Lazy Saturday Reads: Trumpcare’s Ignominious Defeat and Spy News
Posted: March 25, 2017 Filed under: Foreign Affairs, morning reads, Republican politics, U.S. Politics | Tags: Carter Page, Devin Nunes, Donald Trump, GOP health care bill, Michael Flynn, Mike Pence, Obamacare, Paul Manafort, Paul Ryan, Roger Stone, Steve Bannon, tRumpcare, Turkey 51 Comments
Good Afternoon!!
Last night, for the first time since November 8, 2016, I went to bed happy. Thanks in large part to the millions of Americans who marched in the streets, went to town halls or their representatives’ offices to defend Obamacare, the attempt by tRump and Ryan to destroy the health care system has been thwarted–at least for the time being.
Trump is being roasted in the media. Here are a few stories to check out, links only because there are so many:
The Washington Post: ‘The closer’? The inside story of how Trump tried — and failed — to make a deal on health care.
Politico: Trump gets tamed by Washington (click on this one if only to view the absolute worst photo of tRump’s hair so far).
Politico Magazine: Inside the GOP’s Health Care Debacle. Eighteen days that shook the Republican Party—and humbled a president.
The New York Times: How the Health Care Vote Fell Apart, Step by Step.
Jonathan Chait: Why Obamacare Defeated Trumpcare.
I want to highlight one aspect of the tRump strategy. He let Steve Bannon talk to the Freedom Caucus, and it did not go well.
When the balky hardliners of the House Freedom Caucus visited the White House earlier this week, this was Steve Bannon’s opening line, according to people in the conference room in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building:
Guys, look. This is not a discussion. This is not a debate. You have no choice but to vote for this bill.
- Bannon’s point was: This is the Republican platform. You’re the conservative wing of the Republican Party. But people in the room were put off by the dictatorial mindset.
- One of the members replied: “You know, the last time someone ordered me to something, I was 18 years old. And it was my daddy. And I didn’t listen to him, either.”\\ [….]It’s hard to overstate the magnitude of the Day 64 defeat. President Trump, who made repeal-and-replace a central theme of his campaign, and House Republicans, who made it the central theme of every campaign since 2010, lost in a publicly humiliating way despite controlling every branch of government and enjoying margins in the House rarely seen in the past century.
More on Bannon’s role at The Daily Beast: Bannon Tells Trump: ‘Keep a Shit List’ of Republicans Who Opposed You. (This one was published before the bill was pulled.)
According to multiple Trump administration officials speaking to The Daily Beast on the condition of anonymity to talk freely, the president is angry that his first big legislative push is crumbling before his eyes—and his chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon is advising him to take names and keep a hit list of Republicans who worked for Trumpcare’s defeat.
“[Bannon] has told the president to keep a shit list on this,” one official told The Daily Beast. “He wants a running tally of [the Republicans] who want to sink this…Not sure if I’d call it an ‘enemies list,’ per se, but I wouldn’t want to be on it.”
One aide described it as a proposed “hit list” for Republicans not sufficiently loyal. Courses of action stemming from any related tally is yet to be determined, but the idea and message is that “we’ll remember you.”
Two senior Trump administration officials with direct knowledge of the process told The Daily Beast that Bannon and Trump have taken a “you’re either with us or against us” approach at this point, and that Bannon wants the tally of “against” versus “with us” mounted in his so-called West Wing “war room.”
“Burn the boats,” Bannon (in his typical, pugnacious style) advised Trump, according to one official involved. Burning one’s boats is a reference to when military commanders in hostile territories order his or her troops to destroy their own ships, so that they have to win or die trying.
Now let’s get to the really interesting stuff–the spy news.
Is Mike Flynn already talking to the FBI? I would be if I were in his shoes, and he has been awfully quiet since he belatedly registered as a foreign agent for his work in support of Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. And yesterday we learned that Flynn proposed kidnapping Erdogan’s sworn enemy Fethullah Gulen, a former Turkish cleric whom Turkey has been trying to get extradited from the U.S.
The Washington Post: Pentagon weighs response to Flynn working on behalf of Turkish interests without U.S. permission.
President Trump’s ousted national security adviser did not seek permission from the U.S. government to work as a paid foreign agent for Turkish interests, U.S. defense officials said, raising the possibility that the Pentagon could dock the retirement pay of Michael T. Flynn.
Navy Capt. Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman, said that the Defense Department is reviewing the issue. It arose after Flynn, a retired Army lieutenant general, registered retroactively this month with the Justice Department as a foreign agent for work that his company, Flynn Intel Group, carried out on behalf of Inovo BV, a Netherlands-based company. It is owned by Ekim Alptekin, a Turkish businessman who is not a part of the Turkish government, but has links to it.
The Inovo assignment centered on researching Fethullah Gulen, a Turkish cleric whom Ankara blames for fomenting a coup attempt last summer and wants extradited from the United States, where he has lived in exile for years. That led Flynn’s company to conclude that the work “could be construed to have principally benefited the Republic of Turkey,” according to a letter sent by Flynn’s attorney, Robert K. Kelner, to the Justice Department, along with the filing.
Flynn Intel Group received a total of $530,000 in three payments between September and November from Inovo BV before discontinuing the arrangement after Trump was elected president, according to Flynn’s filings. It is unclear from the paperwork how much Flynn personally profited from the deal, but he is the majority owner and chief executive officer of the firm. Kelner, reached by phone Wednesday night, declined to comment on the deal.
Flynn is in deep trouble, and now that tRump has thrown him under the bus in The National Enquirer, Flynn has plenty of motivation to start telling what he knows about the tRump campaign’s coordination with Russia to hurt Hillary Clinton.
In addition, we learned yesterday that the three other tRump guys who are under investigation, Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, and Carter Page, have offered to testify before the House Intelligence Committee.
Next, we have the very strange behavior of Rep. Devin Nunes, the chairman of the Intel Committe, who appears to be working as a double agent for tRump. Nunes has given three bizarre press conferences about supposed secret information he got access to that may or may not show that members of the tRump transition team were caught up in surveillance of foreign actors. It’s obvious that Nunes is way over his head and doesn’t really understand whatever it is he saw. So far he hasn’t shared anything with the members of his committee. But where did he get this mysterious information? He isn’t saying, but here’s some background from Tim Mak at The Daily Beast: Devin Nunes Vanished the Night Before He Made Trump Surveillance Claims.
Rep. Devin Nunes was traveling with a senior committee staffer in an Uber on Tuesday evening when he received a communication on his phone, three committee officials and a former national security official with ties to the committee told The Daily Beast. After the message, Nunes left the car abruptly, leaving his own staffer in the dark about his whereabouts.
By the next morning, Nunes hastily announced a press conference. His own aides, up to the most senior level, did not know what their boss planned to say next. Nunes’ choice to keep senior staff out of the loop was highly unusual.
The Republican chairman had a bombshell to drop.
“The intelligence community incidentally collected information about U.S. citizens involved in the Trump transition,” Nunes told reporters Wednesday morning.
Nunes reviewed “dozens of reports” produced by the U.S. intelligence community that showed this, he added….
Where Nunes went and who his source was for this information—which he said was still incomplete—is now a mystery with serious repercussions for the independence of his investigation into Russian interference with U.S. elections.
“This information was legally brought to me by sources who thought that we should know it,” Nunes added.
Suspicions have been raised that Nunes may have gotten his information from the White House, and so far he has refused to deny it. So who could have been incidentally picked up on wiretaps? Yesterday, Dakinikat posted some links that suggest that person could have been Mike Pence. I’m reposting them here.
DailyKos, 3/22/17: Manafort made Pence the VP, they talked regularly during the transition.
The Daily Beast: 11/30/16: Paul Manafort Is Back and Advising Donald Trump on Cabinet Picks.
Finally, Bill Palmer pull the conspiracy theory together: Mike Pence appears to be the “Donald Trump transition team” member caught on wiretap.
This week House Intelligence Committee chair Devin Nunes got his hands on some kind of classified intelligence through unofficial channels, and it spooked him to the point that he broke every protocol – and may have broken his career in the process. Nunes insists someone on the Donald Trump transition team was legally picked up on a wiretap that was targeted at someone else. And it appears the person incidentally surveilled was Vice President Mike Pence.
Based on Nunes’ description, someone on the Trump transition team was picked up while speaking on the phone with someone who was the subject of a FISA warrant. Widespread media reports have long pegged four people in the Trump campaign’s orbit as being under FBI investigation: Michael Flynn, Carter Page, Roger Stone, and Paul Manafort. These are the four who could realistically have been the subject of a judge-issued FISA surveillance warrant.
Of the four men, the only one who is known to have had phone conversations with anyone on the Trump transition team during the transition was Manafort. And the one person Manafort kept calling? Mike Pence (source: Daily Kos. The two have long been aligned; Manafort went to great lengths to ensure Pence was Trump’s running mate. So it appears that Devin Nunes learned this week that Pence had been caught saying something disconcerting on Manafort’s wiretap. And that may explain why Nunes did what he did from there.
More at the link.
And we can’t forget James Comey’s surprise appearance at the White House yesterday. Will more shoes drop over the weekend? I sure hope so!
What stories are you following?
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
ecocatwoman
grayslady
mablue2
Minkoff Minx
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
Here’s a very scary story.
Politico: Napolitano told friends he was on Trump’s Supreme Court shortlist.
How nucking futs is he? The man is 66 years old and I believe he’s also a cancer survivor. There’s no way trump or any other POTUS in this era would appoint a 66 year old to SCOTUS. If he believed trump was doing anything other than trying to woo him for on-air approval, he needs his head examined.
Mouse, he’s just playing well, chase and tag. Nuts all of them.
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That quote on the CNN screep capture, “I had a duty to tell the president.” In what universe does a legislator responsible for investigating threats to our national security have a duty to inform a target of an investigation about the evidence against him? I am trying to follow Nunes’ actions here, and it looks to me like a chicken with its head cut off. It makes him look suspect, and I can’t figure out why he thinks that would be helpful to him, let alone to the country whose interests he is supposed to be looking out for.
I hope his arse gets scorched! He’s trying to promote his actions, like he is just chewing the fat with Trump, that’s his duty. Good one? NOT.
Yes indeed!
How many times does Hillary Clinton have to tell you, Putin is a born killer! She’s alerted us time and time again, but nobody was paying attention to her, just the drip drip of emails.
Now up to either nine or ten, depending on whether or not Gorokhov survives his four story defenestration.
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He already took the money and ran……………put his feet to the fire till he drops the bag, and informs on them. He’s made a hell of a haul, now we need them to converge on him, and get to the art of the deal.
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Every time I’ve seen Nunes he has a scared look about him. I thought he acted odd the day the committee interviewed Comey and Rodgers. He’s behaving like a desperate, frightened man.
This Flynn thing is probably the tip of the iceberg.
You got it mouse……………..he’s the ICEMAN.
Hope you’re thinking what I am thinking…………….The ICEMAN SPIED HIMSELF.
Every one that comes near Trump gets sucked into Thug land. I swear! or is already a thug!!!
Since it smells like the Russian mafia, I’d guess they were simply thugs-in-waiting and Putrump brought out their latent potential.
All this shit started in his dad’s brothel, and he’s been a regular customer.
Blog post:
http://electionado.com/canvas/1489280334659
Don’t tell me it was those Turkish baths!
Thanks for the links, Boomer. I enjoy reading this stuff, and also appreciate your insights.
Ditto BB, great post. I have an OTOH question. Is Putin writing these bills now instead of ALEC(who wrote Dubya’s). Koch, etc. can’t compete against Russia’s $500 billion oil access? So many have their hands out – mind bending.
Sen. Chris Murphy:
Trump Is Dragging Us Into Another War… And No One Is Talking About It
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/58d5d3f5e4b0f633072b37db
Military’s not happy about Trump’s attitude.
That’s the most immoral thing I’ve read in a long time. That’s basically sanctioning mass murder.
America will be seen around the world as a cruel nation.
We already are. Civilian casualties under Obama were atrocious.
This is our current level of shame and horror:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2017/03/24/airstrike-monitoring-group-overwhelmed-by-claims-of-u-s-caused-civilian-casualties/?tid=ss_tw-bottom
And tRump wants it to be even worse. I’m almost to the point of not caring where the consequences of sexism finally take the U.S., but U.S. victims in foreign countries are innocent of any part in their own deaths.
Yep, he’s going to show them.
And another airstrike in Iraq yesterday, that killed as many as 200 innocent people.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-iraq-mosul-idUSKBN16W0DZ
Fannie, Trump’s is the mindless violence of a redneck in a jacked-up truck, complete with gun rack, armored grill and a hundred blaring lights, looking for something to kill. But on a world wide scale.
I never liked Obama’s drone policy. Killing civilians is of course going to be remembered and bring us more enemies.
Luna, I didn’t think you approved.
Mine was just a reminder of how very much there is to account for on what the U.S. did and does on a world level. Something I still firmly believe Hillary would have worked, effectively, to correct.
Thx, Early, just wanted to make sure. Agree that Hillary would have understood the human consequences on a different level than Obama. Smart diplomacy might help prevent unfortunate consequences.
Thanks JJ…………I was asked today about what we were missing this week in regards to Trump………….I said he had plans to take us to war, and needs that ACA money. So yes, Sen. Chris Murphy is straight on it.
It was clear to me from the very beginning, that trumpy wants to give us a bigger war than bush’s -you know he always wants to be bigger and better. And what shows you’ve got bigger muscles more than a war? What else would he go for with Bannon on his team?
I’ll have to order this one. The movie, Brilliant Mind sits on my shelf, and the prison is over crowded with the mentally ill. Not to mention our society at large.
To keep a closer eye on their puppet?
Stunning, just stunning.
I’m only a few pages into finally reading Winter is Coming by Garry Kasparov. Wow. It’s insightfully analytical, evocatively written — and alarming. Get a copy if you haven’t yet.
How odd. /s This guy has had financial interests in Eastern Europe & Russia for years, which at times he has failed to disclose when he should have. Also he’s on record as saying that Russia did not invade Crimea.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/325808-trump-official-and-tv-surrogate-to-leave-west-wing-gig-report
If you read Cannonfire and Palmer report there is some speculation he is source E of the Trump dossier. They think he set up the Pee Pee tape and could be a Kremlin operative.
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Just when you think he can’t be more embarrassing and ill-informed.
We shouldn’t forget this as Flynn goes state’s evidence.
reminder of life in Putin’s russia … and what Trump would like America to be