Trump's America, March 2017: Using His Inside VOICE

nah we haven't all died yet

Only then can we be a control group.

conservative Philip Klein makes a concession:

One has to admire the commitment that Democrats and Obama had to delivering something they campaigned on and truly believed in. They spent 13 months getting the bill from an initial concept to final passage, and pressed on during many points when everybody was predicting doom. They had public hearings, multiple drafts of different bills, they kept negotiating, even worked into Christmas. They made significant changes at times, but also never lost sight of their key goals. They didn't back down in the face of angry town halls and after losing their filibuster-proof majority, and many members cast votes that they knew risked their political careers. Obama himself was a leader, who consistently made it clear that he was not going to walk away. He did countless rallies, meetings, speeches — even a "summit" at the Blair House — to try to sell the bill, talking about details, responding to criticisms of the bill to the point that he was mocked by conservatives for talking so much about healthcare.

The contrast between Obama and Democrats on healthcare and what just happened is stunning. House Republicans slapped together a bill in a few weeks (months if we're being generous) behind closed doors with barely any debate. They moved the bill through committees at blazing speed, conducted closed-door negotiations that resulted in relatively minor tweaks to the bill, and within 17 days, Trump decided that he'd had enough, and was ready to walk away if members didn't accept the bill as is. It reminded me of the scene in "Duck Soup," in which Groucho Marx portrays Rufus T. Firefly, leader of the fictional Freedonia. Firefly conducts a cabinet meeting that he starts by saying he'll take up old business. One official says, "I wish to discuss the tariff." Firefly responds, "Sit down, that's new business." When nobody has any old business to discuss he decides to turn to new business. "About that tariff —" the same official interjects. "Too late," Firefly responds, "That's old business already."

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/gop-cave-on-obamacare-repeal-is-the-biggest-broken-promise-in-political-history/article/2618413

hail Firefly!

“What we’re starting to do, for the first time in the modern history of the Democratic Party, is active grass-roots organizing,” Sanders said

meh, he's not really a Democrat, shaddap old man

love Bernie but lol @ the idea he's first person to do grassroots organizing in the democratic party. c'mon man

An emergency meeting of the House Republican Caucus was called shortly before the scheduled vote. As it was announced, the House went to recess, with Democrats shouting in a taunting manner, “Vote, vote, vote”, daring Republicans to bring the bill up. They did not.

there can't be enough news stories that contain the phrase "Democrats shouting in a taunting manner" to suit me

MODERN history, Tracer. You know, since the Golden Age of Television started.

"We were a 10-year opposition party, where being against things was easy to do," said House Speaker Paul Ryan, faced with the biggest loss of his career. "And now in three months' time we tried to go to a governing party. We will get there, but we weren't there today."

maybe someday you'll get to where you understand that the Social Security benefits which paid for your expensive private college tuition is a good thing, too, congressperson galt

Sounds like this damages Bannon's reputation as well. Which I'm fine with:

https://www.axios.com/inside-the-trumpcare-meltdown-2329417172.html

When the balky hardliners of the House Freedom Caucus visited the White House earlier this week, this was Steve Bannon's opening line, according to people in the conference room in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building:

"Guys, look. This is not a discussion. This is not a debate. You have no choice but to vote for this bill."

“He'll take your call and invite you to the Oval Office, but he just wants you to say nice things about him on TV,” the source says he told Napolitano at the time.

oh christiepaws

Doesn't scan so good, but it's got potential for a stanza-ending blues lyric imho.

Hey baby, come to the White House tonight
I ain't lookin to get in no fight,
I just want you to say if you can
Tell it to the stuffed suits out at CNN
Baby, can you dig your man?
He's a righteous man
Tell em baby, can you dig your man?

AHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

http://screengrabber.deadspin.com/basketball-fans-treated-to-ads-congratulating-republica-1793629526?utm_campaign=socialflow_deadspin_facebook&utm_source=deadspin_facebook&utm_medium=socialflow

man someone had fun pressing "play" imo

i hope poor milo's doing okay now that people have finally said "no" to daddy

Hey baby, come to the White House tonight
I ain't lookin to get in no fight,
I just want you to say if you can
Tell it to the stuffed suits out at CNN
Baby, can you dig your man?
He's a righteous man
Tell em baby, can you dig your man?

― Neanderthal, Saturday, March 25, 2017 9:54 AM (eighteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Get Henley on the phone, I smell a new single...

what would Don say about these happenings?

Get Over It!

to add to the bannon quote that ned mentioned above, here was trump's contribution:

The report described a meeting that Trump had with members of the Freedom Caucus, in which members pelted him with "wonkish concerns" about specific aspects of the Republicans' bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. Trump cut them off, according to the report, wanting to keep it simple.

"Forget about the little shit," Trump said, unnamed sources told Politico."Let's focus on the big picture here."

That reportedly did not sit well with members in attendance.

"We’re talking about one-fifth of our economy," an unnamed member told Politico's Tim Alberta.

"...and that little shit's name...was Reince Preibus. I'm Paul Harvey."

gooooood day!

The great one speaks!

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/845645916732358656

ObamaCare will explode and we will all get together and piece together a great healthcare plan for THE PEOPLE. Do not worry!

A separate response:

https://twitter.com/KT_So_It_Goes/status/845661683628564481

Sitting back & letting your voters go broke until they love you more is a bold political strategy

On Friday evening, a somewhat shellshocked president retreated to the White House residence to grieve and assign blame. He asked his advisers repeatedly: Whose fault was this?

Increasingly, that blame has fallen on Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, who coordinated the initial legislative strategy on the health care repeal with Speaker Paul D. Ryan, his close friend and a fellow Wisconsin native, according to three people briefed on Mr. Trump’s recent discussions.

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/03/25/us/politics/trump-health-care-defeat-gop-civil-war.html?_r=0&referer=

trump-health-care-defeat-gop-civil-war

that's a nice URL, wish I could have shown myself this the morning of Nov 9

it seemed to some members of that group, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, that he did not have the greatest grasp of health care policy or legislative procedure.

lol ya think?

heh

Mr. Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who returned on Friday from a family skiing trip to Aspen, Colo., had said for weeks that he thought supporting the bill was a mistake, according to two people who spoke with him. The president, according to two Republicans close to the White House, expressed annoyance that Mr. Kushner, who has described himself as a first-among-equals adviser, was not on site during the consequential week of wrangling. Tom Price, who left Congress to become Mr. Trump’s health and human services secretary, was singled out for blame.

heh

Until the final week, Mr. Trump’s team was deeply divided over whether he should fully commit to a hard sell on a bill they viewed as fundamentally flawed, with Vice President Mike Pence pointedly advising the president to label the effort “Ryancare,” not “Trumpcare,” according to aides.

heh

After it was all over, the president dutifully blamed the Democrats, a party out of power and largely leaderless, after turning his back on their offers to negotiate on a bipartisan package that would have addressed shortcomings in the Affordable Care Act while preserving its core protections for poor and working class patients.

Several aides advised him the argument was nonsensical, according to a person with knowledge of the interaction.

Meantime, excellent music criticism here:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/article/2618436#.WNaQpDNWH5c.twitter

For those who don't remember, Papa Roach is a band that had a hit in 2000 called "Last Resort." The song, which is about cutting or something, had a decent guitar lick, but that's the only praise it deserves.

Several Aides Advised Him the Argument Was Nonsensical: The Inside Story Of The Trump Presidency

https://twitter.com/paparoach/status/845465143542611968

perfect

The other two tweets are great too!

https://twitter.com/paparoach/status/845464996695883776

https://twitter.com/paparoach/status/845481000809332737

haha, those tweets are the only good things Papa Roach has ever produced

Well, Trump has a far better grip on political reality than these aides, anyway. It is a nonsensical argument, but that's good.

hmmmmm...

http://m.dailykos.com/story/2017/3/23/1646686/-RussiaGate-blows-WIDE-OPEN-in-Abrahamson-report-High-crimes-and-misdemeanors-by-Trump-Sessions

a compelling story but there's a couple of "this one either isn't true or is unsourceable" annotations that make me think this one'll have no legs

Think whatever's happening with Flynn right now is what to ponder. The guy's been awfully quiet.

The articles with 'blown wide open' and 'this changes everything' need to stop. It's not helpful.

https://twitter.com/mitchellvii/status/845602121923813378

https://twitter.com/mitchellvii/status/845601722110226433

some really amazing contortions here

Per Abrahamson sources, Jeff Sessions "_definitely_" met with the Russian ambassador a third time, which he has continued to conceal from Congress, even after he 'corrected' his testimony about _never_ meeting with the Russian ambassador during the campaign. If the source isn't shit, then that's some nice perjuring there, Mr. Attorney General.

https://twitter.com/SethAbramson/status/845719948018302977

(THREAD) BREAKING: Harvard professor and @CNN political analyst Juliette Kayyem says, per sources, Michael Flynn may have flipped on Trump.

"Sources" whose first port of call is the host of the Security Mom podcast.

yeah i dont see this going anywhere

https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2017-trump-nyc-cost/?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social

Oh god his face follows your mouse.

Oh America...

I gotta get me one of these shirts, though

Their three children, ages 9, 5 and 2, each wore shirts saying “I Am Not Pizza #pizzagate.”

I would argue against wishful thinking re these new Flynn suppositions, obviously...but I would say that whatever smoke sure appears to be getting thicker all of a sudden. Manafort, Page and Stone all being suddenly eager to make their case is of interest.

But I would add two things to consider:

1) Flynn is as much driven by revenge as Trump is. His whole arc of rising up to DIA, being forced out for being incompetent/horrible, brooding angrily, getting on the Trump train and becoming NSA made that clear. And then just a few weeks in, he's out again. I can't imagine this is a happy man. And I can imagine him going "And this is the thanks I get?" and acting accordingly in a variety of possible ways.

2) Let's say this all reached this particular point now even a few weeks ago (which obviously given the timeline couldn't happen but bear with me). Trump, newly inaugurated, already tripped up with the original travel ban but otherwise everything is a love-fest as such between him and Congress, more or less. Likelihood of him getting more support and cover than he already has would be much higher, and we've already seen the weird lengths Nunes will go to.

Buuuut...Friday just happened. All of a sudden a lot of people both in Congress and, more importantly in this case, the White House come across looking like incompetent, disorganized fools who have deeply damaged their images and reputation. A perceived unity of purpose has just been completely smashed on the highest profile issue they've been kvetching about this whole decade to date. And even now you've got a slew of GOP types already worrying about 2018 and thinking that Trump's perceived benefits, or fears resulting from his actions towards them via mean tweets or whatever, are a lot less essential in their calculations.

Neither of these points mean something big is about to happen. But I think things are suddenly looking a little less absolute when it comes to thinking something big could never happen.

Also I'm seeing something about a meeting between Flynn, Turkish officials and Nunes...in January. But I'd like a little more confirmation on that.

This, though, this is interesting:

https://twitter.com/lrozen/status/845730532382199815

Asked spokesman for Flynn if he is cooperating w/the FBI. He said he is not responding. Not denying or confirming, I asked. "Not responding"

http://occupydemocrats.com/2017/03/23/man-testified-trumps-campaign-chair-just-shot-dead

(Apologies if that was already posted. This thread's been like a bullet train the last couple of days.)