And maybe the worst in the long run (although it's hard to make that call) is #3, which simply dropped out of the news.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Thursday, December 31, 2020
We're up to our necks in shit
And as a character in Jo Nesbo's latest novel says, in that case, don't hang your head.
Disturbing
Perhaps those agents should be retired.The US Secret Service has been planning to bring back to the White House a group of agents that previously worked with President-elect Joe Biden when he was vice president to fill out his security detail.
[...]
The staffing changes, first reported by The Washington Post, also come amid concern from Biden allies about the political loyalty of some current agents to Trump, two people familiar with the situation told the newspaper. Some presidential detail members even encouraged other agents not to wear face masks this year, the Post reported, out of loyalty to the President, who didn't like the way they looked.
CNN
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Will Graham get crossways with McConnell?
Most Senate Republicans are giant dicks.Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) broke with his party's Senate leader Thursday, calling for a stand-alone vote on $2,000 stimulus checks.
"If you had a stand-alone vote on the $2,000 check, it might pass," Graham said while appearing on "Fox & Friends."
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has knocked the prospect of raising the stimulus checks that are going out to many Americans from $600 to $2,000, vowing the Senate would not pass a stand-alone bill increasing the amount.
[...]
McConnell has offered a competing measure that would tie an increase in the checks to removing a legal shield for tech companies and creating a commission to examine the 2020 elections. But that proposal is viewed as a non-starter for Democrats.
[...]
President Trump has pushed for the increase and the House passed one earlier this week, but most Senate Republicans are wary.
The Hill
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Trump finally responds to reports of Russian bounties on American soldiers in Afghanistan
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.The Trump administration is declassifying as-yet uncorroborated intelligence, recently briefed to President Trump, that indicates China offered to pay non-state actors in Afghanistan to attack American soldiers, two senior administration officials tell Axios.
[...]
Officials would not describe the source or sources of the intelligence or say when or over what period of time the activity occurred.
One said: "The U.S. has evidence that the PRC [People's Republic of China] attempted to finance attacks on American servicemen by Afghan non-state actors by offering financial incentives or 'bounties'" and said the National Security Council "is coordinating a whole-of-government investigation."
[...]
It seems "incongruous" that China would take such a provocative action in Afghanistan, Andrew Small, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund who specializes in China-Afghanistan affairs, told Axios.
Pursuing peace in Afghanistan is "one of the extremely rare areas where the US and China still have a willingness to work together on an area of importance," Small said. "They know the drawdown is taking place. We’re not in the context where anything else needs to happen to US troops in Afghanistan. There is no reason to create additional pressure on US forces."
Axios
Just using the Trump playbook
If by "Congress" he means Republicans, I concur. They've done the exact opposite of adopting measures to secure the integrity of our elections.Outgoing GOP Rep. Denver Riggleman (Va.) tore into Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) after Hawley sent out a fundraising email boosting his upcoming challenge to the Electoral College results.
“Of course he’s fundraising off fantasy,” Riggleman tweeted. “Getting ready for 2024. Using disinformation and conspiracies as a baseline for fundraising. Grift. Fooling people to take their money. #QAnon and conspiracy theories are the new ‘normal’. Shameful stuff.”
The rebuke comes after Hawley, a staunch ally of President Trump's, said he would object to the counting of Electoral College results during the Jan. 6 joint session of Congress.
Hawley became the first senator to join an effort by a host of Republican House members to contest the results of the election. His objection will ensure a debate in the House and Senate on the Electoral College tally.
[...]
"I cannot vote to certify without pointing out the unprecedented effort of mega corporations, including Facebook and Twitter, to interfere in this election, in support of Joe Biden. At the very least, Congress should investigate allegations of voter fraud and adopt measures to secure the integrity of our elections. But Congress has so far failed to act," Hawley [said].
The Hill
How did Facebook and Twitter interfere in the election?
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE:
How does McConnell keep getting elected?
And he doesn't give a shit about any of them.
Which is what Republicans do every chance they get. That's what the Trump tax cuts did. That's not what the $2,000 checks would do.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE:
Lin Wood, attorney filing lawsuits to overturn the election, is crying for help
UPDATE 1/4:
The man needs help.
Trump's a desperate man
And very dangerous.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Calling Michael Cohen.The Manhattan District Attorney's Office has retained forensic accounting specialists to aid its criminal investigation of President Trump and his business operations, as prosecutors ramp up their scrutiny of his company's real estate transactions, according to people familiar with the matter.
District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr. opened the investigation in 2018 to examine alleged hush-money payments made to two women who, during Trump’s first presidential campaign, claimed to have had affairs with him years earlier. The probe has since expanded, and now includes the Trump Organization's activities more broadly, said the people familiar with the matter. Vance’s office has suggested in court filings that bank, tax and insurance fraud are areas of exploration.
[...]
Vance has contracted with FTI Consulting to look for anomalies among a variety of property deals, and to advise the district attorney on whether the president’s company manipulated the value of certain assets to obtain favorable interest rates and tax breaks. [...] The probe is believed to encompass transactions spanning several years.
[...]
In July, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected Trump’s argument that, as president, he is immune from state court proceedings. Since then, he has argued that the subpoena for his financial information is deficient, amounts to political “harassment” and was issued in “bad faith.”
Though lower courts have rejected those arguments as well, the matter is once again before the Supreme Court. Trump has requested a stay, or a suspension of the proceedings, in his fight with Vance. If the president’s request is denied, the district attorney’s office should get immediate access to his tax records.
[...]
It is possible Vance could find evidence that the Trump Organization as a business entity has broken the law, without attaching personal liability to Trump or other individuals at his company. To bring criminal charges, the district attorney must be able to prove there was an intent to break the law — which probably would require the testimony of an insider witness, experts have said.
WaPo
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Gohmert and allied goobers are suing Mike Pence
It's because Pence drew the line at refusing to count Biden's electoral win on January 6.
Absolutely absurd. He has no such thing.The suit asks Texas federal judge appointed by Trump to declare that Pence has the “exclusive authority and sole discretion” to decide which electoral votes from a given state should be counted.
CNBC
When are these assholes going to get sanctioned?
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE: Dismissed. Of course. On the grounds that they lack standing. Unfortunately, the merits are not discussed. I should say, the lack of merits. Gohmert says he will appeal. I doubt it.
Wednesday, December 30, 2020
Clueless in Queens
Jesus wept.
...but hey, doq what you want...you will anyway.
His Nobel
Bets on whether he'll have a counterfeit medal made for himself?
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Burn it all down
Down to its final weeks, the Trump administration is working to push through dozens of environmental rollbacks that could weaken century-old protections for migratory birds, expand Arctic drilling and hamstring future regulation of public health threats.
The pending changes, which benefit oil and gas and other industries, deepen the challenges for President-elect Joe Biden, who made restoring and advancing protections for the environment, climate and public health a core piece of his campaign.
“We’re going to see a real scorched-earth effort here at the tail end of the administration,” said Brian Rutledge, a vice president at the National Audubon SocietyMany of the final rollbacks still pending under the Trump administration have significant implications for oil and gas companies. That includes the administration’s steps this week toward a sale of energy leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.Some decisions, if they go into effect, will be easy for Biden to simply reverse. He already has pledged to return the United States to the Paris climate accord as a first step in his own $2 trillion climate plan. But he faces years of work in court and within agencies to repair major Trump cuts to the nation’s framework of environmental protections.
[...]
Many of the final rollbacks still pending under the Trump administration have significant implications for oil and gas companies. That includes the administration’s steps this week toward a sale of energy leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
[...]
If Democrats win both, they’ll control the Senate and the House and will be in position to invoke the Congressional Review Act, which allows Congress to strike down newly approved regulations. Otherwise, outside parties could sue or the Biden administration would have to undertake the often lengthy process of reversing changes that are fully enacted before Trump leaves office.
AP
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Another preventable Covid-19 death
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Bad SCOTUS
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Tuesday, December 29, 2020
McConnell lays out his bargaining chips
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE: GOP senator adding pressure.
Suck harder, GOP Trumpies
Even Gohmert isn't this stupid. It's just an attempt to kiss further up Trump's ass.Vice President Pence was sued Sunday by Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) and several other Republicans in a far-fetched bid that appeared aimed at overturning President-elect Joe Biden's election win.
The lawsuit focuses on Pence’s role in an upcoming Jan. 6 meeting of Congress to count states’ electoral votes and finalize Biden’s victory over President Trump. Typically, the vice president’s role in presiding over the meeting is a largely ceremonial one governed by an 1887 federal law known as the Electoral Count Act.
But the Republican lawsuit, which was filed against Pence in his official capacity as vice president, asks a federal judge in Texas to strike down the law as unconstitutional. The GOP plaintiffs go further: They ask the court to grant Pence the authority on Jan. 6 to effectively overturn Trump’s defeat in key battleground states.
The Hill
And here's the pleading naming the ass kissers:
How long will Trump make Maxwell wait for a pardon?
She surely has a lot of dirt on a lot of Trump bigwigs, including Trump.A federal judge on Monday denied Ghislaine Maxwell's renewed request to be released on bail, saying the former Jeffrey Epstein associate accused of being an accomplice in his sex trafficking operation poses a flight risk.
U.S. District Court Judge Alison Nathan had ruled in July against Maxwell's request to be released on a $5 million bond while awaiting trial.
The Hill
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Un.fucking.believable
Rigged! There is NOTHING to admire about Donald Trump.President Trump has ended former President Obama's 12-year run as the most admired man in America, edging out his predecessor in the annual Gallup survey released Tuesday.
[...]
The sitting U.S. president has been named the pollster’s most-admired man in 60 out of 74 years, including all eight years of Obama’s presidency and every year of George W. Bush’s presidency except for 2008. Trump had finished second to Obama in 2017 and 2018.
[...]
Eighteen percent of the survey's respondents named Trump as their most admired man, compared to 15 percent who named Obama and 6 percent who named President-elect Joe Biden. Three percent named National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director Anthony Fauci, while 2 percent chose Pope Francis.
The Hill
Maybe he'll be placated for a while.
Uh-oh
We can guess.The Hotel Harrington released a statement on Monday saying the hotel will shut down between Monday, Jan. 4, and Wednesday, Jan. 6, as Trump’s supporters plan to protest that Wednesday when Congress is scheduled to certify the election results.
The hotel said it will not host guests except for long-term residents and it will provide refunds to all prepaid reservations made for during that time period.
[...]
The hotel bar, known as Harry’s, has also seen an influx of Proud Boys members, and its website said it will not operate on Jan. 5 and 6.
[...]
The Hotel Harrington announced it would close the three days next week after The Washington Post published an article detailing how the Proud Boys have been gathering at the hotel in recent months.
[...]
The closure will come after the president has predicted a “wild” protest in D.C. on Jan. 6 — the day Congress is expected to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s election win.
[...]
“While we cannot control what happens outside of the hotel, we are taking additional steps to protect the safety of our visitors, guests and employees.”
[...]
Two employees at the hotel and bar told the Post that the Proud Boys’ presence at their workplace has intimidated some of the workers, many of whom are Black and Hispanic.
[...]
The expected demonstration will follow after Trump supporters took to the streets on the night of Dec. 12, with many wearing helmets and bulletproof vests and shouting “F--- antifa!” among other chants.
The D.C. police worked to separate the pro-Trump demonstrators from protesters near Black Lives Matter Plaza. When several Proud Boys members could not break through the police line, some took and burnt a Black Lives Matter banner from a church.
Clashes between the groups of protesters resulted in at least four people being stabbed near Harry’s, although police have not revealed the political motivations of those involved, according to the Post.
The Hill
Sure, and double the current room rate.
Democracy tested
So far, democracy is successfully waging a defense against Trumpism. But Trumpism has not been conquered.
I have no doubt Georgia Republicans will file an appeal. Hopefully, the Supreme Court will hold firm and deny standing as they have in other Trumpist state case battles. Republicans will keep working to change the courts and the laws to favor Republicans and disenfranchise voters who vote against them. The battle is more out in the open and more dire than it has ever been.Two Georgia counties must reverse their decision to purge thousands from voter rolls in advance of the state’s 5 January runoff elections that will determine whether Democrats or Republicans control the US Senate.
Georgia federal judge Leslie Abrams Gardner said in an order filed late on Monday that these two counties appeared to have improperly relied on unverified change-of-address information to invalidate voter registrations, Reuters reported.
Guardian
She'll be getting MAGA death threats. Bet on it.“Defendants are enjoined from removing any challenged voters in Ben Hill and Muscogee Counties from the registration lists on the basis of National Change of Address data,” she said in the court order. This judge is the sister of Stacey Abrams, the Democratic activist who lost a race for Georgia governor in 2018.
Monday, December 28, 2020
Oh my
Those were the two things Trump objected to. But that he was willing to veto a bill that provided for the troops surprised me. If he still actually thought he could overturn the election, I bet he wouldn't have risked it.The House voted on Monday to override President Trump’s veto of the annual military policy bill.
[...]
The 322-to-87 vote is the first time a chamber of Congress has agreed to override one of Mr. Trump’s vetoes, underscoring the sweeping popularity of the military legislation, which authorizes a pay raise for the nation’s troops.
[...]
Included in the military policy bill are a number of bipartisan measures, including new benefits for tens of thousands of Vietnam-era veterans who were exposed to Agent Orange, a 3 percent increase in pay for service members and a boost in hazardous duty incentive pay.
It would also take steps to slow or block Mr. Trump’s planned drawdown of American troops from Germany and Afghanistan, and would make it more difficult for the president to deploy military personnel to the southern border.
The legislation also directly addresses the protests for racial justice spurred over the summer by the killing of Black Americans, including George Floyd, at the hands of the police. It would require all federal officers enforcing crowd control at protests and demonstrations to identify themselves and their agencies. And it contains the bipartisan measure that directs the Pentagon to begin the process of renaming military bases named after Confederate leaders.
NYT
Even the cowards know that withholding money for troops is a sure loser.Senior lawmakers shepherding the legislation had hoped that mustering a veto-proof majority in favor of it would cow Mr. Trump into signing the bill. Their willingness to mow over Mr. Trump’s objections to advance the measure was a stark departure from the deference the president has normally received on Capitol Hill.
Which should not have been overridden.Lawmakers have tried — but failed — to override Mr. Trump’s vetoes of legislation cutting off arms sales to Saudi Arabia and other Persian Gulf nations, and a doomed attempt to overturn his emergency declaration at the southwestern border.
[...]
The last time Congress overrode a presidential veto was in 2016, the final year of Barack Obama’s presidency, after he vetoed legislation allowing families of the victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to sue the government of Saudi Arabia.
Tight spot for the GOP. All they can do is blame Sanders for the delay, and I'm sure they will.The margin surpassed the two-thirds majority needed to force enactment of the bill over Mr. Trump’s objections. The Senate, which must also get approval from two-thirds of its chamber, will take up the legislation later in the week.
But attempts to quickly pass it in the Senate could be complicated by Senator Bernie Sanders, independent of Vermont, who said on Monday that he would delay consideration of the military bill unless lawmakers voted on a separate bill — one that would increase the size of individual stimulus checks to $2,000.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE:
CASH Act passed the House
Will McConnell put it to a vote in the Senate?The House on Monday passed legislation that would increase the amount of direct payments in the recently signed coronavirus relief package from $600 to $2,000.
The bill passed in a 275-134 vote, with support from 44 Republicans.
The Hill
I don't see how he can survive if he doesn't bring it up.Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), a member of Senate Republican leadership, said last week that he didn’t think a bill to increase the stimulus checks to $2,000 could pass in the upper chamber.
[...]
Trump brought up Monday’s previously planned House vote in his statement over the weekend and said the Senate would “start the process” for a vote that would increase the size of the direct payments to $2,000. However, a statement from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) issued Sunday made no mention of a Senate vote.
They'll pay. And perhaps with losses in the Georgia runoff. Since Trump supported the $2,000 checks, Trump supporters will support it. Not to mention, a lot of Trump supporters - maybe most of them - desperately need it.Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (N.Y.) said Monday he would try to pass the House measure on Tuesday. His attempt is likely to be thwarted by Republicans, despite support from some GOP senators.
Still peanuts.Monday's bill in the House, known as the CASH Act, would increase the size of payments for both eligible adults and children from $600 to $2,000. Individuals with income of up to $75,000 and married couples with income up to $150,000 would be eligible for the full amount. The amounts would decrease above those income thresholds.
[...]
Republicans generally opposed the bill, expressing concerns about its impact on the deficit and arguing that the checks would not be well targeted.
[...]
The bill would also allow adult dependents, such as college students, disabled adults and elderly relatives, to be eligible for both $2,000 payments and the $500 payments authorized by the CARES Act in March.
The Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that the bill would cost about $464 billion. That’s on top of the $164 billion estimated cost of the $600 payments.
Go for it.Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) is planning to slow down the Senate's vote on overriding President Trump's veto of a mammoth defense policy bill unless leadership agrees to hold a vote on increasing the amount of recently passed coronavirus relief checks from $600 to $2,000.
[...]
"This week on the Senate floor Mitch McConnell wants to vote to override Trump's veto of the $740 billion defense funding bill and then head home for the New Year. I'm going to object until we get a vote on legislation to provide a $2,000 direct payment to the working class," Sanders tweeted.
[...]
Sanders can't ultimately prevent the Senate from voting on whether to override Trump's veto of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which initially passed the Senate earlier this month in a 84-13 vote, with Sanders voting "no" at the time.
But McConnell is likely to have to move to break a rare filibuster of the veto override effort, forcing it to overcome a 60-vote procedural hurdle and delaying a final vote on Trump's veto message for days until later this week. The veto override will ultimately need a two-thirds vote to pass the Senate.
[...]
"I will be joining @BernieSanders in blocking the defense bill until we get a vote on $2000 in direct cash relief. That relief passed in the House today with 44 Republicans voting for it. Senate Republicans must do the same and get the American people the help they need," [Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.)] tweeted.
The Hill
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE 12/29:
Nashville's suicide bomber
Leap.uthorities in Nashville said Sunday that Anthony Quinn Warner was responsible for an explosion on Christmas morning that damaged dozens of businesses in the city's downtown area.
During a press conference Sunday, investigators declared that they matched human remains at the scene to the 63-year-old Warner's DNA and matched a vehicle identification number to a registration associated with him.
[...]
Authorities did not provide any insight on a possible motive for the explosion. However, Nashville Mayor John Cooper told CBS News' Face the Nation on Sunday that the presence of an AT&T building in the area of Friday's blast may have indicated it was intended as an attack on the service.
UPI
No, it doesn't."To all of us locally, it feels like there has to be some connection with the AT&T facility and the site of the bombing," he said. "That's a bit of just local insight in because it's got to have something to do with the infrastructure."
Age-old story.The first clue emerged pointing toward a possible motive; WSMV-TV’s Jeremy Finley is reporting that FBI agents have been “pursuing tips that he (Warner) was paranoid about 5g spying on Americans.” Since the pandemic hit, conspiracy theories have raged that 5G cell phone towers spread COVID-19; scientists have found the claims baseless, according to BBC. In May, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security warned of the potential for attacks by 5G conspiracy theorists against cell towers and wireless providers. However, that’s only one motive being considered, the television station reported. Asked about the possible 5G motive, authorities said only, “We’re aware of certain things online, and we’re looking at every possible angle.”
[...]
In 2018, the Intercept alleged that NSA electronic spying facilities were located in AT&T buildings in cities across the country.
[...]
Authorities said in the news conference that a label of domestic terrorism has to be tied to a political or social ideology. “We haven’t tied to that yet,” they said, as a definite motive remains a mystery so far.
The song “Downtown” by Petula Clark was playing from the RV right before the blast, authorities said. That song’s lyrics start, “When you’re alone and life is making you lonely, you can always go downtown…”
It appears that Warner was shedding elements of his already isolated life in recent weeks; he gave up a job earlier this month and gave up his house for nothing to a California woman last month.
[...]
It was the second house he’d quit claimed to her in the past year, although the reason is unclear.
[...]
Warner, who was unmarried and childless, was self-employed in the IT area, a neighbor said; state records show he once was licensed as an alarm contractor, with a specialty in burglar alarm installation.
In recent years, the reclusive Warner, known as Tony to some, lost a father and brother, leaving him with few living family members.
[...]
Warner worked as a contract laborer doing computer consulting but told the company by email earlier this month that he wasn’t going to work for them anymore. The owner told the newspaper that Warner seemed “very personable” and the bombing “quite out of character.”
Heavy
Oh, and...
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.Snopes debunked another conspiracy theory – one that alleges that AT&T had a contract to audit Dominion voting systems.
[...]
To AT&T, we asked whether the Dominion forensic audit claims were true and whether it’s true the facility in Nashville was used as an NSA substation/hub/facility. Jim Greer, spokesman for AT&T, told Heavy in an email, “I can confirm the conspiracy theory about Dominion is not true. Anything related to the investigation or the government, I’d have to refer you to law enforcement.”
Sunday, December 27, 2020
He'll sign
What does that mean? Jack shit?Donald Trump has signed the Covid-19 relief and spending bill after days of delays, preventing a mid-pandemic government shutdown.
[...]
Sunday night Trump released a statement that he had signed the bill, saying it was his “responsibility to protect the people of our country from the economic devastation and hardship” caused by coronavirus.
“As president, I have told Congress that I want far less wasteful spending and more money going to the American people in the form of $2,000 checks per adult and $600 per child.
“I will sign the omnibus and Covid package with a strong message that makes clear to Congress that wasteful items need to be removed. I will send back to Congress a redlined version, item by item, accompanied by the formal rescission request to Congress insisting that those funds be removed from the bill.
Guardian
I don't know. Maybe the stock market?It was not immediately clear why Trump changed his mind as his resistance to the massive legislative package promised a chaotic final stretch of his presidency.
Thank you, President Trump. Despicable POS.Stock markets in Asia ticked upwards on news that Trump had signed the bill, and US stock futures rose 0.4%.
[...]
Earlier on Sunday, Republican senator Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania said he understood that Trump “wants to be remembered for advocating for big checks, but the danger is he’ll be remembered for chaos and misery and erratic behavior if he allows this to expire”.
Toomey added: “So I think the best thing to do, as I said, sign this and then make the case for subsequent legislation.”
The same point was echoed by Maryland’s governor, Larry Hogan, a Republican who has criticised Trump’s pandemic response and his efforts to undo the election results. “I just gave up guessing what he might do next,” he said.
Republican representative Adam Kinzinger of Illinois said too much was at stake for Trump to “play this old switcheroo game”.
“I don’t get the point,” he said. “I don’t understand what’s being done, why, unless it’s just to create chaos and show power and be upset because you lost the election.”
[...]
And already, his opposition has had consequences, as two federal programs providing unemployment aid expired on Saturday.
Lauren Bauer of the Brookings Institution had calculated that at least 11 million people would lose aid immediately as a result of Trump’s failure to sign the legislation; millions more would exhaust other unemployment benefits within weeks.
How and when people are affected by the lapse depends on the state they live in, the program they are relying on and when they applied for benefits.
In some states, people on regular unemployment insurance will continue to receive payments under a program that extends benefits when the jobless rate surpassed a certain threshold.
[...]
About 9.5 million people, however, had been relying on the pandemic unemployment assistance program that expired altogether Saturday. That program made unemployment insurance available to freelancers, gig workers and others normally not eligible. After receiving their last checks, those recipients will not be able to file for more aid, Stettner said.
And that's being kind.Joe Biden, who won November’s presidential election and who will be sworn in as Trump’s successor on 20 January, accused him of an “abdication of responsibility” in a statement on Saturday.
Trump was going to sign the bill as soon as it was probable that Congress would override his veto. He couldn't stand being a loser over that, too. Mostly, he just wanted to throw another tantrum and suck up journalistic oxygen. His worst nightmare will be when Biden outpaces him in media coverage. Well, second worst. First is that his criminal finance activities will be revealed in New York courts.
UPDATE:
Mnuchin's legacy up in flames
They're all going up in flames here at the end. They all deserve it.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Oh well, he's only got a few weeks left anyway.Mnuchin had emerged with the unique ability to walk a tightrope between Trump and congressional leaders, serving as an emissary in difficult negotiations. That all ended on Tuesday, when Trump posted a video on Twitter ridiculing the agreement.
[...]
[Trump's] demand for $2,000 stimulus checks is a direct rejection of the $600 checks that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin had personally proposed and negotiated with Democrats and Republicans. Now, Trump’s rejection of the deal has confounded many leaders on Capitol Hill because they had thought Mnuchin negotiated the package on behalf of the president. The treasury chief’s standing with many lawmakers is now in tatters just days before a full-blown crisis is set to occur.
WaPo
Where have we heard that story before?The president’s denunciation of the agreement represented a stunning public broadside against his own treasury secretary, who for four years loyally shielded the president’s tax returns, endured repeated presidential tirades in private, and defended even Trump’s most incendiary and contradictory remarks.
Does this look like someone who CAN be embarrassed?[Mnuchin] rejected House Democrats’ attempt to secure Trump’s tax returns, despite a 1924 law explicitly giving them authority to obtain the documents. He defended the president’s handling of protests by white nationalists in Charlottesville in 2017, as well as the president’s derogatory remarks of Black House Democrats.
[...]
The president has privately complained to congressional Republicans that Mnuchin was “giving away the store” in negotiations to congressional Democrats and wondered if he was not pushing back hard enough against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
Trump has also repeatedly berated Mnuchin, fuming at his treasury secretary over small-business aid that went to the Los Angeles Lakers and launching into an explosive tirade over Federal Reserve Chair Jerome H. Powell. Mnuchin in 2017 recommended to the president the selection of Powell.
[...]
Mnuchin has been a very positive force,” said Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.), who became close with Mnuchin and goes for long bike rides with him. “But everyone who has ever tried to speak for Donald Trump has had their legs cut out from under them eventually.”
[...]
“Loyalty and assistance to President Trump generally gets rewarded with humiliation. This is how it ends for a lot of people who work for the guy,” said Brian Riedl, a conservative policy expert at the Manhattan Institute, a right-leaning think tank. “Secretary Mnuchin has been completely embarrassed.”
It's not limited to Congress.In addition to a possible government shutdown on Tuesday, the entire emergency relief package is in jeopardy. The $600 stimulus checks Mnuchin had promised would be sent later this week cannot be sent if the bill isn’t signed into law. And a range of other emergency relief programs that were part of the package, from rental protections to small-business aid, airline assistance and vaccine distribution money, are also now frozen. Congressional leaders have signaled they will make one last attempt to avert a shutdown on Monday, but their options are dwindling.
[...]
“We’ve been assured that the president would sign the bill, and I have no reason to believe that Secretary Mnuchin didn’t believe that,” Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), a member of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s leadership team, told reporters on Thursday. Mnuchin had described the bipartisan deal as “fabulous” one day before Trump called it a “disgrace.”
[...]
Mnuchin was blindsided by the video despite spending months as Trump’s principal negotiator with Congress on the aid package, according to two administration officials with knowledge of the matter.
[...]
[A]ides say the two have barely spoken since. It remains unclear if Trump will sign the bill or veto it.
[...]
The $600 payments were Mnuchin’s idea and formed the centerpiece of a proposal sent by the White House to congressional Democrats earlier this month. The details of that plan were public 13 days before the president made his objections public.
[...]
Trump also attacked the foreign aid package included in a government spending bill coupled with the coronavirus relief package. The bill passed last week had more money for some of these programs than Trump had sought in his budget proposal earlier this year, but congressional leaders did not expect Trump to raise any objections to the funding after it was passed because aides had signed off on the package beforehand.
Trump’s shocking move to possibly blow up the agreement appears to have been his idea alone, according to two people briefed on the matter by White House staff.
[...]
Trump decided to risk torpedoing the effort while raging against congressional Republicans on Twitter for not supporting his effort to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election. Trump has also expressed anger at congressional Democrats for not agreeing to a stimulus package before the presidential election.
[...]
The president has not called congressional Democratic leaders in more than a year.
[...]
The result is that Trump’s final economic act in office could be to block an emergency relief package negotiated by his treasury secretary even as the U.S. economy is battered by a surge in coronavirus cases and a new wave of shutdowns.
As many as 14 million jobless Americans received their last unemployment benefits on Saturday. Millions more could lose their homes as an eviction moratorium expires at the end of the year. Both these cliffs would have been avoided had the president signed the stimulus deal.
[...]
“He’s just angry at everybody and wants to inflict as much pain on Congress as possible,” one person briefed by White House officials on the matter said.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Nasty Trump tweets may not be affecting SCOTUS decisions
But they're surely not good for his cause.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Gettin' his whine's worth
Funny, I don't recall him concerned about the GOP Senate not wanting to see or hear any proof of the impeachment charges against him.
Fake president indeed.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Why you're not getting any Covid relief
So, because Twitter is mean to him by adding notations to his ridiculous eleciton loss tweets saying they're disputed, and he wants to preserve Confederate sympathies, and he can't get his tweets out fast enough, the whole country will suffer pandemic-induced homelessness, economic disaster, and death. He hasn't made any effort to "bring our troops back home." And the troops and their families know it. He shuffles them around, which is nothing new.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
But how many Republicans will be willing to override the veto, even though Trump will no longer be president? They're all looking at his power and control over Republican voters.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has said he would call the Senate back to session on December 29 for a veto override vote.
Both the Senate and the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives, which is expected to hold its veto override vote on December 28, need two-thirds majorities to get past Trump’s veto.
The House voted 335 to 78 on December 8 in favour of the bill, while the legislation passed in the Senate by a vote of 84 in favour to 13 against.
alJazeera
Are you sure it's the last vacation? There's still another four weeks.
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