All purpose news and politics thread part v: The quickening

[Tami]

In Trump’s Washington, the rogue actors are the real players — and the experts are increasingly irrelevant

Two years ago, President Trump shared a version of his foreign policy philosophy with a Fox News interviewer who asked about widespread vacancies at the State Department.

“I’m the only one that matters,” the president said.

Dozens of hours of impeachment testimony over the past two months have revealed the true import of Trump’s boast. When he first took office, most assumed the new president would adapt, perhaps against his will, to the ways of Washington, its bureaucratic processes and legions of subject matter experts.

Instead, the president has turned the U.S. government into a version of the Trump Organization, full of wheeler-dealers inside and outside the official ranks who exist to do his political bidding. In this version of Trump’s Washington, the rogue actors are the real players and the traditional professional class in the National Security Council, the State Department and the Pentagon are largely irrelevant.

During the first two years of his presidency, Trump’s top advisers tried to keep people carrying right-wing conspiracy theories and other poorly sourced documents out of the Oval Office.

“In the beginning, there were all of these free radicals running around the White House, and none of us had any idea what their jobs were, but they injected chaos and strange ideas into the policy process,” said a former White House official who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to share candid thoughts. McMaster and former White House chief of staff John F. Kelly waged campaigns to “root them out,” the official said, “but really they and their influence just went underground.”

Today, the focus in the White House is on weeding out the civil servants and diplomats called before Congress. When the hearings shifted to public testimony, Trump and his allies took to Twitter to disparage them.

Even if the House votes along party lines to impeach Trump, it seems unlikely right now that the Senate will vote to convict him and remove him from office. With the exception of Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah), most Republicans have either been silent or supportive of Trump, who retains the fervent backing of the party’s base.

The prospect of an angry and mistrustful Trump alarms old Washington.

“Unfortunately, the impeachment will make the president hellbent on the destruction of the civil service if he wins a second term,” said one former State Department official who spent two years serving in the Trump White House. “It’s terrifying.”

[Tami]

Joel Clement: Trump's EPA is checking off an anti-environment wish list. Here's who will suffer.

Earlier this month, President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency relaxed rules meant to keep dangerous heavy metals out of water supplies across the country. Arsenic, lead and mercury — toxins known to contaminate drinking water and cause cancer, birth defects and stunted brain development in kids — are among the toxins that leach out of coal ash. Until now, the coal plants responsible for that coal ash were required to monitor such toxins and install devices to keep it out of water supplies. But Trump’s administration thinks regulating such toxins is unnecessary.

What does this mean? Despite ample scientific evidence showing that it will increase health and safety risks, the Trump administration just gave the coal industry permission to dump toxic metals into our water supplies.

It’s hard to believe that the executive branch would act against the needs and values of everyday Americans and intentionally reduce penalties for those who seek to pollute our air and water. And yet, this is exactly what the current administration is doing. In fact, there has been no effort to hide the anti-environment wish lists behind recent executive actions. To the contrary, federal agencies seem to be competing with one another to be the biggest boosters of big industry.

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Tracking deregulation in the Trump era

The Trump administration has major deregulatory ambitions. But how much deregulation is actually happening? This tracker helps you monitor a selection of delayed, repealed, and new rules, notable guidance and policy revocations, and important court battles across eight major categories, including environmental, health, labor, and more. For a more thorough explanation of the tracker, including guidance on how to use its interactive features and an explanation of how entries are selected, click here. Sign up
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Whether you support or oppose ongoing regulatory changes, Americans have the right to participate in the regulatory process and to comment on these proposed rules. Read more on here on how to submit the most effective comments on proposed regulations.

[Mister Mets]

John Hendrickson of the Atlantic considers a potential reason for Biden's gaffe: the guy stutters.

"Maybe you’ve heard Biden talk about his boyhood stutter. A non-stutterer might not notice when he appears to get caught on words as an adult, because he usually maneuvers out of those moments quickly and expertly. But on other occasions, like that night in Detroit, Biden’s lingering stutter is hard to miss. He stutters—*if slightly—on several sounds as we sit across from each other in his office. Before addressing the debate specifically, I mention what I’ve just heard. “I want to ask you, as, you know, a … stutterer to, uh, to a … stutterer. When you were … talking a couple minutes ago, it, it seemed to … my ear, my eye … did you have … trouble on s? Or on … m?”

His eyes fall to the floor when I ask him to describe it. We’ve been tiptoeing toward it for 45 minutes, and so far, every time he seems close, he backs away, or leads us in a new direction. There are competing theories in the press, but Joe Biden has kept mum on the subject. I want to hear him explain it. I ask him to walk me through the night he appeared to lose control of his words onstage.

We’re in Biden’s mostly vacant Washington, D.C., campaign office on an overcast Tuesday at the end of the summer. Since entering the Democratic presidential-primary race in April, Biden has largely avoided in-depth interviews. When I first reached out, in late June, his press person was polite but noncommittal: Was an interview really necessary for the story?

Then came the second debate, at the end of July, in Detroit. The first one, a month earlier, had been a disaster for Biden
. He was unprepared
when Senator Kamala Harris criticized both his past resistance to federally mandated busing and a recent speech in which he’d waxed fondly about collaborating with segregationist senators. Some of his answers that night had been meander*ing and difficult to parse, feeding into the narrative that he wasn’t just prone to verbal slipups—he’s called himself a “gaffe machine”—but that his age was a problem
, that he was confused and out of touch.

Detroit was Biden’s chance to regain control of the narrative. And then something else happened. The candidates were talking about health care
. At first, Biden sounded strong, confident, presidential: “My plan makes a limit of co-pay to be One. Thousand. Dollars. Because we—”

He stopped. He pinched his eyes closed. He lifted his hands and thrust them forward, as if trying to pull the missing sound from his mouth. “We f-f-f-f-further
support—” He opened his eyes. “The uh-uh-uh-uh—” His chin dipped toward his chest. “The-uh, the ability to buy into the Obamacare plan.” Biden also stumbled when trying to say immune system.

Fox News edited these moments into a mini montage. Stifling laughter, the host Steve Hilton narrated: “As the right words struggled to make that perilous journey from Joe Biden’s brain to Joe Biden’s mouth, half the time he just seemed to give up with this somewhat tragic and limp admission of defeat.”

Several days later, Biden’s team got back in touch with me. One of his aides gingerly asked whether I’d noticed the former vice president stutter during the debate. Of course I had—I stutter, far worse than Biden. The aide said he was ready to talk about it. Last night, after Biden stumbled multiple times during the Atlanta debate, the topic became even more relevant.

“So how are you, man?”

Biden is in his usual white button-down and navy suit, a flag pin on the left lapel. Up close, he looks like he’s lost weight since leaving office in 2017. His height is commanding, but, as he approaches his 77th birthday, he doesn’t fill out his suit jacket like he used to.

I stutter as I begin to ask my first question. “I’ve only … told a few people I’m … d-doing this piece. Every time I … describe it, I get … caught on the w-word-uh stuh-tuh-tuh-tutter.”

“So did I,” Biden replies. “It doesn’t”—he interrupts himself—“can’t define who you are.”

"A stutter does not get worse as a person ages, but trying to keep it at bay can take immense physical and mental energy. Biden talks all day to audiences both small and large. In addition to periodically stuttering or blocking on certain sounds, he appears to intentionally not stutter by switching to an alternative word—a technique called “circumlocution”—*which can yield mangled syntax. I’ve been following practically everything he’s said for months now, and sometimes what is quickly characterized as a memory lapse is indeed a stutter. As Eric Jackson, the speech pathologist, pointed out to me, during a town hall in August Biden briefly blocked on Obama, before quickly subbing in my boss. The headlines after the event? “Biden Forgets Obama’s Name
.” Other times when Biden fudges a detail or loses his train of thought, it seems unrelated to stuttering, like he’s just making a mistake. The kind of mistake other candidates make too, though less frequently than he does."

[Tami]

Gotta raise the profile somehow. Good luck to him.

Anyway it really isn't much to be done with ten people on the stage. It's why I'm not bothering listening in live till the field is cut in half.

Honestly, he's P.O.ing me. One of his Twitter supporters called him a 'Victim' (you know, like actual victims of rape or assault). I call him a wealthy, whinny kid uses the privileged card and who thinks money can buy him anything he wants. This whole Boycotting MSNBC and demanding an apology, just imagine any President, not counting Trump, who would stand up at the podium after an international incident and declare to another country, 'You owe me an apology or I will Boycott your country.'

I would have rather have had Castro on the Debate stage instead of Yang.

Gotta remind myself, he's not worth my time or attention.

[Mister Mets]

Bloomberg's in.

[Tami]

Bloomberg's in.

Sheesh.....that's all we need. Like Bernie and Biden, I guess he feels like it's now or never. I would have been more agreeable about him running if he did it in 2016, now it just seems pointless.

[Jack Dracula]

Joel Clement: Trump's EPA is checking off an anti-environment wish list. Here's who will suffer.





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Tracking deregulation in the Trump era

More unethical behavior the Pre-Trump Republicans have been on board with for a long time.

Bloomberg's in.

**** him.

[worstblogever]

So in classified Congressional hearings months ago, Congress was briefed on Russia trying to frame Ukraine for election interference, the myth of the Crowdstrike server, Alexander Chalupa, etc., and were told, "This is Russian propaganda."

Congressional Republicans have used their time in the impeachment hearings to promote what they have explicitly been told is Russian propaganda.

Let me say that again, and underline it to make it clear.

Congressional Republicans have used their time in the impeachment hearings to promote what they have explicitly been told is Russian propaganda.

[worstblogever]

On this date in 2014, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" ran a profile of Roger Rivard, a former Wisconsin state legislator who after receiving an endorsement from none other than current House Speaker Paul Ryan back in the 2010 elections, managed to get himself elected to office where he became a key ally of Gov. Paul Walker, voting for legislation like stricter Voter ID laws, lifting restrictions on mining safety, and to try to lift the ban on hunting gray wolves, even though that could lead to the species’ extinction. When protesters began to assemble in Madison to protest the Wisconsin GOP’s agenda, Rivard was quoted as calling them “terrorists”. That was far from his most egregiously appalling quote, however, as in December of 2011, Rivard was involved in a debate over the state’s “Romeo and Juliet” laws, he said that “as long as sex is consensual, it’s not rape”, which shows a rather poor understanding of statutory rape law. While at first, the media somehow missed the true weight of that quote, during the buildup to the 2012 elections, journalists really started doing digging into any member of the GOP who felt the need to wax poetic about rape. So they followed up with Rivard, who defended his previous discussions on the subject with an anecdote about the advice his father gave him growing up about girls agreeing consensual sex and then having remorse and calling it rape the next day, or as he put it…. “Some girls just rape easy.” Needless to say, after that Rivard was not elected to a second term, and both Paul Ryan and Scott Walker pretended he never heard of the guy after that.


In 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” posted profiles of Elaine Morgan, a Rhode Island State Senator and dry cleaner who only seemed like as kooky as the average conservative at first when she voted against the state of Rhode Island’s attempt to raise the minimum wage, in the midst of its worst period of income inequality in the United States in almost a century, despite in her own words that she thinks the people know “MONEY WORKS BEST IN OUR POCKETS”. But what really got our attention was Morgan’s response to a letter from a constituent who was angry about the idea that the United States would potentially allow Syrian refugees to seek refuge and potentially emigrate to the United States, sending them a horribly Islamophobic response while accidentally CC’ing EVERY MEMBER OF THE STATE LEGISLATURE. Her inflammatory and disgusting take read, ”I do not want our governor bringing in any Syrian refugees. I think our country is under attack. I think this is a major plan by these countries to spread out their people to attack all non Muslim persons . The Muslim religion and philosophy is to murder, rape, and decapitate anyone who is a non Muslim. If we need to take these people in we should set up a refugee camp to keep them segregated from our populous. I think the protection of our US citizens and the United States of America should be the most important issue here.” When asked about her e-mail the next day, she didn’t apologize, and continued to suggest internment camps as an option, saying, “We have veterans in the streets starving, alcoholics, drug addicts. I can see taking Syrian refugees in, but keeping them all centralized – it sounds a little barbaric, but we need to centralize them and keep them in one central area.”

In 2017, Elaine Morgan co-sponsored an unsuccessful attempt to pass a law to drug test welfare recipients. You know, one of those kinds that lose a state a ton of money on the cost of drug testing, that then find that almost statistically no one if on drugs so no savings are found in booting people off of government assistance, and the law really only exists to shame poor people for asking for help in the first place. At least, that’s the initial money lost. States then get the opportunity to lose millions of dollars in lawsuits where the laws, if passed, get overturned as violations of the 4th Amendment that protects citizens from illegal search and seizures without cause. Point being, Morgan’s an idiot for even suggesting such a thing, and thankfully the Democratic majority voted down her attempt.

And, in an extremely depressing turn of events… the Rhode Island GOP did not find anyone to challenge Elaine Morgan for her seat on the Rhode Island State Senate in 2018, and she got her party’s nomination unopposed, before going on to barely survive defeat Democrat Jennifer Douglas with 54% of the vote. She thus has been allowed to hang around the Rhode Island legislature where she has begun pretending parliamentary rules are being violated when she can’t get her way and kill legislation that she doesn’t like, such as pro-choice bills.

We look forward to seeing if 2020 is the year where this extremist twit is bounced from office.

[jetengine]

"Rebuild America" has an awful "MAGA" feel about it or is that just me ?

As for Biden thats legitimately interesting, especially as a guy who has a mild stutter (usually stress based) but unfortunately his forgetting stuff isnt why I wouldn't vote for him. I mean his age IS a factor but its the same for any of the nominees, but the main reason is his weird "When Trumps gone things will be ok and the GOP will go back to being curmudgeons not lunatics"

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Sheesh.....that's all we need. Like Bernie and Biden, I guess he feels like it's now or never. I would have been more agreeable about him running if he did it in 2016, now it just seems pointless.

Perhaps not entirely pointless. I’ve been of the belief Bloomberg, like the rest of his ultra rich brethren have their boxers in a bunch over Elizabeth Warren, a.k.a., “The Billionaire Killer” gaining traction in the campaign, so he’s getting in the race to slow her momentum. I could be wrong, probably am wrong, but that’s my take.

[Iron Maiden]

Perhaps not entirely pointless. I’ve been of the belief Bloomberg, like the rest of his ultra rich brethren have their boxers in a bunch over Elizabeth Warren, a.k.a., “The Billionaire Killer” gaining traction in the campaign, so he’s getting in the race to slow her momentum. I could be wrong, probably am wrong, but that’s my take.

I was also thinking the same thing. There is a very real fear that if Warren gets the nomination, Trump gets re-elected.

[jetengine]

I was also thinking the same thing. There is a very real fear that if Warren gets the nomination, Trump gets re-elected.

Those billionaires will love it when Trumos shenanigans cause the dollar to drop into a nosedive

[Mister Mets]

Perhaps not entirely pointless. I’ve been of the belief Bloomberg, like the rest of his ultra rich brethren have their boxers in a bunch over Elizabeth Warren, a.k.a., “The Billionaire Killer” gaining traction in the campaign, so he’s getting in the race to slow her momentum. I could be wrong, probably am wrong, but that’s my take.

Splitting the centrist vote doesn't seem the best way to blunt Warren's momentum.

[Tami]

Splitting the centrist vote doesn't seem the best way to blunt Warren's momentum.

It might be more that he wants to Flash Speed qualify for the last debate, then take Warren on there. Though I can't see him doing it.