Assuming a Clinton presidency didn't also result in Dems winning the senate I'm not sure they'd have the fight to go 4 years after using the election as an excuse to not give Garland a hearing.

Garalnd would have been confirmed before Hillary was ever sworn in.

I'm seeing on CNN that Gorsuch said he would enforce the travel ban. So, he's basically telling Trump "Hey, get this to the SC, and I'll get you what you want."

**** this guy and **** anyone that endorses him.

source?

Of course he has actually said no such thing.

The role of the parties is in large part to take the limited, finite resources we all have (time, money, attention, interest) and direct it to the appropriate places (people, issues, programs, offices, whatever) to enact the will of the members.

If the party is spending time and attention on Russia, it's necessarily coming at the cost of other issues. It is truly zero sum. Humans don't have infinite time and attention.

If Democrats have evidence of what you've described (he bribes officials for favorable policies) then they should say that. Tell authorities.

If they're just going to make some hand-waving allusions to the idea that might happened and hope voters connect the dots for them or law enforcement will just do whatever they suggest, it's a huge risk. It didn't work in 2016 the way they hoped; they probably did some damage to Trump's personal credibility but little else. It's not clear what it's getting them now unless the other shoe drops, so to speak. Given that Trump is moving on other priorities which we all agree would be bad (repealing ACA), the GOP alternative is seemingly unpopular if not deeply unpopular -- why aren't we talking about that with most of the time Democrats have instead of talk about Russia?

I'm watching the hearing, on CNN, and heard nothing about that from either CNN or Gorsuch...He's basically refused to answer just about every question. But, I've been doing other things while watching so maybe I missed it.

F'ing CNN. SMH.

On the front page, headline says Gorsuch:I'll enforce travel ban.

I was just skimming so I didn't read the article until after I posted here. The title of the actual article is Travel Ban Question: I'll apply the law.

http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/21/politi...urt/index.html

So yea, he never said he would enforce the travel ban but CNN front page made it look like he did.

Yea, I know. I addressed it. CNN's headline said he did though.

Maybe let's slow our roll on LEAK investigations? Might embarrass and or incriminate some of the investigators.

If Democracy Dies in Darkness every WaPo reporter should burn Gowdy and any of his staff.

The idea that you need to MAINTAIN YOUR JOURNALIST ETHICS here for what, future access? In Trump's second term the only legal paper will be that ICE broadsheet about crimes committed by illegal immigrants.

I find that view amazing. It's not the dems conducting the review, it's the FBI right? You even mentioned this Gorsuch - he needs to gets elected, I understand, and surely you are not saying that the people in the Senate haven't got time to debate this or to actually vote because they are too busy pushing the Russia issue?

Exactly how much time do you think the typical dem politician is spending on Russia? Plenty of people with full time jobs (outside of politics), kids, hobbies etc are fairly well up on the concerns and extreme "coincidences". To imply that the dems should not push this hard as there are not enough hours in the day is insane imo. What do you think Putin will do going forward if the dems are so pathetic and weak that there are no consequences? And what if the Russian sanctions are lifted by the WH and Nato starts to fall apart? Do you want more of a push for an investigation then? Or is there no issue at all for you unless the US see an impact directly and quickly? In this case, just think about the 2020 election. If the US don't act now then it may be too late to stop significant involvement then.

Yeah, you guys are severely underestimating the GOP's ability/desire to obstruct.

Every appeal needs a hook. If you convince me you make the best widget in the world I don't care unless you've previously convinced me I need a widget.

Trump is a rich conman playing golf with CEOs, giving them tax cuts, and cutting Meals on Wheels: Yes, good, gotcha.

Trump, and also literally everyone else, are compromised by supervillain Putin and FSB stockpile of kompromat: Uh, ok? And?

Like we can see this from the right's numerous FAILED scandals on Clinton and Obama. They were too ****ing complicated, they didn't have obvious motives, they were just a bunch of poorly sourced facts haphazardly arranged. Tony Rezko, Whitewater, Benghazi, the Clinton Foundation, Pizzagate, these are all things that play great to people with HastenDan's reading list, but the general public doesn't care.


So this Trump Russia **** might be real and that is scary, but it's not politically useful until you have a quid pro quo that you can explain, and you can further explain why that's bad for me, The American Citizen.

The mirror trick with the TV is almost like he is trying to give us a clue.

At least answer the 'And?'

Broken record but so far the Democrats responses are:

...and he's grifting!
...and he and Bannon are instituting a white supremacist global order with Putin!
...and Exxon!
...the election, the pee videos, it's a cover up!

You get like one shot at answering that question. 90% of normal people aren't going to wait around while we spitball theories about what the machinations are here.

Democrats just have a bunch of probably quite incriminating stuff and are still working out what the crime is.

Bob was just trolling imo.

Kind of interesting how politicians are comfortable bashing the press and even calling them "the enemy of the American people", while at the same time, having unrivaled trust in their vows of confidentiality. Wonder if we'll ever see a journalist do a heel turn during a WH briefing and start naming sources and leakers.

Attempts to hold conference on trade with Africa hindered by lack of attendees from Africa:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...l-trade-summit

Every single African citizen who applied for a visa to attend the conference was rejected. And, no, they weren't from countries subject to the ban.

FAKE NEWS!11!

Yea, it pissed me off. I already contacted them on twitter and called them on it.

Troll more? The GOP already has an entirely pliable, gullible media at their disposal that is feckless and ineffective. A subservient cable news channel. All of AM radio. Brietbart and Drudge. What's a few more trolls churning up fake news from Siberian IP addresses? They already have tons of angry whites doing that anyway.

I guess I lack the imagination for Putin co-option but I'll go back to a point I've made in this thread (not in the last 24 hours though). You seem to be veering toward the notion that Putin is truly a supervillain projecting Russian soft-power across the globe to really disrupt the liberal order in drastic, meaningful ways.

If that's so, explain to me the conduct of the last President. The Democrats in the Senate who receive intelligence briefings.

If Putin is truly an unstoppable global menace deploying trolls to such ill effects that it threatens our democracy, is there literally not one patriot at any level of government willing to identify the crimes and the criminals in our midst? If Putin is really upsetting our democratic order and free and fair elections, surely someone somewhere can prove the charge right? Remember Democrats were at the head the executive branch 60 days ago. Where's the evidence? Where's the charges?

Something doesn't add up in this tale either.

Either the Russians are deploying the same old low-rent szalamitaktika tactics Putin cribbed from the KGB archives which are more or less just trolling people -- or Putin's tricks violate the law, there are co-conspirators we can identify, and he's about to get his payback -- he's literally on the verge of ending NATO and free elections in America. Or maybe both, but someone has to tell this story in a compelling way. And if you tell that story and the best you can get from law enforcement and Obama and the Senate Democrats "well actually we're investigating but we're not so sure" then I'll reiterate: you have no good story to tell at all.

At some point the Democrats are going to need validation for these theories, not just "what if...?" and let people's imaginations run wild. Because people don't seem to be letting their imaginations run wild enough and none of what comes next is obvious.

Yet again it seems like we're defending the strategy and tactics here in some alternate universe where this hasn't been tried already. Democrats are ALREADY just whispering whatabouttery and hoping that moves the line. This tactic is being deployed right now ("Putin bad, Russia bad, Trump bad, what comes next?!") Answer the question for people or go talk about something else. If you're what comes next is NATO gone, free elections gone, laws broken, conspiracies everywhere -- I think at some point political gravity is going to catch up with you on those claims. I know that kind of nonsense works for Trump but I think you can argue it's a quixotic form of success for Democrats to try to emulate.

some of them said before the election they were gonna obstruct as long as it took. They blocked for 200 days and people seriously think they were just gonna stop when hillary won? They'll block any dem nominee from now till the end of time if they could.

Yeah guys don't heed DVaut1. It is really a good idea after all for Democrats to completely ignore their "bread and issues" and prove TRUMP is a buddy of da RUSSIANS!!!!