US Politics: What's a couple hundred billion between friends?

[Mlle. Zabzie]

31 minutes ago, WinterFox said:

Yep. Welcome to the future, people. If you're rich as fuck, congratulations.  

*Rich as f*ck and live in Texas.  This is important.  

20 minutes ago, TheKitttenGuard said:

Tax Cuts are the Republican brand and failure is not an option.

There is still the Conference with the House that will need to be done.

It's done.  I'm relatively sure what will end up passing is basically the Senate bill.  

[drawkcabi]

The deplorables are deciding that Flynn is Scooter Libby and this all ends now with his plead.

Also, have you heard their nickname for Mueller? Mule Liar. 

[OldGimletEye]

Opinions differ on the shape of the earth.

Birth control mandate edition.

https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/12/1/16720126/birth-control-trump-contraception-mandate

Quote

Coverage of the contraceptive mandate — the Obama-era requirement that employer health insurance cover birth control without a copay — has framed it as a contentious, hot-button issue. But a recent survey shows that birth control access has broad support among American voters — and the Trump administration’s new exemptions to the mandate are far more controversial.

In a survey of 1,058 registered voters conducted in late November by the polling firm PerryUndem, large majorities of respondents supported access to birth control as a general matter. Ninety-six percent of respondents said they supported women having access to contraception. Ninety percent said it was an important aspect of women’s ability to control their bodies, lives, and futures, and 78 percent said it was part of basic health care for women. Seventy-seven percent of those polled did not think of birth control as a controversial issue, and 90 percent said it was not a religious issue for them. Previous polling on birth control has yielded similar results; a 2016 Gallup poll, for example, found that 89 percent of Americans think contraception is morally acceptable.

A majority of respondents — 71 percent — supported the mandate that employers offer copay-free insurance for birth control. This is in line with other polling on the subject — a poll conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation in June found that 68 percent of people, including 81 percent of Democrats, 68 percent of independents, and 54 percent of Republicans, supported the mandate.

 

[Fragile Bird]

Oh, CNN just read out part of Trump's lawyer's statement, Ty Cobb, full of stunning chutzpah! Along the lines of, Flynn, part of the Trump administration for 25 days [obviously not part of the campaign!] and a former Obama administration official, pled guilty...

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

24 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

In general, or now particularly?  Because Flynn cooperating is definitely a score for team Law and Order. 

Sorry for the lack of clarity. Last night I saw multiple reports that Trump is feeling even more emboldened right now since he’s been able to get out of everything that would normally sink most politicians. There reports did come before the breaking Flynn news though, so perhaps that could change things.

27 minutes ago, S John said:

I remember some murmuring a while back that there were plenty of R's in congress ready to join a rebellion against Trump but they wanted to get tax cuts done first.  Interesting that the Flynn news and the tax cut bill look to be coming down on the same day.  I think rumors of the R's turning on Trump are unlikely wishful thinking, but now that they're probably getting their pet legislation through, perhaps the incentive to look the other way diminishes.  

 

24 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

It remains to be seen if there is anything that could possibly turn Republicans in Congress (or the voting booth) against Trump, but there's a good chance that Trump Jr and Kushner are next.  Trump has only ever shown loyalty to his family, so he'll be loath to just throw them under the bus. 

That’s an interesting point about waiting for the tax cuts to be completed before turning on Trump, though I still remain skeptical that they’ll do anything unless Flynn reveals some damning information, and even then they might not. Trump’s base does not care at all if he’s openly committing crimes, and these gutless MoCs know they need his base to survive a primary and to get reelected. I think the only way they turn on Trump is if there is something so bad and so undeniable that they literally have no choice but to impeach him. Honestly I think the Dems need to retake control of the House and begin the impeachment proceedings for anything to happen.

ETA:

One thing I’ve been wondering about for a while is what happens if the reported Apprentice tapes get leaked? That could possibly finish Trump because Republicans can’t afford to have that associated with their party.

[Mexal]

24 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Note that this does not establish collusion or conspiracy during the election; it instead shows a specific instance of Trump et al doing things illegally, which then gives probable cause to firing Comey to obstruct this. Oddly it makes it less likely that Mueller is going after any kind of coordination during the campaign, but it makes it more likely for charges to actually stick, as firing Yates and Comey who both had information on Flynn is not a good look.

I don't think this is true. Brian Ross was reporting this morning that Flynn is prepared to testify that candidate Trump ordered Flynn to get in touch with the Russians. If that's true, they could still hit on coordination with the Russians. And bringing in Kushner to talk about Flynn is a nice way to trap Kushner if Flynn is able to contradict him. I don't see any reason to assume this signals Mueller isn't looking at Russian coordination during the campaign.

One other thing. We have no idea what Flynn may have on Manafort/Gates and whether this applies additional leverage to them.

[Maithanet]

2 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Sorry for the lack of clarity. Last night I saw multiple reports that Trump is feeling even more emboldened right now since he’s been able to get out of everything that would normally sink most politicians. There reports did come before the breaking Flynn news though, so perhaps that could change things.

I don't see how Trump would be anything but emboldened.  He has every reason to feel bulletproof.  Even as disaster after disaster befalls his administration, it has no effect at all.  And it looks like he's about to get a huge tax cut and half the Obamacare repeal within the next couple of weeks. 

[Kalbear]

6 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

That’s an interesting point about waiting for the tax cuts to be completed before turning on Trump, though I still remain skeptical that they’ll do anything unless Flynn reveals some damning information, and even then they might not. Trump’s base does not care at all if he’s openly committing crimes, and these gutless MoCs know they need his base to survive a primary and to get reelected. I think the only way they turn on Trump is if there is something so bad and so undeniable that they literally have no choice but to impeach him. Honestly I think the Dems need to retake control of the House and begin the impeachment proceedings for anything to happen.

And even that is unlikely. The best case for the US is for Republicans to impeach him. That almost certainly won't happen. 

6 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

One thing I’ve been wondering about for a while is what happens if the reported Apprentice tapes get leaked? That could possibly finish Trump because Republicans can’t afford to have that associated with their party.

Unless there's a tape of Trump actively fucking someone against their will I don't think it'll do shit. We literally have a tape of Trump saying how he likes to commit sexual assault and how he gets away with it. We still have that. We could play that nonstop every day. 

[Morpheus]

Republicans have gone from denying collusion to saying that collusion is not technically illegal, so no, I do not think they will move against Trump no matter what Mueller uncovers. It was discussed earlier about how they cover for his obstruction of justice with the ol "he's new to this world of politics" excuse. It would take high treason for them to act.

 

[Kalbear]

6 minutes ago, Mexal said:

I don't think this is true. Brian Ross was reporting this morning that Flynn is prepared to testify that candidate Trump ordered Flynn to get in touch with the Russians. If that's true, they could still hit on coordination with the Russians. And bringing in Kushner to talk about Flynn is a nice way to trap Kushner if Flynn is able to contradict him. I don't see any reason to assume this signals Mueller isn't looking at Russian coordination during the campaign.

I don't think this is accurate reporting; I think 'candidate Trump' here was referring to when he was POTUS-elect. 

I guess we'll see, but I remain very skeptical that there was actual collusion with the campaigns in any direct way, anyway. 

 

[Sivin]

25 minutes ago, Inigima said:

In a way this could be good news for Congressional Republicans. This will definitely overshadow something as "boring" as a tax bill, Republicans can pass it while everyone is paying attention to the Russia scandal, and Trump can sign it into law before this gets anywhere near him.

I can't decide whether you're trying to look on the bright side... It doesn't matter, there's no relevant outcry or procedural trick that was ever going to save us lowly peasants. This is our harvest from last year's election, and unfortunately I think it's becoming increasingly apparent that the accelerated subjugation of the people was bought by the inconsequential auction of the American Governing Entity to a hostile power. 

Pretty sobering. Much as I depend on the truth of Man's unlimited reach, it would seem that our species' ambition is horrifyingly inadequate to handle the gift of sentience that was wasted on this small blue dot. Surrounded by opportunity and promise, the sons of the 'greatest generation' just decided to indulge in animalistic sedentry. 

When I think about the squandered promise of intellectual advance, I weep for our world. 

[Kalbear]

1 minute ago, WinterFox said:

Pretty sobering. Much as I depend on the truth of Man's unlimited reach, it would seem that our species' ambition is horrifyingly inadequate to handle the gift of sentience that was wasted on this small blue dot. Surrounded by opportunity and promise, the sons of the 'greatest generation' just decided to indulge in animalistic sedentry. 

When I think about the squandered promise of intellectual advance, I weep for our world. 

To be fair, the rest of the world is doing pretty well. Extreme poverty is at an all-time low, hunger is at a low, China is very, very serious about climate change and pollution and electric cars and spaceflight, Europe is doing pretty well. 

America is going down, but it may not be over for the species. Just Americans. 

[Relic]

2 minutes ago, WinterFox said:

I can't decide whether you're trying to look on the bright side... It doesn't matter, there's no relevant outcry or procedural trick that was ever going to save us lowly peasants. This is our harvest from last year's election, and unfortunately I think it's becoming increasingly apparent that the accelerated subjugation of the people was bought by the inconsequential auction of the American Governing Entity to a hostile power. 

Pretty sobering. Much as I depend on the truth of Man's unlimited reach, it would seem that our species' ambition is horrifyingly inadequate to handle the gift of sentience that was wasted on this small blue dot. Surrounded by opportunity and promise, the sons of the 'greatest generation' just decided to indulge in animalistic sedentry. 

When I think about the squandered promise of intellectual advance, I weep for our world. 

Truth. 

[IamMe90]

3 hours ago, Mexal said:

Yea, Benjamin Wittes said the same thing,.

 

While this is correct, I just want to point out for clarification, and because I can see people making faulty conflations down the road based on what they think they know about the legal system, that this only applies to Federal prosecutions. This is because the 5th Amendment of the Constitution provides for a right to indictment by grand jury in criminal proceedings, which means that for a Federal prosecutor to file an information as the charging document in a criminal case, he (generally) must obtain a waiver of that right by the defendant. 

The right to indictment by grand jury has not been incorporated into the States via the 14th Amendment, so in most states (some states do have a right to indictment by grand jury built into their own constitutions), the information is the prevailing criminal charging document. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

25 minutes ago, OldGimletEye said:

Opinions differ on the shape of the earth.

Birth control mandate edition.

https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/12/1/16720126/birth-control-trump-contraception-mandate

 

This just goes to highlight one of the oddest things in American politics. If you go line by line on most of the major issues of the day you’ll find that people tend to overwhelmingly support the Democrat’ and yet they always fail to communicate their message effectively. The best example is the 1972 presidential election. Polling data indicates that the public largely supported McGovern’s positions, but he got smoked in one of the biggest landslide elections in the history of the country.

Democrats MO has always been “Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.”

[Kalbear]

Yeah, here's more on the Flynn ordered to contact Russia bit: it was Kushner, and it was in December.

Quote

Two former officials with the Trump transition team who worked closely with Flynn say that during the last days of the Obama administration, the retired general was instructed to contact foreign ambassadors and foreign ministers of countries on the U.N. Security Council, ahead of a vote condemning Israeli settlements. Flynn was told to try to get them to delay that vote until after Barack Obama had left office, or oppose the resolution altogether.

 

[Fez]

1 hour ago, Mexal said:

Also, McConnell has the votes with Flake saying he's voting yes. Tax cuts will pass.

Well, probably. Slight chance not though. It sounds like Flake agreed to vote yes for a promised fix to DACA that the White House is already walking back, if he realizes it and cares, he could switch again. Though its still not confirmed that Collins is actually a no.

 

43 minutes ago, S John said:

I remember some murmuring a while back that there were plenty of R's in congress ready to join a rebellion against Trump but they wanted to get tax cuts done first.  Interesting that the Flynn news and the tax cut bill look to be coming down on the same day.  I think rumors of the R's turning on Trump are unlikely wishful thinking, but now that they're probably getting their pet legislation through, perhaps the incentive to look the other way diminishes.  

I'm skeptical. President Pence or President Ryan would be thrilled to sign a tax bill, and do a better job of reigning in members and congress and trying to sell it to the public.

 

28 minutes ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

*Rich as f*ck and live in Texas.  This is important.  

It's done.  I'm relatively sure what will end up passing is basically the Senate bill.  

Well, that depends on what comes out of conference right? I'm sure rich Texans would love to keep the SALT property tax deduction that the House bill keeps.

[IamMe90]

7 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

This just goes to highlight one of the oddest things in American politics. If you go line by line on most of the major issues of the day you’ll find that people tend to overwhelmingly support the Democrat’ and yet they always fail to communicate their message effectively. The best example is the 1972 presidential election. Polling data indicates that the public largely supported McGovern’s positions, but he got smoked in one of the biggest landslide elections in the history of the country.

Democrats MO has always been “Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.”

It's not about "messaging," because the contents of the message literally don't mean anything. It is pretty much solely about making people feel good (whether that be hopeful, reveling in spite, or any other myriad of ways people makes themselves feel good about things). I'm convinced that that makes up 99% of voting persuasion for the vast majority of low-education voters, which seems to comprise most significant portions of the electorate (at least with the electoral college in place).  

[Mexal]

16 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I don't think this is accurate reporting; I think 'candidate Trump' here was referring to when he was POTUS-elect. 

I guess we'll see, but I remain very skeptical that there was actual collusion with the campaigns in any direct way, anyway. 

Maybe. He was pretty clear in what he said. He said "candidate Trump, not POTUS-Elect Trump". So we'll see. Lots more to come out. I don't really think we can actually know what Flynn knows until the shoes start dropping. I mean, Flynn was in pretty much every high level meeting with Trump, basically chose his own role and Trump tried to squash the investigation into him.

Plus, it sounds like the WH is a bit scared regardless of the crap Cobb is putting out. 

[Mexal]

5 minutes ago, Fez said:

Well, probably. Slight chance not though. It sounds like Flake agreed to vote yes for a promised fix to DACA that the White House is already walking back, if he realizes it and cares, he could switch again. Though its still not confirmed that Collins is actually a no.

Flake is a coward. He'll cave. But even if he doesn't, they still have Collins, which to me is insane given what's actually in the bill (from what we understand) kills healthcare.