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Trump Timeline ... Trumpocalypse




Before it all totally hit the fan on Tuesday — before Sen. John McCain turned the very concept of JFK’s Profiles in Courage on its head, before our pro-life vice president Mike Pence cast a vote that could lead to the premature death of thousands of uninsured Americans — a hardy band of protesters briefly tried to bring the U.S. Senate to a halt. They chanted “Kill the bill!” and “Don’t kill us!” before the Capitol Police quickly moved in for arrests. Other officers blocked the hallway to keep journalists away from the scene, as one reportedly shouted “No photos!” before adding, “Delete your photos!”

It was only a few months ago that someone warned us that democracy dies in darkness. Now, at 2:45 p.m. on a bright and seasonable July afternoon, the American Experiment was quickly fading to black. And the last thing the co-conspirators wanted was a photographic record. After the last annoying pocket of resistance had been cleared, the U.S. Senate — once, hard to believe, known as the greatest deliberative body in the world — moved with not-deliberative speed to take a great leap forward to briefly debate a plan that no one has actually seen but is believed to divorce millions of Americans — maybe 15 million, maybe 32 million — from their health insurance, while fixing few if any of the actual problems with U.S. health care yet stirring up a beehive of new ones.

To note the insanity of that would miss the point. The Republicans who run this country (with help from their friends Gerry Mandering and E. Lector al-College) weren’t voting Tuesday with the foggiest notion of actually improving your family’s health care. That barely crossed their collective mind. No, they needed to show they could get 51 votes for something to prove and maintain their power over you, which is the No. 1 goal of American government in 2017. There’s a word for this mindless exercise of authority. It’s “authoritarianism.”

Remember “the doomsday clock” that nuclear scientists have promoted since the height of the Cold War, chiding world leaders on how close the world stands toward nuclear Armageddon? It’s time to belatedly wind up a doomsday clock for American democracy. Looking back, we should have started a couple of decades ago with the rise of GOP obstructionism, the war on science, mass incarceration and entertainment’s “Amusing Ourselves to Death” hostile takeover of political discourse. But things start moving downward swiftly in that moment two summers ago when a real estate mogul descended on an escalator from his gilded tower on 5th Avenue. After some ups and downs these six months since Donald Trump became America’s 45th president, we may look back on this last week of July 2017 as the moment the democracy doomsday clock struck 11:58 — and the ticking noise grew insufferable.
 
Michael Scally MD said:



Before it all totally hit the fan on Tuesday — before Sen. John McCain turned the very concept of JFK’s Profiles in Courage on its head, before our pro-life vice president Mike Pence cast a vote that could lead to the premature death of thousands of uninsured Americans — a hardy band of protesters briefly tried to bring the U.S. Senate to a halt. They chanted “Kill the bill!” and “Don’t kill us!” before the Capitol Police quickly moved in for arrests. Other officers blocked the hallway to keep journalists away from the scene, as one reportedly shouted “No photos!” before adding, “Delete your photos!”

It was only a few months ago that someone warned us that democracy dies in darkness. Now, at 2:45 p.m. on a bright and seasonable July afternoon, the American Experiment was quickly fading to black. And the last thing the co-conspirators wanted was a photographic record. After the last annoying pocket of resistance had been cleared, the U.S. Senate — once, hard to believe, known as the greatest deliberative body in the world — moved with not-deliberative speed to take a great leap forward to briefly debate a plan that no one has actually seen but is believed to divorce millions of Americans — maybe 15 million, maybe 32 million — from their health insurance, while fixing few if any of the actual problems with U.S. health care yet stirring up a beehive of new ones.

To note the insanity of that would miss the point. The Republicans who run this country (with help from their friends Gerry Mandering and E. Lector al-College) weren’t voting Tuesday with the foggiest notion of actually improving your family’s health care. That barely crossed their collective mind. No, they needed to show they could get 51 votes for something to prove and maintain their power over you, which is the No. 1 goal of American government in 2017. There’s a word for this mindless exercise of authority. It’s “authoritarianism.”

Remember “the doomsday clock” that nuclear scientists have promoted since the height of the Cold War, chiding world leaders on how close the world stands toward nuclear Armageddon? It’s time to belatedly wind up a doomsday clock for American democracy. Looking back, we should have started a couple of decades ago with the rise of GOP obstructionism, the war on science, mass incarceration and entertainment’s “Amusing Ourselves to Death” hostile takeover of political discourse. But things start moving downward swiftly in that moment two summers ago when a real estate mogul descended on an escalator from his gilded tower on 5th Avenue. After some ups and downs these six months since Donald Trump became America’s 45th president, we may look back on this last week of July 2017 as the moment the democracy doomsday clock struck 11:58 — and the ticking noise grew insufferable.
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The fish continues to rot from the head, of course. It is President Trump — with his non-stop bullying, his stream of falsehoods, a crudeness that mocks the claim he could be more presidential than anyone since Honest Abe, and a willingness, sometimes born of cruelty and sometimes of ignorance, to trample the norms of democracy underneath his tiny footsteps — who is setting the table for American autocracy. Let’s quickly review some of the things that have happened just in the last two days:

Trashing any remaining dignity of the office of the presidency: The bizzaro Trump Youth rally in West Virginia in the guise of a Boy Scout Jamboree was in many ways a moral low point for Trump’s tenure: The crude sexual innuendo, the relentless and highly inappropriate politicking, Trump’s pleas for praise and, of course, for loyalty, and his mocking of political rivals brought the president’s Straight Outta Nuremberg style to our nation’s impressionable youth. Even a former CIA director saw the appalling moment for what it was.

The theme continued Tuesday night, as Trump brought his more familiar brand of rally shtick to Youngstown, where he bullied and mocked a protester, harangued against a free press, and portrayed immigrants as committing violent acts against teenage girls in a sickening style that echoed Europe’s worst autocrats of the 1930s. And the more that Trump pumps this toxic brand of authoritarianism into the system, the more “normal” that the incredibly not-normal becomes.

The lies, remarkably, are increasing: Keeping score of Trump’s prevarications has become something of a sport as 2017 devolves, and https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2017/07/26/26-hours-29-trumpian-false-or-misleading-claims/?utm_term=.7f1494291bc0 (this week the president racked up some epic numbers). The Washington Post has just documented 29 false or misleading “Trumpian” claims in just 26 hours, on everything from the size of his crowds (a favorite falsehood) to the ownership of the Washington Post to the facts in a misleading allegation about ties between the Democratic National Committee and Ukraine.

The rule of law is hanging on by a fingernail: Trump’s bullying of Attorney General Jeff Sessions in an apparent effort to force one of his cabinet members to resign (for arguably the only reason he shouldn’t resign), while the president can (try to) avoid the political consequences that would stem from firing, has become an almost comic soap opera with a most unfunny potential punch line. The reason, after all, for Trump’s dissatisfaction is that Sessions can’t bend to his will and quash the Trump-Russia probe, presumably by firing special prosecutor Robert Mueller. And crushing the independence of prosecutors, along with the media (another Trump target) and the judiciary is the No. 1 hallmark of autocracy.

Alarmingly erratic behavior in the Oval Office: All of the above behavior, including the president’s raging narcissism and inability to display empathy — compounded by Trump’s alternately bullying and paranoid posts on Twitter — has sparked a raging debate among America’s psychologists whether the so-called “Goldwater rule” barring public discussion of a politician’s mental health still applies. But members of Congress and other key players are having these conversations — if not yet in public. Earlier this week, an open hot mike captured Democratic Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island and GOP Sen. Susan Collins of Maine discussing Trump’s “crazy” state of mind, with Collins stating, “https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2017/07/25/senators-on-hot-mic-trump-is-crazy-im-worried/?utm_term=.78bd493eca7c (I’m worried).” Welcome to the club.

Which brings us to why this week’s health care action in the Senate is so important. America’s founders anticipated the potential problems of a chief executive who shredded the rule of law or who otherwise proved to be unfit for the office. But there was no way, constitutionally, to prepare for what happens when the people handed those powers — primarily the Congress — refuse to exercise them. Rather than serve as a realistic check on the authoritarianism at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, House Speaker Paul Ryan, and their minions have chosen to work as accomplices — part out of shameless expediency and part out of fear.

The specifics of the various Obamacare repeals plans that are now being debated, thanks to Tuesday’s vote, are horrific, but the equally significant alarm bell is the wretched legislative process that got us to this point. The lack of “regular order” — a fancy term for having both a lengthy and unhindered debate about health care involving not just lawmakers from both parties but the key stakeholders like patients and their doctors, at open public hearings — is the kind of thing that takes place in a so-called “banana republic” and not a nation that for years has branded itself around the globe as democracy’s shining city on a hill.

The fact that 50 GOP senators, with Pence, were willing to vote to debate a bill that none of them have actually seen is proof that loyalty and discipline are the only things that matter in Trump/McConnell Washington — not the will of the people or a free exchange of ideas. (And there’s just too much to be said about Sen. John McCain and the meaning of political courage to go down that rabbit hole right now, but suffice it to say that his hypocritical vote and broken promise to fight for “regular order” render his pretty-sounding words after the vote utterly without meaning.) In the long run, the Senate’s spinelessness may prove more damaging to democracy than Trump’s buffoonery.

That’s why 11:58 p.m. feels like the proper setting for our democracy doomsday clock. Because the two-minute drill for America’s soul, and maybe even its survival, starts right now. The debate over an actual health care bill, which clearly could go either way, is a starting point. Massive public pressure on a few key lawmakers — phone calls, letters to the editor, protest marches, or even just making your feelings known in your community or on social media — could start to turn things in the right direction. That may prove doubly true in pressing Congress to use whatever’s left in its tool box — including impeachment, if necessary — to thwart a Trumpian coup at the Department of Justice. Such activism stands counter to modern American tendencies — our couch-potato political culture is how we ended up with Trump in the first place, right? — but the alternatives are unfathomable. And the ticking keeps getting louder.
 
Michael Scally MD said:
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The Transgender Ban is Facially Unconstitutional
The Transgender Ban is Facially Unconstitutional | Take Care

This morning, President Trump tweeted that the U.S. government would not “accept or allow transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. military.” Should the U.S. military in fact implement a policy consistent with the President’s tweet, it will violate the Constitution as understood by longstanding Supreme Court precedent.

Put to one side—for now—whether there is any military role to which the government could constitutionally tailor such a policy, of which I am skeptical. President Trump’s tweet refers to unspecified “tremendous medical costs and disruption” that would result from a different policy. He may be thinking of the Obama administration’s policy of paying medical costs associated with gender transition for active duty service members. But this policy decision has no obvious bearing on any individual’s fitness to serve. Transgender status seems not substantially related to any important objective—the constitutional standard for imposing gender classifications—and may not even be rationally related to any legitimate objective—the standard for all other classifications.

But even assuming for the sake of argument that there might be some constitutionally acceptable application of a policy of this sort, there is no rational reason to apply it to service “in any capacity.” The military employs cooks, medics, attorneys, engineers, postal workers, journalists, photographers, chaplains, chemists, and workers in countless other fields. It employs approximately 1.3 million active duty personnel. The idea that a transgender person serving “in any capacity” endangers the readiness or effectiveness of the armed forces is not credible.

Indeed, such a blanket prohibition, tweeted out in advance of the Pentagon completing a policy review, is so lacking in credibility that its only motivation seems to be animus towards transgender people. As the Supreme Court held more than two decades ago in Romer v. Evans, enacting government policy motivated by bare disgust towards a population of Americans is unconstitutional as a matter of first principles.

“Animus” is not always a clear guidepost to determining unconstitutionality, but it is here. We know it because we are seeing it.

If animus is the motivation behind the policy, it should be struck down on its face even if it a differently motivated law might have some constitutionally valid applications. Just as the President cannot institute a travel ban motivated by religious animus even if he could have reached a similar conclusion upon careful review, so too he cannot institute a transgender ban motivated by transgender animus even if he could have done so for legitimate reasons.

I doubt he could find such reasons, but his tweet shows that he didn’t even try.
 


After a week sparring with his attorney general and steaming over the Russia investigation consuming his agenda, President Donald Trump was closing in on an important win.

House Republicans were planning to pass a spending bill stacked with his campaign promises, including money to build his border wall with Mexico.

But an internal House Republican fight over transgender troops was threatening to blow up the bill. And House GOP insiders feared they might not have the votes to pass the legislation because defense hawks wanted a ban on Pentagon-funded sex reassignment operations — something GOP leaders wouldn’t give them.

They turned to Trump, who didn’t hesitate. In the flash of a tweet, he announced that transgender troops would be banned altogether.

Trump’s sudden decision was, in part, a last-ditch attempt to save a House proposal full of his campaign promises that was on the verge of defeat, numerous congressional and White House sources said.
 


[W]hile the events and news over the last 24 hours seem like just another day for the Trump White House, they expose a level of dysfunction and chaos that could leave a lasting mark for a president who said back in February that he was running a “fine-tuned machine.” Consider:
  • The White House couldn’t say what happens to the transgender Americans who are currently serving in the U.S. military after Trump announced that they couldn’t serve in any capacity. (“That’s something that the Department of Defense and the White House will have to work together,” Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said.)
  • The Defense Department was so caught off guard by the announcement that the previous policy — allowing transgender military members to serve openly — is STILL on its website.
  • For a week, top administration officials have tried to talk President Trump down from his public criticism of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the New York Times reports. And the https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-talks-privately-about-the-idea-of-a-recess-appointment-to-replace-sessions/2017/07/26/2a347d32-723c-11e7-9eac-d56bd5568db8_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_sessions-850pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.e2c832948dec (Washington Post adds) that the president has discussed the possibility of installing a new attorney general through a recess appointment.
  • The Alaska Dispatch News says that Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke called Alaska’s two senators to warn them that Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s “no” votes on health care had put the state’s future with the administration in jeopardy. ("I'm not going to go into the details, but I fear that the strong economic growth, pro-energy, pro-mining, pro-jobs and personnel from Alaska who are part of those policies are going to stop," Sen. Dan Sullivan, R-Alaska, said regarding Zinke’s call.
  • And new White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci took to Twitter last night to say he was contacting the FBI because his financial-disclosure form was leaked — and he strikingly tagged White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus in the tweet. But the Politico reporter who wrote about Scaramucci’s form said it was publicly available from the Export-Import Bank, where Scaramucci previously worked. (On CNN this morning, Scaramucci again suggested Priebus is leaking, saying: “I don't know if the relationship with Reince is reparable.”
The whole point of electing a businessman to become president was expecting someone to EFFECTIVELY run the government. But what happens when that businessman can’t run the government? That’s the significant long-term danger for Trump and his administration.
 


HONG KONG — The commander of the United States Pacific Fleet was asked a hypothetical question during a talk on Thursday in Australia: If President Trump ordered a nuclear strike on China, would he comply?

“The answer would be yes,” Adm. Scott H. Swift replied.

Admiral Swift, who was speaking at Australian National University in Canberra, said his answer was a reflection of the principle of civilian control over the military.

“Every member of the U.S. military has sworn an oath to defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies foreign and domestic and to obey the officers and the president of the United States as the commander in chief appointed over us,” he said.

But the scenario, which was put forward by an academic at the conference held by the university’s National Security College, revived the question of President Trump’s fitness to command the nation’s nuclear arsenal. That became an issue during the 2016 presidential campaign, when his opponent, Hillary Clinton, said, “A man you can bait with a tweet is not a man we can trust with nuclear weapons.” Those concerns were echoed by President Barack Obama.
 
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