Trump Dump: Internal Policy (Thread I)

[Gaidin]

Yeah, but let's be honest, who voted because of Mike Pence? And he's tried to insulate himself but he's up to his eyeballs. Trumpzi's base will stay home or sabotage the primaries of any House Republican who votes to in any way condemn, let alone actually try to remove Herr Cheeto from office. After November 2018? Who can say?

Be careful with that one. Who voted because of Truman? And yet the Chicago Daily Tribune had to eat its foot on that one. If offices changed fast enough early enough, for any given reason, and Pence were President for long enough policies would be his, not Trump's, and things might actually move along steadily. And remember, but for the times that Pence has stuck his head up he's done a fairly decent job at keeping his head down in this mess. It'd make it so that you'd need more than just a cardboard cut out Democrat to beat the Republican in 2020, in theory.

[Simon_Jester]

Wait, are people here actually believing he COULD be impeached? By a Republican house and Senate? I mean, however much they may hate what they helped get in an office, I can't see for one moment them doing anything about him.

Remember, if Trump is impeached, Mike Pence is president. If the circumstances of impeachment make it infeasible for Pence to hold office, Ted Cruz is president. A lot of Republican politicians would probably be far more comfortable with either of those two outcomes than with the one that we historically got from the 2016 election.

Personally, I think the idea that there;s anything less than 7 more years of Trump coming is optimistic. Is his support in the places that actually won him the election waning?

Yes, at least by a few percentage points. And since he only won by a few percentage points in the first place, that's enough. If the election were re-held today, Trump would have little or no chance of winning again, even against Hillary, let alone against literally any less unpopular Democrat. He MIGHT be able to re-win the Republican primary, but I'm not sure about that myself.

Personally, I think the idea that there;s anything less than 7 more years of Trump coming is optimistic. Is his support in the places that actually won him the election waning?

Base support is strong no doubt. I mean he's doing what they elected him to do. But could he win an election tomorrow? Probably. Americans are real dumb and all too often willing to give extreme fuckup shitheads like Trumpzi many more chances to fail. His idiocy is a net benefit because the "average voter" (moron) will eagerly buy into the "don't change horses in midstream" bullshit as if that's not what democracy is.

He's less popular now than he was then, and he almost lost as it was- slightly fewer votes, or the same number of votes distributed less favorably through the country, would have ruined him.

I'd say that depends on who his opponent is. A lot of the people who voted for him simply voted for not-Hillary.

If he gets impeached, Hillary doesn't inherit the office. The GOP gets Mike Pence for the next three years. Hell, the sooner Trump is out of there, the more they can advance their establishment agenda before losing Congress to the Democrats in 2018.

Yeah, but let's be honest, who voted because of Mike Pence? And he's tried to insulate himself but he's up to his eyeballs. Trumpzi's base will stay home or sabotage the primaries of any House Republican who votes to in any way condemn, let alone actually try to remove Herr Cheeto from office. After November 2018? Who can say?

I know Republicans who stayed home rather than vote for Trump; I suspect that if Trump hadn't run a relatively respected figure within the party as his veep, he would have had more trouble with that.

I'm not saying it's a sure thing, but Trump is such a massive anchor around the Republicans' neck as his term rolls on that a lot of things become possible. It's no good winning the primary if you lose by a landslide in the general election because all your opponent has to say is "so, why were you kissing up to Trump for two years ON TOP OF trying to take away the health insurance of a hundred thousand of your constituents?"

The converse is also true- being in the position you need for the general election is useless if you can't win a primary. But the point is, this is the kind of dilemma that cuts both ways.

It's not even like the Republicans need a majority of their own caucus to support impeachment. In both houses, it would only take about 40% of the Republicans caucusing with the Democrats to provide a big enough majority for impeachment. While I'd be somewhat surprised to see 40% of Republican congressmen and senators deciding that personal enmity plus the fear of losing the general election overrode their fear of losing the primaries...

It's not a foregone conclusion that this won't happen.

[Flagg]

Paul Ryan, not Ted Cruz. Ryan is Speaker of the House, he's third in line. And that's assuming Pence is impeached and removed before selecting and the Senate confirming a VP of his choice.

[Simon_Jester]

Sorry, I spontaneously goofed working from memory. I should have said Paul Ryan everywhere I said Ted Cruz.

Unlike Cruz, Ryan didn't personally participate in the 2016 primary, so that DOES make a practical difference.

That said, you get my idea- namely, that if impeachment occurs before the next Congress is sworn in, the Republican politicians have the means to ensure that an establishment Republican politician gets the White House. If it's not Pence, it'll be some congressional Republican. Or some Republican from outside Congress drawn in to provide some degree of respectability to the post-impeachment Republican White House, plus a break in continuity with the Trump administration.

Regardless of who it is, Republicans can live with that outcome, probably a lot better than they can live with the outcome of having to spend the next twenty years with youth voters going "oh yeah, Republicans, aren't they the party that kept kissing Trump's butt long after it was obvious he was a corrupt freako Russian stooge?"

...

The game changes if they suffer major reverses in the 2018 election, which seems especially likely if more investigative dirt is revealed on Trump and congressional Republicans don't do anything about it.

[The Romulan Republic]

Again, they're undoubtably planning to vote suppress/fraud their way to victory. The last thing we want is for anyone to assume that we have the next election in the bag. Too many people thought that last time.

Another thing, which is kind of the opposite of what you're saying if I understand you (that Republicans will potentially impeach Trump if they can get someone like Pence in), but which is related enough (and annoyingly common enough) that I want to address it:

I've seen some people saying that we shouldn't impeach Trump because Pence would be worse. Which is frankly such an absurd argument that I wonder how many of those people are actually Trump/Russian bots or trolls. Not just because Pence, while a theocrat and probably corrupt, does not strike me as actually insane/unfit to be entrusted not to push the nuclear button in a fit of spite, but because it entirely misses the point of impeachment.

Impeachment isn't about picking who you want as President. That's not what its for. We have a procedure for that: Its called an election.

Impeachment is for removing a law-breaking President from office. If Trump broke the law, he should be impeached. Ditto Pence. Otherwise, no.

At least, if we're going to maintain even a pretence of the law mattering in America (and the more the credibility of the law erodes, the more people will turn to political violence as their only recourse).

[Gandalf]

Regardless of who it is, Republicans can live with that outcome, probably a lot better than they can live with the outcome of having to spend the next twenty years with youth voters going "oh yeah, Republicans, aren't they the party that kept kissing Trump's butt long after it was obvious he was a corrupt freako Russian stooge?

Or they can do what they did with Bush II once he was out of office; blame his mistakes on others, and otherwise don't mention him. Then turn the focus to whomever their new hotness is, like Gingrich.

It's certainly easier than the massive shifts which would occur if Trump had to be impeached for something less than executing an infant on camera.

[The Romulan Republic]

Yeah, I don't expect most of the Republicans to learn jack fucking shit from this. They make some noises, but they are too dependent on the white supremacist base (fuelled by corrupt corporate money) to really make a hard break from it. I more than half-expect them to blame Trump's problems on him not being "a real conservative" and go for a different flavour of Right-wing hardliner like Cruz next time. Hell, if they're willing to keep swallowing Trump even now, its not hard to believe that when push comes to shove, most of them will be happy, or at least willing, to be Russia's stooges if that's the price to remain in power.

The only real hope for America, and the world, is to keep pounding the Republicans into the ground every election cycle, obstructing them as hard as legally permissible whenever they are in power, until either the party implodes or demographic shifts make its brand of politics completely non-viable.

I realized this probably about a decade ago, at least. Unfortunately, the plan experienced a major fuck up when Hillary proved herself not up to the "pounding them into the ground part", and Vladimir Putin decided to weigh in on their behalf.

[Flagg]

Sorry, I spontaneously goofed working from memory. I should have said Paul Ryan everywhere I said Ted Cruz.

Unlike Cruz, Ryan didn't personally participate in the 2016 primary, so that DOES make a practical difference.

That said, you get my idea- namely, that if impeachment occurs before the next Congress is sworn in, the Republican politicians have the means to ensure that an establishment Republican politician gets the White House. If it's not Pence, it'll be some congressional Republican. Or some Republican from outside Congress drawn in to provide some degree of respectability to the post-impeachment Republican White House, plus a break in continuity with the Trump administration.

Regardless of who it is, Republicans can live with that outcome, probably a lot better than they can live with the outcome of having to spend the next twenty years with youth voters going "oh yeah, Republicans, aren't they the party that kept kissing Trump's butt long after it was obvious he was a corrupt freako Russian stooge?"

Yeah, I figured. They are all turds in the punch bowl, it's an easy mistake to make.

As for the whole impeachment thing, Republicans could live with a president lying us into a war, torture, and essentially being asleep at the switch on 9/11. They can live with Trump. They will just reinforce their bubble from reality. I mean these are people who have literally said, in public, that there were no major terrorist attacks while George W Bush was President. They have just mentally put Bill Clinton in office during the attacks. If you can do that, you can delude yourself about pretty much anything.

...

The game changes if they suffer major reverses in the 2018 election, which seems especially likely if more investigative dirt is revealed on Trump and congressional Republicans don't do anything about it.

Depends on if there will be real elections or if there will be more "irregularities" in the midterms. And I still don't think Democrats will impeach President Cockroach. Would you rather run a candidate against Trumpzi mired in scandal, or President Pence/President <Establishment Republican> who will run on a platform of "Give me a chance"?

[houser2112]

And I still don't think Democrats will impeach President Cockroach. Would you rather run a candidate against Trumpzi mired in scandal, or President Pence/President <Establishment Republican> who will run on a platform of "Give me a chance"?

This is why I think that regardless of whether Trump is removed from office, the Republicans will not run Trump in 2020. The Republicans don't have to let him run on their ticket just because he's the incumbent, right? He might try to run as an independent on ego alone, but I don't think he'll have a chance at getting elected with the political capital he's squandered in this term.

[Ralin]

This is why I think that regardless of whether Trump is removed from office, the Republicans will not run Trump in 2020. The Republicans don't have to let him run on their ticket just because he's the incumbent, right? He might try to run as an independent on ego alone, but I don't think he'll have a chance at getting elected with the political capital he's squandered in this term.

...Have you even been paying attention for the past couple years?

[Flagg]

And I still don't think Democrats will impeach President Cockroach. Would you rather run a candidate against Trumpzi mired in scandal, or President Pence/President <Establishment Republican> who will run on a platform of "Give me a chance"?

This is why I think that regardless of whether Trump is removed from office, the Republicans will not run Trump in 2020. The Republicans don't have to let him run on their ticket just because he's the incumbent, right? He might try to run as an independent on ego alone, but I don't think he'll have a chance at getting elected with the political capital he's squandered in this term.

Yeah, that would be a great way for them to have no chance at keeping the WH in 2020. Their base will revolt.

[Simon_Jester]

As for the whole impeachment thing, Republicans could live with a president lying us into a war, torture, and essentially being asleep at the switch on 9/11. They can live with Trump. They will just reinforce their bubble from reality. I mean these are people who have literally said, in public, that there were no major terrorist attacks while George W Bush was President. They have just mentally put Bill Clinton in office during the attacks. If you can do that, you can delude yourself about pretty much anything.

See, the thing is, the more you reinforce your reality-warping bubble, the more your bubble shrinks, because fewer and fewer people will share it with you. Having to tell one more lie to justify continuing to vote Elephant Tribe instead of Donkey Tribe never results in growth of the pool of potential Elephant Tribe voters.

Depends on if there will be real elections or if there will be more "irregularities" in the midterms. And I still don't think Democrats will impeach President Cockroach. Would you rather run a candidate against Trumpzi mired in scandal, or President Pence/President <Establishment Republican> who will run on a platform of "Give me a chance"?

Well, my own opinion is basically "what TRR said." If after an investigation reveals (as I fully expect it to) that Trump actively conspired to subvert the election, in addition to all manner of malfeasance since he took office, there is no effort to impeach him... Impeachment basically becomes a totally meaningless thing and we have effectively zero protection for the rule of law.

And I know, I know, I'm talking to Flagg, and you will totally go MAXIMUM CYNICAL on this and I'm not even criticizing you when I say that.

My point is just that this is not desirable. Impeaching Trump is in fact the appropriate course of action here. That is almost all of what I am saying at this time.

The only other points I have are:

ONE
An impeachment may well have the desirable effect of publicizing a lot of concrete evidence against Trump. Right now it's ALL news stories and that can be easily waved off as "fake news," not only by committed Trumpists but also by nonaligned stupid people. Formal testimony before Congress and reams of documentation can still be waved off, but they are going to have an effect on some of the nonaligned stupid people. More importantly, they will have an effect on history. It will be much harder to rewrite history in thirty years and say "all the documents and testimony given during the Trump impeachment were lies" than to say "a lot of newspaper reporters and bloggers exaggerated and made stuff up thirty years ago."

I want the idea to DIE. I want it to be totally unthinkable among the mainstream of Americans that it's acceptable for a president to behave this way, to be this demented and corrupt, and to promote this kind of ideology. Because if this idea doesn't die, the republic will. We could survive another round of Dubya, but we can't survive round after round of Trumpoids. It is in everyone's interests, including that of the mainstream Democratic politicians, that this happen. That will require acting in ways that engrave the relevant memes on the history books, not just win today's political battles.

TWO
More cynically... the Democrats were able to make the 2008 election a referendum on Dubya and he wasn't even running. Do you really think the 2020 election will be anything other than a referendum on Trump no matter who is in the White House? Whoever the Republicans pick, all you have to do is play a minute-long add of Trump whargarbling his greatest hits, then play a video of their candidate saying something nice about Trump. Or a video of various Republicans endorsing the nominee, and then those same Republicans endorsing Trump.

[Flagg]

As for the whole impeachment thing, Republicans could live with a president lying us into a war, torture, and essentially being asleep at the switch on 9/11. They can live with Trump. They will just reinforce their bubble from reality. I mean these are people who have literally said, in public, that there were no major terrorist attacks while George W Bush was President. They have just mentally put Bill Clinton in office during the attacks. If you can do that, you can delude yourself about pretty much anything.

See, the thing is, the more you reinforce your reality-warping bubble, the more your bubble shrinks, because fewer and fewer people will share it with you. Having to tell one more lie to justify continuing to vote Elephant Tribe instead of Donkey Tribe never results in growth of the pool of potential Elephant Tribe voters.

Depends on if there will be real elections or if there will be more "irregularities" in the midterms. And I still don't think Democrats will impeach President Cockroach. Would you rather run a candidate against Trumpzi mired in scandal, or President Pence/President <Establishment Republican> who will run on a platform of "Give me a chance"?

Well, my own opinion is basically "what TRR said." If after an investigation reveals (as I fully expect it to) that Trump actively conspired to subvert the election, in addition to all manner of malfeasance since he took office, there is no effort to impeach him... Impeachment basically becomes a totally meaningless thing and we have effectively zero protection for the rule of law.

And I know, I know, I'm talking to Flagg, and you will totally go MAXIMUM CYNICAL on this and I'm not even criticizing you when I say that.

My point is just that this is not desirable. Impeaching Trump is in fact the appropriate course of action here. That is almost all of what I am saying at this time.

The only other points I have are:

ONE
An impeachment may well have the desirable effect of publicizing a lot of concrete evidence against Trump. Right now it's ALL news stories and that can be easily waved off as "fake news," not only by committed Trumpists but also by nonaligned stupid people. Formal testimony before Congress and reams of documentation can still be waved off, but they are going to have an effect on some of the nonaligned stupid people. More importantly, they will have an effect on history. It will be much harder to rewrite history in thirty years and say "all the documents and testimony given during the Trump impeachment were lies" than to say "a lot of newspaper reporters and bloggers exaggerated and made stuff up thirty years ago."

I want the idea to DIE. I want it to be totally unthinkable among the mainstream of Americans that it's acceptable for a president to behave this way, to be this demented and corrupt, and to promote this kind of ideology. Because if this idea doesn't die, the republic will. We could survive another round of Dubya, but we can't survive round after round of Trumpoids. It is in everyone's interests, including that of the mainstream Democratic politicians, that this happen. That will require acting in ways that engrave the relevant memes on the history books, not just win today's political battles.

TWO
More cynically... the Democrats were able to make the 2008 election a referendum on Dubya and he wasn't even running. Do you really think the 2020 election will be anything other than a referendum on Trump no matter who is in the White House? Whoever the Republicans pick, all you have to do is play a minute-long add of Trump whargarbling his greatest hits, then play a video of their candidate saying something nice about Trump. Or a video of various Republicans endorsing the nominee, and then those same Republicans endorsing Trump.

I don't disagree that impeachment is appropriate. It was appropriate in 2006. I'm just talking about political realities as I see them. I'd love to be wrong. But I've just been disappointed by the Democratic Party too many times.

[bilateralrope]

I'm not sure if this article belongs in the internal or foreign policy thread, as it concerns Trump's wall and his threat of a government shutdown if they don't agree to fund it.

US President Donald Trump faces tough choice over border wall threats

Donald Trump has threatened to shut down the government if Congress doesn't fund his border wall.

He now faces a tough choice: cave and lose face or follow through and cause a long and protracted shutdown, which could further divide his party.

Either way, he cannot win.

Tom Cole, the Republican chairman of a House Appropriations subcommittee, warned Mr Trump's threatened shutdown could backfire.

"When you control the presidency, the Senate and the House, you're shutting down the government that you're running," he said.

"I don't think it's smart politically and I don't think it would succeed practically."

The Washington Post's National Political Correspondent James Hohmann wrote the president was in a difficult position.

"If Trump caves once again and signs a budget without funding for the wall, it could make him look weak and ineffective," he writes.

"If there is a protracted shutdown, on the other hand, independents and moderate Republicans might blame him."

During a feisty rally in Phoenix on Tuesday, Mr Trump warned he would shut down the government if Congress doesn't approve $1.6 billion in funding for his wall with Mexico.

"Believe me, if we have to close down our government, we're building that wall," Mr Trump said.

Mexico has already said it won't pay for the wall despite Mr Trump's assertion that the US would fund it initially, and that it would be repaid by its neighbour.

The threat was well received among his supporters, but hasn't gone down so well with his fellow Republican politicians who have hit back at the president.

Mr Trump's threat has also cast a shadow over congressional efforts to raise the country's debt ceiling and pass spending bills.

House of Representatives Speaker Paul Ryan on Wednesday insisted a shutdown wasn't in anyone's interests.

Mr Ryan maintained building a wall along the country's border with Mexico to deter illegal immigration was necessary, but said the government didn't have to choose between border security and continuing operations.

SHUTDOWN THREAT

The US government has never been shut down with the same party in control of both Congress and the White House.

The president threatened the shutdown over one of his key campaign promises.

Congress will have about 12 working days when it returns on September 5 from its summer break to approve spending measures to keep the Government open, while also facing a looming deadline to raise the cap on the amount it can borrow.

A deeply divided Congress will need to come together by the end of the month in order to fund the government into 2018 and raise the legal cap on federal borrowing in order to avoid a debt default.

The threat has added additional complication to the Republicans' months-long struggle to reach a budget deal, according to Reuters.

Mr Ryan said Congress would need to approve a short-term extension, or continuing resolution, of current funding levels so the Senate could have more time to pass a full spending bill.

That would push the budget battle to later in the year and could in turn delay attempts at tax reform, another signature Trump campaign issue.

REPUBLICANS DIVIDED

Friction between Republicans and Mr Trump has grown in recent months, with the president publicly blasting some party leaders, most notably Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

He has also expressed fury that Congress had not passed any significant legislation since his January inauguration.

Mr McConnell said his party was committed to advancing "our shared agenda together and anyone who suggests otherwise is clearly not part of the conversation".

Mr Trump added heat in the rift with congressional leaders including Mr McConnell via Twitter just this week.

The president criticised both the Senate majority leader and Mr Ryan for not taking his advice to tie crucial debt ceiling legislation to a popular veterans bill that recently passed Congress.

Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump
I requested that Mitch M & Paul R tie the Debt Ceiling legislation into the popular V.A. Bill (which just passed) for easy approval. They...

Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump
...didn't do it so now we have a big deal with Dems holding them up (as usual) on Debt Ceiling approval. Could have been so easy-now a mess!

EAT IS ON

Mr Trump turned up the heat Thursday on Republican leaders in Congress, accusing them of dragging their feet when it comes to his key priorities.

The intensifying feud also puts his policy agenda in jeopardy.

The president has publicly attacked a string of Republicans including Senators John McCain, Jeff Flake, Lindsey Graham, Dean Heller, Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski - at the risk of weakening his chances of driving legislation through Congress.

Other Republicans have meanwhile grown more assertive in their criticism of the president, following the furore triggered by his equivocal response to the violence at a white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia earlier this month.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee chairman Bob Corker last week said Mr Trump had yet to demonstrate "the stability, nor some of the competence" needed to be a successful leader.

Lets pull out one line from the article that caught my eye: The US government has never been shut down with the same party in control of both Congress and the White House.
Is Trump going to make history ?

[houser2112]

This is why I think that regardless of whether Trump is removed from office, the Republicans will not run Trump in 2020. The Republicans don't have to let him run on their ticket just because he's the incumbent, right? He might try to run as an independent on ego alone, but I don't think he'll have a chance at getting elected with the political capital he's squandered in this term.

...Have you even been paying attention for the past couple years?

Yeah, that would be a great way for them to have no chance at keeping the WH in 2020. Their base will revolt.

Of course Trump will have his idiot supporters no matter what he does, I just don't think there are enough of them to get him elected on their own. I think everyone but the kooks are frustrated with him. He blasts anyone who doesn't give him what he wants, including people in his own inner circle, and legislators in his own party. He engenders no loyalty. He got the evangelicals because he wasn't HRC, but he's not a good candidate for them. Pence will be much more palatable to the evangelicals, and I think literally any other candidate will be more palatable to all the other Republican voters.

[Flagg]

This is why I think that regardless of whether Trump is removed from office, the Republicans will not run Trump in 2020. The Republicans don't have to let him run on their ticket just because he's the incumbent, right? He might try to run as an independent on ego alone, but I don't think he'll have a chance at getting elected with the political capital he's squandered in this term.

...Have you even been paying attention for the past couple years?

Yeah, that would be a great way for them to have no chance at keeping the WH in 2020. Their base will revolt.

Of course Trump will have his idiot supporters no matter what he does, I just don't think there are enough of them to get him elected on their own. I think everyone but the kooks are frustrated with him. He blasts anyone who doesn't give him what he wants, including people in his own inner circle, and legislators in his own party. He engenders no loyalty. He got the evangelicals because he wasn't HRC, but he's not a good candidate for them. Pence will be much more palatable to the evangelicals, and I think literally any other candidate will be more palatable to all the other Republican voters.

Republicans can't win without Trumpzis, they would likely stay home or if Trumpzi ran anyway, they would split the vote and the Democratic Nominee would win.

[Broomstick]

I've seen some people saying that we shouldn't impeach Trump because Pence would be worse. Which is frankly such an absurd argument that I wonder how many of those people are actually Trump/Russian bots or trolls. Not just because Pence, while a theocrat and probably corrupt, does not strike me as actually insane/unfit to be entrusted not to push the nuclear button in a fit of spite, but because it entirely misses the point of impeachment.

As I keep saying - I actually lived in a state that had Pence as governor for four years. There's a lot of bad I could say about Pence (I did, after all, sign a recall petition for him) Pence is actually was competent as a governor. I didn't like his social policies (neither did a lot of other people) but under him Indiana remained functional, financially sound, and government services were provided in a reliable manner. On an issue like healthcare reform I trust him a hell of a lot more than Trump due to my experiences with state-subsidized health care under his administration. Far from perfect, but not a grimdark dystopian hell, either.

The problem with "Pence is competent" vs. "Trump is incompetent" is that if Trump stays in office the crazy might get so deep the Democrats will take back control. If Pence is in the office he'll be competent enough that the Republicans could retain enough support to remain in power.

[The Romulan Republic]

Yeah, but, as I said, the point of impeachment is not to pick the President you want. Its to remove a law-breaking President (which Dickless Donald is) from office.

Not impeaching Trump to keep Pence from becoming President would be a partisan abuse of the impeachment process.

[Broomstick]

Agreed.

But I do get tired of the wah-wah-wah-Pence-is-Worse-Than-Trump-wah-wah-wah. No. He isn't. At least not from a functional government standpoint.

I fully agree that for select groups (such as homosexual and transgender people) he might be worse. Might. Because I'm not convinced Trump is any better than Pence is for such groups but I think the people who actually are LGBTQ should speak to those points rather than me.

[The Romulan Republic]

Well, my personal view is that a) getting the nuclear codes out of those tiny hands and b) removing the man who is literally condoning Neo-Nazism from the White House while their is still a small chance of preventing the entire country from descending into wholesale political violence trumps (no pun intended) all other issues, if we're going to talk about "who's worse".

[Dragon Angel]

Trump signs order to ban trans troops from enlisting

President Donald Trump on Friday directed the military not to move forward with an Obama-era plan that would have allowed transgender individuals to be recruited into the armed forces, following through on his intentions announced a month earlier to ban transgender people from serving.

The presidential memorandum also bans the Department of Defense from using its resources to provide medical treatment regimens for transgender individuals currently serving in the military.

Trump also directed the departments of Defense and Homeland Security "to determine how to address transgender individuals currently serving based on military effectiveness and lethality, unitary cohesion, budgetary constraints, applicable law, and all factors that may be relevant," the White House official said.

The White House official who briefed reporters on the memo on Friday evening declined to say whether current transgender troops would be allowed to remain in the military under those policy guidelines.

The official signaled that the administration was returning to the military's pre-2016 policy under which no transgender individuals were allowed to serve openly in the armed forces, but said Trump was giving the secretaries of defense and homeland security leeway to determine the policy on currently serving transgender troops.

The official rejected any notion that Trump's directive amounted to discrimination against transgender individuals, and insisted that Trump was not walking back his rhetoric from the 2016 campaign when he vowed to fight for LGBT Americans.

"The President is the President for all Americans, and during last year's campaign he was the first GOP nominee to talk about LGBTQ issues at the GOP convention, but he also was critical of the Obama administration's change in that longstanding DOD policy," the official said.

"He's going to continue to ensure that the rights of the LGBTQ community, as well as all Americans, is protected," the official added.

"This policy is based on a series of national security considerations."

The guidance comes a month after Trump said on Twitter that he would reinstate a ban on transgender troops, an announcement that took many in the military's leadership -- including the joint chiefs of staff -- by surprise.

"After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military," Trump said in a series of tweets. "Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail."

"Thank you," he added.

The White House offered no guidance at the time as to how the ban would be implemented, leaving transgender service members wondering about their future in the military.

Trump's decision reversed a policy initially approved by the Defense Department under President Barack Obama, which was still under final review, that would have allowed transgender individuals to openly serve in the military. Defense Secretary James Mattis announced in June that he was delaying a decision on whether to allow the military to recruit transgender individuals.

Trump's July announcement was met with widespread rebuke by members of both parties and civil rights advocates, who argued that Trump's decision reversed years of progress for LGBT rights and flew in the face of studies showing minimal impacts on the military.

A 2016 Rand Corp. study commissioned by the Defense Department concluded that letting transgender people serve openly would have a "minimal impact" on readiness and health care costs, largely because there are so few in the military's 1.3 million-member force.

The study put the number of transgender people in the military at between 1,320 and 6,630. Gender-change surgery is rare in the general population, and the Rand study estimated the possibility of 30 to 140 new hormone treatments a year in the military, with 25 to 130 gender transition-related surgeries among active service members annually. The cost could range from $2.4 million and $8.4 million a year, an amount that would represent an "exceedingly small proportion" of total health care expenditures, the study found.

Remember, Trump is LGBTQ-friendly everyone. At least that's what I keep hearing from people who still seriously believe that bullshit.

[The Romulan Republic]

That wonderful human capacity for self-delusion...

Trump is friendly to Trump. That's it. And even then, he sometimes undermines himself through ignorance and pettiness.

[Flagg]

Agreed.

But I do get tired of the wah-wah-wah-Pence-is-Worse-Than-Trump-wah-wah-wah. No. He isn't. At least not from a functional government standpoint.

I fully agree that for select groups (such as homosexual and transgender people) he might be worse. Might. Because I'm not convinced Trump is any better than Pence is for such groups but I think the people who actually are LGBTQ should speak to those points rather than me.

Except aside from his reinstating the ban on transgendered individuals in the military, Trumpzi hasn't actually accomplished anything. I'd rather have a non-functioning government that cannot undo the ACA and other things that provide health and safety to tens of millions under Trumpzi than a functioning government that can roll things back under Pence.

[Broomstick]

Except that in Indiana Pence didn't "roll back" the ACA and in fact supported the court battle that maintained the state-subsidized health plan that predated the ACA and in fact used Obamacare to expand the program. He's toeing the party line as VP but in the past he has actually expanded access which is why I don't automatically assume that if he became president he'd opt to kill it. Pence is the reason I've been able to get dental work done these past few years and the new eyeglasses I needed. He's the reason that my dying husband had access to proper care in his final months. Yes, we had to pay the princely sum of $24/month for that, but it was well within our capability to do so and in return we had no co-pays, no deductibles, and I was NOT left a bankrupt widow.

He also funded road improvements, you know, needed infrastructure repairs. He also increased funding for pre-school enabling more poor children to get enrolled in those educational programs, which I think most of us can agree is a good thing.

There's a lot of doom and gloom around Pence and as I've repeatedly said there's a lot I don't like about him, but people really should look at his actual record as governor.

My biggest concern is the effect his religion has had on his governance, but at least he conducts himself like an adult when he loses a poltical battle rather than throwing a tantrum on Twitter.

[Flagg]

I don't really think his time as Governor is all that relevant. If the House and Senate managed to get their shit together and pass an ACA repeal do you really think he'd veto it when that's part of the platform he ran on? If he did, do you think he'd be elected (assuming he wasn't successfully primaried) as POTUS in 2020? State politics is very different from national politics.