Trump's America, March 2017: Using His Inside VOICE

Of all the batshit things about Trump, the endless rallies are some of the batshittiest.

the amount of free time he appears to have is incredible

it's getting pretty strange b/c nearly all his policy ideas are idiotic or in the process of failing, so what exactly is he gonna campaign on? if it's 2018 and there's no replacement of Obamacare, no Muslim shutdown, and no border wall, are people gonna keep hooting and hollering for him? it's so fucking weird for the President of the United States to be doing this.

hooting and hollering is his main appeal fwiw

like, literally

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJeugIJFXas

Well, there's always locking up the former president and his former campaign opponent. That's something.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KILVCs_bhY

https://twitter.com/maggienyt/status/842378765334396929

Apparently he's going to do these every couple of weeks. That bubble he's keen to escape is just "a work environment where a small fraction of the people you encounter judge you on your merits and accomplishments"

amazing how the comments and the content of that video are essentially identical

so what exactly is he gonna campaign on?

the dem fear is that he'll do a big infrastructure bill and run on having created a bunch of jobs

the more he yaps literally the less effective he is, so keep it up loser

xp

the dem fear is that he'll do a big infrastructure bill

this won't happen

mostly cuz it's abundantly clear he can't write a bill at this point. and if you think GOP congress is gonna come up w some awesome infrastructure bill on its own I have a bridge to sell you

(bridge financed entirely by tax breaks for developers btw)

They did a hilarious run down of how limited even a number like $1 trillion is when it comes to "infrastructure." Like, each stop of the NYC subway essentially costs $1 billion. Rebuilding half of the nation's airports would cost $1 trillion. Etc. But of course, Trump wants to fix and rebuild everything. "Everything" being this fallback when he knows nothing.

On NPR this morning.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/C7DDQVvWsAAh9Jq.jpg:large

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/16/politics/paul-ryan-wiretap-response/index.html

House Speaker Paul Ryan said Thursday that "no such wiretap existed," citing intelligence reports to House leaders after President Donald Trump accused then-President Barack Obama of wiretapping Trump Tower last year.
"The intelligence committees, in their continuing, widening, ongoing investigations of all things Russia, got to the bottom -- at least so far with respect to our intelligence community -- that no such wiretap existed," Ryan said in response to a question from CNN at a news conference.

Investigate Paul Ryan! Lyin' Ryan!

"The Speaker of the House -- I like to call him the Weaker of the House, Lyin' Ryan . . ."

we could have rebuilt our country TWICE! maybe even THREE TIMES! if only they'd read ART OF THE DEAL! which I WROTE!!!

we're a bit shy of two months in and it's pretty clear that Trump is ineffective as president of his immediate aides, let alone president of the country. The GOP congress has already splintered into factionalism, and Nancy Pelosi aside the Dems are actually making a go of staying on message throughout. Trump's executive actions are already unpopular and losing in court. I worry that somehow continuing resolutions won't get passed, or the won't get signed, down the road, or the administrative state really will be hollowed out in a fell swoop that causes massive disruption to peoples' health and safety. But Trump has had one half of a positive news cycle this whole time, when the Beltway pundit class decided he seemed very "presidential" exploiting the grief of a military widow.

what does mark levin say about this? mark levin should check in on this so that trump can know how to respond

xpost

Not wrong:

https://twitter.com/GlennThrush/status/842404796137127936

I wonder which reporter writes the "inside" story of how Ivanka/Jared saved arts funding or free milk for babies or umbrellas for widows?

Separately from Haberman:

Trump visibly frustrated last night over travel ban rejection in Hawaii, staff had assured him this one would hold up....SESSIONS, with whom Trump was aggravated for the Russian ambassador/hearing answer, got some of the blowback, per ppl briefed.

Guess another weekend as the greeter at Mar-a-Lago is on the cards.

Meanwhile given Thrush's point, Costa's saying this:

https://twitter.com/costareports/status/842216688674328576

The ascent of Dina Powell in the Trump WH is a reflection of Ivanka Trump's rising influence on matters foreign and domestic....Ivanka, Jared, Gary Cohn, Dina Powell--this is the bloc of Goldman-New York-aligned allies to watch.

All so much old school Kremlinology/tea leaf reading but even so. (I've been thinking all along that if/when it comes to it and it's Kushner vs Bannon, the latter is out.)

really hope this wild goose gets killed

Perhaps most revealing of all are the Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee — charged with investigating these matters — who recently told BuzzFeed how petrified they are of what the Democratic base will do if they do not find evidence of collusion, as they now suspect will likely be the case. “There’s a tangible frustration over what one official called ‘wildly inflated’ expectations surrounding the panel’s fledgling investigation,” BuzzFeed’s Ali Watkins wrote.

Moreover, “several committee sources grudgingly say, it feels as though the investigation will be seen as a sham if the Senate doesn’t find a silver bullet connecting Trump and Russian intelligence operatives.” One member told Watkins: “I don’t think the conclusions are going to meet people’s expectations.”

What makes all of this most significant is that officials like Clapper and Morell are trained disinformation agents; Clapper in particular has proven he will lie to advance his interests. Yet even with all the incentive to do so, they are refusing to claim there is evidence of such collusion; in fact, they are expressly urging people to stop thinking it exists. As even the law recognizes, statements that otherwise lack credibility become more believable when they are ones made “against interest.”

https://theintercept.com/2017/03/16/key-democratic-officials-now-warning-base-not-to-expect-evidence-of-trumprussia-collusion/

sigh.

Greenberg went back last month to conduct four focus groups with 35 non-college educated whites who voted for both Trump and Obama.
There was no buyer’s remorse. Despite the drama of the opening weeks, not one of the participants regretted voting for the president. They described Trump as sincere, complained about unfair media coverage and criticized protesters for not giving him a chance to do good things. They love that he remains politically incorrect. They remain confident that he is a strong leader who will shake up Washington, secure the border and bring back manufacturing jobs. Their faith is strong. Their doubts are sparse.
At the same time, no one in the focus groups trusted congressional Republicans to do the right thing, particularly on the economy and health care.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/paloma/daily-202/2017/03/15/daily-202-reagan-democrats-give-trump-a-long-leash-but-deeply-distrust-gop/58c8f664e9b69b1406c75d69/?utm_term=.46180d406e0a

There is no way to disappoint a racist.

You can't be racist if you voted for Obama!! Racists really hate black people!!

xxpost yeah, I'd have guessed that what looks to us like fucking up and failing looks to his base like trying to fulfill his campaign promises and being thwarted by his enemies

fine w me

They remain confident that he is a strong leader who will shake up Washington, secure the border and bring back manufacturing jobs.

They can think that as much as they want but at some point they'll have to ask if that's happened. (The first, sure, but the other two...)

I have no interest in expending energy "converting" morons racists and ideologues. I will expend energy to make sure none of their preferred policies make it into law/practice though.

Ned these people operate in a fact-free vacuum. Failures are blamed on scapegoats.

I saw #boycotthawaii is trending on twitter.. as if these red state rubes travel. I guess they probably dont eat many macadamia nuts either.

xpost I'm sure but if he specifically says the jobs are coming back and they don't (or they're really terrible, pay less than ever, etc., reflected in more firms moving to automation), it's not like righteous ire is going to pay their mortgage/rent/food and utility bills etc.

Per the Fox News poll the other day, jobs remain the key issue for Trump voters. Ergo, he must deliver. He can't NOT deliver. (Thus infrastructure etc.)

They remain confident that he is a strong leader

^ Sounds about right to me. Anyone who was capable last November of seeing Trump as a strong leader who would reset the country in the right direction after watching the campaign, would still be seeing the same Trump today. For most of them his failures will be seen as failures of the established system and will only reinforce their desire to tear that system down and replace it with whatever white nationalist utopia they fantasize about.

i think republicans should boycott any state that's had a democratic judge at any level, maybe even move out of that state

Meantime the Wall Street Journal has gotten aggro all of a sudden. At least with Flynn:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/mike-flynn-worked-for-other-russian-companies-besides-rt-documents-1489683618?mod=e2tw

President Trump’s former national security adviser, Mike Flynn, was paid tens of thousands of dollars by Russian companies shortly before he became a formal adviser to the then-candidate, according to documents obtained by a congressional oversight committee that revealed business interests that hadn’t been previously known.

I know its the liberal media but this headline continues a trend.. (strokes beard)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/03/16/if-youre-a-poor-person-in-america-trumps-budget-is-not-for-you/

think yr making a mistake in thinking that Trump voters are under/unemployed (they aren't). The unemployment rate is way down (oh no, facts!), they will not be swayed by any reports to the contrary. He can fail to deliver and then blame it on the usual suspects, as is his wont.

xp

Granted if there's a fantasy that a certain strain of voter has always clung to, it's that they're surrounded by lazy people of all stripes who live off the sweat of their own honest toil. (Which is why they spend so much time in comment sections insisting this -- an unusual way to monetize but I perhaps am unaware of a new exchange rate.)

despite my prior disagreements w other posters here about the likelihood of Trump manufacturing an invasion to drum up support (largely due to incompetence and a lack of obvious + handily defeatable enemies to hand), I do think this will become more and more of a risk as the presidency goes on. the temptation to resort to the most tried and true method of "uniting" the country may prove too much, esp if there's any kind of provocation/terrorist attack. I dunno who it would be, cuz it doesn't seem v likely that the military will be all gung ho to invade Iran or North Korea or China (lol) and Trump isn't going to come up with any kind of coherent, carefully orchestrated plan on his own but it does seem that he would be susceptible to "well, gotta attack SOMEBODY" logic.

why else does movement "conservatism" want to de-fund and cut to the bone the State Department?

what's Grenada been up to?

I hear a Foot Locker needs re-liberating

hey let's not go putin the cart before the horse now

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/16/politics/michael-flynn-payments-rt-russia-tv/index.html?adkey=bn