Trump, July 2017: Tweet more

"better ICE"

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jul/21/media-war-trump-destined-fail

Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows reacts to Parliamentarian striking down the abortion funding prohibition.

"Passage almost impossible." pic.twitter.com/txLjSNhfdM

— Matt Fuller (@MEPFuller) July 21, 2017

which relates to this

Defunding Planned Parenthood and the abortion restrictions on the tax credits both subject to 60.

Freedom Caucus?https://t.co/H6p53m83zr

— Matt Fuller (@MEPFuller) July 21, 2017

HUGE NEWS on TrumpCare. Either lots of stuff comes out or Rs have to break decades of precedent and overrule the Senate Parliamentarian. https://t.co/8MSWWZtIj5

— Chad Bolt (@chadderr) July 21, 2017

Overthrow precedent? Surely they wouldn't dare!

their 6 months in insurance limbo for not having coverage penalty is out too.. fucking morons.

wait, the Senate can overrule the Parliamentarian on a simple majority vote?!

that seems crazy

supposedly pence can personally overrule the parliamentarian?

Collins + Murkowski have both said the PP defunding/abortion restrictions would tank the bill for them, so them plus absent McCain and/or Lee and Moran's opposition means this bill is still fucked.

Plus everyone's gone home and no one's negotiating at the moment, so this just seems like another headache for McConnell

supposedly pence can personally overrule the parliamentarian?

I've seen Cruz advance this argument, but I've never seen anyone else in the Senate endorse it or agree w it

I'm only just getting to see video of the Mooch now that I'm out of work.

Is this what having crabs feels like?

hmm well there it is in wikipedia: The Vice President as President of the Senate can overrule the parliamentarian, but this has not been done since 1975

xp

full detail:
Any senator may raise a procedural objection to a provision believed to be extraneous, which will then be ruled on by the Presiding Officer, customarily on the advice of the Senate Parliamentarian. A vote of 60 senators is required to overturn the ruling. The Presiding Officer need not necessarily follow the advice of the Parliamentarian, and the Parliamentarian can be replaced by the Senate Majority Leader. The Vice President as President of the Senate can overrule the parliamentarian, but this has not been done since 1975. In 2001, Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott fired Parliamentarian Robert Dove after dissatisfaction with his rulings, replacing him with Alan Frumin

the huffpo guy who has been covering this all here seems convinced

Guys. It's dead.

— Matt Fuller (@MEPFuller) July 21, 2017

*here = year

I can see Trump telling Pence to do it if he thought it would get the bill passed, but doing so would almost certainly mean they would actually *lose* votes so idk

they have until at least 2018 for this shit, and reconciliation will come again so

next time reconciliation is possible will be the middle of mid-term elections, political calculus will be a bit different

i know it's cliche but i'm not saying never to anything ever at this point

This from @Scaramucci’s book explains why the Bannonites can’t stand him pic.twitter.com/pKf1N9uqVu

— Felix Salmon (@felixsalmon) July 21, 2017

lmao https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/sessions-discussed-trump-campaign-related-matters-with-russian-ambassador-us-intelligence-intercepts-show/2017/07/21/3e704692-6e44-11e7-9c15-177740635e83_story.html

Minor details, sir.

Russia’s ambassador to Washington told his superiors in Moscow that he discussed campaign-related matters, including policy issues important to Moscow, with Jeff Sessions during the 2016 presidential race, contrary to public assertions by the embattled attorney general, according to current and former U.S. officials.

Ambassador Sergey Kislyak’s accounts of two conversations with Sessions — then a top foreign policy adviser to Republican candidate Donald Trump — were intercepted by U.S. spy agencies, which monitor the communications of senior Russian officials both in the United States and in Russia. Sessions initially failed to disclose his contacts with Kislyak and then said that the meetings were not about the Trump campaign.

One U.S. official said that Sessions — who testified that he has no recollection of the April encounter — has provided “misleading” statements that are “contradicted by other evidence.” A former official said that the intelligence indicates that Sessions and Kislyak had “substantive” discussions on matters including Trump’s positions on Russia-related issues and prospects for U.S.-Russia relations in a Trump administration.

Already seeing speculation that this was done to try and finally force Sessions out. I have doubts.

by russia, for the lols, perhaps

There's no way anyone in Trump's circle is feeding the Russia story imo. However much they want rid of Sessions, makes no sense for them to fuel the collusion narrative.

Anthony Scaramucci looks like an extra in the Wolf of Wall Street that they had to fire because he kept trying to talk to Leo

— Ike Barinholtz (@ikebarinholtz) July 21, 2017

I weep for him

Spicer to Hannity on McCarthy/SNL: "There’s a lot of it that was over the line. It wasn’t funny. It was stupid, or silly, or malicious."

— Josh Dawsey (@jdawsey1) July 21, 2017

Hilarious if true:

Scaramucci is being primed to eventually take on the position of WH chief of staff, according 2sources w/ knowledge https://t.co/ZhlbsprsIw

— Tara Palmeri (@tarapalmeri) July 21, 2017

The latest in the seemingly endless series of "He can't really be that stupid, can he? ...Oh, wow..." moments.

Oh and

WSJ FLAG: Kushner releases revised financial filing, disclosing 77 assets "inadvertently omitted" from earlier rpt.https://t.co/QzzbyftESO

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) July 21, 2017

Haha.

I understand the point Thomas Frank is making in that piece linked to a few posts up. It's basically an extension of Listen, Liberal--the venality of the cult of "professionalism," specifically within the Democratic Party--which I read and liked.

But no matter if the press's hatred for Trump is, in Frank's eyes, for all the wrong reasons, I do think its hatred, along with all the misery Trump inflicts upon himself, helps gum things up for him. I don't really buy the idea that, because the media are so hated in poll after poll, therefore Trump benefits from the mutual animosity. With the 30% or so of voters who are staying with him forever, no matter what, sure--they dig in. But as a practical matter, day-to-day, I really believe it hurts him badly. CNN seizes on everything. When Scaramucci gave his press conference today, every time he said something silly (e.g., hoping Spicer goes on to make lots of money), the words immediately showed up on the crawl at the bottom of the screen. I love that they do this; I think it takes a toll.

Is the press "winning" its war with Trump? I don't know what winning exactly means, but they are nurturing and adding to the chaos, and I can't believe that's a good thing for Trump.

Every GOP figure I've spoken to at #AspenSecurity assumes Trump leaked this to force Sessions out. "Certainly not a Mueller leak," one said. https://t.co/5WjsCLkQks

— Garrett M. Graff (@vermontgmg) July 21, 2017

OMG more NEWS: House Intelligence Committee will interview Jared Kushner next Tuesday, per release

— Seung Min Kim (@seungminkim) July 21, 2017

Meantime

https://www.wsj.com/articles/sean-spicer-faced-myriad-obstacles-during-dramaticwhite-houserise-and-fall-1500678379

Less than a month into his new job, White House press secretary Sean Spicer needed to keep his food and drink cold. He wanted a mini-fridge.

He dispatched a top aide to a nearby executive office building where junior research employees are crammed into a room, surviving on Lean Cuisine frozen lunches. Mr. Spicer wants your icebox, the aide said, according to people familiar with the incident. They refused to give it up.

So Mr. Spicer waited until sundown—after his young staffers had left—to take matters into his own hands. He was spotted by a fellow White House official lugging the icebox down the White House driveway after 8 p.m.

The Fridgegate Burglary

Real "who throws a shoe?" territory there

I don't really buy the idea that, because the media are so hated in poll after poll, therefore Trump benefits from the mutual animosity. With the 30% or so of voters who are staying with him forever, no matter what, sure--they dig in. But as a practical matter, day-to-day, I really believe it hurts him badly.

― clemenza, Friday, July 21, 2017 7:24 PM (seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

OTM and the tendency to believe otherwise is more of the fearful, apologetic, and ultimately self-sabotaging shit that got us into the mess in the first place. Dems should not be waiting until 2018 or 2020 wondering if taking no prisoners is NAGL. Three-foot putts be damned, these creeps are increasingly cornered and there is never going to be "the right moment" to take the boot off their throats

^conceding so-called liberal media bias here

I'm depressed to hear that Schumer et al who I would like to see as good guys in this have picked now to illegalise boycotting Israel.

That stink is going to stick to Gillibrand when she eventually announces her presidential candidacy.

A little extra detail

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/21/politics/trump-junior-manafort-agree-to-negotiate/index.html

The leaders of the Senate Judiciary Committee have cut a deal with President Donald Trump's eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort to avoid a high-profile public hearing next week, with the two men agreeing to provide records to the panel and to be privately interviewed ahead of any public session.

In a joint statement, panel Chairman Chuck Grassley and ranking member Dianne Feinstein said, "(W)e will not issue subpoenas for them tonight requiring their presence at Wednesday's hearing but reserve the right to do so in the future."
The committee has issued a subpoena for Glenn Simpson, the co-founder of Fusion GPS, the political firm that compiled a dossier at the center of the federal Russia probe.
Attorneys for Simpson say he will not accept the committee's invitation to testify Wednesday.

So Sessions - or any of them, for that matter - just outright liars who did not think they would be caught?

Fun times!

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/07/21/inside-24-hours-that-broke-press-secretary-sean-spicer-240822

Bannon, people who spoke to the chief strategist said, was still unhappy after the official announcement of Scaramucci's hiring. Priebus spent the day trying to convince others that he and Scaramucci are close friends and that Spicer's departure wasn't bad for his own embattled position in the White House. Scaramucci was heading back to New York for the weekend.

i am not aware of any US pol who has suffered for being maniacally pro-Israel

Grassley planning to subpoena Fusion GPS and not manafort and Jr.! Fuck this

Yeah but that's because they agreed to come in and testify, so.

Well they aren't coming in next week now

Interior Sec. Ryan Zinke, the first speaker at the Western Conservative Summit, wastes no time getting heckled by environmentalists.

— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) July 22, 2017

Protesters just chanted for a solid 5 minutes of Cory Gardner's speech -- #WCS17 staff struggling to remove them from the ballroom. Brutal.

— Tim Alberta (@TimAlberta) July 22, 2017