Monday
Sep252017
The Commentariat -- September 26, 2017
Afternoon Update:
In American People v. GOP, Another Narrow Victory. Seung Min Kim, et al., of Politico: "Senate Republicans do not intend to vote on the Graham-Cassidy bill, putting an end to their Obamacare repeal effort for now. The decision was reached Tuesday after it became clear the bill would fail. Three Senate Republicans had said they would vote against the measure, and the GOP could only afford two defections." This is an update of a story linked earlier today.
BBC News: "... Donald Trump has said he will travel next week to Puerto Rico amid a growing crisis in the wake of destruction caused by Hurricane Maria.... On Tuesday, Mr Trump said the US was sending food, water and supplies on 'an hourly basis'. 'Puerto Rico is very important to me,' he added. 'The people are fantastic. I grew up in New York so I know many Puerto Rican people.' Mr Trump said next Tuesday - which will be nearly a fortnight after the storm struck - was the 'earliest I can go without disrupting relief efforts'. He may also visit the US Virgin Islands.... The White House also on Tuesday announced Mr Trump had increased federal funding and assistance for debris removal and emergency protective measures in Puerto Rico in the aftermath of the storm. Addressing criticism, the president said his administration was doing a "really good job" and that the Governor of Puerto Rico, Ricardo Rossello, was 'so grateful'." ...
... Jordan Fabian of the Hill: "President Trump on Tuesday rejected criticism he is preoccupied with the NFL when his administration is facing a humanitarian crisis in Puerto Rico. 'I have plenty of time on my hands. All I do is work,' Trump told reporters at a White House news conference. Trump said he believes 'the NFL situation is a very important situation' and that players should be banned from kneeling during the national anthem."
Kyle Dropp & Brendan Nyhan of the New York Times: "A new poll of 2,200 adults by Morning Consult found that only 54 percent of Americans know that people born in Puerto Rico, a commonwealth of the United States, are U.S. citizens." ...
... Hillary Wonders if Trump Is a 46-Percenter. Nick Visser of the Huffington Post: "'I'm not sure he knows that Puerto Ricans are American citizens,' [Hillary] Clinton told Sirius XM's Zerlina Maxwell on Monday afternoon.... During appearances on Sirius XM and MSNBC's 'All In With Chris Hayes,' Clinton described the president's approach as a political calculus and being disinterest in the fate of the 3.5 million American residents living on the island. 'He doesn't think that has any political relevance and it's certainly not personally important,' Clinton told Chris Hayes on Monday evening. 'He clearly doesn't want to talk about Puerto Rico, more than 3.5 million American citizens, along with the U.S. Virgin Islands. Not interested, doesn't say a word about it.'"
Darren Samuelsohn of Politico: "Criminal charges against two former top advisers to ... Donald Trump are virtually certain, Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal said Tuesday. Michael Flynn and Paul Manafort are almost sure to be indicted as a result of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, the Connecticut senator told Politico. 'I'm about 99 percent sure there will be some criminal charges from this investigation,' said Blumenthal, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee."
Update: Darryl Fears & Juliet Eilperin of the Washington Post make more clear the meaning of "the flag" than did the Matthew Daly of the AP in a story I linked this morning. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke was complaining about his staff's disloyalty to Trump & him rather than to "the flag" as a national symbol. They character "flag" as military jargon for top dogs, in this case Trump & Zinke.
In Today's Funnies. Natasha Bertrand of Business Insider: "Abbe Lowell, a top Washington lawyer, exchanged emails on Monday with a prankster posing as his client Jared Kushner, at one point telling the prankster he needed to see 'all emails' sent and received from a private email account Kushner had set up in December.... On Monday, the prankster wrote to Lowell from the address kushner.jared@mail.com asking what he should do with 'some correspondence on my private email ... featuring adult content.' 'Can I remove these?' the prankster asked. 'Forwarded or received from WH officials?' Lowell responded." And so on. "Lowell's suggestion that he needs to see all emails sent or received from Kushner's private account raises questions about whether he has fully examined the messages and what kind of information they contained [before issuing a statement Sunday about the correspondence in Kushner's private account]." Mrs. McC: I'm wondering if Lowell will bill Real Kushner for time spent corresponding with Fake Kushner.
Olivia Beavers of the Hill: "Rep. Mark Walker (R-N.C.), the chairman of the conservative Republican Study Committee (RSC), on Tuesday described women in his conservative caucus as the group's 'eye candy.' Walker made the remark ... outside the Capitol, as other members of the group prepared to talk about their priorities. 'The accomplished men and women of the RSC. And women. If it wasn't sexist, I would say the RSC eye candy, but we'll leave that out of the record, are not attention seekers,' Walker said." Mrs. McC: Thanks,m ark. If it weren't sexist, Mark, I'd say you have a teensy, tiny shlong, but I know for sure you're still a big prick. ...
Sometimes There's a Price. Ron Lieber & Stacy Cowley of the New York Times: "The chairman and chief executive of Equifax, Richard F. Smith, stepped down on Tuesday in the aftermath of a data breach that exposed the personal information of as many as 143 million people, the credit reporting agency said. Equifax said that Paulino do Rego Barros Jr., most recently the president of its Asia-Pacific region, had been appointed interim chief executive. The company said it planned to conduct a search for a new chief executive and would consider candidates from inside and outside the company.... Mr. Smith will not receive a bonus in 2017 and will serve as an unpaid consultant to the company for up to 90 days, according to a regulatory filing. Mr. Smith will not receive a severance package or accelerated vesting of any stock that might have been due to him...."
Ben Hubbard of the New York Times: "Saudi Arabia announced on Tuesday that it would allow women to drive, ending a longstanding policy that has become a global symbol of the repression of women in the ultraconservative kingdom. The change, which will take effect in June of next year, was announced on state television and in a simultaneous media event in Washington.... The momentum to change the policy has picked up in recent years with the rise of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, a 32-year-old son of the king who has laid out a far-reaching plan to overhaul the kingdom's economy and society. Beyond the effects it could have on Saudi Arabia's image abroad, letting women drive could help the Saudi economy."
*****
Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times: "Senator Susan Collins of Maine said on Monday that she would oppose the latest plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, leaving Republican leaders clearly short of the votes they need for passage. Ms. Collins, a Republican, announced her opposition in a written statement, delivering a significant and possibly fatal blow to the party's seven-year quest to dismantle the health law.... '... Sweeping reforms to our health care system and to Medicaid can't be done well in a compressed time frame, especially when the actual bill is a moving target,' Ms. Collins said in the statement. 'Today, we find out that there is now a fourth version of the Graham-Cassidy proposal, which is as deeply flawed as the previous iterations,' she said. 'The fact that a new version of this bill was released the very week we are supposed to vote compounds the problem.'" (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Lauren Fox of CNN: "The Congressional Budget Office has released a partial score of the GOP's plan to repeal Obamacare, saying the Graham-Cassidy bill would reduce the budget deficit by at least $133 billion but millions of people would lose comprehensive health insurance. The non-partisan scoring agency estimates that between 2017 and 2026, "the legislation would reduce the on-budget deficit by at least $133 billion and result in millions fewer people with comprehensive health insurance that covers high-cost medical events. The report is not as detailed as previous CBO scores, however." ...
... John Wagner of the Washington Post: "With the latest Republican plan to overhaul the Affordable Care Act collapsing, President Trump focused his ire Monday night on Sen. John McCain, distributing a video that showed the Arizona Republican on board with the mission in the past. 'A few of the many clips of John McCain talking about Repealing & Replacing O'Care,' Trump said in a tweet that accompanied the video. 'My oh my has he changed-complete turn from years of talk!'" ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: So three senators have announced their opposition to a terrible bill and for very different reasons. Since Trump promised better care & lower premiums in "his" mythical bill, & since the Graham-Kennedy bill does neither, Trump should be thanking these dissenters. But of the three, Rand Paul's position is the furthest away from Trump's promise. So by rights, if Trump were to choose one of the three to pound, it should be Paul, who opposes better care & lower premiums. But Trump homes in on McCain because he is fatally ill AND more popular than Trump. This is what a narcissistic bully does.
... Rachel Roubein of the Hill: "Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) was forced to briefly recess the chamber's first hearing on an ObamaCare repeal bill, after protestors refused to stop chanting, leading police to drag several out. 'No cuts to Medicaid, save our liberty,' attendees chanted. Police surrounded the protesters and escorted them out of the room." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Zombie Repeal. Seung Min Kim, et al., of Politico: With Graham-Cassidy apparently dead in the water, some GOP senators are plotting ways to extend the reconciliation procedure that allows passage of bills by a 50-vote majority. ...
Rick Gladstone & David Sanger of the New York Times: "North Korea threatened on Monday to shoot down American warplanes even if they are not in the country's airspace, as its foreign minister declared that President Trump's threatening comments about the country and its leadership were 'a declaration of war.' 'The whole world should clearly remember it was the U.S. who first declared war on our country,' the foreign minister, Ri Yong-ho, told reporters as he was leaving the United Nations after a week of General Assembly meetings in New York." (Also linked yesterday.)
Medlar's Sports Report:
All Hail Donaldus Caesar. David Moye of the Huffington Post: "When ... Donald Trump spoke in Alabama on Friday against NFL players who kneel during the national anthem, he also appeared to come out in favor of concussions. During his speech, Trump argued that rules designed to minimize concussions and CTE, a neurodegenerative disease, are ruining the game: 'Today if you hit too hard ―15 yards! Throw him out of the game!... They're ruining the game! They're ruining the game. That's what they want to do. They want to hit. They want to hit! It is hurting the game.' ESPN analyst Kevin Blackistone ... reminded viewers that black males make up the majority of NFL players ― and the majority of concussions." ...
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Trump imagines himself as Julius Caesar & pro football players -- especially black players -- as gladiators, to fight it out & die for the amusement of his bloodthirsty followers & He Trump. Roman gladiators were usually convicted criminals or prisoners of war, & that is precisely how Trump sees black athletes. The only difference is that today's gladiators are often well-compensated, and Trump -- a former football team owner -- resents that. When today's gladiators aren't servile enough, when they kneel to highlight racial injustice instead of standing to salute an anthem which Trump thinks is now dedicated to him personally, he opines they deserve not just concussions but also firing. Trump, correctly, sees these pleas for racial parity not just as attacks on the criminal justice system but also on him & his racist views. ...
... This is not, BTW, the first time Trump has publicly mocked CTE: Sean Gregory of Time reported contemporaneously that at a rally in Lakeland, Florida, in October 2016, "Trump talked about a woman who had fainted but returned to the crowd. 'The woman was out cold and now she's coming back,' Trump said. 'See? We don't go by these new, and very much softer, NFL rules. Concussion. Oh, oh! Got a little ding on the head. No, no, you can't play for the rest of the season. Our people are tough.'" ...
... Des Bieler & Mark Maske of the Washington Post: "Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones joined his team's players in kneeling before the national anthem before their game Monday night at Arizona. Jones, Coach Jason Garrett and other Cowboys coaches and front office executives locked arms while standing on the field. Before the anthem, Jones and the players and coaches took a knee. They then stood up, with arms still interlocked, for the anthem. Some in the crowd at University of Phoenix Stadium in Glendale, Ariz., where the Cowboys were taking on the host Cardinals, booed at the display. Arizona players also stood and linked arms during the anthem, but they did not take a knee beforehand.... The Cowboys' plan for their pregame display was formulated during a series of meetings Sunday and Monday, according to a person familiar with the planning.... 'Everyone should know, including the president, this is what real locker room talk is,' Joe Lockhart, the NFL's executive vice president..., said in a conference call with reporters earlier Monday." ...
... Kaitlin Collins & Jeff Zeleny of CNN: "White House chief of staff John Kelly was not pleased with the fight that erupted over the weekend between ... Donald Trump and National Football League players who protest by kneeling during the national anthem, two administration officials told CNN.... In a brief interview Monday evening, Kelly told CNN he is 'appalled' by what he sees as a lack of respect for the flag and national anthem. 'I believe every American, when the national anthem is played, should cover their hearts and think about all the men and women who have been maimed and killed,' Kelly said. 'Every American should stand up and think for three lousy minutes.' His son, Robert Michael Kelly, was killed in combat in Afghanistan in 2010." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Kelly's visceral response to the National Anthem is perfectly fine as are numerous other responses. Some immigrants, for instance, may think of how coming to the U.S has affected their own lives. Others may think of how the U.S., in the hands of its officials, has betrayed its promise to them & their families. Kneeling -- a respectable, prayerful stance -- is one way to honor the promise & highlight those promises not kept. While for some like Kelly the anthem invokes military sacrifice (and no wonder with "the bombs bursting in air" and all), the military is hardly the only American quality the national anthem & flag symbolize. I'm not saying that Kelly should get over his own semiotic interpretation; I'm saying he should appreciate & respect other responses to our national symbols rather than insist upon imposing his own reading upon the rest of us. ...
... Digby, in Salon: "All we can do is observe [Trump's] behavior and hope he doesn't completely go off the deep end. This past weekend he came close. First, Trump tweeted out the scariest tweet of his long Twitter career, and that's saying something. He threatened to murder millions of people if the North Korean foreign minister said something he didn't like: 'Just heard Foreign Minister of North Korea speak at U.N. If he echoes thoughts of Little Rocket Man, they won't be around much longer!' ... Meanwhile, when he wasn't threatening Armageddon, Trump decided that the one pressing issue he absolutely had to address was the protests by NFL players against police racism and violence. That he did this during the same week there were large demonstrations in St Louis over the not guilty verdict for a cop who was filmed planting a gun on a suspect -- after being recorded saying he was 'going to kill this motherfucker' -- was probably not an accident. After everything that happened after Charlottesville, Trump just had to rip off the scab and pour salt into the open wound." ...
... Charles Pierce: "... the [NFL's] solidarity was as impressive a statement as we have seen from this class of people since the days of black gloves and Muhammad Ali, and it's a measure of the astonishing ability of this president* to find, and to stomp upon, someone's last nerve, which is his only demonstrable talent as a political leader. There is a strong school of thought that believes this to be a kind of native political wisdom rather than simply a kind of destructive political improvisation. Raise hell with football players and maybe nobody will notice that you're tickling the dragon's tail in east Asia, or that you're prepared to send grandma's chemo money to Scott Walker so he can fix the potholes in his state's highways.... The problem with that theory is that, if you accept that it's true, then he's played the distraction card once too often. It's obvious now and it fools nobody.... The protests this weekend were long on dignity and grace and short on bombast." ...
... Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "Of course Trump's outrage at the NFL protests had to do with race.... The reason for [the players'] protests ... are one of the endpoints of a years-long racial divide that Trump leveraged explicitly as part of his 2016 campaign.... The demonstrations by NFL players (which expanded outward more rapidly after Trump's rebukes) originated with former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick. He began to kneel during the national anthem at games as a way of drawing attention to incidents in which black Americans were targeted and sometimes killed by law enforcement officials. It's not, as some have argued, a protest of the anthem itself. It's a continuation of the argument that powers the Black Lives Matter movement: that there is a systemic problem in how police officers treat black suspects.... Trump's campaign stoked Republican frustration at Black Lives Matter, racial tensions and a black president who was seen as hostile to police officers. In addition to his explicit racial arguments (starting with his disparagement of immigrants from Mexico), Trump repeatedly insisted that he would stand behind and defend America's police -- leveraging hostility to Black Lives Matter for his own purposes.... Trump's entire campaign was about race, explicitly -- whether he realizes it or not. So, too, was his fervent insistence about the NFL over the weekend." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: If you needed a tell, and I'm sure you don't, it was Trump's argument that "If a player wants the privilege of making millions of dollars in the NFL, or other leagues, he or she should not be allowed to disrespect.... our Great American Flag (or Country) and should stand for the National Anthem. If not, YOU'RE FIRED." This was a human-whistle from a billionaire to his base of whitey-white ne'er-do-wells: "These black guys are making millions! And you're not. They don't 'deserve' to whup you. Fire them!" BTW, if you're wondering how Trump launched these attacks, which appeared to come up out of the blue at a campaign rally for a U.S. Senate candidate, I expect he was still smarting from Jemele Hill's calling out his racism. Perhaps at the insistence of his chief-of-staff, all Trump did at the time was demand an apology from Hill's network, ESPN. But days later, he was still smarting, it was Friday night, & Trump couldn't stop himself from taking out his ire on black sports figures. Calling Trump a racist is a waste of time; it just causes him to double-down on racist spittle.
Ed Pilkington of the Guardian: "It took Donald Trump five full days to respond to the devastation wrought by Hurricane Maria on the lives of 3.5 million Americans in Puerto Rico, and when he finally did so his comments on Twitter were so devoid of empathy it threatened to spark a new controversy. Hot on the heels of the billowing dispute he single-handedly provoked over African-American sporting figures protesting racial inequality during the national anthem, Trump launched another provocation on Monday night with a belated and lacklustre response to the Puerto Rican disaster. In a series of three tweets he effectively blamed the islanders -- all of whom are American citizens -- for their own misfortune. 'Texas & Florida are doing great but Puerto Rico, which was already suffering from broken infrastructure & massive debt, is in deep trouble,' he said, without offering any additional federal government assistance for the stricken US territory.... Trump acknowledged that 'much of the island was destroyed', but caustically went on to say that its electrical grid was already 'in terrible shape' and that Puerto Rico owed billions of dollars to Wall Street and the banks 'which, sadly, must be dealt with'." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: But, you know, this isn't about race, either. ...
... Margaret Hartmann: "It's true that Puerto Rico's infrastructure was in bad shape before the storm hit, thanks to a lack of maintenance related to the island's $73 billion debt crisis. But Trump did not respond to Harvey by noting that experts warned for decades that Houston was a flooding disaster waiting to happen."
** Frank Rich writes a brief history of Watergate & compares it to how Trumpgate is unfolding. It's a great refresher course, or a lesson for the many of us too young to remember, to how Watergate happened & an encouraging note on how Trumpgate may come down. Many thanks to PD Pepe for the link. This is one to read, not scan. (Also linked yesterday.)
** The Making of the Presidunce. Jeet Heer of the New Republic on Trump as our first post-literate president & what that means to his ability to reason (uh, he has none).
Lock 'em up. Matt Apuzzo & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "At least six of President Trump's closest advisers occasionally used private email addresses to discuss White House matters, current and former officials said on Monday. The disclosures came a day after news surfaced that Jared Kushner ... used a private email account to send or receive about 100 work-related emails during the administration's first seven months. But Mr. Kushner was not alone. Stephen K. Bannon ... and Reince Priebus ... also occasionally used private email addresses. Other advisers, including Gary D. Cohn and Stephen Miller, sent or received at least a few emails on personal accounts, officials said. Ivanka Trump ... used a private account when she acted as an unpaid adviser in the first months of the administration, Newsweek reported Monday. Administration officials acknowledged that she also occasionally did so when she formally became a White House adviser.... It is not illegal for White House officials to use private email accounts as long as they forward work-related messages to their work accounts so they can be preserved.... Most of Mr. Trump's aides used popular commercial email services like Gmail. Mr. Kushner created a domain, IJKFamily.com, in December to host his family's personal email." ...
... Marie: I just realized how much I am like Javanka. I too "created a domain" -- RealityChex.com -- which hosts one of my personal e-mail accounts. The next thing you know, I'll be buying up vanity buildings in Manhattan at outrageously high prices & currying favor with shady foreign financiers. So long, Bank of America, you shady financiers.
... Well, of Course She Did. Brandon Carter & Megan Wilson of the Hill: "Ivanka Trump used a personal email account to communicate with a member of President Trump's administration, a watchdog group said Monday. American Oversight obtained documents through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) that show Ivanka Trump, a senior White House adviser to her father, used a personal email account to contact Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Linda McMahon in February." (Also linked yesterday.) ...
... Josh Dawsey of Politico: "Frustrated with West Wing aides' rampant use of personal communications devices for official business, former chief of staff Reince Priebus tried over the summer to stop -- or at least limit -- the practice. During a July senior staff meeting, Priebus asked aides to either store their personal phones in secure lockers in the White House or leave them at home during the workday, according to people who attended. The administration subsequently installed additional lockers, typically found only outside secure rooms, in the West Wing, as part of an effort to force aides to use their White House accounts for communications. But the request was largely ignored, according to six current and former administration officials, advisers and others who correspond with the White House. Aides laughed about Priebus' request, and senior officials -- including Priebus -- continued to use their personal phones for phone calls, text messages and emails for White House matters." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: So when Sarah Sanders said at yesterday's briefing that “All White House personnel have been instructed to use official email to conduct all government related work," she was technically truthful. To be actually truthful, she would have had to add, "But we totally ignore those instructions." ...
... Louis Nelson of Politico: "Reports that several current and former top White House staff members, including Jared Kushner, Reince Priebus and Steve Bannon used their private email accounts for official business puts on display the 'rank hypocrisy' of the Trump administration, Hillary Clinton said Monday night." ...
... Mike DeBonis of the Washington Post: "The Republican chairman of the House Oversight Committee and its top Democrat asked the Trump administration Monday for more information about the use of personal email accounts by senior officials -- a day after it was revealed that Jared Kushner ... acknowledged using such an account for official business. The letters, sent from Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) to White House counsel Don McGahn and the leaders of two dozen federal departments and agencies, demand answers to inquiries about the use of nonofficial email and other messaging accounts to conduct official business. Rep. Elijah E. Cummings (D-Md.), the ranking Democrat on the panel, also joined the request." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: Maybe this is just show, but also it's an indicator that Congressional Republicans are breaking up with Trump.
Matthew Daly of the AP: "Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke said Monday that nearly one-third of employees at his department are not loyal to him and ... Donald Trump, adding that he is working to change the department's regulatory culture to be more business friendly. Zinke ... said he knew when he took over the 70,000-employee department in March that, 'I got 30 percent of the crew that's not loyal to the flag.'... To remedy that, Zinke said he is pursuing a major reorganization that would push much of the agency's decision-making outside Washington and move several agencies, including the Bureau of Reclamation and Bureau of Land Management, to undetermined Western states." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: This story confuses me. In the citation, Zinke says the Interior Department employees were disloyal to "the flag," suggesting they are traitors. but Daly writes that Zinke said these employees were not loyal to him & Trump. There is, obviously, a big difference. I could not find any clarifying story. Trump & Zinke do not represent "the flag," whether they know it or not (and Trump definitely doesn't know it -- like Louis XIV, Trump imagines l'Etat, c'est moi). The civil servants of the Interior Department pledged to defend the Constitution, & they must act on that pledge; they are prohibited from following Zinke/Trump's instructions if those instructions violate the law and/or the Constitution.
NEW. Betsy Klein, et al., of CNN: "Donald Trump Jr.'s Secret Service protection has been reactivated, sources familiar with the matter told CNN.... It is not clear what prompted the move." Mrs. McC: Sure it is. Junior went out & bought his super-shredder, set it up in a hidden compartment behind his closet, made sure it worked, & now he's okay with letting the Secret Service follow him around.
Karoun Demirjian & Tom Hamburger of the Washington Post: "Former Trump campaign adviser Roger Stone plans to fiercely deny to the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday that he had any contact, much less colluded, with Russian operatives during the 2016 presidential election, according to a prepared opening statement he shared with The Washington Post. Stone also plans to deny that he had any advance knowledge that emails of Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman John Podesta would be hacked or that his emails would then be released by WikiLeaks -- despite tweeting just days before that Podesta's 'time in the barrel' would soon be coming. In his prepared opening statement, Stone decries the nation's intelligence agencies as 'politicized,' and questions the findings of the intelligence community regarding Russia's efforts to meddle in the 2016 election, including the hacks of the Democratic National Committee and Podesta."
Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times on the undemocratic national of our Constitutional structure which permits the tyranny of the minority.
Kristine Phillips of the Washington Post: "Before Jeff Mateer became President Trump's nominee for federal judgeship in Texas, he fought a local ordinance extending equal protections to members of the LGBT community and said the separation of church and state does not exist in the Constitution. But likely his most controversial statements were made in two 2015 speeches, in which he said transgender children are proof that 'Satan's plan is working' and same-sex marriage is a harbinger for 'disgusting' practices such as polygamy and bestiality. He also appeared to advocate gay conversion therapy, a discredited practice banned by a handful of states and condemned by human rights and medical groups. Those comments, which did not appear in media reports until CNN unearthed them last week, have outraged LGBT rights groups and drawn scrutiny to Mateer's legal career as awaits a Senate confirmation hearing.... The recent revelations on Mateer, Texas's first assistant attorney general, have also raised questions about whether he disclosed his controversial comments to a vetting committee, as required by state law."
Senate Race
Jonathan Martin & Alexander Burns of the New York Times: "Just hours before the polls opened in a special United States Senate runoff in Alabama that will echo through the national Republican Party, two of the best-known figures in President Trump's orbit raced to the state Monday night on behalf of opposing candidates. Senator Luther Strange, trailing in the polls but hoping Mr. Trump's backing can help him close the gap, summoned Vice President Mike Pence to Birmingham to highlight the president's endorsement as part of a get-out-the-vote push in Alabama's largest city. In the same hour, Roy Moore, a former State Supreme Court chief justice, welcomed the former White House senior adviser Stephen K. Bannon to a barn in this community along the Mobile Bay for a rally that mixed praise for Jesus Christ with jeremiads against the Republican establishment."
Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "Anthony D. Weiner, the disgraced former New York congressman who became caught up in a scandal over his exchange of lewd texts with a 15-year-old girl, was sentenced on Monday to 21 months in prison. Mr. Weiner, 53, had pleaded guilty to one count of transferring obscene material to a minor, and had faced up to 10 years in prison." Mrs. McC: Will they let him have his cellphone while he's in prison with nothing to do? (Also linked yesterday.)
Share Article
Comments for this entry have been disabled. Additional comments may not be added to this entry at this time.
Reader Comments (17)
@Whyte Owen
Thank you for the link to Jesse Ventura's thoughtful comments, among others, that a democratic government earns patriotism. Here is a link to a thoughtful September 28, 2016 discussion of the same issues by President Obama, apparently in response to a question from a soldier at a town hall meeting in Virginia: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPqOotT_ta8. It is
painful, yet hopeful, to think of “the way we were” - only one year ago. Here's a link to Barbara Streisand's reminder of the beauty, courage, and continuing importance of Katie Morosky.
A Trump week:
Support for brain damage in the NTL.
A black person who has money has no right to protest.
No protest during the National Trumpanthum.
Insulting someone with an atomic bomb is being tough. I mean I got more bombs than he has!
Sorry about the hurricane mess in Puerto Rico, but we can't help foreign countries. (you want to become a state? change the name to Puerto Trump!)
Mrs. McC.,
Good call on Donaldus Trumpius' self image as some kind of modern Caesar*.
Maybe the Noble Caesar Trumpius would be okay with the (black) captains of each team approaching the Imperial Box, itself drenched in gold with eagle statuettes everywhere, giving the gladiator's salute (clenched fist pounding the chest then arm and fist straight up toward the glorious Son of Zeus), shouting "We who are about to have our brains beat in salute you!"
Trumpius already does the Mussolini chin thing perfectly (which Benito assumed thinking it made him look imperiously Roman). He'd look the part, at least.
*Big difference: Caesar never weaseled his way out of military service by pretending to have a hurt foot. Funny, in'it, how Trumpius goes on at length about honoring the flag and those who fought for it? Does pretending to have a hurt piggy toe in order to avoid fighting alongside those troops count as a new way of "honoring America"? I guess cowardice and mendacity are now American Virtues in the Age of Trump. I seem to recall that he once fancied himself a pretty fair athlete, and he had no problem parading around his military school grounds in his shiny boots and spiffy War of 1812 uniform. But when it came time to serve, it was "Oow! My foot!" At least he picked the foot as his excuse, unlike drug addict Rushbo who had to go before the draft board and yell "Oh! My aching ass!" Dubya didn't bother pretending. He just deserted. Ah, those noble Confederates! They know how to honor America!
An earlier Senator from Maine (also female, also Republican) said this about an earlier tyrant: "I don't want to see the Republican party ride to political victory on the four horsemen of calumny -- fear, ignorance, bigotry, and smear." The tyrant? Joe McCarthy.
And the Senator? Margaret Chase Smith.
After reading Michelle Goldberg's debut column (nicely done) on our undemocratic constitutional structure, I'm adding this segment of a piece Paul Street wrote about capitalism and democracy:
"One does not have to be a Marxist or other variety of radical to acknowledge basic differences and conflicts between capitalism and democracy. “Democracy and capitalism have very different beliefs about the proper distribution of power,” liberal economist Lester Thurow noted in the mid-1990s. “One [democracy] believes in a completely equal distribution of political power, ‘one man, one vote,’ while the other [capitalism] believes that it is the duty of the economically fit to drive the unfit out of business and into extinction. … To put it in its starkest form, capitalism is perfectly compatible with slavery. Democracy is not.”
Listened to some of the health care hearing yesterday: Our democrats were in fine fettle–-bull dogs with loud growls which finally wiped off Cassidy's smirky grin. At the end he was rubbing his head––the ache must have been painful.
I had said this guy is either stupid or he lies really well: I was wrong. Cassidy is not stupid––but he evidently has convinced himself that what he is advocating will be beneficial to all and even though others point out otherwise, he continues to try and sell this nonsense. I guess I'll call him desperate. I'm generous to a fault.
Akhilleus:
Trump is not doing a Mussolini when he raises his chin and turns slightly. He is mightily stretching his wattle so nobody will notice that he's an old dodderer. He does have a choice of look: senility vs. fascist.
PD wrote: "At the end he [Cassidy] was rubbing his head––the ache must have been painful."
Good thing he has superb healthcare, paid for by you and me (natch). Nothing like the non-existent care he promised to millions. Which brings us to what the philosopher John Rawls once called the "original position". The OP is a thought experiment that would be worth adopting when decisions of great moment, affecting tens of millions of citizens, are put to a vote.
Here's how it works. Rawls came up with the OP to counter other political theoretical positions, notably, Hobbes' "state of nature" which is your basic landscape of savage inequality wherein the strong can rape and plunder to their hearts' content, take anything they can grab, and step on the poor and powerless. In other words, Trump World. Hobbes' own description of what life would be like in Trump World, a world without a social contract, is the famous formulation "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short".
Rawls sought a fairer calculation. But how to do it? How to guarantee that those arranging, organizing, and legislating social rules will be fair? Ah-ha! says Rawls. We put them behind a "veil of ignorance". Let's say our society is extremely unequal (oh, wait....it already is...), and let's further say that anyone entering that society has an even money chance of being either a Trump-like richie-rich, or a dirt poor, minority sharecropper, with no education and no healthcare, forced to eke a living out by dumpster diving, feeding their kids cat food (Paul Ryan's plan), and barely living long enough for their hair to turn gray.
Okay, now roll the dice. If you roll the right combination, you're in Trump tower with the rest of the crooks and Russian sleazeballs. If not, you're in the dumpster with the rest of the losers.
Like those odds? No? Because from behind Rawls' veil of ignorance, you have no idea where you'll end up. Think you might, in that case, create a more equal society where everyone can live a decent life and have a chance to get ahead? Or will you say "fuck it all" and go with the 50-50 chance of being poor and sick for your entire short, brutish, nasty life, with no help from anyone?
I'll bet there are some who would take a chance to be in the money, but many comfy Confederate "law makers" probably wouldn't like the idea of having to live like the people they routinely spit on. It really does have the feel of a kind of Pascal's Wager.
Draping the veil of ignorance over Confederates dreaming up new ways to screw the poor with their Potemkin healthcare plans might gurantee a much more equitable and sustainable outcome if there was a good chance that, when they got sick, or suffered from some indeterminate pain (bad headaches), they were given a kick in the ass and told to tell their story walking.
I suppose if an appreciation of morality and a sense of fairness can't be counted on, the threat of having to endure the same sort of horrible existence they force on others might help move Confederates to act in a more equitable and decent manner.
Well, look at it this way. Here in Trump World, we're halfway there. We've got the ignorance, all we need now is the veil.
Where's that Salome when you need her?
Victoria,
I hadn't thought of that. But hey, maybe there's a third option in addition to senile vs. fascist. He could choose "senile fascist"! He's already down with the fascist part. The senility is galloping up the road.
If we thought Sean Spicer was a lying mess whose chaotic, fearful, and obsequious approach to the job of press secretary was unstable and scatterbrained, Sarah Huckabee Sanders is a solid rock of lies and willful, insulting ignorance.
So here she is defending her indefensible potentate in his overtly racist attack on NFL players.
"I think it's always appropriate for the president of the United States to defend our flag, to defend the national anthem and to defend the men and women who fought and died to defend it."
Um....hold on a bit there, Sarah. Don't you mean it's appropriate for Trumpado to defend what the flag and the anthem stand for, and the reasons (ostensible, anyway) that men and women fought and died?
This is classic misdirection. No one is protesting the anthem or the flag or the military or mom or apple pie. The whole thing is about calling attention to racial inequality. Period.
Pretending it's about insulting "The Flag" and "The Anthem!" (which was originally an English drinking song, fercrissakes), is like complaining that anyone concerned about climate change is all for throwing millions of people out of work. It's deceitful, disingenuous, and demagogic. (Quick, throw out three words describing the Trump administration!)
But the larger problem is that Trump doesn't give two runny craps about what the flag and the anthem stand for. Or why people fight and die for America. It's all about points on some scoreboard in his feathered head. It's all about winning and losing some imaginary argument and about one-upping uppity blacks whose mere existence is offensive to a large portion of his base.
And if SHS doesn't know this, then she's a lot stupider than I thought. Which, I suppose, would have the benefit, for her, of making her less perfidious.
There you go, another Trump Era Hobson's choice: Stupidity or Perfidy. You decide.
In summary:
Trumpcare? What's that?
Wall? Where is that?
Keep the Muslims out? We will try again.
Tax plan? We need another year or two to figure it out.
North Korea? Confused. Which one is idiot-in-chief?
On one knee. The real America.
I listened, against my better judgement, to President* Agent Orange's presser with the Spanish PM, Mariano Rajoy. Orange Boy repeatedly referred to him as the "President", which is, of course, incorrect. It seemed like the reporters from both the US and Spain were trying to throw President* Agent Orange a lifeline by going out of their way to direct questions to the "Prime Minister". It didn't matter. Trump continued to call him "president". I guess Prime Minister isn't exalted enough a status to share the dais with President* Collusion.
He also opened the press conference by ignoring the PM--his guest-- for about five minutes to pat himself on the back for his phenomenal response to the Puerto Rico hurricane strike. It was all about Trump. He didn't make the least effort to commiserate with Puerto Rican residents whose lives have been uprooted by back to back natural disasters compounded by Republican intransigence about global warming. He did thump his chest about everyone blessing his name for his superhuman abilities to stand up to the most immense hurricanes in human history. No one else is as great as The Donald! Everyone sez so!
He also spent time lecturing everyone on how the NK situation should have been handled 25 years ago, and how he was "left with a mess", but that he will "clean up that mess". Whadaguy.
It's All Donald, All the Time. And nothing is ever his fault. Despite that schmuck "president" of Spain trying to cramp his style.
This guy finds new ways every day to make the United States look like a collection of ignorant, self-absorbed ass-hats.
@Akhilleus: If I were Rajoy, I could not have stopped myself from addressing Trump as "Mr. Prime Minister."
McConnell calls off the vote on the Graham-Cassidy healthcare bill because of the likelihood of three GOP no votes?
Oh, yeh? I wonder what the real tally of potential no votes would be from those gutless GOP-ers who didn't voice their objections publicly, but I'll bet behind the scenes, in darkened rooms, behind closed doors...there was plenty of pleading with McConnell as to "...how the hell are we gonna get out of this mess?"
Must have been a whole lot of panicky shaking going on.
(See also: "I'm-up'for-re-election-and-can't-risk-it.")
MAG,
I would be ecstatic to discover that there were a score or more of Confederate senators thrilled to have that skin crawling excuse for a healthcare bill extirpated so they didn't have to vote for it (although far less ecstatic to realize that, had passage looked imminent, they would have gone to the mattresses to support such draconian measures if they felt they felt their tribal fealty was being tested).
I seriously doubt that's the case, though.
I doubt there are more than another one or two amongst senatorial wingers who were wiping their brows after such a narrow escape. You don't get elected anymore, into the Confederate ranks, without a deep and abiding hatred of black people, especially the former president.
Most of these people would rather half of their constituents kick the bucket from fucking malaria than give that horrible nee-groe a "win", even if generations of Americans would be guaranteed a better life.
They don't do "better life" unless it's for people like the Glorious Leader.
@AK: I'm just an incurable optimist!
Whenever I see a journalist bring up the private email story about the Trump administration they also add that they didn't use a private server (like Hillary). What they don't acknowledge is that those emails are still out there on some private company's server. Apparently we trust Google or whoever not to look at or use that government correspondence. We all know how much the tech companies care about privacy. And we can all rest assured that if there is a breach in their servers that they'll let us know forwith.