Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Petty moves from a petty man.

I desperately hope that, yet again, i am wrong.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

There are consequences to being an arrogant, sullen prick.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

They love authoritarianism, but only when they get to be the authoritarians.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

Republicans: slavery is when you own me. freedom is when I own you.

No one could have predicted…

This year has been the longest three days of putin’s life.

Red lights blinking on democracy’s dashboard

A thin legal pretext to veneer over their personal religious and political desires.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

Shut up, hissy kitty!

They punch you in the face and then start crying because their fist hurts.

The gop is a fucking disgrace.

“When somebody takes the time to draw up a playbook, they’re gonna use it.”

How any woman could possibly vote for this smug smarmy piece of misogynistic crap is beyond understanding.

‘Museums aren’t America’s attic for its racist shit.’

You are here: Home / Breaking: 75 Year-Old Man to Retire

Reader Interactions

72Comments

  1. 1.

    ruemara

    I’ve rather loved the role of Rockefellers as an antidote to the douchey scions of rich families. It’ll be the first time in my life a Rockerfeller was not in the Senate. He’s done good work on so many issues, so I’m sorry to see him go, but it’s time. I hope there’s a strong candidate in the wings.

  3. 3.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    Strangely enough one of our NC long time reps died yesterday, less than a week after she retired from the State senate. I didn’t know Jean Preston but if it were me I would be mightily pissed off if I retired from the House and Senate after 20 odd years and never got to cash even one retirement check.

  7. 7.

    Zifnab25

    @ruemara:

    I hope there’s a strong candidate in the wings.

    In W. Virginia? We’ll be lucky if we just get a DINO rather than watching the seat flip Republican.

  8. 8.

    BGinCHI

    The prospects for someone more progressive than Rockefeller emerging from a WV election are slim.

    Maybe Cole will run.

  11. 11.

    Violet

    Where’s Cole? We need some WV input on who good Dem candidates might be. I hope Dems can hold the seat.

  14. 14.

    Disco

    Prediction: GOP will have a primary and nominate yet another crazy fucking lunatic. Dems will retain the seat despite mainstream media’s insistence that it’s an easy Repub pickup.

  15. 15.

    Tokyokie

    @Litlebritdifrnt: Reminds me of former Pittsburgh Pirates manager Danny Murtaugh. He did four different stints running the club, returning to the dugout when the team ran into (frequent) jams, despite initially retiring in 1964 because of health concerns. He and general manager Joe L. Brown both announced their this-is-it, no-fooling, not-coming-back retirements the last month of the 1976 season. Brown enjoyed a long retirement, dying only a couple of years ago in his 90s, but Murtaugh suffered a fatal stroke only a couple of months after the end of the 1976 season.

  16. 16.

    Nina

    I don’t think we could possibly get a socially progressive senator out of WVA, but it seems to me (from Maryland) that it ought to be possible to get a pro-labor senator. Most of the people I know in WVA have positive feelings towards the union movement. Of course, that may just be ‘most of the people I know’ confirmation bias, but it’s a hopeful thought.

    WVA would seem to be ripe for another Richard Mourdock/Christine O’Donnell teatard Republican to lose in.

  20. 20.

    Corner Stone

    @Roger Moore:

    Can we get Dianne Feinstein to follow him into retirement?

    Why, so you can get an R in that seat instead? DiFi is the best D it’s possible to get in a red state like CA.

  21. 21.

    Culture of Truth

    Reminds me of the Johnny Carson special I saw part of last night. Everyone was sad that he retired – but he’d been at it for 30 years! He got to go on safari in Africa and enjoy his life for a while before he sadly passed away. Also he went out on a high note, and timing is everything.

  22. 22.

    Corner Stone

    @Violet:

    I think a campaign based on pet rescue, righteous rants, Steelers football could be a winner.

    Don’t forget the late night feeding of drunks and random pantslessness.
    I’d say he’s a mortal lock in WV as long as there are no pics of him liplocking with Obama.

  23. 23.

    Tone in DC

    I don’t think “eat a bag of salted dicks” would go over well as a campaign slogan.

    If Boehner and Dick Cheney can get away with telling people to go fuck themselves, I figure consumption of salted johnsons isn’t too big of an insult by comparison.

  24. 24.

    comrade scott's agenda of rage

    @Linda Featheringill:

    But if John became a US Senator, he’d have to actually read his mail.

    Nah, he’d have extremely hot, very eager to please staffers to do that for him.

    Having spent enough time on the Hill in my previous life, I knoweth of what I speaketh. ;)

  32. 32.

    Corner Stone

    I think Cole should run for Senate on the platform of making the payroll tax holiday permanent. This shit is outrageous!
    I suggest we raise the eligibility age of Medicare and go to C-CPI on SS in exchange for reinstating the payroll tax holiday.

  33. 33.

    Jay C

    IIJM, or does it seem like every single general election (even-numbered years) is a “uphill climb for Democrats in the Senate” according to our “MSM”?? Democrats hold a ten-seat majority in the upper house, but it seems that they always have many more seats to defend/run for than Republicans.

    But as for WV, I think a “flip” is probably likely, more’s the pity…

  35. 35.

    Sloegin

    The rest of us schlubs got 40 or more years of work ahead of us, and he voted to raise my retirement age, so yeah, whatever.

  37. 37.

    FlipYrWhig

    Seems like there ought to be a 45-year-old Robert Byrd III somewhere around that state by now.

  38. 38.

    Elizabelle

    @Raven:

    Huell Howser, host of California Gold (on KCET in Los Angeles), died this week at 67, after retiring in November.

    I really liked him, over the top as he seemed on first glance. (He was sincerely an enthusiastic guy. Not a persona.)

    I’m thinking the Tea Party might help keep West Virginia’s Senate seat blue. Let them work their magic.

  39. 39.

    Elizabelle

    What about it, John Cole?

    Why not run?

    Military vet, interesting back story, a good sense of the absurd.

    You could run a “Lazy Boy and laptop” campaign, updated version of McKinley’s front porch campaign. (ETA: Hopefully, you won’t get shot once you win.)

    You could at least get the candidates talking about some real issues.

    And you will get staff to do the actual work. (Even walk the pets.)

    The ghost of Strom Thurmond wants you to know that.

  40. 40.

    David Hunt

    @Alex S.:

    I’m afraid this seat will become red. Rockefeller was as good as possible for WV I think.

    I’ve got two words for you: Sharon Angle. Don’t underestimate ability of the mouth-breathers to get a full-on ranting lunatic through the primary process onto the Republican ballot. A don’t know how much the GOP machine has their side of WV politics locked down, but these idiots are always a surprise before they win the primary….

  42. 42.

    burnspbesq

    @Corner Stone:

    Why, so you can get an R in that seat instead? DiFi is the best D it’s possible to get in a red state like CA

    Umm, in case you haven’t been paying attention, at the present time every statewide office in California is held by a Democrat, Democrats have two-thirds majorities in both houses of the Legislature, and the House delegation is split 35 Democrats vs. 18 Republicans.

    You really are a fucking moron.

  43. 43.

    Chris

    @ruemara:

    It is nice to have superrich people who aren’t assholes.

    I suppose Warren Buffet and George Soros are the modern version of the Rockefellers.

  45. 45.

    liberal

    Look, I’ll agree as much as the next guy that he’s much, much better than some of the alternatives, but IIRC he was on a committee that could have investigated the Iraq fiasco, and as we all know, no substantial investigation was forthcoming. Which means he’s either corrupt or a wimp.

  46. 46.

    Suffern ACE

    @Elizabelle:

    You could at least get the candidates talking about some real issues.

    Or he could spend the entire campaign explaining one drunken tweet after another.

  48. 48.

    ? Martin

    West Virginia has the highest percentage of registered Democrats in the nation – more than Massachusetts.

    Just gotta be white and like coal and guns.

  52. 52.

    ? Martin

    @burnspbesq: No kidding. Obama won CA by 3,000,000 votes – 23 points. Pretty much the same percentage margin as MA. And we sent all of our Democrats back to the House in 2010 (pretty much the only state to do that), and sent more in 2012.

    I don’t think there’s any state trending more strongly Democratic right now.

  54. 54.

    J R in WV

    We’ll miss Rocky here. My family doctor (seeing the same Dr for 35 years!) used to have a picture of him and Gov. Arch More (felon) in his office. The appointment after Mr. Moore (using the Mr term loosely) plead guilty that photo op was history.

    Soon after Dr. realized who was in favor of health care and who was not, and a Jay IV poster went up. Jay did good work for the state of W Va, and for the USofA. He deserves a happy and long retirement with grandkids and dogs.

    Like others, unless a truly wild-eyed tea party Republican’t gets the nomination, I don’t see another even partly progressive Dem getting elected. The state has changed a whole lot since I was first 21 and able to vote. Most state-wide R candidates have been rich businessmen, crazy but camo’ed by the money.

  55. 55.

    Corner Stone

    @burnspbesq:

    at the present time every statewide office in California is held by a Democrat, Democrats have two-thirds majorities in both houses of the Legislature, and the House delegation is split 35 Democrats vs. 18 Republicans.

    Wow. When did that all happen?

  56. 56.

    Jay C

    @Jay C:

    OK, to answer my own question: according to Ed Kilgore, in 2016, Democrats will only have to defend 10 of 34 seats… better late than never, I guess.

    @Corner Stone:

    Democratic gains in California were pretty much cemented by last year’s general election. It’s been a twenty-year process, but the CA GOP has slowly-but-surely alienated pretty much every voting bloc outside their Angry Old White Guy “base”. And it’s had an effect.

  57. 57.

    burnspbesq

    @liberal:

    Which means he’s either corrupt or a wimp.

    There are a large number of other possibilities, as I’m sure you well know.

    Is it not equally possible that he wanted to pursue an inquiry but was out-voted by his fellow committee members?

  58. 58.

    burnspbesq

    @Origuy:

    Adjust your snark detector, counselor.

    Assumes facts not in evidence. Where CS is concerned, stupid is always the most likely explanation.

  60. 60.

    Corner Stone

    @burnspbesq:

    While you were preoccupied with SEC football and other crimes against humanity.

    It just doesn’t make any sense. Didn’t CA elect Gov Ronald Reagan?

  63. 63.

    NonyNony

    Corner Stone and burnspbesq are the best comedy team since French and Saunders! Or maybe the Smothers Brothers. I dunno – they’re pretty hilarious though.

  67. 67.

    Amir Khalid

    If I’m not mistaken, Senator Jay Rockefeller is the only member of that family whom I’ve met — in 2000, at a conference I covered in Taipei.

  69. 69.

    Donald G

    Damn. Jay was the only West Virginia Democratic senator I could halfway stand, even though he has taken positions in recent years that drive me crazy. Came to the state as a VISTA volunteer and stayed.

    My favorite West Virginia Democrat would have to be longtime WV secretary of state Ken Hechler, but he’s now 99 years old.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Hechler

  71. 71.

    mds

    Okay, strategery time. The WV Dems will almost certainly pick a Manchin- or Rahall-style backstabbing right-wing asshole, if they don’t simply go with Keith Judd, the convicted felon who pulled in 41% in the 2012 Democratic Presidential primary. So Cole needs to dust off his pre-Schiavo persona and run as a Republican. All those drunken tweets, hippie rants, pantsless interludes, and lurid pet photos? Once Cole has an R after his name, he simply declares that he’s found JAYsus. Whereupon anything embarrassing, morally questionable, or outright criminal disappears in a puff of wingnut dumbshit hypocrisy. Once he’s safely elected, which as a “big-boned” white guy who’s a military veteran and a recliner enthusiast should be no problem (Slogan: “COAL TASTES GREAT”), he switches parties again and laughs maniacally, because he’s in for six years whether the rubes like it or not.

    In short, there are no flaws whatsoever in this plan, and the donation link to help make it happen needs to be posted immediately.

  72. 72.

    bob h

    It is probably Rockefeller’s and Byrd’s doing that WV has the highest Federal reimbursement rate in the nation, including Alaska. And yet it is becoming a Red state. The classic Red state formula-hostility to the Federal government while you suck at its tit on our dime.

Comments are closed.