Mega-Thread: Trump Focused Discussion

[Wyrt]

Trump prepared to declare National Security Lol a second time, under the apparent impression that his first declaration (Feb, to send troops) wasn't enough to also add tariffs.

Feels like that's their new slogan: TRUMP: Because National Security Lol.

How would Republicans feel if a Democrat president repeatedly used National Security declarations to circumvent congress?

[zorkuus]

How would Republicans feel if a Democrat president repeatedly used National Security declarations to circumvent congress?

We wouldn't be having this conversation. The US would be in civil war.

[Santti]

How would Republicans feel if a Democrat president repeatedly used National Security declarations to circumvent congress?

Pretty bad I'd imagine.

And since Trump is setting the precedent to declare National Security Lols for things like this, we're quite possibly going to see a Democrat president declaring it for things like climate change and other issues.

[Breccia]

How would Republicans feel if a Democrat president repeatedly used National Security declarations to circumvent congress?

I don't know, but, [url=https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/list-31-national-emergencies-effect-years/story?id=60294693]there have been 60 total/url] since the relevant law was passed. Of those, 33 are still in effect. Trump has 5 of them, 6 when this one comes into play, of those, 4 haven't aged a year yet and aren't up for "re-election" so to speak. Mexico was the fourth, China the fifth.

Here are the list of Obama emergencies that did NOT survive.

H1N1 (lasted one year)
Selling uranium to Russia (ended 2015)

"Ah! So Obama wanted to sell uranium to Russia! He and Killary are traitors!"

Well, he's the one that signed Executive Order 13617 in the first place, so, not really. Also, as it was signed in 2012 and lasted till 2015, and the GOP never sent anything to Obama's desk about it, it seems they were kind of okay with it. Bear in mind, this relates to a 1993 arrangement. But whatever. Obama signed, total, twelve, and let two expire. Trump's continuing the remaining 10. Best of my knowledge, nobody in the GOP tried to end Obama's other 10 early -- considering they were shit like "Somali pirates" I don't think they really wanted to. Correct me if I'm wrong on that.

Also, I seem to remember hearing a lot of talk about "Repubs must not allow Pres Obama to subvert the Constitution of the US for his own benefit & because he is unable to negotiate w/ Congress" in 2014. Hmm. Wonder who said that. Wonder if that tweet aged well. And yes, I know that's about Executive Orders in general, but I think we're past that parallel by now.

Trump can't even get the GOP Senate to send tariffs to the House as a formality. Just "National Security Lol" and off we go.

[Edge-]

https://apnews.com/c2aea42463364ce2b59c6507a2cf12df

The U.S. government on Wednesday will reclassify some of the nation’s most dangerous radioactive waste to lower its threat level, outraging critics who say the move would make it cheaper and easier to walk away from cleaning up nuclear weapons production sites in Washington state, Idaho and South Carolina.

The U.S. Department of Energy said labeling some high-level waste as low level will save $40 billion in cleanup costs across the nation’s entire nuclear weapons complex. The material that has languished for decades in the three states would be taken to low-level disposal facilities in Utah or Texas, the agency said.

“This administration is proposing a responsible, results-driven solution that will finally open potential avenues for the safe treatment and removal of the lower level waste,” Energy Undersecretary Paul Dabber said. “This will accelerate cleanup and reduce risk.”

The agency will maintain standards set by the independent Nuclear Regulatory Commission, “with the goal of getting the lower-level waste out of these states without sacrificing public safety,” Dabber said.

Critics said it’s a way for federal officials to walk away from their obligation to properly clean up a massive quantity of radioactive waste left from nuclear weapons production dating to World War II and the Cold War.

The waste is housed at the Savannah River Plant in South Carolina, the Idaho National Laboratory and Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington state — the most contaminated nuclear site in the country.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, a Democratic presidential candidate, and state Attorney General Bob Ferguson said the Trump administration is showing disdain and disregard for state authority.

“Washington will not be sidelined in our efforts to clean up Hanford and protect the Columbia River and the health and safety of our state and our people,” they said in a joint statement.

The new rules would allow the Energy Department to eventually abandon storage tanks containing more than 100 million gallons (378 million liters) of radioactive waste in the three states, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council.

The change means that some of the “most toxic and radioactive waste in the world” would not have to be buried deep underground, the environmental group said.

“Pretending this waste is not dangerous is irresponsible and outrageous,” group attorney Geoff Fettus said.

Tom Clements of Savannah River Site Watch, a watchdog group for the South Carolina nuclear production site, called the reclassification of waste “a cost-cutting measure designed to get thousands of high-level waste containers dumped off site.” He said moving the waste to Utah or Texas is a bad idea involving “shallow burial.”

The old definition of high-level waste was based on how the materials were produced, while the new definition will be based on their radioactive characteristics — the standard used in most countries, the Energy Department said.

The old definition said high-level radioactive waste resulted from a military production stream, Dabbar said. That meant, for instance, that all the waste from plutonium production at Hanford was classified as high level.

It was a “one-size-fits-all approach that has led to decades of delay, cost billions of dollars, and left the waste trapped in DOE facilities in the states of South Carolina, Washington and Idaho without a permanent disposal solution,” the agency said.

Hanford was established by the Manhattan Project during World War II to make plutonium, a key ingredient in the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan.

The nuclear site 200 miles (322 kilometers) southeast of Seattle contains about 60% of the nation’s most dangerous radioactive waste that’s stored in 177 aging underground tanks, some of which have leaked.

Cleanup at Hanford has been underway since the 1980s, at a cost of more than $2 billion a year.

The Energy Department said it would immediately begin studying one waste stream at the Savannah River Plant to see if it should be reclassified as low-level waste.

“We are excited about reducing the risk faster in South Carolina as a result of this,” Dabbar said.

MAKE AMERICA RADIOACTIVE AGAIN!

[zorkuus]

MAKE AMERICA RADIOACTIVE AGAIN!

freedom particles

It's coming, just wait for it.

[Edge-]

freedom particles

It's coming, just wait for it.

Listen at all the Freedom Particles emanating from this Freedom Juice! This Freedom Measuring Device is clicking off the scales!

[DarkTZeratul]

When even the DoE says that this will save money, it's hard to take seriously any arguments that there are other motivations.

[Masark]

freedom particles

It's coming, just wait for it.

Are those helium nuclei, electrons, or photons?

[Santti]

freedom particles

It's coming, just wait for it.

To be honest, it wouldn't be a big leap from Sunshine Units.

[Breccia]

The latest violator of the Hatch Act? Zinke.

But let's be honest, nobody in the WH cares. Someone who is willing to declare National Security Lol just to destroy his own economy won't raise a tiny pudgy finger for the Hatch Act.

- - - Updated - - -

Our ruling

Trump said, "There has never been, ever before, an administration that’s been so open and transparent."

Trump cited his cooperation with the Mueller investigation, but Mueller himself found several major shortcomings in the Trump White House’s efforts. Beyond that, the Trump administration has assembled a record of aggressive opposition to congressional subpoenas, a longstanding refusal to share his tax returns, a near-zeroing-out of press briefings, and larger numbers of lawsuits demanding the administration release information under FOIA.

We rate the statement Pants on Fire.

[Dontrike]

Our ruling

Trump not interviewing with Mueller immediately proves Trump false right there.

[Breccia]

White House says tariffs on Mexico will be halted if talks go well.

Based purely on their objective history, I call bullshit. The White House is looking for a way to reverse Trump's GOP-breaking decision without losing face, and to salvage the stock market, by claiming the talks went well, but changing nothing.

In fact, I'm just predicting this right now:
a) Monday at the latest, Trump caves on the tariffs.
b) no effective changes from Mexico through June. They might announce something, but that's it.

[Dontrike]

White House says tariffs on Mexico will be halted if talks go well.

Based purely on their objective history, I call bullshit. The White House is looking for a way to reverse Trump's GOP-breaking decision without losing face, and to salvage the stock market, by claiming the talks went well, but changing nothing.

In fact, I'm just predicting this right now:
a) Monday at the latest, Trump caves on the tariffs.
b) no effective changes from Mexico through June. They might announce something, but that's it.

Aw, I was looking forward to the weekly raid tariff debuff on the U.S...I mean Mexico.

[Paranoid Android]

President Trump puts his autograph up top when 15 world leaders sign a D-Day proclamation at a ceremony in Portsmouth, England. (Photo: Kerry Davies/AFP/Getty Images) https://t.co/FLUOHMiBtm

https://twitter.com/axios/status/113...419456001?s=19

Oh man! Of course we can't go a day for the Orange Narcissist to embarrass our country again.

So in a signed D-Day Proclamation (picture in link) the idio signed his name at the way top. Complete narcissism and showing rudeness and me, me attitude. Most will remember the video at NATO when Trump shoved Montenegro PM to get in front of photo.

I can hear Trumpkins now; 'Just look at the bottom and you see there was no room'. Yeah but basic elementary teachings, you learn where to sign your name. Plus all we know, the idiot might have been the first to sign it.

Good news I reckon is they didn't let the Orange Child sign in marker.

[Edge-]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/polit...=.d8f6cb64b8de

Holy shit that Hannity flip-flop.

"It's only OK when we call for the jailing of political opponents without cause, not when anyone else does it."

How anyone can actually listen to his bullshit is truly beyond me. His audience is people who don't have the ability to critically think or think for themselves.

But hey, he's making money off those poor saps, enough to make him one of the "elite" that he rails against.

[some guy]

The moon is a part of Mars. His stupidity has no upper limits.

[DarkTZeratul]

The moon is a part of Mars. His stupidity has no upper limits.

Even the most generous interpretation I can think of is still stupid. Namely, that he's saying going to Mars involves stopping off at the Moon, which might be logical except that he just said we shouldn't bother with the Moon.

[Breccia]

First of all, Trump was pushing for a return to the moon 3 months ago. Just throwing that out there.

I'm sure someone can educate me on how much nonsense was included in this one.

Of course, we've seen people from Dollar General to Costco saying "we have no choice but to increase costs and it's Trump's fault". So that part's just a flat-out lie.

The inflation part is, as another thread's mentioned, partially being curtailed by his own weak jobs report. The tariffs from China aren't in full force yet, nor Mexico, but we've already heard about the issues those will cause. Trump taking the viewpoint of someone who puts a bomb under a bridge and lights the fuse, then denies he's a criminal because the bomb hasn't exploded yet.

As for companies leaving China, he's at best half right. Even China admits some of their companies are leaving, but to the US? @lockedout you know the deal. Trump said "many" so your job is to find three. Three firms, that left China to come to the US, to avoid tariffs. Go for it. 24 hours.

And I've already stated that the WH is already backtracking from the tariffs, coming up with "we'll delay the tariffs if we claim there is progress" because they know how stupid this is and they know the GOP, even McConnell, are ready to bite him on this one. He's looking for a way to get kicked in the balls without crying like a bitch.

[Belize]

The moon is a part of Mars. His stupidity has no upper limits.

Wait.

What???