You jest, Mr. Shorr:
President Trump’s endless promises of a “beautiful” health care plan that he is always just on the verge of unveiling
Why he has one! I’ve seen pictures of it! Leslie Stahl held it in her hands! It was a big, thick binder full of all of the Republican ideas for health care!
Yes, it was all blank paper.
It isn’t Tuck Chodd’s job to inform Americans.
Republicans have basically abandoned international trade agreements after being the major proponents of the concept. NAFTA was “Ronald Reagan’s Dream”. Now they blame Democrats for NAFTA even while they tweak it slightly and claim credit again. The lack of consistency shows that they put Party over Country.
The question is what must we do. But before getting to that I want to address what they do.
In particular I disagree that “all they do now is play for the cheap seats”
Rather, they use racial animus to stop governance and enrich themselves at the expense of America.
Paul Krugman explained our current political situation this way:
"How did we get here? The core story of U.S. politics over the past four decades is that wealthy elites weaponized white racism to gain political power, which they used to pursue policies that enriched the already wealthy at workers’ expense.
Until Trump’s rise it was possible — barely — for people to deny this reality with a straight face. At this point, however, it requires willful blindness not to see what’s going on."
So that is what they do. The question is what must we do. Keith Olbermann well saying what else they do and what we must do or they will not change their playbook including trying to steal future elections:
"The spectacle of local overt racist ballot certifiers in the suburbs of Detroit having the power to overthrow the duly elected government of the united states will still be there for the election of 2024. the tyranny of the minority via the electoral college will still be there for the election of 2024.
"The ingredients of this coup attempt will still be there for the election of 2024 and God knows the scumbags who support Donald Trump who either believe this delusion of him as martyred victim, or pretend to believe it to cover their own racist or fascist motives, they will still be here for the election of 2024.
"There is only one short-term solution when there is a decent and honest president who may not control the Senate and who barely controls the House and who faces a supermajority full of Bible-thumping political toadies on the Supreme Court.
"The people who did this to our democracy must face the imminent prospect of going to prison for how they assailed freedom these last five years, and they and those who supported them must live the rest of their lives in abject fear of going to prison if they try it again."
This article makes perfect sense.
What America has to do is to focus on the puppet masters and not just the Republican puppets. Who benefits from Republican policies? A handful of fossil fuel companies and giant media corporations. A light has to be shown on the puppet masters.
The very nature of the crisis is that consumers and businesses cannot afford to buy anything — a situation that will only get worse if the government stands back and fails to act, as Herbert Hoover saw in the early 1930s.
It was worse than that, not just a failure to act. It was an insistence on “conservative” principles that were shown to be failures, long after the evidence was in. Akin to modern Republicans - the nation should suffer agony lest any conservative shibboleth be renounced. Hoover actively did all he could to obstruct FDR when he was elected.
I have seen some attempts to rehabilitate Hoover, but they all require not judging him too harshly for what he did as President, while playing up his former career, a rose-tinted glasses view that does not look at his actual executive decisions too closely. One historian doing this waggishly suggested though that the appropriate commemoration of Hoover would be a bank holiday.
The other possibility, of course, is that fiscal prudence only matters as a cudgel to use against Democrats — that only Democrats’ deficit spending matters. But whether the explanation is partisan bad faith, intra-party divisions, or incoherence, it doesn’t bode well for Republican cooperation on economic help for Americans who are hurting.
The evidence is in on this.
It is bad faith and plutocratic authoritarianism.
There is no principle.
Moscow Mitch just came out saying it was up to Dems to work with THEM. As Mitch is quoted in Obama’s book he, “Doesn’t care”.
Only thing that will get them to even play nice is a fucking bat upside their head. Media won’t hold them accountable (and if they do then the base will scream fake news) and the “adults” in the party won’t make the “spoiled” children behave.
Just better hope that Georgia goes double D in January.
And it’s stolen.
… The other possibility, of course, is that fiscal prudence only matters as a cudgel to use against Democrats — that only Democrats’ deficit spending matters. …
It’s called Starve the Beast first implemented under Reagan.
Under Republican Admin run deficits they win, under a Democratic Admin they rail again deficits they win.
Knowledge of our political history would really help understand how we got here.
Lack of it is why we keep fighting the same skirmishes and battles over and over again. 
Of course not, the Republicans are doing exactly what they are paid to do by the people who own the big media companies.
Exactly. So let’s punish trump’s people and make that the reason they don’t continue or repeat their actions.
Reaching across the aisle - uniting, blah blah blah. If you think that’s a reasonable goal then answer these two questions…
What would we have to give up to make the trump voters like us.
What would we accept from them in order to forgive past sins.
It’s like compromising with a mad bomber, he says he’s going to kill 100 people next year and the dems say how about you only kill 50 and in return we promise not to prosecute you for the 50. Then he kills 100 anyway because he’s a mad bomber.
#1, it won’t do any good
#2 they own democrats too.
In other words he just completely eliminated the possibility of any compromise or working together, giving the Biden administration complete freedom to put as many of them as possible in prison.
Charlie Pierce had the last word on this a while ago.
Here’s the key paragraph:
“ Far too many people are far too delicate about this. The Republican Party is completely mad, and it has been going in that direction for a very long time. It has been raving through all the halls of all the governments, large and small, like a lost soul with a big knife. The symptoms of the enveloping disease have been obvious for decades, ever since Ronald Reagan served up the first helping of monkey brains in 1976, when he nearly wrested the party’s nomination from Gerald Ford. It is full-blown now, and it is general throughout the Republic. The Republican Party has infected every institution with its own private insanity.”
The partisan thing is headed for change. From staunchly partisan in support of Trump to staunchly partisan in obstructing Biden. Bi-partisan damn sure’s not going to happen.
I agree with what you say but there is the phenomenon of calling wolf too many times. If they become deficit hawks as soon as Biden takes office it won’t be so easy. No one will be fooled. Some will act as if this is OK but all will know it is not.
Trump made a massive effort at diminishing and minimizing the MSM. He insulted them and lied about them. It seems about a year ago the CEOs in that biz gave their reporters carte blanche to go after him for that. I doubt that stops when he leaves and they’ll get on the “how are we going to pay for it” this time.
Yes, they are going to do it. But with more push back and a lot more skeptics.
The established code of conduct is “puff, puff, pass”.
That the author could actually type this out:
… indicates someone is hitting the good stuff, and hard.
I must also protest …
The core of PPACA was their FUCKING PROPOSAL in the first fucking place.
It’s a gross disservice to journalism and any semblance of honest and accurate policy discussion, to fail to point that out.
Seriously, why ignore that fact?