This was a tough choice to make, for a Thursday column. After all, this was a fairly big week in punctuation news, which normally would be catnip for a pedant such as myself. Not only was the president's spokesman trying to use the old "it was in quotes" defense (or should that be the "it was 'in quotes'" defense?), but there was a recent court ruling which actually hinged on the "Oxford comma." The plaintiffs won because they (correctly) argued that absent the final comma in a list, the final two items have to be taken as a single item, at least legally (it hinged on the phrase "loading for transport or delivery" -- which is different than "loading for transport, or delivery"). As you can see, I could easily have gotten a fun (to me, at any rate) column out of those juicy grammatical items alone.

Instead, we turn to the scintillating world of tax returns. Rachel Maddow has gotten some heat for her usual pedantic opening to the scoop on her show, but the only ones really surprised by it seem to be people who have never watched Rachel Maddow ever before. Putting that aside, I thought it'd be fun to go through Trump's 2005 tax return item by item. If that sounds to you like a less exciting prospect than watching paint dry, well then I'd have to advise you to stop reading right this very minute and go do something more interesting (hint: there are lots of very funny cat videos on the internet, for your endless enjoyment). Plus, this is going to be a fairly long article, even for me. You have been duly warned.

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The myth of Paul Ryan is in serious trouble. This was likely inevitable, but it certainly is on stark display in the debate among Republicans over his "Ryancare" bill, which was supposed to be the "repeal and replace Obamacare" answer to all conservatives' dreams. Quite obviously, Ryan's bill fell far short of this lofty goal. It is currently being savaged from all sides within the Republican caucus alone. But beyond the bill's likely failure, the myth surrounding Ryan is also on life support.

The Ryan myth began with a book about three Republican "young guns" who were the best and the brightest of their generation and who seemed destined for leadership positions within the party. Ryan was lauded along with Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy as the future of the Republican Party, but -- importantly -- this was before the Tea Party phenomenon. The phrase "young guns" itself projects a certain cowboy swagger, a manly Reaganesque image of a gun-totin' fighter for the cause. But again, that was before the Tea Party was launched. Nowadays, Ryan doesn't seem to have quite the swagger of a "young gun" anymore, because that role has been co-opted by the Tea Partiers themselves.

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In the hyperkinetic political era we live in, change happens very quickly. President Trump is the driving force behind this increased speed of the political discourse, but Paul Ryan gamely tried to capitalize on the new frenzy by passing his own favored "repeal and replace Obamacare" bill as quickly as humanly possible. He was going to whip it through the House so fast nobody would know what was in the bill, and then the Senate was magically going to refuse to even debate the bill and instead move it directly to the floor for a vote. This would all happen at blinding speed, and then everyone in Congress could go home for the Easter holiday, having already put the bill on Trump's desk. Problem solved!

Instead, it is now looking like Ryan's "Ryancare" bill is going to face a very tough uphill fight, even among his own Republicans. Passage is in no way guaranteed even in Ryan's House, and the prospects of Ryancare emerging from the Senate in its present form is looking vanishingly small. If the Ryancare bill is in serious trouble, what I am now wondering is whether Donald Trump will at some point drop his support for what seems to be a losing proposition. Trump, after all, hates to lose.

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Today was the first reality-check for the Republican goal of health insurance reform since the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was passed. The breathtaking numbers from the Congressional Budget Office just proved what many of us have been saying all along -- this is the first time in the past seven years that Republicans have tried to bring an actual piece of legislation to the floors of Congress for a very good reason. The numbers just don't quite add up the way the GOP has long wished they would. By never writing an actual bill before now, they avoided letting the public in on this crucial bit of information. But now it was "put up or shut up" time, so Republicans were forced to come up with an actual bill. And the C.B.O. just confirmed what Democrats have been saying for a long time -- replacing Obamacare is going to throw millions of Americans off health insurance.

Donald Trump's insistence that "everyone will be covered" has now been proven to be a gigantic lie. Everyone will be covered, except for the 24 million who will lose coverage in the next ten years (starting with 14 million who will lose it next year alone). The number of uninsured Americans will skyrocket from the current 27 million to over 50 million. This won't be because (according to Paul Ryan) they never really wanted health insurance in the first place and would now use their expanded "freedom" to refuse to pay for it -- it will instead be because tens of millions of people will not be able to afford insurance. This was always going to be the reality under a Republican revamp of Obamacare, but now that the C.B.O. has finally been given a chance to run numbers on an actual bill, we can all see just how drastic this is going to be for millions of American families.

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As is becoming the new normal, a ton of things happened in Washington this week. Donald Trump kicked the week off by tweeting out a conspiracy theory, then he rolled out "Muslim Ban 2.0," and by week's end a gigantic fracas within the Republican Party was building to fever pitch. Oh, and that fever will not be covered by the new GOP Obamacare replacement plan, sorry.

But before we get to all the fun, we've got to address a pedantic point. The White House is shrinking in horror from the label "Trumpcare," but if the Republicans ever do manage to pass anything, the label seems inevitable. Trump can decree that the tides stop, but he's going to get swamped in the end. But our point is even more pedantic than that, because while Democrats are gleefully tossing around the Trumpcare label (precisely because it seems to annoy the White House), the biggest pushback so far has been from within the ranks of the Republican Congress. GOP critics of the bill, within the first 24 hours, were already calling it derogatory names (to them) like "Obamacare 2.0" or "Obamacare Lite." But some were pinning the blame directly on Speaker Paul Ryan, and attempted to coin their own new term: "RyanCare."

Here's where we get truly pedantic, because while we do indeed favor naming the bill after the principle mover behind it (for the time being -- because there is plenty of time later to slap Trump's name on it), we must insist on consistency. Therefore, in these pages, we'll be calling it "Ryancare" and not "RyanCare." After all, there is Medicare, Obamacare, and, soon, Trumpcare -- so this capitalization battle has already been fought and won. Mindless grammatical nitpicking aside, though, it's pretty easy to see why any politician would be leery of slapping his name on the new Obamacare replacement bill, because it is so awful.

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That title is not a weak attempt to make a pun on the genetics company "23andMe." It is not a throwback to "23-skidoo." And it's definitely not an attempt to sound like a quarterback calling signals at the line (besides, it's the wrong season for football metaphors). Instead, it represents the three biggest hurdles that Republicans now face in their efforts to dismantle Obamacare.

The first two are actual numbers, unlike (for the moment) the last one. Twenty-two is the number of votes Republicans cannot afford to lose in the House. Likewise, if they lose only three senators, the bill will also fail. So far, Paul Ryan should be worried about both of those numbers. But the biggest headache is going to arrive for Ryan next Monday, when the Congressional Budget Office is slated to release its "score" of the GOP health bill. Because the C.B.O. numbers might just push both the House and the Senate Republicans into open revolt over what was supposed to be their party's signature issue.

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[Program Note: Sorry, no new column today. In anticipation of next Friday, I'm re-running a Paddy's Day column from a few years back. I did check (and update) the final link in this article, because it was the most important one, but haven't checked any of the others, so my apologies if they don't work anymore. Oh, and if you're interested in reading some recent Irish politics, check out this story of the pro-choice protest this week. Otherwise, just sit back and learn why you should never order a "black and tan" in Ireland, as it could save you some severe embarrassment (or worse), should you ever travel there. Regular columns will resume tomorrow.]

Originally published March 15, 2012

I realize I'm a wee bit early for a Saint Patrick's Day column, but tomorrow is our regularly-scheduled Friday Talking Points, and Saturday I will be hoisting a pint of Sir Arthur Guinness' fine product, so we'll just have to make do with today.

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Almost seven years after the passage of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (a.k.a. Obamacare), the Republicans have finally released their much-anticipated replacement bill. They had been content, up until quite recently, to just use "repeal" as a rallying cry without giving a whole lot of thought to replacing Obamacare with anything, and for good reason. No matter whether you agree with them or not, you have to admit that, politically, this tactic worked wonders for them. But now that there's a Republican in the White House again, the pressure was on Paul Ryan to actually show America what Republicans would do differently than Obamacare. Late yesterday, his bill was finally publicly unveiled.

It hasn't even been 24 hours yet, and already the bill is being rhetorically torn to shreds. This would be a normal political reaction, except for the fact that the biggest pushback is coming from Republicans. Democrats are indeed denouncing the bill, but their voices aren't getting as much media coverage as the Republicans who are currently savaging their own party's bill (which, to be honest, is more interesting -- explaining the media's decision to focus on it).

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It's never a dull moment in Donald Trump's White House, and this weekend was certainly no exception. Trump began the weekend early Saturday morning by tweeting out what seemed to be a conspiracy theory. This did precisely what it was intended to do, which was to divert attention from the growing questions about Russian influence in both the Trump campaign and in his administration. Trump was reportedly furious during a Friday meeting that Jeff Sessions had recused himself from the investigation, because to Trump any backing down from any previously-held position is a sign of weakness and not to be tolerated. As dawn broke on Saturday, Trump decided to distract the media by tossing another Twitter hand grenade into the political conversation, and as a result Sessions quickly dropped from the news.

Trump's accusations were breathtaking -- all the more so since he didn't offer the tiniest shred of evidence to back them up. According to Trump, President Barack Obama personally approved wiretapping Trump Tower at the height of the election season. He originally alluded to McCarthy, but then later was apparently counseled that the appropriate political parallel to use was Watergate. Which is more appropriate, since Richard Nixon did all sorts of nefarious things of this nature against his political opponents (see: "enemies list" if you don't remember the term).

Whatever historical analogy you prefer, if Trump was right it would be an abuse of power for Obama to personally order a wiretap on the opposition party's candidate for president in the midst of an election. This would be political misuse of the Justice Department of the highest order. Only problem is, there appears to be absolutely no evidence whatsoever to back up Trump's claim.

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This was supposed to be a good week for Donald Trump. He was going to give a big speech, and he was all set to roll out the 2.0 version of his Muslim ban. As usual in the Trump administration, though, things didn't quite work out as planned.

Trump gave his speech, and because he didn't froth at the mouth or scream at the media, it was deemed his first "presidential" moment. Of course, Trump had offered up a profile in cowardice the morning before his big speech, insisting that the buck not stop anywhere near the Oval Office desk on the botched Yemen raid. First he blamed the generals for "wanting to do" the raid, he tried to blame Barack Obama since the planning "was started before I got here," and then Trump laid all the blame for one soldier's death on "the generals, who are very respected," but who also "lost Ryan." Now just for one moment, imagine what Republicans would say if Hillary Clinton -- or any Democratic president, for that matter -- had said anything even remotely like that. Their indignation would be epic, but when Trump passed this buck, they uttered not a peep.

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