How messed up are Trump Supporters?

[Bucky Ball]

I've heard from a credible source, (shut up ... my dog, OK), that L'll Teddy Cruz tried out for the lead in a new movie ... "Miss Congeniality".

[Whateverist]

In all fairness, if Barack Obama had won an election with help from the Russians, you wouldn't hear the entire conservative community screaming "bloody murder" or anything. 

No I imagine most would just grab their robes, hoods, torches and crosses and run straight to the white house.

[Angrboda]

Selective memory loss is spreading, and it has become a necessary pre-condition to run as a Republican this year

Is selective memory loss a preexisting condition?

Embattled incumbent Rep. Bruce Poliquin (R-Maine) stands accused of voting against health care for more than 100,000 Mainers. “To clarify,” a reporter for the local ABC affiliate asked Poliquin recently, “did you vote to repeal the Affordable Care Act?”

“No,” Poliquin said. “I voted for a replacement plan.” He went on to claim he was “one of three Republicans in the country” against repealing Obamacare without a replacement.

Alas for Poliquin, the image on screen switched to the House floor, with a voice-over: “Poliquin did vote for the ACA repeal bill.”

Indeed, Poliquin helped the American Health Care Act, the repeal bill even President Trump later described as “mean,” clear the House by four votes. It would have weakened protections for those with preexisting conditions.

It wasn’t Poliquin’s first attempt at airbrushing his past. His website, which in 2016 promised to “end Obamacare,” has now struck that language in favor of “protecting our hospitals and healthcare access.”

Poliquin is part of an elaborate attempt at a midterm hoax: Republicans convincing the public that they did not try to repeal Obamacare and its preexisting-conditions protections, and that they would again not do so if reelected.

With the Affordable Care Act hitting record support in a recent Fox News poll , and preexisting-conditions protections remaining overwhelmingly popular, congressional Republicans have recently sought inoculation by introducing various proposals they say would protect people with preexisting conditions. And they are vigorously scrubbing their records, according to archived versions of their websites reviewed by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.

Rep. Tom MacArthur’s (R-N.J.) site last year vowed: “Tom will work to repeal Obamacare, but won’t stop there.” Now? “Tom opposed his own party’s efforts at a speedy Obamacare repeal.”

Rep. Ted Budd (R-N.C.), in 2016, had a pledge: “I will do everything I can to repeal every word of Obamacare.” That passage is now repealed from his website.

Rep. Leonard Lance’s (R-N.J.) website, in 2016, boasted that “Lance is on the front-lines in the fight to repeal and replace Obamacare.” Now, that same passage has been rewritten: “Lance is leading the fight for real Health Care Reform.”

Their problem: Of the 73 incumbent House Republicans in competitive races, 67 voted at least once to eliminate Obamacare’s protections for those with preexisting conditions, according to an analysis by the liberal Center for American Progress Action Fund.

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Similar cases have been reported in California, Kansas, Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Indiana, Montana and North Dakota. This raises a frightening epidemiological possibility: Selective memory loss is spreading, and it has become a necessary pre-condition to run as a Republican this year.

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In Texas, where he is trying to beat back a well-financed challenge by Democratic Rep. Beto O’Rourke, Sen. Ted Cruz said in a debate Tuesday that he would “protect preexisting conditions.” Cruz forced a government shutdown in 2013 over his effort to repeal Obamacare.

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The actions of Republicans, including the president, before this election year have not matched their rhetoric over the past few weeks.

For more than eight years, their greatest and most unifying party rallying cry has been repealing Obamacare. When the House passed legislation to do just that, Trump invited Republican members to the White House and celebrated with them in the Rose Garden. (An early sign of Trump’s current positioning came only weeks later, when the backlash from the public intensified and he called the House measure “mean.”)

After Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) voted “no” on repealing the ACA, effectively killing the GOP’s chances to make good on a years-long promise, Trump began deriding him at rallies, a rhetorical device he has continued to use after McCain’s death.

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“The irony is that what allowed the House to pass [the repeal bill] was a proposal to weaken protections for preexisting conditions. This was not an obscure part of the debate,” said Larry Levitt, senior vice president for health reform at the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Washington Post || Republicans race to back protections for preexisting conditions, after trying for years to gut the law that created the protections

[Angrboda]

Trump finds Saudi explanation of Jamal Kashoggi's death credible

[Minimalist]

Trump is a fucking moron.  No surprise, there.

[downbeatplumb]

And Trump has pulled out of a nuclear arms treaty with Russia.
Analysis this side of the pond says that this action massively helps the Russian government.

[Fireball]

And Trump has pulled out of a nuclear arms treaty with Russia.
Analysis this side of the pond says that this action massively helps the Russian government.

Why doesn't the Chump just have Putin drop trou in front of the US flagpole at the White House and motor-boat his ass right there? You know, I'd lay long money on it that the stupid motherfuckers in his cult would give that some sort of positive spin and run with it. fuckinell.

[Angrboda]

"Oh but you are, comrade, you are...."


The Issues That Russian Operatives Used to Divide Americans, in Their Own Words

Unsealed criminal complaint shows the real source of Republican talking points

Russian operatives combed the American media to identify polarizing issues and then crafted social media messages to promote on Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms. The complaint follows two earlier indictments this year of Russians for election interference, including hacking Democratic computers.

Anti-Trump Republicans



Voter Registration



The Special Counsel’s Inquiry



The Mainstream Media



Immigration

[Angrboda]

Trump’s claim of jobs from Saudi deals grows by leaps and bounds

“It’s $110 billion. I believe it’s the largest order ever made. It’s 450,000 jobs. It’s the best equipment in the world.”

— President Trump, in remarks to reporters, Oct. 13, 2018

“$110 billion in purchasing. It’s 500,000 jobs, American jobs. Everything’s made here.”

— Trump, in an interview with Trish Regan of Fox Business News, Oct. 16

“Who are we hurting? It’s 500,000 jobs. It’ll be ultimately $110 billion. It’s the biggest order in the history of our country from an outside military.”

— Trump, in an interview with Stuart Varney of Fox Business News, Oct. 17

“I would prefer that we don’t use, as retribution, canceling $110 billion worth of work, which means 600,000 jobs.

— Trump, during a defense roundtable at Luke Air Force Base, Oct. 19

“So now if you’re talking about — that was $110 billion — you know, you’re talking about over a million jobs. You know, I’d rather keep the million jobs, and I’d rather find another solution.”

— Trump, in additional remarks to reporters after the roundtable, Oct. 19

President Trump is not very precise with numbers, but this is getting ridiculous. He keeps citing U.S. jobs supposedly at risk if arms sales are cut off with Saudi Arabia after the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Not only has the purported number of jobs from a highly tentative arms deal with the Saudis kept climbing day after day, but in the course of few minutes, Trump appeared to go from 600,000 jobs to 1 million.

To be fair, he appeared to be saying that all of the deals he struck in Saudi Arabia — which he valued at $450 billion — would create 1 million jobs. But that’s just as fanciful. (We had earlier documented that the commercial agreements announced after his 2017 trip to the kingdom were mostly smoke and mirrors, with many of the purported deals aimed at creating jobs in Saudi Arabia, not the United States.)

In his various statements, the president also claims that all of the arms-deal jobs being created would be in the United States, but that’s not true. Saudi officials have said that they will insist that 50 percent of the spending will be in Saudi Arabia, for Saudi jobs, if the tentative agreements are to go forward.

The Facts

We’ve learned over time that the president does not pay much attention to details. So while he keeps increasing the number of jobs that he says would result from this deal, he might be surprised to learn what the official White House statement said when the deal was signed: “This package demonstrates the United States’ commitment to our partnership with Saudi Arabia, while also expanding opportunities for American companies in the region, potentially supporting tens of thousands of new jobs in the United States.”

“Tens of thousands” is much, much lower than 600,000. Even that might be a stretch, though note that the statement uses the phrase “potentially supporting,” rather than “creating,” jobs. That means the White House could have been counting not just new factory workers but also secondary jobs resulting from the “feedback” of employed defense workers. (In theory, each dollar spent by a newly employed person reverberates through the economy, creating jobs for dentists, librarians, bread bakers, farmers, bartenders and so forth.)

According to a confidential 2017 document of all of the military sales agreements reviewed by The Fact Checker, most of the items on Trump’s $110 billion list did not have delivery dates or were scheduled for 2022 or beyond. There appeared to be few, if any, signed contracts. Rather, many of the announcements were MOIs — memorandums of intent. There were six specific items, adding up to $28 billion, but all had been previously notified to Congress by the Obama administration.

Moreover, the Aerospace Industries Association says that in 2016, there were 355,500 manufacturing jobs supported by the entire defense and national security industry, generating $146 billion in annual exports. So it’s hard to imagine that $110 billion in deals with Saudi Arabia, spread over a decade, would significantly add to that total, let alone more than double it. For context, the U.S. economy is worth about $20 trillion a year.

On March 20, when Trump greeted Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House, he claimed 40,000 jobs were being created by about $19.4 billion in deals (most of which had been negotiated by President Barack Obama).

“Some of the things that we’re now working on and that have been ordered and will shortly be started in construction and delivered: the THAAD system — $13 billion; the C-130 airplanes, the Hercules, great plane — $3.8 billion; the Bradley Vehicles — that’s the tanks — $1.2 billion; and the P-8 Poseidons — $1.4 billion,” Trump said. “And what it does is it really means many, many jobs. We’re talking about over 40,000 jobs in the United States.”

The White House never provided an accounting of how the 40,000-jobs figure was determined, so we are dubious that it’s a reliable number. But even if we were to generously apply that same metric to $110 billion — one job for every $485,000 spent — you end up with only about 225,000 jobs.

Note that Trump on March 20 mentioned THAAD — the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense anti-ballistic missile system. The Saudis let a September deadline for the deal with Lockheed Martin lapse, despite a 20 percent price cut given by Trump. So, for now, he cannot even count on the THAAD, which was one of the biggest elements of the $110 billion wish list.

Okay, Trump’s estimate of the number of potential jobs is highly exaggerated. But then he doubles down on the falsehood by claiming, “It’s 500,000 jobs, American jobs. Everything’s made here.”

One of the few “done deals,” according to administration officials, is a $6 billion agreement to sell Lockheed Black Hawk helicopters. But the contract says the helicopters will be manufactured and assembled in Saudi Arabia. A Lockheed spokesman said the agreement would “support” 200 jobs at the company in Connecticut and 250 through “the supply chain” in North America, indicating that these are not new jobs in the United States.

A key part of the crown prince’s Vision 2030 economic plan is that 50 percent of military spending will be done in Saudi Arabia. In August, in an interview with Defense News, Saudi Arabian Military Industries chief executive Andreas Schwer said: “Those [$110 billion in foreign military sales] will be subject to our new scenario. We will apply for each and any of those contracts with the 50 percent localization rule, to be in line with Vision 2030.”

In other words, only half of the $110 billion, if the deals were actually inked, would be spent in the United States.

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We asked the White House for an explanation of the president’s remarks but did not get a response.

[Joods]

I wonder where all the forum's trump supporters are right now? Shouldn't they be in this thread defending their dear leader?

Assholes.