Mourning in America - Trump Year One: November '16 to

Like the best case right now is four years of infighting and bufoonery and blustery talk backed up by little action, with some real damage to federal govt and US standing along the way. My mind is playing out so many worse scenarios right now that I'm having a hard time concentrating on anything.

or rather that's all Trump wants

xp

yeah, it's not all Pence wants, and maybe not Bannon either.

pretty sure he genuinely wants to reduce taxes for his wealthy friends. dunno if that is part of what you mean by money.

I am aware of the toothlessness of the War Powers Act Sanpaku. Nonetheless, I can see avowed "mavericks" I mentioned doing their best to frustrate Trump military adventures in the service of Russia.

xp

dunno if that is part of what you mean by money.

duh, of course it is!

wasn't sure if you just meant himself and his family.

well they would benefit from those tax cuts, so yes

staffing VA psych patients has been v interesting today

huh Congress trying to rally against this Bannon appointment:

BREAKING: Rep Cicilline circulating letter to colleagues asking @realDonaldTrump to rescind Bannon appointment. 120 co-signers so far.

Οὖτις:

I don't see Trump adventurism, outside of unilateral strikes on Iran, being nearly as great a problem as his signals that the U.S. won't stand behind S.Korea/Taiwan/Baltic States.

What happens if Trump says to Russia: we're not going to interfere with bombing East Aleppo? If he removes specops guys working with the FSA? Not much, really.

And, from the nottheonion file:

Ben Carson declines role in Trump administration because he 'feels he has no government experience'

Late on that headline, it seems.

popular vote deficit passed 1 mill! lol mandate

I'd figure the numbers on Trump's promises will start to add up quick. You got to figure it would cost probably 2-3 billion to try and deport 2-3 million people. That would only be a cost of legal and logistics of $1000 a case and I would figure that it could cost lots more per case than that.
― earlnash, Tuesday, November 15, 2016 2:15 PM (twenty-seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

he could just ask Obama what it cost and then try to get a better deal tbh

being nearly as great a problem as his signals that the U.S. won't stand behind S.Korea/Taiwan/Baltic States.

def a problem. I'm sure he'll back them if they "promise to pay up" sad lol

Speaking of thte permanent Washington class:

Michelle Obama has burned off her date-night meals at Washington’s new generation of acclaimed restaurants by pedaling at SoulCycle. President Obama has shopped for Jonathan Franzen novels with his daughters at local independent bookstores. Obama administration staff members, their barhopping chronicled in the gossip pages, have hit the 14th Street hot spots hard.

Decades ago, Washington was broke and run by a mayor best known for smoking crack with a prostitute on a surveillance tape. Neighborhoods had not fully recovered from the 1968 riots, and an aging Georgetown elite still set the tone. The administrations of two Bushes and a Clinton in between hardly had an effect on the city.

But Mr. Obama’s arrival in 2009 coincided with an urban renaissance. Economic development, federal and private investment, and an influx of highly educated young, gay and diverse professionals gentrified neighborhoods, leading to an explosion in restaurants, bars and cafes. And the Obama family — African-American, youthful, attractive and urbane — were archetypes of a modern city on the upswing

― The burrito of ennui (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, November 14, 2016 10:13 PM (yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

after freaking out for a few days last week, we went to DC to visit some good friends this weekend. my wife and i went to college in DC from 2002-2006, the peak of the GWB years, and we were heavily involved in campus activism (particularly the anti-war movement during that time). we've been back to the city since then for obama's 2008 inauguration and a couple of other trips but we hadn't visited our old neighborhoods or the AU campus, so we made an effort to do that this time. it was very surreal, being reminded of that time, having an idiot president, that empowering feeling of being part of a "resistance" but still feeling helpless to affect things, seeing the traffic circle where we held our first major iraq war protest, driving past the campus buildings where we held our organizing meetings. i left DC by the time obama was elected and i often wished we stayed there during the crazy revitalization of DC during the obama years (which was obviously years in the making -- obama came with it but major DC development and gentrification had been happening for some time)

my friends and i all talked about how it was kind of a fantasy world with the obamas in the white house. some of our radicalism had faded during those years but probably less so bc of age and more that we just felt more comfortable knowing obama was running things? obv there was much to object to and protest against w/ obama but we all have had so much affection for him.

our best friends there are an interracial couple who are godparents to our youngest son. the wife, from a working-class italian-american family in boston, talked about how her father voted for trump while her biracial son (about 10 years old) was in tears when she shared the news that trump had won. she was so frustrated that her father could love his grandkids so much but not see how a trump presidency could affect them at all.

one of the other friends we saw this weekend was the one republican guy in our college group of friends. he's a weird dude. he played in a punk band and almost all his friends are pretty far left. he's an extremely moderate republican - the pro-business but socially liberal kind of moderate republican, and he said he abstained from voting this year. it was interesting to talk to him, over a lot of whiskey, and his view was that trump, until a few years ago, was basically a "manhattan democrat" and that i shouldn't worry so much, that he's probably the most moderate and socially liberal republican president we could get right now. he's not a trump fan by any means but he ultimately felt that he wasn't going to do much damage. i had to counter that this "manhattan democrat" basically started his political career attempting to delegitimize the first black president and among other very obvious (to us) things we should be extremely nervous and vigilant, he acknowledged those things are fucked up. but he mostly said we should just expect incompetence and corruption and that the huge, dangerous, and sweeping changes trump promised would be nearly impossible to achieve, that our system isn't really that tolerant of dramatic actions like that. anyways. just one moderate DC republican's pov, lol

just incompetence and corruption nbd

That's in my pile of best-case scenarios for sure. I'm not convinced that it matters what trump "is," which implies that he has some kind of principles.

hi marcos - been wondering how you were doing

hey dude! a little better. but shit this gonna be a rough few years huh

but he mostly said we should just expect incompetence and corruption and that the huge, dangerous, and sweeping changes trump promised would be nearly impossible to achieve

this is exactly what I just told my dad earlier today (lol), altho the difference is I find the likely scale of incompetence and corruption to be truly terrifying. who knows what he is going to fuck up/what crisis he is going to mismanage. This stuff scares me more - partly because it's precisely so unpredictable - than the hand-wringing about unlikely scenarios like mass deportations, Nazi-style deathcamps etc. Dubya looked pretty harmless until 9/11.

yeah this has really been a bitch with young kids in the mix, the compulsion to "keep it together" for their sake is strong but hard to live up to.

xp

totally, i was a wreck last week and our boys definitely noticed

popular vote deficit passed 1 mill! lol mandate

― (•̪●) (carne asada), Tuesday, November 15, 2016 9:40 PM (thirty-three minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hopefully the dems can use this as a weapon against mcconnell's bullshit 'the voters need a voice in the new supreme court pick'

yeah I feel like I have to confine my anxious freakouts to when the kids aren't around ie @ 2 in the morning

xp

in other news, halfway there:

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/we-people-ask-president-obama-immediately-appoint-merrick-garland-supreme-court

ha i did sign earlier today but whoever said it was depressing to see the other "popular petitions" there was otm. eg "We the people ask congress to meet in emergency session about removing George Soros owned voting machines from 16 states. 131,140 SIGNED. 100,000 GOAL"

the internet is a scary place

I'd figure the numbers on Trump's promises will start to add up quick. You got to figure it would cost probably 2-3 billion to try and deport 2-3 million people. That would only be a cost of legal and logistics of $1000 a case and I would figure that it could cost lots more per case than that.
― earlnash, Tuesday, November 15, 2016 2:15 PM (twenty-seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

In addition to the cost, there's also huge procedural burdens. Many immigrants have limited due process rights. While there's situations where 'expedited removal' is available -- prior removal orders, proximity to the border, length of time in the U.S., many people have the right to see an immigration judge, especially some of the people Trump is talking about i.e. those that have been here for a while but also have a criminal record. Currently there's a little less than 400 immigration judges benched -- 2 million people is a potential caseload of 5000 per judge. It takes years to work through the process.

popular vote deficit passed 1 mill! lol mandate

― (•̪●) (carne asada), Tuesday, November 15, 2016 9:40 PM (thirty-three minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

hopefully the dems can use this as a weapon against mcconnell's bullshit 'the voters need a voice in the new supreme court pick'

― carthago delenda est (mayor jingleberries),

really? just like in W's first term?

interesting stats lion

interesting stats lion

― Οὖτις, Tuesday, November 15, 2016 5:26 PM (fifty-seven seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

It just makes me wonder if he's serious, what they'd plan to do to make removal easier. Obviously any legislative change in that regard is going to draw court challenges. Because I think, with those numbers, you'd have to bench half the immigration lawyers in the U.S. to achieve your goal. And they're not going to do it.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/15/new-york-trump-buildings-trump-place-name-removed?CMP=share_btn_tw

lol

of course he isn't serious, he never thought any of this shit through

xp

signed that Garland petition and then saw this one that is much closer: https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/appoint-garland-now-senate-has-waived-its-rights

whoah what the hell? that's a reversal from just a couple days ago. I think there are three, I signed them all

I've never looked into this process before, does someone at the WH really have to write an email like "Guys, free speech" to that YG one

probably

that's what interns are for!

if there's some other avenue to get Obama to take this idea seriously I'd happily pursue it but idk what it is

tombot xp except that border patrol guy.. you mad bc the budget's been slashed? pretty sure thats not entirely obama's fault

and the only reason the border patrol endorsed this clown was they'd get unlimited budget money forever. its all they care about.

i signed the petitions but obama ain't gonna do shit. it's not in his nature

if mitt romney or whoever had won this election I would be cool with this but I really don't want to give trump any precedent for pushing the boundaries in the constitution

I mean he's gonna do it regardless but this would make it easier

obama should've bluffed by outright saying "approve MG now, or I appoint someone 2x as liberal as lame-duck"

Have to admit this infighting/purging gives me a little bit of hope

speaking of which
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/11/15/sen-rand-paul-says-neither-giuliani-nor-bolton-would-get-his-vote-for-secretary-of-state/

https://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/602/the-sun-comes-up

Oh boy

https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2016/11/14/was-election-vote-against-hamilton/HAT5A4m3msG6m8pPORbknL/story.html

OPINION | NIALL FERGUSON
Was the election a vote against ‘Hamilton’?

Have we already shared this, from Elizabeth Warren?

http://www.warren.senate.gov/files/documents/2016-11-15-Trump_Letter.pdf