I got no words:
Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is facing a censure vote from the Arizona Democratic Party, brought by progressives who deem her politics too accommodating to President Donald Trump at the expense of Democratic values.
Sinema, D-Ariz., built a moderate political brand during her three terms in the House of Representatives, which has extended to her early days in the Senate. According to the FiveThirtyEight Trump Tracker, she has opposed Trump while in the Senate 81% of the time. In the House, she supported Trump’s agenda 54% of the time.
While Sinema’s political centrism has earned her Republican support, it has grated on progressives — some of whom silently protested her during a state fundraising dinner in downtown Phoenix. Democratic state committeemen will consider the resolution on Saturday, at the Arizona Democratic Party’s quarterly meeting.
She barely won, and that was not because there were more progressive votes to be had left on the table. I mean, Arizona, ffs. She replaced Jeff Flake. If you know a self styled progressive in Arizona, tell them to fucking pull their shit together.
rikyrah
this is absolutely, positively stupid.
I don’t give a shyt if she’s another Joe Manchin.
THIS is what we have to get when we’re in Arizona. Accept it. Get over it.
zzyzx
Watching the Israeli election and seeing people trying to form coalitions, really brings home how much hidden our system is. Our coalitions form before the election instead of after and our parties are just the names for them. For some reason, everyone expects the Democrats to be a European style party with a core set of beliefs, whereas it’s a mix of 3-4 of them where we’ve agreed to work together.
The leftish branch needs to understand that they’re 10% of the population, tops, and that’s never going to have power by itself unless we form a dictatorship.
Fair Economist
I expect the vote on this resolution will be the overwhelmingly negative vote appropriate for an attack on the highest elected Democrat in Arizona, who does, after all, vote with us 81% of the time. I suspect that 19% is mostly on routine or symbolic votes.
kindness
Let me guess….this ‘progressive’ in AZ is a BernieBro? Gee, why would I wonder that?
PST
First Democrat to be elected from Arizona in some 25 years, and one who is absolutely, positively needed if Democrats are to form a majority in the Senate. That’s almost as important as beating Trump. We need a second one from Arizona as well, and splitters like this aren’t helping.
Tom Levenson
This is as dumb as it gets.
Dumber.
Yarrow
It’ll probably increase her popularity and shore up her moderate cred with embarrassed Republicans.
Downside, it makes Democrats look like loons and may make more moderate voters less likely to want to get mixed up with them.
Baud
I read this part and was worried she actually did something wrongful.
At some point, maybe we’ll kick our addiction to performance art and sticking it to the Establishment, but it shall not be this day.
Kylroy
@zzyzx: I’m not sure it’s “hidden” – American voters explicitly know what ruling coalition they’ll be putting in office before they vote, rather than finding out afterward. If anything, I think it’s almost too honest – the *voters* end up being aware of the compromises and get turned off of politics, rather than getting to vote for a party that matches their preferences more closely but barely affects the actual running of the country.
Don’t get me wrong, I prefer parliamentary systems – turns out one person, one vote, *is* a good idea – but tradeoffs exist.
Baud
@Yarrow:
I’m still pretty left compared to most voters, and I have doubts with getting mixed up with us.
Omnes Omnibus
@Baud: Can we still have giant puppets?
bemused
Wow. The AZ Dem Party actually thinks they have the luxury to censure a Dem that finally got that seat, cutting off their nose to spite their face.
zzyzx
@Kylroy:
I think it’s hidden from a lot of the voters/ elected officals who do shit like this. If those Democrats were members of the Progressive Party and Sinema were in the Moderate Party or something, this idea would make no sense.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’m usually in the more moderate, pick-your-battles camp– I sometimes think I’m gonna wind up in BJ troll jail or self-exile before this election is over–, and an official censure is stupid, but so was voting for William Barr.
That said, the “progressives” in AZ would be better off registering voters and working for Mark Kelly.
Yarrow
From Cole’s Twitter:
Probably true.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Has she said anything about her vote for Barr?
Baud
So the whole caucus, not just a single person. Sigh.
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I probably agree with their criticism on the merits. It’s not censurable conduct, however, and especially not in a very conservative purple state.
206inKY
Fucking shit. We should be looking to Sinema, Abrams, and Beto for lessons on how to swing the sunbelt by double-digits better than baseline. Ditto with Baldwin and Klobaucher up north. It’s devastating that Abrams declined to run for prez, she was our best shot.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Yarrow: I don’t know. She’s been pretty low-profile as a Senator, as far as I can tell. Suzanne is the only BJ-er I know lives in AZ, and I believe her verdict on Sinema is, basically, she’s squirrelly and untrustworthy and better than McSally.
Sab
@kindness: Or one of Chakrabarti’s Justice Democrats?
Leto
@bemused: Not just the luxury, nay, THE RIGHT to go around noseless, ensuring everyone knows just how pure they really are. I’m going to modify a Rumsfeld *shudders* quote here: you go to war with the Dems you have, not the Dems you wish you had. If we were able to get a more progressive candidate elected in WV, AZ, and other states, we would. But we have to work with what we got. That doesn’t mean we don’t try to improve our candidate offering, but we also have to accept the reality on the ground in each county, district, and state.
JFC Arizona, get it together!
Betty Cracker
Counterpoint: Sinema voted to confirm Barr, and this is all bullshit performance art, not just on the part of AZ progressives but from Sinema too:
I get that she has to channel Claire McCaskill to keep her seat and pretend like both sides are playing politics and Republicans aren’t raving lunatics. That doesn’t mean push-back is completely unwarranted. Squawking from the left won’t hurt her with conservative voters, and if it makes her wary enough of her left flank to withhold a vote from the next Barr, it’ll have accomplished something for liberal voters too.
Adam L Silverman
@Sab: They’re the same thing.
schrodingers_cat
The purity lefties are self destructive. My birth city of Mumbai was a labor strong hold since the British era. That’s where industrial revolution first came to India. Both the Swadeshi and the Quit India movement started in Mumbai. Its also the birthplace of the Indian National Congress.
But the lefties fought among themselves and the right wing sons of the soil party (Shiv Sena) took over in the vacuum that formed in late 80s and now it has been a RWNJ strong hold. Indian RWNJs just like our homegrown variety make tall promises but don’t deliver except on the hate. Meanwhile the lefties keep fighting each other on purity points.
Baud
@Betty Cracker:
I don’t mind “push back.” But a “censure” is wrong. Not being progressive is not censurable conduct.
Yarrow
@Betty Cracker: My guess is it gets some press coverage in Arizona, so long as there’s not other bigger news to take the spotlight. Then it pretty much disappears. It’s a party thing. The biggest danger is it splits the Dems, which is rather unhelpful in a state that’s just starting to elect statewide D’s.
Baud
@Yarrow:
By the time she’s up for reelection, this will be forgotten by most voters. But this type of thing ends up creating a “drip, drip, drip” negativity in voters’ minds, even if they don’t recall the specific events. Given how much we nitpick messaging to death, I don’t see why we should ignore this type of negative messaging.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat:
I mentioned the anti-Modi protest in the thread yesterday and saw you responded. Wanted to highlight this paragraph from a Houston Chronicle article on it:
Seems like protesting Modi is bringing other minority groups together. Found that interesting.
Yarrow
@Baud: I agree. It’s dumb. I’m not at all in support of it and agree it can have a drip, drip, drip effect. And definitely it’s bad messaging.
Betty Cracker
@Baud: Fair point. I have no idea what “transgressions” are considered censurable, but it does seem to be a strange vehicle for wrong-think. What I don’t want to see take hold is the notion that blue dogs are such a precious commodity that they can’t be criticized.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: The RSS may consider Sikhs to be Hindu-lite but the Sikhs have no desire to play the second fiddle, unlike the Jains who don’t seem to mind that so much. Also the latest Hindi imposition nonsense is going to irritate non-native speakers of Hindi (74% by some estimates).
Language differences were what broke up Bangladesh from Pakistan.
JDM
You’d never see this sort of thing among Republicans… oh, wait, you do and that’s how they’ve gotten more and more conservative politicians into office in every level of government. But we should never do it, because… we’ll, nobody ever really explains why.
Baud
@JDM:
Conservatives are politically more competent and popular than progressives.
And even they don’t take risks like this in barely purple states.
gratuitous
It sounds to me like a “Dems in Disarray” hypestory so beloved of our liberal media. The transgressions of Sinema are voting to confirm Barr as AG and Bernhardt as Secretary of the Interior, as well as being the only Senate Democrat not to co-sponsor legislation to protect net neutrality. I don’t know if censure is the right option, but criticism of those votes and actions isn’t some loony leftist fever dream. There’s no reason Sinema had to vote to confirm Barr or Bernhardt, or to not sign on for net neutrality. She should take some heat for that from her state party, especially considering the paucity of stuff going through the Senate because Moscow Mitch has mostly shut the place down.
schrodingers_cat
@Yarrow: Sikhs from Punjab and Kashmiri Muslims have far more in common than either would have with say Gujaratis (state where NM is from). And they have the bitter experience (Khalistan movement of the 80s) of knowing what happens when the centre’s boot is on your throat.
Mrs. D. Ranged in AZ
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I live here as well and I agree with Suzanne. She’s better than McSally. It’s not a resounding endorsement. That all being said, the censure is stupid BUT it will probably mean next to nothing in the long run. If anything it might even help Sinema since it will probably solidify her as a Centrist in the minds of moderate conservatives (of which, there are an increasing amount in AZ due to Trump’s hijacking of the party).
SFAW
@JDM:
Yeah, I’m with you. I think they should primary Sinema’s ass, maybe have Noam Chomsky move to AZ, I expect he’s more progressive — liberal, even — and he’d unite AZ like we’ve never seen.
Yarrow
@schrodingers_cat: The chairman of the Sikh National Center in Houston mentioned other groups.
But of course there’s this:
Splitting people apart, just like Trump. No wonder Orange is flying in for the event.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I can think of a couple examples of why: Chris Christie in ’09, Paul Lepage, twice and… what are their names? Oh yeah, George W Bush and Donald Fucking Trump
But by all means, let’s have more maximalist sloganeering purity litmus tests. Now is the time.
ETA: linked comment should be to: @JDM:
BobbyK
sinema has voted with trump 62.2% of the time. she’s a fucking republican for christ sakes.
matt
bernie, bro.
matt
@JDM: because losing seats can flip control of the houses of congress? Schoolhouse rock might help ya.
piratedan
@Mrs. D. Ranged in AZ:my views from the Old Pueblo match yours… is she a perfect Dem? Hell no, but hey, we even bash Nancy Smash because she’s having problems herding Democratic cats for impeachment, so ymmv. Does she vote with the Dems more often than not, yes… was Barr likely to be the AG anyways? more likely than not, so I view those votes as largely symbolic when she establishes/burnishes her cred as not being a wide-eyed liberal.
Will she blow like a reed in the wind if the Dems take the Senate, I certainly think so, as things stands, she’s playing political calculus to ensure the best opportunity to keep the seat. If the AZ Progressive Caucus would rather use their time more wisely in registering The Youngs, the Phoenix metro and rural hispanic voters and work harder on the Rez, then perhaps that would be a tad more effective than this kabuki display of their disaffection. Besides, we all have to work to get Kelly to oust McSally and these asshats have completely forgotten what really fucking matters.
rikyrah
Lowdown, no-good muthaphuckas.
Fake court dates are being issued in immigration court. Here’s why
BY MONIQUE O. MADAN
SEPTEMBER 18, 2019 06:00 AM, UPDATED 1 HOUR 7 MINUTES AGO
J R in WV
deleted, oops.
Baud
@BobbyK:
FTA
Do you have a source for your data so we may assess it’s credibility?
JCJ
I am sure Senator Sinema could be better aligned with the politics of balloon-juice, but I think the same sports statistic analogy applies to her as Manchin:
WAR – wins against replacement
If she votes against Trump 81 times out of 100 that is 81 more times than Jeff Flake would have. Flake might have missed a vote or two after sustaining an injury furrowing his brow, though.
JGabriel
@Yarrow:
Yep. Exactly what I was going to say. This will probably help Sinema more than it hurts her.
Sigh.
Yeah, that too.
Another Scott
More from Cole’s link:
(Emphasis added.)
If she makes as many enemies as Senator For Life St. John McCain, and she votes with Democrats more than half the time, then she’s doing the politics right.
Cheers,
Scott.
schrodingers_cat
In case people are wondering what Yarrow and I are talking about, Modi has a rally planned in Houston, Orange T is going to join him. Here are my thoughts on the meeting of two tyrants.
Also another fun fact about language, Modi, Gandhi and Jinnah are all from Gujarat, which makes Gujarati their mother tongue.
James E Powell
Arizona is a red state. Although they drive us crazy, we have to put up with the Republican things that red state Democratic senators do. That this is not obvious to everyone concerned will always amaze and infuriate me.
The Purity Left has never produced a Democratic win. Instead, they gave us George W. Bush (and thus Roberts and Alito) and Trump (and thus Gorsuch and Kavanaugh). I do not know understand why they are not ashamed. I do not know how they don’t see that they are making the world worse for themselves and everyone who agrees with their goals.
SFAW
@James E Powell:
Their Mumia sweatshirts are good at insulating them from that, you neoliberal shill.
VOR
The perfect is the enemy of the good.
Steve in the ATL
@James E Powell: why do you hate Susan Sarandon?!
J/k. We all hate her.
Tractarian
I am unmoved by this. Getting censured from the left is actually a good look for a red-state Democratic senator!
Now, if the progressives decide they want to run a third-party candidate to throw her seat to the GOP, then we’ve got something to complain about.
In the meantime, chill out, and let the kabuki theater play on.
TenguPhule
For the record, should we ever get a majority in Congress again, this will inevitably happen more often.
??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??
@SFAW:
Tbogg tweeted out a screenshot of that “Mumia shirt” blog post last year in September. You wouldn’t believe the number of purity troll WATB comments, most of which were of the “lol this is bad” variety, with some going, “yeah, how dare we demand better from our elected reps!”, completely missing tbogg’s point.
The top retweet even tried to compare Tbogg’s making a joke about HA Goodman in Salon calling for the FBI to save us from Clinton back in 2016 to a tweet from early 2018 in which Tbogg called for the FBI to retaliate against Trump for his treatment of McCabe, as if it was hypocritical or something!
Twitter lefties are too stupid for words
SFAW
@??? Goku (aka Amerikan Baka) ??:
HEY! I’m a lefty! (Although not on twitter.)
[And if that ain’t a great set-up for you, well …]
Chetan Murthy
@rikyrah:
Better a Joe Manchin, than that coprophage Jim Justice.
The Moar You Know
I did exactly that, because my friend was pulling exactly the bullshit circular firing squad shit described.
She told me to quit “mansplaining” to her, that they were “tired of being ignored in Arizona” and then defriended me on Facebook. Someone I’ve been friends with, one way or another, since 1982.
I think I know where all the lead paint in America was sent, and it’s in Arizona’s water supply. She thinks she’s being ignored now? They can go back to having two GOP Senators and then she can be reminded of what being ignored is truly like. She’s lived there for over a decade, she knows what one-party GOP rule is like there. And apparently that is preferable to a blue-dog Dem who has gone out of her way to accommodate her constituents while not putting herself in a “one and done” position.
Fucking Democrats, man. I despair for my party a lot these days. If I were some true “undecided” (they don’t exist, I believe that fervently, but just for the sake of argument) one that thought Trump was an unbearable asshole, after taking a look at the opposition this cycle I’d probably sit this one out. Save for Warren, we are not putting our best face forward.
SFAW
@The Moar You Know:
And who might that be?
James E Powell
@SFAW:
Actually I’m more of a paleo-liberal
kd bart
Purity Test themselves to oblivion
Dan B
@Mrs. D. Ranged in AZ: Do you have any sense of whether or not this censure is a Putin test run for disrupting Dems in purple states? With micro targeting it would be difficult to know unless you had access to individual feeds but if folks are parroting similar talking points that would be a tell.
Mai naem mobile
Sinema is.my senator and while I don’t expect a Kamala Harris or Liz Warren she can afford to be less centrist than she is. She didn’t have to vote for Bill Barr which she did. She doesn’t need a censure but I would her to at least nominally pay attention to her left faction. She won 50 to 47 against a decent opponent in an off year election. Her next election is going to be a presidential election year with a browner and less old white people electorate. Arizona isnt WV. BTW shes got way too much ironman and AZ tourist trap studd in her Twitter feed.
azlib
I am in AZ. I have not seen this story get much traction here in the press. I supported Sinema and I consider myself a liberal here in AZ. She does some things I have not liked or supported, but I understand why she does what she does given the political demographics here in Arizona. I sometimes think she is a bit too clever with her positioning on some issues, but she is a heck of a lot better than any Republican here in AZ. Some criticism is warranted, but censure! That is ridiculous and counter productive.
sherparick
@zzyzx: I agree with everything except the there are a lot more factions and interests than “3 to 4.” That is within each state. More like 10. Multiply that by (New England, New York, Mid-Atlantic, South Atlantic, Appalachia, Deep South, Texas, Old Northwest, North Central, Great Plains, Southern Rockies, Northern Rockies, Northwest, California, Hawaii, & Alaska, then break up those regions into constituent states and parts and you get the gang of Kilkenny cats that make up the “Democratic Party.” And burning down the barn if you don’t get it painted the way you like is a Democratic tradition that has been passed down from the time it was the White Supremacy Party to its current incarnation. I doubt the censure vote will carry. However, it is not a bad reminder to Sinema if she wants those votes, she will have to at least take some positions and votes for their priorities.
Erin in Flagstaff
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I’m in AZ, and I knew that Sinema would cast some votes that would drive me crazy. I also knew that I’d complain about her, but that I’d vote for her and support her, no matter what.
I feel that the Progressives in Arizona are being ridiculous about this, but who knows? It might help her in the long run, as she can present herself as an “independent” representative who stands up to the extremists in both parties. Always a beloved status for a chunk of voters in this state.
Zifnab
You gotta dance with who brung ya.
And it took a lot of progressive leg work to get Sinema over the line.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@azlib: @Erin in Flagstaff: thanks to all the Arizonans for the reports from the ground
burnspbesq
@Zifnab:
Have a cookie. Have two, in fact.
Agreed, but that doesn’t describe AZ’s progressives—either of them.
Captain C
This sort of posturing on the part of AZ’s self-styled progressives may actually help her with moderate and somewhat conservative voters in AZ. Not that this is the progressives’ intention, but…
Captain C
@James E Powell:
Easy. It’s everyone else’s fault for not doing what they say (or figuring out what to do from the vague platitudes which they produce at an industrial scale).
All the fault of those who don’t instantly agree with and obey them (or, see above).
Captain C
@The Moar You Know:
Having lived in Arizona for 12 years (’93-’05), I can safely say that Arizona is Florida without the coastline and humidity. I think there’s a secret clause in the State Constitution which says that when another state does something especially stupid, cruel, and-or self-destructive, AZ has to top it within six months.
karen marie
I live in this godforsaken shithole known as Arizona. I’ve been to several meetings of Arizona “progressives” over the last several years, and not a single one of them can coherently explain what distinguishes a “progressive.” They’re people suddenly woke to politics who have adopted the Republican narrative about Democrats. Given the very small footprint and even smaller impact of the official Democratic Party presence here, it’s not surprising – and no different than “progressives” in other geographic locations – but it’s still annoying.
“Progressives” can get stuffed, as far as I’m concerned.
Bnad
I’m going to make an “I heart being out of power and protesting” t shirt for the Wilmerbros.
Mrs. D. Ranged in AZ
@Dan B: I don’t have any information one way or the other on the Putin disruption angle. I used watch quite a few of the AZ Prog Dems on Twitter but that was a few years ago and no longer follow the convos. I don’t think Putin has to be behind it. The left perfected the circular firing squad a long time ago with little outside help.
Goblue72
@burnspbesq: the OC corporate offshore tax shelter shyster grad of the University of Spoiled Children can always be counted on to hippie punch.
ObedMarsh
OK. I live in AZ (since ’94) – in Sinema’s old Congressional district. I’ve been involved in local politics for quite some time. Sinema is very unpopular with the local party and always has been. The feelings at the state level are pretty much the same. As a constituent, I never saw her at any local public or political event, unlike her predecessor. In the House, she consistently voted against environmental and educational issues (even though her district includes ASU). She’s a reliable vote on abortion and LGBT issues – but other than that, not much else that we would consider progressive. She was a lackluster campaigner for the House and the Senate both. I’m inundated with campaign material and calls for support during campaigns – her opponents brand her as a wild-eyed leftist abortionist – and she still wins. So this whole thing about the censure hurting her re-election chances is hooey. Voters are so polarized that they vote for the D or the R next to the name, not the person. I’ve voted for her twice – I couldn’t bring myself to vote for her reelection to the House after she ignored my district for two years – but the Senate was just too important. This censure vote didn’t come out of nowhere. AZ Dems are pretty moderate. Something more is at play here, and I don’t yet know what it is. But this censure vote isn’t going to hurt her reelection chances one iota. BTW, the whole “Barr would have become AG anyway” argument is pretty fucking stupid. So if that is the case (and it is), a NO vote wouldn’t have hurt her, would it? Oh, hell. I’m usually on Mill Ave Fridays nights, so you can find me and tell me how stupid I am.