Archives for FUBAR

Trump gets chatty with the press

by CATHERINE LUCEY and KEN THOMAS | October 17, 2017 | No Comments

Reporters were seated in the White House briefing room awaiting an appearance by press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Monday when a call went out over a loudspeaker to head to the Rose Garden. There was no time to lose: President Donald Trump wanted to talk. Again. Chaos briefly ensued as the press corps quickly repositioned itself along a rope line among the famous garden’s fall mums and foliage in front of a podium marked by the presidential seal. While Trump rarely holds formal, stand-alone news conferences, his freewheeling, last-minute Rose Garden scrum was the latest example of his penchant
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Trump called ‘a deranged animal’

by CALVIN WOODWARD | October 17, 2017 | No Comments

For U.S. presidents, meeting the families of military personnel killed in war is about as wrenching as the presidency gets. President Donald Trump’s suggestion Monday that his predecessors fell short in that duty brought a visceral reaction from those who witnessed those grieving encounters. “He’s a deranged animal,” Alyssa Mastromonaco, a former deputy chief of staff to President Barack Obama, tweeted about Trump. With an expletive, she called Trump’s statement in the Rose Garden a lie. Trump said in a news conference he had written letters to the families of four soldiers killed in an Oct. 4 ambush in Niger
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Senate’s aging members: Mostly Republican

by ALAN FRAM | October 17, 2017 | No Comments

Top Republicans coping with a razor-thin majority as they try pushing a partisan agenda through the Senate are running smack into another complication — the sheer age and health issues of some senators. When the office of the ailing Sen. Thad Cochran announced Monday that it was the Mississippi Republican’s “intention to return to the Senate when his health permits,” it underscored the challenges of navigating a chamber that’s the second oldest ever. Cochran’s absence narrows the GOP’s margin for error on a pivotal budget vote this week, and the Appropriations Committee that he chairs hasn’t churned out any spending
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Trump, McConnell claim unity

by ERICA WERNER | October 17, 2017 | No Comments

Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell have reaffirmed their alliance of necessity in a raucous Rose Garden news conference that also underscored their sharp differences. The garrulous president claimed they were longtime friends, now closer than ever; the reserved Senate Republican leader allowed that they share goals and speak often. It was a spectacle that mesmerized Washington, as Trump and McConnell appeared side by side for more than a half-hour, the president tossing off answers — sometimes mini-speeches — on all topics while McConnell, disciplined as always, delivered brief, scholarly explanations about the legislative process and the risks to their party
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Washington: Worst of the worst

by DOUG THOMPSON - Opinion | October 16, 2017 | 1 Comment

All too often, those we send to Washington as Presidents and members of Congress talk about being “the best of the best.” “I drain the swamp and I will replace it with the best of the best,” current President Donald Trump boasted after his election in 2016. Former President Barack Obama said pretty much the same thing. So did George W. Bush and Bill Clinton and just about every other President of our nation. In late 1984, I sat in a dinner for new members of the House of Representatives as then Congressman Trent Lott told those elected the month
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Trump screws base with healthcare move

by CHRISTINA A. CASSIDY and MEGHAN HOYER | October 15, 2017 | 3 Comments

President Donald Trump’s decision to end a provision of the Affordable Care Act that was benefiting roughly 6 million Americans helps fulfill a campaign promise, but it also risks harming some of the very people who helped him win the presidency. Nearly 70 percent of those benefiting from the so-called cost-sharing subsidies live in states Trump won last November, according to an analysis by The Associated Press. The number underscores the political risk for Trump and his party, which could end up owning the blame for increased costs and chaos in the insurance marketplace. The subsidies are paid to insurers
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Trump’s goal: Create chaos

by JULIE PACE | October 14, 2017 | 3 Comments

Unable or unwilling to completely erase his predecessor’s signature initiatives, President Donald Trump this week turned to another approach: wreaking havoc. Trump’s back-to-back body blows against President Barack Obama’s health care law and nuclear agreement with Iran demonstrated the president’s embrace of turmoil as strategy. In both cases, he plunged a pair of policies with broad domestic and international implications into a state of confusion and uncertainty, hoping that the disorder will force Congress to take action. Trump has long thrived on unpredictability, an attribute he views as a virtue. But to the lawmakers, foreign partners, businesses and consumers now
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Republicans & the Iran mess

by RICHARD LARDNER | October 14, 2017 | 1 Comment

Republicans demanded a major say on the Iran nuclear agreement two years ago and never got it from Democrat Barack Obama. Now that President Donald Trump has directed Congress to make the international pact more stringent, the GOP is finding it won’t be easy. Republicans will have to win over skeptical Democrats and key allies in Europe who are wary of altering the accord that they believe has prevented Iran from assembling an arsenal of atomic weapons in exchange for lifting economic sanctions. Republican leaders also may face resistance from members of their own party. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., a
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Trump continues to destroy America

by DOUG THOMPSON - Opinion | October 13, 2017 | No Comments

Donald John Trump, the schizophrenic psychotic who occupies 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with a lease he never qualified for or deserves, proved once again Thursday that he doesn’t give a damn about the idiots who flocked to his rallies and believed his lies. With his latest “executive order,” Trump wiped out protections for preexisting conditions, increased healthcare deductible to obscene levels, sent premiums soaring and destroyed basic coverage requirements for millions of Americans. The moron who promised “affordable health care” for “all Americans” instead is destroying it. After signing his executive order, Trump’s current acting head of Health & Human Services
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Kelly: ‘Chaos? What chaos?’

by JONATHAN LEMIRE | October 13, 2017 | No Comments

The retired general brought in to instill order at a chaotic White House made a rare public appearance Thursday to declare he’s staying in his post — and to insist that the president’s volatile Twitter feed wasn’t making his job harder. “Unless things change, I’m not quitting, I’m not getting fired and I don’t think I’ll fire anyone tomorrow,” chief of staff John Kelly told reporters during a surprise showing at the daily White House briefing. “I don’t think I’m being fired today, and I’m not so frustrated in this job that I’m thinking of leaving.” The extraordinary statement drew
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