Trump's America First economic nationalism agenda has been almost entirely abandoned, courtesy of by the Wall Street crew he's turned the presidency over to and, in retrospect looks like it was never anything more than a shiny lure laced with racism and xenophobia to win votes in the hard-hit industrial Midwest where Hillary's dull centrism wasn't resonating. Wisconsin is a good example.
A protester dressed as a diabolical version of Uncle Sam holds a suitcase full of money at the U.S. border fence in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Sunday, Feb. 26, 2017. (AP/Christian Torres)
In one of his first tweets as president, here’s how Donald Trump promised to spend taxpayer dollars:
“We will follow two simple rules: BUY AMERICAN & HIRE AMERICAN!” he tweeted 55 minutes after taking the oath of office on Inauguration Day.
The circus has come to townDo you find it at all hard to figure out which outrageous Trump endeavor is supposed to get everyone's focus off some other, earlier Trump hour show? You know what I mean? Was the TrumpCare debacle supposed to get out minds off Putin-Gate? Or is Putin-Gate supposed to get us to stop paying attention to the establishment of a kakistocracy? Or is the kakistocracy just a distraction from the kleptocracy?
Trump gave us a glimpse of his idea of infrastructure yesterday when he signed executive orders to re-start the approval process for the Keystone XL Pipeline, for the Dakota pipeline, to rush through environmental reviews and to reduce regulations. Trump touted the Keystone XL as a job creator, although he didn't mention that it will create only 35 or so permanent jobs. This is no way to get a serious infrastructure initiative off the ground.
Queasy unease about the unhinged, impulsive Trump has been quietly driving international gold prices higher.
The queen of coal country screws the retired minersFriday night was this Senate's last. When they adjourned-- actually it was around 6 Saturday morning-- it was for the last time. In January it will be a new Senate with 5 new Democrats-- Kamala Harris (CA), Tammy Duckworth (IL), Chris Van Hollen (MD), Maggoe Hassan (NH) and Catherine Cortez Masto (NV) and 2 new Republicans Todd Yoiung (IN) and John Kennedy (LA).
Wisconsin's deadly job killing duo, Grothman and RyanSometimes when Congress wants to pass embarrassing legislation they're not eager for opponents or just constituents to track down, they give it an innocuous or misleading name. It happens constantly and it happened on Thursday just before the Republicans adjourned the House for the year.
