The Trump Presidency – 2016

[SirFozzie]

Breaking down the analysis of the Denial of the stay of the Temporary Restraining Order. (edit: whew. That's a mouthful)


Instant Analysis of Washington v. Trump | Josh Blackman's Blog

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by NobodyHere

I'm putin you ON NOTICE until you post your theory

Clever

[RainMaker]

Some details on the wall. Looks like it will require seeking eminent domain on a lot of land which would force conservatives to switch their stance on this.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-us...-idUSKBN15O2ZN

[NobodyHere]

The Keystone Pipeline proved that Republicans will eagerly use eminent domain.

[digamma]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

I think I may have just figured out the long game here. And if so, wow, talk about going for the deep ball.

And while I think it's kind of a long shot, I'm not sure that underestimating Trump is a bet I'd be eager to place either.

I'm purposely NOT saying what I'm thinking of here, I prefer to see if anyone else mentions it before I do.
(I'm entitled to entertain myself that way if I want to)

If it doesn't come up, I'll try to remember to come back & expand my thought in a day or so.

We don't live in a spy novel, bud.

[cartman]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

I don't know whether Trump is actually persuaded by the last person he speaks to or whether he just says what he thinks people want to hear, but it's amazing how often his preference seems to change based upon with whom he has meetings.

Hey guess what? On a call with China's Xi Jinping, Trump told him his administration would honor the 'One China' policy.

http://www.reuters.com/article/usa-t...-idUSB9N1FG00K

[MrBug708]

I'd like to see eminent domain used on the freaking 710 freeway.

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by cartman

Hey guess what? On a call with China's Xi Jinping, Trump told him his administration would honor the 'One China' policy.

http://www.reuters.com/article/usa-t...-idUSB9N1FG00K

Another topic that he clearly knows virtually nothing about, but hears the one-sentence version and signs on to. (Hint: look back to news items from just a couple of weeks ago)

[whomario]

Originally Posted by digamma

We don't live in a spy novel, bud.

The transcript might fool a few people 30 years from now though ...

[JPhillips]

The two leaders discussed numerous topics and President Trump agreed, at the request of President Xi, to honor our 'one China' policy," the White House said in a statement on the call.

What a cuck.

[Butter]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

It's just an obvious case of him not having a basic understanding of policy issues, at any level. He talks with foreign leaders, and doesn't even read the basic briefs enough to know obvious issues with them. Someone brings up immigration, and he doesn't have enough familiarity with the issue to hold up his end of the conversation.

He is just going to do this over and over - he's prone to falling for a little snake oil and saying something in the moment that completely contradicts his own "positions" because he doesn't actually know or understand anything. He basically has no foundation to work from. People used to make these jokes/attacks about President George W Bush, but this is an entirely new dimension.

He doesn't read. He doesn't know. He doesn't care. This is just how things are.

Absolutely. It was obvious during the campaign, because he would give interviews where he would contradict stands he had already taken because he either didn't remember them or understand the full impact of... much of anything really.

It really is a matter of who he talks to last and how convincing they are... then his "team" has to kind of re-brainwash him when he takes these walks off the reservation. It's like if W had definitively had early Alzheimer's... and a team full of racist shitbags.

[panerd]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

I think I may have just figured out the long game here. And if so, wow, talk about going for the deep ball.

And while I think it's kind of a long shot, I'm not sure that underestimating Trump is a bet I'd be eager to place either.

I'm purposely NOT saying what I'm thinking of here, I prefer to see if anyone else mentions it before I do.
(I'm entitled to entertain myself that way if I want to)

If it doesn't come up, I'll try to remember to come back & expand my thought in a day or so.

Not sure either of these reach the level of deep ball but two possible scenarios that I'm sure have been said in some variation by plenty of people.

1. Trump the Con Man. The sideshow is this immigration nonsense while him and his buddies cram through unsexy and unnewsworthy items on all sorts of regulations. Just wait until he does his executive order ending abortion and while the two sides go head to head about to take part in the second civil war Trump and company carry out their real agenda.

2. Using the court against Obama. Trump knows this executive order will get blocked by the Supreme Court and that he will have precedent to then undo a lot of Obama's executive orders.

That said...

Occam's Razor: Trump is just a guy not qualified to be president. Like panerd being elected president... I have laundry list of things that I would like changed or done different from behind my keyboard or with my buddies at the bar and this is exactly what it would look like when I went about doing it. "I'm going to end the war on drugs. Who is on the line? Putin? I don't have time for that!"

[Kodos]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

That court should be formally PUT ON NOTICE.

[sabotai]

Originally Posted by panerd

2. Using the court against Obama. Trump knows this executive order will get blocked by the Supreme Court and that he will have precedent to then undo a lot of Obama's executive orders.

Trump can already undo any EOs signed by Obama. It's fairly common when a new President takes office. At the beginning of his Presidency, Obama ended Bush's EO that banned federal money from being used to fund stem-cell research.

[PilotMan]

On top of that, a good point was brought up this morning, that Trump could rescind his order and make a new one with clearer, more specific language, with input from various departments. His new order wouldn't be tied up in the courts, and if time was of the essence it's clearly the better course of action. Sure it would be challenged, but rewritten to narrow the focus would make it much stronger. However, in order for him to do this, he'd have to admit that he was wrong with the first one and his ego just might get in the way of that.

[QuikSand]

Not an unbiased source, but a few interesting takeaways.

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/p...onal_21017.pdf

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: ‘the Bowling Green massacre shows why we need Donald Trump’s executive order on immigration?’

So, in the aggregate, that comes out 57 disagree / 23 agree. But a slight majority of Trump voters agreed with the statement.

Just a "gotcha" question? Or does that actually tell us something about the nature of modern political messaging?

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

Not an unbiased source, but a few interesting takeaways.

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/p...onal_21017.pdf

Do you agree or disagree with the following statement: ‘the Bowling Green massacre shows why we need Donald Trump’s executive order on immigration?’

So, in the aggregate, that comes out 57 disagree / 23 agree. But a slight majority of Trump voters agreed with the statement.

Just a "gotcha" question? Or does that actually tell us something about the nature of modern political messaging?

You'd have that 20-25% show up on either side regardless of the message or topic. There's reckless loyalist in both parties. Doesn't say much other than there's a lot of blindly stupid people.

[JPhillips]

I think it's very much about messaging. I saw a poll a couple of days ago that had 90% of Republicans saying the Trump admin was truthful.

[Easy Mac]

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

You'd have that 20-25% show up on either side regardless of the message or topic. There's reckless loyalist in both parties. Doesn't say much other than there's a lot of blindly stupid people.

Or not

Q20 Do you have a favorable or unfavorable opinion
of Vladimir Putin?
Favorable 10% ........................................................
Unfavorable 72% ....................................................
Not sure 18%

Q31 Would you support or oppose invading
Mexico?
Support 7% ...........................................................
Oppose 83% ...........................................................
Not sure 9%

[digamma]

Easy M, just take Easy D seriously, not literally.

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by panerd

2. Using the court against Obama. Trump knows this executive order will get blocked by the Supreme Court and that he will have ...

I intentionally truncated your quote 'cause up to that part it works for what I'm thinking.

You just have to finish the sentence differently.

Hint: it is not something that's never come up before, i.e. no unique notion like giving everyone electric hippity-hops or something.

[Kodos]

So for the people who support invading Mexico, what is the end goal there? Make them the 51st state? No need for a wall then!

[Easy Mac]

Originally Posted by Kodos

So for the people who support invading Mexico, what is the end goal there? Make them the 51st state? No need for a wall then!

Probably just to kill all the Mexicans.

[Easy Mac]

Liberal scum and their voter fraud... oh... wait.

Former precinct chairman convicted after voting twice; claims he forgot about first vote, DA says

[JonInMiddleGA]

Originally Posted by Kodos

So for the people who support invading Mexico, what is the end goal there? Make them the 51st state? No need for a wall then!

Well, an invasion and an occupation are two different things so you don't necessarily have to have both.

That said, I thought Facebook kept me up with all the trending topics, but I didn't realize this was a thing today.

[CrescentMoonie]

Trump tweets out article that supports appeals court decision

The troglodyte-in-chief is the typical Facebook idiot who, at most, reads the first paragraph of an article and thinks he knows what it says.

His ignorance and inability to understand anything of importance at a critical level is astonishing only in that it shows that he's the perfect representative of the people that voted for him.

[Mizzou B-ball fan]

Originally Posted by Easy Mac

Liberal scum and their voter fraud... oh... wait.

Former precinct chairman convicted after voting twice; claims he forgot about first vote, DA says

I'd love to see how he managed to do that. My poll workers would have given me the side-eye if I came in more than once.

[RainMaker]

Originally Posted by Easy Mac

Or not

Is that recent? Figured Republican support would be much higher for Putin these days.

[Ben E Lou]

Originally Posted by Mizzou B-ball fan

I'd love to see how he managed to do that. My poll workers would have given me the side-eye if I came in more than once.

I don't know about that county, but in mine, early voting and election day voting take place at entirely different locations. I've lived here 2 1/2 years and voted in all Primaries and Generals (missed a special election or two, but you get the point), but have yet to vote at my official precinct location because of early voting. (And I've early-voted at three different places.)

And recall, as I said earlier, anyone who knew my address in SC could have walked in, claimed to be me, and voted.

[Atocep]

I don't think Trump has some grand plan or a "gotcha" up his sleeve. He's learning that the US Presidency has finite power and doesn't run as he likely expected.

Even in the example above in regards to the Executive order on abortion, it's yet another thing he doesn't have the power to do. The president can't overturn, even partially, a Supreme Court ruling.

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

I think it's very much about messaging. I saw a poll a couple of days ago that had 90% of Republicans saying the Trump admin was truthful.

Do you remember what poll it was? I would like to see that.

[Ben E Lou]

Like it or not, she's now the Secretary of Education. The Secretary of Education, who--it is said--needs to have a better understanding of Public Schools, especially heavily-minority ones, gets blocked from getting into a public school that's 95% black??? (Yes, I looked it up. It's 95% black, 3% Latino, 1 % White, 1% Asian.) Whiskey. Tango. Foxtrot.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/10/politi...ool/index.html

Seems to me that the smart move is to educate her as much as possible about what's really going on inside those doors that they blocked her from entering.

[cartman]

Wouldn't that be considered a fire hazard to only have one door in or out?

[ISiddiqui]

Well she did end up getting in, so I assume she entered through a secondary entrance.

[JPhillips]

Originally Posted by Chief Rum

Do you remember what poll it was? I would like to see that.

http://media.wix.com/ugd/3bebb2_1a13...65f001f026.pdf

[sabotai]

Originally Posted by cartman

Wouldn't that be considered a fire hazard to only have one door in or out?

Were the doors chained?

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by sabotai

Were the doors chained?

Ha! I immediately thought of this as well.

[JPhillips]

Heading to Joint Base Andrews on #MarineOne with Prime Minister Shinzō earlier today. pic.twitter.com/4JFhyYdeHO

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 10, 2017

He doesn't understand how Asian names work.

[Chief Rum]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

http://media.wix.com/ugd/3bebb2_1a13...65f001f026.pdf

Thank you for posting.

Something seemed off on the figures you quoted versus the statement you made because it is my impression that outside of the most blinded, ardent supporters of Trump, most would acknowledge he and his administration have told lies or extremely exaggerated points on many if not even most of his stances/actions/etc.

I found the issue looking at the link. The poll question asked if the pollee felt the Trump administration was "generally truthful." That generally gives the pollee a LOT of room to justify their belief the Trump admin is truthful without running into their logic senses.

So from that perspective, I am not sure how much I trust that those numbers properly encapsulate how much (or little) Republicans actually find Trump truthful (and same the other way, since this was also posed to Dems).

[QuikSand]

I agree that in polling, there's certainly a point at which a certain question (or an entire poll) becomes, in the mind of the person answering, just a proxy for "do you support the red/blue team?" And once someone on team blue hears/interprets that the question is "do you support team red" they will reject the question... with the appropriate parallels and converses as appropriate.

I think that's what leads to many seemingly strange findings... like the "Bowling Green Massacre" question that locked in half of Trump voters to agreeing that it happened. Because the question went on to ask whether the BGM supported the need for the immigration ban, that made it smell like a fairly simple "do you support Trump" question and th rest sort of withers away.

[JPhillips]

That's what I meant when I said that it was about political messaging. I think a lot of people answered the question of "Do you trust Trump more than..." whether that be the media, the Democrats, whoever. That's what the White House wants, and it seems to be working.

[Easy Mac]

i feel like everyone on the board collectively decided that this morning was just too dumb to even merit posting.

[Thomkal]

Originally Posted by Easy Mac

i feel like everyone on the board collectively decided that this morning was just too dumb to even merit posting.

Or just not paying attention anymore I saw him on a golf course with the Japanese leader, and attempts to block the press from seeing it. What else did I miss?

[CrescentMoonie]

It's loads of fun when a former NSA analyst points out that the intelligence community doesn't think the Mickey Mouse Oval Office can be trusted with the most important information.

The Spy Revolt Against Donald Trump Begins

--In light of this, and out of worries about the White House’s ability to keep secrets, some of our spy agencies have begun withholding intelligence from the Oval Office. Why risk your most sensitive information if the president may ignore it anyway? A senior National Security Agency official explained that NSA was systematically holding back some of the “good stuff” from the White House, in an unprecedented move. For decades, NSA has prepared special reports for the president’s eyes only, containing enormously sensitive intelligence. In the last three weeks, however, NSA has ceased doing this, fearing Trump and his staff cannot keep their best SIGINT secrets.

[CrescentMoonie]

Originally Posted by Easy Mac

i feel like everyone on the board collectively decided that this morning was just too dumb to even merit posting.

The Mark Cuban dust up?

[JPhillips]

Stephen Miller is one scary dude.

[larrymcg421]

Originally Posted by JPhillips

Stephen Miller is one scary dude.

I thought Ted Cruz had the most punchable face I'd ever seen. Then I saw this dude.

[CrimsonFox]

Originally Posted by larrymcg421

I thought Ted Cruz had the most punchable face I'd ever seen. Then I saw this dude.

I dunno. McConnell's face looks like a ready-made punching bag

[Easy Mac]

Originally Posted by CrimsonFox

I dunno. McConnell's face looks like a ready-made punching bag

Have you paid attention to Paul Ryan's permanent smug face.

[bbgunn]

Originally Posted by JonInMiddleGA

I intentionally truncated your quote 'cause up to that part it works for what I'm thinking.

You just have to finish the sentence differently.

Hint: it is not something that's never come up before, i.e. no unique notion like giving everyone electric hippity-hops or something.

Okay, I'll play the little game.

2. Using the court against Obama. Trump knows this executive order will get blocked by the Supreme Court and that he will have ...
*an opportunity to say that what Obama did was also illegal and press for him to get thrown in jail or something
*the ability to just ban all immigration. Because if the EO gets thrown out because it is deemed a "Muslim ban", then why not just ban everybody then? That way, it doesn't discriminate.