A Pause …..

There’s a slight pause in the news as we stop to celebrate the life of President George H.W. Bush.
It’s still interesting to us to see and hear the media talk today about this WW2 hero and dedicated public servant. It’s certainly different than they treated him back in the late 80s and early 90’s.
In fact you can see him holding a bumper sticker that says “Frustrate the media, Vote Bush”. You can read his memoir (by Jon Mecham) and see how  angry he was with the press. The only difference between his anger and the current President’s was the current attacks back. Yes, it was that bad.
Now though he was the greatest. Remember 90% of the media voted for Bill Clinton over “this gentle and good man”.

One more thing. George Bush got 37% of the vote in 1992. Bill Clinton received 43%. The rest went to a third party candidate Ross Perot who got 19%.  Perot hurt George Bush far greater than Clinton, and many believe he would have won if Perot was not in the race.

SPECIAL AIR MISSION 41 was the name of the flight sent to pick up the President’s body and fly it to Washington. George Bush completed the  missions of his life.

One impact of his passing is congress went back and forth yesterday about how to avoid a shutdown on Friday. The House Republicans said they were fine with a bill that extends funding until Dec. 18 or Dec. 21. The Senate Republican leadership was kicking this around. But late yesterday, the signal from House Democrats was that they would only agree to a weeklong extension. So a showdown is coming.

Mitch McConnell who has a good handle on this doesn’t see a shutdown:
McConnell predicted in the WSJ that lawmakers “will avoid a government shutdown”. He said, “lawmakers would avert a government shutdown when a proposed stopgap measure expires later this month, saying neither party wants the political blame for a lapse in funding”.

Jim Comey came to an agreement over testimony to congress. After pushing for a public hearing (the Repubicans wanted a closed door one), Comey backed down. Why? He knew the court was about to rule against him and he didn’t want that perception out there.

Think about this dilemma the Democrats face:
As they prepare to take control of the House, one high priority for Democrats from northeastern states is to look at rolling back the $10,000 limit on state and local tax deductions included in the Republicans’ 2017 overhaul of the federal tax system.
But analysts say repealing the state and local tax limit is worth just dollars to the average middle-class taxpayer. For the wealthy, though, the proposal could lower tax bills by tens of thousands of dollars.
The Tax Policy Center recently found that more than 96 percent of the tax cuts that would come from repealing the cap would go to the top 20 percent of households in terms of income.
They wouldn’t give tax cuts to the wealthy would they? By the way, I thought the tax cut was for the wealthy from the start. Didn’t they say that?

Politico today, a new way to attack the President:
“Trump handles Bush’s death with abnormal normality”: “For President Donald Trump, there was once no worse insult than being ‘a Bushie.’ That, a former White House official told POLITICO earlier this year, was ‘worse than being a Democrat.’
“If Trump has been thinking such thoughts since the death of former president George H.W. Bush on Saturday, he hasn’t been sharing them. Bush’s death has at least temporarily displaced Trump’s public disdain for the Bush family and, for the moment, he is even borrowing from his late predecessor’s celebrated sense of etiquette.
“On Monday night, Trump visited Capitol Hill to pay personal respects to the 41st president, whose casket arrived earlier in the day and is lying in state in the Capitol Rotunda. The display of respect even extended to the late president’s son, former President George W. Bush, whom Trump has derided as ‘the worst president ever.’ Trump offered Bush the use of his official guest residence, Blair House, while the younger Bush is in Washington for the events surrounding his father’s funeral, according to a White House official.
“In short, the president is behaving normally — a jarring rarity for a man who casually shatters sacred political norms.” POLITICO.

Short Takes

Did you see that Jeff Zucker, head of CNN, is considering a run for political office? He said “it’s something I would consider”. Think he’d run as a Republican or Democrat? Me too.

Did you hear that Brenda Snipes withdrew her resignation and retirement in Florida? She is reacting to charges from Governor Scott.

How come there was no coverage of this?
A convicted murderer was caught in the migrant caravan. Homeland Security said Friday that a convicted murderer was among the members of the migrant caravan, and was caught trying to sneak into the U.S. late last week.

How about these Op Eds in the NYT:
Scent of the Russians
There’s a connection between Cohen’s guilty plea and Ukraine’s desperate plight

.Trump Tops Tricky Dick
And now, the worst and the dumbest.

A European Goes to Trump’s Washington
And what he finds is disturbing.

Mueller Exposes the Culture of Lying That Surrounds Trump
As a businessman, candidate and president, Mr. Trump has demanded loyalty of advisers, including an embrace of his habitual boasts, misstatements and outright falsehood

Try and find the positive stories in the NYT. We can’t.

Here’s an opinion writer from the Washington Times on the media and President Bush 41. It would never be in the NYT.

ANALYSIS/OPINION: