At the moment, Steve Artley may have the best perspective on the elections. There were hopes, as there are always hopes, on both sides, but what was predicted is pretty much what happened.
IMHO, Trump’s pretending he pulled some great victory is no more inaccurate than cartoons suggesting that the influx of women is going to make a huge change or that there will now be a flood of investigations and subpoenas.
The women will make a change and there will be investigations and Trump did well. All true.
But everything within proportion, please.
Matt Wuerker offers the most measured and optimistic take on where we’re at. It’s a big deal but it’s not the end of the rainbow.
At best, as Churchill said, it’s not even the beginning of the end, but perhaps it’s the end of the beginning.
The House will now be able to act as a check, but it comes down to this: Trump will not be able to railroad his policies through both houses, but, then again, the Senate can still kill House legislation and Trump can still use his veto.
And the House could be made up entirely of Democratic women and it wouldn’t change the fact that the Senate handles confirmations of judges and cabinet secretaries and suchlike.
Speaking of which, as Tom Toles does here, there was some surprise that Dear Leader didn’t wait until a new news cycle for this move, but, then again, we all knew it was coming, didn’t we?
Maybe the folks who also thought a giant blue wave was going to totally clear the GOP out of both houses are surprised. But they shouldn’t be. Politics ain’t beanbag, as Mr. Dooley said.
Today, the only use for beanbags is to play a game called — even in front of your mother — cornhole.
Well, politics most assuredly is cornhole, and it’s your turn, Jeff..
I’m sure he feels relieved to not have to go into work with his stomach in knots, and here’s a little farewell tour of Ann Telnaes panels on the fraught relationship the poor guy has endured.
It’s almost enough to make you forget that, in Trump’s eyes, his character flaw was properly recusing himself from the Russia probe and declining to use the Justice Department as Dear Leader’s personal law office, but that, otherwise, he fit right in with the rest of the White House Wise Guys.
I almost went off the road yesterday, listening to Alisa Chang trying to interview Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb) on “All Things Considered.” She asked him about the Sessions firing and his response was some story about how Sessions had — I’m not making this up — helped him change the legal status of some Haitian orphans.
Yeah, and Pablo Escobar built soccer fields for children and Pretty Boy Floyd was a generous tipper.
I wonder if Sessions rescued as many babies as he threw into concentration camps?
Anyway, to go back to Steve Artley’s cartoon, Dear Leader can celebrate because he not only lives in his own reality bubble but is doing a very good job of sharing his delusions.
Now here we have Jim Acosta trying to conduct a five-minute, multi-topic interview in a situation where it’s understood that the deal is one question, and perhaps a related — related — follow up.
Acosta was in the wrong, and any president might well have chided him for it.
But Dear Leader and his crew aren’t going to pass up a golden opportunity like this.
You have have to watch this a couple of times to see that, as the intern tries to take the microphone away, her arm briefly touches his.
Or, to put it through the Sarah Sanders Spin-O-Meter …
At which point, President Trump demonstrated his belief in a free press and his welcoming of tough questions by revoking Acosta’s press privileges.
It’s hard to oppose someone who is so willing to simply flat-out lie, and, while he lost the House in Tuesday’s elections, he still has plenty of cause to celebrate because he still has support from people who believe that there is a caravan of gang members and Middle Eastern terrorists closing in on our border and that “Pardon me, ma’am” is a physical assault.
And ferchrissake stop asking what would happen if Hillary Clinton did the same thing because she wouldn’t have to.
They’d simply declare that she had done it and the slavering Deplorables would gobble it up, the way they gobbled up delusions about her emails, Benghazi and Vince Foster.
And then they’d kick your ass around the block again.
In the words of the ol’ Perfesser:
And while we’re on the topic
Judge Parker has learned that his son’s ex-girlfriend is writing a book. And that his son knows about it.
And that his son is a nitwit.
Coming from behind in the first week of November, we have a new leader for “Best Line of the Year.”
“You told that to a reporter?”
Oh, oh, it’s better than that …
He told it to a reporter who warned him last April.
Not just any reporter. A reporter he met when she was investigating his family’s odd interactions with dark state intelligence agents.
Knowing the story was still live, she went against a professional ethical barrier, but the “What the hell are you thinking?” barrier was there for both of them.
Granted, she’s scum for writing the book. There are times a reporter makes the difficult decision to burn a source, as the term goes, but not just to advance your career or to put money in your pocket.
The one time you might do it is heartbreaking. Only an asshole does it twice.
And, while you should be ashamed of any betrayal, there’s one helluva difference between burning the clerk at town hall who’s been feeding you gossip and burning somebody you’ve slept with.
But, still, come on, Randy: Reporters are called that because they report.
Maybe you should have dated a “trustee.”