Today I’m catching up on video articles, and I’m still working on the new poll and the Monthly report. If you are in our fantasy football league and have not done so, please let me know if you are playing: Dusty, Jack, Pam, Rob, Robb, and Seth. Patty Monster, Squatch, Vivian, and I have committed.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:22 (average 5:17). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From All In: White House weighing attempt to block Comey testimony
The President is consider whether to try and stop former FBI Director James Comey from testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee next week by invoking executive privilege.
I don’t think he can win on executive privilege, after all his bragging and threats, but it will proclaim his guilt again, if he tries. RESIST!!
From Daily Kos: Asking then FBI director James Comey to flat-out drop the investigation might be the most obvious attempt by Donald Trump to obstruct the Trump–Russia investigation. But it’s far from the only move he’s made to block the truth from coming out.
The White House is telling federal agencies to blow off Democratic lawmakers’ oversight requests, as Republicans fear the information could be weaponized against President Donald Trump.
At meetings with top officials for various government departments this spring, Uttam Dhillon, a White House lawyer, told agencies not to cooperate with such requests from Democrats, according to Republican sources inside and outside the administration.
Even more obstruction of Justice. RESIST!!
From NY Times: For years, Republicans savaged Democrats for supporting the Affordable Care Act, branding the law — with some rhetorical license — as a government takeover of health care.
Now, cast out of power in Washington and most state capitals, Democrats and activist leaders seeking political redemption have embraced an unlikely-seeming cause: an actual government takeover of health care.
At rallies and in town hall meetings, and in a collection of blue-state legislatures, liberal Democrats have pressed lawmakers, with growing impatience, to support the creation of a single-payer system, in which the state or federal government would supplant private health insurance with a program of public coverage. And in California on Thursday, the Democrat-controlled State Senate approved a preliminary plan for enacting single-payer system, the first serious attempt to do so there since then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, vetoed legislation in 2006 and 2008.
With Republicans in full control of the federal government, there is no prospect that Democrats can put in place a policy of government-guaranteed medicine on the national level in the near future. And fiscal and logistical obstacles may be insurmountable even in solidly liberal states like California and New York.
Yet as Democrats regroup from their 2016 defeat, leaders say the party has plainly shifted well to the left on the issue, setting the stage for a larger battle over the health care system in next year’s congressional elections and the 2020 presidential race.
It’s about time! RESIST!!
Cartoon:
I miss him even more than I thought I would
6 Responses to “Open Thread – 6/3/2017”
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4:04 Aaah – catnip tea!
All In – What he needs is a whole bunch of noses thumbed at him, IMO. the BEST case scenario would be if he tries to stop it and fails.
DKos – While I don't support the White House in anything, this has been a little blown out of proportion. The Project on Government Oversight points out that it has been White House policy since forever to respond only or primarily to requests from Committee chairs. In a Republican majority Congress, all Committee chairs will be Republican. So this is not really a departure from policy. Of course, it would be nicer if all Congressional requests were prioritized – though I don't know how feasible that is.
NYT – I think this goes in the category of, "Cats appear to operate on the principle that it never hurts to ask for what you want." Yes, we should be promoting single payer vigorously and factually while realizing we are playing a long game!
Cartoon – I think we all miss him – desperately.
AI/DK: The more dt fusses about it, shows his guilt. He's in pretty deep, hope he has a shovel. LOL
*Good to know, JL, thanks!
Cartoon: Yes, I miss him too!
Company coming in, having ribs and the sides. I'd invite y'all, but ACLU has an advisory out, (see Dandelion's C2 post) 4 hrs. ago. Unreal. I'm embarassed to be living in this state. u.g.h.!!!
ACLU Issues Texas ‘Travel Advisory’
https://www.aclu.org/news/aclu-issues-texas-travel-advisory
Hope you have a good, relaxing evening, take care, and Thanks, Tom.
Travel advisory:
Puzzle — 3:14 No catnip tea . . . Earl Grey and not too strong and no lemon. Milk or cream would be an abomination with Earl Grey.
All In — The NY Times has an article that goes into the same discussion. Basically, Drumpf is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't invoke executive privilege. He may very well have shot himself in the foot with his own tweets. If Drumpf has done nothing wrong, then Comey's testimony should not make a big difference. At the end of the day, Drumpf is just another Republican (with delusions of grandeur and autocracy) obfuscating and obstructing.
Daily Kos — As JD says, "…it has been White House policy since forever to respond only or primarily to requests from Committee chairs." However, if one has done nothing wrong, then what is the problem? Lord knows, Drumpf hangs his laundry out in his tweets.
NY Times — Perhaps if California is able to successfully bring forth a single payer system and people really like it, residents of other states may look on with envy and demand their states get onboard. I am not naive enough to think that Republican states will adopt such measures in red states, but such could be the catalyst for wholesale change in government — vote Republicans out!
Cartoon — The job of POTUS really can age someone. But hey, still looking good!
He was not perfect, nobody is! But I do think that he tried to do right for the country. Part of the problem, a big part, were the obstructionist Republicans who don't give a rat's ass about the American people.
Resist and Persist!!!
Do not wait for
tomorrow!!!
I am glad that you were able to get things straightened out and that your surgery is still on target. Once the bandages come off and you can acclimatise to the light etc, it will be wonderful for you. I am very shortly to a pot luck supper and training session at the church very shortly. I am picking up some coleslaw and buns at the grocery store. I'll be back to finish up.
It is sort of nice to watch the GOPigs wriggle and squirm as they try to support the lunatic in the WH.
NYT: We need to take the gov't back, and do some citizen oriented legislating. Single payer sems to be "Blowing in the wind!" Moving left might make Bernie, or Liz, viable options for 2020.
Hope you have a nice and relaxing weekend, TomCat.
AI: The "unmasking" claims in which Nunes has personally involved himself on behalf of the president, without cooperation of the House Intelligence Committee he recused himself from, obviously is another attempt to distract, deflect and disrupt into a lawful investigation into the president's ties to Russia as Eric Swalwell of that Committee so correctly states. Drumpf hinting at preventing Comey from testifying by a presidential decree is more of the same; even he would never be so stupid to that because it would tell all the investigating committees "probably everything we needed to know about whether he [Drumpf] was pressuring James Comey to make the Flynn case go away or the Russia investigation go away." Kind of make you wish Drumpf would try to do it anyway and get his decree dismissed as unlawful, doesn't it.
DK: Given the stunning amount of leaks coming from all kind of agencies it wouldn't surprise me one bit if many individuals within these agencies dislike the White House as much as we do and continue to ignore Drumpf's dictatorial demands. They may not be able to get official information or documents to Democrats in the oversight committees, but they can give them enough unofficially to come out with, take to the media and stir up such a stink that Republicans will have to deal with it, like they did with Comey's dismissal and memos on that.
NYT: You know, if (note not "when") America, and the rest of the world, survives The Drumpf Era, in the end it may turn out that some good has come of it after all. By stepping out of the Paris Climate Agreement, Drumpf may have united 190+ countries in their resolve to stick to their end of the bargain and even do a bit more to save the planet. By repealing Obamacare and in fact destroying healthcare as you know it, Drumpf may have given Americans the motivation to take on what is best for all of them: single-payer healthcare for all. By then Drumpf's Tax plans will have taught Americans how to deal with any (health)insurance companies that are left and resisting to become a non-profit part of government. Here's to your, and our, survival!