TGIF 2/1/19

The first TGIF of February, and it's all good news - how does that sound?

First up,  a shout-out to new Congressman Anthony Brindisi, who represents the district next to mine here in Central New York. Brindisi was named one of the co-chairs of the Blue Dog Coalition, a group of 27  moderate-to-conservative Dems. In his role, he'll be the whip, the one responsible for helping ensure members stick together - and vote together - in support of the caucus's ideals:

The Blue Dogs are dedicated to pursuing fiscally-responsible policies, ensuring a strong national defense for our country, and transcending party lines to get things done for the American people.

Brindisi's already made a dent in his first few weeks in Congress - first, he kept his commitment and did not vote for Nancy Pelosi as House Speaker; and he and John Katko, my Congressman, managed to spend bipartisan time recently calling for an end to the #trumpshutdown.  Good on both of them for that.

Trump in Transition (v28)

The president, in his own words, before a meeting yesterday with his generals or something. Orange emphasis is mine.

So I just heard that they broke into the office of one of my personal attorneys — a good man.  

And it’s a disgraceful situation.  

It’s a total witch hunt.  

I’ve been saying it for a long time.  

I’ve wanted to keep it down.  

We’ve given, I believe, over a million pages’ worth of documents to the Special Counsel.

They continue to just go forward.  

And here we are talking about Syria and we’re talking about a lot of serious things.  

We’re the greatest fighting force ever.  

And I have this witch hunt constantly going on for over 12 months now — and actually, much more than that.  

You could say it was right after I won the nomination, it started.

And it’s a disgrace.

It’s, frankly, a real disgrace.  

It’s an attack on our country, in a true sense.  

It’s an attack on what we all stand for.

So when I saw this and when I heard it — I heard it like you did — I said, that is really now on a whole new level of unfairness.

So this has been going on — I saw one of the reporters, who is not necessarily a fan of mine, not necessarily very good to me.  

He said, in effect, that this is ridiculous; this is now getting ridiculous.  

They found no collusion whatsoever with Russia.  

The reason they found it is there was no collusion at all.  

No collusion.  

This is the most biased group of people.  

These people have the biggest conflicts of interest I’ve ever seen.

Democrats all — or just about all — either Democrats or a couple of Republicans that worked for President Obama, they’re not looking at the other side; they’re not looking at the Hillary Clinton — the horrible things that she did and all of the crimes that were committed.  

They’re not looking at all of the things that happened that everybody is very angry about, I can tell you, from the Republican side, and I think even the independent side.  

They only keep looking at us.

So they find no collusion, and then they go from there and they say, “Well, let’s keep going.”  

And they raid an office of a personal attorney early in the morning.  

And I think it’s a disgrace.

So we’ll be talking about it more.  

But this is the most conflicted group of people I’ve ever seen. 

The Attorney General made a terrible mistake when he did this, and when he recused himself.  

Or he should have certainly let us know if he was going to recuse himself, and we would have used a — put a different Attorney General in.  

So he made what I consider to be a very terrible mistake for the country.  

But you’ll figure that out.

All I can say is, after looking for a long period of time — and even before the Special Counsel — because it really started just about from the time I won the nomination.  

And you look at what took place and what happened, and it’s a disgrace.  

It’s a disgrace.

I’ve been President now for what seems like a lengthy period of time.  

We’ve done a fantastic job.  

We’ve beaten ISIS.  

We have just about 100 percent of the caliphate or the land.  

Our economy is incredible.  

The stock market dropped a lot today as soon as they heard the noise of this nonsense that’s going on. 

It dropped a lot.  

It was up — way up, and then it dropped quite a bit at the end.  

A lot.

But that we have to go through that — we’ve had that hanging over us now from the very, very beginning.  

And yet the other side, they don’t even bother looking.  

And the other side is where there are crimes, and those crimes are obvious.  

Lies, under oath, all over the place.  

Emails that are knocked out, that are acid-washed and deleted.  

Nobody has ever seen — 33,000 emails are deleted after getting a subpoena for Congress, and nobody bothers looking at that.  

And many, many other things.

So I just think it’s a disgrace that a thing like this can happen.  

With all of that being said, we are here to discuss Syria tonight.  

We’re the greatest fighting force anywhere in the world.  

These gentlemen and ladies are incredible people, incredible talent, and we’re making a decision as to what we do with respect to the horrible attack that was made near Damascus.  

And it will be met, and it will be met forcefully.  

And when, I will not say, because I don’t like talking about the timing.

But we are developing the greatest force that we’ve ever had.  

We had $700 billion just approved, which was the reason I went along with that budget because we had to fix our military.  

General Mattis would tell you that above anybody.  

We had to fix our military.  

And right now, we’re in a big process of doing that.  

Seven-hundred billion and then $716 billion next year.

So we’re going to make a decision tonight, or very shortly thereafter.  

And you’ll be hearing the decision.  

But we can’t let atrocities like we all witnessed — and you can see that and it’s horrible — we can’t let that happen.  

In our world, we can’t let that happen, especially when we’re able to — because of the power of the United States, because of the power of our country — we’re able to stop it.

TGIF 12/29/17

And so we come to the last TGIF of the year -- incredible, isn't it?

I was going to do one of those Year in Review things, but tonight doesn't feel like the right time to do it.

I mean, it's Friday, for Pete's sake!  We should be celebrating!

So, let's do that - let's celebrate the week that was, using presidential tweets.

Saturday, December 23: Perhaps more has been accomplished by the Trump Administration than by any other president.

Or, perhaps not.

Sunday, December 24: the massive drilling in the ANWR which is opposed by a majority of US voters, according to Trump's favorite polling company? Yeah, that's a n indicator of an incredible year right there.

Monday, December 25: Say it -- I dare you, just say it!

Um, OK, sure - 'our' cherished and beautiful phrase? If you say so.

Tuesday, December 26: Where are the people shouting warnings from the rooftops that the crazy growth in the stock market is unsustainable? What ever happened to good old irrational exuberance?

Wednesday, December 27. This one, I give him. I've seen nothing to dispute that His Generals have done an excellent job on this front.

Thursday, December 28: All I can say is, now is not the time to be talking about global warming and climate change. Remember? Now is the time to be talking about taxes.

Friday, December 29: Let's end the year by bashing one of America's companies, because its founder happens to own a major national media outlet. 

Completely ignoring the real reason why the USPS is losing money, and missing an opportunity to get rid of a regulation that would make a huge difference. 

Yep - another week in the books.

TGIF.

OrangeVerse XX: Thanks Be to Me

The president talks to the military on Thanksgiving. I kid you not.

Better Me than You

Hello everybody and Happy Thanksgiving.

You're very very special

people to me and to

everybody in this country, 

that I can tell you...

We're going on live now,

and surrounding me

is a lot of press.

Better me than you, 

fellas, better me than you...

Giving Thanks

It's an honor to speak

with you all and

to give God thanks

for the blessings of freedom

and for the heroes who really have this 

tremendous courage that you do

to defend us and to defend freedom

so we want

to thank you all

very much,

very very special

people, like it

doesn't get more special.

Have You Seen My Colonel?

Representing the Army...

Colonel Toby and where is Toby?

Raise your hand Toby

where's Toby

Thank you Toby

 I hear so many good

things about you Toby

that's good news 

that Toby Magsig...

Everybody's Talkin' Bout Me (1)

I have to say just directly

to the folks in Afghanistan:

everybody's talking about the

progress you've made in the

last few months since I

opened it up. 

We opened it up we

said go ahead we're

gonna fight to win we're

not fighting anymore 

to just walk around we're

fighting to win and

you people are really

you've turned it around over

the last three to four months like

nobody's seen and 

They. Are. Talking.

about it so thank you very much.

Brave. Incredible. Fighters.

My Own Private Marine

Semper Fi. Semper Fi.

I have a great Marine

who's the chief of staff

as you know

John Kelly

doing an incredible job

just like any Marine would.

Everybody's Talkin' Bout Me (2)

...to you and all the Marines

doing this great work 

in delivering defeat

after defeat to ISIS

what you're doing with ISIS 

is again, being talked about.

We're being talked about

again as an armed forces. 

We're really winning.

We know how to win.

But we have to

let you win.

We weren't 

letting you win before.

We were letting

 you play even.

We're letting

 you win.

The Power of Positivity

The fight against ISIS,

it's coming our way.

They're coming our way -

big, big difference.

A lot of things

 have happened.

They say

we've made more progress

against ISIS

than they did in years

of the previous administration.

And that's because

I'm letting you

do your job.

We're very very proud of you

and believe me

everyone in this country

is watching and they're seeing

and they're seeing positive reports

for a change instead of

the neutral and negative reports.

It's all positive

One Two Three Four What the Hell are You Fighting For?

For each of you I know

it's hard to be away

from home at this time of

the year. We're doing well at home

the economy is doing really great

when you come back

you're going to see

with the jobs and the companies

coming back into our country and the

stock market just hit a record high

unemployment's the lowest 

it's been in seventeen years so

you're fighting for

something real

for something good.

 A lot of things

 have happened with

our country over

the last very short

period of time

and they're really good,

 they're really good.

I especially like

saying that companies

are starting to come back.

Now we're working on tax cuts,

big fat beautiful tax cuts

and hopefully

we'll get that and then

you're really gonna see things happen.

In Closing

So as we give thanks

for this holiday I know

I speak on behalf of

all Americans when I say that

we totally support you - in fact

we love you, we really do

we love you and this is a 

Thanksgiving that you won't forget.

You're in a very different part

of the world than you

 were used to but boy,

you're doing a job there and

thank God for you, thank God for you.

We also want to

give thanks to your loved ones

our amazing military families. 

I know they miss you and 

they miss you so deeply

and so badly.

They're every bit as

important as everyone

else who you work with

because they put up 

with so much they put up

with the time away

and all of those things

that they have to endure and 

they endure it

because they love our country 

and because they love you 

and believe me

I know so much 

about military families...