A short while ago, Senate Minority Leader McConnell, America’s foremost political insurgent currently holding elected office, was able to call in enough personal favors to block the the bill that would have created the negotiated with the Republicans bipartisan, independent 6 January Commission from proceeding. As expected, rather than actually forcing more debate on the issue and bipartisan compromise, the silent filibuster that McConnell has been using for over a decade to stifle all Senate business other than confirming Trump judicial nominations actually prevented the bill from proceeding to the debate stage. So it will not even be discussed as potential legislation, let alone debated by various members or amended, on the Senate floor.
What happened earlier today is simply one battle in the ongoing revolutionary war that the Republican Party and the conservative movement that both sustains and comprises it have been, are, and will continue to wage against the United States, the constitutional order, and small “l” small “d” self governing liberal democracy. This was not unexpected and anyone surprised by this outcome is a fool. I would also like a really good explanation as to why Senators Sinema and Murray missed this vote! I understand the nine Republican senators who couldn’t be bothered, they knew it would fail and could care less, so flew home early for the recess, but Sinema and Murray have some explaining to do!
Last week, as part of a 12 tweet thread, Rick Wilson nailed the central dynamic here in tweets 3 through 7 (I’m copying and pasting the text of the tweets because WordPress is still behaving funky with embedded tweets):
3/ More important in their minds is something darker. They see the majority in their grasp, and just as they did in the states this year, they’ll strike quickly, mercilessly, and without a moment of hesitation of a scintilla of shame to make the next election the last.
4/ For them, the problem wasn’t an attack on our republic and a democratic election. For Kevin and Co, the problem was that it didn’t work the first time. They need the shock and awe, the spectacle, the Trumphadi terror threat out there.
5/ This zero-sum game of power/not-power is what the Democrats never, ever, ever grasp. This year in the states, the GOP — directed and assisted by Heritage Action — has passed sweeping voter restrictions. Democrats couldn’t mount a response. They played defense.
6/ Even now, too many think policy will save them. “But our climate plan” or “but our control gun plan” or “but our daycare plan” isn’t politics. It’s masturbation. The bad guys are willing to send people to kill you and you respond with a white paper? GTFO.
7/ This is why the Democrats should stop negotiation over a January 6th commission and just freaking DO it. Do you think some kind of bipartisan comity and goodwill will be lost somehow? THEY SENT PEOPLE TO KILL YOU. Get a goddamned grip. Play offense. Drag them.
Wilson, in these five tweets, zeroed straight in on the dynamic in America right now What he described above is revolutionary warfare being waged by the Republicans and the conservative movement against the US, the constitutional order, and every single American that is outside of what they consider the acceptable in terms of which is and is not an American. Specifically, we are in the midst of a domestic low intensity revolutionary war being waged to determine what America is, who it is for, and who gets to be an American with all the rights that come along with that and who will be, at best, a second class citizen with granted privileges that can be revoked at any time for any reason. This is exactly the dynamic that has played out since late 2003 in the sectarian warfare between Sunni and Shi’a Arabs in Iraq. A sectarian war that our stupid, useless, and self defeating invasion of Iraq in 2003 precipitated.
What Wilson is describing, both the Republican Party’s overriding strategic objectives and the seeming inability by the Democrats to grasp the actual reality of that objective, which I think is an accurate and correct assessment, reminded me of something from the literature on low intensity warfare and conflict. Specifically one of Bernard Fall’s less well known, but in my professional opinion as one of his professional descendants, most important works on the subject. And this is what I wanted to bring to your attention for consideration.
In Fall’s The Theory and Practice of Insurgency and Counterinsurgency he delineates two equations that explain his theory of what he calls Revolutionary Warfare. The first is for Revolutionary Warfare the second for countering it. From page 2 of his essay, which was adapted from a lecture (emphasis mine):
Let me state this definition: RW=GW+P, or revolutionary warfare equals guerrilla warfare plus political action. This formula for revolutionary warfare is the result of the application of guerrilla methods to the furtherance of an ideology or a political system. This is the real difference between partisan warfare, guerrilla warfare, and everything else. Guerrilla simply means ‘small war’ to which the correct Army answer is (and that applies to all Western armies) that everybody knows how to fight small wars; no second lieutenant of the infantry ever learns anything else but how to fight small wars. Political action, however, is the difference. The Communists, or shall we say, any sound revolutionary warfare operator (the French underground, the Norwegian underground, or any other European anti-NAZI underground) most of the time used small-war tactics, not to destroy the German Army, of which they were thoroughly incapable, but to establish a competitive system of control over the population. Of course, in order to do this, here and there they had to kill some of the occupying forces and attack some military targets. But above all they had to kill their own people who collaborated with the enemy.
But the ‘kill’ aspect, the military aspect, definitely always remained the minor aspect. The political, administrative, ideological aspect is the primary aspect. Everybody, of course, by definition, will seek a military solution to the insurgency problem, whereas, by its very nature, the insurgency problem is military only in a secondary sense, and politically, ideologically, and administratively in a primary sense. Once we understand this, we will understand more of what is actually going on in Viet-nam or in some other places affected by RW.
What Wilson wrote, as a diagnosis of the strategic problem facing the US as a small “l” small “d” liberal democratic self governing constitutional republic speaks loudly in paraphrase of Fall’s point above. The Republican Party and the conservative movement that sustains it have become a revolutionary party and movement in support of reactionary goals. And while the Democrats and the liberals, progressives, and centrists that comprise the Democratic Party are all waiting for Speaker Pelosi to do something administrative to bring McCarthy and his caucus to heel, or for Senator Schumer and President Biden to finally convince Senators Manchin and Sinema to give up the idea that the filibuster forces bipartisanship (all the data shows it does not), or for AG Garland to bring the insurrectionists to justice, or for Director Wray to cut the FBI loose to round up white domestic extremists – the latter two actions can neither be done nor will be done on the scale necessary to resolve the problem – the Republicans and the conservative movement are engaging in political action to further their reactionary revolutionary goals to turn the US into a populist minority party managed/illiberal democracy similar to what Orban has done in Hungary. Almost all of this political action is non to less than lethal, even when it includes implicit or explicit threats of violence, with use of actual violence (guerrilla warfare), such as the attack on the Capitol on 6 January, the plot against Governor Whitmer, GOP state legislatures and governors changing state laws allowing drivers to run over protestors if they subjectively feel threatened, whatever it is Ammon Bundy is really up to in southern Oregon right now, women doing high speed hit and run attempts through vaccination clinics, the domestic terrorism by mass shooting in El Paso, the domestic terrorism by mass shooting at the synagogues in Pittsburgh and Poway, and the dozens and dozens more low intensity acts of political violence targeting Jewish Americans, Asian Americans and Americans of Pacific Islander descent, attacks on Muslim Americans and those who “look” Muslim, etc will continue to be denied and denounced as lone wolf acts, but whose violence can be leveraged for effect.
And this leads to the second of Fall’s equations, which he does not make explicit, but does describe on pages 15 and 16 of the essay. Counter-Revolutionary War=Counter-Guerilla Warfare+Counter-Political Action+Civic Action (CRW=CGW+CPW+CA). Fall defines Civic Action as:
Civic action is not the construction of privies or the distribution of antimalaria sprays. One can’t fight an ideology; one can’t fight a militant doctrine with better privies. Yet this is done constantly. One side says “Land reform,” and the other side says “better culverts.” One side says “we’re going to kill all those nasty village chiefs and landlords.” The other side says “Yes, but we want to give you prize pigs to improve your strain.” These arguments do not match. Simple but adequate appeals will have to be found sooner or later.
The reality we face right now is that we are in an ongoing low intensity domestic revolutionary political war with occasional spikes of lethality. And that political war is really about just who gets to define what America is and determine who is a real American and who is, at best, a second class citizen to be tolerated. This is akin to what the fight between Sunni and Shi’a Arabs and the Kurds is about in Iraq. Their sectarian fight is about who gets to be an Iraqi and, as a result, who gets to control Iraq and benefit politically, socially, economically, and religiously from doing so. This domestic political war we are in, but which almost no one wants to explicitly state is ongoing, isn’t going to be won, to paraphrase Fall, by having better policies. Not because they aren’t better policies, but because no amount of tactical success is going to magically transmute itself into strategic success if you don’t actually understand the theater strategic problem. We failed to achieve theater strategic success in Iraq and Afghanistan despite significant tactical successes in both theaters because senior leadership, including three different national command authorities, failed to properly understand the theater strategic reality because our concepts and doctrine for doing so are historically contextually inaccurate (a discussion for another day). We are on the brink of loosing the domestic low intensity revolutionary political war we are in here at home for similar reasons: far too much of the Democratic Party is unable to or unwilling to recognize the strategic reality we are facing in the domestic American theater that this revolutionary political war is taking place in and, as a result, are proposing solutions that are and will be ineffectual.
Right now the few institutional restraints and constraints on the GOP have been completed blown off, demolished, and/or are in the process of being demolished wherever possible by the GOP. They’re at the point where they are so close to achieving their goal and they see it so clearly that they don’t care that they are sloppily telegraphing all of it in broad daylight. From sending NRCC and NSCC and GOP party officials to meet with corporate execs to explain why they don’t need to continue boycotting GOP officials and organizations for donations because of the insurrection on 6 January to keeping a “bipartisan” commission from happening to rewriting state laws on elections and who gets to determine election outcomes to everything in between. They don’t care who knows what they are doing because they have made the decision they can pull the whole thing off in broad daylight. And, in fact, doing so makes it even more legal and constitutional because no one can accuse them of hiding or concealing or obscuring what they were doing. Even as they claim it is not what they are doing.
The real problem we have is that if in November 2024 the Democratic presidential candidate clearly wins a majority of the popular vote in enough states to win the electoral college and therefore become president and either 1) enough GOP controlled states have changed their laws allowing the state legislature to appoint the electors they want regardless of the outcome of the vote in their states and/or 2) as Ian Milhiser asks: the Republicans hold a majority in the new Congress sworn in at the beginning of January 2025 and decide that they refuse to certify the Democrats win and instead select the Republican nominee, there is no actual constitutional or statutory remedy to what will have been a naked theft of the presidency. And it won’t matter if the Republican nominee is Trump, DeSantis, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Tucker Carlson, or someone even worse. That’s the real problem we are staring at.
The conditions are being set, and in some places have already been set, to do this. And there is absolutely no constitutional remedy anyone knows of for these types of actions. They are not illegal, they are not unconstitutional. And because it was they are all being done openly and under cover of law, the military will be given an out because whichever Republican would be installed as president would have been so in a legal and constitutional manner, therefore he or she would, indeed, be the president in terms of also being commander in chief. This will also apply to the rest of the civil service. This completely renders the second half of Milhiser’s question about whether the union comes apart at that point moot. If the military leadership decides that a Republican president installed in this way is legal and constitutional because no laws were violated and there’s nothing in the Constitution to stop what a lot of people are worried about and that I have described as happening and NY, CA, IL, WA, and a few other very large blue states revolt, they will take orders to put down that rebellion. Because the person giving the orders will be the lawful, constitutional president and orders to put down a rebellion against the US would also be lawful.
I cannot express just how dangerous a place we are in right now. No matter how much work Stacey Abrams does, no matter how many other places Democrats or liberals and/or progressives seek to emulate her work, as David Schor correctly states: “the idea that you can organize your way out of a 3% bias in the median seat is pretty wild.” Translated into non election jargon, if the gerrymanders that are going to be put in place during the next round of redistricting are audaciously large enough, combined with the inherent disparities that already exist in how the Senate is comprised and, as a result, how the Electoral College functions are large enough, no amount of political work at election time to turn out the vote is going to be enough to overcome artificially created electoral roadblocks of that size! And no amount of Marc Elias’s yeoman’s legal work will be enough to prevent it!
So what is to be done? Democrats, especially elected officials at the state and Federal levels, need to actually clearly recognize what is going on and actually call it out and describe it in plain terms. It needs to be hammered until the media is unable to both sides the coverage of it even as Republican elected officials and conservative movement leaders and commenters squeal like stuck pigs. And those same Democratic elected officials, where they have any leverage and power have to use it and fast to either stop what is happening or prevent it from happening. They have to engage in counter-political warfare and civic action! Because the bottom line of this lesson is if they do not use the power they have right now, if they do not develop an effective counter-political warfare and civic action strategy and execute it, it will not matter if the policies they are proposing are better for Americans because the Republicans opposing them DO NOT CARE ABOUT POLICY! They care about obtaining power and doing so in order to never have to relinquish it again!
The liberal and progressive organizations that support and comprise the Democratic Party need to acting as if their heads are on fire over this. Many of your reading this, or commenting on it, are already doing excellent work being engaged, but right now that engagement has to shift to pounding the message home to Democratic elected officials and Democratic Party leaders at the Federal, state, and county levels that we are in the midst of a revolutionary war and the fate of our self governing liberal democratic Republic hangs in the balance!
If action is not taking by this Autumn, especially at the Federal level, it will be too late. Once Congress goes into its Autumn recess, which is when the 2022 midterm campaigns will begin in earnest, Congress’s work for this term will effectively be over. It is all well and good that Senate Majority Leader Schumer has scheduled Senate Bill 1, the Senate equivalent to House Resolution 1: The For the People Act, for a vote during the June work period. That is a great start. Unfortunately, Senate Majority Leader does not have the votes to even bring the bill to the floor for debate as long as the silent filibuster remains in place.
We find ourselves in the midst of a revolutionary war. Our leaders need to recognize that fact and begin to act like it. This is not business as usual. The next seventeen months, but especially the next six months, will determine if we remain a small “l” small “d” liberal democratic self governing republic or if we become a managed, illiberal democracy. It can not only happen here, it is happening as I type this!
Simple, but adequate appeals will have to be found sooner or later…
Open thread!
Calouste
The filibuster will be gone the moment the GQP gets 50 Senators, the Presidency, and a majority in the House. As will be democracy as you know it. Me, I’ll be out of the US before November 2024 with time to spare. I can watch how things work out from a safe distance, like a different hemisphere.
rp
I see the green lantern theory is alive and well.
germy
family emergency:
Wyatt Salamanca
These words are as true today as when they first appeared in print back on October 25, 2018:
h/t https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2018/10/25/suffocation-of-democracy
Mart
I just wanted my political anxiety to coast awhile after dumping tfg; but it was only fleeting.
Matt McIrvin
I see a lot of the online left simply arguing that all this is happening because “the Democrats” secretly want it to happen too. So they don’t necessarily have our backs either.
Johnny Gentle (famous crooner)
@Calouste:
@Calouste:
You’re too pessimistic. McConnell wouldn’t reverse himself on these institutional principles just for short-term gain. After all, he established that no Supreme Court Justice would be confirmed during an election year after Scalia died, and he kept to his word and honored that rule after RBG died.
Old School
@Calouste:
Not necessarily as tax cuts for the rich and confirming Republicans judges can already be done without changing the current filibuster rules at all.
Matt McIrvin
Where my mind goes when I think about all this is a kind of automatic “I need a gun”. But then I realize that (1) I’m the last person in the country who should be anywhere near a gun and (2) guns by themselves don’t do anything good; it’s not as if you can actually overthrow the government with them. It’s just the inverse of the Republican gun-guy fantasy of a bloody last stand against home invaders.
But I do think Republicans don’t have the same fear that their actions will be met with violence that we do. Or, rather, they only fear violence from their own right. And that’s an imbalance that affects everything.
Warblewarble
Surely you cannot doubt Herr Hitler, has not said he has no further territorial demands to make in Europe.
Citizen Alan
And now, I have to explain to my 83-year-old mother that I’m leaving Mississippi for NYC for a year or more to get an LLM, and that the whole time, I’ll be looking for a legal job that will let me emigrate.
MJS
@germy: Nope, sorry, Toomey had the same excuse, it’s bullshit no matter who is saying it. The obligation to the Constitution should trump family issues if you want to be a U.S. Senator.
debbie
@germy:
Sorry. Several hours would not have made a difference. It’s your fucking job, Patty.
MJS
@germy: Also, it says “personal family matter”, not “family emergency”.
germy
Ksmiami
Then plan for war and the end of our country.
MJS
Seriously, fuck Sinema and Murray. They have given cover to every Republican who bailed on the vote.
germy
@MJS:
I figured it was an emergency if it was important enough to pull her away from her job.
I don’t know anything about her. So she just didn’t want to vote, and made up that excuse? Is she one of the conservadems?
Just Chuck
Any state that refuses to certify a legal federal election should be regarded as being in rebellion.
debbie
Illiberal democracy? More like illiberal autocracy, based on the red state legislation we’ve been seeing.
Omnes Omnibus
@MJS: Since it wouldn’t have made a difference to the end result, I am not overly concerned.
For that matter, I am not overly concerned about this vote. The GOP are who they are, the investigation will go forward in the end, and this is more dirt on the grave of memory of bipartisanship.
Eolirin
@Just Chuck: If they hold the house, it won’t be the states that do it. It’ll be congress itself.
MJS
@germy: I don’t know her motivation, and I don’t really care. It’s dereliction of duty, plain and simple.
germy
They’re riling up the base as we speak
MJS
@Omnes Omnibus: It gave Republicans like Toomey cover for missing the vote for the very same reason.
matt
We need to get ready to put troops in the field.
Elizabelle
@MJS:
You fuck them, MJS. Patty Murray is a phenomenal Senator; she put out a statement saying she had to fly home for a family emergency. If you want to call her a liar, have at it.
Sinema: no idea what was up with her.
I was not sorry to see the vote’s outcome. I think we have a better chance at justice and truth with Congressional hearings conducted by Democrats. Screw anyone who wants to babble that’s not “bipartisan.” You were not going to have anything other than window dressing with what the GOP just refused to get on board with. Rightwing media is going to lie and tell stories no matter what. They deserve the “fuck them.”
TFG is in a world of criminal and financial trouble. I don’t think the Republicans are unbeatable and thus we are doomed. I think they are deplorable, with few exceptions, and an obstacle to be worked around and opposed.
A lot can change in three months.
Also, I doubt the 2022 midterms will resemble previous midterms. How many have we conducted, in the wake of an attack on the US Capitol, fomented by a Republican “president”?
People are noticing the voter suppression and the Supreme Court being gamed.
Another Scott
I’m uncomfortable with this line of argument, because I do not believe it is correct.
The choice you’re outlining seems to be:
1) The GQP is throwing democracy away, therefore we are doomed if we continue to fight within the system
2) The GQP is throwing democracy away, therefore we must throw democracy away in order to save it.
I do not believe those are the choices.
The GQP rammed 3 Justices onto the SCOTUS, and they lost. They had people inside in the 2020 election, and they lost. They had people inside the Capitol and the Pentagon on January 6, and they lost. It’s going to be more difficult for them in 2024, not less.
Yes, they are changing state laws, but those laws are being/going to be challenged. There are still people in office in those states that take their oaths seriously.
Finally, some of us remember the bombings and hijackings and assassinations of the ’60s and ’70s. The crazies have always been lurking out there. Sometimes they have some political support, usually they don’t. But institutions have held in the battle against them.
Ultimately, elections are won for a lot of reason: 1) likability; 2) trust; 3) “of my tribe”; 4) not being disenfranchised and being able to vote; etc. Screaming “the other guy tried to overthrow the government” doesn’t sound like a winning strategy to get people who aren’t paying much attention. Carter tried something like that with the 1980 debate with Reagan, reminding voters that RWR had spent years railing against Communist Social Security and the rest. “There you go again…” The truth – and it was the truth – didn’t matter.
What matters is finding ways to connect with voters enough so that they fill out the ballot for you. Too often, that comes down to likeability. Saying we’re doomed when voters look around and don’t see their neighborhood burning down and seeing the grocery is fully stocked doesn’t sound like a winning message.
Yes, these are dangerous times, but Biden’s approach is the way out. The DoJ is working, and the PBs and 3%ers and all the rest are not getting stronger.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
We need fifty Senators willing to (politically speaking) break Mitch McConnell’s kneecaps. The rest is commentary.
Elizabelle
@Omnes Omnibus: Thank dog you are here.
germy
Definitely. A “bipartisan” committee would have Republicans throwing pocket sand on every gear.
Elizabelle
@germy: Also, I suspect the Dem leadership knew they did not have the GOP votes needed.
JMG
Mr. Silverman’s 2024 scenario leaves out an important point. Until 1/20/25 Biden will be President with full control of the executive branch and all its powers. Should he win the election, he will be in a position to enforce his victory. Many of the conditions specified by Millhiser were in place in 2020, too, but the Republicans in a position to do something to install Trump didn’t have the nerve, and that’s with HIM as President to back their play. Rudy Giuliani and Trump’s other lawyers, even the nutbars, wouldn’t even allege fraud in court for fear of their own liability. Supreme Court Justices have good security. Senators and Congresspeople have some, but as Steve Scalise knows, not that much. The average Republican state legislator, who ran for office so local car dealers would keep shipping their legal work his way, has none. They may not wish to spend their lives with targets on their backs.
MJS
@Elizabelle: She did not say family emergency. She said “personal family matter”, coincidentally the exact same language Toomey used, and the exact language his staff used when I called his office to ask why he missed the vote. Murray may be great, but it was important for Democrats to show a unified, unanimous front. Now it looks like skipping the vote was no big deal.
hilts
Adam,
That’s Senator “Beer Hall Putsch” McConnell to you.
Eolirin
I don’t think this ends with uppity blue states being put down by the military while everyone watches the Republicans install a President via illegitimate means and then they just hold power forever, even if there is military action against initial blue state attempts at retaliation.
We can do low intensity asymmetric warfare too, and an event that big would get people to take this stuff seriously. The numbers do not work in their favor, the gaps in competency and the lack of cultural acceptance of their positions do not work in their favor. The economic and technological damage that we can bring to bear is significant. But it’d definitely destroy the country in the process. It’s hard to know what would come out of that.
germy
And Officer Sicknick voted for Trump!
Matt McIrvin
@germy: I love the contrast between the 2nd Amendment talk, and how Republicans act when anyone other than Republicans makes the slightest step in the direction of violence. Time for the cops to mow ’em all down!
Elizabelle
One thing maybe we can help with: educate people that “bipartisan” does not mean “fair” or “the best we can do.” I still need to read that marvelous Guardian op ed [Stop glorifying ‘centrism‘].
It’s not like the watered down bipartisan commission was going to be better. It was actually going to be worse.
We do not generally put the criminals and their accomplices on their own juries. For a reason.
There is so much sloppy thinking out there, and the “conventional wisdom” just props up a status quo that is regressive. We jackals have language. We are out and about in our communities. We can make our case out there. Many jackals are apparently very generous in giving money, in addition to their time.
We can do our part to try to change the framing.
Elizabelle
@germy: Yup. Officer Sicknick rescued dachshunds, too.
I suspect his death woke up some of those disposed to support the Trumps of the world. All the shabby ass congresscreeps who helped foment this radicalism that ended in a physical assault on the US Capitol police.
Ksmiami
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: yep. We do outnumber them and we can mount a fierce response to these people with no teeth
Kay
I think this part is really important for people to recognize because it allows people to break out of the idea that there are “legal fixes” that can be applied. You can’t stay in that box, comforting as it may be to do so.
I also think there remains a sort of yearning among “institutionalists” to insist the thing is working, will work, is not collapsing and it’s not coming from a bad place in most of them- it’s coming from a place where they value institutions and norms so can’t admit they’re failing. I sympathize, but it’s past time to face it.
I have to say though, I am not as disappointed in media as a lot of you. I think a good number of them are conscious of the level of the threat and are quite concerned, just as people or citizens. I think they do a fairly good job covering the insurgents, etc.
rp
@Elizabelle: I agree that this vote isn’t a bad thing, esp. if it helps convince Manchin (and maybe Sinema) that we need to get rid of the filibuster.
Ksmiami
@Eolirin: we’d be a pariah state and the blue states could easily ask Canada for protection and redrawn borders
germy
Reminder:
Calouste
@germy: Well, good luck going up against Mark Zuckerberg’s security detail.
Omnes Omnibus
@Elizabelle: Not for long. Not doing doom today. Especially not over a foregone conclusion. This vote was never in doubt. Now we investigate without the GOP. And we watch Manchin; he got six not ten. This gives him more of an excuse to come regretfully to the conclusion that things must change.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Kay:
That’s Manchin in a nutshell (though I would add in that he seems to have a pretty shallow intellect– besides the procedural issues, look at the way he’s dithered around on infrastructure spending and tax increases– and I think the attention and importance have gone to his head. ETA: I also think Sinema is not very fixed intellectually or ideologically. To go from the Green Party (was she actually part of Code Pink, or am misremembering?) to trying to out-Lieberman Lieberman is just…. something.
I agree with this too. My media diet is admittedly pretty much an MSNBC bubble, but I see clips of CNN– what I think of as “the airport network”, people just kind of absorb it– and they mostly seem to be putting all the information out there. The challenge, as ever, is making people care. Making people realize, to circle back to the above, that this isn’t ‘just politics’.
Lyrebird
@MJS: I can’t provide a better analysis than
@Omnes Omnibus did already, but I can say as a parent and a child of aging parents, sometimes sh*t comes up and you have to go.
If we’re going to talk about vote heroics, let’s give some props to Sen. Hirono for saving the ACA while battling cancer. Then I for one am gonna buy popcorn for the House hearings that are gonna come.
James E Powell
@Matt McIrvin:
I’m not so sure that the online left is the left or any left at all.
Any soi-disant leftists who spend all their time castigating the Democratic Party should simply be ignored. Let’s keep our faces toward the real enemies.
Lyrebird
@Omnes Omnibus: Best to you Omnes!
Spanky
Add me to the commenters who thought this was a foregone conclusion. Next stop is a Democratic investigation from the House snd Senate.
I do wonder if we might get help from those 6 GOP senators, but really not holding my breath.
Spanky
@James E Powell: Half the online left is posting from St. Petersburg. And not the one in FL.
James E Powell
@germy:
Mitch thinks this because he has been able to keep the truth from coming out for ten years now.
Let’s put that select committee together next week. Stop fucking around. Republicans refused to allow a vote on this bullshit bipartisan commission. That’s a fastball right over the plate. Do not fail to hit it out.
We should all call our D congress persons right now.
hilts
This day in Rethuglican WTF:
https://www.mediaite.com/news/they-could-not-take-her-pride-gop-rep-paul-gosar-celebrates-slain-capitol-attacker/
germy
@hilts:
She’s their Horst Wessel
Geminid
@germy: It’s easy enough to research Patty Murray, and draw your own conclusions as to whether she is a “conservadem,” as you speculate..
Another Scott
@Omnes Omnibus: +1
JC’s Twitter thing has Manchin’s video tweet about it. He sounds like he feels betrayed. But I’m sure he’s not really surprised. And maybe this is part of his game plan to get enough cover to do what he knows (and says he knows) needs to be done to move the country forward.
Politics is slow. I’m sure Moscow Mitch is trying to drag it out as much as he can into the fall/winter and then say “we can’t do it in an election year”. I don’t think he’s going to get his wish, but he’s laying the predictable groundwork to attack it as “partisan” and somehow illegitimate.
It’s what he does.
Ultimately, I think Manchin and Sinema are going to be on board with the big things that need to be done. The question is, what is their price. But we’ll see.
Cheers,
Scott.
germy
Manchin? “Ignore my daughter’s corruption.”
Sinema? “Look at me!”
James E Powell
@hilts:
That is the first Republican elected official of whom I am aware who mentioned Ashli Babbitt’s name. I so want some journalist to ask Cruz, Hawley, etc., “She died for you, did you go to her funeral? Send flowers? Talk to the family?”
But none of them have the guts.
Omnes Omnibus
@Another Scott: I basically agree with this.
Elizabelle
@hilts: Nope. Will not spend one brain cell on Gosar and Ashli Babbitt.
It was interesting about the late and whackadoodle Ms. Babbitt: the WaPost could not allow reader comments on stories about her death. The readers were slamming her (and I had no sympathy for her, either, save that she went so bad at some point and over time). She earned her death, very honestly, as did all the insurrectionists who did not survive the event.
There were reader comments on other insurrection-related stories, but the WaPost was (wisely) being extremely cautious about opening up comments in the immediate aftermath. For one thing, you don’t want your comment boards used to pass messages and signals.
ETA: I know this, because the WaPost did open some of the early Babbitt stories to comments, and then closed and deleted them. I got a chance to see a lot before they vanished.
Steve in the ATL
@Elizabelle:
You forgot to add the “said no one ever!”
CaseyL
Joe Biden is an institutionalist par excellence, but he has got to be angry at the destruction of the institutions he’s devoted his life to serving. The Patriot Act is still on the books; I hope he uses it.
Also, (armed) insurrection is one of the situations that the Constitution itself says Constitutional law can be suspended for. I imagine Biden is also aware of that.
I do worry, a fair bit, about the loyalty of the military, only because we know the RW has bene infiltrating it for decades now. But I have to, hope to, believe the vast majority of the armed forces take their oaths seriously.
This slow degeneration is enraging, but if push comes to shove, it will be an opportunity to clean out the rot once and for all. If the fascists want a war, they may be in for a surprise.
Omnes Omnibus
@Steve in the ATL: Except yo momma.
Timurid
@CaseyL: Joe Biden has literal skin in the game, unlike Manchin or Sinema. If Trump becomes President again in 2025, there’s a real chance that Biden dies in prison.
Elizabelle
@CaseyL: Good comment.
@Timurid: I truly think Trump will be indisposed, by health, death, or prison/house arrest by 2024. However, a good point, because the Tom Cottons of the world would be far more deadly.
Kent
No it won’t. They already had those things from 2016 to 2018. The reason is that the filibuster is ALREADY gone for everything that the GOP cares about:
Judges – filibuster gone
Tax cuts -filibuster gone (reconciliation)
Deregulation – filibuster gone via the Congressional Review Act and conservative judicial review.
There is really nothing that the GOP actually wants to do anymore that is subject to the filibuster. Their entire agenda is nothing but judges, tax cuts, and deregulation. The last big GOP legislative initiative was Bush’s Social Security privatization effort and that failed without even being filibustered.
The will keep it because it is a completely one-sided measure that stops progressive measures in their tracks while doing nothing to curtail GOP objectives.
Elizabelle
@Steve in the ATL:
@Omnes Omnibus:
!!! Well played.
Soprano2
Look at what is happening in Russia right now. They are passing legislation making the opposition party illegal. I can see them trying this by saying we are a threat to the country. It’s preposterous, but they might try it.
Calouste
@Old School: But necessary to pass the Voting Transparency Act, or whatever they are going to call that abomination. Which will be like the VRA, but in photonegative, and will allow Congress to invalidate the votes in states that don’t implement voter suppression laws.
Amir Khalid
@germy:
Matt Gaetz should go back and re-read the second Amendment, which says nothing of the sort:
The states of the early republic needed armed citizens to protect them from rebellion. No state in human history has been crazy enough to give its citizens a right to armed rebellion, because pretty soon there would be no state anymore; and no sane constitutional scholar would say that Americans have ever had any such right.
Kay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
That’s a nice way to put it. I really dislike her. I don’t know why she wants that job. I feel as if people forget or lose track of their basic job description more than one would think they would.
Is she, like, an actor? A professional, full time promoter of bipartisanship and maverickyness? She’s the next Susan Collins and no one needed that. Why can’t she ever just give a straight answer to anything?
Omnes Omnibus
@Elizabelle: We are ready for the Algonquin Round Table.
Elizabelle
@Omnes Omnibus: As long as the ice and liquor hold out.
Calouste
@Kent: See my comment above, permanent majority is the next step. And the GQP are extremists, and extremists always want more. What you’re describing is the GOP of Boehner, and he is long gone.
Brachiator
It’s funny. There are some ultra-progressives who keep waiting for some precipitating event to spark a revolution. But when real shit happens, they have nothing to offer.
I think the problem lies in what they expect from “revolution.” The sad truth is that they and the right wing idiots both hate democracy.
Kropacetic
Republican leaders have to be held accountable for the grievous act of tourism they encouraged. Wait, that can’t be right…
Martin
We’re continuing to up our emergency prep, and I regret saying also our personal defense. No guns, because in any such situation the guns will be brought to us.
I’m keeping my faith in the 1st, 5th, and 11th marine regiments down the road from me, and the 40th Infantry Division looking out for us.
I can’t do much for what’s happening in Texas and other states, but we’ve got to make sure California is the anchor for the House, so that’s where I’m at. I said in 2016 I was putting all of my energy into CA politics, and this is why. Flipping our seat in 2018 was critical, and we hit it out of the park if I do say so myself. But there’s a neighboring seat we need to flip back after 2020.
I wish I had your optimism. I think the die is already cast. Mitch’s play is to ensure the peaceful resolution of this situation dies in the Senate. I think the only possible outcome is some degree of violence. I’m in no position to know what that looks like or how small or large it will be, but the last check against violent resolution of political issues is the ballot box, and that’s falling in some places.
Mike in NC
It would appear that the majority of Republicans in Congress are literature fans: The Hunger Games and A Handmaid’s Tale. They are also big fan’s of Trump’s boss Putin.
Geminid
@Kay: One commenter who lived in Arizona and followed Sinema’s political career describes Sinema as a “social climber.” This speaks to character more than policies, but the commenter seems to be a perceptive observer of Arizona politics, and moved to the Northeast only recently.
Lapassionara
@CaseyL: I think many in the military were mad at Trump for taking money from the military to use for his border wall. The money had been designated, as I understand it, for improvements to base housing, etc. So having it taken from them affected both the enlisted and their families. Biden has restored that funding.
I remember the outpouring of joy in the streets when the networks called the election for Biden. Do the Republicans think that those happy dancing mostly young people are going to do and say nothing if their state legislatures decide to change the outcome when Biden (or whoever) wins in 2024?
in any event, 2022 is critical, and we all need to focus our energies on keeping the house majority and strengthening the senate majority.
Elizabelle
@Martin: Mitch has to be so dirty.
Find the bodies. Find the connection to Russia and any other entities supporting an autocracy here.
raven
@hilts: Have you seen her fucking lunatic rant?
Geminid
@Martin: As you point out, one thing we who live in blue states can do is replace Republican representatives with Democrats in 2022. My VA 5th will be a battleground, and it sounds like some Southern California districts will be as well. I still believe that, despite reapportionment and redistricting, Democrats can gain House seats next year.
Brachiator
@Elizabelle:
The Republican base don’t care. And a good chunk of the base now yearn for a white patriarchal autocracy.
But going after McConnell and other Republican rats is a good thing. It would energize Democrats and probably a significant number of Independents.
dnfree
@germy: I bet she has a family member graduating. Which should not come first if that’s the case.
Elizabelle
@Brachiator:
Goddamnit, it is not all about the Republican base. They are deplorables.
You inform those who are reachable and educable. There are actually way more of them.
Fuck the Republican base. And I am sick of having them brought up, over and over, as if they are all powerful and the compleat determinant of what we can do and be.
I am with Omnes. Out of here if we just get doom and gloom
ETA: I had missed your final paragraph, as you can see! I think we have more gettable votes than the GOP does. If we did not, they would not be all in on voter suppression.
Cut off their money spigot, too. (Where do the Mercers get their money? That has to be knowable, to some extent. Go get ’em, IRS.)
New Deal democrat
I pretty much agree with all of the comments above.
We are one election away from losing the (1st) American Republic. And, unfortunately (looking at you, Sens. Manchin and Sinema), it is probably going to happen soon, maybe in 2024.
If and when it happens, I want the GOPrs to take the first shot. And then I want the blue states to draw up a new Constitution, using the “Constitutional Convention” template of the existing one, and once a majority of States pass it, declare that the 2nd American Republic is now in existence – all perfectly legal under the 1st Constitution, thank you.
Brachiator
This makes so much sense. A bipartisan panel would have been nice, but it is not necessary. The Republicans have revealed themselves to be an enemy of democracy. There is nothing to be gained, and much to lose, in trying to appease them.
Steve in the ATL
@Omnes Omnibus: that’s because my momma’s so fat that…no, wait, your mother is the fat one, or…damn it I’m all confused now!
Martin
On the topic of revolutionary warfare, the Bundys are getting involved in the Klamath river situation.
In short, the Klamath river runs from Oregon to the Pacific in California. It’s an important salmon river, and the feds have treaties with local tribes to preserve their ability to fish the river. But because of the rapidly worsening drought, the river is low and there have been massive fish kills, so the feds turned off an irrigation canal fed by the river in order to preserve the river’s function and abide by our treaties. A couple of Bundys followers have bought the land around the headgate to the canal and look like they’re setting up for another Malthur situation and forcing the canal open. They’ve done this before years ago and federal marshals had to be stationed there to keep it closed.
This is a bit more of a sensitive situation than some of the other dipshit standoffs because the river crosses into California and fisheries are a surprisingly important part of CA ag (just the fishing component of CA ag is about 4x larger than Oregons entire agriculture industry), and the fisheries are accustomed to fighting with the growers over water rights. So you have a federal treaty involved, you have CA fisheries who are accustomed to fighting this kind of stuff, and you have an impact that doesn’t just rely on the patience of the OR gov and legislature, but also the CA gov and legislature (and we tend to not have a ton of patience for this particular brand of dipshittery). So everyone here is expecting this to fully spiral out of control.
lgerard
@Kent:
1000% true
Kay
This is a good argument and I bet you could get people to understand it. There would be more bipartisan legislation without it. It doesn’t protect moderates- it allows the extremes to hijack everything and hold it hostage.
Spanky
@Elizabelle: Right! The Republican base is literally – literally, Steve! – less than 27% at this point.
Fuck ’em.
Seriously
Hmmmm…. perhaps this is not the best time to expend political capital on gun control?
In fact, perhaps the responsible thing is for democrats to arm themselves and work to gain proficiency.
hrprogressive
The only disagreement I have here is that we have till 2024 to worry about this.
The Fascist States of Republican America are on our doorstep next year if this doesn’t get addressed.
I don’t believe it will.
I really don’t.
WaterGirl
@Martin: Wow, that’s a dark view for you, Martin. Any chance that you are in a low place and that you won’t feel like that a week or month from now?
Cameron
This was made a few years ago, but I think it’s a pretty good picture of where we’re headed.
https://youtu.be/tnWP2Emps1M
mys_lys
@Calouste: Do you have a dual citizenship, and/or a concrete plan to emigrate to a specific country where you can feasibly obtain permanent residency?
asking because most people i’ve heard saying “oh, i’ll just move overseas” seem to think you can just … like … roll out of bed one day and randomly decide to move to another country.
?BillinGlendaleCA
States are sovereign. If Republicans try any of these things to retain or achieve further power, the United States will become smaller and poorer.
WaterGirl
@Steve in the ATL: Your trash talking game could use some work. :-)
WhatsMyNym
So who will take over when McConnell dies (from natural causes) ? It’s going to be sooner rather than later, I’ve seen enough older guys hit the end of the road and he really looks like he’s there.
schrodingers_cat
Doom mongering based on what the guy who was the architect of Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, says. I think I will pass.
Brachiator
@Martin:
I cannot express just how dangerous a place we are in right now.
I don’t think the Republicans realize the mischief that their refusal to break with Trump might cause. They are blind and stupid, and don’t know how to step back from the brink.
Violence will not resolve anything, at least not in any way that might possibly benefit the GOP. This is something else that the GOP does not understand.
The GOP was able to succeed to some extent because they hid behind the facade that they were the true patriots, and the true defenders of the Constitution. They threw that all away with Trump, who could not even spell the word “constitutional,” and who was all about resentments and naked power grabs.
But all this is ultimately weak because it is mindless and infantile. The majority of Americans backed the Democrats and will continue to do so because the Republicans have nothing to offer. They can make some noise, but they cannot win.
lowtechcyclist
The only mention I see of certification in the Constitution is that which the Electors do. Congress only does this, per the 12th Amendment:
That’s it. If a candidate has 270 or more Electoral votes, that person “shall be the President.”
That isn’t to say that a GQP-controlled Congress couldn’t stir up a great deal of trouble by pretending to vote someone else into the Presidency: one can easily envision the January 6th mob trying to storm the White House next time. But it’s such a mob that there’s no Constitutional remedy for; the only remedy is that we’d have to show up in even greater numbers, like we did in early 2017.
But Congress can’t override the Electoral College tally. The Constitution makes that clear.
Wyatt Salamanca
Elie Mystal @ElieNYC
I have an idea: How about we stop letting Republicans and former Republicans control the narrative of how Republicans ended up being a threat to democracy.
Maybe instead we could listen to people who have *always known* what Republicans are all about.
https://twitter.com/ElieNYC/status/1398345934715695112
Elie Mystal @ElieNYC
What’s funny is that if the filibuster didn’t exist, the 1/6 commission would have gotten 10-15 Republican votes.
Like, Manchin gets that, right? This bill *would have been* bipartisan if the filibuster did not reward total obstructionism.
1:48 PM · May 28, 2021
https://twitter.com/ElieNYC/status/1398335292046823424
Elie Mystal
@ElieNYC
McConnell using the first filibuster to block the broadly popular *investigation into terrorism* is him calling Joe Manchin a punk bitch to his face while sitting on Manchin’s couch and taking his remote control.
1:22 PM · May 28, 2021·Twitter Web App
https://twitter.com/ElieNYC/status/1398328926427136005
randy khan
I am totally in favor a House Select Committee on the Insurrection. While a bipartisan commission had its points, a select committee will still have subpoena power, and need not be hamstrung by requiring agreement between the parties. And you still can hold hearings (in fact, hearings probably are easier with a select committee), which should be pretty good TV.
PPCLI
@germy: Thank heavens she never wrote a song. The Trumpers in every Republican state would make it mandatory to sing before every sporting event and official gathering.
WaterGirl
@randy khan: I am totally with you on all points.
HRA
@hilts: I was watching the incident on that day on my desk top. There were a few men and her on the balcony over the side of the Capitol building. One of the men was working on getting out windows. There was a small opening on the window he did remove and she was the only who could fit in it. You could see the capitol policeman standing alone inside about mid way on the floor.
Matt McIrvin
@Lyrebird:
I have to admit, my first impulse here was to have dark thoughts about how maybe somebody produced this family crisis just to get her out of there.
Soprano2
In Missouri we passed a gerrymandering reform in 2018; it got 62% of the vote, which means a significant number of people in conservative areas voted for it. There would have been a non-partisan commission to draw state districts in a fairer way; it probably would have meant an end to the Republican super majority in the state house, although they still would have had a majority. So what happened? Republicans got the people to repeal it in 2020, and in its place they put a scheme basically like the old one, only now it’s a lot harder to challenge what the totally Republican state government is going to do this year. How did they do that? By repeating, over and over and over, that it would be an unfair process where ‘they’ would draw long, skinny districts that would have to reach into cities in order to be ‘fair’. In so many words they told people in the rural areas that if they left this reform in place, they would have black people in their districts and would no longer be truly represented. They also said that Clean Missouri was passed by “outside interests”, which is untrue. All of this is to say that in a conservative state even if you pass reform all you have to do is dog whistle, and they’ll undo it due to fear of black people.
This used to be a swing state; in 2008, Obama almost won it. What happened? Conservatives got the people to pass term limits so they could get rid of all the rural Democrats, so gradually those people were replaced with Republicans. Then, the 2010 election happened, and Republicans have had a majority in both chambers since 2012. Jay Nixon held them off until 2016, when Greitens became governor, and it’s been all bad stuff ever since. This year they’re probably going to pass a voter ID bill and gut the referendum law in a special session so that Democrats can’t win anything except local offices in KC and St. Louis and a few seats in the state legislature. I have no idea if Democrats can ever overcome this. In 12 years we went from being a swing state to being overwhelmingly dominated by Republicans.
I think many of you underestimate how many people just don’t give a shit about politics or who is in office. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard “why even vote, they’re all the same and they do the same things. Stuff never changes for me”. People really believe this, so even if something happens here like it did in Hungary a lot of them will just shrug and continue to live their lives. They’re white, so it won’t affect them much, and they won’t be able to tell much of a difference. There will still be elections, so they’ll feel like nothing much has changed. They might even be happier, because they won’t have to worry anymore about those liberal teachers filling their kid’s head full of nonsense. I want to be optimistic and say it’ll all be better, but from this extremely conservative part of a conservative state sometimes it’s hard. I know quite a few people who wouldn’t be that unhappy with a benevolent dictatorship that would stop “those people” from burning down cities and committing so many crimes and would let the Christian religion dominate public schools and the public square.
Cheryl Rofer
I am with Another Scott, Omnes, Elizabelle, and I think a few others on this.
It’s maddening, but I’m sure Adam has heard about that “don’t shoot until you see the whites of their eyes” thing.
We could roll over the Republicans if we had a few more senators, but we don’t. With 50 senators, it would be exacting even if Manchin and Sinema were not doing their things.
The way I see today and the likely sequelae:
My two cents. Or eight.
Ella in New Mexico
Well can I just say that THIS is a depressing fucking place to hang out?
Reminds me of all the threads about how the Democrats were totally fumbling the 2020 Presidential Election strategy and we were doomed to lose and have Trump install himself as King of America.
Not to say Adam’s points are not pertinent, but dang, we’re like barely 6 months into the Biden Administration with majorities in the House and Senate all of which we never expected to happen. We’re conquering COVID for fucks sakes, after living in literal lockdown for almost a year. It’s too soon to go all “End Times, They’re a Comin”.
I’m with @Omnes Omnibus: and Another Scott: Given the 4+ years of Trump that felt like a frigging lifetime I’m frankly enjoying normalcy and calm of having sane people back in power and the ability to feel like things will work out ok.
Can I not totally collapse in the fetal position under my bed heaving sobs of defeat quite so soon?
Elizabelle
@Ella in New Mexico: Good to see you here. Keep that courage. No need to wallow in EeyoreWorld.
Calouste
@mys_lys: I have citizenship in the country that I will move to.
lowtechcyclist
@Cheryl Rofer:
I hope you’re right. It’s just scary as hell to think that the fate of our Republic might be hanging on how Joe Manchin sees things.
TriassicSands
Yes, because life is always black and white. Period.
Murray’s absence made no difference in the outcome and she knew that.
TriassicSands
I expect Joe to keep hoping…and hoping…and hoping…and…
Geminid
@Ella in New Mexico: Sure, this post brought out a lot of the negativity and pessimism that is prevalent in this forum. But I think Mr. Silverman was correct in his assessment that Democratic politicians and their voters have to recognize that Republicans are playing by a new set of rules (or rather, no rules), and must act accordingly. I don’t see this as a “doompost,” so much as “a firebell in the night.”
lowtechcyclist
@Ella in New Mexico:
I don’t do hopelessness, so I wouldn’t urge it on anyone else either. But now that we’ve had a pleasant and desperately needed four-month break from TFG and his minions, it’s not too soon to be aware that the GQP really is launching an attack on our democracy and our nation itself, and this attack is happening on a number of levels.
But I wish I had a better idea of what ordinary citizens like ourselves could be doing about this. I’m in solidly blue Maryland, so the shit that’s going down in some states isn’t happening here. There aren’t any crazy bills being considered by my legislature to rally against. So what *does* someone like me do?
Martin
@WaterGirl: No. I’ve been here for quite a while.
I mean, we’ve been heading toward a showdown on white supremacy for centuries, and eventually that day needs to come, and I think we’re now here. I would prefer that be done legislative and electorally, but no previous step on this journey has happened without violence, so maybe it’s a bit naive to think it could happen peacefully.
So, you know, we’ve been in this place before, we’ve gotten through it with varying degrees of bloodshed, and I expect we will again. On the backside is usually a period of significant progress, so I’m optimistic about that part.
But the tools of peaceful governance are nearly exhausted. That leaves unpeaceful governance.
WaterGirl
@Ella in New Mexico: There are lots of us here who agree with you. I had to stop reading some of Adam’s threads before the election or I would have slit my wrists. (not literally)
WaterGirl
@Martin: I appreciate the reply.
Benw
I can’t agree with Adam’s analysis enough. We’re in a tight spot!
We’ve got to keep the house and senate in 2022 and the presidency in 2024 or we’re in real trouble, so let’s get off our butts and win. Not much hope here in my very red NY district, but I’m going to go all in on volunteering for 2022!
WaterGirl
@Benw: We are most definitely in a tight spot, but if we are convinced that we will lose, we most definitely will!
Mallard Filmore
@Matt McIrvin:
Is Derek Chauvin the reason we need to keep the 2nd Amendment?
Martin
@WaterGirl: I’m not convinced that we’ll lose. It’s about understanding where you can win, what you must sacrifice, and where your energy is best directed. A lot of my energy is just getting my mom out of the swamp so just deprogramming some of our relatives may prove the most helpful, along with advertiser boycotts against Fox, pressure on Facebook, pressure against corporate campaign contributions to 1/6 politicians, etc.
Brachiator
@Martin:
If democracy is overturned by violent or even unfair peaceful means, what results is not “governance” at all.
Ksmiami
@Martin: wipe the GOP out- all of them. And take Fox etc with them
Benw
@WaterGirl: I agree! It was bad in 2020 and we motivated and kicked ass, we can do it again.
Richard Guhl
John Cole, could you please take a copy of this post to the nearest office of Sen. Manchin, and ask to meet with a staffer to discuss this? And persist until you get a hearing.
Ella in New Mexico
@Elizabelle: I’m here every single day because this is one of the only places that have normal humans lurking about and it feels like family. Seriously it’s the Albuquerque Journal and Ballon Juice every single morning and then I’m in clinic from 7:30 to around 6 pm. After which I love some good wine and Netflix. I love this joint, even if we have dark days.
@WaterGirl: I love Adam. LOVE him. Because he’s so frigging smart and is always on track. Joe Biden should hire him as Chief Advisor to the President for COMMON FUCKING SENSE. So of course it’s hard to read his posts. He’s above our pay grade. But sometimes we all have to skip it or I’ll heads will explode.
@lowtechcyclist:
All I can say at age 59 is they’ve been doing this my entire life and while I wish we could gently put that party down we’ll always be fighting a percentage of them attacking democracy and our nation itself. It’s in America’s DNA apparently, and we’ve been fighting this forever.
And yet, we’ve been pretty successful over time because human beings like what Democrats support, we’ve adopted our programs to become permanent institutions in our lives, so, my optimism.
NotoriousJRT
@MJS:
I called every one of Murray’s offices (not one of them answered) to express my displeasure with my Senator for missing the vote. She’s a member of leadership FFS. Her tweet referenced a family ISSUE not emergency. Maybe it’s the same; I don’t know. I still think she has explaining to do. Sinema, too. I don’t think Dems get what we’re up against. It is very disheartening.
Uncle Cosmo
You know who knows where the bodies are? You know who holds ironclad proof that GOP really stands for Global Oligarchy Putsch, and its ruling caste is a wholly-owned subsidiary (via compromise or threat) of the putative Global Oligarchs, who have joined forces with Vlad the Paler and every would-be tinpot dictator in the world to destroy liberal democracy?
The Intelligence Community. They have the receipts, all of them. Including the “pundits” and “journalists” who’ve been suborned, compromised or credibly threatened with harm to underpin or ignore the putsch.
They’re just not convinced it’s in their interest to present them.
If the FOLD (Forces Of Liberal Democracy) can dig up the evidence on their own, without involving the IC, perfect. If a Deep Throat (singular or plural) is needed to drop some leading hints or even draw the equivalent of a pirate’s treasure map, that can probably be arranged – once the IC concludes that the threat is dire.
But the IC is not going to wade into the fray guns blazing if they can possibly avoid it. They might not win. Or they might win, but only at the cost of most of the assets and access they’ve amassed over generations.
I suspect many in the IC look back longingly to the days when the Stasi and Securitate and KGB rode high & think, Why can’t we have those nice things? And would view herrenvolk pseudo-democracy as less of a challenge to their activities than liberal democracy.**
IMO the best chance for the FOLD to prevail is to convince the IC that we are less of a threat to them than the Global Oligarchs, and induce them to throw in their lot with us. How is unclear, but someone better start thinking up a “how” toot-sweet.
** And there’s always the chance that they could end up running the whole show. Beria came damn close after Stalin’s death; it took the combined forces of the rest of the Soviet leadership to take him down. Harry Turtledove ‘s rather bizarre alt-history novel Joe Steele – in which Iosip Dzugashviliand and a few key henchmen grow up in the USA and rise to power here – ends with a power struggle in which [SPOILER ALERT] J. Edgar Hoover ends up Director, i.e. Dictator, of the US.
Geminid
@Uncle Cosmo: I remember thinking that former CIA Director Brennan, and former NSA Director Hayden had a knowing smile when they talked about trump. Like they knew stuff they would not say. And while conservatives frequently threatened to “go after” Brennan and Hayden, they never did. I expect the CIA has a very thick file on trump, dating back at least to his first visit to Russia in the 1980s.
MontyTheClipArtMongoose
@hilts: say what you will about bono, he doesn’t deserve this.
MontyTheClipArtMongoose
@Elizabelle: hawley-gabbard 2024. national unity. national-conservatism. papa john’s.
& #ourrevolution will be just as gungho for the rise of white worker state capitalism as sen. jd vance (q – oh).
MontyTheClipArtMongoose
@Martin: i believe you mean greater idaho.
jimmiraybob
@Amir Khalid: “The states of the early republic needed armed citizens to protect them from rebellion. No state in human history has been crazy enough to give its citizens a right to armed rebellion, because pretty soon there would be no state anymore; and no sane constitutional scholar would say that Americans have ever had any such right.”
I refer to this as the framers and ratifiers not adding a national suicide clause. Gaetz and his ilk are either completely loony or just playing the ignorant and loony base.
George Washington whom the right may or may not still revere, did not hesitate as president to use the military powers of the state to put down armed rebellion.
I blame the NRA for advancing this narrative.
jimmiraybob
@Ella in New Mexico:
I second the sentiment but would redo the title include INFORMED FUCKING SENSE. If there were such a thing as common sense we wouldn’t be in the pickle we’re in.
jimmiraybob
I wrote it. It’s too long. I decided not to post it. But then I’ve seen Hawley’s name mentioned twice and it fits the theme. So here it is.
The most influential and powerful and broadly organized portion of the New-America Coalition – the MAGA movement – is based on the notion that all political authority should flow from God and His laws. MAGA is, at root, a war against secular modernity and pluralism.*
Right before coming across this post, I was going over a commencement speech given by Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) at The King’s College in New York in May of 2019. It’s only about 17 minutes long. I’ve been pondering it since I first came across it in 2020. In it he defines today’s most dire crisis – the CRISIS! – as unrestricted and unfettered free-thought, free-choice, free expression, meritorious achievement (leading to a hierarchy of elites) and lack of adherence to God’s true laws.
He charges the graduates with ending the CRISIS! that he couches in terms of Medieval heresy against the Church. He tells the class that it is their greatest mission to fight the heresy.
Of course, it just so happens that the heresy is encapsulated in the US Constitution and the constitutional order and in the rule of law that has developed from it. A system set up by the heathens and heretics that are the founders and framers of our American Democracy – a representative form of democracy accommodating a pluralistic society. In essence, they fight for God and Bible with great zealousness against a system set up against them.
That is pretty powerful motivation and yes, they will do anything to advance the cause. Hundreds to thousands of years, depending on when you start counting, of European orthodoxy-establishing and heresy-hunting along with the Crusades, the Inquisitions, actual witch hunts, and religious wars should teach us the extent to which the primitive superstitious mind will go, even if they have degrees from Stanford and Yale Law School (I think that Hawley might just be a true believer).
Scratch just below the surface of many or most of the Capitol Hill MAGA-protestors and -insurrectionists on Jan 6, and their defenders and protectors now, and you get a crusader for God. They not only don’t recognize the legitimacy of the last election and Biden as president, they don’t recognize the legitimacy of the system that will always fail them. Everything is “radical leftist, communist and illegitimate” this or “radical leftist, socialist and illegitimate” that when you are fighting to end modernity for God. And, if you have won the government what would ever lead to the idea of voluntarily relinquishing that power.
I see a dire moment but it is not one shared with the Senator.
*The various MAGA coalition partners have common cause and a rallying point with the rest of the MAGA coalition – 1776! – a magical time before there was a Nation or a Constitution or an American system of norms and law based on that constitution and the sentiments in the Declaration of Independence (1776 prior to July). (Just ignore that the rebellion then was to overthrow a divine right monarchy and parliament and that the rebellion today is to establish an authoritarian one-party state with a God-anointed supreme leader…. you know, much like a divine right king and his parliament.)
Hart Liss
Just a minor clarification or two.
What GOP is doing now is to lock in a Republican state (not a Republican Republic because they’ve already brought about a failed state) that they’ve been working towards since St. Ronnie, so a counter-revolution.
And add that in addition to the DNC being sanguine, the mainstream media are also sanguine which, you know, ends up greasing the way for the GOP. Not news; they’ve been supportive of the GOP since Ronnie through thick and thin. The GOP can’t do anything much to piss off the media other being dissed by Trump. Even Donnie’s literally murderous response to Covid didn’t bother them all that much. Of course, the media are just serving the Powers That Be, spewing propaganda and since the PTB are cool with a one-party plutocratic state, their media are as well.
Anyway.
Part of the problem for the Dems is that the leadership at the top decided that the party should be an echo of the GOP so as to be able to tap into contributions from the GOP’s special interests: money they can keep on leaving office and the possibility of lucrative post-retirement employment. (The Dem base is not on board with that — they skew towards being an opposition as opposed to an echo.)
anyway, this post was even scarier than my nightmares.
Miss Bianca
@Soprano2: They are already saying this shit. A local reactionary dipshit who I made the mistake of trying to talk to once put me on his email list and he was raving the other day about “Biden and his socialist traitors!” (ie, Democrats). It’s pretty scary out here in my neck of the woods.
Bill Arnold
@jimmiraybob:
IMO, that speech killed any presidency (of the US) prospects for Mr. Hawley. It’s just too blatantly enemy-of-the-USA material. (That, and some other related speeches and writings of his.)
I don’t see the text anywhere but the cspan transcript:
https://archive.org/details/CSPAN_20190529_000200_Commencement_Speeches_Sen._Josh_Hawley_The_Kings_College
I agree that it’s a loathsome speech, TBH.
Sheesh. As a kid, I (not a Christian) attended a summer Day Camp run by them (slightly upstate NY at that point). Still remember a biology professor (maybe studied reptiles?) there (maybe it was later) going through intellectual contortions about evolution. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_King%27s_College_(New_York_City)