No Wall, No Deal,

[Khandro]

During an interview broadcast on Thursday’s edition of the Fox News Channel’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Vice President Mike Pence declared that “We will have no deal without a wall.”

Pence said, "The president’s made it clear, we’re here to make a deal. But it’s a deal that’s going to result in achieving real gains on border security, and you have no border security without the wall. We will have no deal without a wall. The president’s made it very clear, no wall, no deal.”

Will Trump get his way?

[Theland]

I hope Trump wins. Democrats don't mind scum poring into the country because scum vote Democrat.

[jim360]

Who knows who's going to win this? But, in terms of popular support, the Democrats have a more significant mandate than the President does. That has to count for something.

[dannyk13]

No, the Democrats will block it.

[Old_Geezer]

Coincidence, we will have no deal without a wall, as well !

[CallMeDawg]

shame we dont have anybody that knows how to negotiate the right way...

[jim360]

Who is "we" in this context?

If by "we" you mean the UK (re: Brexit), then I am not sure that we should be looking to the current US Congress/President for negotiating tips, since the entire conversation runs:

President: "Give me money for the wall."
Congress: "No."
President: "Give me money for the wall."
Congress: "No."
President: "Give me money for the wall."
Congress: "No."
President: "Give me money for the wall."
Congress: "No."
President: "Give me money for the wall."
Congress: "No."
President: "Give me money for the wall."
Congress: "No."

& c., & c.

[youngmafbog]

"in terms of popular support, the Democrats have a more significant mandate than the President does"

Ah, that old chestnut. The Dems gave The Donald the presidency and still dont get it.

In a way I hope the POTUS doesn't win as it will be used against the dems in the next election and since they still have not done any work on building a new presidential candidate, they will loose again.

[naomi24]

^That's persistence ... as opposed to:

Mrs May: 'Give me a reasonable deal'.

EU, No.

Mrs May, oh, okay then.

[naomi24]

^That to Jim.

[jim360]

I was thinking more about the recent Midterms, YMB, where Democrats took control of the House of Representatives (the effective equivalent of the House of Commons) by a hefty margin. As it happens, the result in 2016 is also vaguely relevant -- the simple fact is that the US President has only ever appealed to a minority -- but it's possible to ignore that and *still* claim, quite correctly, that the Democrats have a mandate to deny the President funding for his wall.

Neither side can really afford to back down. Well, more accurately, Trump *could* have backed down earlier, and probably nobody would have really noticed (least of all his core support). But now he can't. The catch about trying to be a strongman is that *any* sign of weakness destroys that image. Better to be a sensible leader, and accept that there is no support for the wall but still a mandate for other of his policies.

Oh, and in any case, unless people forgot, the Mexicans were going to pay for the wall anyway. So why does he need the US to pay for it?

[Bazile]

jim 360

You forgot

President : ''If you give me money , i'll build a nice wall - it will be a gorgeous wall ''

[youngmafbog]

"the simple fact is that the US President has only ever appealed to a minority"

Really? so you can be POTUS by only appealing to a minority?

Must be nice to live up there in cloud cuckoo land.

[jim360]

No, no, that's not what I meant. I mean that *this* US President, ie, Donald Trump, not every president there has ever been.

[youngmafbog]

The question still remains.

You are implying you can be POTUS by appealing to a minority.

[jim360]

Well, you can be. That's how the Electoral College works -- indeed, if anything, that is how it was designed. A president can win the Electoral College even if he receives only around a quarter of the popular vote. Admittedly this would be in a highly extreme case, and it's more likely to happen on, say, a 45/55 split at most -- but it can, and does, happen that the winning President has a minority of the public backing him.

[youngmafbog]

You have a very strange way of looking at things and choice of words when trying to fit your lefty agenda dont you? I wonder if you will be so vocal about it when the Dems win by a "minority"

Really it still goes back to what I said originally - not that old chestnut again.

[jim360]

I wish I understood what you were going on about. Trump won 42% of the popular vote, and Clinton won 45%. Which of those two numbers is smaller? It's not a "lefty agenda" to point out how arithmetic works. The US system is broken, and that has been true not because Donald Trump won but because it is broken by design. If Clinton had won I would have been pointing out the same thing -- I can quite happily prove that by citing old AB posts, if you like.

[-Talbot-]

jim360 I wish I understood what you were going on about. Trump won 42% of the popular vote, and Clinton won 45%.


Trump wants a border wall/fence call it what you will... so does Clinton.
But shhhhhhhh!

[jim360]

Oh, and while we are at it, let's get any (entirely wrongly) alleged, hypocrisy into perspective: In 2012, in the wake of Obama's second victory, it looked briefly like Obama was going to be the one winning the presidency but losing the popular vote. Trump's response?

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/266038556504494082

In the event, it turned out that Obama won both College and popular vote, so Trump's reaction was based on flawed data. Now, Trump actually *did* pull off that trick. Let's see what he's said about the Electoral College since then, shall we?

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/798521053551140864

https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/811560662853939200

[Khandro]

jim; Trump never backs down, he is a street fighter who has to win, and I'm sure one way or the other, he will get his wall, and if it's statistics you want, you should look at how many US citizens want a stop to illegal immigration, and for that there needs to be a wall.

I read somewhere that Army vets are starting a crowd-funding project to help pay for it too.