US General Election 2016

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/31/opinion/neil-gorsuch-the-nominee-for-a-stolen-seat.html?

David H wrote:It does sound from that like at least part of the team was thinking ahead.  I sure hope they can come together and start working as a team soon!  All politics aside, we all suffer when our leadership stumbles like this.

I don't really find it conceivable that anyone can start working as a team when the person in charge of the executive is pushing through some of his most controversial policies without even consulting congress republicans..

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/01/30/politics/republican-boils-over-trump-refugee-order/index.html

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/31/us/politics/trump-ban-immigrants-refugees.html?

Surprise, surprise..

Bluebottle wrote:
I don't really find it conceivable that anyone can start working as a team when the person in charge of the executive is pushing through some of his most controversial policies without even consulting congress republicans..

OK, but on the other hand there are some very intelligent people in Trump's inner circle, and so I find it equally inconceivable that they won't learn something from their recent mistakes.
Personally I'm hoping they'll eventually learn how to play nicely with the other children or this is going to be a very long 4 years....

Bluebottle wrote:https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/31/opinion/neil-gorsuch-the-nominee-for-a-stolen-seat.html?

NYT wrote:The seat Judge Gorsuch hopes to sit in should have been filled, months ago, by Merrick Garland, the chief judge of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, whom President Barack Obama nominated to the court last March. Judge Garland, a former federal prosecutor and 20-year veteran of the nation’s most important federal appeals court, is both more moderate and more qualified than Judge Gorsuch.

And Gorsuch formerly worked in a high-level position in the DOJ before his 10 years service on a federal appears court. Sure, Garland has more experience, primarily because he's 15 years older than Gorsuch, but they have pretty similar resumes (including graduating from Harvard Law School and clerking for Supreme Court Justices) that are full of the kind of things you expect to see from a SCOTUS nominee.

NYT wrote:He is even more conservative than Justice Scalia in at least one area — calling for an end to the deference courts traditionally show to administrative agencies, like the Environmental Protection Agency, that are charged with implementing complex and important federal laws.

Yeah, and this is a good thing for liberals right now, considering that (as the very next paragraph of the article states), there are a lot of reasons to be concerned about the actions of the executive branch (and that of independent agencies with heads appointed by the President) if you disagree with the goals of the Trump Administration. Having a Justice who takes a dim view of executive overreach is a lot better than one who bases decisions based on how any given case fits with his political preferences (though of course it's hard to say how exactly any given nominee will behave on the bench in the long run).

Look, I'm disappointed that the balance of the court will swing more conservative in the future (and have been since the election results became clear; SCOTUS nominees were one of my main reasons for supporting Clinton), but can we not act like every single thing Trump does is an affront to democracy or whatever? I think picking our battles is a better strategy for winning over marginal GOP/Trump voters in the next election (though given the fixation on 2016 being an election inversion and the insistence that Trump is a Nazi I'm not sure how many Democrats want to do that), and it decreases the chances of burnout for liberal voters because there's only so long you can be constantly outraged for and I think most people's limit is considerably less than four years.

By all means, oppose Garland's nomination, but keep some perspective. Please.

NYT wrote:WASHINGTON — A far larger number of people were affected by President Trump’s executive order on refugees than he initially said, Department of Homeland Security officials acknowledged on Tuesday.

...

Homeland security officials said the White House was referring to the number of people who were either detained or denied boarding during the initial hours after the travel ban was signed, a total based on preliminary calculations.

Shockingly, the number of people affected by a travel ban increases with time, as more people attempt to travel to the US each day.

(Also, Trump's original tweet was about how low a percentage of total travelers were affected by the ban, so the fact that more people have been detained or denied entry since the initial calculations were made doesn't really tell us anything without knowing how many more total travelers there were during that period; something the Times didn't bother to address. Not that this sort of arguing over numbers matters if you object to the travel ban on principle, but if you're going to try to catch someone in a lie, do your homework first.)

Been reading a little more about the SEAL raid in Yemen, which seems to represent an increase in the level of US involvement in that country's civil war. Trump was always sorta contradictory between saying he didn't want the US to be interventionist and saying he'd be more militarily aggressive on terrorism. Hopefully this does not foreshadow greater numbers of US troops being involved in Yemen.

Also, they apparently killed Awlaki's eight-year-old daughter who, like Awlaki and his son who was killed by the US at age 16, was an American citizen. While this was probably not intentional*, the optics of it aren't very good, which makes it harder for the US to build reliable alliances and/or play peacemaker in regional conflicts.

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/seal-american-girl-die-first-trump-era-u-s-military-n714346

*Although one Obama administration figure's response to Awlaki's son's death (which came in a separate attack two weeks after his father's death) was to say that he should have had a more responsible father, which seems to indicate, at best, a disturbingly cavalier attitude towards killing relatives of terrorists. And I'm sure we all remember Trump's comments on that topic during the campaign. So who knows.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2012/10/how-team-obama-justifies-the-killing-of-a-16-year-old-american/264028/

And because I feel bad about repeatedly going after the NYT Editorial Board on this page I'll drop a link to one of their pieces that I do largely agree with (dumb headline aside):

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/30/opinion/president-bannon.html

Although The Atlantic has a marginally more optimistic take on the situation:

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/01/trump-vs-the-generals/515109/

I don't think it's a dumb headline at all. Ever since Trump picked Bannon as his chief advisor after the election I've been referring to the "Bannon Administration".

{{Just some musings on the Trump ban thing and how its been taken in the US and globally.

Was it unAmerican? Thats a charge quite a few have leveled and I dont get it- its perfectly American, Americas done it before. The scale changes but its not unAmerican.
Obama did it with Iraq. There wasnt an uproar then because 1) there was a tangible threat detected that needed addressed which sparked the need for it 2) it was targeted and not blanket.
So its certainly not unAmerican.
Is it legal? Again I dont see how not- he said he would introduce 'extreme vetting' if elected- the people elected him, he has a right to introduce it. In fact I would go as far to say that there is nothing wrong with anew President suspending any existing government program for a review period to make sure the sytem is robust and up to the task- this is in fact exactly what the Obama admin did when they suspended refugees from Iraq- they used the time to improve the vetting process before reinstating the travel rights of Iraq's.

So in principle Trump has done nothing more than what has been done before, all be it on a larger scale than before, and what he promised those who voted for him he would do.

So whats gone wrong as it obviously has? Well seems to m the problem is two fold- communications and consequences.
The first is that those who it seems should have known what was going on and exactly how the ban was to be worked- those on the front line having to actually implement it, clearly had no idea what they were doing, or exactly who it effected or did not.
This confusion goes right back to the WH where mixed messages about green card holders emerged when it became apparent there was a problem.
There was also no coordination or planning with allies who were caught unawares by the effect it could have on their citizens.
Which brings me onto consequences- it just wasn't thought out, repercussion it, its effect on allied nations who could, and would not support it, the bad PR it has done as the world watches people who gave up everything and risked their lives and families to help the US get barred from entry, when 5 year old's are handcuffed on arrival. And because of these consequences, unforeseen because they didn't think through all the ramifications of the ban as written, that got all the protestors out and that makes it all look even more chaotic than it actually is.

Basically the policy, though I disagree with it, I think it helps our enemies rather than harms them in any
way and so makes us all less safe not more so, but I don't think its unAmerican, or illegal, or outside what Trump is entitled to do.
The reaction to it, though in part led by the desire by some to simply protest Trump the person, is mainly down to appalling mishandling, appalling communication, and appalling delivery at point of use- which is more worrying than the ban itself. Trump promised he would surround himself with the 'Great' the 'best' business minds and leaders he could gather to his service, and their first major policy implementation fails on four things that all business need to get right to be successful- bad management, bad communications, bad implementation and bad PR. }}}

I agree Petty, he could have stepped up tough border controls and it could have gone largely smoothly if he hadn't yelled about it for months, or said he was planning on 'banning muslims' he hasn't helped things and as you said, its just handy ammunition.

this is happening now America.

{{I like him. He has a regular show on the GQ youtube channel }}

I'm impressed that you'd watch something so full of historical and legal intricacies of the USA.

Eldorion wrote:

Bluebottle wrote:https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/31/opinion/neil-gorsuch-the-nominee-for-a-stolen-seat.html?

NYT wrote:The seat Judge Gorsuch hopes to sit in should have been filled, months ago, by Merrick Garland, the chief judge of the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, whom President Barack Obama nominated to the court last March. Judge Garland, a former federal prosecutor and 20-year veteran of the nation’s most important federal appeals court, is both more moderate and more qualified than Judge Gorsuch.

And Gorsuch formerly worked in a high-level position in the DOJ before his 10 years service on a federal appears court. Sure, Garland has more experience, primarily because he's 15 years older than Gorsuch, but they have pretty similar resumes (including graduating from Harvard Law School and clerking for Supreme Court Justices) that are full of the kind of things you expect to see from a SCOTUS nominee.

NYT wrote:He is even more conservative than Justice Scalia in at least one area — calling for an end to the deference courts traditionally show to administrative agencies, like the Environmental Protection Agency, that are charged with implementing complex and important federal laws.

Yeah, and this is a good thing for liberals right now, considering that (as the very next paragraph of the article states), there are a lot of reasons to be concerned about the actions of the executive branch (and that of independent agencies with heads appointed by the President) if you disagree with the goals of the Trump Administration. Having a Justice who takes a dim view of executive overreach is a lot better than one who bases decisions based on how any given case fits with his political preferences (though of course it's hard to say how exactly any given nominee will behave on the bench in the long run).

Look, I'm disappointed that the balance of the court will swing more conservative in the future (and have been since the election results became clear; SCOTUS nominees were one of my main reasons for supporting Clinton), but can we not act like every single thing Trump does is an affront to democracy or whatever? I think picking our battles is a better strategy for winning over marginal GOP/Trump voters in the next election (though given the fixation on 2016 being an election inversion and the insistence that Trump is a Nazi I'm not sure how many Democrats want to do that), and it decreases the chances of burnout for liberal voters because there's only so long you can be constantly outraged for and I think most people's limit is considerably less than four years.

By all means, oppose Garland's nomination, but keep some perspective. Please.

I pretty much agree. Opposing the nomination at this point is a windmill, but I'm affriad it is a windmill the Democrats might have to face at this point. The republicans held a Presidential nomination for the Court hostage for close to a year when offered a clear compromize candidate. The Democrats migth have to face the alternative of a clear conservative pick down, and force the Republicans to the politicly damaging step of removing the Nuclear option with regard to Supreme Court nominees in response. It might be a windmill. But the Democrats migth have to play Don Quiote with this one to win the narrative. Bernie Sanders keep repeating this and he is right, the majority of Americans support moderate views and values. For a lot of reason that didn't turn into an Electoral College win for Clinton. But Democrats need to be the voice for the moderate view. The voice of moderation in a time of.. well.. madness. To be that voice they have for that position in cases like this can they believably play that role for the electorate. At least that is my thinking.

Petty; It is illegal, both from an International Refugee Law and national law point of view;

Mr. Trump appears to want to reinstate a new type of Asiatic Barred Zone by executive order, but there is just one problem: The Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 banned all discrimination against immigrants on the basis of national origin, replacing the old prejudicial system and giving each country an equal shot at the quotas. In signing the new law, President Lyndon B. Johnson said that “the harsh injustice” of the national-origins quota system had been “abolished.”

Nonetheless, Mr. Trump asserts that he still has the power to discriminate, pointing to a 1952 law that allows the president the ability to “suspend the entry” of “any class of aliens” that he finds are detrimental to the interest of the United States.

But the president ignores the fact that Congress then restricted this power in 1965, stating plainly that no person could be “discriminated against in the issuance of an immigrant visa because of the person’s race, sex, nationality, place of birth or place of residence.” The only exceptions are those provided for by Congress (such as the preference for Cuban asylum seekers).

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/27/opinion/trumps-immigration-ban-is-illegal.html

https://sputniknews.com/us/201701311050189333-icrc-refugees-ban-trump/

Petty wrote:but I don't think its unAmerican, or illegal, or outside what Trump is entitled to do.

I think all three of those points are worthy of discussion as a nation.

Un-American no longer means what it did during the Cold War, or WWII, or the Great Depression, or WWI. The whole concept of what is  and isn't "American" is a moving target that's only meaningful if we can have some kind of national discussion from time to time.

The legality of the order has so far been challenged by the Attorneys General of 4 states so far. That alone is enough to make it a significant issue. All of our international law is outdated in the 21st century, so it's well worth looking at the legality when something likes this comes up.

And what Trump (or any President) is entitled to do is something that's been debated since the very beginning of our Constitution.  The debate on presidential powers is itself one of the strongest checks on presidential power. Lincoln had to face it. Both Roosevelt's crossed the line IMHO. It's an important part of our democratic process, so don't be letting ANY President off to easily. This kind of challenge is a part of the job, and that's exactly how it should be.

Edit: Good point Blue!

At least one constant remains, lawyers always get paid.

An even better point Blue!

Pettytyrant101 wrote:{{I like him. He has a regular show on the GQ youtube channel }}

yeah me too. he seems like a voice of reason with a sense of humour.

Financial folks are getting wobbly knees:

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-honeymoon-is-over-wall-street-is-finally-taking-trump-literally-2017-02-01?siteid=yhoof2&yptr=yahoo

Dayum.  I didn't realize just how rapier her wit was. She's more gentle in the books.

https://www.yahoo.com/tv/j-k-rowling-responds-fans-190632346.html

Yeah I saw that

http://europetoday.standupforeurope.eu/donald-trump-is-going-to-snap-very-soon-and-here-is-how-i-know/

The first 1/3 of that was completely useless. But the later point that never before has he had so much ridicule focussed on him is a good one. I'm not convinced he'll snap - I think he'll compartmentalize. He's already been doing it.