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Author | Topic: The Trump Presidency | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
AZPaul3 Member Posts: 8552 From: Phoenix Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
This could get interesting.
Mueller's office, which seldom says anything about anything, put out a statement denying the BuzzFeed report that President Trump directed his attorney Cohen to lie to congress about Trump Tower - Moscow.
quote: On the other hand, Buzzfeed is unyielding:
quote: Washington Post I note that the Mueller statement DOES NOT SAY the BuzzFeed report is outright bogus but that its characterization of the documents and testimony are not accurate. That leaves open a wide swath of potential documentation and testimony that may somewhat support the BuzzFeed report if not in specifics.
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Percy Member Posts: 22493 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
I'm going to have to walk this back. Late yesterday the special counsel's office issued a statement denying the BuzzFeed report:
quote: BuzzFeed says they stand by their report and has expressed uncertainty about which portions this denial refers to, but it seems pretty clear to me that the special counsel's office is saying that they do not have conclusive evidence that President Trump directed Michael Cohen to lie to Congress. The article was written by two respected journalists, one a Pulitzer Prize winner. Hopefully we'll hear more about this, but for now it looks like there's still no smoking gun. --Percy Edited by Percy, : Grammar.
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Percy Member Posts: 22493 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
If memory serves I've been reading George Will since the 1970's. I don't recall his opinion pieces from the Nixon era, so today's in the Washington Post (The shabbiest U.S. president ever is an inexpressibly sad specimen) is the most harsh I ever recall him writing. It's worth reading the whole thing, but here are some excerpts:
quote: George may also have provided the so-far-unfound appropriate Trump sobriquet: Dotty Donald --Percy
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ringo Member (Idle past 438 days) Posts: 20940 From: frozen wasteland Joined: |
Taq writes:
As George Bush Sr. said (on The Simpsons), "I accomplished everything I wanted in my first term, so there was no need for a second." Trump is already the greatest President in history. I'm sure he could point at the wall today and his supporters would see it. He could also pull an LBJ and refuse to run for a 2nd term, or lose in the Republican primary.And our geese will blot out the sun.
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Percy Member Posts: 22493 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9
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After taking office Trump took away DACA protections. Much more recently Trump shut down a third of the government and took away their salaries. Now he's offering to give them back in return for his wall (see, for example, the Fox News report Trump offers immigration compromise to end partial shutdown; Dems cool to offer).
This is the way kidnappers work. Take away a loved one, then offer to give them back in return for something of value. Giving in to kidnappers' demands is the wrong approach. It only encourages them to do it again. Trump doesn't yet understand that it's not his wall causing the stalemate but his approach. It is highly inadvisable to capitulate to blackmailers, extortionists and hostage takers, which is what Trump is. It only invites more of the same. If he wants to negotiate about a wall then he should reopen the government, which is one thing, and only then begin negotiations about the wall, which is another completely separate thing. He shouldn't hold the government hostage for his wall. Once the government is reopened and open and honest negotiations have begun, it's important to note that it's unlikely that Democrats will agree to just a wall. They will agree to a variety of border security measures that could include some wall and that must include permanent DACA status. Great negotiator - hah! No wonder 20 years of trying never resulted in a Trump Tower in Moscow. He can't even carry out successful negotiations with people trying to make him president. --Percy Edited by Percy, : Added a detail in last para.
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PaulK Member Posts: 17827 Joined: Member Rating: 2.3
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Let us also note that Trump has a reputation for not holding up his end of a deal, if he can get away with it.
He’s already reneged on promises to sign legislation - so giving in may only encourage him to refuse the deal and demand more. Worse, once he has what he wants - funding for the wall - he is liable to go back on any promises he made to get agreement. If Trump were a great - or even competent - negotiator he’d understand that making a deal isn’t about screwing over the other parties. Reputation is important. Screwing people over in one deal will make it harder to get future deals.
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Percy Member Posts: 22493 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
The Washington Post today reports that President Trump made 8158 false or misleading claims in his first two years. More than 6000 came in just his second year, more than tripling the production of his first year. Obviously he's perfecting the techniques of lying and dissembling.
--Percy
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Percy Member Posts: 22493 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
The Trump Border Patrol's inadequate and ultimately fatal efforts handling the humanitarian crisis on our southern border motivated members of No More Deaths to leave water and food in Cabeza Prieta, a protected 860,000-acre (equal to a 36-mile square area) refuge that cannot be entered without permits. They have just been convicted of federal crimes.
The four women testified that as a matter of conscience they could not ignore the significant loss of life in the desert and had to do something. They could be sentenced to as much as six months in federal prison. See They left food and water for migrants in the desert. Now they might go to prison. This is Judge Bernardo Velasco who rendered the verdict:
--Percy Edited by Percy, : Grammar. Edited by Percy, : Grammar, add link. Edited by Percy, : Add image of judge. Edited by Percy, : Fix image.
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Pressie Member Posts: 2103 From: Pretoria, SA Joined: |
I must admit that it is quite entertaining to watch in the rest of the world. Like some episodes of The Kardashians.
You really hate them for making so much money for really doing nothing except for talking; yet lots of people watch it.
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Percy Member Posts: 22493 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9
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Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is intent upon bringing his "compromise" to reopen the government and fund Trump's wall. Here's what each side gets in this "compromise":
Trump and the Republicans get:
Democrats get:
In a true compromise both sides make concessions, and a true compromise wouldn't involve (as one pundit put it) "the gun of a government shutdown pointed at the country." If McConnell's bill actually represented the basis for a compromise then there is no need to keep the government shuttered. --Percy PS - The bookkeeper in me notices that McConnell's name contains three double letters. I wonder if there's any word that has three consecutive double letters. Edited by Percy, : Left out a couple items in the list of things Trump and the Republicans get. Edited by Percy, : Grammar. Edited by Percy, : Fix rendering.
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Taq Member Posts: 10073 Joined: Member Rating: 5.2
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Percy writes: PS - The bookkeeper in me notices that that McConnell's name contains three double letters. I wonder if there's any word that has three consecutive double letters. You should form a committee and find out . . . Oh, wait. [they aren't consecutive, but close]
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Theodoric Member Posts: 9197 From: Northwest, WI, USA Joined: Member Rating: 3.2
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Yes Mr. Bookkeeper, I can think of one. Two if a hyphen is allowed.
Sweet-toothed. Facts don't lie or have an agenda. Facts are just facts "God did it" is not an argument. It is an excuse for intellectual laziness. If your viewpoint has merits and facts to back it up why would you have to lie?
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Percy Member Posts: 22493 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 4.9 |
While the pundits have been describing what Trump is doing in plain language, Democrats in Congress have been remarkably muted and circumspect in thier comments, but Representative Ted Lieu (D-CA) finally spoke plainly:
quote: And, of course, capitulating to Trump's ransom demands would only encourage him to use the tactic again and again. Source: No one knows how Trump plans to end the shutdown --Percy
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Theodoric Member Posts: 9197 From: Northwest, WI, USA Joined: Member Rating: 3.2 |
Even more plainly and more direct.
Facts don't lie or have an agenda. Facts are just facts "God did it" is not an argument. It is an excuse for intellectual laziness. If your viewpoint has merits and facts to back it up why would you have to lie?
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dwise1 Member Posts: 5949 Joined: Member Rating: 5.2 |
Trump finally agreed to reopening the government for three weeks while talks continue on his demand for money for his border wall. The bill passed the Senate by voice vote, was approved by the House, and was sent to Trump for his signature. So as long as Ann Coulter doesn't get to Trump first, the government will be open by end-of-day.
However, not everybody will get back pay. Certainly, all government employees will get their back pay, but contractors and their workers won't (depending on the terms of their contracts. Nor will the businesses that have lost money because their regular customers couldn't buy anything. Furthermore, the federal workers' spending habits will undoubtedly change to only buy essentials while hoarding all the money they can into a reserve that they can draw from during the next shutdown, like in three weeks -- once bitten, twice shy. That got me thinking and a question came up. Prison correctional officers have been having to work without pay, but what about the for-profit prisons? The payments to those contractors must be tied to the funding of actual federal prisons, so they shouldn't have been getting paid either, which would mean that the private correctional officers also weren't getting paid. Now with the return of funding, will those contractors get back pay? Will those private guards get pack pay? This is one case where what happens depends on the actual terms of their contracts. But that leads us down another path. Some commentators (eg, Thom Hartman, I think) notice a right-wing agenda to privatize as many government functions as possible and attribute many of the Republican drives to destroy government to being for the purpose of bringing about their privatization agenda. There are some public services where awarding contracts to private companies makes sense (eg, sanitation, sewage and water treatment), but they need to be regulated properly such as through the terms of their contracts. Of course, the right-wing agendae also push for the elimination of government regulations, which would make privatization much more problematic. In a world where government functions have been mostly privatized, what will happen to their employees during a future shutdown? If this most recent shutdown is any indication, they'll be screwed.
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