Republicans are desperate – and not even doing much or well to hide it – to have Democrats start negotiating with them about a wall. We’ve moved on from demanding the chunk of money. Now it’s wanting to negotiate, begging frankly. For all the atmospherics and strategies, the only important point to make is that the President is holding the government hostage to force his way. That has to stop. The shutdown bacillus that Newt Gingrich injected into our political system in 1995 must be eradicated. It was dormant for almost two decades until Republicans (neo-Gingrichites) returned to power in the House in 2011. It’s wrong. It’s destructive. And it’s the same principle we apply to all terrorists. You can’t negotiate with terrorists or hostage takers, because it encourages the behavior.

A judge’s ruling reveals the Trump administration effort to add a citizenship question to the census to be a much bigger scandal than it initially looked. These tip-of-the-iceburg moments could happen a lot this year, as the Democratic controlled House begins issuing subpoenas, Tierney Sneed explains for Prime members.

Here’s the intro to Tierney Sneed’s preview of what oversight is probably going to look like in 2019.

Here’s one thing that struck me as I covered revelation after revelation about the Trump administration’s effort to add a citizenship question to the Census: Under the surface of a controversial Trump administration move was an even messier and more ham-handed process than I would have guessed.

It made me wonder which of the other Trump scandals that have unfolded over the last two years are going to end up looking even more damning if and when real congressional oversight of his administration occurs.

Read the rest here (sub req).

Nancy Pelosi is clearly playing hardball by essentially disinviting President Trump from giving a State of the Union address at the end of January. It’s a good move in terms of political leverage and to make a point. But it’s good for a reason that goes beyond political posturing or negotiation. It’s the same reason it was a good thing that Democratic senators are refusing to move bills on non-budgetary issues until the shutdown ends. Read More

We’re just days away from introducing the new ad free version of Prime (Prime AF). If you had already expressed interest in upgrading to Prime AF when it’s released I sent you an email last week with details about the new service, how to upgrade, why and a special discount for signing up early. If you haven’t, the details are below the fold. If you’re a current subscriber and care about the future of this site I’d ask you to take a moment to read through the post below. And thank you for doing so. Read More

GOP Rep says he was unaware of holocaust denier’s “previous associations” when they discussed eugenics today in the halls of Congress.

Trump’s companies ramped up its foreign worker visas to a 10 year high in 2018.

Last night Rudy Giuliani dramatically shifted his defense of the President, claiming that he’d never denied there was collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia during the 2016 election. That’s obviously false. He claimed it a million times. The point though is what he’s now claiming, or rather unwilling to claim. Giuliani now only claims that the President himself did not collude with Russia. Indeed, he makes a further, related claim that the only potential crime would be if President Trump was personally involved in the hacking of DNC servers and email accounts or paid those who did. Read More

In an unusual move, the office of special counsel Robert Mueller has issued a statement denying key elements of the Buzzfeed blockbuster that alleged President Trump directed Michael Cohen to lie to Congress:

Read More

The Buzzfeed brouhaha and the Mueller denial recall a basic point. Our most critical national and civic need is to find out the truth of what happened in the 2016 election and who President Trump really works for today. That imperative is far more important than whether any individual person or group of individuals is incarcerated or otherwise punished for crimes. But that is not the purpose of the Mueller probe. It never has been. The Special Counsel investigation is a criminal and counter-intelligence investigation. Its goal is to find out whether crimes were committed and to prosecute them. Read More