Yeah, it's a nice thought experiment, but unless the shutdown is prolonged, then any suit to declare a Congressional pay freeze unconstitutional would be moot by the time it was brought.

Do the courts even work during a shutdown?


But yeah the story I linked does say that any changes won't take effect until the next congress is seated.

Lots of legalese.

How about congress just donate their pay during this shutdown to a charity of their choice as a matter of principle?

It'll be interesting to see how the 'Christians' feel if this is ever invoked by another religion against something they deem a 'norm' ...

I'm sure it will be something like evil Muslims trying to spread Sharia law over us god-abiding Christians...

Rep. Duckworth, an Iraq war vet, and double amputee, lectures "Cadet Bone Spurs" about the military and govt. shutdown:

Duckworth slams Trump: I won't be lectured on military needs by a 'five-deferment draft dodger' | TheHill

I get to pay a penalty on my taxes because I can't afford insurance. Thanks Obama!

I guess one of the few positives about Trump is that he got rid of it.

I think I remember the IRS getting an instruction to not enforce the fine. You may want to look into that.

Dems tried to introduce a bill that would ensure military was paid through the shutdown and McConnell wouldn’t let it come to the floor for a vote.

If the R's did anything they proved that total obstruction, no matter how it plays in the short term, does enough damage in the long term, that the base gets fired up about the fight, making it worth it.

This would have changed had trump not gotten elected, but that reward now is set in political stone.

Once Nunes authorizes himself to release the memo written by himself then Obama, Hillary, and every liberal in the country is going to jail and no one has to worry about a budget vote.

So this is the message you get when you call the White House:

Veronica Rocha on Twitter: "This is the message you get when you call the White House. https://t.co/Ry8UcxBCxQ"

I think that playbook only works for R’s though, being the anti-government party means there is really no downside for them.

And there is no way it would have ended if Hillary won, that shit would have gone to 11. Congressional obstruction by R’s isn’t some devised strategy, it’s a desperate response to the base.

It's a little of both. Obstruction was the strategy from the word "go" once Obama got sworn in, but once you commit to total obstruction of the blah guy, anything less than obstructing 100% of what any other Democrat wants to do is a non-starter.

Look at a certain Georgian around these parts for the base's opinion of any Republican whose commitment to that ideal is sufficiently impure.

Senate reaches a compromise on the shutdown:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/22/polit...ess/index.html

I had bought some "No" on the shutdown on predictit.com

Reading the fine print, I think that I will still lose because they will consider it a shutdown if 500,000 or more were furloughed for part of the day.

Haven’t the Repubs consistently said they’ll do things to pass bills and then not done them. Flake was promised a DACA resolution and Collins was promised an ACA stabilization and neither happened. Why are they believing that McConnell will keep to his word this time?

My thoughts (worth probably about 0.4 cents):

(1) The Dems bungled the messaging on this shutdown. I think that they thought that the "the GOP is in charge of everything and let it shut down" message would be the talking point and didn't really work to make it the message. The GOP came out strong with "Schumer shut down the government for a bunch of illegal immigrants" and were starting to really change public opinion. So the Dems' hand was getting weaker by the hour.

(2) CHIP funding isn't nothing. At a minimum, it take the issue off the table. And I think that a lot of Dems really wanted it.

(3) McConnell's promise was pretty public and important this time. It will be harder for him to weasel out of it.

In short, the Dems were in a weak position 2 days into the shutdown. Getting out of it with CHIP and a promise was probably the best they could do.

He probably won't, but if we get another shutdown after February 8, then it will quite obviously be seen as a result of McConnell not honoring his part of the bargain. Basically it puts the Dems in a better position than this shutdown (though it seems from the polls more people blamed the Republicans for this shutdown than the Dems).

They got 6 years of CHIP funding and much more leverage in a few weeks if McConnell backs out. Not sure what people expected them go get considering they don't hold any power.

McConnell can let the immigration bill pass in the Senate and Ryan can just block it. House will pass its own version and nothing will get done. Next CR in 3 weeks, Republicans will just hold something else hostage like opioid or disaster relief funding and we'll be right back where we started.

It forces Ryan to put it up for vote or they have a reason to shutdown again.

And even then it's a nice campaign message that if you win the House you can pass DACA which is very popular.

Given that Trump already wants to cut 95% of the opioid relief, the Dems should just shrug and let him do it if they try to hold it over them.

Its typical Trump though - given the chance he'll claim he had billions ear marked and its the evil Democrats who blocked it ..then again he'll probably do that anyway ;)

This is pretty good, too.

.@SenTedCruz : "I have consistently opposed shut downs"

CHIP funding should never have been a part of this discussion. It's a bipartisan issue with strong support across both sides of the aisle. It's an easy one for the R's to push on and call a negotiating victory. We see it in pilot contract negotiations. You've got something that has been agreed to for years, then as you get closer to the end of the contract, the company starts taking little things away that they had been doing, it goes to grievance. That process takes years, meanwhile the company then uses it as a bargaining chip for you to give something up to get, avoid grievance and get it in language in the new contract. The basically take something for nothing, and it's a bargaining win.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...ean-energy-yet

I guess these 23,000 jobs aren’t important. What a fucking waste of oxygen this guy is.

I'm a bit surprised Trump didn't just ignore the threat and just let it happen:

Man arrested, accused of threatening to kill CNN employees

I actually think it's not as bad as headlines are laying it out to be. There's a lot to argue on one side to support it. God, if Obama had tried to do something like this there might have been howling from the right about socialism and ending capitalism.

From NPR:


The Chinese are essentially the Amazon of the global market. They command sheer size and scale enough to completely disrupt a market. On top of that, they will steal any tech or product they can, and attempt to reproduce it in mass for much cheaper, quality be damned. We've seen it all over.

If American companies can't even get a foothold in their own country in the industry before the Chinese force them out, how are we going to develop this industry? Protectionism has to work on some level. Frankly, I'm shocked that his base isn't screaming Socialism.

I'm good with protectionism for nascent industries. With China stealing and not playing "fair" with Google et al, I'm good with specifically targeting (and competing) with China more broadly. US should protect our "intellectual capital" more.

I understand other countries and markets will fill the void and US may be left out (sorry Buick, Tesla, Google, FB, Tinder et al). However, I think this is economic warfare and we should respond strategically (we need a good old Japanese-like crash in China), think long term, and create new, strengthen existing partnerships with other countries (and I'm not saying Trump is doing a good job here).

Stuff like this is a good reminder that people who profess to be large proponents of "the free market" are only interested in it inasmuch as it helps the already wealthy. One can quickly skim any list of the wealthiest Americans and realize that the list is directly shaped by how the United States government enforces intellectual property laws.

Looking forward to this.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/23/polit...ump/index.html

In addition to that moment, she also announced she is pregnant-which would make her the first woman to give birth while serving in the Senate. 49 years old.

Biden: McConnell stopped Obama from calling out Russians
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/...e-biden-359531

And then in 2017 when proof came out that the Russians were doing it they would have been vindicated and McConell would have been pilloried. Just do what's right and stop worrying about the electoral consequences.

Big +1`

or conservatives would have gone SEE THE DEEP STATE LAID A PLAN IN 2016 TO DESTROY TRUMP THEY TRIED TO PREVENT HIS ELECTION AND NOW THEY'RE TRYING TO SMEAR HIM

...wait, what they're doing already.

(point is no I don't think McConnell would have taken shit from the political right at all. the right would have found a way to blame Obama; they always have)

I agree with Sack. The same evidence is before the public already, and Republicans are ignoring it. I have no sense that they'd be more likely to believe it had President Obama come out with it earlier.

Let's not forget we only care about......BENGAZI!!!!!!!!

Sure the Trump supporters would ignore the evidence, but stating the truth clearly and casting the light on McConnell would have been miles better than staying silent so that the GOP wouldn't make inflammatory statements.

I generally think too many Dems, especially Obama, came to believe the jokes about eleven-dimensional chess and too often looked for ways to win an imaginary game rather than just stating principles and living with the consequences. I think that will work much better long term.

Schumer's lack of a clear strategy on the shutdown is another good example.

One of the things that bothers me about Obama's presidency is how the messaging out of his office tended to downplay news, whether positive or negative. I can understand why they went that way, trying to not ruffle feathers and to continue working in a bipartisan manner, but there are some points that should've been laid out. If they had this evidence, that should've been laid out.

This helps the narrative that the GOP understands its base fairly well: do just enough to be able to make the argument that they're working for them and the base will allow a lot. The Dems still don't know how to get a united message out to their base, and it's hurting their prospects

The problem with this is that to 30-40% of the electorate, Obama was the "food stamp" president and any good news coming from him would be interpreted as something that was robbing "real Americans" to benefit undeserving minorities.

I'd agree on the Russian interference being something worth mentioning, and I'm guessing Obama was looking at it from the establishment Democrat point of view that Hillary was 99% likely to win anyways and as a result he didn't want to give Trump something to use to possibly foment violence once defeated.


Half the base just needs a tax cut, and the other half will put up with whatever as long as you make sure minorities are even worse off than they are.

Kind of wondering why the Turks bombing the shit out of and killing US aligned fighters in Syria isn't getting more negative coverage here.

As a solar company, we are devastated to learn Trump has imposed a 30% tariff on solar panels virtually killing the solar industry. Solar employs more people than coal and oil combined. today's decision will cause the loss of roughly 23,000 American jobs this year.

— Eugene Wilkie (@NOW1SOLAR) January 22, 2018

Boy that guy sure likes solar-his comments go and on in the comments section.

Donald J. Trump‏Verified account @realDonaldTrump 3h3 hours ago




Will soon be heading to Davos, Switzerland, to tell the world how great America is and is doing. Our economy is now booming and with all I am doing, will only get better...Our country is finally WINNING again!


Yes yes I'm sure all those countries will love being told how much better America is. Honestly I hope they laugh him out of the building.

Some leaders are already getting their shots in before he arrives:

Even Before Trump Arrives, He's The Elephant In The Room At Davos | HuffPost

I dunno how we're supposed to take a 77 year old John Kerry as a serious presidential candidate(again).

He already got to run against a popular vote loser. And lost. No repeats.