"Know when to hold'em, know when to fold'em..."

"While former presidents George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan all responded to midterm election losses with high-profile firings, Obama’s chief of staff, Denis McDonough, said there would be no shake-up.

“I don’t see anything like that on the horizon,” McDonough said in an interview with Al Hunt on the “Charlie Rose” show, which airs on PBS and Bloomberg Television.

Obama senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer said the president wouldn’t scale back his immigration plans, which may result in millions of people getting a reprieve from deportation. Pfeiffer said Obama also wouldn’t shrink from using his unilateral authority to move his agenda ahead during his remaining two years in office.

“We’re going to do what we think is best for the country,” Pfeiffer told reporters and editors yesterday at a Bloomberg Politics breakfast in Washington. “If they have disagreements about the things we do, they have the capacity to legislate.”"  Businessweek

 

--------------------------

 

Well, well, pilgrim...  Delusional?  Narcissistic? Megalomaniacal?  What do you say, Walrus?

 

I have it on good authority that Democratic Party seniors have appealed to the president to rid himself of the succubus of his inner circle, a group that is dragging him toward his doom.  Apparently, their pleas mean nothing to this entrenched clique.

 

According to the two fellows quoted above, Obama intends to govern by imperial fiat without reference to whatever it is that a Republican Congress and a Republican dominated SCOTUS might want.

 

 

He is probably on solid ground with regard to use of the armed forces and CIA overseas against the Islamists and/or Iran.  IMO a lot of the neanderthals who will be in the new congress will vote whatever he asks for so long as it is generally in line with what Bibi/AIPAC want and it is anti-Muslim.

 

Domestically the situation is quite different.

 

IMO if he tries by executive order to declare what amounts to amnesty for millions of illegal aliens, he will create a firestorm of rage on the part of the very Americans who just gutted his party.  If the flames burn high enough and fiercely enough it might be surprising to see how fast the congress might move against him.   

 

And then there is the fire burning just below the surface of the ground in Missouri over the Brown/Wilson affair.  IMO the mob wants Wilson lynched.  That is their idea of justice.  The state grand jury is unlikely to indict Wilson for homicide.  There is too much evidence that contradicts anti-Wilson testimony for the grand jury to indict.  It is also unlikely, but possible, that the DoJ investigators will seek a trial for Wilson on Civil Rights violations charges.  The evidentiary situation is the same in this case.  And then, there is the matter of "re-organization" by the DoJ of the local police forces in the St. Louis suburbs.  To do that would amount to seizure of control of those local, non-federal, police forces by the federal government.  I believe for that to occur a federal judge and/or jury would have to rule that these jurisdictions are in violation of the US Constitution or some derivative federal law.  This would be subject to appeal unless the local jurisdictions agreed to "consent decrees" surrendering to the federal government.  Why would they do that, to avoid mob action?  

 

Let us consider a scenario in which all legal matters go against the mob and the Obama Administration.  Would his newly confirmed (maybe) AG try to seize control of the situation?  She looks like a malleable and biddable soul.  Would the state respond in the courts and with the National Guard, this time for real?  Would Obama then call the Missouri Guard into federal service?  What would the US Congress do in response?

 

Perhaps Obama should stop talking tough and consider how weak his hand really is.  pl

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2014-11-08/obama-seeks-to-grab-momentum-after-election-losses

http://www.cnn.com/2014/11/08/politics/attorney-general-nominee-loretta-lynch/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loretta_Lynch

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Attorney_General 

 

Comments

[William R. Cumming]

Very troubling! IMO! Much good workm could be accomplished but only with new help! "acting" will be a very common title in the Executive Branch in the very near future. As to SCOTUS replacements doubtful!

[turcopolier]

WRC

Have I got the law right here? pl

[Jane]

The Republicans gerrymandered the Congressional districts to the point that they controlled the House despite the fact that a majority of Americans voted for Democrats fir the last four years. Then the Republicans insisted that nothing would be voted on unless is was accepted by a majority of their party. That meant that a minority of the House could block any agenda that was not their own. The net results is that the President's agenda, endorsed by the people, was blocked.

I don't see that the Republcans have any beef coming as long as President Obama stays within his constitutional powers. So far the complaints have been along the lines of "I don't like the outcome he seeks" and "he's doing it", but few of the complaints are of the form "He did such and so and such and so is unconstitutional because"

Turn about is fair play.

[Petrous]

Your paragraph regarding the " use of the armed forces and CIA overseas against the Islamists and/or Iran ... so long as it is generally in line with what Bibi/AIPAC want and it is anti-Muslim .." is right on target and it is probably the best, most concise evaluation of FP in the ME I have seen in a while.

This truth ca not be lost on the Iranian side. Maybe the tagging along of Mr. Ali Akbar Valayati, Khamenei's personal envoy (and ex Foreign Minister) to Oman for talks with Sec. Kerry, is an indication of how seriously they take the situation. And how badly they might want to wrap up things before the next congress has a chance to muck-up everything. Of course on this side the administration too might want to move this to its side of the ledger before the whole ledger is set on fire after the next congress settles in.

[turcopolier]

Jane

"Republicans gerrymandered the Congressional districts to the point that they controlled the House despite the fact that a majority of Americans voted for Democrats fir the last four years" How do you reckon that they managed that? Do the Democrats not gerrymander districts? pl

[VietnamVet]

Colonel,

I had thought that being raised for a while in Indonesia would have given the President a broader world view. Instead he has identified totally with the Chicago breed of transnational elite. He is all for more wealth and lower wages.

The Democratic voter suppression campaign worked great here in Maryland. If you have no reason to vote for the Democrat, the Republicans win.

I do not disagree with your upcoming flash points. Two more for your consideration; a Grand Bargain to gut Social Security to cut taxes plus starting WWIII. The West appears to be hell bent on starting a winter war in the Ukraine which inevitably will draw NATO and Russia into a shooting war.

[Tyler]

Jane,

Good grief you guys just took a shellacking across the country and STILL cant face reality.

The American people want no part of the progressive agenda. How did they gerrymander Illinois, Maryland, or Massachusetts where the Democrats lost the governorship of these deep blue states.

The Left declared war on white men and got it back in spades, and you can't smell the coffee. Amazing but unsurprising - the progressive ideology is on that ignores reality as much as possible.

Me for the next goodness only knows on SST: http://imgur.com/tLebfIy

[Babak Makkinejad]

I have come to the conclusion that US is an Israel-centered country.

So, there will be no agreement with Iran since any agreement with Iran that is acceptable to Iranians is a "Bad Agreement".

Each time Obama has written a letter to Iranians, it has been followed by further negative actions against Iran.

I expect after the failure of the current negotiations on November 24-th, Obama will spend the rest of his presidency trying to wound Iran even more.

I also expect Israel to move to murder more Palestinians with more vigor in the coming years.

If I am correct in my surmise, policy initiatives such as Pivot to Asia have very little chance of implementation since the United States, as an Israel-centric country - will continue to be sucked into the affairs of the Middle Eastern states and peoples.

Peoples with whom she shares no affinity - not Arabs, not Turks, not Iranians, not Israelis, not Afghans, not Azeris, not Kurds, not anybody.

And as US sinks deeper into this quagmire, she will also drag EU, Canada, and Australia in as well; in my opinion.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Yes, but when Democrats do it, it is for the Greater Good; after all, they are the Good Guys.

[Walrus]

"Delusional? Narcissistic? Megalomaniacal? What do you say, Walrus?"

Be aware that with a narcissist, everything is personal. So the question to ask is "what changes to the inner circle team would make the President feel better about himself?"The current inner circle exist to please the President and make him feel good about himself. Their actual expertise in what they purport to do for the country is a secondary consideration as long as they don't fail publicly and embarrass him.

To change the inner team for the better you would need to find highly competent individuals who are so used to dealing with Prima Donna bosses that they can procure good policy outcomes while appearing to be subservient acolytes hanging on his every word of wisdom. This is not easy as some here may know.

To put it another way. I watched a highly intelligent and hard working chief of staff get fired by our narcissist boss for the crime of correcting one of the bosses more obvious mistakes.

Should Obama invite highly competent and battle hardened professionals into his inner circle? Of course. Will he? Nope, it would hurt too much, what you might get instead is One or Two changes that the President thinks would be suitable cosmetic adornments.

[Babak Makkinejad]

"War on the White Man", "War on the Black Man", and soon to be announced "War on the Brown Man" by some Hispanics - attest to the deep fantasies that are lived by so many people in the United States.

Is it the extreme wealth of the United States that fosters this type of magical thinking?

Or is it something else; I mean 700,000 people claim to have been abducted by aliens as well.

What gives?

[Walrus]

VietnamVet,

Obama was taken as a Six year old child to Indonesia and placed in a local school. He faced the quadruple trauma of (1) New Stepfather. (2) School for the first time. (3) Living in a Third world country. (4) Foreign language.

In my opinion, that is what made him what he is and destroyed any hope of empathy with ordinary humans. It is my perception that this period had been glossed over. It must have been absolutely, terribly traumatic in my opinion.

[Fred]

Jane,

"The Republicans gerrymandered the Congressional districts..."

Pray tell how did they managed that? A smoke filled room at RNC HQ? Where oh where were all the Democrats in the USA while that was happening.

[different clue]

Jane,
A lot of what the President allowed us to think he was running on was false and deceitful. When a voting majority of We The People "endorsed" what we "thought" was the President's agenda, We The People did not think we were voting for Obama to conspire with Boener/McConnell to make the Bush Tax Cuts permanent or to create a brand new Permanent Ever-Tightening Sequester. We did not think we were voting for immunity and impunity for the Criminal Bankers. We did not think we were voting for the ratification and permantization and routinization of torture and omni-spying as standing tools of the New Governance. We did not think we were voting for the unasked-for and unwanted appointment of a Catfood Commission to help plow the ground for Catfood Cuts against Social Security. We did not think we were voting for the aggressively fanatical pursuit of TTAs ( Trade Treason Agreements) such as TPP and TTIP. And we did not think we were voting for the Heritage Forced-Purchase insurance plan conspiracy against any hope whatever of Canadian Single Payer ever in the future.(And of course some of us were just voting to keep McCain out of office in order to prevent an overt all-out war with Iran. And so far Obama has delivered a delay on overt all-out war with Iran. Still . . . even those of us who voted against McCain did not really anticipate the depth of Obama's utter treachery against what we considered to be beneficial Democratic achievements and programs.)
By 2012 the depth of Obama's treachery and OverClass Aggressionism had become clear enough to me that I found Obama intolerable. I entered the Republican Primary to vote for Romney because I thought Romney was the most tolerable potential President the Republicans had to offer. If Romney were the nominee I could at least vote against Obama. The only thing that kept me from voting for Romney himself was his statement that Russia is our most dangerous geopolitical foe. So I voted Third Party. (And it looks like Obama is working to bring us the war with Russia which I was afraid Romney would bring us.)
So I hope the Democratic Party can be purged and disinfected and decontaminated of all its Clintonites and Obamabots and Catfood Democrats. If it can't, then I hope it can be deleted from existence so that a legitimate political party can
emerge on the freed-up space, if the ground that a mercifully removed Democratic Party occupied can ever be politically bio-remediated enough to where anyone can ever again build anything at all on that ground.

[The beaver]

@ Babak

That's why the Pentagon is learning from Israel:
http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/US-sent-lessons-learned-team-to-model-Israel-tactics-in-Gaza-operation-381078

[ Quote]“We sent a team of senior officers and non-commissioned officers over to work with the IDF to get the lessons from that particular operation in Gaza,” he told an audience at the Carnegie Endowment [eoq].

I am just hoping we kicked Harper out next year as far as Canada is concerned.

[jonst]

Lectures from a citizen of a nation that hunts down dogs and kills them. And hunts women and throws acid in their faces.What gives?

[jonst]

Jane, just keep thinking the shellacking had nothing to do with policies and was a result of a 'fix' and you will see, the Dems will lose in 2016 too. There has to be SOME reevaluation of policy, does there not?

[Babak Makkinejad]

It is not a lecture, it an observation and a question.

[kao_hsien_chih]

The idea that gerrymandering can be used to significantly distort election results is a myth. It is not even mathematically possible. You can increase representation abnormally only by diliting your supporters,so if Republicans actually did what they are accused of, they would be far more willing to compromise.

The idea is a myth, part of the attempt (by both sides) to deny the other's legitimacy. It is as mythical as the notion that Obama was elected via ACORN-engineered election tampering. We have to wake up from delusions like these if we want to get anything serious done.

[Babak Makkinejad]

I disagree - if they were not advancing political interests why are they there?

Why not just draw lines on the maps, with a rules, and divvy up the districts?

[Stephanie]

Fred, until and if Jane replies, here is an answer for you, in a surprisingly candid report direct from the GOP in the link below. It happened in 2010, following the midterm elections in that year:

http://www.rslc.gop/redmap_2012_summary_report

With regard to the original post, Mitch McConnell and other Congressional Republicans have from the beginning been quite open about having no plans to work with Obama.In 2008 Obama ran on a platform of "bringing Washington together," and he appears to have been naive -and egotistical - enough to believe that he could do that where other Democrats had failed. Obama could be far better in his dealings with Congress, but he does not bear primary responsibility for the state of gridlock.

[curtis]

There will be "Bonfire of the Vanities" activity on both sides of the partisan divide.

[Will Reks]

Republicans ran on Obama being to blame for everything that ails the lives of the average Americans and not their own agenda. And they were right and smart to do so. But where was the wrath of the white man in 2012? I don't think the war on white men started in the last two years, do you? This stuff is cyclical. We're basically see-sawing the other way every two years. I wouldn't be surprised to see the people tire of the new Congress in two years time and vote Hillary and her neo-liberal agenda into office.

[Amirnot]

I am sure you also would like to see packs of wild dogs roaming the streets of DC. As it happens a percentage of wild dogs in Iran carry rabies. The problem is that one does nor know which one of the pack, is infected. If there were no budgetairy constraits, a solution might have been to imploy animal rights groups to screen the dogs, in stead of culling them.

[Amirnot]

"'A country' that hunts down women and throws acid in their face"... Basically all citizens of Iran, Pakistan, India,... you know, the brownies are guilty and need to be civilized.
Is more hyperbole possible from a citizen, that is more engaged with exposing "women-hunters" at the other side of the globe, than addressing mass rape in colleges, militairy, prisons and random shootings in our own backyard?