Mediaboss Marketing

Mitch McConnell has a quick, dirty job. Photo: Aaron P. Bernstein/Getty Images

Not long ago, a Senate Republican aide made a devastating confession to reporter Caitlin Owens about the GOP health-care law: Best to get it over with and move on to things Republicans are good at. The devastating part here is not the desire to get it over with but the concession that writing legislation concerning health care, one of the most vital domestic functions of government, is a function the party is constitutionally incapable of performing.

The Republican Party is incapable of passing a health-care bill that is not absolutely horrific. That may sound like a partisan statement, but it is one Republicans themselves have shown, not only through their words but also through their actions, that they believe themselves.

The American Health Care Act, which passed the House last month, is a shockingly unpopular bill that even most conservative policy analysts dislike. They hate the bill because it fails to advance any theory, conservative or liberal, of a functioning health-care system. It does not harness any set of incentives or mechanisms that could plausibly reduce costs or resolve the failures of the system. The only thing it does is cut spending for people in the exchanges and on Medicaid.

The details of the emerging Senate bill seem to be conceptually similar. Republicans promised to take their time and get it right, but they very quickly changed their mind about this. The Senate bill replicates the House bill in its overall design, which is Obamacare-but-a-lot-less-of-it.

The primary emerging difference between the Senate health bill and the House appears to be that the Senate is phasing in its cuts to health-care subsidies more slowly. Rather than a three-year phase-out, they may go for five years or even seven. That is the moderate wing of the Republican party in its essence: They will complain loudly and then ultimately do the same thing the far right wants, only not quite as fast.

The slower phase-out is designed to insulate incumbent Republican elected officials from the public backlash that is sure to ensue. By the time the cuts take effect, the vote to enact them will have been long past. Indeed, Republicans may not even control government at that point.

In pointed contrast to the leisurely pace of implementing the GOP plan is the frantic pace of passing it into law. The Senate GOP is determined to vote before the end of the month. Rushing to pass a bill that wont take effect for many years may seem like a joke, but both elements serve the common purpose of minimizing democratic accountability for its extremely unpopular choices.

In 2010, when the Democrats passed their health-care bill after dozens of hearings and months of open debate, Nancy Pelosi made a statement that Republicans made infamous: We have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it away from the fog of the controversy. Pelosi believed that, once the public could actually see how the new system operated, its features would be understood the bill did not contain death panels, did not force people out of their employer insurance, did not threaten Medicare beneficiaries, and so on. It was an optimistic, perhaps nave belief. (Obamacare did not become popular until this year, when Republican threats to end the law made the public finally appreciate what it had.) But Pelosi did believe that public exposure to the laws actual operation would redound to its benefit.

Republicans have a very different belief. They have no confidence the public will like what the law does when they see it. Instead they believe the opposite, which they have confessed with shocking bluntness. I dont think this gets better over time, said Republican Missouri senator Roy Blunt, a member of leadership. This is not like fine wine, it doesnt get better with age, admits Lindsey Graham.

The Republicans have spent eight years insisting that they could produce a better health-care-reform plan if they had the chance. They have come to realize that this promise was false. The only thing they can do is rip away the benefits Obamacare has given millions of Americans. Their sole objective now is to do so with the minimum level of transparency or accountability.

The administration was trying to reassure Qatar that it has Americas support, when Trump declared Doha a funder of terrorism at a very high level.

The network said it will not be moving forward with the second season of Aslans show Believer.

The president says he never encouraged Comey to drop the FBIs investigation into Michael Flynn and would be happy to say so under oath.

The NBA and NHL could crown champions, Nadal is in the French Open finals, and USA vs. Mexico at Estadio Azteca.

All the norms the president has already destroyed.

Republicans realize they cant write a decent health-care plan. That isnt stopping them.

Theres a group of guys in a back room somewhere that are making these decisions.

The First Daughter called her current plan a placeholder and is open to other approaches, according to a report.

After a horrific election, she is managing to form a minority government. But her political situation is fragile.

A White House pick voiced a certain view of who is eligible for salvation. The Vermont senator considered that disqualifying.

Comey made unauthorized disclosures to the press of privileged communications with the president, Marc Kasowitz said.

The president says that James Comey is a liar and also a reliable source who completely and totally vindicates him.

In which Jezzas high five goes spectacularly wrong.

Smart tech-boy Jared Kushner will try to modernize the government.

The nations most expensive House race just keeps getting pricier.

The attorney general has admitted to two meetings with the Russian ambassador. There may have been a third.

She called an election early to shore up her majority and now her political future is in doubt.

The U.K. election shows the populism weve seen bolster the right is a fickle beast.

Hes been uncharacteristically quiet, but aides worry this is just the calm before the tweetstorm.

Defying expectations, Theresa May did not buttress her majority and Labour did not fall apart under Jeremy Corbyn. Either could wind up in power.

See original here:
Republicans Know Their Health-Care Plan Is Garbage. They Might Pass It Anyway. - New York Magazine

The FBI chief he fired called the president a liar, but the response from many Republicans was a collective shrug. The GOP still needs Donald Trump if it has any hope of accomplishing its legislative agenda and winning elections, and it's going to take more than James Comey's testimony to shake them.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Friday boasted of the GOP's accomplishments under Trump thus far, and promised more to come, making no mention of Comey in a speech. A group of House conservatives discussed taxes and the budget, with no reference to Comey or the federal investigations into Russia's election meddling and possible collusion with the Trump campaign.

Elsewhere, there were few outward signs of concern from the top Republican officials, donors and business leaders who gathered largely behind closed doors in Park City, Utah, for a conference hosted by former presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

"The people in this room, who give money to the Republican Party and who are focused on helping get Republicans elected, they do it because they believe in an agenda," Spencer Zwick, House Speaker Paul Ryan's fundraising chief, said in an interview. As for the Comey testimony, "there's nothing we can do about it," Zwick said.

It all underscored what's become a hardening dynamic of the Trump presidency: Republicans on Capitol Hill and off are mostly sticking with the president despite the mounting scandals and seemingly endless crises that surround him.

Though some are privately concerned, and frustration is regularly voiced about the president's undisciplined administration and the distractions he creates, Republicans have scant incentive to abandon him now. Trump's signature remains key to the still-nascent GOP agenda, and he has the ability to appoint judges to lifetime appointments, a thrilling prospect for conservatives.

And, despite Trump's low approval ratings nationally, his core base of supporters remains firmly behind him. Those voters will be key to the GOP's success in next year's midterms when Republicans will be defending a fragile majority in the House and looking to pick up seats in the Senate, thanks to a favorable map that has a large group of Democratic incumbents up for re-election in states that voted for Trump.

"I think the last 24, 48 hours were all good for the president, confirmed he was telling the truth all along, that he wasn't under investigation," GOP Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio said Friday, referring to Comey's confirmation that he had informed Trump that the president wasn't being personally investigated.

Comey also bluntly accused the Trump White House of lying, asserted that Trump asked him to back off an investigation into former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, and contended that Trump fired him in an effort to change the course of the Russia investigation. But Republicans chose to ignore those things and focus on the aspects of Comey's testimony on Thursday that were favorable to Trump. Trump himself, appearing alongside the president of Romania on Friday, attacked Comey and said some of his testimony wasn't true.

"I think he was exonerated," GOP Rep. Mark Meadows of North Carolina, who chairs the conservative House Freedom Caucus, said Friday of Trump. "He said that he wasn't under investigation and indeed that was verified."

Ryan and other Republicans explained away Trump's interactions with Comey as the understandable blunders of a Washington neophyte.

"It's no secret to anybody that this president is not experienced in the ways of Washington, of how these investigations work," said GOP Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, who sits on the intelligence committee. "When you have the FBI director telling you three times you're not the subject of an investigation and you ask him, 'would you please announce that publicly' and he refuses, I can understand why the president would be frustrated by that."

Outraged Democrats argued that Comey had laid out all the elements of an obstruction of justice case, even as Democratic leaders tried to tamp down calls for impeachment coming from some liberals, including some members of Congress. Chances that Republicans themselves would initiate or even consider impeachment proceedings were zero, and that will change only if the Justice Department special counsel on the case, Robert Mueller, delivers a verdict they cannot ignore whenever his investigation concludes.

To be sure, not all Republicans were so quick to dismiss Comey's testimony and the Russia investigation.

The Tucson Weekly published quotes from what it said was a private talk by GOP Rep. Martha McSally of Arizona to the Arizona Bankers Association last week. McSally, who represents a closely divided district targeted by Democrats, expressed concerns that the House majority could be at risk partly because of "distractions" from Trump and his tweets.

"Any Republican member of Congress, you are going down with the ship. And we're going to hand the gavel to Pelosi in 2018," McSally said, referring to House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California. "The path to that gavel being handed over is through my seat. And right now, it doesn't matter that it's me, it doesn't matter what I've done. I have an 'R' next to my name and right now, this environment would have me not prevail."

A litmus test comes in two weeks when voters chose a new House member in a competitive Georgia district, where a GOP loss would unnerve some two dozen incumbents like McSally.

Associated Press writers Michelle Price in Park City, Utah, and Andrew Taylor in Washington contributed to this report.

Excerpt from:
With an eye on agenda, Republicans shrug off Comey revelations, stick with Trump - Chicago Tribune

New York Times

Republicans' Secretive Plan for Health Care New York Times Republicans in the Senate will need 50 votes to pass their version of the American Health Care Act. Several senators have expressed reservations about the House version of the bill, which withdraws federal support for Planned Parenthood and rolls back ... Republicans are making Trumpcare happen while no one is lookingVICE News Senate Republicans Hope You Won't Notice They're About to Repeal ObamacareThe Nation. Senate Republicans consider keeping parts of Obamacare they once promised to killWashington Post snopes.com -MSNBC -Daily Kos -Politico all 587 news articles »

Excerpt from:
Republicans' Secretive Plan for Health Care - New York Times

When questioned June 8 about President Trump's interactions with Former FBI director James B. Comey, House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) said President Trump is "new to government" and "probably wasn't steeped in the long running protocols." (Reuters)

THE MORNING PLUM:

Now that James B. Comeys testimony to Congress has painted a picture of President Trumps contempt for the rule of law thats far more forceful and persuasive in its dramatic details than Republicans ever bargained for, the new and emerging GOP defense is that Trump is a political and procedural naif. He merely needs tolearn the rules. This line of obfuscation requires pretending that many of the events of the past six months never happened.

But this spin from Republicans has a significance that runs deeper than merely revealing the absurd lengths to which theyll go to protect Trump from political and legal harm. More urgently, their new line unwittingly reveals the degree to which Trumps abuses of power and assault on our democracy have depended all along upon their tacit and willful complicity and, perhaps worse, it leaves little doubt that this enabling will continue, with unforeseen consequences.

The Posts Mike DeBonishas a good piece laying out this strategy. It takes various forms. Paul Ryan casts Trumps interactions with Comey as a mere matter of inexperience.The presidents new at this, Ryan says, adding that Trump probably wasnt steeped in the long-running protocols that under our system establish law enforcements independence from the White House. Others ground the argument in Trumps business past or affection for the theatrics of disruption. Hes used to being the CEO, insists one House Republican. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.)adds that Trump is merely being crude, rude and a bull in a china shop.

[Comeys testimony changed everything and not in Trumps favor]

But Republicans making this argument are dishonestly feigning naivete about much of what weve seenfrom Trump since the beginning of his presidency. The problem with the idea that Trump merely needs to learn the rules is that we have a large pile of evidence showing that Trump is deeply convinced that the rules should not apply to him.

Post Opinion columnists Ruth Marcus and Jennifer Rubin deconstruct the legal and moral quagmire President Trump faces following fired FBI director James B. Comey's testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee on June 8. (Adriana Usero/The Washington Post)

For starters, there is a massive clue in Comeys written testimony that shows this to be the case. In Comeys recounting of Trumps requests of him,Comey also relates his own effort to explain to Trump why his requests were improper. After Trumpdemanded loyalty during their private Jan. 27 dinner, Comey recounts that he then explained why it was so important that the FBI and the Department of Justice be independent of the White House. Comey added that he explained that blurring those boundaries undermines public trust. After that, Trump nonetheless repeated: I need loyalty. And then, on Feb. 14, Trump asked Comey to let his former national security adviser Michael Flynn go, a request Comey interpreted as a direction or order.

Comeys previous effort to explain the rules to Trump went entirely ignored twice. And when Comey testified yesterday, he said explicitly that he took notes because he was concerned Trump might lie about their interactions, because of the nature of the person. Every Republican who continues to pretend Trumps interactions with Comey are merely a matter of Trumps inexperience, theatrical inclinations or business mind-set knowsthese basic facts. They all know perfectly well that Comeys suspicions that Trump would deliberately mislead the American people about them had ample basis, and, indeed, are now being borne out.

Beyond this, as Brian Beutler points out, this faux naivete about Trump on the part of Republicans requires forgetting that he is surrounded by experienced officials who are ostensibly there to keep the White House within basic boundaries. Instead, they are willfully carrying out Trumps relentless trampling of them.

This touchingly innocent GOP naivete also requires forgetting all the ways that Trump has flouted the rules and shown total contempt for our institutions and democratic processes, norms and constraints on multiple other fronts for months. All these Republicans have witnessed the White Houses repeated attacks on the news media, which have strayed deep into an effort to undermine the fundamental institutional role of the press as a check on lawmakers excesses or corruption. They know Trumps attacks on the courts have shaded into an effort to undermine their very legitimacy at a time when they are constraining Trumps power to impose an immigration ban, which a senior Trump adviser explicitly described as a test run to demonstrate that his power will not be questioned.

All these Republicans know that Trumps business arrangement and refusal to release his tax returns are shredding basic norms of transparency (in fact, many Republicans criticized the latter during the GOP presidential primaries, remember?) that presidential candidates in both parties held themselves to for decades. They have witnessed Trumps serial use of important diplomatic business to promote Mar-a-Lago, at an increased cost to taxpayers. All these things are about more than just concealing conflicts or enriching himself and his family. They are functions of Trumps autocratic and authoritarian tendencies he does these things to demonstrate that he can.

Republicans, of course, have done little to nothing to check all of these abuses. But this amounts to more than mere abdication of oversight. It represents a refusal to acknowledge what all of these things add up to a picture of a lawless president who does not believe that rules, norms or constraints should apply to him. In this context, the spin that Trump will behave once he learns the rules represents a much broader and deeper abdication of responsibility to admit to, and grapple with, the authoritarian reality in our midst. Even worse, it confirms that their complicity with these abuses will continue. With Trump likely to descend further, to unforeseen depths, we have only begun to grasp the stakes of this enabling exercise, and have no idea where the bottom lies, in the minds of Republicans, or indeed, if there is any bottom at all.

* DUMB GOP TALKING POINT ON TRUMP IS DEBUNKED: Republicans keep saying Comey testified that Trump only said he hoped Comey would drop the probe into Michael Flynn, as if this shows it was not a directive. Charlie Savage punctures this talking point by citing several casesin which a prosecution was brought for obstruction based on such a vague formulation.

As one former prosecutor tells Savage:We have examples all the time in criminal law of people saying things only slightly subtly, where everyone understands what is meant Nice pair of legs you got there; shame if something happened to them. Indeed, Comey testified that he took Trumps hope as direction.

* RNC GOES ON THE ATTACK AGAINST COMEY: The Washington Examiner reports that the Republican National Committee is launching attacks on Comey, a shift in the committees mission its now acting as Trumps defender against accusations of legal wrongdoing:

Its unusual in the recent history of the Republican Partys national campaign organization to defend a president or other top leaders in personal feuds and against threats emanating from beyond the traditional political and legislative arenas. Yet the RNC has slowly shifted in the direction of functioning as an arm of Trumps personal attack machine.

Something tells us the RNC will be increasingly busy in this new and less-than-savory role in the coming weeks and months.

* A BIG BLOW TO THE SENATE REPEAL BILL? The Hill reports that the Senate parliamentarian now says a key provision in the Senate repeal-and-replace bill may not be passable under reconciliation by simple majority:

The parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, has flagged language that would bar people from using new refundable tax credits for private insurance plans that cover abortion If Republicans are forced to strip the so-called Hyde language from the legislation, which essentially bars federal funds from being used to pay for abortions unless to save the life of a mother or in cases of rape and incest, it may doom the bill Unless a workaround can be found, conservative senators and groups that advocate against abortion rights are likely to oppose the legislation.

The thing is that in the dark underground maze otherwise known as Senate rules, magical and surprising things tend to happen.

* IS OSSOFF IN THE LEAD? A new Atlanta Journal-Constitution poll finds that Democrat Jon Ossoff has taken a seven-point lead among likely voters, 51 percent to 44 percent, over Republican Karen Handel in the special House election in the Atlanta suburbs. Note this:

Hes capturing about 13 percent of Republican voters and 50 percent of independents a crucial voting bloc that typically leans right in Georgia. It shows almost no cross-over on the flip side; only 3 percent of Democrats say theyre backing Handel.

One wonders whether thats the Trump Effect. Still, view these numbers with care; other polls have shown a much tighter race, and this district went for Republican Tom Price in 2016 by 23 points.

* WHAT COMEY DIDNT SAY IS ALSO IMPORTANT: Eugene Robinson makes a good point: What Comey didnt say yesterday is at least as important as what he did say:

Topics he scrupulously avoided may give a hint of where the investigation is headed. He declined, for example, to answer a question in open session about Vnesheconombank (VEB), a Russian government-owned development bank linked to President Vladimir Putin. Trumps adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, met last year with VEB executives. Comey was also reticent about his interactions with Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who was his boss and who had to recuse himself from Russia-related investigations.

Kushner is now a focus of the FBI investigation. Meanwhile, Comey subsequently told senators in a closed-door briefing that Sessions may have had an additional undisclosed meeting with the Russian ambassador that Comey didnt want to discuss in open session.

* THE WORST IS YET TO COME: Paul Krugman notes that the Comey testimony starkly revealed Trumps contempt for the rule of law and runs through all of the damage Trumps unfitness for office is doing on many other fronts:

Everything suggests that Trump is neither up to the job of being president nor willing to step aside and let others do the work right The American presidency is, in many ways, sort of an elected monarchy, in which a temperamentally and intellectually unqualified leader can do immense damage. Thats whats happening now. And were barely one-tenth of the way through Trumps first term. The worst, almost surely, is yet to come.

Happy Friday!

* AND THE TRUMP TWEET OF THE DAY, TOTALLY-IN-THE-CLEAR EDITION: Good morning, Mr. President. Thinking about the Russia probe again at this early hour, are we?

Yeah, except you werent vindicated at all. Nonetheless, were going to see lots of headlines that trumpet Trumps claim of vindication, without informing readers this is total nonsense.

View post:
The latest Republican defense of Trump is built on a massive lie - Washington Post (blog)

Just a handful of California cities still have a majority of Republican voters Sacramento Bee Good luck finding a California city these days where most voters are Republicans. Fifteen years ago, Republicans comprised more than half of the voters in 66 of California's 482 cities. Today, they are a majority in just 14 cities, according to the ...

Read more:
Just a handful of California cities still have a majority of Republican voters - Sacramento Bee