (never having voted in Mexico) is that the balloting system there has you voting for a party.

You're right, we don't vote for so many positions, 10-15 at most. This is a sample ballot for president. I can't comprehend voting for 100 things on one go. This explains the need for a butterfly ballot.
posted by Omon Ra at 7:47 AM on February 9, 2018


Here's an article about the Meacham book: "George Bush Sr book reveals a more dangerous Dick Cheney than anyone knew. Destiny and Power shows a VP with more authority than almost all his predecessors, making plain Bush Jr’s administration could have been even worse"

Response at the time by Rumsfeld: "'He's getting up in years': Rumsfeld says Bush Sr wrong in criticism of son's aides. Bush Jr ‘made his own decisions’ says former defense secretary, who is labelled arrogant and damaging to president in new biography of George HW Bush"
posted by zarq at 7:52 AM on February 9, 2018


Fwiw, scan-tron ballots, with locked retention AND precinct level manual auditing of representative samples is all the security we need, however it still leaves the whole "Both scanners are down" issues as well as the "The rolls don't list you so we need to go through the manual exception process turns into a distributed denial-of-service" attack still open to be resolved.
posted by mikelieman at 7:52 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


On the most recent episode of Chapo Trap House they posited that the Democratic Party generally lacks a strong ideology, and would rather be a marginal corporatist party than a successful socialist party. I'm beginning to believe that's true. They also said:

-If a politician offers a political program that will clearly improve peoples' lives in a concrete, meaningful way, they will vote for that politician.

-Only politicians with strong ideological commitment are likely to offer such a political program and be able to carry it out without compromising the bulk of it as soon as is convenient.

If you buy these premises, the DSA's candidates are actually generally more electable than Democratic rank and file. Thus far we've seen the Democratic Party either fail to provide them any resources or, even worse, actively work against them. I'm hoping the DSA is able to overcome this and make a foothold, because the Democratic Party desperately needs an infusion of left ideology.
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 7:53 AM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


The NYTimes' Trump whisperers Haberman and Baker are floating this trial balloon for the White House, Unwelcome Attention for John Kelly, the Man Enlisted to Bring Calm:
For now, it is Mr. Kelly who is in trouble. The president has little tolerance for aides who attract negative media attention that spills onto him, and in recent days Mr. Kelly has drawn a string of unwelcome headlines. He roiled negotiations over immigration legislation by declaring that some immigrants were “too lazy” to apply for legal status. And he initially defended a deputy accused by two ex-wives of physically abusing them.

All of which has again fired up the will-he-last speculation that has erupted periodically in the six months Mr. Kelly has been in office. Mr. Trump has recently asked advisers what they think of Mick Mulvaney, who currently holds twin posts as director of the White House budget office and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, as a possible chief of staff, according to two people briefed on the discussions.
posted by peeedro at 7:59 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


The choice isn't between impossibly tallying everything by hand and Russian-tampered online systems. There is a system that combines the best of hand-done ballots and machine counting, it makes voting as easy as taking your SAT, at least in terms of filling in little ovals and it's in use in a lot of place. Optical-scanning systems involve permanent ballots that can be tallied by machine so you get results fast and that can be viewed by hand if you need to have a recount. I still miss the old voting machines here in Boston - the Wizard-of-Oz lever you had to pull to close your curtain and then to register your vote made such a satisfying thunk, and now voting is like filling out a withdrawal slip at the bank - but I'm not worried my vote won't be tallied.
posted by adamg at 7:59 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


So I'm at a loss to explain the actions of the Democrats. Are they really such cowards lacking all principle, or is there some deep thing I'm missing here?

One cynical part of my brain wonders if it's calculated accelerationism. Have they decided that doing showy #Resistance stuff like Pelosi's filibuster and then folding in the actual fight will give them the best shot in the midterms? I mean that theory does still make them cowards lacking all principle, but it offers some logical motivation behind their otherwise inexplicable actions.
posted by contraption at 8:00 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


To be clear, are you talking here about DSA members running in Democratic party primaries as Democratic candidates for office?

Yes, exactly. To my knowledge, the DSA only runs candidates as Democrats. They have an entryist strategy.
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 8:01 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Unwelcome Attention for John Kelly, the Man Enlisted to Bring Calm

Buried down in the article is this gem: "[Kelly] appeared as a character witness in a 2016 court-martial of a Marine colonel accused of sexually harassing two female subordinates. Mr. Kelly praised the colonel as a “superb Marine officer.”"

It's almost like all generals aren't good people just because they're generals, and maybe John Kelly has always been a fucking monster.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:02 AM on February 9, 2018 [53 favorites]


Believe it or not, the story gets worse:
A 33-year Marine officer and former commander of the Wounded Warrior Regiment, he was sentenced to two months in the brig last year after pleading guilty to sending sexual text messages to a female enlisted subordinate, obtaining and using testosterone without a prescription, and driving drunk to his own arraignment aboard Marine Corps Base Quantico, Virginia.

Master Police Officer Linda Kuehn, a spokeswoman for the department, told Military.com Tuesday that the charges against Tomko include three counts of aggravated sexual battery, three counts of indecent liberties with a child, and one count of felony cruelty to children.
posted by zombieflanders at 8:13 AM on February 9, 2018 [45 favorites]


One cynical part of my brain wonders if it's calculated accelerationism. Have they decided that doing showy #Resistance stuff like Pelosi's filibuster and then folding in the actual fight will give them the best shot in the midterms? I mean that theory does still make them cowards lacking all principle, but it offers some logical motivation behind their otherwise inexplicable actions.

It's far more likely that they want to play both sides in the hopes of everyone loving them rather than having to commit to a concrete ideology and having someone hate them.

Then everyone hates them because they have no spines to stand up for what's right when necessary.
posted by Talez at 8:18 AM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Either the Congressional Democratic leadership knows something we don't

Yes. They know the minority party doesn't actually have any power. I wish their voters knew this.

Sure, they could fillibuster the budget bill, and shut down the government, temporarily. Until people get really pissed because their family members aren't getting paychecks and they can't get the services they need. Just long enough for everyone to get really angry at Democrats, and then Republicans kill the fillibuster and move on without having to compromise with Democrats ever again.

You want Democrats to do things? ELECT MORE DEMOCRATS! Give them the majority. Then they will actually have the power to do the things you want.
posted by OnceUponATime at 8:20 AM on February 9, 2018 [77 favorites]


I’m not sure what the pros and cons are for taking a previously-passed House bill, but the Senate does this fairly regularly, especially on spending bills.

“All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.”

— Article I, Section 7, Clause 1

Whether it's fucking stupid to call a bill as having originated in the house if you completely hollow it out afterwards is left as an exercise for the reader. But the same thing happened with the ACA.
posted by phearlez at 8:22 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Guardian: California police worked with neo-Nazis to pursue 'anti-racist' activists, documents show

Compare and contrast:

(1) The officer’s write-up about an African American anti-fascist activist included a photo of him at the hospital after the rally and noted that he had been stabbed in the abdomen, chest and hand. Ayres, however, treated the protester like a suspect in the investigation. The police investigator recommended the man be charged with 11 offenses, including disturbing the peace, conspiracy, assault, unlawful assembly and wearing a mask to evade police. As evidence, Ayres provided Facebook photos of the man holding up his fist. The officer wrote that the man’s “Black Power salute” and his “support for anti-racist activism” demonstrated his “intent and motivation to violate the civil rights” of the neo-Nazi group.

(2) Officers also worked with TWP member Derik Punneo to try to identify anti-fascist activists, recordings revealed. Officers interviewed Punneo in jail after he was arrested for an unrelated domestic violence charge. Audio recordings captured investigators saying they brought photos to show him, hoping he could help them identify anti-fascist activists. The officers said, “We’re pretty much going after them,” and assured him: “We’re looking at you as a victim.” Ayres’s report noted that Punneo was armed with a knife at the neo-Nazi rally and that one stabbing victim told officers he believed Punneo was responsible. Using video footage, Ayres also noted that Punneo was “in the vicinity” of another victim at the time he was injured, but the officer said the evidence ultimately wasn’t clear. Punneo and McCormack, who could not be reached for comment, were not charged.

Stabbed black guy who was photographed with a raised fist: guilty.

Nazi with domestic violence charges who was observed stabbing people: victim.

ACHPAB.
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:23 AM on February 9, 2018 [74 favorites]


Are they really such cowards lacking all principle, or is there some deep thing I'm missing here?

There is a not-that-deep-thing you're missing, which is that congressional Democratic leadership is answerable to their caucus, and a lot of the Democratic members of Congress are pretty conservative and prone to revolt if they're pushed too far. This is because they represent conservative districts and states, and the values and actions they take are in line with that representation. As frustrating as it may be for you and I, the reality is that the majority of the country is wildly more conservative than we are, and this places extremely strong constraints on what it is possible for more liberal Democrats to achieve. The Democratic leadership passed Obamacare knowing the effect it would have on the next election, and sure enough, in 2010 we got our assess kicked, and many of the freshmen Democratic representatives elected with the 2008 Obama wave were not reelected for a second term, and the Republicans rode the anti-Obamacare wave to claim state legislatures all over the country, redrawing congressional districts and sending the House even more right-wing. The Democrats passed Obamacare anyway because getting some kind of healthcare reform was critical, even though the real solution, universal coverage, was politically out of reach, but they knew the cost they'd pay for it. They were not cowards or idiots, they were simply making a difficult political calculation.

I get really sick of people characterizing the Democratic leadership as cowards and idiots. Yes, they are flawed humans who make mistakes. And we should not hesitate to criticize their bad decisions when we see them. But they've also been here before and borne the political scars of their difficult past decisions. Refusing to acknowledge the extremely difficult constraints they're operating under, and the extremely difficult decisions they've made in the past, and how these factors might color their current decision making, these are fundamentally defeatist positions. Because no human being could possibly live up to the standard you're setting, and so at a core level what you're effectively communicating is that good political leadership is impossible, and anyone who attempts it will fail so badly that they are worse human beings than if they had never tried at all.

So please, criticize Pelosi and Shumer and whomever else you like for their decisions you disagree with. Do it all day long, and try to create political leverage to force them to change their decisions to ones you're happier with. And if you think there's someone who would make better decisions, campaign to get them elected instead. But please stop calling the people who are fighting their best for us in an arena few others want anything to do with cowards and idiots.
posted by biogeo at 8:24 AM on February 9, 2018 [80 favorites]


indecent liberties with a child

This is diplomatic-sounding legalese for "he has been charged three times with attempting (or actually committing) sexual assault of one or more children under the age of 16."

The article notes that there were three victims.
posted by zarq at 8:24 AM on February 9, 2018 [17 favorites]


On a sort-of-related note, WaPo: Breaking with tradition, Trump skips president’s written intelligence report and relies on oral briefings

The real question here is whether he mutes Fox and Friends when being briefed or whether he just turns the volume down a bit.
posted by dis_integration at 8:25 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


The Congressional Democrats' actions are not inexplicable. They got a lot of what they wanted from the budget deal. An article linked upthread shows that the Democrats got some of what they wanted.

As the minority party, they didn't get absolutely everything they wanted. But... that's kinda life when you're in the minority. Maybe it's just my experience as a Wisconsinite under 8 years of unified Republican rule but it seems pretty unusual that the Dems got any concessions at all for anything.

On preview, what OnceUponATime said.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 8:26 AM on February 9, 2018 [21 favorites]


On the most recent episode of Chapo Trap House they posited that the Democratic Party generally lacks a strong ideology, and would rather be a marginal corporatist party than a successful socialist party

Here's a better explanation.

Since at least the 1960s the Republicans have been stealing racist voters from the Democrats (and it's been working for them). See "Southern strategy" etc.

In response, the Democrats have been stealing the votes of Republicans who are capitalist but anti-racist.

So the divisions between the parties have become less and less about economics and more and more about race.

If you think there are a lot of voters out there who are both socialist and anti-racist, you're gonna have to prove it by getting them to show up and vote. Because to date, they never really have.
posted by OnceUponATime at 8:26 AM on February 9, 2018 [14 favorites]


Yes. They know the minority party doesn't actually have any power. I wish their voters knew this.

Thank you. Public opinion was against a shutdown. They're playing the hand they've got, against an opponent who cares not a bit about the rules.

Anyway, I actually came here to post what cjelli just posted about Tim Kaine. I hope this gets more attention. The constitutional crisis continues.
posted by Emmy Rae at 8:28 AM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


There is a not-that-deep-thing you're missing, which is that congressional Democratic leadership is answerable to their caucus, and a lot of the Democratic members of Congress are pretty conservative and prone to revolt if they're pushed too far. This is because they represent conservative districts and states, and the values and actions they take are in line with that representation.

Except that this isn't necessarily correct. For example, here's a bit from the article ZeusHumms linked above:
The outcome of any final immigration deal is unknown, in part because Democrats voluntarily relinquished much of their leverage by striking a bargain on the budget. But there can be little doubt that many in the party were prepared to make serious—and politically unpopular—policy concessions to Trump. At one point, that reportedly included funding for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border (opposed by 60 percent of Americans). As it stands, Democrats in both houses appear to be on the brink of dropping demands to protect the “Dreamers,” undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children (protections that are supported by 74 percent of Americans).
Note that those figures are among all Americans, which in practically all cases means that strong support among Democrats and middling-to-strong support among independents is thrown off by very low GOP numbers. It also doesn't square with the Senators and Reps from safely blue states and districts that also threw their constituents overboard.

You want Democrats to do things? ELECT MORE DEMOCRATS! Give them the majority. Then they will actually have the power to do the things you want.

Because it's so easy to elect more people who don't seem to care whether you or your family is attacked by brownshirts and/or deported back to places where they will be de facto sentenced to death.
posted by zombieflanders at 8:37 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


> H.R. 4980, the Preventing the Allocation of Resources for Absurd Defense Expenditures (PARADE) Act.

#notgoosesteppingist
posted by theora55 at 8:41 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Aw, crap. Rick Nolan [D-MN-08] is retiring. Seat has a PVI of R+13, went for Trump 54-39. Tough seat to hold.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:42 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


Because it's so easy to elect more people who don't seem to care whether you or your family is attacked by brownshirts and/or deported back to places where they will be de facto sentenced to death.

They care. They just can't save them without hurting a lot of other people. "You should have let them shoot the OTHER hostages" is not a great rallying cry. People depend on the work of the EPA and the CDC, among many, many others.

Give them a majority. Take the gun out of Republican hands. Then all the hostages can live.
posted by OnceUponATime at 8:43 AM on February 9, 2018 [29 favorites]


Mitheral: "Remember that in some places Americans elect things like tax collector."

Monstrous.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:44 AM on February 9, 2018 [73 favorites]


"You should have let them shoot the OTHER hostages" is not a great rallying cry.

"Elect more Democrats when you're not sure who they'll let be shot" ain't one either.
posted by zombieflanders at 8:45 AM on February 9, 2018 [12 favorites]


The choice isn't between impossibly tallying everything by hand and Russian-tampered online systems. There is a system that combines the best of hand-done ballots and machine counting, it makes voting as easy as taking your SAT, at least in terms of filling in little ovals and it's in use in a lot of place. Optical-scanning systems involve permanent ballots that can be tallied by machine so you get results fast and that can be viewed by hand if you need to have a recount. I still miss the old voting machines here in Boston - the Wizard-of-Oz lever you had to pull to close your curtain and then to register your vote made such a satisfying thunk, and now voting is like filling out a withdrawal slip at the bank - but I'm not worried my vote won't be tallied.
This is the system we use here in Cincinnati/Hamilton County, OH. It works really well. If I recall correctly from a book I once read on elections, the downside to using them is that the printing costs for the ballots are the highest because they require more precise printing. Not sure if that has changed in the subsequent years since that book was published. Costs would be increased as well if you had to provide the optical scan ballots in lots of different languages.
posted by mmascolino at 8:46 AM on February 9, 2018


Give them a majority. Take the gun out of Republican hands. Then all the hostages can live.

But god damn it, it's not enough to let the hostages live for another couple years. The hostages need to be freed, the hostage-takers need to be disempowered and punished, and steps need to be taken to prevent future hostage-taking. There has to be a way out of the darkness and it's not enough for the alternative to be "sit down in the darkness and hope somebody turns the light back on."
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:48 AM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


zombieflanders: It's true that a strong majority of the public support protecting or even expanding DACA, but it's also true that a majority oppose shutting down the government over it. Maybe that would still have been the right thing to do, maybe it'd wouldn't have been. But "the public would have supported it" isn't a reason for it to have been the right thing to do because they wouldn't and didn't.
posted by Justinian at 8:51 AM on February 9, 2018 [12 favorites]


If you think there are a lot of voters out there who are both socialist and anti-racist, you're gonna have to prove it by getting them to show up and vote. Because to date, they never really have.

Who would they have shown up to vote for? I agree with you that the division between the parties has centered race much more in recent years while economic issues get left in the margins. This has meant that there have been almost no anti-racist, socialist politicians to turn out these voters. I believe that the enormous mass of Americans who rarely or never vote contains a pretty significant chunk of people who would be receptive to a socialist message, but we rarely get to hear one.
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 8:52 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Oh, and stop pretending that passing Obamacare was some sort of guarantee of failure in the midterms. It was also a failure of messaging, a failure to keep the conservative wing in line, a failure to organize beyond election years, a failure to organize beyond the federal level, and an intense desire to play nice with the GOP; all of which absolutely fell on Democratic leadership, including Obama.

The idea that 2010 and 2014 were 100% inevitable calamities that were out of their hands is rubbish. Even if the bleeding couldn't have been stopped, it could have been slowed.
posted by zombieflanders at 8:54 AM on February 9, 2018 [30 favorites]


I’d say it would be reasonable to acknowledge that Congressional Democrats have to choose from a smorgasbord of terrible choices. It’s not even a matter of finding the diamond in the pile of shit right now, it’s basically just a pile of shit. They are damned no matter what they pick, and the reality of a government run by a malignant narcissist enabled by an enthusiastic Republican Party is that being visibly obstructionist, even for things that anyone with a sense of justice and morality would obstruct, will set Trump and the GOP off to do things that are even more inhumane. Nothing is off the table at this point. Cancel elections? Drop bombs on someone? Start creating lists of registered Democrats and accuse them of crimes against the state? We’re poised on the verge of an outright dictatorship and there are no good moves for elected Democratic officials right now, except to mitigate what they can, and to encourage voters to mobilize before the GOP gets it into their head to throw the lawbook out entirely.

And that is *before* getting to the finer point of realizing that Congressional Democrats aren't necessarily going to support policies that Democratic voters support.

And yeah, the hostages do need to be freed, but right now the hostage-takers are threatening to blow the place up. You’re not going to win the stand-off by trying to out-tough the GOP when you are outnumbered and when the GOP can easily, handily consolidate behind party lines and just nuke it all. They have obviously already demonstrated their willingness to do that.
posted by Autumnheart at 8:58 AM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


To clarify, I am not saying that Democrats shouldn’t obstruct because then the GOP will be even meaner. I’m saying that it’s a careful balancing act between obstructing what they may and not appearing to be such a threat that the GOP decides to go full autocrat. Which they have the power and, apparently, the will to do at any moment. Right now they’re confronting the loon with the explosive vest and they need to wait for backup. We’re the backup.
posted by Autumnheart at 9:01 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


Hey y'all, is this sort of armchair politicking around tortured hostage metaphors either productive or informative?
posted by runcibleshaw at 9:03 AM on February 9, 2018 [28 favorites]


biogeo The main reason I don't accept that explanation, basically that the Democrats are giving in because there's a lot of conservative Democrats (and that America is basically a conservative country) is because that's not what any of the actual people in power are saying.

Schumer isn't out there saying "look, this is the best we could do, we know McConnell and Ryan won't let there be a DACA vote, but we had to take this deal because that's all our caucus would let us take".

Schumer is out there saying "I trust Mitch McConnell will give us the DACA vote!"

Maybe you're right and the Democrats had to throw away any chance of leverage here. But I don't see how pretending to be such morons they buy McConnell's Lucy and the football level blatant lies fits that.

Am I just to assume that when Schumer and so his fellow high ranking Democrats tell me that they trust McConnell and Ryan that they're lying and I have to somehow puzzle out their true, noble and honorable, motives? That seems like an invitation to conspiracy theorizing.
posted by sotonohito at 9:04 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


Hey y'all, is this sort of armchair politicking around tortured hostage metaphors either productive or informative?

There are many ways in which it is not a metaphor and it will become even less of a metaphor very soon.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:05 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


OnceUponATime: "If you think there are a lot of voters out there who are both socialist and anti-racist, you're gonna have to prove it by getting them to show up and vote. Because to date, they never really have."

This is a cruel thing to say and I think you know why. If any politicans actually ran on socialist platforms (and weren't jailed like Eugene Debs, eg), then maybe people would show their support. It's hardly right to blame socialists for not showing up when they've not had any fucking reason to.
posted by TypographicalError at 9:08 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


Schumer is out there saying "I trust Mitch McConnell will give us the DACA vote!"

But the reality of the situation is that it doesn’t matter what Schumer says. Democrats can’t get the DACA vote by themselves. Saying “McConnell is full of it and won’t deliver the DACA vote” states the likely truth but accomplishes nothing concrete, except to tell Democrats what we already know and to give Republicans an excuse to make Democrats look like assholes. Schumer could just not say anything at all and it would accomplish exactly the same things. Nothing is going to make Republicans vote for DACA.
posted by Autumnheart at 9:09 AM on February 9, 2018 [15 favorites]


Am I just to assume that when Schumer and so his fellow high ranking Democrats tell me that they trust McConnell and Ryan that they're lying and I have to somehow puzzle out their true, noble and honorable, motives? That seems like an invitation to conspiracy theorizing.

Only if you’ve literally only just heard of “politics” like...yesterday?

Come on, I don’t pretend to have a crystal ball, but lining up to take shots at the party who’s trying to stop the Nazis for not entirely stopping the Nazis because they have to make terrible choices given that their options are constrained by Nazis seems myopic at best.

The Democrats not being perfect, or failing to thread a needle or pull a rabbit out of a hat or whatever when they are a minority in every respect, are not the problem. The fucking Nazis are the problem.
posted by schadenfrau at 9:11 AM on February 9, 2018 [43 favorites]


It's hardly right to blame socialists for not showing up when they've not had any fucking reason to.

CANDIDATE A: I'm not a socialist.

CANDIDATE B: HERE ARE SIX DOZEN FACEBOOK MEMES ABOUT HUNTING SOCIALISTS FOR SPORT LOL

yeah, no reason at all.
posted by prize bull octorok at 9:12 AM on February 9, 2018 [21 favorites]


It's hardly right to blame socialists for not showing up when they've not had any fucking reason to.

That “preventing white supremacists from gaining national power” is not considered a “reason” for socialists to show up and vote is, perhaps, the problem.
posted by schadenfrau at 9:13 AM on February 9, 2018 [53 favorites]


sotonohito, why would Schumer admit that there are divisions within the Democratic caucus rather than setting up the opportunity to paint McConnell/GOP as negotiating in bad faith if nothing gets done for the dreamers?

I've never seen a political party anywhere that will admit to that sort of weakness. For better or worse setting up someone else as the bad guy always takes priority over acknowledging reality. Lemons and lemonade or something like that.
posted by N-stoff at 9:13 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Schumer is out there saying "I trust Mitch McConnell will give us the DACA vote!"

I don't believe Schumer ever actually believed this. From interviews he's given on Colbert and other places, it's pretty clear Schumer is working the individual personalities of people he knows directly. I don't know what he's doing, and maybe he's just nuts with no real clear strategy. I suspect he's trying to turn a few specific Republicans against McConnell, or deepen the wedge between the more right-wing members of his own party and the Republican leadership. But I doubt anyone's really in a position to know whether whatever he's doing is working until the book is written on all of this.
posted by biogeo at 9:14 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


Hey y'all, is this sort of armchair politicking around tortured hostage metaphors either productive or informative?

When the Republicans claim to support DACA but "need something in return," I think the metaphor of a hostage situation is actually pretty apt.
posted by biogeo at 9:16 AM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


I believe that the enormous mass of Americans who rarely or never vote contains a pretty significant chunk of people who would be receptive to a socialist message, but we rarely get to hear one

1) Maybe, but non-voters don't vote, so their opinions don't matter. "Oh, but they would vote if there were a socialist on the ballot!" I don't see a lot of evidence for that. Bernie motivated some first-time voters -- but not enough to win. And Trump motivated a bunch of first time voters too...

2) Even if there are a bunch of socialist non-voters... Do they live in places Democrats already win? Because running up the win margins in cities will not actually give Democrats any more power in the government.
posted by OnceUponATime at 9:18 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Mod note: Y'all please cool it some, this is feeling a lot like hollering at each other because the people we're actually angry at aren't listening and I don't see it getting more productive over time at this rate.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:19 AM on February 9, 2018 [39 favorites]


I get really sick of people characterizing the Democratic leadership as cowards and idiots. Yes, they are flawed humans who make mistakes. And we should not hesitate to criticize their bad decisions when we see them. But they've also been here before and borne the political scars of their difficult past decisions. Refusing to acknowledge the extremely difficult constraints they're operating under, and the extremely difficult decisions they've made in the past, and how these factors might color their current decision making, these are fundamentally defeatist positions. Because no human being could possibly live up to the standard you're setting, and so at a core level what you're effectively communicating is that good political leadership is impossible, and anyone who attempts it will fail so badly that they are worse human beings than if they had never tried at all.

Holding public figures to the promises they make is a reasonable standard, and one which can be met. It's not in any way 'impossible'. McConnell has made numerous promises to his own base and to Democrats that have failed to materialize. He's a liar who does not give a damn about rules or fair play.

Knowing that one is dealing with someone who will say or do anything to get what they want (and therefore treating every "promise" they make as worthless) is the barest minimum we should expect from our minority leader. I'm a New Yorker. I'm proud of what Schumer has done for me and my state. But in not fighting as hard as he can for DACA and believing McConnell's meaningless, worthless lies, he is failing his constituents. You know, folks like me, who repeatedly voted his ass into office as a Rep and then as a Senator.

His ultimate obligation isn't just to his Caucus. It's to the people who can and will replace him if he fucks us over.
posted by zarq at 9:24 AM on February 9, 2018 [9 favorites]


zarq: Can, and will replace him if the next election is actually free and fair. Which it still may not be.
posted by SansPoint at 9:30 AM on February 9, 2018


I was a bit too snarky in making this point and got (probably rightly) deleted for it, but I do think it's an important point and I'd like to try making it again with more sincerity:

Politics is hard, and political strategy is hard. If you think you understand it better than the current political leadership, then, seriously, run for office. We need politically savvy people with good values and good policies in office, and if you think you'd be better at it than the people currently there, then please, serve your country by running for office. If you really are the political savior we need, you'll be able to work the machine and get elected, and help lead us out of the wilderness we currently find ourselves in.

But if you don't honestly think you'd do a better job than the folks currently there, then lobbing bombshells about how they're so obviously cowardly and idiotic, and anyone can see it, isn't helpful. Me, I would be a terrible politician. I have no hesitation voicing my disagreement and criticism of my own elected officials and of Democratic leaders like Pelosi and Schumer, but I respect that they're doing an extremely hard job that I couldn't do, and that they seem sincere in doing that job in the service of the American people, unlike their counterparts on the Republican side of the aisle who are obviously working for corporate donors and right-wing insurgents.
posted by biogeo at 9:35 AM on February 9, 2018 [46 favorites]


Even if there are a bunch of socialist non-voters...

I know we don't trust polling anymore, but I've never seen any polling that indicates there are "a bunch" of self-identified socialists who just don't vote ever, regardless of what anyone may personally believe about their existence.
posted by aspersioncast at 9:39 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


Before 9/11 if a bunch of people took over an airplane you assumed that it was a hostage situation and that there needed to be a negotiation to get the hostages back etc... etc... 9/11 changed the rules and now you'd assume they are going to take that plane and slam it into a building instead, with the hostages irrelevant. To a certain extent 9/11 is a non repeatable event because they changed the rules there and everyone knows it.

Republicans basically 9/111 the shit out of everything every day and Pelosi and Schumer dick around waiting for hostage negotiations to happen.
posted by Artw at 9:42 AM on February 9, 2018 [23 favorites]


I have no hesitation voicing my disagreement and criticism of my own elected officials and of Democratic leaders like Pelosi and Schumer, but I respect that they're doing an extremely hard job that I couldn't do, and that they seem sincere in doing that job in the service of the American people, unlike their counterparts on the Republican side of the aisle who are obviously working for corporate donors and right-wing insurgents.

I don't disagree with this. But the minority leader is not from a conservative state with a conservative electorate. He should absolutely reflect that.

I'm from New York. Born and mostly raised here. We're an immigrant city. We're a diverse city. We show the rest of the country by example that our immigrants are a precious resource, that should be valued and cultivated. Our Senator should be highlighting and defending immigrants. The NYC DOE schools chancellor issued two letters last year when Trump targeted and threatened Muslims with deportation through his executive orders. In part, it read:
We take pride in our diversity. Immigrant parents, students, principals, teachers and other staff are a part of what makes our schools, and New York City, the amazing, strong, vibrant places they are. Whether you or your family arrived 100 years or 100 days ago —you are New Yorkers— and we stand with you."
I want Schumer to embody those sentiments.

Otherwise, why the hell is Lady Liberty sitting in our harbor?
posted by zarq at 9:45 AM on February 9, 2018 [15 favorites]


So in this analogy, what would Schumer and Pelosi storming the cockpit doors look like?
posted by jetsetsc at 9:46 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


I don't disagree with this. But the minority leader is not from a conservative state with a conservative electorate. He should absolutely reflect that.

[...]

I want Schumer to embody those sentiments.

Otherwise, why the hell is Lady Liberty sitting in our harbor?


This is a criticism of Chuck Schumer I can stand with.
posted by biogeo at 9:50 AM on February 9, 2018 [9 favorites]


New Marist poll (graded A by 538) is interesting.

11 point D generic congressional advantage (+6 from last month)
24/44 Trump strong approval/strong disapproval (strong disapproval +5% from last month)
66% would believe the FBI's word over Trump's, 24% believe Trump over the FBI.
71% think FBI's doing it's job, 23% say it's biased. 16% want Mueller fired.
65/28 Favorable/unfavorable for FBI in general.
Non-college white belief in Trump vs Mueller: 43% Trump, 40% Mueller.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:53 AM on February 9, 2018 [18 favorites]


I feel like we're talking past each other. I don't see resisting the Republican onslaught and trying to vote them out as two mutually exclusive things. In fact, I see them as synergistic. You can't drag people out of their houses and make them vote. You need to motivate them and then make it as easy as possible to vote. Resisting is where the motivation comes from in part. By making it clear that the other side is doing bad things that affect actual people, you can motivate large numbers.

Now liberals don't have a counterpart to tools like Faux Nooz, Dimbart, Limpbag, InfoScars, rightwing religious nuts, the NRA, white supremacists, Nazis, and the rightwing "think tanks" to motivate people to vote by crafting and pushing phony wedge issues like voter ID, scary Muslims, bad Latinos/as taking jobs and forming gangs, transexuals invading bathrooms to rape young girls, etc., etc., etc. And we don't want them. We have plenty of real issues to win on, and our challenge is to make it clear whose fault it is that those issues have not been resolved to people's favor and in many cases who has caused those problems in the first place.

So, yes, get out and vote and urge others to. Work to make sure others can vote. Talk to as many people as you can to make sure they see how you see the problems and their solutions. But also strategize how to oppose the GOP agenda and appreciate the difficulties our liberal elected officials face in gaming out responses that will optimize hurting as few people as possible while also making it clear who is causing the damage and who is opposing it. This is not a trivial task, especially in light of the GOP's vast toolbox for propagandizing and muddying the waters, often assisted by their friends in Russia.

And never, never, ever give up.
posted by Mental Wimp at 9:54 AM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


I know we don't trust polling anymore, but I've never seen any polling that indicates there are "a bunch" of self-identified socialists who just don't vote ever, regardless of what anyone may personally believe about their existence.

I never said there were a bunch of self-identified socialists in the US, I said there are plenty of people receptive to socialist ideas. I can't prove this because in the past several decades the closest thing we've had to a socialist with a platform is Bernie, and he's (believe it or not) politically to the right of most self-identified socialists. But I do believe that the surprising success of Bernie in the US and Corbyn in the UK is a strong hint that a loud and proud socialist message could really resonate here, with people who currently have no idea what socialism actually is.
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 9:56 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Now liberals don't have a counterpart to tools like Faux Nooz, Dimbart, Limpbag, InfoScars,

Can we just use the real names?
posted by Autumnheart at 10:00 AM on February 9, 2018 [37 favorites]


So in this analogy, what would Schumer and Pelosi storming the cockpit doors look like?

Shutting down the government until both houses vote on the DREAM Act, which has overwhelming support even among the Republican electorate and which would fly through the House and Senate if it made it to the floor.
posted by contraption at 10:01 AM on February 9, 2018


The glint of a silver lining I see in the budget deal is that Trump now knows a bipartisan agreement can happen without his meddling.

I had a follow-up point there, but I've lost it in a wave of fatalism.
posted by DrAstroZoom at 10:02 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


Probably not the place for this, but while I'd certainly like to think more people would be receptive to socialist ideas (and am heartened by the actual term no longer being political poison), I'm increasingly convinced many of my fellow Americans are actually opposed to helping anyone else in any way would be perfectly content to let anyone less fortunate than them starve in the fucking street while being mocked for their physical infirmity.
posted by aspersioncast at 10:04 AM on February 9, 2018 [18 favorites]


Shutting down the government until both houses vote on the DREAM Act, which has overwhelming support even among the Republican electorate and which would fly through the House and Senate if it made it to the floor.

We don’t have the votes to do that either, and considering the Republicans have shut down the government twice already because they can’t even pass their own legislation, I doubt a third shutdown will stand out as a principled stance, and would simply get lost in the noise.
posted by Autumnheart at 10:04 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


I want to back up a bit and consider something else from Barack Spinoza's link to Aaron Blake's WaPo piece about Rob Porter's violence towards women. Blake bring up a good point:
It's not clear that either McGahn or Kelly knew the full extent of the allegations or that they included spousal abuse, but the best possible explanation is that they seemed to have a real lack of curiosity. It also raises the question of who else in the White House knew, including the president himself.

... They seemed to try their hardest not to find out whether someone they respected as a colleague might have done something truly awful, and when they did, they were prepared to defend him until they could no longer do so, because of either hubris or incompetence. And now they have a full-blown scandal on their hands.
For me the question goes well beyond "What did everyone know about Porter and when?", into "Who else has similar histories of violence/abuse that they have an idea about?" and "Who else are they protecting from similar allegations?"

These men have repeatedly shown that they do not care about women, both on micro and macro scales. They shrug off abuse (e.g. Lewandowski, Porter, Trump) so easily that it'd be shocking if Rob Porter is the only one in the White House with these sorts of allegations.
posted by Excommunicated Cardinal at 10:04 AM on February 9, 2018 [30 favorites]


66% would believe the FBI's word over Trump's, 24% believe Trump over the FBI.
71% think FBI's doing it's job, 23% say it's biased. 16% want Mueller fired.
65/28 Favorable/unfavorable for FBI in general.


For partisan motivated reasoning, there was a Reuters/Ipsos poll from monday showing that 73% of republicans agreed that "members of the FBI and Department of Justice are working to delegitimize Trump through politically motivated investigations." And a SurveyMonkey poll from last week showing that only 38% of republicans have a favorable opinion of the FBI.
posted by peeedro at 10:05 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'm increasingly convinced many of my fellow Americans are actually opposed to helping anyone else in any way...

Same as it ever was. We don't need for them to agree, because they are a (very vocal) minority.
posted by Mental Wimp at 10:05 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


WaPo: Kelly offers account of Porter exit that some White House aides consider untrue
White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly on Friday morning instructed senior staff to communicate a version of events about the departure of staff secretary Rob Porter that contradicts the administration’s previous accounts, according to two senior officials.

During a staff meeting, Kelly told those in attendance to say that he took action to remove Porter within 40 minutes of learning that abuse allegations from two ex-wives were credible, according to the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because discussions in such meetings are supposed to be confidential.

“He told the staff he took immediate and direct action,” one of the officials said, adding that people after the meeting expressed disbelief with one another and felt his latest account was not true.

That version of events contradicts both the public record and accounts from numerous other White House officials in recent days as the Porter drama unfolded. Kelly — who first learned of the domestic violence allegations against Porter months ago — issued a glowing statement of support for Porter’s personal character after the allegations first surfaced publicly Tuesday and privately urged him to remain on the job until the next day when his resignation was announced.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 10:08 AM on February 9, 2018 [22 favorites]


it'd be shocking if Rob Porter is the only one in the White House with these sorts of allegations.

At least one other White House occupant has domestic violence and (a couple dozen) sexual assault accusations.
posted by Rust Moranis at 10:08 AM on February 9, 2018 [19 favorites]


WaPo: Kelly offers account of Porter exit that some White House aides consider untrue

Meanwhile, Trump seems to be blaming Hope Hicks.
posted by peeedro at 10:13 AM on February 9, 2018 [12 favorites]


Shutting down the government until both houses vote on the DREAM Act
...
We don’t have the votes to do that either


I don't think that's at all clear. It's a bill with overwhelming popular support even in red districts.
posted by contraption at 10:13 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Meanwhile, Trump seems to be blaming Hope Hicks.

That's nice — antagonize someone else who's already talked with Mueller.
posted by CommonSense at 10:15 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


Mod note: Bunch of stuff deleted. See previous recent note about cooling it.
posted by cortex (staff) at 10:15 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


Meanwhile, Trump seems to be blaming Hope Hicks.

I will be quite happy if this ends in Hicks and Kelly losing their jobs and Mulvaney being either pulled away from the CFPB or so busy also being Chief of Staff that he doesn't have time to completely the CFPB.
posted by jedicus at 10:16 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


The resistance gets rolled - The budget debate shows that the activist left lacks the kind of pull with Democrats that tea partiers once enjoyed with Republicans.
Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), who took heat from immigrant-rights activists for supporting a short-term spending bill in December, described liberal groups as integral to understanding the substance of immigration and other issues — but less helpful with political strategy.

“We listen carefully to them on matters of policy,” Kaine said in an interview. “But often on matters of tactics and strategy, those of us who have been here a while and kind of know it ... on policy yes, tactics less.”
Tim Kaine, the tactical genius who lost a debate to Mike Pence and an election to Donald Trump wants the left to STFU and let him handle it.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:16 AM on February 9, 2018 [32 favorites]


White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly on Friday morning instructed senior staff to communicate a version of events about the departure of staff secretary Rob Porter that contradicts the administration’s previous accounts, according to two senior officials.

Jesus Christ, these people are like compulsive self-owners. First, Hope Hicks's "don't worry; it'll never get out" seems to be the entire White House motto for everything, which is just. so. dumb. Of course it will get out, of course it will! If you didn't realize that a year ago, you surely should now. And if you don't realize that now, you are too fucking dumb to work in the White House.

And then when the Thing du Jour predictably does get out, they never just cut their losses and say, "Yeah, our bad. Here's the story" and stick to it. Like, even if you're going to tell some ridiculous implausible lie, commit to it and get everybody on the same page and brazen it out!

They're so bad at being evil!
posted by FelliniBlank at 10:17 AM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Meanwhile, Trump seems to be blaming Hope Hicks.

Isn't Hope Hicks Trump's closest non-family confidant within the White House at this point?
posted by diogenes at 10:17 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Man is exposed as an abuser of women.

His boss, with a record of abuse of women himself, immediately blames the nearest woman.

And somebody out there is still going to pretend to be shocked or confused or "troubled" by this.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 10:18 AM on February 9, 2018 [48 favorites]


Meanwhile, Trump seems to be blaming Hope Hicks.

aha see it was womanly emotions that kept the domestic abuser in the white house
posted by prize bull octorok at 10:18 AM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


I don't think that's at all clear. It's a bill with overwhelming popular support even in red districts.

It's not really a question of merely having the votes, though. For a vote to even happen, Paul Ryan needs to let it come to a vote, which is to say that Paul Ryan needs to be willing to sacrifice his position as Speaker for it (which, um, he isn't).
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 10:20 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


I don't think that's at all clear. It's a bill with overwhelming popular support even in red districts.

And next to none among the Republicans who represent those districts. If Ryan brings it to the floor, they'll make him the next Boehner. Since all Ryan cares about is shoveling money into rich people's bank accounts and preserving his own power, he will not do that.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:21 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


For partisan motivated reasoning, there was a Reuters/Ipsos poll from monday showing that 73% of republicans agreed that "members of the FBI and Department of Justice are working to delegitimize Trump through politically motivated investigations."

That seems like sort of a vague question. "Members" is 2+. I absolutely believe members of the FBI are trying to delegitimize Trump. I also think members of the FBI think the moon landing was fake, have a foot fetish, etc and so on, because in an org that big pretty much everything is represented. What is the point of a question that vague? Why wouldn't you ask about the FBI as a whole? Why is fucking SURVEYMONKEY offering up a more useful question than Reuters?
posted by phearlez at 10:21 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


What would going to bat for DACA consist of in the current situation though? I can't see any leverage the Dems have which is strong enough to force Paul Ryan to bring it to the floor.
posted by Justinian at 10:29 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


I can't see any leverage the Dems have which is strong enough to force Paul Ryan to bring it to the floor.

The floor doesn't matter. Republicans tried to repeal Obamacare 60 times even when they knew they would never succeed, because they knew it would play well in right-wing propaganda. Giving up on DACA without even trying is literally handing the Russians the propaganda they could use to defeat the Democrats again in November.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 10:34 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


Republicans were in the majority when they did that! That's how they could vote on the bills to repeal Obamacare. By bringing a bill to the floor and voting on it even though they knew it would never pass the Senate (without reconciliation) and if it did pass the Senate then Obama would veto it.

I guess I don't understand what you mean by "the floor doesn't matter". What can the Democrats do if the bill doesn't come to the floor? Are you asking for a press conference? What?
posted by Justinian at 10:36 AM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


What would going to bat for DACA consist of in the current situation though? I can't see any leverage the Dems have which is strong enough to force Paul Ryan to bring it to the floor.

I don't hold Dems responsible for failing to win on DACA. I know that's an uphill battle. I hold them responsible for failing to fight for it. We know they're in the minority and that we don't have a chance at real wins until at least Jan 2019. But they're basically saying "we're only willing to fight for people when it's easy, when we're assured to win."

There may not be a way to save Dreamers through the legal system right now. That's irrelevant to whether it's worth fighting for them.
posted by melissasaurus at 10:40 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


The leverage was a government shutdown contingent on holding a vote. If it went on for a while, and the Democrats were out there talking about how eager they were to pass a budget if we could just hold a vote first on that thing we were promised over and over, that everyone says they want, that the public is overwhelmingly in favor of, Paul Ryan might just find his Speakership imperiled from the center, no?
posted by contraption at 10:44 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Meanwhile, the markets are tanking again today. With two hours of trading left:

Dow falls 500 points as it heads for worst week in 9 years (CNBC)
The Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 500 points in volatile trading, heading for its worst week since October 2008. The Dow fell 500 points as of 1:37 p.m. ET; the index has swung more than 700 points in volatile trading. The S&P 500 dropped 1.87 percent, breaking through its 200-day moving average and falling to its lowest level since October. The Nasdaq composite fell 2 percent, joining the Dow and S&P 500 in correction territory.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 10:46 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


The group of Republicans who've held their noses and continued to vote with their party post-Trump has zero overlap with the group who care enough about immigrants to actually take a stand on DACA that would carry meaningful consequences.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:47 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


> But they're basically saying "we're only willing to fight for people when it's easy, when we're assured to win."

I think it's a bit more complicated than that when there is another group of people whose livelihoods are put in peril by that decision to fight. The GOP sleight-of-hand on CHIP was enough to fool a lot of independents who don't pay attention closely enough, and even though government workers aren't in as desperate need of help as Dreamers or CHIP recipients, asking them to take it on the chin for an undetermined amount of time knowing there's no chance at a legislative victory, and not really knowing how much it will increase the chances of an electoral victory in November... That has to be factored into the, uh, game theory. This isn't "we fought for Dreamers, elect us", it's "we fought for Dreamers, and did so by imperiling government workers and CHIP recipients, elect us." That resonates with some, but will hurt with others.
posted by tonycpsu at 10:47 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


Shutting down the government until both houses vote on the DREAM Act, which has overwhelming support even among the Republican electorate and which would fly through the House and Senate if it made it to the floor.

Whoa. That's some fancy elision you did there. DACA may have overwhelming public support, but government shutdown has overwhelming public opposition.
posted by JackFlash at 10:48 AM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


What would going to bat for DACA consist of in the current situation though? I can't see any leverage the Dems have which is strong enough to force Paul Ryan to bring it to the floor.

Moderate Republican House members sign the Dream Act discharge petition. Up or down vote on Dream Act in both the House and Senate. After those are done send it to Two Scoops. Only then does the government reopen with D support and a budget deal reached.

Schumer ballsed up the shutdown and now he’s throwing DACA kids under the bus to get rid of the Democrats’ only leverage.
posted by Talez at 10:49 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Leon Panetta, a former CIA director and defense secretary for President Barack Obama, said Trump could miss important context and nuance if he is relying solely on an oral briefing

Ya think? How is anyone still talking about this guy as any sort of a normal person? Absent corporate normalizing greed, etc.

WaPo: Kelly offers account of Porter exit that some White House aides consider untrue

Daaaamn, WaPo! *Some* consider it *untrue!* oh no you didn't! That is hard fuckin core, bro.

/18_minute_gap
posted by petebest at 10:50 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


Because I think we could really use some good news right now... it looks like Mattis has reached an agreement with Homeland Security that no military member or veteran will be deported, except for “serious felonies”.
posted by corb at 10:50 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


The fact that we effectively lost DACA and no Democratic Congressperson was arrested in the process means they didn't try hard enough. There was a sit-in over the no fly/no buy list ffs. Dreamers are protesting and getting arrested because their lives are on the line. It's really not too much to ask that our predominantly wealthy white Democratic politicians put something at risk too other than their poll numbers.
posted by melissasaurus at 10:50 AM on February 9, 2018 [28 favorites]


Moderate Republican House members sign the Dream Act discharge petition.

And I'd like a unicorn.

Especially on race/immigration issues, there are no meaningfully moderate House Republicans. There is the Freedom Caucus, and the people who are happy to let the Freedom Caucus run things while paying lip service to the idea of human decency. Barbara Comstock is not going to suddenly decide that white supremacy is too much of a price to pay when her entire career in politics has been based on exactly the opposite.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 10:52 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


it looks like Mattis has reached an agreement with Homeland Security that no military member or veteran will be deported, except for “serious felonies”.

I’m an LPR and I don’t even get that level of security. If I protest the government and get arrested in a kettle I get to explain in 2023 why I got arrested when I go to renew my green card and hope the immigration officer didn’t have a bad day or is a Trump fan.
posted by Talez at 10:55 AM on February 9, 2018 [18 favorites]


DACA may have overwhelming public support, but government shutdown has overwhelming public opposition.

The blame for the last, brief shutdown was looking like it was going to settle on the Trump crew. Carrying one on longer and giving their side time to respond to demands would carry a lot of risk, absolutely, but it's the Republican's government to run, they can't run it on their own because they can't control their own right wing, and if they wanted Democrats' help there'd have been a clear and wildly popular way to get it. It just would have meant taking an actual stand.
posted by contraption at 10:55 AM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


but it's the Republican's government to run, they can't run it on their own because they can't control their own right wing,

Point of order but the first shutdown this year had HFC approval and McConnell had 50 votes. He had 52 actually. The shutdown was Schumer not allowing cloture to push the threshold to 60. Then he caved and let cloture proceed.
posted by Talez at 10:59 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


But they're basically saying "we're only willing to fight for people when it's easy, when we're assured to win."

I think it's useful to draw the distinction between "impossible", "when we're assured to win", and "possible". Dems not fighting when victory is impossible is distinct from Dems only fighting when victory is assured.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 11:01 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Dow falls 500 points as it heads for worst week in 9 years (CNBC)

How long has it been since Bush crashed the economy? Oh, yeah, 9 years. Heh.
posted by Mental Wimp at 11:04 AM on February 9, 2018 [14 favorites]


Where we go from here:
1. DACA/immigration in general hits the Senate floor on Monday afternoon on an open rule. Nobody knows what will get enough votes to pass. They are writing a few different amendments now. Of course, anything that can get 60 votes will have substantial Republican backing.
2. If something passes the Senate, it’s up to the House to take it back up. What happens here really depends on what the bill looks like that the Senate passes. There should be enough cover for moderate Republicans to come on board, but the question is if that will be enough. A discharge petition takes a couple of weeks to get a bill to the floor even after they get enough signatures. It’s possible that the Senate comes up with something Ryan can support outright, and/or that Trump randomly decides to endorse, but that seems unlikely. Most likely course of action here is still probably nothing until next session.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 11:07 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


queer people, for another.

There have (surprisingly) been no issues about queer people lately. There was the transgender military thing, but the Dems didn't (have to) cave on that, because Tromp didn't bother to actually do anything ... And even Republicans have been against Tromp on that.

@everyone please correct me if I'm wrong. After the election I thought trans people would be an easy target, and I'm surprised to find that not the case.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 11:16 AM on February 9, 2018


I don't mean to pile onto the "let's blame dems for not doing enough" side of this argument. If that's how this comes across, let me know & I'll try to better explain.

What I think is at issue & how those of us on the "couldn't they have done more" side can best be understood is this:

Intersectionality.

It's simply not enough to advocate for women's rights at some times or for LBTQ rights at others. To fight for working class assistance now, but for people of color later. To throw immigrants under the bus in order to protect muslims.

We have to advocate for all of these things all of the time. Period.

So yes, I get it: we got some good things accomplished with funding for CHIP & infrastructure.

But the problem is, we lose whenever we make these gains at the expense of other marginalized groups.

It's this false dichotomy of either/or that seems to be at the root of the issue. Clearly, we're in relatively uncharted waters, having one party abjectly disinterested in governing & therefore completely untrustworthy as an opponent in negotiations. What I would like to see are congressfolk on our side standing up & saying: we want movement in all of these directions & the only thing negotiable is how much.

It's not enough for someone to vote yes on an item that satisfies their particular segment. We need to stand united for everyone's segment. If the democratic party could make this their brand & messaging: that no group will be left behind, then I think there's a potential for real gains.

The democratic party prides itself on a big tent. If folks want to see themselves out because they think the party is wasting its effort on fringe issues that don't affect them, directly, so be it. But the democratic party loses when it sacrifices the strength of unity for these ideals in order to hold on to the few selfish members who only see their own segment as crucial while everyone else's is negotiable.

I think that the democratic party, voting as a bloc, saying point blank: we will not sign this measure unless it includes provisions for each & every group we represent, would be a difficult message to spin or to put down.

It's only when democrats themselves give in to the idea that some things are more important than others that the opposition is able to drive a wedge & to call out hypocrisy.

So that's why it feels like an own goal. Democrats say they'll stop at nothing to protect DACA & that they're willing to let the GOP tantrum & shut down the gov't if that's what it takes. Then, as soon as the GOP throws them a bone regarding another democratic plank, they completely reverse their position.

It's not that the dems are stupid, it's just that they seem to be missing the bigger picture. I've been trying to figure out (for my own interest) how I'd vote on issues like these were I a congressperson. The best gameplan I could conceive is something like this:

Things can't get worse if they stay as they are. That is, stopping the machinery is better than speeding up the bad parts of the machinery as a consequence of implementing good in the machinery. So if a vote comes along with a rider or amendment that's bad, even one single bad thing: vote no. Period. If a vote comes along with good things, but it's missing a crucial bit that we'd lose leverage to implement were it to pass (that's how I read the vote this morning), vote no. Period. The "yes" vote is only granted when it will 1) "first do no harm" by hurting no individual section as-is & 2) when it supports "down to the wire" issues that will otherwise lose leverage if passed.

The reason I think I'd vote according to this metric is because it seems maximally defensible:

"Mr. Narwhal, sir, why didn't you vote for this bill that sends funding to soldiers? Don't you support the troops?"

"Of course I support our troops. Unfortunately, that bill had a provision that would cut funding for children's health insurance. If the GOP wants to craft a clean bill that only funds the troops, I'll happily vote for it! Nevertheless, I won't sacrifice the well being of our children in exchange for troop funding. We are a wealthy nation & we can do both."

"Mr. Narwhal, why didn't you vote to increase funding for infrastructure funding? You ran on that as one of the planks of your platform!"

"I'm deeply saddened to have had to vote against it. At this time, we need to support our Dreamers. I can't allow myself to be bribed with the promise of infrastructure funding at the expense of losing our leverage to make sure we protect these Americans. Since this bill is our only hope of getting DACA extended, I need to hold out until a bill delivers that extension. It's troubling that the GOP is willing to extend an olive branch in order to persuade us to give up on these children."

I think honesty & truth win when they aren't hedged or played as cards in a game. I get that it's a risky play to advocate for folks outside of the direct constituency that got you elected, but again, that's what most democrats want. We're the party that votes against our best interests. We're the ones who want taxes raised on the wealthy, even though the wealthy amongst us will bear that additional burden. We're the ones who advocate for affirmative action even though the whites amongst us will necessarily miss out on a job opportunity or a school admission. If the party had faith in itself & the justness of its ideals, I think it could be much more successful, even as a minority.

We know the opposition will lie & spin & distort, regardless of how we play the game. There's no secret combination of jiu-jutsu voting that will magically render an impenetrable defense against lies & deceit.

So let's go the other way with it. Let's be paragons of virtue. Let's first do no harm. Let's take every single bill & vote & withhold our support unless it meets those two criteria. Let the slings and arrows fall around us. I love our country & I truly believe that in the face of such a courageous & united stand for everyone the democratic party represents at all times, the average, disaffected voter might see something to cheer for. I think that's how we turn things around & motivate our base to get out & vote. And our base is huge. It contains everyone & anyone with eyes to see will recognize it.
posted by narwhal at 11:19 AM on February 9, 2018 [18 favorites]


Because I think we could really use some good news right now... it looks like Mattis has reached an agreement with Homeland Security that no military member or veteran will be deported, except for “serious felonies”.

This isn't "good news."

This is them placing one group into privileged status and treating the rest like garbage. For shitty political reasons.

Because deporting immigrants who have served their country would make the GOP look bad and undermine their bigoted, racist messaging.
posted by zarq at 11:21 AM on February 9, 2018 [41 favorites]


> After the election I thought trans people would be an easy target, and I'm surprised to find that not the case.

I'm sure they're being saved for when the Republicans *really* need to gin up the outrage machine. "Liberals are trying to force your boys to become girls in public schools (and vice versa)" - coming to some cable TV ad campaign near you for the midterms.

If I were you, I would definitely not get my hopes up.
posted by RedOrGreen at 11:21 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Just to reiterate the point I made five days ago in anticipation of this very debate, what we generally know is:

1. DACA is very popular (+)
2. In polls, people support keeping the government running over shutting down over DACA (-)
3. Most polls showed people blaming Trump and the Republicans more than Democrats in the last shutdown (+)
4. Trump's approval, which has been steadily rising, took a distinct dive during the last shutdown (+)
5. Consistent with this, polls generally show the ruling party being hurt more by shutdowns (+)
6. However, none of these approval effects seem to ever last very long (0)

So given all this, while 2 supports the danger of a shutdown to Democrats, 1, 3, 4, and 5 all suggest that it actually helps Democrats. But whichever side you come down on, 6 is almost universally believed to be true among political scientists -- there is no serious long-term polling risk for either party from a shutdown.

More broadly speaking, consistent with (6), although the Democrats took a "shellacking" in 2010, those losses were well within the bounds of what we would be expected in a first midterm after a new party takes the presidency. So even something as huge as Obamacare had a small or at least ambiguous effect on actual election outcomes.

So the main upshot is that, whatever the risk and rewards of a shutdown over DACA, elections probably isn't it, and if anything, there might be a marginal polling upside to it. In my own view, the main reason center-right Democrats voted against a DACA-shutdown is not so much because they were desperate to protect the Dreamers but made a pragmatic decision that this was the only path that saved the most hostages, but rather that this outcome (raising domestic and military spending, kicking the can and/or losing the DACA fight) was their preferred outcome, and they voted for the outcome they preferred. As other have said, whatever one thinks about game theory in legislative politics (and there are hundreds of political science books and papers on this, so it's a very legitimate way to analyze these things), the main solution is via elections: not just replacing Republicans with Democrats, but if you object to the preferences of centrist Democrats, replacing centrist Democrats with more liberal Democrats in the primaries.
posted by chortly at 11:22 AM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Yeah, while that is certainly good for the affected people it's also a big step toward "service guarantees citizenship".
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 11:22 AM on February 9, 2018 [14 favorites]


Paul Ryan might just find his Speakership imperiled from the center, no?

In fact, no. Not in a million fuckin' years. The republicans who say they want to help DACA recipients are, overwhelmingly, just lying. Frankly, I expect that a lot of white people who say they want to help DACA recipients or that DACA recipients should stay in the US are likewise lying to avoid appearing racist.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 11:22 AM on February 9, 2018 [13 favorites]


queer people, for another.

There have (surprisingly) been no issues about queer people lately.


-rescinded DOJ guidance on trans kids in public schools
-removed sexual orientation question from census
-Masterpiece cakeshop pending at SCOTUS
(to name a few)
posted by melissasaurus at 11:22 AM on February 9, 2018 [34 favorites]


But how does that play out in the political arena? Withholding support for bills sends a message but does not affect what kind of legislation gets passed. Republicans also spin the withholding of support as unpatriotic, wanting government to fail, fill in your Republican-serving bullshit reasoning of choice. This may or may not negate the message Democrats send. It may also be used as a reason to shut Democratic officials out entirely because they’ve “proved” that they won’t cooperate, anti-American, yadda yadda.

I’m not saying Democrats shouldn’t obstruct. They should. But they will pay a price for doing it and that cannot be ignored.
posted by Autumnheart at 11:24 AM on February 9, 2018


This isn't "good news."

This is them placing one group into privileged status and treating the rest like garbage. For shitty political reasons.


Yes, and also continuing the fascistic trend toward elevation of the military to Super-Citizens, to whom the rest of us are indebted and unfit to critique.
posted by contraption at 11:28 AM on February 9, 2018 [32 favorites]


Yeah, while that is certainly good for the affected people it's also a big step toward "service guarantees citizenship".

Which would be a huge change in the way our country's armed forces work. American military service has never been and should never be an automatic path to US citizenship. The rules are, it's the other way around: people who serve in the military are supposed to hold valid and lawful immigration status. That means that enlistees are required to be either US citizens, US nationals, or lawful permanent residents with a green card.

We don't live in the world of Heinlein's "Starship Troopers." Thankfully.
posted by zarq at 11:29 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


This isn't "good news."

This is them placing one group into privileged status and treating the rest like garbage. For shitty political reasons.


This is absolutely good news for a LOT of people and families, and acting like it’s terrible to protect some people because we can’t protect all the rest yet is kind of..not great.

Secondly, this wasn’t something Homeland Security, or the Republican Party, came up with on its own. This is something Mattis came up with, and it extends to everyone under his sphere of control, including Delayed Entry Program - high school kids who haven’t even seen a day of boot camp yet. Veterans who have been out for decades. And he’s saying it’s open now, so it’s a valid way to protect people who are at risk.
posted by corb at 11:35 AM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


There have (surprisingly) been no issues about queer people lately.

Except for a sharp rise in violence against them, as well as a drop in support for their civil and human rights.
posted by zombieflanders at 11:36 AM on February 9, 2018 [18 favorites]


@Autumnheart: But how does that play out in the political arena? Withholding support for bills sends a message but does not affect what kind of legislation gets passed. Republicans also spin the withholding of support as unpatriotic, wanting government to fail, fill in your Republican-serving bullshit reasoning of choice. This may or may not negate the message Democrats send. It may also be used as a reason to shut Democratic officials out entirely because they’ve “proved” that they won’t cooperate, anti-American, yadda yadda.

According to all available data, this happens even when Democrats make good faith concessions & attempt to bargain, anyway.

That is, why adopt a "safer" position that weakens your own stated goals while being equally assailable by a faithless opponent?

If the GOP played by the rules & behaved honorably, then sure, we could employ "tit for tat" legislation and hope that the history of our country will be long & arc toward justice.

However, as we see on a daily basis, Democrats who attempt this strategy still get mired in lies and propaganda. The only difference is that they also conceded ground. Now, when the next battle occurs, they have less leverage, an equal amount of smear written against them, and yet another item on the table that needs to be clawed back.

To put it another way: is there a single Republican outlet praising the Democrats who signed this bipartisan legislation?
posted by narwhal at 11:36 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


The republicans who say they want to help DACA recipients are, overwhelmingly, just lying.

I'm agnostic about this, but very interested to know how you determined that.
posted by Coventry at 11:38 AM on February 9, 2018


The republicans who say they want to help DACA recipients are, overwhelmingly, just lying.

The Republicans who say they want to help DACA recipients are not necessarily lying.

The Republicans willing to _lose their jobs_ by helping the DACA recipients, however, are nowhere to be found. And lose them, they would; every House Republican knows that casting a pro-DACA vote is a one-way ticket to Primaryville and will hang a huge "Kick Me" sign on their back for every conservative media outlet to see.
posted by delfin at 11:39 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


4th Circuit, on 2-1 Vote, Grants Emergency Stay in North Carolina Judicial Primaries Case

Republicans eliminated judicial primaries to try and shield Republican incumbents by forcing Democratic candidates to run against each other and split the vote. The District Count had issued a preliminary injunction.
posted by T.D. Strange at 11:39 AM on February 9, 2018 [9 favorites]


Good News Dept - Democrats running candidates for all Ohio Senate and Ohio House races. That's the first time they've done that since 2006 (Senate) and 2012 (House).
posted by Chrysostom at 11:39 AM on February 9, 2018 [30 favorites]


Republicans eliminated judicial primaries to try and shield Republican incumbents by forcing Democratic candidates to run against each other and split the vote. The District Count had issued a preliminary injunction.

This, by the way, is why jungle "primaries" suck and should be abolished.
posted by NoxAeternum at 11:43 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


This is absolutely good news for a LOT of people and families, and acting like it’s terrible to protect some people because we can’t protect all the rest yet is kind of..not great.

The reasons why have been pointed out above, viz "service guarantees citizenship." Holding military service over civilian service, let alone simply being a rightful citizen, is a defining trait of autocracies everywhere. It could be one small step forward, but a huge step backwards for democracy.

This is something Mattis came up with

No, it isn't. He had to be shamed into it by immigration activists.
posted by zombieflanders at 11:43 AM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


This, by the way, is why jungle "primaries" suck and should be abolished.

On balance I agree. It's possible California will end up with Republicans holding districts here that should easily go Democratic because we split the vote so many ways. Jungle primaries are one of those things that seems like a great idea but falls apart in practice.
posted by Justinian at 11:45 AM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


This is absolutely good news for a LOT of people and families, and acting like it’s terrible to protect some people because we can’t protect all the rest yet is kind of..not great.

An ex service member praising this as something that's good when a lot of people are getting fucked over by a policy that veterans and service members are excluded from is pretty much the textbook definition of "fuck you, i've got mine." but whatever. Par for the course.
posted by zarq at 11:46 AM on February 9, 2018 [19 favorites]


As the person who made the Heinlein comparison, I want to emphasize that no immigrant deserves the horrorshow of the Trump administration, and I don't begrudge anyone taking advantage of a bad policy to avoid that existential threat. But assigning that benefit specifically to the military plays into the general deification of military service (related to the militarization and deification of police) that goes hand in hand with fascism.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 11:48 AM on February 9, 2018 [33 favorites]


It's good news in the same way as it's good news when the bully takes your lunch without punching you in the face this time. We can all be happy for those folks being spared without feeling the slightest need to view it as cause for celebration or praise.
posted by phearlez at 11:53 AM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


In the novel, Federal Service (which guarantees the right to vote) is not necessarily military service. Admittedly, the rest of the book focuses on the military.

Anyway, Heinlein is always a derail.
posted by Chrysostom at 11:54 AM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


Jungle primaries are one of those things that seems like a great idea but falls apart in practice.

They don't even really sound all that great once you get into what they entail. It's another bad "good government" practice that gets pushed because too many "good government" types see parties as the Root OF All Political Evil.
posted by NoxAeternum at 11:55 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Anyway, Heinlein is always a derail.

It happens, though.
posted by Coventry at 11:56 AM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


In the novel, Federal Service (which guarantees the right to vote) is not necessarily military service. Admittedly, the rest of the book focuses on the military.

The point is that military service in the book is one of several paths to citizenship. Which is not the way things work here in the U.S. The books emphasize that citizenship must be earned by contributing members of society, not freely given.
posted by zarq at 11:58 AM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


The Venn diagram between people who valorize military service vis-a-vis citizenship while vilifying civilian service is almost a complete circle (one, I should note, that Heinlein was smack-dab in the middle of). I'm not about to give anyone a pat on the back for perpetuating that, let alone a man who's quite plainly a dishonorable, piece of shit, fascist enabler who had at least one major civilian massacre on his watch.
posted by zombieflanders at 12:06 PM on February 9, 2018 [9 favorites]


Which is not the way things work here in the U.S.

Last week, "our immigration system has a separate, harsher deportation process for immigrants who don't join the military" wasn't the way things worked in the U.S. either. Baby steps.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 12:12 PM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


The core mission of the GOP is now to defend abusers (Jennifer Rubin | WaPo Opinion)
Amanda Carpenter, former speechwriter for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), had this to say on the subject of the Trump White House’s protection of Rob Porter: “They protect abusers . . . If you are willing to defend someone who hurt someone in this fashion you have no boundaries, you have no respect for the law.”

She was speaking of the White House, which she rightly says has the primary mission to defend someone who bragged about assaulting women (and possibly obstructed justice and received aid from Russia in winning an election), but the same is true at this point of members of the entire GOP. They are, as we have noted, abusers in every sense of the word and in every aspect of the presidency and leadership of Congress.
This is followed by many, many examples illustrating her thesis, which is not limited to physical abuse or abusers alone.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 12:15 PM on February 9, 2018 [41 favorites]


On balance I agree. It's possible California will end up with Republicans holding districts here that should easily go Democratic because we split the vote so many ways. Jungle primaries are one of those things that seems like a great idea but falls apart in practice.

No it won't because it always defaults to the top two in the runoff. You'd have to have a massive cockup in vote splitting for it to be R vs R in a California election.

If anything, California's jungle primaries turns everything statewide into liberals vs progressives.
posted by Talez at 12:16 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


The California primary concern is, I believe, primarily for congressional races in relatively red/purple areas in the south and east of the state. Statewide, your observation holds.
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 12:18 PM on February 9, 2018


If anything, California's jungle primaries turns everything statewide into liberals vs progressives.

Time for a statewide memo: “Take it to CaliMeTa.” :p
posted by Barack Spinoza at 12:19 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


Well if it's a red part of the state like the Central Valley then yeah, if you're getting 30-30 splits in the R vote and 20-20 splits in the D vote you're going to get R v R in the general. But there is clearly a dominant Republican vote not a Democratic should have been.
posted by Talez at 12:20 PM on February 9, 2018


That's what happened in CA-31 in 2012. Dems took 48.5% aggregate vote in the first round, but it was split four ways, and the Republicans took the top two slots.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:30 PM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


That's what happened in CA-31 in 2012. Dems took 48.5% aggregate vote in the first round, but it was split four ways, and the Republicans took the top two slots.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:30 PM on February 9 [1 favorite +] [!]


Was this a result of poor chess skills among Democrats or did the GOP ratfuck the race?
posted by Mental Wimp at 12:35 PM on February 9, 2018


From Walter Shaub, former director of the Office of Government Ethics: Trump's Ethics Office has blessed an unethical legal defense fund for the president's associates [LA Times]

some highlights:

...[The Office of Government Ethics] Trump-appointed acting director, David Apol, blessed a shockingly permissive arrangement for funneling cash to White House appointees and others linked to Trump.

The fund, which will reimburse legal fees stemming from the Russia investigations, represents a radical and dangerous departure from established practice for government-employee legal defense funds. [...]

In fact, the fund's newly finalized charter does discourage payments to criminal defendants, but it also includes a convenient exception: The fund's manager has "sole and absolute discretion" to determine that the defendant acted "in good faith and without knowledge" of any illegality.

[...] Not so with the [Patriot Legal Expense Fund Trust]. Despite its name, it is set up not as a trust but as a limited liability company — an LLC — and its funds can go to any of the White House staffers, campaign workers or other Trump associates who get caught up in the Russia investigations. The fund's charter is largely silent as to the selection process except to grant absolute power to the fund manager, who alone passes judgment on who is worthy or unworthy of support.

[...] The 49-page charter is a lush garden of legal formalities that conceal the fund's minimal consideration of ethical safeguards. No firewall prevents the president from bending the manager's ear about who should or shouldn't receive the fund's largesse. Nor is the manager required to seek any guidance from ethics officials to determine if donations come from prohibited sources.

[...] Instead, it allows the manager to track bad and good donations separately. Money from prohibited sources would count only toward distributions to recipients outside the government, who aren't subject to federal ethics rules. This is a shell game.

[...] Finally, the charter includes a provision authorizing distributions from the Patriot Fund to Trump's reelection campaign. This is unprecedented in my experience — legal defense funds are not also campaign fundraising tools.

--------------------
Honestly you should probably just read it, it's not that long.

So the White House's uninvited guest can get money from whomever (like, say his neighborhood Russian oligarch? Just to pick a random example), and use it for whatever, and the Ethics Office decided it's opposite day and everything is cool about that.
posted by Emmy Rae at 12:42 PM on February 9, 2018 [26 favorites]




Was this a result of poor chess skills among Democrats or did the GOP ratfuck the race?

I think maybe people hadn't properly gamed out how this would work - that was the first election with the top two.

Candidates were:

Pete Aguilar - then mayor of Redlands, went on to win the district in 2014.
Justin Kim - DOJ staffer, aide to Claire McCaskill
Rita Ramirez - looks like she's worked for the state party, seems like a bit of a perennial candidate
Renea Wickman - looks to be a community activist, also a perennial candidate
posted by Chrysostom at 12:45 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


The PA thing is a step in the right direction, but:
The state, however, is not requiring counties to discard their old equipment. The directive only requires them to buy machines with a paper backup if they decide to switch systems. Nor does the Wolf administration's budget plan , released this week, include any new money to help counties replacing their aging systems.
We gotta take back the legislature.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:47 PM on February 9, 2018 [25 favorites]


Somebody heading for the exit at State? Diplopundit seems to think so. (Or did I miss an announcement?)
posted by MonkeyToes at 12:55 PM on February 9, 2018


Dow falls 500 points as it heads for worst week in 9 years

And now it's up +330 at closing, buoyed by (rolls 1d20) a group of kobold warriors.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 1:04 PM on February 9, 2018 [40 favorites]


^ Good catch. Turns out this week was only the worst in two years, not nine.
the kobolds growl menacingly. roll for initiative.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 1:09 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


On a sort-of-related note, WaPo: Breaking with tradition, Trump skips president’s written intelligence report and relies on oral briefings

I remember some behind the scenes documentary (PBS?) about the Obama White House and being struck by how much time he spent reading for his work. Not sure how that contrasts with POTUS 43. Pretty sure how that contrasts with potus 45.
posted by ZeusHumms at 1:17 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


I think maybe people hadn't properly gamed out how this would work - that was the first election with the top two.
...
posted by Chrysostom at 12:45 PM on February 9 [1 favorite −] Favorite added! [!]


No organized political party...

Seriously, Democrats need to get better at strategy. The GOP has national-level coherent, experienced strategists looking many years out to take advantage of local political milestones (e.g., redistricting) and changes in rules. If we don't have the right people at the top we can at least lobby our local leaders to keep their eyes and ears open and focused on the future.
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:17 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


It's really difficult not to call this a scandal now.

Somebody needs to start a website that's just called Any Other Administration, which lists the things that, in any other administration, would be massive scandals
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 1:17 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


What qualifies as a paper backup by this order? I used to be an election worker, specifically a Machine Inspector, in Philadelphia. As a job, it's basically George Jetson: go behind the machine and push a button, but the Philadelphia voting machines do have a paper trail. When the polls close, the machines spit out a tally of votes onto a long roll of, essentially, supermarket receipt paper.

There's no paper _ballot_, but the article doesn't indicate that there will be a requirement for a paper ballot, just a paper _backup_. So, I'm confused.
posted by SansPoint at 1:24 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


John Kelly must go (Vox)

“The White House chief of staff has proven himself unfit for the job. ... Kelly has become a symbol of the Trump White House’s misogyny and white nationalism.”
posted by Barack Spinoza at 1:25 PM on February 9, 2018 [21 favorites]


I feel like Trump is already a symbol of those things?

My fear about letting Kelly go is, what will they replace him with? Nothing good.
posted by emjaybee at 1:27 PM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


So if a vote comes along with a rider or amendment that's bad, even one single bad thing: vote no. Period.

You will soon have a chance to put your principle into action. I can guarantee you that Monday the proposed amendment for DACA authorization will also have an amendment for money for Trump's wall. Do you vote no? Period?

Democracy is complicated.
posted by JackFlash at 1:27 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


It occurs to me that with the exception of George HW Bush, the Republican Party has had successively dumber, more corrupt, and more authoritarian Presidents for my entire life.

I'm older than you and every Republican president in my lifetime* has been actively criminal. Nixon: Watergate and illegal invasion of Cambodia; Reagan and Bush Sr: Iran-Contra, "turns out we do negotiate with terrorists"; Bush Jr: illegal invasion of Iraq.

* Except maybe Ford. He was maybe just dumb.

Then we got a respite with Bush Sr, who was wishy washy, mean mouthed, milquetoast, and medium evil, but not stupid or diabolical.

Well, he was the director of the CIA, so he's at least diabolical. And regret to inform he was up to his ass in Iran-Contra, despite his "out of the loop" denials.
posted by kirkaracha at 1:28 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


My fear about letting Kelly go is, what will they replace him with? Nothing good.

Reince has been leaking that Trump has been calling him so he obviously wants back in.
posted by PenDevil at 1:30 PM on February 9, 2018


Well, [Bush Sr] was the director of the CIA, so he's at least diabolical. And regret to inform he was up to his ass in Iran-Contra, despite his "out of the loop" denials.

Mike Pence has been using the "out of the loop" act to great effect - here is [twitter link] a reporter finally calling him out on that.
posted by Emmy Rae at 1:34 PM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


My fear about letting Kelly go is, what will they replace him with? Nothing good.

The most benefit the administration got from Kelly wasn't from him being a monster but from him initially granting an air of legitimacy and control. Of course this lasted only weeks before Kelly threw away all respectable appearances to forever reveal his gross core.

Who's still wraithable? I feel like they're left with Reince and assorted other Priebi at this point.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:36 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


My fear about letting Kelly go is, what will they replace him with? Nothing good.

With John Kelly under fire, Mick Mulvaney reportedly emerges as possible next Trump chief of staff

Who else?
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:39 PM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


Yale Law grad, 25-year House member, Minority Leader, member of the Warren Commission?

Literally none of these things are evidence that someone isn't dumb.
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:40 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


Slightly interesting fact: today is Kelly's 193rd day as Chief of Staff. Reince lasted 192.
posted by theodolite at 1:40 PM on February 9, 2018 [20 favorites]


Who else?

Ted Cruz?
posted by orrnyereg at 1:44 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


@JackFlash: You will soon have a chance to put your principle into action. I can guarantee you that Monday the proposed amendment for DACA authorization will also have an amendment for money for Trump's wall. Do you vote no? Period?

I'd hold the forthcoming bill up to the following test:

1) "First do no harm." I don't see funding for a wall as doing harm to any group represented by Democratic Party ideals. It seems unwise, grandstanding, and ultimately foolish, but from my view, it wouldn't do harm. However, if someone can help me by explaining how it does harm a subgroup of the Democratic Party, then yes- I support voting "no."

2) Does it in any way capitulate or cede bargaining power? If the purpose of the bill is ostensibly to extend DACA & we have nothing to lose by passing it (that is, no other rider is necessary from a Democratic Party perspective), then vote "yes."

That's how I'd make my decision. Pass those two tests & vote "yes." Fail either & vote "no."

I don't think that "refusing to fund a wall" is a Democratic Party principal. I think voting "for" the wall could be explained thusly:

"Mr. Narwhal- you campaigned that building a wall between the US & Mexico is foolhardy & that you don't support it? Why then, did you just vote for a spending bill dedicating funding toward its creation?"

"Well, as I'm sure you understand, democracy is complicated. The principal aim of this legislation is to extend DACA. That's what we wanted & that's what we got. Despite making mouth sounds to the contrary, it appears that Republicans were only willing to extend DACA if we were willing to concede funds for their wall. To me, if you want something, but only if you get something else, you don't really want it. So I can't explain why folks would 'want to extend DACA' but then attach additional riders. Luckily, we're a wealthy nation & if the party of small government & fiscal responsibility feels the need to spend money on a foolish building project, so be it. I look forward to challenging those expenditures at a later date to see if we might put them toward more sensible construction projects like updating our infrastructure or making broadband access a public good. In the meantime, I've happily earmarked this money for an imaginary wall & protected our Dreamers. Mission accomplished."
posted by narwhal at 1:44 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


My fear about letting Kelly go is, what will they replace him with? Nothing good.

"The current employee is a terrible, unfit, unqualified disaster but the next one may be even worse" is not grounds for retaining employee #1.
posted by FelliniBlank at 1:48 PM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


MetaFilter: Reince and assorted other Priebi at this point.
posted by petebest at 1:50 PM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]




"The Wall" is (for the parts that already exist)/would be an ecological disaster, and there are a bunch of land rights issues with communities that abut the border. I think the congress could fund increased "border security" and a "technology wall" and call it "Funds for the Wall". There was a similar compromise in the previous Senate agreement, and I think the white house would accept it.

The other issue is that House may try to implement the "four pillars" immigration reforms, which would also limit legal immigration numbers, eliminate the lottery, and reduce family immigration, as the price for dreamer citizenship.
posted by Hermeowne Grangepurr at 1:53 PM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


1) "First do no harm." I don't see funding for a wall as doing harm to any group represented by Democratic Party ideals. It seems unwise, grandstanding, and ultimately foolish, but from my view, it wouldn't do harm. However, if someone can help me by explaining how it does harm a subgroup of the Democratic Party, then yes- I support voting "no."

It is erecting a literal monument to white supremacy and white nationalism and wasting billions of dollars to do it. That is absolutely a terrible harm.
posted by Pope Guilty at 1:54 PM on February 9, 2018 [28 favorites]


Somebody needs to start a website that's just called Any Other Administration, which lists the things that, in any other administration, would be massive scandals

Or go ahead and call them massive scandals, because that is what makes them "massive scandals".

It worked for Benghazi!
posted by saturday_morning at 1:55 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


I don't see funding for a wall as doing harm to any group represented by Democratic Party ideals.

Stakeholders opposed to the fucking wall: every environmental group in the country (because construction or attempted construction will do incalculable and irreversible damage to water quality, endangered species, cultural resources, and sensitive habitat without any mitigation or documentation released to the public about that damage); Native American tribes and communities (whose reservations and traditional areas of occupation cross the border); local property-owners (whose property will be condemned for a fraction of its value and whose remaining property use will be badly impaired); local governments and businesses (because the cross-border traffic will slow to a crawl) and and and...

Democratic party ideals include allowing the public who will be affected by federal actions an opportunity to comment on those actions; respecting tribal sovereignty; respecting individual property rights; respecting local governments.

How anyone can look at the proposed wall and not see how it harms Democratic Party ideals is beyond me.
posted by suelac at 1:56 PM on February 9, 2018 [20 favorites]


ABC News: Sources: Chief of Staff John Kelly expressed to President Trump willingness to resign

President Donald Trump, furious over the handling of domestic abuse allegations involving one of his closest aides, has spoken to confidantes about the possibility of replacing embattled Chief of Staff John Kelly, sources close to the president tell ABC News.

One confidante — longtime friend and former executive chairman of his inaugural committee, Tom Barrack — was approached to gauge his interest in the chief of staff position, a source familiar with the matter told ABC News. Barrack said he won’t take the job, the source said.

posted by Rust Moranis at 1:58 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Chyron: CNN Breaking News: Trump Defends Ex-Aide, Expresses No Sympathy For Women

"The Cut: When asked about Porter’s resignation on Friday, Trump praised his former aide’s work, and made a point to highlight Porter’s self-proclaimed innocence. According to tweets from Fox News producer Pat Ward, the president told reporters:"
We wish him well, he worked very hard. We found out about it recently and I was surprised by it, but we certainly wish him well and it’s a tough time for him. He did a very good job when he was in the White House. And we hope he has a wonderful career and he will have a great career ahead of him. But it was very sad when we heard about it and certainly he’s also very sad now.

He also, as you probably know says he’s innocent and I think you have to remember that. He said very strongly yesterday that he’s innocent so you have to talk to him about that, but we absolutely wish him well, he did a very good job when he was at the White House.

posted by zarq at 1:58 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


That's how I'd make my decision. Pass those two tests & vote "yes." Fail either & vote "no."

Well, now your original simple rule has become quite nuanced. People may disagree whether money for the wall harms anyone or capitulates to Republicans.

By the way, there will also be an amendment that provides lots more money for ICE and ICE officer increases.

It gets more nuanced all the time.
posted by JackFlash at 2:00 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


The Stephen Miller of Boston? Turns out the anti-Semitic white supremacist that Republican Congressman took to the State of the Union was born in Boston's Dorchester neighborhood and grew up in Milton, across the Neponset River from Dorchester, where he went to the pricey Milton Academy. The Boston Globe reports all his classmates hated him because, like Miller, he was an obnoxious troll even then.
posted by adamg at 2:00 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


With John Kelly under fire, Mick Mulvaney reportedly emerges as possible next Trump chief of staff

If this keeps up, Mulvaney will have taken on as many different jobs in the administration as Kushner.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 2:00 PM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


I agree that actual construction of the wall is awful.

But is allocating funds for its construction (given the expectation that one might be able to fight the implementation of these funds) the same thing as building it? I ask this seriously. If funding the wall == building the wall && building the wall == bad, then vote "no." I haven't been convinced that authorizing funding == building the actual thing. I could be wrong, though. Feel free to convince me if necessary, but realize that if you do convince me, then I'm simply going to advocate voting "no."

Here's how I'd explain it:

"We do support Dreamers, but we also support the protection of the environment and the fundamental human decency of family migration and the responsibility of the United States to accept as many refugees and immigrants as she can. Our Dreamers certainly understand that we shouldn't jeopardize other groups of Americans and future Americans viability in exchange for their own safety. We must advocate for what is right for everyone, not only what is right for some."
posted by narwhal at 2:01 PM on February 9, 2018


Rachel L. Brand, the No. 3 official at the Justice Department, plans to step down after nine months on the job as the country’s top law enforcement agency has been under attack by President Trump, according to two people briefed on her decision.

This seems.... bad?


Unfortunate for the nation, sure, but she has got to be sick unto death of working for Jeff Sessions and trying to keep her morale up. She and Rosenstein both looked . . . subdued at that event where Sessions was at a podium praising them on the same day Trump was trashtalking the Justice Department.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:02 PM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Regarding all the heated "Democrats didn't do enough" / "Democrats made the best of a bad situation" arguments above...
One thing I notice that seems to be working for the right, rhetorically, is that when they don't get what they want, they grumble about RINOs, but they scream about liberals. Primary those cucks, but shout about liberal obstruction! The liberal media! Anything goes wrong, blame the liberals!
When the left has a setback, we grumble about Republicans, but we scream about... liberals.
Then we're surprised when liberals lose elections even though liberal ideas always poll better. (Though I guess we can wonder less about that now, knowing a foreign actor is helping the GOP-- another factor that seems weirdly absent from the blame game. Democrats are a minority fighting two mutually cooperative forces that are both willing to burn everything down to win. But every setback is their own fault? If this is what we think of our own party, how do we convince other people to help us win?)
To get people fired up to change things and vote, progressives need to talk up all the good things the left does and blame the right for everything bad, over and over, always. Not saying don't criticize, but consider the effect of "Our leaders are garbage and our side always caves and we're helpless" vs. "We're outgunned, we're scrappy rebels against the Empire, how can we hit harder?" Bluster works when enthusiasm is currency. "Primary the blue dogs" may be an empty threat but even a hypothetical call to action is better rhetoric than "We're losers." There's this vicious circle of discouragement in so many left spaces, and then we wonder where the blue wave went. It's still out there.
posted by wiremommy at 2:05 PM on February 9, 2018 [51 favorites]


One confidante — longtime friend and former executive chairman of his inaugural committee, Tom Barrack — was approached to gauge his interest in the chief of staff position, a source familiar with the matter told ABC News.

The Wolff book also talks about this and how Barrack - in addition to being one of the "he's a dumbshit" voices - was spooked by the idea of putting his assets in jeopardy to take a WH job. Both because it would cost him a ton of money and because his assets would be under scrutiny by people who could bring charges. Not that any impropriety was involved at any time, Senator. No sireee.
posted by petebest at 2:06 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


> ... We shouldn't jeopardize other groups of Americans and future Americans viability in exchange for their own safety. We must advocate for what is right for everyone, not only what is right for some.

And that is why, fellow citizens, we are cutting off Social Security and Medicare, which only benefit older Americans, and directing all the money to combating the effects of global climate change.

(Said no politician, ever. Politics is hard, and everything is nuanced.)
posted by RedOrGreen at 2:08 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


But is allocating funds for its construction (given the expectation that one might be able to fight the implementation of these funds) the same thing as building it?

Dude, they're already building it.

And let me be clear: if the money is allocated, DHS absolutely will spend it. That's what federal agencies live to do: spend money. They will obligate those funds as fast as they can, in case they get clawed back.
posted by suelac at 2:08 PM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


My understanding is that no-one can fire Mueller unless they have been confirmed by the Senate. However, as occurred with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Trump has the (apparent) legal right to temporarily appoint anyone who has been confirmed for any job to any vacancy. So here's a scenario:
1) Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand resigns.
2) Trump fills the vacancy by unilaterally appointing anyone who's already been confirmed for another job. How 'bout Acting Associate Attorney General Ben Carson why not.
3) Trump fires Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who is also Acting Attorney General regarding the Russia investigation, and Ben Carson Or Whoever becomes Acting Attorney General.
4) Ben Carson Or Whoever fires Mueller citing some nonsense justification.
5) Impeachment/mattresses/etc.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 2:09 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


It feels vaguely ad hominem to attack the veracity of my "first do no harm" suggestion based on whether or not I, personally, can intuitively sense that funding the wall is equally as bad as bulldozing wild lands to build a racist monument to keeping brown people out of the US.

As I said: if funding the wall is as bad as building the wall, then vote "no" on DACA+wall funding.

Is there a problem with my actual method as opposed to my limited understanding on funding vs. building?
posted by narwhal at 2:13 PM on February 9, 2018


How 'bout Associate Attorney General Ben Carson why not.

Because he's not an attorney. Let's review: you can appoint any old Senate-confirmed wackjob to be Commerce Secretary or head of Homeland Security. But you can appoint only Senate-confirmed attorneys to be attorney general or deputy A.G. So Mick Mulvaney, Evil Esq. but not Ben Carson or Betsy DeVos.

However, Mulvaney can't be appointed one of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or Surgeon General, so there's that at least.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:15 PM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


Democrats should modify an LRAD to play "and who's gonna pay for it? MEXICOOOO!" at 160 dB and just hit that button whenever anyone says "wall" and "funding" in the same sentence.
posted by theodolite at 2:15 PM on February 9, 2018 [22 favorites]


Mulvaney's being considered for Chief of Staff too. How can anyone consider this economy a success when Mick Mulvaney has to take four jobs just to get by?
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 2:26 PM on February 9, 2018 [51 favorites]


idk, on the possible ways a Mueller firing could play out, I'm still putting "Trump fires him by tweet and the entire Republican apparatus bends over backwards to justify it" well over any shenanigans with appointments.
posted by jason_steakums at 2:26 PM on February 9, 2018 [13 favorites]


James Risen is not generally considered a hysteric. Which is why I'm posting this link to his story at The Intercept:
Over the past year, American intelligence officials have opened a secret communications channel with the Russian operatives, who have been seeking to sell both Trump-related materials and documents stolen from the National Security Agency and obtained by Russian intelligence, according to people involved with the matter and other documentary evidence. The channel started developing in early 2017, when American and Russian intermediaries began meeting in Germany. Eventually, a Russian intermediary, apparently representing some elements of the Russian intelligence community, agreed to a deal to sell stolen NSA documents back to the U.S. while also seeking to include Trump-related materials in the package.
posted by suelac at 2:36 PM on February 9, 2018 [21 favorites]


Eventually, a Russian intermediary, apparently representing some elements of the Russian intelligence community, agreed to a deal to sell stolen NSA documents back to the U.S.

I'm confused. Why would the US want to buy back documents stolen from NSA? Did they not have a copy? Or did they assume Russia wouldn't have made a copy? Or did they want to know exactly what was stolen?
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 2:40 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


No it won't because it always defaults to the top two in the runoff. You'd have to have a massive cockup in vote splitting for it to be R vs R in a California election.

Hi, let me introduce you to the Democratic Party! Have a brochure.

They've cocked it up before and there is some concern they're going to cock it up again this cycle. I live here. Trust me. Because there are a lot of people jumping into primaries from the Democratic side. In any case, it's not a theory it's something that has already actually happened albeit rarely (eg CA-31 as Chrysostom noted.)
posted by Justinian at 2:41 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


*pops in from very very very far away to quote this bit of the Risen story, which is so odd*:
Some people involved with the channel believe that the CIA has grown so heavily politicized under Pompeo that officials there have become fearful of taking possession of any materials that might be considered damaging to Trump.
...
In December, 2017, the Russian turned over documents and files, some of them in Russian. The documents appeared to include FBI investigative reports, financial records, and other materials related to Trump officials and the 2016 campaign.

“The information was vetted and ultimately determined that while a significant part of it was accurate and verifiable, other parts of the data were impossible to verify and could be controversial,” the documents obtained by The Intercept state. It is not clear who vetted the material.
What the fucking fuck? They have FBI files?

It’s also not clear to me how you buy back stolen documents when they are already stolen and spread all over the place.
posted by zachlipton at 2:43 PM on February 9, 2018 [21 favorites]


But you can appoint only Senate-confirmed attorneys to be attorney general or deputy A.G.

Not true. There is no legal requirement that the attorney general be a lawyer or even attend law school. Neither do you have to be a lawyer to serve as a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.
posted by JackFlash at 2:45 PM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


If "Justinian asserts" isn't good enough for people (😢) here's an article from NBC about the concerns here. "Democrats are having a banner recruiting year — and it could cost them".
posted by Justinian at 2:46 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


I mean, logically, there's a lot someone not licensed to practice law would not be allowed to do - attorney-client privilege would have some problems, they would need to restrict their activities as AG to things that would fall outside the definition of "the practice of law," etc. But I can easily imagine it being done anyway.

Right -- they do potentially have to be able to offer legal advice, appear in court, file charges and motions, question grand jury witnesses, etc., don't they?, even if the peons tend to do most or all of it. It's the legal advice thing and privilege that really matter, though? The other stuff technically people can do pro se, but can you represent The People as a prosecutor without being a member of the bar somewhere?
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:46 PM on February 9, 2018


Not true. There is no legal requirement that the attorney general be a lawyer or even attend law school.

Groovy -- then Associate Attorney General Ben Carson it is!
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:51 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


6 senators - 3 Ds, 3 Rs - have introduced a bill to secure our elections from electronic hacking risks.

I know I always say this stuff, but it's worth calling your senators about!
posted by Emmy Rae at 2:54 PM on February 9, 2018 [21 favorites]




[...] Not so with the [Patriot Legal Expense Fund Trust]. Despite its name, it is set up not as a trust but as a limited liability company — an LLC — and its funds can go to any of the White House staffers, campaign workers or other Trump associates who get caught up in the Russia investigations. The fund's charter is largely silent as to the selection process except to grant absolute power to the fund manager, who alone passes judgment on who is worthy or unworthy of support.

So, the FBI is all up in your business of laundering Russian money, and you go and form a company that has a misleading name, called a Trust ?

This is like "Money Laundering 101". Form a bearer corporation called "Citi Bank Trust", and start moving money into the sinks...
posted by mikelieman at 3:00 PM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


News is reporting that the job RB resigned for is chief counsel at Walmart. While that may not sound like the most impressive job ever I am guessing the number of zeros being added to the end of her paycheck is.
posted by Justinian at 3:04 PM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


If "Justinian asserts" isn't good enough for people (😢) here's an article from NBC about the concerns here. "Democrats are having a banner recruiting year — and it could cost them".

Jesus fucking Christ.
We have two modes:

1) Democrats Are Losing and Will Continue to Lose Forever
and
2) Democrats Are Winning; Here's Why That's Bad for Democrats

Swear to God, Nancy Pelosi could pull a universal cancer vaccine out of her pocket today and by 6pm we'd be hearing about how this spells electoral disaster for Democrats.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 3:08 PM on February 9, 2018 [103 favorites]


While it's been only a little more than a month since the publication of Michael Wolff's White House fly-on-the-wall tell-all Fire and Fury, Michael Lewis steps up to show how properly sourced and properly framed long-form political journalism is done: Has Anyone Seen the President? (Bloomberg)

Although Lewis spends a bit more time with the exiled Steve Bannon in this 8,000-word article than would seem necessary but for his Balzacian vividness, his section on former Office of Government Ethics head Walter Shaub—now, to his dismay, a CNN commentator and a must-follow on Twitter—is worth the price of admission by itself:
The ethics office had only two sources of power. One was the Senate’s refusal to hold hearings for nominees before the office had signed off on them. The second was the vigilance of the White House counsel, always on alert for anything that might tarnish the president. These sources of power are matters of custom, not law. There is no law saying the Senate needs to wait for the office to vet candidates. And there is no law saying the White House counsel needs to care about corruption. He just always has -- until now. McGahn struck Shaub as both uninterested in ethics, and ignorant. “My mind was blown by how little he knew about the process,” Shaub says. “I’ve never met an attorney less equipped for the job he was about to undertake. How could he know as little as he knew and be taking this on?”

Trump soon answered that question. He himself didn’t care. He wasn’t going to divest himself of his businesses, but instead mix his new political life into his old business life. (No conflict, no interest!) That, thought Shaub, set the tone for his entire administration. “We were expecting a tidal wave of financial disclosure reports, and they were not coming,” Shaub says. Only the Senate’s last-minute insistence on maintaining a role for the ethics office stopped it from becoming entirely powerless. But Shaub soon found himself in this bizarre situation where Trump would announce that “the Ethics Committee” was holding up his nominations. “He used Anthony Scaramucci as an example,” Shaub says. “And we’d never even heard of Scaramucci. I never saw a Scaramucci report or a Scaramucci anything.”

Shaub quit in July. “I thought, I don’t want to be window dressing for corruption,” he says.
Here's hoping Lewis has been working on a book about the Trump administration. In the past year, he's produced excellent reporting on the Trump USDA and Department of Energy for Vanity Fair.
posted by Doktor Zed at 3:11 PM on February 9, 2018 [47 favorites]


It’s also not clear to me how you buy back stolen documents when they are already stolen and spread all over the place.

“Pssst! Comrade? Do you have any nude pictures of your wife? No? Would you like to buy some?”
posted by valkane at 3:11 PM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


If "do no harm" is your standard for political action, you will almost never take any action. Just about every political decision harms someone. The passing of the ACA really did leave some people worse off than they were before in meaningful ways, but we believe it was worth it because the overwhelming majority of people benefited from it, and those who were negatively affected were mostly sufficiently well-off to be able to tolerate the hit.

Any move toward "building the wall" (that is, continuing the process of creating physical barriers which has been going on for decades) is absolutely going to hurt some people, many of whom already have relatively little to sacrifice, not to mention the fundamentally un-American nature of such a project that others have mentioned. But hundreds of thousands of Americans are also at risk of deportation as DACA protections end, and if we take no action to save them the cost they bear will be tremendous, and the abandonment of our fellow Americans will also be fundamentally un-American. Is it worth it to offer to fund the wall if doing so gets real protections for Dreamers? I don't know, but we need to be honest and clear-minded about both the costs and benefits of this option.

Right now, thanks to the idiotic choice a minority of Americans made in 2016, every choice before us is a bad one. The question is only which is the least bad.
posted by biogeo at 3:13 PM on February 9, 2018 [10 favorites]


News is reporting that the job RB resigned for is chief counsel at Walmart. While that may not sound like the most impressive job ever I am guessing the number of zeros being added to the end of her paycheck is.

Yes but lawyers at her level can print money. She can leave DOJ and walk into a multi-million/yr partnership at any firm in the country any time she wants. It might be just a lot of zeros, but that would've always been there. Being at the top of DOJ won't. Maybe it was just money, but you don't normally see top officials walk away for cash after less than a year, especially careerists who spent 20 years working their way up the ranks.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:18 PM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Solicitor General Noel Francisco would be next in line after Rosenstein.

Francisco looks bad, and the options get worse to-not-better from there. Solicitor General Noel Francisco: Former clerk to Judge Luttig and Justice Scalia, a veteran of the George W. Bush administration (Office of Counsel to the President and then OLC in the DOJ), and then litigator in a series of constitutional cases, often on the side of legal/movement conservatives for Republican officials and against the Obama administration (e.g., NLRB v. Canning). This background does not mean Francisco cannot be independent and fair, but it is worth raising questions at a time when President Trump is looking for partisan help to limit Mueller.
posted by T.D. Strange at 3:24 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Feel like I should note after my last comment: I'm not trying to criticize Justinian by quoting him and in fact I really value his input on these threads. That headline (yes I read the article) really struck something that has bothered the hell out of me for a couple weeks now, particularly on the blue but also beyond it.

What's driving me absolutely nuts here is how everything is Complete And Total Doom. Defeats are catastrophic, victories are either unimportant or even Pyrrhic and wasteful, and nothing anyone does is good enough. Good news is only ever reflective of something bad.

This is a long haul. It's ugly, it's painful, and real harm will come to real people. It already has. But if we're going to keep freaking out over everything even when it's potentially positive, and if every encouraging sign is only going to be slapped down with anger, then what the hell are we even doing here?
posted by scaryblackdeath at 3:27 PM on February 9, 2018 [55 favorites]


Democratting!
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 3:36 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


@biogeo: I think we actually agree for the most part.

In your first example, re: the ACA, it is a "pillar" of the democratic party that we are willing to ask more of our better off constituents in order to provide for those with less. I don't mean "first do no harm" in the literal sense of never passing anything that ever adversely affects anyone. I mean "first do no harm" as in "never betray one principle in service to another." I don't believe that the "harm" we did to wealthier democrats counts in this specific case.

As for your second example, re: DACA, it is precisely this measure of cost/benefit that should go into our calculations. Yes, we want to protect Dreamers, but also, we want to protect family migration and refugees. So if we're faced with a devil's bargain of one at the cost of the other, we simply vote "no."

There might arise a gray area where we do need to do something that hurts one group to help another, but I can only think of artificial examples at the moment. The GOP has shown us that they are faithless: they don't care about a balanced budget & they don't care about the deficit. Thus, it's not a Democratic responsibility that if we pay for one thing we necessarily cut another. We can agitate for both things simultaneously & repeat ad infinitum that the GOP is lying when it claims we need to be concerned about the bottom line.

The facts & justice are on our side: the common sense platform of the Democratic party at this stage is imminently feasible & affordable. We have the money & resources to accept more immigrants and it is the right thing to do. We have the money & resources to invest in infrastructure and it is the right thing to do. We have the money & resources to provide a public healthcare option and it is the right thing to do. We have the money & resources to maintain our existing entitlement services and it is the right thing to do. We have the money & resources to strengthen our education system & reduce the cost of public school and it is the right thing to do. We have the money & resources to do all of these things together. We do not need to cut any cost anywhere to afford all of these things. It is a lie to insist otherwise & we can win by calling out that lie at every opportunity & agitating for these noble goods.

Bills are positive legislation. I don't mean "positive" in the value sense, I mean "positive" in that they actively "do" something. Voting "no" doesn't mean "do" the opposite, it just means "don't do" the thing.

So if faced with a "lesser evil" bill, we aren't under the gun to pick which hostage to save vs. shoot. It's never a Sophie's choice, because we have the third option: choose not to choose.

So vote "no" on the bill that helps some people at the expense of others.

If Republicans cram it through anyway, great: at least some people got some help & we can continue to claim (and be able to prove via our voting record) that we are the party of everyone & we won't sell out one group in order to protect another.

If Republicans can't pass anything without us, great: now we've got the leverage necessary to say "this won't pass unless we're on board & we won't ever be on board with a bill that pits one group of Americans against another."

In my political memory (the last 20 years or so), we have lost, ultimately, every time that we concede one good thing for another. The ACA is a sparkling example: by trying to make concessions to get the GOP on board, we allowed them to poison the plan such that they have had a continuous source of baked in wretchedness to lob against it. By playing ball, we armed the opposition.

I'm not saying that we never cooperate with the GOP. I'm simply saying that at this stage in the game, we never vote "yes" on anything that harms our platform. If they want to be the party that steals elections & rigs all three branches of government, let them run it alone. They shouldn't get a single vote from a single democrat in either house for any of their Faustian propositions. Importantly, any time they put forth a common sense plan that "first does no harm" & doesn't weaken our possible leverage on an unrelated issue, we should loudly & thunderously join in & pass it with muster. We can prove that we are willing to be bipartisan on any initiative that moves this country in the right direction.

The opposition will demonize us no matter what we do, so let's do what's right & let them say what they will. If, & only if, an actual scenario arises where we need to fundamentally weigh the needs of one group against another (again, I have a failure of imagination coming up with a true example), then we let the groups in question guide our decision. It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest to hear that if we actually asked Dreamers vs. veterans (to make up a thin air conflict), that one of the two groups would volunteer to go under the knife for the good of the other.

And finally finally finally, I'm not suggesting this methodology out of some vitriol against the recent decision of some Democrats to pass the bill last night or against some future Democrat who might be willing to throw refugees under the bus to protect Dreamers. I'm offering the methodology to this group, the smartest collective of political thinkers I have ever encountered, because I think it could work and I'm interested in where my thinking is wrong or should be reconsidered. So please, continue to challenge me, but also know that 1) I'm not calling for a circular firing squad & 2) I'm not an authority on what is harmful or not. If my examples are bad, help me clean them up. For example, if I suggest 2+2=4 & someone (rightly) points out that the second value is actually 3, please don't insist that I am claiming 2+3=4. Give me a chance to clean up the equation & state that 2+3=5. If I claim 2+3=6, feel free to correct me as necessary. :)
posted by narwhal at 4:03 PM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


More Kansas news!

In a surprise to absolutely nobody, Kansas Gubernatorial candidate and man who is constantly shrieking about voter fraud (while failing to prosecute white people who actually commit voter fraud) Chris Kobach is on the board of a "veterans group" that doesn't actually help veterans.
"A review of the group’s 2014 and 2015 filings with the Internal Revenue Service showed that 94 percent of the money donated to the group went to fundraisers, according to a news release from the Better Business Bureau."
"Kobach said that his understanding was that money donated to the group was “going to a variety of causes for veterans … and also to support political causes and issues important to veterans as well.”
This is the man who is leading the race for Kansas Governor right now. He consists of nothing but 100% pure fraud, and he's probably going to win.
posted by god hates math at 4:18 PM on February 9, 2018 [25 favorites]


This is a long haul. It's ugly, it's painful, and real harm will come to real people. It already has. But if we're going to keep freaking out over everything even when it's potentially positive, and if every encouraging sign is only going to be slapped down with anger, then what the hell are we even doing here?

The Mel Brooks' tune from The Twelve Chairs is "Hope for the best, expect the worst".

Some days, being a democrat is like "Hope for the worst, expect the worst."
posted by mikelieman at 4:20 PM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


The NYT version of the Russia story is even more batshit: Matthew Rosenberg, American Spies Paid $100,000 to Russian Who Wanted to Sell Material on Trump
The N.S.A. even used its official Twitter account nearly a dozen times to send coded messages to the Russian.

The episode ended earlier this year with American spies chasing the Russian out of Western Europe, warning him not to return if he valued his freedom, the American businessman said. The alleged Trump material was left with the American, who has secured it in Europe.

The Russian claimed to have access to a staggering collection of secrets that included everything from the computer code for the cyberweapons stolen from the N.S.A. and C.I.A. to what he said was a video of Mr. Trump consorting with prostitutes in a Moscow hotel room in 2013, according to American and European officials and the Russian, who agreed to be interviewed in Germany on the condition of anonymity. There remains no evidence that such a video exists.
...
At the same time, there were questions about the Russian’s reliability. He had a history of money laundering and a laughably thin legitimate cover business — a nearly bankrupt company that sold portable grills for streetside sausage salesmen, according to British incorporation papers.
This all sounds like a giant disinfo op, but what the actual fuck? Pee tape in the Times?
posted by zachlipton at 4:36 PM on February 9, 2018 [29 favorites]


Dozens of Trump officials still lack full security clearance (Jim Sciutto, Gloria Borger, Zachary Cohen | CNN)
Thirty to 40 White House officials and administration political appointees are still operating without full security clearances, including senior adviser to President Donald Trump Jared Kushner and -- until recently -- White House staffer Rob Porter, according to a US official and a source familiar with the situation.

The White House claims that the backlog of interim security clearances is a procedural consequence of the review process carried out by the FBI and White House Office of Security, which can take time to complete.

But several sources, including intelligence officials who have served previous Democratic and GOP administrations, describe the backlog as very unusual and make clear that the process should have been completed after a year in office.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 4:42 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


NT Alexandra Petri, WaPo: But it never happened in the (Oval) Office: The Rob Porter story
We wish our departing colleague well. He worked very hard. And we should say, in his defense, he never stored any human corpses in the office refrigerator.

That he had a brown paper bag with a human head in it at home is, indeed, icky, but he never brought that bag to the office. All the brown bags he brought to the office contained office-appropriate substances.

They say he made leggings from a human corpse, but all I can say is, he never wore them at work. He just wore regular pants.

He never dissolved his supervisor in a vat of lye. In fact, his supervisor only has good things to say about him.

When we heard what he had been accused of for definitely (definitely!) the first time, we were, of course, appalled and we express our deepest condolences to the families of all those as-yet unidentified corpses. These are not activities we would ever approve of around the workplace, or I guess outside the workplace, but definitely not around the workplace. If he’d done them in the office, we would have spoken up right away and we would not have minced our words, as we are sorry to hear he minced several human beings.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 4:43 PM on February 9, 2018 [39 favorites]


Breaking: A second White House aide has resigned amid past domestic abuse allegations, which he denies (WaPo)
The abrupt departure of speechwriter David Sorensen comes after his former wife claimed that he was violent and emotionally abusive during their turbulent two-and-a-half-year marriage — allegations that he vehemently denied. Rather, Sorensen said he was the victim of domestic violence in their marriage.

Sorensen’s resignation comes two days after another administration official, staff secretary Rob Porter, departed after two ex-wives said that he physically abused them.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 4:44 PM on February 9, 2018 [19 favorites]


Wapo's Josh Dawsey: Trump will not approve of releasing Dem memo, per person with knowledge. Instead, he will tell legislators that memo needs changes before it could be released.
posted by FelliniBlank at 4:48 PM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


David Shepardson: .@realDonaldTrump says he cannot declassify Democratic memo

Contains images of letters from DOJ, FBI and Nunes.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 4:55 PM on February 9, 2018 [15 favorites]


So it seems the “national security review” of the GOP memo consisted of Trump ignoring the protestations of Wray and Rosenstein and declassifying the memo unilaterally, whereas when it comes to the Democratic memo, Trump suddenly became very curious about whether Wray and Rosenstein had concerns. It turns out they had similar concerns to the other memo! So sad. The President’s hands are tied. :’(
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 5:08 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


No surprise, really. Releasing this memo gets him nothing. And Trump’s philosophy is pretty much “playing fair is for dead guys and losers.”
posted by valkane at 5:12 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


Breaking: A second White House aide has resigned amid past domestic abuse allegations, which he denies (WaPo)

Called it. The men leading this shitshow are thoroughly steeped in misogyny--it informs their policy and personnel choices. I doubt they even really see what Porter and Sorenson did as truly wrong--they just know that others find verbal/physical/sexual abuse to be unacceptably transgressive. An environment so support of patriarchal misogyny has to have attracted more lower-level staffers like Porter and Sorenson. As others have mentioned, the man at the top is all about mistreating women.
posted by Excommunicated Cardinal at 5:13 PM on February 9, 2018 [19 favorites]


I'd argue that the Nunes memo played itself hard enough that drawing any more attention to the story by leaking the counter memo would accomplish nothing of value

like, what, we're gonna peel off some Hannity watchers over this?
posted by prize bull octorok at 5:13 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


The NYT version of the Russia story is even more batshit: Matthew Rosenberg, American Spies Paid $100,000 to Russian Who Wanted to Sell Material on Trump.

I'm so confused right now. What the hell am I supposed to take away from these articles?
posted by diogenes at 5:14 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


TL;DR: "we saw you voted to release a memo. We're very concerned about the separation of powers issue and also we have national security concerns. The President really very much would like to release the memo, actually, but you know -- national security concerns. We'd be happy to send a group of minders from the Justice Department to help guide you as you decide what we might or might not be willing to release at a later date"

I squint at twitter pics so you don't have to
posted by tivalasvegas at 5:14 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Hard to say, because it involves a lot of guessing about the contents, but I think I'll be quite satisfied if someone can release just Trump's suggested edits to the memo.
posted by dirge at 5:14 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Mod note: If you're repeating an argument you've had before ... don't.
posted by Eyebrows McGee (staff) at 5:15 PM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


Breaking: A second White House aide has resigned amid past domestic abuse allegations, which he denies (WaPo)

I guess White House staffers played a game of Never Have I Ever... at happy hour today.

It looks from the Rob Porter timeline that The Daily Mail broke the abuse story with just a couple of days of investigation after a tabloid paparazzo caught Porter and Hope Hicks "canoodling" in a cab. Since we know that the Trump administration version of vetting was DGAF about anything other than saying mean things about Trump, being too short, or having a mustache, I hope reporters are taking the hint to keep digging, that there's probably more gold in them hills.
posted by peeedro at 5:19 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


I'd argue that the Nunes memo played itself hard enough that drawing any more attention to the story by leaking the counter memo would accomplish nothing of value

Melissa McEwan: I can't help but notice that if Trump used members of the IC to deliver a blackmail payment, public disclosure of which he could then use to discredit the IC, with whom he's long been at war, it might look a lot like this story. (Referring to NYT)
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 5:20 PM on February 9, 2018 [27 favorites]


Trump “is inclined” to release the Democratic memo in the same way that he “is inclined” to sit down for an interview with a Mueller, or that he “is inclined” to release his tax returns
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 5:23 PM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


I'd argue that the Nunes memo played itself hard enough that drawing any more attention to the story by leaking the counter memo would accomplish nothing of value

Yea. The Nunes memo was so incompetent that the necessity of rebutting it has passed. Nunes self-owned so hard that he undermined his own case more than anything Schiff could have written.

If there was something in there catching on with the public, then I'd stand by the earlier discussion of Democrats NEED to take action to rebut it. But, that's not happening. When this first came up, I assumed a much more competent effort to undermine the investigation, but Nunes is such an obviously traitorous buffoon to an even marginally serious observer, and his idiotic memo was immediately laughed out of everywhere other than the set of Hannity.

Democrats get no courage credits here, and those criticisms are still valid because we continually get more evidence in support of them, but saving the ammo for another day looks like the correct move a week later.

If there's going to be 5 more Nunes memos, that's 5 more chances to grow a spine, if required.
posted by T.D. Strange at 5:23 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


I can't help but notice that if Trump used members of the IC to deliver a blackmail payment, public disclosure of which he could then use to discredit the IC, with whom he's long been at war, it might look a lot like this story

McEwan's theory makes no sense. Trump wouldn't want the IC anywhere near these allegations, and could probably mine twenty saner ways to deliver hush money from his own earlier payouts.
posted by Coventry at 5:25 PM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


What happened to the administration's firm commitment to transparency?
The Trump White House and GOP leaders have zeroed in on one main justification for releasing the controversial Devin Nunes memo: It's all about transparency. "I've always believed in the public's right to know," Vice President Pence said Thursday. “We have said all along, from day one, that we want full transparency in this process,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told CNN Wednesday.

White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly leaned into it even harder Wednesday on Fox News Radio: “Frankly, in every other case that I can remember in my lifetime where a president was in some kind of trouble, the president, the White House attempted to not release things. This president has said from the beginning . . . 'I want everything out. I want this thing, I want the American people to know the truth.'”
posted by kirkaracha at 5:29 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


"domestic abuse" is as stomach-wrenchingly minimizing a term as "indecent liberties" (discussed above.) headlines should read that this latest guy, for example, put out a cigarette on a woman, ran over her foot with a car, etc. etc. etc. if that means the headline needs to be five lines long before the type can get smaller, that's what it needs to be.

and the car attack wasn't fucking domestic violence. you can't do that inside the house, the sacred space where a man is king of his castle and torture has a special, tamed name. fuck "domestic." it's violence. detail it.
posted by queenofbithynia at 5:30 PM on February 9, 2018 [113 favorites]


"I've always believed in the public's right to know," Vice President Pence said Thursday. “We have said all along, from day one, that we want full transparency in this process,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told CNN Wednesday.

White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly leaned into it even harder Wednesday on Fox News Radio: “Frankly, in every other case that I can remember in my lifetime where a president was in some kind of trouble, the president, the White House attempted to not release things. This president has said from the beginning . . . 'I want everything out. I want this thing, I want the American people to know the truth.'”


I feel like you only lie this stupendously and brazenly when you're not worried that your base will even bother to listen to the truth. Not a good look for democracy.
posted by Rykey at 5:41 PM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


and the car attack wasn't fucking domestic violence. you can't do that inside the house, the sacred space where a man is king of his castle and torture has a special, tamed name. fuck "domestic." it's violence. detail it.

Yeah I’m about done with the term “domestic violence.” queenofbithynia is so right I’m actually sort of stunned by the truth of it. It’s torture to terrorize someone like this. These aren’t regular guys with bad habits or bad tempers. They are monsters.
posted by schadenfrau at 5:50 PM on February 9, 2018 [53 favorites]


My fear about letting Kelly go is, what will they replace him with? Nothing good.

This is the NYTimes take on it:
The president has now sounded out several people as possible replacements for Mr. Kelly. Those possible replacements include Mick Mulvaney, the budget director; Representative Kevin McCarthy of California; and Gary D. Cohn, Mr. Trump’s top economic adviser. He has also returned to a notion he has raised privately in the past, telling people he would like Thomas J. Barrack Jr., a close friend and confidant, to take the job.

Mr. Kelly is not ready to explicitly offer a resignation, according to a person familiar with his thinking. But people close to Mr. Trump said the president had begun the process of making the job so unpleasant for Mr. Kelly that it might hasten his departure, the same sort of ritual humiliation to which he subjected Reince Priebus, his first chief of staff, before his departure in July.
posted by peeedro at 5:53 PM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Those possible replacements include Mick Mulvaney, the budget director; Representative Kevin McCarthy of California

“There’s two people I think Putin pays: Rohrabacher and Trump,” McCarthy (R-Calif.) said, according to a recording of the June 15, 2016, exchange."

It's in Trump's interest to keep Kevin under his wing.
posted by Rust Moranis at 6:06 PM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


Mr. Kelly is not ready to explicitly offer a resignation, according to a person familiar with his thinking.

Is that actually a real phrase people use or do they euphemistically mean Kelly?
posted by Nonsteroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drug at 6:33 PM on February 9, 2018 [12 favorites]


WaPo: As Jared Kushner’s security clearance is delayed, White House hesitates to act on others with possible problems
Two U.S. officials said they do not expect Kushner to receive a permanent security clearance in the near future. . . . The president’s son-in-law and close adviser has been allowed to see materials, including the President’s Daily Brief, that are among the most sensitive in government. He has been afforded that privilege even though he has only an interim clearance and is a focus in the ongoing special counsel investigation into whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to influence the election.
"U.S. officials." Is it starting to feel like these security-clearance-related leaks/stories lately are a little early Valentine from the FBI to the White House in response to the Nunes memo bullshit? Like, "Oh, you want transparency, assholes? Here you go."
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:38 PM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


The assertion in that WaPo piece that Porter was kept around for months because Crown Prince Jared couldn't get his own clearance sorted out and McGahn didn't want to set a precedent is... quite something.

And we're back to duelling leakers picking their preferred outlets.
posted by holgate at 6:41 PM on February 9, 2018 [6 favorites]


god hates math: "This is the man who is leading the race for Kansas Governor right now. He consists of nothing but 100% pure fraud, and he's probably going to win."

He's got a good shot, but he's not home free yet. He's currently defending himself ("fool for a client") in a suit about requiring proof of citizenship to vote, he's got this veteran thing, and there are lawsuits pending about data leaks from his Crosscheck program. On top of that, his fundraising has been really lackluster.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:51 PM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Since basically no one is really in the weeds on the memo bullshit and it all comes down to talking points, handwaving, and insinuation, isn't it actually good for the story to be that the Democratic memo is being suppressed? That reads as "something to hide" in a way that doesn't require one to know or understand anything about the details.
posted by prefpara at 7:09 PM on February 9, 2018 [22 favorites]


Two U.S. officials said they do not expect Kushner to receive a permanent security clearance in the near future. . . . The president’s son-in-law and close adviser has been allowed to see materials, including the President’s Daily Brief, that are among the most sensitive in government.

The security clearance system and classification of material is under the discretion and authority of the president and the executive branch. If Trump says that Jared and Ivanka are cleared to see top secret material, they are authorized, even if they don't have "official" clearances. All it takes is the word of the president declaring a need to know. There's nothing congress or anyone else can do about it.
posted by JackFlash at 7:19 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


The Michael Lewis piece is great. I almost forgive him for his bizarre article on Germany a few years back.
posted by Slothrup at 7:23 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Turns out both of Porter's ex-wives were counseled by Mormon bishops to just buck up and stick with it. They both divorced against the church's advice.
posted by JackFlash at 7:31 PM on February 9, 2018 [60 favorites]


Security clearance ... just another piece of security theater.

I don't feel secure.
posted by Dashy at 7:33 PM on February 9, 2018


Since basically no one is really in the weeds on the memo bullshit and it all comes down to talking points, handwaving, and insinuation, isn't it actually good for the story to be that the Democratic memo is being suppressed? That reads as "something to hide" in a way that doesn't require one to know or understand anything about the details.

Especially since they can still read it (redacted or not) into the Congressional Record. All Trump did was make himself look guilty and hypocritical, he didn’t stop shit if Dems want that memo out.
posted by leotrotsky at 7:38 PM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


Mike Pence is busy throwing a tantrum in South Korea
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:45 PM on February 9, 2018 [16 favorites]


Willoughby said that when Porter smashed a window in their home, the Mormon bishop said that taking out a protective order might jeopardize Porter's career.
posted by JackFlash at 7:45 PM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


The Mormon aspect makes me wonder if domestic violence will play any part in Romney's Senate run. Not in the insinuation that he's an abuser, but that this is an issue in that community at large and if he's prepared to speak on it.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 7:47 PM on February 9, 2018 [3 favorites]


ELECTIONS NEWS

** PA gerrymandering -- The GOP-controlled legislature squeaked under the wire and submitted a proposed map tonight (there were some twists and turns as to if they did it properly, but they're probably immaterial). Basically, it throws the 7th to the Dems, but otherwise mostly tries to protect incumbents. Odds are that governor Wolf rejects it, and we're off to a court appointed special master to draw maps.

** PA-18 special -- Former VP Joe Biden coming to stump for Lamb. Joe Kennedy was here the other day, as well,

** 2018 Senate -- PPIC poll has Diane Feinstein comfortably leading Kevin de León 46-17. No major GOP candidates as yet.

** 2018 House:
-- Dem Rick Nolan [MN-08] will not be running for re-election. District is traditionally blue, but went for Trump 54-39. Ratings guys have the race as a toss-up; Minnesota politics Twitter reaction is basically, "Not as bad as it sounds, Nolan was an underperformer."

-- Duncan Hunter [R-CA-50] swears he's running for re-election, but he's not raising much, and spending a ton, mostly on his legal woes. District went 54-40 Trump.

-- It sure looked like Veterans Affairs chair Phil Roe [R-TN-01] wasn't going to run again - he's raised almost nothing - but now he confirms he's in. He should be safe, seat went Trump 78-20.
** Odds & ends:
-- That PPIC poll has Gavin Newsom with a narrow 23-21 lead over Antonio Villaraigosa for California governor. Top Republican is only pulling 8 points. It's increasingly looking like the top two slots for both governor and Senator will be Democrats, which will likely have a measurable negative impact on GOP turnout and hurt them downballot.

-- State Attorney General race ratings. Democrats looked poised to pick up at least a few states.

-- Dems running for all seats on the ballot in state legislatures in Ohio and Arizona.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:55 PM on February 9, 2018 [36 favorites]


Dems running for all seats on the ballot in state legislatures in Ohio and Arizona.

I'll still never get over that just running a candidate in every election is considered a Democratic win.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:03 PM on February 9, 2018 [21 favorites]


Security clearance ... just another piece of security theater.

Does anyone doubt that any white guy under the guise of "hamburger delivery" or something similarly clever could just waltz in anytime?

The Wolff book may not name names for every quote, but it's not wrong: the White House is in chaos. There's no one driving that thing.
posted by petebest at 8:08 PM on February 9, 2018 [8 favorites]


Well, I hear you. On the other hand, there are plenty of seats where the GOP isn't running anyone.

Uncontested Democratic-held seats:

IL Senate - 14
IL House - 38
KY Senate - 1
KY House - 7
TX Senate - 1
TX House - 37
WV House - 7

There were 22 uncontested D-held seats in the Virginia House election last November, too.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:08 PM on February 9, 2018 [20 favorites]


All it takes is the word of the president declaring a need to know. There's nothing congress or anyone else can do about it.

Well, yes, but the "permanent interim clearance" approach is still in the domain of "following normal protocols in a fucked-up way"; tossing out those protocols might not have a constitutionally-stipulated recourse, but there's plenty the people currently doing the vetting can do.
posted by holgate at 8:32 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


there's plenty the people currently doing the vetting can do.

Not sure what you are saying. If Trump wants Jared and Ivanka to see the top secret daily security brief, there's nothing anyone can do short of impeachment.
posted by JackFlash at 8:38 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Well you could take Jared's bullshit security clearance application and throw him in jail for lying on it.
posted by ryanrs at 8:53 PM on February 9, 2018 [9 favorites]


Ivanka Trump knows state secrets. This is a factual statement. Oh God.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 8:54 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


Donald Trump knows state secrets. This is a factual statement. Oh God.
posted by Mental Wimp at 8:55 PM on February 9, 2018 [31 favorites]


The Russians know state secrets. Etc.
posted by Autumnheart at 8:56 PM on February 9, 2018 [17 favorites]


Just assume there's no such thing as state secrets anymore. Whatever there was, the Russians have all of it, up to and including our nuclear launch codes. Electing the Manchurian candidate has consequences.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:58 PM on February 9, 2018 [26 favorites]


Well you could take Jared's bullshit security clearance application and throw him in jail for lying on it.

That would be the responsibility of the DOJ, which Trump effectively controls through Sessions, right?
posted by Coventry at 9:08 PM on February 9, 2018 [1 favorite]


Hey, does anyone want to read another NYT profile of a Trump supporter? This guy isn't a Nazi, he just hates the Clintons and thinks there are too many immigrants and that Trump isn't really racist, and that we should respect the presidency.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:19 PM on February 9, 2018 [11 favorites]


WaPo coverage inside the White House, ‘Very turbulent’: Trump and White House consumed with turmoil amid abuse allegations:
In a conversation with Trump, Kelly said he would be willing to resign if that would improve the situation, but he made the offer casually and did not submit a letter of resignation or take formal action, according to two White House officials.
...
Aides described a resulting level of dysfunction not experienced behind the scenes at the White House since the early months of Trump’s presidency. Dormant ­rivalries have come alive, with suspicions swirling about some of the most senior officials and the roles they apparently played in protecting Porter.

“People are using it to their advantage,” one West Wing aide said. “If you hate Kelly, this is your moment. Hope’s enemies are using it to go after her.”
posted by peeedro at 9:27 PM on February 9, 2018 [14 favorites]


Lawmaker won’t apologize for Rand Paul crack. (WaPo)
There was bipartisan support Thursday night on essentially one issue: for Rand Paul to quiet down.

As the libertarian held the Senate at bay into Friday morning to protest an estimated $320 billion being added to the national debt under a bipartisan budget deal, Rep. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.) and outspoken liberal actress Bette Midler both made quips that referenced a physical attack made in November against the Republican senator from Kentucky.

“When Rand Paul pulls a stunt like this, it [is] easy to understand why it’s difficult to be Rand Paul’s next-door neighbor,” Dent said Thursday night.
...
In a phone interview with The Post, Dent said he likes and respects Paul, but he would not apologize for what he called a “clearly facetious” comment made in jest.

“Who knew libertarians were so sensitive and concerned with political correctness?” he said... “Is he [Paul] going to apologize for shutting down the government?” Dent asked rhetorically.
posted by peeedro at 10:29 PM on February 9, 2018 [13 favorites]


From upthread:

The most benefit the administration got from Kelly wasn't from him being a monster but from him initially granting an air of legitimacy and control.

I've had a few conversations, as everybody has, about how The Generals are going to protect us from the worst that Trump could do. But a couple of weeks ago my parents, staunch NeverTrumpers, came to visit, and said that "those three guys might turn out to be American heroes."

I was just ....... speechless. Kelly? An American hero? People are really and truly desperate to believe there are some grownups running this show.
posted by gerstle at 10:41 PM on February 9, 2018 [5 favorites]


Just hit this line in the Lewis piece:
Steve Bannon reminded me of someone, but it’s not until I’m back in my hotel room that I realize who. He was a character from “The Big Short.” He saw the world differently from virtually everyone in his profession, and it led a lot of people to think that he was insane. But he was right and they were wrong, and the rest of the world has yet to come to terms with why.
As terrifying and disgraceful as Bannon's achievements have been, I think that's true.
posted by Coventry at 10:44 PM on February 9, 2018 [4 favorites]


Shaub is a goddamn hero, though. Is there some way to send him a donation?
posted by Coventry at 10:53 PM on February 9, 2018 [2 favorites]


In a phone interview with The Post, Dent said he likes and respects Paul, but he would not apologize for what he called a “clearly facetious” comment made in jest.

“Who knew libertarians were so sensitive...?”


I think I found somebody who has never talked politics with a libertarian.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 11:02 PM on February 9, 2018 [48 favorites]


Lewis on Bannon on #metoo etc.:
He’s a connoisseur of anger, and in women’s anger about sexual harassment he senses a prelude to their anger about a lot more. “I think it’s going to unfold like the Tea Party, only bigger,” he says. “It’s not Me Too. It’s not just sexual harassment. It’s an anti-patriarchy movement. Time’s up on 10,000 years of recorded history. This is coming. This is real.”
posted by Coventry at 11:24 PM on February 9, 2018 [7 favorites]


Yeah, we know exactly what kind of "connoisseur" Steve Bannon is. The whole column is the most nauseatingly enthusiastic attempt to rehabilitate the guy who is not yet two months out from failing to elect an anti-Semitic homophobic pedophile Republican to be a Senator from Alabama. I'm amazed y'all were able to read the whole thing.
posted by J.K. Seazer at 12:09 AM on February 10, 2018 [34 favorites]


How do you get rehabilitation from that?

Bannon comes off as smart, but narrow-mindedly xenophobic, and as proud architect of an appalling travesty, Trump's victory.
posted by Coventry at 1:49 AM on February 10, 2018 [3 favorites]


FYI listening to The Black Panther soundtrack, now streaming, is a great cathartic way to fight those Nazi blues
posted by angrycat at 5:01 AM on February 10, 2018 [12 favorites]


The Black Panther soundtrack

Thanks! On now
posted by Myeral at 5:17 AM on February 10, 2018 [3 favorites]


It’s an anti-patriarchy movement. Time’s up on 10,000 years of recorded history. This is coming. This is real.

I mean, let's hope so

It's pretty telling Bannon would see such a thing in apocalyptic terms
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:02 AM on February 10, 2018 [24 favorites]


One of the most curious Bannon stories in the Wolff book is the infamous dinner (at Wolff's house) with Roger Ailes, discussing Trump-as-Pres-elect. He's offered wine and says, "I don't drink."

Wut. It's just this bizarre non-sequitur with no follow-up. Can Bannon, can *anyone* look more alcoholic and not drink? The answer, of course, is "none".

It just stood out as a weird detail in a book comprised entirely of weird details surrounding the outrageous upending of all the things in the Presidency. It made me suspect, along with Wolff's comments on the various shows, that Bannon and Katie Walsh were 80% of the source.
posted by petebest at 7:13 AM on February 10, 2018 [1 favorite]


I don't think it's at all hard to believe that Bannon is the sort of alcoholic who does all his drinking in "secret" or who sometimes makes ineffectual attempts to get on the wagon.
posted by contraption at 7:57 AM on February 10, 2018 [2 favorites]


In from the "that was totally expected" news desk, Trump will not be declassifying and releasing the Schiff memo.
posted by Talez at 7:58 AM on February 10, 2018 [1 favorite]


@realDonaldTrump
According to the @nytimes, a Russian sold phony secrets on “Trump” to the U.S. Asking price was $10 million, brought down to $1 million to be paid over time. I hope people are now seeing & understanding what is going on here. It is all now starting to come out - DRAIN THE SWAMP!

Any doubt that (Putin and) the administration set this up as a disinfo op should evaporate upon Trump's compulsive bragging about having haggled down the price.
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:11 AM on February 10, 2018 [33 favorites]


@realDonaldTrump
Peoples lives are being shattered and destroyed by a mere allegation. Some are true and some are false. Some are old and some are new. There is no recovery for someone falsely accused - life and career are gone. Is there no such thing any longer as Due Process?

Donald, you either just admitted to sexual assault or are claiming that your life and career are gone. Por que no los dos?
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:16 AM on February 10, 2018 [42 favorites]


@realDonaldTrump
The Democrats sent a very political and
long response memo which they knew, because of sources and methods (and more), would have to be heavily redacted, whereupon they would blame the White House for lack of transparency. Told them to re-do and send back in proper form! (emphasis mine)
I know Trump doesn't want to do anything not immediately advantageous for him, but my gut tells me his main objection to Schiff's memo is that it's too long (for Trump) to read.
posted by Fiberoptic Zebroid and The Hypnagogic Jerks at 8:21 AM on February 10, 2018 [35 favorites]


Due process only clears someone of criminal or civil charges. Reputation is decided by the court of public opinion.
posted by Autumnheart at 8:22 AM on February 10, 2018 [10 favorites]


I just want to revisit how "peoples [sic] lives are being shattered and destroyed by a mere allegation" comes from the entity who alleged that Obama is a Kenyan who founded ISIS, that five innocent black kids were monsters that must be executed, and that Ted Cruz's dad killed JFK.
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:35 AM on February 10, 2018 [118 favorites]


Fox News pulls executive's column slamming focus on 'darker, gayer' Olympics

"Unless it's changed overnight, the motto of the Olympics, since 1894, has been 'Faster, Higher, Stronger,'" Moody wrote. "It appears the U.S. Olympic Committee would like to change that to 'Darker, Gayer, Different.'


I'm on board with HBO's gritty Olympics reboot.
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:45 AM on February 10, 2018 [33 favorites]


It took me a minute to realize that by "darker" they did not mean emotionally wrenching.
posted by maggiemaggie at 8:55 AM on February 10, 2018 [28 favorites]


... Wait, do you think that when they said "gayer" they did not mean "merrier" either?
posted by Too-Ticky at 9:09 AM on February 10, 2018 [8 favorites]


According to the @nytimes, a Russian sold phony secrets on “Trump” to the U.S... I hope people are now seeing & understanding what is going on here. It is all now starting to come out...

I read the Times article. I'm still confused. What is the story that Trump is trying to sell here?
posted by diogenes at 9:12 AM on February 10, 2018 [10 favorites]


Some are old and some are new.

Some are red, and some are blue.
Some are sad, and some are glad,
And some are very, very bad.

Reading level established: Dr. Seuss
posted by kirkaracha at 9:19 AM on February 10, 2018 [15 favorites]


I’m at the gym and CNN is on in the background. One of the pundits speculated that Trump decided not to release the Democratic memo because it “contained too much intelligence”.
posted by Autumnheart at 9:37 AM on February 10, 2018 [50 favorites]


Gosh I love how this weekend Donald Trump and Bret Stephens are all about protecting downtrodden oppressed vulnerable underdogs like Rob Porter and Woody Allen from the life-ruining tragic injustice of women saying negative things about them and depriving them of their god-given right never to hear criticism or experience ego wounds.
posted by FelliniBlank at 10:06 AM on February 10, 2018 [46 favorites]


diogenes: I read the Times article. I'm still confused. What is the story that Trump is trying to sell here?

It seems like Moscow ran an op to sell bogus Trump info to the CIA. If CIA had taken them up on it, they would've leaked info (maybe through Wikileaks?) showing it's bogus info to discredit any other Russian info (Steele Dossier) or investigations (Mueller). Since CIA didn't bite, they're leaking the story now to dirty the water to make it seem the CIA is out to get Trump.

As Evan McMullin said, Trump is now echoing Moscow's narrative.
posted by bluecore at 10:07 AM on February 10, 2018 [44 favorites]


Some hometown regrets about John Kelly: Kelly is from Boston's Brighton neighborhood, and after his appointments to Homeland Security and then as CoS, local veteran Rick Hollahan (who's still in the Army Reserves), repeatedly praised his fellow Brightonite on social media (and even began thinking about how to create a monument to him). Not anymore. The Boston Globe talked to him (usual newspaper caveat: Don't read the comments).
posted by adamg at 10:15 AM on February 10, 2018 [2 favorites]


As Evan McMullin said, Trump is now echoing Moscow's narrative.

Now? It's not even the first time this week.
posted by peeedro at 10:16 AM on February 10, 2018 [2 favorites]


What is DARVO?

“DARVO refers to a reaction perpetrators of wrong doing, particularly sexual offenders, may display in response to being held accountable for their behavior. DARVO stands for "Deny, Attack, and Reverse Victim and Offender." The perpetrator or offender may Deny the behavior, Attack the individual doing the confronting, and Reverse the roles of Victim and Offender such that the perpetrator assumes the victim role and turns the true victim -- or the whistle blower -- into an alleged offender. This occurs, for instance, when an actually guilty perpetrator assumes the role of "falsely accused" and attacks the accuser's credibility and blames the accuser of being the perpetrator of a false accusation.”

I would add that this is a common manipulative tool used by narcissists and people with personality disorders in general, not just people who commit sexual assault.
posted by Autumnheart at 11:01 AM on February 10, 2018 [105 favorites]


Yeah I’m about done with the term “domestic violence.” queenofbithynia is so right I’m actually sort of stunned by the truth of it. It’s torture to terrorize someone like this. These aren’t regular guys with bad habits or bad tempers. They are monsters.

As someone who works in a domestic violence-adjacent field, the preferred term in our world is "family violence", which encompasses spousal abuse, child abuse, and elder abuse all in one term. In terms of criminal procedure, my understanding is that in my state "family violence" is an indicator attached to a given crime, sort of like a hate crime. In other words, two people having a fistfight outside of a bar would be assault not classified as family violence, but someone punching their spouse would be assault classified as family violence.

For the purposes of newspaper headlines, I wholeheartedly agree that the writing need to be more specific. With no other context, "domestic violence" could mean anything from a black eye to attempted murder.

/derail
posted by Ndwright at 11:44 AM on February 10, 2018 [10 favorites]


Regarding DARVO, this is exactly the dynamic of my arguments with bigots in general, including every Trump voter I know.

Like the old fraternity "buddy" who posted a transphobic meme on FB, who when I noted his transphobia responded by repeatedly calling me schizophrenic, then suggested that I should apologize for attacking him.

Or the sister who claimed that Trump was only going to deport criminals, who when I asked what she thought of all the stories of outrageous ICE actions against innocent people told me to stop harassing her and that unless it has to do with our aging parents she's no longer interested in anything I have to say.

Supporting Trump is a personality disorder, is I guess what I'm saying.
posted by Lyme Drop at 12:19 PM on February 10, 2018 [92 favorites]


Politico, Railroad agency's acting chief resigns amid questions about his employment
A top official charged with overseeing the safety of U.S. railroads has resigned "effective immediately," the Department of Transportation said Saturday after POLITICO raised questions about whether he had been simultaneously working as a public relations consultant for a sheriff's department in Mississippi.

Heath Hall became the Federal Railroad Administration's acting administrator in June but subsequently appeared on at least two occasions in Mississippi media reports as a spokesman for the Madison County sheriff, in a community where Hall has long run a public relations and political consulting firm. The firm continued to receive payments from the county for its services from July to December, despite his pledge in a federal ethics form that it would remain "dormant" while he worked at DOT.
Trains keep crashing and FRA hasn’t had a permanent director in over a year, and this guy apparently wasn’t even full-time.
posted by zachlipton at 12:22 PM on February 10, 2018 [18 favorites]


Justice in the factory: how Black Lives Matter breathed new life into unions
As Black Lives Matter and other social justice campaigns focus more on economic inequality, unions see an opportunity
Unions have suffered as manufacturing has moved south away from their old strongholds in the north of the US. Membership rates were 10.7% in 2016, down from 20.1% in 1983, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. At the same time the shift from manufacturing to service industry jobs has hurt them too.

But as the Black Lives Matter and other social justice campaigns increasingly focus on economic justice, unions see a new opportunity. And ironically, a series of defeats for labor in the south is helping to fire up recruitment drives and attracting international support in the process.
posted by Coventry at 12:47 PM on February 10, 2018 [45 favorites]


As Evan McMullin said, Trump is now echoing Moscow's narrative.

Ah, so the upshot of the Times article and Trump's response is that Trump is working in concert with Russian intelligence to discredit US intelligence. This is fine!
posted by diogenes at 1:20 PM on February 10, 2018 [8 favorites]


But as the Black Lives Matter and other social justice campaigns increasingly focus on economic justice, unions see a new opportunity.

Well that's a nice change from unions' historical racism. Hopefully it reflects a permanent generational change in attitudes and not just opportunism.
posted by Jacqueline at 1:29 PM on February 10, 2018 [3 favorites]


Ah, so the upshot of the Times article and Trump's response is that Trump is working in concert with Russian intelligence to discredit US intelligence. This is fine!

Go further. Trump is working in concert with Russian intelligence to discredit US intelligence supported by British intelligence about Trump working in concert with Russian intelligence, by suggesting loudly that the US intelligence and British intelligence were working in concert with known false and salacious Russian intelligence.

If anyone has any fucking intelligence left at this point they should get a nice plate of cookies.
posted by delfin at 1:55 PM on February 10, 2018 [30 favorites]


California Truck Rules Set Up Potential Conflict with Trump Administration -- The rules seek to preserve the state’s authority to regulate emissions from two sectors that the administration has backed away from (Debra Kahn with contributions from Camille von Kaenel, for ClimateWire E&E Newson, reprinted with permission on Scientific American, February 9, 2018)
California regulators approved a set of greenhouse gas regulations for trucks yesterday that deviate from the Trump administration, setting up a potential legal conflict.

The California Air Resources Board (ARB) voted unanimously to adopt emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks starting with the 2020 model year.

The rules are largely parallel to Obama-era federal standards adopted by U.S. EPA and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration in October 2016. But they also seek to preserve California's authority to regulate emissions from two sectors that the Trump administration has backed away from. That could lead to legal conflicts.

State regulators said they were sticking to the Obama-era regulations for glider kits, or truck frames designed to hold refurbished engines, because the kits allow trucks to release copious amounts of nitrogen oxides and particulate matter—four to 40 times as much NOx and 50 to 450 times as much particulate matter as newer models, according to U.S. EPA testing. "That's a no brainer," board member Dan Sperling said. "It's embarrassing what's happening in Washington."
That's near-term. In mid-to-longer term actions, there are active discussions on prohibiting emission vehicles (emitting vehicles?) by 2050:
Ting said it's needed if California hopes to cut its greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent by 2050. Transportation accounts for about 37 percent of state emissions.

"If we don't do something very aggressively on changing people's habits in regards to passenger vehicles, we're not going to be able to come close to meeting our greenhouse gas reduction goals," Ting said in an interview.

In addition to China [Saying It Will Stop Selling Internal Combustion Engine Cars], officials in France and the United Kingdom have said they're considering banning internal combustion engine vehicles. Neither has approved policies to do that, but Ting said their pledges factored into his thinking.
Assembly Member Phil Ting pushing the topic and trying to get public support.
posted by filthy light thief at 2:28 PM on February 10, 2018 [14 favorites]


Well that's a nice change from unions' historical racism.

That's rather ignorant of history. This is among the standard slurs by union bashers. But remember, the reason Martin Luther King was in Memphis, where he gave his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech and gave up his life, was in support of a union labor strike. And union labor leaders helped organize the Rosa Parks bus boycott in Montgomery.

I've commented on this previously. There is a long, mixed history of race and labor unions. The craft unions of the AFL in the 1920s and 1930s were particularly segregationist. On the other hand, the CIO led the way in job integration in the 30s and 40s, including over 80,000 black steelworkers, long before the rest of society even thought about integration.

Company bosses often exploited and exacerbated racial animus, using black workers to break strikes at primarily white factories and white workers to break strikes at primarily black factories. But after WWII most factory unions were integrated, even though some of the building trades remained recalcitrant. By the 1960s, African Americans represented 25% of union membership, twice their percentage in the country's population. Unions were way ahead of the rest of the country on integration.

Unions have been the primary vehicle for lifting African Americans from Jim Crow poverty into middle class wage jobs. Today, both black and white union members lead better lives due to their solidarity.
posted by JackFlash at 2:29 PM on February 10, 2018 [131 favorites]


How is that NYT article a disinformation campaign? It plainly states that the American spies were skeptical of the information provided by the Russian, especially due to his credentials, and even after shown 15 seconds of the possible pee tape, were still skeptical, and predominantly wanted to get the cyber weapons back. What’s so bad about this? No one bit, the story shows the American spies as being highly skeptical, there’s nothing really bad there.
posted by gucci mane at 2:34 PM on February 10, 2018 [1 favorite]


And please correct me if I totally read the article wrong.
posted by gucci mane at 2:34 PM on February 10, 2018


I'm agnostic, but it did occur to me when the Intercept/NYT stories broke that the leaks may come from people who just want to sow confusion, because the story is so damn confusing. So it wouldn't be NYT waging the disinfo campaign, but their sources.
posted by Coventry at 2:37 PM on February 10, 2018 [6 favorites]


I guess I’m just confused. It says the Russian wanted $10 million, then put it down to $1 million bc he had info on Trump. The US spies didn’t care, they didn’t want to be caught up in that shit (probably bc it would have intersected with another agency’s investigation), they just wanted their cyberweapons (which, if you read emptywheel, is directly connected to the Russian hacking of the election). None of it looks bad, it shows our intelligence guys as being highly skeptical and trying to keep Trump stuff at a distance. They had one objective: to get the weapons back, and they didn’t want to pay when they realized the stuff the guy had shown was already publicly released. That looks good on our part more than anything, at least to me. Am I totally reading this wrong?
posted by gucci mane at 2:41 PM on February 10, 2018 [5 favorites]


What’s so bad about this? No one bit, the story shows the American spies as being highly skeptical, there’s nothing really bad there.

They could be trying to discredit all the information that has been dug up about Trump and his dealings with Russia as nothing more than fake data peddled by charlatans.
posted by PenDevil at 2:42 PM on February 10, 2018 [4 favorites]


I'll still never get over that just running a candidate in every election is considered a Democratic win.

By all accounts running for Congress, or even winning, is a hateful enterprise composed 90% of begging assholes for campaign contributions -- not just during the campaign, but every minute of the time you hold office, too. So it's no surprise that it would be hard to find someone to run, in districts heavily skewed to the other party.

But it's crucial, to develop (and find) new candidate talent, to be ready in case of scandal, and -- when there's really no chance of winning -- because the candidate is freer to speak truth.

Also, you need to block out fringe candidates who will happily fill the void, such as the Republican's Nazi candidate in Illinois. Larouche followers try this continually in Democratic primaries, with some getting through in 1986 and 2014.
posted by msalt at 2:44 PM on February 10, 2018 [10 favorites]


"That's rather ignorant of history. This is among the standard slurs of union bashers."

Or it's from the stories from actual Teamsters organizers (my parents) about the uphill battles they had to fight to combat endemic racism and sexism in the labor movement. It was pretty fucking awful in the 70s.
posted by Jacqueline at 2:45 PM on February 10, 2018 [4 favorites]


There was endemic racism and sexism in an American institution in the 1970s? Who knew?
posted by Coventry at 2:48 PM on February 10, 2018 [11 favorites]


Well, sure, but surely that’s a reflection of the times more than of the labour movement alone?
posted by Sys Rq at 2:49 PM on February 10, 2018 [4 favorites]


Mod note: Enough, leave it alone.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 2:49 PM on February 10, 2018 [6 favorites]


States are allowed to pass regulations that are more strict than federal regs, so hooray for my state and its metaphorical middle finger to the Trump administration.
posted by elsietheeel at 2:50 PM on February 10, 2018 [1 favorite]


States are allowed to pass regulations that are more strict than federal regs

Not exactly, California is the only state under the federal Clean Air Act that is allowed to set their own vehicle emissions standards, all other states are allowed to adopt standards identical to California's or follow the federal standards. CA must still obtain an EPA waiver to enforce its own rules.
posted by peeedro at 3:09 PM on February 10, 2018 [2 favorites]


Holy crow. Mike Pence took Fred Warmbier to South Korea.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 3:33 PM on February 10, 2018 [4 favorites]


I guess I’m just confused.

Me too. That's probably the goal. The story isn't actually good for Trump, but it adds to the confusion about what really happened. And by cherry-picking pieces of it (and ignoring others), it can be spun by Trump as being vaguely indicative of bad acts by the "Deep State."

I'm sure if we want to see the game plan here, we could watch Hannity tonight.
posted by diogenes at 3:37 PM on February 10, 2018 [3 favorites]


Thinking about it further, it doesn't matter to Trump and his co-conspirators that the story doesn't make sense or add up. It allows them to use the words "CIA," "bogus information," and "payments" in the same paragraph. That's all that matters when your goal is to sow doubt and confusion.
posted by diogenes at 3:43 PM on February 10, 2018 [22 favorites]


IC veterans on Twitter have taken advantage of the platform's enforced brevity to sum up the NYT/Intercept story, and Trump's reaction, concisely:

Former DoD special prosecutor Ryan Goodman‏ @rgoodlaw:
Here's what's important to understand.

NYT: "The United States intelligence officials said they cut off the deal because they were wary of being entangled in a Russian operation to create discord inside the American government."

Now guess what the President is trying to do
Former CIA operations officer Evan McMullin @Evan_McMullin:
Trump appears to be working in concert with Moscow on this. Russians ran a likely dangle op (http://nyti.ms/2BnTZYs ) to set up US intel, which assessed and rejected it. Having taken the op as far as it could, Moscow likely planted the story. Now, Trump echoes Moscow's narrative.
Former CIA analyst Nada Bakos @nadabakos:
CIA denies report over mystery Russian who promised Trump info (Yahoo)
Yet Trump tweeted this morning that the story was true and to 'drain the swamp' - CIA [led by Trump appointee Pompeo] denies report over mystery Russian who promised Trump info - looks like Russia succeeded yet again to sow discontent
Former CIA clandestine operative John Sipher‏ @john_sipher:
The President's willingness to mouth Russian talking points, play along with their games or believe their lies is extremely troubling.[...]
(Also, "John Sipher" for a spook's last name? The Trump Era Writers aren't even trying.)
posted by Doktor Zed at 3:59 PM on February 10, 2018 [66 favorites]


This president has said from the beginning . . . 'I want everything out. I want this thing, I want the American people to know the truth.'”

How's Summer Zervos' lawsuit going, anyway? Still chugging along? Donny's looking forward to his day in Court?
posted by Capt. Renault at 4:09 PM on February 10, 2018 [4 favorites]


CA must still obtain an EPA waiver to enforce its own rules.

Booooo! My knowledge of state vs. federal regs generally only applies to 7 CFR, so that's what I get for speaking about things that aren't in my wheelhouse.
posted by elsietheeel at 4:13 PM on February 10, 2018


CA must still obtain an EPA waiver to enforce its own rules.

A little background on this. When the Clean Air Act was written in 1970, California already had emissions rules that were stricter than the proposed new law, so an explicit waiver was written into the law allowing California to impose its own emission rules as long as they at least met the EPA rules.

Up through the 1980s or so, automakers would make two versions of their cars, one complying with the more lenient EPA rules and one complying with California's stricter rules. Since then 15 states, comprising more than half the U.S. population, have adopted the California rules so that today automakers build all vehicles to the higher California standards.

For nearly 40 years, as California gradually adopted ever more strict rules, waivers have been granted by the EPA -- until 2008 and the G.W. Bush administration. They refused to extend the waiver, but a few months later Obama took office and allowed the waivers to continue.

But guess who now is trying once again to revoke the half century old California waiver that 15 other states have also adopted? California and other states have vowed to fight back in the courts. "States rights, my ass."
posted by JackFlash at 4:54 PM on February 10, 2018 [48 favorites]


Aside re: car emissions in CA - There were still CA special versions of cars in the '90s. Can make finding parts a challenge.

But wow. Lots of politics have been happening. Thanks, everyone, for keeping on it.
posted by monopas at 5:59 PM on February 10, 2018 [2 favorites]


The latest last ditch Republican gerrymandered map in Pennsylvania would still create 12 Trump districts and only 6 Clinton districts (14 would've went for Toomey and only 4 for McGinty).
posted by T.D. Strange at 7:02 PM on February 10, 2018 [4 favorites]


Marty Lederman, Just Security: It is up to House Intel Committee, not Trump, whether to release Democratic memo on the Page FISA application
Most news outlets, such as the New York Times, are reporting that President Donald Trump has “blocked” the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI) from publicly disclosing the Democratic memorandum rebutting Devin Nunes’s claims that FBI and other officials acted improperly in seeking FISA warrants concerning Carter Page.

That’s not right: The President doesn’t have the power to block the HPSCI from releasing its memo. Committee members, including Adam Schiff, will undoubtedly consult with DOJ and the FBI to make reasonable efforts to amend the memo so as not to burn any important sources or methods–something that Schiff himself recommended. Even so, it’s ultimately up to the Committee to decide whether to release the memo, and whether to redact certain classified information before doing so.

Tonight’s letter to HPSCI from White House Counsel Douglas McGahn states that the memo in question includes certain information that the President declines to declassify, due to the determination of the Department of Justice that disclosure of that information would raise “especially significant concerns for the national security and law enforcement interests.” That’s the President’s prerogative. As I explained here back in 2014, however, the classification system merely regulates what Executive branch personnel can do with information entrusted to them. It does not regulate what members, or committees, of Congress may lawfully do with such information.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:41 PM on February 10, 2018 [22 favorites]


Ok, so this was upthread:

There have (surprisingly) been no issues about queer people lately.

I feel like one of the really difficult things about life under the Trump administration is that it's like facing a thousand burning garbage fires at once. Under these circumstances, I'm not going to attack or blame someone for being unaware of the fires I've been helping to fight as an intersex/trans/queer advocate, while they've been focused on some other blaze. It does make me feel kind of anxious to be reminded that for some people, the only LGBTQ+ issue that has hit their radar under Trump has been the trans military ban, which was blocked by court order and, while still on the books, isn't being implemented. But that was a dramatic national story, in that it started with a surprise presidential tweet declaring a ban, with minimal if any input from military leaders. And there are so many fires burning that really need attention that it's hard to keep track of the ones that are neither right in your backyard, or all over the news of the day.

I think that other than the trans military ban, the main issue that has gotten a lot of press has been the Masterpiece Cakeshop Supreme Court case which was argued in December, addressing the issue of whether a baker's refusal to make a wedding cake for a gay couple is Constitutionally protected under freedom of religion.

But there have been many actions by the Trump administration that have hurt LGBTQ+ people. Trans people have been particularly negatively impacted, because most of the federal protection we had gained, such as it was, came through federal regulatory bodies' interpretations of regulations. These have been wiped out by Trump appointees. So: under the Obama presidency, HHS interpreted bans on gender discrimination in the Affordable Care Act as prohibiting discrimination by health insurers and care providers against trans people. This was huge, for those of us living in red and purple states. I'm a Wisconsin state employee; our health insurance excluded coverage for any trans-related care or meds. In the summer of 2016, after the HHS guidances were released, our insurers sent out letters saying that starting on January 1, 2017, trans-related health care would be covered. Then came the inauguration, a swift nuking of these guidances, and on February 1, 2017, the ban on coverage of trans-related care was reinstated for Wisconsin state employees. For my family (my wife is also trans), this means paying over $4000 a year out of pocket for HRT that, were we cis people prescribed the same hormones, would cost us $120 per year.

Similarly, the departments of education and justice had issued guidances that instructed public schools and state colleges not to discriminate against trans students. Those were rescinded, and the DoJ pulled out of all enforcement actions that had been initiated under the Obama administration to protect trans students from discrimination. Republican governors in half of the states, including mine, who had been suing to block federal trans protections at the time of the presidential election, were elated that now they would get to torment trans kids at will (sorry, "protect [cis] students' privacy").

Not only is the DoJ taking the position that Title IX does not protect trans people, under Sessions it is now arguing that Title VII doesn't protect people against employment discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation--and intervening in discrimination lawsuits by LGB people to file amicus briefs to assert that.

Meanwhile, Sessions' DoJ recently released an update to its policy manuals that requires each U.S. Attorney's Office to appoint a "religious liberty czar." That person must work to ensure "religious freedom" (read, freedom to discriminate against LGBT people, and to refuse to cover birth control or abortion)--and must also inform DoJ hierarchs when any case involving "religious liberties" arises. The Nashville Statement put out by evangelical leaders last summer codifies as core evangelical Christian beliefs that the Bible prohibits same-gender marriage and gender transition, and also requires parents of intersex children to seek doctors to perform genital sex reassignments on children born sex-variant to give them penises or vulvas. This handy document can now be submitted as evidence in cases framing discriminating against LGBTQI+ people as religious liberty.

Meanwhile, all mention of LGBTQI+ people and history is being scrubbed from federal websites. Plans to finally start asking people their sexual orientation on the 2020 census are being attacked. The CDC instructed its agents not to use the word "transgender" in any documents seeking federal funding.

But really, the big change for a lot of us outside the major urban areas in blue states has been in the levels of harassment and fear we have to deal with--especially if we are trans, and most especially, of course, for those who are immigrants, folks of color, are living with a chronic illness or disability, etc. I'm sure that sounds very familiar to many.

So, I'm afraid we queer people do, as it were, have issues.
posted by DrMew at 8:09 PM on February 10, 2018 [163 favorites]


T.D. Strange: "The latest last ditch Republican gerrymandered map in Pennsylvania would still create 12 Trump districts and only 6 Clinton districts (14 would've went for Toomey and only 4 for McGinty)."

The chance that governor Wolf okays the proposal seems very small.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:19 PM on February 10, 2018 [3 favorites]


Sexual assault charges fell rising political star Wyoming SOS Ed Murray.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:36 PM on February 10, 2018 [7 favorites]


Sen. Chris Murphy Criticizes Pence's antics at the Olympics: Why does Pence hate the opening ceremonies? Oh wait...he's a using ceremony at a sporting event to protest something else. Where have I seen that before?" Murphy tweeted.
posted by TwoStride at 8:51 PM on February 10, 2018 [52 favorites]


"The latest last ditch Republican gerrymandered map in Pennsylvania would still create 12 Trump districts and only 6 Clinton districts (14 would've went for Toomey and only 4 for McGinty)."

Governor Wolf's rejection will send it back to the state Supreme Court, right? It seems crazy for the Republicans to be so blatant. How can the Supreme Court -- which already ruled against them -- not take this as clear evidence of guilt and bad faith? Seems like a counterproductive attitude to leave the Court with as they start drawing a map against your wishes.
posted by msalt at 9:04 PM on February 10, 2018 [1 favorite]


Yes. If Wolf rejects it, it goes to the court, who already have a special master on tap to draw the lines.

It is a bit surprising the GOP tried this, one would think they would put together a map that advantages them, but not blatantly.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:14 PM on February 10, 2018 [2 favorites]


They can't even pretend to act in good faith.
posted by ryanrs at 9:36 PM on February 10, 2018 [22 favorites]


Probably means they think they have a plan which makes good faith unnecessary.
posted by Coventry at 9:51 PM on February 10, 2018 [5 favorites]


Imagine how awesome it would be to live in a country where the constant indisputable evidence that every single fucking candidate of one of the only two viable parties is entirely, absolutely, constitutionally incapable of acting in good faith would mean they get even one less vote come Election Day.

This more than anything is what makes me despair about the country's future. It's not just that we have an entire party that has fully embraced cheating, lies, hatred, racism, and bigotry of all stripes. It's that 40% of the voting populace will continue to support them regardless. If we manage to get rid of Trump, guess who the party will rally around next? Spoiler: more Trumps (both figuratively and, quite possibly, literally).
posted by Two unicycles and some duct tape at 10:29 PM on February 10, 2018 [50 favorites]


>There have (surprisingly) been no issues about queer people lately.

Except for a sharp rise in violence against them, as well as a drop in support for their civil and human rights.


I looked into exactly how big this rise was and was shocked. The National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs recorded 52 LGTBQ hate-based homicides in 2017 ― an average of one each week. That’s a sharp increase from 28 single-incident anti-LGTBQ homicides in 2016. Mostly, it's against trans women and cis queer men, and disproportionately people of color.
posted by en forme de poire at 12:07 AM on February 11, 2018 [28 favorites]


Thank you very much for correcting me on that point, DrMew. I ... live in New Jersey and my HRT is covered by Medicaid. So I am incredibly sobered.
posted by Rainbo Vagrant at 1:03 AM on February 11, 2018 [3 favorites]


Administration Imposes Sweeping Limits on Federal Actions Against Companies, Robert Pear, NYT
The Trump administration has adopted new limits on the use of “guidance documents” that federal agencies have issued on almost every conceivable subject, an action that could have sweeping implications for the government’s ability to sue companies accused of violations. [...]

The new policy, issued by the No. 3 official at the Justice Department, Rachel L. Brand, is significant because federal agencies have issued hundreds of guidance documents on a wide range of laws covering issues like health care, the environment, civil rights and labor.

Under the revised policy, Ms. Brand said, the Justice Department will not “use its enforcement authority to effectively convert agency guidance documents into binding rules.” Moreover, she said, Justice Department lawyers, who represent federal agencies in court, “may not use noncompliance with guidance documents as a basis for proving violations of applicable law.”

In a footnote, the Trump administration makes clear that the new policy has broad ramifications: It applies to any civil lawsuits filed on behalf of the federal government to “impose penalties for violations of federal health, safety, civil rights or environmental laws.”

It also applies to cases in which the government asserts that health care providers or federal contractors defrauded the government by filing false or inflated claims.

Lawyers and lobbyists have been rushing to tell clients about the policy, which was issued on Jan. 25.
Gillibrand: If Trump wants due process, we'll have hearings on allegations against him, Jacqueline Thomsen, The Hill
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) went after President Trump on Saturday for his tweet questioning a lack of "due process" in abuse claims, saying that Congress could hold hearings about sexual misconduct allegations against him if he wanted due process.

“The President has shown through words and actions that he doesn’t value women. It’s not surprising that he doesn’t believe survivors or understand the national conversation that is happening,” Gillibrand tweeted.

“If he wants due process for the over dozen sexual assault allegations against him, let’s have Congressional hearings tomorrow,” she continued. “I would support that and my colleagues should too.”

Trump had raised concerns about due process in a tweet earlier Saturday, which came after two White House aides resigned amid allegations of past domestic abuse.

White House staff secretary Rob Porter and speechwriter David Sorensen both resigned this week over the newly revealed allegations, claims that they have denied.
Utah school changes name to honor NASA engineer instead of Andrew Jackson, Avery Anapol, The Hill
The Salt Lake City school board has voted to change the name of the city's oldest elementary school over an outcry about its namesake, former President Andrew Jackson.

The school board voted unanimously earlier this week to change the name of Andrew Jackson Elementary School to Mary Jackson Elementary School, according to [Erin Alberty in] the Salt Lake Tribune.

The school's name now honors the first black female NASA engineer whose story was featured in the film “Hidden Figures.”

It is also the first Utah school to be named after a woman. [...]

The school prides itself on its diverse population, according to the Tribune, which noted that 85 percent of students are children of color.
[content warning: sex assault, crimes against children; autoplay video]
Registered Sex Offender Elected As Fire Chief In Pa. Town, Mayor Defends Decision, AP/ CBS Pittsburgh
The mayor of a small Pennsylvania town is standing by its volunteer fire company’s re-election of a registered sex offender as its fire chief.

Chief Roger Gilbert Jr. was convicted in 2001 of sexual intercourse with a 4-year-old girl and is listed in the state’s Megan’s Law database, The (Corry) Journal reported Saturday. Court records show Gilbert is a felon who completed a five- to 10-year sentence for “involuntary deviate sexual intercourse.”
posted by Sockin'inthefreeworld at 3:58 AM on February 11, 2018 [38 favorites]


Matthew Dessem, Slate: I Am the Very Model of a New York Times Contrarian
posted by Faint of Butt at 4:08 AM on February 11, 2018 [21 favorites]


It’s an anti-patriarchy movement. Time’s up on 10,000 years of recorded history. This is coming. This is real.
--Steve Bannon

Recorded history goes back 5000 years, to the time when writing was invented. So if Bannon's prediction is correct, we still have 5000 more years of patriarchy to deal with.
posted by jabah at 5:22 AM on February 11, 2018 [4 favorites]


Slate bagging on people for knee-jerk contrarianism? What a country!
posted by thelonius at 5:54 AM on February 11, 2018 [18 favorites]


Here's a twitter thread breaking down how HR620 will defang the ADA.

My hot take is that the law will require the DOJ to do more education work re: ADA issues with the money currently allotted for enforcement. So education of businesses re: accessibility issues will take priority over suing businesses that violate provisions of the ADA.

There's also a series of technical requirements that are being suggested that will act as a barrier for folks using the ADA in court. A demand letter that needs to set forth the legal argument regarding how the business violates the ADA needs to be sent. If say you sue because there's no ramp, you send a demand letter stating this, they build the ramp, the shelves are inaccessible, you have to send another demand letter because this is a different complaint regarding violation of the ADA.

In short, by taking money away from the part of the DOJ that can sue to enforce the ADA and making it really difficult for individuals to sue because of these new technical requirements (and most disabled folks do not have the thousands in legal fees) businesses will have some relief from the onerous requirements of the ADA. /bleak sarcasm.

There's also something about how plaintiffs suing under the ADA aren't entitled to monetary relief for damages, and I don't know if that's new or not, honestly, I got depressed and didn't want to know any more.
posted by angrycat at 6:28 AM on February 11, 2018 [27 favorites]


Washington Senate Passes Automatic Voter Registration, Brandon Letsinger, Cascadia Underground [am unfamiliar with this publication but cannot find other citations]
[link to state legislature's page on the bill]
During a Saturday session, the Washington State Senate overwhelmingly passed Senate Bill E3SSB 6353 which provides for automatic voter registration in Washington State. The Senate Bill passed by a vote of thirty-four to thirteen, with two senators abstaining, and further removes barriers to voting access for millions of Washington residents.

Washington joins other Cascadian states such as Oregon in passing automatic voter registration, which was signed into law by Oregon Governor Kate Brown in 2015. Currently, nearly 20% of eligible voters in Washington State are not registered to vote.
5 arrested amid clashes between [Trump supporters], counterprotesters at UW rally [in Seattle], Jessica Lee, Dahlia Bazzaz
and Christine Willmsen, Seattle Times
Chaos came roughly 75 minutes in, despite police efforts to keep apart a couple of hundred protesters who far outnumbered the Patriot Prayer and pro-Donald Trump crowd. Those protesters came to denounce the president and promote anti-capitalist or pro-civil-rights themes.
This Former NFL Player Is Running on a Progressive Agenda to Flip a Red District in Texas, Kate Aronoff, InTheseTimes.com
Among [Democrats running in the Lonestar State] is Colin Allred, a civil rights attorney and former Tennessee Titans linebacker who has thrown his hat into the ring for the 32nd Congressional District. [...] The 32nd has been represented by Republican Pete Sessions since it was created in 2003 as a safe Republican seat. That safety was called into question in 2016, when voters in the district chose Hillary Clinton over Donald Trump by one point. [...]

Allred considers himself the most progressive candidate in the race, and is running on a platform of Medicare for all, a $15 minimum wage, campaign finance reform and automatic voter registration.
More on Allred:
Interview: Berkeley Law Alum And Former NFL Player Colin Allred On Following Obama, The American Dream, And His Path Back To Dallas, Renwei Chung, Above the Law

Endorsement and Voter Guide: We recommend Colin Allred in the Democratic primary for 32nd Congressional District, Dallas Morning News editorial
Senator seeking admin records on Trump's sale of Palm Beach mansion to Russian, Katelyn Polantz and Marshall Cohen, CNN
Sen. Ron Wyden, the committee's ranking member, on Friday requested the financial records of the sale of Trump's former estate in Palm Beach to Dmitry Rybolovlev.

Wyden's letter outlined how Donald Trump bought a 6.3-acre property in Florida for $41.35 million in 2004 and then sold that property to a company owned by the businessman four years later. The sale price to Rybolovlev more than doubled Trump's initial investment, to $95 million. The property's appraisal in 2008 fell short of that sale price by $30 million, Wyden said.

"In the context of the President's then-precarious financial position, I believe that the Palm Beach property sale warrants further scrutiny," the Oregon Democrat wrote. "It is imperative that Congress follow the money and conduct a thorough investigation into any potential money laundering or other illicit financial dealings between the President, his associates, and Russia."
Global Shipping Business Tied to Mitch McConnell, Secretary Elaine Chao Shrouded in Offshore Tax Haven, Lee Fang and Spencer Woodman, The Intercept (Feb. 5, 2018)
The Paradise Papers reveal that Trump’s Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and Sen. Mitch McConnell have more ties to tax havens than previously known. [...]

Over a period of five years, millions of dollars were quietly funneled to a Chao family foundation via two offshore firms that list a New York address but are not incorporated anywhere in the United States. Two entities with the same names, however, are incorporated in the Marshall Islands, known as one of the world’s most secretive offshore havens for firms seeking to avoid taxes and a preferred foreign locale for the Foremost Group, the Chao family’s New York-based shipping business.
posted by Sockin'inthefreeworld at 6:51 AM on February 11, 2018 [50 favorites]


Chrysostom: "Yes. If Wolf rejects it, it goes to the court, who already have a special master on tap to draw the lines.

It is a bit surprising the GOP tried this, one would think they would put together a map that advantages them, but not blatantly.
"

We're talking about Mike Turzai here, the guy who once bragged in a speech that PA voter ID laws would give the state to Mitt Romney in 2012.
posted by octothorpe at 6:58 AM on February 11, 2018 [9 favorites]


If you would like some schadenfreude, Turzai just dropped out of the governor's race.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:05 AM on February 11, 2018 [25 favorites]


I doubt that he had much chance to be governor but I'm pretty sure that he'll still be speaker of the PA house next year.
posted by octothorpe at 7:10 AM on February 11, 2018 [1 favorite]


The mansion deal? Bearer corporations in the Marshall Islands?

2018 midterms should be about finance reform. Because it appears that everyone's laundering money to avoid paying their fair share of taxes.
posted by mikelieman at 7:26 AM on February 11, 2018 [7 favorites]


Washington joins other Cascadian states such as Oregon

Wait, there's another "Cascadian" state besides those two? And it has automatic voter registration?
posted by contraption at 7:26 AM on February 11, 2018


Alaska would be that third state.
posted by Autumnheart at 7:31 AM on February 11, 2018 [3 favorites]


Politico: Devin Nunes creates his own alternative news site

Resembling a local, conservative news site, “The California Republican” is classified on Facebook as a “media/news company” and claims to deliver “the best of US, California, and Central Valley news, sports, and analysis.” But the website is paid for by Nunes’ campaign committee, according to small print at the bottom of the site. Leading the home page this week: A photograph of Nunes over the headline: “Understanding the process behind #ReleaseTheMemo.” [...] Asked for comment about “The California Republican” website Saturday, Anthony Ratekin, Nunes’ chief of staff, said in an email, “Until Politico retracts its multitude of fake stories on Congressman Nunes, we will not go on the record.” (sweet DARVO, DARV-bro)

The site's currently down. As always, the only thing really fighting them is their incompetence.
posted by Rust Moranis at 7:55 AM on February 11, 2018 [27 favorites]


Newsweek does not appear to be going out quietly...

A protege of Michael Flynn, Devin Nunes has long been criticized in Washington for his penchant for alternative facts.

Besties with Moscow Mike Flynn, apparently.
posted by Artw at 8:01 AM on February 11, 2018 [10 favorites]


New congressional map would kick Conor Lamb out of 18th District

I'm sure that's purely coincidental.
posted by octothorpe at 9:30 AM on February 11, 2018 [5 favorites]


As long as we're beating on Devin Nunes this morning, here's a recent roundup:

The Hill: Lawmakers In Dark About 'Phase Two' of Nunes Investigation:
House Intelligence Committee lawmakers are in the dark about an investigation into wrongdoing at the State Department announced by Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) on Friday.

Democrats on the committee say Nunes has refused to brief them on the probe, which he described as “phase two” of his investigation into alleged surveillance abuse at the Department of Justice. Senior members say they learned of the investigation when Nunes announced it on Fox News.[...]

The apparent confusion comes as Democrats have accused Nunes — they suggest perhaps alone — of breaking committee rules by launching new investigations without briefing the minority.

"What you can glean from the process, in what he is saying, is this is not a committee activity, this is a Devin Nunes activity or arguably maybe a majority activity,” Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.) said Thursday. “But again, none of the Democrats to my knowledge have been briefed on this.”

Ranking member Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) during Monday’s meeting called the investigation “a farce.”
Chicago Tribune: Fact check: Nunes makes dubious claims about Hillary Clinton colluding with Russians (Verdict: Four out of four Pinnochios)

MSNBC Nunes Challenger Andrew Janz: "People are really fed up with Devin Nunes" "While Nunes won his district by a two-to-one margin in 2016, he has a new challenger this time around. Fresno County Deputy D.A. Andrew Janz is running against Nunes, and a new poll has Democrats within 5 points of reclaiming the seat."
posted by Doktor Zed at 9:35 AM on February 11, 2018 [30 favorites]


Devin Nunes creates his own alternative news site

Masthead: "All The Nunes That's Fit To Print"
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 9:44 AM on February 11, 2018 [19 favorites]


Fact check: Nunes makes dubious claims about Hillary Clinton colluding with Russians (Verdict: Four out of four Pinnochios)

Christ, I wish journalists would get over this allergy they have to the idea of calling a lie a lie. I mean, great that they're doing fact checking, but enough with the coy "four out of four Pinnochios" bullshit.

"Nunes lies about Hillary Clinton colluding with Russians." It's simpler, it's more accurate, it's more honest, and it's more helpful to their readers.
posted by biogeo at 9:50 AM on February 11, 2018 [64 favorites]


Christ, I wish journalists would get over this allergy they have to the idea of calling a lie a lie. I mean, great that they're doing fact checking, but enough with the coy "four out of four Pinnochios" bullshit.

"[I]n the big Pinocchio there is always a certain force of credibility because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big Pinocchio than the small Pinocchio, since they themselves often tell small Pinocchios in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale magically animated puppets."
posted by Rust Moranis at 10:01 AM on February 11, 2018 [13 favorites]


Devin Nunes creates his own alternative news site

Darkness at Nunes
posted by kirkaracha at 10:10 AM on February 11, 2018 [7 favorites]


(not)@realDonaldTrump
Peoples lives are being shattered and destroyed by a mere allegation.
Some are false and some are true.
Some are old and some are new.
Not one of them is like another.
Don't ask us why, go ask your mother.


-apologies to Dr. Seuss
posted by Trinity-Gehenna at 10:13 AM on February 11, 2018 [4 favorites]


The Trump Administration is Beta-Testing DACA Deportations, and the Tests Are a Huge Success
Today's Nicholas Kristof column in The New York Times is about Syed Jamal, a chemistry professor in Lawrence, Kansas, who's in the process of being deported after living in America for three decades. [...]

But when I go to the the page listing the "Most Popular" items at the Times, this column is nowhere to be found. It's not among the ten "Most Emailed," "Most Viewed," "Most Shared on Facebook," or "Most Tweeted" Times stories. There's much more interest in stories about Rob Porter and U.S. spies trying to retrieve stolen cyberweapons. Maureen Dowd's latest column is popular. Readers are interested in the Olympics and tilapia.

There's another awful immigration story at HuffPost. [...] It's not a trending story at HuffPost. [...]

It's been argued that the Trump administration is engaged in especially cruel immigration arrests out of pure racism or sadism. Those are among the obvious motives -- but this is also a test, one that we're failing as a nation. [...]

Like support for universal gun background checks or a ban on bump stocks, support for sympathetic undocumented immigrants is widespread but doesn't inspire passion -- the passion is overwhelmingly on the minority side. Gun lovers and immigrant haters will absolutely turn out to vote based on how they feel about gun policy or immigration law. The evidence suggests that our side won't.
posted by tonycpsu at 10:34 AM on February 11, 2018 [34 favorites]


Michael Lewis was just on Larry Wilmore's podcast a couple days ago. He doesn't spill all the beans on the article he was writing, but its still a good listen.
posted by lkc at 11:14 AM on February 11, 2018


The sell-off of America continues. International Space Station could be privatized under Trump plan.
posted by scalefree at 11:19 AM on February 11, 2018 [5 favorites]


If you want a picture of the future, imagine Elon Musk's Roadster stamping on a human face – forever.
posted by tonycpsu at 11:27 AM on February 11, 2018 [5 favorites]


The sell-off of America continues. International Space Station could be privatized under Trump plan.

I'm certain that if a real billionaire, Elon Musk, didn't own a few news-cycles for doing $Real_Billionaire_Stuff, then the ISS wouldn't even show up on Trump's radar. But having to sit through Fox talking about Elon must have really steamed his potato.

My suggestion to the writers? Elon Musk shows up at the White House with his checkbook, ready to deal.
posted by mikelieman at 11:29 AM on February 11, 2018 [1 favorite]


While that human face points at the cute Hitchhiker's Guide reference on the dashboard and shouts between stamps, "See, he's just like us!"
posted by biogeo at 11:30 AM on February 11, 2018 [6 favorites]


“He tells it like it is.”
posted by kirkaracha at 11:35 AM on February 11, 2018 [6 favorites]


My suggestion to the writers? Elon Musk shows up at the White House with his checkbook, ready to deal.

Running a company on government sponsored research is pretty much his MO at the moment.
posted by PenDevil at 11:36 AM on February 11, 2018 [5 favorites]


Gun lovers and immigrant haters will absolutely turn out to vote based on how they feel about gun policy or immigration law. The evidence suggests that our side won't.

I don’t even know what to do about this, except scream into the void.

I want to urge that we tell the truth, and call these policies what they are — the tip of an ethnic cleansing program.

But I’m afraid that, even if we could get the Democrats the and the media to adopt that language, to start telling the truth, maybe enough people still wouldn’t care.

Literal fucking Nazis.
posted by schadenfrau at 11:48 AM on February 11, 2018 [14 favorites]


Some 500 people showed up at a local church to write letters in support of Jamal, and Leuschen said some were Trump supporters who were aghast that the immigration crackdown meant locking up their friend.

Face eating leopard party ate my friend's face!

Also a great idea to kick out people with STEM PhDs and ruin their lives, there will be no hard feelings leading to radicalization. But that's probably bullet point 9 on some PowerPoint by Kelly and Miller.
posted by benzenedream at 12:00 PM on February 11, 2018 [8 favorites]


Jennie Willoughby, one of two ex-wives who told the FBI of their abuse at the hands of Rob Porter, is pushing back forcefully against Trump:

Jennie Willoughby: ‘President Trump Will Not Diminish My Truth’ (Time)
On Friday, a friend and I watched as the President of the United States sat in the Oval Office and praised the work of my ex-husband, Rob Porter, and wished him future success. I can’t say I was surprised. But when Donald Trump repeated twice that Rob declared his innocence, I was floored. What was his intent in emphasizing that point? My friend turned to me and said, “The President of the United States just called you a liar.”

Yes. And so he did.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 12:46 PM on February 11, 2018 [34 favorites]


*sigh*

There is an open thread over here if you want to Elon Musk up the place. There are already several people over in that thread that have mentioned how truly awful a human Musk is, and how awful he is to his employees, and how awful it is to be that rich and not just give it away like the Buddha.
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 12:55 PM on February 11, 2018 [6 favorites]


Devin done got DDoSed.

The Hill: Devin Nunes' media site down after reported 'attack' on server
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:55 PM on February 11, 2018 [1 favorite]


More than 100 New York City attorneys protest after Ice arrests Bronx man, AP in NY / The Guardian
More than 100 New York City public defenders have walked out in protest of their clients getting detained at the courthouse by federal immigration officials.

The Thursday protest took place outside a Bronx courthouse, where attorneys say Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (Ice) officers are arresting their clients with no distinct pattern. WABC-TV reports the protest was sparked after Ice arrested Aboubacar Dembele Lanier, who was leaving the courthouse.
N.Y. Teamsters form ‘sanctuary union’ to fight ICE agents, Ginger Adams Otis, NY Daily News
The Teamsters’ decision to openly challenge immigration enforcement under President Trump is rooted in the loss of one of its own members.

On Aug. 24, Teamster Eber Garcia Vasquez, 54, a married father of three U.S.-born children, was detained by immigration agents when he showed up for a routine annual appointment [and deported] roughly 10 days later — despite a clean criminal record and two pending green card applications for him, one from his U.S. citizen wife and another from his son. [...]

At a Wednesday class, funded by the Consortium for Worker Education, Mike Spinelli of Local 553 listened carefully as trainer Luba Cortés walked everyone through the difference between an administrative warrant and a judicial one. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents often present a document that says “warrant” on it — but that doesn’t mean that it’s a judicial warrant, Cortés warned. Under the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution, only a judicial warrant allows authorities to search a home or business or make an arrest.
The Trump administration wants to turn the International Space Station into a commercially run venture, NASA document shows, Christian Davenport, WaPo
The White House plans to stop funding the station after 2024, ending direct federal support of the orbiting laboratory. But it does not intend to abandon the orbiting laboratory altogether and is working on a transition plan that could turn the station over to the private sector, according to an internal NASA document obtained by The Washington Post. [...]

The plan to privatize the station is likely to run into a wall of opposition, especially because the United States has spent nearly $100 billion to build and operate it.
posted by Sockin'inthefreeworld at 2:04 PM on February 11, 2018 [47 favorites]


We're being looted.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 2:20 PM on February 11, 2018 [80 favorites]


More on the PN gerrymandering update:

Pennsylvania Republicans have drawn a new congressional map that is just as gerrymandered as the old one, Christopher Ingraham, WaPo
On Friday, Republican leaders in the legislature submitted their new map for the governor's approval.[...]

[Redistricting expert's analysis of old and new maps show same partisan makeup, vote margins, etc. Plaintiffs and GOP argue about political bias and intent.]

Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf (D) has until Thursday to review the new Republican-drawn map. If Wolf rejects it, the Supreme Court will instruct independent redistricting expert Nathaniel Persily of Stanford University to draw a new map from scratch.
posted by Sockin'inthefreeworld at 2:21 PM on February 11, 2018 [6 favorites]


What's that you say? Trump’s Kentucky campaign chair pleads guilty to child sex trafficking?

Threatened young women and girls under the age of 18 with arrest or eviction to force them into sex, paid women and juveniles with heroin and painkillers, and gets 20 years, but is eligible for parole in 2022?

Color me surprised on all fronts.

Fun facts: Kentucky's state slogan is Unbridled Spirit. Previously, It's That Friendly.

Oh, and who's that posing next to him? Why, it's Mrs. Chao's husband. That turtlehead just seems to pop up in the most unseemly places, doesn't it?
posted by perspicio at 2:22 PM on February 11, 2018 [41 favorites]


The Hill: Devin Nunes' media site down after reported 'attack' on server

There is literally no evidence of any attack of any kind. Much more likely that this news site -- which Nunes paid a consultant a total of $8,000 to create, including the actual "news gathering" -- was poorly set up and collapsed under the slightest volume of traffic. Probably a Wix site.
posted by msalt at 2:24 PM on February 11, 2018 [16 favorites]


Kentucky's state slogan is Unbridled Spirit.

I will defend Unbridled Spirit to the death because (a) it's nice to tie our slogan in with something actually distinguishing about the state (horses), and (b) they've started replacing it on license plates with "In God We Trust" and I'm all like "WHY DO YOU HATE AMERICAKENTUCKY?"
posted by jackbishop at 3:00 PM on February 11, 2018 [12 favorites]


We're being looted.

And kidnapped.
posted by Sys Rq at 3:14 PM on February 11, 2018 [9 favorites]


Get ready for (another) infrastructure week, Trump’s big infrastructure plan has a lot of detail on everything but how to pay for it (WaPo)
The plan calls for investing $200 billion in federal money over the coming decade to entice other levels of government and the private sector to raise their spending on infrastructure by more than $1 trillion to hit the administration’s goal of $1.5 trillion in new funding over 10 years. It also seeks to dramatically reduce the time required to obtain environmental permits for such projects.

White House aides say Trump is open to a new source of funding to cover the federal share — such as raising the federal gas tax for the first time since 1993 — but Congress will have to make such decisions.

For now, the White House is suggesting that lawmakers cut money from elsewhere in the budget, including some existing infrastructure programs. That prospect seems unlikely given that Congress just last week reached a bipartisan deal to spend significantly more funds over the coming two years.
Also an opinion piece by Karen Tumulty, Which is scarier — that Trump doesn’t read his daily intel briefing, or that Jared Kushner does?
There are two sets of issues to be concerned about here. The more serious one, of course, is whether the president is getting the information he needs to keep the country safe — or alternatively, whether his handlers may be dumbing things down to avoid overtaxing his attention span or challenging his preconceptions.

In the case of Kushner, there is a potential security risk but also the more immediate question of how appropriate is it for him to have access to the material under any circumstances. That takes us back to the fact that the 37-year-old real estate scion has no credential to merit holding his current White House job, outside of whom he married.
posted by peeedro at 3:18 PM on February 11, 2018 [30 favorites]


octothorpe: "New congressional map would kick Conor Lamb out of 18th District

I'm sure that's purely coincidental.
"

Well, you don't have to reside in your district to represent it. But yeah.
posted by Chrysostom at 4:45 PM on February 11, 2018 [1 favorite]


Two book reviews and a critique: "Master of the circus" by Julius Krein
The reality is that almost everyone, including the President’s opponents, derives more benefit from his “unpresidential” behaviour than they would from its absence.

Without the impassioned “resistance” Trump provokes, for example, the Democratic Party would have to seriously confront its severe internal schisms. Just as the unthinking opposition to President Obama held the conservative movement together long after Bush had demonstrated its bankruptcy, protesting against Trump’s latest outrage is perhaps the only thing that allows Bernie Sanders and Larry Summers to pretend that they belong in the same party. Meanwhile, Trump has accomplished more for the conservative establishment than Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio ever will. As long as he continues to marshal his base in support of tax cuts and deregulation, donors and party elites will continue to countenance any rhetorical or behavioural deviations.

The most counterintuitively symbiotic relationship, however, is that between Trump and the professional intellectual classes who appear to despise him the most. Frequently advertised but seldom properly considered is the fact that Trump has singlehandedly increased profits for the “mainstream media” in a way that would have been unimaginable just a few years ago. The New York Times, Washington Post et al may honestly believe that democracy is dying in darkness, but at least it makes for good clickbait. If Trump did not exist, media executives would probably try to invent him – as, to some extent, they already have.
posted by Apocryphon at 4:58 PM on February 11, 2018 [8 favorites]


petebest: "Spread the Vote looks perfect, although there are only three states so far, FL, GA, and TN. Here's Tennessee to see what they're looking for. Maybe some intrepid MeFites want to save the voting world for their state?"

VoteRiders appears to be doing similar work. NBC story.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:07 PM on February 11, 2018 [5 favorites]


ELECTIONS NEWS

** 2018 Senate:
-- Dems dominating in fundraising for Senate races.

-- TN: Corker may be having second thoughts about retiring. I think this will prove to be a "no backsies" situation for him, though - he won't win the primary if he runs.

-- PA: Trump vocally backing Barletta. I don't think Casey is too worried at this point.
** 2018 House:
-- We talked about the PA-16 Dem primary the other day, which has developed into a left vs establishment sort of thing. Regardless of who you like, it's pleasing to see that both Dems have raised more money than the incumbent Republican.

-- You might remember that WaPo generic ballot poll that showed Dems doing much better in GOP-held districts than Dem-held districts. That's unusual - normally, the swing is relatively even. Analysis of special elections so far confirms that, though - the margin shift in R seats is 2.5x that in D seats. The implication is that a given lead in the generic may imply more seats flipped than normal.
** Odds and ends:
-- Doug Jones's victory is energizing Alabama Democrats.

-- How the DLCC and the Obama/Holder NDRC are plotting to take back state-level offices. And the NDRC target list.

-- Finally got final numbers on the Minnesota caucuses. Dems had about 3x the GOP turnout; GOP was lowest in the last 20 years or so. There's a governor and two Senate races in MN this year, so it's not for lack of things to be interested in.

-- GOP self-identification is falling, which may be one reason for polls that show Republicans still love Trump (i.e., those who don't, stop considering themselves Republican).

===

Two special elections in Minnesota tomorrow (I don't know why on a Monday), and then three more on Tuesday. Here's a detailed look at Tuesday's FL-HD-72 race, which is probably the best shot for a flip.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:27 PM on February 11, 2018 [32 favorites]


A Reckoning with Women Awaits Trump (David Remnick | The New Yorker)
Donald Trump is the least mysterious figure in the history of the American Presidency. His infantile character, duplicity, cold-heartedness, and self-dealing greed are evident not merely to the majority of the poll-answering electorate but, sooner or later, to those who make the decision to work at his side. This is manifest even in Trump’s favored medium, reality television. Recently, fans of “Celebrity Big Brother” witnessed Omarosa Manigault-Newman, the unforgettably forgettable former White House aide in charge of nothing at all, tearfully confessing her global despair. “It’s not going to be O.K.,” she said.

No kidding. Sooner or later, Trump’s satraps and lieutenants, present and former, come to betray a vivid sense of just how imperilled and imperilling this Presidency is. In their sotto-voce remarks to the White House press, these aides seem to compete in their synonyms for the President’s modesty of intelligence (“moron,” “idiot,” “fool”); his colossal narcissism; his lack of human empathy. They admit to reporters how little he studies the basics of domestic policy and national security; how partial he is to autocrats like himself; how indifferent he is to allies. They are shocked, they proclaim, absolutely shocked. In the past few days, it has been Trump’s misogyny, his heedless attitude toward women and issues of harassment and abuse, that has shocked them most. And those who know him best recognize the political consequences ahead. ...

Trump’s cruel and clueless remarks are of a piece with the tactics he has used to tamp down all his other scandals, miscues, and embarrassments. Just as he tries to divert attention from his, and his circle’s, errors and wrongdoing in the Russia scandal by shouting “fake news,” by casting blame on the F.B.I. and the Justice Department, and by deploying a congressional lackey like Devin Nunes, he diverts attention from his own encyclopedic record of miserable behavior toward women by casting doubt on the accusers. This is a neat trick, yet hardly original. It has come to the point when even Trump’s closest aides know that a reckoning is coming. It’s not going to be O.K.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 5:37 PM on February 11, 2018 [35 favorites]


It’s not going to be O.K.

It never was. I was reading a thoughtful comic in the oatmeal wherein it is written - on whatever it is that they write on over there - that when people are faced with logical challenges to their beliefs, their neurons respond as if they are being physically attacked.

That just means it's going to get ridiculouser and ridiculouser. Fox News has really done a number on this country.
posted by petebest at 5:59 PM on February 11, 2018 [43 favorites]


Regarding the FL-HD-72 race...
I met Margaret Good last month when I was down there, and she is charismatic.
I've got high hopes for her, and hope to be texting for her tomorrow.
posted by MtDewd at 7:04 PM on February 11, 2018 [5 favorites]


Twitter Suspends ‘Alt-Right’ Candidate Paul Nehlen After Meghan Markle Tweets (Aiden Pink, Forward)
Twitter suspended the account of congressional candidate Paul Nehlen, the “alt-right” congressional candidate who has associated himself with white supremacists.

The reason for the suspension is currently unclear, and Nehlen has not yet spoken out about it on Facebook, his other primary means of communication. But Wisconsin news site Channel 3000 speculated that it may have had to do with a Photoshopped tweet superimposing the head of “Cheddar Man,” a dark-skinned 9,000-year-old Mesolithic man “rebuilt” from the DNA of a skeleton in southwest England, on the body of Meghan Markle, the fiancee of Great Britain’s Prince Harry.
I've been swinging by that piece of shit's account every couple of days and reporting his vile posts.
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:13 PM on February 11, 2018 [62 favorites]


>I'm confused. Why would the US want to buy back documents stolen from NSA? Did they not have a copy? Or did they assume Russia wouldn't have made a copy? Or did they want to know exactly what was stolen?

Yes, they weren't trying to "get it back" per se as that cat is w-a-y out of the bag. But they would really like to know exactly what the Russkies did and/or did not get.

This whole story really stinks to high heaven. Why is this Russian inside source guy suddenly singing like a bird--and giving a whole treasure trove of documents, no less--to a bunch of journalists?

If he is a REAL mole/double agent, that is a sure-fire way to end your career/life with a delicious polonium sandwich.

It's far, far more likely this is some kind of a bait dangling operation by the KGB. Plan A would have been if the NSA/CIA purchased the info, which undoubtedly would have been filled with various kinds of misinformation or other nasty payloads. (And what worries me about The Intercept's article is the reporter seems to just credulously pass along the story told him by this intermediary agent, without even raising the question that there very likely is double-dealing planned and going on here.)

When that fell through, Plan B--widely broadcasting the affair via the media to discredit the U.S. intelligence agencies--is almost as good.

And in fact double good when our dupe of a president reinforces that message loudly and publicly.

Don't ever forget that Putin's goal is to spread confusion, discredit western institutions, and sow distrust in democracy wherever he can.

And always, always--weaken his opponents.

It's always unfortunate when our president plays right into his hands.
posted by flug at 8:57 PM on February 11, 2018 [10 favorites]


I'm still a Republican, but my party needs to be fumigated (Tom Nichols, USA Today)
One day we'll be needed to recreate the GOP as a center-right party rather than a vehicle for inane populist keggers. For now, I hope Democrats win Congress in 2018.

Republicans once believed in limited government, fiscal restraint, support for the defense and national security establishments, family values, and a strong American role in maintaining global order. More than that, we were the party that believed in logic and prudence over emotion. Our hearts were perhaps too cold, but never bleeding.

Today’s Republicans, however, are a party of bellowing drama queens whose elected representatives blow up spending caps, bust the deficit, and attack America’s law enforcement and national security agencies as dangerous conspirators. Their leader expects banana republic parades, coddles the Kremlin, protects violent men in positions of responsibility, and overlooks child molestation. The rank-and-file GOP members who once claimed that liberals were creating a tyrannical monarchy in the Oval Office now applaud the expansion of the presidency into a gigantic cult of personality.

So, am I still a Republican?
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 9:45 PM on February 11, 2018 [23 favorites]


Don't ever forget that Putin's goal is to spread confusion, discredit western institutions, and sow distrust in democracy wherever he can.

It is, but sometimes I wonder why he’d bother, aside from force of habit. Those things are pretty good at doing that to themselves.
posted by Sys Rq at 9:59 PM on February 11, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'm confused. Why would the US want to buy back documents stolen from NSA? Did they not have a copy? Or did they assume Russia wouldn't have made a copy? Or did they want to know exactly what was stolen?

This sounds like the same trick the George W. Bush campaign did to defuse the scandals about cocaine and his evaded military service (remember that W's dad was CIA director). IE leak or dangle fake documents about true scandals -- if the press or opponents bite, you expose he fakeness of the docs (since you created them) and discredit the true allegations.

As a bonus, they ruined Dan Rather's career. The journo, having strong reason if not partial evidence to believe the allegation, is tempted to "bite the cheese" and cut corners.
posted by msalt at 11:00 PM on February 11, 2018 [17 favorites]


That Tom Nichols opinion piece is total garbage - most notable from what wasn’t quoted above was labeling Trump a life long Democrat (labeled in all bold and underlined within the article) — the excuse we’ve all seen the Republican Party preparing. His major thesis is the majority of the candidates and party actually aren’t representative of real republicans as they were former Obama voters who also just want more government welfare directed to themselves.

Let me know when Tom Nichols actually does something tangibly positive as opposed to just waiting for the republican party to collapse so it can be fixed while disparaging Democrats.

I’m about as tired of the handwringing articles of inaction by “never trumpers” who still call themselves Republicans as I am of the profiles of yet another rural trump supporter. This is just another bullshit article trying to make the claim that Trump isn’t “one of them” from someone unwilling to reap what he has sown, without a single thing to offer of his own in any way. Fuck that.
posted by MysticMCJ at 11:23 PM on February 11, 2018 [68 favorites]


The Crosstab: GOP-proposed PA district map might actually be more gerrymandered than the current one.

Fun fact: Governor Wolf has a Ph.D. in political science, and his thesis was on the House.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:24 AM on February 12, 2018 [25 favorites]


Due Process - Spirit Giants (lyrics by President Donald Trump)

Someone sets Trump's "due process" tweet to music. Results are predictably amusing.
posted by Talez at 5:41 AM on February 12, 2018


> Trump a life long Democrat

I *guess* this is a passable talking point if you squint really hard (or are barely paying attention, which, well...), but even if you accept it at face value what does it say about the strength of the ostensible values of your political party if somebody like Trump can just waltz in and take over?
posted by The Card Cheat at 6:05 AM on February 12, 2018 [8 favorites]


Daily Beast, Lachlan, https://www.thedailybeast.com/donald-trumps-inaugural-committee-still-wont-say-what-its-doing-with-its-leftover-money
The committee smashed the record for inauguration fundraising, bringing in about $107 million, double the sum raised for Barack Obama’s first inauguration, which held the previous record. But Trump’s inaugural committee only spent about half of that money. The rest, it said, would go to philanthropic ends.

More than a year later, no one knows what those ends will be.

A spokesperson for Tom Barrack, Trump’s personal friend and the chairman of the committee, told The Daily Beast on Dec. 8 that it would be filing an annual report detailing its charitable giving with the Internal Revenue Service “in the next several weeks.” It is now Feb. 12, and it still hasn’t done so and there is no indication of when it will.
They've been "we'll tell you anytime now"ing us for since last summer.
posted by zachlipton at 6:12 AM on February 12, 2018 [15 favorites]


They've been "we'll tell you anytime now"ing us for since last summer.

I Know What You Hid Last Summer (2018)
starring: Jennifer Hugh Hewitt
posted by Barack Spinoza at 6:17 AM on February 12, 2018 [6 favorites]


Axios, Allen and Swan, Trump's real plan for 2018
President Trump today will unveil a $1.5 trillion infrastructure plan that his own aides don't think will pass, and a $4 trillion budget that reads like "science fiction."

It's the strangest of year-ahead plans for a party that controls the White House and both chambers of Congress: Top Republicans see Job 1 for this year as promoting the tax cut they passed last year.

The state of play: With the House in danger in November's midterms, a Republican close to the White House tells me this is a year for pumping Trump's base on taxes, economic growth and the wall (or the fight for the wall), "while the Dems help with focus on immigrants. For Rs, this is a year to avoid losing."

So ignore the documents and blather today. Here's Trump's real plan for '18:

A source close to the White House tells me that with an eye to getting Republicans excited about voting for Republicans in midterms, the president this year will be looking for "unexpected cultural flashpoints" — like the NFL and kneeling — that he can latch onto in person and on Twitter.

The source said Trump "is going to be looking for opportunities to stir up the base, more than focusing on any particular legislation or issue."
...
"But what he's really interested in is storylines revolving around him — driving the conversation with whatever crosses his mind at that moment, and then comes out of his mouth or his fingers."
One storyline is the policy thread, which contains an awful lot that really matters to people,but about which the President doesn't give a damn. Are Dreamers deported? Are they allowed to work? How badly are baby boomers pillaging their grandchildren's generation by blowing up the budget? Whose rights are protected and whose are striped away?

But Trump knows he loses on policy, and he doesn't bother to understand it anyway, so his real plan, the storyline we always end up with based on him reacting to whatever he sees on cable, is what it's always been: he's going to be more racist. And he thinks if he racists hard enough, Republicans will win the midterms. It's going to be a long year.
posted by zachlipton at 6:25 AM on February 12, 2018 [28 favorites]


NPR goes behind the press release to tell us about Golden Lantern, the payday lender the CFPB was pursuing in court until the bureau suddenly dropped its lawsuit after interim bureau chief Mick Mulvaney took the job:
Within weeks of coming on board, Mulvaney has worked to make the watchdog agency less aggressive. Under his leadership, the CFPB delayed a new payday lending regulation from going into effect and dropped an investigation into one payday lender who contributed to Mulvaney's campaign. In another move that particularly upset some staffers, the new boss also dropped a lawsuit against an alleged online loan shark called Golden Valley Lending. The suit says the lender illegally charges people up to 950 percent interest rates. It took CFPB staffers years to build the case.
Lots more at the link, including a Trump voter disappointed that the leopard ate her face.
posted by notyou at 6:39 AM on February 12, 2018 [22 favorites]


Josh Marshall of TPM with an excellent analysis of the Rob Porter situation vis-a-vis the predation of one Donald Trump: Rob Porter Is the Illumination Flare of Trumpist Rot
Individual wrongdoing should largely be centered on the person in question. It doesn’t naturally attach to their coworkers or employers. But from the start, in this case, everyone around Rob Porter seemed compromised by his offenses – and not in random ways. His story, this ignored and covered up offense, has managed to expose and highlight all the failings of the President and his coterie – not simply their indifference to racism or gender violence but interwoven factors like indifference to the rule of law and personal loyalty to leader as the highest, indeed singular, value.

We can start with the simple fact that this President surrounds himself with men who abuse women. Abuse and predation may know no party. But abusers seek out and run together. Trump’s politics are rooted in grievance, both gendered and racial. Trump is consistent if nothing else. He is an embodiment of his politics. It’s no surprise that this isn’t theoretical or merely expressed in political terms but is interpersonal and personally violent as well. Abusers know the President is one of them. They seek him out and he protects them in turn. Few men in the President’s coterie have multiple wives who’ve been willing to take the step of describing their former husband’s violence on the record. But it’s remarkable the number of Trump’s top advisors who have a history of abuse, whether it’s accusations of harassment or sexual assault or chronic physical violence against former spouses or girlfriends. [...]

Then there’s the President’s Chief of Staff, once held up as a professional and an adult accepting the burden of service to a transgressive President out of a sense of duty. That false impression has been whittled away until we arrive at the present moment where we can see unmistakably that John Kelly is an expositor of what we might call Total Quality Trumpism, a more disciplined and professionalized version of the President’s desire to rebuild traditional gender, racial hierarchies and seek revenge against a world he believes is spinning out of control. Such a traditionalist manifesto was the centerpiece of his broadside last fall against Florida Rep. Frederica S. Wilson (D). [...]

All of it starts to feed on itself. The President is defined by his predation. He attracts these people to him or they are the only options available and he in turn protects them. He’s staffed by the inexperienced, the incompetent and the reprobate. They are unable to hide his nature even when it would be in his interest to allow them to do so. The rush of crises and incapacity yields desperation and lying, in part because of the nature of the situation but even more because these behaviors are validated from the top. Did John Kelly start out as a liar? We don’t know. He seems to be one and a not terribly good one now. Porter’s exposure is like a brief but sustained flash of light amidst the moral darkness and squalor of Trump White House, briefly illuminating all the dreck and rot of the rough beast of Trumpism.
posted by Excommunicated Cardinal at 6:55 AM on February 12, 2018 [56 favorites]


the president this year will be looking for "unexpected cultural flashpoints" — like the NFL and kneeling — that he can latch onto in person and on Twitter.

...

he's going to be more racist. And he thinks if he racists hard enough, Republicans will win the midterms. It's going to be a long year.


Let him, there's more of us than his base, we're more motivated than ever, and we're getting out the vote.

Not trying to be flippant by saying "Let him" be racist, I know racism has real effects on people less privileged than I am. I mean it in a "Go ahead and pursue a losing strategy, we'll be out getting people who hate you to the polls" way.
posted by Rykey at 6:59 AM on February 12, 2018 [3 favorites]


IE leak or dangle fake documents about true scandals -- if the press or opponents bite, you expose he fakeness of the docs (since you created them) and discredit the true allegations.

I think the most disturbing part of this story is that the Russians have decided to indirectly go after the Mueller investigation.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 7:10 AM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


the president this year will be looking for "unexpected cultural flashpoints" — like the NFL and kneeling — that he can latch onto in person and on Twitter.

And with the exception of his hard-core supporters, people think he's a disgrace and a loon when he does that stuff. He can't win with only his base, even if they all turn out. There are lots of things to worry about, with gerrymandering and voter suppression and violence, and the steady, largely invisible destruction of our research/social services/health/disaster-readiness infrastructure, but Trump's "strategy" of "vote for me because I say racist things about football players" isn't what I'm anxious about.

Speaking of "steady erosion": Last week I was talking to a friend who is a higher-up in a large social services nonprofit, and he told me that the Trump administration has stepped up reporting requirements on spending to the point where they're having trouble both staffing programs and meeting the new reporting requirements. Bear in mind, this isn't some fly-by-night operation, and reporting requirements for orgs that receive federal funding were already pretty extensive. My perception is that the intent is both to sabotage these programs and to justify cutting or withholding funds with the aim of shutting down as much as possible. Once you've had to lay off program staff because you lose funding, it takes a long time to rebuild even if your funding is restored fairly quickly.

Some of what Trump is doing can be undone fairly quickly, but the deep sabotage to the federal agencies is going to be hard to deal with.
posted by Frowner at 7:11 AM on February 12, 2018 [53 favorites]


This might be an interesting point with which to hammer the White House. According to the SF Chronicle, Trump is privately saying that Porter is "sick."

So the media should ask if it's true, and if so, why Porter is being defended in public, and if not, why is Trump supportive of someone who is bad enough that a restraining order was put out for him?
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 7:12 AM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


Lots more at the link, including a Trump voter disappointed that the leopard ate her face.
Aren't there enough of these people for the Dems to run a whole year of ads with people saying: I voted for Trump and see where that got me
posted by mumimor at 7:22 AM on February 12, 2018 [20 favorites]


And with the exception of his hard-core supporters, people think he's a disgrace and a loon when he does that stuff. He can't win with only his base, even if they all turn out. There are lots of things to worry about, with gerrymandering and voter suppression and violence, and the steady, largely invisible destruction of our research/social services/health/disaster-readiness infrastructure, but Trump's "strategy" of "vote for me because I say racist things about football players" isn't what I'm anxious about.

It's going to be amazing to see how many 2018 ads and campaigns are all going to be about two people -- Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton -- neither of whom is running for office in 2018.
posted by delfin at 7:36 AM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


Arrrgh. It’s Golden Valley Lending, not Golden Lantern.
posted by notyou at 7:36 AM on February 12, 2018


Well, they both sound like cults lead by supervillains, so I can understand the mix-up.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:47 AM on February 12, 2018 [23 favorites]


Watching 44 speak live at the presidential portrait unveiling. What a relief to see the Obamas.
posted by Oyéah at 7:48 AM on February 12, 2018 [10 favorites]


It's going to be amazing to see how many 2018 ads and campaigns are all going to be about two people -- Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton -- neither of whom is running for office in 2018.

If the ads for the special election in PA are any indication, it'll probably be Nancy Pelosi more than Hillary Clinton. Also, they'll be selling the shit out of the tax scam.
posted by dirigibleman at 7:53 AM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


Who's creating all the FaceTweet bots for the Democrats? Is there some kind of opposite-country-to-Russia somewhere?
posted by petebest at 7:56 AM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


The committee smashed the record for inauguration fundraising, bringing in about $107 million, double the sum raised for Barack Obama’s first inauguration, which held the previous record. But Trump’s inaugural committee only spent about half of that money. The rest, it said, would go to philanthropic ends.
I think I see the problem. I'm guessing that a more accurate statement would be "But Trump’s inaugural committee only spent about half of that money on the inauguration. "
posted by Tabitha Someday at 7:58 AM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


Is there some kind of opposite-country-to-Russia somewhere?

Ukraine would be the obvious choice here.
posted by Sophie1 at 8:00 AM on February 12, 2018 [3 favorites]


I think I see the problem. I'm guessing that a more accurate statement would be "But Trump’s inaugural committee only spent about half of that money on the inauguration. "

"One for you; one for me. Two for you; one, two for me. Three for you; one, two, three for me..."
posted by Faint of Butt at 8:01 AM on February 12, 2018 [5 favorites]




White House budget proposes increase to defense spending and major cuts to safety net programs, but federal deficit would remain
The budget plan comes as Congress prepares to finalize spending for the current fiscal year. It would continue to markedly increase military spending and set aside money for a wall along the Mexico border, among other things.

It also calls for major spending reductions in Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps and other social programs, reductions that have long been targeted by conservatives.

But even with these reductions, which combine for more than $3 trillion in cuts over 10 years, it would not bring the budget into balance because of tax revenue lost to the recent tax cut and higher spending on other programs.
#@)($OI@#HJLK:FDSHJFL

$3 trillion over 10 years? Can someone please make sure Mulvaney has no investments in Soylent Green because holy shit, that's old people and poor people dying in gutters level of spending cuts.
posted by Talez at 8:40 AM on February 12, 2018 [36 favorites]


Houston Chronicle: A North Texas teacher had died from complications from the flu. Heather Holland, a second-grade teacher at Ikard Elementary School with the Weatherford Independent School District died over the weekend, the Weatherford Democrat reports. Holland got sick about a week ago and took medication, but delayed picking up the prescription due to the $116 copay, according to the newspaper.

Guardian: Trump campaign adviser tells people to skip flu shots in favor of prayer

"Well, listen, partners, we don't have a flu season," Minister Gloria Copeland said on a Facebook video for her church that was posted last week. "And don't receive (a flu shot) when somebody threatens you with, 'Everybody's getting the flu.' We've already had our shot: He bore our sicknesses and carried our diseases. That's what we stand on." Copeland, who works with her husband at Kenneth Copeland Ministries in Texas, said to followers in the clip: "Inoculate yourself with the word of God." By praying and saying "I'll never have the flu. I'll never have the flu," Copeland says followers can ward off the virus.

Cause of death: GOP.
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:40 AM on February 12, 2018 [75 favorites]


So this was a fun read this morning: https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/the-terrifying-future-of-fake-news

Maybe there is a future in epistemology after all. Take that, parents who couldn't understand why someone would major in philosophy!

[edited to clicky the hyperlink]
posted by Fezboy! at 8:49 AM on February 12, 2018 [12 favorites]


Rachel L. Brand, the No. 3 official at the Justice Department, plans to step down after nine months on the job as the country’s top law enforcement agency has been under attack by President Trump, according to two people briefed on her decision.

This seems.... bad?


Pretty bad in light of this scoop from NBC: Top Justice Department official Brand quit partly over fear she might be asked to oversee Russia probe
The Justice Department's No. 3 attorney had been unhappy with her job for months before the department announced her departure on Friday, according to multiple sources close to Associate Attorney General Rachel Brand.

Brand grew frustrated by vacancies at the department and feared she would be asked to oversee the Russia investigation, the sources said.

She will be leaving the Justice Department in the coming weeks to take a position with Walmart as the company's executive vice president of global governance and corporate secretary, a job change that had been in the works for some time, the sources said.

As far back as last fall, Brand had expressed to friends that she felt overwhelmed and unsupported in her job, especially as many key positions under her jurisdiction had still not been filled with permanent, Senate-confirmed officials.
Coincidentally, this NBC article Who Is Rachel Brand, And How Does Her Resignation Affect Mueller's Russia Investigation? concludes, , after going through all the permutations of DoJ succession:
But even if Brand’s departure ends up having no bearing on the Russia investigation, specifically, it’s still an ominous sign more generally. After less than nine months, the third-ranking official in the Justice Department resigned, according to an associate, “[b]ecause she is very smart, accomplished, and talented, and wants to protect her career.” If someone as smart and accomplished as Brand came to the conclusion that the best way to protect her career was to leave the Trump administration, one can only imagine — the Russia investigation aside — exactly what she is trying to protect her career from.
Emphasis in the original, because the government is sailing in uncharted waters.
posted by Doktor Zed at 9:20 AM on February 12, 2018 [29 favorites]


From the budget (this is devastating):

Rightsizes the Proper Role of the Federal Government.The Budget continues the 2018 Budget proposals to eliminate low-performing or ineffective programs, such as the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP) and the Community Services Block Grant (CSBG). Many States and utility companies currently provide energy assistance services, reducing the need for a distinct Federal program to fulfill this role. Further, LIHEAP is unable to demonstrate strong performance outcomes, and the Government Accountability Office has raised concerns about fraud and abuse in the program in the past. CSBG also has difficulty in demonstrating effective outcomes. In addition, eligible entities that receive funding from CSBG receive funding from many other sources, including other Federal sources. CSBG accounts for just five percent, on average, of total funding that these eligible entities receive, and these funds are distributed by a formula that is not directly tied to performance and outcomes.
posted by anya32 at 9:37 AM on February 12, 2018 [10 favorites]


Laurence Tribe had an interesting debate on Twitter on Friday re: Rachel Brand's departure. He's disappointed in her and he hinted at a behind the scenes conspiracy between Trump admin and Walmart to get her out of the Justice Department.
posted by Sophie1 at 9:42 AM on February 12, 2018 [3 favorites]


The Budget continues the 2018 Budget proposals to eliminate low-performing or ineffective programs, such as the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program (LIHEAP)

In my neck of the woods, this is how low-to-no-income folks get the firewood that gets them through -40 degree winters. A lot of people will freeze to death because of this.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:48 AM on February 12, 2018 [25 favorites]


low-performing or ineffective programs

Not killing enough poor* people?
posted by ArgentCorvid at 9:50 AM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


CSBG accounts for just five percent, on average, of total funding that these eligible entities receive

If it's so negligible, why not leave it alone? Surely it's just a rounding error compared to the rest of the federal budget.
posted by Faint of Butt at 9:52 AM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


And it gets worse with a gutting of LSC funding. The administration: “The Budget proposes to end the one-size-fits-all model of providing legal services through a single Federal grant program, the Legal Services Corporation (LSC). This proposed elimination puts more control in the hands of State and local governments that better understand the needs of their communities.”

I just saw a cut of 367 million from the 2017 enacted amount. I cannot find an online source. Came through a policy network that I am on.

I cannot even express the level of devastation this will have if it goes through. Republicans have wanted to gut LSC for a very long time.
posted by anya32 at 9:58 AM on February 12, 2018 [12 favorites]


GOP just doesn't give a shit about immigration reform, part FS#$^#!@$KNKSF$@^@:


Immigration Debate To Start As A Jump Ball In The Senate
(Kelsey Snell for NPR, February 12, 2018)
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., will open the unpredictable path with a Senate vote on unrelated legislation. The goal is for the Senate to vote on immigration proposals and amendments from every corner of the political spectrum. Anything that can get 60 votes will pass, everything else will fall by the wayside.

"Whoever gets to 60 wins," McConnell told reporters at a news conference on Feb. 6. He added, "There's no secret plan here to try to push this in any direction. The Senate is going to work its will, and I hope that we will end up passing something."
Emphasis mine - because WTF, AGAIN AND ALWAYS. "Ya know, we've been in power for over a year, but let's throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks." Why bother doing the hard work of trying to get people to agree, when you could let anyone shout out some nonsense and if enough people vote Aye, it wins! First one up takes it all!

But don't worry, there's still the House:
The outcome is particularly uncertain because the Senate debate is just the start of a longer process of passing an immigration package. House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., has not yet said how the House will proceed beyond promising to vote on an immigration bill, so long as it has the support of President Trump.

That promise has Democrats and other critics worried that the House could block whatever the Senate is able to pass. Ryan addressed those critics last week, telling reporters that he plans to hold a vote on immigration.

"To anyone who doubts my intention to solve this problem and bring up a DACA and immigration reform bill, do not," Ryan said. "We will bring a solution to the floor, one the president will sign."
I, for one, have absolute confidence ... that this will be another massive GOP failure, which they'll spin as a failure of the Dems to propose anything that wins over the GOP majorities and the GOP president. "We gave them a chance, see? And what did they do? Nothing. Those do-nothing Dems!"
posted by filthy light thief at 9:58 AM on February 12, 2018 [9 favorites]


If it's so negligible, why not leave it alone? Surely it's just a rounding error compared to the rest of the federal budget.

Because the GOP model of Spending Cuts Theater relies on slashing a bunch of rounding errors so you can provide a long list of ways you're pinching pennies as a distraction from the Scrooge McDuckian levels of cash you continue to shovel into military pork.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 9:59 AM on February 12, 2018 [24 favorites]


Please note that the Trump budget is just a PR exercise - Congress does the budgeting, not the White House.

Not a defense of any of the appalling stuff in it, but Ryan and McConnell are going to do what they do without reference to it.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:14 AM on February 12, 2018 [7 favorites]


According to the SF Chronicle, Trump is privately saying that Porter is "sick."

I wonder if this leak is designed to soften the perception of his horrifyingly misogynist defense of Porter, a two-layer dog whistle. “See, he’s a good guy in real life,” while perps can derive the opposite message.

Similar to his long delay before denouncing the Klan back in 2016. Everyone gets their own narrative.
posted by msalt at 10:22 AM on February 12, 2018 [8 favorites]


Twitter thread preview of tonight's Minnesota special elections.

Oh, and I guess they're on Monday because there's already a school board election happening tomorrow in one of the districts. That doesn't strike me as a very good reason, but I'm not the governor of Minnesota.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:33 AM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


peeedro: Get ready for (another) infrastructure week, Trump’s big infrastructure plan has a lot of detail on everything but how to pay for it (WaPo)

Emphasizing how fucked up his "plan" is: the program that would flip funding burden
Administration officials say the president's plan addresses the funding shortfall by committing $200 billion in federal funding over 10 years to stimulate state and local spending and private investment. Half of the funding, $100 billion, will be used as incentives to entice cities, counties and states to raise at least 80 percent of the infrastructure costs themselves.

So, for example, if a state has a project or need identified and can come up with 80 or 90 percent of the funding for it through increased state or local taxes, like the gas tax, or with user fees like tolls, then under this plan, the federal government would kick in the rest.

Critics worry that would lead to only projects that could generate revenue, such as toll roads or bridges, getting funded.

That's a radical departure from the way many projects are funded now. Funding for federal-aid highways, including interstates, is usually allocated in an 80-20 federal-state split. This program would flip that funding burden. Major mass transit projects are often funded on a 50-50 federal-local basis. Again, this plan puts a much greater burden on local taxpayers and users.
And this flip is worse for states with more significant percentages of designated public lands, because there's a sliding scale (PDF, dated but good for general reference), where most of the western states (and some not so western states) have to pay lower state match percentages, which would likely impact red states more heavily, as they generally have less in-state spending power and rely heavily on federal funds to develop projects.

And all that is on top of the talk that officials said the $200bn in federal support would come from cuts to existing programs. (AP via Guardian, Feb. 11, 2018)

Which leads me to three questions of varying levels of grimness:
1. Because Paul Ryan is staunchly against raising the gas tax (Paulryan.house.gov link), despite the fact that gas (and diesel) taxes were last changed in 1993, and are not tied to inflation, which has increased 64.6 percent from 1993 until 2015 (which is like being stuck with the same paycheck for 25 years), how many more states will increase fuel taxes? Seven states increased their state taxes on Jan. 1, 2017 -- those weren't the first to do so, and they definitely won't be the last, unless something changes at the Federal level.

2. How is this flip intended to play with the voting base, and major donors? "Sticking it to the states" doesn't really have any sort of appeal that I can imagine, and that's what would happen, unless the tax give-away to corporations really "pays out" in that we get more corporations to pay even lower taxes to build infrastructure (Robert Reich in an opinion piece on The Guardian, June 10, 2017) slightly dated, though I think the general "plan" is still the same idea:
His “$1tn infrastructure plan”, unveiled last week, doesn’t amount to $1tn of new federal investment in infrastructure. It would commit $200bn of federal dollars over ten years, combined with about $800bn of assorted tax breaks to get developers to build things instead of the federal government doing it.

And it’s hardly a plan. It’s not much more than a page of talking points.

Worse, its underlying principle is deeply flawed. It boils down to a giant public subsidy to developers and investors, who would receive generous tax credits in return for taking on the job.

Which means the rest of us would have to pay higher taxes or get fewer services in order to make up for the taxes the developers and investors would no longer pay.

For example (in one version of the plan I’ve come across), for every dollar developers put into a project, they’d actually pay only 18 cents – after tax credits – and taxpayers would contribute the other 82 cents through their tax dollars.
That gets us to my 3rd question:

3. At what point is US infrastructure so bad that private companies start handing money to local jurisdictions to "just fix the damned road/ bridge/ water and/or sewer pipes"? And how many jobs leave this country in the meantime?
posted by filthy light thief at 10:34 AM on February 12, 2018 [21 favorites]


At what point is US infrastructure so bad that private companies start handing money to local jurisdictions to "just fix the damned road/ bridge/ water and/or sewer pipes"?

Oh, money will be offered, but it'll be a purchase, not a donation. The roads, water, etc will be privatized, with all of the well-documented environmental, labor, and cost problems that come from the privatization and monopolization of basic infrastructure.
posted by jedicus at 10:45 AM on February 12, 2018 [15 favorites]


Emphasis mine - because WTF, AGAIN AND ALWAYS. "Ya know, we've been in power for over a year, but let's throw a bunch of shit at the wall and see what sticks." Why bother doing the hard work of trying to get people to agree, when you could let anyone shout out some nonsense and if enough people vote Aye, it wins! First one up takes it all!

This is Mitch McConnell "keeping" his promise to Schumer for ending the shutdown stunt. McConnell doesn't actually want to pass anything on immigration, he knows whatever they pass won't get a vote in the House, so he's just throwing open a vote on whatever like its open whiteboard night in the Brietbart writers room. He never promised a vote on any specific bill, just a vote.
posted by T.D. Strange at 10:48 AM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]




CNN: Sessions invokes 'Anglo American heritage' of sheriff's office

Invoking "Anglo-American heritage" seems to have been an impromptu decision by the attorney general. A written version of the remarks says that Sessions was supposed to say: "The sheriff is a critical part of our legal heritage."

Very fine people.
posted by Rust Moranis at 10:53 AM on February 12, 2018 [49 favorites]


If John Kelly was still an active duty general he could be court martialed himself for covering up domestic abuse by his direct subordinate.

Laurence Tribe had an interesting debate on Twitter on Friday re: Rachel Brand's departure. He's disappointed in her and he hinted at a behind the scenes conspiracy between Trump admin and Walmart to get her out of the Justice Department.

At least now we get an idea of what would have happened happens when the Smedley Butler (previously, previousler, previouslist) role supports the plot.

In hindsight it's not like the corporate interests that tried then were ever going to stop. It was basically just sheer luck that Butler happened to be in the right place in the right time and not actively profiteering himself. The idea that all it takes for evil to flourish is for good men to do nothing is typical Tory victim blaming: once a system becomes sufficiently corrupt then all the sprinkling of good people that trickle up the pyramid can do is ameliorate the damage. Not sure what the solution is.⚔

In summary: not only are the writers on drugs, but this is a budget (have you seen the wardrobe and makeup??) remake; sort of like the Ghostbusters one, but instead of women, this one empowers the baddies and lets them win for a change.


⚔ *cough*SMASH CAPITALISM*cough*
posted by Buntix at 11:02 AM on February 12, 2018 [5 favorites]


“The office of sheriff is a critical part of the Anglo-American heritage of law enforcement"

Know what other part of Anglo-American heritage of law enforcement shouldn't be eroded, Mr. Sessions? The idea that NO MAN IS ABOVE THE LAW.
posted by MonkeyToes at 11:07 AM on February 12, 2018 [31 favorites]


Ebony Slaughter-Johnson at The Establishment: Why Aren’t Black Voters Rewarded By The Party That Depends On Them To Win Elections?

This article gets into some grim, but interesting stats - two examples:

Data from 2014 shows that TANF covered 850,000 adults and their 2.5 million children, a fraction of those covered at its inception in 1996. Between 1996 and 2013, while poverty and deep poverty increased, TANF covered 60 percentfewer recipients. Stated differently, before the transition from the more generous Aid to Families with Dependent Children to TANF, which marked the “end of welfare as we know it,” seven in 10 poor families received cash assistance. Today, two in 10 do.

[...]

Unfortunately, [black voters'] loyalty has not always been repaid with proportionate policy responsiveness, most disappointingly from Democrats. Political scientist Nick Stephanopoulos conducted a study to determine the extent of group political power on effecting policy outcomes at the state and federal levels. Unsurprisingly, black voters had less power than whites: Unanimous support among whites for a federal policy corresponded to a 60 percent chance of adoption, while unanimous support among black Americans for such a policy corresponded to a 10 percent chance of adoption. Somewhat correspondingly then, Stephanopoulos found that the less support a policy had among black Americans, the higher its likelihood of enactment. A policy with no black support had a 40 percent chance of enactment compared to the aforementioned 10 percent for a policy with unanimous support.
posted by Emmy Rae at 11:25 AM on February 12, 2018 [27 favorites]


That doesn't strike me as a very good reason, but I'm not the governor of Minnesota.

This is where you find out that you shouldn’t have written yourself in for MN governor, either!

posted by Barack Spinoza at 11:31 AM on February 12, 2018 [19 favorites]


Rachel Brand getting out while her giant golden parachute is still intact and shiny was very smart. It isn't particularly brave or noble but smart... yeah. I suppose it's easy to volunteer other people for shitty, thankless jobs which put them in direct conflict with the President and not so easy to turn down a billion dollars in order to do it, but then nobody forced her to join DOJ in the first place either. So I vacillate between understanding and disdain.
posted by Justinian at 11:38 AM on February 12, 2018 [6 favorites]


yes the proud 'anglo-american heritage' as seen in Sheriff Joe Arpaio...no wait....
posted by Wilder at 11:43 AM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


Just to note that Scotland has sheriffs (who are judges, not police officers), while England doesn't - or, rather, it's been a mostly ceremonial office since the Tudors. And it really kicked off with the Normans. Of all the things to blame Anglo-American culture for, the modern day American sheriff, which has no even remotely close equivalent in the UK, is really rather an odd one to choose; I know US law and policing did take a lot of its DNA from the British when it forked, but a lot's happened since.
posted by Devonian at 11:47 AM on February 12, 2018 [11 favorites]


The proud Anglo-American heritage of Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane. And I'll bet Sessions has a lot of admiration for the Sheriff of Nottingham, too.
posted by Faint of Butt at 11:49 AM on February 12, 2018 [9 favorites]


I read an article last week, but I cannot remember where I read it nor can I find it again (and I can't find it as a previous link in this thread) that talked about the DoJ's change in backing Federal Agencies, as in taking away authority/no longer backing Agency Decisions as though they are law, and that Rachel Brand was the person at the DoJ that wrote those letters. I was wondering if that may have had something to do with her leaving. I read it before she decided to leave, and now every google search brings up pages and pages about her leaving, but not that article. Did anyone else read that? Can you point me to it? Thanks!
posted by W Grant at 11:49 AM on February 12, 2018


Laurence Tribe had an interesting debate on Twitter on Friday re: Rachel Brand's departure. He's disappointed in her and he hinted at a behind the scenes conspiracy between Trump admin and Walmart to get her out of the Justice Department.

No such conspiracy is required if Brand's been as unhappy for a while in her position at the DoJ as today's NBC report suggests. Besides, one of her last acts there was to issue a very corporation-friendly memo: “Brand Memo” Prohibits US DOJ From Converting Agency Guidance Into Binding Legal Obligations In Civil Enforcement Actions (Government Contracts Law Blog). Arguably that's an indication she was thinking about the private sector rather than the civil service as a career path and has probably been sending out signals for a while. Additionaly, this kind of cashing-out among appointees is far from unusual in itself, but it typically occurs toward the end of a presidential term—which says a lot about how Trump's is going.
posted by Doktor Zed at 11:58 AM on February 12, 2018 [6 favorites]


Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., will open the unpredictable path with a Senate vote on unrelated legislation. The goal is for the Senate to vote on immigration proposals and amendments from every corner of the political spectrum. Anything that can get 60 votes will pass, everything else will fall by the wayside.

"Whoever gets to 60 wins," McConnell told reporters at a news conference on Feb. 6. He added, "There's no secret plan here to try to push this in any direction. The Senate is going to work its will, and I hope that we will end up passing something."


The big shock here for me is that McConnell actually kept his word to the Democrats on starting immigration with a clean slate on the Senate side, instead of starting with a poison pill bill from Cotton or Cruz.

It's a world gone mad.
posted by leotrotsky at 12:00 PM on February 12, 2018 [9 favorites]


Here The pot and the kettle, nointly share the hard sycophant enemy look.
posted by Oyéah at 12:01 PM on February 12, 2018 [3 favorites]


Rachel Brand getting out while her giant golden parachute is still intact and shiny was very smart. It isn't particularly brave or noble but smart... yeah.

The way to get out of this administration while the getting's good AND be a decent citizen is to immediately start talking to the press and tell the world what's going on in there.
posted by contraption at 12:33 PM on February 12, 2018 [22 favorites]


I wish Democrats would sometimes frame social safety net issues as national defense issues. Ensuring the health and well being of the population leads to a stronger nation. And using such framing might make social programs more untouchable by those who wrap themselves in the flag.

The problem with this is that a notable quantity of the population - and not just on the conservative side - has demonstrated that they're willing to disadvantage themselves if they can be confident that The Wrong People won't also benefit from things. So if this is supposed to defuse the ability of the wardrum-beaters to demand we cut social for the sake of defense, it's not gonna accomplish that. The more defense-heavy party is also heavier on the "don't let the [epithats] get free [whatever] on our dime."
posted by phearlez at 12:50 PM on February 12, 2018 [6 favorites]


Holy shit.

Bloomberg: Trump Budget Would Swap Food Stamps for ‘100% American’ Food Packages - In budget proposal, most recipients would get food directly

The plan is part of an effort to reform SNAP and save a projected $214 billion over a decade. It would give all households receiving more than $90 a month in cash a food-aid package that would "include items such as shelf-stable milk, ready to eat cereals, pasta, peanut butter, beans and canned fruit, vegetables, and meat, poultry or fish," according to the proposal.


They want to replace EBT with government cheese. I for one have great faith that there'll be lots of vegetables and fish in those packages and not spoiled commodities.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:14 PM on February 12, 2018 [60 favorites]


Rust Moranis: So, THIS is how Blue Apron is going to become profitbale.
posted by SansPoint at 1:15 PM on February 12, 2018 [37 favorites]


Sens. Grassley and Graham have sent a set of questions to Susan Rice about an email she sent herself for the record on January 20th, on her way out the door, memorializing a meeting she had with President Obama on January 5th following a briefing on Russian involvement in the election. The email in question is at the end of the PDF and is worth reading.

The memo recounts Obama's instructions to do everything "by the book" and that he was not requesting any kind of law enforcement action (because he actually knew and cared how the DOJ works). Then it says:
From a national security perspective, however, President Obama said he wants to be sure that, as we engage with the incoming team, we are mindful to ascertain if there is any reason that we cannot share information fully as it relates to Russia
And then, making it all the more ominous, there's a blacked out classified paragraph. The email closes by saying that Comey would inform the President if anything changed in how classified information would be shared with the Trump team.
posted by zachlipton at 1:21 PM on February 12, 2018 [14 favorites]


Big (good) news: Thomas Brunell, a controversial potential pick for a top Census Bureau post, is no longer under consideration for the position, a Department of Commerce spokesperson confirmed to TPM Monday.
posted by Chrysostom at 1:22 PM on February 12, 2018 [14 favorites]


Rust Moranis, I think you've linked to the wrong article? The one you linked to doesn't go into details about food stamps. I think this is what you mean to link to? Alan Bjerga: "Trump Budget Would Swap Food Stamps for ‘100% American’ Food Packages"
posted by papercrane at 1:23 PM on February 12, 2018 [12 favorites]


Oops, that's right papercrane. I blame bloomberg.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:25 PM on February 12, 2018


The roads, water, etc will be privatized, with all of the well-documented environmental, labor, and cost problems that come from the privatization and monopolization of basic infrastructure.

You know those "Adopt a Highway" signs on roadsides? They're about to become a lot more literal.
posted by delfin at 1:25 PM on February 12, 2018 [9 favorites]


Also included in the Bloomberg piece: "tightened eligibility rules for recipients, such as stricter work requirements, as well as changing income and benefits calculations 'to ensure benefits are targeted to the neediest households.' "

So they would take away most people's food stamps and the rest would get a box of peanut butter and shelf-stable milk. Tens of millions of people unable to feed their families due to unambiguous government maliciousness is how widespread political violence happens. Maybe they want that, but it doesn't seem like they're prepared for it.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:31 PM on February 12, 2018 [14 favorites]


"items such as shelf-stable milk, ready to eat cereals, pasta, peanut butter, beans and canned fruit, vegetables, and meat, poultry or fish."

Oh my god, this is the governmental equivalent of that asshole at the grocery store who stands in line behind the person with the EBT card huffing and puffing and judging their purchases: "How dare poor people piss away food stamps on Cheez-Its and other food middle class people also like to eat?" Meanwhile, tax dollars are funding the President's wholesome diet of McDonald's, ketchup, and chocolate cake.
posted by FelliniBlank at 1:34 PM on February 12, 2018 [29 favorites]


International Space Station could be privatized under Trump plan

It's past its sell-by date anyway. Remember that the ISS was scheduled to deorbit in 2016 under the Obama admin, but no president wants to invoke the memory of Jimmy Carter with Skylabs falling to earth, unless it's falling under your opponent's term. Anyway, this isn't just a Trump admin idea.

But I think this is a boneheaded idea that will go nowhere, because no one really wants this white elephant. I'd worry more about national parks and airports and stuff.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 1:42 PM on February 12, 2018 [5 favorites]


Maybe they want that, but it doesn't seem like they're prepared for it.

Oh, they're most certainly prepared for it. See: ICE and CBP's license to do anything they want, the test runs various governors and mayors conducted coordinating inter- and intra-state responses to BLM and Occupy Wall Street, the way the press covers (or fails to cover) tens of thousands of people in Womens' marches vs the way they fell all over themselves to praise as few as 3 people cosplaying in tricorn hats shouting "Tea Party!" etc.

Can't wait for Schumer, Kaine, and others to pat us on the head and tell us they have to allow things like this to go unchallenged in order to buy concessions from the Republicans further down the line. How much further down the line? Always juuuuuuust around the corner. Any day now, we'll get those concessions and enact bipartisan legislature that favors the Democrats' core constituencies. Just a matter of time.
posted by lord_wolf at 1:43 PM on February 12, 2018 [13 favorites]


I lived two years on a Sioux reservation in SoDak. We ate government cheese from the USDA FDPIR and watched as it poisoned the community with diabetes and heart disease. Replacing SNAP should be a red line. Pitchforks and torches.
posted by Richard Saunders at 1:46 PM on February 12, 2018 [62 favorites]


I expect the Food Stamp scam will go about as well as FEMA aid to Puerto Rico. These fucking monsters.
posted by Space Kitty at 1:49 PM on February 12, 2018 [28 favorites]


You know, I think there's an argument that a non-shitty non-racist non-garbage-in-every-way administration could make for a nationwide subsidized available-to-everyone food program. Identify a diverse but limited spectrum of food offerings - rice, beans, bread, vegetables (that have the best nutrition & yield ratings), fruits (same), etc. Set up a program to license growers/producers/bakers such that they can sell the items at $x and the government covers the spread between that and costs plus a reasonable profit margin. (What we called "cost plus" when I worked in the government consulting space)

Make it a criminal offense for vendors to sell those items at higher than $1.1x or whatever. Effectively insure that anyone who wants to buy the necessities of life to keep body and soul together for, say, $10 a week can do so. It's not without its own problems (see the scolds FeliniBlank mentions, the inevitable efforts to cut all benefits down to 70% of the weekly cost of those products, etc and all the usual shittyness), but if you really wanted to make some effort at creating a program that reduced some of the problems with cash payouts (varying area COL, etc) you could make a non-shit go at it and perhaps get around some of the rabid voices who fight the idea that anyone might get access to something they can't get.

I feel confident that this administration couldn't come up with a non-awful, non-corrupt variant on anything, though.
posted by phearlez at 1:49 PM on February 12, 2018 [10 favorites]


Replacing SNAP should be a red line. Pitchforks and torches.

As a whole, this budget is a proposed act of war by the powerful against the powerless, in which everything that protects the most vulnerable would be gutted. It is not an exaggeration to say that millions would be killed by it.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:52 PM on February 12, 2018 [39 favorites]


The plan is part of an effort to reform SNAP and save a projected $214 billion over a decade. It would give all households receiving more than $90 a month in cash a food-aid package that would "include items such as shelf-stable milk, ready to eat cereals, pasta, peanut butter, beans and canned fruit, vegetables, and meat, poultry or fish," according to the proposal.

Even WIC doesn't work like this.
posted by melissasaurus at 1:52 PM on February 12, 2018 [13 favorites]


Re: Funding social programs:

these funds are distributed by a formula that is not directly tied to performance and outcomes.

So, what's the performance and outcome scoring for all this 'defense' spending. If they're underperforming social programs, shouldn't they lose their funding too? I observe the US Military hasn't solved Afghanistan and Syria, so let's stop wasting money on those.
posted by mikelieman at 1:59 PM on February 12, 2018 [32 favorites]


On the upside, a White House budget proposal is an utterly meaningless thing. On the downside, Paul Ryan is probably creaming his jeans at the prospect of this SNAP proposal, except he thinks the food-aid package should be a packet of stale saltines and three wilted celery stalks.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:00 PM on February 12, 2018 [13 favorites]


There’s *literally no way* to do a “limited spectrum” without it being racist as fuck.

There's plenty of ways you could run such a program in a racially - and more likely religiously - problematic manner. But since I don't know the exact metric for "as fuck" I'll just disagree with the idea that it's flat out impossible to create a variety of food offerings that could be valuable to all citizens.
posted by phearlez at 2:07 PM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


...and just one more note on Anglo-American heritage and sheriffs..."Numerous clauses in Magna Carta in 1215 limited the oppressions of sheriffs. Clause 24 said that they were no longer to hold pleas of the crown (that is, hold royal courts), and clause 30 that they were not to requisition horses or carts from free men without their consent. Clause 45 said that men were not to be appointed sheriffs and justices who did not know the law of the land or wish to observe it well."

My bold. THAT"S a law enforcement heritage worth preserving...
posted by MonkeyToes at 2:09 PM on February 12, 2018 [18 favorites]


Universal SNAP, let’s start talking about it now
posted by The Whelk at 2:16 PM on February 12, 2018 [20 favorites]


But the thing with "let's reform SNAP" is that SNAP actually works very well given how underfunded and restrictive it is. There is very, very little fraud or abuse and it is extraordinarily effective on a dollars-spent level. The ways to improve SNAP would be to give people more, make the qualifications less onerous and allow things like soap, toilet paper, toothpaste and so on that people incontrovertibly need but can't buy now.

Talking about how we need to "reform" SNAP is falling for a de facto racist, anti-poor line because it relies on everyone incorrectly believing that it's a bad program full of waste, which is basically believing that "we" are wasting money on "them". The only answer to "let's reform SNAP" is "SNAP does not need reform; SNAP is an effective program which feeds hungry people for very little money".
posted by Frowner at 2:16 PM on February 12, 2018 [101 favorites]


I'll just disagree with the idea that it's flat out impossible to create a variety of food offerings that could be valuable to all citizens.

The important qualifier to this is 'nutritionally' valuable to all citizens. However, as a nation of immigrants we are a diverse population culturally and you cannot presume that all who would benefit nutritionally from a given selection would know how to cook it into a meal. Or that they would enjoy the result, for that matter.

More SNAP sounds good.
posted by carsonb at 2:18 PM on February 12, 2018 [5 favorites]


Reminds me of a story I read in a postcolonial lit class once - it mentioned that the British government had shipped massive amounts of powdered milk as food aid to some colonies where everyone was lactose-intolerant. They wound up using it to whitewash the walls of buildings.
posted by showbiz_liz at 2:20 PM on February 12, 2018 [19 favorites]


The important qualifier to this is 'nutritionally' valuable to all citizens. However, as a nation of immigrants we are a diverse population culturally and you cannot presume that all who would benefit nutritionally from a given selection would know how to cook it into a meal. Or that they would enjoy the result, for that matter.

I was typing but this says it better than I could. Food is a huge cultural marker and this seems like it would be quite literally "if you don't/can't work to afford your own food, you will be assimilated into what we decide is Correct Food." It really comes down to a pervasive ethos that if you're poor, you don't deserve to get to make choices.
posted by nakedmolerats at 2:23 PM on February 12, 2018 [43 favorites]


That's certainly a problem but I feel like its a surmountable one. I just happen to like the idea of a subsidized foodstuff system as a way to sneak something UBI-lsh into the nation, provide employment, create continuity protection for growers in another way than current farm subsidies do and various other little payoffs. I'd never personally want to see it REPLACE things like SNAP & WIC.
posted by phearlez at 2:30 PM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


You know, I think there's an argument that a non-shitty non-racist non-garbage-in-every-way administration could make for a nationwide subsidized available-to-everyone food program.

Implement a system of state-run, casual cafeteria-style restaurants that pay their workers a decent wage, serve simple healthy unprocessed food, and charge prices based on the cost of the food and the labor (maybe subsidized a bit on the premise that healthy food is preventative health care,) payable with regular dollars or whatever godawful scrip equivalent poor people continue to get stuck with. Employ people from the local community and let them decide what to cook for their customers. (h/t The Whelk)
posted by contraption at 2:34 PM on February 12, 2018 [7 favorites]


Ebony Slaughter-Johnson at The Establishment

. . .
posted by petebest at 2:40 PM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


Because apparently today didn't have enough garbage news: Syed Jamal, one of two Kansas men recently targeted by ICE, is to be deported immediately.
posted by god hates math at 2:40 PM on February 12, 2018 [7 favorites]


It really comes down to a pervasive ethos that if you're poor, you don't deserve to get to make choices.

Anyone who wants to mandate specifics of what a family eats should first be required to spend a year getting small children to eat some food they are determined not to.
posted by C'est la D.C. at 2:41 PM on February 12, 2018 [31 favorites]


Anyone who wants to mandate specifics of what a family eats should first be forced to live on SNAP for a year.
posted by aspersioncast at 2:45 PM on February 12, 2018 [52 favorites]


Because apparently today didn't have enough garbage news: Syed Jamal, one of two Kansas men recently targeted by ICE, is to be deported immediately.

Trump takes ‘shackles’ off ICE, which is slapping them on immigrants who thought they were safe (WaPo):
...as ICE officers get wider latitude to determine whom they detain, the biggest jump in arrests has been of immigrants with no criminal convictions. The agency made 37,734 “noncriminal” arrests in the government’s 2017 fiscal year, more than twice the number in the previous year. The category includes suspects facing possible charges as well as those without criminal records.

Critics say ICE is increasingly grabbing at the lowest-hanging fruit of deportation-eligible immigrants to meet the president’s unrealistic goals, replacing a targeted system with a scattershot approach aimed at boosting the agency’s enforcement statistics.
posted by peeedro at 2:47 PM on February 12, 2018 [27 favorites]



Because apparently today didn't have enough garbage news: Syed Jamal, one of two Kansas men recently targeted by ICE, is to be deported immediately.


My sister lived on the same small block with him and his family; their kids played in the street together. He is a great dad and this is insane.

The family is, as of this morning, trying to file an appeal with the Board of Immigration Appeals. DHS is denying the family due process by rushing the deportation. He was on a plane this morning, but it hadn't taken off yet.
posted by eyesontheroad at 2:50 PM on February 12, 2018 [45 favorites]


Implement a system of state-run, casual cafeteria-style restaurants that pay their workers a decent wage, serve simple healthy unprocessed food, and charge prices based on the cost of the food and the labor (maybe subsidized a bit on the premise that healthy food is preventative health care,) payable with regular dollars or whatever godawful scrip equivalent poor people continue to get stuck with. Employ people from the local community and let them decide what to cook for their customers. (h/t The Whelk)

In a similar thought, a few months ago I was thinking that something similar wouldn't be a bad use of a 1/2 billion dollar powerball jackpot.
posted by ArgentCorvid at 2:52 PM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


Implement a system of state-run, casual cafeteria-style restaurants that pay their workers a decent wage,

I'm down if the union can negotiate a bit of time off each day to do do gay communist space station role plays out the back of the cafeteria.
posted by Coventry at 2:57 PM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


The family is, as of this morning, trying to file an appeal with the Board of Immigration Appeals. DHS is denying the family due process by rushing the deportation. He was on a plane this morning, but it hadn't taken off yet.

There is an update to the article, posted like 4 minutes ago, stating that the Board of Immigration Appeal has granted a new stay of removal.
posted by nubs at 2:57 PM on February 12, 2018 [16 favorites]


Because apparently today didn't have enough garbage news: Syed Jamal, one of two Kansas men recently targeted by ICE, is to be deported immediately.

NEW NOT-GARBAGE NEWS! The Board of Immigration Appeals has granted him a new stay of deportation!
posted by eyesontheroad at 2:57 PM on February 12, 2018 [46 favorites]


Meanwhile, highlights from my Talk Radio Adventure on my ride home:

* Not only was Mike Pence not disrespectful for giving all things North Korean the coldest shoulder at the Olympics, he was SUPREMELY respectful just for sitting there at all during their Opening Ceremony entrance and anthem. And why was he not surrounded by Secret Service agents on full alert the whole time he was there?

* Special guest Louie Gohmert, Padishah Emperor For Life of the Crazy People, on Mueller: A special counsel needs to be appointed immediately to investigate Mueller and his whole team, as they're obviously corrupt and hip-deep in Hillary's criminal uranium deal.

* Louie, not done yet: The entire FISA court system is corrupt and has zero respect for the truth, which is why he voted against renewing 702 until real reforms could be made. And if FISA judges weren't corrupt, they would call in those lawyers from the Page warrants immediately and say "You lied to me, you misrepresented this and that, so you are in contempt" and jail them all for 180 days on the spot. "Because nobody respects a judge until he starts putting people in jail."
posted by delfin at 2:59 PM on February 12, 2018


Already posted in this thread, but here's an update from the NYT:

Senate Launches Immigration Debate — With the Outcome Unknown
With the fate of hundreds of thousands of young, undocumented immigrants in the balance, the Senate on Monday began an open-ended debate on immigration — an exceedingly rare step that, in effect, will allow senators to attempt to build a bill from scratch on the Senate floor. The highly unusual debate, expected to unfold throughout the week, will test whether a series of legislative concepts and proposals championed by President Trump and a variety of Republicans and Democrats can garner 60 votes, the threshold for a measure to pass the Senate. No one has any idea how it will turn out.

... The idea of an open-ended debate is so novel that many newer senators say they have never experienced one, and are scurrying to learn the rules.
So we were all rightfully skeptical of Senator Schumer and the Democratic Senate caucus for folding on the shutdown and surrendering their leverage, but I have to admit that this outcome is pretty much the best possible deal they could have got, given that they are in the minority.

Of course it'll go nowhere in the House. Probably. But weirder things have happened in 2018 – and it's not even mid-February.
posted by RedOrGreen at 3:12 PM on February 12, 2018 [7 favorites]


If a good bill passes the Senate and fails in the House, but the House flips at the end of this year, can they consider it again without McConnell's blessing? I understand that's far too late and ICE will run roughshod over thousands of innocent Americans' lives in the interim, but is it an option if nothing else has materialized by then?
posted by contraption at 3:24 PM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


wow, this author I follow on Twitter made a joke about the white dust being cocaine, which granted is not the nicest thing to say but--I'd never seen a mob form in real-time. The author tweeted separately that she was doing a reading at Powells and people were tweeting at Powells things along the lines of DO YOU APPROVE OF MAKING JOKES ABOUT DEATH BY TERRORISM.

Things got weird and comical when I had read one too many comments about fat lesbians and reported the homophobic fat-name-caller and made the mistake of saying I had reported the comment but the homophobic fat shamer thought or pretended to think that I was saying I had reported the cocaine joke.

Then this insult person just went NUTS because in part of my saying no I reported you dumbass I said I'm also an author in this thing that is getting a reading at Powells. The insulter like changed its name to the small press that put out the book, got the exact same icon and background, which confused me a lot because for a minute I was like why is this small press telling me 'u shut yur filthy mouth'

It's like, well THAT was a lot of energy expended over a dumb joke
posted by angrycat at 3:38 PM on February 12, 2018 [10 favorites]


So the same people who bitched when Michelle Obama suggested that people eat healthy foods are going to be fine when President Cheeseburger lets his lackeys decide what constitutes three square meals for SNAP recipients.
posted by vverse23 at 3:48 PM on February 12, 2018 [63 favorites]


Implement a system of state-run, casual cafeteria-style restaurants that pay their workers a decent wage, serve simple healthy unprocessed food, and charge prices based on the cost of the food and the labor (maybe subsidized a bit on the premise that healthy food is preventative health care,) payable with regular dollars or whatever godawful scrip equivalent poor people continue to get stuck with. Employ people from the local community and let them decide what to cook for their customers. (h/t The Whelk)

Public school kitchens nationwide could do an open community dinner seating every day, using the infrastructure already in place. Show up between 5 and 7, grab a tray. Clean up after yourself. The people working in the school get more in their paycheck for the extra hours. We use infrastructure we already have, and you know, feed the hungry for less money than one of them fighter jets.
posted by mikelieman at 3:49 PM on February 12, 2018 [49 favorites]


"So the same people who bitched when Michelle Obama suggested that people eat healthy foods are going to be fine when President Cheeseburger lets his lackeys decide what constitutes three square meals for SNAP recipients."

I suspect it's going to be the same procurement sources already used for military dining facilities. OOH! Lunchables!
posted by mikelieman at 3:51 PM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


actually, they have a program like that during the summer for kids in michigan - it's called meet up, eat up
posted by pyramid termite at 3:52 PM on February 12, 2018 [3 favorites]


actually, they have a program like that during the summer for kids in michigan - it's called meet up, eat up

The USDA's Summer Food Service Program. MY TAX DOLLARS AT WORK!
posted by mikelieman at 3:56 PM on February 12, 2018 [14 favorites]


The Turtle knows that the Senate Republicans had no plan and have no plan for immigration. Even if he had the desire to pass something meaningful that could get 60 in the Senate, it can't pass the House, and even if it did it can't pass the Cheeto Veto. The mere act of proposing anything short of Deport Them All Today will get him pilloried by Trump's base as a filthy amnesty advocate and enemy of all patriots.

So why accept any blame? If it's not going to pass, let the Dems do the work and then when it all blows up, it's their fault for Not Being Constructive and Being Unwilling to Compromise and Unrealistic in Their Demands. Or at least that's a good cover story.
posted by delfin at 4:09 PM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


Haaretz: Abbas Tells Putin: 'We Refuse to Cooperate With U.S. in Any Form'; Putin: Trump Sends Best Wishes "In a meeting between the Palestinian and Russian presidents in Moscow, Putin assures Abbas that he has spoken with Trump, knows Palestinians want U.S. out of peace talks"
Putin is hosting Palestinian President Abbas in Moscow today, and he reportedly told Abbas that Trump coveys "his best wishes" to the Palestinian leader, who has been boycotting the U.S. Administration for two months now, ever since Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

Abbas told Putin he could no longer accept the role of the United States as a mediator in talks with Israel because of Washington's behaviour, the Interfax news agency reported.

"We state that from now on we refuse to cooperate in any form with the U.S. in its status of a mediator, as we stand against its actions," Abbas told Putin at the start of talks in Moscow. He said last week that he hoped Russia could assume a greater role in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, saying the United States "can no longer play a leading role."

Putin said during the meeting with the Palestinian leader that he had just spoken by telephone with U.S. President Donald Trump.
And why were Trump and Putin talking today? CNN reports:
President Donald Trump spoke Monday with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin to express condolences for a weekend plane crash outside Moscow, according to a US official.[...]

Russian news agencies reported the phone call also included discussion of the situation in Israel. Putin was meeting Monday in Moscow with Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas.[...]

Tensions in the region are high after Syrian forces downed an Israeli F-16 fighter jet over the weekend. The jet was hit and went down Saturday in northern Israel after coming under "massive anti-aircraft fire" from Syrian forces, according to the Israeli army.
None of this is normal. It's Bizarro-World not-normal.
posted by Doktor Zed at 4:38 PM on February 12, 2018 [29 favorites]


If a good bill passes the Senate and fails in the House, but the House flips at the end of this year, can they consider it again without McConnell's blessing?

Both houses end at the same time in January, and all legislation that hasn’t passed both houses by then dies.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 4:56 PM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


NYT:
Across New York State, politicians, activists and even some prosecutors have been pushing to reduce the use of cash bail, calling it a source of injustice, especially in poor, minority communities.

But last month, for the first time, a state judge added the imprimatur of a judicial ruling to the chorus of voices clamoring for reform, lending momentum to those who want to abolish the practice.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:34 PM on February 12, 2018 [26 favorites]


Jeff Sessions Just Said Slavery Caused the Civil War. That’s an Outrageous White Supre—Oh, Wait, That’s Actually Right
Though many Southerners try to say otherwise—and I love my people—slavery was the cause of the war. It was not states’ rights or tariffs or agrarian versus industrial economies. Those issues were all solvable and would have been solved. The cloud, the stain of human bondage—the buying and selling of human beings—was the unsolvable problem and was omnipresent from the beginning of the country.
Remarks as prepared for delivery
posted by kirkaracha at 6:40 PM on February 12, 2018 [18 favorites]


Sessions' speech is actually pretty good about Lincoln and the war, until he gets to "things we are doing to restore the rule of law and the constitutional balance."
posted by kirkaracha at 6:44 PM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


Sheriffs now explicitly being a racist institution at least puts the cards on the table, I guess.
posted by Artw at 7:08 PM on February 12, 2018 [5 favorites]


"Let them eat cheese." fucking bring. it.
posted by j_curiouser at 7:20 PM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


Giant advertiser Unilever threatens to pull its ads from Facebook and Google over 'toxic content'
One of the world's largest advertisers is threatening to pull its ads from social sites such as Facebook and YouTube if the tech companies don't do more to minimize divisive content on their platforms.

Unilever's chief marketing officer, Keith Weed, called on Silicon Valley on Monday to better police what he describes as a toxic online environment where propaganda, hate speech and disturbing content that exploits children thrive.

"Fake news, racism, sexism, terrorists spreading messages of hate, toxic content directed at children — parts of the internet we have ended up with is a million miles from where we thought it would take us," Weed said in a speech at the Interactive Advertising Bureau's Leadership Meeting in Palm Desert. "It is in the digital media industry's interest to listen and act on this."
posted by Coventry at 7:22 PM on February 12, 2018 [50 favorites]


> Giant advertiser Unilever threatens to pull its ads from Facebook and Google over 'toxic content'

Tomororw's news today: wingnuts call for boycott of Unilever for kowtowing to the librul snowflake SJW agenda, then discover that you literally can't boycott Unilever because they fucking make everything.
posted by tonycpsu at 7:30 PM on February 12, 2018 [64 favorites]


ELECTION RESULT

GOP HOLD in Minnesota House 23B, 59-40. This is a Dem overperformance of about 7.5 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:46 PM on February 12, 2018 [18 favorites]


One of the world's largest advertisers is threatening to pull its ads from social sites such as Facebook and YouTube [...]

That's a pretty strong rejection of the theory that corporate officers have a fiduciary duty to maximise share price to the exclusion of everything else.
posted by Joe in Australia at 7:50 PM on February 12, 2018 [7 favorites]


GOP politician mocked Meghan Markle with image of prehistoric black Briton. Twitter banned him. (Kristine Phillips, WaPo)
In a statement Monday, Nehlen called the suspension of his Twitter account “the epitome of interfering with a federal election” and an effort to “suppress right-wing political speech.”

“These are unprecedented, brazen acts of censorship by a corporate monopoly that controls a primary channel of public communication,” said Nehlen, who’s running against Ryan in the GOP congressional primaries in Wisconsin. “It has severely compromised the integrity of our election processes, and Congress needs to hold public hearings and conduct a full investigation into these matters without delay.”

A Twitter spokeswoman confirmed that the company has permanently suspended Nehlen’s account for “repeated violations of our terms of service.” In a recent blog post, Twitter acknowledged that blocking politicians or world leaders from using Twitter would “hamper necessary discussion around their words and actions.”

“We review Tweets by leaders within the political context that defines them, and enforce our rules accordingly,” the company wrote. “No one person’s account drives Twitter’s growth, or influences these decisions. We work hard to remain unbiased with the public interest in mind.”
Emphasis mine. One down, hundreds of thousands to go…
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 7:58 PM on February 12, 2018 [19 favorites]



ELECTION RESULT

Dem HOLD in Minnesota Senate 54, 51-47. This is a Dem overperformance of about 5 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:01 PM on February 12, 2018 [25 favorites]


Sheriffs now explicitly being a racist institution at least puts the cards on the table, I guess.

Most Sheriffs seem to be more Buford T. Justice than Andy Taylor these days
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 8:05 PM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


> In a statement Monday, Nehlen called the suspension of his Twitter account “the epitome of interfering with a federal election” and an effort to “suppress right-wing political speech.” “These are unprecedented, brazen acts of censorship by a corporate monopoly that controls a primary channel of public communication,” said Nehlen ...

Oooh, oooh, can we get a bipartisan consensus to investigate Twitter and Facebook and corporate monopoly strangleholds on essential communications media? Maybe also throw in Sinclair Broadcasting?

> ... who is running against Ryan in the GOP congressional primaries in Wisconsin.

Crap.

(Sad trombone plays as I put away my fantasy of serious oversight on corporate monopolies.)
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:18 PM on February 12, 2018 [2 favorites]


So here's the latest salvo in the GOP's "I know you are but what am I?" campaign to defend Trump by throwing a bunch of shit in the air & hoping some of it hits the target. Up to bat are Chuck Grassley & Lindsey Graham; the main target is Susan Rice but also, Comey, Obama & others. From Josh Marshall: Through the Looking Glass.
Senators Grassley and Graham have sent a letter to former National Security Advisor Susan Rice asking her to explain an email which they clearly believe is highly suspicious. The two released a letter with Rice’s email and a long list of pointed questions about when it was written, why and so forth.
And here's the Grassley/Graham letter [PDF] itself.
posted by scalefree at 8:22 PM on February 12, 2018


As an aside, is there a reason why the press still shows up for Sarah Huckabee Sanders briefings? Or if they do have to go, why they don't pack rotten eggs and fruit?

TPM Livewire: White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Monday said that President Donald Trump expressed well-wishes to a former aide who resigned amid spousal abuse accusations because Trump “hopes that all Americans can be successful.
“I think the President of the United States hopes that all Americans can be successful in whatever they do and if they’ve had any issues in the past, I’m not confirming or denying one way or the other, but if they do, the President wants success for all Americans,” Sanders said at her daily briefing.

WTF. Just, WTF, Ms. Sanders?
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:33 PM on February 12, 2018 [6 favorites]


Yes, I'm sure Grassley and Graham do "clearly believe" it's suspicious. Susan Rice should do the right thing and tell them whether it is or not. /s
posted by rhizome at 8:34 PM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


ELECTIONS NEWS

** 2018 House:
-- Rothenberg: Don't get worked up over swings in the generic ballot advantage.

-- Nate Cohn: Republican structural advantages (incumbency, gerrymandering) have been fading a bit this year. I.e., Dems need less generic ballot edge to flip control. Probably between 7 and 8 points?

-- Vox runs a fundamentals model, which has done decently well in predictability in the past; this also shows Dems flipping the house.

-- Dems targeting several Texas districts: TX-32 (Sessions), TX-07 (Culberson), and TX-23 (Hurd). I believe they're also hoping for TX-21 (Smith, retiring).
** 2018 Senate:
-- AZ: Kelli Ward calls for McCain to resign immediately.

-- TN: Internal polling has GOP worried, may be the reason for Corker suddenly waffling about retiring.

-- WI: The parents of a GOP candidate have both donated the legal maximum to Dem incumbent Tammy Baldwin. Family gatherings must be awkward.
** Odds & ends:
-- Dems excited about opportunity in Georgia gubernatorial.

-- UNF poll has positive initial numbers for the Florida felon vote restoration initiative, 71-22 in favor. To pass, it will need 60% approval by voters.

-- Vox chat with DecisionDesk's Brandon Finnigan about Pennsylvania. tl;dr: It's purple.

-- 538: Seven governorships the GOP has a shot at picking up. (AK, CO, CT, MN, OR, PA, RI - I don't buy all of these)

-- Nebraska state Sen Bob Krist has switched parties to the Democrats in order to run against governor Ricketts. NE Dems don't have much of a bench, so this might be their best shot.

-- Looks like New York state may be adding early voting. Gov Cuomo has wrangled some funding, if I'm reading this right.
====

Three more special elections tomorrow, including a high profile Florida House race.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:35 PM on February 12, 2018 [40 favorites]


Lissa Lucas, West Virginia House candidate silenced and removed from the WV House floor for making comments with public information about contributions to law makers from oil and gas companies.

"Drag me off, then."
posted by Crystalinne at 8:39 PM on February 12, 2018 [53 favorites]


The next round of memos will be the Grassley/Graham/Nunes memos as the official Republican conspiracy to coverup the treason conspiracy spreads.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:55 PM on February 12, 2018 [4 favorites]


Sheriffs now explicitly being a racist institution at least puts the cards on the table, I
guess.


There's a strain of conservative thought that the Sherriff is actually the highest power in the land, and not congress or the president or the police or the mayor.

It's a theory that has it's roots in a modified US constitution published and distributed by Cleon Skousen, and that lead to the formation of the CSPOA (use private mode while googling) - of which trump besties Arpaio and Clarke are members.

Sessions "sheriffs" comment was an explicit dog whistle of support to the Bundys and their gaggle of moron shitbrain supporters.

The whole "Constitutional Sheriff" thing is moon law, but it's moon law that is now abetted by the head of the DoJ.

I'm a bit surprised* that this angle isn't getting more play. It's very significant, IMO.

*not actually surprised
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 9:27 PM on February 12, 2018 [53 favorites]


Also see the "religious liberty" cases and "religious liberty" coordinators installed in every US Attorney office this week.

Republicans are trying to opt out of the rule of law by creating "alternative" doctrines determinative by outcome, and the outcome is always "Republicans win".

This can also been seen in "originalism", which was always bullshit and legal codetalking for "Republicans win".
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:36 PM on February 12, 2018 [18 favorites]


It's amazing to me that Americans can vote for law enforcement and judicial appointments. The opportunities for miscarriages of justice are so huge.
posted by awfurby at 10:57 PM on February 12, 2018 [7 favorites]


I generally lurk, because I'm in an almost-constant state of utter exasperation, probably better suited to the MeTa "Fuck!" threads.

I will just say, however, that these days really call to mind Eugene McDaniels' "Love Letter to America." It might actually be more relevant today than it was when he released it. Especially if you're one of America's non-white citizens.
posted by CommonSense at 11:44 PM on February 12, 2018 [1 favorite]


Anti-Democratic Populism Caused The Dreamer Impasse
Our impasse on DACA, and immigration policy more generally, is driven in no small measure by the populist conviction that the majority position on immigration lacks legitimate democratic authority, and that the restrictionist minority—which sees itself as the authentic and authoritative source of American identity and American political authority—is morally entitled to prevail.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 11:51 PM on February 12, 2018 [13 favorites]


As a whole, this budget is a proposed act of war by the powerful against the powerless, in which everything that protects the most vulnerable would be gutted.

Democrats need to get ahead of the curve on the "class warfare" rhetoric that Republicans trot out any time there is an attempt to rebalance laws insanely favorable to the wealthy.

Because this budget, and everything Trump has proposed, really is class warfare. It's so extreme that people making $100,000 a year are on the poor side. Dems need to preeempt (and reclaim) that argument now.
posted by msalt at 11:54 PM on February 12, 2018 [26 favorites]


-- 538: Seven governorships the GOP has a shot at picking up. (AK, CO, CT, MN, OR, PA, RI - I don't buy all of these)

I can only speak to Oregon but that's ridiculous. Cook has it as Likely Democratic. Yes, Kate Brown inherited the seat and is not beloved, but Oregon is bright blue and she beat Buehler in 2012 (for Secretary of State).

Oregon has the 8th highest job growth in the nation, and Brown has no glaring weakspots or scandals (but is kind of meh). Meanwhile, Buehler faces a possible primary challenge from the right (he's pro-choice), and a former Blue Angels leader who outpolled Buehler last fall just entered the race. 5 days ago, Buehler "parted ways" with his "combative" "bomb-throwing" spokesman 5 days ago. Apparently, he couldn't stomach the rightward shift he had previously decided on.

Buehler skipped the 2016 governor's race (2 years to fill a resignation-created opening), because he figured that Hillary would win and he'd have a better chance in the midterm, when the out party usually rallies. Kate Brown is leading 46-29 in a recent poll.
posted by msalt at 12:18 AM on February 13, 2018 [6 favorites]


That food stamp plan is going to wreck take and bake pizza places. I used to work at Papa Murphy's and a lot of the sales ~33% were food stamps. Going to watch FRSH when the markets open.

This will fuck every grocery store and food supplier. I do not see this happening. But I am wrong about everything.
posted by johnpowell at 1:21 AM on February 13, 2018 [26 favorites]


Yeah, you have to wonder how Wal-Mart is going to react to the prospect of losing their first-of-the-month SNAP money influx.
posted by MrVisible at 5:29 AM on February 13, 2018 [16 favorites]


This will fuck every grocery store and food supplier.

Yet another way that the incessant venality of these people seems like a zero-sum game, played by morons with very little capacity for relational thinking. Since all of these systems are already gamed toward the very rich, messing with any of them at this scale is going to actually cost someone wealthy money. Its impact on the poor is horrific and magnified, but the owners of Safeway and WalMart (who don't give a shit at that remove) seem like they're going to be hit as well, just as American auto when its employees can no longer afford its cars.

In an economy driven by consumption, you'd think the last thing you want to do is discourage consuming.

[on preview, jinx!]
posted by aspersioncast at 5:30 AM on February 13, 2018 [28 favorites]


In an economy driven by consumption, you'd think the last thing you want to do is discourage consuming.

In a competent administration, sure. There are probably lifers in all areas that are snapping pencils everyday.

But Trump's only motivation is to be Famous and Feared. He absolutely does not care what else comes out of Washington. How does it make him look, that's all.

He's led by the nose until he either bites who's leading him or sits obstinately for someone more flattering to take over. Kelly's turn is up, bring in the next general. Or maybe we're flagging on generals and we want to abuse another GOPer. Whatever. Who's got the remote?
posted by petebest at 5:52 AM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


Intriguing to read about Nehlen's suspension from Twitter at the same time that I received notification from them that an account I complained about (itself as a result of reading a Metafilter post) was being closed for violating its TOS. The tweet I reported (I'm sure along with many other outraged folks) was a picture of Meghan Markle with a gorilla's face superimposed.
posted by Myeral at 6:44 AM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


Omarosa’s Shocking Big Brother Reveal: Mike Pence Is Pretty ‘Scary’ Too
“Can I just say this? As bad as y’all think Trump is, you would be worried about Pence,” she said. “So everybody that’s wishing for impeachment might want to reconsider their lives.”

Omarosa then threw some slightly more specific shade at Vice-President Mike Pence: “We would be begging for days of Trump back if Pence became president. He’s extreme. I’m Christian, I love Jesus, but he thinks Jesus tells him to say things. I’m like, ‘Jesus ain’t saying that.’ He’s scary.”
posted by kirkaracha at 6:58 AM on February 13, 2018 [27 favorites]


Omarosa is a career reality TV star; her job description is literally stirring up drama. So as much as I believe that Pence is an evil fundamentalist conservative wingnut who may (by virtue of being somewhat competent) in fact be worse than Trump, I would not believe anything Omarosa says without many hectares of salt evaporation fields.
posted by Westringia F. at 7:14 AM on February 13, 2018 [42 favorites]


Omarosa’s Shocking Big Brother Reveal: Mike Pence Is Pretty ‘Scary’ Too

Now I'm wondering if Omarosa isn't essentially running a Trumpist psyop on the reality-TV-watching public. The "but what about Pence" line of thinking on impeachment has always felt like a tactic to weaken our resolve in holding Trump accountable for his crimes.

We've had scary Christian presidents before -- literally within the past 10 years -- and we've resisted them with a decent degree of success. But a President who cozies up to foreign authoritarian powers and domestic Nazis? That's a guy who needed to be gone last year.
posted by Strange Interlude at 7:39 AM on February 13, 2018 [20 favorites]


Omarosa is a career reality TV star; her job description is literally stirring up drama.

The Trump White House responded in kind: "Omarosa was fired three times on 'The Apprentice.' And this was the fourth time we let her go."

Meanwhile, the Economist Intelligence Unit, in their Democracy Index 2016 report, announced they had downgraded the US to a “flawed democracy” from a “full democracy”—"because of a further erosion of trust in government and elected officials there."
posted by Doktor Zed at 7:41 AM on February 13, 2018 [12 favorites]


If we bring Trump and Pence down based on Omarosa's urging, then Omarosa needs to come down along with them too, for being complicit.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:42 AM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


The problem isn't trump. He doesn't hold any policy positions that Ryan or McConnel, or hell, many democratic pols don't hold. Trumps the tip of the racist shitberg.

Removing trump means getting an administration that doesn't manage to step on its own dick every day - so, W again. And people like to downplay how bad W was, but he was very bad - and more to the point, few of his policy positions varied that much from trump's.

The fundamental problem is that conservatism is broken. Replacing trump with pence doesn't solve any actual problems. Focusing on impeachment is a fool's game.

We need better democrats.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 7:45 AM on February 13, 2018 [13 favorites]


Isn't Pence the Dominionist theocrat qualitatively different from anyone in the Reagan/Bush administrations, who at least had nominal loyalty to a recognisable version of the United States?
posted by acb at 7:46 AM on February 13, 2018 [11 favorites]


We need better more Democrats.

Better would be great, but taking the house with a motley crew of Blue Dogs, Progressives, and bland centrists would still be a huge a huge step in the right direction.
posted by jetsetsc at 7:53 AM on February 13, 2018 [29 favorites]


Trump needs to be impeached because he is a criminal. Whatever happens after that is a different problem.
posted by mumimor at 7:55 AM on February 13, 2018 [62 favorites]


Isn't Pence the Dominionist theocrat qualitatively different from anyone in the Reagan/Bush administrations, who at least had nominal loyalty to a recognisable version of the United States?

Insofar as Pence ran Indiana basically like a Fox News cargo-cult version of Reagan (going so far as to have the largest notable HIV outbreak since the 1980s), I'd argue that they're not that different at all. I'm not arguing that Pence isn't a monster. I'm saying that he's a monster we've already fought, and have a fairly good and well-documented understanding of how to fight.
posted by Strange Interlude at 8:03 AM on February 13, 2018 [13 favorites]


CNN's Jeremy Diamond, covering Christopher Wray's senate testimony:

FBI Dir. Chris Wray says the FBI submitted a partial report on Rob Porter's background check in MARCH. A completed report in late JULY, shared follow up info in NOVEMBER, and closed the file in JANUARY.

so tell me again about what happened last Tuesday, Feb 6th?
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 8:04 AM on February 13, 2018 [18 favorites]


Trump’s new problem: There’s growing talk of a downturn in 2019
Even with the large cuts Trump proposes for many programs that aid the poor, he still isn’t able to balance the budget. In fact, the budget released Monday has $3.7 trillion lower revenue over the next decade than his first budget projection in May did, a seeming admission that the tax cuts would struggle to produce enough revenue to offset the costs.

“Their budget effectively assumes that tax cuts don’t pay for themselves,” said Jason Furman, a Harvard professor who was head of President Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:06 AM on February 13, 2018 [27 favorites]


T.D. Strange: The assumption is correct. Tax cuts _never_ pay for themselves. The goal of the tax cuts isn't to stimulate the economy, but to further tighten the noose around the very idea of a civil government that runs social programs. If the Republican Party could get away with it, they'd even privatize the military. (And, in some ways, they already have via deals with Xe (formerly Blackwater).
posted by SansPoint at 8:11 AM on February 13, 2018 [19 favorites]


I'm not arguing that Pence isn't a monster. I'm saying that he's a monster we've already fought, and have a fairly good and well-documented understanding of how to fight.

Theocratic dominionism is a plague upon this country that we do not have a 'well-documented understanding' of how to fight. We've only ever passively reacted to its depredations rather than moving aggressively, proactively against them.

We don't always win those battles, either. In the meantime, the movement has built up a tremendous foundation of support both with the public and in the highest levels of government.

Pence's politics and religious beliefs are extremely dangerous to our democracy. A significant portion of the voting public would support his quest to remake this country into an evangelical Christian theocracy.
posted by zarq at 8:13 AM on February 13, 2018 [24 favorites]


A significant portion of the voting public would support his quest to remake this country into an evangelical Christian theocracy.

And an even more significant portion of the voting public CURRENTLY supports Trump's quest to remake this country into a white supremacist utopia so I guess we have to start somewhere.

Work to impeach Trump, then work to defeat Pence. They are both threats to our democracy.
posted by lydhre at 8:17 AM on February 13, 2018 [10 favorites]


Mod note: Good morning! Let's table the "who's worse, Trump or Pence" thing, since we've been over it many times. They're both awful and the only result of this line of discussion is to create bad feelings between site members.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 8:17 AM on February 13, 2018 [32 favorites]


Jeff Sessions Just Said Slavery Caused the Civil War. That’s an Outrageous White Supre—Oh, Wait, That’s Actually Right

The administration (and Sessions himself) have been trying to sell the AG to the American public as some sort of civil rights champion for the last year. The idea is laughable. As is typical of virtually everyone associated with the Trump administration, Sessions manages to undermine that messaging every chance he gets. Must be his "Anglo" heritage.
posted by zarq at 8:34 AM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


You can of course be a white supremacist and still be against slavery. Everyone draws a line somewhere...
posted by pipeski at 8:46 AM on February 13, 2018


You can of course be a white supremacist and still be against slavery. Everyone draws a line somewhere...

As though it’s not slavery if you first go to the trouble of arresting and convicting black men via coercive “deals” before you make them work, in confinement, for almost no pay.

These people support slavery. They just want to call it something different.

Also, Pence and his bullshit got run out of Kansas. If you can’t sell your Christian Dominionist libertarian hellscape in Kansas, you probably can’t sell it most places.
posted by schadenfrau at 8:53 AM on February 13, 2018 [13 favorites]


And yet here he is, Vice President of the United States. If you control the courts, the bureaucracy and the military you don't need to sell your bullshit to people, you can force it upon them.
posted by The Card Cheat at 8:55 AM on February 13, 2018 [5 favorites]


Pence was governor of Indiana.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:57 AM on February 13, 2018 [21 favorites]


I'm not going to bother with links, sorry, but for historians from the future picking through the rubble of the 21st century (greetings!) here are the headlines on the NYT front page right now:
  • Russia Likely to Meddle in 2018 Races, Officials Tell Senators
  • Breaking News: F.B.I. Contradicts White House on Porter Timeline
  • News Analysis: Republicans Used to Hate Deficits. Have They Given Up?
  • Editorial: Trump’s Nasty Budget
  • Brooks (Op Ed): The End of the Two-Party System
  • Krugman (Op Ed): Trump Doesn’t Give a Dam

It's too much. Too many things flying apart at the same time - it's not even a slow-motion crisis any more. It's a runaway train wreck.
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:57 AM on February 13, 2018 [39 favorites]


These people support slavery. They just want to call it something different.

“Prisoners with Jobs”
posted by Artw at 8:57 AM on February 13, 2018 [30 favorites]


Welp, retract the Kansas thing then.

Though honestly I might make the same argument about Indiana.

(Brownback broke Kansas! So at least Kansas did run one bugfuck looney tunes right winger out of their state.)
posted by schadenfrau at 8:59 AM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


Well, they didn't run Brownback out, Trump appointed him to something. It remains to be seen what Kansans do in the elections.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:01 AM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]


Does Kansas still have two governors?
posted by ZeusHumms at 9:03 AM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]


I cannot even express the level of devastation this will have if it goes through. Republicans have wanted to gut LSC for a very long time.

posted by anya32 at 9:58 AM on February 12 [10 favorites +] [!]


And it's not like LSC provides rich-guy levels of representation that would compete with rich guys' total domination of the legal system. They don't want any poors to have any legal representation. Garden-level evidence of GOP's corrupt soul.
posted by Mental Wimp at 9:04 AM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


They didn’t run Brownback out because he saw the writing on the wall and fled before they had a chance. He was only dethroned as least popular Governor by Chris Christie, he of the meatloaf-eating dignity wraiths from blue states.
posted by schadenfrau at 9:04 AM on February 13, 2018


Though honestly I might make the same argument about Indiana.

Pence's difficulties in Indiana were only partially related to his religious beliefs. Evangelical religious Hoosiers loved him. He tried to set up his own government-run communist-style news bureau, eliminated common core, tried to set up a health care program (HIP) which limited medical treatment options, attacked the publicly-elected schools superintendent and tried to stop Syrian refugees from being resettled in the state for racist reasons.

On the religious side, he tried to establish the most restrictive anti-abortion law in the nation and make women who'd had abortions pay for fetus funerals. Religious moderates balked, as did a lot of other people. Oh and he tried to protect business from being sued for discriminating against LGBTQ people.

He wasn't run out of the state. His approval rating wasn't great but it wasn't impeachment level.
posted by zarq at 9:11 AM on February 13, 2018 [11 favorites]


Business hated Pence, though, because it turns out it's kind of hard to recruit people from the coasts and from other countries when your governor is a right-wing cartoon, and it's not exactly like "come to Indiana!" is as enticing as "come to California" anyway - many, many of the state's big corporations petitioned against the LGBTQ stuff he proposed, for example.

Pence is incompetent. He was unpopular as governor, he did not have a deep network of political connections, he got very little done, he has no idea how to build alliances or work the system - I would definitely not want him for president, but he wouldn't just frog-march us all to Gilead since he simply isn't bright, charismatic or talented enough. (I have family in Indiana, so I heard about him before.)
posted by Frowner at 9:22 AM on February 13, 2018 [27 favorites]


Pence is incompetent. He was unpopular as governor, he did not have a deep network of political connections, he got very little done, he has no idea how to build alliances or work the system - I would definitely not want him for president, but he wouldn't just frog-march us all to Gilead since he simply isn't bright, charismatic or talented enough.
The problem is that he doesn't have to build an alliance if there's one sitting there just waiting for him.
posted by Nerd of the North at 9:30 AM on February 13, 2018 [5 favorites]


OTOH, there's incompetent, and there's Trump-level dysfunctional. Compared to Trump, who can't keep his thoughts straight for the duration of a sentence and keeps kicking own goals against his own agenda, Pence is an organisational genius, and, for that matter, so would be the proverbial drover's dog.
posted by acb at 9:32 AM on February 13, 2018


Mod note: Hi gang, we are now debating whether Trump or Pence is worse, and I'm going to call it there. Trump and Pence, both very bad indeed.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 9:33 AM on February 13, 2018 [50 favorites]


The GOP Deficit Scam Will Never Die They can spend big on issues they care about (like corporate tax breaks and the military), racking up big bills that they can later use as an argument to gut social spending programs, like food for the poor and health care. Deficit spending, in other words, is totally fine as long the nation is racking up debt for Republican priorities.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:43 AM on February 13, 2018 [19 favorites]


Speaking of "very bad indeed," NYT, Dozens of Russians Are Believed Killed in U.S.-Backed Syria Attack
Four Russian nationals, and perhaps dozens more, were killed in fighting between pro-government forces in eastern Syria and members of the United States-led coalition fighting the Islamic State, according to Russian and Syrian officials.

A Syrian military officer said that about 100 Syrian soldiers had been killed in the fighting on Feb. 7 and 8, but news about Russian casualties has dribbled out only slowly, through Russian news organizations and social media.
This cold war is increasingly hot.

Relatedly, Russia Sees Midterm Elections as Chance to Sow Fresh Discord, Intelligence Chiefs Warn
As the midterm elections approach, Russia is likely to throw more propaganda at Americans, using people sympathetic to their messages and fake personalities on social media — many of them run by bots — to sow further political and social divisions in the United States, the top American intelligence officials said on Tuesday.

The intelligence chiefs warned the Senate Intelligence Committee, during an annual hearing on worldwide threats that Russia believes its interference in the 2016 presidential election largely achieved its chief aim — weakening faith in American democracy. Moscow now sees the coming congressional elections as a chance to build on its gains, they said.

“There should be no doubt that Russia perceives its past efforts as successful and views the 2018 U.S. midterm elections as a potential target for Russian influence operations,” said Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence.

“Throughout the entire community we have not seen any evidence of any significant change from last year,” he added.
Even Trump's CIA puppet Pompeo agreed.
posted by zachlipton at 9:48 AM on February 13, 2018 [17 favorites]


Speaking of "very bad indeed," NYT, Dozens of Russians Are Believed Killed in U.S.-Backed Syria Attack
Four Russian nationals, and perhaps dozens more, were killed in fighting between pro-government forces in eastern Syria and members of the United States-led coalition fighting the Islamic State, according to Russian and Syrian officials.


At today's Senate hearing, Tom Cotton (ick, I know) implied that 200 Russian mercenaries were killed. Bloomberg suggests a Russian death toll of 100-200 and strongly implies that a lot of them were killed by US forces and not just US-backed Syrian forces:

U.S. forces killed scores of Russian mercenaries in Syria last week in what may be the deadliest clash between citizens of the former foes since the Cold War, according to one U.S. official and three Russians familiar with the matter. More than 200 contract soldiers, mostly Russians fighting on behalf of Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, died in a failed attack on a base held by U.S. and mainly Kurdish forces in the oil-rich Deir Ezzor region, two of the Russians said. The U.S. official put the death toll at about 100, with 200 to 300 injured.

Very, very, very bad.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:58 AM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


Omarosa’s Shocking Big Brother Reveal: Mike Pence Is Pretty ‘Scary’ Too

I'm not going to link to Piers Morgan in the Daily Mail, but in the interest of knowing what's out there, it's surely not a coincidence that a Trump-aligned figure is using this occasion to make vile accusations about her behavior during Celebrity Apprentice in response to her attacks on the administration.
posted by zachlipton at 10:05 AM on February 13, 2018


There’s *literally no way* to do a “limited spectrum” without it being racist as fuck.

There's plenty of ways you could run such a program in a racially - and more likely religiously - problematic manner. But since I don't know the exact metric for "as fuck" I'll just disagree with the idea that it's flat out impossible to create a variety of food offerings that could be valuable to all citizens.
posted by phearlez at 2:07 PM on February 12 [2 favorites +] [!]


I think you may be talking past each other, one focusing on the nutritional value of the food and one focusing on the cultural specificity of food and the way it is prepared and consumed. But I may be misinterpreting you, phearlez. I think the complexity of providing culturally and religiously appropriate food to each tiny ethnic/racial/cultural/religious group far outstrips a government's ability. YMMV.
posted by Mental Wimp at 10:37 AM on February 13, 2018 [4 favorites]


It's as though the way we're currently providing food assistance via SNAP is actually the best way.

You'd think conservatives being, you know, interested in conserving the status quo wouldn't be so quick to jump on a blanket repeal & replacement of an existing system.

Wait, what's that? Oh, they're not faithfully executing conservative ideals but simply co-opting a team name in order to dismantle & loot the government?

Gotcha. Man, I bet a lot of conservatives will be shocked & appalled that their guiding ethos is being sullied by these crooks. If only there was some trustworthy way to communicate with the masses. Ah well. I suppose that's a problem for the next experiment in democracy and government. It was a fun run, though!
posted by narwhal at 10:50 AM on February 13, 2018 [17 favorites]


Well fucking with SNAP is certainly one way to mobilize the poor to vote in the midterms. Time to set up some voter registration tables outside grocery stores in poorer neighborhoods.

Trump is turning out to be the best thing that ever happened to the Democratic Party!
posted by Jacqueline at 10:54 AM on February 13, 2018 [8 favorites]




ELECTION RESULT

Dem HOLD in Minnesota Senate 54, 51-47. This is a Dem overperformance of about 5 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.


nelsonhaha.jpg

I know a lot of people in this district and basically everyone who has met the losing GOP candidate in person ostensibly to "discuss issues" and has disagreed with him has a story of him being overly combative, aggressive and rude. During the gay marriage fight in MN he particularly done pissed off every queer person and their allies. He finally 'retired' from his state house seat and came back to run for this seat in the senate. This one is sweet.
posted by nakedmolerats at 11:05 AM on February 13, 2018 [28 favorites]


scaryblackdeath: "Swear to God, Nancy Pelosi could pull a universal cancer vaccine out of her pocket today and by 6pm we'd be hearing about how this spells electoral disaster for Democrats."

That's not hard at all: Older people tend to lean GOP.
posted by Mitheral at 11:05 AM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


I think any misunderstanding about this pie in the sky thought experiment I am talking about can mostly reasonably boil down to anyone wrongly thinking I'd support actually messing with current assistance programs to create it.

But as I said in a comment later than the one you quoted, Mental Wimp, I just think this sort of scheme would be an interesting way we could do some good for everyone in the nation with some overlap on things we already do and accomplish some jobs programs sort of things as well as encouraging some entrepreneurship by paying folks to grow, make, and sell affordable food. Not to replace anything, but to be a little sneaky indirect universal basic income by paying it instead into creating a selection of more affordable food. You couldn't cover all the needs of different religions and cultures but I bet you could have the majority of your offerings be acceptable to the majority of the country and the rest of the stuff they get elsewhere.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ it was just meant as a comment on the fact that everything the Trump administration (and really all the current Republicans in power) does they manage to do in the most awful and shit way possible. And as narwhal points out, it's the sort of thing that is the exact opposite of supposed conservatism - spinning up these big operations which enrich private business with government dollars and do it by making big changes to huge parts of our business economy.

But what else is new? The day I knew I would never be a Republican was as a teen during the Reagan administration when there was all this kerfuffle over midnight basketball, some programs for keeping community centers open late to offer alternatives to at-risk youth. All these Reaganites sneered at it as waste and all I could think was "didn't we already pay to build all these centers and aren't they just sitting dark at these times anyway? Why wouldn't we want to pay a small additional amount to open them and possibly divert kids from trouble? Do we need to stop even more than one shooting for it to pay for itself?"
posted by phearlez at 11:08 AM on February 13, 2018 [8 favorites]


Time to set up some voter registration tables outside grocery stores in poorer neighborhoods.

Come to think of it, getting together to conduct voter registration drives could make for a pretty cool series of MetaFilter IRL meetups.
posted by Jacqueline at 11:08 AM on February 13, 2018 [40 favorites]


Nancy Pelosi did a great job as Speaker of the House and she's doing a great job, or at least making the best of a bad bargain, as House minority leader. Let's put it this way: if Nancy Pelosi from San Francisco were Nathan Pelosi from Small Midwestern City we'd not be hearing half of the "Nancy Must Go!" yapping.

Kirsten Gillibrand has been knocking it out of the park don't read the comments on that last link with standing up against sexual harassment and calling Trump to account for it, but of course cue the braying about her "ambition" and "she's doing this just to get elected" and etc. (No, we don't even know if she's running in 2020 ffs!) It sounds dismayingly...familiar.

I am convinced that if the Russians want to derail the Democrats, all they have to do is play the misogyny card. I am very, very glad that a record number of women are running in the 2018 elections, and wish we could have a quota for women office-holders (that would never fly in the US, I know). I just die inside every time someone nitpicks a woman candidate and calls for a "return to the center" or something like it.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 11:18 AM on February 13, 2018 [43 favorites]


Here's a good generic guide for running a voter registration drive. You'll also want to check your state's elections department website for state-specific rules and resources. For example, in Virginia, there's a training video and you have to turn in all forms within 10 days.
posted by Jacqueline at 11:22 AM on February 13, 2018 [12 favorites]


Trump wants to overhaul America's safety net with giant cuts to housing, food stamps and health care (WaPo)

Why. Why does the Washington Post need to softball this grotesque monstering with "wants to overhaul" language? Given that the Trump/Mulvaney budget is only an opening salvo from a White House that is infamously erratic and undecided, and therefore a detailed analysis is somewhat beside the point, why do they bothsides it like that?

The first paragraph starts strong enough, but ends up like all who wrestle with pigs metaphorically:
The budget that President Trump proposed Monday takes a hard whack at the poorest Americans, slashing billions of dollars from food stamps, public health insurance and federal housing vouchers, while trying to tilt the programs in more conservative directions.


Are "more conservative directions" not also wanting to decimate the same safety net? Of course they are, the phrasing is deliberately bothesidsing something that only has one side. "The bullshit is also attempting to be disrespectful gratuitous lying."

Democracy is dying in that particular inky darkness. At best we should be treating corporate news like a random noise element. It's an incredibly reluctant and late source of truth, if at all.
posted by petebest at 11:24 AM on February 13, 2018 [13 favorites]


tonycpsu: wingnuts call for boycott of Unilever for kowtowing to the librul snowflake SJW agenda

This isn't the be-all end-all answer, but it looks like Unilever (associated individuals) have most recently been 100% behind democrats, with the top candidate in terms of contributions towards an individual's campaign being HRC at $18,673, with Bernie getting a third of that at $6,147. But this might just be a weird aggregation of clearly associated individuals, and Unilever as a corporation might have different political leanings.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:26 AM on February 13, 2018 [2 favorites]


I was halflistening to Fresh Air today and Teri Gross was talking to the author of "Devils' Bargain: Trump + Bannon, Sittin' in a Tree," which is out in paperback with a new preface.

There was extended discussion of Steve Bannon's mind-is-blown spiritual meltdown which he experienced after watching Oprah at the Golden Globes. He thinks the coming of The Matriarchy is "an existential crisis" for the altright and republicanism generally. Because the women are a legit, powerful movement, Bannon thinks. He was impressed by all the black dresses, apparently.

And Teri Gross says, "Well, is Bannon on the women's side in this, does he admit they kinda have a point, or is he just, 'They're coming for us, man the battle stations!'" And Devils' Bargain guy says, "Oh, very much the latter."

So my question for I guess Bannon since nobody else seems to know is this: what is the strategy for battling against this, Bannon?

Assuming you're right and #MeToo #TimesUp is an effective movement and the women really will haul out a guillotine and deball all of you with it-

(Because, as has been noted here, he said this. Just... Exasperating: how is that a reasonable or effective use of a tool designed to remove heads? Or an efficient way to castrate all the members of a large group? Come on, you just wanted to scream something incendiary about guillotines and work balls into it.)

-then what, I say what is the nature of your plan to defeat the women? Enslave the women, a la Margaret Atwood? Eliminate the women entirely and make a fleet of impregnable sex robots? Or just disenfranchise the women somehow or make them self-disenfranchise by making barefoot kitchen living great again via... what propaganda campaign would do that for you, Steve-O? What's the plan? You must have some ideas in mind, redpill: What are they?

(Or does he not actually believe any of it; he's just trying to goad the MRAs into more high jinks?)
posted by Don Pepino at 11:42 AM on February 13, 2018 [11 favorites]


Talez: $3 trillion over 10 years? Can someone please make sure Mulvaney has no investments in Soylent Green because holy shit, that's old people and poor people dying in gutters level of spending cuts.

As a probably unnecessary reminder, the White House budget means next to nothing. For example, the popular Advanced Research Projects Agency—Energy (or ARPA-E) program, which has funded early-stage energy research through a federal grant program for years, is again on the chopping block (Megan Geuss for Ars Technica, Feb. 12, 2018), but
ARPA-E was slated for elimination in Trump’s budget proposal last year, but Congress ended up allotting the energy projects incubator $15 million more than it was initially supposed to receive.
Emphasis mine. It's basically a "visionary" policy paper, designed to indicate what the President and his staff handlers want to happen. Yes, it's a reminder that their vision is that of killing off old and poor people, but that's not news, is it? I don't mean we should normalize what he's suggesting, but instead freak out a bit less, understanding that Congress will continue to play favorites with the myriad of industries and special interests (and probably even consider some actual constituent feedback) and generally ignore the president's budget.
posted by filthy light thief at 11:43 AM on February 13, 2018 [6 favorites]


I am convinced that if the Russians want to derail the Democrats, all they have to do is play the misogyny card. I am very, very glad that a record number of women are running in the 2018 elections, and wish we could have a quota for women office-holders (that would never fly in the US, I know). I just die inside every time someone nitpicks a woman candidate and calls for a "return to the center" or something like it.

posted by Rosie M. Banks at 11:18 AM on February 13 [+] [!]


They used that very effectively in 2016. Even my sister, a PhD in history with solid liberal credentials and an activist from an early age, sniffed at Hillary (but voted for her), reasoning that there had to be something criminal about the Clinton Foundation. This was an idea pushed not only by the Trump campaign and the GOP, but also by left-seeming sources that I suspect were fed by Russian sources. Dampening enthusiasm through this sort of campaign by insinuation is easy to do with the sorts of resources Russia is adept at using. They will definitely do this and the Trump administration will wink and urge them on.
posted by Mental Wimp at 11:46 AM on February 13, 2018 [9 favorites]


"...it’s just a proven goddamn fact that you SHOULD JUST GIVE PEOPLE CASH WITHOUT RESTRICTIONS for the best results."

FYI FWIW, this isn't just some progressive maxim -- "just give them money" is taught even by relatively conservative economics professors in business schools. Even hardcore libertarian economists like Hayek and Friedman recommended this approach.

So anyone who advocates for government making purchasing decisions for poor people instead of giving them cash or cash-like benefits is either completely ignorant of all the relevant research and should not be making policy, or their true goal is something other than making welfare programs more effective and efficient.
posted by Jacqueline at 11:46 AM on February 13, 2018 [34 favorites]


And I'm behind the times w/r/t the budget: Trump Offers Spending Blueprint, But Congress Already Wrote The Check (NPR, Feb. 12, 2018)
President Trump released his 2019 budget proposal Monday calling for increased spending on the military, border security and the opioid crisis. But the White House blueprint has already been overtaken by events. The two-year budget deal passed by Congress last week boosts spending for both the military and domestic programs by nearly $300 billion over the next two years, complicating White House efforts to reorder federal priorities.
Emphasis mine - because [nelson] ha ha! [/nelson].
"We really thought we could cut a deal with the Democrats that would increase defense spending in order to defend the nation," White House Budget Director Mick Mulvaney told Fox News Sunday. "But when the doors closed, what happened was they would not give us a single dollar worth of additional defense spending without giving us additional money for welfare spending and that's just the world we live in."
Emphasis mine, natch. Mulvaney went on to say "it really hampers the dreams of an evil super villain to be limited by the whims of congress. I'm not sure who doesn't want to prioritize Super Mega Army Force over the welfare of their neighbors, friends and family, but apparently there are some such minds in the Senate." [/fake]
posted by filthy light thief at 11:52 AM on February 13, 2018 [16 favorites]


From Vox, "Why there’s so much chaos in the Trump administration":
2) Incoherence at the top leads to constant infighting below. Trump is uninterested in core questions of governance, has never resolved the ideological tensions in his administration, and is heavily influenced by whoever gets to him last. The result is an ongoing battle, which plays out through both bureaucratic maneuvering and constant leaking, between the various ideological factions of the administration. These fights often seem catty and personal when they spill out into the press, but the stakes are nothing less than the direction of America’s domestic and foreign policy.

This makes the Trump White House a particularly dangerous place to work. All of the factions are constantly maneuvering to consolidate or regain influence by deposing members of rival factions. If you’ve noticed a lot of knives out for Kelly in the aftermath of Porter’s resignation, this is partly why: Kelly tightly controls access to Trump and is personally pushing Trump toward a hard line on immigration, and so White House staff who don’t want Trump to take such a hard line on immigration or who just want more access to Trump are using Kelly’s mishandling of Porter to weaken or oust him.
Nothing in here particularly ground-breaking for regular megapolitics thread readers but I think it's worth highlighting this specific dynamic. I seem to recall that there's a name for this kind of governance structure, i.e.: a weak nominal ruler surrounded by a whole bunch of suck-ups and schemers all jockeying for position in order to get close to and influence the ruler in order to push their agenda. I keep thinking it's called "regency" but that's not quite right because the prince regent is (or, at least, can be) a real ruler and you don't necessarily have this chaotic, battle royale, free-for-all situation.
posted by mhum at 12:00 PM on February 13, 2018 [9 favorites]


@pdmcleod:
So here’s a quick rundown on where we’re at on the immigration debate. [Lights cigarette, gazes longingly out window.] We were supposed to be having an open debate on the floor of the Senate by now, but it got jammed before the starting line...
GOP and Dems [pours shot] are arguing over the terms. GOP wants to bring sanctuary cities into the mix, Dems objecting. So we’re [pours second shot] we could be here til midnight as that plays out...
Meanwhile a bunch of different factions are drafting pieces of legislation but no one knows what, if anything can pass. Also [takes puff of opium] McConnell says they have til Thursday to sort out a deal.
So the Senate has just three days to solve this immigration crisis and [dies] they’re in the process of burning one in a standoff.
@mollyereynolds:
This tactic—deadline setting by McConnell—should be familiar to viewers of Reconciliation Seasons 1 and 2 in 2017, but I think the goal is the opposite here. Rather than set a short deadline to force action, McConnell may be attempting to follow through on the letter of his promise to Dems without actually leaving enough time to get something done. But what about March 5, you ask? As I understand the current court ruling, 3/5/18 is not as much of a deadline as it once was. Even still, there’s a week of recess next week (which you could cancel if you really wanted to) and a week after that before March 5 rolls around
Allowing precisely four days to fix the immigration system...I wonder what this "debate" would look like if McConnell didn't want a deal. But he keeps promising that he does. I'm sure he's operating in good faith.
posted by zachlipton at 12:10 PM on February 13, 2018 [21 favorites]


they would not give us a single dollar worth of additional defense spending without giving us additional money for welfare spending

I like that even Dedicated Supervillain Mick Mulvaney can't figure out a way to phrase this that's not "those mean Democrats wanted to give us more money!"
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 12:20 PM on February 13, 2018 [5 favorites]


3 Trump properties posted 144 openings for seasonal jobs. Only one went to a US worker.
A Vox analysis of hiring records for seasonal workers at three Trump properties in New York and Florida revealed that only one out of 144 jobs went to a US worker from 2016 to the end of 2017. Foreign guest workers with H-2B visas got the rest.
"From this day forward, it's going to be only America first, America first...We will follow two simple rules; buy American and hire American."
posted by kirkaracha at 12:35 PM on February 13, 2018 [55 favorites]




Seriously, "Government bureaucrats decide what you're going to eat" would be a Republican nightmare dystopia if they weren't assured it would only happen to poor people.
posted by RobotHero at 12:49 PM on February 13, 2018 [50 favorites]




I seem to recall that there's a name for this kind of governance structure, i.e.: a weak nominal ruler surrounded by a whole bunch of suck-ups and schemers all jockeying for position in order to get close to and influence the ruler in order to push their agenda.
In political science, sultanism is a form of authoritarian government characterized by the extreme personal presence of the ruler in all elements of governance. ... "[T]he essential reality in a sultanistic regime is that all individuals, groups and institutions are permanently subject to the unpredictable and despotic intervention of the sultan, and thus all pluralism is precarious"
Examples include "Haiti under the Duvaliers, the Dominican Republic under Trujillo, the Central African Republic under Bokassa, the Philippines under Marcos, Romania under Ceauşescu, and North Korea under Kim Il Sung."
posted by jedicus at 12:51 PM on February 13, 2018 [23 favorites]


“With the special counsel probe under wraps,” Winter writes, “the BuzzFeed court case could represent the first public airing of an investigation into the veracity of some of the dossier's claims.” (WaPo)

If the writers have any respect for themselves, Trump must be hoisted by his own petard. While I was hoping for something to take down the whole GOP in minutes on live TV, I would also accept Buzzfeed independently verifying the Steele dossier. Followed by a counter-suit for all he's got.
posted by petebest at 1:09 PM on February 13, 2018 [5 favorites]


DACA injunction order [pdf]
The question before the court is thus not whether Defendants could end the DACA program, but whether they offered legally adequate reasons for doing so. Based on its review of the record before it, the court concludes that Defendants have not done so. First, the decision to end the DACA program appears to rest exclusively on a legal conclusion that the program was unconstitutional and violated the APA and INA. Because that conclusion was erroneous, the decision to end the DACA program cannot stand. Second, this erroneous conclusion appears to
have relied in part on the plainly incorrect factual premise that courts have recognized "constitutional defects" in the somewhat analogous Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents ("DAPA") program. Third, Defendants' decision appears to be internally contradictory, as the means by which Defendants chose to "wind down" the program (namely, by continuing to adjudicate certain DACA renewal applications) cannot be reconciled with their stated rationale for ending the program (namely, that DACA was unconstitutional). Any of these flaws would support invalidating the DACA rescission as arbitrary and capricious.
Note: the injunction covers only the rescission of DACA for those who had applied as of September 5, 2017, it does not permit new initial DACA applications to be filed.
posted by melissasaurus at 1:29 PM on February 13, 2018 [33 favorites]


Seriously, "Government bureaucrats decide what you're going to eat" would be a Republican nightmare dystopia if they weren't assured it would only happen to poor people.

Likewise, Donald Trump deciding what you're going to eat should be the easiest position for Dems to take
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 1:42 PM on February 13, 2018 [13 favorites]


And once again, Trump tweets were used to support the plaintiff's case:
FN10: It is not clear that the Attorney General's views are those of the Administration he serves. On September 5,2017, President Trump tweeted that "Congress now has 6 months to legalize DACA (something the Obama Administration was unable to do). If they can't, I will revisit this issue!" ...It is not clear how the President would "revisit" the decision to rescind the DACA program if the DACA program were, as the Attorney General has stated, "an unconstitutional exercise of authority by the Executive Branch." (Sessions Ltr.) Defendants' contention that the President simply "emphasized the need for legislative action and expressed [his] intention to revisit Administration policies on childhood arrivals—not the legality and defensibility of the DACA program—if Congress did not timely act" (Defs. Opp'n at 33) is unsupported by the text of the President's tweet. //

Moreover, although the Government generally has a substantial interest in the speedy deportation of removable aliens... the court finds that the Government's interest in ending the DACA program is not so compelling. For one thing, the President has stated his support for keeping DACA recipients in the country (albeit preferably pursuant to legislation rather than executive action). Donald J. Trump, @realdonaldtrump, Twitter.com (Sept. 14, 2017 3:28 AM), ("Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really! ").
posted by melissasaurus at 1:47 PM on February 13, 2018 [32 favorites]


Probably to nobody's surprise: FBI director reveals the White House has been blatantly lying about the domestic abuse scandal
During congressional testimony on Tuesday, FBI Director Christopher Wray presented a timeline of when the White House was informed about red flags in Rob Porter’s background check process that conflicts with the talking points Trump officials have been using over the past week.

“What I can tell you is that the FBI submitted a partial report on the investigation in question in March, and then a completed background investigation in late July,” Wray said. “Soon thereafter we received requests for follow-up inquiry, and we did the follow-up and provided that information in November, and then we administratively closed the file in January, and then earlier this month we received some additional information and we passed that on as well.”
posted by bonehead at 1:47 PM on February 13, 2018 [48 favorites]


They're lying on all fronts, contradicting Kelly's claim that Porter was "gone 40 minutes later" after being briefed on the allegations of abuse, Politico reports that the White House held an off the record press event to defend Porter and push back against the allegations:
In the hours immediately after the Daily Mail published a photograph of Porter’s first ex-wife with a black eye, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders hastily arranged an off-the-record meeting in the West Wing with Porter and four reporters:The New York Times’ Maggie Haberman, The Washington Post’s Josh Dawsey, Axios’ Jonathan Swan and The Wall Street Journal’s Michael Bender. In that meeting, which hasn’t previously been reported, Porter relayed his version of events and fielded questions from the group.
posted by peeedro at 2:08 PM on February 13, 2018 [21 favorites]


In my head I say Haberman the way Seinfeld used to say Newman. Ugh.
posted by phearlez at 2:18 PM on February 13, 2018 [36 favorites]


I just... don't think any of this matters. They lie and lie and do all sorts of terrible things and none of it matters? I know the "nothing matters" thing is a joke but I honestly don't know how to deal with a regime (and a party, really) where nothing matters except power and there is no reality except what they claim it is. And that strategy works for better than 40% of the electorate.
posted by Justinian at 2:18 PM on February 13, 2018 [37 favorites]


Sarah Huckabee Sanders hastily arranged an off-the-record meeting in the West Wing with Porter and four reporters:The New York Times’ Maggie Haberman, The Washington Post’s Josh Dawsey, Axios’ Jonathan Swan and The Wall Street Journal’s Michael Bender. In that meeting, which hasn’t previously been reported, [...]

Sarah Huckabee Sanders chose those reporters. I have never thought that journalists should accede to demands from administration officials, barring the rare cases when an official is spilling the beans on their comrades, but reporters who agree to an off-the-record briefing from a press secretary are nothing more than mouthpieces for the administration.

People here have frequently complained about journalists' both-sidesism or their papers' undue focus on Buttery Males. There's definitely a case for covering discreditable stories from both sides, even when one story is evidently mere weak sauce when compared to the fiery Tabasco of the other side. Nobody should be given a pass, they don't want to appear partisan, they're also trying to sell papers. But this here isn't journalism: it's prosecuting a war on behalf of the administration. There's no reason to think that their complicity is fresh, either: these journalists have almost certainly also been used to help cover up previous scandals and I think it's time their colleagues started asking them the hard questions.
posted by Joe in Australia at 2:31 PM on February 13, 2018 [29 favorites]


In journalism news, it appears the NYT's latest op-ed hire—Quinn Norton—in addition to being best buds with Nazi hacker weev, has said some rather *interesting* things on Twitter in the not-too-distant past.
posted by Atom Eyes at 2:44 PM on February 13, 2018 [23 favorites]


Oh good, we needed some fresh insights on why nazis are actually good from them, now in new gamergatey techno-nazi flavour!

Oh and she's the "lead opinion writer on the power, culture and consequences of technology" for extra laughs.

Unsubscribe.
posted by Artw at 2:54 PM on February 13, 2018 [21 favorites]


There's no reason to think that their complicity is fresh, either: these journalists have almost certainly also been used to help cover up previous scandals and I think it's time their colleagues started asking them the hard questions.

Yep. But who reports on the reporters? That shouldn't ever need to be asked, but here we are.
posted by petebest at 2:55 PM on February 13, 2018


> In journalism news, it appears the NYT's latest op-ed hire—Quinn Norton—in addition to being best buds with Nazi hacker weev, has said some rather *interesting* things on Twitter in the not-too-distant past.

It's like NYT feels threatened by WaPo's hire of Megan McArdle, and wants to ensure that everyone knows that their op-ed page is the worst this side of the Wall Street Journal.
posted by tonycpsu at 2:59 PM on February 13, 2018 [10 favorites]


Lordy. In this Quinn article in praise of a nazi she manages to lay claim to both native american heritage and once having a jewish boyfriend.
posted by Artw at 3:01 PM on February 13, 2018 [13 favorites]


Was following some twitter person's commentary on the bill that would gut the ADA and some person replied to the first person, going on about how "the ADA had gone too far" and how wack it was that each bathroom in their workspace had an accessible stall when "only one disabled person works there."

It's like, riddle me this, the ADA has gone to far? Like, those curb cuts are really pissing you off? And can you not use the accessible toilet? Like are you worried there are cripple germs in there? Ramps are aesthetically unpleasing? And what's this special disabled person detector that you have, knowing that there is only one person with a disability in your building? Like, what the fuck has gone wrong in this person's head that they are going on about how the ADA is ravaging the land?
posted by angrycat at 3:04 PM on February 13, 2018 [51 favorites]


Oh, and she likes to call people "fag". Presumably she'll be telling us this is actually affectionate and okay because she's besties with Milo the Nazi or something.
posted by Artw at 3:04 PM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


(RE: Quinn Norton—What's really odd is how many seemingly decent journalists on my Twitter feed have quite cheerily chimed in to congratulate her on landing the job.)
posted by Atom Eyes at 3:06 PM on February 13, 2018 [11 favorites]




If any consolation, my Twitter feed is lousy with good journalists (I used to be one, if you’re using “good” generously), and Quinn Dances With Nazis is getting a really comprehensive dragging right now. Her selection is especially egregious because I can think of dozens of excellent and eminently accomplished and qualified commentators on social issues and technology who do not hang out with Nazis.

I remain utterly unable to grasp what the New York Times or the Washington Post are thinking here. I am pretty sure their core demographic - you know, people who don’t already believe the mainstream media is evil - are not demanding this stuff. It’s like they’re competing to shed the subscription momentum they accumulated in the immediate aftermath of Trump’s election.
posted by faineg at 3:14 PM on February 13, 2018 [18 favorites]


@theshrillest: would like to place a bet that norton's first column will be about the reaction to her becoming a new york times columnist and defending her friendships with nazi, and that said column will be passed around as a hate read
posted by Artw at 3:16 PM on February 13, 2018 [15 favorites]


I remain utterly unable to grasp what the New York Times or the Washington Post are thinking here. I am pretty sure their core demographic - you know, people who don’t already believe the mainstream media is evil - are not demanding this stuff. It’s like they’re competing to shed the subscription momentum they accumulated in the immediate aftermath of Trump’s election.

What we like from them is likely a few employees pushing things along and this sort of garbage is pushed down from whoever owns the paper (or a truly garbage hiring manager).
posted by Slackermagee at 3:26 PM on February 13, 2018


The New York Times is currently as bland, bourgeois, and corporatist as they’ve always been, at a time when it’s more clear than usual how ethically dubious that ideological configuration is and always has been.

Never forget that in 1922 they ran a puff piece about Hitler.
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 3:27 PM on February 13, 2018 [16 favorites]


Lordy. In this Quinn article in praise of a nazi she manages to lay claim to both native american heritage and once having a jewish boyfriend.

She's using a biblical story about Jews (and a Jewish holiday) in a story about Nazis, the holocaust and genocide. As if by pointing to a Jewish myth and saying we were on "both sides of the knife," she can make the Holocaust seem "complicated."

But hey, some of her good friends are Nazis.

The Times should fire her ass for this alone.
posted by zarq at 3:27 PM on February 13, 2018 [28 favorites]


Casually calling Obama the n-word on twitter?!? And the NYT hired her.
posted by sebastienbailard at 3:28 PM on February 13, 2018 [11 favorites]


I actually expect someone at the NYT found all of the Twitter history, and it was impetus to continue with the hiring of Norton.
posted by Mister Fabulous at 3:31 PM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


For people unfamiliar with Weev and just how horrifying Quinn Norton's ongoing friendship with him is, he's a much more radicalized Nazi than Richard Spencer and is one of only a couple influential alt-right figures that openly advocate genocidal violence, including specific planning: for example, he talks in nonfantasy contexts about cheaply mass-produced miniaturized drone bombs that automatically target based on skin color. I would be more forgiving of someone claiming to be friends with serial killers.
posted by Rust Moranis at 3:38 PM on February 13, 2018 [45 favorites]




Haha fantastic. Megan McArdle was the reason I cancelled my Atlantic subscription, and, depending how things go, probably will be the reason I cancel my WaPo sub.
posted by notyou at 3:49 PM on February 13, 2018 [9 favorites]


It's like NYT feels threatened by WaPo's hire of Megan McArdle

Ugh. For those who also did a spit take, they just announced this today.
posted by Anita Bath at 4:08 PM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]


That Norton article in praise of a Nazi is incredible. Aside from the vacuous and offensive concept (what if a Nazi did a good thing, didja ever think of that??), it's just terribly written--cliche navel-gazing of the worst sort. I expect my morally reprehensible NY Times columnists to at least be good writers.
posted by Mavri at 4:12 PM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


Ha ha... @quinnnorton: Today I realized I'd probably make a lot more money being a racist for @nytimes.
posted by Artw at 4:15 PM on February 13, 2018 [14 favorites]


I'll bet this one is the one that got her the job, given that the need for everyone to be nice to white racists and hear out their concerns is like NY Times editorial numbers 1 to a hundred these days.
posted by Artw at 4:17 PM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]


That tweet's from 2014, right before the portal to Hellworld opened.
posted by Rust Moranis at 4:18 PM on February 13, 2018 [9 favorites]


angrycat: "And can you not use the accessible toilet?"

This is something that is changing (around here anyways) Accessible toilets used to be sort of socially reserved for people who needed the accommodation. With a move to re-sign the facilities with unisex graphics rather than wheelchair graphics I think more people are using them as just plain restrooms rather than something special to be reserved for wheelchair users.
posted by Mitheral at 4:21 PM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]


Rust Moranis - Yeah, probably should have added that context. It remains pretty damn hilarious.

(I guess we are the "are they going to go through with this?" phase and it'll seem less hilarious when it turns out they have no intention of letting any of this stopping them form promoting a perfectly good nazi sympathizer)
posted by Artw at 4:24 PM on February 13, 2018


Never forget that in 1922 they ran a puff piece about Hitler.
But several reliable, well-informed sources confirmed the idea that Hitler’s anti-Semitism was not so genuine or violent as it sounded, and that he was merely using anti-Semitic propaganda as a bait to catch masses of followers and keep them aroused, enthusiastic, and in line for the time when his organization is perfected and sufficiently powerful to be employed effectively for political purposes.
We've come a long way, baby.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:30 PM on February 13, 2018 [46 favorites]


Good news, everyone!

As in, literally, news about Margaret Good, who appears to have won in Florida’s special election tonight for state House District 72.

This is a Dem pickup!
posted by darkstar at 4:33 PM on February 13, 2018 [62 favorites]




Unofficial results, 100%
posted by MtDewd at 4:35 PM on February 13, 2018


That continues the trend where the swing from 2016 is correlated with how red the district is. Blue districts are seeing modest swings in the mid single digits, purple districts are seeing swings in the low double digits, and red districts are seeing huge swings, sometimes more than 20 points. Which isn't enough to flip some of those red districts but it's still interesting.

I'd certainly rather see the 12 points swings in purple districts and 5 point swings in blue districts than the reverse, so let's keep that up purple district voters.
posted by Justinian at 4:38 PM on February 13, 2018 [8 favorites]


Guardian: Bill Gates warned that the proposed Trump administration budget could directly lead to millions of preventable deaths around the globe, due to proposed vast cuts to foreign aid and development funds [...] if that goes away, even a 10% cut would mean 5 million deaths over the next decade,” he said at an event with his wife to launch the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s 2018 letter.

I guess millions will die at home and abroad isn't catchy enough for Democrats to run with?
posted by Rust Moranis at 4:40 PM on February 13, 2018 [40 favorites]


would mean 5 million deaths over the next decade


It’s because of shit like this that people on the internets stopped invoking Godwin’s Law.
posted by darkstar at 4:52 PM on February 13, 2018 [5 favorites]


what if a Nazi did a good thing, didja ever think of that??

Steven Spielberg made a movie based on this same premise and won seven Academy Awards. Oskar Schindler was a Nazi, too. (A Nazi spy, even.)

John Rabe helped protect about 200,000 people during the Rape of Nanking. Schindler's list had 1,200 people on it.

Norton sounds like a jerk, but she presented Rabe as "personal patron saint of moral complexity" and both he and Schindler are complex people that saved lots of lives. Bad people can do good things.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:53 PM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


Like, apparently, write for the New York Times.
posted by Atom Eyes at 4:55 PM on February 13, 2018 [15 favorites]


zombieflanders: "Apologies in advance to Chrysostom:

See, I was at the stupid borough council meeting.
posted by Chrysostom at 4:56 PM on February 13, 2018 [42 favorites]


I'll bet this one is the one that got her the job, given that the need for everyone to be nice to white racists and hear out their concerns is like NY Times editorial numbers 1 to a hundred these days.


And I'm putting my money on the one where McArgleBargle, commenting before the ashes are cold at Grenfall:

“It’s possible that by allowing large residential buildings to operate without sprinkler systems,” McArdle wrote, “the British government has prevented untold thousands of people from being driven into homelessness by higher housing costs.”

Because she can only imagine a world in which poor people have just two choices -- freezing to death in the cold homeless or burning alive in a fire trap tenement. Hey, it's just economics 101.

McArdle is a monster.
posted by JackFlash at 4:58 PM on February 13, 2018 [42 favorites]


Doggone it, came to post about House 72, my home district, was even going to say "Apologies to Chrysostom."

I can't tell you what a big deal this is. Margaret Good is literally a good person, I'm one-degree from her, a lot of mutual friends. And her opponent, James Buchanan (really!) just slimed her mercilessly down the stretch. Local media was no help at all; a week before the election, they did the classic "both-sides"ism story on how the two campaigns were so negative.

I wrote to the reporter, listing every piece of mail I'd gotten that week: 11 mailings from Buchanan, 8 of them negative attacks on Good. She'd sent five that week, two of them negative. (She finally -- way too late, in my cynical judgment -- rolled out some attack ads in the last few weeks.

The reporter -- I know him personally, too -- was all "Wow, isn't that surprising." I wrote him with two story tips, one outlining the insane web of Tallahassee PACs filtering money to Buchanan, and another on how the Buchanan family was dodging campaign finance limits by using 15 family businesses to route money to the campaign.

(If that name sounds familiar, there's a reason: James' dad is Vern Buchanan, the Republican congressman from this area, and is one of the 10 richest men in Congress. They were trying to set up a nice little family political dynasty here on the Gulf Coast. Also, Vern initially won his seat via a ballot design controversy, so he's illegitimate himself. but I digress...)

So the heck with them, and bless social media... earlier this week I wrote up my findings in a 1,500 word report, posted it on Facebook and people started re-posting it all over. I re-posted a short form today, and direct messaged a few dozen people urging them to vote.

In the end, this was a way healthier margin than most polling and the early voting numbers suggested, and I'm under no illusions that my screed mad a difference. But man, it's great to see this district flip, to see a little bit of karma play out and most importantly to have a good Democrat representing my town. #GoodForFlorida!
posted by martin q blank at 4:59 PM on February 13, 2018 [108 favorites]


FYI, this moves the Florida House balance to GOP control of 76-41, 3 vacancies.
posted by Chrysostom at 4:59 PM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]




Justinian: "That continues the trend where the swing from 2016 is correlated with how red the district is."

Interesting thread here from David Byler (Weekly Standard's data guy) who observes that it's both a) normally red districts and b) traditionally blue districts who swung Trump.

This would imply that Dems are benefiting from both improved turnout and at least some Obama to Trump voters returning to the fold.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:07 PM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]


Steven Spielberg made a movie based on this same premise and won seven Academy Awards. Oskar Schindler was a Nazi, too. (A Nazi spy, even.)

John Rabe helped protect about 200,000 people during the Rape of Nanking. Schindler's list had 1,200 people on it.

Norton sounds like a jerk, but she presented Rabe as "personal patron saint of moral complexity" and both he and Schindler are complex people that saved lots of lives. Bad people can do good things.


Rabe saved lives while wholeheartedly believing in and supporting Hitler, the Third Reich and Nazism. Happily supporting those who threw my family members and others into concentration camps, where they were subject to atrocities. While Schindler tried to save those he could, Rabe made a choice to support genocide.

We shouldn't compare the two. Schindler was an honorable man.
posted by zarq at 5:15 PM on February 13, 2018 [29 favorites]


ELECTION RESULT

GOP HOLD in Georgia House 175, 71-24 (two other Reps also got small vote totals). This is a Dem UNDERperformance of about 22 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:12 PM on February 13, 2018 [4 favorites]


ELECTION RESULT

GOP HOLD in Oklahoma Senate 27, 68-32. This is a Dem overperformance of about 37 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:24 PM on February 13, 2018 [8 favorites]


Re: H72. So my mom will turn 80 this year and has lived in H72 for the last couple decades. Her whole life she's been self-identified as "apolitical"-- felt like "things will just work out" Well this time, she got in touch with a friend who has recently been more involved in local politics. Got the list of D voters in her retirement community. Called every single one of them asking if they were planning on voting today and did they need a ride. Several weren't aware there was even an election today. Mom ended up driving several folks to the polls.

Folks, if you think you have no power, if you think you can't change things-- an 80 year old just moved the needle and helped flip a district. Get out there. We can do this.
posted by coffee and minarets at 6:34 PM on February 13, 2018 [124 favorites]


GOP HOLD in Oklahoma Senate 27, 68-32. This is a Dem overperformance of about 37 points compared to the 2016 presidential margin.

Erm? Dem overperformance of 27 points maybe?
posted by notyou at 6:36 PM on February 13, 2018 [2 favorites]


SPOILER ALERT: He has not been reimbursed. I will honestly never get over how cheap Trump is.
I will never get over people's continued loyalty to him. We've all had that flaky friend who forgot to bring his credit card to the bar or never has enough money to chip in on gas, but you don't mind because you've got the money and he's hilarious and kind. What the hell does Trump have to offer but betrayal, belittlement, abandonment, and constant pressure to do the worst thing possible in any given situation?
posted by xyzzy at 6:38 PM on February 13, 2018 [41 favorites]


No, I report out the margin improvement, because there was often significant third party vote in the 2016 presidential. The *margin* moved towards the Dems by 37 points. Dem vote share proper went up about 25 points.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:38 PM on February 13, 2018 [12 favorites]


Erm? Dem overperformance of 27 points maybe?

It means it went from something like 86-14 to 68-32. From 72 points to 35.
posted by Talez at 6:52 PM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


@swin24: Michael Cohen had told friends privately in the initial aftermath of the news of his role in the Stormy Daniels payment was, and I quote, “bullshit” and “fake news.” He is admitting to Maggie here that he was lying to close friends. Surprise!

I suspect we're going to have a lot of ultimately meaningless discussion (because the FEC is meaningless) over Cohen's claim that the money "was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone." DOJ went down that road in the John Edwards case.
posted by zachlipton at 6:55 PM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


It means it went from something like 86-14 to 68-32. From 72 points to 35.

Paging god hates math. god hates math to the thread, please.
posted by petebest at 6:56 PM on February 13, 2018 [3 favorites]


They must be really worried about the special congressional election here in PA, Trump is coming back to campaign for Saccone a second time next week.
posted by octothorpe at 6:57 PM on February 13, 2018 [4 favorites]


Rabe saved lives while wholeheartedly believing in and supporting Hitler, the Third Reich and Nazism. Happily supporting those who threw my family members and others into concentration camps, where they were subject to atrocities. While Schindler tried to save those he could, Rabe made a choice to support genocide.

Do you have any evidence he supported genocide? I don't see any in articles by the Atlantic, the New York Times, or Facing History, but maybe you have better sources than I do. Rabe lived in China for decades, and according to NPR, he "had never been to Hitler's Germany or seen firsthand what was going on there; even so, he didn't believe the mounting criticisms he heard about Hitler. " When he returned to Germany in 1938 he reported the Japanese atrocities to Hitler and others and was arrested by the Gestapo.
posted by kirkaracha at 7:00 PM on February 13, 2018 [2 favorites]


Donald Trump deciding what you're going to eat

I think you've identified the motivation for the USDA announcement — this new "shelf-stable food package" is going to force all SNAP recipients to eat canned government meat loaf, isn't it?

(If only someone could get it into Trump's head that benefitting from socialized medicine is a humiliation we should inflict on the undeserving poor.)
posted by mubba at 7:00 PM on February 13, 2018 [4 favorites]


ELECTIONS NEWS

** Special elections -- To summarize Dem margin improvement in this week's specials:
  • MN SD-54 +5
  • MN HD-23B +7
  • FL HD-72 +12 (Dem flip)
  • GA HD-175 -22
  • OK SD-72 +37
WP writeup on the FL HD-72 in particular, and Dem success in specials in general.

There's a Saturday special in Louisiana, then another big one for the KY House on Tuesday.

** 2018 Senate -- ND: There has been a ton of drama on the GOP side recently, but the short version is that one of the two current candidates has dropped out, and Rep Kevin Cramer may finally jump in. Cramer is probably their best bet - he has won statewide - but he's had a number of cases of foot in mouth disease, so the race would probably still lean towards incumbent Dem Heitkamp.

** Odds & ends:
-- Hillary Clinton plans to do targeted candidate support in midterms and state races where she'd be an asset.

-- "Yard signs don't vote" but they may have played a crucial role in the Doug Jones victory.

-- Nifty new site PlanScore lets you measure historical gerrymandering and score new maps (full disclosure: I helped with beta testing of the site).

-- New Morning Consult Trump approvals in all 50 states. Morning Consult tends to lean right, but the trends can be valuable. Average drop from Jan 2017 of 19 points.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:02 PM on February 13, 2018 [20 favorites]


octothorpe: "They must be really worried about the special congressional election here in PA, Trump is coming back to campaign for Saccone a second time next week."

There's a new poll dropping in the next day or so, I'm very interested to see it. We've been hearing about very close internals on both sides, fwiw.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:04 PM on February 13, 2018 [2 favorites]


What the hell does Trump have to offer but betrayal, belittlement, abandonment, and constant pressure to do the worst thing possible in any given situation?

He's a conman. That's short for confidence man, someone who gains your confidence then exploits it for personal gain. I don't get it either but his record of swindling people is long enough, he has to have some talent at persuasion among a certain type of victim.
posted by scalefree at 7:04 PM on February 13, 2018 [11 favorites]


Quinn Norton just tweeted that she lost the NYT job.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:05 PM on February 13, 2018 [64 favorites]


0/11 = 0 Scaramuccii
posted by Rust Moranis at 7:08 PM on February 13, 2018 [39 favorites]


They must be really worried about the special congressional election here in PA, Trump is coming back to campaign for Saccone a second time next week.

why do they keep sending trump out to “campaign” for these seats? he just holds a rally, barely mentions the candidate, and with his current approval rating he’s gotta be net neutral at best, if not a boat anchor.

is it just the white house trying to keep him happy and out of trouble with a rally?
posted by murphy slaw at 7:08 PM on February 13, 2018


Reading defenses of Quinn Norton (who I've never heard of) on twitter;
"Yes she called Obama a n*gg*r, other people f*gs, defends Nazis and literally has Hitler's haircut, but this is just a ridiculous witch hunt because she's a lesbian and a good leftist".

Cool, cool.
posted by bongo_x at 7:08 PM on February 13, 2018 [18 favorites]


Quinn Norton just tweeted that she lost the NYT job.

So she's too toxic, but they'll publish whatever shit John Lott manages to smear on paper.

The Nazi Yes Times, indeed.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 7:08 PM on February 13, 2018 [6 favorites]


Her tweets about losing the job justify all the things she was called out for and paint her as the victim.
posted by Mavri at 7:09 PM on February 13, 2018 [1 favorite]


Well that can be her first col... oh wait.
posted by Artw at 7:13 PM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


@quinnnorton
For those of you honestly concerned. I don't support weev, that's not given in how I define friendship. I believe white folks should engage with the racists in their life [...] and I believe all people are redeemable, and "all people" is all people.

Norton at the NYT would be sympathetic Nazi biographies every goddamned day. She will never understand that Weev would literally want her murdered as soon as she outlived her usefulness.
posted by Rust Moranis at 7:16 PM on February 13, 2018 [20 favorites]


AP, ICE lawyer in Seattle charged with stealing immigrant IDs
The chief counsel for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Seattle has been charged with stealing immigrants’ identities.

Raphael A. Sanchez, who resigned from the agency effective Monday, faces one count of aggravated identity theft and another of wire fraud in a charging document filed Monday in U.S. District Court.


Prosecutors with the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section allege that Sanchez stole the identities of seven people “in various stages of immigration proceedings” to defraud credit card companies including American Express, Bank of America and Capital One.
posted by zachlipton at 7:19 PM on February 13, 2018 [44 favorites]


Quinn Norton just tweeted that she lost the NYT job.

Call me crazy, but maybe the self-proclaimed "newspaper of record" with its ginormous research staff should take a fucking moment to Google people before hiring them. The slipshod laziness!
posted by FelliniBlank at 7:19 PM on February 13, 2018 [61 favorites]


Maybe the NYT just mistook Quinn Norton for Rob Porter, the one they really wanted on their op-ed page.
posted by oneswellfoop at 7:32 PM on February 13, 2018 [4 favorites]


Well. That didn't last long. Longer than it should have, but still.

@NYTimesPR: The following is attributable to James Bennet, editorial page editor, The New York Times: "Despite our review of Quinn Norton’s work and our conversations with her previous employers, this was new information to us. Based on it, we’ve decided to go our separate ways."
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 7:34 PM on February 13, 2018 [11 favorites]


I bet there’s a real scramble in the quasi-Nazi thinkpeice writer community to be her replacement.

Also now she has a wingnut welfare friendly tragic backstory there’ll be a scramble to sign her up in the Nazi press... first story being her feeling sorry for herself over this of course.
posted by Artw at 7:36 PM on February 13, 2018 [8 favorites]


Also now she has a wingnut welfare friendly tragic backstory there’ll be a scramble to sign her up in the Nazi press... first story being her feeling sorry for herself over this of course.

I'll never understand people being friends with people who would see them first in line at the train station to the concentration camp.
posted by Talez at 7:44 PM on February 13, 2018 [26 favorites]


BuzzFeed is going all out to prove Trump's "pee tape" is real – David Gilbert, VICE News
BuzzFeed is being sued for libel by Russian technology executive Aleksej Gubarev, who claims the website was reckless in publishing the series of memos written by Steele, paid for by the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign.
posted by xyzzy at 7:44 PM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


But then again the whole god damn neo-nazi movement makes no sense. It's like a corollary that white supremacists are always the untermensch of society.
posted by Talez at 7:47 PM on February 13, 2018


I'll never understand people being friends with people who would see them first in line at the train station to the concentration camp.

It's the Geek Social Fallacies at work. Though in this case, I'm wondering if there's also the fact that the community came out so heavily in defense of weev, only for him to wind up being a Nazi.
posted by NoxAeternum at 7:54 PM on February 13, 2018 [13 favorites]


I'm wondering if there's also the fact that the community came out so heavily in defense of weev, only for him to wind up being a Nazi.

I think that was what one would term a "whoopsie".
posted by Talez at 7:58 PM on February 13, 2018 [8 favorites]


@NYTimesPR: The following is attributable to James Bennet, editorial page editor, The New York Times: "Despite our review of Quinn Norton’s work and our conversations with her previous employers, this was new information to us. Based on it, we’ve decided to go our separate ways."

NYT, you officially do less research than the fucking Ted Cruz campaign. That's a new low bar, and you should fucking feel bad.
posted by corb at 8:10 PM on February 13, 2018 [56 favorites]


Despite our review of Quinn Norton’s work and our conversations with her previous employers, this was new information to us.

"It's not that we support Nazis. It's just that we're TERRIBLE investigative journalists."
posted by mmoncur at 8:22 PM on February 13, 2018 [76 favorites]


Do you have any evidence he supported genocide?

I read his diaries, which were published in the United States in the 1950's. Rabe was a staunch Nazi and Hitler supporter. He was the party's local head in Nanjing and a Deputy Group Leader. He represented Germany during the Rape of Nanjing. His diary notes his devotion to the Fuhrer and Nazi ideals.

None of this is in question.

It's important to remember that the Nazis didn't simply appear from thin air in Germany. They were literally the end product of decades of antisemitism and laws against Jews, starting in the late 1800's. Around 15 years prior to the start of the Holocaust, newspapers were agitating for boycotts of Jewish businesses, which resulted in the Aryanization of many. Jews, communists and socialists were being shipped to concentration camps by then-Chancellor Hitler as early as 1933. The German government passed The Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service the same year. Once 1934 hit, Jews were banned from serving in the German military. In 1935, the Nuremberg Laws were passed. They deprived Jews of German citizenship and the right to vote, prohibited Jewish households from having German maids under the age of 45, prohibited any non-Jewish German from marrying a Jew and outlawed sexual relations between Jews and Germans. In 1935 and '36, Jews were banned by law from parks, restaurants and swimming pools. We were no longer allowed to use electrical/optical equipment, bicycles, typewriters or records. Their passports were restricted. Many Jewish students were removed from German schools and universities. Here's a timeline.

Any and every member of the Nazi party would have been indoctrinated to their Party's ideologies. They would publicly espouse these views. And even expat Germans living abroad would have been informed by their news outlets and the government of these major changes in their country. Especially if they were high-ranking members of the Nazi party. It is willfully ignorant to argue otherwise.

This is what supporting the Nazi party during WWII meant. It wasn't a kindly political organization. It was an extreme right wing Nationalist party that was elected to power (and maintained said power) through racism, antisemitism and bigotry, all wrapped up in an aggressively nationalist message and speeches by its leader that said Germans were destined to conquer and inherit the world. And heaven help anyone who stood in the way of Lebensraum for the Reich.

For a man who vocally embraced Naziism and never renounced his Fuhrer even after returning to the Fatherland, the excuse that he "didn't see atrocities firsthand and didn't believe what was happening" isn't quite morally equivalent to "he was only following orders," but it's close enough for me. The excuse that Germans didn't know of the atrocities their countrymen were committing (and in Rabe's case, that his own Nazi Party was committing,) is just that, an excuse. They knew. It was well-publicized. By contrast, Oskar Schindler played a small part in undermining the Nazi war effort. Schindler tried to protect the Jews who worked for him (and whom he kept employed to maintain that protection.) He renounced Naziism through his actions against the party.
posted by zarq at 8:23 PM on February 13, 2018 [73 favorites]


I'll just disagree with the idea that it's flat out impossible to create a variety of food offerings that could be valuable to all citizens.

It's flat-out impossible to create a standardized set of food offerings that are nutritionally valuable to all aid-eligible families in the US. It wouldn't be impossible to create a selection, and let people choose - but you can bet they're not talking about setting a dollar amount and letting people decide whether to buy meat or veggies with it. They already have that, and they want to replace it with "here's your box of food for the month."

Nevermind if some families are vegan; it'll have meat products. Nevermind if some are gluten intolerant, or would literally die if they eat peanuts - it'll include peanut butter and bread. (Or maybe crackers, since it's supposed to last a month: A pack of saltines instead of bread for sandwiches.) Nevermind if there are religious restrictions - poor people don't get the luxury of following their religion's dietary requirements; besides, we all know that only weirdo religions have food limitations.

And of course, we can just hand food to families and expect the kids to eat it, whatever it is, right? Kids don't have food preferences that would impact their health or education if not met. If they're poor, they'll eat whatever's on the plate-- it's not like their grades will drop if they don't get the foods that (1) are healthy for them and (2) don't make them gag.

"Official Gov't Food" has been tried before; it's always been horrible.

(I've been told that the blocks of American cheese made passable candles, though.)
posted by ErisLordFreedom at 8:25 PM on February 13, 2018 [36 favorites]


I quite liked the government cheese we used to get back in the 80s. I think it would make a grilled cheese superior to that of any of the fancy cheeses currently in the fridge.
posted by salix at 8:34 PM on February 13, 2018 [16 favorites]


I've been side-eyeing the NYT since the run-up to the Iraq war but lately it feels like they've been hitting new lows.
posted by maggiemaggie at 8:37 PM on February 13, 2018 [7 favorites]


mmoncur: "It's just that we're TERRIBLE investigative journalists.""

It's pretty unlikely the HR department is stocked with investigative journalists.
posted by Mitheral at 8:41 PM on February 13, 2018 [5 favorites]


The Feldgrau Lady
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:42 PM on February 13, 2018 [2 favorites]


I think it would make a grilled cheese superior to that of any of the fancy cheeses currently in the fridge.

Processed Cheese/Cheese Food products are quite literally engineered to be superior melting products to natural cheeses, among other things. You're not wrong.
posted by bonehead at 8:45 PM on February 13, 2018 [12 favorites]


It's pretty unlikely the HR department is stocked with investigative journalists.

You don't get a column on the NYT opinion page just by sending in a resume to HR, someone in the executive newsroom had the affirmative thought "we're not putting out enough pro-Trump/alt-Right/Neo-Nazi voices on the opinion page, who haven't we called yet?" Adding a columnist is an editorial decision, and yes, the paper's leadership should know enough to run a cursory google search, or like, read anything she ever wrote. Except that's why they decided to hire her in the first place isn't it? They wanted subtle endorsement of creeping Nazism, they're only backing out because they missed Norton was loudly pro-Actual Nazis.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:49 PM on February 13, 2018 [43 favorites]


"Many people are concerned that you are so quick to defend your friends and allies--alleged perpetrators of physical assault and sexual misconduct--because you yourself have been accused by multiple women and that you're just priming your base for when the time inevitably comes that you are finally brought to justice. Is that true?"

Randy Rainbow, "Stand By Your Man"
posted by kirkaracha at 8:55 PM on February 13, 2018 [6 favorites]


I’m not defending the NYT, but she seems to be respected by many people in tech-adjacent fields, including some prominent Mefites. I think this raises big, gross questions about what is and isn’t tolerated in that world, but I don’t think she was hired just because she enjoys palling around with Nazis.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 8:58 PM on February 13, 2018 [8 favorites]


I've been side-eyeing the NYT since the run-up to the Iraq war

You were a little late to the party. The New York Times was on the forefront of the war on Clinton going back to 1992, followed by the war on Gore in 2000, which led of course to the election of Bush and the war on Iraq. The New York Times has been garbage for a very long time.
posted by JackFlash at 9:13 PM on February 13, 2018 [18 favorites]


Norton suggested in her Patreon post about being hired that she was courted because of being "edgy" and "provocative" --
I'm as surprised as you are. The Times approached me in January with the idea, and I gently shot it down. . . . Also, I tried to imply, strongly, I'm kind of weird. As I interviewed with Katie, then James, they made it clear that they weren't going to get put off by a little weird. As for how weird, well that's for them to discover.
I guess they discovered it.
posted by FelliniBlank at 9:16 PM on February 13, 2018 [24 favorites]


I’m not defending the NYT, but she seems to be respected by many people in tech-adjacent fields, including some prominent Mefites. I think this raises big, gross questions about what is and isn’t tolerated in that world, but I don’t think she was hired just because she enjoys palling around with Nazis.

Obligatory They Might Be Giants.
posted by Catblack at 9:33 PM on February 13, 2018 [14 favorites]


she was courted because of being "edgy" and "provocative" --

"edgy" and "provocative" these days means they were targeting the rightwing shitlord demo. They knew exactly what they were doing.
posted by T.D. Strange at 9:35 PM on February 13, 2018 [50 favorites]


I just... don't think any of this matters. They lie and lie and do all sorts of terrible things and none of it matters? I know the "nothing matters" thing is a joke but I honestly don't know how to deal with a regime (and a party, really) where nothing matters except power and there is no reality except what they claim it is. And that strategy works for better than 40% of the electorate.

I understand your feelings, Justinian, I do. But here's the thing: As you know very well, we can win without those people. We are, in fact, winning. coffee and minarets' soon-to-be 80-year-old mom got out the vote yesterday. For the first time ever in her life, that mom got involved.

Periodic despair is completely reasonable in the face of the things we learn every day. But that's a good reason to take a break when we need to, treat ourselves well, and then come back renewed for the fight. I don't know if Theodore Roosevelt really said, "Do what you can, with what you have, where you are." I think it is good advice all the same. And I greatly appreciate all that you bring to this thread, Justinian, as well as the overworked moderators plus a zillion other people I'm not going to name for length reasons.

And thank you to all the MeFites and their families and friends who are doing the best they can in the dull, daily grind of trying to save our democracy one election at a time via one postcard at a time, one ride to the polls at a time, one text message at a time. This shit is tedious. Both important and dull. That makes it hard work. I have so much respect, love, and awe for those who continue to do what they can, with what they have, where they are. As I have recently relocated, I have to recalibrate what that means for me. In the meantime, please give your mom my best, coffee and minarets. She clearly kicks ass.
posted by Bella Donna at 9:54 PM on February 13, 2018 [69 favorites]


Donald Trump's Valentine's Day Card To Melania Trump
According to Colbert.
posted by kirkaracha at 10:38 PM on February 13, 2018 [2 favorites]


Why do Italian fascists adore Syria's Bashar al-Assad?

Interesting Al-Jazeera article on the fondness of far right movements in Europe and the US for the Syrian Authorities.
posted by stonepharisee at 1:54 AM on February 14, 2018


Am I the only person who didn't know that Quinn Norton is a garbage-Nazi? Because that seems like the worst Milkshake Duck ever.

And what's with Laurie Penny supporting her? Between this and her friendship with Yiannopoulos, she's like a one-woman Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.
posted by acb at 2:22 AM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


Am I the only person who didn't know that Quinn Norton is a garbage-Nazi? Because that seems like the worst Milkshake Duck ever.

Well, take me as someone who would have assumed she's OK. I'm predisposed to think that attacks on women in tech are false or exaggerated, because they so often are. I don't follow any of these people closely so there were only a few things (e.g., her friendship with Weev-the-Nazi) that made me raise my eyebrows. But given that I had already assumed she was cool, I was ready to ascribe that to a quirk or my misunderstanding. It's only now that the pieces have been put together for me that I can see she's ... superficial? in it for the lulz? a proto-Nazi? I think lots of people were basically like that; we never had occasion or a reason to put the pieces together.
posted by Joe in Australia at 2:51 AM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


Why do Italian fascists adore Syria's Bashar al-Assad?

Because the Ba'ath party is facist? I mean in theory it's build on 'Arab socialism' but in practice that just means the government looks out for "us" and does not care about "them"?
posted by PenDevil at 3:23 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


Mod note: At this point, if the Quinn Norton thing needs more discussion it should probably get its own post, since it's sucking up a lot of air here and not really direct Trump/WH news.
posted by taz (staff) at 3:25 AM on February 14, 2018 [10 favorites]


Corker Reconsiders Retirement, but He Must Win Over Trump to Do It

They must be really worried about Phil Bredesen. Corker unretiring and begging Trump to save his seat would surely be the end of the NeverTrump farce it was always destined for.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:44 AM on February 14, 2018 [9 favorites]


With regard to support for Assad from weird places - from people aligned with the far-right and, unfortunately in some cases, the far-left - this op-ed from the founder of Bellingcat is a a worthwhile read: What is the truth on chemical attacks on Syrian civilians?

Yes, it is Newsweek, but Higgins directly calls out Newsweek for supporting the denialist trend.
posted by faineg at 5:26 AM on February 14, 2018 [1 favorite]


I know it’s been said about this (and many other of Trump’s transgressions / violations / crimes etc.), but can we take one moment to acknowledge what would’ve happened if, one year into President Obama’s first term, it was revealed that Obama’s attorney paid a porn star hush money the week before the 2008 election?

I can actually hear the indignant screams for impeachment (and worse) coming from that alternate timeline.

Meanwhile, back here in the dumbest possible timeline, it’s barely a blip of a blip of a blip. It can be so maddening.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 6:05 AM on February 14, 2018 [51 favorites]


Why do Italian fascists adore Syria's Bashar al-Assad?

I would have thought “they are both backed by Russia” would be the simplest and most obvious answer.
posted by Artw at 6:11 AM on February 14, 2018 [12 favorites]


The brazen hypocrisy is the part of this timeline that gnaws at me the most. It's gaslighting on a national - even international! - scale.

If Obama's lawyer had paid a porn star hush money to cover up an affair right before the election Republicans wouldn't have screamed for impeachment. They would have stormed the fucking White House.

Now it's just a regular Wednesday, with all the attendant silence and occasional shrugs. It is literally undermining my sense of reality.
posted by lydhre at 6:12 AM on February 14, 2018 [75 favorites]


Blue-Apron-style replacement for SNAP is a marvelous idea (Alexandra Petri, WaPo)
Some people have raised objections to the concept proposed by Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney of replacing SNAP with a “Blue Apron-style” shipment of nonperishables. They point out that this is really nothing like Blue Apron, which sends perishables to families that choose to eat them every week. They say that this untested, difficult-to-scale approach is an insult on par with forcing people to pedal for hours on a stationary bike in order to receive housing assistance and calling this a “Soul Cycle-style opportunity.”

But what do they know? Answer: not better than I, a corn baron, who has never known poverty or sadness except, once, the sadness of not having a bill small enough that a vending machine would accept it. I also once read a Dickens novel.

They should have been born with wealth, as I was (the spoon in my infant mouth was GOLD), and the dim sense that anyone struggling is doing so just to have a compelling narrative about adversity to put on their college application and take away poor Junior’s slot at Penn. Or that anyone who requires government assistance is doing this just for fun and recreation — they get a keen thrill from the judgment and the paperwork. Clearly, these people are insufficiently motivated to have been born to scions of wealth, and therefore we must replace their safety HAMMOCK with a fire.

Indeed, this program does not go far enough. Why stop at taking away people’s (already constricted) ability to choose food that suits their families? Why not mandate Stitch Fix-style deliveries of sackcloth and ashes so that we may know that these people are truly humbled? Why not insist that if you have smiled even once in your life, you should be ineligible for any assistance?
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 6:12 AM on February 14, 2018 [47 favorites]


And speaking of Italian fascists. I am a dual citizen so I vote both in the US (as a resident) and in Italy (as an expat). I just got a vile letter (in English!) in the mail from the racist, xenophobic, fascist fucking party telling me to vote for them and by god they couldn't have missed their target audience more. Fuck their brazen evil. They love Assad because Assad is a dictator and Putin is a dictator and in their most intimate hopes and dreams they want to be dictators too.

In Italy, a literal Nazi (with the tattoos and all) shot up a group of immigrants last week. The mainstream fascists are already justifying it because "Italians are right to be frustrated". This is where we are. Where we're heading is even scarier.
posted by lydhre at 6:20 AM on February 14, 2018 [27 favorites]


Daniel Dale (Twitter) Wherein Scott Pruitt claims that he wastes taxpayer money on first-class flights because if he sits in coach, people tell him he's a terrible environment-destroying dick:
There have been instances, unfortunately, as I’ve flown and have spent time, of interaction that’s not been the best.
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:28 AM on February 14, 2018 [67 favorites]


There’s no way Michael Cohen paid Stormy Daniels out-of-pocket. He’s made up that stupid story to cover up for something stupider and more damaging.
posted by chrchr at 7:01 AM on February 14, 2018 [37 favorites]


Of course he paid Stormy Daniels out of pocket. And then, by a total coincidence, he just happened to get $130,000 from Trump for **TOTALLY UNRELATED SERVICES**.
posted by sotonohito at 7:02 AM on February 14, 2018 [15 favorites]


Well he basically said it, didn't he? When a Trumpist says "we didn't use campaign money", that's exactly what they did.
posted by mumimor at 7:04 AM on February 14, 2018 [11 favorites]


White House reels as FBI director contradicts official claims about alleged abuser
When asked if Kelly could have been more transparent or truthful, that [White House aide] wrote: “In this White House, it’s simply not in our DNA. Truthful and transparent is great, but we don’t even have a coherent strategy to obfuscate.”
posted by kirkaracha at 7:11 AM on February 14, 2018 [39 favorites]


Of course he paid Stormy Daniels out of pocket. And then, by a total coincidence, he just happened to get $130,000 from Trump for **TOTALLY UNRELATED SERVICES**.

I find it hard to believe that Trump would pay 100% of any invoice.
posted by ZeusHumms at 7:11 AM on February 14, 2018 [14 favorites]


"...how vulnerable to blackmail is the President?"

To be successfully blackmailed, he would have to feel shame or have something to lose from being exposed. But none of these scandals seem to matter.
posted by Jacqueline at 7:12 AM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


Yeah, but that was back when he was still trying to get elected. Now that he's in office, it seems like there's nothing that could be bad enough for him to resign or for Republicans to support impeaching him. They'll all just call it "fake news" and proceed as if it never happened.
posted by Jacqueline at 7:19 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


Let's pretend for a minute that replacing food stamps with boxes of food isn't about treating poverty as a moral failing that proves poor people can't be trusted with simple decisions. Let's pretend that removing the millions of people on public food assistance from the retail food economy won't be destructive to market forces. Let's further pretend that poor people will somehow be able to get proper nutrition from boxed junk sent in the mail.

Okay.

The only thing necessary to think it will work now is faith that this will all be enacted with a thorough, cogent plan without fuckery by the Trump administration. We just need a successful, fair, corruption-free plan from people with a history of incompetency, bankruptcy, fraud, and double dealing.

I know. I know. I KNOW.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:20 AM on February 14, 2018 [20 favorites]


Luckily once you go full Manchurian candidate blackmail isn't a problem.
posted by benzenedream at 7:22 AM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


the punchline has to be that trump has some sort of backroom deal with Soylent Bro.
posted by murphy slaw at 7:22 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


I think the profoundly misogynist malignant narcissist who views the world as a bleak dominance hierarchy would do pretty much anything to prevent evidence of his own unmanning from being made public

Trump’s razor tells us it wouldn’t even be something a sane person not in thrall to the primitive emotional bonds that make Trump into the monster he is would even recognize as damaging

Literally just bad lighting
His paunch
An inability to perform

His definition of obscene or shameful is so fucking warped we might not recognize the thing that shames him as being obscene or shameful

But his fucking base will.
posted by schadenfrau at 7:24 AM on February 14, 2018 [17 favorites]


Well then let's hope Buzzfeed acquires and publishes the pee tape.
posted by Jacqueline at 7:32 AM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Actually, the best hope for defeating this dumb boxes of food plan may be lobbying pressure from food manufacturers and groceries. Because you can bet your ass, Kroger and Safeway aren't interested in closing a bunch of stores because some GOP knucklehead wants to remove all of their WIC card customers from their shopping ranks.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:40 AM on February 14, 2018 [19 favorites]


White House reels as FBI director contradicts official claims about alleged abuser

Or as NPR put it this morning, "appears to contradict." Feh.

Speaking of contradiction, on Michael Cohen's story, he is now apparently on the record as having denied paying Daniels off and admitting he did so. One of those two stories is a lie. Journalists would do well to remember Cohen is an admitted liar the next time their "access" nets them a juicy quote.
posted by Gelatin at 7:40 AM on February 14, 2018 [6 favorites]


House oversight looks into Porter

I assume they'll subpoena Obama staffers and Clinton campaign correspondence.
posted by orange ball at 7:42 AM on February 14, 2018 [44 favorites]


I would have thought “they are both backed by Russia” would be the simplest and most obvious answer.

Yeah, pro-Assad talking points among people who have no reason to be pro-Assad... That's what strikes me as the clearest proof that Russian influence is really A Thing.

The other day I had the most frustrating argument in a Bernie Sanders oriented Facebook group. A couple of people were claiming that the war in Syria was just another American war for oil, like Iraq, engineered by the Project for A New American Century. (Of whom they thought Obama was just another tool.) They posted pictures of proposed pipeline route through Syria and claimed we were "training terrorists against Assad" in order to ensure control of territory for a pipeline.

I was like.... This is Putin's colonialist war against brown people. Not ours. Putin is the one who cares desperately about pipeline routes through Syria. How many American soldiers do you know who served two tours in Syria, as opposed to Afghanistan and Iraq? Obama kept us almost entirely out of this damn war. Even when Assad used chemical weapons, crossing Obama's "red line." Even when floods of refugees started destabilizing European democracies. Even though Assad was running death camps. Even though Obama really believed that America is safer and fewer wars happen when there are more democracies in the world, and wanted very much to support the Arab Spring democracy movement which started the uprising against Assad... Still Obama said (and I would have said the same) "we can't get involved in any more middle eastern wars. This could too easily escalate into a clash of world powers, if Russia, Iran, and the US all end up with troops on the ground on opposite sides." And we stayed out. We were focused on the Iran nuclear deal, and didn't want to antagonize Iran by tangling with Assad. and The only troops we sent were there to fight ISIS (who wanted to depose Assad but were not interested in replacing him with a democratic government), which put our troops on the same side as Assad and Russia!

I typed out a whole capsule history of the Syrian civil war, explaining that it had about as much to do with securing American oil supplies as Vietnam did. That we (now an oil-exporting nation) were barely involved at all, but to the extent that we were supplying arms or training, it was based on some kind of "domino theory" logic of wanting to see more democracies, rather than Russian and Iranian allied dictatorships, in the middle east.

And for all that typing, what did I get? Paraphrased: "Why do you just want to talk about Russia and not American imperialism?"

I said "Yeah, we can be bad guys sometimes. That doesn't mean we are the only bad guys or that we are always the bad guy."

"Anybody who criticizes American militarism is called Russian troll these days."

"It never occurred to you that maybe Russian propaganda really would blame America for Russian imperialism?"

It's eerie. American media doesn't really discuss Syria at all. So people don't have any preconceived notions. I think that makes it awfully easy for the Russian narrative to get a foothold, and it is perfectly tailored to play to the cynicism the Iraq war left us with.

Even on MeFi there were people saying, last time Assad used chemical weapons, that "maybe the rebels did it." Which was, of course, exactly the line Russia was pushing. It's almost spooky, the way they seem to be able to repeat their talking points without having any idea that's what they are doing. And in the case of Assad, it's really hard to see where else people could be getting those alternative facts.
posted by OnceUponATime at 7:44 AM on February 14, 2018 [54 favorites]


Kroger and Safeway aren't interested in closing a bunch of stores because some GOP knucklehead wants to remove all of their WIC card customers from their shopping ranks.

Which, of course, opens the door to an argument Democrats routinely fail to make -- food stamp recipients spend that money locally, which creates jobs at least as demonstrably, and probably more so, than giving the wealthy a tax cut does.

The flip side to pointing out that supply side economics doesn't work is asserting that demand side economics do bring prosperity to ordinary Americans.
posted by Gelatin at 7:45 AM on February 14, 2018 [36 favorites]


"...lobbying pressure from food manufacturers and groceries."

Why would they lobby against it when there's more money to be made in winning the sweet government contracts to become the monopoly suppliers and distributors of food aid?

I saw this ad on TV yesterday and realized "So that's who will be delivering the America's Harvest Boxes."
posted by Jacqueline at 7:46 AM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


[At this point, if the Quinn Norton thing needs more discussion it should probably get its own post, since it's sucking up a lot of air here and not really direct Trump/WH news.]

Here you go.

posted by NoxAeternum at 7:50 AM on February 14, 2018 [6 favorites]


I am learning from ongoing Facebook discussions about this that there are many people who think we need to have a serious conversation about how it might not be worth it to feed starving people if a few people get too much or get things they didn't deserve. This is not a view of morality I can relate to or understand.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:55 AM on February 14, 2018 [35 favorites]


Gillibrand signing on as co-sponsor to Booker's pot legalization bill.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:59 AM on February 14, 2018 [25 favorites]


Of course things move too fast to keep up with in OmnishamblesGate, but even in this firehose torrent of flaming garbage, I have to pause and consider this:

Trump (apparently, possibly) stiffed his lawyer after the lawyer paid off the porn star he was having an affair with. And - FSM help us - this is Trump's defense against charges of campaign finance violation.

Bravo!

(WaPo: Longtime Trump attorney says he made $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels with his money. In his statement, Cohen [who has called himself the “fix-it guy” for Trump] did not say why he made a payment to Daniels or whether Trump reimbursed him or knew about the payment. He did not respond to follow-up questions about these topics.)
posted by RedOrGreen at 8:03 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


Isn't saying "No no, my client didn't pay off that person he had an affair with. I, his attorney, paid off that person he had an affair with." basically admitting that he had an affair with her?

Regardless of whether or not Trump paid it. Ignoring the money path (i know I know, that IS important) isn't this admitting that it happened?
posted by Twain Device at 8:12 AM on February 14, 2018 [6 favorites]


There really is a fairly large group of Americans who believe it's better that ten innocent people starve than one undeserving poor eat a steak.

I don't know how to deal with such people. It's largely rooted in racism, the mythic welfare queen never even had to be explicitly described as black, in America "welfare" and "black" are intractably linked, despite the fact that white people are the majority of welfare recipients and always have been.

Hell, don't forget that John Kasich rewrote how Ohio handled food stamps so that black people would be cut off while allowing white people to stay on. It wasn't explicitly racist, he put in restrictions on food stamps then put in loopholes for people living in rural areas that didn't apply to people in urban areas, but the intent was racially based and the white poor in Ohio certainly recognized it for what it was and approved strongly of it.

White people are inherently deserving. Black people are inherently undeserving. But for the Republicans, and even a lot of poor white people who desperately need government assistance, it's better that even the deserving white people starve as long as it keeps those inherently undeserving black people from getting help.

Over and over we see that most of the problems are rooted in racism. Like Chris Rock said, there's no such thing as race relations. White people used to be crazy, now they're not quite so crazy.

But many/most white people are still sufficiently crazy that they will gladly hurt themselves on the promise that a black person gets hurt more.
posted by sotonohito at 8:15 AM on February 14, 2018 [68 favorites]


It's eerie. American media doesn't really discuss Syria at all. So people don't have any preconceived notions. I think that makes it awfully easy for the Russian narrative to get a foothold, and it is perfectly tailored to play to the cynicism the Iraq war left us with.

I read a couple of articles about "red-brown" alliances (eg, fascist/far-left) - which involve a tiny minority of leftists! not typical! - which advanced the idea that because the US left has no developed ties in much of the Middle East or Eastern Europe (unlike, eg, Mexico or South America where there are lots of connections), people have no internal way to fact-check (you can't just say "the Teachers' Union is a known quantity and they say [X] about the situation, as one would if one were considering, eg, Oaxacan protests). And so people readily fall victim to right nationalists pretending to be anti-imperialists.

It's also this damnable side-choosing mentality - if you don't like Washington, Moscow must be A-OK, and if you don't like Moscow, you must support the US - as if the only way to understand the world is picking which empire are the good guys and cheering them on.

But honestly stanning for a powerful male leader even though you're on the left isn't new, either. Certain people like Putin because they like the idea of a tough guy standing up to the US, just like certain people have always liked extremely dubious leaders. I used to know a couple of leftists who were huge fans of Saddam Hussein on the theory that any counterweight to the US was a good counterweight.

Humans don't learn, considered as a species.
posted by Frowner at 8:15 AM on February 14, 2018 [19 favorites]


Wouldn't making a hush payment on behalf of one's client be the sort of thing that isn't covered by client-lawyer confidentiality? Or is it not a crime to pay someone not to disclose a crime? (Not that sex work should necessarily be illegal, but as the law stands now it is....)
posted by tivalasvegas at 8:16 AM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


In circular firing squad news, democrats in STL elected a progressive alderwoman who ran as an independent after not getting the democratic nomination. The St Louis Democratic Party is pitching a tanty and trying to codify candidate shaming into their by-laws.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 8:17 AM on February 14, 2018 [12 favorites]


Isn't saying "No no, my client didn't pay off that person he had an affair with. I, his attorney, paid off that person he had an affair with." basically admitting that he had an affair with her?

Naw. It is the appearance of an affair that matters, not who put what where. So you pay her off if she can make you look bad whether you slept with her or not.
posted by Bovine Love at 8:18 AM on February 14, 2018


I doubt Cohen made the payment, it smells of a lie to cover up another lie. My money is on the money coming from some oligarch's Cypriot bank account.
posted by localhuman at 8:18 AM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


The broader point, though, is that this is the one story we know about: we don't know what other stories might still be buried -- which is why the cover-up is itself concerning.

I apologize for the rawness of my response, but there's no other way to say this.

The preponderance of evidence shows that Donald J. Trump raped a 13 year old girl in 1994.

This is not a showstopper to anyone still a member of the GOP.

Period.

It doesn't matter what else can come out. The GOP doesn't give a damn what their Chosen Ones do.
posted by mikelieman at 8:20 AM on February 14, 2018 [50 favorites]


That's the hilarious thing. Trump's lawyer wasted his money and risked jail for nothing. Trump would have been elected anyway.

Well, hilarious in a horrifying despair sort of way
posted by dirigibleman at 8:26 AM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


I read a couple of articles about "red-brown" alliances (eg, fascist/far-left)

Any leftists interested in the "Red-Brown Alliance" experience: take a walk into the woods, pretend to be forced to dig your own grave, and pretend to be shot in the neck. How does the revolution feel?

These people are malignantly useless.
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:29 AM on February 14, 2018 [24 favorites]


The best people, etc etc. This makes Trump administration member number five under investigation for improper travel expenses, according to the article.

Veterans Affairs chief Shulkin, staff misled ethics officials about European trip, report finds
posted by marshmallow peep at 8:34 AM on February 14, 2018 [17 favorites]


I am putting this quote here, because of the ending clincher. One of the best circumnavigations of Americana in a while.

"Today, EPA’s Pruitt blamed his 1st-class air tickets on staff. Hannity blamed his nutjob sperm/sexually innuendo/portrait post on staff. The White House blamed the Porter crisis on staff. “The buck stops here”now only applies to real money."
posted by Oyéah at 8:34 AM on February 14, 2018 [26 favorites]


Oh my god replacing SNAP with commodity boxes? They're treating poor people like Natives now. The obesity epidemic is only going to get worse when everyone gets fucking commod bod.

Is Trump going to give out smallpox blankets to the homeless next?
posted by elsietheeel at 8:36 AM on February 14, 2018 [21 favorites]


I find it hard to believe that Trump would pay 100% of any invoice.

Can confirm, quite apart from Trump's history. In my previous life providing land use economics consulting services, we charged the BSD-style (big swinging dick) developers about 30 percent more per hour than the government or non-profit clients because:
a) as a group, they tended to stiff us in part or in whole, especially if they didn't like the findings;
b) if they didn't like the findings, e.g., that their project idea wasn't feasible or that other projects further down the pipeline would capture the same slice of market demand first, salvaging the fee meant doing a bunch of other analyses for free to find an idea that would work, and;
c) many were just unpleasant to be around.

Some of them also liked paying more as a form of showing off.
posted by carmicha at 8:37 AM on February 14, 2018 [15 favorites]


mikelieman: "
The preponderance of evidence shows that Donald J. Trump raped a 13 year old girl in 1994.
"

Wait, What? Details at least enough to google?
posted by Mitheral at 8:38 AM on February 14, 2018 [1 favorite]


"Details at least enough to google?"

Google: Donald J. Trump raped a 13 year old girl in 1994
posted by Jacqueline at 8:40 AM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]






This makes Trump administration member number five under investigation for improper travel expenses

Trump said he'd run government like a business. So far that's the only campaign promise he's kept.

(Adding to the long, long list of frames Democrats seem shy of using, they need to push back on the implication that business == good and government == bad. Businesses extract value for the owners; government should be for everyone. The Republican scam is to turn government into another mechanism to transfer wealth upwards. And ironically, one of the key conservative critiques of government is called The Road to Serfdom.)
posted by Gelatin at 8:44 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


Russia Sees Midterm Elections as Chance to Sow Fresh Discord, Intelligence Chiefs Warn

Furthermore: Trump’s Top Intelligence Officials Contradict Him on Russian Meddling (Atlantic)
“There should be no doubt that Russia perceives its past efforts as successful and views the 2018 U.S. midterm elections as a potential target for Russian influence operations,” Dan Coats, the Director of National Intelligence, said during the Senate Intelligence Committee’s annual worldwide-threats hearing on Tuesday.

“We have seen Russian activity and intentions to have an impact on the next election cycle,” CIA Director Mike Pompeo said later. Other top intelligence officials, including the FBI Director Chris Wray, agreed.

The director of the National Security Agency, Mike Rogers, emphasized that steps should be taken “to ensure the American people that their vote is sanctioned and not manipulated in any way,” and Coats advocated for as much transparency as possible.

“We need to inform the American public that this is real … and that we are not going to allow some Russian to tell us how we’re going to vote,” Coats said. “There needs to be a national cry for that.”
And: Trump Still Unconvinced Russia Meddled in 2016 Election (CNN)
Tuesday's hearing was the latest opportunity for Democrats to pounce on the conflicting messages coming from the intelligence chiefs and their commander in chief. Maine Sen. Angus King, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, urged the intelligence officials to convince Trump that the issue of collusion was separate from election meddling.

"I understand the President's sensitivity about whether his campaign was in connections with the Russians, and that's a separate question. But there is no question -- we've got before us the entire intelligence community, that the Russians interfered in the election in 2016 -- they're continuing to do it, and they're a real imminent threat to our elections in a matter of eight or nine months," King said.

"My problem is I talk to people in Maine who say the whole thing is a witch hunt and a hoax because 'the President told me'," he added.

Sen. Jack Reed, a Rhode Island Democrat, asked whether the steps the intelligence community was taking to counteract Russia's election interference efforts had been directed by Trump.

"Not specifically directed by the President," Wray said.
Lastly, on MSNBC’s “The Beat with Ari Melber” former CIA analyst Ned Price said, “We have heard that President Trump has personally himself done absolutely nothing to help our national security establishment and infrastructure stop the next round of Russian meddling. That should be hugely troubling to all of us. Both what he has done and has not done are very clear signals to Moscow — a clear signal that they have the green light to continue.”
posted by Doktor Zed at 8:46 AM on February 14, 2018 [28 favorites]


Frankly, the Democrats should be all, "Since Republicans seem to have decided that fascism isn't so bad after all, maybe it's time we gave socialism another look."
posted by Gelatin at 8:46 AM on February 14, 2018 [18 favorites]


In the greater scheme of things, this is just a tiny little thing, but ... The White House's infrastructure page uses as an example of Obamastructure the problems of rebuilding the Anderson Bridge over the Charles River between Allston and Harvard Square. Only problem is the photo they posted is of the Weeks Footbridge, a completely different and much smaller bridge (it's just for pedestrians, as you might guess from its name). Via.

As to why the bridge has taken forever to rebuild, well, let Larry Summers (yes, that Larry Summers) explain. In fact, Massachusetts now has an accelerated bridge replacement program that seems to work very well on bridges with no historical significance where pedestrian access and hidden water mains are not issues.
posted by adamg at 8:47 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


One aspect of the SNAP-to-Box-of-Corn-Syrup budget proposal that people aren't really discussing is that though the fantasy description includes "fruits and vegetables," the boxes are also supposed to be nonperishable. Which means no fresh produce at all.

I'm dumbfounded that elected Democrats aren't standing on literal soapboaxes shouting "TRUMP AND THE GOP WANT TO TAKE ALL VEGETABLES AWAY FROM THE POOR" but I guess even establishment Dems don't give one fuck if every low-income kid in the country dies of diabetes or colon cancer or a heart attack at 40.
posted by Rust Moranis at 8:48 AM on February 14, 2018 [24 favorites]


Oh my god replacing SNAP with commodity boxes?

Obviously it's a terrible idea and should be treated as such, but given that 1) Congress passed -- and the President signed -- a two year spending bill last week that covers the same FY 2019 this budget proposal covers; 2) budget proposals from the President are, as OMB chief Mick Mulvaney noted "vision documents" and so the line items contained therein shouldn't be taken as certainties; and 3) this is a terrible idea that everyone hates, it seems unlikely we'll ever actually enact this commodity box program.
posted by notyou at 8:54 AM on February 14, 2018 [20 favorites]


SNAP boxes are going to be far more expensive bureaucratically than what is currently in place (delivery? please. boxing up thousands of boxes rather than letting someone go to the store with their coupons?) It is expressly meant to humiliate people in a situation where they are economically disadvantaged. It is cruel and inhuman treatment.
posted by Sophie1 at 9:08 AM on February 14, 2018 [37 favorites]


I'm dumbfounded that elected Democrats aren't standing on literal soapboaxes shouting "TRUMP AND THE GOP WANT TO TAKE ALL VEGETABLES AWAY FROM THE POOR"

The boxes aren't replacing SNAP entirely. There will be money left for people to buy fresh meat, vegetables and other essentials. How much remains to be seen, though since the proposal also includes a 30% cut.

It also apparently will include canned vegetables, so "take all vegetables away from the poor" wouldn't be accurate.

The plan is rife with idiocy and shitty morality assumptions about the poor, who are (in true Conservative form) being portrayed as people who can't be trusted with government money or to even take care of themselves.

The numbers also don't add up, but it's not like the government has ever given a shit about that.
posted by zarq at 9:22 AM on February 14, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'm dumbfounded that elected Democrats aren't standing on literal soapboaxes shouting "TRUMP AND THE GOP WANT TO TAKE ALL VEGETABLES AWAY FROM THE POOR" but I guess even establishment Dems don't give one fuck if every low-income kid in the country dies of diabetes or colon cancer or a heart attack at 40.

Do you honestly think this, or are you indulging in hyperbole because it's just irresistible to take a terrible Trumpian idea as a jumping-off-point for slagging on "establishment Dems"? I think there might be a bit of a difference between "they should condemn this more quicky/loudly" and "obviously it's because they don't care if kids die".
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 9:24 AM on February 14, 2018 [22 favorites]


And since

but given that 1) Congress passed -- and the President signed -- a two year spending bill last week that covers the same FY 2019 this budget proposal covers;

it's not even going to happen anyway, so maybe they have more urgent things to do than get on soapboxes to rail against this particular plan.
posted by a snickering nuthatch at 9:26 AM on February 14, 2018 [10 favorites]


One thing I've noticed is that frequently something outrageous happens and then everyone says, "Why aren't the Democrats saying anything about this???" And then it turns out that in fact plenty of Democrats have said things about it and trying to do something about it, but they just haven't gotten media coverage.

It's frustrating.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:32 AM on February 14, 2018 [91 favorites]


The boxes aren't replacing SNAP entirely. There will be money left for people to buy fresh meat, vegetables and other essentials. How much remains to be seen, though since the proposal also includes a 30% cut.

It also apparently will include canned vegetables, so "take all vegetables away from the poor" wouldn't be accurate.


What I read stated that the proposed boxes would replace most they'll try to take away SNAP from as many people as possible and replace it as much as possible with boxes. They want to replace it entirely and that's how they're framing it. And if you take comfort in the GOP's promise of a possible can of boiled-to-mush green beans or corn instead of SNAP recipients' current option of just buying whatever fresh produce they want, I don't know what to tell you.

Do you honestly think this, or are you indulging in hyperbole because it's just irresistible to take a terrible Trumpian idea as a jumping-off-point for slagging on "establishment Dems"? I think there might be a bit of a difference between "they should condemn this more quicky/loudly" and "obviously it's because they don't care if kids die".


At a certain point elected Democrats need to start saying in no uncertain terms that the GOP is trying to kill us. That's not hyperbole. After a year of our supposed representatives not being brave enough to say it, now including when the GOP wants to forbid you from buying a raw carrot with food stamps, I'm ready to ask Democrats to at least pretend to care about attempted genocide.
posted by Rust Moranis at 9:35 AM on February 14, 2018 [11 favorites]


The boxes aren't replacing SNAP entirely. There will be money left for people to buy fresh meat, vegetables and other essentials. How much remains to be seen, though since the proposal also includes a 30% cut.

Can we not talk about this like it's already happening? As others have said, this policy was proposed after congress already passed a budget. This is not law, and it's not likely to be law. There's no point in freaking people out by pretending it's already set in stone.
posted by One Second Before Awakening at 9:39 AM on February 14, 2018 [40 favorites]


The SNAP box thing is to get us into frothing outrage over something that will never happen in order to distract us from what what actually went down in the Senate Intel Comte yesterday.
posted by fluttering hellfire at 9:46 AM on February 14, 2018 [32 favorites]


The SNAP box thing is to get us into frothing outrage over something that will never happen in order to distract us from what what actually went down in the Senate Intel Comte yesterday.

This, this - a thousand times THIS!
posted by mosk at 9:50 AM on February 14, 2018 [12 favorites]


I don't think there's an intentional plan to distract. Everything this administration does is an impulsive act of throwing shit on the wall that just happens to have the effect of distracting people, because there's too much bad shit going on to focus on any one or even ten things each day. Denial of service attack on the outrage center of the brain.
posted by tonycpsu at 9:53 AM on February 14, 2018 [28 favorites]


That can't actually be true, like, factually since it takes more than a day to put together a budget. Unless the theory is they had this crazy budget just sitting around for a rainy day.
posted by Justinian at 9:53 AM on February 14, 2018 [6 favorites]


One thing I've noticed is that frequently something outrageous happens and then everyone says, "Why aren't the Democrats saying anything about this???" And then it turns out that in fact plenty of Democrats have said things about it and trying to do something about it, but they just haven't gotten media coverage.

Which reminds me, the Democrats also need to be out there pushing back on the notion that the media is liberal. ^_^

But seriously, the Democrats do talk about individual issues to varying degrees of effectiveness, but what I don't see is discussion around what one might call the metagame, how Democratic ideas and values are superior to Republican ones, while the same is not true for Republicans -- witness the concept that "run the government like a business" seems to be accepted by everybody as a self-evidently good idea.

Part of it, I'm sure, is that the Democrats have assumed that the Republicans share certain values -- that Republican politicians share value of wanting the American experiment to succeed, and simply have different policy preferences. I contend that the era of Trump disproves that notion. (Meanwhile, anyone listening to Rush Limbaugh in the 80s could tell you that Republicans were already at least pushing the propaganda that Democrats and liberals were literally scheming to destroy America.)

Every time Mitch McConnell says "job-killing regulation," a Democrat needs to respond "there you go again, wanting to push the cost of doing business onto the American public." Every time Trump rails against immigrants, pointing out that Olympic sensation Chloe Kim is the daughter of immigrants, who brought home gold medals for the US. Republican ideas are no longer to be debated; they're to be diminished until the New York Times no longer feels compelled to hire dishonest hacks to present them in its op-ed page out of some twisted noton of "balance."
posted by Gelatin at 9:55 AM on February 14, 2018 [16 favorites]


One thing I've noticed is that frequently something outrageous happens and then everyone says, "Why aren't the Democrats saying anything about this???" And then it turns out that in fact plenty of Democrats have said things about it and trying to do something about it, but they just haven't gotten media coverage.


See also: "vast majority of Muslims" and "condemning terrorism."
It is never hard to find rational voices. They just don't get attention because rational voices don't drive clicks or ad sales.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 9:56 AM on February 14, 2018 [9 favorites]


It might not be an intentional distraction because I am perfectly willing to believe that Mick Mulvaney thinks this idea he's had is truly the most pure, distilled essence of genius that political science has ever known, and the entire world needs to hear about it for the next ten news cycles. But yeah, it's not a thing. It's not going to be a thing. I'm frankly disappointed that the Weeds podcast made me sit through like 40 minutes of hashing out what is in this entirely fictional document, while starting the hour by noting that executive branch budget proposals are never actually real. They weren't even real when they actually contained good ideas.
posted by soren_lorensen at 9:56 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


I don't think there's an intentional plan to distract. Everything this administration does is an impulsive act of throwing shit on the wall that just happens to have the effect of distracting people, because there's too much bad shit going on to focus on any one or even ten things each day. Denial of service attack on the outrage center of the brain.

It's also, intentionally or not, pushing the Overton window a smidge to the right. Next will be David Brooks penning a dishonest column -- but I repeat myself -- about how it's wrong to tempt poor people into making the wrong nutritional choices and the Freedom Boxes represent a true act of charity in that they, allegedly, feed people.
posted by Gelatin at 9:59 AM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


House oversight looks into Porter
Not that I mind, but is this their business? It's not the White House Oversight Committee.
Shouldn't they spend more time overseeing the House? It could use some.
(Although depending on the definition of oversight, maybe they're already doing it)
posted by MtDewd at 10:01 AM on February 14, 2018


And if you take comfort in

My responding to you in measured tones is not an example of my "taking comfort" in anything. If you had bothered to read the rest of what I had written there, you'd probably have understood that.
posted by zarq at 10:03 AM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


With regard to the "shocking" preponderance of Republican travel abuses (just picking an example, but the metaphor holds across the spectrum), I find the following Downton Abbey analogue helpful:

Republicans' imagine the role of senior gov't officials (like Treasury Secretary, Health & Human Services Secretary, EPA Administrator, Secretary of the Interior, etc.) to be akin to the aristocracy while rank & file gov't employees are the household staff.

These mighty men of action are the noble job creators, going about the oh-so-important business of managing the property. Of course, if they need to go into town on an errand, they summon a driver & make haste at their convenience! If the gentlefolk are entertaining, they throw a massive banquet.

Meanwhile, if any of the staff needs to run into town (even if it's to fetch groceries for the lord's dinner), they are relegated to walking or cycling. Can you begin to imagine the impropriety of a scullion maid taking a car?

This is how the Republican leadership understands their roles vs. those of "regular" government employees.

Of course, ethics and budgetary concerns are deeply troubling when it comes to "improper" usage by the help. And of course, ethics and budgetary concerns aren't issues at all when employed in the service of the aristocratic leadership.

When viewed through this lens, the stunning hypocrisy recedes and bog standard classism & elitism emerges. You know, the ol' foundation of the modern Republican party.

Naturally, we would insist that no gov't employee is above another, let alone in a different caste entirely, but then that's what makes us & our quaint view of public office as a service losers.

The metaphor is so striking, in fact (regarding both the Republican party and the staggeringly wealthy), that I personally dislike watching Downton Abbey. It humanizes the aristocracy such that we get feels for the poor little rich folk desperately trying to maintain the status quo so that they can continue being good masters for their wage slaves. I sometimes wonder if they're intentionally conditioning us to accept the coming times predicted by Picketty et al. as the natural order.
posted by narwhal at 10:03 AM on February 14, 2018 [19 favorites]


Back to budget nonsense: Mulvaney defends the White House budget: 'Does it balance? No' (Meridith McGraw for ABC News, Feb 12, 2018)
Director of the Office of Management and Budget Mick Mulvaney said the $4.4 trillion budget proposed by the White House would increase the federal deficit and would not balance the budget.

"Does it balance? No it doesn't," Mulvaney told reporters on Monday. "I couldn't tell you using solid numbers that we could balance the budget in 10 years."
...
On Tuesday, Mulvaney takes the budget to Capitol Hill where it's unlikely to be well received by deficit hawks. Mulvaney, a former Tea Party Republican, said on CBS News on Monday that if he were still in Congress, it's not something he would support.

"I will always be a deficit hawk," said Mulvaney. "I am today, I was yesterday, I am tomorrow...these are the cards we've been dealt."
Wait, you're claiming that the GOP Tax Sham was "dealt" to you? But I thought that was a brilliant plan that you were supporting in person! With "gimmicks" to allow the MASSIVE corporate welfare plan to pass with fewer votes. You fucking rigged the game, then you come complaining about how you didn't rig it enough? FUCK YOU. Ahem, where was I? Oh, the citation:

You Know You're Saying This Out Loud, Right? -- Mick Mulvaney and Kellyanne Conway forgot to use their inside voices. (Charles P. Pierce for Esquire, Nov 20, 2017)
Over the weekend, Mick Mulvaney, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, and a man who is no more an economist than I am LeBron James, made the rounds of the Sunday Showz. On Meet The Press, Mulvaney let the kitty go screeching out of the burlap, via NBC News:
Under the GOP tax plan, tax cuts for corporations would not have an expiration date, but the cuts for individuals expire after ten years—a fact Mulvaney admitted on Sunday was a “gimmick” to ensure the legislation adheres to the Senate’s strict rules that allow them to pass it with 50 votes instead of 60. “In order to do that, the certain proposals can only have certain economic impact,” Mulvaney said on “Meet The Press.” “One of the ways to game the system is to make things expire," Mulvaney said. "The Bush tax cuts back in early 2000 did the same thing. They supposedly would expire after nine years. What we tell folks is this is if it's good policy, it will become permanent. If it's bad policy, it will become temporary…A lot of this is a gimmick. Obamacare was a gimmick to get through these rules in the Senate. And what you should really be looking at is the policies themselves. And we think these are excellent policies."

One policy got health insurance to millions of Americans who previously couldn’t afford it. The other “gimmick” will not allow union members to deduct their dues, but still allow corporations to deduct expenses accrued by union busting, and will not allow schoolteachers to deduct the cost of supplies they pay for with their own money, but will allow the owners of private jets to deduct those expenses. Plus, as Conway pointed out, this tax plan is so important that the voters should install an alleged pedophile in the United States Senate to ensure its passage.
Jesus, these really are the fcking mole people.
Charles Pierce for EVERYTHING.

And deficit hawk, you say? Budget deficit hawk by day, racking up debt like most Americans at night (Matthew Schofield for The State, January 26, 2017)
Every family knows that if they handled their household budgets the same way the U.S. government does, they’d be ruined, Mick Mulvaney, President Donald Trump’s budget chief nominee, said during his Senate confirmation hearing this week.

So what does that mean to the South Carolina Republican congressman’s family? After all, his financial disclosure statements indicate that he hardly shies away from debt in his private life. And by all accounts, he’s not ruined.

Mulvaney was clear when he testified before the Senate Budget Committee.

“Our gross national debt has increased to almost $20 trillion,” Mulvaney said. “That number is so large as to defy description. I choose to look at it another way: To an ordinary American family, that translates to a credit card bill of $260,000. Families know what that would mean for them. It is time for government to learn the same lesson.”
...
Yet his disclosure statements indicate that he carries as much as $10.35 million in debt, while reporting an annual household income that might be as high as $440,000.

The disclosure statement gave only ranges for debt and income, so it’s possible his debt is as low as $2.15 million, and his family income as low as $292,000. The only certain number is his House of Representatives salary of $174,000.

Mulvaney did not respond to requests for comment.
They really are the best people ... at being able to spout shit day after day and not ever choke on the filth and lies they spout.
posted by filthy light thief at 10:05 AM on February 14, 2018 [26 favorites]


>> House oversight looks into Porter
> Not that I mind, but is this their business? It's not the White House Oversight Committee. ... Shouldn't they spend more time overseeing the House?


It's the United States House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, so it is very much their business, should they actually choose to care.
posted by RedOrGreen at 10:07 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


Can we please table the hand-wringing and surrounding discussion about commodity boxes until it's more tangible than a bullet point on Republican wet-dream shopping list?
posted by Tevin at 10:09 AM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Looking ahead, I just realized that Black Panther will open on ... President's Day Weekend, and it's forecasted to be a record-breaking money maker, already breaking records for ticket pre-orders. I look forward to what Trump has to say about this ;)
posted by filthy light thief at 10:10 AM on February 14, 2018 [16 favorites]


I personally dislike watching Downton Abbey

This reality show about living in an Edwardian Country House offered all the charm of Downton Abbey with a much more realistic perspective about what it was like for the servants. Recommended for those who like to temper their period pieces with modern political perspectives.
posted by OnceUponATime at 10:15 AM on February 14, 2018 [11 favorites]


Trump's Infrastructure Plan Threatens to Leave Little Cities Behind (Aarian Marshall for Wired, Feb. 14, 2018)
“The president is almost always the main proponent for how to move policy discourse in the country, so the sheer introduction of all of this loosens up a logjam,” says Adie Tomer, who studies infrastructure policy at the Washington, DC, think tank the Brookings Institution. And whatever the details, there’s a chance the basic idea of the bill—that competitive grant process and scant direct funding—will remain.

That should worry the many smaller cities that just can’t chip in significant money for their own infrastructure. A 2017 survey by the National League of Cities (PDF), an advocacy group that represents 19,000 cities, towns, and villages across America, found 31 percent of respondents felt “less able” to meet their expenses than in 2016. Nearly of them said infrastructure cost them more than the year before.

Don’t rush to blame this on fiscal irresponsibility. A recent Brookings Institution analysis shows smaller metros have struggled to keep up with their big brothers after the recession, with private employment, income, and the labor participation rate growing more slowly. A smaller, poorer tax base means not a lot of money to compete for a grant program, or for the attention of a private company with a profit motive.

“The infrastructure plan as proposed seems very much focused on leveraging private and local and state dollars,” says Brooks Rainwater, who oversees the National League of Cities' Center for City Solutions. “Oftentimes those dollars by the nature of private investment tend to flow to larger cities.” You know, the places where companies can actually make a buck tolling well-trafficked roads or running well-used transit.
You're preaching to the choir, but I don't think the congregation is listening yet, so preach on, preach on!
posted by filthy light thief at 10:19 AM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Fundraising numbers:
Latest House FEC data (sorry, took a while to compile): There are 179 Democratic candidates across 94 GOP-held seats with at least $100,000 in the bank.

By comparison, there are only 29 GOP candidates across 21 Dem-held seats with at least $100,000 in the bank.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:39 AM on February 14, 2018 [18 favorites]


This reality show about living in an Edwardian Country House offered all the charm of Downton Abbey with a much more realistic perspective about what it was like for the servants. Recommended for those who like to temper their period pieces with modern political perspectives.

Terrifyingly, after just, what - a few months? - of living like an aristocrat, the father from the Edwardian Country House then ran for office on a super conservative platform and his son, only 9 years old at the time of the experience, changed his political beliefs and joined a super conservative thinktank. So while Edwardian Country House is a fucking fascinating slice of anthropology, it's also a terrifying experiment that really should have been reviewed by an IRB before being allowed to be conducted.
posted by corb at 10:47 AM on February 14, 2018 [18 favorites]


it's also a terrifying experiment that really should have been reviewed by an IRB before being allowed to be conducted.

nobody would complain if you re-staged the Stanford Prison Experiment as long as you filmed the whole thing and showed it in 22 minute chunks during prime time
posted by murphy slaw at 10:53 AM on February 14, 2018 [39 favorites]


Which reminds me, the Democrats also need to be out there pushing back on the notion that the media is liberal. ^_^

I've been chewing for a few days on this Brian Beutler piece, which takes a different tack: Mainstream Media, Embrace Your Liberalism, which argues that real media is inherently a liberal institution, in the broad sense of the term rather than the peculiar way it is used in America, and that recognizing that some of the people it covers are increasingly embracing an illiberal tradition and responding accordingly is essential:
Outside of the specific American context, the word liberal describes something more abstract and less partisan. Internationally, it describes a philosophical approach to organizing society that is capacious enough to include people who believe governments should provide robust safety nets to citizens, and people who believe taxes should be low and the poor left to fend for themselves. What those people share is a common commitment to basic Enlightenment-era ideals like equality, democracy, and empiricism.

In recent years, political science tells us, the two American parties have polarized, and the polarization has been asymmetric. Republicans have become more conservative faster than Democrats have become more progressive.

It is increasingly clear that asymmetric polarization is the wrong metaphor for what has happened in American politics. To say the parties are asymmetrical is to imply that they’re fundamentally similar, but that one has become distorted in some way—that while Democrats and Republicans are still committed to basic Founding values, Republicans are rapidly adopting more extreme policy prescriptions. They’ve changed, but they can change back.

Whether or not that was ever true, it clearly no longer is. The parties aren’t two different animals of the same species. They have speciated.
...
The job of the mainstream media isn’t to cast judgment on people with different value systems, but journalists can’t do their jobs well if they aren’t aware that the value systems of mainstream journalism and American conservatism are different and in conflict. It should be perfectly possible to apply the neutral rules of modern journalism to both American political parties while accepting that Democrats (and journalists and scientists) descend from the enlightenment tradition, while Republicans (and their allies in conservative media) descend from a different, illiberal tradition—and that this makes the parties behave in different ways.
I think back on the 2012 Should The Times Be a Truth Vigilante? debate, which really shows the debate starkly. Lying in politics is far from new, but outright asking "hey, do you all think we should identify falsehoods or just regurgitate them?" is pretty much just asking if the paper of record should aspire to liberal ideals or illiberal ones.
posted by zachlipton at 10:54 AM on February 14, 2018 [27 favorites]


That would be what's known in contract law as a "whoospiedoodle".
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 11:04 AM on February 14, 2018 [50 favorites]


Do NDAs layout exactly what isn't to be disclosed? And do both parties sign off on the events that occurred?
posted by Mitheral at 11:08 AM on February 14, 2018


I work with a lot of NDAs. They generally do not include fine details. They're typically blanket injunctions.

Also, nullifcation or violation clauses ("this agreement will be null and void if...") are usually written quite clearly and firmly.
posted by zarq at 11:12 AM on February 14, 2018 [10 favorites]


The Intercept has a bunch of Wikileaks DMs. Holy shit.
Twitter messages obtained by The Intercept provide an unfiltered window into WikiLeaks’ political goals before it dove into the white-hot center of the presidential election. The messages also reveal a running theme of sexism and misogyny, contain hints of anti-Semitism, and underline Assange’s well-documented obsession with his public image. ...

A major focus of the private Twitter group was strategizing online attack campaigns, including creating false identities, something that Assange explicitly encouraged. Assange philosophized on how to approach such activities in conversation with a WikiLeaks supporter who told the group that Scottish Member of Parliament Paul Monaghan had retweeted her. The supporter added that others in the group should tweet at Monaghan as well to try for more retweets. Assange responded, “Exactly what we were hoping for. Be the troll you want to see in the world.” Discussing another British politician, Assange suggested that the supporter change her account avatar to a “pretty blonde,” or a “dead actress if you want plausible deniability,” or to just create a new sock puppet account for trolling. ...

The direct messages from Assange also include an attack with anti-Semitic undertones against an Associated Press journalist. In August 2016, AP reporter Raphael Satter tweeted a story he helped write about the harm caused when WikiLeaks publishes private information about individuals. “He’s always ben a rat,” Assange posted in the Twitter group in response. “But he’s jewish and engaged with the ((()))) issue.” ...
posted by maudlin at 11:16 AM on February 14, 2018 [45 favorites]


"hints of anti-Semitism / anti-Semitic undertones"

“He’s always ben a rat,” Assange posted in the Twitter group in response. “But he’s jewish and engaged with the ((()))) issue.”

That's not a hint or an undertone, Intercept; that's a bullhorn.
posted by Rust Moranis at 11:20 AM on February 14, 2018 [64 favorites]


Politico, Senate moderates reach immigration deal — but GOP opposition builds
A bipartisan Senate group has clinched a deal on immigration, though it faces an uncertain future as GOP opposition builds against any plan that deviates from President Donald Trump's proposal.

The text of the agreement is expected to be unveiled later Wednesday, multiple senators said as they left a bipartisan meeting aimed at getting a consensus agreement to the floor. The accord would provide $25 billion for border security and a wall, a path to citizenship for 1.8 million young immigrants and restrictions on those immigrants' parents becoming citizens, according to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.).
But GOP leadership is demanding massive cuts to legal immigration as part of any deal. Key questions for this deal will be how the $25B in wall money is structured (up front, doled out over a decade?) and exactly how this impacts Dreamers' parents.
posted by zachlipton at 11:25 AM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


Any immigration deal needs 11 Republicans on board to pass the Senate, assuming the Democratic caucus holds solid. The politico story doesn't so far as I can tell mention how many Republicans are involved with this "deal"? That could mean the bipartisan deal is the Democrats plus Lindsey Graham and that's it. Until they provide some kind of whip count I'm gonna assume it's DOA.
posted by Justinian at 11:31 AM on February 14, 2018


Of course there's GOP opposition, they're the party of xenophobes and they hate/fear brown people, non-English languages, and the poor. Is there a danger of message fatigue in calling them out for being predictably nativist?
posted by rhizome at 11:35 AM on February 14, 2018


Wait, now I’m all confused. I thought Glenn Greenwald and the intercept and wikileaks and Assange were all banded up together as russian apologists/deniers of conpiracy. Are they in a messy break-up or something?
posted by valkane at 11:44 AM on February 14, 2018 [9 favorites]


It's hard to keep the hate straight in the Information Age.
posted by rhizome at 11:46 AM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


The Intercept is a mixed bag, I think. Greenwald is pretty awful, but I think they are willing to publish other voices as well, and some of them are better.

I think the main problem with The Intercept is that they are terribly credulous whenever anyone tells them anything which purports to be a secret. So I'll take even this with a grain of salt, even though it lines up perfectly with what I expect and want to hear. Maybe even more so BECAUSE it lines up perfectly with what I expect and want to hear.
posted by OnceUponATime at 11:48 AM on February 14, 2018 [21 favorites]


Steve Schale on yesterday's Florida Election.
posted by wittgenstein at 11:56 AM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


With the Intercept, it's important to look at the bylines. This is always the case, of course, but it's even more important than usual, with them. The botched Reality Winner leak makes a lot of sense when you see the names on the story. I'm inclined to take this one more seriously, given the bylines.
posted by halation at 11:57 AM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


The timing of this Wikileaks-leak with a UK judge upholding his 2012 arrest warrant is suspicious to say the least. Now that Assange's potentially facing Ecuadorian embassy eviction and UK extradition, watch for intelligence ops to burn his credibility as a potential witness should he ever turn his coat. Meanwhile, he continues to stir up whatever shit he can on Twitter.

As for the Intercept's big scoop, please note that this "low security" channels avoids establishing any connection between Assange and either Russian intelligence or the Trump campaign—the chatter specifically tries to discredit Roger Stone as a Trump surrogate—but it does push the Putin line as far as Assange's sympathies about Russia being "on the defensive" and reacting to US "attempts to foment an orange revolution in an explicitly stated policy of regime change".

Since it's not news that Wikileaks wanted Trump to win and Clinton to lose, or that Assange is a misogynistic asshole, it's important to to ask cui bono about the Intercept's reporting.
posted by Doktor Zed at 12:03 PM on February 14, 2018 [14 favorites]


cjelli: And yet, it does have to be said -- and what he said has to be questioned -- because Trump didn't fire Rob Porter (which he should have, had he known) and hasn't fired John Kelly (which he should have, had Kelly in fact kept facts hidden from Trump).

And 19 women have accused Trump of "sexual misconduct", so anything he says on this general and awful topic is tainted.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:07 PM on February 14, 2018 [12 favorites]


I can't help but wonder if Trump is going to use the Porter issue to fire Kelly.

We know from past experience that, bluster and reality TV tough talking scripted "YOU'RE FIRED" shit to the side, Trump is apparently quite reluctant to actually fire people and has to work himself up to it over the course of several weeks and have an excuse.

It's fairly well established that Trump despises Kelly, or at least despises Kelly's attempt to actually do the job of a chief of staff and impose some order on the chaos Trump loves. And Kelly has looked bad with his outright lies about Porter.

I doubt Trump engineered this, but I don't doubt he's capable of seeing it as an opportunity to rid himself of this troublesome general.
"I am totally opposed to domestic violence of any kind everyone knows that and it almost wouldn't even have to be said."
Like all statements from Trump this one would appear to be a lie of the "telling the opposite of the truth" variety. Trump has been credibly accused of domestic violence cumulating in rape by Ivana Trump, an accusation only withdrawn after Donald Trump threatened her with lawsuits that she couldn't afford to defend against.

I have little doubt that Donald is a serial domestic abuser, it fits both his known profile and his well established disdain for women.
posted by sotonohito at 12:07 PM on February 14, 2018 [14 favorites]


Trump seems to be incapable of not lying if he thinks it will make him look good. He just made up a story about GM moving a plant to Detroit.
posted by CheeseDigestsAll at 12:09 PM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


wittgenstein: Steve Schale on yesterday's Florida Election.
Two things - final partisan model will be a few points more Democratic than registration -- and several more Democratic than 2016. In other words - Democrats showed up and Republicans didn't. But at same point, in a seat where again, 2,500 more Republicans voted, Good doesn't win by winning a sizable number of Republicans.

Putting a finer point on it: On Election Day, Republican voters outnumbered Democrats by over 2,000. They only won the day by 110 votes. A bunch of Republicans chose to revolt today -- both by not voting, and by voting for Good.

In years like this, when swing voters are frustrated with the incumbent President, their only vehicle to express their frustration is through members of the incumbent party. And in HD 72, that revolt happened with center-right voters -- which in some ways, is why this matters more than some other races. Just as Democrats struggled in 2010 and 2014, when their base voters stayed home, as Obama proved in Florida in both 08 and 12 -- and in a lot of states in the midwest in both cycles, Republicans face real math problems if they can't run up the score with voters like these.

So yes, this matters. It matters for confidence, but more than anything, it matters because this shows center-right moderates felt the need to send a message - and the only way they could send a message is to vote against the President's party. And trust me, having lived through 2010 and 2014, this is the biggest challenge Republicans will face in the coming months, figuring out how to navigate their own base, while still talking to voters who are dissatisfied with the direction of the Presidency.
Emphasis mine, because the direction of the Presidency is not likely to get better in the coming months.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:12 PM on February 14, 2018 [11 favorites]


Bella Donna: "We are, in fact, winning."

Sounds nice, but in this very thread you have dozens of people telling us how we just have to sell the Dreamers out because we're the minority party. We are not winning and not even close. We're just barely getting back into a fight that's been being lost for 50 years. So your hope is nice, but you don't need to dress up the hellscape.
posted by TypographicalError at 12:32 PM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


Another school shooting. This time a HS in Florida. Details unfolding. 20-50 wounded.
posted by anya32 at 12:34 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


Re. the wall funding: does it matter if the funds are allocated all at once? They can't be spent that fast, and couldn't a successor administration just cancel the project?
posted by Johnny Wallflower at 12:39 PM on February 14, 2018


>Another school shooting. This time a HS in Florida. Details unfolding. 20-50 wounded.

I'm on the verge of tears here.

I saw Deray retweet one of the kids who's in lockdown in a classroom.

This kid was tweeting out some pictures, showing everyone hiding. I go to the comments to see if he's OK.

In real time these reporters slide in asking for permission to use his photo.

This child is afraid for his life and reporters are asking to use his photo for their news story.

Our country and everything is so broken; this is the most despair I have felt in the last two years and that's really saying something.
posted by Tevin at 12:40 PM on February 14, 2018 [68 favorites]


Yeah, the Florida HD-72 was super interesting (here's another good analysis) because there's been a critique that: yeah, Dems are pulling these wins off because specials are normally really low turnout, so you can manifest a really pronounced turnout advantage. In a general election, they're not going to be able to pull off that kind of edge. The HD-72, though, had record turnout for an FL special - it ended up about 36%. And Dems did better on turnout than GOP (on a relative basis; there are more Republicans in the district, so the GOP did better absolutely).

So we have some evidence that they Dems can still manifest high turnout in more active elections. Plus, as noted by Schale, there were a substantial number of crossover GOP voters voting for Dem Good. GOPer Buchanan had gone out of his way to brand himself as a Trumper, so it seems clear there are registered Republicans willing to vote against Trump types.

It obviously depends on the district, but the path to victory for some Dems may be a two pronged approach of trying to sway these well-educated suburban types who are historically Republican while simultaneously trying to turn out traditional Dems who haven't tended to vote in midterms.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:50 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


The messages also reveal a running theme of sexism and misogyny, contain hints of anti-Semitism

It's almost like maybe when somebody's a fucking rapist, you should trust women who tell you maybe there's something off about that fucker no matter what else "good" he is doing in the world. I am completely unsurprised that he has turned out to be an evil shithead. Completely.
posted by corb at 12:55 PM on February 14, 2018 [27 favorites]


I saw Deray retweet one of the kids who's in lockdown in a classroom.

This kid was tweeting out some pictures, showing everyone hiding. I go to the comments to see if he's OK.


Those pics... I've been through a lot of lockdowns as a teacher for crime in the neighborhood, or false alarms, or drills. I know that view from the floor. And I can still only imagine having to endure the real thing as a kid. It's awful enough when it's for practice or when the school doesn't suffer any actual violence (as if the lockdown isn't an effect of violence in itself).

I'm really wrestling with those pics and what to do with them, 'cause that's a kid and he doesn't deserve any of this, OR the attention he's going to get for having posted them. Mostly I think Deray and others who retweeted it did the right thing, but I'm still wrestling with it. I want that kid to be protected, but I also want those pictures to be everywhere. I want them to be inescapable.

And I wish to God it would make any difference at all.
posted by scaryblackdeath at 1:03 PM on February 14, 2018 [16 favorites]


Per pool report, from the White House: 'The President has been made aware of the school shooting in Florida. We are monitoring the situation. Our thoughts and prayers are with those affected.'

They're waiting to learn the race/ethnicity/religion/citizenship status of the shooter before they comment.
posted by Faint of Butt at 1:04 PM on February 14, 2018 [40 favorites]


"Per Sarah Huckabee Sanders: in light of the ongoing school shooting in South Florida, there will be no White House press briefing today."

For context:
---> Press Secretary Sarah Sanders will brief the media at 1pm
Update: The briefing will now take place at 2:30pm
Update #2: The briefing will now take place at 3pm
Update #3: The briefing will now take place at 4pm
I don't think it takes away from the horror that is happening in Florida to point out that they were trying to dodge this briefing before the shooting took place.
posted by zachlipton at 1:07 PM on February 14, 2018 [32 favorites]


I called my Senator Ernst's office to say that I thought by receiving $3m from the NRA and supporting their agenda she was morally culpable for the deaths, and that the staffer receiving my call was also morally culpable, but less so.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:08 PM on February 14, 2018 [49 favorites]


There's a school shooting like every other day now. Should we just go ahead and cancel all those press briefings too?
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 1:09 PM on February 14, 2018 [8 favorites]


That's both a uncharitable and inaccurate reading, I think, of people talking about the real limits of not having control of the government, and I don't think anyone here is saying that we 'have to sell the Dreamers out,' period (but, admittedly, it's been a long thread so perhaps I missed something?

Nope, that was just a complete mischaracterization.
posted by schadenfrau at 1:09 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


East Manitoba, how did the staffer respond?
posted by Emmy Rae at 1:09 PM on February 14, 2018


The staffer was entirely professional and pleasant! Maybe this happens all the time!
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:10 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Lucky for them if they get into trouble because of a domestic abuser and then another domestic abuser helps them get out of it.
posted by Artw at 1:10 PM on February 14, 2018


We know from past experience that, bluster and reality TV tough talking scripted "YOU'RE FIRED" shit to the side, Trump is apparently quite reluctant to actually fire people and has to work himself up to it over the course of several weeks and have an excuse.

Also, at this point the Trump administration is literally running out of folks of any age or (lack of) qualifications willing to fill their jobs. Especially given their very strict screens against anyone who has ever criticized Trump, or even used marijuana. (Today's firing was simply because a guy -- former CIA analyst at that -- admitted smoking weed in 2013.)

I'm hoping that there are quietly Never Trump Republicans and undercover journalists ready to fill those open positions, for malicious reasons. More likely it will be Russian assets though.
posted by msalt at 1:10 PM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


4chan is doing it's Sam Hyde shit again by the way, so worth being skeptical of all early shooter identfications especially if the source is unclear.
posted by Artw at 1:11 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


The White House is a place where people feel lucky and relieved when they don't have to talk to the press because children were massacred.
posted by Rust Moranis at 1:13 PM on February 14, 2018 [51 favorites]


While he remains unidentified, the sheriff says the shooter is in custody. So that's good.
posted by Justinian at 1:14 PM on February 14, 2018


I'm waiting for a statement from the pro-domestic violence lobby to come out. Maybe congress can pass some sort of ban on domestic violence, you know the way they moved so quickly and decisively on banning bump stocks after the Vegas shooting. Thoughts and prayers.
posted by misterpatrick at 1:15 PM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


"...how vulnerable to blackmail is the President?"

To be successfully blackmailed, he would have to feel shame or have something to lose from being exposed. But none of these scandals seem to matter.

posted by Jacqueline at 7:12 AM on February 14 [4 favorites +] [!]


Yeah, I've thought about that a lot. The puzzler is if he isn't blackmailable, why is he such a sycophant to Putin and his coterie of oligarchs? Why will he say nothing negative about any of them nor even acknowledge their constant attacks on our political system? I'm left to conclude that they do have something on him that is so very much more heinous than anything he's already been proven to have done that he will do anything to keep it quiet. And because he is such a useful tool, Russia will do everything it can to keep him in power, including using its cyberwarfare tools to popularize favorable memes for him, including defending him from criticism for the things he is actually known to have done.

I must conclude the pee-tape is real, people. The pee-tape is real.
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:18 PM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


why is he such a sycophant to Putin and his coterie of oligarchs?
He owes them money. A lot of money. Remember, he went bankrupt and then mysteriously recovered, with only Deutsche Bank wanting to lend him anything.
posted by mumimor at 1:27 PM on February 14, 2018 [36 favorites]


Naah, it doesn't take a pee tape. Just money. Trump has no loyalty, but I think he is very sensitive to any indication or claim that he's not as rich as he claims he is. The Russians don't need a pee tape, just books that prove he's not a billionaire or that his wealth is only due to their support.

I don't think a pee tape would bother him. The claim is that Trump paid Russian prostitutes to pee on a mattress Obama had once slept on. I think that not only wouldn't shame him if it got out, I think a lot of his supporters would laugh and cheer.

But a threat to his proclaimed billionaire status? That'd hurt his feelings.
posted by sotonohito at 1:28 PM on February 14, 2018 [15 favorites]


The puzzler is if he isn't blackmailable, why is he such a sycophant to Putin and his coterie of oligarchs? Why will he say nothing negative about any of them nor even acknowledge their constant attacks on our political system?

That's easy -- Trump has been laundering money for Russian oligarchs since the time literally no one but Deutsche Bank would lend him money, and the Russkies kept the receipts.

Forget the pee tape -- the Russians likely have evidence of Trump's actual criminal conduct. And, by this time, complicity on the pehalf of a small army of Republicans.

The Republican Party routinely accused protestors against the Vietnam War, or even union organizers, of being dupes of Moscow. But it turns out it was they who sold this country out to the Russians, and that's unforgivable.
posted by Gelatin at 1:29 PM on February 14, 2018 [45 favorites]


...the only way to understand the world is picking which empire are the good guys and cheering them on.

The Star Wars ethos.
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:29 PM on February 14, 2018 [1 favorite]


On the "even a stopped clock is right twice a day" front, here are Michael Chertoff (yes, him!) and Grover Norquist (yes, him!) arguing in favor of paper ballots:

WaPo OpEd: We need to hack-proof our elections. An old technology can help.
... there is a framework to secure our elections that can win bipartisan support, minimize costs to taxpayers and respect the constitutional balance between state and federal authorities in managing elections ... an elegantly simple fix: paper ballots. ... The best estimates show that we can replace all paperless voting machines in the United States for about the cost of a single F-22 fighter jet. ... Members of Congress should recognize that election cybersecurity reforms are in their own personal interest — and in the interest of the United States’ national security.
It's like the whiplash induced by Jennifer Rubin 2.0 and Bill Kristol 2.0, but worse. It's a sane, rational policy fix, and apparently these Republicans are in favor? There must be a catch?
posted by RedOrGreen at 1:30 PM on February 14, 2018 [17 favorites]


There is no pee tape. It's a distraction. Money laundering is the kompromat.
posted by vibrotronica at 1:30 PM on February 14, 2018 [14 favorites]


Its a metaphorical pee-tape
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 1:30 PM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


Eh, so we're counting on adding-machine tape.
posted by notyou at 1:34 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Forget the pee tape -- the Russians likely have evidence of Trump's actual criminal conduct.

But isn't there already ample evidence of Trump's criminal (not to mention unconstitutional) conduct? If we had a normal Congress instead of the power-mad party hacks currently in office, Trump would have been impeached long ago. My sense is that Mueller could produce all the evidence in the world of money laundering, self-enrichment, double-dealing, and Russia-collusion, and neither the House nor the Senate would twitch an eyebrow. So it's gotta be something much worse, much more humiliating. Right?
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:35 PM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


Or there IS a pee tape, and it's also a distraction from the money laundering kompromat. That's my bet.
posted by scarylarry at 1:35 PM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


the real pee tape was the money we laundered along the way
posted by prize bull octorok at 1:37 PM on February 14, 2018 [116 favorites]


the sheriff says the shooter is in custody

Big shock: armed man shooting people taken into custody instead of just being shot a bunch is white.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 1:38 PM on February 14, 2018 [45 favorites]


So it's gotta be something much worse, much more humiliating. Right?

Trump may have been able to convince himself Mueller isn't going to find anything -- recall that he (Trump) keeps making statements to the effect that he (Trump) will be cleared any minute now -- and that the people who have pled guilty or are under indictment aren't going to turn on him.

But Trump would know that the New York attorney general's office would love to get their hands on what Trump knows full well the Russians have, because Trump himself was directly involved. And the presidential pardon doesn't extend to state crimes.
posted by Gelatin at 1:40 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


It’s all real, everything is a distraction from all the rest. That’s one reason why the response is often paralyzed, notwithstanding Republican’s complete complicity and wholesale institutional coverup. The collusion was real, the bribery is real, the pee tape is likely real, all of the other lesser scandals like flights and no bid contracts and porn stars, all real, all of it.

Just one thing isn’t “the distraction” distracting us from the one big thing, it’s scandal and corruption and obstruction and treason literally everywhere you can see until it’s impossible to even remember all of the concurrent scandals and investigations. And no one thing will change it until there’s a change in Congress.
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:44 PM on February 14, 2018 [29 favorites]


(I should have said: appeared white in a brief video segment)
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 1:47 PM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]




I understand the basics of how money laundering works, but only under circumstances where a single criminal/organization is running the whole operation -- my fake restaurant/whatever might take a loss, but it's worth it to me if, at the end of the day, it legitimizes my ill-gotten gains.

Can anyone give a simple explanation of the way Trump (who as far as I know isn't literally a mob member/boss himself) may have participated? Like, where's the mutual benefit? Would he have been permitted to take a slice of the money, in exchange for funneling the rest back to its Russian source? (If so, how does it get there inconspicuously, without needing "laundering" of its own?) Or did his company actually get to keep all of the enormous real estate income, and the Russians are just happy the money is now "clean" and they can count on a grateful, cash-infused Trump for future favors?
posted by InTheYear2017 at 1:49 PM on February 14, 2018


I absolutely acknowledge Senator Rubio's desire for this day to never come, I simply question his desire to use his powers to prevent this day from coming
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:49 PM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


After the day comes once, maybe twice, you'd think you'd maybe make some vague motion towards it coming a third time, but no... juts hopes I guess. And prayers, presumably.

Shills for child murder the fucking lot of them.
posted by Artw at 1:51 PM on February 14, 2018 [8 favorites]


AP: Porn star who alleged Trump affair: I can now tell my story

That these incompetent boobs can step on their own dicks so often and still be in office to continue their looting and pillaging is a stark illustration of just how dysfunctional our political system has become.
posted by Mental Wimp at 1:52 PM on February 14, 2018 [19 favorites]


Today in the NYT normalizing autocracy and the undermining of our democracy: Judges Say Throw Out the Map. Lawmakers Say Throw Out the Judges
Rather than simply fighting judicial rulings, elected officials in some states across the country — largely Republicans, but Democrats as well — are increasingly seeking to punish or restrain judges who hand down unfavorable decisions, accusing them of making law instead of interpreting it.
Just a routine bothsides do it.
posted by T.D. Strange at 1:55 PM on February 14, 2018 [44 favorites]


I'm not a lawyer but I think removing judges from office does not cause their rulings to disappear in a puff of logic
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 1:58 PM on February 14, 2018 [10 favorites]


They don't even seem to have thrown in the traditional lopsided comparison there, as far as I cna see the both-siderism is just thrown in out of nowhere.
posted by Artw at 1:59 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


I sure hope she gets more than 130k for her story now. Negotiate, woman!
posted by Dashy at 2:02 PM on February 14, 2018 [9 favorites]


the sheriff says the shooter is in custody

Big shock: armed man shooting people taken into custody instead of just being shot a bunch is white.


A young man committed a mass shooting on Valentine’s Day. I think the odds his first victim was a romantic interest (if you can call it that) are pretty high.
posted by schadenfrau at 2:03 PM on February 14, 2018 [31 favorites]


Generally when a democrat or otherwise lefty person tries to unseat a judge- its because they have participated in some kind of horrible miscarriage of justice (See Brock Turner) and have shown that they are not impartial, and therefore deserve to lose their seat.

When a republican or otherwise righty person tries to unseat a judge- its because they were impartial and didn't participate in a miscarriage of justice, and therefore (to them) deserve to lose their seat to someone who will toe the party line rather than be impartial.
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 2:05 PM on February 14, 2018 [31 favorites]


Or he was an MRA/incel/Red Pill/whatever type and decided that since he hadn't gotten the sex that he imagined women owed him then he might as well just shoot a lot of people.
posted by sotonohito at 2:07 PM on February 14, 2018 [14 favorites]


Big shock: armed man shooting people taken into custody instead of just being shot a bunch is white.

The Miami Herald has reported that the shooter is Nicolas de Jesus Cruz, a former student. So it's not clear yet if your snark is warranted.
posted by Justinian at 2:07 PM on February 14, 2018 [1 favorite]


Mulvaney, re: machinations to pass tax cut bill with 50 votes: Obamacare was a gimmick to get through these rules in the Senate.

The facility with which these people lie is just jaw-dropping.
posted by Mental Wimp at 2:11 PM on February 14, 2018 [11 favorites]


Can we avoid speculating about the shooter's race and political leanings? That stuff is gross and dumb, no matter who's doing it.
posted by neroli at 2:11 PM on February 14, 2018 [15 favorites]


Mod note: Seconding that -- enough on the shooting speculation.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 2:13 PM on February 14, 2018 [10 favorites]


Sadly it determines how much of an official response there will be and to what extent people will be harmed by that response, so it’s a thing people are going to want to know. I think experience should have taught us not to assume or speculate before we know for sure though.
posted by Artw at 2:13 PM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]


Shills for child murder the fucking lot of them.

The NRA has been a hate group and a terrorist organization for decades. The politicians who support it, and the gun owners that defend it, are enablers complicit in tens if not hundreds of thousands of murders. The ones who continue to stay silent are little better.
posted by zombieflanders at 2:17 PM on February 14, 2018 [9 favorites]


Regarding money laundrying, today's episode of the Trump, Inc. podcast covers the topic with respect to the Trump's former casino.

As for potential money laundering and real estate, it is my understanding that the Russian oligarchs and the like really want to get their wealth out of their own countries because otherwise another oligarch might just steal it. That's where investing in US real estate comes in. Up until very recently, reporting requirements for all cash real estate transactions were very lax. That would allow the oligarchs to invest in something relatively safe without fear of losing their investment and without many people knowing that they owned that property.

The advantages for someone who was selling is pretty obvious. These kinds of giant real estate developments are heavily financed and as such you need a stream of buyers in order to make the loan payments.
posted by mmascolino at 2:18 PM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


Lots of non-Catholics (and/or some other flavors of christian) are probably not aware that today is Ash Wednesday, one of the holiest days of the year. "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return." The images of people grieving over dead children with the cross of ashes on their foreheads is particularly horrifying.

I'd like to say that such images will finally move us to action but if Sandy Hook couldn't because of the sheer horror of the tiny bodies and Las Vegas couldn't because of the sheer horror of the massive scale of hundreds of bodies then I am not sure there is literally anything that could happen to get Republicans to do the smallest thing to stop this from happening.

So that's one more reason to do everything we can this year and going forward; Republicans are the party of dead children.
posted by Justinian at 2:24 PM on February 14, 2018 [28 favorites]


And later, the buyer could get the money out of the investment either by selling the asset, or borrowing against it?

(Speaking of borrowing. Holy cow but Jared and Ivanka owe a lot of money:
The changes take Kushner and Trump’s reported debts to a range of approximately $31 million to $155 million from the previously reported range of between about $19 million and $98 million.

When Ivanka Trump first filed her disclosure form in July, she reported the debts at the same level her husband originally did. However, in revisions to the form before it was formally certified by the Office of Government Ethics on Dec. 26, the outstanding debt for the three credit lines was raised to the higher level.

One debt did drop in value as Ivanka Trump’s form was revised: the amount owed on a Visa account went down to a range of $50,001 to $100,000, from $100,001 to $250,000.
posted by notyou at 2:24 PM on February 14, 2018 [8 favorites]


Gateway Pundit scraped the shooter's Instagram posts before his account was disabled, if anyone is feeling morbidly curious.

Please don't link to Gateway Pundit, it's a hate site that serves up the worst wingnut conspiracies straight from the chans/Daily Stormer/etc. They have a history of ascribing any mass shooting to Muslims, BLM, antifa, etc, often by just passing on straight-up manufactured documents.
posted by zombieflanders at 2:31 PM on February 14, 2018 [42 favorites]


As for potential money laundering and real estate, it is my understanding that the Russian oligarchs and the like really want to get their wealth out of their own countries because otherwise another oligarch might just steal it. That's where investing in US real estate comes in. Up until very recently, reporting requirements for all cash real estate transactions were very lax. That would allow the oligarchs to invest in something relatively safe without fear of losing their investment and without many people knowing that they owned that property.

Ok, put a couple of crooked banks in the mix ( e.g.: Cyprus ) and it works even better.

So, the Russian Criminals have 100 million to launder.

They go to their criminal bank, deposit the funds, then uses them to underwrite a 100 Million loan to another shell corp, that is then used to buy Trump's mansion. The cypriot banking laws make discovering the principles behind the accounts difficult, and provides a firewall between the stolen russian money and the trump mansion.

Of course, that's before paying Trump 60 Million more than the free-market value, in a crashed real-estate market.

I suspect Mueller's dilemma here is that once he got the cypriot shell companies books, he's got the checks they wrote to the GOP congress. Can you imagine how hard it is to decide whether to RICO the entirety of the National Republican party?
posted by mikelieman at 2:31 PM on February 14, 2018 [15 favorites]


Riding an Untamed Horse: Priebus Opens Up on Serving Trump NYTimes/Peter Baker
posted by mumimor at 2:34 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


One debt did drop in value as Ivanka Trump’s form was revised: the amount owed on a Visa account went down to a range of $50,001 to $100,000, from $100,001 to $250,000.

Just the thought of having that much on a credit card makes me hyperventilate. Does it stop seeming real after a certain number of zeroes? And why would any CC keep extending credit to someone who already owes so much on a revolving account?
posted by orrnyereg at 2:36 PM on February 14, 2018 [10 favorites]


POTUS responding to questions shouted during pool spray: "I am totally opposed to domestic violence of any kind everyone knows that and it almost wouldn't even have to be said."

The pattern:
1. Fucked-up thing happens.
2. White House completely botches response to fucked-up thing.
3. Trump, who can easily state some basic obvious platitude against the fucked-up thing, is dead silent. Then he makes problematic remarks suggesting that he doesn't mind the fucked-up thing.
4. After days of being flogged about it, Trump grudgingly says some totally insincere kneejerk comment about how he opposes the fucked-up thing.
5. Within a few days, Trump can't resist blurting out some profoundly offensive racist misogynist ranty awfulness and/or publicly admitting to obstruction of justice.

We just got #4 today, so excuse me while I go pop some corn in preparation.
posted by FelliniBlank at 2:38 PM on February 14, 2018 [17 favorites]


Mod note: Deleted the Gateway Pundit thing. And the seriously, people can hold off on stuff about the shooting until there's more substantial info.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 2:39 PM on February 14, 2018 [14 favorites]


Riding an Untamed Horse: Priebus Opens Up on Serving Trump

Could we not derail with Chuck Tingle titles please?
posted by Rust Moranis at 2:41 PM on February 14, 2018 [57 favorites]


This is a pretty good tutorial on how you too can use luxury Manhattan real estate for all your money laundering needs. Assuming you have a few million in cash and a shell company...

"The Treasury Department explains it this way: "The real estate market can be an attractive vehicle for laundering illicit gains because of the manner in which it appreciates in value, 'cleans' large sums of money in a single transaction, and shields ill-gotten gains from market instability and exchange-rate fluctuations."
posted by OnceUponATime at 2:42 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


A Trump paid back money they owed? FAKE NEWS
posted by The Card Cheat at 2:42 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


TPM:
Former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus warned President Donald Trump that letting Attorney General Jeff Sessions resign would cause a “spiral of calamity” worse than the backlash to his abrupt termination of FBI Director James Comey, according to an upcoming book.
Coincidentally, "Spiral of Calamity" is the title of the new album by hipster-rockers Cake.
posted by msalt at 2:45 PM on February 14, 2018 [12 favorites]


BuzzFeed, The Trump Administration Says Proposed Heroin Injection Sites Could Face “Legal Action”
Katherine Pfaff, a spokesperson for the DEA, told BuzzFeed News that agents may take legal action against the facilities because they’re federally prohibited. Three major cities — San Francisco, Philadelphia, and Seattle — recently approved drug injection sites, with San Francisco’s site expected to open as soon as summer.

“Supervised injection facilities, or so-called ‘safe injection sites,’ violate federal law,” Pfaff told BuzzFeed News. “Any facilitation of illicit drug use is considered in violation of the Controlled Substances Act and, therefore, subject to legal action.”

In Seattle, prosecutors are prepared to fight back against Attorney General Jeff Sessions, whose Justice Department oversees the DEA.

“I am just girding for the legal battle, and that could be a lot of fun — a face off with Jeff Sessions,” King County Prosecuting Attorney Dan Satterberg, told BuzzFeed News. King County is slated to operate the facility in Seattle.
posted by zachlipton at 2:47 PM on February 14, 2018 [20 favorites]


Spiral of Calamity: title of my sex tape
posted by kirkaracha at 2:49 PM on February 14, 2018 [10 favorites]


Here is the Vanity Fair Priebus story. It's as crazy as one would expect, and then some. Short: Priebus is a bad guy who got out-badded
posted by mumimor at 2:59 PM on February 14, 2018 [13 favorites]


Hermeowne Grangepurr: The other issue is that House may try to implement the "four pillars" immigration reforms, which would also limit legal immigration numbers, eliminate the lottery, and reduce family immigration, as the price for dreamer citizenship.

The four pillars are back, with Trump's explicit support: President Donald J. Trump Calls on the Senate to Support the Grassley Bill, Oppose Bills that Fail to Deliver for the American People (whitehouse.gov, Feb. 14, 2018)
want to thank Chairman Grassley for introducing legislation based on the White House Immigration Reform and Border Security Framework. The Grassley bill accomplishes the four pillars of the White House Framework: a lasting solution on DACA, ending chain migration, cancelling the visa lottery, and securing the border through building the wall and closing legal loopholes. I am asking all senators, in both parties, to support the Grassley bill and to oppose any legislation that fails to fulfill these four pillars – that includes opposing any short-term “Band-Aid” approach. The overwhelming majority of American voters support a plan that fulfills the Framework’s four pillars, which move us towards the safe, modern, and lawful immigration system our people deserve.
Trump Threatens to Veto Immigration Bills that Don’t Meet His Demands (Michael D. Shear and Sheryl Gay Stolberg, for New York Times, Feb. 14, 2018)
Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, responded harshly to the president’s entreaty, noting with dismay that Mr. Trump last September ended the Obama-era program known as DACA, or Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which protected the Dreamers from deportation and provided them work permits.

“The American people know what’s going on,” Mr. Schumer said on the Senate floor. “They know this president not only created the problem, but seems to be against every solution that might pass because it isn’t 100 percent of what he wants. If, at the end of the week, we are unable to find a bill that can pass — and I sincerely hope that’s not the case due to the good efforts of so many people on both sides of the aisle — the responsibility will fall entirely on the president’s shoulders and those in this body who went along with him.”

Republicans searching for a compromise on immigration were similarly perplexed.

“The president’s going to have a vote on his concept. I don’t think it will get 60 votes,” Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina said, adding, “The bottom line then is: What do you do next? You can do what we’ve done for the last 35 years — blame each other. Or you can actually start fixing the broken immigration system. If you came out of this with strong border security — the president getting his wall and the Dream Act population being taken care of, most Americans would applaud.”
posted by filthy light thief at 2:59 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


My neighborhood in San Francisco is, right now, a giant unsafe injection site. I see people actively shooting up and the needles they leave behind not infrequently (and we have needle exchange programs). I pass people lying on the street or in the subway with a needle in their arm, and I have no clue whether they want to be left alone, need urgent medical attention, or are already dead. We need more drug treatment, absolutely, but we desperately need safe injection sites, where at least someone with medical training can check on my neighbors and make sure they're still breathing.
posted by zachlipton at 3:01 PM on February 14, 2018 [49 favorites]


This kid was tweeting out some pictures, showing everyone hiding. I go to the comments to see if he's OK.

In real time these reporters slide in asking for permission to use his photo.


There's something about the age of instant media that distances observers from the situation. If a reporter's KPI is about article clicks, he or she will just want a catchy photo and flashy copy to drive those KPIs. So the kid gets the word out to thousands of observers, the reporter gets the photo to package it to thousands more observers, and we the readers click on the photo and engage with the article for about 15 seconds until we move on to other media. Maybe we retweet the article. By the end of the day you're reading a retweet of a retweet of an article collected from a primary source. You're 10 degrees of separation from the actual event and engaging for 10 seconds. Like watching a circus from the nosebleeds with 5 acts and 50 different animals.
posted by hexaflexagon at 3:02 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]




I'm sorry but I'm fairly certain Spiral of Calamity was a blue Sorcery card from Magic The Gathering.
posted by contraption at 3:02 PM on February 14, 2018 [20 favorites]


Priebus on the inauguration from the Vanity Fair article.
"It’s Washington, D.C. We’re in an 85 percent Democrat area. Northern Virginia’s 60 percent. Maryland’s 65 percent. . . . This is a Democrat haven, and nobody cares."
Pro tip: anyone who uses "Democrat" like this is either ignorant or an asshole. Or a Republican. But I repeat myself.
posted by kirkaracha at 3:06 PM on February 14, 2018 [31 favorites]


The Intercept has a bunch of Wikileaks DMs. Holy shit.
"Meanwhile the US hacks the hell out of it [Russia], and attempts to forment an orange revolution in an explicitly stated policy of regime change."
An orange revolution? Well if that ain't the pot calling the kettle black.
posted by Talez at 3:06 PM on February 14, 2018 [3 favorites]


Trump’s Military Parade Could Cost $30 Million (Alan Rappeport for NYT, Feb. 14, 2018)
Mick Mulvaney, the White House budget director, estimated on Wednesday that the public display of America’s military might that Mr. Trump has called for could cost between $10 million and $30 million, and said the government would have to come up with a way to cover the cost.

Funding for the parade was not included in the White House’s 2019 budget request, which was released on Monday, because it was a relatively new idea, Mr. Mulvaney said at a House Budget Committee hearing on Wednesday. He explained that the final cost would be determined by the size, scope and length of the parade.

“We will continue to work with you folks if we decide to continue forward with this initiative,” Mr. Mulvaney said. “Of course, you’d have to appropriate funds for it or we would have to find funds that we’ve already appropriated.”
That's Mick Mulvaney, Deficit Hawk and stater of the obvious. Yes, we would have to appropriate funds, or use previously appropriated funds, to pay for this parade.

Because no one thought of having a military parade before earlier this month (linking upthread), as that's not something we feel the need to do as a country.
posted by filthy light thief at 3:07 PM on February 14, 2018 [6 favorites]


If you came out of this with strong border security — the president getting his wall and the Dream Act population being taken care of, most Americans would applaud.”

See this is the thing. Graham is sitting there on his high horse like two sides acting in good faith just want different things. If it was just that then I'm pretty sure Schumer would take it in a heartbeat. $20 billion dipshit wall to save the Dreamers? Fuck yeah I'd take that deal.

But Trump doesn't just want his wall. He wants a White United States policy and that's where most Democrats will start to choke on their own bile when trying to vote for it in a "compromise".
posted by Talez at 3:12 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


I only got as far as "I still love the guy,” he says" in that Vanity Fair article about Priebus. That's really all I need to know about him and his time working for Trump.
posted by The Card Cheat at 3:23 PM on February 14, 2018 [19 favorites]


I just read a pair of the most interesting and informative articles I have seen about how the Russian disinformation people used social media to meddle in our politics: In the case of the particular Twitter account that was the subject of the study, the disinformation campaign has continued over a lengthy period of time and taken on many guises:
According to Prier, @Fanfan1911 changed his display name from Jermaine to “FanFan,” after fears at Mizzou subsided. The profile picture of a black man changed to the image of a German iron cross.

“The next few months, FanFan’s tweets were all in German and consisted of spreading rumors about Syrian refugees,” Prier wrote.

By the spring of 2016, the same account began tweeting in English, supporting messages from right-wing news organizations such as Breitbart.

In Sept. 2016, when presidential candidate Hillary Clinton referred to some of Donald Trump’s supporters as “deplorables,” @FanFan once again underwent a transformation.

The account became “Deplorable Lucy,” and its picture became a “white middle-aged female with a Trump logo” at the bottom.

Followers of the account increased by more than 10,000 people.

After the release of Trump’s Access Hollywood tape, Prier said, the account joined other bots, Russian trolls and real American accounts in efforts to “drown out negative attention to Trump on Twitter.”
posted by flug at 3:31 PM on February 14, 2018 [51 favorites]


Sadly it determines how much of an official response there will be and to what extent people will be harmed by that response,

If the ethnicity previously reported is correct, I am fucking terrified about how this is going to affect the immigration debate and racists in this goddamn country. Like I pulled my car over and am just anticipating the worst right now.
posted by corb at 3:38 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Yeah I saw the shooter's name and immediately thought "Oh shit." :(
posted by Jacqueline at 3:48 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Oh, God, The Card Cheat, you gotta keep going in that Vanity Fair article. There's not really that much in it that I hadn't heard before, but new little details made it way worth it. Plus the pace was zippy and the recap was impressive. Most of all it was the size of the pile of outrageous bullshit that happened basically just now but that I had forgotten all about in the onrush of still more recent outrageous bullshit. Stunning.
posted by Don Pepino at 3:48 PM on February 14, 2018


@realDonaldTrump
My prayers and condolences to the families of the victims of the terrible Florida shooting. No child, teacher or anyone else should ever feel unsafe in an American school.

Newsweek, today. Students walk out of Texas high school after classmate detained by ICE

Intercept, this week. From School Suspension to Immigration Detention: For Immigrant Students on Long Island, Trump’s War on Gangs Means the Wrong T-Shirt Could Get You Deported

Philly Inquirer, last month. Defying ICE: Undocumented mother in Philly sanctuary church sends her children to school. This new bid to have both sanctuary and school poses a direct challenge to ICE, which has detained children as young as 10 and asserts the right to arrest undocumented immigrants anywhere.

Fuck off.
posted by Rust Moranis at 4:00 PM on February 14, 2018 [129 favorites]


I frankly think they want people in vulnerable populations to die.

I mean? Yes? This has been the focal point of the party's strategy since the 80s at least.
posted by poffin boffin at 4:00 PM on February 14, 2018 [21 favorites]


I wanted to favorite Rust Moranis's comment, as all those articles are so good and so timely and so heartbreaking, but it appears You hit your favorite limit for the day. So I favorite your comment in my heart. The hypocrisy of that tweet is astonishing, but not particularly surprising anymore.
posted by Homo neanderthalensis at 4:22 PM on February 14, 2018 [7 favorites]


When Sandy Hook happened, Obama went out and addressed the nation on the same day.

Today Trump used the Florida shooting as an excuse to not answer questions about his scandals.
posted by T.D. Strange at 4:29 PM on February 14, 2018 [58 favorites]




Real presidents kill their own flies.
Goddamn, so young.
posted by kirkaracha at 4:35 PM on February 14, 2018 [47 favorites]


I wanted to favorite Rust Moranis's comment

I had plenty of leftovers Homo neanderthalensis so, I took care of it for you.

Meanwhile, we need a fake tag added to Cake's new album title. msalt suggested was a potentially legit one based on all their other ones before the hellfire of "reality" we have entered now.
posted by a non mouse, a cow herd at 5:25 PM on February 14, 2018 [1 favorite]


"If the ethnicity previously reported is correct, I am fucking terrified about how this is going to affect the immigration debate and racists in this goddamn country."

He's wearing a MAGA hat in one of his IG pics so the mental gymnastics of the conservatives should be interesting.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:52 PM on February 14, 2018 [16 favorites]




Yeah I saw the shooter's name and immediately thought "Oh shit." :(

Turns out he was adopted so his name may not be representative of his ethnicity. Meanwhile, other students have described him as very pale with red hair. So hopefully there won't be any immigration angle at all.

It's sad that whenever there is one of these shootings that I'm relieved if it turns out to be just another white guy, because at least whites don't have to worry about backlash against their entire ethnicity. White privilege indeed.
posted by Jacqueline at 6:11 PM on February 14, 2018 [14 favorites]


More than 130 political appointees working in white house didn't have permanent security clearances as of November 2017

In fairness to the Trump administration, it's hard to get security clearances for everyone on your staff when most of them are agents of foreign governments.
posted by chrchr at 6:24 PM on February 14, 2018 [42 favorites]


Frank Rich (NY Mag) calls for John Kelly to resign. Worth it for this bit alone:

“The administration’s “adult” will now be remembered as a man who used his power to tar a black congresswoman and defend a wifebeater. He is making the brief interregnum of the Mooch look in retrospect like a golden age.”
posted by Barack Spinoza at 6:25 PM on February 14, 2018 [65 favorites]


I just listened to governor Scott say he was leaving the press conference to go directly to the hospitals to see the victims and their families, and offer his assistance in any way possible. Unless I miss heard, he was talking about things like emotional support, clerical help, administrative support Etc.

I hope by everyone he means everyone, and people aren't reluctant to get help due to their immigration status. This seems like the kind of place ICE would show up, these days.
posted by ezust at 6:29 PM on February 14, 2018 [9 favorites]


Rep Mike Coffman [R-CO-06] calls for VA Secy to resign in light of Euro trip ethics scandal.

Coffman serves on Armed Services and Veteran's Affairs committees.
posted by Chrysostom at 6:46 PM on February 14, 2018 [13 favorites]


RedOrGreen posted this link to an article which is short: bring back paper ballots. As someone who has scrutineered twenty or so elections, I agree. I do not understand the fascination with gimmickry which has resulted in a lot of bad systems. Paper ballots forever!
(And, weird side note, one of the article's authors is Grover Norquist -- But, wait! Paper ballots are still a good idea even if Norquist is for them.)
posted by CCBC at 7:35 PM on February 14, 2018


I do not understand the fascination with gimmickry which has resulted in a lot of bad systems.

Government contracts to campaign donors. And in some places, lack of accountability and ease of ratfucking is the whole point. We've never had a truly free, fair, and traceable voting system, ever. It's a fantasy to believe we've ever actually lived in a democracy, instead of the illusion of one.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:09 PM on February 14, 2018 [5 favorites]




The WH schedule for tomorrow (THU) does not include a presser with Sarah Sanders. Looks like they're going to skip the conference tomorrow as well. Given the number of mass shootings in the USA maybe they can soon get away with never having another presser again out of "respect" for the victims.
posted by Justinian at 8:24 PM on February 14, 2018 [4 favorites]


Oh, the WH has extra reason now to keep quiet tomorrow, especially if they were mistakenly thinking the Florida shooting would draw people's attention away from the Porter situation. Surprising nobody at all, the Boston Globe reports:
The suspect in the Florida shooting was expelled last school year after a fight with his ex-girlfriend’s new boyfriend and had been abusive to his girlfriend, a student said.
posted by FelliniBlank at 8:29 PM on February 14, 2018 [37 favorites]


Sahil Kapur: McConnell filed cloture tonight for four immigration amendments, setting up votes in this order:

• McCain-Coons (DACA+border)
• Toomey (sanctuary cities)
• Rounds-King (DACA+security/wall)
• Grassley (Trump’s four pillars)

Grassley's bill is a replacement that wipes out all other text and swaps it with the Trump backed bill slashing legal immigration, and that's what McConnell is giving the top billing. No vote on Durbin-Graham or the mysterious alleged bipartisan compromise bill.
posted by T.D. Strange at 8:40 PM on February 14, 2018 [8 favorites]


A couple of those, possibly all of them will get over 50 votes but none will get to 60.
posted by Justinian at 8:42 PM on February 14, 2018 [2 favorites]


I've been buried in my own TX32 race since the middle of January, so I have no idea what's going on. (There's a really crowded primary, which is a great problem to have, but I love this team and I don't want to lose them on March 6th.) I guess that this is just to say, take heart. After Virginia, Texas is really difficult, but there's enough people that are mad and want to do something about it that I am starting to allow myself hope on a macro level. on a micro level-- I cannot lose these people. and I know there's more like me nationwide.

if we all do the work, it might yet be okay. I am glad y'all are still here.
posted by dogheart at 9:37 PM on February 14, 2018 [26 favorites]


America is a Gun

England is a cup of tea.
France, a wheel of ripened brie.
Greece, a short, squat olive tree.
America is a gun.

Brazil is football on the sand.
Argentina, Maradona’s hand.
Germany, an oompah band.
America is a gun.

Holland is a wooden shoe.
Hungary, a goulash stew.
Australia, a kangaroo.
America is a gun.

Japan is a thermal spring.
Scotland is a highland fling.
Oh, better to be anything
than America as a gun.


Brian Bilston
posted by Going To Maine at 10:31 PM on February 14, 2018 [61 favorites]


Remington Arms is seeking to file for bankruptcy.

Most of the reportage has been focusing on the gun control fears that drove sales during the Obama administration and have since collapsed.

That's highly misguided in this case. Remington is ~$billion in debt, but Cerberus group extracted billions from the company over the years. It is vastly over-leveraged. Additionally, although its an open question as to whether they face any liability in Sandy Hook shootings, it is settled that they still owe on several class action settlements for faulty and unsafe firearms.

Point is - Remington was run into the ground as part of a scheme to stiff the banks dumb enough to lend to it. It weren't democrat gun control fears that killed it.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 10:45 PM on February 14, 2018 [27 favorites]


Yep, Obama really dropped the ball on that whole taking-all-their-guns thing.

Hey, remember that time he got in trouble for saying "they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations" and then they proved him wrong by never doing any of those things? Good times.
posted by kirkaracha at 11:08 PM on February 14, 2018 [50 favorites]


CCBC: As someone who has scrutineered twenty or so elections, I agree. I do not understand the fascination with gimmickry which has resulted in a lot of bad systems.

Didn't a lot of them pop up in the wake of the 2000 election? After spending weeks hearing about hanging chads, I recall electronic voting machines seeming like an obvious solution to a lot of folks.
posted by joedan at 11:24 PM on February 14, 2018 [9 favorites]


Chuck Grassley has realized that all his loyalty and twenty five cents still doesn't buy him a phone call: 'Incensed' Grassley Rips Sessions for Torching Justice Overhaul
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley blasted Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Wednesday after Sessions criticized his criminal justice overhaul a day before a committee vote.

Sessions wrote a letter charging that the legislation, if passed, could let the "very worst criminals" and gang members out of prison early. Grassley accused the attorney general of being ungrateful, saying that he had supported Sessions when President Donald Trump wanted to fire him and protected him from repeated Democratic demands for public hearings on Sessions’ contacts with Russians in 2016.

"I think it’s legitimate to be incensed and I resent it, because of what I’ve done for him. He had a tough nomination, a tough hearing in my committee," Grassley, an Iowa Republican, said in an interview in his Capitol Hill office.

"They wanted to call him back every other day for additional hearings about his Russian connection, and I shut them off of that until we had the normal oversight hearing in October I believe it was, see? And the president was going to fire him, and I backed him, you know? So why wouldn’t I be irritated?"
What's that Senator? You outright admit that you thought running interference for Sessions that time when we all said he was too racist to be AG and then then again in the Russia investigation would somehow make him give a damn about sentencing reform?
posted by zachlipton at 12:31 AM on February 15, 2018 [56 favorites]


A young man committed a mass shooting on Valentine’s Day.

For a reference point as to how gun violence has become normalised: the 1929 Chicago St. Valentine's day massacre, which went down in infamy due to how shocking it was, resulted in the death of 7 adult mob gang members.
posted by Buntix at 12:54 AM on February 15, 2018 [75 favorites]


The part that gets me is that 17 people are dead, and this isn't the deadliest shooting at a school in America, it isn't the deadliest shooting in Florida, it isn't the deadliest shooting in the last six months.
posted by MattWPBS at 2:53 AM on February 15, 2018 [42 favorites]


Tfw you wanted to drain the swamp but the kids want to install a literal GS banker to be Chief of Staff.

Also, he's a Democrat so lol. JFC this administration is so stupid.
posted by Talez at 3:51 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


@joanwalsh: (The Nation, CNN)
I want to remind everyone about Virginia 2017: In the 13 races where pro-gun control Democrats squared off against NRA Republicans, Democrats won 12. Top of the ticket -- Northam, Fairfax and Herring -- had F NRA ratings, and all won. It's not hopeless.
posted by chris24 at 3:59 AM on February 15, 2018 [65 favorites]


Welp Fox and Friends is discussing everything posted on the shooter's Instagram account *except* the red MAGA hat.
posted by Jacqueline at 4:18 AM on February 15, 2018 [11 favorites]


In other news, I think the guy I'm dating is gradually watching Fox News less for information and more for the entertainment value of listening to me mercilessly drag them. Critical thinking can be taught!
posted by Jacqueline at 4:27 AM on February 15, 2018 [7 favorites]


Meanwhile, a chorus of Daily Mail commenters, some or all of whom could be paid staffers in Russia, are claiming that the gunman was a Democrat/ANTIFA/leftist/black militant of some sort.
posted by acb at 4:29 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


I've seen those same comments all over.
posted by octothorpe at 5:02 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


Fox and Friends now blaming antidepressants, opiates, and violent videos for school shootings. Then, after the commercial break, they open with the Snapchat video of the shooting. I think their producers are the ones on drugs.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:03 AM on February 15, 2018 [7 favorites]


I want to remind everyone about Virginia 2017: In the 13 races where pro-gun control Democrats squared off against NRA Republicans, Democrats won 12. Top of the ticket -- Northam, Fairfax and Herring -- had F NRA ratings, and all won. It's not hopeless.

@#$%#%#@

STOP 👏 ATTRIBUTING 👏 IRRELEVANT 👏 REASONS 👏 TO 👏 BACKLASH 👏 WAVES

Gun control is not abortion. The number of people in those districts who are single issue gun control voters I could probably count on one hand.
posted by Talez at 5:03 AM on February 15, 2018 [4 favorites]


WTF, Grassley, the question is not why wouldn't you be irritated, it's why would you admit to a restive populace that is waaaay more than just "irritated" at this point that you supported Sessions? When you knew perfectly well that Sessions is dirty AF?

"They wanted to call him back every other day for additional hearings about his Russian connection, and I shut them off of that until we had the normal oversight hearing in October I believe it was, see? And the president was going to fire him, and I backed him, you know? So why wouldn’t I be irritated?"

TL;DR, "I, along with everybody else, knew he was a Russian agent and a danger to the nation, but I wanted him to back my creepy schemes in congress, so I sold out my country, and now he's not backing my creepy schemes, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"
posted by Don Pepino at 5:05 AM on February 15, 2018 [16 favorites]


Fox and Friends now blaming antidepressants, opiates...

In a bunker somewhere in the California desert, Tom Cruise knowingly nods his head.
posted by PenDevil at 5:06 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


Trump is going with blaming the victims on twitter
So many signs that the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed, even expelled from school for bad and erratic behavior. Neighbors and classmates knew he was a big problem. Must always report such instances to authorities, again and again!
Seen the #seesomethingsaysomething tag around a bit as well yesterday, so presumably that's the narrative they are going with.

Of course, it's pretty certain Trump himself would have been expelled (and nearly was) but for his rich daddy.
posted by Buntix at 5:07 AM on February 15, 2018 [10 favorites]




Holy shit. I honestly did not anticipate that Trump would lash out in a fascist manner over dead kids. Of course I should've but--Christ it makes me sick to my stomach.

And yes, as a child Trump liked to throw rocks at other children. Other kids were scared of him. He got sent to military school because he was doing shit like the rock-throwing.
posted by angrycat at 5:13 AM on February 15, 2018 [22 favorites]


Those tweets don't sound like Trump. He would have rambled incoherently about how arming all students was the answer, and misspelled some words.
posted by emjaybee at 5:14 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


"The number of people in those districts who are single issue gun control voters I could probably count on one hand."

I had 1,000+ Libertarians/libertarians on my FB friends list in 2016 and only a couple of them defected to Trump because of Weld's stance on gun control. So even amongst a relatively hardcore gun rights crowd, it's not their top priority issue.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:17 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'll give Fox and Friends credit for one thing: They aren't speaking the shooter's name, much less imputing anything about his possible ethnicity or immigrant heritage based on his name. (Which should be minimum standards for so-called journalists, but they fail to meet those standards so often that it's very much a "Dear Diary, today Fox News was not horrible" moment.) And since we know this is the show from which Trump gets many of his ideas, maybe he won't go down that road either?
posted by Jacqueline at 5:24 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


STOP 👏 ATTRIBUTING 👏 IRRELEVANT 👏 REASONS 👏 TO 👏 BACKLASH 👏 WAVES

The point wasn’t that those 12 won because they were pro gun control, but that they didn’t lose because of it. Which used to happen. A lot. Especially in red/swing states. Hence the supposed monolithic power of the NRA.
posted by chris24 at 5:24 AM on February 15, 2018 [48 favorites]


Third White House official resigns after being told he wouldn’t qualify for full clearance...

Banks said he was told that his clearance would not be granted because he admitted to smoking marijuana in 2013.


It was my impression that past drug use would not prevent an individual from getting a security clearance as long as they were honest with the FBI about it. Is Banks lying?
posted by rdr at 5:25 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


Must always report such instances to authorities, again and again!

and therein lies the problem: how many people dealing with abusive or violent partners or family members have tried to go to the authorities, again and again, and aren't taken seriously?

again, and again, and again
posted by halation at 5:26 AM on February 15, 2018 [43 favorites]


I'll give Fox and Friends credit for one thing:

Don’t.
posted by Barack Spinoza at 5:29 AM on February 15, 2018 [21 favorites]


It was my impression that past drug use would not prevent an individual from getting a security clearance as long as they were honest with the FBI about it.

Eh. They say that, but I knew a few people in college that believed them and got burned for it. One of them was such an innocent that she once ate one of those car-winning Hershey’s bars that said “HAPPINESS” on it instead of “HERSHEYS”, because she just thought Hershey’s wanted people to be happy. She’d tried pot once. They were still like “you did illegal drugs.”
posted by schadenfrau at 5:29 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


So many signs that the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed, even expelled from school for bad and erratic behavior. Neighbors and classmates knew he was a big problem. Must always report such instances to authorities, again and again!

Beyond the victim blaming, Trump reversed restrictions on people with mental issues buying guns last year.
posted by chris24 at 5:31 AM on February 15, 2018 [62 favorites]


I read the barest of bare bones stories about the shooting on the bus and it was mentioned that the shooter's mom called the cops on him multiple times. He was expelled from school for bringing weapons. Those people all count as authorities who were notified. What were they supposed to do before he killed 17 people? They aren't precogs. He purchased his weapons legally.
posted by soren_lorensen at 5:32 AM on February 15, 2018 [37 favorites]


What were they supposed to do before he killed 17 people?

Some kind of counselling or mental health assessment?
posted by PenDevil at 5:35 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


He purchased his weapons legally.

DING DING DING.

The only answer is restricting access to weapons. I've given up hope, to be honest, that we will ever make any headway on this issue at all. 8 school shootings this year alone and it's only fucking February.
posted by lydhre at 5:37 AM on February 15, 2018 [14 favorites]


Some kind of counselling or mental health assessment?

The question was rhetorical given that there were clear warning signs.
posted by Talez at 5:39 AM on February 15, 2018


What were they supposed to do before he killed 17 people?

Well, if he was abusive to his girlfriend, and domestic violence was taken seriously as a crime, he would have already had an intervention. But domestic violence is never taken seriously ever because people don’t value women and the fact that Trump of all people is now pretending to care about DV is making me nauseous. People reported him and now he is fucking President. This is the season of the abuser.
posted by corb at 5:39 AM on February 15, 2018 [62 favorites]


You can't compel adults to seek mental health treatment unless they are in immediate danger.

The problem here is access to guns. No one, not a sane person, not a mentally ill person, not a young man or an older adult, not someone who's never had a parking ticket nor a violent criminal should have access to weapons of mass destruction and an arsenal full of ammo. I hate this hair splitting about what does or does not count as a "red flag" or something that should have prevented a legal gun sale. NO ONE NEEDS THESE WEAPONS.
posted by soren_lorensen at 5:41 AM on February 15, 2018 [58 favorites]


One of them was such an innocent that she once ate one of those car-winning Hershey’s bars that said “HAPPINESS” on it instead of “HERSHEYS”...She’d tried pot once.

it took me an embarrassingly long time to parse this anecdote; i thought somehow the actions were simultaneous and your friend had accidentally gotten hold of a hershey's edible and i clearly have not had enough coffee yet

regarding honesty with clearances, my impression is that it varies from agency to agency and type to type? i have known people who weren't able to apply for clearance-type jobs because of past substance use/abuse, but providing evidence that the use/abuse is not ongoing (or the pursuit of treatment and the maintenance of abstinence) will work for some types of clearance. i can totally imagine the FBI being bigger sticklers for this than some of the other agencies, though, given their nature.
posted by halation at 5:42 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


Someone on /r/wallstreetbets pointed out that gun stocks always go down after mass shootings in a less than savory way. Maybe we can take advantage of that, create a bot that buys shares in gun manufacturers after shootings, sets the dividends aside, and then uses those dividends to buy more shares in gun manufacturers after shootings.

See it we can get the gun industry to eat itself by funneling their profits into acquiring them and/or using it in politics to shut them down.
posted by Talez at 5:45 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


Ted Cruz condemning Democrats for "politicizing tragedy" then two minutes later arguing why Congress should pass "Kate's Law."

Do they not listen to the words coming out of their own mouths or what.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:46 AM on February 15, 2018 [18 favorites]


"Some kind of counselling or mental health assessment?"

Yeah they actually did that for this guy and he simply stopped going to the counseling.
posted by Jacqueline at 5:48 AM on February 15, 2018 [6 favorites]


Yeah I was interviewed as part of an American friend/co-worker's security clearance process once (for TS clearance). I was told to be honest about their pot use during the time we hung out, so I was. They got their TS clearance and went on to get NATO TS clearance later on, and that was 15 years ago. They did work for DoE and DoD security since then. So I guess it's kind of a grey area.
posted by some loser at 6:04 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


Oh good, he’s going to address the nation at 11.
posted by T.D. Strange at 6:08 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


Yeah, I know a person who held a TS clearance and worked at the Pentagon, while smoking pot daily. He was open about it with the investigators. A security clearance isn't so much about what it is that you do, so much as it is about if you have your life and finances together and can't be blackmailed or bribed over it, which are the quickest paths to being a threat to national security.
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 6:10 AM on February 15, 2018 [20 favorites]


Oh good, he’s going to address the nation at 11.

I wonder how much bloviating will be required to say "we will do everything in our power to make sure this doesn't happen again except for any sort of meaningful gun control".
posted by Talez at 6:19 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


...so much as it is about if you have your life and finances together

Which segues nicely into Kushner's lack of clearance, amid stories like this from Bloomberg: Kushner Investors Subpoenaed by U.S. Tax Authorities, Source Says

IRS circling in on Trump family financials, eh. Almost as nice as the rumours - which I cannot source even to today's minimalist standards, but I like anyway - that the Russia-NRA-GOP cash pipeline is under active RICO investigation, with the possibility of the GOP being indicted as a criminally corrupt organisation. It's clearly impossible, because only bad impossible things happen, but a girl can dream...
posted by Devonian at 6:24 AM on February 15, 2018 [17 favorites]


Ted Cruz condemning Democrats for "politicizing tragedy"

That's a tell, that and the spike in gun buying in the immediate wake of a massacre over fears that gun regulation is forthcoming. The first thing the pro-gun side themselves think of when there's a massacre is restricting access to guns.
posted by Gelatin at 6:24 AM on February 15, 2018 [12 favorites]


"This is the season of the abuser."

All of human history has been the "season" of the abuser. This is the season of speaking up and pushing back.

Listening to old people talk about these scandals is mind-boggling. They're genuinely bewildered why people are digging into the "private business" of these men. It's like they see domestic violence as morally equivalent to picking your nose and eating the booger -- a nasty habit no one wants to see/hear/think about, but irrelevant to a person's career or reputation unless they're blatantly public about it. And if you bring it up, *you're* the uncouth one.

Some other WTFerky from old people:

"I thought we weren't supposed to care anymore about what people did in the privacy of their own homes" like being an abuser is the same as being gay.

"If we go after everyone who ever did a bad thing, there will be no one left to run the country" as if a) abusing women is just an inherent characteristic of being male and b) women couldn't run the country.

That beating one's wife and kids is no longer seen as the prerogative of the male "head of household" is a pretty significant generational attitude change.
posted by Jacqueline at 6:27 AM on February 15, 2018 [45 favorites]


I don't even understand how this see something, say something thing is supposed to work. Are we going to summarily incarcerate people for being creepy? It seems pretty clear that lots of people tried to intervene with this guy. The school expelled him and circulated an email about how he wasn't allowed on campus. His mother called the cops on him and got him counseling, but she has been unable to do anything since November, when she dropped dead of the flu. His friend's family reached out to him after he was orphaned in November and took him in. I bet they're going to take the blame, but I'm not sure that I could distinguish between a high-school senior who was acting strangely because he was recently suddenly orphaned and a high-school senior who was going to shoot up his former school. Who should have contacted the authorities and didn't? What would the authorities have done if they had been contacted?
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:28 AM on February 15, 2018 [31 favorites]


Chuck Grassley is my senator, so I called his DC office to ask about this money quote from the Bloomberg article:
"I think it’s legitimate to be incensed and I resent it, because of what I’ve done for [Attorney General Sessions]. He had a tough nomination, a tough hearing in my committee," Grassley, an Iowa Republican, said in an interview in his Capitol Hill office.

"They wanted to call him back every other day for additional hearings about his Russian connection, and I shut them off of that until we had the normal oversight hearing in October I believe it was, see? And the president was going to fire him, and I backed him, you know? So why wouldn’t I be irritated?"
I said that I was concerned because this seemed to be an admission that Senator Grassley had attempted to undermine the Russia investigation in exchange for a perceived quid pro quo commitment of personal loyalty from the Attorney General, which sounded like corrupt intent leading to felony obstruction of justice, and has Senator Grassley made any statements about whether he committed felony obstruction of justice? He has not, it turns out. Neither, as far as the staffer knows, has the senator been interviewed by Special Counsel Mueller who is tasked with investigating obstruction of justice relating to the Russia investigation. The staffer was unable to say whether Grassley would be willing to testify under oath regarding this possible crime, and declined to say whether he himself would testify as someone who works with the senator and thus could be a material witness. I ended by sending a personal message to the senator, which is, please stop committing felonies, and please retire before you say anything else incriminating. The staffer said he would pass my message along.
posted by East Manitoba Regional Junior Kabaddi Champion '94 at 6:31 AM on February 15, 2018 [55 favorites]


Are we going to summarily incarcerate people for being creepy?

We can summarily revoke their access to legal weapons.
posted by Talez at 6:33 AM on February 15, 2018 [4 favorites]


Who should have contacted the authorities and didn't? What would the authorities have done if they had been contacted?

Evidently he was already on the FBI's radar for threatening a school shooting online. People did 'see something / say something' and it didn't help.
posted by halation at 6:36 AM on February 15, 2018 [39 favorites]


Yeah, for me it boils down to the family who took him in being all, "well yes, he did have an AR-15, but we made him keep in in a case to which he held the key." Once again the clear red flag is "civilian with an AR-15" and that shit needs to END.

Also, as seen on FB in response to stuff like Ted Cruz condemning Democrats for "politicizing tragedy" , pictures of the Newtown victims with the heading saying something like "Well can we finally talk about this shooting now?"
posted by TwoStride at 6:38 AM on February 15, 2018 [9 favorites]


"the Russia-NRA-GOP cash pipeline is under active RICO investigation, with the possibility of the GOP being indicted as a criminally corrupt organisation"

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE

Which crossroad do I have to meet the Devil at to make a deal because I would happily sell my soul to see this happen.

Just the idea of it being a possible outcome of the investigations into the 2016 election has me so giddy that I'm dancing in my office chair.

(Nobody hates the GOP more than a left-Libertarian hates the GOP.)
posted by Jacqueline at 6:41 AM on February 15, 2018 [31 favorites]


Seriously. How is this hard? Every weapon gets a serial and a chain of custody involving a national federal firearms license. Any weapon that isn't reported stolen is liable to the last known owner. The owner when disposing of the weapon through sale is required to logon to a government website, put in the new FFL# and notify the government on the new owner. Gun gets stolen? Safe gets inspected, if it's not up to code your FFL gets pulled. Caught with a stolen gun? 5 years, strict liability. Put the serial number in the website, or go to cop shop and have them do it. Unregistered gun? Fine for stupidty, or 12 months for malice. Permanently ineligible for a FFL. Just a tiny bit of fucking prudence here.

Kid brings a weapon to school? You call the feds and have his license pulled and a black mark that stops him from getting it back. Cops go round his place, pick up any weapons he has. You work it out in civil action in court after that. Someone lends him a weapon? They're going down for involuntary manslaughter. Black market weapons? Sure. If the kid can spend 40 grand on an AR-15 or 15 grand on a handgun (because those are the street prices in Australia).

I mean this shit isn't hard. It won't stop everything but it'll put a dent in it.
posted by Talez at 6:43 AM on February 15, 2018 [40 favorites]


I'll just link to my first comment gun control in 2013 and save the time typing.

FWIW, This is one of those topics where "been there done that and need a rational government acting in good-faith for it to work"
March 5, 2013
posted by mikelieman at 6:43 AM on February 15, 2018 [5 favorites]


Safe gets inspected, if it's not up to code your FFL gets pulled.

That's what insurance is for. You don't have a UL Listed 30minute/side safe? No insurance for you, which means no registration for your firearms. When you can bring proof of insurance back, we'll let you register it.
posted by mikelieman at 6:45 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


Fellow students 'predicted' Florida school shooting suspect might lash out

He’s show people his gun videos abscond everyone would say “that’s a future school shooter” and nothing happens.
posted by Artw at 6:49 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


I'm not sure if this has been brought up yet, but is the "politics/election thread" the right place for in-depth discussion of the shooting and gun control? Can it go to a new thread?
posted by Tevin at 6:50 AM on February 15, 2018 [5 favorites]


We can summarily revoke their access to legal weapons.
According to the GOP, access to firearms is a fundamental right, like the right to religious liberty or free expression. It's more fundamental than the right to vote. So if that's what they're saying, they're saying that we have no rights that can't be summarily violated.

The alternative would be to recognize that access to firearms should not be a fundamental right, but they're not going to do that.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 6:51 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


That's what insurance is for. You don't have a UL Listed 30minute/side safe? No insurance for you, which means no registration for your firearms. When you can bring proof of insurance back, we'll let you register it.

Insurance will just fight paying any money out. When you have a chain of custody and a last known responsible person just have the feds compensate the victims, put it on the last known owner's tab at the IRS, have the IRS confiscate every tax return and garnish wages until the compensation is repaid.
posted by Talez at 6:51 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


Are we going to summarily incarcerate people for being creepy?

You know what? Maybe it’s 2018 and I’m just sick of shit, but “creepy” often means “has committed a lot of low level crimes” and I’m just not cool with us using the first word to make it sound more harmless.

Harassment is illegal.
Stalking is illegal.
Assaulting someone for dating your ex is illegal.
Bringing a gun to school to threaten someone is illegal.

It’s not “summarily incarcerating people” to say they should be held accountable for their /actual crimes/.
posted by corb at 6:52 AM on February 15, 2018 [63 favorites]


they're saying that we have no rights that can't be summarily violated.

Freedom of speech can be summarily denied if there's "imminent lawless action". Seems fucking trivial to apply that to the second.
posted by Talez at 6:54 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


I wanted to offer this insight into NRA membership.

Apparently there is a faction within the NRA that is not insane. There is a fellow running for the board who supports gun regulation. I have no idea how much weight a board membership has, but the Wayne LaPierre folks have dubbed the fellow 'the enemy within' and changed the election rules to make it harder for this fellow, so I guess they're not very happy with him.

So: if you pay $500 to NRA you can get lifetime membership and immediately start voting. You don't pay any more, ever. So, it's not like you're sitting down at the end of the year and saying to yourself, if you have lifetime membership, 'why am paying $$ to this crazy organization.' But you get to vote on it for the rest of your life.

I think the NRA is an evil organization and the person who shared this info with me, who thinks he can change the organization from within, misguided. At some point you have to choose a side. I'd be horrified to be associated with the NRA.

However, I am starting to grok why this organization can rope people in, create tribal affiliations, and just go crazy. You've got reasonable people who think that they can change the organization by being members, and maybe a couple years after they paid their $500, they have second thoughts, but they've already made the investment so why not just rationalize their staying within the organization.
posted by angrycat at 6:55 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


Seems fucking trivial to apply that to the second.

There seems to be nothing "well-regulated" about walking into a school and murdering students, too.
posted by thelonius at 6:56 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


However, I am starting to grok why this organization can rope people in, create tribal affiliations, and just go crazy. You've got reasonable people who think that they can change the organization by being members, and maybe a couple years after they paid their $500, they have second thoughts, but they've already made the investment so why not just rationalize their staying within the organization.

You also are required to have an NRA card to use many club gun ranges.
posted by Talez at 6:58 AM on February 15, 2018 [10 favorites]


According to the GOP, access to firearms is a fundamental right, like the right to religious liberty or free expression.

The Democrats should take the originalist tack here. You have the right to bear arms where those arms are non-rifled, single shot, muzzle loading, black powder muskets.
posted by PenDevil at 6:59 AM on February 15, 2018 [5 favorites]


Insurance will just fight paying any money out. When you have a chain of custody and a last known responsible person

The purpose of the insurer really isn't paying off losses, it's about using the same infrastructure we use to make sure our cars are up to standards for the firearms category. UL listing is a great way to separate real gun safes from crap.

I am 100% behind nation licensing, registration, and insurance because OF the chain of custody you mention, but I'd take it further.

You "lose" a firearm and it ends up in the hands of a criminal, and that "loss" wasn't immediately reported to the police and insurer? You're chargeable for any and all crimes committed with the gun you "lost" and ended up in criminal hands along with the criminal. Enjoy sitting on death row next to the guy who kills a cop with a gun that you "lost"....

And thus criminals are denied access to firearms.
posted by mikelieman at 6:59 AM on February 15, 2018 [4 favorites]


According to the Gun Violence Archive, this brings the total number of people killed in mass shootings (defined as incidents in which at least four people are injured or killed) in the US so far this year — over 45 days — to 58.

At this rate, we can expect another 412 deaths in mass shooting this year.

Will lawmakers offering "thoughts and prayers" for victims of the past due anything to reduce the number of future victims?

If they're at a loss for ideas, last November Scientific American proposed four laws that could reduce that number, with supporting evidence.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 7:01 AM on February 15, 2018 [12 favorites]


I wanted to offer this insight into NRA membership.

Many private shooting ranges require a current NRA membership and passing a NRA-taught course to become a member of their range. It's annoying because I'd much rather support JPFO but the NRA has a near monopoly on entry level gun safety training programs.
posted by Jacqueline at 7:02 AM on February 15, 2018 [6 favorites]


flug: In the case of the particular Twitter account that was the subject of the study, the disinformation campaign has continued over a lengthy period of time and taken on many guises

With all the hype around machine learning and the power of social media companies to micro-target ads to their users, you'd think these drastic shifts in persona would be flagged, if nothing else to change which ads get fed to said user. And if such flags exist, Twitter could also flag accounts as potentially being bots.

And if such flags exist, there must be a record of them, which Twitter could then show, say, congressional folks who are interested in how bots are being used to spread dissent and undermine America or something.
posted by filthy light thief at 7:02 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


(and keeping this creaky thread loading without issues)

We're at 1894 comments which means this thread is not long for this world. That's probably why the mods are letting it proceed and letting people process but I don't want to speak authoritatively for them. In the new thread which will probably happen later today or tomorrow they'll probably come down hard on derailing away from #potus45.
posted by Talez at 7:02 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


The only answer is restricting access to weapons.

I agree, if by "restricting access" we're also including restrictions on the manufacturing end. The industry needs to hang for this crisis.
posted by Rykey at 7:02 AM on February 15, 2018 [6 favorites]


Freedom of speech can be summarily denied if there's "imminent lawless action". Seems fucking trivial to apply that to the second.
The cops are certainly allowed to try to apprehend someone who is taking his AR-15 to shoot up a high school. They're just really likely to get killed in the process, because guns are lethal in a way that words aren't.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:06 AM on February 15, 2018


I'm working on a post for the shooting.
posted by Jacqueline at 7:08 AM on February 15, 2018 [6 favorites]


According to the GOP, access to firearms is a fundamental right, like the right to religious liberty or free expression.

This is the part of the problem that is so depressing and makes the American situation so unique. Given current Supreme Court precedent, we're not going to be able to do an Australia style gun buyback and regulatory regime without a constitutional amendment. And we're so politically polarized right now that there is absolutely 0 hope of such a constitutional amendment.
posted by dis_integration at 7:09 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


Sahil Kapur: McConnell filed cloture tonight for four immigration amendments, setting up votes in this order:

• McCain-Coons (DACA+border)
• Toomey (sanctuary cities)
• Rounds-King (DACA+security/wall)
• Grassley (Trump’s four pillars)


Kapur elaborates those points in his Twitter thread, taking special note of the odious Pat Toomey:
A few observations:

1. Democrats’ amendments are both bipartisan. Republicans’ amendments are both partisan.

2. Toomey’s sanctuary city cutoff is pure election-year politics to trap Dems. Not even Trump is asking for this with DACA.

3. None of the four appear to have 60 votes.

4. Trump’s plan will be voted on last, which gives McConnell the option to make a “if you really want to fix DACA this is your final chance” pitch. Sets up the blame game between now and November.

Here’s the text of the Rounds-King-Collins-Manchin bill, which is basically a DACA fix (in which they cannot sponsor their parents) + $25 billion for border security. 👇

https://www.collins.senate.gov/sites/default/files/Text%20of%20Immigration%20Security%20and%20Opportunity%20Act.pdf

Pat Toomey is the rare senator who’ll pointedly attack a major region he represents on the Senate floor and target it with legislation.
Philly Voice: Toomey Targets Philadelphia And Other Sanctuary Cities Amid Senate Immigration Debate
Pennsylvania

Senator Pat Toomey introduced an amendment to the immigration bill that would change policies in places such as Philadelphia
n.b. Xenophobic PAC Federation for American Immigration Reform has been pushing anti-sanctuary cities Youtube ads targeting Toomey's Democratic counterpart, Bob Casey, who's up for re-election this year. Toomey's legislation is clearly coordinating with them.
posted by Doktor Zed at 7:13 AM on February 15, 2018 [13 favorites]


The cops are certainly allowed to try to apprehend someone who is taking his AR-15 to shoot up a high school.

Yeah, but it's legal to open-carry an AR-15 in Florida. It was legally purchased, and he was 19 years old. It was legal for him to have it and walk around with it, right up until he stepped onto school property, and then it was too late.
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 7:17 AM on February 15, 2018 [19 favorites]


New post for Florida school shooting: When "see something, say something" fails
posted by Jacqueline at 7:21 AM on February 15, 2018 [18 favorites]


Pat Toomey is the rare senator who’ll pointedly attack a major region he represents on the Senate floor and target it with legislation.

I think you'll find this is not at all rare in any state with an R senator and a mid-sized to large city. They hate cities. Pennsylvania Republicans particularly hate Philadelphia. They dislike Pittsburgh but don't hate it quite so much because there are many fewer Black people. The entire state GOP caucus basically exists to destroy Philadelphia via legislation. If they could Bugs-Bunny-Florida-style cut off Philadelphia from the rest of the state, they would do so tomorrow.
posted by soren_lorensen at 7:21 AM on February 15, 2018 [27 favorites]


In other news, I think the guy I'm dating is gradually watching Fox News less for information and more for the entertainment value of listening to me mercilessly drag them. Critical thinking can be taught!

posted by Jacqueline at 4:27 AM on February 15 [1 favorite +] [!]


My older daughter's husband was caught in the right-wing bubble because all his friends acquired in adolescence were. She slowly dragged him out of there through the same technique and now he's the same engaging, thoughtful person and a sane human being, to boot. He's even the primary caretaker for my two beautiful grandchildren from them.
posted by Mental Wimp at 7:21 AM on February 15, 2018 [15 favorites]


Oh. Correction: Florida IS one of the few states with a restriction on open carry.
posted by Xyanthilous P. Harrierstick at 7:24 AM on February 15, 2018 [2 favorites]


soren_lorensen: "should have access to weapons of mass destruction and an arsenal full of ammo. "

Let's not muddy the definitions; a gun, even a fully auto machine gun, is not a WMD.

Gelatin: " The first thing the pro-gun side themselves think of when there's a massacre is restricting access to guns."

No, they think other people are going to advocate and succeed on regulation because practically every halo gun control legislation across the world has been passed as the result of a specific shooting.
posted by Mitheral at 7:27 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


Evidently he was already on the FBI's radar for threatening a school shooting online. People did 'see something / say something' and it didn't help.

posted by halation at 6:36 AM on February 15 [13 favorites +] [!]


This tragedy is horrible and regrettable, but I have some hope that it is a perfect storm, wherein an anecdote defies all of the arguments used by pundits to resist regulation of firearms. It can illustrate that all of the other actions we might, and in many cases should take are insufficient to stem the violence and what we need are rational controls on gun ownership and usage, including a national registry of guns. And sometimes the only thing that convinces those who distrust statistics and research is an anecdote.
posted by Mental Wimp at 7:28 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]


passing a NRA-taught course

I read that as passing a NRA-thought course for a moment.
posted by Pendragon at 7:33 AM on February 15, 2018


Mod note: Heya, there's a thread specifically about yesterday's shooting now; let's steer related shooting/gun/policy/NRA stuff thataway aside from whatever very specifically and pertinently ties to actual national politics things happening.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:42 AM on February 15, 2018 [11 favorites]


As for Toomey attacking Philly: He's been in office for exactly 2,600 days and has had zero town halls in the greater Philadelphia area. More than 45% of his constituents live in that area. He very clearly and very openly does not believe he represents us -- except when he can tweet out about "our Eagles" winning the Super Bowl.

There are one million more registered Democrats in Pennsylvania than Republicans. Folks, this is what happens when Democrats don't turn out to vote.
posted by mcduff at 8:06 AM on February 15, 2018 [30 favorites]


Running government like a business, check.
posted by Gelatin at 8:23 AM on February 15, 2018 [13 favorites]


soren_lorenson: If they could Bugs-Bunny-Florida-style cut off Philadelphia from the rest of the state, they would do so tomorrow.

And speaking as a Philadelphian (in exile), if we could do the same, we would do so today.

And, I dunno, become part of Delaware, because fuck New Jersey too.
posted by SansPoint at 8:50 AM on February 15, 2018


I took advantage of this lull to create a new thread.
posted by Emmy Rae at 8:56 AM on February 15, 2018 [11 favorites]


President Trump’s inaugural committee paid nearly $26 million to an event planning firm started by an adviser to First Lady Melania Trump, while donating $5 million — less than expected — to charity

Less than who expected? Not less than anyone who has read any of Farenthold's writings, surely. I'm surprised it was that high by about 4.75M.
posted by phearlez at 8:59 AM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


But the mandatory tax return it filed with the Internal Revenue Service indicates that the group’s charitable donations included only an already publicized $3 million for hurricane relief, plus a total of $1.75 million to groups involved in decorating and maintaining the White House and the vice president’s residence.

Oh and by the way, fuuuuuuck calling that second part a donation unless there's an accounting of the in-kind value of said decorations and service. If I go to a charity auction and win a bid $200 on a private meal from a local celeb cook, my tax return absolutely cannot count that as a $200 donation; I have to deduct the assessed reasonable value of that and if it's $200 or up? No deduction at all.
posted by phearlez at 9:03 AM on February 15, 2018 [8 favorites]


We appreciate it!
posted by Chrysostom at 9:06 AM on February 15, 2018 [1 favorite]




why doesn't it have a #devinnewthread tag
posted by rhizome at 12:23 PM on February 15, 2018 [3 favorites]


cjelli: "Ms. Winston Wolkoff personally received $1.62 million for her work,"

Wait is that salary for the single event or some sort of cost plus number?
posted by Mitheral at 12:28 PM on February 15, 2018


But...Lisa is the smart and successful one!

thatsthejoke.jpg
posted by scaryblackdeath at 12:14 PM on February 22, 2018 [2 favorites]


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