Credit Suisse is a stock rating entity which generates a sliding scale for future stock valuations based on evaluations of brand sentiment.  The scale runs from -100 to +100 with zero as a “hold” or “take no position” recommendation.
Back in January Starbucks announced they were going to stand in opposition to President Trump; and to display their virtuous immigration bona fides they announced their intention to hire 10,000 refugees as employees in lieu of current American applicants for employment.
An almost immediate backlash began as pro-USA consumers and President Trump supporters turned away from the Starbucks brand.   As a consequence the Starbucks business model has been severely impacted.
Prior to their virtue-signaling announcement, Starbucks held a +80 position with Credit Suisse.  Today that rating dropped to ZERO as analysts announced the latest brand rating against the back drop of significant drops in sales.
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FACT: ObamaCare was passed, using the original legislative vehicle, at 1:38am on 12/24/09 with 60 votes in the Senate (see below).  The House then approved that Senate Bill without changes; and in February 2010 created a secondary bill which created the opportunity for the Senate to modify ObamaCare using “reconciliation” for a lower vote threshold of 51 votes.
Literally under the cloak of darkness Democrats rammed their holy grail of a socialist construct down the throat of every American. We no longer needed to imagine having usurping representation that did not represent the will of the people – we saw it.
[Understand the full construct by reading HERE]  If you do not understand how legislation is created; if you do not understand the difference between the Senate and House; if you do not understand the way ObamaCare was created, you really need to read this first.
A clean repeal bill, meaning a law to repeal the entire ObamaCare construct only, would require another 60 vote hurdle in the Senate.
Republicans, while in the majority, only control 52 seats.  Without 8 Democrats voting to approve a “repeal bill”, any House (Or Senate) bill that repeals ObamaCare cannot pass the Senate.
This is why Mark Levin is a con-man; selling snake oil as outrage to keep a listening audience angry, yet clueless and hopeless.   That’s what I don’t like.
A complete repeal of ObamaCare is currently impossible.  The House Freedom Caucus can push all the repeal bills they want, but they cannot get a clean repeal bill through the Senate because they cannot get the 60 votes needed. Period.
Additionally, despite claims to the contrary, the GOP has never passed an Obamacare “repeal bill”. Ever.  What they did previously pass was a “defund bill” using the lower vote reconciliation process. President Obama vetoed it.  A defunding bill was possible because of the financial pathway which falls under reconciliation rules.  The current Ryan bill is almost identical to the 2016 defunding bill everyone is mistakenly calling a prior “repeal bill”.
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Two important videos containing two important aspects to advancing legislation.  In the first video President Trump is meeting with Republican House “whip team”.  The role of the House Majority Whip, Steve Scalise, is to get the various republicans factions to unite in support of a singular legislative goal.  Unite the clans.
President Trump is not meeting with the House Majority Leader, Kevin McCarthy, because Trump views McCarthy as a weasel (don’t ask – just watch).  President Trump gives remarks to the media during the White House meeting:

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The second meeting is Speaker Paul Ryan, House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy and Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Greg Walden. Ryan, McCarthy and Walden outline the three-step legislative process that a full and replace bill needs.
Walden outlines the House Energy and Commerce Committee beginning the mark-ups on the bill which starts tomorrow.
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There are bazillions of opinions on the current ObamaCare repeal and replace efforts. Many people are rightly concerned their wants, wishes or needs do not seem addressed within the Price/Ryan bill announced last night.
CTH is far from a SME on the details.  However, we do know the legislative “process” and we followed the original construct closely.  Many people are missing the big picture challenges with “repeal and replace” – perhaps we can explain a little, and maybe it will settle some nerves.

The best way to explain what appears to be the Price/Ryan legislative road-map is to remind ourselves how a Dem legislature was able to enact ObamaCare with zero Republican support.   In 2017 the reversal of this process also lines up to be a Republican repeal with zero Democrat support.
Way back in 2009 when ObamaCare was being constructed, there were two procedural legislative constructs to create ObamaCare- one from the House (Pelosi) and one from the Senate (Reid).
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Oh, this is just too funny.  Confirmation of how effective President Trump’s strategy is against the media surfaced today as MSNBC’s Katy Tur gets into a heated conversation with Congressman Chris Stewart.
Katy Tur claimed the media never said Trump campaign officials were in contact with Russian intelligence.  Defending the media against Trump, Katy Tur said:

“I don’t think any news organization actually claimed that there were direct ties between the Trump campaign and Russian spies”.

Seemingly oblivious to the past two months of media proclamations including the New York Times whose headline was: “Trump Campaign Aides Had Repeated Contacts With Russian Intelligence.”  (Link)

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The media has been completely knee-capped and can no longer report on intelligence leaks without confirming the position of President Trump. The media is now in a position of denying all of their previous reporting simply because President Trump has accepted their presentations and turned their reporting against the previous administration.
That’s BRILLIANT.
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Tread carefully, this is a Paul Ryan announcement which inherently means the various GOPe elements, legislative authors, are most likely the primary sources.

WASHINGTON—House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) issued the following statement on introduction of the American Health Care Act:
“Obamacare is rapidly collapsing. Skyrocketing premiums, soaring deductibles, and dwindling choices are not what the people were promised seven years ago. It’s time to turn a page and rescue our health care system from this disastrous law. The American Health Care Act is a plan to drive down costs, encourage competition, and give every American access to quality, affordable health insurance. It protects young adults, patients with pre-existing conditions, and provides a stable transition so that no one has the rug pulled out from under them.
“Working together, this unified Republican government will deliver relief and peace of mind to the millions of Americans suffering under Obamacare. This will proceed through a transparent process of regular order in full view of the public. I want to thank all of our members who have contributed their ideas, especially Chairman Walden and Chairman Brady, as well as Secretary Price and the Trump administration, for their commitment to keep this promise and get this right.”

Links To Bill – LINK #1 and LINK #2

 

Something about Michelle Malkin’s disappearance, then Mark Steyn being summarily fired from Mark Levin’s CRTV (Conservative Review TV), and then the timing of Levin rushing to the front lines of Team Trump just didn’t seem disconnected.  A look at the financier behind the entire Conservative Review apparatus reveals a financial angle.

For more than four years we have been predicting a grand awakening among battered conservatives to discover the identity of their abusers.  Candidate Trump, now President Trump simply sped up and spotlighted those revelations exponentially.
Almost all of the political positions espoused by the most visible faces of “conservative” punditry are specifically due to the financial benefactors of those who underwrite the media enterprise.  As previously outlined almost of the Never Trump community was most certainly funded by the financial network of special interest billionaires.
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In lieu of an on-camera press briefing White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer held a press gaggle today to brief reporters and answer questions.  The “press gaggles” are less formal and are not generally accompanied with broadcast video.
A full audio of the briefing is below which includes several minutes of recorded ‘hot mic’ conversations between various media reporters prior to Press Secretary Spicer beginning. Sean Spicer enters the briefing at 05:05 of the audio below:

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March 5th, 2017 – Statement from the Press Secretary

“Reports concerning potentially politically motivated investigations immediately ahead of the 2016 election are troubling.

President Donald J Trump is requesting that as part of their investigations into Russian activity, the congressional intelligence committees exercise their oversight authority to determine whether executive brance investigative powers were abused in 2016.

Neither the White House nor the President will comment further until such oversight is conducted.” ~ Office of the President

John Hayward at Breitbart News accurately puts the intention of the President Trump administration into context.
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Hypocrisy, thy name is…

According to the New York Times, FBI Director James Comey is reported to be requesting the President Trump Department of Justice to refute the possibility of the FBI having intercepted communications from Trump Tower in the latest “Wire Tapping” denial.
So lets give this request by Director Comey some context.

It was only a few weeks ago when the same FBI went to President Trump’s Chief of Staff and told Reince Priebus there was no truth to media reports, based on FBI leaks, of FBI evidence showing Trump campaign officials involved with Russian officials regarding the 2016 election.  It was all a complete nothingburger.
Details – On February 15th while discussing another issue FBI Assistant Director Andrew McCabe asked Reince for 5 minutes alone after the meeting.  At the one-on-one meeting McCabe told Priebus the New York Times Russia and Trump campaign story was a “bunch of BS”.
Priebus asked McCabe if McCabe would be able to say that publicly and get the media off his back about a ridiculously false narrative.  Asst. Director McCabe said he would check with his boss, FBI Director James Comey.  Later, McCabe called back and said he couldn’t issue a statement about it. (more…)