In 1969, the band Three Dog Night sang, “One is the loneliest number.”

Newly-crowned NCUA Chairman J. Mark McWatters may soon find out if that's true.

As you may recall, the NCUA board currently has two members – McWatters, a Republican, and Rick Metsger, a Democrat. It's had two members since Debbie Matz resigned last year.

Metsger's term expires on Aug. 2. If President Trump wishes Metsger to stay on until a replacement is confirmed, he may ask him to do so.

Either way, Trump has two vacancies to fill and only one of those selections can be a Republican.

Based on current trends, those vacancies may stay open for quite a while.

The Partnership for Public Service and the Washington Post have been tracking the nomination/confirmation process during the opening months of the Trump Administration.

The results are not pretty.

Looking at 562 key Trump Administration posts, the two organziatoins reported that as of June 28, some 390 positions remained open, with no one nominated to fill them. Only 44 people have had their nominations confirmed.

By comparison, President Obama had 170 people confirmed by the same date.

Obama tried to fill one seat last year when he nominated John Herrera, an officer at Self-Help Credit Union, to serve as a Democratic member on the board. But in the closing months of the administration, Senate Republican leaders were in no mood to confirm any Obama nominees, so the Herrera choice died at the end of last year.

Had he been confirmed, the board would have been left with two Democrats.

There's precedent for a single member on the NCUA board. Both JoAnn Johnson and Dennis Dollar spent some time as the single member.

The Senate isn't scheduled to be in session for the month of August, so if the positions are to be filled, Trump had better get on the stick. The administration has no shortage of interested people and is believed to have a list of possibilities.

And somebody in the administration is paying attention to the NCUA because Trump recently made McWatters the chairman of the board rather than “acting” chairman.

But McWatters and Metsger seem to be getting along swimmingly, so there may not be a huge rush to shake up the board.

On the other hand, McWatters has been talking about “regulatory relief” and may want to do some things that would make Democrat Metsger bristle.

One quick and easy way to accomplish the task might be for the Senate to pair nominations – the Democratic member with the Republican member. The Democrats might get someone they want and the administration might get someone it wants. The Senate could confirm them as a package.

Typically, as the Senate prepares to be out on an extended break, it goes through a process informally known as “wrap up.” It involves taking a huge number of actions by unanimous request.

The Senate might try to confirm NCUA nominees using that process.

But first, nominees must be named and go through the committee confirmation process.

So, don't hold your breath.

Crazy Appropriators

Although his authorship has never been confirmed, supposedly Albert Einstein defined crazy as “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

Based on that definition, Republicans on the House Appropriations Committee might be considered certifiably nuts.

Once again, this year, House Republican appropriators have included plans to neuter the CFPB in the annual Financial Services appropriations bill. This year, they went even further by including several provisions of the Financial CHOICE Act in the spending bill.

Now, the Senate has never agreed to any proposals to diminish the powers of the CFPB during appropriations negotiations. Senate Democrats have already made it clear that they do not want “poison pill” policy riders attached to spending bills.

And the Democrats have the votes to block bills that contain such riders since CFPB opponents don't have the 60 votes needed to ram such proposals through the Senate.

Congress is supposed to have a budget process that involves enactment of 12 separate spending measures divided up among subject areas. Congress hasn't succeeded in enacting those bills in years. Subcommittees and committees produce 12 bills that are then bundled into an omnibus spending bill or Continuing Resolutions to fund the government.

And those bills generally don't include policy riders pushed by House Republicans.

So why do those Republicans think that this year's process will produce bills loaded with policy riders?

Crazy, isn't it?

You Can't Make This Stuff Up

OK, let me see if I've got this straight.

The president of the United States said that established news organizations such as CNN and the Washington Post are fake news.

Then came the revelation from the Washington Post that hanging in Trump's golf clubs is a cover of Time magazine with a photo of Trump. The cover contains the line: “TRUMP IS HITTING ON ALL FRONTS … EVEN TV!”

The issue is dated March 1, 2009.

But the cover is PHONY – produced by some faker.

The folks at Time magazine have asked the president to kindly remove the fake covers from the golf clubs' walls.

Sheesh.

David Baumann is a Correspondent-at-Large for CU Times. He can be reached at [email protected].