JustOneMinute

Can Democrats Dial The Outrage Back To Ten?

Two straws in the gale leave us wondering whether Democratic leaders do in fact have a shred of common sense?

From Politico:

Democrats seek to quell Trump impeachment talk

Party leaders caution against rushing into a political trap.

They call it the ‘I’ word.

Just a month into Donald Trump’s presidency, Democratic Party leaders are trying to rein in the talk of impeachment that’s animating the grass roots, the product of a restive base demanding deeper and more aggressive investigations into Trump’s ties to Russia.

Democratic officials in Republican-dominated Washington view the entire subject as a trap, a premature discussion that could backfire in spectacular fashion by making the party appear too overzealous in its opposition to Trump. Worse, they fear, it could harden Republican support for the president by handing his party significant fundraising and political ammunition when the chances of success for an early impeachment push are remote, at best.

No kidding.

And in the #OppositionParty NY Times:

Are Liberals Helping Trump?

By SABRINA TAVERNISE    FEB. 18, 2017

effrey Medford, a small-business owner in South Carolina, voted reluctantly for Donald Trump. As a conservative, he felt the need to choose the Republican. But some things are making him feel uncomfortable — parts of Mr. Trump’s travel ban, for example, and the recurring theme of his apparent affinity for Russia.

Mr. Medford should be a natural ally for liberals trying to convince the country that Mr. Trump was a bad choice. But it is not working out that way. Every time Mr. Medford dips into the political debate — either with strangers on Facebook or friends in New York and Los Angeles — he comes away feeling battered by contempt and an attitude of moral superiority.

“We’re backed into a corner,” said Mr. Medford, 46, whose business teaches people to be filmmakers. “There are at least some things about Trump I find to be defensible. But they are saying: ‘Agree with us 100 percent or you are morally bankrupt. You’re an idiot if you support any part of Trump.’ ”

He added: “I didn’t choose a side. They put me on one.”

Sounds about right. The old adage is that Democrats look for heretics while Republicans look for converts, and here we are.

But before we hope for a return by the Democrats to a low Earth orbit, let's note that the "Are Liberals Helping Trump" is currently the third most emailed NY Times article, number 1 is this Nick Kristof Outrage Porn:

How Can We Get Rid of Trump?

We’re just a month into the Trump presidency, and already so many are wondering: How can we end it?

One poll from Public Policy Polling found that as many Americans — 46 percent — favor impeachment of President Trump as oppose it. Ladbrokes, the betting website, offers even odds that Trump will resign or leave office through impeachment before his term ends.

But after Mr. Kristof chats with professors and political savants there is no happy ending for NYT readers:

My take is that unless things get much worse, removal may be a liberal fantasy.

"May be". Bold words. But this is what sells papers because the readers want it, so Keep Hope Alive!

 

From The Loyal Opposition

The NY Times, NOT an enemy of the people, sets us straight on Trump in the Sunday Business section.

From Gretchen Morgenson:

Yes, Mr. President, Banks Are Lending

You see, when Trump blames Dodd-Frank regulations he is over-simplifying. The real issues are more complex. Do tell:

There is no doubt that Congress’ regulatory response to the financial crisis of 2008, which was largely fueled by reckless mortgage lending, tightened the rules for banks. Chief among them was a requirement that these institutions set aside greater amounts of capital to cover potential losses. That was justified, but it is crimping lending.

And there are other reasons these institutions are relatively restrained in their lending, Mr. Bove said.

“You cannot make the case that bank loans have not grown as a result of Dodd-Frank,” he said. “The only case you can make is that Dodd-Frank has been a depressant on bank loans because of the increase in capital ratios and the need to put more money into liquidity.”

Other drags on loan growth, Mr. Bove said, include rising interest rates, which reduce the value of the securities these banks hold. Increasing interest rates contributed to diminished common equity positions at a group of banks Mr. Bove follows.

I love "rising interest rates" as an explanation for why Trump is wrong-ish. The first Fed hike in years came in December 2016; the ten year Treasury spiked after Trump's election (like the stock market), presumably anticipating tax cuts, infrastructure spending and growth, growth growth.

And reducing the number of regulations? Believe it or not, that is also complicated. Robert Shiller of Yale explains:

Why Trump’s 2-for-1 Rule on Regulations Is No Quick Fix

President Trump intends to pare back a vast array of government regulations in fields like environmental protection, food and drug safety, and consumer finance. On Jan. 30 he ordered that for every new regulation it imposes, the government must get rid of two old ones.

It is an interesting idea but a misguided one. Even if government regulations are sometimes a burden, they are clearly critical to the functioning of a modern economy and society.

Yet while Mr. Trump’s approach is wrongheaded, there is logic to it. The concept has backing in some behavioral economics and business circles, and is certainly popular among many of his followers, who are quite hostile to what they see as massive over-regulation. The emotional part of the issue is important, reflecting a long-term societal schism between highly business-oriented people and those of other persuasions.

And eventually, following an explanation of the varying incentives of regulators and regulatees:

Mr. Trump’s two-for one executive order might be considered an application of behavioral economics to deal with an intractable dilemma. Tying the culling of old regulations to the imposition of new ones can be seen as a strategy for forcing regulators to overcome their inability to see problems created by past regulations that remain in force. The order might motivate them to divert time and energy away from their presumed enthusiasm for creating new regulations, using it to clean up the errors their predecessors left behind.

But translating this attentional device into good regulatory policy will be difficult if not impossible, because the issues intrinsic to regulation are so subtle.

So we might very well be over-regulated, but it's complicated!

On the other hand, a journey of a thousand miles is begun with a single step, and Trump is attempting to get people's attention while instilling a new mindset. Could it work? Well, wave an ax and suddenly the scalpel looks a lot more appealing.

As to whether Trump has the attention span and staffing ability to deliver useful de-regulation (useful to whom? - ed. Go bother Mickey) while avoiding regulatory re-capture by the intended targets of regulation, time will tell. And good luck to all of us.

 

LMAO Re-Reading IMAO

Glenn links to a Sarah Hoyt piece which updates the Frank J Fleming "Nuke The Moon" classic from - take a seat - fifteen years ago.

I know, right? Who else here read that back in the day? Well, I hurt myself laughing then and I hurt myself laughing again today.

MEMORY LANE: From my archives, Frank J Fleming's first blogiversary piece reprises all sorts of early fun. One more.

On The Border

Another day, another Big Media fail. Even Voxsplainer Dara Lind hangs up the No Sale sign.

Here We Go Again

I imagine there is new news to discuss.

Out Like Flynn

National Security Adviser Michael Flynn resigns. make that "Embattled National Security...".

NOW We Learn This?

Matt Drudge is headlining a Washington Examiner story by Paul Bedard that should have been part of the roll-out of Trump's Executive Order on immigration:

Report: 72 convicted of terrorism from 'Trump 7' mostly Muslim countries

Since 9/11, 72 individuals from the seven mostly Muslim countries covered by President Trump's "extreme vetting" executive order have been convicted of terrorism, bolstering the administration's immigration ban.

According to a report out Saturday, at least 17 claimed to be refugees from those nations, three came in as "students," and 25 eventually became U.S. citizens.

The Center for Immigration Studies calculated the numbers of convicted terrorists from the Trump Seven:

— Somalia: 20

— Yemen: 19

— Iraq: 19

— Syria: 7

— Iran: 4

— Libya: 2

Clicking through to the report from CIS and their Excel spreadsheet, we see that "convicted of terrorism" is meant as an assessment, or informed conclusion - e.g., some of the people were convicted of "18/1028 (fraud/theft of identity documents)" or "false statements" and received probation or time served. Others had long sentences for material support to terrorist organizations, which is more clearly terrorism.

Also, die-hard critics of the Trump order will note that there are a lot of Somalis and al-Shabaab supporters, but no ISIS. (I'm trying to think like Rachel Maddow here, so please feel my pain.)

Well. Why we are reading this now and not weeks ago is a puzzle; it should have been part of the roll-out package. That might have avoided statement like this (back to the Wash Ex):

In dismissing the Trump executive order, San Francisco's Ninth Circuit court of appeals said, "The government has pointed to no evidence...that any alien from any of the countries named in the order has perpetrated a terrorist attack in the United States."

Of course, taken literally this report does not refute this claim - at a quick read-through, none of these people were convicted of actual attacks. Would supporting terror groups or plotting attacks have impressed these judges, or were they looking for an actual body count? Who knows?

Saturday Day Live

Putin gifting Edward Snowden to Trump? Thanks for the hot potato, Vlad! Geez, Trump brought his checkers to a chess match.

And Ed Morrissey earns his big paycheck with a dive into reversal rate statistics for the circuit courts. His inspiration was the headline 80% reversal rate for the Ninth Circus but his answer will surprise and enlighten many.

Bracing For The Blizzard

Traditional '60 degree day followed by a foot of snow' open thread.

Creating News

If the NY Times hints at something but won't say it outright, what does it mean? For some, it means an opportunity for self-generated 'fake news'.

This passage from their exhaustive story of life in the Trump White House has attracted attention:

Mr. Priebus bristles at the perception that he occupies a diminished perch in the West Wing pecking order compared with previous chiefs. But for the moment, Mr. Bannon remains the president’s dominant adviser, despite Mr. Trump’s anger that he was not fully briefed on details of the executive order he signed giving his chief strategist a seat on the National Security Council, a greater source of frustration to the president than the fallout from the travel ban.

Now, let's take a moment. Is the Times telling us that Trump is upset because he did not realize Bannon would end up on the principals committee of the NSC? Or is he upset about some other details of a memo which is widely remembered and easily described as the one that put Bannon on the principals committee?

Let's start with this - these Times writers have written before and clarity is normally within their reach. If we aren't sure what they are saying it is because they aren't sure they want to say it. And does anyone think that if they had a solid story that Trump was mad at Bannon for his self-promotion they would have failed to pound the table with that? "Trump Angry At Bannon's Self-Promotion" would have been a headline, not a hint.

As to what the Times is saying, here are Doctors Marshall and Drezner on Twitter:

"Supposed to infer"? Why would the Times not say it outright unless they hoped their readers would make a leap the Times was not comfortable reporting explicitly?

Flashing back a week, here are Landler and Sanger of the NY Times reporting on the order in question and noting several controversies:

What Trump’s Changes Mean for the National Security Council

WASHINGTON — President Trump announced on Monday that he would add the director of the Central Intelligence Agency to the National Security Council after critics questioned a memorandum released last weekend that also gave a seat to his chief political strategist.

Mr. Trump’s decision to include the strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, on the council’s “principals committee” — where he will sit alongside the secretaries of state, Treasury, defense and energy, and other policy makers — has set off an eruption among the Washington national security establishment. The memo did not stipulate that the director of national intelligence or the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff would automatically attend those meetings, and raised concerns about the influence Mr. Bannon would exert over national security.

The White House press secretary, Sean Spicer, insisted on Monday that the director of national intelligence and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Joseph Dunford, were welcome to attend any meetings of the committee on subjects relevant to their portfolios. And he noted that Mr. Trump was adding the C.I.A. director, Mike Pompeo, to the list.

Is it inconceivable that Trump is irked because the failure to include the CIA head, as well as the short-shrifting of the DNI and the JCS Chair, made him look slack on national security? Is it possible that Trump has been fielding WTF phone calls from those guys worried about their own status, not Bannon's?

Maybe! Maybe the Times has solid reporting that Trump is angry about the re-organization order but can't pin down the 'why'.

But I'll say this - the idea that Trump has adopted more conventional (dare I say "earth-bound") logic and is worried about this NSC re-organization for the same reason Dan Drezner is worried about it strikes me as an unwarranted burst of optimism from the good Doctor.

For my money, Trump's anger might be due to the public reaction to Bannon, it might be the absence of the national security heavyweights, it might be the color of the paper the order was printed on, or it might be the font. But I decline to "infer" a conclusion that suits the CW when the Times is pointing in that direction but won't actually go there.

This post-truth era calls for critical thinking, not wishful thinking. Assuming that Trump is upset for the same reasons a normal person would be is a path lacking a firm evidentiary foundation.

BY WAY OF COUNTEREXAMPLE: Kevin Drum will yield to no one in his disdain for Trump but he does not leap to (or at least, emphasize) the possibility that Trump is annoyed with Bannon's self-promotion.

So That Happened

I woke up this morning thinking that I had just had the strangest dream and today was Super Sunday.

Traditional 'Go, Pats!' Super Bowl Thread

My big sister is a U Mich alum so I adopted Tom Brady years ago. Also, if Brady et al win this then lots of youngsters can claim to have seen the GOAT at quarterback. Otherwise, we are harking back to Joe Montana, who could play a bit himself. (Unitas and Graham were before my time, but obviously dominant in their era.)

The NYT on Gorsuch - With Enemies Like This...

Nicholas Fandos of the NY Times briefly seems to forget which side his readers are on as they sift through Supreme Court nominee Gorsuch's columns from his days as a student at Columbia:

In His Own Words: Gorsuch’s Lively Writings at Columbia

WASHINGTON — Decades before he began writing legal opinions, Judge Neil M. Gorsuch, President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, was a student columnist at Columbia University. And he had no shortage of opinions.

His topics ranged broadly, from life on campus to the Iran-contra affair. His conservatism was a constant. And he had a lively writing style that persists to this day.

And their first example of that constant conservatism? Brace yourself:

‘Free speech works’

While mounting an ultimately unsuccessful bid for a seat on the university Senate as a freshman in 1986, Judge Gorsuch was asked by The Columbia Daily Spectator for his views on hot-button issues, including the question of whether the Marines should be allowed to recruit on campus.

“The question here is not whether ‘the Marines should be allowed to recruit on campus’ but whether a University and its community, so devoted to the freedom of individuals to pursue their own chosen lifestyles and to speak freely, has the right or obligation to determine who may speak on campus or what may be said. To fulfill an immediate end, we are likely to forget the underlying principle that every human being, according to our nation’s proclamations, and reinforced by our University’s standards, has an inalienable right to express himself or herself — whether we agree or not. Free speech works; it works better than any form of censorship or suppression; and in exercising vigorously, the truth is bound to emerge.”

Hmm. And the proper progressive position is that free speech doesn't work? Well, actually, yes, as we recently saw at Berkeley and NYU, not to mention other campuses for years, but is this how the left wants to frame it?

And ROTC is back at the Ivies, so Gorsuch was simply ahead of his times.

His other excerpts seem similarly unobjectionable. In defending gender-segregated fraternities and sororities, Gorsuch noted freedom of association and explained the Columbia easily allows the formation of new, more inclusive fraternities and sororities. Radical stuff! But do read it all. If this is what they've got, it's less than nothing.

Raid In Yemen

Allahpundit puzzles over the Reuters account of a raid in Yemen that was botched by Trump because he didn't... what?

The grim Reuters allegation is this:

U.S. military officials told Reuters that Trump approved his first covert counterterrorism operation without sufficient intelligence, ground support or adequate backup preparations.

As a result, three officials said, the attacking SEAL team found itself dropping onto a reinforced al Qaeda base defended by landmines, snipers, and a larger than expected contingent of heavily armed Islamist extremists.

So now Trump is expected to weigh in on the appropriate level of ground support?!? And maybe eyeball some satellite photos? As Allahpundit notes. General Mattis, now SecDef, has some experience here. Gen. Dunford, Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and National Security Advisor Flynn, formerly a Lt. General who oversaw raids like this for a living, were also in the final meeting. Please.

IMHO the Commander in Chief approves these missions, or rejects them, based on the possible rewards and any risks associated with the country in question (Yemen, here), other allies, and US and world opinion. If the Defense Department submitted a half-baked plan after months of effort, well, that's on them. More reasonably, these are dangerous missions and sometimes things happen. E.g., the last known raid in Yemen, Dec 2014, failed to rescue the targeted hostages:

2 Hostages Killed in Yemen as U.S. Rescue Effort Fails

Or in Syria, Oct 2015:

US special forces soldier is killed in Isis hostage rescue mission in Iraq

Almost done. Back to AllahP:

What’s missing from any of the reporting is the suggestion that Defense warned the Trump White House that they weren’t ready to roll but the White House demanded action anyway. Until that evidence is produced, why should we assume that Trump is the negligent party?

OK, into the Bonus Round for outrageous reporting. Here is the Guardian, picked up by The Week:

Saturday's Navy SEAL raid in Yemen — which resulted in the death of an 8-year-old American girl and a U.S. naval officer — had previously been rejected by former President Barack Obama, The Guardian reports. President Trump approved of the raid in his first military strike as commander-in-chief:

[Colonel John] Thomas said he did not know why the prior administration did not authorize the operation, but said the Obama administration had effectively exercised a "pocket veto" over it.

A former official said the operation had been reviewed several times, but the underlying intelligence was not judged strong enough to justify the risks, and the case was left to the incoming Trump administration to make its own judgment. [The Guardian]

Oh, brother. CNN addresses the veto claim specifically:

The raid was greenlit by President Donald Trump shortly after taking the oath of office, but multiple officials told CNN the mission had been planned months in advance and had been briefed to then-President Barack Obama.

 

Both defense and Obama administration officials said the operation was never vetoed by Obama and that "operational reasons" were why it was pushed back after January 20 and why Obama left the task of authorizing the raid to his successor.

 

People want to believe and the media wants to give their customers what they want. Unexpectedly reality-based reporting from the NY Times on this.

 

WHAT TIPPED THE BAD GUYS? Why did our troops lose the element of surprise after arriving by helicopter five miles away? Speculation in the Times:

 

In this case, the assault force of several dozen commandos, which also included elite soldiers from the United Arab Emirates, was jinxed from the start. Qaeda fighters were somehow tipped off to the stealthy advance toward the village — perhaps by the whine of American drones that local tribal leaders said were flying lower and louder than usual.

 

Through a communications intercept, the commandos knew that the mission had been somehow compromised, but pressed on toward their target roughly five miles from where they had been flown into the area. “They kind of knew they were screwed from the beginning,” one former SEAL Team 6 official said.

 

Too many eyes in the sky making too much noise? Plausible? Surely we have done this lots of times.