Fast tracking US citizenship (EB-5) by investing your ill-gotten wealth has made any remaining campaign finance regulation almost irrelevant. Get your dual citizenship in 5years and then you’re free to donate to your favorite Super PAC or better yet, create your own. No regulation (it’s free speech right?) and little transparency. And it’s 100% legal. Thanks GOP appointments to Supreme Court for selling out our democracy. We are in a world of hurt.
Why is MikeJohnson seemingly lacking the understanding that aid to our allies is for National Security. A hot war in Europe and we need to replenish our stockpiles. This isn’t some fluff money. This is our border. We need to produce goods for ourselves. We gave Ukraine items that were decommissioned that was a wash financially to our military budget and he cannot grasp the boarder includes not just TX. He tanked the border bill. A good bill created with a right leaning Republican at the helm. No checking account and he goes on vacation leaving our National Security in a deadlock. I never liked Regan. But I never once lost sleep worrying about stockpile and support of our allies. He disappoints. Liz Cheney said it perfectly. tfg will be gone some day and dishonor will remain with him
XGirl, it's not that Johnson is "lacking the understanding," it's that he's more concerned with keeping his Speaker's job - if he even calls a vote on the bipartisan bill, the crazy eight (Gaetz & Co.) will bring down his speakership (like they did to McCarthy) and Johnson is willing to let the country and the world go to hell as long as he keeps his job (and stays on the good side of Trump, who wants NO DEAL because he thinks it'll help him in Nov.
I'm old enough to remember JFK's "Ask not ..." but today's political mantra is "me, me, me"
Imagine people in the future reading about the Trump Era and shaking their heads: how could they let it happen? Something like when we read about Germany in the 1930s.
Love thine enemies and the trounce them soundly by magnifying the Democratic voice however you can. Every little bit hurts. The South Carolina Primary shows Trump’s weakness. A whole lot of Repubs just won’t vote for the flaming madman anymore. After a while the insanity just goes too far.
I'm not as optimistic as you, Robert. Hitler's 1932 "Make Germany Great Again" campaign unleashed the horror of fascism on Germany and the world. Insanity + Power can have a long long run, and doesn't end well.
This ugly Trumpism has to be stopped dead in its track with a massive Blue turnout in November, or else the insanity will linger. Sure he's a flaming madman, but he's got a flaming crazy cult following - which wouldn't be enough to win, except that this time around the Dems are fractured (Palestine!) and there are enough 3rd party candidates to squeak in the flaming madman. Color me nervous, scared, terrified - but I see Germany 1932 replaying in America 2024. And every time history repeats itself, the cost goes up.
Trump, once in the White House will insist on cleaning up election “fraud”. That will take years and years if not decades for him( only he can fix it) to do, it will always be just around the corner.
R states will not hold elections at his insistence. The Supreme Court will complain, but then will come up with some “originalism” ruling confirming Trump’s dictatorship.
And there, the greatest democracy in history will disappear with a whimper undone by a lazy ignorant mendacious loser.
Now I’m hearing a new story from those same GOP insiders (as well as other commentators) about Trump’s schemes for 2024. Here’s what I’m hearing Republicans are planning in the event Joe Biden wins re-election and Democrats hold the Senate and take the House this November:
First, Republicans need to make sure they’re in control of the House of Representatives on January 6th, 2024, when the new president will be certified.
To do that, even though Democrats might have won enough seats to take back the House in the 2024 election, Speaker Johnson will refuse to swear into Congress on January 3rd a handful of those Democrats, claiming there are “irregularities” in their elections that must be first investigated.
Consider that Johnson is still refusing to swear in Tom Suozzi (who recently won George Santos’ old seat), something Johnson apparently did to maintain enough Republican-majority votes to impeach Alejandro Mayorkas. (Johnson says they’ll swear him in this coming Thursday, but nobody’s holding their breath.)
Like Mitch McConnell withholding Merrick Garland’s nomination to the Supreme Court for over a year, withholding certification of a handful of Democrats would be easy, legal, and completely immoral. There’s nothing Democrats can legally do to stop Speaker Johnson from pulling this off: he can postpone swearing a member in for as long as he wants.
That keeps Speaker “MAGA Moscow Mike” Johnson in charge of the House, so they can also refuse to accept the Electoral College certificates of election from a handful of states where they claim there are “problems.”
Keep in mind, Johnson was the guy who organized the wave of 138 House members who voted not to certify Joe Biden’s election in January of 2020. That’s why Trump wanted him as speaker.
Elise Stefanik, the number 3 person in House Republican leadership, has already refused to say whether she’d vote to certify the presidential election results this November.
Others, like Kentucky Republican Congressman Thomas Massie, are repeatedly mentioning their belief that the House gets to decide who’s president, not the people or even the Electoral College. As Massie posted on X:
So, does anyone have a comment about this. Is this a product of Thom's active imagination or a really possible way he thinks they are planning on trying to pull off the next overthrow. It is so simple that nobody would expect this. Trump distracts the media, the shills do the dirty deeds. And we all know who the shills are, don't we? Someone reassure me this could never happen in reality in the US, please?
Jan.6 already happened, and the leader of the Republican Party not only incited it, but continues to praise the "patriots" who openly tried to overthrow a duly elected president; then there's the whole "fake electors" scheme; and on and on. Sure this can happen here.
Only a massive Blue turnout in Nov will flush these traitors down the toilet - so that's Mission Critical Job Number One. Or America is fucked.
Remember, Hitler was ELECTED in 1932 (on a platform of "Make Germany Great Again") he had his enablers and apologists and industrial backers and mobs of disciples - just like Trump & MAGA today - and we all know how that turned out.
Half of America is lost in the Trump Trance, and the rest of America? Well, someone better ring the Alarm Bell, or God help us all.
Hmmm. I get it. It’s kinda scary. Look, that Trump is going down in flames right now is my only consolation. I have a real sense he is finished, but if the house won’t certify we have a shit show of epic proportions.
The Republican acolytes are going deeper in their “let’s do nothing and see if they’ll notice” legislative style. They figure their constituents are so unhinged and focused on the golden words of Herr Dumpkoft that now’s the time to go full-bore MAGA. And it seems to be working for them.
The crazies at CPAC were projectile vomiting some of the most heinous, unAmerican plans to inflict pain on Dems over tRump’s 50 year reign. I know there’s that freedom of speech thing that allows them to speak openly with forked tongues. But there has got to be someway to gag them. So why can’t ball gags be marketed and sold. We’ll tell them that they are “original reproductions” of tRump’s personal favorite personally drooled on by the future “dick-tater” for a day.
SCOTUS has been rewriting history with their wild interpretations of the Constitution, ignoring decades of legal precedents and just pulling decisions our of their favorite oligarch’s ass.
It’s a free exchange of oppressive ideas wrapped in pages from the Bible.
In 1935, as Hitler was gaining traction in Europe, Nobel Prize winner Sinclair Lewis wrote "When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.”
A great book, It Can't Happen Here, which I read last year. Lewis was modeling the scenario on an FDR challenge from his left by the demagogue Huey Long in '36 (FDR tried to balance the budget prematurely and the Great Depression was raging on). Huey Long got assassinated after the book was in the works, so that's a fork we never took.
How a person can run house without even having the ability to run a checking account is keeping me awake at night. Me think his big boy footprints don’t match his paws in birth certificate.
Rick, Thom Hartmann published this newsletter today. If you have time to give it a quick look, I would like your opinion on this scheme that Republicans are working on in the event that Joe Biden wins the next election, and Democrats have a majority in Congress. It makes my stomach turn, but it’s a distinct possibility, in my opinion, because these people are out of their freaking minds. Also note that Tom Suozzi still has not been sworn in. Holy MAGA Mike (who is actually the embodiment of Satan) pledged to do it this Thursday, but we still don’t know if that will happen.
Yikes. If Johnsonless doesn't swear in Suozzi by Thursday, a five alarm has to go off in the pro-democracy community. Hartmann's right -- only a resounding public outcry can even begin to hope to stop this ultimate nightmare scenario.
My favorite: New shit has come to light! I think of that phrase every day as I watch this Republican Congress fall all over themselves, like people with two left feet. But supposedly they have a plan to undo everything if they don’t like the election results.
I'm a huge Coen bros fan and The Big Lebowski is in my top tier (so many of them are so good). But it was absurd and diverting, the product of a different time, portraying an even earlier time, the Poppy Bush years.
Agreed!! I put nothing past these crazed people. They know they cannot win elections, and they will do whatever they can to stay in power. Thom Hartmann predicted the insurrection before anyone even thought about it. Eight months before Biden was elected in 2020, Hartman laid out what he thought Trump and his cronies would do, and he was completely right about it.
And this is hardly like it's beneath them or anything. Or like they haven't _openly talked about it._ But right now we have bigger fish to fry with the looming shutdown. If Johnson lets / makes that happen, there's more than enough media juice in this rotten lemon to squeeze out their future plans.
Even the New York Times may have to take notice, LOL
Charlie Sykes (I was gutted when he left The Bulwark) coined clowns with chainsaws. Respectfully, Rick, I like that one a little better. Guignol Gates is more a clown who likes to exploit children than a child himself.
And yet, and yet....how many of these imbecilic Trump-barnacles will get tossed out by their voters this November? Very few. Marjorie "Counterexample to evolution" Taylor Green is apparently quite popular in her district. Which means there's a district in Georgia where a majority of the voters are Stupid, Evil, Lazy and/or Crazy. And there's LOTS of districts like that! We don't have a Congress problem, we have a voter problem.
I'm a fierce opponent of bothsiderism and false equivalencies, but this is a problem that goes deeper than political ideology. Our public education system has been allowed to atrophy to the point that it's doing a terrible job of teaching critical thinking skills (let alone the basics). Throw social media into that mix and it's just a nightmare. Hey, you can productively use social media to gain new information. But you have to be educated first.
There will be no new magic sparkle pony. We have to save ourselves.
agreed, "we have to save ourselves." Long term, so much to do, but short term there's 5-Alarm Red-Alert Emergency: defeating Trumpism at the ballot box - and that depends completely on a massive Blue turnout. The victory has to be overwhelming and resounding, or else we'll have another "rigged" "stolen" mess. This year is America's (last) chance to flush Trumpism into the dustbin of history - that's how I see the mandate "to save ourselves."
We've always had a voter problem thanks to the magic of gerrymandering. We had districts like that with nut clusters since the Dems crushed the House in '18, something which is getting more sure by the day we'll do again this year.
During the SuperBowl jets soared overhead with red-white-and-blue contrails while the crowd sang with heart-crossing tearful-glee about the glorious USofA.
But next day it's "what a shithole our country is under Biden."
For some reason the logic-based among us can't fathom, Mike and the MAGAs have convinced themselves that if the republicans shut down the government, the non-lunatic world will view it as a Biden disaster. That's certainly Trump's motivation. It's like no matter how many times these loons touch the hot stove, they think this time it won't burn.
I HOPE the Biden campaign and other pro-democracy organizations *cough Lincoln Project* have their attack ads ready to go, and hang that giant bell around Mikey's neck.
Janet in NC writes: "For some reason the logic-based among us can't fathom ..."
We can't fathom MAGA because they don't run on logic, they run of emotion - mainly resentment and anger and hate, all stirred up and kept boiling at a fever pitch by FOX and company.
No surprise 64% of Trump's primary voters in SC were "angry" about the way the country was being run.
My wife suggested they might want to spend a few weeks in Gaza; they'd come running home to the USA with gratitude.
How did this get so fucked up? I in my life have never heard of such a case that a few criminals,and I am being polite here, can hold our entire life in their grubby paws and there is no way out of their madness??? That is an issue that we as a country MUST change at all costs. Democracy is at stake but unless there are intelligent clear headed leaders that are our elected officials in Congress Democracy as we know it is dead regardless. Even during the Nixon criminality years cooler heads prevailed and coul;d and did do the right thing for our Country. Now the MAGAT hordes that the mostly unintelligent south elected are carrying guns and chainsaws into our chambers of government.
How besides waiting for the election cycle to hopefully resolve the "Idiocy" factor may we stop at least some of this??? I am all ears people who are a lot more experienced than Me.
I think the ONLY way this madness gets resolved is through a MASSIVE Blue turnout at the ballot box. All attention and effort should be focused on turnout. The abortion issue could bring a major turnout ( especially for women, of all ages - come on Taylor Swift) and getting abortion on state ballot initiatives could drive that turnout.
As for MAGA, there's no cure for stupidity, no escape from cults, but they've peaked out and can only lose voters, but with 3rd party candidates scooping up some Dems, there's no room for complacency.
America's only hope to escape Trump's neo-fascist hordes is through a Bluenami in November. It's Mission Critical, Job Number One.
Did you see Janet (CO)'s post at the time of the thread? Read Thom Hartmann's piece. Johnsonless could just refuse to swear in enough new Democratic House members to keep the majority, no matter what the vote totals. It's totally immoral and reprehensible, but apparently not illegal or unconstitutional. The House can run its elections as it likes.
That is the nightmare scenario. We're not only gonna need a Bluenami, we're also going to need a massive public education campaign about this starting right now. Public outcry might be our only thin reed of hope at this point.
I've been arguing for a national deprogramming initiative for a while now. That's the only way the average MAGA will be persuaded away from the Cult of Trump.
I love Wilson alluding to something rarely pointed out in the mainstream media, mistaking trump's drug fueled mania for actual work, which is the fact that trump is nothing if not lazy as hell. Of course, he couldn't do the actual work of a House speaker and therefore needs a factotum to push along his diabolical agendas; the man spent his "executive time" channel surfing for mentions and gossiping on the phone before emerging for a boxed McDonald's lunch and on a good day, a trip to a rally to keep his bloated yet voracious ego satiated.
I had to laugh at his claim that his indictments are a form of election interference even though there are charges that were being investigated long before he declared a very premature run for the seat he supposedly never lost. This is a man who is so needy of sustained worship that he is the first president in history to campaign throughout his presidency, after losing and now "officially". I guess by that measure anything that has happened to possibly thwart him over a decade can be described as 'election interference."
As for gremlin Johnson, he is basically a lawn ornament being trampled by the nihilists shooting croquet balls over his head. If he was chosen by God and not the inability of the GOP caucus to elect a functioning speaker leading them to throw up their hands with a hearty "what the hell - someone has to take the blame, might as well be a seditious back bencher." we've yet to see evidence of the Almighty's wisdom in his wretched performance.
The bottom line is that the Republicans are doing their best to make trump's wishes come true ie that the earth stand still until he somehow slithers back into his winter White House to invoke holy hell on the Constitution, separation of powers and foreign affairs. Given his last few months in office where he tried to stuff every unqualified loyalist he could into pre-insurrection/set up jobs, one can only imagine the crew he would put in this time around, a who's who of cranks, incompetents and ambitious sociopaths of every stripe. There are hints in his incoherent babblings and they are not reassuring.
At least at long last, the mainstream press appears to be slowly waking up to the fact that his walnut sized brain is in free fall. Hence the "rubber/glue" narrative about Biden's cognition, which appears to be perfectly fine according to those who interact with him including world leaders, all of whom minus the dictators, are in a state imagining the horror movie sequel, trump II.
Definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
The pending government shut down in (checks notes) 4 days seems to be in the category of the boy who cried wolf: There is no believing a liar, even when he speaks the truth.
Aesop tells us the story of a boy who vexes the villagers again and again by crying “Wolf!” even though there was none only to watch them rushing to help. He learns his lesson when it is too late: There is no believing a liar, even when he speaks the truth.
Fast tracking US citizenship (EB-5) by investing your ill-gotten wealth has made any remaining campaign finance regulation almost irrelevant. Get your dual citizenship in 5years and then you’re free to donate to your favorite Super PAC or better yet, create your own. No regulation (it’s free speech right?) and little transparency. And it’s 100% legal. Thanks GOP appointments to Supreme Court for selling out our democracy. We are in a world of hurt.
Why is MikeJohnson seemingly lacking the understanding that aid to our allies is for National Security. A hot war in Europe and we need to replenish our stockpiles. This isn’t some fluff money. This is our border. We need to produce goods for ourselves. We gave Ukraine items that were decommissioned that was a wash financially to our military budget and he cannot grasp the boarder includes not just TX. He tanked the border bill. A good bill created with a right leaning Republican at the helm. No checking account and he goes on vacation leaving our National Security in a deadlock. I never liked Regan. But I never once lost sleep worrying about stockpile and support of our allies. He disappoints. Liz Cheney said it perfectly. tfg will be gone some day and dishonor will remain with him
XGirl, it's not that Johnson is "lacking the understanding," it's that he's more concerned with keeping his Speaker's job - if he even calls a vote on the bipartisan bill, the crazy eight (Gaetz & Co.) will bring down his speakership (like they did to McCarthy) and Johnson is willing to let the country and the world go to hell as long as he keeps his job (and stays on the good side of Trump, who wants NO DEAL because he thinks it'll help him in Nov.
I'm old enough to remember JFK's "Ask not ..." but today's political mantra is "me, me, me"
Imagine people in the future reading about the Trump Era and shaking their heads: how could they let it happen? Something like when we read about Germany in the 1930s.
A sad chapter in American history for sure.
Love thine enemies and the trounce them soundly by magnifying the Democratic voice however you can. Every little bit hurts. The South Carolina Primary shows Trump’s weakness. A whole lot of Repubs just won’t vote for the flaming madman anymore. After a while the insanity just goes too far.
I'm not as optimistic as you, Robert. Hitler's 1932 "Make Germany Great Again" campaign unleashed the horror of fascism on Germany and the world. Insanity + Power can have a long long run, and doesn't end well.
This ugly Trumpism has to be stopped dead in its track with a massive Blue turnout in November, or else the insanity will linger. Sure he's a flaming madman, but he's got a flaming crazy cult following - which wouldn't be enough to win, except that this time around the Dems are fractured (Palestine!) and there are enough 3rd party candidates to squeak in the flaming madman. Color me nervous, scared, terrified - but I see Germany 1932 replaying in America 2024. And every time history repeats itself, the cost goes up.
Trump, once in the White House will insist on cleaning up election “fraud”. That will take years and years if not decades for him( only he can fix it) to do, it will always be just around the corner.
R states will not hold elections at his insistence. The Supreme Court will complain, but then will come up with some “originalism” ruling confirming Trump’s dictatorship.
And there, the greatest democracy in history will disappear with a whimper undone by a lazy ignorant mendacious loser.
Amazing.
We will not let it, though, will we. We will hold the wall. It’s up to us.
Historian Tim Snyder wrote (in On Tyranny) that "any election can be the last."
I just read a shocking article in Thom Hartman's Substack.
https://hartmannreport.com/p/the-new-over-the-top-secret-plan-518?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=302288&post_id=142011165&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=3g44z&open=false&utm_medium=email
Now I’m hearing a new story from those same GOP insiders (as well as other commentators) about Trump’s schemes for 2024. Here’s what I’m hearing Republicans are planning in the event Joe Biden wins re-election and Democrats hold the Senate and take the House this November:
First, Republicans need to make sure they’re in control of the House of Representatives on January 6th, 2024, when the new president will be certified.
To do that, even though Democrats might have won enough seats to take back the House in the 2024 election, Speaker Johnson will refuse to swear into Congress on January 3rd a handful of those Democrats, claiming there are “irregularities” in their elections that must be first investigated.
Consider that Johnson is still refusing to swear in Tom Suozzi (who recently won George Santos’ old seat), something Johnson apparently did to maintain enough Republican-majority votes to impeach Alejandro Mayorkas. (Johnson says they’ll swear him in this coming Thursday, but nobody’s holding their breath.)
Like Mitch McConnell withholding Merrick Garland’s nomination to the Supreme Court for over a year, withholding certification of a handful of Democrats would be easy, legal, and completely immoral. There’s nothing Democrats can legally do to stop Speaker Johnson from pulling this off: he can postpone swearing a member in for as long as he wants.
That keeps Speaker “MAGA Moscow Mike” Johnson in charge of the House, so they can also refuse to accept the Electoral College certificates of election from a handful of states where they claim there are “problems.”
Keep in mind, Johnson was the guy who organized the wave of 138 House members who voted not to certify Joe Biden’s election in January of 2020. That’s why Trump wanted him as speaker.
Elise Stefanik, the number 3 person in House Republican leadership, has already refused to say whether she’d vote to certify the presidential election results this November.
Others, like Kentucky Republican Congressman Thomas Massie, are repeatedly mentioning their belief that the House gets to decide who’s president, not the people or even the Electoral College. As Massie posted on X:
More here:
https://hartmannreport.com/p/the-new-over-the-top-secret-plan-518?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=302288&post_id=142011165&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=3g44z&open=false&utm_medium=email
So, does anyone have a comment about this. Is this a product of Thom's active imagination or a really possible way he thinks they are planning on trying to pull off the next overthrow. It is so simple that nobody would expect this. Trump distracts the media, the shills do the dirty deeds. And we all know who the shills are, don't we? Someone reassure me this could never happen in reality in the US, please?
sure this could indeed happen in today's USA.
Jan.6 already happened, and the leader of the Republican Party not only incited it, but continues to praise the "patriots" who openly tried to overthrow a duly elected president; then there's the whole "fake electors" scheme; and on and on. Sure this can happen here.
Only a massive Blue turnout in Nov will flush these traitors down the toilet - so that's Mission Critical Job Number One. Or America is fucked.
Remember, Hitler was ELECTED in 1932 (on a platform of "Make Germany Great Again") he had his enablers and apologists and industrial backers and mobs of disciples - just like Trump & MAGA today - and we all know how that turned out.
Half of America is lost in the Trump Trance, and the rest of America? Well, someone better ring the Alarm Bell, or God help us all.
Hmmm. I get it. It’s kinda scary. Look, that Trump is going down in flames right now is my only consolation. I have a real sense he is finished, but if the house won’t certify we have a shit show of epic proportions.
The Republican acolytes are going deeper in their “let’s do nothing and see if they’ll notice” legislative style. They figure their constituents are so unhinged and focused on the golden words of Herr Dumpkoft that now’s the time to go full-bore MAGA. And it seems to be working for them.
The crazies at CPAC were projectile vomiting some of the most heinous, unAmerican plans to inflict pain on Dems over tRump’s 50 year reign. I know there’s that freedom of speech thing that allows them to speak openly with forked tongues. But there has got to be someway to gag them. So why can’t ball gags be marketed and sold. We’ll tell them that they are “original reproductions” of tRump’s personal favorite personally drooled on by the future “dick-tater” for a day.
SCOTUS has been rewriting history with their wild interpretations of the Constitution, ignoring decades of legal precedents and just pulling decisions our of their favorite oligarch’s ass.
It’s a free exchange of oppressive ideas wrapped in pages from the Bible.
In 1935, as Hitler was gaining traction in Europe, Nobel Prize winner Sinclair Lewis wrote "When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross.”
A great book, It Can't Happen Here, which I read last year. Lewis was modeling the scenario on an FDR challenge from his left by the demagogue Huey Long in '36 (FDR tried to balance the budget prematurely and the Great Depression was raging on). Huey Long got assassinated after the book was in the works, so that's a fork we never took.
A review of Lewis's "It Can't Happen Here" was my first post when I started my Substack newsletter:
https://neofascism.substack.com/p/it-cant-happen-here
And it sure CAN happen here!
I just commented on it in your substack. Good review ;)
How a person can run house without even having the ability to run a checking account is keeping me awake at night. Me think his big boy footprints don’t match his paws in birth certificate.
Rick, Thom Hartmann published this newsletter today. If you have time to give it a quick look, I would like your opinion on this scheme that Republicans are working on in the event that Joe Biden wins the next election, and Democrats have a majority in Congress. It makes my stomach turn, but it’s a distinct possibility, in my opinion, because these people are out of their freaking minds. Also note that Tom Suozzi still has not been sworn in. Holy MAGA Mike (who is actually the embodiment of Satan) pledged to do it this Thursday, but we still don’t know if that will happen.
Here is the link:
https://open.substack.com/pub/thomhartmann/p/the-new-over-the-top-secret-plan-518?r=2vk1c6&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
this is some very scary shit; and yet, history teaches us that insanity can indeed achieve political power.
If this was a chapter in a history book, we'd all be shaking our heads and asking: how could they let this happen?
Yikes. If Johnsonless doesn't swear in Suozzi by Thursday, a five alarm has to go off in the pro-democracy community. Hartmann's right -- only a resounding public outcry can even begin to hope to stop this ultimate nightmare scenario.
My favorite: New shit has come to light! I think of that phrase every day as I watch this Republican Congress fall all over themselves, like people with two left feet. But supposedly they have a plan to undo everything if they don’t like the election results.
I'm a huge Coen bros fan and The Big Lebowski is in my top tier (so many of them are so good). But it was absurd and diverting, the product of a different time, portraying an even earlier time, the Poppy Bush years.
This is as serious as brain cancer.
Nothing is beneath them, and that’s the whole problem right there.
I feel like Walter Sobchak at the bowling alley with The Dude:
"Am I the only one around here who gives a shit about the rules?"
Love that movie. 😊
Nihilists, Donnie. Fuck me. Say what you will about the tenets of National Socialism, at least it was an ETHOS.
Or my other favorite (and I can quote 'em for days):
Three thousand years of beautiful tradition from Moses to Sandy Koufax.
Agreed!! I put nothing past these crazed people. They know they cannot win elections, and they will do whatever they can to stay in power. Thom Hartmann predicted the insurrection before anyone even thought about it. Eight months before Biden was elected in 2020, Hartman laid out what he thought Trump and his cronies would do, and he was completely right about it.
And this is hardly like it's beneath them or anything. Or like they haven't _openly talked about it._ But right now we have bigger fish to fry with the looming shutdown. If Johnson lets / makes that happen, there's more than enough media juice in this rotten lemon to squeeze out their future plans.
Even the New York Times may have to take notice, LOL
Charlie Sykes (I was gutted when he left The Bulwark) coined clowns with chainsaws. Respectfully, Rick, I like that one a little better. Guignol Gates is more a clown who likes to exploit children than a child himself.
Oh my utter bad. Charlie's was clowns with flamethrowers, making children with chainsaws a valid parallelism (with a nice alliteration). Carry on ...
And yet, and yet....how many of these imbecilic Trump-barnacles will get tossed out by their voters this November? Very few. Marjorie "Counterexample to evolution" Taylor Green is apparently quite popular in her district. Which means there's a district in Georgia where a majority of the voters are Stupid, Evil, Lazy and/or Crazy. And there's LOTS of districts like that! We don't have a Congress problem, we have a voter problem.
and if there isn't a massive Blue turnout, then there's also a serious "voter problem" on the left.
I'm a fierce opponent of bothsiderism and false equivalencies, but this is a problem that goes deeper than political ideology. Our public education system has been allowed to atrophy to the point that it's doing a terrible job of teaching critical thinking skills (let alone the basics). Throw social media into that mix and it's just a nightmare. Hey, you can productively use social media to gain new information. But you have to be educated first.
There will be no new magic sparkle pony. We have to save ourselves.
agreed, "we have to save ourselves." Long term, so much to do, but short term there's 5-Alarm Red-Alert Emergency: defeating Trumpism at the ballot box - and that depends completely on a massive Blue turnout. The victory has to be overwhelming and resounding, or else we'll have another "rigged" "stolen" mess. This year is America's (last) chance to flush Trumpism into the dustbin of history - that's how I see the mandate "to save ourselves."
We've always had a voter problem thanks to the magic of gerrymandering. We had districts like that with nut clusters since the Dems crushed the House in '18, something which is getting more sure by the day we'll do again this year.
Media: “GOP mavericks stick it out for fiscal responsibility. Details at ten.”
Commercial: “The economy is in bad shape and Biden is asleep at the wheel. Buy gold!”
During the SuperBowl jets soared overhead with red-white-and-blue contrails while the crowd sang with heart-crossing tearful-glee about the glorious USofA.
But next day it's "what a shithole our country is under Biden."
For some reason the logic-based among us can't fathom, Mike and the MAGAs have convinced themselves that if the republicans shut down the government, the non-lunatic world will view it as a Biden disaster. That's certainly Trump's motivation. It's like no matter how many times these loons touch the hot stove, they think this time it won't burn.
I HOPE the Biden campaign and other pro-democracy organizations *cough Lincoln Project* have their attack ads ready to go, and hang that giant bell around Mikey's neck.
Janet in NC writes: "For some reason the logic-based among us can't fathom ..."
We can't fathom MAGA because they don't run on logic, they run of emotion - mainly resentment and anger and hate, all stirred up and kept boiling at a fever pitch by FOX and company.
No surprise 64% of Trump's primary voters in SC were "angry" about the way the country was being run.
My wife suggested they might want to spend a few weeks in Gaza; they'd come running home to the USA with gratitude.
How did this get so fucked up? I in my life have never heard of such a case that a few criminals,and I am being polite here, can hold our entire life in their grubby paws and there is no way out of their madness??? That is an issue that we as a country MUST change at all costs. Democracy is at stake but unless there are intelligent clear headed leaders that are our elected officials in Congress Democracy as we know it is dead regardless. Even during the Nixon criminality years cooler heads prevailed and coul;d and did do the right thing for our Country. Now the MAGAT hordes that the mostly unintelligent south elected are carrying guns and chainsaws into our chambers of government.
How besides waiting for the election cycle to hopefully resolve the "Idiocy" factor may we stop at least some of this??? I am all ears people who are a lot more experienced than Me.
I think the ONLY way this madness gets resolved is through a MASSIVE Blue turnout at the ballot box. All attention and effort should be focused on turnout. The abortion issue could bring a major turnout ( especially for women, of all ages - come on Taylor Swift) and getting abortion on state ballot initiatives could drive that turnout.
As for MAGA, there's no cure for stupidity, no escape from cults, but they've peaked out and can only lose voters, but with 3rd party candidates scooping up some Dems, there's no room for complacency.
America's only hope to escape Trump's neo-fascist hordes is through a Bluenami in November. It's Mission Critical, Job Number One.
Otherwise, fugedaboudit.
Did you see Janet (CO)'s post at the time of the thread? Read Thom Hartmann's piece. Johnsonless could just refuse to swear in enough new Democratic House members to keep the majority, no matter what the vote totals. It's totally immoral and reprehensible, but apparently not illegal or unconstitutional. The House can run its elections as it likes.
That is the nightmare scenario. We're not only gonna need a Bluenami, we're also going to need a massive public education campaign about this starting right now. Public outcry might be our only thin reed of hope at this point.
I've been arguing for a national deprogramming initiative for a while now. That's the only way the average MAGA will be persuaded away from the Cult of Trump.
I love Wilson alluding to something rarely pointed out in the mainstream media, mistaking trump's drug fueled mania for actual work, which is the fact that trump is nothing if not lazy as hell. Of course, he couldn't do the actual work of a House speaker and therefore needs a factotum to push along his diabolical agendas; the man spent his "executive time" channel surfing for mentions and gossiping on the phone before emerging for a boxed McDonald's lunch and on a good day, a trip to a rally to keep his bloated yet voracious ego satiated.
I had to laugh at his claim that his indictments are a form of election interference even though there are charges that were being investigated long before he declared a very premature run for the seat he supposedly never lost. This is a man who is so needy of sustained worship that he is the first president in history to campaign throughout his presidency, after losing and now "officially". I guess by that measure anything that has happened to possibly thwart him over a decade can be described as 'election interference."
As for gremlin Johnson, he is basically a lawn ornament being trampled by the nihilists shooting croquet balls over his head. If he was chosen by God and not the inability of the GOP caucus to elect a functioning speaker leading them to throw up their hands with a hearty "what the hell - someone has to take the blame, might as well be a seditious back bencher." we've yet to see evidence of the Almighty's wisdom in his wretched performance.
The bottom line is that the Republicans are doing their best to make trump's wishes come true ie that the earth stand still until he somehow slithers back into his winter White House to invoke holy hell on the Constitution, separation of powers and foreign affairs. Given his last few months in office where he tried to stuff every unqualified loyalist he could into pre-insurrection/set up jobs, one can only imagine the crew he would put in this time around, a who's who of cranks, incompetents and ambitious sociopaths of every stripe. There are hints in his incoherent babblings and they are not reassuring.
At least at long last, the mainstream press appears to be slowly waking up to the fact that his walnut sized brain is in free fall. Hence the "rubber/glue" narrative about Biden's cognition, which appears to be perfectly fine according to those who interact with him including world leaders, all of whom minus the dictators, are in a state imagining the horror movie sequel, trump II.
Definition of insanity: doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.
The pending government shut down in (checks notes) 4 days seems to be in the category of the boy who cried wolf: There is no believing a liar, even when he speaks the truth.
Aesop tells us the story of a boy who vexes the villagers again and again by crying “Wolf!” even though there was none only to watch them rushing to help. He learns his lesson when it is too late: There is no believing a liar, even when he speaks the truth.
Right on! Go Rick!!