OrangeVerse XLV: Cities and Their State

The president chatted with his Number Two, Tucker Carlson, the other night - Sean Hannity must have been off working on policy papers with Jared, or something.

Carlson got things going,talking about cities they'd seen on the trip to the G-20, with no graffiti, no one going to the bathroom on the street, no junkies. And how that was "very different" from our cities. The president corrected him, saying "some of our cities." Carlson and Trump agreed it was "sad" about cities like New York, San Francisco,  and Los Angeles.

And it is - there's no question about that. We do have issues with homelessness, and drugs, in many cities large and small, in the suburbs, and perhaps even more critically, in rural areas where there are even fewer services available than in our cities.

Where it got poetic, though, was when the president ruminated on why it is that American cities have this kind of issue.

It's On Me

It's a phenomena 

that started two yeas ago.

It's disgraceful.

Seriously Maybe Important

I'm gonna maybe

and I'm looking at it

very seriously,

we're doing some

other things

as you've probably noticed

like some of the

Very Important Things

we're doing now.

Can't Have That

But we're looking at it

Very Seriously

because you can't do that. 

You can't have what's happening

where Police Officers are

getting sick by

just walking the beat.

I mean

they're actually

Getting. Very. Sick.

In Sickness and Mental Health

Where people are getting sick

where the people are

living in hell, too.

Although some of them

have mental problems

where they don't even know

they're living that way.

In fact, perhaps,

they like living that way.

Oh Wait - Maybe It's Not On Me?

They can't do that.

We cannot ruin our cities.

And you have people

that work in those cities.

They work in office buildings

and to get into the building

they have to walk through a scene

that nobody would have believed

possible three years ago.

And this is the liberal establishment.

Fight. Fight. Fight

This is what I'm fighting.

They - I don't know

if they're afraid of votes? 

I don't know 

if they really believe

this should be taking place.

But it's a terrible thing

that's taking place. 

The Situation Room

And we maybe

you know - I had a situation

when I first became president.

We had certain areas of

Washington DC where

that was starting to happen

and I ended it

Very Quickly. 

I said "you can't do that"

when we have leaders of the world

coming in to see the president

and they're riding down a highway

they can't be looking at that. 

I really believe

it hurts our country.

The West Coast Has The Sunshine

San Francisco, I own

property in San Francisco

so I don't care except

that it was

so beautiful.

And now areas

that you used to think of being,

so, you know, being really

Something Very Special,

you take a look

at what's going on

with San Francisco it's terrible. 

Checking Our Equipment

So we're looking at it

Very Seriously

We may intercede.

We may do something

to get that whole thing

cleared up. 

It's inappropriate.

We have to take the people

and do something.

We have to do something.

And you know

we're not really very equipped

as a government

to be doing that kind of work.

That's not really

the kind of work

the government should be doing.

We've never had this

in our lives before

in our country. 

Nope, Definitely Not On Me!

At the same time

most of our cities

are doing great.

But if you look at

some of these,

they are usually sanctuary cities

run by Very Liberal People

and the states are

run by Very Liberal People.

Wondering on Wednesday (v101)

What are we wondering about tonight? Let's see...

We've got a shot fired literally over the bow of Japan by North Korea, and we have, as usual, a couple of different responses from the Trump administration. The president himself reminded us, in a tweet, that

The US has been talking to North Korea, and paying them extortion money, for 25 years. Talking is not the answer.

Did he mean that we were done talking to Kim Jong Un now, in those back-channel conversations we've heard about, I wonder? Or, maybe he meant we're done talking at the UN and we're not going to push for additional sanctions, since they don't seem to be working anyway? Could he have meant we're done trying to talk China into doing something?  Or, dare we even wonder, did he mean we were now looking only at military options, all others having been removed from the proverbial table?

Well, maybe we don't have to wonder about that after all, not if the cooler head of Defense Secretary James Mattis prevails. In yet another seeming contradiction (Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has had a few of his own recently), Mattis allowed as how

We're never out of diplomatic solutions. We always look for more. We're never complacent. 

In a speech in Springfield (Missouri, not any of those other Springfields we know and love), Trump talked taxes, and the need for tax reform, and #MAGA stuff.  Here's an excerpt:

We cannot restore our wealth if we continue to put our businesses at such a tremendous disadvantage. We must reduce the tax rate on American businesses, so they keep jobs in America, create jobs in America and compete for workers right here in America -- the America we love.  Thank you. Thank you very much.

I understand that he was speaking at a private company, behind closed doors, and so he's guaranteed a pro-Trump audience - but I can't help wonder what he would have said if someone had asked what it would take for him to bring production of his branded products, and Ivanka ("My beautiful daughter, she's working very hard, I'm very proud of her") branded products, to America from China and all of the other countries where they're made? I know the question has been asked by the media, and ignored, but I really wonder what would happen in one of these closed-door sessions. Does he have any intention of bringing those jobs to America once we lower his taxes, or no?

We all know that the president has been tweeting! about how prepared he was! and his administration was for the epic! and historic! events taking place down there in the Gulf region. He even managed to get in a crowd size comment, in case you were wondering.

Thank you. Thank you everybody. Thank you. I just wanted to say, we love you, you are special. We're here to take care of you. It's going well. And I want to thank you for coming out. We're going to get you back and operating immediately. Thank you, everybody. What a crowd. What a turnout. 

I wonder, sometimes, if he will actually take credit for the magnitude of the storm, adding it to his list of superlative accomplishments?

And finally, as I write this, news is breaking that US District Judge Orlando Garcia issued a decision that will keep the Texas law barring sanctuary cities from taking effect while a suit against it proceeds.  The law is one of the strongest of its kind; major cities in Texas sued to block it. I wonder, how long before we see the first tweet from the president? Do you think he'll be able to wait until tomorrow morning?

Sunday School 4/23/2017

On this gorgeous day, it's kinda hard to believe that folks were inside gibber-jabbering about politics, but that's what happens during Sunday School.

Today, let's check in with the folks at ABC's This Week with George Stephanopoulos; one classroom is about all of the attention I have.

The focus of the round table discussion was on Trump, and his first 100 days, and those pesky coastal elites versus Trump voters in the heartland, and the new ABC-Washington Post poll, which shows Trump voters love Trump way more than the rest of us do, which of course is no surprise - but he's got the lowest 100-day approval rating (42% in this poll) than anyone since sliced bread or something, to the extent that really matters.

Trump himself has called the 100-day measure ridiculous, at the same time as he's tooted his own horn about having the most successful 90 days since that same loaf of bread was sliced. I guess it's those fast and furious last 10 that will make the difference in his opinion. Jonathan Karl, ABC's White House guy who reported on today's show, noted

But I've got to tell you, I am seeing a mad scramble in the West Wing to try and get points on the board before the 100-day marker. On the on hand, they want to pass, make another effort to pass health care. And then there's tax reform. You mentioned the promise that he made on Friday that he is going to unveil a plan for tax reform on Wednesday of next week. This shocked his own top advisers.  The idea had been floated a few days earlier. They had agreed that they wouldn't do it yet. It wasn't ready, And then they heard him say it, clearly an indication that he wants to still get something done, something more before they reach that 100 days. 

Also chiming in this morning was Terry Moran, the network's chief foreign correspondent, with some interesting insight. Stephanopoulos asked about Trump's handling of things overseas, and wondered about the sense that "he's trimming his sails, that the world is changing Trump more than Trump is changing the world."

Moran offered this:

Well, I think what president Trump is learning, George, is what all presidents learn. It was summed up a long time ago by a British prime minister who was supposedly asked by a young reporter, "what's your foreign policy?" And he said "events, dear boy - events."  And it's true, events can drive presidents more than presidents can.

Talking about how strong Trump's support is among his base, we heard from Bill Cunningham, a radio guy from Cincinnati. He had lots to say about why people love Trump, and that he never gets a call from anyone complaining about Trump, but here's the most interesting - and, for Democrats, perhaps the most important thing he said:

You know, George, I think largely it's emotional (Trump's 'hold' on his voters). Donald Trump is a rock star. And to give you some idea, we're the middle of Trump country. I ca walk or drive to Canada, Mexico, the Atlantic Ocean, and the border of California, and never set foot in a Clinton state or a Clinton county. 

That's an uphill climb, for sure, for whoever becomes the standard-bearer for the heartbroken Democratic Party.  It seems Bernie (Still Not a Democrat) Sanders is still getting his free media time, which is good for him, I guess, but not for the party, IMHO.

Also on the show? US Attorney General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III, talking about walls (good), crime (bad), gangs (bad), sanctuary cities (bad) and DREAMers (iffy). And the contrast there was California's Attorney General Xavier Becerra, who had these opinions about walls (medieval), crime (California has the world's sixth largest economy), gangs (not mentioned), DREAMers (we're just trying to move forward, create jobs, we did our infrastructure, keeping families together is good for the economy, hard to know who to believe) and sanctuary cities, which were recently notified by Sessions III that federal funding was at risk:

We're ready. We have been abiding by federal law for quite some time before Jeff Sessions became the attorney general. We're going to continue to abide by federal law and the US constitution. And we're hoping the federal government will also abide by the US constitution, which gives my state the right to decide how to do public safety. That's not their responsibility under the US constitution... We fully respect that they have the responsibility to enforce immigration law. So, we're in the business of public safety. We're not in the business of deportation.

When the AG of California refers to the US government as a "hostile external force" things are apt to get interesting, don't you think?

See you around campus.