Patterico's Pontifications

3/12/2019

Two High Profile Democrats And Their Response To Trump

Filed under: General — Dana @ 2:15 pm



[guest post by Dana]

I can’t say it’s not amusing to watch the Democrats publicly struggle to stay unified (or at least present a unified front). Cheap thrills, I suppose. Beholden to neither party, the novelty of the Democrats imploding a bit and dragging themselves through the mud these days is a good distraction from the Republicans’ proposed whopper of a budget, in which the president laughably warned that the federal government” must protect future generations from Washington’s habitual deficit spending.” …

Anyway, this is an interesting look at the divide within today’s Democratic party: the view of President Trump held by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and that of Rep. Ilhan Omar. The circumstances prompting their opinions are certainly different – one was interviewed in a planned upon date and time by a mainstream media outlet, the other was “interviewed” on the run in a hallway by a Fox news reporter (that the representative is obviously trying hard to blow off). Yet it is still revealing about both individuals and how they view the president.

From Pelosi, in an interview with The Washington Post:

How would you describe your relationship with the president?

Is there a relationship? [Laughs.] How would I describe my relationship to the president? My relationship toward him is respectful, respectful of the office that he holds. Straightforward, just tell him what I think. And I always say you’re not going to hear me saying anything publicly that I’m not saying here in the office. Hopeful that at some point we can find common ground that he’ll stick to. So, yeah, respectful, honest and hopeful.

Do you feel that he has done anything that has been good for America?

He’s been a great organizer for Democrats, a great fundraiser for Democrats and a great mobilizer at the grass-roots level for Democrats. [Laughs.] And I think that’s good for America.

There have been increasing calls, including from some of your members, for impeachment of the president.

I’m not for impeachment. This is news. I’m going to give you some news right now because I haven’t said this to any press person before. But since you asked, and I’ve been thinking about this: Impeachment is so divisive to the country that unless there’s something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don’t think we should go down that path, because it divides the country. And he’s just not worth it.

And from Omar:

The Minnesota Democrat said in an interview with Fox News in a congressional hallway that her criticisms of Mr. Obama last week for the “caging of kids” along the U.S.-Mexico border and the “droning of countries around the world” don’t mean he is like Mr. Trump.

“Absolutely not, that is silly to even think and equate the two,” she said, going on to explain how the two men differ.

“One is human. The other is really not,” she said.

Omar (along with Rep. Tlaib) were the first two congresspersons to sign a pledge to impeach President Trump).

I appreciate more Omar’s blunt in-your-face-take-no-prisoners easy to read hate than that of the much more polished hate couched in Pelosi’s carefully crafted responses. At least with Omar, you’re never going to guess where she stands on anything Trump, whereas with Pelosi, because she’s sublimely practiced at the art of deception and finessing that which might be seen as problematic, one needs to pay close attention to what she says. Maybe it’s just an old-school Democrat versus a progressive Democratic socialist, or experienced, savvy player versus that of an impulsive, impatient player who still hasn’t learned to watch her words and weigh them out carefully before uttering them aloud.

(Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.)

–Dana

37 Responses to “Two High Profile Democrats And Their Response To Trump”

  1. On a side note, here’s an interesting look at Pelosi and the non-impeachment of Trump. A method to her madness, if you will:

    the House is already pursuing an impeachment track. There are several committees — including Judiciary, Oversight and Reform, Ways and Means, and Intelligence — currently conducting investigations designed to produce evidence that could be used in developing articles of impeachment against Trump.

    Pelosi is well aware of what her chairmen are doing. There are plenty of meetings about jurisdiction and witnesses and timing. To listen to Pelosi’s words without considering the context of the actions her committees are taking is to deny her guile, her power and her understanding of the institution she runs.

    She may even have lulled Trump into a false sense of security in January by assuring him that it’s not her intent to impeach him.

    White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said in an interview on Fox News on Tuesday that the battle within the Democratic Party is evidence that Pelosi isn’t fully in charge — but that she’s on the right side of the fight.

    “I think she’s clearly starting to lose control of her party,” Sanders said. “I’m glad she sees what the rest of us see, that there is no reason, no cause for impeachment.”

    It’s not clear that there are now — or ever will be — enough Democratic votes in the House to impeach the president. If she says she’s reached a conclusion that the president should be impeached before the committees have done their work, it will make her less influential both with other lawmakers and with the American public.

    Dana (023079)

  2. The on;y news about Pelosi and not impeaching Trump is that she’s willing to say it now. Jerrold Nadler said it weeks ago. The on;y thing she might have been thinking about is how to put it. Or maybe she has gone alittle bit further – that she mht not want to do it even with some Republican support

    There is the idea that the Democrats are thinking maybe history from 1972 to 1974 might repeat itself – that he might be impeached in a secind term. Right now it would hamr their 2020 Presidential election chances.

    Sammy Finkelman (102c75)

  3. I agree with Sammy: it would be crazy to try to impeach Trump before his possible reelection. Not only do you risk rallying Republicans and alienating independent voters who you want on your side in 2020, but you also might find yourself running against President Mike Pence who would be less of a lightening rod (no matter how much he aggravates the crybullies) and might look a whole lot more moderate and stable than a Kamala Harris or a Bernard Sanders.

    JVW (54fd0b)

  4. Pelosi will be tested when she has to discern the difference between St. Patrick’s Day and Easter…

    https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2019/02/14/nancy-pelosi-happy-thanksgiving-valentines-day-border-wall-bill-signing/

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  5. Democrat women are not doing any favors for my daughters.

    mg (8cbc69)

  6. About impeaching Trump: What does Speaker Waters thing about that?

    Oh, wait, that’s a question from next July.

    Kevin M (21ca15)

  7. Wait ’til 1% Joe jumps in. You can see the tweets now…

    ‘So 1% Joe, did it take you 3 months or 5 to decide on that tie 4-2day.’

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  8. Palomino!

    nk (dbc370)

  9. fake tan

    mg (8cbc69)

  10. They will try to run him ragged with winning being icing on the cake or focus their MKULTRA game onto a Trump rally goer and hope for what often happens when a president or ruler makes one small deviation that true believers dont agree with (Cesar Altieri, but pointed inward).

    urbanleftbehind (1cb9fd)

  11. Joey Plugs…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  12. They’ll be doing fishing expedition info requests till Election Day at least.

    harkin (58beea)

  13. And their eunuchs in the media will provide them cover…

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  14. I know that lots of folks are supposed to like creepy Joe Biden. I have lots of reasons not to, but this is the video that needs to play over and over if he tries to run. Good Lord.

    https://youtu.be/QWM6EuKxz5A

    And then he starts spewing lies. Little petty lies. Ugh.

    Simon Jester (c8876d)

  15. I know that lots of folks are supposed to like creepy Joe Biden.

    I thinka you know the wronga kinda peoples, kid.

    nk (dbc370)

  16. Probably crimethink just to mention that,,

    Ot re shazam I didnt recall dr. Sivana as the villain.

    Narciso (d735f1)

  17. Facebook reverses their decision on zero hedge,

    Narciso (d735f1)

  18. Watching Blythe Pepino, founder of Birth Strike, being interviewed and her responses (and non-responses) to questions is surreal. Have things degenerated, or is this a continuation of Ehrlich and the buffoons of the early 70s?

    Or is it both?

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  19. Narciso,I’m thinking more along the lines of deranged fans or those who buy the gas of Trump being a relative wimp on immigration (Coulter, Kaus and 40 % o Dusqus).

    urbanleftbehind (1cb9fd)

  20. @20. ‘Folks…’

    That’s a popular term w/him.

    The ‘folks’ down at the Altoona Carbon Paper & Ink Well Works will soon endorsed 1% Joe, too.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  21. He’s quite a character, Simon. I’m guessing that was before one of the plagiarism charges.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  22. Re Brexit, what would Biden plagy victim Neil Kinnock do?

    urbanleftbehind (1cb9fd)

  23. I understand that both Alexandria and Ilhan have combined bills to help people like Biden who had their higher education in spurts: The Deferred Undergraduate Matriculation Bill/Post Undergraduate Training Act.

    nk (dbc370)

  24. I’ll try to find a video Biden’s speech today. It was epic rambling and old man repetition.

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  25. “It was epic rambling and old man repetition.”

    Doesn’t he know that’s Trump’s shtick?

    Davethulhu (9847a2)

  26. Much worse than Trump. He repeated himself over and over and over… https://m.facebook.com/NowThisPolitics/videos/267246247532731/

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  27. Not a joke… not a joke… not a joke… defined… defined… defined… community… community… community… hyperbole… hyperbole… literally… literally… literally… leaving nobody behind… leaving nobody behind… leaving nobody behind… leaving nobody behind… leaving nobody behind…

    YOU KIDS GET OFF MY LAWN!!!!!

    Colonel Haiku (2601c0)

  28. @33. How many times did he say ‘folks’!?!?

    Oh yes, the ‘folks’ over at Ashtabula Gravel & Pet Rock Quarry will be endorsing 1% Joe Wednesday.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  29. @26. Don’t go there; … see indicted Elisabeth Kimmel for details… for starts.

    DCSCA (797bc0)

  30. @36. KFMB’s Elisabeth Kimmel caught in Georgetown admission bribe; $244,000 allegedly paid to tennis coach Gordie Ernst – By Matt Potter, March 12, 2019

    A former pillar of San Diego’s Republican media establishment has wound up as a key figure in the nation’s sprawling college admission scam in which wealthy parents allegedly forked over big money to bribe their children’s way into college. Until little more than a year ago, La Jolla’s Elisabeth Kimmel, was part-owner of Midwest Television, holder of the lucrative federal broadcast licenses of the KFMB TV and radio stations acquired by her grandfather August C. Meyer, Sr. back in 1964. For decades Meyer was one of San Diego’s most politically powerful men. He died at 91 in December 1991.By 2012, Kimmel was billed as president of Midwest. “She went to work for the company in 1993 as general counsel and ‘became third generation owner in 2007,” per a profile posted online by the Harvard Business School Club of San Diego.Kimmel, the writeup added, “received a BA in History with Distinction and Departmental Honors, Phi Beta Kappa, from Stanford, where she currently serves on the Task Force for Undergraduate Education. She graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School.”Amongst Kimmel’s extensive local political involvements, she and husband Gregory Kimmel, a former San Diego Deputy District Attorney with a law degree from the University of Southern California, funneled $2000 to the ultimately-doomed 2012 mayoral campaign of then-San Diego city councilman Carl DeMaio.During DeMaio’s try for the House of Representatives in 2014, Kimmel had to contend with critics who called her out for what they said was illegal electioneering and fundraising by KFMB’s then-radio talk show host and fallen San Diego mayor Roger Hedgecock on DeMaio’s behalf.”I would like to have a complaint put [into] KFMB’s Public File. I would like to complain about Roger Hedgecock and the blatant campaigning he is doing for Carl DeMaio,” wrote Brian Kyd, a supporter of another GOP candidate in the race. I think this clearly violates the journalistic and ethical standards KFMB holds.”DeMaio won a spot in the June primary but was subsequently defeated in the November general election by incumbent Democrat Scott Peters. In December 2017, the KFMB stations were sold for $325 million to Tegna, Inc.The charges by federal prosecutors against Kimmel involve her efforts to get her daughter into Washington, D.C.’s Georgetown University by way of $275,000 obtained from the Meyer Charitable Foundation, her family-run tax-exempt non-profit that has favored causes linked to the Koch brothers.$244,000 of the foundation’s cash, according to the allegation, was allegedly paid to Georgetown tennis coach Gordie Ernst to misrepresent her daughter’s playing record and potential to school admission officials.”Kimmel’s daughter matriculated at Georgetown in the fall of 2013 and graduated in or about May 2017,” says the document. “She was not a member of the tennis team during her four years at Georgetown.”In 2017, the feds charge, Kimmel’s foundation slipped $250,000 into an account run by William Rick Singer, the cheating case’s alleged mastermind who has turned cooperating witness. The money went to induce officials at the University of Southern California to admit Kimmel’s son, a recent Bishops graduate, by falsely claiming he was a champion pole-vaulter.That resulted in at least one uncomfortable moment picked up by the feds in a wiretapped July 26, 2018, phone call between Kimmel and her husband and an unnamed participant in the conversation, per court documents.”The only kind of glitch was, and I– he didn’t– [my son] didn’t tell me this at the time– but yesterday when he went to meet with his advisor, he stayed after a little bit, and the– apparently the advisor said something to the effect of, “Oh, so you’re a track athlete?” And [my son] said, “No.” ‘Cause, so [my son] has no idea, and that’s what– the way we want to keep it.”

    – source, https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2019/mar/12/ticker-pro-demaio-harvard-lawyer-college-scam/#

    That’s why: it’s an equal opportunity scandal.

    DCSCA (797bc0)


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