The Trump Government Shutdown -- Part 3

[dueda]

Last night at midnight, the Republican House, Senate, and President of the United States shut down the government.
As a result, some 800,000 federal employees may be sent home without a paycheck.

Bernie Sanders

So it's not a definitive closure but just a recess - they didn't terminate the government as institution, just closed the buildings temporarily ?
Or is it just a silly allegory by an "ironic commentator" (Sanders, the comedian) ?

Oh, pitty. I'd like to see what could be tremendously worse than 2008 world economic collapse. Someone please deport Sanders to Saturn!

[Executive]

So it's not a definitive closure but just a recess - they didn't terminate the government as institution, just closed the buildings temporarily ?
Or is it just a silly allegory by an "ironic commentator" (Sanders, the comedian) ?

Oh, pitty. I'd like to see what could be tremendously worse than 2008 world economic collapse. Someone please deport Sanders to Saturn!

Semantics.     Sanders is correct but he just didn't elaborate on that point.  Of course it's a temporary and partial ( but still sizable ) shutdown.  Congress isn't back in session until late next week.  So it will be the Democrats in the House who will be the adults and re-open the government.  Maybe Pelosi can trick Trump into signing that funding bill.  She's played him for the fool he is before, so it wouldn't be the first time. The Senate will pass it as long as it has the same border security funding as last year. But wait.... Trump didn't spend the previous $1.3 billion he got for the border last year.. Oh well.

[dueda]

Dang. Oh well, send the spare change to me, could use it.

[Executive]

And the government shutdown continues..... House Democrats passed the exact same Republican legislation to re-open the government that previously passed the last Senate 80 to 20. Now McConnell won't re-vote on that, because he doesn't believe Trump will sign it. What a hypocrite !
Let's say McTurtle allowed the vote and the president vetoed it. Both chambers of Congress surely have enough votes to override that veto.

Some people want to see the Dems bargain with Trump. Well, they tried that last year in the Senate when Schumer actually offered $25 billion ( !!! ) for the wall. Trump almost went for that deal, until two Republican House Freedom Caucus members talked him out of it.
Now Trump wants $5.7 billion for that wall which will never get built. Keep in mind that Congress authorized $1.3 billion for border security last year. So far about 4% of that money was actually used for that purpose...

This "president" continues to be a disgrace, stubborn, irrational, and self-serving. Does anyone here believe he's going to declare a "National Emergency", when there is no border crisis ....other than how immigrants kids are being taken from their parents and inhumanely detained in cages ? There weren't 4000 illegal border crossings in 2018. There were a mere 6 ! If Trump continues to violate the U.S. Constitution, he could even shut down the Internet. I'm not saying he would go that far, but we all know how crazy the guy is. 

[rorschach69]

Shutdown or no shutdown- whatever it is politics. The part that really sucks IMO is that he said he was onboard and would sign and then flipped a day later. Nobody knows what to expect with this guy. Turmoil and uncertainty is not good for government, leadership, the economy, etc.

[politux]

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...ch/579850/

“Leverage: don’t make deals without it.” The words appeared under Donald Trump’s byline on page 55 of the 1987 best seller The Art of the Deal. Trump did not write them, and he seems not to have understood how to apply them. In this budget shutdown, Trump discarded his leverage from the very start, by declaring for the cameras that the budget shutdown was his decision, his responsibility. When the shutdown began to hurt, Trump and his surrogates hastily tried to transfer the onus—but it was too late. Everybody knew that it was Trump’s doing, and that it was done for reasons rejected by large majorities of Americans.

The idea of invoking “emergency powers” was a last grasp for the leverage Trump had already abdicated, and it had to be abandoned for fear of what the courts and public opinion would say.
After the January 8 Oval Office address, little doubt remains of how this shutdown will end. Sooner or later—probably sooner—it will end the way Trump’s threats of nuclear war upon North Korea ended: with a sudden Trump about-face. It is now only a matter of time. The polls will arrive over the next hours. Democrats and Republicans will both see that Trump did not move public opinion in his favor. They might see that Trump could not even motivate very many Americans to watch him. The panic slowly building among congressional Republicans will boil. Trump, trapped without a decent exit in a predicament of his own making, will yield everything and get nothing.

[Executive]

Here's an idea : If Mitch McConnell doesn't re-vote on the Senate bill from last month to re-open the government, the House IMPEACHES HIM !

I know...his Senate would never convict him, but how great would that be to see the man lie under oath and be totally discredited on international television ?
Then they bring out all the dirt on The Turtle, including how his wife Elaine Chow takes money from the Chinese and the drug connection, the money Mitch takes from the NRA, how he held up Merrick Garland during President Obama's last 11 months, etc.

The Democrats need to play hardball too! They will be with their investigations into Trump / Russia, but nobody cares about Brett Kavanaugh anymore.

And so if McConnell takes their threat seriously as he should, then he will back down and hold that crucial vote. Most of the Senate Republicans who should be standing up to the Majority Leader and the President have yet to grow spines.

[politux]

Congressional republicans are definitely craven opportunists who have been negligent in their duty to provide a check on an out of control president. That being said, McConnell is not really relevant. Let's wait for the Mueller report to drop. The rah rah retard base isn't going to admit it but fair minded independents and some republicans might see the extent of Trump's criminality and turn on him. Best case scenario he accomplishes nothing in the next two years and then either doesn't run again or loses.

BTW: I'm starting to think that Trump shut down the govt to shut down the FBI and judiciary.

[Kotter]

BTW: I'm starting to think that Trump shut down the govt to shut down the FBI and judiciary.

If only he knew, or could read, this:

Prepared By Vice Chairman Leahy’s Senate Appropriations Committee Staff
More Than 420,000 Will Be Working Without Pay Including:

• More than 41,000 Federal Law Enforcement and Correctional Officers, Including:
  

• 2,614 ATF agents;
  
• 16,742 Bureau of Prisons correctional officers;
  
• 13,709 FBI agents;
  
• 3,600 deputy U.S. Marshals; and
  

• 4,399 DEA agents.
  

Now for what fucks me:

More Than 380,000 Will Be Furloughed, Including:

• 86 Percent of Department of Commerce (Approximately 41,000 Staff),
  

• 96 Percent of NASA (Approximately 16,700 Staff)
  

• More than 80 Percent of the National Park Service (Approximately16,000 Staff)
  

• At least 80 Percent of the Forest Service (Approximately 28,800 Staff)
  

• More than 30 Percent of Dept. of Transportation (Approximately 18,300 Staff) [FRA]
  

• 95 Percent of HUD (Approximately 7,100 Staff)
  

• Approximately 52,000 IRS Staff
  

Source: here

[politux]

• 96 Percent of NASA (Approximately 16,700 Staff)
  

That one pisses me off, because the space program is one of the few things they do that I support.