So, first can we at least agree that when it comes to getting other lawyering jobs, it doesn't matter the least bit whether these guys resigned or were fired. The post you were responding to was clearly alluding to those types of jobs, which is what most of these guys are going to do when they're done. There's not really any mention of this in your post above. In that scenario (which is the common one), the decision makers are well-informed fellow attorneys and not random citizens.

With that out of the way, I guess you thesis is that well if these guys someday run for office it will look better if they resigned rather than if they were fired. I seriously doubt that it will make a difference, but even if it did, I think it probably works the other way. Do you think Bharara's political future was enhanced or hindered by forcing trump to fire him? Given all the coverage in the last few days, I think it's pretty clear his chances of winning a nom and getting elected are improved by being fired than if he just quietly resigned.

These guys are all Obama appointees who are probably Dems. To get elected they need to get their party's nomination. Making Trump fire him is just the kind of thing that will raise their profile within their party and get the nom. Given that most Americans have an unfavorable opinion of Trump, getting fired by him is not only not a big deal, it's practically a badge of honor. Possibly in a red state this analysis is debatable, but that doesn't explain why every one of the other 45 just resigned. In a blue state, forcing Trump to fire is much more likely to help political aspirations than hurt them.

We're back to everyone's favorite subject secret e-mails!

Rex Tillerson aka Wayne Tracker, is accused by the new york attorney general to have used an e-mail alias under that name while at exxon to discuss climate change.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/rex-til...ays-1489450814

Well, that's probably as far as that's gonna get in relevance to this admin, but let's throw yet another one on the board.

Rex Tillerson, "The Silent Man." He's kind of a creepy guy too.

population of Australia right there.

Went on like a week long purge of politics and now that I'm caught up it seems the dumpster fire has only gotten worse. Cool. Cool.

Haha Bitchbart perfect.

It has gotten worse. I don't know who I'd like to punch more out of Trump, Bannon, Tillerson, Spicer, Ryan, McConnell, Pruitt. I can't even name them all. Too much pure evil to remember.

Australian total government expenditure, state and federal, on healthcare annually is $100 billion. CBO estimate for how much the government will save by chucking the same number of people off healthcare is only $34 billion.

US can't afford it though, gotta increase military spending by $54 billion because of reasons.

US amb to UN is nikki haley, who only took down the confederate flag a couple years ago off the state capitol of south carolina because of extreme pressure is somehow currently last by a large gap on the list.

You missed Sessions/Devos/Pence/etc, hell just google the cabinet, they all go on it somewhere. Nunes/Burr (house/senate intel committee chairs)/Chaffetz (ethics chair of apparently everything but trump)/ damn still forgetting a few/that iowa congress guy/ben carson
Kushner too

worse, we still don't have all the people with russian ties since there's at least one in our ****ing CIA/FBI/NSA/etc and probably multiple.

oh right nat sec mcmaster's a neocon but he hopefully won't get on the list. Wish they all got the YOU JUST MADE THE LIST chris jericho treatment.

Gone is turkey agent and russian dinner with putin flynn.

See, I told you I couldn't remember them all. There's so many, naming them off the top of your head just doesn't do the trick.

It will never flatten out, much less begin to improve, until these people lose their power.

For any period of time that you want to check out, when you check back in you don't have to do anything to catch up besides see who is (still) in power.

Trump is, essentially, my 400-pound middle school choir teacher who always had crumbs all over her desk and all over any papers she'd hand out. But her compulsive overeating didn't stem from being painfully self-aware and self-critical or anything like that. She wasn't aware of anything at all.

They're both pure id.

Sadly, you are correct : /

I hear Australians have electric kettles for tea. We have to use microwaves that can turn into cameras.

Death Panel tweet is solid.

They thought he was going to get rid of Obamacare (healthcare for blacks and Muslims, probably) not the Affordable Care Act (a good thing for whites).

Yeah, West Virginia has a long history of being favor of socialistic tendencies as long as black people don't benefit or get to live there

People kinda have the wrong idea about a lot of states that way, but WV has a history of turning it up to 11

One minor but extent risk is that the GOP flounders a bit for a few months, even years during the Trump Admin trying to cobble together a coalition for their domestic policies but then settle on precisely this strategy. When Round 2 of the AHCA or RyanCare or whatever it's called is far more explicitly a good things for whites but not blacks or other undeservings kind of plan.

I mean here we are, where the GOP is throwing off the bonds of racial and religious egalitarian norms in rhetoric but largely not in health care policy yet (e.g., no one on the GOP side is proposing racial or religious tests to get government assistance).

But they also can't get the tax/spending math together to satisfy the Ryan wing, e.g., the tax and debt hawks of the party, and they can't get enough coverage and handouts for the middle class and older whites to satisfy the Trump wing.

What is the modern GOP but a second best compromise between the Ryan wing that lower taxes and a white working class that does NOT want a lower taxes, but does not want to be paying taxes and accepting of tax where benefits go to minorities/immigrants?

The result so far, in rhetoric, increasingly immigration policy, maybe foreign policy -- is nationalist populism that satisfies both groups.

I don't see why they won't arrive to this sooner or later: the judiciary and the law is likely strong enough to stand up to anything overt, but like voters IDs and the now reformed travel ban, like criminal justice and sentencing, like zoning laws in cities -- legislators are entirely capable of writing laws that give de facto assistance to whites over blacks even if they can't do it on a de jure basis.

It's probably far more likely the GOP just flounders and clowns around and does nothing, but I can very easily imagine where the GOP sees electoral risk headed their way and pivots the Trumpian/Bannon, far-right nationalist European path: "OK, OK, conceded: we're going to get a great CBO score on this 'health care for whites, nothing for blacks and other layabouts' plan" whereby they satisfy both wings by giving whites health care and producing the savings by not giving it to blacks and Muslims and single mothers and whoever else.

It's pretty clearly exactly what their voters want. You mean it sardonically but the reason why the right-wing is tearing itself up over this is encapsulated in your quip here: the Ryan wing is trying to reform health care in a race neutral way that simply enriches themselves and gets them more money. The Trump wing is trying to reach the voters who wanted to get rid of Obamacare for blacks but wants to keep the Affordable Care Act for whites. Both sides can get behind what the other wants so long as they get something they want. It seems like they'll square that circle eventually, it's like the perpetual compromise of the modern GOP. Why not here?

Because Trump/Ryan aren't terribly bright and they aren't very good a dealmaking, that's my guess.

DV if there's one thing I've taken away from your summaries on what animates the GOP base it's that we absolutely must rethink public education and emphasize the **** out of critical thinking in high school (among many, many other things).

I hope dvaut is wrong on this, but yeah, ACA with criminal background/ID checks looks like a real possibility.

Holy crap that's exactly what's going to happen. I wonder how explicit they'll end up being. The ultimate gop dream is single payer for whites, die in the streets for "other", pass the savings onto the top 1% as tax cuts.

I don't think that helps much. The problem isn't critical thinking. It's motivated reasoning and cognitive bias, which are related but not the same. But I don't think you fix them with logic. I don't know how to fix them, so I'll just blame culture.

Drug testing for premium support but fentanyl and oxy don't count as positive tests. "Work requirements". More broadly, what would absolutely work beautifully for this is to make it about geography, pass a "Rural Health Improvement Initiative" or something and then just repeal the ACA. Subsidize people who live far away from hospitals because they need the help more.