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The Trump Presidency 13: The (James) Baker's Dozen

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Segnosaur said:
Some republican senators have started to complain about Trump's treatment of Mccain.

From: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/republican-senator-slams-trump-for-mccain-criticism/
Sen. Johnny Isakson, a Georgia Republican, will denounce President Trump's criticism of the late Sen. John McCain in a radio interview Wednesday afternoon....After McCain's death in August, Isakson said on the Senate floor that "anybody who in any way tarnishes the reputation of John McCain deserves a whipping." The senator now intends to fulfill that promise with Mr. Trump, telling The Bulwark, "I want to do what I said that day on the floor of the Senate."

Oh no! He's going to say mean words to Trump! That will really change things. Or not.

I think we can assume Isakson's comments are just empty rhetoric. The fact is, Trump has attacked McCain (as well as other veterans) since before the 2016 election. (Remember the "I prefer people who weren't captured" comments.) Yet Isakson still voted for Trump's supreme court nominees. He still voted for the health care and tax bills. He voted in favor of other Trump nominees. And the next time he's called on to approve another Trump nominee I'm sure he will be eager to cast his vote.

If he really wanted to express his disapproval, he would have told Trump and the rest of the GOP that until Trump starts acting as a normal human being he'll stop rubber-stamping everything Trump and McConnell put in front of him. But I rather suspect he won't do that.
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Isakson likes the things he votes for. He disapproves of Trump's comments on McCain and does so publicly. Seems reasonable to me.

If I were in his position and thought that Kavanaugh was a worthy and good nominee for the Supreme Court, I would vote for Kavanaugh regardless of who nominated him. I disagree with Isakson's politics but I think that publicly chastising the president is a decent thing to do in his shoes. Not the bravest but not the most kowtowing either.
 
Armitage72 said:
I don't think you get it. Not being able to mandate prayer in schools is oppression. Colleges have all been turned into liberal atheist Communist indoctrination centers, so grade schools and high schools obviously need to be used as a counterbalance. It's only fair.
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I'm sure that prayers to Satan and Vishnu will be protected in the same manner.
 
phiwum said:
I think we can assume Isakson's comments are just empty rhetoric.
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If he really wanted to express his disapproval, he would have told Trump and the rest of the GOP that until Trump starts acting as a normal human being he'll stop rubber-stamping everything Trump and McConnell put in front of him. But I rather suspect he won't do that.
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Isakson likes the things he votes for. He disapproves of Trump's comments on McCain and does so publicly. Seems reasonable to me.
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If ALL your doing is disapproving and "saying things", then quit making a big deal about how the president "deserves a whipping". Simply saying bad things about Trump does not count as a "whipping".
If I were in his position and thought that Kavanaugh was a worthy and good nominee for the Supreme Court, I would vote for Kavanaugh regardless of who nominated him.
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Even if he thought Kavanaugh was an acceptable nominee, the fact is there were probably dozens of other candidates that they could have found to fit the right-wing demands of the GOP. (I think even the head of the federalist society, the group that put forward his name, among others, said there was nothing particularly special about Kavanaugh.) He could have voted no, and should Kavanaugh end up losing, they would have just picked another right-wing judge to do the same thing.

The same goes with other Trump nominees. I'm pretty sure they could have found someone similar to DeVos for education foe example.
 
The Great Zaganza said:
I'm sure that prayers to Satan and Vishnu will be protected in the same manner.
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Obviously it has to be the right prayer. Otherwise you end up with something like that situation that happened in Louisiana in 2012, when they decided to allow state vouchers to be used for religious schools and were horrified to discover that Muslim schools were eligible.
 
Captain_Swoop said:
The President of the United States of America releases a statement


George Conway, often referred to as Mr. Kellyanne Conway by those who know him, is VERY jealous of his wife’s success & angry that I, with her help, didn’t give him the job he so desperately wanted. I barely know him but just take a look, a stone cold LOSER & husband from hell!
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I find it ironic that The PDJT is the only one who calls Conway that, but then says he barely knows him.
 
Segnosaur said:
If ALL your doing is disapproving and "saying things", then quit making a big deal about how the president "deserves a whipping". Simply saying bad things about Trump does not count as a "whipping".

Even if he thought Kavanaugh was an acceptable nominee, the fact is there were probably dozens of other candidates that they could have found to fit the right-wing demands of the GOP. (I think even the head of the federalist society, the group that put forward his name, among others, said there was nothing particularly special about Kavanaugh.) He could have voted no, and should Kavanaugh end up losing, they would have just picked another right-wing judge to do the same thing.

The same goes with other Trump nominees. I'm pretty sure they could have found someone similar to DeVos for education foe example.
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The word "example" doesn't fit, but I like calling DeVos the education foe. Kinda with you on this.

You're right that public admonition is somewhat toothless, but it's a greater commitment to political integrity than we've seen recently.

And I don't see the point of voting against Kavanaugh if one thinks he's a good nominee. It should go without say that I don't share that view, but folks do like to misinterpret around here (not Segnosaur, far as I can recall). The vote for Kavanaugh is a vote on the merits of the nominee, not the merits of the nominator.

(Of course, voting on the merits of Garland didn't even cross the minds of the Republican-led Senate, but that's a different matter.)
 
Conway today

for months out of respect for me. But you think he shouldn’t respond when somebody, a non-medical professional accuses him of having a mental disorder? You think he should just take that sitting down?
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Yes. That is exactly what I think we should do in that position. The fact it isn't someone with a medical background is why it can be ignored as noise.
 
Armitage72 said:
I don't think you get it. Not being able to mandate prayer in schools is oppression. Colleges have all been turned into liberal atheist Communist indoctrination centers, so grade schools and high schools obviously need to be used as a counterbalance. It's only fair.
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4/10. You've a ways to go to catch up with Caine.
 
The Great Zaganza said:
Why?
What do you expect?
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Given that I believe Obama was a generally decent person, there would be a few occasions where he hold untruths but not nearly at the rate Trump does. I'm also interested in seeing if anyone was keeping track, or if the counting started only with Trump.

Stacyhs said:
Yes:https://twentytwowords.com/new-report-reveals-just-how-often-trump-lies-compared-to-obama/

Trump told 6X the amount of lies in his first 10 months in office as Obama did in his entire 8 years in office.

https://www.statista.com/chart/12338/how-trumps-lies-compare-with-obamas/
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Aridas said:
Stacys already gave a link. I was going to post the image directly, but it was uncomfortably large and I'm too feeling too lazy to shrink it. With that said, I do rather doubt the 18 number (Politifact has 150 mostly false and worse or less than a quarter of challenged statements, with only 9 Pants on Fire rated), but there's no real doubt that Obama lied to the American people overwhelmingly less than Trump (Politifact has him at about 2/3 mostly false and worse, with 97 Pants on Fire rated, for the fun of it).
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Thanks! It's interesting to see the difference between these two people. Even when it comes to the most severe category of untruth, Obama had a full order of magnitude less over eight years compared to Trump over only two years.
 
Armitage72 said:
I don't think you get it. Not being able to mandate prayer in schools is oppression. Colleges have all been turned into liberal atheist Communist indoctrination centers, so grade schools and high schools obviously need to be used as a counterbalance. It's only fair.
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The sad part is you're a lot closer to the truth (of the mentality, not the truth of... like reality) then you think.

If take a step back and really listen to how a lot of social/political stuff is worded and phrase and presented... it kind of only makes sense if the person saying is operating under an unspoken "But this is all to counter balance the bias/force/advantage/etc that the other side has accumulated."
 
Captain_Swoop said:
The President of the United States of America releases a statement

George Conway, often referred to as Mr. Kellyanne Conway by those who know him, is VERY jealous of his wife’s success & angry that I, with her help, didn’t give him the job he so desperately wanted. I barely know him but just take a look, a stone cold LOSER & husband from hell!
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If grabbin 'em by the pussy isn't going to affect Trump supporters, then virtually nothing will. I checked Twitter accounts for some "Never Trumpers" and they had no comment on it. Jonah Goldberg did have an article about "Beto-mania and Our Cult of Personality Politics."
 
phiwum said:
You're right that public admonition is somewhat toothless, but it's a greater commitment to political integrity than we've seen recently.
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Actually we've seen quite a few of these toothless "commitments to integrity" since Trump was elected. For example Corker and Flake made a big deal about their anti-Trump statements... yet still fell in line with the rest of the GOP senators.
And I don't see the point of voting against Kavanaugh if one thinks he's a good nominee.
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The point is that it establishes to the President that if he is going to behave inappropriately he will lose support.
It should go without say that I don't share that view, but folks do like to misinterpret around here (not Segnosaur, far as I can recall). The vote for Kavanaugh is a vote on the merits of the nominee, not the merits of the nominator.
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In a normal, rational world, I agree that politicians should be voting on the merits of the nominee (or whatever bill they are trying to pass).

But we are no longer in a normal, rational world. We have a president who is either incompetent, compromised or corrupt (or likely all 3). We have a congress who (at least until the midterm) was failing to provide the proper checks to presidential authority. Neo-nazis are "fine people" and alternative facts are now a thing.

Because things are no longer normal, the rules of decorum have been voided, and the political system is basically undergoing catastrophic failure, then voting against a nominee (especially when replacements are plentiful and easy to find) may be the only way to express real, actual disapproval.
 
Segnosaur said:
Actually we've seen quite a few of these toothless "commitments to integrity" since Trump was elected. For example Corker and Flake made a big deal about their anti-Trump statements... yet still fell in line with the rest of the GOP senators.

The point is that it establishes to the President that if he is going to behave inappropriately he will lose support.

In a normal, rational world, I agree that politicians should be voting on the merits of the nominee (or whatever bill they are trying to pass).

But we are no longer in a normal, rational world. We have a president who is either incompetent, compromised or corrupt (or likely all 3). We have a congress who (at least until the midterm) was failing to provide the proper checks to presidential authority. Neo-nazis are "fine people" and alternative facts are now a thing.

Because things are no longer normal, the rules of decorum have been voided, and the political system is basically undergoing catastrophic failure, then voting against a nominee (especially when replacements are plentiful and easy to find) may be the only way to express real, actual disapproval.
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I think something close to a second Civil War is now inevitable...Now that the Dems seem likely to be takin over by a group of hard line ideologues, and become a mirror version of the GOP, with the political center frozen out complety. Think Spain in the 1930's.
Just look at the threds here, and the total contempt the hard liners on the left have for moderates and centralist...some going so far as to pretty much deny their existence.
I might just focus an the survival of my family, and forget tyring to save the country. It might be beyond saving.
 
dudalb said:
I think something close to a second Civil War is now inevitable...Now that the Dems seem likely to be takin over by a group of hard line ideologues, and become a mirror version of the GOP, with the political center frozen out complety. Think Spain in the 1930's.
Just look at the threds here, and the total contempt the hard liners on the left have for moderates and centralist...some going so far as to pretty much deny their existence.
I might just focus an the survival of my family, and forget tyring to save the country. It might be beyond saving.
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Sometimes I wonder if breaking the US up into a number of smaller unions would be a good idea. The south, west coast, east coast, whatever else. Maybe the coasts can link up somehow...
 
Belz... said:
Sometimes I wonder if breaking the US up into a number of smaller unions would be a good idea. The south, west coast, east coast, whatever else. Maybe the coasts can link up somehow...
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Designate Route 66 as something like the autobahn that used to run from West Berlin through East Germany to West Germany.

ETA: I-10 would likely work better, but Route 66 is iconic.
 
Belz... said:
Sometimes I wonder if breaking the US up into a number of smaller unions would be a good idea. The south, west coast, east coast, whatever else. Maybe the coasts can link up somehow...
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A decade ago I would have thought "Dumb idea". Now? Not so much.

You've got an extremely polarized electorate and increasing resentment. The "heartland/flyover country" likes to pretend that their feelings were hurt because Hillary didn't talk nice enough to them in 2016 (although I think we can safely assume it was just a cover for their bigotry). And thanks to the electoral college and senate seat distribution, these largely rural states have maintained a disproportionate amount of power. (For example, look at the number of republican-appointed supreme court justices that were appointed by presidents who lost the popular vote.) They are turning the U.S. into a hell-hole (where neo-nazis are fine people and deficits don't matter).

Split the country up, and areas like the west coast and north east can probably become successful political entities. Cut states like Wyoming, Kentucky and West Virginia free. Those parts of the country will probably go into severe decline, but better that they should fail than bring the whole country down with them by electing politicians like Trump.
 
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