Month: September 2017

 
From Tommy Christopher:

The Republicans’ last-ditch attempt to pass Trumpcare looks like it may have been defeated by the unlikely team of Jimmy Kimmel and Sen. John McCain (and all of the Democrats, of course), which means that Congress will soon be looking for an alternative.

Luckily, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders should have one right in her back pocket, if some reporter would only ask her about it. In July, Sanders promised to find out where Americans could buy health insurance for $12 a year:

– More –
 

Wondering why a few conservative friends are less than impressed.

• Yellow Dog at Blue in the Bluegrass tells us what Republican plan (come on, we can guess) will cost Kentucky almost $12 billion, and how the Governor will handle it.
   
• Jon Perr at PERRspectives explains the heart of the newest Republican program to repeal and replace Obamacare with block grants to states to do with as they please. We will then be able to rely on the good faith and best intentions of state and local Republicans.
   
• @bjork55 at Bjork Report brings in Lewis Black to explain to Republicans what health insurance actually is. Educational rants are the best.
   
• nojo at Stinque considers one Senator and the health care debate, and has a hard time coming to terms with obsessive inhumanity.
   
• North Carolina pastor John Pavlovitz applies that theme more generally, telling Republicans he simply does not understand their embrace of cruelty.
   
• Lots of debate these days about whether a single-payer system would be better than Obamacare, whether it is practical, whether it is even possible. Libertarian Michael A. LaFerrara at Principled Perspectives covers some of that before going straight for transcendence. He concludes single-payer would be immoral.
   
• Jonathan Bernstein has been following Republican tax reform efforts. He reports that our national lawmakers are less concerned with actual reform, which is hard, than they are with an easier goal: tax cuts for the wealthy to be sold as tax cuts for you.
   
• Our favorite Earth-Bound Misfit provides a condensed explanation of Donald Trump’s foreign policy.
   
• Tommy Christopher examines the new trending word dotard as those of third grade mentality proxy-fight nuclear war. Tommy makes reference to William Shatner’s wonderfully terrible butchering of ‘Rocket Man’ the night of January 20 1978, an evening which will live in infamy.
   
• This week’s note in Trumpian ‘Alternative Facts’ comes from The Washington Post, reporting that the Trump Administration ordered up a report on how much refuges have cost the US in the past decade. They were shocked by the answer. So did they revise their position in light of new evidence? Nope. They buried the report.
   
• President Obama took less vacation time than President Bush, and a whole lot less than President Trump at this point in his Presidency. But the attacks about his time off were unrelenting. Something about presumed laziness, I suppose. Jack Jodell at The Saturday Afternoon Post takes note of President Trump’s continuous retreats from a job he seems not to like and suggests a better solution.
   
• driftglass brings back fictional Winston Wolfe from fictional “Pulp Fiction” fiction to buzzsaw Kathleen Parker for mindless both siderism. I confess to some bias on that. I don’t mind truth-in-the-middle, both-sides-do-it as a legitimate conclusion. I object to it as an unexamined premise.
   
• I do remember how Wheaton College in our neighboring state of Illinois made a professor’s life very hard for suggesting that Muslims and Christians worship the same God. As if we don’t.
   
  Michael John Scott of MadMikesAmerica contrasts that quick firm action with the story of 5 students who kidnapped and sodomized a classmate. The college kept the rape secret for a year, then punished the criminals, requiring of them hours of community service and a written essay. Poor lads. I’m glad Michael didn’t mention the college was founded by Methodists.
   
• John Scalzi at Whatever has fun with a critic who insists Scalzi will never be able to generate an income from writing.
   
• Infidel753 considers internet ads that clog the browser and suggests they can’t be producing results, except to annoy users.
   
• In The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser, Bruce recounts a searing experience from years ago and why, to this day, he cannot bring himself to drink Sprite. Yuck.
   

 
On Monday, we linked to a piece by T. Paine at Saving Common Sense quoting President Obama on immigration reform:

… for me to – simply through Executive Order – ignore those Congressional mandates would not conform with my appropriate role as President.

He then excoriated Obama for taking exactly the action he had described as unconstitutional.

He praised, at least in title, President Trump for defending the Constitution by rescinding DACA, but encouraged Congress to enact an equivalent law protecting Americans brought here as immigrant children.

As might be expected, some conversation resulted.
Continue reading “Saturday Rate of Exchange:
Was DACA Unconstitutional?”

 
From Vixen Strangely at Strangely Blogged:

At President Trump’s UN speech yesterday, the cameras caught Chief of Staff John Kelly in a studious face-palm, looking not unlike a college basketball coach whose team was down by 40 points at the half, trying to convince himself that this was a young team in a building year, and surely, the recruiters hadn’t been having him on. The White House can try and tell us he’s just tired because of Trump’s vigorous schedule or what have you, but I think the real story is–he can’t not know that this speech boxed Trump in and fubar’d his options massively.

This was a speech Trump gave as if for one of his rallies for the maybe 30% die-hards who need to hear his MAGA line of business. But he gave it in front of an audience of world leaders, and this was not the speech he needed to give to them.

– More –
 

 
From The Intersection of Madness and Reality:

Enters Jemele Hill to call out the president for all of his contribution to the chaos. Not one to cower to white tears and mayo-splaining, Hill kept things quite honest. She noted the singular issue that most people have with Donald Trump: he is a white supremacist president. She made it known that Trump was the most “ignorant, offensive president” of her lifetime and that his rise was a direct result of white supremacy. In all, Jemele Hill reflected on the thoughts of millions of other U.S. citizens.

However, ESPN wasn’t having it. So, she apologized. ESPN accepted the apology. And life is moving on.

The malarkey doesn’t stop there.

– More –
 

 
From Frances Langum:

Mike Pence is for some reason… this Thursday…. when Congress is out of town…. the guest on the morning talk shows. For now I’ll spare you the Fox and Friends tongue bath and highlight this revealing moment from CBS This Morning:

CHARLIE ROSE: Do you believe – Mr. Mueller is exceeding his jurisdiction?

MIKE PENCE: Well I think that’s for others to say. What I can assure you is that we’re fully cooperating with the special counsel and we’ll continue to do that. I’ve made clear that during my time on the campaign I was not aware of any contacts or any collusion with Russian officials. I stand by that and as I said we’ll provide any information the special counsel requires, but honestly, this is not what the American people are focused on.

What, no declaration of innocence for the so-called president? Just, not me?

– More –
 

 

Senators Bill Cassidy and Lindsey Graham, Governor Chris Christie, and Fox TV Personality Brian Kilmeade mockingly accuse Jimmy Kimmel of ignorance about Health Care.

Jimmy Kimmel responds here.

Wondering why a few conservative friends see our former President as “an arrogant buffoon”.