Senate Rejects #ObamaCare 'Skinny Repeal', 51-49, in Dramatic Light-Night Vote

I actually really liked "skinny repeal." It would have removed ObamaCare's individual and employer mandates, and it would have rescinded the medical device tax. I've said all along that protections for pre-existing conditions should remain. Plus, since I have a 21-year-old kid, I can see how allowing young people to remain on their parents insurance can be helpful (even though I still shake my head sometimes to think that 26-year-old Americans should be dependent on their parents, but wtf?).

In any case, even the skinny repeal got rejected, owing a lot to Sen. John McCain, who's generated some enormous animosity since last night.

In any case, at the New York Times (FWIW), "Senate Rejects Slimmed-Down Obamacare Repeal as McCain Votes No":

WASHINGTON — The Senate in the early hours of Friday morning rejected a new, scaled-down Republican plan to repeal parts of the Affordable Care Act, derailing the Republicans’ seven-year campaign to dismantle President Barack Obama’s signature health care law and dealing a huge political setback to President Trump.

Senator John McCain of Arizona, who just this week returned to the Senate after receiving a diagnosis of brain cancer, cast the decisive vote to defeat the proposal, joining two other Republicans, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, in opposing it.

The 49-to-51 vote was also a humiliating setback for the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who has nurtured his reputation as a master tactician and spent the last three months trying to devise a repeal bill that could win support from members of his caucus.

As the clock ticked toward the final vote, which took place around 1:30 a.m., suspense built on the Senate floor. Mr. McCain was engaged in a lengthy, animated conversation with Vice President Mike Pence, who had come to the Capitol expecting to cast the tiebreaking vote for the bill. A few minutes later, when Mr. McCain ambled over to the Democratic side of the chamber, he was embraced by Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California. A little later Senator Amy Klobuchar, Democrat of Minnesota, put her arm around Mr. McCain.

The roll had yet to be called, but the body language suggested that the Trump administration had failed in its effort to flip the Arizona senator whom President Trump hailed on Tuesday as an “American hero.’’

Many senators announced their votes in booming voices. Mr. McCain quietly signaled his vote with a thumbs-down gesture. He later offered an explanation on Twitter:

Skinny repeal fell short because it fell short of our promise to repeal & replace Obamacare w/ meaningful reform...

After the tally was final, Mr. Trump tweeted:

3 Republicans and 48 Democrats let the American people down. As I said from the beginning, let ObamaCare implode, then deal. Watch!

The truncated Republican plan that ultimately fell was far less than what Republicans once envisioned. Republican leaders, unable to overcome complaints from both moderate and conservative members of their caucus, said the skeletal plan was just a vehicle to permit negotiations with the House, which passed a much more ambitious repeal bill in early May.

The “skinny repeal” bill, as it became known at the Capitol this week, would still have had broad effects on health care. The bill would have increased the number of people who are uninsured by 15 million next year compared with current law, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. Premiums for people buying insurance on their own would have increased roughly 20 percent, the budget office said...

More.

Also, at Politico, via Memeorandum, "How McCain tanked Obamacare repeal." And at the Los Angeles Times, "McCain's surprise vote doomed GOP healthcare bill, but did it open the door for Senate bipartisanship?" (No.)

Post-Hillary Democrats

This is good.

From Daniel Henninger, at WSJ, "The Post-Hillary Democrats: How in God’s name, the Democrats wonder, did we ever lose the 2016 election to HIM?":

On climate change, Democrats believe they know to the 10th decimal place that Earth is on the brink of an apocalypse. But by their own admission this week, they don’t have a clue about which way the wind is blowing with the American voter.

On Monday the Democrats released something called “A Better Deal,” a set of policy ideas to win back voters. Think of it as the party laying down the first quarter-mile of blacktop on its road back to power.

The short version of “A Better Deal” is that they would bust up corporate trusts (Teddy Roosevelt, circa 1902), ramp up public-works spending ( FDR, circa the Great Depression) and enact various tax credits (Washington, circa eternity).

The more interesting question here lies in the document’s unspoken subtext: How in God’s name did we lose a presidential election to . . . him?

In a recent Washington Post interview, one of Hillary Clinton’s closest advisers, Jake Sullivan, admits, “I am still losing sleep. I’m still thinking about what I could have done differently.” Who wouldn’t? What happened Nov. 8 was like losing five Super Bowls in one day.

Hillary Clinton has taken to citing one fact: “Remember, I did win more than three million [more] votes than my opponent.” True, notwithstanding the pesky two-centuries-old Electoral College vote, which she lost.

Here’s another fact that still poses a maddening question for many: Donald J. Trump got more than 62 million votes. It wasn’t long before Election Day that many political sophisticates wondered how Donald Trump would get 620 votes, much less 62 million—after the McCain slander, the “Access Hollywood” tape, the generalized ignorance.

A conventional explanation for the loss—and we know this because Chuck Schumer conventionalized it last weekend—is to blame her. “When you lose to somebody who has 40% popularity,” said Sen. Schumer, “you don’t blame other things—Comey, Russia—you blame yourself.”

This is rich. It’s almost oxymoronic. The reason Democrats lost to him is that they had an unelectable candidate. But if both parties were running “unelectable” candidates, then a lot of that day’s 138 million voters based their decisions on something more concrete than the personalities of two celebrities.

Hillary Clinton was running as the extension of Barack Obama’s two-term presidency. If the Democrats are now throwing her under the bus, Mr. Obama is down there with her.

The Obama presidency was a watershed for the Democratic Party for reasons having little to do with his historic candidacy. Mr. Obama moved his party significantly to the left, arguably as Ronald Reagan had moved his to the right. But those two buzzwords—left and right—have substantive meaning. In practice, the Obama years constituted an abrupt enhancement of state power. ObamaCare was the tip of the iceberg.

Barack Obama was as smooth as Bill Clinton was slick, and he used his eloquence to soften the hard edges of the many policy coercions by his Justice, Labor and Education departments and the omnipresent EPA.

In 2016, the Clintons, especially the ex-president, recognized the risks of running on this leftward legacy in a general election. Thus Hillary’s efforts to essentially talk and fog her way past that reality.

Still more.

Anthony Scaramucci Unloads on Reince Priebus in Profanity-Laced Interview at the New Yorker

So, a little while ago, I go to turn on the Diamondbacks at Cardinals on the MLB channel, and I get an error message saying the broadcast isn't available in my area (which is weird, since I live nowhere near St. Louis and the game wouldn't normally be blacked out). Okay, fine. It's happened before. I then go to click out of the channel and CNN pops up. My wife must have been watching it earlier, because I haven't watched CNN in months. It's four-o'clock and Erin Burnett's coming on with breaking news about Anthony Scaramucci. So I watched for a while. Then I click around the dial a little more and come back a few minutes later and she's got neocon never-Trumper Bill Kristol on. He's ranting about how unprecedented is this White House power struggle, even going so far as to suggest that Scaramucci's mentally unstable and should be denied an FBI security clearance. Then I flip over to Fox News. Martha MacCallum's got Dana Perino on. She argues that this kind of White House battle can only be decided by the president ultimately. Martha goes to a commercial and I flipped the off button.

At issue is this interview with Ryan Lizza, at the New Yorker, "Anthony Scaramucci Called Me to Unload About White House Leakers, Reince Priebus, and Steve Bannon" (via Memeorandum):

On Wednesday night, I received a phone call from Anthony Scaramucci, the new White House communications director. He wasn’t happy. Earlier in the night, I’d tweeted, citing a “senior White House official,” that Scaramucci was having dinner at the White House with President Trump, the First Lady, Sean Hannity, and the former Fox News executive Bill Shine. It was an interesting group, and raised some questions. Was Trump getting strategic advice from Hannity? Was he considering hiring Shine? But Scaramucci had his own question—for me.

“Who leaked that to you?” he asked. I said I couldn’t give him that information. He responded by threatening to fire the entire White House communications staff. “What I’m going to do is, I will eliminate everyone in the comms team and we’ll start over,” he said. I laughed, not sure if he really believed that such a threat would convince a journalist to reveal a source. He continued to press me and complain about the staff he’s inherited in his new job. “I ask these guys not to leak anything and they can’t help themselves,” he said. “You’re an American citizen, this is a major catastrophe for the American country. So I’m asking you as an American patriot to give me a sense of who leaked it.”

In Scaramucci’s view, the fact that word of the dinner had reached a reporter was evidence that his rivals in the West Wing, particularly Reince Priebus, the White House chief of staff, were plotting against him. While they have publicly maintained that there is no bad blood between them, Scaramucci and Priebus have been feuding for months. After the election, Trump asked Scaramucci to join his Administration, and Scaramucci sold his company, SkyBridge Capital, in anticipation of taking on a senior role. But Priebus didn’t want him in the White House, and successfully blocked him for being appointed to a job until last week, when Trump offered him the communications job over Priebus’s vehement objections. In response to Scaramucci’s appointment, Sean Spicer, an ally of Priebus’s, resigned his position as press secretary. And in an additional slight to Priebus, the White House’s official announcement of Scaramucci’s hiring noted that he would report directly to the President, rather than to the chief of staff.

Scaramucci’s first public appearance as communications director was a slick and conciliatory performance at the lectern in the White House briefing room last Friday. He suggested it was time for the White House to turn a page. But since then, he has become obsessed with leaks and threatened to fire staffers if he discovers that they have given unauthorized information to reporters. Michael Short, a White House press aide considered close to Priebus, resigned on Tuesday after Scaramucci publicly spoke about firing him. Meanwhile, several damaging stories about Scaramucci have appeared in the press, and he blamed Priebus for most of them. Now, he wanted to know whom I had been talking to about his dinner with the President. Scaramucci, who initiated the call, did not ask for the conversation to be off the record or on background...

More.

At one point Scaramucci calls Priebus a "fucking paranoid schizophrenic, a paranoiac..." And of course, this has all the chattering-leftist mouths agape across the establishment. Keep in mind that leftists will play up any Oval Office flame-war to the hilt. If this is seen as weakening the effectiveness of the administration, all the better. And they're going to play it all the more, because Scaramucci's been kicking ass. He's been taking down the fake news memes on the cable broadcasts and forwarding an extremely on-point and effective message for the president. Leftist will exploit any angle to take him down, and by extension take down his boss, President Trump.

More at Memeorandum.

Everything is high drama. Scarmucci's high drama, but he's pissed at how the president's been getting reamed and he's serious about cleaning house. He's serious about take the battle to the fake news outlets. That's what leftists hate. Let's see how this goes over the next few days, because if Scaramucci starts winning some victories, leftists'll be even more freaked out. Knives are sharpening at this minute as it is.

Ayn Rand, For the New Intellectual

At Amazon, Ayn Rand, For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition).

Ayn Rand, The Return of the Primitive

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, Ayn Rand, The Return of the Primitive: The Anti-Industrial Revolution.

Ayn Rand, We the Living

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, Ayn Rand, We the Living (75th-Anniversary Edition).

Transgender Accommodations and Military Realities

Following-up from yesterday, "Read J.R. Salzman's Twitter Stream."

Here's Ryan Anderson, at the Daily Signal, "5 Good Reasons Why Transgender Accommodations Aren’t Compatible With Military Realities":

On Wednesday, President Donald Trump announced that he was reversing an Obama-era policy that opened the military to people who identify as transgender.

That policy, announced during the last year of President Barack Obama’s second term, was scheduled to go into effect earlier this month, but Secretary of Defense James Mattis announced a six-month delay in its implementation to review whether it was in fact prudent given the nature of the military and its mission.

The mission of our armed forces is winning wars and protecting the nation. So any personnel policy must prioritize military readiness and mission-critical purposes first.

Trump’s announcement that it would not be feasible to open the military to personnel who identify as transgender returns the military to the policy it had always observed, before the Obama administration’s 12th-hour, politically driven imposition of a transgender agenda.

Americans need an alternative to the mainstream media. But this can't be done alone. Find out more >>

As I explain in my forthcoming book “When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment,” the best biology, psychology, and philosophy conclude that sex is a biological reality and that gender is the social expression of that reality.

The most helpful therapies for gender dysphoria focus not on achieving the impossible—changing bodies to conform to thoughts and feelings—but on helping people accept and even embrace the truth about their bodies and reality.

Unfortunately, 41 percent of people who identify as transgender will attempt suicide at some point in their lives, compared to 4.6 percent of the general population. And people who have had transition surgery are 19 times more likely than average to die by suicide.

People who identify as transgender suffer a host of mental health and social problems—including anxiety, depression, and substance abuse—at higher rates than the general population. Biology isn’t bigotry, and we need a sober and honest assessment of the human costs of getting human nature wrong.

So there were well-justified concerns that Obama was using the military to advance the latest social justice culture warrior agenda item—seeking to mainstream transgender identities and promote controversial therapies for gender dysphoria.

Obama’s policy change ignored the reality that placing individuals who might be at increased risk for suicide or other psychological injury in the most stressful situation imaginable—the battlefield—is reckless.

But even people who disagree about the underlying transgender issues should acknowledge that there are practical concerns for the military when it comes to people who identify as transgender.

Wednesday’s announcement reflects good reasons why transgender accommodations are incompatible with military realities. Here are just a few of the considerations...

Keep reading.

BONUS: Pre-order Anderson's book at Amazon, When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment.

Mengo Aluma Air Vent Magnetic Phone Holder

Cool unit.

At Amazon, Mengo Magnetic Air Vent Car Mount – Aluma Magnetic Phone Holder – Universally Compatible for iPhone Samsung HTC LG Phones – Strong Magnetic Vent Mount.

BONUS: Michael Mandelbaum, The Case for Goliath: How America Acts as the World's Government in the Twenty-first Century.

Rolling Stone Asks Why Justin Trudeau Can't Be President of the U.S.

The magazine's cover story reads, "Justin Trudeau: Canadian Prime Minister, Free World's Best Hope."

The problem: Of course, he's not. Canada isn't anywhere near the leader of the free world, Justin Trudeau or not.

Leftist are insane. More insane than ever.
See Twitchy, "Wow. Rolling Stone has a cover so bad even Chris Hayes calls it ‘unseemly’."

And here's Mark Steyn:

Kate Upton, Ashley Graham Soak Up the Sun (VIDEO)

At Sports Illustrated Swimsuit:

Shop Today

At Amazon, Gold Box Deals.

See especially, Dyson Ball Animal Upright Vacuum, Purple (Certified Refurbished).

Also, BLACK+DECKER LHT2436 40V Cordless Hedge Trimmer, 24".

More, GreenWorks MO40L410 G-MAX 40V 20-Inch Cordless 3-in-1 Lawn Mower with Smart Cut Technology, (1) 4Ah Battery and Charger included.

And, Mountain House Just In Case...Classic Assortment Bucket.

Plus, KIND Breakfast Bars, Peanut Butter, Gluten Free, 1.8 Ounce, 32 Count.

Still more, ALASKA BEAR® Natural silk sleep mask & blindfold, super-smooth eye mask (One Strap).

More here, FYLINA Beach Blanket Huge Picnic Blanket Water Resistant Sand Free 7' 9' Oversized Nylon Outdoor Blankets with 4 Stakes Lightweight Portable Picnic Mat Machine Washable.

BONUS: Martin Meredith, Diamonds, Gold, and War: The British, the Boers, and the Making of South Africa.

Why Ohio Just Gave Donald Trump a Hero's Welcome

From Salena Zito, at the New York Post:

YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio — This town was on fire.

By 1 in the afternoon on Tuesday, every main thoroughfare downtown was filled with happy people heading toward the Covelli Centre. Folks dressed in red, white and blue crisscrossed the main grids as vendors sold “Make America Great Again” ball caps, American flags and bottles of water.

Thousands had filled the gravel parking lot to wait until the doors opened at 4, license plates revealing they had traveled from as far as Indiana, Michigan, Pennsylvania and West Virginia to see the president speak directly to them in this Rust Belt city.

Music played on almost every corner as Donald Skowron, a retired Youngstown police officer, drove his green pickup truck up and down Champion Street — in the back, a 6-by-8-foot homemade wooden Trump-Pence sign straddling the bed of the truck, with two large Trump flags flowing from the top.

“I am very happy with the president’s performance so far,” said Skowron. “He has set the exact tone I was looking for, although I’ll be honest, I wish he didn’t tweet all of the time, but that is hardly anything to complain.”

Skowron said he is encouraged by reading about Trump’s constant meetings with industry leaders as well as union and trade members in trying to understand how to create jobs: “We have a president invested in trying to navigate between the people who create jobs and the men and women doing the jobs and how repealing regulations help both.”

Six months after Donald J. Trump was inaugurated as the 45th president of the United States, he received a hero’s welcome in this town. The festive scene made a counter-visual to the daily nonstop press reports about investigations into members of his inner circle, Russian interference in last year’s election and the debate over ObamaCare.

Trump’s approval rating, according to Gallup, is 39 percent. Youngstown is the 39 percent.

On Monday, police said the advance ticket request of over 20,000 had exceeded the 6,000-seat capacity of the center, prompting the event coordinators to put a large screen outside the center for the overflow crowd...

Keep reading.

James Poulos, The Art of Being Free

At Amazon, James Poulos, The Art of Being Free: How Alexis de Tocqueville Can Save Us from Ourselves.

Pauline Maier, From Resistance to Revolution

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, Pauline Maier, From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765-1776.

John Lukacs, The Duel

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, John Lukacs, The Duel: The Eighty-Day Struggle Between Churchill and Hitler.

Amber Lee's Less Humid High-Pressure Forecast

It's been mild.

Where's all the apocalyptic global warming we're always hearing about. It's been a positively mild summer in the O.C.

Here's the lovely Ms. Amber, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:

Read J.R. Salzman's Twitter Stream

Following-up from earlier, "President Trump Reverses Obama Administration's Transgender Military Policy."

Read this thread from J.R. Salzman, on Twitter, "I served in Iraq in 2006. For the first five months I was on a 12 man firebase out in the middle of nowhere in the desert."

Model Madison Headrick's Instagram Feed is One Long Summer Party

At GQ, "Meet your new favorite Instagram model, Madison Headrick."

Antje Utgaard

Fabulous, on Twitter.

And flashback from last year, "Antje Utgaard Dances in Her Underwear and Skinny Dips (VIDEO)."

Walter Lord, The Miracle of Dunkirk

*BUMPED.*

At Amazon, Walter Lord, The Miracle of Dunkirk: The True Story of Operation Dynamo.