Wondering on Wednesday (v123)

Well, well, well. It's Wednesday again - let the wondering begin.

I've been disconnected from news and stuff most of the day, so I have to wonder whether anyone else did a 'Hope and change' comment about poor Hope Hicks, the president's other daughter, resigning from her position as White House communications director?  That was one headline I saw as soon as I got back home. Hicks, who admitted to telling 'white (house) lies' in her role as Communications Director, was the one who wrote the press release praising alleged domestic abuser Rob Porter who, it seems, was her boyfriend at the time.  She's apparently been planning this for a while, and it's not related to her testimony before the House Intelligence Committee where the lying was admitted. 

While Hicks was fairly under the radar - didn't handle press briefings or do interviews or any of the traditional CommsDir roles -- she apparently made her mark on folks, like Trump's General Kelly.

I quickly realized what so many had learned about Hope: she is strategic, poised and wise beyond her years. She became a trusted adviser and counselor, and did a tremendous job overseeing the communications for the president's agenda including the passage of historic tax reform. She has served her country with great distinction. To say that she will be missed is an understatement.

Of course, this is the same General Kelly who spoke so highly of Porter in that lovingly crafted press release.

Rob Porter is a man of true integrity and honor, and I can't say enough good things about him. He is a friend, a confidante, and a trusted professional. I am proud to serve alongside him.

I wonder, is there some compromised judgment here on the part of the General? Or compromised sense of duty?

Speaking of compromised judgment, the president managed to blow yet another tweet gasket about his Attorney General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III.

Why is AG Jeff Sessions asking the Inspector General to investigate potentially massive FISA abuse. Will take forever, has no prosecutorial power and already late with reports on Comey etc. Isn't the IG an Obama guy? Why not use Justice Department lawyers? DISGRACEFUL!

This time, instead of rolling over and playing dead, Sessions fought back.

We have initiated the appropriate process that will ensure complaints against this Department will be fully and fairly acted upon if necessary. As long as I am the Attorney General, I will continue to discharge my duties with integrity and honor, and this Department will continue to do its work in a fair and impartial manner according to the law and Constitution.

I have wondered, for a while, why it is that Sessions stays and puts up with Trump's bullying, public thrashing, and general abuse. I still wonder about that, but at least he took a step today and fought back, something that DOJ employees have long wanted, since Trump also attacks them with impunity and with regularity.

One more before we go: remember the "Hispanic, we believe" judge who was involved in the Trump University case? The one who would not be able to be fair to Trump because of his heritage, and because Trump was building a wall, and therefore it was impossible for the judge to rule on anything in Trump's favor?

Yeah, that Judge handed down a very beneficial ruling on the border wall.

US District Judge Gonzalo Curiel has cleared on potential obstacle to president Donald Trump's long-promised border wall, ruling Tuesday that the administration has the authority to waive a host of environmental laws and other regulations to begin construction.

I wonder, how long will it take for Trump to apologize for his extremely racist comments about the judge?

Sunday School 1/14/18

Today, I listened in on the conversation on NBC's Meet The Press, where Kentucky's Senator Rand Paul was one of Chuck Todd's guests; from the other side of the aisle, Colorado's Senator Michael Bennett joined. Immigration and racism and salty language were on tap for the conversations - no surprise there. Similar conversations were held on the other shows as well.

Rand Paul was up first, and he told a story of when he went to Haiti and Central America to perform eye surgeries, using that to frame Trump's most recent incredible comments in a different context for us.

You know, I don't think the comments were constructive at all. But I also think that to be fair, we shouldn't draw conclusions that he didn't intend. I know personally about his feelings towards Haiti and towards Central America... I did about 200 cataract surgeries with a group of surgeons in Haiti and the same in Central America. And when we asked Donald J. Trump as a private citizen to support those trips, he was a large financial backer of both medical mission trips. So I think it's a unfair to sort of draw conclusions from a remark that I think wasn't constructive, is the least we can say. 

And I think it's unfair then to sort of all the sudden paint him, "Oh well, he's a racist," when I know for a fact that he cares very deeply about the people in Haiti because he helped finance a trip where we were able to get vision back for 200 people in Haiti. 

Um -- "sort of all the sudden" talk about Trump being a racist? Where has Rand Paul been hiding? There have been more than ample opportunities, some of which were mentioned on the show.

For some reason, the comments that get skipped are the ones about Judge Gonzalo Curiel, the American judge with the funny sounding name and who, according to Trump

happens to be, we believe, Mexican... I have a Mexican judge. He is of Mexican heritage and should have recused himself...

So, no, Senator Paul -- there's NOTHING sudden about calling Trump a racist.

And, if you change the word 'shithole' to 'economically-deprived' and actually used the term in a nuanced sentence such as the two you suggest, we would be having a completely different conversation than the one Trump decided to have.

Let's take the whole scenario and put different words in there and let's say, "We'd rather have people from economically-prosperous countries than economically-deprived countries." Or, "We realize there are more problems in economically-deprived countries, therefore there's a bigger impetus for them to want to come." Then it wouldn't have been so controversial. 

We do need a "valid, legitimate debate over immigration" and we need it to be bipartisan and we need it to address a number of issues, not the least of which is the DACA issue, and also not the least of it is the crush of illegal immigration.

And you can't have an immigration compromise if everybody's out there calling the president a racist. They're actually destroying the setting. And he's a little bit of it, but both sides now are destroying the setting in which anything meaningful can happen on immigration.

Sounds sort of like the president talking about Charlottesville, doesn't it? "Good people on both sides"? I also think I'd say that the president is more than "a little bit of it."

Senator Bennett, when Todd asked him about whether concluding that Trump is a racist was fair, did his best to provide context as well.

I was raised not to call people racist on the theory that it was hard for them to be rehabilitated once you said that. But there's no question what he said was racist. There's no question  what he said was un-American and completely unmoored from the facts.

He seems to have this impression that immigrants to the United States, like my mom and her parents who were Polish Jews who came here after the Holocaust, somehow, you know, come to the United States and are just lazy and, and the truth is exactly the opposite. You spend any time in neighborhoods across Colorado, what you find is immigrants here striving to make this country better and provide for their families and for the next generation. So I think he has no idea what he's talking about.

And - and on the question of what's in his heart, do you have any idea - thought, Chuck, that he would've called into question Barack Obama's birth certificate if Barack Obama were white?

That's a pretty basic question that no one -- Trump nor any of his minions, have answered. And, as far as I'm concerned, don't need to actually speak to - we know the answer is no.

See you around campus.

No, It's Not a Double Standard

White House Communications Director and Press Secretary Sean Spicer frequently gets himself all entwangled fighting off the press in the tiny White House briefing room. Like he did the other day, when speaking to comments made by the Trump SCOTUS nominee.

Neil Gorsuch, in a conversation with Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal, said that "any criticism about a judge's integrity and independence" were "disheartening" and "demoralizing."
The comments were conveyed as being in reference to statements made by Trump regarding the "so-called judge" (that would be James Robart) who issued the temporary restraining order halting the Executive Order on Immigration.

Gorsuch confirmed the dis- and de- comments were his, even as Trump suggested otherwise (and, of course, personally attacked Blumenthal).  While others confirmed that Gorsuch was specifically referring to Trump's comments, Spicer offered this instead:

There's a big difference between commenting on the specific comments that have been made, and the tweet, and his general philosophy about the judiciary and the respect for his fellow judges. 

He literally went out of his way to say I'm not commenting on a specific instance. So to take what he said about a generalization and apply it to a specific is exactly what he intended not to do. 

And Spicer also noted that executive criticism of the judiciary was a time-honored tradition, and even Barack Obama did it in a State of the Union address.

I get it, but at some point is seems like there's clearly a double standard when it's how this is applied. When President Obama did it, there was no concern from this briefing room. When (Trump) does it, it's, you know, a ton of outrage. 

So, I checked to see what Obama said in his 2010 SOTU, where he made some very well-reported (and seriously wrong place, wrong time) comments, to see whether I could find a personal attack on one or more justices of the Supreme Court in Obama's remarks (emphasis added):

With all due deference to separation of powers, last week, the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests - including foreign corporations - to spend without limit in our elections. I don't think elections should be bankrolled by America's most powerful interests or, worse, by foreign entities. They should be decided by the American people. And I urge Democrats and Republicans to pass a bill that helps correct some of these problems.

In 2015, on the fifth anniversary of the decision, Obama made a broader statement on the case, and I looked again for a personal attack against a SCOTUS justice (again, emphasis added):

Our democracy works best when everyone's voice is heard, and no one's voice is drowned out. But five years ago, a Supreme Court ruling allowed big companies - including foreign corporations - to spend unlimited amounts of money to influence our elections. The Citizens United decision was wrong, and it has caused real harm to our democracy.  With each new campaign season, this dark money floods our airwaves with more and more political ads that pull our politics into the gutter. It's time to reverse this trend. Rather than bolster the power of lobbyists and special interests, Washington should lift up the voices of ordinary Americans and protect their democratic right to determine the direction of the country that we love. 

Unless I'm blind, I don't see Obama doing what Trump did to Judge Robart - including allocating blame directly to the judge, "should anything happen."  And, if there's nothing Robart-like in Obama's statements, there certainly isn't anything remotely close to Trump's comments about Judge Gonzalo Curiel, the Indiana-born "Mexican" judge who was involved in the Trump University case.

Remember that one, when Trump was a candidate?  Let's all refresh our memories, by reviewing these comments from campaign appearances and media interviews (emphasis added):

...very hostile judge...because it was me... there's a hostility toward me by the judge, tremendous hostility, beyond belief...he happens to be Spanish... he is Hispanic... a judge who is very hostile... extremely hostile to me... he has been extremely hostile to me... a very hostile judge. Now he is Hispanic, I believe. He is a very hostile judge to me. I said it loud and clear... A hater of Donald Trump, a hater. He's a hater. His name is Gonzalo Curiel and he is not doing the right thing... judge, who happens to be, we believe, Mexican, which is great. I think that's fine... I think Judge Curiel should be ashamed of himself... it's a disgrace that he's doing this... the judges in this court system, federal court... they ought to look into that Judge Curiel because what Judge Curiel is doing is a total disgrace... he's proud of his heritage, OK? I'm building a wall... we are building a wall. He's a Mexican.We're building a wall between here and Mexico... he is giving us very unfair rulings, rulings that people can't even believe... he is giving us unfair rulings Now, I saw "why?" Well, I'm building a wall, OK? And it's a wall between America and Mexico. Not another country. He's of Mexican heritage and he's very proud of it... 

It makes me want to vomit all over again, just reading all of this hatred from the man who wanted to be - and now is - the president.

But - back to the point -- I'm STILL trying to find a similarity between Obama blasting a SCOTUS decision and Trump's comments about either Judge Robart or Judge Curiel. There is no double standard here, is there?

We might need some clarification from Sean Spicer on this one.