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You are here: Home / Slow On The Uptake

Slow On The Uptake

by John Cole|  September 30, 20139:51 pm| 205 Comments

This post is in: Clown Shoes, Teabagger Stupidity

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My NY Times alert on my iPhone informs me that the Senate has, once again, rejected the bullshit the clown car caucus sent over, for what must be at least the fifth time. I know these teahadists in the House reject science, but I didn’t realize they hated basic math. At any rate, they’ve voted 42 times to overturn the ACA, so maybe they really are just dumber than even I thought they were.

How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

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205Comments

  1. 1.

    JPL

    September 30, 2013 at 9:53 pm

    Reasonable and republicans do not belong side by side.. Told you to take lots of pet pictures cuz we need them to maintain some type of stability during the next month.

  2. 2.

    Jerzy Russian

    September 30, 2013 at 9:54 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    Good question. They could always be independent if the thought of being “liberal” scares them.

  3. 3.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 9:54 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    PFL, of course.

  4. 4.

    dmsilev

    September 30, 2013 at 9:55 pm

    Yes, but the _next_ vote, in which they vote to replace Obamacare with a set of leeches and balancing of the humors, is _guaranteed_ to pass the Senate and be signed by Obama.

  5. 5.

    PsiFighter37

    September 30, 2013 at 9:55 pm

    I think they really want to hit at least 50 votes to repeal ACA before they’re done. Heck, it’s as good an explanation as any. They are making themselves look like complete morons voting over and over again – and getting failed on in the Senate.

    According to the reporting, apparently a lot of lawmakers (probably the family values crowd) stank of booze – Orange Julius must be sharing the personal stash he’s got in the Speaker’s office.

  6. 6.

    dmsilev

    September 30, 2013 at 9:56 pm

    @PsiFighter37: Do they get frequent-flyer miles for every ACA-repeal vote or something?

  7. 7.

    Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader

    September 30, 2013 at 9:56 pm

    Fun fact: Reasonable is only one letter removed from treasonable.

  8. 8.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 9:56 pm

    @dmsilev:

    Ah, good old Theodoric of York, medieval congressman.

  9. 9.

    MikeBoyScout

    September 30, 2013 at 9:56 pm

    Wait. What? When did Republicans become insane?

    I really need to start paying attention

  10. 10.

    Keith P.

    September 30, 2013 at 9:57 pm

    I wish just one of these news orgs would point out that if Obama were to agree to a delay to get government funding, we’d just be going through this bullshit again next year. But then, I also wish they’d point out that the GOP demands for tax cuts equal to the size of debt limit increases is mathematically, uh, challenging in both the long and short term.

  11. 11.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 9:58 pm

    @Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader:

    Reasonable is only one letter removed from treasonable.

    And there ain’t a dime’s worth of difference between the Rethugs’ behavior and treason.

  12. 12.

    MattR

    September 30, 2013 at 9:58 pm

    Anyone know if staffers are still manning phone lines or do I have to wait til tomorrow to make my call (which really should have been done earlier today).

  13. 13.

    PaulW

    September 30, 2013 at 9:58 pm

    Reasonable Republicans like myself fled the party 8 years ago.

    In the meantime, here’s my suggested list on how to survive the Shutdown:
    http://noticeatrend.blogspot.com/2013/09/how-to-survive-impending-shutdown-in.html

    It’s just follows three simple steps.

  14. 14.

    James E. Powell

    September 30, 2013 at 9:59 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    I think it is now generally understood that there are no reasonable Republicans.

    For the “reasonable” ones, there is no downside, no risk, involved in riding along with the radicals because no one will blame the “reasonable” ones. They were, after all, faced with the millennial terror of a black president. They had no choice!

    There are only two laws of elected official behavior: 1) get elected, 2) get re-elected.

    Being “reasonable” means they don’t win the primary, so they don’t get elected. Being “reasonable” means they draw a primary opponent who will have funding, so the second rule means they don’t do it.

    The incentives to be “reasonable” are . . . I am not aware of any.

  15. 15.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 9:59 pm

    @MattR:

    Operators are standing. Bye!

  16. 16.

    dmsilev

    September 30, 2013 at 9:59 pm

    So, I just went over to National Review to see how that set of gibbering loons was coping with tonight’s events, and found this bit of hilarity:

    This afternoon I got a voicemail at AEI from someone who’d heard me on NPR earlier in the day. I’m leaving out her phone number and name and just sharing her thoughts:
    “And I just wanted to say that as far as I’m concerned, as a friend of Ted Cruz, this means that you are a friend of a severe narcissist and a vile liar and a terrorist. As far as we are personally concerned. He makes wild statements without any basis in fact such as ‘millions of Americans are being hurt by Obamacare.’ Really? Well, I would like to have specific identification of those millions and specifically how they are being harmed.

    As far as I’m concerned, if I heard, if I turned on the television and I heard that he had been set on fire and thrown out of an airplane, I would not shed a tear. Also as far as I’m concerned, it appears that you are from another country and I highly suggest that you go back to that country and stir up trouble there instead of supporting terrorists in our Congress.”

    That, I remind you, was from someone at the American Enterprise Institute.

  17. 17.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 10:00 pm

    Insanity, same thing, different results, etc.

    I think on some level, the GOP is hoping Obama will just wear down, like a parent buying their whiny kid an ice cream after 30 minutes of screaming. Best I can come up with.

  18. 18.

    jefft452

    September 30, 2013 at 10:00 pm

    “How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?”

    Remember when Sharon Angle beat a “reasonable” Republican in the NV Senate primary?
    The “reasonable” Republican she beat wanted to replace health insurance with paying for your cancer treatment by giving your Doctor a chicken

    I see no reason why “reasonable” Republicans would not still self-identify with this party

  19. 19.

    CaseyL

    September 30, 2013 at 10:01 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    Those would be the people who really only care about keeping their taxes as low as possible, and business as unregulated as possible.

    Also known as: parasites.

    But compared to the nihilists running the show, parasites seem “reasonable.”

  20. 20.

    mai naem

    September 30, 2013 at 10:01 pm

    Fuck this shit. Anybody know when they’re going to have the Health Exchange rates up? At midnight or tomorrow AM? I went to the Healthcare. gov site on Sat. and they said it’s not going to be up till 10/1.

  21. 21.

    maye

    September 30, 2013 at 10:02 pm

    It will be interesting to see if this plays out the same way it did in the 90s. These people live in an echo chamber with their rabid constituents, in their gerrymandered districts, so it may not phase them at all. They were sent to Congress to be anarchists, and that’s their only mandate.

  22. 22.

    Narcissus

    September 30, 2013 at 10:02 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    They don’t like blacks, gays, hispanics, women and the like.

  23. 23.

    Splitting Image

    September 30, 2013 at 10:03 pm

    If I identify as a reasonable Republican, then identifying with the party is by definition reasonable.

    It works the same way as religion: if I identify as a Good Christian, then anything I personally support, such as bashing gays with cinderblocks or barring women from making decisions about their health care, is by definition consistent with being a Good Christian.

  24. 24.

    Jerzy Russian

    September 30, 2013 at 10:03 pm

    @dmsilev: Now TCDS is a disease? Jesus Hussein Christ.

  25. 25.

    beltane

    September 30, 2013 at 10:03 pm

    @PsiFighter37: Too bad it wasn’t enough booze to make a few of them pass out in a pool of their own vomit.

  26. 26.

    JPL

    September 30, 2013 at 10:04 pm

    @mai naem: Since it does not go into effect until January 1, I advised a friend to wait a few days… Sebelius is great but I can’t imagine even the best of systems failing cuz of overload.

  27. 27.

    lamh36

    September 30, 2013 at 10:04 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    By calling themselves “Independents or Libertarians” and still voting for RWNJ GOP pols and skewing the polls such that the beltway bubble actually believes that “independents” would blame Obama and GOP equally for shutdown.

  28. 28.

    jefft452

    September 30, 2013 at 10:05 pm

    “Wait. What? When did Republicans become insane?”

    I would tell you 1963,
    But then again, my dad would say 1935
    So take it for what its worth

  29. 29.

    Jerzy Russian

    September 30, 2013 at 10:07 pm

    @JPL:

    Told you to take lots of pet pictures cuz we need them to maintain some type of stability during the next month.

    Mr. Cole will have a hard time topping that last picture of Max. However, that does not mean that he shouldn’t try.

  30. 30.

    PsiFighter37

    September 30, 2013 at 10:08 pm

    I wonder if this nonsense is going to go on all day tomorrow. Seriously, the GOP looks worse and worse each time. Even the Villagers aren’t going to take them seriously after the 10th time or so. Or will it be longer?

  31. 31.

    dmsilev

    September 30, 2013 at 10:11 pm

    @PsiFighter37: I dunno. I think relying on the existence of Peak Village Tolerance is about as silly as waiting for Peak Wingnut.

  32. 32.

    Howard Beale IV

    September 30, 2013 at 10:12 pm

    @dmsilev: Yer forgetting that one treatment that all so-called Republicans must have…

    Trepanning.

  33. 33.

    agorabum

    September 30, 2013 at 10:13 pm

    C’mon Cole. Both sides do it, don’t cha know…. Seriously though, it’s because a ‘reasonable republican’ is an extinct breed. There may be reasonable people who are republicans, but that’s only because they haven’t been paying attention – they watch fox from time to time, read the WSJ, they know there’s a lot of buzzing going on and when they tune in, they hear the Dems are equally (or more) to blame, and then tune back out. And at election time dutifully vote Republican – maybe because they haven’t been paying attention, maybe for some single pet issue (tax cut, abortion, unlimited guns, they are repressing gay urges and need everyone else to stay in the closet or they’ll end up back at that rest stop again and then Susan will leave and take the kids, etc.).

  34. 34.

    MattR

    September 30, 2013 at 10:13 pm

    @MattR: Took a shot, but unsurprisngly there was no one answering the phones. Will have to take care of that when taking a break from work tmrw.

    On the positive side, the impending shutdown meant that I was able to have dinner tonight with my friend who was in the NYC area for the weekend but now doesn’t have to worry about getting back to DC for work tomorrow. Luckily, he is able to afford the missed paycheck and is looking forward to a little extra vacation.

  35. 35.

    Baud

    September 30, 2013 at 10:13 pm

    I can’t even begin to describe how messed up Balloon Juice is for me right now.

  36. 36.

    Poopyman

    September 30, 2013 at 10:14 pm

    @beltane:

    Too bad it wasn’t enough booze to make a few of them pass out in a pool of their own vomit.

    The night is still young.

  37. 37.

    joel hanes

    September 30, 2013 at 10:14 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    The same way that ordinary German people supported the Reich: we’re watching Hannah Arendt’s banality of evil play out before us.

    The primary tactic is to avoid cognitive dissonance.
    One must be careful not to consciously and overtly learn anything that makes one’s R identification uncomfortable. ( CNN and NPR have been cooperating with this requirement for many years now; there’s no need to resort to Fox News) Best to concentrate on all the prominent, respectable people in your community who are Republicans — there can’t be anything really wrong with it if these successful and upstanding people are members too.

    This formula worked for my mother until Sarah Palin was too blatant to be ignored — but Mom still feels the siren call of the society of prominent Republicans, and has many “reasonable” Republican friends.

  38. 38.

    James E. Powell

    September 30, 2013 at 10:14 pm

    @PsiFighter37:

    Seriously, the GOP looks worse and worse each time.

    They always look that way to us. But to the people who vote for them and give them money the House Republicans are heroes, fighting to save America.

  39. 39.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:15 pm

    @Howard Beale IV:

    Trepanning.

    Or try this. @SFAW:

  40. 40.

    NotMax

    September 30, 2013 at 10:15 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    Sad to say, the rhetorical flourishes about lowering (or not increasing) taxes remains a powerful attractant to too many who are mostly disengaged from the wider policy process.

    Plus the dog whistles about all those ‘others.’

    /depressing

  41. 41.

    Gopher2b

    September 30, 2013 at 10:16 pm

    As I told a buddy today, I’ve voted for three Democrats in my life – Obama, my Congressperson and another I knew personally – and I cannot foresee a scenario within the next decade where I would vote for a republican. Why would I aid abet these nutters.

  42. 42.

    dmsilev

    September 30, 2013 at 10:17 pm

    @Howard Beale IV: Personally, I’m a fan of retro-phrenology.

  43. 43.

    Mike

    September 30, 2013 at 10:21 pm

    We should create a new class of government medals/awards, like the Mark Twain or the Medal of Freedom. For going to extraordinary lengths to destroy the nation that elected a black guy, we could give out the Robert E. Lee award, if a Congress person does it while using extraordinary dog whistle phrasing, we can hand out the Nathan Beford Forrest award.

  44. 44.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:22 pm

    @dmsilev:
    A close cousin to “Getting Hit on the Head Lessons.” [Waaaaaahhhh! (Oh, he’s good.)]

  45. 45.

    Eric U.

    September 30, 2013 at 10:22 pm

    it really has gotten bad for Republicans, there are only so many people that are willing to let their racism get in the way of voting for people who will serve their best interests. One of my facebook friends went from pretty die-hard Republican back in 2001 to posting Daily Kos links now. And he’s in his ’40s. Haven’t talked to him about it, I imagine the sequester probably had a big effect

  46. 46.

    GregB

    September 30, 2013 at 10:23 pm

    Has anyone called Boehner a chickenshit appeaser yet?

    Someone needs to.

  47. 47.

    atlliberal

    September 30, 2013 at 10:24 pm

    @MikeBoyScout:
    January 20th 2009

  48. 48.

    Jeremy

    September 30, 2013 at 10:24 pm

    The republicans should include a provision that demands that the President resign and go to jail in the spending bill.

    At this point include the most absurd stuff.

  49. 49.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:24 pm

    @Mike:

    Don’t forget the Jefferson Davis Award (for wearing women’s clothes to avoid capture).

    ETA: Of course, some of them might do it just because it makes them feel pretty. Oh so pretty. Pretty, and shitty, and whiiiiite.

  50. 50.

    srv

    September 30, 2013 at 10:24 pm

    Extremism is the new white.

    @Baud:

    I can’t even begin to describe how messed up Balloon Juice is for me right now.

    It’s always darkest just before it goes pitch black.

  51. 51.

    Baud

    September 30, 2013 at 10:24 pm

    @GregB:

    His mama probably has.

  52. 52.

    nineone

    September 30, 2013 at 10:25 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    It’s not easy, but a setady stream of hookers and blow probably help.

  53. 53.

    MJ

    September 30, 2013 at 10:25 pm

    @Eric U.:

    Same with my stepfather. He was a die-hard Republican, hated Clinton, believed all the “Clinton Body Count” garbage, even voted for Bush II. Then Katrina happened and it was like the blinders were ripped off. He has been hardcore Democrat ever since. It’s been a shocking turnaround.

  54. 54.

    Tim F.

    September 30, 2013 at 10:25 pm

    A ‘reasonable Republican’ is John Cole.

    Homestly, anyone who made it through Schiavo is beyond saving. These days you can only use ‘reasonable’ in the most relative sense. Today’s reasonable faction the side smart enough to pursue reckless, insane and cruel policies with a faint whiff of long term self-interest.

  55. 55.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:27 pm

    @efgoldman:

    I think you mis-counted.

  56. 56.

    JPL

    September 30, 2013 at 10:28 pm

    In a perfect world, after this show down, they will raise the debt limit with no changes.

    okay. there is no perfect world and they are willing to tank the government.

  57. 57.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 10:28 pm

    @Jeremy:

    “We demand that the president bring us a shrubbery!”

  58. 58.

    Mike in NC

    September 30, 2013 at 10:29 pm

    All of this bullshit reminds me of those CareerBuilder ads from a few years ago featuring those chimpanzees. But that’s a slam on chimps.

  59. 59.

    Heliopause

    September 30, 2013 at 10:30 pm

    Slow On The Uptake

    Yet here they are, shutting down the most powerful government in the history of the universe at their pleasure. Don’t you wish the left could be this stupid every once in a while?

  60. 60.

    mai naem

    September 30, 2013 at 10:30 pm

    All the Repubs I’ve met in the last ten years have basically been either racist, anti-abortion, or anti-gay, usually added on with the “GOP are for low taxes” crap. Of course the vast majority of them would never benefit from the tax cut.

  61. 61.

    JPL

    September 30, 2013 at 10:31 pm

    @Heliopause: no

  62. 62.

    srv

    September 30, 2013 at 10:31 pm

    Hillary’s thugs are already setting the stage for her rein. Liberal media rolls over:

    NBC and CNN are backing away from projects about Hillary Rodham Clinton.

    NBC is abandoning plans for Hillary, a miniseries planned for next year that would have starred Diane Lane as the former first lady with a story that started in the midst of her husband’s Monica Lewinsky sex scandal.

    CNN announced earlier Monday that it is dropping a planned documentary about the potential 2016 presidential candidate after its director received backlash from Clinton’s inner circle and the Republican National Committee.

    Republicans should pre-emptively impeach her.

  63. 63.

    beltane

    September 30, 2013 at 10:33 pm

    @Mike in NC: I was thinking the same thing. And if they keep drinking like this, their next set of demands will be scrawled in feces on the walls. Perhaps Jane Goodall can be brought in to communicate with them.

  64. 64.

    Cheryl from Maryland

    September 30, 2013 at 10:33 pm

    The old saying — what I tell you 42 times is true. Dumb fucks — thank you House Republicans for shutting down my work at the Smithsonian and leaving me LESS time to do my work as the deadlines won’t change despite this furlough.

  65. 65.

    scav

    September 30, 2013 at 10:34 pm

    @Spaghetti Lee: And deliver us pizza and six-packs for our late-night pep-meeting right now!

  66. 66.

    Bubblegum Tate

    September 30, 2013 at 10:35 pm

    @jefft452:

    Remember when Sharon Angle beat a “reasonable” Republican in the NV Senate primary?
    The “reasonable” Republican she beat wanted to replace health insurance with paying for your cancer treatment by giving your Doctor a chicken

    You’ve got that backward–Angle was the “chickens for checkups” one.

  67. 67.

    J

    September 30, 2013 at 10:35 pm

    I can think of lots of reasonable Republicans, Mark Hatfield, Jacob Javits, Millicent Fenwick… Oh you mean a living Republican holding elective office. That’s much harder. How much time have I got?

  68. 68.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:35 pm

    Tweet stream at CNN says the Traitors are going to pass another CR with Obamacare provisions, and ask the Senate to go to Conference.

    One hopes that, if the do get to Conference, Harry Reid has an appropriate response.

  69. 69.

    scav

    September 30, 2013 at 10:37 pm

    @srv: The reins on reigns fall mainly on the networks.

  70. 70.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 10:37 pm

    @Heliopause:

    If it was the most powerful government in history, Obama would be an absolute monarch and have them all executed.

  71. 71.

    mdblanche

    September 30, 2013 at 10:38 pm

    Days like this remind me about what I wrote here the day after the election:

    Conservatives really aren’t going to take this well. They’ve been slapped down hard. The rest of us have just let teh gayz into their marriages and their Senate, mistreated their beloved job creators as if they were common minority voters, and disrespected their god by making use of the science of statistics. Worst of all, we’ve denied them their one overarching goal of the last four years and returned that “Marxist negro” (direct quote) to the White House. And having been denied that I think they’re going to want to take it out on those of us who voted for him.

    I think they’re going to double down on making life miserable for gays, and non-whites, and women, single women especially, and the young, and the poor, and anyone who lives in a blue state. I think their fear and hate and anger has only grown. I think it only gets uglier now. After being denied by the rest of us I fear they’re ready to destroy the country just to have their revenge. After what we just did, they think it’s a goner anyway.

    Nothing the crazies have done since has scared me because they’re no better than they should be. It’s the “reasonable” Republicans who are scaring me right now. I think that Wall Street’s hold on the GOP, perhaps the only constant in our politics since the Civil War, has been damaged a lot more than anybody realized. They were only able to get two Congressmen to rebel against the party’s kamikaze plan while all the other “reasonable” ones like Deven “lemming” Nunes voted to go over the cliff. I wouldn’t be surprised if they were the ones everybody smelled, drinking away the pain like Boehner does. The GOP caucus as a whole is more afraid of the crazy than the Chamber of Commerce and that’s what motivates their actions. Maybe the “reasonable” ones will switch their votes with enough cover, but is an invertebrate like Boehner really up to giving it to them? And if he isn’t, what then?

  72. 72.

    Baud

    September 30, 2013 at 10:38 pm

    Somewhere, Assad is saying, “I can’t believe I gave up my chemical weapons to these idiots.”

  73. 73.

    karen marie

    September 30, 2013 at 10:38 pm

    @mai naem: The site will crash from everyone jumping on it. I’m going to wait at least a week.

  74. 74.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:38 pm

    @Bubblegum Tate:

    You’ve got that backward–Angle was the “chickens for checkups” one.

    No, that was Sue Lowden.

  75. 75.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 10:39 pm

    @Bubblegum Tate: @Bubblegum Tate:

    Let the record show that Sue Lowden was in fact the chicken lady: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sue_Lowden

  76. 76.

    Mary G

    September 30, 2013 at 10:40 pm

    Welp, last week I hand-wrote a letter to my new representative, Darrell Issa, telling him that if he shut down the government and didn’t raise the debt ceiling, I would devote all my time, money and influence to make sure he didn’t get re-elected next year. Guess I’ll be very busy.

  77. 77.

    beltane

    September 30, 2013 at 10:40 pm

    @Bubblegum Tate: No, it was Sue Lowden, Angle’s “reasonable” opponent who proposed the chickens for checkups healthcare plan: http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20003163-503544.html

    There are no reasonable Republicans. There are, however, some Republicans who are still capable of using indoor plumbing. That is what passes as reasonable these days.

  78. 78.

    maya

    September 30, 2013 at 10:41 pm

    @J:

    I can think of lots of reasonable Republicans, Mark Hatfield, Jacob Javits, Millicent Fenwick…

    Absolutely loooved her in The Mouse That Roared and Mouse on the Moon.

  79. 79.

    Jeremy

    September 30, 2013 at 10:41 pm

    @Spaghetti Lee: LOL !

  80. 80.

    Mike in NC

    September 30, 2013 at 10:41 pm

    @PsiFighter37: Fucking “Americans for Prosperity” clowns have been inundating us here with TV ads about the evil of Obamacare for a couple of weeks now. Deranged assholes on the Koch payroll.

  81. 81.

    Anoniminous

    September 30, 2013 at 10:42 pm

    @SFAW:

    This is the first step in attempt to open negotiation. Reid has to tell them to “bite me.”

  82. 82.

    Bubblegum Tate

    September 30, 2013 at 10:42 pm

    @SFAW:

    You are correct; I stand corrected. I had actually forgotten Lowden existed and thought Angle owned all the crazy there. My bad.

  83. 83.

    mai naem

    September 30, 2013 at 10:43 pm

    The comments on Ramesh Ponnururu’s TCDS are just breathtaking! The last one mocking Harry Reid as being the woman who left the voicemail. Ironic since I’ll be flipping radio channels and I hear somebody who I think is a woman talking who ends up being Ponnururu. This has happened to me several times.

  84. 84.

    Yatsuno

    September 30, 2013 at 10:44 pm

    @Mike in NC: Have you seen the really creepy one where Uncle Sam is the gynecologist? Whiskey Tango Foxtrot? Who approves this shit?

  85. 85.

    Jeremy

    September 30, 2013 at 10:45 pm

    @J: Yes, the good old days of republican moderates and liberal republicans.

  86. 86.

    The Dangerman

    September 30, 2013 at 10:45 pm

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    Easy.

    After the Bush disaster, the Republicans had to agree to absorb a bunch of racist, sexist, xenophobic shits or spend much time in the political wilderness; it gave them the House 2 short years later (and then cost them the Senate with Christine O’Donnell, Sharon Angle, and Todd Akin). The Tea Party has had their utility for “reasonable Republicans” and they know that cutting them loose sends them back to the wilderness they thought they had avoided (and fucking over the country is secondary to Party).

  87. 87.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:46 pm

    @Bubblegum Tate:

    No worries. But I am concerned about your “owned all the crazy there” comment. Have I taught you nothing? (Well, not me personally, of course.) “All the Rethug crazy” is like Peak Wingnut: a theoretical construct which does not exist in the real/rational world.

  88. 88.

    Anya

    September 30, 2013 at 10:47 pm

    The Affordable Care Act goes into effect in 75 minutes.

  89. 89.

    JPL

    September 30, 2013 at 10:47 pm

    @Jeremy: I for one am sick and tired of people talking about Reagan again.. Gee.. get over it..
    Everyone knows Nixon was a dem..

  90. 90.

    ruemara

    September 30, 2013 at 10:47 pm

    Tribalism. SATSQ.

  91. 91.

    Bubblegum Tate

    September 30, 2013 at 10:48 pm

    @SFAW:

    But I am concerned about your “owned all the crazy there” comment.

    Oh, I meant that I thought she owned all the crazy in that particular race in that I was attributing Lowden’s crazy to her as well.

  92. 92.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 10:49 pm

    @J:

    Am I the only one who thinks it’s amusing that at basically the same time in the late ’50s, NY had Senators named Irving Ives, Jacob Javits, and Kenneth Keating, along with attorney general Louis Lefkowitz? They should have kept going with the alphabet thing, we could be up to Xavier Xhemajli and Ziggy Zorn by now.

  93. 93.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:49 pm

    @Bubblegum Tate:

    OK, thanks for ‘splainin’. I wuz a little worried.

  94. 94.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 10:50 pm

    @Anya:

    Maybe for you EAST COAST ELITISTS!

  95. 95.

    Ash Can

    September 30, 2013 at 10:50 pm

    @maya: Heh! You know, Doonesbury’s Lacey Davenport character was based on her.

  96. 96.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:50 pm

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    Am I the only one who thinks it’s amusing that at basically the same time in the late ’50s, NY had Senators named Irving Ives, Jacob Javits, and Kenneth Keating, along with attorney general Louis Lefkowitz?

    Yes

  97. 97.

    Hill Dweller

    September 30, 2013 at 10:51 pm

    The House has decided not to have anymore votes tonight. We’re heading for a shutdown.

    ETA: WaPo is reporting it, but cable seems to think they’re going to vote for another CR.

  98. 98.

    Hungry Joe

    September 30, 2013 at 10:51 pm

    “Reasonable.”

    You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

  99. 99.

    RobertDSC-Power Mac G5 Dual

    September 30, 2013 at 10:52 pm

    @Bubblegum Tate:
    The chickens for checkups lady was Sue Lowden, the “reasonable” one. Angle was the “2nd Amendment remedies” nutcase.

  100. 100.

    RaflW

    September 30, 2013 at 10:52 pm

    I was on a plane this afternoon w/ live TV, not great choices, watched maybe 10 mins of Wolf Blitzer before I had to switch to cool jazz ‘radio’ and the flight mapper to maintain sanity.

    Wolf had Cruz on. He kept talking about how the GOP was compromising and Wolf kept saying, “you don’t have the votes (to get what you want)” which just bounced off.

    I know the GOP is insane about message discipline, but I think it pervades their brains, makes them forget that “you don’t have the votes” isn’t just something TV wanks say that you need to spin against, but is an observable fact.

  101. 101.

    nineone

    September 30, 2013 at 10:53 pm

    Sharon Angle likes “Second Amendment Solutions”. You should too.

  102. 102.

    Suffern ACE

    September 30, 2013 at 10:53 pm

    @Heliopause: from the looks of it, we will end up with a temporary government shut down and the “cave” will be a delay in the implementation of ACA. If that. The tax to fund Obamacare will remain intact, as will the rest of the plan. What did their obstinacy get them this year? It’s not like we can do much about them until 2014 anyway.

  103. 103.

    Patricia Kayden

    September 30, 2013 at 10:54 pm

    @Anya: YAY! Although the government shuts down and 800,000 federal employees get an unwanted unpaid vacation beginning tomorrow. Oh well. We take the good and the bad, I guess.

  104. 104.

    Anya

    September 30, 2013 at 10:54 pm

    @Spaghetti Lee: Is there another coast? I thought we were it.

  105. 105.

    Violet

    September 30, 2013 at 10:55 pm

    So what’s the latest? Is the House voting again to repeal Obamacare? Is Boehner drunk and in hiding somewhere?

  106. 106.

    Jeremy

    September 30, 2013 at 10:56 pm

    @JPL: LOL ! If Nixon were around the current republican party would call him a communist. Though he made his mark raging against it.

  107. 107.

    Ash Can

    September 30, 2013 at 10:57 pm

    @Hill Dweller:

    The House has decided not to have anymore votes tonight.

    “Boehner can’t stand up anymore, the guys from Texas are singing dirty songs at the tops of their lungs, and a couple of guys from Georgia have passed out and I can’t wake them up. What the fuck should we do??”

    “Go out and tell the reporters that we’re calling it quits for tonight. And for god’s sake, make sure they stay the hell out of here.”

  108. 108.

    Baud

    September 30, 2013 at 10:57 pm

    Eric Cantor ‏@GOPLeader 6m

    Members are advised: the House will vote tonight to adopt a motion insisting on our last amendment and request a conference with the Senate.

  109. 109.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 10:58 pm

    @Violet:

    So what’s the latest? Is the House voting again to repeal Obamacare? Is Boehner drunk and in hiding somewhere?

    Something about wanting to go to conference committee.

    For a continuing resolution to keep the government operating FFS.

    GOPers keep trying to pretend that “give us XYZ or the country gets it” is a legitimate political debate.

  110. 110.

    GregB

    September 30, 2013 at 10:58 pm

    Hopefully the GOP will break apart and Susan Lowden can lead the Keep on Fucking That Chicken Caucus.

  111. 111.

    JPL

    September 30, 2013 at 10:59 pm

    @Ash Can: Are we sure that the Texas evangelical libertarians are only singing dirty songs? I have it on good authority, Newt told him about the garage. That and a pint is all they need.

  112. 112.

    Jeremy

    September 30, 2013 at 11:00 pm

    The government is going to shut down and the republicans will face a large amount of push back over the coming days and Boehner will have to cave and put up a clean CR.

  113. 113.

    mai naem

    September 30, 2013 at 11:01 pm

    @Anya: I feel like going to every wingnut site in 75 minutes and posting “nanannanannananananananana, Obamacare is here nanananannanananananana, fuck you, elections have consequences, fuck Ted Cruz, Fuck Rand Paul, Fuck Rick Santelli, Fuck Sheldon Adelson, Fuck Bill Kristol, Fuck Chuck Grassley, Fuck John Barrasso, Fuck Tom Coburn, Obama care is here to stay”

  114. 114.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 11:01 pm

    @Baud:

    “We will vote on a motion that confirms our previous vote on a motion that’s been rejected multiple times.” Well, I’m glad you’re not just being a passive-aggressive dick or anything, Cantor.

  115. 115.

    Belafon

    September 30, 2013 at 11:02 pm

    @beltane: “Where did Steve get the brown crayon?” Went and saw Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2. Some really cute food puns. Cantelope and Hippotatoes for one.

  116. 116.

    Ash Can

    September 30, 2013 at 11:03 pm

    @Baud:

    request a conference with the Senate.

    I hope Reid et al. tell them to go fuck themselves. Or show up to said conference with brass knuckles, baseball bats, and steel-toed boots. That would work too.

  117. 117.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 11:04 pm

    @Ash Can:

    “How the hell does Ralph Hall even know so many verses to ‘The Good Ship Venus?!'”

  118. 118.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 11:04 pm

    Harry Reid just said from the Senate floor “We will not go to conference with a gun to our head”.

    Looks like Boner’s last card has been played.

  119. 119.

    Baud

    September 30, 2013 at 11:04 pm

    @Ash Can:

    According to Twitter, he has.

  120. 120.

    Anya

    September 30, 2013 at 11:05 pm

    Harry Reid to GOP: Go Pound Sand.
    Chuck Schumer: Boehner is a weak shithead and we will not go into conference with a gun held to our head.

  121. 121.

    nineone

    September 30, 2013 at 11:05 pm

    @Cacti:

    GOPers keep trying to pretend that “give us XYZ or the country gets it” is a legitimate political debate.

    Wait, you mean it isn’t?

    @Ash Can: Ha! It’s like you’re a fly on the wall. Now it can be told!

  122. 122.

    Ash Can

    September 30, 2013 at 11:07 pm

    @Baud: Atta boy, Harry!

  123. 123.

    Heliopause

    September 30, 2013 at 11:08 pm

    @Suffern ACE:

    I was commenting upon the fact that, in spite of their obstinacy and stupidity, they can do this at all. And vomit all over basic voting and reproductive rights, can concentrate wealth at the top to a vastly greater degree than a generation ago, bring a halt to any meaningful action on the existential threat to the species known as climate change,and on and on. Quite the multitaskers, in spite of being obstinate and stupid.

  124. 124.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 11:08 pm

    The GOP has resisted going to conference for months now.

    There’s zero good faith behind this latest proposal. Good on Reid for telling Boner to go pound sand.

  125. 125.

    Anya

    September 30, 2013 at 11:09 pm

    @mai naem: I will go with you but first, I need to know if stupid and hateful contagious. Let me check what the CDC says about that.

  126. 126.

    Anoniminous

    September 30, 2013 at 11:10 pm

    @Cacti:

    HALLE-FUCKING-LUJAH!

  127. 127.

    cckids

    September 30, 2013 at 11:10 pm

    Well, color me amazed. Jon Stewart just called out the media for the “both sides do it” crap they’ve been spewing about the government shutdown. It was pretty fabulous. “This isn’t a game of chicken! Its one side being an asshole & causing a head-on collision!”.

    Nice.

  128. 128.

    joel hanes

    September 30, 2013 at 11:11 pm

    @JPL:

    sick and tired of people talking about Reagan again

    Sorry, but Reagan charted (in his rhetoric) the course the Republicans have sailed for the last thirty five years, and is more to blame for the current parlous state of the Union than any other single person before or after. His genial demeanor and twinkling affability were employed to convince a great many people of a great many toxic lies, lies that flattered their egos but have poisoned our politics.

    I lived through that as an adult, and I will never forget, and never forgive.

  129. 129.

    beltane

    September 30, 2013 at 11:12 pm

    @Heliopause: It takes a lot less skill and intelligence to engage in destructive acts than to engage in creative ones.

  130. 130.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 11:13 pm

    @joel hanes:

    more to blame for the current parlous state of the Union than any other single person before or after.

    I’d give that honor to Murdoch. At least Reagan’s dead.

  131. 131.

    MikeJ

    September 30, 2013 at 11:14 pm

    @mai naem:

    “nanannanannananananananana, Obamacare is here nanananannanananananana, fuck you, elections have consequences,

    Ten years from now it will be very, very rude to call it Obamacare. You can’t be so mean that you try to convince people that it was only Obama who wanted that ultrapopular program. You’ll be required to give equal credit to the teatards.

  132. 132.

    PsiFighter37

    September 30, 2013 at 11:14 pm

    So just finished exercising, and it seems the latest thing is the House wants to appoint representatives to a budget conference.

    Isn’t the same thing they have refused to do for several months now? And won’t their asshole colleagues in the Senate GOP just block it? (because they REALLY don’t want to go to conference)

    This is like playing one-dimensional chess while eating crayons. If they put the crayons up their noses and made funny faces they’d look better than they do now.

  133. 133.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 11:15 pm

    @joel hanes:

    Sorry, but Reagan charted (in his rhetoric) the course the Republicans have sailed for the last thirty five years, and is more to blame for the current parlous state of the Union than any other single person before or after. His genial demeanor and twinkling affability were employed to convince a great many people of a great many toxic lies, lies that flattered their egos but have poisoned our politics.

    I lived through that as an adult, and I will never forget, and never forgive.

    The most significant political change over the past half century is how the GOP has become more radical and revanchist with every successive national election. Reagan was just the culmination of what had been set in motion 16 years earlier, and delayed for a few years by the interlude of Watergate.

  134. 134.

    CalD

    September 30, 2013 at 11:16 pm

    I’m so old, I can remember when John Cole was the single Republican blogger that I most feared the most, because god help me I really got a got a kick out of reading his stuff sometimes. I still marvel at the transformation, but I can’t see any way it benefits the cause of conservatism to keep alienating their best and brightest.

  135. 135.

    J.D. Rhoades

    September 30, 2013 at 11:18 pm

    @Baud:

    Love this. Tweeted. (With attribution).

  136. 136.

    Spaghetti Lee

    September 30, 2013 at 11:18 pm

    @PsiFighter37:

    Patty Murray and Harry Reid responded with basically “You had months to sit down and talk and now you want to do it with one hour left? Fuck you, it’s your fault we’re here in the first place.”

  137. 137.

    Chris

    September 30, 2013 at 11:19 pm

    @jefft452:

    I would tell you 1963,
    But then again, my dad would say 1935

    1876, the Tilden-Hayes compromise, when they first sold their soul to the Confederacy.

  138. 138.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 11:19 pm

    Senator Patty Murray says conference with House GOPers on the budget was requested and refused 18 times previously.

  139. 139.

    mdblanche

    September 30, 2013 at 11:20 pm

    @GregB: I think Calgary Cruz has, but he probably isn’t who you had in mind.

    @Anya: The CDC says “we’re sorry, but we are closed due to government shutdown and can not process your request.”

  140. 140.

    PsiFighter37

    September 30, 2013 at 11:20 pm

    @Cacti: Facts have a liberal bias, how many times do you need to be told this? Give me the other side of the story, and by other side I mean the non-existent, imaginary universe side of the story that involves ponies and rainbows.

  141. 141.

    MattR

    September 30, 2013 at 11:20 pm

    @Cacti: Well then, obviously it is the Dems fault for not asking a 19th time.

  142. 142.

    Mike in NC

    September 30, 2013 at 11:22 pm

    @joel hanes: Who could ever forget the Gipper’s comments about strapping young bucks buying T-bone steaks with food stamps and welfare queens driving Cadillacs?

  143. 143.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 11:23 pm

    @PsiFighter37:

    Facts have a liberal bias, how many times do you need to be told this?

    Hey, it’s not Chuck Todd’s job to report facts.

  144. 144.

    Johnnybuck

    September 30, 2013 at 11:26 pm

    That woman in the ad has some crazy eyes, I mean like weird.

    GOP: “Stupid is, as stupid does”

  145. 145.

    ? Martin

    September 30, 2013 at 11:26 pm

    Given that the Confederacy doesn’t appear eager to secede any time soon, is there anything in the Constitution that allows us to kick them out?

  146. 146.

    SatanicPanic

    September 30, 2013 at 11:26 pm

    “I would say to the president: This is not about me. It’s not about Republicans here in Congress. It’s about fairness,” Boehner said in a speech that drew applause for the embattled speaker from Republicans.

    It’s not fair that we keep losing national elections! It’s not fair that we can’t impose our will on the rest of the country!

  147. 147.

    Felonius Monk

    September 30, 2013 at 11:28 pm

    “reasonable” Republicans

    As most everyone else has said in one form or another, this is an oxymoron.

    And speaking of morons, Peter King show-boated earlier this evening and wound up with a large turd in his undies. What a dick — I am reclassifying him as a Total Asshole again per my earlier comment several threads back.

  148. 148.

    ? Martin

    September 30, 2013 at 11:28 pm

    So, it sounds like the Senate’s clean CR would get somewhere around 400 votes in the House, yet this is a both sides thing.

  149. 149.

    Villago Delenda Est

    September 30, 2013 at 11:29 pm

    @Baud:

    Oh, sure. Like screaming at the Senate AGAIN will change anything.

    Someone spank Cantor and sit him in the corner.

    Forever.

  150. 150.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 11:29 pm

    @SatanicPanic:

    It’s not fair that we keep losing national elections! It’s not fair that we can’t impose our will on the rest of the country!

    It’s not fair that we can’t keep undesirables from voting! It’s not fair that women can’t stand our patriarchal policies! It’s not fair that coloreds don’t like it when we insult everything about them non-stop! It’s not fair that young people see us as the party of no fun! It’s not fair that our base is aging into extinction!

  151. 151.

    joel hanes

    September 30, 2013 at 11:30 pm

    @Cacti:

    We agree, with this proviso : prior to Reagan, no Republican had made John Birchism seem attractive to ordinary people. We’ve always had the Birchers, but Reagan made them mainstream by embracing their paranoid delusions about the world, and convincing millions of other Americans to likewise embrace those delusions.

    Without Reagan’s immense marketing talent, the Right is left with a bunch of out-of-touch tycoons and unattractive scolds and crackpots, such as their most recent slate of Presidential candidates. Goldwater couldn’t sell movement conservatism, but Reagan made it the national brand leader.

  152. 152.

    PsiFighter37

    September 30, 2013 at 11:32 pm

    @? Martin: Clearly it won’t. How many fucking times can it be credibly said that the House GOP is under hostage from 30 teabaggers?

    That’s pure stupidity. If it weren’t, we would discharge petition this shit and it’d be done with. Again – no idea that the GOP is doing, except that are playing chess on a 1×1 board and munching on Crayolas at the same time.

  153. 153.

    Frankensteinbeck

    September 30, 2013 at 11:33 pm

    @Heliopause:
    A sufficiently determined two year old can bring a family, a store, and if he’s really spoiled enough lives to a halt. That doesn’t mean he’s admirable in any way or what he’s doing is a good idea. Destruction is much easier than creation.

    EDIT – @joel hanes:
    I agree. This is why they revere Reagan so and want him back. Reagan told America all the lies the GOP is telling now, and America ate it up. They want that magic back desperately.

  154. 154.

    Chris

    September 30, 2013 at 11:33 pm

    @joel hanes:

    Goldwater couldn’t sell movement conservatism, but Reagan made it the national brand leader.

    I always thought Reagan was just synthesizing the work of the two previous conservative icons. Goldwater had the ideology, but not the electoral strategy. Nixon had the electoral strategy, but not the ideology. Reagan put the two together.

  155. 155.

    joel hanes

    September 30, 2013 at 11:35 pm

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    [nominates Rupert] Murdoch [as person who has most damaged the United States]

    I will happily support a bill to make the date of Rupert Murdoch’s death a national holiday (and if anything, Roger Ailes is worse). But Faux News exists to re-tell and elaborate on the lies that Reagan told, so that those who believe them need not suffer contradiction or the distress of cognitive dissonance.

  156. 156.

    SatanicPanic

    September 30, 2013 at 11:35 pm

    @Cacti: And stop playing that TINY VIOLIN!!!!!!!

  157. 157.

    beltane

    September 30, 2013 at 11:36 pm

    @Chris: Reagan made evil attractive in a way that Nixon could not. He seduced America the way Lucifer seduced Eve, and Americans have been paying the price ever since.

  158. 158.

    Suffern ACE

    September 30, 2013 at 11:38 pm

    Hmmm. Since nothing more will happen tonight, lets start a rumor that Boehner as part of the compromise has agreed to allow the UN to store Syria’s leaky chemical weapons in a golf course Cantor’s home district and because of the sequester, they’ll be guarded by 500 Iranian guards. Lets leave Peter Kings number for people to call if they don’t want that to happen.

  159. 159.

    Passerby

    September 30, 2013 at 11:38 pm

    The FTC should find any short positions from Reps or staff and send the insider traders to the Martha Stewart suite.

  160. 160.

    Lizzy L

    September 30, 2013 at 11:39 pm

    There are no reasonable Republicans.

    I’ve been pissed off for days, but I’m not even angry any more. I’m amused, in an apres-moi-le-deluge kind of way, and I am mighty curious as to how we, the country that is, is going to get out of this, because as has been pointed out, you cannot negotiate with crazy people, and the House Republicans are not making any decisions which I recognize as sane.

    Anyone know? Where do we go from here?

  161. 161.

    Roger Moore

    September 30, 2013 at 11:42 pm

    @Heliopause:

    Quite the multitaskers, in spite of being obstinate and stupid.

    That’s because most of their stances boil down to blocking action on things that need to change and blowing stuff up. Inertia and entropy are powerful allies.

  162. 162.

    max

    September 30, 2013 at 11:43 pm

    @Hill Dweller: The House has decided not to have anymore votes tonight. We’re heading for a shutdown.

    In the last 8 hours, no one has linked the video appropriate to this situation!

    Part 1 (Youtube)!

    Part 2 (Youtube) !

    (Sorry about the two parts, but apparently the version with the whole thing isn’t up anymore. Boo.)

    max
    [‘And since fucking wordpress is so cranky about links, I’ll stop.’]

  163. 163.

    Gian

    September 30, 2013 at 11:46 pm

    after the 1990s
    and the 2011 credit downgrade
    any federal employee who votes for a republican needs a mental health workup and all that goes with it.

    the republicans hate you if you work for the government. they want to starve you and drown you in a bathtub.

  164. 164.

    Ruckus

    September 30, 2013 at 11:51 pm

    Reposted from a dead thread.
    I think people are giving the orange drunk too much credit. Saying that he knows he can’t keep this going too long, that he is only trying to protect the speakership, that he really wants to do the right thing. It sounds to me like a few rethugs see the problem or have at least had it properly explained to them and they haven’t been able to convince the speaker to act. No I’d say he is a bat shit crazy as any of them. Didn’t he once forget the stupid hastert rule? And he can’t do that again? Either he doesn’t have the votes for a clean CR no matter what or he is one of the crazy. He just isn’t that smart to be playing even one dimensional chess.

  165. 165.

    Ruckus

    September 30, 2013 at 11:54 pm

    @PsiFighter37:
    Rethugs are the kids that ate paste in the 2nd grade.
    And liked it.

  166. 166.

    SFAW

    September 30, 2013 at 11:54 pm

    From CNN blog/Twitter/WTFII:

    20 minutes before the shutdown Republican Rep. Todd Rokita was on Erin Burnett and said House Republicans have to take a stand against Obamacare. “We want to keep the government open … But the healthcare law is the most insidious law known to man,” Rokita said.

    Fucking clown. I hope a surveillance drone follows his sorry ass for the next 13 years, then he might revise his idiotic “most insidious” comment.

    ETA: Better yet, count his as three-fifths of a person (although that’s probably being generous), see how he likes being one of “those people.”

  167. 167.

    Violet

    September 30, 2013 at 11:54 pm

    Zeke Miller ‏@ZekeJMiller 1m

    OMB: “agencies should now execute plans for an orderly shutdown due to the absence of appropriations.”

  168. 168.

    Cacti

    September 30, 2013 at 11:58 pm

    The GOP is punishing us for voting wrong in 2008 and 2012.

  169. 169.

    David Koch

    September 30, 2013 at 11:58 pm

    [**Spoiler Alert**] This series finale of the GOP House has a plot twit at the end: Boehner fakes his own death and resurfaces in Belfast sipping daiquiris Michelle Bachman, while Nancy Smash poisons Cruz with ricin.

  170. 170.

    Emerald

    September 30, 2013 at 11:59 pm

    The National Zoo panda cam shut down four minutes early.

    The had some good shots of the little cubbie too.

  171. 171.

    Violet

    September 30, 2013 at 11:59 pm

    @Cacti: Fuck ’em. Preferably with a rusty farm implement.

  172. 172.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    September 30, 2013 at 11:59 pm

    Rachel Maddow is right, John Boehner is bad at his job.

  173. 173.

    Mike in NC

    September 30, 2013 at 11:59 pm

    @SFAW: That “Breaking Bad” finale with the M-60 needed to actually focus on House Republicans, not Neo-Nazis, but I repeat myself.

  174. 174.

    Violet

    October 1, 2013 at 12:00 am

    U.S. Capitol ‏@uscapitol 4m

    Due to a lapse in government funding, this account will not be active until further notice.

  175. 175.

    scav

    October 1, 2013 at 12:01 am

    iacta alea est. The Lemmings are in the Rubicon.

  176. 176.

    PsiFighter37

    October 1, 2013 at 12:02 am

    @SFAW: I bet being the useless fucking tool that she is, Erin Burnett didn’t bother to challenge him on that point either.

    She was so fucking terrible on CNBC; I have no idea how she parlayed that into a news gig at CNN. Having seen her lack of brains on display at work every day for a long time, I’d have to guess it was the looks.

  177. 177.

    SFAW

    October 1, 2013 at 12:04 am

    @PsiFighter37:
    No idea if Burnett was involved. Ed Payne posted the comment I copied-and-pasted.

  178. 178.

    Villago Delenda Est

    October 1, 2013 at 12:05 am

    @Cacti:

    That is indeed what it boils down to.

    These traitors need to be dealt with in harsh terms.

    Sent to bed without their nightcaps, minimum.

  179. 179.

    Violet

    October 1, 2013 at 12:05 am

    Twitter is upset that pandacam is shut down.

  180. 180.

    Spaghetti Lee

    October 1, 2013 at 12:06 am

    @Violet:

    Well, that’s as good a rallying cry as any. “DEATH TO THE TEA PARTY! BRING BACK PANDACAM!”

  181. 181.

    SFAW

    October 1, 2013 at 12:07 am

    @Spaghetti Lee:
    Why dilute the message with that Panda-cam shit?

  182. 182.

    Violet

    October 1, 2013 at 12:09 am

    @SFAW: It might take the loss of PandaCam to wake up some people. PandaCam going dark is a big complaint on Twitter.

  183. 183.

    Villago Delenda Est

    October 1, 2013 at 12:09 am

    @David Koch:

    Are you sure Boner is not in Mombasa, in a bar room drinking gin? Because some headless Thompson gunner action would be appropriate.

  184. 184.

    BillinGlendaleCA

    October 1, 2013 at 12:09 am

    It looks like the House is voting on something, I guess their next offer. The Senate has gone home. The Senate will table what the House sends over tomorrow morning.

  185. 185.

    PsiFighter37

    October 1, 2013 at 12:10 am

    @Violet: If true…it’s kind of sad it takes a fucking livecam of a bear to get people’s attention about this.

    Decline and fall, indeed.

    @BillinGlendaleCA: Might as well pass a bunch of shit that will never make it through the Senate once you’re this hammered = GOP philosophy

  186. 186.

    SFAW

    October 1, 2013 at 12:11 am

    @Violet:

    It might take the loss of PandaCam to wake up some people.

    Understood, but that wasn’t my point.

  187. 187.

    David Koch

    October 1, 2013 at 12:12 am

    atleast the Texas Ranges lost and we won’t have to see Bush preening during the playoffs.

  188. 188.

    Roger Moore

    October 1, 2013 at 12:12 am

    @Violet:

    Fuck ‘em. Preferably with a rusty farm implement.

    Channeling Sister Rusty Pitchfork of Decency AsiangrlMN?

  189. 189.

    Violet

    October 1, 2013 at 12:13 am

    @SFAW: I agree with your general point. PandaCam may just be the thing that pushes people to support the rallying cry.

  190. 190.

    xenos

    October 1, 2013 at 12:14 am

    @PaulW:

    In the meantime, here’s my suggested list on how to survive the Shutdown:<

    Good work — Item #2, where you get as man people as possible to register as independents so gerrymandering software will not work very well, is pretty brilliant. I have not seen this suggested anywhere else, and it could really help in critical states after 2020.

  191. 191.

    Spaghetti Lee

    October 1, 2013 at 12:18 am

    @David Koch:

    Just for the record, Dubya hasn’t owned the Rangers since 1998.

  192. 192.

    Roger Moore

    October 1, 2013 at 12:18 am

    @Violet:

    PandaCam going dark is a big complaint on Twitter.

    No shit. I especially liked this one:

    Pandacam is dead and healthcare.gov is alive.— Arnie Seipel, NPR (@NPRnie) October 1, 2013

  193. 193.

    jefft452

    October 1, 2013 at 12:25 am

    @Bubblegum Tate:
    “You’ve got that backward–Angle was the “chickens for checkups” one”

    Nope, it was Sue Lowden – Reasonable Republican

  194. 194.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    October 1, 2013 at 12:35 am

    @Ruckus: Boehnead said some time ago the crazies needed to get a shutdown out of their system. Based in the wholly insane shit they’ve been saying and doing yesterday and today, I believe he’s right.

  195. 195.

    Fair Economist

    October 1, 2013 at 12:47 am

    @Ruckus:

    Rethugs are the kids that ate paste in the 2nd grade.

    Obviously they still had some nasty brain-damaging chemicals in the paste back then. Darn government, making good American manufacturers take poison out of things for kids!

  196. 196.

    FlipYrWhig

    October 1, 2013 at 12:55 am

    @Just Some Fuckhead: I really do think the whole farce has been nothing more than a way for the Dipshit Caucus can brag about how they went to Washington and did this totally amazing thing, bro. They thought it would be fun, so they did it. They haven’t thought it out beyond that because there is no beyond it, it just is what it is.

  197. 197.

    Roger Moore

    October 1, 2013 at 1:01 am

    @xenos:

    Good work — Item #2, where you get as man people as possible to register as independents so gerrymandering software will not work very well, is pretty brilliant.

    I think initiatives to switch to some kind of non-partisan districting system would be a good move where it’s possible. It’s simultaneously politically expedient, a good idea in its own right, and something that ought to be easy to sell to people who are fed up with politics.

  198. 198.

    fuckwit

    October 1, 2013 at 1:12 am

    Where are the “reasonable Republicans”? Why, most of them are right here these days! And at LGF. And a few at the Great Orange Satan (including its proprietor).

    I realized the Republicans were fucked up around the time of MADD and kowtowing to the fundamentalists, then was damn sure after Iran Contra and arms for hostages and “we begin bombing in 5 minutes”, and then after Newt Gingrich’s clown show and finally after Shrub and absolutely certain after 9/11 and Iraq. Finally actually changed my registration to Democrat after Kerry stumbled his way to a loss, which was bound to happen after the most inspiring Democrat I’d seen in years, Howard Dean, got pilloried by the media.

    So, yeah, most of the “reasonable Republicans” are now known as “Democrats”.

  199. 199.

    Spaghetti Lee

    October 1, 2013 at 1:23 am

    @Roger Moore:

    Independent third-party redistricting commission. I mean Jesus Christ. Asking state legislatures to do it is like hanging up a big neon sign that says ‘Corrupt Politicians Welcome!’ Get a bunch of stats geeks from MIT to do it-they’ll be thrilled just be to working with so many juicy data points.

  200. 200.

    Ruckus

    October 1, 2013 at 1:53 am

    @Just Some Fuckhead:
    That doesn’t mean he doesn’t agree with them.
    Or that he has no idea how to disagree with them.

  201. 201.

    Roger Moore

    October 1, 2013 at 1:54 am

    @Spaghetti Lee:

    Asking state legislatures to do it is like hanging up a big neon sign that says ‘Corrupt Politicians Welcome!’

    Exactly! And this is something that people who only pay attention to politics around elections and other times when it intrudes unavoidably into their lives can grasp intuitively. They already think politicians are crooks, so pointing out an instance where they actually are and providing a straightforward solution to the problem should be an easy sell.

  202. 202.

    dollared

    October 1, 2013 at 3:46 am

    @Baud: FTW!

  203. 203.

    celiadexter

    October 1, 2013 at 8:05 am

    There are no reasonable Republicans any more, but you already knew that.

  204. 204.

    Sasha

    October 1, 2013 at 8:25 am

    How do “reasonable” Republicans still self-identify with this party?

    I’ve a friend who is a self-described partisan RINO. Once, when I asked him why he’s still a registered Republican, he told me that it’s easier to do outreach to conservatives that way.

    (BTW, his rather excellent blog, the Political Omnivore, is something I’d recommend adding you your reading list.)

  205. 205.

    John Weiss

    October 1, 2013 at 1:52 pm

    @GregB: Oh, me, me! Boner is a chickenshit mo-fo!

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