…and other fun stuff discovered walking through this new winner wonderland.

Making good on a consistent campaign promise, and in absolute rebuke to the best laid plans of Tom Donohue, the Asian Pacific Nikkei reports:

WASHINGTON — Soon after President Donald Trump was sworn in, his administration announced the U.S. withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade pact championed by former President Barack Obama and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The White House on Friday also wasted no time in declaring a renegotiation of the North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA. (more)

It would appear the economic plan continued before the actual nomination is proceeding according to a well designed plan. The elimination of TPP is a complete rebuke of The Big Club.

But wait, oh it gets better.

For the past six weeks I have been staring at an index card stuck in the middle of our research white board which simply states: “Why Mulvaney?” It’s been nagging at me, because choosing Mick “Cantalopes” Mulvaney for OMB director just didn’t make sense.

Then a friendly cow walked up and licked me square on the face.

My friendly bovine asked three questions:

♦ 1.) “What makes you think President Donald Trump wasn’t aware of the Mulvaney housekeeper issue“? ♦ 2.) “Remember how candidate Trump shot the arrow into the Achilles heel of Bush and Rubio’s Wall Street alignment“? and ♦ 3.) “Isn’t Paul Ryan quite literally, and similarly, attached to the Mulvaney pick”?

After an ah-ha moment I grinningly wiped the slobber from my noggin, and I must now apologize for my one-dimensional-chess, shallow thoughtlessness and previously expressed position.

While it is prudent to hide the smile and wait for the predictably toxic OMB confirmation hearing. In the interest of belaying concern, we might point out the Dem side of the confirmation hearing is not accidentally being led -quite loudly- by Senator Chuck Schumer who would like nothing more than to have a notch on his partisan anti-confirmation belt.

The Senate minority leader needs a win.

Schumer being a New Yorker n’ all – nudge-nudge, wink-wink,.. say no more, say-no-more.

Oh, how the media would gleefully play up such a defeat, and how President Trump would be protesting the loss, almost pearl-clutchy if done just right. The optics of political opposition toward other cabinet appointments necessarily decreases; the dems already carrying a scalp to prove their oppositional bona-fides.

Additionally, considering all the angles, the first Trump budget is due by constitutional requirement to congress by March 31st. The media never held Obama accountable for this deadline, and he missed it in six of the eight years in office. Not a single Obama budget ever passed congress even though Dems controlled the House and Senate for two of those proposals.

Heck, after year #5 in office the media quit even mentioning the absence of an Obama budget, and worse yet the last two fiscal years Obama never even presented a proposal that mattered. Boehner, then Ryan, went along with CR’s, totally eliminated the debt ceiling and passed record setting Omnibus bills.

However, we can easily predict EPIC media protestations if a Trump budget doesn’t meet the legal deadline for submission; and we can only imagine how the media will SCREAM about Trump not having one.

♦ Phase Two – Walking out the play…. brings the OMB Director (Mulvaney or other), and the Paul Ryan budget approval process, immediately into play. If Ryan doesn’t get the Trump budget from fellow consort Mulvaney’s architecture, Ryan’s going to get it from a lesser ideological aligned, non GOPe, OMB director. Interesting paradox.

♦ Phase Three – Most predictably meaning a Trump budget proposal more likely at loggerheads with what Ryan would prefer. Where “loggerheads” is most likely defined as President Trump not spending enough on the stuff which will make Ryan’s Wall Street UniParty lobbyists happy etc.

♦ Phase Four – The above back-and-forth leads to a potential continuing resolution, or impasse of sorts. Which could ultimately mean Trump is in the same non-budget position as Obama, at least in the short-term.

In that “short-term” the president gets to prioritize what aspects of government are funded…. Oh, hurt me. Please don’t throw me in the Briar Patch, please.

…see where this is headed?

Tell me where President Trump loses in all of the assembled variables?

Either Mulvaney is confirmed albeit usefully damaged goods, and as OMB Director complies with Trump’s construction priority, setting up friction with Ryan…. which ends with Trump in control of spending prioritization anyway….. Or, Mulvaney doesn’t pass confirmation, Schumer is happy, and by direct extension Mulvaney’s primary advocate, Paul Ryan, is usefully wounded in the process…. which ends with Trump in control of spending prioritization.