Discussion: How Trump's Obamacare Sabotage Sets Him Up For His Own Political Misery

[khyber900]

About 70% believe that GOP/Trump own Trumpcare. Almost 60% believe the NFL Players are protesting b/c of police brutality. It seems like a solid majority of Congress wants to keep the Iran deal in place. In addition, people are now associating Weinstein with Trump instead of Weinstein with Dems. He just got served a subpoena (actually a while ago) that will re-open all of the stuff that should’ve buried him in '16. Trump’s game isn’t working.

However, in my view, the GOP is completely politically paralyzed and with only 1 federal election coming in AL-Sen (which frankly the GOP is heavily favored to win), there are no accountability moments between now and the looming budget crisis.

I do believe there’s a strong chance that Trump causes a protracted government shutdown that exceeds the '94 shutdown. With PR/USVI relief (and probably a lot more needed to be done in TX/FL), CSR payments, CHIP, Iran Nuclear deal, his ‘stupid fucking wall’, tax cuts.

I don’t think the GOP is capable of getting consensus within their caucus. I think McConnell and Ryan are traitors who believe that the only way for them to stay in power is to never do a deal with Democrats except when they have the permission of the Koch Bros. I think Trump is so dumb, angry and his narcissistic void is so wide that he wants to blow something up just to watch it burn. The thing that really burns dumb people with delusions of grandeur is when everyone else in the room knows they’re dumb. Morongate exemplifies this in spades.

The other wildcard out there is North Korea. I know of no major military asset movements which would suggest that a major Iraq style war is on the horizon. I don’t believe that we have the ability to take out the regime and occupy NK by ourselves.

However, I could see Trump do this in stages. I could envision him beginning with an air bombardment campaign to demonstrate air superiority, expose a hollowness in NK’s air defense, and just bait Kim into hitting back to provoke a larger war. This would make for great PR for him, as he would dominate the TV screens as the CiC. Sure more than half would say he was crazy, but he’d control the stage.

Then there would be a month of diplomatic efforts, followed by further escalations. Trump could keep this in the news for months if he’s convinced that Kim doesn’t want war.

The risk here, obviously, is that Kim doesn’t give a shit and if his country is attacked, he will follow through on what has been drilled into his head since he was born and hit back, with SK taking the brunt. Thousands would die. These scenarios are now more probable than they were several months ago thanks to the political paralysis of the GOP.

[pquincy]

I mean, most hostage-takers will let the sick and injured go - in order to set up good faith negtiations with the cops

Excuse me, what are these “good faith negotiations” you’re talking about? Never heard of them, and people are saying they’re no good.

[Lacuna-Synecdoche]

I don’t think the GOP is capable of getting consensus within their caucus. I think McConnell and Ryan are traitors who believe that the only way for them to stay in power is to never do a deal with Democrats except when they have the permission of the Koch Bros.

And Putin. Don’t forget Putin.

[origamitrain]

Funny thing about OP is that you’d think they’d find the money for that little pocket of the metro since it’s in their back yard. There’s plenty of it floating around down that way.

[squirreltown]

Kinda OT but really TPM, bad shopping is a thing, but there needs to be some style. This looks like the spam ads at the bottom of the front page.

[tiowally]

The Dotard has fallen and he can’t get up. Waaaaaaah!

[the_loan_arranger]

House Republicans sued the Obama administration in 2014, claiming the payments were illegal because they hadn’t been appropriated by Congress.

@tierney, this is a facile statement that is just wrong. There was never a claim that the payments are illegal. The claim was that the payments couldn’t be made with funds that were appropriated for a different purpose. The payments are mandated by law and there has never been a question that they are illegal. There was no claim that the payments were illegal; it was manner in which the payments were being made that was the gist of the gestae.

[daveyjones64]

Dementia is certainly possible as you say. It could also include a combination of low intelligence, not having any understanding about the issue or topic he’s talking about, and just going into braggadocios salesman auto-mode.

The problem with that theory is, its quite easy to go back 20 or 30 years and see how he spoke, and to track the deterioration of his word choices and vocabulary. That’s not low intelligence, its a symptom of a deeper issue.

Whether its dementia or some other degenerative condition, he has/is suffering a serious deterioration in his verbal skills

[butlerknights]

Morals and ethics and concern for the general welfare of the public expected from an American President? How quaint. /s

[rickjones]

Good point. I agree there’s dementia or degeneration. I just think the other things are included in his propensity for unintelligible talk when he’s off the teleprompter. And, maybe they are partially the result of (lack of knowledge or understanding) or attempts to compensate for (auto-mode sales talk) the dementia.

[clemmers]

I’m sure he prides himself on his crude, bumbling, Mafioso-style negotiating skillz. No one’s buying it.

[butlerknights]

It’s absolutely bonkers that Republicans decided to sue President Obama over this instead of, you know, fixing the problem by just appropriating the money but that’s Republicans for you. :-/

[butlerknights]

Guess he thinks that, because that sort of thing might work (to some degree) in the business world, that he can just do it in government? :-/

[squirreltown]

Whether its dementia or some other degenerative condition, he has/is suffering a serious deterioration in his verbal skills

Did you see the video on twitter that @geofu54 posted? He was slurring like he was on quaaludes. Screw verbal skills, he’s starting to have trouble forming words.

[dave_adams]

“It’s amusing to me how desperate Democrats are to rid themselves of
the failed law they worked so hard to force on the country. You’d think
they’d be proud of it,” the spokesman, Don Stewart, told TPM via email."

Well see Don, we’re not trying to get rid of it. That’s what you guys are doing.

And I think just about everyone paying the slightest attention understands that. See you next year.

[novatom]

Charley Baker is the governor of Massachusetts, (MA) not Maine (ME) (although I wish he was, anything’s better than the moron currently residing in the Blaine House).

[daveyjones64]

The other wildcard out there is North Korea. I know of no major military asset movements which would suggest that a major Iraq style war is on the horizon.

We maintain significant military assets in South Korea, and have since the cease fire. Its a far different situation than before the Iraq invasion, where we had basically no military assets or logistics in place until the build up.

That being said, if a military campaign were seriously under consideration, one would expect to see additional assets being deployed, and that really hasn’t popped up on any news radars.

The stage thing won’t work. The moment a USAF bomb is dropped on NK, they will unleash their own bombardments of South Korea, followed up by an invasion. Assuming such US military actions are preemptive, the global sentiment would be strongly against the US. Any PR that Trump tried to garner would be washed away, both domestically and internationally. Trump would not control the stage, he would have to respond to the UN and our allies…let alone China and Russia…publicly and repeatedly condemning his actions. And we all know how much he hates to be forced to share the spotlight

And that’s before Trump gets bored and petulant with the military when NK doesn’t unconditionally surrender within a week. Because that IS how he will react, and start whining and blaming the military.

The bottom line on this is, any war with NK will not go according to the plans that Short Attention Donnie may have in his head. And when his plans fail, he goes into grievance mode. Personal grievance mode for a President involved in a preemptive war of his own choosing, would play disastrously on the home front, even among many in his base.

[teddythecat]

Governor Brownback took hundreds of millions from the highway accounts to try and maintain his tax cuts. Most think it will take years now to catch up. Now with the state looking at having to come up with another $500-600 million to fund schools due to a Kansas Supreme Court ruling, his coming successor may do the same.

To add to Overland Park’s possible troubles, if T-Mobile and Sprint merge, you can say goodbye to 6000+ headquarters jobs. That would really hit the city and state of Kansas really hard. Johnson County residents (which OP is part of) have laughed at Kansas City MO for years. It maybe that KCMO will become the more economically strong one again if all of this plays out as the city is more progressive and trying it’s best to move forward.

[rickjones]

[quote=“butlerknights, post:52, topic:63763, full:true”]
It’s absolutely bonkers that Republicans decided to sue President Obama over this instead of, you know, fixing the problem by just appropriating the money but that’s Republicans for you. :-/
[/quote]And now some Republicans are scurrying around trying to figure out how to fix it now, because they see how it could bite them in the ass in the 2018 mid-terms.

[pwmesq]

Appears as though they got the guv part right, but not the state – not that, as a Mainer, I wouldn’t swap Charlie Baker for Paul LeRage in a nanosecond.