March 8-14, 2017: Climate Change is Real, the GOP Healthcare Plan is Lousy, and Fear the Toasters

 

3/8/17: The GOP healthcare proposal is so lousy the American Hospital Association, Catholic Health Association, Association of American Medical Colleges, Children’s Hospital Association, American Medical Association and AARP all voice opposition.  

__________ 

Almost every major health organization hates GOP plan.

__________ 

 

Also: 

American Nurses Association

American College of Physicians

National Nurses United

National Physicians Alliance

Association of American Physicians and Surgeons

American Academy of Pediatrics

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3/9/17: Congress, with both houses firmly in GOP hands, sees its approval rating “surge” to 23%.

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3/10/17: Bureau of Labor Statistics show the economy added 235,000 jobs in February, and unemployment dipped to 4.6%. Sean Spicer is asked if the president still believes the numbers are “totally fiction” and “phony,” as Trump insisted when Obama was adding an average of 214,000 jobs monthly in his second term. 

Spicer replies: “They may have been phony in the past, but it’s very real now [emphasis added].” (See: 4/8/17.)  

You had to be a moron to swallow that line. Many Trump supporters swallow it without a thought.

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3/11/17: Trump tweets: “We are making great progress with healthcare. ObamaCare is imploding and will only get worse. Republicans coming together to get job done!”

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3/12/17: Kellyanne Conway claims that surveillance of the Trump campaign may have involved “microwaves that turn into cameras.”  

Apparently, we also need to fear toasters.

Are you watching your food? Or is the microwave watching you?

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3/13/17: The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office announces that under the proposed GOP health care plan, 14 million fewer Americans will have insurance in 2018, 24 million fewer in 2026.  

It took seven years for Republicans to craft this gem.

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3/14/17: The cherry trees in Washington D.C. are expected to bloom earlier than ever. This is one of countless signs that climate change is real. The previous month, large swaths of Australia reported record high temperatures, including 113° F in New South Wales. (See also: 4/21/17; 4/22/17.)

Cherry blossoms come early.

July 19-20, 2017: President Trump "Out of His Legislative Depth"

 

7/19/17: The GOP healthcare plan looks deader than Davy Crockett at the Alamo. Fingers are pointing in all directions. Even Republicans see the president “as so out of his legislative depth as to be a liability.” 

No matter. Trump demands that Congress remain in Washington and keep working till a really great plan can be hammered out and slapped on his desk, ready for his weirdly huge signature. Forget August recess! Stick around D.C. and do the job the people elected you to do. 

Where, exactly was the president the previous weekend, during a critical stage in the fight for Trumpcare? He was “busy” watching an LPGA tournament at his course in Bedminster, New Jersey.

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7/20/17: “Made in America” week continues. You might not have noticed because the “Fake News” folks keep uncovering evidence that Russians had been lurking in every nook and cranny of the Trump 2016 campaign. 

On Monday, the president is let loose on the White House grounds to play with various machines and products from all fifty states. You could, for instance, watch him pat the wheel of a giant Caterpillar earth mover. This seems ironic, since Caterpillar has long been willing to outsource jobs to places like Mexico. 

Companies like Ford, GM, GE, and Proctor & Gamble gleefully ship jobs to Mexico and other faraway lands, too. 

Is the problem too much regulation? Is the problem greedy union workers who won’t allow companies to cut costs? Perhaps top executives could take a pay cut and save a few more jobs. 

Consider compensation for top Caterpillar executives in 2016: 

 

Speaking of greed, investigators are reportedly studying records related to Trump’s finances at Deutsche Bank. No evidence of wrongdoing has yet been uncovered. Still, Deutsche does have a lengthy rap sheet. The bank once paid a $630 million fine for helping Russian criminal interests launder an estimated $10 billion. This came on top of Deutsche getting socked for a $7.2 billion fine for peddling toxic mortgages and a $2.5 billion fine for manipulating worldwide interest rates. 

See! Who would ever think it’s a good idea to regulate Big Business! These guys are the best!!!!!!!!!!