;)
The Commentariat -- September 25, 2017
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Well, of Course She Did. Brandon Carter & Megan Wilson of the Hill: "Ivanka Trump used a personal email account to communicate with a member of President Trump's administration, a watchdog group said Monday. American Oversight obtained documents through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) that show Ivanka Trump, a senior White House adviser to her father, used a personal email account to contact Small Business Administration (SBA) Administrator Linda McMahon in February."
Rick Gladstone & David Sanger of the New York Times: "North Korea threatened on Monday to shoot down American warplanes even if they are not in the country's airspace, as its foreign minister declared that President Trump's threatening comments about the country and its leadership were 'a declaration of war.' 'The whole world should clearly remember it was the U.S. who first declared war on our country,' the foreign minister, Ri Yong-ho, told reporters as he was leaving the United Nations after a week of General Assembly meetings in New York.
Rachel Roubein of the Hill: "Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) was forced to briefly recess the chamber's first hearing on an ObamaCare repeal bill, after protestors refused to stop chanting, leading police to drag several out. 'No cuts to Medicaid, save our liberty,' attendees chanted. Police surrounded the protesters and escorted them out of the room."
Frank Rich writes a brief history of Watergate & compares it to how Trumpgate is unfolding. It's a great refresher course, or a lesson for the many of us too young to remember, to how Watergate happened & an encouraging note on how Trumpgate may come down. Many thanks to PD Pepe for the link. This is one to read, not scan.
Philip Bump of the Washington Post: "Of course Trump's outrage at the NFL protests had to do with race.... The reason for [the players'] protests ... are one of the endpoints of a years-long racial divide that Trump leveraged explicitly as part of his 2016 campaign.... The demonstrations by NFL players (which expanded outward more rapidly after Trump's rebukes) originated with former 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick. He began to kneel during the national anthem at games as a way of drawing attention to incidents in which black Americans were targeted and sometimes killed by law enforcement officials. It's not, as some have argued, a protest of the anthem itself. It's a continuation of the argument that powers the Black Lives Matter movement: that there is a systemic problem in how police officers treat black suspects.... Trump's campaign stoked Republican frustration at Black Lives Matter, racial tensions and a black president who was seen as hostile to police officers. In addition to his explicit racial arguments (starting with his disparagement of immigrants from Mexico), Trump repeatedly insisted that he would stand behind and defend America's police -- leveraging hostility to Black Lives Matter for his own purposes.... Trump's entire campaign was about race, explicitly -- whether he realizes it or not. So, too, was his fervent insistence about the NFL over the weekend." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: If you needed a tell, and I'm sure you don't, it was Trump's argument that "If a player wants the privilege of making millions of dollars in the NFL, or other leagues, he or she should not be allowed to disrespect.... our Great American Flag (or Country) and should stand for the National Anthem. If not, YOU'RE FIRED." This was a human-whistle from a billionaire to his base of whitey-white ne'er-do-wells: "These black guys are making millions! And you're not. They don't 'deserve' to whup you. Fire them!" BTW, if you're wondering how Trump launched these attacks, which appeared to come up out of the blue at a campaign rally for a U.S. Senate candidate, I expect he was still smarting from Jemele Hill's calling out his racism. Perhaps at the insistence of his chief-of-staff, all Trump did at the time was demand an apology from Hill's network, ESPN. But days later, he was still smarting, it was Friday night, & Trump couldn't stop himself from taking out his ire on black sports figures. Calling Trump a racist is a waste of time; it just causes him to double-down on racist spittle.
Benjamin Weiser of the New York Times: "Anthony D. Weiner, the disgraced former New York congressman who became caught up in a scandal over his exchange of lewd texts with a 15-year-old girl, was sentenced on Monday to 21 months in prison. Mr. Weiner, 53, had pleaded guilty to one count of transferring obscene material to a minor, and had faced up to 10 years in prison." Mrs. McC: So will they let him have his cellphone while he's in prison with nothing to do?
*****
Washington Post: "The Trump administration announced new restrictions Sunday on visitors from eight countries -- an expansion of the pre-existing travel ban which has spurred fierce legal debates over security, immigration, and discrimination. Officials had said they wanted the new rules to be both tough and targeted. The move comes as the key portion of Trump's travel ban, which bars the issuance of visas to citizens of six majority-Muslim countries, is set to expire.... Three new nations were added to the list of countries whose citizens will face the restrictions: Chad, North Korea, and Venezuela -- though the restrictions on Venezuela target that country's leadership and family members. One country, Sudan, fell off the travel ban list issued at the beginning of the year. Senior administration officials said a review of Sudan's cooperation with their national security concerns and information-sharing showed that it was appropriate to remove them from the list."
Peter Baker of the New York Times: "Over the course of just 17 hours this weekend, President Trump assailed John McCain, Chuck Schumer, Stephen Curry, the National Football League, Roger Goodell, Iran and Kim Jong-un — the 'Little Rocket Man.' And that was on his day off. While football players knelt, locked arms or stayed in their locker rooms during the national anthem in protest on Sunday, any notion that Mr. Trump may soften his edge, even under the discipline of a new chief of staff, seemed fanciful. While he has restrained himself for brief stretches, his penchant for punching eventually reasserts itself.... In his brief career as president and a candidate for president, Mr. Trump has attacked virtually every major institution in American life: Congress, the courts, Democrats, Republicans, the news media, the Justice Department, Hollywood, the military, NATO, the intelligence agencies, the cast of 'Hamilton,' the cast of 'Saturday Night Live,' the pope and now professional sports. He has attacked the Trump administration itself, or at least selected parts of it (see Sessions, Jeff), and even the United States of America ('you think our country's so innocent?'). ...
... Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: Baker's analysis is remarkable for the fact that Baker is a high priest of Both-Sides-Do-It. ...
...Juan Cole: "Trump's dreary tweetstorm on Saturday was intended to gain him popularity with white supremacists and the covert racists on the right of the Republican Party, through beating up on uppity black athletes and impudent yellow peril Orientals.... That was a great day for Trump. The politics of racial division were on full display...Trump goes after everyone but the white supremacists and Vladimir Putin. Why?" --safari...
... Julie Davis of the New York Times: "When President Trump gave a fiery campaign speech in Huntsville, Ala., on Friday evening, he drew a rapturous roar by ridiculing Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, as 'Little Rocket Man.' Among diplomats and national security specialists, the reaction was decidedly different. After Mr. Trump repeated his taunt in a tweet late Saturday and threatened that Mr. Kim and his foreign minister 'won't be around much longer' if they continue their invective against the United States, reactions ranged from nervous disbelief to sheer terror. Mr. Trump's willingness to casually threaten to annihilate a nuclear-armed foe was yet another reminder of the steep risks inherent in his brute-force approach to diplomacy. His strengths as a politician -- the ability to appeal in a visceral way to the impulses of ordinary citizens -- are a difficult fit for the meticulous calculations that his own advisers concede are crucial in dealing with Pyongyang." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: If these two front-page NYT analyses don't alarm you, you're either not paying attention or have a remarkably thick skin. The New York Times, however, does want you to know that that Trump is a dangerous loon. ...
... Jonathan Chait: "It may seem pedantic, in the face of a threat as radical as the Trump presidency, to quibble over terminological distinctions between different varieties of odious people [i.e. Nazis; Fascists; White supremacists; Racists]. But the language we use organizes our political thinking. And one of the terrible things Trump has done to this country has been to warp the terms and categories -- and, hence, the character -- of the political opposition through the exertion of sheer terror. Seemingly harmless changes have crept into our political lexicon, which may have dangerous consequences...To flatten the language we use to describe different kinds of right-wing politics is to bludgeon our capacity to make vital distinctions.... This danger may sound hypothetical, but it is already playing out before us." --safari
Medlar's Sports Report:
Pro Football v. Trump. Benjamin Hoffman, et al., of the New York Times: "N.F.L. players across the country demonstrated during the national anthem on Sunday in a show of solidarity against President Trump, who scolded the league and players on Twitter this weekend. With the support of owners, some of whom joined their teams on the field, dozens of players knelt in silent protests, while Tom Brady and others opted to stand and lock arms. The Seattle Seahawks and Tennessee Titans both stayed in their respective locker rooms during the anthem in Nashville. The Steelers also skipped the anthem in Chicago. After the demonstrations began, Trump weighed in once again, saying he approved of players locking arms, but declaring that kneeling during the anthem was 'not acceptable.' Every N.F.L. game today has carried some level of demonstration by players, with some teams going as far as not appearing on the field for the national anthem. But nearly nine hours after the games had begun, President Trump once again took to Twitter to condemn the players who choose not to stand for the anthem, and the league that allows it. It was his 12th sports-related tweet or retweet in a 36-hour period."...
... Jacqueline Thomsen of the Hill: "Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Alex Smith questioned why President Trump was condemning NFL players more strongly than he did white supremacists last month...'It's the same guy who couldn't condemn violent neo-Nazis. And he's condemning guys taking a knee during the anthem,' Smith said." --safari...
Watch to the end:
... Les Carpenter of the Guardian: "All Colin Kaepernick ever asked was for his country to have a conversation about race. This, he warned, would not be easy. Such talks are awkward and often end in a flurry of spittle, pointed fingers and bruised feelings. But from the moment the former San Francisco 49ers quarterback first spoke about his decision to kneel or sit during the national anthem, he said was willing to give up his career to make the nation talk. In one speech on Friday night, Donald Trump gave Kaepernick exactly what he wanted...'I think this is something that can unify this country,' Kaepernick said in the summer of 2016, at his first press conference about his protest...Nothing has given Kaepernick's protest fuel like Trump's words...The discourse might not be civil. It probably isn't reasoned or rational. But it's discourse. And, really, that's the reason Kaepernick took his knee." --safari ...
... Jonathan Chait: "... rather than seize the mantle of patriotism, Trump has oafishly ceded it to his opponents. He has set off a firestorm of race, sports, and patriotism that is going to end up burning him. Trump began his foray into the matter with one of his man-on-a-barstool rants, lamenting how football has gotten too soft.... It was odd to hear a defense of football from the only American president -- indeed, the only American, period -- who single-handedly destroyed a viable professional football league. Trump pushed his argument into utter derangement by challenging players’ very right to protest.... [Trump's] comments had two swift effects, each disastrous for the president. First, it turned the question away from the style of the protest to the right to conduct it.... Second, it turned the pregame drama into an anti-Trump protest. The pregame kneel has now become a spectacle of resistance, with dramatic gestures of white players joining black ones to oppose the crude attacks from the great orange bigot." ...
... Henry Gomez of BuzzFeed: "A political group with close ties to ... Donald Trump is amplifying his attack on professional athletes who kneel during the national anthem as a form of protest. 'Turn off the NFL,' reads a digital ad produced by the nonprofit America First Policies, which planned to begin spreading the message on social media Sunday afternoon. The ad includes a photo with Trump, hand over his heart, and a #TakeAStandNotAKnee hashtag. It follows Trump's recent remarks, first delivered during a Friday night speech in Alabama, aimed at football players who have protested police brutality and other causes."
Josh Dawsey of Politico: "... Jared Kushner has corresponded with other administration officials about White House matters through a private email account set up during the transition last December, part of a larger pattern of Trump administration aides using personal email accounts for government business. Kushner uses his private account alongside his official White House email account, sometimes trading emails with senior White House officials, outside advisers and others about media coverage, event planning and other subjects, according to four people familiar with the correspondence. Politico has seen and verified about two dozen emails.... The decision to set up new, private accounts as Kushner was preparing to enter the White House came in the wake of a bitter election campaign in which Trump routinely excoriated his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton for using a personal email account to handle government business when she was secretary of state. There is no indication that Kushner has shared any sensitive or classified material on his private account, or that he relies on his private email account more than his official White House account to conduct government business.... Kushner and his wife, Ivanka Trump, set up their private family domain ... at the time Kushner ... was expected to be named to a White House role...." ...
... Maggie Haberman & Sharon LaFraniere of the New York Times: Abbe Lowell, Kushner's lawyer, "said the emails were all forwarded to Mr. Kushner's official account, creating a record." ...
... Benjamin Hart of New York: "The news is a jaw-dropper because -- though it's all mostly been forgotten -- Hillary Clinton's usage of a private email server played just a tiny role in the coverage of the 2016 election. Coming on the heels of his father-in-law's vicious attacks on Clinton over the issue, Kushner's private communications may strike some as a wee bit hypocritical. But Trump partisans have shown again and again that the administration's hypocrisy matters little to them, and the people who bray 'lock her up' at the president's rallies are unlikely to care that Kushner and his co-workers may have violated the Presidential Records Act."
Capitalism Is Awesome, Ctd. Zuckerberg Knows Best. Adam Entous, et al., of the Washington Post: "... huddled in a private room on the sidelines of a meeting of world leaders in Lima, Peru, two months before Trump's inauguration, [President] Obama made a personal appeal to [Facebook CEo Mark] Zuckerberg to take the threat of fake news and political disinformation seriously. Unless Facebook and the government did more to address the threat, Obama warned, it would only get worse in the next presidential race. Zuckerberg acknowledged the problem posed by fake news. But he told Obama that those messages weren't widespread on Facebook and that there was no easy remedy.... Like the U.S. government, Facebook didn't foresee the wave of disinformation that was coming and the political pressure that followed. The company then grappled with a series of hard choices designed to shore up its own systems without impinging on free discourse for its users around the world. One outcome of those efforts was Zuckerberg's admission on Thursday that Facebook had indeed been manipulated and that the company would now turn over to Congress more than 3,000 politically themed advertisements that were bought by suspected Russian operatives."
Eric Schmitt of the New York Times: "At the ... White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico earlier this year, nearly a dozen military contractors armed with laser guns, high-tech nets and other experimental systems met to tackle one of the Pentagon's most vexing counterterrorism conundrums: how to destroy the Islamic State's increasingly lethal fleet of drones. The militant group has used surveillance drones on the battlefield for more than two years. But an increase in deadly attacks since last fall -- mostly targeting Iraqi troops and Syrian militia members with small bombs or grenades, but also threatening American advisers -- has highlighted the terrorists' success in adapting off-the-shelf, low-cost technology into an effective new weapon. The Pentagon is so alarmed by this growing threat ... that it has launched a $700 million crash program overseen by two senior Army generals to draw on the collective know-how and resources of all branches of the armed services, Silicon Valley and defense industry giants like Boeing and Raytheon to devise tactics and technology to thwart the menace. In the meantime, the Pentagon has rushed dozens of technical specialists to Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan to help protect American troops and to train and, in some cases, equip local allies against the drone threat, which has killed more than a dozen Iraqi soldiers and wounded more than 50."
Thomas Kaplan of the New York Times: "... the latest plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act teetered closer to collapse on Sunday, even as the White House and the proposal's backers tried to win over reluctant Republican senators. Senator Susan Collins of Maine made clear that she was all but certain to oppose the proposal. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas said he had not yet been won over and suggested that Senator Mike Lee of Utah had the same stance. And Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky once again criticized the bill in blunt terms, despite pressure from President Trump to rethink his opposition." ...
... Wooing Lisa. M. J. Lee, et al., of CNN: "As the Republican Party's last-ditch effort to repeal Obamacare hangs by a thread, a revised version of the Graham-Cassidy bill was circulated to Senate Republicans on Sunday with the aim of winning over key votes. Even with the new changes, the task ahead is daunting. GOP Sens. Rand Paul and John McCain have already publicly opposed the bill, and leadership can't afford to lose one more. Plenty of others, including Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine have made known their deep reservations -- Collins went as far as to say on CNN Sunday morning that it was 'very difficult' for her to envision getting to a 'yes.'... In an important nod to Murkowski, the revised bill says Native Americans and Alaska Natives enrolled in Medicaid expansion prior to 2020 could continue to be eligible after that point, according to documents circulated Sunday night to senior Senate aides and obtained by CNN.... In one new provision particularly beneficial to Alaska, the state would receive a 25% boost in federal matching funds for Medicaid due to its defined high-level of poverty.... The updated bill would also allow states to design some of their own insurance rules. This would wipe away many of Obamacare's protections not only for those with pre-existing conditions, but also for those who get medical care." ...
... Wooing All the Hold-outs. Caitlin Owens of Axios: "Sens. Lindsey Graham and Bill Cassidy have revised their health-care bill, allowing states to loosen more of the Affordable Care Act's regulations while diverting more money to the states whose senators hold the deciding votes on the legislation. They will formally release the revised measure tomorrow.... The deadline to pass a bill with just 50 votes is Saturday. The Congressional Budget Office is expected to release preliminary estimates this week of the initial -- and now outdated -- version of the bill. With the clock ticking and little time for independent economic analyses, Graham and Cassidy are making a last-minute play for senators who have been critical not only of the bill's contents, but of the rushed process, too.... According to Graham and Cassidy's analysis, the revised bill would direct more money to Alaska, Arizona, Kentucky and Maine, compared with earlier versions. But it would still reduce overall federal funding to those states -- whose Republican senators are, for now, opposed to the bill or undecided.... The revisions also ramped up some of the regulatory rollbacks needed to help win conservative votes. Sen. Ted Cruz said earlier today that he's not yet on board with the legislation.
GOP Seeking Ways to Make Tax Bill Look Less Like a Giant Gift to the Rich. Damian Paletta of the Washington Post: "White House officials and Republican leaders are preparing a set of broad income and corporate tax cuts.... Party leaders are quietly circulating proposals to lower the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 20 percent and lower the top individual income tax rate from 39.6 percent to 35 percent, according to the people familiar with the plan. White House advisers are divided over whether to cut the top individual tax rate, and Republican leaders, aware the plan could be construed as a huge giveaway to the wealthy, are trying to design features to the package that would ensure that the rich don't get too large a share of the plan's tax relief. Top White House negotiators and key GOP leaders have agreed on those targets, but apparently President Trump has not. On Sunday, as he was about to board Air Force One in New Jersey, Trump told reporters he hoped to see the corporate tax rate lowered to 15 percent, a level that his own negotiators had privately dismissed weeks ago.... The lack of agreement, days before the plan is set to be unveiled more broadly, underscore the difficult Republicans face in uniting behind a tax bill." ...
... Mrs. McCrabbie: I hope I'm wrong, but I predict that whatever bonanza these wretched schemers come up with will pass with flying colors. These guys don't care about deficits & they definitely don't care about middle-class taxpayers. The tax cut bill will be all about making sure their big-bucks donors are happy. ...
... Paul Krugman: "... the bill for cynicism seems to be coming due. For years, flat-out lies about policy served Republicans well, helping them win back control of Congress and, eventually, the White House. But those same lies now leave them unable to govern."
Edward-Isaac Dovere of Politico: "Democratic attorneys general, aiming to take on the Trump administration..., are planning to spend $10 million to $15 million to elect more of their own next year.... It's also part of a longer-term effort to build a bigger and more diverse bench for the party to draw on in gubernatorial and Senate races over the next decade. The hope, according to sources familiar with the effort, is to catch up to the Republican Attorneys General Association, which ramped up its legal and political work during the Obama years, notching major successes on both counts. RAGA put $23 million into races in the past two years, helping win and hold 29 of the country's attorneys general offices."
Annals of Journalism, Ctd. Gail Collins welcomes Michelle Goldberg to the NYT op-ed page. Mrs. McC: I can't believe the NYT went to Slate to find a columnist for its august opinion section, & not only that, but a columnist whose work I know & admire. Their usual search takes them to the Wall Street Journal (Brett Stephens) or the Weekly Standard (Bill Kristol). Maybe it took President* Trump for them to realize that confederate "balance" was a big mistake.
Way Beyond the Beltway
The Center Holds. Steven Erlanger & Melissa Eddy of the New York Times: "Angela Merkel won a fourth term as chancellor in elections on Sunday, placing her in the front ranks of Germany's postwar leaders, even as her victory was dimmed by the entry of a far-right party into parliament for the first time in more than 60 years, according to preliminary results. The far-right party, Alternative for Germany, or AfD, got some 13 percent of the vote -- nearly three times the 4.7 percent it received in 2013 -- a significant showing of voter anger over immigration and inequality as support for the two main parties sagged from four years ago. Ms. Merkel and her center-right Christian Democrats won, the center held, but it was weakened."
Juan Cole: "The Kurdistan referendum held today is probably not as likely to produce immediate turmoil in the Middle East as some pundits would have it. The 'Domino Theory' that if the Kurds secede from Iraq then they will secede from Turkey, Iran and Syria as well, may be as incorrect as the idea that a Communist victory in Vietnam would lead to Communist domination throughout Asia and the world. Iraqi Kurds have a particular history that has led to today's referendum that is not exactly replicated in other countries with large Kurdish minorities (Iran, Turkey and Syria)." --safari: A history lesson by Prof. Cole.
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Reader Comments (16)
Well, this book just jumped to the top of my to-buy list.
Bill Moyers interviews Robert Jay Lifton, co-author of "The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump."
"... the work of 27 psychiatrists, psychologists and mental health experts to assess President Trump’s mental health. They had come together last March at a conference at Yale University to wrestle with two questions. One was on countless minds across the country: “What’s wrong with him?” The second was directed to their own code of ethics: “Does Professional Responsibility Include a Duty to Warn” if they conclude the president to be dangerously unfit?"
very interesting...
When the sport's world is rallying round in opposition to the words of the president* of their country then... the clock is ticking.
And again I ask: Is there no one who can tell HIM that he is out of bounds? "look, Mr. President, sir, take a gander at the headlines in all these papers–-you, sir, are being tarred and feathered on a daily basis."
No one?
Here's Frank Rich's looong piece––some history, some compare and contrast with Nixon, and lots of food for thought.
JUST WAIT––– Watergate didn't become Watergate overnight either..
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/06/frank-rich-nixon-trump-and-how-a-presidency-ends.html?utm_source=kw&utm_medium=p2&utm_campaign=kw_y_091817_fb2_ad5&kwp_0=529493&kwp_4=1891846&kwp_1=798126
unwashed, thanks for the link. To sum it up, the problem with declaring Trump has malignant NPD is that NPD is only one of his mental illnesses.
Taking a Knee
As the blustering bully from this past weekend sits on his throne considering the next group of Americans to insult and belittle, all to feed his monstrous ego and the black racial animosity of his weak, friable soul, let's consider "both sides" for a moment and what they're really saying.
I'm not trying to be reductive when I say "both sides" because, as with many issues, there are many sides. But here there is not.
We have a problem. A big one. Been here a looooong time and it ain't goin' anywhere anytime soon.
Race is such a huge issue in this country that there is really no getting around it. We have to go right at it. It's like a family torn asunder by alcoholism or some other addiction or enormous problem bedeviling one or more members, and by extension, the rest of the family as well. But no one ever talks about that problem. They walk around it or pretend it doesn't exist or that it was taken care of long ago so bringing it up again is pointless.
We've all seen families like that. And if you consider yourself an American, and believe we, as citizens, are a kind of family, then we're in one right now. And Daddy wants to pretend that anyone who points out our biggest problem should be kicked out of the family, or barring that, made a laughing stock and insulted on a daily basis.
Because that's always the best way to handle difficult issues.
Daddy believes that taking a knee is an insult, but it's anything but. In the sports world, for athletes, taking a knee is a time honored tradition. We do it in all sports. The coach calls everyone in, teammates gather round, remove their helmets, or batting gloves, or whatever, and the coach says "Okay, bring it in. Everyone take a knee." It's time to talk. And more importantly, to listen.
Taking a knee says "Timeout, everyone. Let's talk." Usually it's to discuss an issue, or some team problems, it could be technical stuff, or the next game, but more often, players take a knee to listen to some overriding concerns that will help everyone function as a better team, to back each other up, to play more efficiently together. It's time, mostly, to inject a little quiet philosophy into an endeavor comprised predominantly of action and physical exertion, to get the brain--and the heart-- to function as crisply and efficiently as the body.
This is all Colin Kaepernick hoped to accomplish. Let's all take a knee for a minute. And listen.
But Daddy says "Fuck that! You want to listen???? Listen to me. No Talking. I talk. You all do what I say!"
Coaches (and daddies) like that almost always fail. They might be successful in the short run with a very few players, but being unable to talk and listen will doom them and the team. And they will alienate and eventually lose a lot of very talented players.
Would Trump and his racist supporters prefer guns in the streets? Would they fancy Watts style riots? Streets of fire? Armed insurrection? Militant camps on either side raining violence and destruction on one another?
Or some serious conversation?
So here's how it goes. One side wants everyone to take time out to talk and listen.
The other wants them to fuck off, drop dead, and go away.
That's it. There's no middle ground here. You're either down with talking or you're all in on bluster, bullying, ignorance, violence, and more of the same.
In a very real sense, the president should act as the coach, calling the team in, telling everyone to take a knee so we can all lay out the issues. Obama was good at this. A lot of team members refused to listen, but at least he gave everyone the opportunity. The current guy is like one of those drunk dads sitting in the stands yelling and screaming insults and telling everyone that if he were in charge, he'd straighten everyone out right quick
Taking a knee is not an insult, and it isn't disrespectful; it's a very civilized, respectful request for the family to figure out its biggest problem and move on--all of us--together.
Must have been a nice welcome back for the Glorious Leader, returning from his weekend off, after insulting millions of Americans (his usual), flying back from his golf course/mansion in Bedford, NY.
As he's going through his edited press clippings, his secretary comes in with a response to his NFL tweets, and says "Oh, Mr. President, while you were gone, this came for you."
Have a nice day.
In Other GOP Lies...
This morning NPR Morning Edition guest host Mary Louise Kelly (really liking her as a host) went right at lying asshole Ron Johnson (R-DB) who was caught handing a bag of cash to Republican holdouts on the latest iteration of the Don't Care bill--now with even less to recommend it!--being rammed through the senate. A plan that purports to take care of millions of Americans should look like this. The Graham-Cassidy-Heller-Johnson plan looks like this. Except without the emergency workers in the background. Their presence would not be fiscally responsible.
Anyway, here's ol' Lyin' Ron this morning trying like bloody hell to get out of answering Kelly's insistent questions about how the bribery is going, and whether or not that's a reasonable way to pass legislation.
Johnson's answer? California, New York, and Massachusetts get too much money now, under the ACA, and their plan is blah, blah, blah, something, something, will "fix" that.
Also, (ready for this?) Democrats are to blame for the entire healthcare mess. If only they'd listen to reason and try to work with Confederates, everything would be jake.
These fucking guys are shameless.
Oh, and he also said that if the senate doesn't give in to their demands to repeal a healthcare plan that's working and providing care to tens of millions of Americans who had nothing before, and replace it with a half chomped cheroot, they will also hold up any negotiations on the budget. Which could endanger their plan to give the 1% even more obscene tax breaks. Isn't this a little like saying, if you don't give us what we want, we'll hold our breath until we pass out and make sure our friends, standing by, kick us in the ribs for a half an hour once we're down?
Is it me or are these guys, in addition to being amoral weasels, stunningly moronic?
What "Plan"?
One other little thought about this Confederate "healthcare" plot.
The idea here, being foregrounded by the liars and schemers, is based on the GOP's old saw about the wonders of federalism.
Hmmm....
Okay. So what they're saying is that they want the states to create and administer workable, fair, and decent healthcare programs--from scratch, by themselves--and they want to this to happen in a matter of months. Right?
But wait...hasn't the Glorious Leader himself declared healthcare "complicated"? Who knew it was hard, he cried, after realizing that an ACA repeal and replacement was not as easy as ordering a piece of chocolate cake for the Japanese PM at that gussied up mausoleum in Florida.
So the thinking here is that Scott Walker, who hides under his desk when third grade teachers come calling, and Rick Snyder, whose idea of healthcare is poisoning thousands of people in Flint, then blaming "government", and Rick Scott, who deleted calls for help from a nursing home with dying patients, will all, in short order, do something on their own that the entire Confederate brain trust (snicker, snicker) couldn't do in seven years?
Oh...THAT plan!
@Akhilleus: In fairness to Johnson, he is the dumbest guy in the Senate.
The ultimate irony of the "states' rights" baloney is that these government haters are selling their plan as an excellent opportunity for state governments to create superb government-run health care hammocks for their constituents. And to boot, the plan will have the most negative effects on those states that actually accepted federal help to aid their populations, while rewarding the states that chose to forgo improving the health and lives of their populations, run by Republican, government-can't-do-anything, "free-market" radicals. The mind-bending logic that they're employing to sell their snake oil is mind-blowing.
These men have become numb to humanity, serving only the dollar.
And please let this last gasp of political malpractice forever stain any whitewashed reputation of Lindsey Graham. Fuck him. He's held up as a "real", traditional Republican, but publicly declared himself a Trumpist after he randomly sent missiles into Syria and now he's publicly hawking a self-named health care bill that's the equivalent of dropping a cluster bomb into American health care markets, without knowing when and where the bomblets will make their most damage. Such a shining symbol of Republicanism he is.
Re: Weiner,
"Mrs. McC: So will they let him have his cellphone while he's in prison with nothing to do?"
I venture to guess he'll have his hands full without the phone.
Politicizing sports? Nothing new there...
I've been running across (wish I could say that was literal) a slew of whiny wingers complaining that the NFL (blahs and blah supporters) are "politicizing" a "great American" sport. Something that's NEVER been done.
Oh, please.
Grow up. And go to the library, if you know where it is, and grab a couple of history books.
Sports and politics have always been intertwined.
The first recorded sports event had a political caste to them. After Patroclus is killed in battle, as Homer recounts in grisly detail in Book 16 of the Iliad (and Book 17, in the fight over his body), Akhilleus decrees that funeral games will be held in honor of his friend. The games, which include archery, wrestling, boxing, races, and a chariot contest, could easily have passed for the first Olympic games. These games become a point of solidarity for the Achaeans whose ranks had become splintered. The tide of battle turns dramatically after the funeral games. After killing Hector, champion of the Trojans, Akhilleus allows Priam's people nine days to prepare his funeral rites (another political event). The sporting events in the wake of these deaths are inextricably tied to the politics of both camps.
In recent decades, we've seen a long list of politically charged connections with sports. John Carlos and Tommie Smith's Black Power salutes at the '68 Olympics in Mexico City. The Battle of the Sexes between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs in '73 (watched it with my roommates in college). The entrance of Jackie Robinson into Major League Baseball. The stripping of Muhammad Ali of his boxing crown and his banishment from the sport for years because he was black, Muslim, and anti-war. Jesse Owens' feats at the 1936 Olympics in Munich. Babe Didrikson's breakthroughs against misogynistic rules in professional golf. And amazingly, even though Babe was a star in the thirties, it's only very recently that girls were allowed to compete with boys in football and baseball.
This weekend I attended an MLB game. I noted, once again, that there is not just one, but two built-in segments of the game in which nationalistic sentiment predominates. We're all familiar with the singing of the national anthem--which, of course, is fine--but if you haven't been at a professional baseball game for a while (since Dubya made not saluting the flag--and himself--tantamount to treason, after the 9/11 attack, a tragedy that his insouciance and stupidity allowed), the seventh inning stretch has been co-opted, from a friendly and slightly goofy time for standing, stretching, and crooning "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" into a second rigid kowtowing to the xenophobic concept of America First, when a stodgy, religious singing of "God Bless America"is required. Everyone is instructed to rise, doff their caps, and demonstrate, without fail, their eternal patriotism.
Professional football games are even more overtly politicized. And not by Colin Kaepernick neither. Every single game in the NFL has an overt military presence, including things like flyovers by military jets.
The only people who don't think that's a political statement are those who fully agree with it.
Why can't they ever "Honor America" by bringing out teachers, or moms and dads, or nurses, or writers, or painters, or community organizers? Or blog editors?
And who can forget the YOU-ESS-AY cheers by American nationalists at Olympic games? There is nothing wrong with cheering on your team and your country. I do it too. But when it becomes xenophobic, the change in tenor is noticeable and angry.
In 1980, Jimmy Carter banned American athletes from competing in the Olympics to stick it to the Soviet Union.
That wasn't political?
Sports, especially in America, have become a primary venue for politicization, it's impossible to deny the connection, whether you agree with the leanings or not. For some, like the Trumpbots, it's all fine, as long as the leanings are in the direction of Whites First, America First, Blow up the Browns and non-Christians.
But as soon as the political wind blows from a non-white part of the field....Oh christ...these people are politicizing sports! Call out the fucking National Guard!
I sometimes, vis à vis SCROTUS, have quipped that, when living in MN, we "also survived Jesse Ventura," even while recognizing that he came to office with some substantial political experience and promoted, successfully, some initiatives against stiff opposition, including a new, now successful, light rail system hated mightily then and now by the repubs. His Achilles heel (sorry Ak) was a thin skin. His take on the NFL kerfuffle is worth a listen.
NYT: Collins Says She’ll Oppose G.O.P. Bid to End Obamacare
Another American hero!
The Republican's main defense of their latest Coffin Care Bill is "Your State would NEVER sell you out for a steak dinner and a tiny campaign contribution. What would ever give you that idea?"
Whyte,
Not to worry. I've been well heeled oft of a politico tractatus.
Colin Kaepernick is everything that frumpy is not - handsome, smart, articulate, thoughtful and rich. This is a root cause of his and many of his supporters' hate. And he is all those things while being - Black. How disrespectful! We know frumpy is a mean, spiteful bum, and jealousy is a big part of his disordered personality.
I wish people would stop calling him a Billionaire, he loves it and it's not true. Someone who grifts for every thousand bucks they can is sailing close to the wind, if not already in the drink. He knows he could not have liquidated his "businesses" because he would have been bankrupted, debts worth more than assets and no banks to shore him up (this time), only Putin.