9th Circuit Court of Appeals Upholds Stay of Travel Ban EO

I have been trying so hard to have faith that the system will work. This gives me a glimmer of hope.

 

Another glimmer. Trump's response:



Which isn't the same thing as "THE HECK WITH THE COURTS, WE'RE ENFORCING THE ORDER ANYWAY!" Which is what I sort of would've expected.

Still could happen. But hasn't yet.

 

Unfortunately, my glimmer of hope is going out the last couple of days. Okay, yeah the 9th Circuit Court stopped this particular crazy. But there's still crazy gushing out of every other orifice. And you have "reasonable GOP Senator" Lindsey Graham saying Elizabeth Warren deserved what the Senate did to her because, "The bottom line is, it was long overdue with her. I mean, she is clearly running for the nomination in 2020."

So even though we should have suspected, even in the face of the cornerstones of our democracy being tested daily, the most important thing is winning elections. So Russia doesn't matter, conflicts of interest don't matter, pissing off our allies doesn't matter, the rule of law doesn't matter. What matters is painting someone with a D behind their name, especially a woman or a minority as the enemy. After all, vacancies are open now since Hillary Clinton and President Obama will not be running for more offices. And they will have to painted as something even more toxic to keep the base energized against them considering the toxicity levels of their guy.

The GOP isn't going to come to its senses and suddenly see the forest they have walked deep into the middle of, and start doing their job. So all the while, the world will burn.

 

The world is not burning. Feel free to freak out when it does ... but so far it's not.

By the way, as I've mentioned two or three times, I follow several never-Trump conservatives on Twitter, some of whom have a great deal of sense (and others are just entertaining). And they've all to a man pointed out that the censure of Elizabeth Warren has to have been a deliberate and premeditated political move by the GOP ... because they want the Dems to rally around Elizabeth Warren and make her their candidate in 2020. Their polling shows - and I think it's right - that she's Hillary 2.0, a divisive figure that will win California by 10 million votes while getting clobbered in the electoral college, because regardless of politics or anything else, the "base" dislikes her with a purple passion. She comes across as shaky, shrill, obnoxious and power-hungry on camera, her rhetoric is divisive and confrontational and aimed straight at the liberal wing (and the heck with everyone else in the country) - in other words, she's a super-liberal Trump with none of the media skills. In other other words, she can't beat Pence (or Ryan or Huckabee or Sasse or whoever).

So be careful what you wish for ...

 

What you mean about be careful what you wish for? This isn't about Warren, specifically, other than the GOP needs a bogeyman and this week it's her. If some other Democrat sticks their head out, I'm sure the rhetoric will change to how that person is obviously setting up a Presidential run and pivot the attack dogs on that person. Finding the next bogeyman matters MORE than the things I mentioned: Russia, ethics, laws. And that's a problem when it comes to expectations concerning Congress playing its checks & balances role.

 

The Lindsey Graham portion of it that you mentioned as your example, specifically is.

Congress will start playing its checks and balances role as soon as they see it as being in their interest ... which at this rate might be any second now. Meanwhile, the courts, including Trump's new SCOTUS nominee, have our back.

 

I still don't know why you said be careful for what you wish for? Who? I'm not wishing for a Warren presidential run, so do you mean the GOP types who are hoping she runs so that they are ready for her? They should be careful?

 

Problem is, Mawnck is right. She lacks the necessary charisma, and is easily despised. Hillary 2.0 indeed.

They can release the hounds all they want, if they're aiming at someone charming and likable like a Barack Obama (or a Bill Clinton or a JFK) they lose.

Clinton/Warren? Not so much. Easy to beat (even a psychopath could do it!).

I'm not entirely certain there isn't some sort of misogyny at work in this (even within my own self! I'm looking closely and trying to know myself better on this...), but even if so, it doesn't matter. There are plenty of "true blue Dems" still wailing and gnashing their teeth and spitting hate at Sanders and the Green party and all those damned DINO's and the rest of the bastards that robbed their perfect candidate of her rightful crown, but Trump is still Prez. And if you ask me, Obama would've wiped the floor with the clown if he'd been eligible for a 3rd term.

The next Obama is the one we should be searching for. Elizabeth Warren ain't it.

 

There is an important difference between Clinton and Warren not yet remarked upon here, however. And that is that, unlike with Hillary, the Democratic base adores Warren. Yes, the right-wing base would despise her, but they despised Obama too, with a white-hot (see what I did there?) passion, and he still won easily. Twice. Because he was adored by the Democratic base - like Warren is, and like Clinton never was. The enthusiasm gap in 2016 was enough to push Trump over the top in just enough states. But that only existed because Dems weren't especially enthusiastic about Hillary.

Trump/Warren would be a battle of the bases, and the Democratic base is bigger. Plus, those former Obama voters who were conned into voting for Trump in 2016 (and were necessary to putting him over the top in the swing states) will probably have figured out by then that he never actually gave crap one about them.

Now that assumes Trump is still in office in 2020. Warren/Pence would be a different calculation that I wouldn't hazard a guess about now, because Pence is still too unknown a quantity nationally (though it's worth noting that his numbers were in the toilet even in red-state Indiana after he'd been around a while).

 

I think almost certainly he'll choose option 4. The president actually has pretty wide leeway in the fields of national security and who gets let in. But he can't do it in a blatantly unconstitutional way, and there were portions of the sloppily written Executive Order that were blatantly unconstitutional - applying it to green card holders being an obvious one.

If they rework it more carefully, they could probably get it to stand. Of course, people from those 7 countries were already being heavily vetted, so stopping them entirely probably doesn't make us any safer and almost certainly does the precise opposite, by playing into the narrative of actual terrorists, i.e. "they hate us and it's us against them" - increasing rather than decreasing the likelihood of a terrorist attack down the road.

And when one happens, Trump can say "See, I was right! I'm so, so smart!" and then increase the ban to more countries, and/or institute measures against American-born Muslims. And if the attack is serious and people are scared enough, he'll probably get away with it.

 

Reminder - Trump got fewer votes than Romney. The Democratic base stayed home, as they are wont to do. There's not much evidence that Obama-Trump voters were a factor. If you're counting on a "battle of the bases", the GOP wins.

And yes, I think it's a safe assumption that it won't be Trump in 2020, if for no other reason than I don't think he'd run again. Been there, done that.

Oh, absolutely. But if the courts find the revised version constitutional, then it's constitutional. And we're back to "elections have consequences".

I still think the most inviting major terrorist target would be a great big building in another country that has the POTUS's name on it in gigantic letters. And that sort of thing may not work well with that narrative.

 

Sure there is. He won PA, MI, WI and FL all by 1 percent or less (people forget about FL because it's a different region and went red more recently than the others, but he squeaked by there too). Exit polls indicate much more than 1% of the vote in all those states were Obama 2012/Trump 2016. They were hardly his base, but they put him over the top in just enough states. Without them, he loses those states, and the electoral college.

I think you just contradicted yourself. The Dem. base stayed home because they were "meh" on Hillary, in a way they weren't "meh" on Obama, and presumably wouldn't be "meh" on Warren. If both bases show up, Democrats win.

Plus, if he manages to hang around 4 years, he almost certainly will be less popular than now. If he thinks he'll lose, he declare "victory" (he'll say "victory for America," but he'll mean for himself) and decline to run again.

That's IF he manages to last 4 years, which is far from a gimme.

Opinion | Trump’s two-year presidency

(From sane conservative Kathleen Parker).

I think that sort of attack is likely too. But almost certainly there will be more attack(s) here also, if only of the lone wolf type a la San Bernardino and Orlando. And I worry it could become a vicious cycle of attack/fear/call for "something to be done" about Muslims/something done (expended travel ban, surveillance of mosques, increased police presence and harassment in Muslim communities)/further alienation and susceptibility to ISIS-type entreaties to American Muslims (even if only a handful)/attack/fear/call for "something to be done"... wash, rinse, repeat.

 

An interesting point.

Also a chilling one.

Are we to the point where the middle is no longer relevant? Used to be (and by "used to" I mean eight freaking years ago!) that politicians had to pivot and appeal to the moderate types eventually. That led to sane and rational governance.

We've already seen what happens (in Congress) when the extremes take the reigns. If that holds true in the White House as well, America really is going to be the rotting shithole Trump envisions pretty soon, no matter which side 'wins'!

 

Or in fewer words, what she lacks is a penis. She is smarter, more articulate and more courageous then any 10 of the current "law men" in the Senate. She may be lacking the appendage but she has far more cahoonas than all of the rest of them put together. They are almost all spineless crapheads.

 

Mr. X, I guess I just don't see Warren as some wild eyed extremist, as some on the right want to paint her. Most of her positions have plenty of appeal to centrists.

 

Well, not her per se, but what the left wing base will demand of her (like what the right wing base has done to the once measured and reasonable Republican party). My point is, if they're forced to appeal to the fringes to win, we get a fringe government.

Oh, and by the way, on the left winger sites these days the favorite rallying cry is "PRIMARY THEM!".

*shudder*

 

I still think Warren lacks the charisma to go all the way, though. I seriously doubt she'll ever be Prez.

 

So? Four more years of the GOP is four more years of the GOP. You need to get real here. If she can't win, then it doesn't matter why.