Trump MAGAthread VII

[The Black Forrest]

Getting a cabin in the woods filled with food and alcohol seems like the best bet to survive these next 8 years...

8 years? Shit, you're even more pessimistic than I am

He is probably right. I thought I understood his supporters. A branch of the family is in that camp. After the last election; I admit I don't. The one image that still plays in my head was an interview with a Kentucky coal miner. Making america great is a myth. The coal jobs aren't returning. I am going to be worse off. I still support him.
Then there was this old woman who said obamacare saved her grandchild. Loosing it will be dangerous but she still supports him.

I used this think he was guaranteed to at the most of having one term. I am not so sure now.

[MERIZoC]

Can I just say how much I'm going to hate these next three and a half years?

Constant whining and moaning on the left, constant whining and moaning on the right with the noticeable partisan division in America growing as well. Not to mention Trump's relatively odd policies. People say to be "politically aware" but considering that the political world is a shitstorm at the moment, I don't think I want to.

Ron Fournier is that you

[Gauthier]

8 years? Shit, you're even more pessimistic than I am

He is probably right. I thought I understood his supporters. A branch of the family is in that camp. After the last election; I admit I don't. The one image that still plays in my head was an interview with a Kentucky coal miner. Making america great is a myth. The coal jobs aren't returning. I am going to be worse off. I still support him.
Then there was this old woman who said obamacare saved her grandchild. Loosing it will be dangerous but she still supports him.

I used this think he was guaranteed to at the most of having one term. I am not so sure now.

Tribalism and Sunk Cost Fallacy makes alcohol and drugs feel like soda pop.

[Corrian]

11 Marine National Monuments and Sanctuaries are of course under threat too

[Geilinor]

11 Marine National Monuments and Sanctuaries are of course under threat too

According to the attached document, 7 of those sanctuaries were expanded by Obama. Why am I not surprised?

[Zanera]

11 Marine National Monuments and Sanctuaries are of course under threat too

"Why aren't we drilling the good shit?"
"Because the good shit is under marine sanctuaries, and we can't drill there."
*starts writing*
"What marine sanctuaries?"

*three years and two oil spills and a tweet later*
"We are truly the best ecological admin. Stray dogs have so many rights! BIGLY RIGHTS! MAGA!"

[AiliailiA]

I was just about to post that guys comment. Holy shit.

It's interesting to see Republicans from Mississippi becoming frustrated with Trump.

And Kentucky, along with Florida the only states to disenfranchise ex-felons for life:

"This commission was formed to try to find basis for the lie that President Trump put forward that has no foundation," Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes told Reuters in an interview.

I'm torn between thinking Kentucky might have something to hide, and "OMG, even fucking Kentucky says you're full of shit"

Trump's Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity sent a letter to all 50 states on Wednesday asking them to turn over voter information including names, the last four digits of social security numbers, addresses, birth dates, political affiliation, felony convictions and voting histories

Well any serious investigation would need to do that, you obviously couldn't trust the states who would be prime suspects themselves. Voting history of course means whether the person voted that year, not who they voted for. All of this stuff is already known to 'government' except that's state governments not Federal. One rather obvious vector for voter fraud would be people who are registered in more than one state (and vote twice, either in person or by altering a friend in the other state the friend can use their name). To detect that, you'd want the records of both states together in one place, ie the investigator's office.

That's a ton of info though, with really obvious potential for abuse, so if this is to be done at all it's got to be done according to guidelines which are pretty strict, requiring the information be kept securely at all times, with a time limit on how long it can be kept at all, and a requirement it be destroyed by the time limit if no case to prosecute is found. Obviously I wouldn't trust the President (or his ratfuck AG) to write or enforce such guidelines, even assuming good intentions they're just not competent to. This would have to come from Congress, and the investigator be the FBI. Anything they found I think would be referred to prosecutors in that state (since the suspected crime happens there) and only if they decline to prosecute would it come back to the AG. That's how I'd do it anyway, and yeah I'd still be nervous about the kind of info being requested and sifted through there.

Despite the strong impression the whole show is just Trump telling lies to salve his own ego, then trying to blow public money to find some tiny shred of support for his lie, there might seriously be vote fraud to investigate, and we'll never know if we just leave it to states to run their standard audits (which are essentially just repeating after the election the same voter roll checks done to compile and cull the roll in the first place) because as I say, the states themselves are prime suspects for vote fraud.

[Keldros]

Can I just say how much I'm going to hate these next three and a half years?

[The Black Forrest]

11 Marine National Monuments and Sanctuaries are of course under threat too

The fake President is such a petty little shit.

[AiliailiA]

11 Marine National Monuments and Sanctuaries are of course under threat too

According to the attached document, 7 of those sanctuaries were expanded by Obama. Why am I not surprised?

It would also include Bush's signature sanctuary in the Pacific, if I'm remembering correctly.

Way to go, Donald. Just about the only thing the Shrub did in 8 years which I liked, why not whack that


EDIT: Hmm, I've found the table on page 28828 and I'm not seeing a big marine sanctuary I recognize, from 2007 or 2008. The only one pre-Obama is "Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary" May 24, 2007, it's tiny ... unless there's a naval base or something involved, I think that's included just for window dressing.

[Dahon]

He is probably right. I thought I understood his supporters. A branch of the family is in that camp. After the last election; I admit I don't. The one image that still plays in my head was an interview with a Kentucky coal miner. Making america great is a myth. The coal jobs aren't returning. I am going to be worse off. I still support him.
Then there was this old woman who said obamacare saved her grandchild. Loosing it will be dangerous but she still supports him.

I used this think he was guaranteed to at the most of having one term. I am not so sure now.

Battered voter syndrome -- "He's a complete dick, but he loves us, I'm sure!"

[Geilinor]

According to the attached document, 7 of those sanctuaries were expanded by Obama. Why am I not surprised?

It would also include Bush's signature sanctuary in the Pacific, if I'm remembering correctly.

Way to go, Donald. Just about the only thing the Shrub did in 8 years which I liked, why not whack that

Trump: "I'm going to whack everything people like but I know my supporters. I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody or wreck the environment and I won't lose any voters."

[AiliailiA]

It would also include Bush's signature sanctuary in the Pacific, if I'm remembering correctly.

Way to go, Donald. Just about the only thing the Shrub did in 8 years which I liked, why not whack that

Trump: "I'm going to whack everything people like but I know my supporters. I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody or wreck the environment and I won't lose any voters."

That's a bit wordy. Why not just "fuck you dolphin! fuck you WHALE!" ..?

EDIT: It is on the list. I missed it by looking for dates 2007 and 2008, it's Mariana Trench and Bush designated it on January 12, 2009.

Too deep for oil drilling but we can dump leaky nuclear subs or something I'm sure. There's always some way of fucking up something so beautiful and fragile.

[Corrian]

11 Marine National Monuments and Sanctuaries are of course under threat too

The fake President is such a petty little shit.

Not really the President in this case. Sure, it relates, but Ryan Zinke is the one in charge of this shit.

[Dahon]

House Republicans just went even more mwahahahaha we're fucking evil mode, what with this seriously scary shit.

[Corrian]

House Republicans just went even more mwahahahaha we're fucking evil mode, what with this seriously scary shit.

I don't know the source, but what the fuck? We're in a moment of worry about voter machines and they do this?

[Soldati Senza Confini]

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/ ... spartanntp

America First Policies, a nonprofit group created to back President Trump’s agenda, suspended its advertising campaign against Mr. Heller after he agreed to attend a West Wing
meeting on the health bill and after a group of Republican senators in attendance complained about the commercials. But Mr. Heller, perhaps the most vulnerable Republican senator on the ballot next year, has by no means escaped the wrath of Mr. Trump and his vocal supporters, including two billionaire casino magnates, Sheldon G. Adelson and Steve Wynn.

“All of the Trump supporters I talk to are furious with Heller,” said Danny Tarkanian, the son of the legendary Nevada basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian and a frequent Republican candidate for office in the state. Mr. Tarkanian said he was considering taking on the senator next year and had been encouraged to do so by some of the president’s ardent grass-roots admirers.

The political fallout from Mr. Heller’s high-profile news conference a week ago offers a vivid illustration of the new fault lines on the right in the Trump era. After years of fierce clashing between Republican hard-liners and mainstream conservatives, the purity-versus-pragmatist wars have given way to a new, Trump-centered debate that highlights how fully the president has taken over the party.

On the other hand, Mr. Heller faces enormous grass-roots pressure to stand his ground against the bill. He has clung tightly to his state’s popular Republican governor, Brian Sandoval, a staunch opponent of the repeal who accepted the Medicaid expansion dollars in the Affordable Care Act. More than 200,000 Nevadans have gained insurance through Medicaid since the passage of the health law.

What angered the Republican rank and file about Mr. Heller’s critique was not so much his unease with the compromise Senate legislation — a measure that many on the far right are also displeased with — but that he would so purposefully undermine the president’s agenda.

And it is not just party activists who are displeased with the senator.

Mr. Adelson and Mr. Wynn, two of Las Vegas’s leading gambling titans, each contacted Mr. Heller at the request of the White House last week to complain about his opposition to the Republican-written health overhaul, according to multiple Republican officials.
One ally of Mr. Heller’s acknowledged that Mr. Adelson and Mr. Wynn were unhappy with the senator at the moment and that their relationship needed some repair work.

Both billionaire donors are close to Mr. Trump, a fellow tycoon. Mr. Adelson played a pivotal role in Mr. Trump’s election, showering Republican groups last year with tens of millions of dollars. Mr. Wynn is the finance chairman of the Republican National Committee and oversaw a fund-raiser on Wednesday at the president’s Washington hotel that Mr. Trump said raised about $7 million for the party committee and his re-election campaign.

Earlier that day, America First Policies held a donor meeting for those who were in the capital for that evening’s fund-raiser. Every contributor who raised the issue of the anti-Heller
campaign — an extraordinary offensive against a vulnerable senator in one’s own party — said they approved of the attacks, according to an attendee.

Ronald M. Cameron, a major Republican donor who gave the maximum $5,400 donation to Mr. Heller’s re-election campaign this year, said he would consider investing in primary race challenges to Republican lawmakers who oppose the health care bill or other White House legislative priorities.

“I might support a challenger, and would certainly withhold support from someone that I thought was against Trump’s agenda,” said Mr. Cameron, an Arkansas poultry magnate who donated more than $2 million to committees supporting Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign and attended the Wednesday fund-raiser for his re-election.

Mr. Cameron — who was solicited by America First but said he had not donated to the group — said that he was not familiar with the group’s ads against Mr. Heller, but that he did not object to the idea of publicly calling out lawmakers who oppose the health care bill.

They should “shape up or get out of the way,” he said.

Mr. Trump himself, while acknowledging the complaints of the Republican senators at the White House meeting, has in other private sessions with his aides and allies made clear that he very much approved of the onslaught against Mr. Heller. At the wedding of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin last Saturday and then again in the White House this week, he told advisers that he supported the ad blitz, according to multiple Republican officials who have spoken to the president.

Officials with America First insist that Mr. Trump and the White House staff all supported their decision to target Mr. Heller. But there has been some unease in the administration over the strategy, which created a significant rift with the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and other Republican senators at the very moment they were trying to forge consensus around the repeal bill.

This explains a lot why Republicans are just rolling over with Trump's agenda. Most of them are scared to be primaried by rich donors who are behind Trump.

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-backers-%E2%80%98furious%E2%80%99-that-senator-stood-against-health-care-bill/ar-BBDvaoV?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp
This explains a lot why Republicans are just rolling over with Trump's agenda. Most of them are scared to be primaried by rich donors who are behind Trump.

Ah yes... Plutocracy in action.

[Frank Zipper]

Trump's Twitter feed seems more and more like a slightly upgraded version of Microsoft's chatbot Tay.

[AiliailiA]

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-backers-%E2%80%98furious%E2%80%99-that-senator-stood-against-health-care-bill/ar-BBDvaoV?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp

America First Policies, a nonprofit group created to back President Trump’s agenda, suspended its advertising campaign against Mr. Heller after he agreed to attend a West Wing
meeting on the health bill and after a group of Republican senators in attendance complained about the commercials. But Mr. Heller, perhaps the most vulnerable Republican senator on the ballot next year, has by no means escaped the wrath of Mr. Trump and his vocal supporters, including two billionaire casino magnates, Sheldon G. Adelson and Steve Wynn.

“All of the Trump supporters I talk to are furious with Heller,” said Danny Tarkanian, the son of the legendary Nevada basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian and a frequent Republican candidate for office in the state. Mr. Tarkanian said he was considering taking on the senator next year and had been encouraged to do so by some of the president’s ardent grass-roots admirers.

The political fallout from Mr. Heller’s high-profile news conference a week ago offers a vivid illustration of the new fault lines on the right in the Trump era. After years of fierce clashing between Republican hard-liners and mainstream conservatives, the purity-versus-pragmatist wars have given way to a new, Trump-centered debate that highlights how fully the president has taken over the party.

On the other hand, Mr. Heller faces enormous grass-roots pressure to stand his ground against the bill. He has clung tightly to his state’s popular Republican governor, Brian Sandoval, a staunch opponent of the repeal who accepted the Medicaid expansion dollars in the Affordable Care Act. More than 200,000 Nevadans have gained insurance through Medicaid since the passage of the health law.

What angered the Republican rank and file about Mr. Heller’s critique was not so much his unease with the compromise Senate legislation — a measure that many on the far right are also displeased with — but that he would so purposefully undermine the president’s agenda.

And it is not just party activists who are displeased with the senator.

Mr. Adelson and Mr. Wynn, two of Las Vegas’s leading gambling titans, each contacted Mr. Heller at the request of the White House last week to complain about his opposition to the Republican-written health overhaul, according to multiple Republican officials.
One ally of Mr. Heller’s acknowledged that Mr. Adelson and Mr. Wynn were unhappy with the senator at the moment and that their relationship needed some repair work.

Both billionaire donors are close to Mr. Trump, a fellow tycoon. Mr. Adelson played a pivotal role in Mr. Trump’s election, showering Republican groups last year with tens of millions of dollars. Mr. Wynn is the finance chairman of the Republican National Committee and oversaw a fund-raiser on Wednesday at the president’s Washington hotel that Mr. Trump said raised about $7 million for the party committee and his re-election campaign.

Earlier that day, America First Policies held a donor meeting for those who were in the capital for that evening’s fund-raiser. Every contributor who raised the issue of the anti-Heller
campaign — an extraordinary offensive against a vulnerable senator in one’s own party — said they approved of the attacks, according to an attendee.

Ronald M. Cameron, a major Republican donor who gave the maximum $5,400 donation to Mr. Heller’s re-election campaign this year, said he would consider investing in primary race challenges to Republican lawmakers who oppose the health care bill or other White House legislative priorities.

“I might support a challenger, and would certainly withhold support from someone that I thought was against Trump’s agenda,” said Mr. Cameron, an Arkansas poultry magnate who donated more than $2 million to committees supporting Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign and attended the Wednesday fund-raiser for his re-election.

Mr. Cameron — who was solicited by America First but said he had not donated to the group — said that he was not familiar with the group’s ads against Mr. Heller, but that he did not object to the idea of publicly calling out lawmakers who oppose the health care bill.

They should “shape up or get out of the way,” he said.

Mr. Trump himself, while acknowledging the complaints of the Republican senators at the White House meeting, has in other private sessions with his aides and allies made clear that he very much approved of the onslaught against Mr. Heller. At the wedding of Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin last Saturday and then again in the White House this week, he told advisers that he supported the ad blitz, according to multiple Republican officials who have spoken to the president.

Officials with America First insist that Mr. Trump and the White House staff all supported their decision to target Mr. Heller. But there has been some unease in the administration over the strategy, which created a significant rift with the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and other Republican senators at the very moment they were trying to forge consensus around the repeal bill.

This explains a lot why Republicans are just rolling over with Trump's agenda. Most of them are scared to be primaried by rich donors who are behind Trump.

Perhaps, but Trump and his backers can only do that so many times. The threat is more formidable than the act, and if a few Republicans stand up to him those people will find themselves spending millions to punish Republicans when the probable effect is to get a Democrat elected instead. Particularly in the case of Senator Heller.

But you know, there were four other Republican Senators besides Heller who rolled the turtle earlier this week. Not even bringing the Senate healthcare bill to the floor for debate is an absolute slap in the face, it's more defiant than block or delay it with poison pill amendments, or even voting against it at the end. It's saying "this bill is such shit, it can't even be fixed. No further negotiation, just No."

I was surprised to hear there were that many, but the point is that five senators (or say 20 House members) going against leadership is getting into too big a problem to fight against with threats of primary challenges. Going after them all, to intimidate the others, isn't much of a threat because once war is declared they have nothing to lose, and they have 16 months to make life hell for the party before the threat goes live. Just one or two senators, Republicans can still govern without. Five, that's their problem getting out of hand.

[Vassenor]

Can I just say how much I'm going to hate these next three and a half years?

With a 36% Approval Rating?

[AiliailiA]

With a 36% Approval Rating?

There's a while to go. I know it seems like it's been ages, but actually half a year which is only an eighth of one term.

You and I think he's fucked up enough just in that short time, that he can't possibly turn it around, but the voters generally are not all convinced.
That 36%? Yes it's pretty bad, it's 'unelectedable' as it stands. But it's really remarkable how long it has held around there. Voters haven't given up on Trump yet.

[Vassenor]

With a 36% Approval Rating?

There's a while to go. I know it seems like it's been ages, but actually half a year which is only an eighth of one term.

You and I think he's fucked up enough just in that short time, that he can't possibly turn it around, but the voters generally are not all convinced.
That 36%? Yes it's pretty bad, it's 'unelectedable' as it stands. But it's really remarkable how long it has held around there. Voters haven't given up on Trump yet.

Especially since unlike every other civilised nation on earth you don't actually need the support of the voters to be elected.

[AiliailiA]

There's a while to go. I know it seems like it's been ages, but actually half a year which is only an eighth of one term.

You and I think he's fucked up enough just in that short time, that he can't possibly turn it around, but the voters generally are not all convinced.
That 36%? Yes it's pretty bad, it's 'unelectedable' as it stands. But it's really remarkable how long it has held around there. Voters haven't given up on Trump yet.

Especially since unlike every other civilised nation on earth you don't actually need the support of the voters to be elected.

Eh?
CDU/CSU (Germany) 42%
Liberal (Australia) 42%
Liberal (Canada) 39%

Much more 3rd-etc-party vote than in the US, they're all plurality winners, but you can't really say they have the support of voters.

It's fair to say that no plausible amount of representative distortion could get Trump elected with only 36% of the vote. It could only happen with a big third-part vote. What's Ralph Nader up to nowadays ..?

[Vassenor]

Especially since unlike every other civilised nation on earth you don't actually need the support of the voters to be elected.

Eh?
CDU/CSU (Germany) 42%
Liberal (Australia) 42%
Liberal (Canada) 39%

Much more 3rd-etc-party vote than in the US, they're all plurality winners, but you can't really say they have the support of voters.

It's fair to say that no plausible amount of representative distortion could get Trump elected with only 36% of the vote. It could only happen with a big third-part vote. What's Ralph Nader up to nowadays ..?

In theory you can be elected president of the US with 22% of the vote. And my point was more that he won the position when by most metrics he lost the election.