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[Culise]

Presume they're going to continue trying to fuck the population to enrich their donors and you're probably in good shape. Maybe they'll get around to screwing the national parks so that protected lands can be torn to hell in search of profit? Iirc the GOP was starting work on something along those lines earlier this year.

Bears Ears National Monument was the big one with an 85% reduction in total area, which led to interesting headlines like "Trump to Trim Bears Ears" and calls to protect Bears Ears.  Grand Staircase National Monument was also reduced in the same measure by around half.  The big legal fight right now is whether a sitting president who has the power to create national monuments (as opposed to national parks, which go through Congress) also possesses the concomitant power to alter or eliminate existing national monuments, or if this power is reserved to Congress.  As such, it's a significant delaying fight, but it's probably not going to be enough to remedy the present situation given the present state of Congress.

[smjjames]

Well, aside from all the stuff in January Congress has to do, the House wants to take on entitlement and welfare reform, the Senate (McConnell anyway) has said they don’t want to do that, especially in an election year, but they’re not sure what they want to do. Meanwhile, Trump has said he wants to do the infrastructure stuff.

Basically, they don’t have a plan that they have agreed on yet.

[Frumple]

I could see republican attempts at welfare and entitlement reform going staggeringly well, particularly when they're coming into the elections having pretty straight up facefucked blue states and massive swaths of high end professionals everywhere. Might let us see the highest minority turnout in ever :V

[scriver]

Bears Ears National Monument was the big one with an 85% reduction in total area, which led to interesting headlines like "Trump to Trim Bears Ears" and calls to protect Bears Ears. 

Worry that Trump's to clear bare Bears Ears here and there no longer mere fears

[Frumple]

Oh, hey. Limited injunction on the third travel ban came out of the 9th circuit appeals court just recently, and the ban itself found variously unconstitutional, if the thread hasn't already noticed.

Too early in the morning for me to go news article hunting, but you can find a .pdf of the ruling itself here.

[Antioch]

Did you guys see Nikki Haleys speech to the UN?

Highlight:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpglttVYeu0

Basically: WHEEEEEEH you can't make resolutions condemning US actions because we pay the largest UN contribution.

Makes the Trump administration look even more like a joke than they already were.

[Rolan7]

They say we're making threats and "going nuclear" over a mere non-binding resolution.  Literally saying that such resolutions don't matter.  Who doesn't respect the UN in this scenario?

Declaring Jerusalem the capital was just as non-binding, and look at the real consequences that had.  I suppose we're supposed to continue paying for, quote, "soft influence" with a group that's condemning us to our faces.

Or we could have not pointlessly stirred shit with the Jerusalem statement, of course.  I'm just saying that "We'll remember this" is far *less* nuclear than an official condemnation.  It's nothing more than standing by a sovereign decision (mistake, even).

[Baffler]

That's pretty much par for the course. It's her job to talk up whatever the US does and she's been doing it for a while. This isn't even close to the most ridiculous thing she's gone to bat for.

[Egan_BW]

*The United States will remember that

[Loud Whispers]

*The United States will remember that

This USA expansion sucks. The choices don't matter

[EnigmaticHat]

They say we're making threats and "going nuclear" over a mere non-binding resolution.  Literally saying that such resolutions don't matter.  Who doesn't respect the UN in this scenario?

Declaring Jerusalem the capital was just as non-binding, and look at the real consequences that had.  I suppose we're supposed to continue paying for, quote, "soft influence" with a group that's condemning us to our faces.

Or we could have not pointlessly stirred shit with the Jerusalem statement, of course.  I'm just saying that "We'll remember this" is far *less* nuclear than an official condemnation.  It's nothing more than standing by a sovereign decision (mistake, even).

Meh, the UN isn't a private PR firm.  We've been condemning China's human rights violations for years and they're a huge player in the UN.

Also, its not just "soft power", its de facto control over the organization that carries out the nuclear investigations.  If we withdraw our funding from the UN, someone else picks up the bill for the IAEA.  That means that Israel gets found in violation of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, and the best case scenario is that the middle east is further destabilized and we look like complete assholes.

(which to be clear, I would be OK with that outcome, but we fund the UN for our own purposes is my point)

[Strife26]

You mean the npt that they're nonsignatories to?

Edit: removed an errant o

[Dunamisdeos]

Merry Christmas Ameripol :3

I won't be back till Tuesday.

[Egan_BW]

Have a very Ameripol holidays, with the screaming and the gibbering.

[EnigmaticHat]

You mean the npt that they're nonsignatories to?

Edit: removed an errant o

We did sign it.  Our continued support of them erodes our ability to call out places like Iran and NK for their development of nukes.