Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Fear or fury? The choice is ours.

I might just take the rest of the day off and do even more nothing than usual.

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. keep building.

The cruelty is the point; the law be damned.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

People are weird.

Trump’s cabinet: like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.

Giving in to doom is how authoritarians win.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

The unpunished coup was a training exercise.

I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

President Musk and Trump are both poorly raised, coddled 8 year old boys.

The media handbook says “controversial” is the most negative description that can be used for a Republican.

We still have time to mess this up!

This isn’t Democrats spending madly. This is government catching up.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

How stupid are these people?

If you voted for Trump, you don’t get to speak about ethics, morals, or rule of law.

These are not very smart people, and things got out of hand.

Putin must be throwing ketchup at the walls.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

You are here: Home / Or Maybe People Just Like Jobs and Roads and Being Able to Take the Bus to Work

Or Maybe People Just Like Jobs and Roads and Being Able to Take the Bus to Work

by | 82 Comments

This post is in: 

Jennifer Rubin:

Big Labor and Big Business are teaming up to protect Big Government. As Greg Sargent put it yesterday, in describing the budding alliance between the AFL-CIO and the Chamber of Commerce: “The two groups rarely agree on anything, and frequently target each other in the harshest of terms, but one thing they agree on is that they don’t want the House GOP to make good on its threat to subject highway and mass-transit programs to budget cuts.”

I guess this just doesn’t strike me as crony capitalism. When I think of crony capitalism, I think of the incestuous relationship between retired military officers working for defense contractors and using their relationships at the Pentagon to get bids. I think of the revolving door between government and Wall Street. But this just strikes me as two entities advocating for their interests.

And I reject the notion that the government building roads is “Big Government.” Do we really not even agree anymore that one of the unarguably legitimate roles of government is to build roads, bridges, etc? But then again, this is Jennifer Rubin, who thinks the only legitimate role of the US government is the defense of Israel.

Reader Interactions

82Comments

  2. 2.

    Dreggas

    But if the government builds roads then they can force me to choose what route I take! As a result I won’t need that 4 wheel drive off-road monstrosity I now have and will be forced to buy a Prius or some other smaller car produced by Government Motors!

  4. 4.

    Mike Kay (Chief of Staff)

    first they came for the roads,

    then they came for the traffic signals,

    then they came for the speed limit,

    then they came for the airbags,

    then they came and set up death panels at Commandant Daley’s FEMA detention camps.

  6. 6.

    Mark S.

    But then again, this is Jennifer Rubin, who thinks the only legitimate role of the US government is the defense of Israel.

    Is this today’s Moore Award submission? Unfortunately, it is disqualified for being 100% true.

  7. 7.

    ronin122

    I would like to think that about 75% of the country thinks it’s a no-brainer that one role of government, be it federal, state or whatever, is to build and maintain our roads/streets/highways/etc. The fact that the CoC and AFL-CIO support it is barely relevant; only an idiot or a wingnut–not mutually exclusive–would think such a function of government is “big” or “excessive”.

  9. 9.

    c u n d gulag

    And how do you get to “work” there, Jen? 6 studs hand carrying your Cleopatra carriage?
    The question is who, or what, will Fred hire next?
    Bonzo, like Reagan is dead.
    What new moronic low-life can he find?

  10. 10.

    The Dangerman

    This is fallout from the High Speed rail issue; since High Speed rail or good roads is in the same sector of the public works AND because the Top Black Dude is in favor of High Speed rail (and, thus, by definition, socialism (Edit: Fuck, I used the S word and am now in moderation)), roads have to go, too.

  11. 11.

    J

    But aren’t roads a Muslim idea–I bet they’re in the Koran–or socialist and can’t homosexuals use them and Mexicans? Or something.

  12. 12.

    KG

    They read the constitution on the floor of the House the other day right? So they caught this part, right:

    The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;…To establish Post Offices and Post Roads;

    So then, this shouldn’t be anything, right?

  15. 15.

    Rick Taylor

    Do we really not even agree anymore that one of the unarguably legitimate roles of government is to build roads, bridges, etc?

    __
    I’ve been wondering that myself. Conservatism has come a long way.

  16. 16.

    gex

    I believe one of Santorum’s pet project ideas was a privatization of the Interstate system. So, no, we can’t agree on even that.

    I know a lot of comedians and, to the man, the conservative/libertarian comics bitch about paying tolls.

  17. 17.

    General Stuck

    It is a the enemy of my enemy is my friend kind of thing. Here being the interests of two groups who usually are at odds over the eternal employer and employee tug of war. Like I was saying in previous threads, country club wingnuts follow the profit ideology, rather than some visceral loyalty to conservatism and the GOP at large. This is some of the best news in a long while to offset the tea bagger message of nihilism.

  18. 18.

    JAHILL10

    You guys forget that there is a big push on now by cash strapped states to sell highways to private companies who will in turn charge large tolls for the privilege of getting your ass to work. If the feds run around building new roads and bridges, they lessen the profits these pioneering entrepreneurs can make off you Galtian underlings.

    EDIT: Dang! gex beat me to it!

  21. 21.

    Emma

    God. I got off the boat. I went to read. Excuse me, but does anyone have an economy size can of bleach? My brain needs a thorough cleaning.

    General welfare, anyone?

  22. 22.

    Nick

    This post reminds me of BuckeyeBlogger over at the now-dead MyDD who after telling us what a staunch Democrat was, informed us he would no longer vote Democrat and Obama was a failure because he was spending money repairing and building roads in his part of Philadelphia (which is apparently in Ohio now), and he needed to cut taxes so the economy will grow again

    Oh, and we have to abolish the Dept. of Education too.

    Staunch Democrat.

  23. 23.

    Calouste

    @gex:

    Has anyone ever pointed out to the conservatives that the only major country with a privatized highway system is France?

  24. 24.

    Restrung

    seriously, though- Target, Home Depot, Wal*Mart and the MOTUs downtown were inconvenienced when 35W fell into the fucking river too. Thirteen people died, but think of the commerce.

  27. 27.

    GregB

    Gex,

    I noticed in the past few years how many comics are conservative.

    One guy I know was red faced apoplectic because before a show he walked into a store, it happened to be a Spanish bodega, and was outraged at all of the Hispanics in there.

    I called him a racist and asked him if he got pissed off at all of the Chinese in Chinese restaurants?

  30. 30.

    gex

    @GregB: My GF just started stand up. And in the year we’ve been involved (in the Mpls scene, which is not shabby) the thing that I’ve noticed is there are two kinds of people who go into comedy. People who are really different than the main, sensitive, have insights, etc. I’m thinking Chris Rock, Maria Bamford types.

    The others are basically misanthropes or some such. They work for themselves, spend a lot of time in bars, and can get paid to say things on stage that would get them beat to a pulp in a bar.

    @cathyx: Not to waste it. To give it to the right kind of people. You make it sound so untoward.

  33. 33.

    Nick

    @kdaug:

    What the hell do these people think government is for?

    Oppressing protecting America from Muslims, Mexicans, Gays, Women, Liberals, Communists, Russians, New Yorkers, etc.

    and blowing shit up to make us feel better about ourselves and compensate for our small penises.

  34. 34.

    Dollared

    Do we really not even Surely we can agree anymore that one of the unarguably legitimate roles of government is to build roads, bridges, etc?

    Not fixed, but Mcmegan’ed.

  36. 36.

    Redshift

    Since I’ve been seeing the name “Jennifer Rubin” a lot lately (usually along with the words “woefully misinformed”), I skimmed over to her previous post, which is a Very Serious look at the anti-‘Czar’ bill.

    Gaahh!

    Since she has the sympathetic pro-conservative beat, she is incapable of reaching the conclusion that is immediately obvious, that the incoming Republican majority has no idea how to govern or to address any of the country’s problems, so we’re going to be treated to two years of them picking up the Democrats’ solution and complaining about things like the color of the cover.

  39. 39.

    Ella in New Mexico

    OT know, but how about submitting this mistermix quote for a Moore Award nominee:

    Perhaps that’s because, unlike BoA,, their business doesn’t depend on their ability to stick their pus-encrusted, syphilitic peni straight into the asses of the unsuspecting, ever-gullible American consumer.

  40. 40.

    handy

    who thinks the only legitimate role of the US government is the defense of Israel.

    Even better if done by outsourcing to private security! Free markets everywhere!1!

  41. 41.

    GeneJockey

    @kdaug:

    What the hell do these people think government is for?

    1) Keeping colored people from voting Preventing voter fraud.

    2) Preventing gay sex Supporting Traditional Families

    3) Ensuring the rich get richer and the poor get poorer Preserving the Free Market

    4) Making sure unmarried women who have sex are punished Protecting the Unborn

    5) Killing Swarthy Foreigners National Defense

  44. 44.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    But then again, this is Jennifer Rubin, who thinks the only legitimate role of the US government is the defense of Israel.

    Ouch! Raoooowwww.

  45. 45.

    General Stuck

    @Redshift:

    Before I think I even started commenting on BJ, I was a fairly regular troll on her blog, until she finally quit allowing comments. She is a neo con version of mcardle, and once it was fun to pull her chain. But no mo.

  47. 47.

    kdaug

    So, to summarize, the worldview is to keep people from voting, so that they can continue to drop free-market bombs on people in other countries?

    That about cover it?

  48. 48.

    Comrade Dread

    Do we really not even agree anymore that one of the unarguably legitimate roles of government is to build roads, bridges, etc?

    Silly, liberal.

    The only legitimate role of government involves either killing people, incarcerating them, or turning them away at the border preferably with razor wire and machine guns.

  50. 50.

    beltane

    The privatization of road maintenance was tried during the Dark Ages. It worked out well for the petty feudal lords as they could demand tolls and whatnot from anyone traveling on the roads. It didn’t work out to well for the roads themselves, or for commerce. One of the first things that commie good-for-nothing Charlemagne did was social-ize the roads.

    The golden age for conservatism must have been the 7th century, the heart of darkness of western history.

  52. 52.

    Comrade Dread

    @WereBear: I find your arguments intriguing and would like to subscribe to your newsletter, Sir.

    Please send me more information on how I might become a member of the Chthulunitarian church.

  53. 53.

    Keith G

    Jennifer Rubin, who thinks the only legitimate role of the US government is the defense of Israel.

    And why would she think that?

  56. 56.

    kdaug

    @beltane: So you’re saying conservatives are the trolls who live under the bridge?

    I seem to remember a fairy tale about that…

  59. 59.

    SFAW

    I seem to remember a fairy tale about that…

    I don’t think the conservatives would allow fairies into their stories.

    Just manly men (who vote Rethug all the time).

    Who wear leather chaps. And not much else.

    And fondle their “weapon” a lot.

  60. 60.

    maus

    Big Labor and Big Business are teaming up to protect Big Government. As Greg Sargent put it yesterday, in describing the budding alliance between the AFL-CIO and the Chamber of Commerce: “The two groups rarely agree on anything, and frequently target each other in the harshest of terms, but one thing they agree on is that they don’t want the House GOP to make good on its threat to subject highway and mass-transit programs to budget cuts.”

    How is this at all strange? The reason why we never went through a Communist revolution in the states is because of the occasional class cooperation, to break up the struggle.

  62. 62.

    Mike in NC

    @Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:

    I wonder what the overlap is between Hummer buyers and people who think the gummint should leave roadbuilding to private enterprise?

    I have a Tea Party neighbor who used to have a Hummer — until he fell asleep at the wheel and ran it into a ditch. Now the driveway only has a convertible sports car, an SUV, and a golf cart.

  63. 63.

    El Cid

    Union federations and the Chamber of Commerce also oppose the US’ joke and pointlessly cruel embargo of Cuba.

  66. 66.

    Tehanu

    this is Jennifer Rubin, who thinks

    Obviously a misstatement. If what goes on inside Jennifer Rubin’s head is “thinking,” I’m cutting my own head off.

  67. 67.

    Montysano

    I caught a few minutes of Mark Levin’s show on the drive home, and he had the spittle flying over the unholy alliance of Big Corpa/Big Union/Big Statist. I listened for a few minutes and came away totally confused. Is it that anything that is Big is now the new enemy?

  70. 70.

    Caz

    It’s just another area that should be privatized. It seems like everything the gov’t runs is run inefficiently, incompetently, corruptly, and costly.

    The problem with privatization is that it robs the federal government of its ability to control the population and create a culture of dependency through which they can “fundamentally transform” this country.

    If the progressives had their way, the Constitution would be a thing of the past and the government would run everything and everyone.

  71. 71.

    SFAW

    It seems like everything the gov’t runs is run inefficiently, incompetently, corruptly, and costly.

    It only “seems” that way to the people who are stupid enough to believe the bullshit the Rethugs are peddling. But to people with an IQ above room temperature, not so much.

    The problem with privatization is that it robs the federal government of its ability to control the population and create a culture of dependency through which they can “fundamentally transform” this country.

    Been using the Random Bullshit Generator again, have we?

    If the progressives had their way, the Constitution would be a thing of the past and the government would run everything and everyone.

    I don’t know if that statement is a prime example of projection, stupidity, or parroting of Rethug talking points. Oh, wait – it’s all three! Lucky you, you hit the Trifecta! What do we have for this Loser (yet again), Johnny?

  73. 73.

    Mike G

    Just like Bush brought to Washington the sleaze, corruption, cronyism and authoritarianism of Texas state government, the gap-toothed, barefoot Confederate teatard hicks won’t be happy until the entire country has as shitty infrastructure as the South would have if they weren’t massively subsidized by the rest of the country.

  74. 74.

    WereBear

    @Mike G: until the entire country has as shitty infrastructure as the South would have if they weren’t massively subsidized by the rest of the country.

    Yes. Rule by “One’s Betters.”

    As someone who “groaned under that yoke” (as in “Shut up, ya pansy, the Modern South rewards those who kiss the biggest ass”) and failed and fled North, I must say:

    Thank the heavens above there is a place where the Laboratory of the States still exists, and it is called New York City, and this humble soul fled to it, and was supped with Art, and interacted with Fellows of Art, and exists to this day upon the fuel this lent Their Imagination; a substance the Southern Baptists called the very Middle Finger of the Devil.

    Amen.

  75. 75.

    Kyle

    @SFAW:

    It seems like everything the gov’t Republicans run is run inefficiently, incompetently, corruptly, and costly.

    Public or private. And with egregious meanness, bullying, exaltation of stupidity and brutalism. When your primary aim is greed, self-dealing and looting, that’s pretty much inevitable.

  76. 76.

    SFAW

    Kyle –

    Thanks for the help. I am chagrined that I didn’t think of it first.

    But the question is begged: is that “inefficiently, incompetently, corruptly” like a disk drive is inefficient, incompetent, and corrupt?

  78. 78.

    JasonF

    @Montysano:

    I caught a few minutes of Mark Levin’s show on the drive home, and he had the spittle flying over the unholy alliance of Big Corpa/Big Union/Big Statist. I listened for a few minutes and came away totally confused. Is it that anything that is Big is now the new enemy?

    Everything that is Big except for Rush Limbaugh.

  79. 79.

    GeneJockey

    @Caz:

    It seems like everything the gov’t runs is run inefficiently, incompetently, corruptly, and costly.

    As opposed to, say, investment banking?

  80. 80.

    Wile E. Quixote

    @Caz:

    It’s just another area that should be privatized. It seems like everything the gov’t runs is run inefficiently, incompetently, corruptly, and costly.

    You’re a lawyer? Really? Whose dick did you suck to get that J.D? Seriously, after reading that sentence I pity any poor bastard who’s relying upon you to write a coherent brief.

    The problem with privatization is that it robs the federal government of its ability to control the population and create a culture of dependency through which they can “fundamentally transform” this country.

    This has got to be DougJ. Seriously. No one could be this stupid. Actually Caz the problem with privatization is that it creates crony capitalists who figure that it’s easier and cheaper to purchase politicians and then get them to sell them public assets for cheap or who, instead of competing on the quality of the services they offer, purchase the same politicians and get them to guarantee them fat contracts, thus negating any potential cost savings that might be realized through competition. Don’t believe me? Well go look at the DoD. Yeah, those private defense contractors sure are efficient.

    If the progressives had their way, the Constitution would be a thing of the past and the government would run everything and everyone.

    Yeah, too bad for the progressives that the Republicans got there first and spent eight years trashing the Constitution. Not that you gave a shit when George W. Bush signed the PATRIOT act into law, created the TSA, passed Medicare Part D and No Child Left Behind. So you’re going to start killing Republicans now right? I mean if you’re concerned about the Constitution then you should start shooting Republicans because they spent eight years increasing the size and power of the government. Right? When is your Republican killing spree going to start Caz?

  81. 81.

    Origuy

    The Chicago Skyway and Indiana Toll Road are already privatized; a consortium made up of two Spanish and Australian companies has a 99-year lease to operate each of them. They’re supposed to maintain them in return for collecting the tolls. Mitch Daniels was the governor who made the deal for the Indiana Toll Road; I think the current Mayor Daley is responsible for the Chicago Skyway.

  82. 82.

    New Yorker

    You know, when the AFL-CIO and Chamber of Commerce agree on something, maybe that something is actually really important to all Americans and that elitist neocon “intellectuals” should reconsider their views?

    Christ, I can see Rubin’s next article: “Today, the AFL-CIO and Chamber of Commerce agreed that kicking puppies is wrong. Of course, the Chamber is sticking its head in the sand if it fails to recognize the long Marxist history of the anti-puppy kicking movement. Saul Alinsky worked to infiltrate public school with his anti-puppy kicking propaganda, and it’s well known that Marxist anti-Colonialist Kwame Nkrumah established anti-puppy kicking by fiat as soon as the British left Ghana.”

Comments are closed.