July 22, 2017

Trump now unable to deliver for Putin

It will be interesting to see what the Russians and Putin do from this point forward.

Someone earlier posted that Trump had not delivered for the Russians. I argued that he has done a lot so far, but eliminating or substantially relaxing the sanctions is what Putin wants most.

There's a lot of nasty stuff the Russians have available to leak on Trump.

Wonder if we could see the emergence of a smoking gun. There's no reason now to not let things out that could utterly destroy Trump.

The US will remain effectively paralyzed whether they make Mueller dig it out or they make it easy by leaking it to mainstream journalists.

July 21, 2017

Bingo!

July 20, 2017

How'ya figure?

Trump so far has destabilized the NATO alliance, handed Syria over to Putin, has telegraphed that he's going to give back their seized Maryland compounds, has hamstrung any serious investigation of Russian election tampering, has leaked in public extraordinarily sensitive human asset information to the Russians, and just had two extensive off the record conversations with Putin during the G20 summit. Oh, and we just announced that we are ending a program of providing American arms to the Syrian rebel faction we found to sufficiently non-radical. The Russians found this program irritating as these rebels were shooting at soldiers of Russia's client Assad.

Granted, he hasn't dropped the sanctions but he was unable to persuade Congress. He"ll keep trying.

I think he is paying off better than Putin can even believe.

This is, at best, a partial list. Trump has paid off better than a broken slot machine spewing jackpots.

He's clearly scared of Putin and the hits will just keep on coming.

July 20, 2017

Wow! $2 million?

Damn, that'll leave a mark.

Someone at Exxon is going to hurt themselves laughing. Maybe have a car wreck because their vision is blurred from the tears (of laughter).

July 20, 2017

Who will stop him?

This is my greatest fear. He is now feeling confident that he can do anything he wants because there is nothing that can stop him.

With the Congress taken out of the mix (if anyone thinks that this Congress will impeach Trump I've got some fine swamp land to sell you) there is nothing standing in his way. The judiciary has been neutered. Just get the case to the Supreme Court and they can be relied upon to render nakedly partisan judgements in Trump's favor. Once Kennedy retires and Trump gets to appoint another partisan jurist then we can expect nothing but the legalization of whatever anti-constitutional action Trump wants.

He can fire anyone else. Mueller? When he fires Mueller who can push back? Anyone? Anything?

The naked, brutal truth is that the Republicans cheated to win the Presidency and, in retrospect, that basic fact seems fairly obvious. But, if you can fire the investigator investigating you and the utterly corrupt party that took you in--well, what's to stop you?

Well nothing. He's essentially asking for the resignation of Sessions (that should only take a couple of days to play out) and when he gets someone more competent into position (that might take a few weeks) the new, un-recused Attorney General will get rid of the entire mechanism of investigation. Mueller, Rosenstein--all of them gone.

What center of power are we to look to? The military? I guess we could hope for a coup, but given the extreme right wing tendencies of the senior leadership of the military that is a frying pan into the fire kind of hope.

Not seeing much hope here. Someone talk me down off the ledge.

July 19, 2017

Awww!

Poor little elephant murdering fella!

July 18, 2017

It was never about health reform

Let's start by having some precision in language. This was never about any reform. It was always about de facto repeal and cutting the taxes of the wealthiest among us.

Because of that central fact there was never any way to do much beyond stand alone repeal with a bit of window dressing, lipstick for the pig, and a dash of sleight of hand.

The Republicans, behind closed doors and working only with 13 members of the He-Man Woman Haters club came up with something that beggars the name atrocity. The biggest (and best thing in Republican eyes) thing it did was essentially start the process of defunding and dismantling Medicaid. Paul Ryan has had a woodie for destroying Medicaid since he was a Young Republican in college.

This was never about "reform" it was all about destroying a hated social program that helps the undeserving masses of "takers".

We need to call these authors and media outlets about using the Republican Orwellian language where right is wrong and freedom means the freedom to die.

July 12, 2017

This administration is populated by old white men

I'm constantly struck by how this administration is populated by old white man with old ideas.

So, they are intellectually married to a lot of ideas that have been tried--most of which didn't work.

The "war" on drugs. Supply side economics/massive tax cuts, deregulation, privatization of the commons, and a preference for exploitative extractive industries...

These are old men with old ideas.

They just want to keep digging the hole we are in deeper. It is all that know and all they can imagine.

Power in these hands at this critical time is extraordinarily dangerous.

July 12, 2017

The DOJ is corrupt

As long as Jeff Sessions leads the DOJ I think these sort of things will either not happen at all or happen verrrrrrrry slowly.

Jeff Sessions is, and always has been, utterly corrupt.

July 12, 2017

Forced to undertake global climate engineering

As a species we are suddenly at an inflection point.

As unattractive as it is if we are to survive we will be forced to attempt global climate engineering.

We've already performed accidental climate engineering--now we will be forced to do it deliberately to compensate for the accidental engineering.

There will, inevitably, be unintended consequences. But the alternative is to passively cook.