I harped on this from the beginning – Trump’s attempts to do the things he wants are dependent on US Senate support. With 24 Republicans up for reelection / replacement, the most optimistic outcome was 56, short of the 60 needed for cloture.
Well, Republicans did not pick up Harry Reid’s Nevada seat, and lost in Illinois and New Hampshire, the total is 51. Louisiana is a mess – 9 “Republicans” were on the ballot, including David Duke. That made a runoff necessary – on December 9th. If Republicans win that race, the US Senate will have 52 Republicans.
In 2001, “Republican” Jim Jeffords (VT) switched parties, moving the Senate from 51-49 to 50-50. To avoid deadlock, Republicans agreed to a power sharing agreement.
So what does Trump do? Can 8 Democrats be convinced to become Republicans by bribing them with Committee chairmanships or pork projects? Will Trump persuade Democrats to support his agenda? Will Republicans go with the nuclear option and change the filibuster rule?
A thin margin leaves Trump vulnerable to a “gang of eight” insurgancy. His Senate “majority” includes Ted Cruz, John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Mike “#nevertrump” Lee, and Marco Rubio. Are they reliable allies?
Having only a two vote margin has several crippling implications. Firstly, it leaves Trump open to political extortion – you want this, I want this – or I don’t vote for your wall. This also largely rules out picking a US Senator to take a Cabinet position, like John McCain to run the Department of Defense. Each state has different rules of how vacancies are filled and when/if special elections are held. The honeymoon is over. Democrats will wake up from their knockout punch. Will they be conciliatory or aggressive?
You raise some interesting points, and I have no doubt the RINOs will try to hinder him at every turn. The nevertrumpers will have the upper negotiating hand.
One could make the case that Trump is a RINO
It took a long time before I could bring myself to pull the lever for a guy who said Hillary Clinton was a great secretary of state and would make a good president, that Planned Parenthood had done a lot of wonderful work, and who funded the Gang of Eight while Ted Cruz was fighting them.
But with every street riot and “not my president” hashtag, I’m more and more confident that Trump will side with “us” rather than “them” going forward.
Lyndsie Graham-ham-ham,,,,, ham. ham. Loser, expose him for what he is and he is gone.
McClown, he is a ‘good-time’ pork republican, totally worthless POS.
( throw in Jeff Flake too.) Flake needs to be grabbed by his p____y and told this is how its going to work.
Rubio might be able to work with, but he abandoned the tea party when he first got elected.
Kelly Ayotte: well she threw Trump under the bus, so hey Buh bye!
I don’t know about Lying Ted, he could be sneaking, but supposedly no one else likes him, he could be isolated now, I think he will lose his next election, and Rick Perry may win in Texas, if he is not in washington.
Senator Jeff Sessions, He is the man ! he knows where the bodies are buried and is trustworthy. I think Richard Shelby Alabama is good too.
steam roll the carp lover twins McClown & Lyndsie , make them ambassadors to Narnia and Freedonia.
Parrott
Wikipedia has a source (which I didn’t verify) saying that Laura Ingraham could move to Arizona to challenge Flake in the primary. Wikipedia also says that both Gabby Giffords and her astronaut husband Mark Kelly could run for the Dems.
Senator Al Franken proves that anything is possible in politics
Two words: Executive Orders
The precedent has been set by Obama (including the Autopen), and I don’t think the Republicans will have room to wiggle… lest they trigger a wave of recall petitions.
I commented a while ago how Dems would rue the day they cheered all those EO’s.
Trump should sternly remind Congress (and democrats) how they sat on their hands with tacit approval of Obama’s myriad ‘executive actions’. “An EO a day for the first 100 days”… keep the MSM heads spinning like tops; by the time they report and try to digest one EO, another should be coming at them the next day. Their own medicine…
The flaw there is the Democrats control the Federal Courts
Say the magic words: Homeland Security National Emergency. Nationwide rioting and terrorizing 50% of voters fills the bill.
Then they open up the secret extermination camp in Indiana called the “Amtrak Maintenance facility” surrounded by razor wire
and use ‘Autoracks’ because the have chains and straps to secure automobiles in transit to mixing centers. There is a ‘Mixing Center’ just north of Winston Salem in Walkertown, on the old N&W.
Those are not Human transport cars. They are Autoracks. Geesh.
Yeah I seen the video on the Beech Grove Amtrack facility. Monkeys
parrott
I’m pretty sure Amtrak offered to let him go anywhere in the facility, look behind any door, look for secret tunnels, etc
The “gas chamber” is a building where they dry paint on the locomotives.
Alex Jones can’t handle the truth that it is just an Amtrak maintenance facility.
Holy cow, never thought of that Chairman.
Its the same soros kids recycled from Occupy wall street.
Dumb-asses all of them. They stand for nothing so they fall for anything, and sometimes free stuff.
Pick them up put in Gitmo or pay one of the *stan countries to hold them.
They are not contributing to society, but you could say the whole Kalifornia legislature is not contributing to society, at least in a good way.
Yeah they are not contributing much.
Parrott
Back in the 1970s I worked for a US agency for the summer. One of the things they had me doing was updating manuals (remove pages 17-18 and replace with new pages 17-18g, etc Really boring stuff.
One of the manuals in the bookcase of manuals concerned continuity of government in a national emergency. The key detail was in the event of an emergency event (like nuclear war), employees would report to their post office and fill out a card announcing they were still alive. It dealt with mundane issues like “how will I get paid”, do I get vacation pay? And the like. The flow seemed to be this process would tabulate who was left and where and figure out how to restart things after an EMP pulse (not a concern back then)
I don’t doubt the Amtrak facility appears in documents like that. It is on railroad tracks, has lots of land for tents, is in an area where food is available, etc. if you had to evacuate 9 million people from New York City, that takes advance planning.
Where Jones goes over the line is his assumption that FEMA would start killing civilians as opposed to protecting them. Could it happen? Maybe. Are there secret underground tunnels leading to crematoriums? Probably not. Could they be built in a week? You bet.