TGIF 10/20/17

Oh, what a week it was...

In no particular order:

The president was questioned on why the White House hadn't made any comment on the death of four American soldiers in Niger, and on whether he had reached out to the families of the fallen.

Paraphrasing here, he said he'd call the families when it was possible for him to do so and (apparently) falsely accused President Obama and his predecessors (most of them/many of them) of not making these most personal Commander in Chief calls.

But then he said he had no proof (I'm SHOCKED!) but that someone told him that was the case and then Trump politicized the death of the son of his chief of staff, General Kelly, in an attempt to slam Obama one more time.

Then, there was a huge she said he said about a call he did make, in which there was a strong perception by the soldier's family that they had been dissed by Trump, who said he had proof but presented none (I'm SHOCKED!) and even worse, General Kelly then joined the fray, name calling and (apparently) lying about a Florida congresswoman who was close to the soldier's family way before she was a Congresswoman and way before the soldier was a soldier.

And it's still going on. (I'm SHOCKED!)

The Republicans in the Senate passed a budget bill that will allow tax reform to go through reconciliation (we remember that term from the healthcare debacle, right) and pass with only 50 votes instead of 60, eliminating the need to have Democrats on board.

The budget also approved $1.5 trillion in deficit spending (I'm SHOCKED!) to make up for money that the government won't receive from the 1% once the tax reform package goes through.

No, seriously - we don't know for sure what's actually going to be in the tax plan, other than pain points for people who live in blue states and bonuses for people who live in red ones.  At least, that's what we've been told to expect, and I have no reason to doubt that instruction.

Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, our Lying Attorney General, went to Congress today and ran into more questions about Russia, and why he keeps changing his story. Senator Al Franken reminded Sessions that the Russian Ambassador is in fact a Russian; you can imagine how SHOCKED! Sessions must have been to learn that.

Sessions also said he would not be able to guarantee that reporters would be allowed to do their jobs without risk of being jailed for doing so.

Trump spoke out in favor and in opposition and in favor and in opposition of the bipartisan bill, cobbled together by Lamar Alexander from the right and Patty Murray from the left, to fund the cost sharing reductions that insurance companies are forced to pay under the Affordable Car Act to reduce the out of pocket cost burden on lower income Americans.

Oh wait - the CSRs line the coffers of insurance companies, sorry. Which would be a good thing, for any other industry, because of all the winning that's going on right now economically.

And finally, former President George W Bush gave a speech this week which was interpreted by many to be about the Trump administration, but which the Trump administration said was not about them, because if it was really about them, Bush would have called out Trump by name. Which, of course, the president would have tweeted. (I'M SHOCKED!)

TGIF, everyone.