I wonder how that happened. https://t.co/kH5xIW3vqT
— Patrick Chovanec (@prchovanec) January 25, 2021
You might even call him fekkin’ pathetic!
From the available evidence, McCarthy is neither a spotlight-seeking moron, or a sociopath incapable of understanding normal human reactions. Which makes it that much harder to understand why he chose to put himself forward as the “leader” of the Leopards Eating Peoples Faces Party rump, but as the old joke goes, at least it’s show biz…
?? "We're eating sh*t for breakfast, lunch and dinner right now," a McCarthy aide told @axios https://t.co/sZaNpYGDng
— Jim VandeHei (@JimVandeHei) January 24, 2021
Why it matters: The House Republican leader had been hoping to use this year to build toward taking the majority in 2022, but his efforts to bridge intra-party divisiveness over the Capitol siege have him taking heat from every direction, eroding his stature both with the public and within his party…
Pressure is mounting on McCarthy financially, politically and publicly.
– Corporate donors are freezing him out for challenging the Electoral College vote on Jan. 6.
– The media is lampooning him for initially saying “the president bears responsibility” for the Capitol attack but amending that last week to say, “I don’t believe he provoked it, if you listen to what he said at the rally.”
– McCarthy also got hit for saying during an interview this weekend that “everyone” bears responsibility for the political temperature in the country.
Meanwhile, the pro-Trump wing of his conference is angry with him for not condemning Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) more forcefully after she voted to impeach Trump…
As Mom would say, you order it you eat it.
— Leslie (@LeslieBryant44) January 24, 2021
“Where all are guilty, no one is; confessions of collective guilt are the best possible safeguard against the discovery of culprits, and the very magnitude of the crime the best excuse for doing nothing.”
—Hannah Arendt https://t.co/uoBc6rgd1b— Windsor Mann (@WindsorMann) January 24, 2021
Let the Truth & Reconciliation Committee begin right here, right now. BENGHAZI! (but in the U.S. Capital).
I hope everyone understands that even if Pence, Pelosi, and/or other members of Congress had been assassinated by the mob, Republicans would still oppose holding Trump accountable. https://t.co/nU0MPRoYCQ
— Steve M. (@nomoremister) January 24, 2021
To be fair when the gop is telling Dems to move on now that there’s a new president from all their riot & impeachment talk, it is not inconsistent from their past activity. The moment the last new president was elected, the GOP stopped caring about 4 Dead Americans immediately
— Asawin Suebsaeng (@swin24) January 25, 2021
cope
When I was a kid, the rule at the table regarding new dishes was “You don’t have to eat it all, you just have to try it”.
Come on, Mr. HR Leader, you at least have to try one bite.
ALurkSupreme
I have deeply examined my conscience and can say with all sincerity that I accept no responsibility for 6 January.
West of the Rockies
McCarthy is just not that bright or charismatic. But at least he is not as aspirational as Cruz or Hawley. Both of them are well educated, but have charisma deficits comparable to black holes.
Also, I wish Silverman was here. I see it being reported that Russia is having massive protests despite their efforts to control social media. Is it possible that our people are at last fucking with them?
I hope we are finally returning serve on that diminutive, drab dwarf named Putin.
Omnes Omnibus
Fuck that shit. I didn’t vote for crazies*, I didn’t encourage crazies, I didn’t storm the Capitol, etc. That’s on you and your people.
*Hell, I didn’t even support Baud in the primary.
SFAW
Quite the understatement — they’d try to push through a Constitutional amendment declaring him president-for-life.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
And yet here you are.
Sorry about the Pack, by the way. I was hoping they’d beat Brady.
Another Scott
“There’s two people I think Putin pays: Rohrabacher and Trump,” McCarthy (R-Calif.) said, according to a recording of the June 15, 2016, exchange, which was listened to and verified by The Washington Post.
It’s all a game to these GOP clowns. They knew for years what Donnie was but didn’t care as long as it helped them hold power.
Grr…
Cheers,
Scott.
Omnes Omnibus
@SFAW: Yeah, the Tampa had their number this year. Fuck.
trollhattan
If all politics is local, McCarthy better put some attention to California if he wants to drag the Republicans out of the gutter. Behold.
“Calling me racist is racist, maaaaaan!“
West of the Rockies
@Omnes Omnibus:
You didn’t support Baud? Yeah, well, there’s crazy, and then there’s crazy.
Mike in NC
Hope they’re all getting two scoops, just like that loser down at Mar-A-Lago.
SoupCatcher
The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) report, Lynching in America: Confronting the Legacy of Racial Terror, documented two lynchings in California, both in Kern County, which is represented in Congress by Kevin McCarthy.
gene108
McCarthy, like all Republicans, talks like an abuser trying justify his actions.
I mean sure I could take some blame for not delving into the depths of 4chan or 8kun or get a Parler account to pushback on the lies, but it’d be much simpler for Republicans to not have promoted or have stood silently by as the lies propagated.
MattF
McCarthy bought into the idea of being successful in Congress. And he succeeded. And now he’s paying a price. #ETTD, and all that.
trollhattan
@SFAW:
Never was a Brady fan but how do you explain Tampa without Tommy? And at seventy-three.
SFAW
@Omnes Omnibus:
I grant I’m not a great football mind, but during the brief periods when I actually watched the game, it looked like Green Bay’s secondary was performing more like the Jets’ defensive backfield than like a would-be NFC champion.
catclub
@West of the Rockies: 
There is a youtube channel called ‘advoko makes’ and the guy looks like a young V. Putin. Or a generic Russian white guy.
Anonymous At Work
Impeachment covers Trump only. A few Benghazi-style hearings for people like Meadows where 11 hours of testimony are expected…? Do you really think Trumpers can testify for more than 5 minutes without perjury?
catclub
also, Gronk may NOT have been the key to Brady’s success over the years.
West of the Rockies
@trollhattan:
Why don’t Proud Boys refer to themselves as men? I dont like adult men using diminution, including with their names. Hey, look, it’s lil’ Tommy Tuberville! Hey, little fella..
Llelldorin
My best guess is that Kevin McCarthy has an unearned reputation for brilliance from people who don’t know California well—after all, he’s one of fewer than ten Republicans elected from California in the 2018 election. The thing is—he represents Bakersfield, which politically might as well be in Oklahoma. It doesn’t require any particular cleverness to get elected as a Republican in Bakersfield.
Because seriously, otherwise I have no idea at all how this guy somehow ended up in a leadership position.
catclub
Definitely not gay, right?
SFAW
@trollhattan:
Yeah, Brady’s pretty amazing. As best as I can tell, he’s kind of a dick — his trying to trademark “Tom Terrific” springs to mind — but he’s a great QB, probably the GOAT.
Anonymous At Work
@Llelldorin: GOP third-string leadership is based on fundraising, both positive funds raised and negative threats of scaring away donors. It’s how Pence rose in the GOP leadership as well.
Llelldorin
@Anonymous At Work: Ah! Thanks, that makes much more sense. Clever or not, he represents a lot of oil wells in a wealthy state, and there are a lot of California Republicans (in absolute terms, not relative) who have very few people to send money to.
waspuppet
I dunno. He went on TV and said out loud that the point of the Benghazi investigations was to damage Hillary Clinton’s poll numbers, and he seemed to think that was an OK thing to say. He has also said out loud that Trump is “one of two people Putin pays.”
@SFAW: To do otherwise would be divisive.
Cheryl Rofer
@West of the Rockies:
Not Silverman, but here’s my take.
Whatever our cyberfolk may be doing, that’s not Putin’s problem. Putin’s problem is that he’s put Navalny in jail again, and Russian citizens are not happy. They are not happy for a number of reasons, including being lied to about the pandemic and the general economic stagnation under Putin. The feeling that Russia and their lives are going nowhere.
There have been protests in Khabarovsk since last summer, although I think they died down late in the fall. Belarus (which is Russia’s nextdoor neighbor who Putin would like to get closer to) has had protests since last summer against Lukashenka’s refusal to give up the presidency.
Anything our folks add is superfluous. This is one of those things that isn’t about us.
Just Chuck
@Llelldorin: California’s Republican pols are some of the craziest of the crazy, because they’re more or less all that’s left. No one else wants to run that hollowed-out party.
Geminid
@Llelldorin: Someone did an analysis of voting and demographic patterns of interior California. He found a high correlation between descendants of “Okies” and “Arkies” and Republican voting. An interesting but not surprising finding.
West of the Rockies
@Cheryl Rofer:
Thank you, Cheryl. That was edifying. Nonetheless, I hope the US is doing what it can to kick the box out from under that vile, little twerp and his criminal and despotic rule.
trollhattan
@Cheryl Rofer:
Timing is not Vlad’s friend ATM. He’s forced to claim “Is not my palace!” over the aerials of his palace. Which is quite the Trumpish architectural overkill for a humble dacha.
Steve in the ATL
@Omnes Omnibus: maybe I’ve watched too much SEC football, but is it possible that the NFL front office encouraged the refs to ensure, or increase the likelihood of, Tom Brady versus Patrick Mahomes in the SB? There were three flags the whole game, then two critical ones to give TB first downs to run out the clock and win.
Of course, even if that were true, that doesn’t excuse kicking field goal with two minutes left when you desperately need a touchdown are at the goal line.
SoupCatcher
@Just Chuck: I’m not convinced that the Republican Party is dead in California. In the two areas of which I am most familiar (Silicon Valley and Los Angeles) there was a non-trivial amount of support for Trump. Suzanne made the comment that Trump was appealing as a successful family-business owner (ignore the actuality), and that really resonated with me, and explains a lot of the support I saw here. It’s the anti-tax brigade of small business owners, the IGMFU caucus, as well as the Libertarian-curious tech-bros who think the poor are icky, and that those with less privilege should know their place.
Hungry Joe
Can someone please tell me what I’m missing here?
Assume, for the sake of argument, that Trump and Clark had been successful in 86’ing acting Attorney General Rosen. Assume also that Clark sends threatening letter to Georgia election officials. Since we’ve gone this far, let’s assume those officials cave. What then? They already sent their verified electoral vote tally (15 for Biden) to Congress. Do they fire off a message? “Whoops — we meant 15 votes for Trump. Sorry about the mixup.” And, finally — what the hell, right? — assume Congress says, “No worries. We’ll just flip those votes. Easy-peasy.”
Even if all that happens, Biden’s EV total drops from 306 to 291. He wins by 21 EV instead of 36. So … why bother? What were they (and I use the following term loosely) thinking?.
taumaturgo
@West of the Rockies: Undescended testicles (cryptorchidism)?
neldob
@West of the Rockies: I think they didn’t like Navalny (sp?) getting tossed in the clink so fast.
Baud
@Omnes Omnibus:
No pardons for you!
zhena gogolia
@West of the Rockies:
Russians are not being directed by the US to protest. Do not even suggest it.
West of the Rockies
@Hungry Joe:
Dominos, dude, dominos! First Georgia caves, then AZ freaks out and reverses its election results, then… ummm, underpants gnomes steal the CA results and–whamo!–a second Trump term.
hitchhiker
@Steve in the ATL:
Brady also threw 3 interceptions; the failure of the Packers to turn them all into points isn’t b/c of anything he did. If they had, we’d be talking about how hard it is to see a once-great QB flail.
Nicole
@Hungry Joe: His hope was, I believe, that if GA overturned their election results it would encourage other states (PA, AZ) to overturn theirs as well
(Or what West of the Rockies said, and much funnier than how I did)
Another Scott
@Hungry Joe: Donnie’s brilliant plan seems to have been to come up with something, anything that would create an issue that the SCOTUS would have to rule on, and then – naturally – they would do what he wanted and make him the winner because he appointed them.
The actual rules and the laws don’t enter into it. He thinks that because he appointed 3 of them they have to do what he wants.
That’s it.
Cheers,
Scott.
West of the Rockies
@zhena gogolia:
I agree, but if we can make it even minutely easier or safer…
Dorothy A. Winsor
I have to admit McCarthy surprised me by going full the-election-was-rigged. I thought of him as standard issue R.
Bill Arnold
@Cheryl Rofer:
True, but accusations of American(/Western) interference are flying. (I haven’t looked to see if any actual evidence of American government involvement is being cited.)
There could be (I’m fairly sure is of the non-state class) subtle influence operation activity, both state and non-state actors, but my impression (from talking with a few Russians) is that the Russian public is generally pretty wary/self-aware about such things (as is (clearly) the Russian government, though paranoid too.).
(Now off to find some current analyses.)
Cacti
And the R on R rhetorical violence continues unabated, as a spox for Liz Cheney basically calls Matt Gaetz a fag.
West of the Rockies
@taumaturgo:
The little beast does enjoy over-compensating. That shirtless horseback ride could have been about 20% cooler.
Betty Cracker
@Hungry Joe: From what I read, similar efforts were going on in some of the other states (Michigan, Arizona, etc.), so I guess the Trump people were going for an autocratic inside straight. Georgia Republicans (of all people!) spoke out loudest, but Trump was definitely attempting shenanigans elsewhere.
On a related note, I wouldn’t be surprised if other shoes drop in the coming days, both on attempts to steal the election behind the scenes with vote counting and the involvement of Trump’s flunkies in the Capitol assault.
Just Chuck
@Dorothy A. Winsor: That _is_ Standard Issue Republican. Most are just not so stupid as to say it out loud.
p.a.
2nd half Brady was all: “here you go Pack, good luck in the Super Bowl.” Rogers was: “Goodness! As your hosts today it would be quite impolite to take advantage of your generosity…”
Eunicecycle
@Hungry Joe: I have the same question!
ETA and thanks to all for the answers!
Baud
Jonathon Turley attacks Erik Loomis at LGM.
Cole needs to step up his game. He hasn’t been attacked nearly enough for the owner of a top 10,000 blog.
gvg
I think if you hang out with undereducated morons who don’t believe in facts that contradict their worldview and are terrible at logical thinking, you end up with a poor ability to judge what is normal, legal, acceptable to the general public and looking stupid. These people live in an echo chamber until reality decides to hit them.
jonas
Fuck that shit indeed. This is the equivalent of “chickens coming home to roost” rhetoric after 9/11. And we all remember how sanguine Republicans were about that sort of thing…
Just Chuck
@Betty Cracker: The poetic justice is that the suits and extortion have almost certainly cost the party future votes, or at least hardened D voters who were once on the fence. To say nothing of, yunno, Jan. 6
Everything T touches …
Jeffro
@ALurkSupreme:
Me too! Maybe next coup
RobertDSC-Mac Mini
@catclub:
4 of his 6 wins have been without Gronk in the big game.
The 4th, his greatest, was a 25 point comeback against the Falcons in Super Bowl 51.
Geminid
@SoupCatcher: California Republicans actually did well in the November election. They won back three districts that they lost in 2018. And in the 25th District north of L.A., Repuican Mike Garcia barely held on to Katie Hill’s old seat, winning by 330 votes. In 2022, California is expected to lose a Congressional seat in redistricting.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@Geminid:
The smarter farmers were able to figure out how to recover and stayed put. As was the course of westward expansion, the fuckups and failures folded up and moved west, relying on cheap or free land and lots of federal largesse in clearing it and building infrastructure.
’Murka…
CaseyL
@gvg: Reality did hit them, with Covid 19, and has had no effect.
The seal is hermetic and will not be broken.
Hungry Joe
@West of the Rockies: Of course: underpants gnomes! Ultimately, it’s always the underpants gnomes that make the difference. Thank you for that.
Jeffro
Me too…then I remembered, ‘standard-issue Republican’ may well mean ‘being blackmailed/threatened by trumpov and/or Putin’ at this point.
Lacuna Synechdoche
@Omnes Omnibus:
Ah, but you provoked them with sanity and common sense.
We all did.
And from their point of view, that is truly unforgivable because … we make them feel dumb. And that makes them angry. And anger leads to fear. And fear leads to hate. And hate leads to the GOP.
Just Chuck
@Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes: Their failure wasn’t necessarily fuckups. A lot of those Okies probably originally came out of the Dust Bowl.
Just Chuck
@Jeffro: I don’t think they’re being blackmailed, I think they’re just that venal and craven.
catclub
I think Drew Brees is twitching.
BretH
I am recalling the greatest quarterback duel I ever saw – Joe Montana vs John Elway on Monday Night Football in 1994.
https://www.milehighreport.com/2019/12/14/21021543/john-elway-v-joe-montana-denver-broncos-kc-chiefs-rivalry-game-for-the-ages
Brent
@Dorothy A. Winsor:
One of the things we all have to get into our heads is that his type of sociopathic dishonesty IS standard issue Republicanism and to some extent, it always was.
Baud
@catclub:
He’ll probably retire, but in fairness, he’s not only old (for a QB) but he suffered a significant injury this year which he apparently hasn’t fully recovered from.
Baud
@Lacuna Synechdoche:
Did you see how we were dressed? We were asking for it.
trollhattan
@RobertDSC-Mac Mini:
I left a Superb Owl party at halftime during that one, declaring NE to have had the fork inserted by Atlanta indicating perfect doneness. Was that ever a lesson.
Lyrebird
@ALurkSupreme: Yep, same here.
AFAICT, the only way what he said could be “true” is if you also believe, like the seditionists do, that Black citizens voting somehow equals fraud. Actually, if we are looking at GA GOP, PA GOP, and AZ GOP… they think that the existence of people who disagree with them is a violation of their rights.
UGH
if only we could make acting like a WATB with fashie tendencies a barrier to getting firearms.
Geminid
@Cacti: And Cheney’s impeachment wing-man Adam Kinsinger (IL) piled on, tweeting that Gaetz does in fact keep a “beauty bag” with him. Don’t know if that is exactly gay, but it is un-Western.
Mary G
@SoupCatcher: I agree that you can’t count California as always reliably blue. My precinct went 55-45 for Hillary in 2016 and switched to 55-45 for HWDNBN in 2020, because there are a lot of obscenely rich people who made obscenely giant gobs of money in the stock market during the last four years and didn’t want to pay more taxes on it.
Chief Oshkosh
@Steve in the ATL: Exactly my thinking. The officials should be collecting big fat paychecks from TB. Maybe they’re getting free use of some time-share palaces.
Redshift
In local appalling/amusing GOP news:
Appalling: The Virginia state GOP chair has drawn a lot of flack for complaining that state party staff have to work in “a literal ghetto” (apparently about the state of their HQ building, not the neighborhood.)
Amusing: The reason their headquarters is in such terrible shape is that the state GOP has $1500 in the bank, so they’ve been putting off repairs.
trollhattan
@Redshift:
If I have a shitty computer does it mean I work in a virtual ghetto?
Trying to get my terminology straight.
Redshift
@Omnes Omnibus:
trollhattan
@Mary G:
2020 election California is significantly less blue than 2018 California, which is darn hard to explain but there it is–not just elected office but also the propositions.
The Newsom recall has a non-zero chance of going forward and while the statewide jungle primary probably excludes any Republican from becoming governor the normal way, we know exactly how Arnold got into office.
Barry
@Dorothy A. Winsor: “I have to admit McCarthy surprised me by going full the-election-was-rigged. I thought of him as standard issue R.”
That *is* standard issue R.
Alison Rose
Since it’s an open thread, and since the GOPs whining and crying is sweet, sweet music to my ears, and speaking of sweet stuff…………..
Anyone here happen to have a Girl Scout in their circles who has the new Toast-Yay cookie for sale? Our local troops aren’t carrying it and it sounds great and we all deserve cookies after 2020. (“All” does not include Trump supporters.) Gimme the digital cookie link and I will fork over the money.
Also too, GFY McCarthy.
Poe Larity
The party needs a real Ranger like Tom Cotton for 2024.
Cacti
@Geminid: But you’re thinking about it like a liberal.
When a right winger takes a dig at a right wing male for wearing makeup, it’s definitely them slagging his sexuality.
sdhays
@Dorothy A. Winsor: I think he is a standard issue Republican, but he’s in way over his head trying to be the Leader of the Shit Flinging monkeys that make up the House Republican Caucus. He just follows along with whatever his monkeys want to do so that they let him remain as nominal leader.
It’s really indicative of the dearth of talent in the House Republicans that this guy, who was on the cusp of being Speaker in 2014 only to embarrass himself and the party days or weeks before the vote, is the guy that they’ve come back to. He doesn’t have the skills for this position, but it seems no one does, so he’s what they’re left with.
Gravenstone
@West of the Rockies: I doubt we’re doing much of anything in Russia. Putin has been accumulating enemies for a very long time. And the latest attempt on Navalny, and his subsequent treatment when he returned to Russia are likely the mobilizing factors for the current unrest.
RobertDSC-Mac Mini
@trollhattan:
I was with my ex-girlfriend at the time at her house. By the end, she and her mom were cheering with me for the Pats to complete the comeback, cursing the Falcons for each positive play they made.
sdhays
@Baud: I thought we were merely a “nearly top 10,000” blog. Have we gone up in the rankings?
Cacti
@RobertDSC-Mac Mini: The Falcons blowing a 25 point lead in the Super Bowl is the most Falcons thing ever.
mrmoshpotato
Took Dump’s Shithouse Rat Nuts Express to Crazytown but never wanted to actually arrive in Crazytown.
Too bad, so sad, fuck ’em!
“You are all
my childrenthe Kremlin’s bitches now!” -Donnie KruegerBlueGuitarist
@Another Scott:
Thanks for mentioning McCarthy said Putin paid Trump and Rohrabacher. McCarthy should be confronted about this much more frequently. Republicans initially denied the statement. When they found out WaPo had a recording, having been caught lying, they tried to dismiss it as old news and a joke. McCarthy: “If you listen to it, everybody laughs.” Apparently if you listen to it, after people laugh, McCarthy says “Swear to God,” and Ryan says “No leaks.” They laughed: funny because it’s true but usually hidden. Like when McCarthy blurted out they didn’t care about Benghazi but wanted to damage Clinton. (as waspuppet pointed out).
Benw
It’s hard to believe that someone as smart as Arendt and someone as dumb as McCarthy are in the same species. Like great dane/chihuahua strange
Nicole
@Alison Rose: As a former Girl Scout, your comment piqued my interest. Here’s some info:
https://www.ibtimes.com/new-girl-scout-cookie-toast-yay-will-only-be-available-select-areas-3030430
If you’re near any of the areas ABC Bakers serves, you can go on the GSUSA website and see if there’s a way to connect to one of the troops there for a digital order (heck, they may ship to you even if you’re not near them).
BlueGuitarist
@SoupCatcher: Thanks for pointing out the Kern county lynchings and your point about family business owners support for Trump. Seems likely that a significant share of the white, non-college demographic that gets presented as working class is actually family business owners.
trnc
No one thought they would conflict. It’s part of being a professional republican.
laura
McCarthy isn’t looking so “Young Guns” these days – and he’s earned it. Per the Conservative:
By self-acclamation, Cantor was “the leader,” Ryan was “the thinker” and McCarthy was “the strategist.” McCarthy was quietly derided as the weak link, but his moniker ended up most apt, as he held formal power the longest (he remains, at time of writing, the House Minority Leader).
But the group did little else but survive (Ryan is now at Fox News, Cantor in investment banking).
What a bunch of shite bags. It is to laugh…..
Jinchi
It’s pretty clear that Trump was working several angles, the push to overturn Georgia’s election was simply one of them. If he’d succeeded there, he would have gone after the rest. He had already ousted people at DoJ and the Pentagon and replaced them with loyalists who were actively trying to help him. Two-thirds of the Republican House caucus voted to overturn the results. He’d successfully sent his brownshirts on an attack against the Capitol and clearly many on the inside were cheering the mob on.
We fall into a trap asking ourselves about the details of the of Biden’s EV vote total, forgetting that if he was successful he would hardly have stopped there.
Trump took a wild gamble at an internal coup that probably had a 1% chance of succeeding. Those are better odds than you get buying a lottery ticket, and currently he’s seen no down-side to the attempt.
Redshift
@sdhays: Ever since the first wingnut revolt against Boehner, which failed because they all agreed they wanted him out as Speaker, but none of them wanted the job, GOP “leaders” have been by definition whoever was dumb enough not to realize it was a no-win situation.
Cheryl Rofer
@trollhattan: That was a weak move on Putin’s part. Interesting that he felt pressed to do it.
Redshift
@Redshift: It makes me think of the old saw “there’s a sucker at every poker table — look around; if you don’t know who it is, it’s you.”
Cheryl Rofer
@Bill Arnold:
Of course. This is Volodya’s favorite go-to.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Jinchi: He was going after MI and PA hard, at one point I seem to recall they thought they could flip Minnesota early on. Oddly, I don’t remember any serious moves with the AZ legislature (?), though there was a fairly menacing gathering outside I forget which gov’t office where votes were being tabulated.
Alison Rose
@Nicole: Yeah, that’s been the issue in the past, the different bakeries used by different areas. I’m not in the right zone :) You can order online from any troop, but you need a specific Scout’s link to do so
ETA: Ooh wait, I may have figured it out, huzzah!
Cheryl Rofer
@Alison Rose: I saw something about a Girl Scout Troop 600 for underserved city girls. I’d check it out first, but that might be a good place to get cookies.
Steeplejack (phone)
@Baud:
Almost top 10,000 blog. That’s what keeps us flying under the radar.
Geminid
@Redshift: If you want to get a good up-close view of Virginia Republican party politics, the internet journal Bearing Drift would be interesting. Published by self-described conservatives, its writers for the most part still consider themselves Republicans, but they are highly critical of the radical turn of the state and national party. A good example is M.D. Russ’s Bearing Drift article “Donald Trump is the Republican President.” Russ reviews party history since Gingrich’s Contract With America and asks the question, did trump “hijack the Republican party?” Russ concludes no, “trump just answered the curtain call.”
This year Virginia votes for statewide offices, and the republicans are foregoing primaries and will select nominees by caucus and convention. This may show a lack of confidence in their voters.
Alison Rose
@Cheryl Rofer: Oh cool, thanks
ETA–darn, they don’t carry the new one, either.
VeniceRiley
SCOTUS just murdered the emoluments clause.
Kevin McCarthy’s touring troupe of “The Aristocrats!”
Llelldorin
@trollhattan:
I don’t think it’s that hard to explain. In 2018 we were furious and the Republicans weren’t hugely active—they thought they’d already “owned the libs.” In 2020 everyone was active, including the conservatives, and those of us on the left were mostly obsessing about other states and not paying enough attention at home. It’s all well and good funding Stacey Abrams, but we have to keep an eye on Orange County as well. We’re doing extremely well in CA, but we haven’t won forever here at home; we still need to work at it.
Kent
@Hungry Joe: they are thinking it gives them more momentum for the challenges in PA and AZ or wherever else.
FelonyGovt
@Geminid: I’m making it a personal mission to work to get rid of Mike Garcia in 2022. He voted against certifying the Electoral College votes. I can’t believe a district willing to elect Katie Hill supports such seditious behavior.
leeleeFL
@Geminid: Ungrateful shitheads much? WTAF, they didn’t starve to death, rebuilt their lives, and now, their descendants shit on California!? They should move back….
Ruckus
@Another Scott:
I believe that it is more than they just don’t care. Their goal is reduced government and how do they do that? By making government work not at all, or even worse for long time acceptance of their “policies,” actually harm those they don’t like. To me that means they recognize that trump was good for them, disruptive, destructive, incompetent beyond belief. Their goal for the last 120 yrs has been to make the government far less effective. That time has been spent trying within the rules and changing the rules (mitch) to make government less effective and far less intrusive to their paymasters, the extremely wealthy. And it’s worked, what is the only actual legislation that happened during trump ? The tax “reform” bill that gave additional tax breaks to the very wealthy. They feigned horror at the insurrection, because it struck close to home and put them at risk but the moment shitforbrains is out of office, they have spun 180 degrees and are protesting who is in power, not them, right back to their old tricks of money is EVERYTHING.
Redshift
@Geminid:
Yeah, it’s kind of fascinating, because typically in recent years, the more extreme wing of the state GOP wants a nominating convention, because it’s a small group of true believers they expect to be more in line with their views. (Like when a convention nominated Cuccinelli and EW Jackson.) It’s a sign how radicalized their base is now that they think their chances of avoiding an Amanda Chase nomination would be worse in a primary.
Llelldorin
@leeleeFL: I’d complain if the same thing weren’t working in our favor in reverse in Texas right now. Conservatives are sure that all these people are fleeing “California taxes,” but most of the time it’s just >$2500 rents that they’re fleeing. There’s only so much buildable land within reasonable commute distance of San Francisco, Mountain View, and Cupertino.
Suzanne
@Lacuna Synechdoche:
Angry and dumb is no way to go through life.
In all seriousness, there’s no way to make these people feel better about being wrong. Shame is powerful but dangerous.
germy
https://www.linns.com/news/us-stamps-postal-history/pmg-dejoy-names-three-new-csac-members
Jinchi
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: There were also some pretty serious signals that Trump was trying to move the levers of power to stay in office.
That editorial was written 3-days before the attack on the Capitol. The former defense secretaries were clearly getting word that Trump was planning to use the military to intervene and were signaling to people on the inside that they needed to stop it. At the time, Mike Flynn and others had already openly called for martial law and using the military to oversee “new elections”.
The hours-long delay before the national guard was mobilized is pretty clear evidence that some of the military leadership wanted to see how things played out before responding.
Redshift
@Llelldorin: One analysis of 2020 is that a good chunk of the people who powered the midterm blue wave were anti-Trump, but not pro-Democrat, so when they had an election where they could vote against Trump directly, they voted for Republicans downballot.
It seems plausible, but I’d like to see it revisited now that final vote totals are in, because I’ve also read that a lot of the takes on previous elections based on election-night totals are just flat wrong once the final counts come in, but have nonetheless remained as conventional wisdom.
leeleeFL
@Llelldorin: Point taken. My Daughter and I moved to Flori-DUH right after the 2000 Debacle. No correlation, but if ppl asked why, I said, ” now is the time for all good Democrats to live to a Red State!”. Some of them believed me!
Edited to add: can we see that McCarthy gets a great big bag of salted dicks? Putz!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Llelldorin: Usually, the folk that move to Texas from California move because their company moved and their jobs moved. Rent refugees usually move to Nevada or Arizona.
sab
@germy: GOP contributors?
West of the Rockies
@Geminid:
Gaetz’s beauty bag is not working. Any chance he can deflate that enormous melon a bit? It’s like an orange on a toothpick.*
(So I Married an Axe Murderer.)
John S.
@germy: I am not up on the protocol for Postmaster General, but how the fuck does an incompetent hack like Louis DeJoy still have a job?
John S.
@West of the Rockies: It’s like Sputnik — spherical, but quite pointy at parts!
Llelldorin
@Redshift: Right. The electorates in 2018 and 2020 were very clearly different, so I’m a little skeptical of takes that assume the exact same people were voting in both elections.
Jinchi
@John S.: Probably has to do with this.
Llelldorin
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Ah, that’s interesting and fair. My perspective is probably colored by my job—I work tech up in the Bay Area, so most of the people I know are very able to switch states if they want to pretty much at whim, and Texas is another very strong tech state (because of Austin, basically).
cmorenc
Strange what a relief it is that we’re back to the paradigm of GOP congressional obstruction vs a Democratic president, instead of the daily toxic shit-show of the past four years, when we were constantly disappointed and disgusted, but never surprised at Trump’s bottomless stupidity, cruelty, and narcissistic selfishness. It was as if daily, Trump said: “your thought yesterday was over the top, well hold my beer and watch this!” (Yeah, Trump doesn’t drink beer, so it was his diet coke he asked someone to hold while he did his next toxic trick).
Now we’re more constructively focusing daily on “so how’s Biden gonna pull all this off”, hoping of course that he does.
sdhays
@John S.: I think the USPS is supposed to be semi-independent like the Federal Reserve, but the Supreme Court, in its infinite wisdom, ruled that independent agencies make a mockery of the Executive Branch and that the President should be able to fire anyone, anywhere (in the Executive Branch, that is).
Theoretically, I think he should be shielded by the USPS Board of Directors (or whatever they’re called), but with that Supreme Court ruling, that seems less solid to me.
But IANAL..
ETA: I see Jinchi got there first, but I am curious about why the Supreme Court’s ruling on the CFPB wouldn’t also apply to DeJoy and the USPS.
Jim Appleton
@Redshift:
Ding! Ding!
Except you can leave blanks for “Boehner” and “Speaker”.
Circular firing squad …
germy
That’s my guess. They’re certainly not stamp enthusiasts.
Geminid
@leeleeFL: I don’t know a lot about California history of the 1930s. But I wonder if the California natives, and the California cops, showed the Okies how to treat an underclass, and the Okies internalized this. No longer economic refuges, now they are the native Californians who think they can guard their power and status by keeping others down.
zhena gogolia
Transgender ban lifted! Yay!
burnspbesq
@Llelldorin:
He also represents more carrots and almonds than you can possibly imagine. Ag is every bit as big as Oil in that district.
zhena gogolia
@zhena gogolia:
NYT
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/01/25/us/biden-transgender-ban-military.html
Aleta
In case anyone is interested, a friend sent me this. (Speakers and rally start in 15 minutes, at 7 pm GMT; 2 pm EST; 11 am PT)
One can register to be there on zoom, or watch the live video at the f* book video feed for Code Pink or Stopthewarcoalition
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Geminid: They didn’t need any training.
Jeffro
@Just Chuck: six of one, half-dozen of the other, maybe?
?BillinGlendaleCA
@burnspbesq: And a whole lot of mountains and desert.
burnspbesq
@Baud:
If there were ever two people who deserve each other…
Jeffro
@Redshift: I’ve been (pleasantly) surprised that some of VA’s richer wingnuts haven’t stepped in and told the party powers-that-be to get their shit together.
oh well!
centerfielddj
It is incorrect to assert McCarthy does not appear to be a moron. He not only appears to be a moron, but there are lots of evidence points to establish that he is a moron.
Among those evidence points is McCarthy’s abysmal performance when he was the California Republican Assembly Leader when we suffered through the 2009-12 budget crises. A person I know who was wired in on one of those budget negotiations told me “One of the biggest problems we’re having in reaching a deal is that McCarthy doesn’t know how to read a budget or understand a pension adjustment, so no one, not even the Chamber of Commerce, can explain to him that the deal is an acceptable one.”
Barbara
@Geminid: Virginia Republicans turn to caucuses when they want to engineer or avoid a particular outcome. Apparently, this year, they are terrified that Amanda Jones might manage to get herself nominated. On the other hand, they also turned to a caucus to ensure that Ken Cuccinelli got the nomination over the lieutenant governor at the time, Bill Bolling, who was not nearly as steeped in culture war issues as Cuccinelli. So yes, it shows lack of confidence in their voters.
Jeffro
I’m surprised that more Dem politicians don’t make an issue of this. “Shouldn’t your government at least work (and ideally, work for you)? Yes? Then why would we want GOP candidate X who’s both a) a moron and b) ideologically opposed to government doing good for Americans?”
Hence the appointment of so many Cabinet secretaries who were essentially enemies of those agencies’ very missions.
MisterForkbeard
@SoupCatcher: Trump also got a good amount of support here in 2020 because the right-wing has decided Gavin Newsome is The Worst Ever And Must Be Recalled.
Basically, they’re blaming him for all the covid restrictions. A good federal response would have absolved him of that, but that was part of Trump’s ‘plan’. :/
Subsole
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Maricopa, I believe.
Land of Tent-City Joe.
cckids
It can be easy to dismiss people’s attitudes that are so detached from reality. In 2016, I kept hearing people talk about how they didn’t care about all of Trump’s bankruptcies because “that just shows he’s been down, and worked his way back up”. This was in Vegas; which was ground zero for the 2009-10 housing meltdown and resulting BK’s.
People are disengaged, and it is a political problem, especially for the Democrats.
Subsole
@germy: Yep. That bullshit about teaching kids pro market independent ideals is the tell.
The USPS just got DeVos’ed.
Edit: well, even more than it did when DeJoy got hired.
You know what I meant.
Mike G
“I never thought the Shit Restaurant would serve ME shit,” sobbed McCarthy
brendancalling
Thanks to the personal isolation necessary to survive covid-19, my twice/thrice annual depression—normally 24 hour affair, nothing like what a lot of people deal with—is now a weekly event. Sometimes 2 or 3 times a week. Last week, I had my very first 48-hour spell.
This is all due to covid 19. And, as noted previously, I left my home in Tennessee as a result, and I haven’t seen my kid in nearly a year either.
Kevin McCarthy’s sadness, sadly, doesn’t make me feel better. There’s only one thing that would make me happy, and it’s not nice to wish death on people, even people like Kevin McCarthy.
So I won’t say that.
mrmoshpotato
Mr. Simon has a helpful suggestion for Ghouliani.
Just One More Canuck
@Steve in the ATL: are suggesting that something nefarious is happening with SEC football refereeing? That literally blows my mind
Doc Sardonic
Who the hell is Amanda Jones and why are Va Republican so frightened of her?
germy
Yes, that part jumped out at me (limited gubmint!) and it’s the reason I decided to bring it here. They’re doing what they can to introduce their … “ideas”… into our public services.
glory b
@Llelldorin: I’m sorry but anyone who thinks “untrustable” is a word isn’t smart, let alone brilliant.
I find Rachel Maddow frustrating at times, but a while ago she did a segment on McCarthy’s wonky version of the English language that was pretty funny.
trollhattan
@MisterForkbeard: @cckids:
More Californians voted Trump in 2020 than ’16 because more Californians voted. What’s not to be overlooked is that he got more votes here than any other state (6M). With that out of the way, so did Biden to the tune of 11 million.
Geminid
@Redshift: Aside from Maine and a few Congressional Districts like the VA 1st and the Maine 2nd, there really did not seem to be much ticket splitting overall last election. At the Senatorial level Steve Bullock ran 4 points ahead of trump, most senate races were closer to the presidential vote, I think. The dropoff from Biden to a Democratic Nebraska Congressional Candidate was such that she lost while he won the District’s Electoral Vote, but that race could be an outlier. I think most of the seats lost were in districts carried by trump, like the NM 2nd held by Xochitl Torres-Small.
NeenerNeener
@Nicole: Grubhub is delivering Girl Scout cookies this year, too.
catclub
yep. It is only allowed while the president it targets can drag out the proceedings indefinitely. Once he can no longer drag out the proceedings, it is moot. That’s some catch, that catch-22
ETA: I can hope I am wrong and the SC dropping it means the case can now proceed in lower courts. Am I?
germy
@catclub:
Trump still has the money, though.
Is the moola moot?
Barbara
@Doc Sardonic: Sorry, it’s Amanda Chase. You can look her up. She is a gun nut, similar to Lauren Boebert or Marjorie Taylor-Greene. She’s crazy and she’s is seeking the gubernatorial nomination.
planetjanet
@Redshift: I would not give Rich Anderson such credit. The downtown Richmond neighborhood where the office is located is a bit too diverse for Republicans.
Michael Cain
@SFAW:
In prior years watching New England I would remark, “How did someone get that open?” Watching Tampa Bay yesterday I frequently thought the same thing, along with “And open on the same kind of patterns they were open on in New England.” I note that the Tampa Bay head coach gave an answer to a question sometime in the past week that was basically, “Of course I let Tom help coach. I’d be stupid not to.” I suspect that Brady’s defense-reading has reached Peyton-esque levels, and after a full season the receivers understand what he’s telling them to do.
Jeffro
@Barbara: yup – a self-proclaimed “trumpov in a skirt”.
Yikes.
Go try that shit out in Oklahoma or something, Amanda!
Geminid
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Well, I credit you with more than my own general knowledge of California and Okies.
geg6
@Baud:
Campos and Loomis have been tearing him an new asshole on LGM the last few weeks. Deservedly so.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@trollhattan: Henry Ford considered several Rabbis good friends while he was selling Protocols of Zion at his dealerships. Himler’s personal doctor was Jew. Inconsistency among racists is nothing new under the sun since they are dumb fucks.
Geminid
@Barbara: By denying Bill Bolling a primary in the 2013 Republican Governors race, Virginia culture warriors acheived their goal of a small tent party for small-minded people. A lot want to keep it that way.
geg6
@Cheryl Rofer:
My thought exactly. Very interesting.
geg6
@Alison Rose:
I tried ordering online the other day and couldn’t figure it out. What’s the secret?
Barbara
@Geminid: Oh yes, they did that for sure, and it’s interesting that even they have either begun to hit the limit of their tolerance for deepening failure or it finally dawned on them that the days has arrived when the crazy train would demand the right to set the route.
Elie
I wanna know when that process server from the New York Attorney General’s Office is gonna ring the doorbell at Mar-a-Lago? Or show up at Trump Jr’s condo or whatever? I’m counting on these folks to start their job and start making the bastard’s life true hell.
Alison Rose
@geg6: You need to get either a direct link from a Scout or a troop, or else you can search on the main site for troops in your area and choose from the list. But you can’t just order cookies from Girls Scouts USA itself–has to be from a troop.
J R in WV
@Steve in the ATL:
I watched that take place in total disbelief — I’ve never worn pads to play a football game, yet I knew that kicking a field goal then was stupid strategically and tactically.
And about the Green Bay defense, they didn’t seem to have a game plan designed to make it hard for Brady to do what he lives to do. Isn’t that something a defensive coordinator does?
But also, The Tampa Bay Offensive Coordinator is the former great QB out of Marshall University, my alma mater, Brian Leftwich, who obviously out coordinated everyone working for Green Bay.
Must be great working with a great QB like the despicable human Tom Brady… Tom Terrific? I dunno ’bout that shit!
Doc Sardonic
@Barbara: Thank You…..Now I understand the Va Republican’s case of the fantods.
Ceci n est pas mon nym
@germy: Goddam. DeJoy is really burrowed in, isn’t he? What are our options for repairing the USPS? Could we indict him for interfering with the mail?
A woman from anywhere (formerly Mohagan)
@West of the Rockies: There’s a lot of that in sports. I think they just hold on to the name they had when they first started playing. That, or they are just all big boys. Kenny, Tommy, etc.
J R in WV
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
That’s my take on this thing. He deliberately took steps to impede the timely delivery of important mail, ballots, to interfere with an election.
Every piece of mail that was delivered later than it would have been without his interference is a federal crime in my book.
SFAW
@Michael Cain:
Brady’s always been good at finding his Nth receiver when N-1 are covered, but I was talking about blown coverages — d-backs (CB or S, not sure which the particular defenders were) getting turned around by a not-especially-super move, or not covering what we used to call “prevent defense” when it was called for.