Happy New Year!

New Year, Same Songbook:  The year may be coming to an end but the crazy Trump train continues to hurdle down the tracks.  Tomorrow morning, a portion of the government will still be closed with 800,000 people either furloughed or working without pay.  As expected the Office of Personnel Management’s solution that cash strapped, unpaid workers try bartering with their landlords, offering up services like garbage hauling and random painting in lieu of rent payments, was greeted with more than a little bit of dismay.  To no one’s surprise Trump, who not too long ago insisted that he would own the shutdown, is casting blame on Democrats, most notably Speaker-to-be Nancy Pelosi, saying that her refusal to provide any wall funding comes from a concern than any concession on her part will jeopardize her winning the speakership vote. For their part Pelosi, Chuck Schumer and the rest of the Democrats, who successfully turned the midterms into an election over health care and pre-existing conditions have distanced themselves from earlier calls for the dissolution of the INS.  Their rebranded message is that they are all in on funding border security as long as money  is used for 21^st century solutions rather than  the equivalent of a Medieval wall.  To that end, while vacationing in Hawaii, Pelosi dispatched Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, the newest member of her House leadership contingent and a possible future speaker himself out on the talk show circuit to say that Democrats will provide funding for enhanced security, drones, and people, but no wall. Trump’s quixotic push for wall funding wasn’t helped yesterday after the LA Times published outgoing Chief of Staff John Kelly first post-Trump world interview.  In the interview Kelly reveals that Trump’s proposed border project "is not a wall" and that all plans for a concrete wall were abandoned long ago. Kelly goes on to say that Trump “still says ‘wall’ — oftentimes frankly he’ll say ‘barrier’ or ‘fencing,’ now he’s tended toward steel slats. But we left a solid concrete wall early on in the administration, when we asked people what they needed and where they needed it."  Despite Kelly’s comments, his replacement Budget Director/Acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney hit the news show circuit yesterday pressing for wall funding. He attacked the Democrats for refusing to negotiate with Trump who he asserts has backed off of his $5 billion demand and is willing to accept some smaller number, probably somewhere around $2.5 billion as long as a portion of it can be used for a wall like structure.  Kellyanne Conway was out mostly attacking Nancy Pelosi for vacationing in Hawaii.  For their part Nancy and Chuck appear to have decided to let Trump stew in the White House, where he is hanging now that he has cancelled his plans to ring in the New Year at Mar a Lago.  At least for now they are refusing to negotiate in part because every time they think they’ve reached a workable compromise with VP Pence or another one of Trump’s designees, Trump, fearing the wrath of his right wing media advisors Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh, moves the goal post and ups his demands. Senator Lindsey Graham, who was back to playing Trump buddy this weekend claims that there probably is a compromise that would result in Trump getting his full $5 billion in exchange for a resolution of the DACA (Deferred Action for Child Arrivals)  and TPS (Temporary Protected Status) problems, but that’s probably a pipedream, at least for now.  Expectations are that immediately after her speakership role is formalized, Speaker Pelosi will bring a clean funding resolution to a vote in the House, one that looks strikingly similar to the one previously passed unanimously in the Senate, tossing the responsibility for opening the government back to Senate Majority Leader McConnell and Trump.  Pelosi’s bill will probably include two adjustments, in all likelihood she’ll include a provision providing back-pay to all the government employees hurt by the shutdown and another reinstating the cost of living adjustment for government employees that Trump unceremoniously cancelled this week because while tax cuts for the rich are affordable, small wage increases for middle class workers not so much. Trump won’t be happy but at some point he will declare “victory” moving on to the next fight and with Nancy Pelosi now running the House, there will be many.  

Migrant Deaths:  Homeland Security Secretary Nielsen, who for some inexplicable reason still has a job, went on a site visit to the border to see where the two young Guatemalan children died. Following the Trump/Stephen Miller playbook she still hasn’t acknowledged that clampdowns at the border and the delayed processing of people seeking refugee status or the government’s treatment of migrants contributed to the environment that led to the children’s deaths.  She did however commit to making some changes in the way the “unprecedented surge” of “migrants, particularly children, “ who she said “are increasingly facing medical challenges and harboring illness caused by their long and dangerous journey" are treated.  For the record, there is no surge, the number of migrants crossing into the US from Mexico is down. For his part, during the same LA Times interview where he disparaged the Trump wall, departing Chief of Staff Kelly slammed former Attorney General Jeff Sessions saying that the controversial "zero tolerance" immigration policy that led border officials to separate children from their parents was Session’s “brainchild” and was not handed down from the White House.  As to migrant kids dying, Republican Congressman Peter King stood up for the INS, saying that it was “only two kids” adding kids die in housing projects all the time, what’s the big deal.  Oy.

Russian Front:  Rudy Giuliani continues to spout nonsensical comments most of which can be summarized as though “Trump may have committed a few crimes, they aren’t crimes because Trump did them and Hillary should be in jail anyway.”  For his part Special Counsel Mueller remains silent, continuing to let his actions speak louder than his words.  As to those actions, expectations are that Trump buddy Roger Stone will be indicted sometime very soon.  One interesting tidbit did emerge last week.  In his infamous dossier, Christopher Steele reported a trip made by one time Trump lawyer/fixer Michael Cohen to Prague back in the summer of 2016, a trip that Cohen continues to deny.  Last week reporters from McClatchy DC, a reputable media outlet, published a story claiming that several intelligence agencies tracked one of Cohen’s phone pinging in the Prague area at that time. So far no other news outlets have confirmed the McClatchy story but if it is correct, it would suggest that Mueller has evidence that Trump sent Cohen to Europe to meet with a high-ranking Kremlin official, “ostensibly to discuss Russian concerns that their intrusion in the presidential campaign on Trump’s behalf might be exposed.”  The Daily Beast put it this way, if the facts of the story are true, then Peter Stone and Greg Gordon, the McClatchy reporters, are the next Woodward and Bernstein, if not their careers are toast. 

Wishing all a happy and healthy New Year full of good news, real facts, and some other nice things!