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PoliGAF 2017 |OT4| The leaks are coming from inside the white house

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pigeon

Banned
You would lose lots of votes for this. More pragmatically, you could just allow it to rise with inflation, which is such a technical change nobody would care.

The McConnell rule de facto abolishes the debt ceiling and it passed last year on a temporary basis. I think we should try to get it passed on a permanent basis.
 
@JDiamond1
SPOTTED at private 2013 dinner with @realDonaldTrump & Agalarovs: Ike Kaveladze, 8th person at Trump Tower meeting

http://www.cnn.com/2017/07/18/politics/eighth-man-trump-tower-meeting-russia/index.html ...
DFB8sT1U0AAsjui.jpg

Hey CNN, you want to mention Ike having been implicated in money laundering in the past?
 

Dan

No longer boycotting the Wolfenstein franchise
Hey CNN, you want to mention Ike having been implicated in money laundering in the past?
From WaPo's piece, a little more on the old investigation.
According to the GAO, Kaveladze opened 236 bank accounts in the U.S. for corporations formed in Delaware on behalf of mostly Russian brokers. Kaveladze told officers of two U.S. banks that he had conducted investigations of the Russian companies for which he opened accounts. However, he told GAO investigators that was not truthful.

“He admitted to us that he made such representations to the banks but that he in fact had not investigated the companies,” the report said.


All told, the report traced the movement of $1.4 billion in wire transfer transactions deposited in to 236 accounts opened at the two banks, Citibank and Commercial Bank.

The report said that IBC and an associated firm established those accounts and that more than $800 million was wired from foreign countries in to IBC-related accounts.
Mmm hmm.
 

Drkirby

Corporate Apologist
This horrible congress has to pass a budget and raise the debt ceiling within the next 2 months. We're fucked. The President and ruling party don't not own stuff by just claiming they don't, lol. The GOP controls the entirety of government + the Senate has changed the rules repeatedly just to try to make stuff easier on themselves and still can't pull it off. They're on the hook for absolutely everything. Never mind the twisted, inhuman logic behind hoping people suffer so much they might come back and negotiate.
I really don't think the debt ceiling will be a real debate this time and will be Rubber Stamped like in the Bush years. It was only a hot topic on Obama, since the Republicans just wanted him to look bad.

The Budget is another story, that I expect to be a huge struggle.
 

Slacker

Member
The awesome Katy Tur on what she wants to name her hour on MSNBC:

Katy Tur @KatyTurNBC
I'm trying to name it "Get TURnt" but it's not going well.
 

kirblar

Member
Yeah, in light of this latest stuff...

I think it's safe to say that the issues with the GOP legislative agenda are structural. The titanic rifts in ideology and general lack of policy aptitude is going to sink them going forward.
Who could have imagined trying to lead from the extreme flank instead of capturing the middle could go badly?
 

Stinkles

Clothed, sober, cooperative
Yeah, in light of this latest stuff...

I think it's safe to say that the issues with the GOP legislative agenda are structural. The titanic rifts in ideology and general lack of policy aptitude is going to sink them going forward.


More and more they look like a coalition of racists, corporatists, libertarians, evangelicals and straight up loons. They have no unified philosophy beyond "not democrats."
 
Who could have imagined trying to lead from the extreme flank instead of capturing the middle could go badly?

Certainly not me!

Maybe me.

We talk a lot about Dems in Disarray here, and to an extent it's true, but looking at this healthcare bill... when Democrats want to do healthcare reform, we're all basically on the same page in terms of overall direction: we want to make insurance cheaper and more available. There'll be strong differences on exactly how to accomplish that, but everybody's agreed on the end goal.

With Republicans, they can't even do that. Part of why these bills were such disasters is that they couldn't really get behind the idea of reforming health care in their health care bill, so there were all these bizarre wrinkles where people just didn't think stuff through or actively worked against their policy outcomes or didn't even have anything to DO with them, like the tax cuts.
 
Wow, they're broken.
The crazy thing is after the midterms when Democrats hopefully control the House, I could totally see Trump signing off on some Democratic bills. Dude just wants a win more than anything, he doesn't care who gives it to him and the Senate would likely neuter anything too progressive anyway.

I would never have imagined the party having to take this route after six months with a full majority. Like Christ, this party is just bankrupt.

Wonder if the August recess is still partially canceled.
 
Certainly not me!

Maybe me.

We talk a lot about Dems in Disarray here, and to an extent it's true, but looking at this healthcare bill... when Democrats want to do healthcare reform, we're all basically on the same page in terms of overall direction: we want to make insurance cheaper and more available. There'll be strong differences on exactly how to accomplish that, but everybody's agreed on the end goal.

With Republicans, they can't even do that. Part of why these bills were such disasters is that they couldn't really get behind the idea of reforming health care in their health care bill, so there were all these bizarre wrinkles where people just didn't think stuff through or actively worked against their policy outcomes or didn't even have anything to DO with them, like the tax cuts.

I don't think the Democrats are in disarray at all. I think there's just a tiny niche subset of the Democrats that wish the Democrats were in disarray so they could seize control.

Wonder if the August recess is still partially canceled.

At this point McConnell might just cancel it out of spite. Doubt he could possibly lose any more respect or control than he lost over the last month.
 

Drkirby

Corporate Apologist
Yeah, in light of this latest stuff...

I think it's safe to say that the issues with the GOP legislative agenda are structural. The titanic rifts in ideology and general lack of policy aptitude is going to sink them going forward.
They don't have a real platform, the Freedom Caucus people just cripples them in the house, and the Senate doesn't have a large enough majority to ignore the democrats. They are a collocation of a bunch of various right learning political ideologies, that pretends to be a unified party.
 

Piecake

Member
And now Sessions wants to end it. Just to be clear about what this would do: Sessions wants to force federal forfeiture law onto states whose legislatures have explicitly rejected it. And he wants to do this to expand a policy that even conservative groups feel is unfair and unjust, that studies have shown is biased by class and race, and that 80 to 85 percent of Americans oppose.

Sessions claims to be a federalist — an advocate for “states’ rights” and local control. But he makes exceptions. What’s interesting is when he makes exceptions and when he doesn’t. For example, Sessions thinks the Voting Rights Act — which aims to preserve the voting rights of minorities — is intrusive federal meddling. He thinks that Justice Department’s investigations into police abuses — which frequently include allegations of racial bias, and tend to be disproportionately directed at minorities — are also intrusive federal meddling. He thinks that requiring states to recognize same sex marriage — a protection for a minority group — is intrusive federal meddling. He feels the same way about adding sexual orientation to the list of categories protected by federal hate crimes laws, and about requiring states to protect transgender students — again, these are all protections for a specific minority group.

So where does Sessions make exceptions to “states’ rights”? For starters, he thinks sanctuary cities should be punished for not enforcing federal immigration law, despite the wishes of the people who live in those cities, and despite protests from law enforcement that doing so would make those cities more dangerous. The people likely to be hassled by Sessions’s favored policy here are, of course, also minorities, whether they’re citizens, legal residents or undocumented. He has expressed his desire to impose federal law on the states that have legalized recreational marijuana. Though Sessions hasn’t yet openly targeted those states, that’s likely more for practical reasons than ideological ones. He is on record expressing support for enforcing federal drug laws in those states and reportedly has sought support from members of Congress to target medical marijuana distributors in states where the drug is legal. Marijuana prohibition, like all drug prohibition, also disproportionately targets minority groups. And now, Sessions wants to reinstate the adoption program, which would essentially impose federal civil forfeiture law on states that have explicitly acted to make forfeiture more difficult. Forfeiture too disproportionately affects minority groups.

Perhaps it’s all just coincidence. But there’s really only one principle that remains consistent through Sessions’s various positions on these issues. And it isn’t federalism.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...except-when-he-doesnt/?utm_term=.791752f7a8d6
 
Yeah, in light of this latest stuff...

I think it's safe to say that the issues with the GOP legislative agenda are structural. The titanic rifts in ideology and general lack of policy aptitude is going to sink them going forward.

There were a lot of warning signs even when they first took the House that people didn't see because they chalked it up to Obama/GOP fighting rather than internal tensions.
 
The crazy thing is after the midterms when Democrats hopefully control the House, I could totally see Trump signing off on some Democratic bills. Dude just wants a win more than anything, he doesn't care who gives it to him and the Senate would likely neuter anything too progressive anyway.

I would never have imagined the party having to take this route after six months with a full majority. Like Christ, this party is just bankrupt.

Wonder if the August recess is still partially canceled.
If they decide to hold the repeal vote this week, I'll bet it won't be unless they want to get some confirmations out of the way and clear the schedule for the Debt/Budget fight.
 
so much winning

@JenniferShutt
.@SenateMajLdr: We’ll be moving on to comprehensive tax reform and infrastructure.

@JenniferShutt
Just a reminder that Congress needs to adopt a fiscal 2018 budget resolution before a tax bill can move through reconciliation.

@JenniferShutt
At the moment there is no budget resolution in the Senate and the House doesn't have enough votes on the floor to pass its budget resolution
 
I don't think the Democrats are in disarray at all. I think there's just a tiny niche subset of the Democrats that wish the Democrats were in disarray so they could seize control.



At this point McConnell might just cancel it out of spite. Doubt he could possibly lose any more respect or control than he lost over the last month.

I mean, a subsection of the party is trying to make it so the party is in chaos so they have a chance to seize control which does suggest some disarray :p
 
Seems that Whitmer has cleared the field.

MI-Gov: Former state Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer, who is the ostensible frontrunner in next year’s Democratic primary, received a major boost on Tuesday after University of Michigan Regent Mark Bernstein announced he won’t run for governor and instead endorsed her campaign. Bernstein hails from a wealthy and prominent family of lawyers that includes a current state Supreme Court justice. His already considerable name recognition and fundraising potential likely would have made him a serious contender for the nomination had he chosen to run.

However, Whitmer still does not have a clear path to the Democratic nomination for next year’s contest to succeed term-limited Republican Gov. Rick Snyder. Businessman Shri Thanedar jumped into the contest last month, while former Detroit Health Commissioner Abdul El-Sayed is also running, but both Democrats are relatively lesser-known. Nevertheless, a few big names are still potential candidates, since Macomb County Executive Mark Hackel and well-known attorney Geoffrey Fieger have previously said they’re thinking about running.
 

jtb

Banned
Definitely need to retire the debt ceiling permanently.

I mean, a subsection of the party who wants to make it so the party is in chaos so they have a chance to seize control does suggest some disarray :p

Discontent in the ranks =/= disarray. If anything, there's more discontent when the party is run like a well-oiled, vertically integrated machine.
 

Plinko

Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
ABC News Politics‏Verified account @ABCPolitics

MORE: Paul Manafort not committed to an appearance at next week’s planned hearing by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Subpoena him.
 
Zeke Miller‏Verified account
@ZekeJMiller
Follow
More
Inbox: SCF Will Seek Primary Challengers Against Obamacare Republicans

Senate Conservatives Fund

Maggie Haberman‏Verified account @maggieNYT 39m39 minutes ago
More
.@johnrobertsFox leaves briefing early. Sanders notes it from podium. He calls back, "If it was on camera, I might not be." Ooohs.

Heh
 

Hindl

Member
This is true and it has been politicized recently, but I question how much people truly care about debt. This POTUS ran on a platform of fiscal expansion and tax cuts ...

People care about debt when the right-wing media endlessly shouts about how Democrats are endlessly taxing the middle class and spending all that money for nothing. When a Republican is in charge suddenly the right-wing media drops that talking point, so people stop caring about it. It also doesn't help that most people don't understand how national debt works, hence why people think "running the country like a business" is a good idea
 
Honestly a little surprised there's not more serious rumbles about replacing McConnell and/or Ryan at this point. Not that I think it would work out well for them or anything, but I remember when the house bill was failing there was (possibly idle?) talk about replacing Ryan.
 
Honestly a little surprised there's not more serious rumbles about replacing McConnell and/or Ryan at this point. Not that I think it would work out well for them or anything, but I remember when the house bill was failing there was (possibly idle?) talk about replacing Ryan.
I think because neither has an obvious successor. Do you remember the utter chaos when Boehner stepped down and McCarthy fell through? GOP Congressmen hiding in the closets crying, Dent and some other moderates talking about a bipartisan Speaker. Madness.
 

jtb

Banned
Honestly a little surprised there's not more serious rumbles about replacing McConnell and/or Ryan at this point. Not that I think it would work out well for them or anything, but I remember when the house bill was failing there was (possibly idle?) talk about replacing Ryan.

McConnell stole a Supreme Court seat. There's almost nothing that Ryan could do that would compare in significance or legacy.

McConnell led the party with scorched earth tactics. Just because he has to deal with the consequences now doesn't mean they weren't successful at the time.

Whoops misread this. But just replace McConnell with Boehner. McConnell still has good will left in the tank
 
Honestly a little surprised there's not more serious rumbles about replacing McConnell and/or Ryan at this point. Not that I think it would work out well for them or anything, but I remember when the house bill was failing there was (possibly idle?) talk about replacing Ryan.

Same problem when Boehner went out..Who would want that job? Stuck between an incompetent WH and a divided base.
 
I think because neither has an obvious successor. Do you remember the utter chaos when Boehner stepped down and McCarthy fell through? GOP Congressmen hiding in the closets crying, Dent and some other moderates talking about a bipartisan Speaker. Madness.

I do, and think it would be even worse/better this time, with a real possibility of a bipartisan speaker happening in the house in order to thwart one of the HFC numbnuts from getting it. McConnell's replacement would be another shitberg though.

McConnell led the party with scorched earth tactics. Just because he has to deal with the consequences now doesn't mean they weren't successful at the time.

Well sure but it's not that time anymore, and he's clearly not as well suited to leading the party when it's in power compared to when it's not. Not that I think any of the ones who could do better are dumb enough to take the job if he stepped down.
 
There's no price Pelosi can really ask for. The Democrats aren't insane and don't intend to jeopardize the global economy, it's not like they are going to say 'no, we won't vote to raise the debt ceiling without concession X!" because there's literally no concession that's better than the absence of global economic melt-down.

Maybe they'll abolish the debt ceiling after the disruption. The reasons for its existence and keeping it around to extract policy concessions aren't good. There's always the chance that one day people go all the way because they believe the US government is broke.
 

Plinko

Wildcard berths that can't beat teams without a winning record should have homefield advantage
Sahil Kapur‏Verified account @sahilkapur 5m5 minutes ago

It's happening: Senate HELP Chairman Lamar Alexander says he'll hold hearings in the next few weeks on stabilizing the Obamacare markets.

Trump has to be fuming right now.
 
McConnell still has good will left in the tank

McConnell commands no more respect from Republican Senators and he burned many bridges with this healthcare failure. He left GOP senators on both ends of the spectrum feeling abused and disrespected.

McConnell is only lucky Trump is in his party, or he'd be the most embarrassing leader of the party currently in office.
 
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