[Discussion] Hope to Remember The Trump Administration Thread as being 'transparent and honest'

Let's follow and discuss what our newest presidential administration gets up to, the good, the bad, the lawsuits, and the many many indictments.

One good thing is that the military has said that they will not react to directives made through Twitter. They will only follow the appropriate chain of command protocals.

r013nt0 wrote:

And here's Aaron Rupar's thread, complete with video clips.

Reminder: donald thinks this makes him look good.

He sounds a bit hoarse, tbh.

r013nt0 wrote:

And here's Aaron Rupar's thread, complete with video clips.

Reminder: donald thinks this makes him look good.

I'm not sure, I think they are hoping to just get all of the bad news done with today and tomorrow (Debate and Rudy) so they can try keep screaming about Hunter next week.

But, the bad news never ends for them and he's now on the record saying that he hopes the SC overturns Obamacare.

So....... good luck with that.

Does no-one in his Campaign War room not realize that, given friday, saturday and sunday, that 60 Minutes staff won't be able to take the clips he released, compare it to what they actually filmed, and show the creative editing his staff undoubtedly did?

Sometimes they come across as "Well, we are completely incompetent, so I assume everyone else is as well."

Also, how could anyone campaigning for president go on 60 Minutes and not expect a hard hitting interview where the interviewer is going to be prepared as hell?

If anything is an indication of his state of mind, it should be this.

I mean, it's 60 freaking Minutes!!

r013nt0 wrote:

And here's Aaron Rupar's thread, complete with video clips.

Reminder: donald thinks this makes him look good.

If Trump thinks that makes him look good, well, then tonight's debate is going to be interesting.

mudbunny wrote:

I mean, it's 60 freaking Minutes!!

I remain convinced that the only thing he thinks about with TV is big rating numbers and people praising him.

When they don't praise him enough, he calls reporters and tells them that he's "John Barron" and that this Trump guy is beautiful and has a lot of money.

This Canadian will be watching, if only to see Trump's meltdown when his mic is muted.

That didn't take long

New York (CNN Business)CBS News on Thursday called out the White House for violating an agreement it had with the network and posting President Trump's full "60 Minutes" interview online ahead of its Sunday air date.

"The White House's unprecedented decision to disregard their agreement with CBS News and release their footage will not deter '60 Minutes' from providing its full, fair and contextual reporting which presidents have participated in for decades," CBS News said in a statement.

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/xAq4mdb.png)

Does Trump think this makes him look good (like with his "perfect" Ukraine call) or does he think that he's somehow getting back at 60 Minutes by undercutting their ratings or something?

ClockworkHouse wrote:

Does Trump think this makes him look good (like with his "perfect" Ukraine call) or does he think that he's somehow getting back at 60 Minutes by undercutting their ratings or something?

Por que no los dos, RelojtrabajoCasa?

HomerSimpsonMakingClownsInMashedPotatoes.gif

ClockworkHouse wrote:

Does Trump think this makes him look good (like with his "perfect" Ukraine call) or does he think that he's somehow getting back at 60 Minutes by undercutting their ratings or something?

He thinks it shows that MSM are big meanies who refuse to praise him for his endless and amazing achievements and, instead, ask him questions he thinks are specifically designed to make him look bad.

Sadly there are a lot of Fox News-watching Americans who agree with him.

OG_slinger wrote:

IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/xAq4mdb.png)

Not really a spoiler but psst...he has no plan but yet people are still willing to back him..

That's what I still don't understand...the degree of willful suspension of disbelief that you have to have to believe that he's going to provide any protection at all to people with pre-existing conditions.

Someone should ask him what "preexisting conditions" are and see if he has any idea at all.

I could almost see believing him if it was his first term but he hasn't done it. Why would anyone expect he suddenly will?

Yeah they had the presidency and both houses of Congress and all they managed to do was one tax cut, fail to kill Obamacare (RIP McCain), and work in a government shutdown over budget. Real competent gang of assholes there.

They really put themselves in an impressive bind with the ACA where they've run for years on how terrible it is, but every provision within the ACA aside from the individual mandate continues to be popular with voters. They have to promise to protect all the things the ACA does while advocating for the ACA to be abolished.

‘Stunning’ Executive Order Would Politicize Civil Service

Government Executive Magazine wrote:

President Trump on Wednesday signed an executive order creating a new classification of “policy-making” federal employees that could strip swaths of the federal workforce of civil service protections just before the next president is sworn into office.

The order would create a new Schedule F within the excepted service of the federal government, to be composed of “employees in confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating positions,” and instructs agency heads to determine which current employees fit this definition and move them—whether they are members of the competitive service or other schedules within the excepted service—into this new classification. Federal regulations stating that employees hired into the competitive service retain that status even if their position is moved to the excepted service will not apply to Schedule F transfers.

Positions in the new Schedule F would effectively constitute at-will employment, without any of the protections against adverse personnel actions that most federal workers currently enjoy, although individual agencies are tasked with establishing “rules to prohibit the same personnel practices prohibited” by Title 5 of the U.S. Code. The order also instructs the Federal Labor Relations Authority to examine whether Schedule F employees should be removed from their bargaining units, a move that would bar them from being represented by federal employee unions.

“Except as required by statute, the civil service rules and regulations shall not apply to removals from positions listed in Schedules A, C, D, E, or F, or from positions excepted from the competitive service by statute,” the order states.

The order sets a swift timetable for implementation: Agencies have 90 days to conduct a “preliminary” review of their workforces to determine who should be moved into the new employee classification—a deadline that coincides with Jan. 19, the day before the next presidential inauguration.

The White House argued that the executive order is a necessary reform to ensure that federal officials can more efficiently remove “poor performers.”

“Effective performance management of employees in confidential, policy-determining, policy-making or policy-advocating positions is of the utmost importance,” the order states. “Unfortunately, the government’s current performance management is inadequate, as recognized by federal workers themselves. For instance, the 2016 Merit Principles Survey reveals that less than a quarter of federal employees believe their agency addresses poor performers effectively.”

But federal employee groups and government observers described the executive order as a “stunning” attempt to politicize the civil service and undermine more than a century of laws aimed at preventing corruption and cronyism in the federal government.

“The [1883] Pendleton Act is clearly in the sights of this executive order,” said Donald Kettl, the Sid Richardson professor at the University of Texas at Austin’s Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs. “It wants to undo what the Pendleton Act and subsequent civil service laws tried to accomplish, which was to create a career civil service with expertise that is both accountable to elected officials but also a repository of expertise in government. The argument here is that anyone involved in policymaking can be swept into this new classification, and once they’re in they’re subject to political review and dismissal for any reason.”

American Federation of Government Employees National President Everett Kelley said in a statement on Thursday that the executive order is “the most profound undermining of the civil service system in our lifetimes.”

“This executive order strips due process rights and protections from perhaps hundreds of thousands of federal employees and will enable political appointees and other officials to hire and fire these workers at will,” Kelley said. “Through this order, President Trump has declared war on the professional civil service by giving himself the authority to fill the government with his political cronies who will pledge their unwavering loyalty to him—not to America.”

Can Biden just do a single executive order on January 20th that states: "All of Trump's executive orders are hereby reversed."

JC wrote:

Can Biden just do a single executive order on January 20th that states: "All of Trump's executive orders are hereby reversed."

I'd love to see that. EOs have no legal protection I'm aware of.

However, the Grand Opposition Party will be in full force, so he'll probably want to go a bit more granular to fend off the inevitable law suits.

JLS wrote:
JC wrote:

Can Biden just do a single executive order on January 20th that states: "All of Trump's executive orders are hereby reversed."

I'd love to see that. EOs have no legal protection I'm aware of.

However, the Grand Opposition Party will be in full force, so he'll probably want to go a bit more granular to fend off the inevitable law suits.

Fix the courts, let them sue.

JLS wrote:
JC wrote:

Can Biden just do a single executive order on January 20th that states: "All of Trump's executive orders are hereby reversed."

I'd love to see that. EOs have no legal protection I'm aware of.

I'm not sure I'm right (correct me if I'm wrong) but I tried to cheer up my wife the other day with basically this point.

Anything enacted/enabled by an executive order can be reversed by an executive order.
Any law passed can be reversed/modified by another law.
The only things that are hard to reverse are Supreme Court decisions. They may, however, be circumvented by a new law that is a copy/paste of the old law minus that which the SC has deemed unconstitutional.

Using the ACA as an example:

Should the SC invalidate the ACA due to the individual mandate being unconstitutional, there is nothing to stop a new law being passed that has everything EXCEPT the individual mandate. Meanwhile, those who have healthcare through the ACA (like me) will continue to be covered until renewal time (I have pre-existing conditions and had found myself uninsurable until the ACA came along). So the only people at risk of losing coverage are those whose coverage is up for renewal in that time between the SC ruling and the new law being passed.

Assuming that the Dems win a full sweep Nov 3, they could start working on the new law in November, present it to both houses Jan 2, and have it ready for Biden to sign Jan 17th.

It's all about priorities and focus. Unlikely to happen, but it *could*.

Post-debate, please spend a few seconds per day to carefully watch the stock prices of:

JNJ (Johnson & Johnson)

MRNA (Moderna)

PFE (pfizer)

And new numerous others....

Moggy wrote:

Any law passed can be reversed/modified by another law.
The only things that are hard to reverse are Supreme Court decisions. They may, however, be circumvented by a new law that is a copy/paste of the old law minus that which the SC has deemed unconstitutional.

When the Supreme Court rules on a Constitutional issue, overturning the decision requires a Constitutional Amendment, unfortunately. Like if we want to completely be rid of Citizens United, for example, we would need 2/3s of both houses of congress to pass the resolution, which would then be sent to the states for ratification, and you need 38 of those to sign.

And good luck with that.

r013nt0 wrote:

When the Supreme Court rules on a Constitutional issue, overturning the decision requires a Constitutional Amendment, unfortunately.

Or you install 3 conservative justices that'll overturn precedent. Getting 3 timely deaths seems to be all you need.

r013nt0 wrote:
Moggy wrote:

Any law passed can be reversed/modified by another law.
The only things that are hard to reverse are Supreme Court decisions. They may, however, be circumvented by a new law that is a copy/paste of the old law minus that which the SC has deemed unconstitutional.

When the Supreme Court rules on a Constitutional issue, overturning the decision requires a Constitutional Amendment, unfortunately. Like if we want to completely be rid of Citizens United, for example, we would need 2/3s of both houses of congress to pass the resolution, which would then be sent to the states for ratification, and you need 38 of those to sign.

And good luck with that.

Yes, if you want to change the constitution. On the other hand, if you have a law (like the ACA) that is deemed unconstitutional by the Supreme Court because of one clause (Individual Mandate), you could pass a new law that is a cut-and-paste of the old law MINUS the clause deemed unconstitutional.

Wouldn't that then require the courts to re-examine the law to determine constitutionality?

r013nt0 wrote:
Moggy wrote:

Any law passed can be reversed/modified by another law.
The only things that are hard to reverse are Supreme Court decisions. They may, however, be circumvented by a new law that is a copy/paste of the old law minus that which the SC has deemed unconstitutional.

When the Supreme Court rules on a Constitutional issue, overturning the decision requires a Constitutional Amendment, unfortunately. Like if we want to completely be rid of Citizens United, for example, we would need 2/3s of both houses of congress to pass the resolution, which would then be sent to the states for ratification, and you need 38 of those to sign.

And good luck with that.

That's not true, especially in this case. They can pass the law without the part that was considered unconstitutional.

The reason the ACA is in front of SCOTUS is to determine if ACA is "inseverable from the individual mandate" now that the individual mandate part of the ACA was removed by a law passed in 2017.

If the ACA is struck down by SCOTUS, it's not because the ACA itself is unconstitutional. It's because Congress removed the individual mandate of the original ACA. A new ACA can be passed without the individual mandate.

Quintin_Stone wrote:
r013nt0 wrote:
Moggy wrote:

Any law passed can be reversed/modified by another law.
The only things that are hard to reverse are Supreme Court decisions. They may, however, be circumvented by a new law that is a copy/paste of the old law minus that which the SC has deemed unconstitutional.

When the Supreme Court rules on a Constitutional issue, overturning the decision requires a Constitutional Amendment, unfortunately. Like if we want to completely be rid of Citizens United, for example, we would need 2/3s of both houses of congress to pass the resolution, which would then be sent to the states for ratification, and you need 38 of those to sign.

And good luck with that.

That's not true, especially in this case. They can pass the law without the part that was considered unconstitutional.

The reason the ACA is in front of SCOTUS is to determine if ACA is "inseverable from the individual mandate" now that the individual mandate part of the ACA was removed by a law passed in 2017.

If the ACA is struck down by SCOTUS, it's not because the ACA itself is unconstitutional. It's because Congress removed the individual mandate of the original ACA. A new ACA can be passed without the individual mandate.

Where did I mention the ACA?