Sunday Political Brunch: A Political Potluck – June 25, 2017
Mark Curtis, GoLocalProv Contributor
Sunday Political Brunch: A Political Potluck – June 25, 2017
“Fake News Facilitator” – President Trump went on Twitter to announce that he’s now officially under investigation. Then one of his lawyers – the well-known Jay Sekulow – went on several network talk shows to deny Mr. Trump was under investigation. Well, which is it? It can’t be both. In either case, does this mean President Trump is now his own source for “fake news?” I would say maybe!
“The Comey Tapes” – Trump has a way of playing the media, and he’s good at it. A few weeks back, after he hinted there might be recordings of conversations between him and then FBI Director James Comey, Trump said, “Oh, you're going to be very disappointed when you hear the answer.” I believed that you could take his answer two ways: 1) The media would be disappointed there were no tapes; or 2) there were tapes that supported Trump’s claims about Comey (which might disappoint media members who dislike Trump.) Either way, he made big headlines and perpetuated speculation about the existence of the tapes for two weeks.
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“Georgia on My Mind” – Like many of you, I have been following Georgia’s special Congressional election for weeks. It turned out to be the most expensive race for the House of Representatives in U.S. history. I consider it also the most over-hyped race ever. If I hear one more network commentator say, “It’s being viewed as a referendum on the Trump Presidency,” I will scream. One lone Congressional race is not a national bellwether. Yes, the Democrats fielded a very competitive, well-funded candidate; but he lost. There have now been four special elections since Trump took office, and Republicans won them all. However, these wins are not positive referendums for Trump’s policies either. Let's stop exaggerating the importance of what are predominantly local contests!
“Obamacare Repeal” – This agenda item is in trouble, and could be a big loss for President Trump and the Republican-led Congress. The House passed its repeal with two votes to spare. Let’s assume the Senate makes amendments that will help its bill regain a majority vote in the upper chamber. The biggest problem is that the House and Senate have two very different bills. Right now, it’s hard to fathom they can craft a single bill that will be acceptable to majorities in both chambers. To use a medical term, the Obamacare repeal is on “life support.”
“Spotting Trends” – There are 535 seats in the U.S. Congress. As mentioned above, four very distant and unique special elections in the House are hardly a prediction of anything. There’s no trend you can gauge. On the other hand, when five Republican members of the U.S. Senate say they can’t support the pending replacement of Obamacare, that’s a measurable trend. Why? Because you need 50 votes, plus the Vice President’s tie-breaker, to win. Right now, the GOP has only 47 votes for repeal. Do the math! As I always say, “Politics is as much about math, as it is about ideology.”
“Strange Bedfellows” – I am always amazed at how different factions can line up and work together, often creating a patchwork – if not successful - legislation. West Virginia finally passed a long-overdue state budget this week. The sides were odd. The Democratic Governor teamed with the Republicans who control the State Senate. On the other side, Senate Democrats joined the House Republicans (the big majority) and the House Democrats. It was far from a perfect budget. Everyone got something, but no one got everything they wanted. We’ll see whether it works; but, as always, politics can make for some strange bedfellows.
“Russia” – This week, we learned that the Obama Administration had evidence that Russian President Vladimir Putin had direct knowledge of and ordered the cyberattacks on the U.S. electoral process, and also that some potentially retaliatory measures were put in place. While I know that the focus will continue to be on what, if anything, the Trump campaign knew and did about Russia's interference, I think there’s a bigger picture here. A foreign and unfriendly government tried to interfere with our election. Maybe it helped Republicans this time; maybe it will benefit Democrats next time; but we, as a nation, should be outraged. This should not be a partisan issue. It’s equal to enemy troops landing on our shore.
“North Korea” – One of the big questions of the week revolves around the death of Otto Warmbier, the University of Virginia student who was tortured (and perhaps poisoned) at the hands of the North Korean government. How will the U.S. respond beyond the tough sanctions already in place against North Korea, a hostile nation which continues to test-launch potentially nuclear missiles? Forget the Obamacare repeal and the FBI investigation! This will be the real true test of the Trump Administration.
What should President Trump do about North Korea? Just click the comment button at www.MarkCurtisMedia.com.
Trump's Win - What Does it Mean for Rhode Island?
Jennifer Duffy
Cook Report
"We don't really know what a Trump presidency means for the nation, never mind the smallest state. One of the unintended consequences of last night's results is that Sen. Jack Reed won't be chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Chalk that up as a loss for RI."
Pam Gencarella
Head of Ocean State Taxpayers' Association
"Trump’s win means that his signature issue, illegal immigration, could have a big impact on RI, hopefully reversing our course as a sanctuary state and saving the state taxpayer millions of dollars. While we agree with his 'repeal and replace' Obamacare stance, we have no idea what that means to the RI debacle known as UHIP. It is not a stretch to believe that federal funding for this kind of system will be off the table so, will RI be stuck with this massively expensive system that still doesn’t work and that is expected to cost another $124 million to fix?
Trump's belief that there is significant fraud in the Food Stamp program and the policies that may come from that belief could have a negative impact on RI's local economy since there are businesses in certain cities that rely heavily on this program, fraud and all. On the upside, we may be able to ditch the UHIP program if there is significantly less need for processing welfare program requests (ie. Medicaid and food stamps) resulting from fewer illegal immigrants and less fraud. While we are ambivalent about his touted child care policies, if enacted, it may force our legislators to revisit the ever growing state cost of subsidies in this area and possibly reduce the fraud and abuse in this system."
Kay Israel
Professor at Rhode Island College
"With a Republican President and Congress, Rhode Island will probably be excluded from the 'fruits of victory."
The congressional delegation will be able to vocally make their presence felt, but in the long term it's more symbolic than substantive.
For Rhode Island it's a matter of holding on and waiting until '18 or '20 and a surge in Democratic influence."
Jennifer Lawless
Professor at American University
"The RI congressional delegation just became even less powerful than it was. With unified government, Trump doesn’t need to quell Democrats’ concerns or acquiesce because he’s worried about a Democratically-controlled Senate.
His appointments will reflect that. His executive orders will affect that. And the conservative policy agenda he puts forward will affect that."
Len Lardaro
Professor at University of Rhode Island
"Well there's a few things -- because there's not going to be gridlock, that's a big difference if it had been Hillary and a GOP Congress, in which nothing would got done. We'll at least get a half a billion in infrastructure that's going to pass which will have an impact.
I think you'll see there will be reduced reliance on government nationally -- and that's where we'll stick out like sore thumb. We've relied way too much on government -- and our government is highly inefficient and ineffective. Maybe, just maybe, in this who cycle of things we might be forced to be small and more efficient for once.
A couple of other things -- interest rates jumped. The one to follow is the ten year government bond rate -- which is tied to mortgages. It went from 1.7% to 2.05% in one day. The point is -- if the ten year stays high, mortgage rates will start going higher -- and in the short time people will run to re-finance.
That's the short term impact -- but then if rates stay hight, that will make mortgages more out of reach. And we just passed a bond issue to limit open space -- housing has limited upside here.
The next thing -- the Fed Reserve will go ahead with tightening next month. A strong dollar will hurt manufacturing. When the dollar is strong our exports become more expensive overseas.
Our goods production sector -- manufacturing and construction -- in the near term will do a little better, but as time goes on will be more limited. But something you won't hear, is there are lags in fiscal policy, of six months to year. So we won't really see the effects until the third our fourth quarter of 2017, going into 2018."
Mike Stenhouse
RI Center for Freedon and Prosperity
"As the unbelievable turned into reality this morning, it struck me that the presidential election was not really all about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. It was about a fed-up people, revolting against a corrupt system - the "beast" - that relentlessly favors insiders. Hillary personified the beast, while Donald personified the slayer.
Sadly, based on election results in our state, Rhode Island's version of the beast lives on. I fear our political class has not learned the lessons from the Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump movements - and will continue with their government-centric, anti-family, anti-business status quo."
Kristina Contreras Fox
VP of Young Democrats of America
"A Trump Presidency means the validation of the ugliest part of America. In RI, as with the rest of the country, the hammer of his hatred will fall hardest on minority communities. Being a blue state doesn't make us immune from this danger.
Trump won over 35% (39.5) of the vote here! We need to look in the mirror, and not lie about what the reflection shows us. No more hiding underneath a blue blanket. I expect those who claim Democratic values to be true to those values. The gulf between words and actions have turned into fertile ground for Trump's message to grow here in RI. If you call yourself a Democrat, if you claim to stand in opposition to Trump, now is the time to prove it. Show up and fight back."
