Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[mvaliz]

Absolutely, I'm not trying to blame the FBI with this.

You know what? I bet you Dumbass Donnie Dump will publicly blame the FBI.

I just also saw a headline talking about the FBI apparently received a tip back in January 5th about the Florida Shooter.

I bet you a guinea to a gooseberry that Fukwit Dump is going to use both of these things to publicly attack the FBI and blame them for the problems. I'd be almost willing to put money down on it! In his little shriveled heart and self-centered mind he would believe he would be trying to kill three birds with one stone - 1) Dodging blame, 2) theoretically appeasing the outrage about those situations while also 3) attempting to hurt the FBI's credibility.

[Breccia]

Absolutely, I'm not trying to blame the FBI with this.

Sorry, didn't mean to imply you were. But someone could potentially blame the FBI, if they never got their act together and ran the background check. Your link destroys any such attempt they could have made.

[Poopymonster]

130 people is a gross number,

Actually 144 is a gross number.

I'll see myself out....

[Breccia]

More bad news for Trump, he's trying to protect the steel industry when their prices are at a seven-year high. Incidentally, same with coal. That's why people are looking for alternatives -- imported steel, wind and solar power.

Which, in turn, is why Trump is looking to greatly increase steel tariffs while also propping up the coal industry/attacking the solar industry. Well, domestically at least. In Trump's first year, US investment in overseas solar power doubled.

Because coal isn't selling overseas, and solar is.

Oh, and because he's a hypocrite.

Can't wait to see the GOP try to pus the infrastructure bill at a time steel prices are about to go up even higher.

- - - Updated - - -

Here's another story that's par for the course at this point.

Tillerson, who says that relations with Turkey are reaching a breaking point, had a meeting with Turkish officials to talk, one expects, about the violence in the region. Same ol' same ol', right?

Except Tillerson chose to have the meeting without foreign policy aides or a translator present. Most likely at Erdogan's insistence based on what I've seen, but he still agreed, and that's a break in long-standing protocol.

The meeting was an unusual break from protocol, with aides, note-takers and relevant translators typically attending meetings between American officials meeting with their foreign counterparts.

"If the meeting is not conducted in English, it is foolhardy in the extreme not to have at his side a State Department translator, who can ensure that Mr. Tillerson's points are delivered accurately and with the proper emphasis," former Obama administration State Department spokesman John Kirby told CNN.

"That Mr. Tillerson eschewed this sort of support in what he knew would be a tense and critical meeting with President Erdogan smacks of either poor staff work or dangerous naïveté on his part," he added.

A State Department official told CNN that Tillerson has "met before with President Erdogan, and he's okay with the foreign minister doing the translation. They have a good, strong working relationship."

Yes, that strong working relationship he just said was falling apart, was a reason to meet with one of the planet's most visible dictators without backup. Or witnesses.

And apparently, he's done that before.

As a reminder, Erdogan is a dictator who sentences journalists to life in prison and Trump has praised him on more than one occasion. Also, Flynn.

[Edge-]

Holy shit, what the fuck is Tillerson talking with Erdogan about that he doesn't want anyone at the State Department to know about it?

That's sketchy as fuck.

[Breccia]

Holy shit, what the fuck is Tillerson talking with Erdogan about that he doesn't want anyone at the State Department to know about it?

That's sketchy as fuck.

It is, but from the sources I read Erdogan probably asked for it and Tillerson just shrugged and said "sure". Tillerson knows Trump's opinion is the only one that matters and he wasn't going to make any progress anyhow.

Granted, he still agreed to "sketchy as fuck". Just probably not his idea to do so.

- - - Updated - - -

Aaaaaaaaaaaand there goes another Trump appointee.

The embattled chief of staff for Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin is retiring amid controversy over her role in Shulkin’s overseas travel and allegations her email was hacked by people looking to undermine the secretary.

Shulkin told the Military Times on Friday that Vivieca Wright Simpson “called me this morning and told me she doesn’t want to be in this environment anymore.”

A VA spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment from The Hill.

Wright Simpson was at the center of a damning allegation in a inspector general report released Wednesday about a trip Shulkin took to Europe last year.

The report charges that Wright Simpson altered an email to make it appear Shulkin was getting an award during the trip in order to gain approval to use taxpayer dollars to pay for Shulkin’s wife to accompany him.

Shulkin has defended Wright Simpson, saying she showed him evidence backing up her denial that she sent the email in question.

Shulkin has suggested the email was sent by hackers looking to undermine him. On Thursday, he told reporters that “we know” someone took over Wright Simpson’s email.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

*deep breath*

HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Edge-]

http://thehill.com/homenews/administ...ial-disclosure

So we're a over a year into this administration and Kushner is still adding previously undisclosed business interests to his personal financial disclosure forms.

[Breccia]

So we're a over a year into this administration and Kushner is still adding previously undisclosed business interests to his personal financial disclosure forms.

To further nail this point home: one of them was Trump's DC hotel.

Yes. Javanka forgot to disclose Trump's DC hotel was their responsibility. That is some epic-level forgetfullness right there. Good thing he doesn't have a security clearance.

[ati87]

http://thehill.com/homenews/administ...ial-disclosure

So we're a over a year into this administration and Kushner is still adding previously undisclosed business interests to his personal financial disclosure forms.

Kind of Shockley surprised with the Hill reporting, allot of good stuff coming out of them without having to bother with a paywall (Washington Post).

My biggest beef with them is allowing right-wing propaganda shit pieces that include more fantasies then a random Disney movie. The Hill allows shit post from Sebastian Gorka....this isn't a difference of opinion, this is literately given a horrible human being a platform to write his nones .

[Dontrike]

More bad news for Trump, he's trying to protect the steel industry when their prices are at a seven-year high. Incidentally, same with coal. That's why people are looking for alternatives -- imported steel, wind and solar power.

Which, in turn, is why Trump is looking to greatly increase steel tariffs while also propping up the coal industry/attacking the solar industry. Well, domestically at least. In Trump's first year, US investment in overseas solar power doubled.

Because coal isn't selling overseas, and solar is.

Oh, and because he's a hypocrite.

Can't wait to see the GOP try to pus the infrastructure bill at a time steel prices are about to go up even higher.

I'll never understand Trump's addiction with helping coal. By doing what he's doing he's quite literally costing the U.S. billions of dollars and potentially thousands of jobs because he wants to keep us in the fucking stone age of fuel and power.

[Breccia]

Well, there goes another Trump administrator.

Reed Cordish, assistant to the president for intergovernmental and technology initiatives, is stepping down, the Washington Post reports.

Cordish is a good friend of Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, and played a crucial role in creating the administration's infrastructure plan. Cordish is the latest to join the list of over a dozen White House aides who have left since Trump's inauguration.

- - - Updated - - -

I've heard of worse ways to mobilize people to vote.

An activist group has launched a voter registration effort aimed at black voters at screenings of the “Black Panther” movie nationwide.

Members of the Electoral Justice Project, an offshoot of the Movement for Black Lives, are seeking to “mobilize the black electorate” and increase political engagement with the #WakandaTheVote campaign, the website Blavity reported.

Wakanda is the fictional African nation featured in the long-anticipated Marvel film “Black Panther.”

Kayla Reed, Jessica Byrd and Rukia Lumumba founded the Electoral Justice Project last year, and told Blavity that the movement has been effective “because we meet our communities where they are, whether that's in the streets, at the city council meeting, or in the movie theater.”

"This weekend we wanted to meet our people in Wakanda," Byrd and Reed told Blavity. “We know that for some it's a superhero world, but we know that the world we deserve is still waiting to be built — and we want to build it.”

The project’s website notes that volunteers will be wearing “Wakanda inspired outfits” to help moviegoers register to vote.

Byrd and Reed told Blavity that they plan to further their efforts ahead of the 2018 midterm elections by holding a campaign manager institute called the “Electoral Justice League,” and to have “thousands of conversations” with black voters about upcoming elections.

“We want to take every opportunity to engage our communities in the conversation of electoral justice,” they said.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh shit, this headline.

Confluence of crises crashes Trump's 'Infrastructure Week'

"Okay everyone, we're going for Infrastructure Week 2: Now with Fewer Nazis. There's no march, no parade, no event scheduled, and my donors at the KKK said they'd be quiet this time. We all ready?"
"Yes, Mr. Trump."
"Good. Let's roll out that gas tax, that increase to state taxes, and Make Am--"

Porter resigns.

"Okay, that sucked bigly. But let's Make Am--"

Nobody has a security clearance. Kelly under fire for allowing it to happen and covering it up.

"...we done? Okay. Let's Make Am--"

Trump is caught paying hush money to a porn star.

"Mr. Trump, maybe we should -- "
"No, no, that's got to be the last of it. Let's Make Am--"

A crazy white supremacist murders 17 people within a short drive of Mar-a-Lago.

"Please, Mr. Trump, this isn't the time --"
"YUGE! JOBS! MAKE AMERICA GR--"

Mueller indicts at least 13 Russians for attacking the election on Trump's behalf.

"GOD DAMMIT! Honey, we're going to Florida."
"She left hours ago."

[PosPosPos]

I'll never understand Trump's addiction with helping coal. By doing what he's doing he's quite literally costing the U.S. billions of dollars and potentially thousands of jobs because he wants to keep us in the fucking stone age of fuel and power.

If you ever read up on the Cultural Revolution, you would understand what Trump and the Republican party are trying to do.

[Dontrike]

If you ever read up on the Cultural Revolution, you would understand what Trump and the Republican party are trying to do.

Trump is acting like my boss. He was losing money on antiquated procedures and systems and I tried to save him money, but he was too stubborn to do that as "it's what used to work". You wouldn't think you could lose money cleaning an office building, but my boss found a way and Trump is finding a way with the same things.

[Warning]

"With as much detail as possible, please provide any other information, including information about other members of your family, which could suggest a conflict of interest, be a possible source of embarrassment, or be used to coerce or blackmail you."

I hope for their sake Javanka, Don Jr and Eric are at least allowed to work together on this project.

[BrerBear]

I mean, no one probably needs to be reminded that Trump is a shell of a human being with no empathy, but this quote during his Florida shooting victim visit is just worth putting out there.

At the end, Michael Leonard, the officer who found the gunman and handcuffed him, spent 15 seconds explaining his actions.

The president was not satisfied, so he elaborated for the officer:

“That was so modest; I would have told it much differently,” Trump said. “I would have said, without me, they never would have found him.”

Yes, Trump, of course you would have.

[Thekri]

I mean, no one probably needs to be reminded that Trump is a shell of a human being with no empathy, but this quote during his Florida shooting victim visit is just worth putting out there.



Yes, Trump, of course you would have.

Modesty confuses Trump. He isn't sure what is going on there. Still, nobody voted for Trump because of his ability to be compassionate or even decent, so this really doesn't mean much.

[Edge-]

http://thehill.com/homenews/administ...te-house-staff

Jared "interim security clearance" Kushner seems to be making more requests for classified information than almost anyone else in the White House.

On the one hand this makes sense, not many people in the White House seem to actually want to work and his portfolio is basically "everything".

On the other hand, he's got tens/hundreds of millions in personal debt, his families businesses are swimming in debt, and he's still using an interim clearance. The kind that Porter and over 100 others in the White House are using because they have issues that are holding up them getting a permanent clearance.

This isn't remotely concerning at all.

[Stormspark]

http://thehill.com/homenews/administ...te-house-staff

Jared "interim security clearance" Kushner seems to be making more requests for classified information than almost anyone else in the White House.

On the one hand this makes sense, not many people in the White House seem to actually want to work and his portfolio is basically "everything".

On the other hand, he's got tens/hundreds of millions in personal debt, his families businesses are swimming in debt, and he's still using an interim clearance. The kind that Porter and over 100 others in the White House are using because they have issues that are holding up them getting a permanent clearance.

This isn't remotely concerning at all.

I'm sure they are selling information to the Russians at this point. You can come out and say it.

[szechuan]

BWAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAH thanks for the comedy Trump. If you care so much about Gun Control then fix it.

Just like they don’t want to solve the DACA problem, why didn’t the Democrats pass gun control legislation when they had both the House & Senate during the Obama Administration. Because they didn’t want to, and now they just talk!

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/...09332042596352

[Dontrike]

BWAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAH thanks for the comedy Trump. If you care so much about Gun Control then fix it.

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/...09332042596352

So I can either say that this is Trump trying to play the blame game, but I'm going to think he wants gun control.