Trump

[bannination]

Donald Trump: I may not repeal Obamacare, President-elect says in major U-turn

[Vrede too]

... "Either Obamacare will be amended, or repealed and replaced," Trump told the newspaper. "I told him I will look at his suggestions, and out of respect, I will do that." ...

Single payer, public option? Anyhow, filibuster, it was never gonna be "repealed" and any Trumpette or Republican that thought otherwise is a gullible fool.

Looks Chris Christie's loyalty to Trump is being returned about as much as was expected.

Well, Christie's aides were just convicted. Trump is an idiot for having Christie lead his transition team in the first place, but any pol would have dumped him.

[rstrong]

Donald Trump: I may not repeal Obamacare, President-elect says in major U-turn

To be fair, that gives him credibility as a Washington outsider. An insider would have made some token changes and then declared it repealed and replaced.

[Vrede too]

Donald Trump could be impeached within weeks, claims legal professor
Many have expressed hope that they will be able to remove Donald Trump from power through legal proceedings

Making Pence his running mate was a genius decision. How many Dems will vote for impeachment or conviction?

[GoCubsGo]

I'm sorry, the Donald is otherwise detained (groping some young thing while Melania and the Barron (who names their kid Barron??!!) are living in Manhattan.

Acting President Pence speaking......

"The new guys may come in feeling good, but after they walk out of one of those briefings, their faces fall," a retired official who has been involved in those briefings in past administrations told CNN.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11/10/polit ... wn-jewels/

[rstrong]

Donald Trump: I may not repeal Obamacare, President-elect says in major U-turn

He's already reversed his "Drain the Swamp" promise about getting rid of the cronies and lobbyists.

Politico: Lobbyists abound on Trump transition

His transition team:

— Cindy Hayden of tobacco company Altria is in charge of Homeland Security.

— Steve Hart, the chairman of Williams & Jensen, is in charge of Labor. His clients include Visa, the American Council of Life Insurers, Anthem, Cheniere Energy, Coca-Cola, General Electric, HSBC, Pfixer, PhRMA and United Airlines. He worked at the Labor Department in the Pension Welfare Benefits Program and on the Office of Management and Budget's ERISA Reorganization Task Force under Ronald Reagan.

— For the Energy Department, Michael McKenna of MWR Strategies lobbies for Engie (formerly GDF Suez), Southern Company and Dow Chemical.

— For Interior, David Bernhardt of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck lobbies for the Westlands Water District and used to represent Freeport LNG Expansion and Rosemont Copper Company. He was the Interior Department's solicitor, deputy solicitor, deputy chief of staff, counselor to the secretary of the Interior and director of the Office of Congressional and Legislative Affairs under George W. Bush.

— Michael Torrey, who has the Agriculture portfolio, has his own firm representing the American Beverage Association and the Crop Insurance and Reinsurance Bureau.

— Mira Ricardel, tasked with defense, isn't a registered lobbyist but is a consultant for Federal Budget IQ, a government research firm. Until recently she worked for Boeing.

— Dan DiMicco, overseeing the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, serves on Duke Energy's board and represents steel company Nucor (of which he used to be CEO) on the U.S. Council on Competitiveness and the Coalition for a Prosperous America.

— Paul Atkins, though not a lobbyist, is CEO of advisory firm Patomak Global Partners and charged with independent financial agencies.

— Ken Blackwell, in charge of domestic issues, isn't a lobbyist but is a senior fellow of the Family Research Council, which does lobbying.

I took a look at just the first one, Cindy Hayden of tobacco company Altria. OpenSecrets.org's list of their lobbying donations for 2015 shows around $13 million dollars in "support", and its the same most years. But the interesting thing is.... look at their Revolving Door Profile on the same page. Everyone with the yellow circle is someone who rotates between government positions and corporate lobbying depending on who is in power.

The good news is they own and operate only one of the 466 former members of Congress "supported" in kind for their efforts with cushy lobbying jobs.

Under Trump, the revolving door continues to spin.

[Vrede too]

I shared that one with my mostly liberal football pool. 4 or 8 year sentence?

[O Really]

Here's what we can expect for as long as Trump manages to stay in office...

"During a radio talk show on Thursday, Nigel Farage, Britain's most outspoken cheerleader for President-elect Donald Trump, claimed credit as the “catalyst” for the Republican nominee's electoral success and cracked a joke about Trump molesting conservative British Prime Minister Theresa May.

“I'm now going to become a diplomat. Come and schmooze Theresa — don’t touch her, for goodness sake,” Farage said on TalkRadio, a popular program, offering a bit of the proverbial British banter."

Of course, it seems possible that he won't make it very long. Either impeached or forced to resign by his own party. They'd much prefer a President Pence.

[Vrede too]

"President Trump"

"The following words in your search query were ignored because they are too common words: president trump."

[rstrong]

Here's what we can expect for as long as Trump manages to stay in office...

"During a radio talk show on Thursday, Nigel Farage, Britain's most outspoken cheerleader for President-elect Donald Trump, claimed credit as the “catalyst” for the Republican nominee's electoral success and cracked a joke about Trump molesting conservative British Prime Minister Theresa May.

Yup. That's a problem with courting the racists and nutjobs. Soon it's not your enemies' opposition making you look bad; it's your allies' support.

Farage has no credibility left in Britain, not even with his own party. Small wonder he's in America visiting Trump Tower today to beg for a position.

[Mr.B]

To the two forum head moderators who decide what is proper to post --- Please allow me to post this photo of a current news item I found on the Internet. Please, I beg of you, don't get all out of sorts over this photo, as I didn't design it, nor do I believe there's any truth in it. (do you?)

[rstrong]

Nationalists and Populists in Serbia and Macedonia Celebrate Trump's Victory

David Duke and the American neo-Nazis and KKK and Mr.B aren't alone. The far-right Serbian and Macedonian ultra-nationalists who celebrate the Milosevic legacy of rape-camps, genocide and ethnic cleansing, love Donald Trump.

[rstrong]

Hitler's only kidding about the antisemitism
- New York Times, 1922

Several reliable, well-informed sources confirmed the idea that Hitler's anti-Semitism was not so genuine or violent as it sounded, and that he was merely using anti-Semitic propaganda as a bait to catch masses of followers and keep them aroused, enthusiastic, and in line for the time when his organization is perfected and sufficiently powerful to be employed effectively for political purposes.

You can't expect the masses to understand or appreciate your finer real aims. You must feed the masses with cruder morsels and ideas like anti-Semitism. It would be politically all wrong to tell them the truth about where you really are leading them.

[Mr.B]

Nationalists and Populists in Serbia and Macedonia Celebrate Trump's Victory

"David Duke and the American neo-Nazis and KKK and Mr.B aren't alone. The far-right Serbian and Macedonian ultra-nationalists who celebrate the Milosevic legacy of rape-camps, genocide and ethnic cleansing, love Donald Trump."

So ---- now what? Who did you impress this time?

[Vrede too]

... David Duke and the American neo-Nazis and KKK and Mr.B aren't alone....

Putin loves Trump, too, and helped him a bunch. Real patriots would object to that.

[Mr.B]

"Real patriots would object to that."

Why don't you fire off an email and ask them?

[Vrede too]

Trump Backs Away From Major Pledges
Gingrich says wall promise was 'campaign device'

Ryan: We Are Not Planning Deportation Force
Says 'we don't want' racist elements in the GOP

Poor cons, you got duped. They're already backing down on so many things.

[JTA]

[Vrede too]

Good luck with that.

[JTA]

A lot of conservative types are pretty enthusiastic about Trump's potential cabinet picks.

I feel like it's going to be one of the first cult-of-personality cabinets. A lot of highly recognizable names are floating around - Gingrich, Palin, Giuliani, Carson - all people that've been in the limelight, names that even the dullest and most ignorant person probably recognizes.

You remember back when you were young and idealistic and everything was so incredibly simplistic and you'd often think "How can these idiots be this dull. All they need to do is X to solve Y!" And then as you grew older and your ignorance started to fade, you learned that things aren't as simple as they seem at face value? Reality is more nuanced than what it seems on the surface.

Well, I think a lot of people are stuck within those bubbles of ignorance for most of their lives. The world is super simplistic to them. Talking politics with my incredibly ignorant family whose days consist of watching Maury and Duck Dynasty has reinforced this belief of mine. Now, I'm not equating "conservative" with ignorance, because I feel like this applies just the same to those on the opposite side of the political spectrum.

But knowing what I know about how my family thinks, Trump's cabinet full of a bunch of personalities is going to seem like the dream team of presidential cabinets to them. It's like our first reality TV presidential administration.

Man. It's like the boundary between entertainment and reality has been blurred to the point where they've become one and the same. People can no longer differentiate the two.