A cooped-up Trump's threats fail to break budget deadlock

[left-of-center2012]

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/12/28/trump-wall-debate-close-border-1076471

Cooped up in the White House after canceling his planned two-week-plus vacation to his private Florida club, Trump is consumed by the shutdown, according to people close to him. And the president is increasingly isolated.
Congress has essentially recessed until the new year,
and First Lady Melania Trump headed back to Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort on Thursday.

The White House’s ratcheted-up rhetoric on Friday has done nothing to move Democratic leaders Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). Democrats barely acknowledged Trump’s latest volley, with a Pelosi spokesman saying Friday that real negotiations won’t begin until the president publicly endorses an offer to reopen the government.

“Democrats have made it clear that, given that the president has changed his position so many times, we would not consider any offers from the White House that the president has not publicly endorsed,” Drew Hammill, Pelosi’s spokesman, said Friday.

Trump spent much of Friday in the West Wing meeting with staff and making calls, according to White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. Trump’s latest apparent ultimatum was a pledge that Trump would close the U.S.-Mexico border if Democrats didn’t come around. He also threatened to cut off aid to Central American countries, saying they “are doing nothing for the United States but taking our money.”

[dhol82]

1. Wonder when he will start talking to the portraits?

[PJMcK]

4. That started a while ago

Lincoln's portrait told Trump to relax and that he should go see a play.

[dhol82]

5. At the Ford Theater?

[PJMcK]

6. Of course!

A revival of “Our American Cousin” is coming to town.

[dhol82]

7. Perfect.

[delisen]

2. Maybe the phone call are to his lawyers.

[Shaddox]

3. Goddamit! I thought u said Trump threatens to break his dreadlocks. Not the Irie Vibe,Donald!