Politico Playbook describes Trump’s schedule. He leaves lots of time for watching FOX News and tweeting. Now we understand what he meant when he said he could run the country and the Trump Organization at the same time. It’s a piece of cake, with plenty of time for golfing.
SNEAK PEEK … THE PRESIDENT’S WEEK AHEAD: MONDAY: The president will have lunch with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. He will participate in a briefing with senior military leaders. He and First Lady Melania Trump will have dinner with senior military leaders and their spouses. TUESDAY: Trump will have lunch with VP Mike Pence. He will present the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Edwin Meese.
THURSDAY: Trump will hold a campaign rally in Minneapolis. FRIDAY: The president will participate in a photo op with the Little League Baseball World Series champions and the Little League Softball World Series champions.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
He’s a traitorous liar and a joke.
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Clearly, Diane, you don’t understand how easy it is to run a country if you are a “very stable genius” and “winner” with perfect “intuition” and “great genes, OK?” The best genes. Genes like you wouldn’t believe. Incredible. Incredible genes. Believe me. Just incredible.
You seem to be under the impression that the president of the United States has to be sane and credible.
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Is it reasonable to hope that the president will not ask other countries to dig up dirt on his opponents?
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Hmm. I wonder.
Is it reasonable to expect the president not to insist that legal asylum seekers be shot, not to give big shout outs to white supremacist groups, not to use racist language, not to paw at random women, not to refer to the women who work for him as “honey” and “sweetheart,” not to charge people to attend a fake university to learn fake secrets to becoming rich in real estate, not to exclude black people from his properties, not to lie about his nonexistent healthcare plan, not to promise trillions of dollars in nonexistent infrastructure programs, not to gut clean air and water regulations, not to ignore climate change, not to kow tow to foreign dictators, not to launder money for Russian mobsters, not to give big tax cuts to the wealthy and then describe these to his friends as a “Christmas gift,” not to sleep with porn stars and then pay them off for their silence, not to pretend he’s a devout Christian and then make references to “Two Corinthians,” not to stiff his contractors, not to solicit foreign governments to hack his opponents’ emails, not to cover up for the murder of American journalists, not take away free school lunches from poor people, not to stop protecting kids from predatory for-profit fake colleges, not to preside over an Education Department committed to privatizing US education, not to have buddies like Jeffry Epstein, not to use his “charity” as a personal bankbook, not to profit from the military booking rooms at his hotels, not to profit from foreign diplomats booking rooms at his hotels, not to profit from his Attorney General holding parties at his hotels, not to say that he has no business in Russia when he is running for election and negotiating a tower in Moscow, not to sell condos to Russian oligarchs for cash, not to tell 100 lies a day, not to scream and yell at his staff, not to fire almost everyone who goes to work for him, not to cheat on his wife with Playboy bunnies, not kidnap children and separate them from their parents?
Hmmm.
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cx: to ignore climate change, pull us out of the Paris Accord, and refer to it as “weather”
additions: to divert military funds to his stupid wall, to alienate all of our allies, to work to dismantle NATO? Oh, my Lord, one can go on and on and on
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All of which goes to show that with the right kind of delegation to rapacious servants of the oligarchy, even a part-time president can do incalculable damage.
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Imagine if he were full time. He could engage another half dozen countries in his search for dirt on his political opponents.
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I don’t think Trump being full time is the problem since he has his band of corrupt White House worker bees who can do much of his heavy lifting. How many foreign countries was William Barr meeting with himself? I am sure Trump is so grateful that his employee William Barr works longer hours so Trump has more time to tweet.
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True that, Abigail! LOL.
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Are we all sure that Donald Trump’s demented attention span would last long enough to contact a half dozen countries asking for fake dirt on Biden and his son?
How long can Donald Trump talk or Tweet without praising how great and smart he is?
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LOL. It’s pretty funny. As Diane Ravitch has said many times on this blog, smart people don’t have to tell you how smart they are. And rich people don’t have to tell you how rich they are, either. If it weren’t for money laundering for the Russians, Don the Con would have lost everything long ago.
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Donald Trump’s brain is like a pinball machine. And there is one dim light that says, “I’m really smart,” and another dim light that says, “I’m really rich,” and another dim light that says, “Fake News,” and another dim light that says, “Build the wall,” and another that says, “I’m a winner, and she’s/he’s a loser,” and another that says, “They should be shot,” and something happens, anything, and the ball bounces around in that empty space and dings these dim lights and he tallies up his “points,” and then there is silence in there, for a time before it starts all over again.
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Hmm, there must be a way to pull the pinball machines electric plug from the socket so the brain dies like a burnt-out light bulb?
Wait, DT’s brain is probably already dead but doesn’t know it yet.
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Trump announced that he will no longer use the term “fake news.”
His new favorite insult is “corrupt news” and “corrupt media.”
FOX excluded, of course.
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Of course, DT now has the United States Department of Justice working full-time to dig up dirt on his political opponents. That’s quite the coup. His own private opposition research firm.
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The DOJ is run by William Barr, a man that believes in the Imperial Presidency. The only way Barr gained any positions of power was because he has support from other powerful and wealthy men that think as he does.
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He is devoting himself, we are told by the media, to an exhaustive study of the origins of the Mueller investigation in an attempt to discredit critics of Donald Trump. This is in keeping with lots and lots of extreme right-wing conspiracy theories about “Deep State” never-Trumpism. Is this what the Attorney General of the United States should be making his main priority? Is it right and proper for him to serve as another of the president’s lawyers? For Trump to be telling a foreign leader to contact him and Guiliani to follow up on digging up dirt on his political opponent? Disgusting. Sickening. It’s like a scenario from some banana republic or Mafia clan.
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Trump’s definition of the “deep state” is anyone who is not owned by him. The federal government relies on career civil servants whose political views are unknown. Trump hates them. He doesn’t trust them.
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Question: why does he need to ask Ukraine and China to find dirt on his opponents when he has taken control of the FBI and the CIA?
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He has not, of course. He has taken control of the Attorney General.
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Trump has 16 Members of the U.S. Intelligence Community he can order to do things for him:
For the rest of the list, click the link
http://mentalfloss.com/article/22076/16-members-us-intelligence-community
However, Trump doesn’t trust any of them because he is a firm believer in the alleged “Deep State” and clearly thinks all of these US agencies support that “Deep State”.
Thanks to Faux News and its talking brainless heads like Hannity.
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Trump thinks work is bragging about himself on the golf course or around the dinner table, and he is the only one talking because he doesn’t allow or offer time to anyone else to talk unless he knows what they will say is praise for him.
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XLV doesn’t really have to do anything but keep us all distracted, a task at which he is the Augean Stable Genius.
Meanwhile, behind the scenes and under every table, the Krypto-Kristian-Korporate Machine is cranked up full tilt and it’s stuffing its hoppers with every last bit of the Common Wealth it can get its Tyrannosaurean Tiny (But Invisible) Hands on …
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The Augean Stable Genius!!!! ROFLMAO!!!! Oh, that is good.
And yes, he is a useful idiot, to Vlad AND to the Krypto-Kristian-Korporate Machine.
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https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/10/keeping-our-eyes-on-the-ball
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https://www.currentaffairs.org/2019/10/why-bernie-has-to-win
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Psst. Bernie is not going to win.
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The fact that Bernie is 78 and just had a heart attack will hurt his candidacy. Trump’s barrage of attacks on Biden may muddy him. Then Trump will aim to destroy Warren. That’s his style. Gutter politics.
I dream that the Republicans in the Senate band together and agree to convict this man who enslaves them.
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Any chance of Bernie winning the nomination, no matter how slim, ended with that heart attack.
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Just another do-nothing week for Trump, at least as far as real work goes. Trump is a lazy, arrogant, Know Nothing.
But, Trump DID undermine American allies in Syria – the Kurds – and just threw them under the bus. And he is giving the Medal of Freedom (gasp, cough) to Ed Meese, who helped to subvert the Constitution during the Regan era, orchestrating the Iran-Contra cover-up.
Republicans not only have no shame whatsoever, but also they hate the Constitution and the Republic.
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Yes, Trump gave Turkey the go-ahead to attack the Kurds, our allies.
From CNN this am:
“In a stunning change in US foreign policy, the White House announced last night that US forces would step aside as Turkey plans a military offensive against the Kurds in northern Syria. The move is astonishing because the US-backed Kurdish forces have been America’s most reliable partners in Syria and played a huge role in the fight against ISIS. Turkey has long considered the US-backed Kurdish militia YPG as a terrorist group and has wanted to eliminate it. The White House added Turkey would now be responsible for all captured ISIS fighters who are currently being held by US-backed Kurdish forces in northern Syria. The announcement followed a phone call between President Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. There are about 1,000 US troops operating in northeastern Syria right now.”
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This is stunning, insane, despicable, horrific, unconscionable
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Did Trump really play this game to have a political advantage or is there more to the story? Here are some statements to consider:
Trump’s base will never consider anything he does in a negative light. No matter what he does, they will justify it, either pointing to the gutting of the federal government (which they want) or the appointment of extreme conservatives to the Supreme Court.
Some trump opponents think that impeachment is not a good idea due to the possible effect on people who might vote for him out of all the controversy.
Trump is certainly an individual who believes in his own cult of personality.
Thus I question whether trump set up this scenario all along. Surely he thinks he can tweet his way out of the political consequences of this affair while his republican senate acquits him. The timing of this seems perfect for trump given the election being a year off. Time enough for a democratic indictment and a senate acquittal followed by a voter cycle of forgetting.
Given all this, it could be a political gamble that blows up in his face. He may underestimate the people who do not go to the polls. They might show up and remove him from office.
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The a Democrats had to begin impeachment because of his flagrant violation of laws, norms, basic decency. No president has ever asked a foreign government for dirt on his opponent in the next campaign. How low can you go without consequences?
Some Democrats fear that impeachment will rouse his base. They are already roused. You are right. There is no crime so heinous that his base will not accept and forgive.
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