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Friday May 5th – Open Thread

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL.

For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen †

President Trump Meets With Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull…

Prior to delivering remarks aboard USS Intrepid to celebrate the historic military alliance between The United States and Australia, President Trump and Prime Minister Turnbull met on the sidelines for a bilateral discussion. Interesting interpersonal dynamic, brings out a sensibility from President Donald Trump not customarily noted…

During the briefly allowed press Q&A both leaders provided additional thoughts and comments on various current events: Healthcare, legislation, social-media etc.

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It’s the first time POTUS has been photographed taking the dominant position in a handshake with an international leader.  It denotes a certain amount of skepticism…

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White House Announces President Trump Foreign Travel Schedule…

Against the backdrop of President Trump assembling the mid-east alliance group, and with the previous diplomatic outline of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in mind, the travel schedule is not necessarily a surprise.

WHITE HOUSE – President Trump has accepted the invitation of King Salman bin Abd Al-Aziz, the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques, to visit the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia later this month. The visit will reaffirm the strong partnership between the United States and Saudi Arabia and allow the leaders to discuss issues of strategic concern, including efforts to defeat terrorist groups and discredit radical ideologies.

President Trump has also accepted the invitation of President Reuven Rivlin and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to visit Israel, where he will further strengthen the United States-Israel partnership. The leaders will discuss a range of regional issues, including the need to counter the threats posed by Iran and its proxies, and by ISIS and other terrorist groups. They will also discuss ways to advance a genuine and lasting peace between the Israelis and Palestinians.

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Republicans Vote to Bring Back “Compensatory Time” Option For Workers…

The various media pundits and news stories are calling H.R. 1180 a “new overtime bill”.  However, in reality the ‘take pay or take time off’ concept is more than 50 years old; we used to call it “compensatory time” or “comp time”.

WASHINGTON – […] Voting along party lines, the House of Representatives passed a bill Tuesday that would allow private-sector employers to compensate their overtime-working employees with paid time off instead of paying them time-and-a-half as currently required.

The bill, H.R. 1180, would tweak the Fair Labor Standards Act, which mandates employers that require hourly-paid employees to work more than 40 hours a week to pay time-and-a-half, or 1.5 times their usual hourly rate. The bill also prohibits employers from coercing or intimidating employees to choose time off instead of overtime pay.

House Republicans passed the bill, sponsored by Rep. Martha Roby (R-Ala.), with no Democrats voting in favor. The bill will now go to the Senate, where it will require 60 votes to avoid a filibuster by Democrats. (read more)

The professionally Democrat hate the concept, but most Democrat politicians have zero experience in understanding how incredibly beneficial compensatory time can be.

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Former President Obama Officially Endorses Emmanuel Macron in French Election…

There’s a massive amount of obtuse hypocrisy within Democrats’ accusing Russia’s Vladimir Putin of interfering in the U.S. election and yet they watch Barack Obama campaign for Emmanuel Macron in French election.

Yes, the ever present Mamet Principle is once again clearly on display.

However, on the same day when Barack Obama produces a video to officially endorse Emmanuel Macron, the divisive French candidate calls his opposition “enemies of France”.

Mr. Macron — who currently leads Front National leader Marine Le Pen in the polls — took to the stage at a 10,000-strong rally in Paris to dub Front National the “anti-France party”, branding their supporters “fearmongerers” and “extreme”.  “They’re here. It’s they. It’s they who are our true enemies,” declared Mr. Macron.

“Powerful, organized, skillful, determined,” he said: “You pass them in the streets, in the countryside or on the web, most often well hidden. As hateful as they are cowardly. You know them. The party of the agents of the disaster, the fearmongerers. The French far-right. It’s here”.  (link)

The outrageously divisive comments from Macron are profoundly ironic considering the claimed reason for Obama’s endorsement.   Obama says he supports Macron because he appeals “people’s hopes and not their fears”.

Yes, you really just can’t make this stuff up.

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President Trump Signs Executive Order Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty…

Earlier today President Trump signed an executive order promoting speech and religious liberty during a ceremony in the Rose Garden:

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Details of the Executive Order:

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Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross Discusses Congress, Trade, Education, China and NAFTA…

U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross sat down for a comprehensive discussion on trade, education and commerce policies with Bloomberg’s David Gura at the Bloomberg Breakaway Summit in New York.

In his direct and often humorous style Wilburine describes some of the current economic trade challenges and presents an outline of U.S. forward policy.  Secretary Ross spends quite a bit of time explaining how the NAFTA trade agreement is obsolescent in the modern era and how many of the products and industries in 2017 are not part of the agreement.

Wilburine also discusses how the business community is interacting with the Trump administration to deliver on specific aspects to the larger economic policy goals. A very good and substantive discussion segment:

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Additionally, COMMERCE – Earlier today, U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin held a phone conversation with Vice Premier Wang Yang of China. Commerce Secretary Ross, Treasury Secretary Mnuchin and Vice Premier Wang discussed bilateral issues related to the U.S.- China Comprehensive Dialogue and the overall economic and trade relationship between the two countries. (link)

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May 4th – 2017 Presidential Politics – Trump Administration Day #105

In an effort to keep the Daily Open Thread a little more open topic we are going to start a new daily thread for “Presidential Politics”. Please use this thread to post anything relating to the Donald Trump Administration and Presidency.

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This thread will refresh daily and appear above the Open Discussion Thread.

President Trump Twitter @POTUS / Vice President Pence Twitter @VP

Sean Spicer Twitter @PressSec

Thursday May 4th – Open Thread

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL.

For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen †

Sly UniParty Healthcare Vote Manuever…

The UniParty is sly, I would say professionally and expertly so, and before readers feel the need to point out the obvious – when it comes to legislation, yes, I am professionally cynical.

The reason is simple, having trained ourselves to see when the pea is never under the shell, the legislative conversations that really matter are always behind a Potemkin Village called K-Street.

You have to know the unwritten legislative rules of the UniParty as they have been evidenced for almost 15 years to understand the ruse.

♦ First, the reason a vote, any vote, is “announced”, and just doesn’t take place, is because it provides the controlled opposition time to frame their anti-(fill_in_the-blank) talking points.  This is by design.  When a legislative vote is “announced” it is a dog-whistle call out to the institutional lobbyists that the legislation will be rail-roaded and ultimately fail.

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