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Donald Trump is the village idiot who keeps on giving comedy to the world…

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Kiwithrottlejockey
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« on: December 08, 2018, 12:36:38 pm »


from The Seattle Times…

Trump and China: Deal or no deal?

President Trump came back from a meeting in Argentina with the Chinese president
claiming to have made a deal that would end the trade war with China. Then Trump
began sending out tweets that made it clear there may be no deal at all.


By DAVID HORSEY | 1:12PM PST — Friday, December 07, 2018



PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP, who inherited a family real estate business from his father and managed to go bankrupt running a casino, is not really a great businessman. He just played one on TV. Nevertheless, he imagines himself a fabulous dealmaker.

He came back from a meeting in Argentina with Chinese President Xi Jinping claiming to have made a deal that would end the trade war with China. The stock market loved the news. However, in the days following his return, the White House had a terrible time describing the details of the alleged deal. Then Trump began sending out tweets that made it clear there may be no deal at all. Stocks plummeted.

“President Xi and I want this deal to happen, and it probably will,” Trump declared in a tweet on Tuesday. “… I am a Tariff Man. When people or countries come in to raid the great wealth of our Nation, I want them to pay for the privilege of doing so.”

Boasting about being a “Tariff Man” is a bit like boasting about playing a knight at a Medieval fair. It may be fun to put on a costume, but it is an exercise in anachronism. Tariffs are blunt instruments whose deep flaws became apparent way back in the 19th century. The biggest fallacy in the current situation is that China will pay the cost of tariffs. In fact, it is American consumers who will pay the higher price of the many Chinese products they desire and cannot get anywhere else.

Trump is no longer dealing with some lowly subcontractor in Queens, he is bumbling into the complexities of a deeply integrated world economy. And Americans are paying the price for his ignorance.


__________________________________________________________________________

• See more of David Horsey's cartoons at The Seattle Times HERE.

https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/trump-and-china-deal-or-no-deal





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« Reply #1 on: December 12, 2018, 12:47:31 pm »


The hilariously funny entertainment on the western side of the North Atlantic ocean these days is rivetting stuff.

Such as Trump's dummy-spitting meeting in front of television cameras with Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer. I guess Trump cannot handle it when a mere woman publicly stands up to him while it is being broadcast on live television, especially when she answered his “chucking the toys out of the cot” threat to shut down the government if she refused to give him $5 billion for his wankfest wall, by telling Trump it was “his choice” if he wished to institute a Trump shutdown of the US federal government. Trump's body language when she publicly put any shutdown squarely on the Orange Idiot himself was hilariously entertaining. And even funnier was the way Trump was continually interupting her and shouting, yet she simply remained calm, but didn't give an inch. Go find the footage (it's on YouTube) and see for yourself. Or … check out the following articles published by The New York Times


Trump Threatens Shutdown in Combative Appearance With Democrats

‘Don't Characterize the Strength That I Bring,’ Pelosi Tells Trump

A photo opportunity quickly turned into a heated confrontation. Here are 5 takeaways from Mr. Trump's meeting with Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Schumer.


The smirk on the face of Chuck Schumer as Trump loses his cool in the second photograph kinda says it all…





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« Reply #2 on: December 13, 2018, 03:52:18 pm »

trump owned them money for a wall or close down the government hahaha Dems are pussies
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« Reply #3 on: December 13, 2018, 07:30:35 pm »


Trump can shut down the government.

Nancy Polosi told Trump to go right ahead and institute a Trump shutdown of the government.

In other words, it is Trump's choice.

Anyway, why does Trump need money for his wall from the American government?

After all, he boasted that Mexico is going to pay for it, so the American government therefore is entitled to take Trump at his word and refuse to contribute because he said Mexico is paying for it.
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« Reply #4 on: December 14, 2018, 04:33:57 am »

they didn't like being own in front of the press it was panic time the Dems looked like the shit they are
trump sucker punched them they don't like the world watching their bullshit
weak pussies can't handle it

and the Dem party is so full of infighting it's fucked with all the new alt left idiots
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« Reply #5 on: December 14, 2018, 08:37:52 am »


From January next year, Trump's goose is cooked.

Trump has been unable to get legislation passed with Republicans controlling both Congress and the Senate and he definitely won't be able to get legislation passed from next January when the Democrats control Congress, which is the MAIN legislative house where ALL legislative bills have to first be passed.

And ... Trump is no longer going to have two sycophantic branches of the government looking the other way from his criminal families corrupt and criminal activities. A Democrat-controlled congress is going to appoint special investigators to dig deep into Trump and his criminal family and with the FULL BACKING and PROTECTION of the main legislative house in the American government. Hence why Trump is panicking. Hahaha ... it's going to be the greatest entertainment show in the world watching Trump unravel as the screws get tightened on him. But even funnier will be watching investigators turn their blow-torches on Republican politicians who covered up for Trump. Because that is OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE and I reckon a large number of Republicans will be going to jail for obstruction of justice, with many more singing like birds to the special investigators about what they know about Trump's corrupt and criminal activities in a desperate attempt to save their own necks.

However, the best entertainment of the lot will be watching the idiot from Woodville unravel as his hero gets taken down.
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« Reply #6 on: December 14, 2018, 10:34:13 am »


from The Washington Post…

Help Trump complete the wall between him and American voters

Stand back and let him self-destruct.

By TOM TOLES | 7:00AM EST — Wednesday, December 12, 2018



I GUESS President Trump wanted some kind of spectacle in the Oval Office on Tuesday and got one. I guess he thinks if there’s a spectacle and he's in it, he wins. It worked once, anyway, which is why he gets to invite people to the Oval Office. But there is a difference between a campaign spectacle and a spectacle of desperation: a flailing, floundering presidency.

The pundits are frantically rating the performance of Melee Mouth, and I'll leave the finer points of scoring the exchange to others. I was just happy to see Trump confronted with something resembling sanity as the Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer delegation kept the focus on border security as opposed to “the wall,” Trump's middle-school-civics-project-idea that he tries to pass off as policy. I was also glad to see that they apparently learned from early in his first term that there is no point in trying to engage with him normally to reach a “deal.” All Trump deals are either bad or unreliable, as is the very process of dealing with him.

The Democrats' job in the next two years is to let Trump be Trump, all by himself, and let the voters see unmistakably what a defective product he is, just like all of his other products. Trump had his chance in his first two years, and he made his choices. He chose to further bankrupt the government with a deficit-financed tax cut for the rich. He chose to subvert science and public support for a stable climate at every turn. He chose to try and wreck health-care coverage. He chose to rule by division, stoking racial and ethnic divides in a nation that is built on bringing diverse peoples together. He chose to undermine, on a daily basis, truth, respect for truth, and even the very concept of truth, and to attack and undermine the institutions that try to generate and disseminate and hold people accountable to the truth. He chose to govern by building a cult of personality around himself; a government of, by and for Trump.

We've seen a lot. The man is a fundamental menace. To democracy, to science, to the planet, to equality, to justice, to truth, to the United States. Americans are not waiting to see whether Democrats can “work together” to prop up Trump's malice so that he can win re-election. Trump made the 2018 election about him, and the voters gave their preliminary answer. All Democratic legislators need to do is stand back and let all Americans see Trump ever more vividly for who he is. And spend their time laying a foundation for sane governing after 2020.

Trump has made his bed. Let him lie in it and tweet.




__________________________________________________________________________

Tom Toles is the Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist for The Washington Post and writes the Tom Toles blog. He joined the newspaper in 2002, after 19 years as the cartoonist for the Buffalo News and nine years with the Buffalo Courier-Express. He has also produced a syndicated a comic strip, “Curious Avenue”, and a syndicated panel, “Randolph Itch, 2 a.m.”. The Madhouse Effect: How Climate Change Denial Is Threatening Our Planet, Destroying Our Politics, and Driving Us Crazy, a book he co-authored on climate change, was published in 2016. His cartoons are also collected in six books, and he is the author of a children's book, My School Is Worse Than Yours.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2018/12/12/help-trump-complete-wall-between-him-american-voters
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« Reply #7 on: December 14, 2018, 02:29:01 pm »

Poor horse face

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« Reply #8 on: December 14, 2018, 02:35:03 pm »



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« Reply #9 on: December 15, 2018, 01:55:35 pm »

In the west, we have dogs as pets.

In communist countries they are so poor they eat their dogs

Communist are trash with a life so bad their life is not worth living


China murders their own people and then sells their organs

Compared to communist leaders Trump looks like a saint
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« Reply #10 on: December 16, 2018, 08:38:01 am »


from The Washington Post…

All the things Trump didn't count on

Trump really didn't think ahead.

By JENNIFER RUBIN | 12:30PM EST — Friday, December 14, 2018

Michael Cohen walks through the lobby at Trump Tower in January 2017 in New York. — Photograph: Drew Angerer/Getty Images.
Michael Cohen walks through the lobby at Trump Tower in January 2017 in New York. — Photograph: Drew Angerer/Getty Images.

PRESIDENT TRUMP's inability to respond to one charge emanating from one witness, a charge not even within the purview of the special counsel, suggests he will be entirely overwhelmed when the closet full of shoes starts dropping. He never knew about the payments, or he did, or it was Michael Cohen's fault, or it wasn't a crime, or if it was a crime it was no big deal. This might be the most inept response to allegations of presidential wrong-doing ever.

Michael Cohen's interview with ABC News underscores a critical point: His own credibility has been enhanced because prosecutors have so much information tying Trump to illegal payments and suggesting he knowingly made the payments in a way to avoid detection or harm to his campaign. (“There’s a substantial amount of information that they possess that corroborates the fact that I am telling the truth,” he said.)

Now consider all the other investigations out there — on collusion, the Trump Foundation and obstruction of justice. Each of those investigations represents a bevy of possible criminal charges. Under the umbrella of “obstruction,” there could be specific criminal violations for obstruction, witness tampering, perjury and conspiracy. Consider that Robert S. Mueller III and the Southern District of New York could have multiple witnesses, phone records, texts, financial records, Trump's own words and, in some cases, recordings to bolster his case. The sheer weight of all that evidence would break even a stable defendant represented by the best counsel.

For Trump, it is becoming hard to imagine how he survives politically or legally. Even if he avoids impeachment or avoids removal, only about a third of the country (with a smidgen of the total universe of evidence available to them) thinks he's innocent. When charge after charge piles up, each backed up by multiple pieces of evidence, it's not impossible to imagine that elected Republicans will turn on him — or that Republican voters, who see his presidency at a standstill, will begin to look for alternatives for 2020.

Remember that Trump never thought he'd really get elected — and then all this would come out. And once he got elected, he failed entirely to appreciate that he could not control investigators, witnesses, the press and even former associates. Cohen is right when he says that “the pressure of the job is much more than what he thought it was going to be. It's not like the Trump Organization where he would bark out orders and people would blindly follow what he wanted done.”

Trump seems to have gotten a bunch of things wrong:


  • He thought former attorney general Jeff Sessions would shut down the Russia probe;

  • He thought the bullying and lies and congressional allies would impede investigators;

  • He thought Cohen would never flip and would never have tapes and other evidence;

  • He never thought Trump Organization chief financial officer Allen Weisselberg or American Media executives or David Pecker would cooperate with authorities;

  • He never thought his tweets and public outbursts were helping to incriminate him;

  • He never thought the shady operation of his foundation would draw the attention of the press, and in turn of New York state authorities;

  • He never thought his pardon power would be so useless (If he pardons associates, the dam may break in Congress; if he tries to pardon himself it likely would be ineffective);

  • He never thought he'd have to answer prosecutors' questions, or that his written answers may have locked him into answers that could be disputed by multiple witnesses;

  • He never thought he'd face Democrats in Congress with subpoena power; and

  • He never thought his media circus would be entirely ineffective in stopping skilled prosecutors.

Trump's presidency, his financial empire and even his freedom are at risk. (Presidents can be indicted after leaving office and cannot pass out pardons for state offenses.) He can be angry at Sessions or Cohen, but he is solely responsible for his own fate, which right now looks awfully bleak.

__________________________________________________________________________

Jennifer Rubin writes reported opinion from a center-right perspective for The Washington Post. She covers a range of domestic and foreign policy issues and provides insight into the conservative movement, the Republican Party and threats to Western democracies. Rubin, who is also an MSNBC contributor, came to The Post after three years with Commentary magazine. Prior to her career in journalism, Rubin practiced labor law for two decades, an experience that informs and enriches her work. She is a mother of two sons and lives in Northern Virginia.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • VIDEO: ‘I will not be the villain’: Michael Cohen's post-sentencing interview, annotated

 • VIDEO: Opinion | Here's what you need to know about Mueller's grand juries


https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2018/12/14/all-things-trump-didnt-count
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« Reply #11 on: December 16, 2018, 10:28:44 am »

Yawn

He Never thought how stupid reporters of propaganda are at the washington post
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« Reply #12 on: December 16, 2018, 11:02:11 am »


from The Seattle Times…

Moving on from Tariff Man to Shutdown Man

This is not necessarily a sign of bravery on Trump's part. He knows his hardcore followers will
cheer for any stunt he pulls, so what has he got to lose? It is, however, a sign of ignorance.


By DAVID HORSEY | 2:19PM PST — Friday, December 14, 2018



WHETHER OR NOT Congress and the president reach a budget deal, it is singular that President Donald Trump expressed his willingness to accept responsibility for shutting down the government if he does not get $5 billion to fund his scheme to build a wall along the Mexican border. On those past, very rare occasions when the business of government was halted by political gridlock, no one wanted to take credit and everyone was quick to shift blame.

This is not necessarily a sign of bravery on Trump's part. He knows his hardcore followers will cheer for any stunt he pulls, so what has he got to lose? It is, however, a sign of ignorance. Shutdowns are a costly failure that hurt the economy and disrupt vital public services. Politically, they are usually damaging for whomever gets pinned with blame.

Nevertheless, in a bizarre, televised Oval Office meeting with the House and Senate Democratic leaders, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, Trump became exasperated when they were unwilling to agree to fund his wall. Instead, right in front of the TV cameras, they pointed out the fallacies upon which his border delusions are built.

“I will take the mantle. I will be the one to shut it down,” Trump finally declared. That is a mantle the Democrats would be very happy to see him wear.


__________________________________________________________________________

• See more of David Horsey's cartoons at The Seattle Times HERE.

https://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/moving-on-from-tariff-man-to-shutdown-man
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« Reply #13 on: December 16, 2018, 11:03:17 am »


Yep ... Donald J. Trump as prez of America is excellent for the world.

'cause Trump is making it easy for China to take over in a post-America world as he burns his own country to the ground.
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« Reply #14 on: December 19, 2018, 08:12:01 am »





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« Reply #15 on: December 30, 2018, 05:20:56 pm »


from The Washington Post…

Who's afraid of the MAGA mob? Only Trump.

A politician can only fail to pull a rabbit out of a hat for so long before losing his audience.

By EUGENE ROBINSON | 5:52PM EST — Thursday, December 27, 2018

Supporters of President Donald J. Trump cheer as he speaks during a campaign rally on Septemer 20 in Las Vegas. — Photograph: Evan Vucci/Associated Press.
Supporters of President Donald J. Trump cheer as he speaks during a campaign rally on September 20 in Las Vegas. — Photograph: Evan Vucci/Associated Press.

FOR THE NEW YEAR, critics of President Trump should resolve not to be intimidated by the potential wrath of his vaunted political base. The only one who should cower before the Make America Great Again legions is Trump himself.

And he does fear them, bigly. The latest illustration is the way he chickened out on a bipartisan agreement to keep the government fully funded, instead forcing a partial shutdown over chump change for “the wall”. I use quotation marks because there never was going to be an actual, physical, continuous wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, much less one paid for by the Mexican government. The president is desperately trying to avoid acknowledging this and other realities before the 2020 election.

Anyone who thinks Trump is a master politician is wrong. He's a master illusionist, which isn't the same thing. Politicians can't keep pulling rabbits out of empty hats forever. At some point, they face a reckoning, and Trump's is well underway.

Trump is talented at making it appear that he has more than he really does — more money, more respect, more support. All those campaign rallies before the mid-term elections were not just an attempt to save the Republican majorities in Congress or feed Trump's insatiable ego. They were also demonstrations of the fervor of his core supporters — and implied warnings to Republicans who might cross him.

Trump tries to project an image of immense strength. But it turns out that the man who made “You're fired!” a television catchphrase can't summon the nerve to actually dismiss anyone in person. Trump's bluster camouflages great weakness.

Look at his political standing. Trump won the presidency with 46 percent of the popular vote. (That's compared to 48 percent for Hillary Clinton, but who's counting?) His margin in the electoral college, which he tries to portray as a great landslide, was actually quite puny — smaller than either of Barack Obama's, either of Bill Clinton's, the late George H.W. Bush's or either of Ronald Reagan's wins.

Trump did have a bigger electoral margin than George W. Bush ever managed to win. But only Trump has the unflattering distinction of winning a presidential election while losing the popular vote by nearly 3 million votes.

No matter. A skilled politician would seek to expand his base of support. But, according to Gallup, Trump's approval has been underwater since the day he took office — never once reaching higher than 45 percent — and now stands at 39 percent.

Does that apples-to-oranges comparison of vote percentage and approval rating really mean that Trump has lost significant support? Not necessarily — until you also take into account the results of the mid-term elections, which can be read only as a massive repudiation of Trump and all he stands for. Democrats captured the House, defended all but two of their imperiled senators, and grabbed governorships and state legislatures across the country. The Democratic Party's House popular-vote margin was the biggest ever seen in a mid-term.

So much for the ethnonationalist-populist wave that Trump is supposed to be surfing.

It is a mistake to underestimate Trump's base or to suggest that all the issues he raises are, because he raises them, invalid. There are legitimate reasons, for example, to want to ensure border security. But racism is not one of them, and a useless wall, meant to symbolize rejection of a brown-skinned “invasion,” is not an actual solution.

The fact is that Trump touched a nerve that was already inflamed. Race, ethnicity, cultural heritage, economic dislocation, opioid addiction, the effects of free trade, the impact of robotics — all these issues were out there already, and a lot of people believed our elected officials weren’t dealing with them adequately. Trump hasn't a clue about what to do or how to do it. But he knows how to poke and prod; he knows how to rile people up and sell them red hats.

If his core, unshakable base of support is, say, around 35 percent, then he almost surely would lose a re-election bid in 2020. I say “almost” because we don’t know whom the Democrats will run against him or whether there will be a significant independent or third-party challenger. And I say “would” because we can't be entirely sure that Trump will run again.

For now, he may be calculating that 35 percent is enough to keep the GOP-led Senate from removing him from office in the event that the House finds compelling grounds to impeach him. What keeps him from compromising isn't principle or determination. It's simple fear.


__________________________________________________________________________

Eugene Robinson writes a twice-a-week column on politics and culture for The Washington Post and hosts a weekly online chat with readers. In a three-decade career at The Post, Robinson has been city hall reporter, city editor, foreign correspondent in Buenos Aires and London, foreign editor, and assistant managing editor in charge of the paper's Style section. He started writing a column for the Op-Ed page in 2005. In 2009, he received the Pulitzer Prize for Commentary for “his eloquent columns on the 2008 presidential campaign that focus on the election of the first African-American president, showcasing graceful writing and grasp of the larger historic picture.” Robinson is the author of Disintegration: The Splintering of Black America (2010), Last Dance in Havana (2004), and Coal to Cream: A Black Man's Journey Beyond Color to an Affirmation of Race (1999). He lives with his wife and two sons in Arlington.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • VIDEO: Will Trump supporters turn out in key states in 2020?

 • Anne Applebaum: The debate over Trump's wall isn't really about border security

 • Eugene Robinson: Trump is incompetent, impulsive and amoral. Heaven help us all.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/whos-afraid-of-the-maga-mob-only-trump/2018/12/27/0faa2f1e-0a0e-11e9-a3f0-71c95106d96a_story.html
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« Reply #16 on: December 30, 2018, 05:21:36 pm »


from The New York Times…

Trump Threatens to Close Border if Congress Won't Fund Wall

The president's tweets were the latest indication that he was
digging in for a protracted partial government shutdown.


By ANNIE KARNI | Friday, December 28, 2018

Migrants crossed a section of the border wall between Tijuana and San Diego. President Trump threatened to close the border entirely if a deal to fund the wall is not reached. — Photograph: Daniel Ochoa De Olza/Associated Press.
Migrants crossed a section of the border wall between Tijuana and San Diego. President Trump threatened to close the border entirely
if a deal to fund the wall is not reached. — Photograph: Daniel Ochoa De Olza/Associated Press.


WASHINGTON D.C. — On the seventh day of a partial government shutdown, President Trump threatened on Friday to close the southern border and cut off aid to Central America if Congress refuses to fund a wall.

“We will be forced to close the Southern Border entirely if the Obstructionist Democrats do not give us the money to finish the Wall & also change the ridiculous immigration laws that our Country is saddled with,” Mr. Trump tweeted on Friday. “Hard to believe there was a Congress & President who would approve!”

Mr. Trump escalated his threats as up to 800,000 government workers were left in limbo and with Congress not set to take up the issue again until after the new year. “At this point, it looks like we could be in for a very long-term shutdown,” Representative Mark Meadows, Republican of North Carolina and a close ally of Mr. Trump's, told CNN.

Democrats stood firm against agreeing to funding for a border wall, according to a spokesman for Representative Nancy Pelosi, Democrat of California and the incoming House speaker. “Democrats are united against the President's immoral, ineffective and expensive wall, the wall that he specifically promised that Mexico would pay for,” the spokesman, Drew Hammill, said in a statement. Mr. Hammill also noted that the White House has made no formal outreach to Ms. Pelosi since December 11, when Ms. Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the minority leader, met with the president at the White House.

Mr. Trump also reiterated his threat on Twitter on Friday to cut off aid to Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador as punishment to countries he claimed “are doing nothing for the United States but taking our money.”

Migrants have been fleeing Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, choosing to join caravans and confront Mr. Trump's threats to prevent them from crossing the border over the dangers of life at home.

Mr. Trump has made threats to shut down the border completely before. Last month, Mr. Trump said he would close the border “permanently” if Mexico refused to send asylum seekers back to their native countries.


Migrants run after crossing the border fence through a hole to enter the United States from Tijuana, Mexico on December 26. — Photograph: Daniel Ochoa De Olza/Associated Press.
Migrants run after crossing the border fence through a hole to enter the United States from Tijuana, Mexico on December 26.
 — Photograph: Daniel Ochoa De Olza/Associated Press.


His latest warning comes as Democrats are preparing to take control of the House of Representatives and have shown no sign of caving on his demands for $5 billion for a border wall. Democrats are considering three different ways to reopen the government, none of which include money for Mr. Trump's proposed wall, his signature campaign promise.

In a series of tweets on Friday morning, Mr. Trump also complained that the North American Free Trade Agreement cost the United States so much money “that I would consider closing the Southern Border a ‘profit making operation’.”

In another sign that the White House sees no end to the shutdown in sight, Mick Mulvaney, the budget director who is set to take over as acting White House chief of staff in the new year, said on “Fox & Friends” on Friday that Mr. Trump would remain in Washington through New Year's Eve.

Mr. Trump, who had been scheduled to spend a 16-day stretch over the holidays at his private club in Florida, has postponed the trip because of the shutdown. His wife, Melania Trump, left on Thursday for the Palm Beach club, Mar-a-Lago, a spokeswoman said.

When asked about Mr. Trump's threat to close the border entirely, Mr. Mulvaney said that “what the president is trying to do, and rightly so, is shed some light on what's happening here.”

Mr. Mulvaney also sought to divide Democrats, indicating that while he believed Mr. Schumer might be willing to come to a compromise on wall funding, “the more we're hearing this week is that it's Nancy Pelosi who is preventing that from happening.”


__________________________________________________________________________

Annie Karni covers the White House for Politico. Before that, she covered Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign. Prior to joining Politico, she was a political reporter at the New York Daily News, where she covered the 2013 mayoral race and the de Blasio administration. She is also a veteran of the New York Post and the now-defunct New York Sun.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • With No Votes Scheduled, a Government Shutdown Will Greet the Democratic House (December 27, 2018)

 • End of Government Shutdown May Depend on the Definition of ‘Wall’ (December 26, 2018)

 • In Latest Shutdown, Some Lawmakers See a Diminished Congress (December 24, 2018)


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« Reply #17 on: December 30, 2018, 05:22:17 pm »


from The Washington Post…

How does Trump escape the trap he laid for himself?

The president's folly will end in defeat.

By JENNIFER RUBIN | 10:30AM EST — Friday, December 28, 2018

A migrant family from Honduras is caught climbing a border fence between Tijuana, Mexico, and the United States on December 26. — Photograph: Daniel Ochoa de Olza/Associated Press.
A migrant family from Honduras is caught climbing a border fence between Tijuana, Mexico, and the United States on December 26.
 — Photograph: Daniel Ochoa de Olza/Associated Press.


POLL AFTER POLL shows that Americans hold President Trump and his Republican allies responsible for the shutdown, which is hardly surprising since Trump declared he'd be “proud” to shutter the government. In the most recent poll conducted by Reuters/Ipsos, 47 percent of Americans blame the president for the shutdown, compared to 33 percent who fault the Democrats. Moreover, according to NBC News, “just 35 percent of those surveyed in the Reuters/Ipsos poll said they backed including money for the wall in a congressional spending bill. Only 25 percent said they supported Trump shutting down the government over the matter.”

For those with a passing relationship to reality, the entire exercise is politically inane. The public doesn't support either the ends (the wall), or the means (the shutdown). Next week, Democrats will take charge of the House, swiftly pass the clean continuing resolution to open the government, and send it to the Senate, daring Republicans there to vote against the exact same resolution they previously supported.

At that point, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Republican-Kentucky) has four options:

First, he can put the clean resolution on the floor, where it will pass, and see whether Trump has the nerve to veto it, and if so, whether there are 67 votes in the Senate for an override. That would be most humiliating option for Trump. Hence, it's the least likely route for McConnell to take.

Another possible outcome would be to pass all the appropriations bills and reserve a separate vote on wall funding, which, of course, will fail. Then Trump can holler about Congress's lack of nerve. This is a less obvious but no less complete collapse so, once again, McConnell likely won't try this.

A third alternative would be to nudge up the dollar amount for border security (from $1.6 billion to, say to $2 billion), without specific permission for the wall-building. Trump can claim he got money for “steel slats” (which he now considers a wall), while Democrats can remind voters Trump didn't get a wall, defined as “a continuous vertical brick or stone structure that encloses or divides an area of land.” This is a less obvious capitulation, so McConnell might try it.

The final alternative makes the most sense, but would be furiously opposed by White House policy adviser Stephen Miller, Senator Tom Cotton (Republican-Arkansas) and the anti-immigrant zealots that make up a critical part of the president's base: Give Trump his $5 billion (less than the $25 billion once on the table, reminding us Trump is the worst presidential negotiator ever) in exchange for legalizing the “dreamers.” Given the logistical nightmares entailed in building the wall — beginning with environmental hurdles and Fifth Amendment property seizures (taking rural lands owned mostly by Republicans), Democrats know the wall is unlikely to be built anytime soon. (A subsequent Congress can always defund it.) It would be ransom, but relatively cheap ransom — a phony wall — in exchange for somewhere between about 700,000 and 3.6 million dreamers.

None other than Newt Gingrich (who, along with Donald E. Graham) recently argued: “Whether you support money to build the wall or regard it as a waste, everyone knows it is of central importance to the president, and he is proving he is prepared to fight for it. Why shouldn't Congress take advantage of the best opportunity in years to give the dreamers the open door they deserve?” In other words, pro-dreamer lawmakers would get a sweet deal, and Trump would no doubt quickly anger a good chunk of his base, which regard any legalization of anyone to be the dreaded “amnesty.” (Cue the scary music.)

And that's why the fourth and most reasonable alternative is unlikely to fly either. The same crowd that went nuts when Trump was prepared to sign a continuing resolution would have a meltdown if Congress spent $5 billion to legalize possibly millions of people.

The solution here, given Trump's rotten bargaining position, is for Democrats to find the approach most advantageous to them and most embarrassing to Trump. If I were a betting person, I'd lay odds we'll wind up with steel slats.


__________________________________________________________________________

Jennifer Rubin writes reported opinion from a center-right perspective for The Washington Post. She covers a range of domestic and foreign policy issues and provides insight into the conservative movement, the Republican Party and threats to Western democracies. Rubin, who is also an MSNBC contributor, came to The Post after three years with Commentary magazine. Prior to her career in journalism, Rubin practiced labor law for two decades, an experience that informs and enriches her work. She is a mother of two sons and lives in Northern Virginia.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • VIDEO: Opinion | We are not doomed. Seriously.

 • Paul Waldman: The best way to force Trump's hand? Ignore him.

 • CARTOON: One day Trump will promise an even bigger wall

 • Eugene Robinson : Who's afraid of the MAGA mob? Only Trump.

 • WASHINGTON POST EDITORIAL: The way out of the shutdown has been obvious for weeks


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« Reply #18 on: December 30, 2018, 05:22:29 pm »


from The Washington Post…

The media should stop playing along with
Trump's threat to ‘close the border’


Another empty boast from the president.

By JENNIFER RUBIN | 3:30PM EST — Friday, December 28, 2018

A section of border fence near Santa Teresa, New Mexico, on December 23. — Photograph: Paul Ratje/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images.
A section of border fence near Santa Teresa, New Mexico, on December 23. — Photograph: Paul Ratje/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images.

PRESIDENT TRUMP in another episode of his extended temper-tantrum over the wall he is getting, now threatens to “close the border”. Unfortunately, the media repeats it, as though it's a coherent dare. It's meaningless, and the media should point it out.

What would “closing the border” entail? By definition, legal immigrants intend to cross the border without authorization, so “closing” means … I'm not sure. If he wants more money so the Department of Homeland Security can do a better job securing the border, he should take the Democrats' offer of $1.3 to $1.6 billion in new money. Unfortunately, the government shutdown means that non-essential DHS personnel are furloughed, and I'm not sure what rejecting more money and keeping DHS employees at home accomplishes. It doesn't “close the border.”

Maybe the president means he won't let legal residents and citizens back into the country from Mexico. That's not legally possible. Trump cannot keep out people who, well, have a legal right to be here. Moreover, such a move would destroy a good deal of the economy of border states (e.g., Texas), and wreak hardship on the rest of us. Someone should ask border-state senators and governors — who generally do not even support the wall — how an attempt to shut the border would affect their states.

Perhaps he means he is going to deny all asylum claims. However, two federal courts have already held that his efforts to curtail or redefine asylum are legally and constitutionally ineffective.

As we and others have pointed out, Judge Emmet G. Sullivan, in his 107-page opinion, explained that “it is the will of the Congress — not the whims of the Executive” that determine the process for denying asylum claims. He permanently enjoined the administration from removing migrants in the United States “without first providing credible fear determinations consistent with immigration laws.”

Listen, even Fox News analyst Andrew Napolitano fesses up: “[The president] cannot legally do it. We know that because of federal statutes. They were last revised in 1986 when our relationship with migrants coming north was very different than it is now.” He continued that migrants who have an asylum claim, “meaning you are escaping a government that is pursing you, or escaping a government that is failing to enforce basic law and order, can enter the U.S. The president doesn't want to hear this but it's the law.”

So why does Trump say such nonsense? It's unclear whether he thinks he has the power to do this, or if it logistically possible. He probably doesn't care or know what is possible at this point; he's busy whipping his base into a fury. But here's the thing: If he has the power to “close the border,” why does he need a wall?

The media does the country a disservice by simply repeating Trump's threat without pointing out that it is meaningless. It should insist that the president explain what he means.

Good news! Beginning on January 3, a Democratic-controlled House can call administration officials to testify and ask them directly, “What the heck is Trump talking about?” It should make for gripping TV.


__________________________________________________________________________

Jennifer Rubin writes reported opinion from a center-right perspective for The Washington Post. She covers a range of domestic and foreign policy issues and provides insight into the conservative movement, the Republican Party and threats to Western democracies. Rubin, who is also an MSNBC contributor, came to The Post after three years with Commentary magazine. Prior to her career in journalism, Rubin practiced labor law for two decades, an experience that informs and enriches her work. She is a mother of two sons and lives in Northern Virginia.

__________________________________________________________________________

Related to this topic:

 • VIDEO: Trump says shutdown will last until Democrats agree to fund border wall

 • Trump retreats from public view as shutdown continues over border wall fight

 • Trump threatens to shut down southern border as government funding stalemate drags on

 • The Fix: Here’s why Trump can't really shut down the border ‘entirely’

 • The Fix: Trump's job is about to get much harder with divided government

 • Migrant boy dies in U.S. custody; Trump vows shutdown will last until border wall is funded


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« Reply #19 on: December 30, 2018, 05:23:18 pm »


from the print edition of the Los Angeles Times…

Trump, Pelosi likely to tussle on impasse

Republicans appear happy to foist the government shutdown on the Democrats' leader in the House.

By SARAH D. WIRE | Saturday, December 29, 2018

Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Charles E. Schumer, right, meet with President Donald J. Trump and Vice President Mike Pence. — Photograph: Jabin Bostford/The Washington Post.
Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Charles E. Schumer, right, meet with President Donald J. Trump and Vice President Mike Pence.
 — Photograph: Jabin Bostford/The Washington Post.


WASHINGTON D.C. — During a combative White House meeting with Democratic leaders on December 11, President Trump said House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi was constrained in her ability to negotiate for a border wall because of a leadership fight in the House.

Pelosi, who won that fight, was in no mood for mansplaining.

“Mr. President, please don't characterize the strength that I bring to this meeting as the leader of the House Democrats, who just won a big victory,” Pelosi said. Later, aides put out word that she had mocked Trump's border wall as “a manhood thing” for him.

Trump's battle with Congress over his demands for $5 billion as a down payment for a border wall was at an impasse on Friday. Democrats have refused to budge past $1.3 billion, and one-fourth of the federal government has been unfunded and shut down since last Saturday because of the dispute.

Negotiations have sputtered to a halt. No votes are likely before Thursday, when the new Congress opens and Pelosi, who has represented a San Francisco district in Congress since 1987, is all but certain to be elected House speaker.

That sets the stage for a possible shutdown showdown between Trump and Pelosi. Republicans, who have controlled both chambers of Congress for the last two years, appeared happy to shift some of the responsibility — or blame — to her.

It could be a risky strategy. In Pelosi's 36 years in Washington, male politicians have repeatedly underestimated her. From her first opponent who called her a debutante before she crushed him, to Republican leaders who tried to bully her when she entered House leadership, it has yet to work.

“She just keeps going. It's like a nuclear sub and then when it's time to strike? Bam,” Representative Anna G. Eshoo (Democrat-Menlo Park) said. “I don't think anyone is a match for her.”

Trump already has sought to throw a depth charge. On Friday, he threatened in three separate tweets to shut U.S. ports of entry along the entire 2,000-mile southwestern border unless Democrats backed down. “Either we build (finish) the Wall or we close the Border,” he warned.

Several hundred thousand people and about $1.6 billion in trade cross the U.S.-Mexico border every day. Shutting the gates would send shock waves through the economy and create instant havoc in San Diego and other communities in the four states directly affected.

By most accounts, Trump lost face when he squared off with Pelosi in that Oval Office meeting.

Video of Pelosi walking out of the West Wing with dark sunglasses and a smile ricocheted across social media. The manufacturer of the orange coat she wore received so much demand it began making the coat again.

Her defiance all but ended a small but vocal resistance to her leadership bid. She is expect to become just the sixth person in history, and the first woman, to fill the speaker's chair twice.

Some Republicans see an up side in positioning Pelosi as their foil, hoping to force her to focus on a fight over funding the border wall rather than on ethics reform, voting rights legislation, investigations of Trump finances and other concerns she has promised will be the Democrats' priorities.

Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill said on Twitter that those saying Democrats can't battle Trump and move on other agenda items underestimate the incoming speaker's political skills.

“Pelosi can walk and chew gum,” Hammill tweeted.

Ellen Tauscher, a California Democrat who represented Walnut Grove in Congress from 1997 to 2009 and then joined the Obama administration, said the White House is “used to sycophants and they are used to bullying people, and neither apply to Nancy Pelosi.”

“Anybody who mistakes Nancy's charm and smile for anything other than the kind of the steel that holds airplanes together is in trouble,” she added. “I think the president has finally met somebody who will stand up to him.”

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders argued on Friday that Pelosi wouldn't negotiate because she “doesn't want to do anything that might jeopardize her speaker vote,” something the president and other White House officials echoed.

Hammill said the White House had not contacted Pelosi since the December 11 meeting.

Trump has cast the shutdown — which forced him to stay in Washington D.C. over the holidays, other than a one-day trip to visit U.S. troops in Iraq, instead of taking a planned 16-day vacation in Florida — as a fight between his version of border security, meaning a wall, and open borders, which he says Democrats want.

“He has a very simplistic policy solution that is a emotional touchstone in the culture wars. If the debate becomes about open borders versus the wall, Democrats are on very thin ice,” said Mike Madrid, a Republican political strategist. “It behooves the president to wait until the Democrats take over.”

Trump alluded to that strategy on Thursday, tweeting that Democrats may be able to block his plans to build a wall “but we have the issue, Border Security. 2020!”

From all accounts, substantive negotiations to reopen government offices stalled the day the shutdown began on December 22, when Vice President Mike Pence made an offer to Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (Democrat-New York).

Schumer's spokesman, Justin Goodman, said he rejected the offer of $2.1 billion for the wall and $400,000 for other border security measures immediately, telling the vice president that he could not get Democratic votes to pass the 60-vote threshold needed in the Republican-controlled Senate.

“For the White House to try and blame anyone but the president for this shutdown doesn't pass the laugh test,” Goodman said.

The White House effort to shift blame to Pelosi, especially when her party is not yet in power and she can't bring legislation up for a vote, left strategists and pundits scratching their heads.

“Out of the gate she's not some type of villain that somehow acquits the president of the hole he's dug himself,” Republican strategist Rob Stutzman said. Democrats “are poised to win the showdown on the shutdown. They just are.”

House Democrats plan to vote on Thursday on a spending package to reopen the government. They have floated several options, but none that includes more than $1.3 billion for border security, potentially including a wall.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Republican-Kentucky) has said the Senate won't vote on legislation to fund the government unless the president will sign it, and Trump has said he will not accept less than $5 billion for a wall. Stutzman said it would fall to McConnell to persuade Trump to compromise.

How Trump and Pelosi resolve the impasse could be telling for the next two years.

Trump has dominated Washington as few presidents before him, but after next week he'll be forced to work with a divided Congress for the first time.

“He's going to be playing defense, which he's not good at,” Madrid said. “He's going to have to create a boogeyman. That's how he wins. He has to create an enemy, whether it is Mexicans or Muslims or Pelosi.”

For her part, Pelosi is known as a master legislator and negotiator, someone unlikely to fold under Trump's insults and jibes.

“She knows when to charm him and I think she knows when to give him rope and let him hang himself,” Stutzman said. “She understands him rather well.”


__________________________________________________________________________

• Sarah D. Wire came to the Los Angeles Times in 2015 to write about California's 55-member congressional delegation after covering politics in Washington D.C. for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. She has been a statehouse reporter for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and Associated Press bureaus in Idaho and Missouri. Wire, a Colorado native, is a graduate of the University of Missouri.

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« Reply #20 on: January 05, 2019, 05:03:58 pm »


I'm reading news reports about large numbers of border security workers failing to turn up to work, because with Trump's “shut-down” wankery they aren't being paid and can no longer afford to travel to work. As Trump's “shut-down” wankery continues, a large proportion of border security workers (who are paid crap wages anyway) will be forced to walk away and look for other jobs to pay the bills. And that will mean that hordes of illegal immigrants will be able to cross the southern border into the USA because Trump's stupidity will have opened up the border.

Faaaaaarking hilarious, eh? I'm ROFLMAO!!
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« Reply #21 on: January 06, 2019, 01:17:33 pm »


The “Trump shutdown” continues…



from the print edition of the Los Angeles Times…

Democrats and Trump make no progress on wall

Party leaders report he's willing to prolong shutdown for ‘months or even years’.

By ELI STOKOLS and JENNIFER BABERKORN | Saturday, January 05, 2019

House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, Senate Minority Whip Richard J. Durbin and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, from left, had an unsuccessful meeting with Trump. — Photograph: Evan Vucci/Associated Press.
House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, Senate Minority Whip Richard J. Durbin and
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, from left, had an unsuccessful meeting with Trump. — Photograph: Evan Vucci/Associated Press.


WASHINGTON D.C. — President Trump and congressional leaders remained far from an agreement over his demand for money for a border wall after another White House meeting, an impasse that has blocked funding for many government operations and forced a partial shutdown now two weeks old.

Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York, the Senate Democratic leader, said after the talks in the privacy of the White House Situation Room that Trump told the group he would be willing to keep the affected government agencies closed for “months or even years.”

“I did say that, absolutely I said that,” Trump told reporters later. “I don't think it will, but I am prepared.” He added, “I hope it doesn't go on even beyond a few more days.”

The Democrats insisted that negotiating over border security could only follow after funding and opening the quarter of the government that is now shuttered.

“We really cannot resolve this until we open up government,” said new House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Democrat-San Francisco). “We made that clear to the president.”

Trump and top Democrats each put the burden on the other to end the stalemate. Neither appeared to feel much pressure from their respective supporters to give ground even as roughly 450,000 federal employees had to work without pay and an additional 380,000 are unpaid on furlough. But cracks have opened in support among Republicans in Congress for the president's hard line.

Trump, speaking to reporters in the Rose Garden after the meeting, expressed more optimism than Pelosi and Schumer about resolving the shutdown impasse, possibly through meetings among aides that will continue through the weekend. Even so, he refused to budge from his demand, calling conditions at the border “a dangerous, horrible disaster.”

“We've done a great job,” he said. “But you can't really do the kind of job we have to do unless you have a major, powerful barrier.”

He added, “We won't be opening [the government] until it's solved.”

Trump suggested that he could declare a national emergency to build a wall unilaterally without congressional approval. “I may do it,” he said. “We could call a national emergency and build it very quickly. That's another way to do it. But if we can do it through a negotiated process, that's better.”

In recent days, White House aides had signaled openness to a compromise offering Democrats legal protections for so-called Dreamers, young undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children, in exchange for more wall funding. But Trump, who has contradicted his aides several times, has not suggested such a trade, and Democrats, now holding the leverage of their new House majority, have ruled it out.

As the shutdown has stretched on, Trump has dug in more firmly. Though Vice President Mike Pence complained this week that Democrats never responded to him over the holidays about a proposal to reduce the funding demand to about $2.5 billion for wall construction, the president subsequently scoffed at the notion that he'd accept that amount — he blamed “fake news” for mischaracterizing his position — and publicly stuck to his demand for $5.6 billion.

Democratic leaders also stuck to a hard line.

Late on Thursday, hours after her election as speaker, Pelosi reiterated to reporters that a wall between countries is “an immorality.” Asked whether Democrats would even give Trump a dollar for a border wall, she responded: “A dollar? Yeah. One dollar.”

She spoke after House Democrats, newly in charge of the chamber after eight years of Republican control, passed measures to reopen the government and to approve $1.3 billion for border security funding that explicitly ruled out spending on a wall.

But the Senate, which approved a similar proposal just over two weeks ago when Republicans assumed Trump would go along, won't consider the two House bills. Wary of the White House's mixed signals, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Republican-Kentucky) has said the Senate won't vote on any proposal until it's clear Trump will sign it.

When Trump addressed reporters after the meeting with Democrats, McConnell was conspicuously missing among the Republican congressional leaders who flanked the president in the White House Rose Garden. A spokesman for McConnell said he would have attended had he been asked.

At one point last month before the shutdown, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House press secretary, seemed to suggest Trump was backing off his wall money demand altogether, saying that he would be able to find the $5 billion he wanted in other government accounts.

Following a backlash from supporters including conservative pundits Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, who criticized Trump as having caved on the issue, the president reversed course and said no to the package approved unanimously by the Senate, forcing the shutdown that began on December 22.


President Donald J. Trump confirmed he was prepared for the shutdown to last “months or even years,” as Democratic leaders had reported. — Photograph: Saul Loeb/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images.
President Donald J. Trump confirmed he was prepared for the shutdown to last “months or even years,” as Democratic leaders had reported.
 — Photograph: Saul Loeb/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images.


Trump has attempted to put pressure on Democrats by claiming there is an ongoing “humanitarian crisis” at the border because of a wave of illegal immigrants, as well as an unsubstantiated influx of terrorists and criminals.

In his remarks to reporters, Trump falsely said his administration had “built a brand-new wall in San Diego.” The border barriers there were first built in the 1990s. Customs and Border Protection has been upgrading some fencing, including a long-planned 14-mile stretch in western San Diego County on which construction began in June. Democrats have already agreed to appropriate money for that project and similar ones.

Trump, who now says a barrier could be of steel bars or fencing, disputed a reporter's suggestion that he'd promised during his campaign that he would build a wall of concrete. He had, however, at one point telling campaign supporters, “No windows, no nothing — precast concrete going very high.” The other day, he tweeted that “An all concrete Wall was NEVER ABANDONED.”

Speaking of the Obama-era program for Dreamers, Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, Trump also falsely said that President Obama, when he signed the executive order to defer deportations for about 700,000 young immigrants, “admitted” that “this isn't going to work.” He implied that Obama agreed with him that the order exceeded the president's authority. Obama did not say anything of the sort, but defended DACA's legality even as he acknowledged that executive authority had limits.

On Friday, just before resuming talks with Democrats, Trump sent a letter to all members of Congress with information that his Homeland Security secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, had presented days earlier to congressional leaders. Pelosi and Schumer, Trump wrote, “did not want to hear the presentation at the time.”

Trump argued that “it is essential that we make decisions based upon the facts on the ground — not ideology and rhetoric — and that we listen to the law enforcement personnel on the front lines.”

While Trump and congressional allies believe that fighting for border wall funding is a political winner with their party's base, a few Republicans facing difficult re-election bids in competitive states in 2020 are signaling opposition to the prolonged shutdown.

Polling so far has shown that the general public blames Trump and the Republicans for the shutdown more than they blame congressional Democrats. And spending taxpayer money on a border wall is an unpopular idea with most Americans.

A non-partisan survey last month by Quinnipiac University, for example, found that voters nationwide opposed shutting down the government over money for the wall by nearly 2 to 1. The same polls also show, however, that the wall remains popular with Trump's core supporters, which is the audience the president has consistently focused on.

Colorado Senator Cory Gardner, perhaps the most vulnerable Republican senator for 2020, was the first to call for reopening the government and leaving the fight over border wall funding for later.

“We can pass legislation that has the appropriations number in it while we continue to get more, but we should continue to do our jobs and get the government open,” Gardner said on Thursday, referring to the amount for border security that Democrats have already agreed to.

Senator Susan Collins (Republican-Maine), who also could face a tough re-election battle next year, staked out a similar position.

In the House, seven moderate Republicans voted with Democrats on Thursday night in support of the spending package to reopen the government. Five of them also backed the separate bill funding the Department of Homeland Security that did not include money for the wall.

One of the Republican defectors, Representative Will Hurd, represents a sprawling Texas district that includes 41% of the nearly 2,000-mile southern border with Mexico. He has steadfastly opposed construction of a wall, and was re-elected in November after a tough campaign in which he emphasized that position.

Representative John Katko (Republican-New York) said after the vote that he supports border security but not at the cost of continuing a shutdown. “I remain increasingly frustrated by the inaction of both sides in Congress on this issue,” he said.

“Still, a government shutdown is a costly and unnecessary maneuver that does not help resolve Congress' failure to act.”

Friday's White House meeting came on the second day of the new Congress, quickly putting an end to the hopes for bipartisanship expressed by both Republicans and Democrats on Thursday.

Separately, Republicans expressed outrage after newly elected Representative Rashida Tlaib (Democrat-Michigan) told progressive allies Thursday night that she came to Washington to “impeach the mother—.” Democrats were privately upset with the remark as well, as Pelosi and other party leaders have sought to mute talk of impeachment at least until special counsel Robert S. Mueller III releases his report.

Trump called Tlaib's remarks “disrespectful” to the country, adding, “I think she dishonored herself and she dishonored her family.” Trump also said that Pelosi, in the White House meeting, told him that Democrats were “not looking to impeach” him.

On Twitter, Pelosi's spokesman said, “Speaker Pelosi made clear that today's meeting was about reopening government, not impeachment.”


__________________________________________________________________________

• Eli Stokols is a White House reporter based in the Los Angeles Times Washington, D.C., bureau. He is a veteran of Politico and The Wall Street Journal, where he covered the 2016 presidential campaign and then the Trump White House. A native of Irvine, Stokols grew up in a L.A. Times household and is thrilled to report for what is still his family's hometown paper. He is also a graduate of UC Berkeley and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

• Jennifer Haberkorn covers Congress in Washington, D.C., for the Los Angeles Times. She has reported from Washington since 2005, spending much of that time roaming the halls of the U.S. Capitol. Before arriving at the L.A. Times, Haberkorn spent eight years at POLITICO writing about the 2010 healthcare law, a story that took her to Congress, the states, healthcare clinics and courtrooms around the country. She also covered Congress and local business news for The Washington Times. Haberkorn is a native of the Chicago area and graduated from Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

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Kiwithrottlejockey
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Having fun in the hills!


« Reply #22 on: January 06, 2019, 01:19:58 pm »


Economics, Trump-style…




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If you aren't living life on the edge, you're taking up too much space! 
Im2Sexy4MyPants
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WWW
« Reply #23 on: January 07, 2019, 02:28:26 pm »

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Are you sick of the bullshit from the sewer stream media spewed out from the usual Ken and Barby dickless talking point look a likes.

If you want to know what's going on in the real world...
And the many things that will personally effect you.
Go to
http://www.infowars.com/

AND WAKE THE F_ _K UP
Kiwithrottlejockey
Admin Staff
XNC2 GOD
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Posts: 32232


Having fun in the hills!


« Reply #24 on: January 07, 2019, 07:13:01 pm »


Hahaha … America is most definitely the world's laughing stock.

All thanks to President Donald J. “shit-for-brains” Trump … the idiot who keeps on giving to the world of comedy.
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If you aren't living life on the edge, you're taking up too much space! 

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