You'll remember, 'he' was successful in winning all of the replacement elections for the folks who left Congress to become cabinet members; the results of those elections I think were as much attributable to Democrats struggling to get a message out vs. just throwing dollars from all around the country at the different races.
Over the past several weeks he had been running a full-bore Twitter campaign, and even held a rally in Alabama in support of Big Luther Strange, the 'loyal' candidate in the race against Constitution disregarder Judge Roy Moore. Moore, with the support of Trump's former Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, took the primary race.
The outcome for Trump? He started deleting his Big Luther tweets, although he may or may not have time to get all of them taken care of between his "we're doing great in Puerto Rico" messaging and his yelling at his cabinet members and his stumping for his once-in-a-lifetime tax reform for the rich program and threatening #NoKo with war and whatnot. (In case you're wondering, here's some analysis on the legality of him deleting his tweets).
The outcome for Bannon? Tossed from the White House, reinvigorated at the helm of Breitbart news, and boldly defying his former boss. And oh -- attacking any candidate that has the support of Mitch McConnell (Strange had that, you see), even if it means going on the air against Trump to tell people the best candidate for Trump's agenda. Which, of course, is fascinating -- the guy who has the agenda doesn't even know who best will support it? Or maybe the better question is, which agenda are we supporting, anyway?
Arizona Senator John McCain confirmed earlier this week his doctors say his prognosis is poor, which is not stopping McCain from doing his job in the Senate, nor is it stopping the president from continuing to bash him for his 'no' vote on the last best hope to make a mess of the Affordable Care Act while not repealing and replacing it. Trump tweeted a montage of McCain saying the ACA needed to be r-and-r'd. And, according to Axios, Trump is physically mocking McCain's thumbs down vote in July. Which simply can't be true, since he has never and would never mock anyone who has a disability, or, you now, serious injuries incurred as a POW.
One final note: a while back, I expressed my dismay that SCOTUS Justice Neil Gorsuch was going to be giving a speech - at Trump's Washington DC hotel - a few days before the start of the 2017-2018 court season. The speech, which was given yesterday at a luncheon for the Fund for American Studies, was met with a few dozen protesters trying valiantly to create the 'din of democracy' that Gorsuch mentioned. He also included this comment:
To be worthy of our First Amendment freedoms we have to all adopt certain civil habits that enable others to enjoy them as well.Civility? That thing we're seeing none of from the White House these days?
The hotel, of course, is the subject of a number of lawsuits, many pointing at the Emoluments Clause forbidding a president from accepting foreign 'gifts' - and it's possible that these cases will end up before the Supremes at some point...along with all of the other Trump related cases that might be end up there... which is why I was not thrilled with Gorsuch participating in the speech there in the first place.
On the plus side? The president will be relentless in expressing his displeasure with "his" Supreme Court Justice should Gorsuch rule against him at any time -- so I'll hold out hope for that.
In the meantime, TGIF.
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts!