Presumptuous Politics : Apr 24, 2016

Sunday, April 24, 2016

Obama Lame Duck Cartoons

After Confederate flag controversy, GOP House replaces US flag display with state coins


Once again the minority shoves it down your throat.

This is a story about flags, coins, congressional spending bills and a tunnel. But sometimes there’s more than meets the eye behind what appears to be a rather innocuous series of seemingly non-related events.
The Architect of the Capitol announced last September it would close off the tunnel that runs from the U.S. Capitol, under Independence Avenue and to the Rayburn House Office Building.
The memo declared that “construction will last for approximately one year with the majority of the work to take place nightly between the hours of 9:00 pm and 6:00 am.”
The AOC said the closure was necessary to renovate the tunnel’s ceiling, light fixtures, fire alarms and sprinklers.
And so as construction began, down came the flags of all 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories which embroidered the tunnel’s wall.
The tunnel looked pretty barren. The lack of flags accentuated the tunnel’s parabolic, curvature. The naked, vanilla wall still revealed a “shadow” of each flag and its state seal imprinted on the plaster. The exposed ceiling showed a network of nine parallel pipes running between the Capitol and Rayburn.
A few days ago, House Administration Committee Chairwoman Candice Miller, R-Mich., announced that the flags wouldn’t return when the tunnel’s work wrapped up. In place of the flags, the Architect of the Capitol would install reproductions of commemorative quarters issued by the U.S. Mint for all 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories.
“Each quarter serves as a reminder of the ideals, landmarks, and people from each state, as well as this nation’s great motto, ‘out of many, one,’” Miller said in a statement.
OK. No biggie. Just an aesthetic, “interior design” decision. Going for a different motif, right?
Perhaps.
But one of these flags was not like the others.
Forty-nine state flags seemed fine. But it was the flag from Mississippi that caused trouble.
Georgia adopted a new flag 13 years ago, dropping Confederate imagery. That left Mississippi as the only state emblem still depicting the Confederate battle flag. The upper left-hand corner of the banner features the deep blue cross cast against a red backdrop. Thirteen stars festoon the blue stripes.
The Mississippi flag has hung in the tunnel for years. A similar subterranean passageway stretching from the capitol and to the Dirksen and Hart Senate Office buildings continues to display the flags of all 50 states, including Mississippi.
But the Mississippi flag ignited a firestorm at the capitol after a massacre at the Emanuel African Methodist Church in Charleston, S.C. last June. Shooting suspect Dylann Roof later told police he began firing at black parishioners attending a Bible study in hopes of starting a race war.
A few days later, South Carolina GOP Gov. Nikki Haley ordered the removal of the Confederate flag from the state capitol. And Haley’s decision set into motion a whirlwind of issues in Congress as lawmakers tried to usher annual spending bills to passage.
Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Calif., crafted a little-known amendment to the appropriations bill that would fund the Interior Department. Huffman’s plan would prohibit the flying of the Confederate flag at many federal cemeteries. Without fanfare, the House approved Huffman’s amendment, hooking it the Interior spending bill.
But later the same night, Rep. Ken Calvert, R-Calif., introduced an amendment to counter Huffman -- apparently at the behest of the Republican leadership. The Calvert amendment would trump Huffman’s idea. As a result, the House scheduled a vote on the Calvert amendment and the full Interior Department spending bill the next day.
They couldn’t have picked a worse day. It was the same day Haley would preside over a ceremony removing the Confederate flag from the statehouse grounds.
The GOP brass worried it might not have the votes to pass the appropriations bill without attaching the Calvert amendment. Some Republicans simply couldn’t be on the record approving a bill that wiped out the display of the Confederate flag in federal cemeteries. By the same token, the optics were awful for the Republicans. They didn’t want to vote in favor of the Confederate flag just as Haley pulled down the Confederate flag.
The GOP yanked the entire Interior bill from the House calendar.
Then-House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, wanted a compromise.
“I want members on both sides of the aisle to sit down, and let’s have a conversation about how to address what, frankly, has become a very thorny issue,” Boehner said.
It was at that point Democrats knew they had somewhat unintentionally marched House Republicans into a political box canyon.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., pushed a resolution to “remove any state flag containing any portion of the Confederate battle flag” from the House side of the capitol. However, the resolution included a carve-out for lawmakers to continue displaying the flag inside their offices if they chose to do so.
If the House adopted Thompson’s resolution, officials would have to remove the Mississippi flag from the Rayburn tunnel. The effort would force Republicans to take a tough vote -- or pay a political price for not doing so.
House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., punted the resolution so the House wouldn’t have to deal directly with Thompson’s initiative. The House voted with McCarthy, sidestepping a direct up or down vote.
But while Republicans could a skirt a vote on the resolution, they couldn’t avoid the issue.
Democrats repeatedly tried to push a vote on Thompson’s resolution without success. Republicans knew how embarrassing the outcome of the issue would be: The House would most likely defeat the resolution.
That would help Democrats portray individual lawmakers -- now on the record on a specific roll call vote -- as voting in favor of maintaining the Mississippi flag. People would cry racism. Callousness. You name it. All of the things Republicans struggle with as a party that performs poorly with minority voters.
There was residual impact, too. Democrats made it clear they would try to hook a version of the Huffman amendment onto any of the remaining appropriations bills.
Variations of Huffman’s plan might not pertain directly to flying Confederate flags at federal cemeteries. But Democrats could sure include an amendment to ban the display of such a symbol at any other federal facility governed by the remaining spending measures.
Thus, the appropriations process ground to a halt. Republicans couldn’t risk taking a vote on such a toxic issue. The House put the appropriations cycle on ice until winter.
The maintenance of the Rayburn tunnel was long planned before this political dustup.
But last year, multiple sources confided in Fox that the timing and removal of the flags may prove fortuitous. With the refurbishment of the tunnel slated to run through this September, there was hope that the Mississippi legislature would vote to change the flag in its next session.
The Mississippi legislature concluded its 2016 session with multiple bills to redesign the state flag falling by the wayside.
Back in Washington, lawmakers stared at the start of annual appropriations bills in just a few weeks and a naked wall lining the Rayburn tunnel.
Could the summer of 2016 be a repeat of the summer of 2015?
That’s when Miller engineered the state coin idea, mothballing the flags.
“Given the controversy surrounding Confederate imagery, I decided to install a new display,” she said. “I am well aware of how many Americans negatively view the Confederate flag. And, personally, I am very sympathetic to these views. However, I also believe that it is not the business of the federal government to dictate what flag each state flies.”
And so the installation of the commemorative quarters.
As Miller says, each U.S. quarter is emblazoned with the phrase “E Pluribus Unum,” which means “out of many, one.”
The protracted banishment of the Mississippi flag forced the removal of all state flags from the Rayburn tunnel.
That would be “E Pluribus Non,” which means “out of many, none.”

Obama defends controversial comments about UK vote on EU exit

President Obama, speaking to reporters in London Friday, defended his prior comments urging British voters to remain in the European Union, following scathing criticism that he was meddling in the U.S. ally's affairs.
“I don’t believe the E.U. moderates British influence in the world, it magnifies it,” Obama said at a press conference at 10 Downing Street, alongside British Prime Minister David Cameron.
In recent days Obama has provoked ire from some British lawmakers for getting involved in the “Brexit” debate – earning him the title of “most anti-British American president there has ever been.”

“I don’t believe the E.U. moderates British influence in the world, it magnifies it.”
- President Obama

“Brexit” refers to Britain’s possible exit from the European Union. Britain is set to have a referendum this summer on whether to remain in the 28-member bloc. If a majority votes to leave it, Britain will exit.
“The E.U. has helped to spread British values and practices across the continent,” Obama said, adding that “the single market brings extraordinary economic benefits to the United Kingdom.”
He cast a grim picture of the economic stakes, saying flatly that the U.S. would not rush to write a free trade deal with a newly independent Great Britain.
"Let me be clear, ultimately this is something that the British voters have to decide for themselves but ... part of being friends is to be honest and to let you know what I think," he said. "It affects our prospect as well. The United States wants a strong United Kingdom as a partner."
Obama spoke on the first day of a three-day visit to London, likely the last of this presidency. The visit comes two months before a June referendum on leaving the union.
Polls suggest it will be a close-fought race, with most phone surveys indicating a lead for the Remain campaign while some online polls put the Leave camp ahead.
Obama described the votes as potentially damaging to the British economy. He said the U.S. is focused on writing a massive trade agreement with the European Union and would not prioritize a bilateral agreement with the UK. Britain would have to get "in the back of the queue," he said.
As he landed Thursday night, the president laid out his arguments in an op-ed in a London newspaper, harkening back to the "special relationship" forged by wartime allies President Franklin Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill. With that special status comes with leeway to interfere, Obama argued, writing that he was offering his thoughts with the "candor of a friend."
Obama's candor wasn't universally appreciated. In increasingly heated language, critics accused Obama of meddling in British business. London Mayor Boris Johnson, head of the Leave campaign, called Obama's advice "paradoxical, inconsistent, incoherent" and suggested Obama's background played a role.
Writing in The Sun newspaper, Johnson recounted a claim that a bust of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was removed from the Oval Office after Obama was elected and returned to the British Embassy. The White House has said that a different Churchill bust is still in a prominent place in the presidential residence.
Johnson wrote that some said removing one of the busts "was a symbol of the part-Kenyan president's ancestral dislike of the British Empire, of which Churchill had been such a fervent defender."
Obama's late father was from Kenya, a former British colony that gained independence in the 1960s.
Obama has remained a broadly popular figure in Britain. In June 2015, three-quarters of Britons told pollsters they had confidence in his judgment on world affairs, according to a Pew Research survey.
That goodwill hasn't kept Britons in breaking from U.S. at key moments. In 2013, as Obama leaned on Cameron to join in threatened airstrikes in Syria, the House of Commons rejected the idea.
There have been other recent signs of stress on the relationship. British officials bristle over Obama's recent comments in the Atlantic magazine, in which he said he regretted trusting Europeans to stabilize Libya after the 2011 death of strongman Muammar Qaddafi. He specifically said Cameron had become "distracted by a range of other things" while Libya devolved into chaos.

Report: Clinton campaign cautiously begins considering running mates


Pretty damn arrogant isn't she.

Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton’s advisers and allies have begun extensive discussions about who should be her running mate, seeking to compile a list of 15 to 20 potential picks for her team to start vetting by late spring, according to The New York Times.
Clinton’s team will grapple with complicated questions like whether the United States is ready for an all-female ticket, and whether her choice for vice president would be able to handle working in a White House in which former President Bill Clinton wielded significant influence on policy.
Campaign advisers and more than a dozen Democrats close to the campaign or the Clintons say the candidate does not have a front-runner in mind.
Among the names under discussion: Sens. Tim Kaine and Mark Warner, former governors from the key state of Virginia; Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, who represents both a more liberal wing of the party and a swing state; former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, a prominent African-American Democrat; and Thomas E. Perez, President Obama’s Labor secretary and a Hispanic civil rights lawyer.
But Mrs. Clinton is also open to a woman, campaign advisers said. One obvious possibility is Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, hugely popular among progressive Democrats, though she has not been helpful to Clinton’s campaign, declining to endorse the former secretary of state.

White House poised to release secret pages from 9/11 inquiry

Oct. 12, 2012: Bob Graham speaks in Gainesville, Fla. The Obama administration will likely soon release at least part of a 28-page secret chapter from a congressional inquiry into 9/11. (AP) (The Associated Press)

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration will likely soon release at least part of a 28-page secret chapter from a congressional inquiry into 9/11 that may shed light on possible Saudi connections to the attackers.
Those pages — now kept in a secure room in the basement of the Capitol — address specific sources of foreign support for some of the hijackers while they were in the United States.
Bob Graham, who was co-chairman of the bipartisan panel, and others say the documents point suspicion at the Saudis. They've denied allegations that they assisted in the attacks.
The former Democratic senator from Florida says an administration official told him that intelligence officials will decide in the next several weeks whether to release at least parts of the documents.

In front, Trump shows no signs of 'toning it down' on campaign trail

Donald Trump showed no signs Saturday of “toning it down” on the campaign trail, attacking the Republican establishment and presidential rivals -- after attempts to be “more presidential” and assurance from a top adviser a day earlier that the GOP front-runner would show more restraint.
Trump said at a rally in Bridgeport, Conn., that “being presidential is easy” but boring.
“I have to keep you people entertained and awake,” Trump told the crowd of about 1,000. “Have you seen Hillary Clinton using a teleprompter … . People starting yawning. It’s a disaster.”
He also returned to calling Clinton, the Democratic presidential front-runner, “Crooked Hillary” and the argument that the Washington Republicans’ system of awarding delegates for primary and caucus wins is “rigged.”
Trump appeared unwilling to spare anybody on Saturday, suggesting GOP rival Ohio Gov. John Kasich change the spelling of his last name so that it could be more easily pronounced. And he returned to calling his closest primary rival, Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, “Lyin’ Ted,” after referring to him as “Senator Cruz” after Trump’s commanding victory Tuesday in the New York primary.
“I sorta don’t like toning it down,” Trump said Saturday.
Democrats and Republicans this coming Tuesday will hold primaries in Connecticut, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania and Rhode Island.
On Saturday, Democratic candidate Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders was in Baltimore, where he continued to criticize Clinton for being supported by Wall Street and million-dollar PACs, or political action committees.
He was scheduled to make a stop in Wilmington, Del., late Saturday, while Clinton visited the Orangeside diner in New Haven, Conn., where she largely focused on such economic issues as family leave, equal pay for women and increasing the minimum wage to $15 hourly.
“We need paid family leave because it's the most important part of anyone's life,” she said. "Equal pay? We shouldn't be talking about it in 2016. It's almost embarrassing.”
Kasich was in Rhode Island, while Cruz, the most conservative in the GOP field, was in Indiana, ahead of that state’s May 3 primary.
Cruz finished third in the New York primary and is not projected to do well Tuesday, according to most polls.
Those polls show Trump with double-digit leads in Tuesday’s races.
Clinton also leads in all five states but by single-digit margins in Pennsylvania and Rhode Island, according to several polls.
Trump will look to increase his delegate count toward getting 1,237 of them to secure the GOP nomination before the party’s convention in July. He now has 845 pledged delegates, followed by Cruz with 559 and Kasich with 148.
Clinton has 1,428 pledged delegates, compared to 1,153 for Sanders, toward securing their party’s presidential nomination with 2,383 delegates.
Earlier Saturday, at a rally in Waterford, Conn., Trump made similar, sarcastic remarks about appearing more presidential, a move his campaign and wife Melania apparently have urged him to make.
Trump’s new senior adviser, Paul Manafort, privately assured Republican National Committee officials at their spring meeting in Florida this week that the candidate knows he needs to tone down the vitriol and that Trump is merely “projecting an image.”
“The part that he’s been playing is now evolving,” Manafort said. “The negatives will come down. The image is going to change.”