The conservative Wall Street Journal calls out our president for some of his recent televised remarks. Besides the obvious display of ignorance and pro-Russia propaganda, I expect his statements will enrage people in Afghanistan. Not exactly a brilliant move, considering our current role there. Unless, like most people these days, they just roll their eyes at his continuing stupidity.
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/4238 ... ng-russian
In an editorial published Friday by the newspaper, the board's writers blasted Trump's comments during Wednesday's Cabinet meeting as "absurd" and "reprehensible," while condemning the president's grasp of history regarding the Soviet invasion of the South Asian country as an "utterly false narrative."
"He said: 'The reason Russia was in Afghanistan was because terrorists were going into Russia. They were right to be there,'" the board wrote, quoting the president.
"Right to be there? We cannot recall a more absurd misstatement of history by an American President," the article continued. "The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan with three divisions in December 1979 to prop up a fellow communist government."
David Frum at The Atlantic explains the history more fully:
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archi ... an/579361/
It was only one moment in a 90-minute stream of madness.
President Donald Trump convened a Cabinet meeting, at which he invited all its members to praise him for his stance on the border wall and the government shutdown. There’s always a lively competition to see which member of the Cabinet can grovel most abjectly. ...
But that was not the crazy part. The crazy part came during the president’s monologue defending his decision to withdraw all 2,000 U.S. troops from Syria and 7,000 from Afghanistan, about half the force in that country.
...“Russia used to be the Soviet Union,” he said.
Afghanistan made it Russia, because they went bankrupt fighting in Afghanistan. Russia … the reason Russia was in Afghanistan was because terrorists were going into Russia. They were right to be there. The problem is, it was a tough fight. And literally they went bankrupt; they went into being called Russia again, as opposed to the Soviet Union. You know, a lot of these places you’re reading about now are no longer part of Russia, because of Afghanistan.
Let’s go to the replay... To appreciate the shock value of Trump’s words, it’s necessary to dust off some Cold War history....
He also analyzes the disturbing implications:
Inflicting that defeat on the U.S.S.R. was a major bipartisan foreign-policy priority of the 1980s. The policy was designed by Jimmy Carter’s national-security adviser, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and executed by the Reagan administration.
It’s amazing enough that any U.S. president would retrospectively endorse the Soviet invasion. What’s even more amazing is that he would do so using the very same falsehoods originally invoked by the Soviets themselves: “terrorists” and “bandit elements.”
It has been an important ideological project of the Putin regime to rehabilitate and justify the Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan. ..
Putin-style glorification of the Soviet regime is entering the mind of the president, inspiring his words and—who knows—perhaps shaping his actions. How that propaganda is reaching him—by which channels, via which persons—seems an important if not urgent question.
Trump is trying to feed more easily refuted lies to Americans:
https://thehill.com/policy/finance/4238 ... king-house
As I have stated many times, if the Democrats take over the House or Senate, there will be disruption to the Financial Markets. We won the Senate, they won the House. Things will settle down. They only want to impeach me because they know they can’t win in 2020, too much success!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 4, 2019
...Overall, 2018 marked the worst year for U.S. stock markets in a decade. December was particularly brutal, with the worst December drops since the Great Depression.
...The market ended a lengthy period of relatively stable increases last January, entering a new phase of volatility that has seen wild swings in the markets. By late summer and early autumn, markets seemed to have recovered, only to come tumbling down again in October.
Before the downturn, Trump frequently took credit for the stock market's performance.
https://thehill.com/policy/finance/4238 ... ked-him-to
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Friday he would not resign from the central bank if President Trump asked him to step down.... The chairman also said he hadn’t received any direct communication from the president or White House, but stressed that the Fed would not be influenced by politics.
...While most Republicans approve of the Fed’s efforts to raise borrowing costs, Trump has called on the central bank to maintain low, stimulatory interest rates despite the relatively strong economy.
Rising interest rates have also played a minor role in the sharp stock market downturn that began in the second half of 2018. Trump has blamed the Fed, Democrats and an unspecified “glitch” on the brutal stock losses, but analysts attribute the sell-off to damage from trade tensions and fears of an impending economic slowdown.
Shutdown news:
https://thehill.com/homenews/house/4237 ... opposition
The House passed legislation to end the partial government shutdown on Thursday, hours after Democrats took control of the chamber and elected Nancy Pelosi as Speaker.
...The first bill passed by the House in a 239-192 vote was a continuing resolution funding the Department of Homeland Security through Feb. 8. The House voted 241-190 to approve funds for [the other] six agencies through the end of the fiscal year.
...The shorter funding bill for DHS is intended to provide time for more talks on the wall, since border security is overseen by that agency.
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... g-shutdown
The White House on Thursday formally opposed two Democratic bills that would end a partial government shutdown, now in its 13th day.
“The Administration is committed to working with the Congress to reopen lapsed agencies, but cannot accept legislation that provides unnecessary funding for wasteful programs while ignoring the Nation’s urgent border security needs,” the White House Office of Management and Budget wrote in a statement of administration policy.
President Trump is insisting any funding bills provide $5 billion for his proposed border wall along the southern border.
Some of those "wasteful" programs.
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/12/25/heal ... a-cdc-hhs/
As the government shutdown loomed over the holidays, heads of federal agencies and departments overseeing health and public assistance services tweeted that, regardless of what was happening in Washington, they were attending, as much as possible, to business as usual.
...According to the statement, 61% of the Department of Agriculture's employees would continue to work through the first week of the shutdown, but that number would decrease the longer the shutdown continues.
Some of the agency's offices to be hit hardest by the closure include the office of Food and Nutrition Services that oversees the Child Nutrition, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC). By the end of the fifth day of the shutdown, staffing will be cut by 95%...
We're entering week 3.
https://www.nbcnews.com/health/health-n ... lu-n954161
There seems to be no end in sight for the current partial government shutdown, the third since the beginning of the Trump administration.
... Congress has already passed five of its major appropriations bills, funding about three-fourths of the federal government, including the Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Veterans Affairs.
But seven bills are outstanding — including those that fund the Interior, Agriculture and Justice departments — and that puts the squeeze on some important health-related initiatives.
....Since HHS funding is set through September, the flagship government health care programs — think Obamacare, Medicare and Medicaid — are insulated. That’s also true of public health surveillance... But some other public health operations are vulnerable because of complicated funding streams.
Although the Food and Drug Administration falls under the HHS umbrella, it receives significant funding for its food safety operations through the Department of Agriculture, which is entirely caught up in the shutdown.
...Health services for Native Americans are [also] on hold...
I think the EPA is also affected. And IRS refunds may be late if this goes on much longer.
Meanwhile...
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... own-report
Senior political appointees chosen by the president including Cabinet officials, top administrators and the vice president will reportedly see their pay raise by around $10,000 per year on Saturday amid the ongoing government shutdown.
The Washington Post reported that accumulated pay raises for top officials affected by a longstanding Washington pay freeze will go into effect on Saturday without legislation to stop them, citing documents from the Office of Personnel Management and federal pay experts.
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-envir ... lling-plan
The Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM), which, along with multiple other agencies in the federal government is mostly shut down due to a Dec. 22 funding lapse, said it is moving ahead with hosting four meetings over the next week in northern Alaska towns on the plan’s environmental review process.
Elsewhere in Interior, trash is building up at national parks and wildlife refuges are closed, among other shutdown impacts.
What we lost when Trump got rid of the remaining "adults in the room" who tried to restrain Trump from his worst impulses, leaving mostly sycophants and people with their own agendas (Bolton, Stephen Miller, Peter Navarro, et al)
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... own-report
Newly-appointed acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney is reportedly pushing President Trump to stand firm and not accept a spending deal from Democrats that does not involve fully funding his plans for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Politico reports that sources close to Mulvaney say the aide is among several top officials counseling the president to reject any bills from Congress that do not supply the desired $5 billion the White House hopes to secure for a border wall.
... Mulvaney saw his role "as reminding the president this is a bad deal."
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... t-shutdown
Vice President Pence on Thursday night backed President Trump's position demanding $5.6 billion in border wall funding, telling Fox News's Tucker Carlson, "No wall, no deal."
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/423 ... wn-resolve
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has declared any legislation passed by the House to fully reopen federal agencies will be a non-starter in the Senate but he may have trouble keeping all his troops in line.
McConnell has tried to keep his conference out of the fray altogether by insisting any government funding deal depends on negotiations between President Trump and Democratic leaders.
GOP lawmakers, feeling nervous about the prospect of a shutdown dragging on for weeks, are starting to weigh in.
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... om/579421/
Trump’s Strange, Fleeting Briefing-Room Cameo
At 4:07 p.m. eastern time, Press Secretary Sarah Sanders tweeted that there would be a White House briefing at 4:10, three minutes later. The ranks of reporters at the executive mansion were thin...but those on the spot scrambled to get in place. ... Finally, at nearly 4:30, Sanders came onstage, floridly introduced “our very great president, Donald J. Trump,” and got out of the way.
Thus began Trump’s first-ever visit to the briefing room, a milestone he acknowledged in his subsequent remarks.
...He congratulated the speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, on her election, then launched into a set of talking points about the need for a border wall. “I’ve never had so much support than I’ve had in the last week over my stance on border security, for border control, and for, frankly, the wall or the barrier,” he said.
Then he introduced three of the men, who turned out to be Brandon Judd, the president of the National Border Patrol Council and a frequent Trump advocate; Art Del Cueto, a vice president of the NBPC; and Hector Garza, another vice president. Their message: A wall is necessary and important. Del Cueto, a veteran peddler of bunkum, delivered the message most eloquently and most threateningly: “You all got to ask yourself this question: If I come to your home, do you want me to knock on the front door, or do you want me to climb through that window?”
Trump then returned to the lectern, claiming that the men had been at the White House for a long-planned meeting. ...Then they were all gone—Trump, Judd, Del Cueto, Garza, and Sanders, without taking a single query from the press. “The point of the briefing room is to take questions!” an anguished reporter shouted as Trump left.
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house ... s-two-year
Amidst the incessant shock waves emanating from the Trump presidency, there’s solace to be had in one happy happenstance: people are re-learning basic civics. And in that connection, the process of effective self-governance is finally beginning to function again.
Most of us were taught in middle school that our government is one of separated powers created by three co-equal branches of government, with each checking the other two for abuses. The reason for the “three-headed boss” model is simple: the revolutionaries who fought and died for American independence from England detested autocracies. One thing’s for sure: Under the United States Constitution, a single boss of all bosses is intolerable. Period.
This is why, regardless of individual political and ideological affiliation, every American should be concerned over the steady accumulation of unchecked power by the Trump presidency...
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... nt/579364/
On Thursday, with the government shutdown in its 13th day, with no sign of abating, and the new Democratic majority taking over the House, the president tweeted this:
The Shutdown is only because of the 2020 Presidential Election. The Democrats know they can’t win based on all of the achievements of “Trump,” so they are going all out on the desperately needed Wall and Border Security - and Presidential Harassment. For them, strictly politics!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 3, 2019
...t’s that simple phrase, “presidential harassment,” that jumps out. This is the eighth time he’s employed it, according to factba.se, with uses coming more frequently of late. The nascent rise of the phrase is an indication that Trump feels newly embattled, but it also underscores the way he tries to construe any criticism of himself as illegitimate...
https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/01/03/tr ... an-mattis/Trump’s ‘Compliant’ New Pentagon Chief
Patrick Shanahan, the acting U.S. defense secretary as of Jan. 1, could be just the kind of man President Donald Trump wants at the helm of the Pentagon.
Known as “Mr. Fix-It” during his 31 years at Boeing, Shanahan has a reputation for cutting costs and cleaning up troubled programs like the 787 Dreamliner. These kind of management skills will no doubt come in handy in overseeing the nation’s largest bureaucracy.
But even more appealing to the White House, perhaps, is Shanahan’s record of deference to the president.
https://www.theguardian.com/law/2019/ja ... violations
The Trump administration has stopped cooperating with UN investigators over potential human rights violations occurring inside America, in a move that delivers a major blow to vulnerable US communities and sends a dangerous signal to authoritarian regimes around the world.
Quietly and unnoticed, the state department has ceased to respond to official complaints from UN special rapporteurs, the network of independent experts who act as global watchdogs on fundamental issues such as poverty, migration, freedom of expression and justice. There has been no response to any such formal query since 7 May 2018, with at least 13 requests going unanswered.
EDIT:
Whoever told Dear Leader about the "national emergency" toy, where he can do whatever he likes by declaring one, should be barred from public service for the rest of his/her life. You don't hand matches to a toddler.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/trump-d ... d=60164759
President Donald Trump is seriously considering potential options to circumvent Congress, including declaring a national emergency to help pay for parts of his desired border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, according to multiple sources familiar with the ongoing discussions.
Among the options are reprogramming funds from the Department of Defense and elsewhere, sources said.
Sources tell ABC News the discussions are still on the "working level" adding that there's a range of legal mechanisms that are being considered before such a decision is announced.
Trump confirmed it
https://thehill.com/homenews/administra ... order-wall
We can call a national emergency because of the security of our country, absolutely. We can do it. I haven’t done it, I may do it. I may do it, but we can call a national emergency and build it quickly, it’s another way of doing it,” he said at a press conference Friday.
Don't forget that he already declared a national emergency during the Christmas holidays to freeze the wages of civilian government workers. [Edit - sorry, I misspoke - he declared that as a "national security issue," which is also how he got all his tariffs. It's another way Trump violates the norms of presidential behavior to get his way, but not the same thing.]
I have to admit I agree with the freshman congresswoman who expressed what many of us say in private (though maybe not in exactly the same words
):
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/4239 ... y-with-her
Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.) [made] provocative comments at a MoveOn.Org event Thursday night, hours after she was sworn in to Congress,
“People love you and you win,” Tlaib said on the video in which she does not name the president specifically. “And when your son looks at you and says ‘Momma, look you won. Bullies don’t win.’ And I said, ‘baby, they don’t.’ ”
“Because we’re going to go in there and impeach the motherf---er,” Tlaib added as the crowd erupted in cheers.
Seriously, Trump demonstrates over and over how unfit he is to be president. And insiders have been warning us for many, many months. How long do we have to wait for Congress to grow a spine and do something? Until he does something that can't be repaired?
Edit: It's interesting to see how, over the last day, people have managed to focus the public discourse on "she said a naughty word" instead of the substance - that many people would like to see Trump gone and her remarks were cheered by the private group where she spoke. I'm also rather amused by this reaction, considering that Trump apparently used the "f word" more than once during his meeting with lawmakers on Friday. And I'm quite sure he's not the only politician or businessman to regularly use profanity in private, sometimes throwing such words around fairly casually, where, as far as I know, Tlaib used a single profanity as emphasis.
btw, if anyone wants to know how extensive a president's powers can be if he/she declares a national emergency, see this article. It's a disturbing read.
https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2018 ... cy/153366/
The moment the president declares a “national emergency”—a decision that is entirely within his discretion—he is able to set aside many of the legal limits on his authority.
...Unknown to most Americans, a parallel legal regime allows the president to sidestep many of the constraints that normally apply. The moment the president declares a “national emergency”—a decision that is entirely within his discretion—more than 100 special provisions become available to him. While many of these tee up reasonable responses to genuine emergencies, some appear dangerously suited to a leader bent on amassing or retaining power. For instance, the president can, with the flick of his pen, activate laws allowing him to shut down many kinds of electronic communications inside the United States or freeze Americans’ bank accounts. Other powers are available even without a declaration of emergency, including laws that allow the president to deploy troops inside the country to subdue domestic unrest.
https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/defense-one/
Factual Reporting: HIGH
Notes: Defense One (DO) is an online news site that reports primarily on matters relating to national defense and security. The articles are well written, well sourced, and highly factual.
Also, it seems that the Do Not Call list is not the only automated government website shut down:
https://thehill.com/policy/energy-envir ... g-shutdown
The agency’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request website--an automated site that typically accepts requests through drop-down menus--is no longer receiving new submissions.
Members of the press, advocacy groups and individuals looking to request public information are now greeted with a message that reads: “No FOIA requests can be accepted or processed at this time.”
Though this one is odd because the FOIA sites for other affected agencies are not shuttered.
FOIA requests for other agencies affected by the partial shutdown remain functioning via Foiaonline.gov, which serves agencies like the Justice Department, Environmental Protection Agency and U.S. Customs and Border Protection.