Friday, December 8, 2017
Wednesday, December 6, 2017
Monday, December 4, 2017
Sunday, December 3, 2017
"Here's What's In It": Goldman Explains All You Need To Know About The Current State Of Tax Reform
by Tyler Durden
Dec 3, 2017 6:04 PM
To the delight of Donald Trump, just before 2am on Saturday morning the Senate passed the Republican Tax bill in a 51-49 vote, and with tax reform legislation now passing both chambers of Congress it looks very likely to become law by year-end, probably within the next two weeks according to Goldman Sachs which now ascribes a 90% probability of the legislation becomes law by year end.
Nine Nominations Sent to the Senate Today
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
December 01, 2017
Nine Nominations Sent to the Senate Today
NOMINATIONS SENT TO THE SENATE:
Matthew D. Harris, of Utah, to be United States Marshal for the District of Utah for the term of four years, vice James Alfred Thompson, term expired.
Ted G. Kamatchus, of Iowa, to be United States Marshal for the Southern District of Iowa for the term of four years, vice Michael Robert Bladel, term expired.
Joseph P. Kelly, of Nebraska, to be United States Attorney for the District of Nebraska for the term of four years, vice Deborah K. R. Gilg, retired.
Joseph D. McClain, of Indiana, to be United States Marshal for the Southern District of Indiana for the term of four years, vice Kerry Joseph Forestal, resigned.
Scott W. Murray, of New Hampshire, to be United States Attorney for the District of New Hampshire for the term of four years, vice Emily Gray Rice, resigned.
David A. Weaver, of Colorado, to be United States Marshal for the District of Colorado for the term of four years, vice John Leroy Kammerzell, term expired.
David C. Weiss, of Delaware, to be United States Attorney for the District of Delaware for the term of four years, vice Charles M. Oberly, III, resigned.
Jelena McWilliams, of Ohio, to be Chairperson of the Board of Directors of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation for a term of five years, vice Martin J. Gruenberg, term expired.
Statement from the Press Secretary on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
December 02, 2017
Statement from the Press Secretary on the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act
President Donald J. Trump applauds the Senate for passing the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. The Senators who voted for these historic tax cuts did a great service to their constituents as they supported putting America first, growing the economy, and rebuilding our great country. The policies in this bill will cut taxes for hardworking families and put our economy on a path of sustainable economic prosperity and job creation. We have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reclaim America’s great destiny. The Administration looks forward to working with Congress to fulfill the promise we made to deliver historic tax cuts for the American people by the end of the year.
Thursday, November 30, 2017
Monday, November 27, 2017
Sunday, November 26, 2017
Statement from the Press Secretary on the Humanitarian Crisis in Yemen
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
November 24, 2017
Statement from the Press Secretary on the Humanitarian Crisis in Yemen
The United States welcomes the announcement from Saudi Arabia and the Saudi-led coalition that it is reopening Hudaydah port and Sanaa International Airport to allow the urgent flow of humanitarian aid to the people of Yemen. Full and immediate implementation of the announced measures is a first step in ensuring that food, medicine, and fuel reach the Yemeni people and that the aid organizations on the frontlines of mitigating this humanitarian crisis are able to do their essential work. We look forward to additional steps that will facilitate the unfettered flow of humanitarian and commercial goods from all ports of entry to the points of need. The magnitude of suffering in Yemen requires all parties to this conflict to focus on assistance to those in need. All sides must support a political process with facilitating humanitarian relief as the top priority.
We remain committed to supporting Saudi Arabia and all our Gulf partners against the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ aggression and blatant violations of international law. Backed by the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Houthi rebels have used destabilizing missile systems to target Saudi Arabia—systems that were not present in Yemen before the conflict. The international community must take the necessary steps to hold the Iranian regime accountable for its repeated violations of United Nations Security Council Resolutions 2216 and 2231 as the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps exploits the grave humanitarian crisis in Yemen to advance its regional ambitions. Millions of Yemenis are currently enduring severe deprivation; the United States continues to believe that this devastating conflict, and the suffering it causes, must be brought to an end through political negotiations.
Statement from the Press Secretary regarding the Attack at a Mosque in Egypt
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
November 24, 2017
The United States condemns in the strongest terms today’s horrific terrorist attack at a mosque in Egypt’s North Sinai province. We offer our condolences to the families of those killed and wounded, and we stand with the people and government of Egypt against terrorism. There can be no tolerance for barbaric groups that claim to act in the name of a faith but attack houses of worship and murder the innocent and defenseless while at prayer. The international community must continue to strengthen its efforts to defeat terrorist groups that threaten the United States and our partners and we must collectively discredit the extremist ideology that forms the basis of their existence.
Readout of the President's Call with President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi of Egypt
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
November 24, 2017
President Donald J. Trump spoke today with President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi of Egypt to offer condolences to the people of Egypt after the heinous attack on worshippers in Egypt’s North Sinai province. President Trump condemned the attack and reiterated that the United States will continue to stand with Egypt in the face of terrorism. The international community cannot tolerate barbaric terrorist groups and must strengthen its efforts to defeat terrorism and extremism in all its forms.
Saturday, November 25, 2017
Trump Wants Peace With Erdogan - The Miltary Wants To Sabotage It
President Trump is attempting to calm down the U.S. conflict with Turkey. The military junta in the White House has different plans. It now attempts to circumvent the decision the president communicated to his Turkish counterpart. The result will be more Turkish-U.S. acrimony.
Yesterday the Turkish foreign minister surprisingly announced a phone call President Trump had held with President Erdogan of Turkey.
United States President Donald Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan spoke on the phone on Nov. 24 only days after a Russia-Turkey-Iran summit on Syria, with Ankara saying that Washington has pledged not to send weapons to the People’s Protection Units (YPG) any more.“President Trump instructed [his generals] in a very open way that the YPG will no longer be given weapons. He openly said that this absurdity should have ended much earlier,” Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu told reporters after the phone call.
Trump had announced the call:
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrumpWill be speaking to President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey this morning about bringing peace to the mess that I inherited in the Middle East. I will get it all done, but what a mistake, in lives and dollars (6 trillion), to be there in the first place!
12:04 PM - 24 Nov 2017
During the phone call Trump must have escaped his minders for a moment and promptly tried to make, as announced, peace with Erdogan. The issue of arming the YPG is really difficult for Turkey to swallow. Ending that would probably make up for the recent NATO blunder of presenting the founder of modern Turkey Kemal Atatürk and Erdogan himself as enemies.
The YPG is the Syrian sister organization of the Turkish-Kurdish terror group PKK. Some weapons the U.S. had delivered to the YPK in Syria to fight the Islamic State have been recovered from PKK fighters in Turkey who were out to kill Turkish security personal. Despite that, supply for the YPG continued. In total over 3,500 truckloads were provided to it by the U.S. military. Only recently the YPK received some 120 armored Humvees, mine clearance vehicles and other equipment.
The generals in the White House and other parts of the administration were caught flat-footed by the promise Trump has made. The Washington Post writes:
Initially, the administration’s national security team appeared surprised by the Turks’ announcement and uncertain what to say about it. The State Department referred questions to the White House, and hours passed with no confirmation from the National Security Council.
The White House finally released what the Associated Press called:
a cryptic statement about the phone call that said Trump had informed the Turk of “pending adjustments to the military support provided to our partners on the ground in Syria.”
Neither a read-out of the call nor the statement AP refers to are currently available on the White House website.
The U.S. military uses the YPG as proxy power in Syria to justify and support its occupation of north-east Syria, The intent of the occupation is , for now, to press the Syrian government into agreeing to a U.S. controlled "regime change":
U.S. officials have said they plan to keep American troops in northern Syria — and continue working with Kurdish fighters — to pressure Assad to make concessions during peace talks brokered by the United Nations in Geneva, stalemated for three years now. “We’re not going to just walk away right now,” Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said last week.
To solidify its position the U.S. needs to further build up and strengthen its YPG mercenary forces.
When in 2014 the U.S. started to use Kurds in Syria as its foot-soldiers, it put the YPG under the mantle of the so called Syrian Democratic Forces and paid some Syrian Arabs to join and keep up the subterfuge. This helped to counter the Turkish argument that the U.S. was arming and supporting terrorists. But in May 2017 the U.S. announced to arm the YPG directly without the cover of the SDF. The alleged purpose was to eliminate the Islamic State from the city of Raqqa.
The YPG had been unwilling to fight for the Arab city unless the U.S. would provide it with more money, military supplies and support. All were provided. The U.S. special forces, who control the YPG fighters, directed an immense amount of aerial and artillery ammunition against the city. Any potential enemy position was destroyed by large ammunition and intense bombing before the YPG infantry proceeded. In the end few YPG fighters died in the fight. The Islamic State was let go or eliminated from the city but so was the city of Raqqa. The intensity of the bombardment of the medium size city was at times ten times greater than the bombing in all of Afghanistan. Airwars reported:
Since June, an estimated 20,000 munitions were fired in support of Coalition operations at Raqqa. Images captured by journalists in the final days of the assault show a city in ruins.
Several thousand civilians were killed in the indiscriminate onslaught.
The Islamic State in Syria and Iraq is defeated. It no longer holds any ground. There is no longer any justification to further arm and supply the YPG or the dummy organization SDF.
But the generals want to continue to do so to further their larger plans. They are laying grounds to circumvent their president's promise. The Wall Street Journal seems to be the only outlet to pick up on the subterfuge:
President Donald Trump’s administration is preparing to stop sending weapons directly to Kurdish militants battling Islamic State in Syria, dealing a political blow to the U.S.’s most reliable ally in the civil war, officials said Friday.
...
The Turkish announcement came as a surprise in Washington, where military and political officials in Mr. Trump’s administration appeared to be caught off-guard. U.S. military officials said they had received no new guidance about supplying weapons to the Kurdish forces. But they said there were no immediate plans to deliver any new weapons to the group. And the U.S. can continue to provide the Kurdish forces with arms via the umbrella Syrian militant coalition.
The "military officials" talking to the WSJ have found a way to negate Trump's promise.
A spokesperson of the SDF, the ethnic Turkman Talaf Silo, recently defected and went over to the Turkish side. The Turkish government is certainly well informed about the SDF and knows that its political and command structure is dominated by the YPK. The whole concept is a sham.
But the U.S. needs the YPG to keep control of north-east Syria. It has to continue to provide whatever the YPG demands, or it will have to give up its larger scheme against Syria.
The Turkish government will soon find out that the U.S. again tried to pull wool over its eyes. Erdogan will be furious when he discovers that the U.S. continues to supply war material to the YPG, even when those deliveries are covered up as supplies for the SDF.
The Turkish government released a photograph showing Erdogan and five of his aids taking Trump's phonecall. Such a release and the announcement of the call by the Turkish foreign minister are very unusual. Erdogan is taking prestige from the call and the public announcement is to make sure that Trump sticks to his promise.
This wide publication will also increase Erdogan's wrath when he finds out that he was again deceived.
Posted by b on November 25, 2017 at 12:14 PM | Permalink
Congress has handed Trump a historic presidential victory
- Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley is giving President Trump yet another major victory on judicial nominations.
- None of this would have been possible without Harry Reid's decision to kill the filibuster.
- The result is Trump will get to fill the most federal judiciary vacancies in 40 years.
Published 10:26 AM ET Fri, 24 Nov 2017CNBC.com
Olivier Douliery | AFP | Getty Images
Donald Trump
President Donald Trump should give special thanks to two U.S. Senators this Thanksgiving weekend. One is still serving in the Senate, the other recently retired. One is a Republican. The other a Democrat. And what should President Trump be thanking them for? Quite simply they have handed him one of the biggest victories any president could claim in the past 45 years.
Yes, this has happened even as one of the most widely covered stories of the past year has been President Trump's difficulties in working with Congress. The growing rift between him and Republican Senators John McCain, Jeff Flake, and Bob Corker alone has made headlines for months. For a U.S. president to have this many public feuds with senators from his own party this early in his presidency is really unprecedented and makes for hot news copy.
But that story ignores a bigger and longer-lasting development in the federal judiciary. That brings us first to naming the Republican gift giver: Senator Chuck Grassley from Iowa. The longtime member of Congress has big time clout as the Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. And Grassley has just used that clout to eliminate one of the final hurdles in the already furious pace of Trump administration judicial appointments to the federal bench.
Late last week, Grassley decided not to honor a Senate tradition of holding up hearings for judicial nominees who aren't cleared by their own home state senators. That tradition is known as the "blue slip courtesy" born out of time before nationwide communication technology when a given state's senators had access to much more information about nominees than their colleagues from the rest of the country. Grassley correctly noted that Democrats were now trying to use the blue slips tradition to replace the filibuster, and he's having none of that. As recently as last month, the Democrats and much of the news media's punditry were expecting Grassley, who is no fan of the president, to keep the blue slip tradition in place. But Grassley gave Trump this very special gift instead.
And that brings us to the Democrat who provided the initial generous source of President Trump's solid triumph: Former Senate Majority Leader, and Democrat, Harry Reid. Reid is a major reason this good fortune has befallen President Trump because Reid was the one who killed the filibuster rule for judicial nominees in 2013. And when he killed it, it was gone for good.
Republicans were powerless to stop a series of President Obama's judicial nominees after that. That is, until they won control of the Senate in the 2014 elections. The GOP may have failed at using that majority to achieve much, especially making even a dent in Obamacare. But they were able to freeze the Obama nomination process in its tracks, most notably by delaying and eventually killing Merrick Garland's nomination for the Supreme Court.
That long period of confirmation obstruction has given President Trump a huge number of seats to fill; twice as many as President Obama's also large number of vacancies when he took office in 2009. The Christian Science Monitor reports this is likely the most vacancies for a president to fill in 40 years. And the Trump team hasn't been wasting much time.
For those who believe President Trump won the 2016 election thanks to a series of Democratic Party errors, this is cut from the exact same cloth.
Consider that as of November 3rd, 13 Trump nominees to the courts have been confirmed this year. The big name is Supreme Court Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch, but we also have eight new federal appeals court judges, and four new U.S. district court judges. President Trump has now already surpassed the last four presidents' records for first-year judifical confirmations. And he's even tied President Ronald Reagan number of appeals court confirmations in year one.
But this isn't just about sheer numbers, it's about ideology too. While President Trump and conservatives have diverged in matters of policy several times over the past year, the judicial nomination process is decidedly not one of them. The nominees sent to the Senate from the White House are more conservative and even younger than what we saw during President George W. Bush's two terms in office.
In case the importance of making an impact on the courts is lost on anyone, just note the many setbacks the Trump administration has suffered this year alone thanks to the courts. Delays and changes to the White House-imposed travel and immigration bans have grabbed the most attention. But the administration is also dealing with judicial push back and other potential hurdles on everything from its opposition to the AT&T-Time Warner merger to its transgender military ban.
Now fast forward a couple of years where the Trump judicial appointment surge will have set in across the federal system. Just for this administration alone, that could make a huge difference. And for conservative causes and cases over time, it will be even more significant.
Sure, the tax reform and Obamacare repeal bills may be jeopardized by internal spats between the GOP and the White House. But real history is being made in the courts all thanks to a bad bet made by Senator Reid and remarkable cooperation between the Trump team, Senator Grassley, and Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. While the fights with other senators like Flake et al may grab headlines, these judicial confirmations will have a much bigger impact.
And unless the Democrats win control of the Senate in 2018, there's nothing they can do about it.
So on this Thanksgiving weekend the most grateful person in America should be President Trump. An unlikely set of benefactors has truly given him the political gift that will keep on giving.
Commentary by Jake Novak, CNBC.com senior columnist. Follow him on Twitter @jakejakeny.