Shutdown Deal Reached; Donald Trump Caves!

With a shutdown deal reached and the US government reopened, how does Donald Trump save face now?

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On Friday — 35 days after the US government was brought to a grinding halt — Donald Trump caved and agreed to a temporary compromise to reopen and fund the federal government through February 15th.  The agreement allowed the government to reopen temporarily so that Democrats could negotiate a legitimate border security deal with Trump without a gun being held to their heads or federal workers being held hostage.

Interestingly, the shutdown deal is the same agreement Democrats offered Trump BEFORE the longest federal furlough in US history and a deal that (had he accepted) could have completely avoided the 35-day calamity altogether.

While Trump held his breath and threw a tantrum in the hopes of getting $5 billion dollars to build a sporadic wall along the US/Mexico border, Democrats remained steadfast that they would not give in to his monument to white supremacy and would not play games with the livelihoods of 800,000 federal workers.  Democratic Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi called ‘The Donald’s’ bluff and formally canceled next week’s planned State of the Union Address due to the shutdown.  She and the Democrats even remained unified and kept blame for the shutdown directed firmly at The White House.

As the shutdown entered its 35th day, Donald Trump’s options had dwindled to nothing.  He and the Republicans were recipients of a bloody beatdown in public opinion polls for taking the US government hostage just to win a policy decision.  Democrats were adamant that they would not and could not cave to Trump and hand him a “weapon” (shutting down the government) to use any time he didn’t get his way.  Several cabinet members and even a Trump family member took to television and appeared tone-deaf to the suffering unpaid federal workers were enduring. Then, all hell broke loose.

By Friday morning, airports across the country had come to a standstill.  Unpaid air traffic controllers simply stopped showing up to work for free, causing stranded passengers to sit on airport tarmacs for 2+ hour delays.  Flights were suspended and/or canceled.  The air traffic controllers union admitted its members were stressed over the possibility of personal financial ruin, which inadvertently created a safety hazard in the sky.  Conservative Americans across the country were calling their representatives and complaining that they were beginning to feel the pain.  Trump’s temper tantrum wasn’t working.

With no other option left, Trump was forced to accept a government shutdown deal, return federal workers back to work, agree to back pay for the 2 weeks these workers went unpaid, and prepare himself for the wrath he almost immediately began to face from his base and conservative media personalities who are livid that GOP nemesis Nancy Pelosi (of all people) was able to beat Trump at his own game.

Now, conservatives and Trump lovers are losing their minds that ‘The Donald’ got “Trumped!”

“I’m disgusted. There’s no other way to put it,” conservative blogger Mike Cernovich said upon learning that the government had reopened without Trump’s wall.

“I don’t like to be lied to,” he added. “Just say I’m not going to build the wall.  I’m a coward.  I don’t have what it takes.”

Controversial conservative media darling Ann Coulter also weighed in, calling Trump a “wimp.”

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Good news for George Herbert Walker Bush: As of today, he is no longer the biggest wimp ever to serve as President of the United States.

— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) January 25, 2019

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This is undoubtedly the weakest moment of President Trump’s tenure in office. He handed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi a win by agreeing to postpone the State of the Union address and handed her a second win by caving on the government shutdown. The president may be the commander-in-chief of the American military, but Nancy Pelosi now looks like the commander-in-chief of Donald Trump. He has upset his relationship with Republicans just before the Mueller report comes out and on the day Roger Stone gets hauled off to jail. – USA Today

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Let’s be frank:  Donald Trump lost on all fronts here.  He lost the $1.5 billion dollar deal he was offered before the shutdown occurred.  He (twice) lost a political stare-down with the hated House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.  He lost the support of a number of congressional Republicans and an unknown quantity of his base for staging a standoff that, in the end, left him with nothing to show for it.

Now, ‘The Donald’ and the Democrats have 3 weeks to find a permanent solution to Trump’s continuing demand for $5 billion dollars for a border wall — or else we could be back to square one.

Trump has threatened that he continues to hold a “Trump-card” in his back pocket and could still declare a national emergency to build the wall anyway.  However, if he was serious about playing that card, he would have done so by now.  Additionally, if there really was a national emergency at the US/Mexico border, it would be nonsensical and a national threat to wait for 3 weeks and not sound that alarm until the temporary funding bill expires.

Could it be that Donald Trump is fibbing in yet another feeble attempt to get his way?

Oh, say it ain’t so!

OK WASSUP! discusses the Top News Today:
Shutdown deal reached; Trump reopens the US government.