He's a showman, plain and simple. He wanted the attention and recognition of fixing his own problem all while making it sound like his zero tolerance policy will still stand and be enforced. He tried to have a win/win with a topic that could only be a lose/win situation. What he wasn't prepared for was the further blow back of how to reunite the children they already separated or the legal battle his EO created which essentially "kicked the can down the road" and is going to draw this out further.AllThingsKC wrote:But, this is what I don't understand: If it was policy that could have been changed anytime by Trump, then what was the point of the executive order? Why wouldn't Trump just change the policy? If he didn't need an executive order to enact the policy, why was it needed to end the policy? Besides, it will likely be challenged in court, and I suspect Trump knew that when he signed it. So what was the point of it in the first place? To make it look like short-term band-aid to the problem?FangKC wrote: It was a policy that could have been changed at any time by Trump. It didn't require any action by Congress.
http://kcur.org/post/security-concerns- ... s#stream/0A massive voter-tracking program run by Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach — which purports to help states keep voter rolls accurate — has halted operations over concerns about its own accuracy and security.
The Interstate Crosscheck system, which Kobach’s office promised would be working ahead of the 2018 elections, has been sidelined while the U.S. Department of Homeland Security conducts a security assessment following the unintended release of hundreds of voters’ private information.
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https://www.kansascity.com/opinion/edit ... 01279.html...
In a letter every Missourian should read, Rep. Jay Barnes was emphatic: The committee he chaired had plenty of evidence of Eric Greitens' involvement in "multiple acts constituting crimes, misconduct, and acts of moral turpitude," it says.
Greitens slandered the woman at the center of the case, Barnes says. The former governor lied about use of a donor list belonging to a veterans' charity. Greitens faced a near-certain criminal conviction for computer tampering, the chairman writes.
The Republican "may have engaged in criminal fraud" in a grant application. He may have committed literary fraud. The list goes on.
Barnes was particularly concerned about A New Missouri, the former governor's dark money nonprofit. "Missourians deserve a full accounting of A New Missouri, Inc., which I have come to believe was a criminal enterprise from its inception," the chairman writes.
Barnes says he plans to file a formal ethics complaint against A New Missouri. He also suggests that the state attorney general and Cole County prosecutor investigate the secretive organization.
We support these inquiries. We'd also suggest federal authorities, including the FBI, examine A New Missouri's financial books.
But authorities may want to expand their vision beyond the nonprofit alone. In total, the letter provides investigators with a clear road map to pursue several criminal investigations of Greitens and his associates.
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I doubt that would even do anything, there is almost nothing the democrats can do alone to stop this, republicans in the senate would need to grow some ovaries and step up but fat chance of that happening.grovester wrote:Only hope is for Mueller to drop the hammer.
You make a good point. Hopefully no red state dems cave, that would be just truly pathetic.grovester wrote:With McCain aliling and not in DC it would only take one defection. Collins and Murkowski are likely already signaling to Trump to not overplay his hand by nominating an extreme candidate. Adding Mueller into the equation would only expand their influence on the pick.
That being said, we probably end up with a Gorsuch clone and have to rely on Roberts to be the reasonable one.
Yea, we're pretty much screwed here.phuqueue wrote:Collins said she won't block a nominee over Roe. Truly a mystifying decision, given that she's not up for reelection and in her state she'd probably be safe anyway even if she were. It would be crass and gross if she were selling out the things she supposedly believes in to save her job, but it's not even the case here.
I think Murkowski also made some statement about how Roe wouldn't be the "only factor" to consider, which sounds a lot like laying the groundwork to approve whatever FedSoc white supremacist Trump puts out there.
There really are no "moderate" Republicans, there are Republicans who are fully on board with Trump, and there are Republicans who like to nurture a reputation that they aren't but are too spineless to ever take meaningful action (see also: Flake, Jeff)
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/06/ ... ats-685940Obama mocked Trump and others for being among the angry: “They’re mad even when they win.”
Trump’s executive actions and legal maneuvers to cut down Obamacare after failing to repeal it in Congress are a perfect example of what he means, Obama said.
“I am not surprised that instead of replacing what we had done with something better, they just have done their best to undermine and erode what’s already in place,” he said. “Of course people are going to be angry about that, because if you had health care and suddenly somebody who says they’re going to make it better comes in and makes it worse, you’ll be pissed. You should go out and vote.”
Obama called that an opportunity for Democrats.
“Reality has an interesting way of coming up and biting you, and the other side has been peddling a lot of stuff that is so patently untrue that you can get away with it for a while, but at a certain point, you confront reality,” he said. “The Democrats’ job is not to exaggerate; the Democrats’ job is not to simply mimic the tactics of the other side. All we have to do is work hard on behalf of that truth. And if we do, we’ll get better outcomes.”
That has literally never been code for "Wouldn't overturn Roe v. Wade" on any other nominee she's ever voted on. If the new judge is the fifth vote to dismantle Roe, Collins will have voted yes on four of those five (with Thomas predating her Senate tenure).As for Collins, while she says she won't use a "litmus test", she does want a candidate with good "judicial temperament" and a "respect for precedent".
That's code for "Wouldn't overturn Roe v. Wade"
Counterpoint: Obama spent eight years doing this and look where we are now.Barack Obama wrote:“The Democrats’ job is not to exaggerate; the Democrats’ job is not to simply mimic the tactics of the other side. All we have to do is work hard on behalf of that truth. And if we do, we’ll get better outcomes.”
I absolutely agree with the last part of your post. The game has changed.phuqueue wrote:I agree that if 50 Republicans vote for the nominee anyway, it doesn't make sense to punish red state Dems who latch onto a fait accompli. No Dem should be the deciding vote though.
That has literally never been code for "Wouldn't overturn Roe v. Wade" on any other nominee she's ever voted on. If the new judge is the fifth vote to dismantle Roe, Collins will have voted yes on four of those five (with Thomas predating her Senate tenure).As for Collins, while she says she won't use a "litmus test", she does want a candidate with good "judicial temperament" and a "respect for precedent".
That's code for "Wouldn't overturn Roe v. Wade"
Counterpoint: Obama spent eight years doing this and look where we are now.Barack Obama wrote:“The Democrats’ job is not to exaggerate; the Democrats’ job is not to simply mimic the tactics of the other side. All we have to do is work hard on behalf of that truth. And if we do, we’ll get better outcomes.”
Not that I think the Dems should "exaggerate" or lie -- and I don't think they need to, either. In a vacuum, if you strip away everybody's dumb tribal identities and all the bullshit, Dem policies are more popular than GOP policies. But they should absolutely "mimic the tactics" of the GOP in other respects, because the GOP has proven those tactics work. For instance, if by some miracle, the Dems retake the Senate (unlikely) before a new justice is confirmed (even more unlikely), they should blockade any nominee, just as McConnell did. If they retake the entire federal government in 2020, they should pack the court and admit DC and Puerto Rico as new states. They tried "when they go low, we go high," and it was an astonishing failure. It's time for them to try "when they take off the gloves, we put on the brass knuckles."
