Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Technically true, but collectively nonsense

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

rich, arrogant assholes who equate luck with genius

If you tweet it in all caps, that makes it true!

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

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

Republicans in disarray!

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

The words do not have to be perfect.

Tick tock motherfuckers!

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

A snarling mass of vitriolic jackals

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

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

Just because you believe it, that doesn’t make it true.

Prediction: the GOP will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

It’s time for the GOP to dust off that post-2012 autopsy, completely ignore it, and light the party on fire again.

But frankly mr. cole, I’ll be happier when you get back to telling us to go fuck ourselves.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread: Hide Your Kids & the Silverware, Congress Is Back in Session

Open Thread: Hide Your Kids & the Silverware, Congress Is Back in Session

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Steve Scalise is keeping his job in the leadership, per Dave Weigel at Bloomberg, and “the GOP Thinks It’s Turned A Corner“:

… Scalise’s survival might actually mark a turning point for conservatives and the press. For most of his public life, Family Research Council President Tony Perkins has been pilloried by the Southern Poverty Law Center and other groups because he once spoke to the Council of Conservative Citizens, and because he managed the 1996 Senate campaign that contracted a Duke-connected group for voter contact. Scalise had taken some of the same pummeling, and survived. Why?

“It’s the trump card that they’ve worn out, the race card,” said Perkins. “It’s–anybody who has spoken to any group associated with any group is like that group. And that’s not sustainable. You look at who the president has had at the White House, child molesters who’ve been at functions, who’ve raised money for him–they don’t say the president embraces that. You look at what people had said about Scalise, and I’ll say it, too: I’ve never heard him utter in public or private under a word that could be seen as a racist. Sometimes, you’re invited to speak to unfamiliar groups. Part of the whole deal in politics is persuasion.”

In other words, the GOP has succeeded in defining deviancy down.

John Boehner is keeping his job as Speaker, too, despite what Dana Milbank called “Louie Gohmert’s freak show“. Matt Kibbee at Freedomworks will have a big sad, until he can use this Triumph of the RINOs to gin up another few thousand love gifts from grateful marks small donors. You know it’s a grift because Word Salad Sarah jumped onto the snow machine bandwagon, per Weigel:

Roughly 80 minutes before the new House of Representatives assembled to vote for speaker, Sarah Palin joined the rebellion against John Boehner.

“It’s time for new energy and positive progress in Congress,” the former Alaska governor wrote in (of course) a Facebook post. “Please consider ‘Gunnin’ for Gohmert’ or going ‘Yahoo for Yoho’ when you vote for Speaker of the House today. Both Representatives are true Constitutional, commonsense conservatives who’ve proven to America they keep their promises to We the People. They know they serve America, not the power brokers in DC. “…

Goddess bless Harry Reid, he defies the haterz (& the rogue exercise machines):

************
Apart from keeping a sharp eye on the Repub miscreants (always a sound strategy), what’s on the agenda for the evening?

Reader Interactions

35Comments

  2. 2.

    lamh36

    ‘Selma’ Cinematographer Bradford Young Details Hollywood’s Diversity Problem

    …At the first New York screening, you discussed being a black cinematographer and how rare that is in the industry. How has that affected your life?
    This wasn’t a life at all. This was not something I imagined myself doing at 18 or 22. This wasn’t even something I imagined myself doing at 27. I came to this realization that I wanted to be an image maker later in my life. The fact that I’m a black man living in America is something I’ve had to deal with from day one. These two things happened to collide. Divorced from the images I create as a cinematographer, I’m still dealing with the same socio-economic and cultural issues that 100 percent of all black people in America are dealing with. The other side of that is that my voice as a cinematographer is informed and shaped by my own sociology and psychology as a black man in America. Every frame, every inch of my being, every inch of how I light a scene or how I see the world is informed by that lens. I would say I’ve had the opportunity to work with filmmakers who have opened the door — whether they be black, white or other — and allowed me to access that part of my soul and put it into the images themselves.

    But as many blessings and opportunities that have been given to me to be the image maker I am now, and the image maker I want to be, it still doesn’t dismiss the fact that a majority of the sets I work on are not populated by folks of color. They are not diverse. “Selma,” at the end of the day if you did it by numbers, the majority of the crew on the film was not African-American, was not of color. This is something I see every day and something I’m aware of. The good thing — the beautiful thing — is that nobody is under the illusion that I’m not aware of that. Everybody knows who I am, everybody knows my position on this thing. But listen, it’s a continuous conversation we’ve been having for 400 years of our existence in this country, which is just allow me to be a human being, see me for who I am, let me see myself. Because if I don’t see myself, how can I make a contribution to the greater society?…

  3. 3.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    New Congress is 80% white, 80% male & 92% Christian

    aka The Washington Branch of the European-American Unity and Rights Organization.

  5. 5.

    lamh36

    @lamh36: another good bit from the article:

    So much is made about diversity onscreen and behind-the-camera, but you don’t often hear about the disparity on all production levels too.
    Here’s the deal: Most of us in the film community, across the board, work with people who we know, who we consider friends and family. If you use that as a barometer to look at the film world, it just shows you how segregated, xenophobic, sexist, racist and backwards we are as Americans in terms of how we deal with one another. I’m not throwing anybody under the bus for hiring who they hire, but if we’re honest with ourselves — for whatever it’s worth for the person who could actually admit it to themselves — we have a lot of work to do. If film sets are representations of the American public as a whole, which they’re supposed to be, then film crews haven’t moved out of the era that we see Martin Luther King fighting in during “Selma.” Chris Rock’s letter in The Hollywood Reporter is just proof of it. Here’s a man who, for all intents and purposes, can try to ignore the fact that he’s a black man working in a white industry. He wouldn’t be able to, but he could try. But here’s a guy with nothing to lose because he doesn’t see it as a stain on his career to say, “Listen, I work in an industry where I don’t see myself and it bothers me. No matter how much money you pay me, or how many times you pat me on the back and say I’m doing a good job, it still doesn’t quench my thirst to see a greater form of representation in the filmmaking community.” Steve McQueen said this a couple of years ago on a Hollywood Reporter panel with all the directors: How are you guys making films in American cities that have so much cultural diversity, but I don’t see that diversity in your films? How can you make a film in New York but have only one black character, one Latino character, one Asian character? You have to look at these things from a different lens if we really want to change the landscape.

  6. 6.

    Elizabelle

    Grateful for the Washington DC snowstorm (such as it is) and Transvaginal Bob’s sentencing to keep my mind off Republicans controlling the House AND Senate.

    Dog bless Harry Reid. Those look like fighting injuries.

    Suspect local DC news is glad not to have to cover Congress too much. One big theme on News Channel 8 is parents’ irritation that Fairfax and Loudoun Counties opened their schools — there’s even a hashtag about FCPS. Or so I’m told.

  7. 7.

    MattF

    Well, of course Perkins want the “race card” to just go away. I suppose he also wishes the “war-on-women card” and the “church-and-state card” would also get out of his way. But it’s not that simple– reality has an unpleasant habit of sticking around whether or not you want it to.

  8. 8.

    Chyron HR

    Jeez, Harry! I know the Democrats took a beating in the midterms, but it was supposed to be a metaphor.

  10. 10.

    Bubblegum Tate

    I just wish Christians could finally get representation in this country. Did you know that they’re really, really oppressed? Go ahead–ask them!

  11. 11.

    Jay C

    BTW, what is Tony Perkins going on about re “child molesters at White House functions”?

  13. 13.

    dmsilev

    Via TPM, this is the best editorial we are likely to read all month, and quite possibly all year.

    (also, when reading it, pay careful attention to sequence of first letters of each paragraph)

  14. 14.

    g

    . “Please consider ‘Gunnin’ for Gohmert’

    I don’t think that means what she thinks it means.

  15. 15.

    lamh36

    hmmm…

    Jim Webb and the White Man’s Burden http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2015_01/jim_webb_and_the_white_mans_bu053600.php via @washmonthly

    As a POC, I just can’t get behind Jim Webb. He is way to comfortable with the use of racial words and sentiments. I’m not saying racist, just racialized ya know what I mean. But sure he could take some white voters form HRC, but no way he gets even usual Dem minority votes with this type of rhetoric.

  16. 16.

    Ripley

    what is Tony Perkins going on about re “child molesters at White House functions”?

    Karl Rove is back in town?

  17. 17.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    I just wish Christians could finally get representation in this country. Did you know that they’re really, really oppressed? Go ahead–ask them!

    @Bubblegum Tate: I did. Wow. Had no idea. I thought that they were the majority and ran everything but it turns out that’s black people instead. The Christians can’t even pray in public without getting beaten up by Muslims and homosexuals, did you know? I sure did not.

  18. 18.

    lamh36

    @SenGillibrand 15m15 minutes ago
    Today I’m joining @SenFeinstein @RepJerryNadler & @RosLehtinen as an original cosponsor of Respect for Marriage Act to formally repeal #DOMA

  20. 20.

    Mike in dc

    Well the House Republican majority demographic has to be 100% Christian, 90+% White and 90+% male, does it not?

    Clearly a broad cross section of America.

  21. 21.

    JMV Pyro

    @Jay C:

    That would be “President of Family Research Council” Tony Perkins, right? He probably means the gays, as his warped mind is still stuck in 1950’s propaganda videos.

  23. 23.

    Calouste

    @Jay C: The Age of Consent is 18 in the following 12 states:
    Arizona, California, Delaware, Florida, Idaho, North Dakota, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, Wisconsin

    Technically, that’s a heck of a lot of “child molesters” there.

  24. 24.

    CONGRATULATIONS!

    Some asshole in Scotland abandoned their dog at a railway station with a suitcase containing his things.

    @Amir Khalid: I saw that this morning. There is nothing more heartbreaking than an abandoned dog. They know exactly what has happened to them. This one sure did.

  25. 25.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @lamh36: The overwhelming majority of lower class white voters are ignorant racists, or at the very least hold views of white supremacy. This affectation is all they’ve got, otherwise they are the bottom feeders in our noble experiment. Because there are so many of them in America, invariably some Democrat thinks they can harness them but these voters don’t have one boilerplate political philosophy to appeal to other than one of resentment. So that’s the sorta thing you have to appeal to.

  28. 28.

    SRW1

    Roughly 80 minutes before the new House of Representatives assembled to vote for speaker, Sarah Palin joined the rebellion against John Boehner.

    Delaying things until the last moment is the normal way when you have to schlepp yourself to a task your heart’s not really in any more.

    Is poor Sarah getting bored again and about to do some more quittin?

  29. 29.

    SRW1

    @Jeffro:

    Hey check this out: informing the public about CEO’s REAL pay is just like slut-shaming:

    Well, there occasionally are whiffs of obscenity when that topic comes up. It’s just that the lady at Fox is somewhat confused about what causes that sentiment.

  30. 30.

    trollhattan

    @lamh36:
    I like Gillibrand. Don’t know from here on the opposite coast whether she has a potential future in higher office, but always enjoy seeing her on my teevee machine. Very smart and seems to have a solid and decent core.

  31. 31.

    lamh36

    So Bomb in front of NAACP ofc and doesn’t warrant any on air news coverage? Carry on American media, carry on…SMDH!

  34. 34.

    MaryRC

    @g: I was going to say! Has she been using this idiom all her life without ever realising that it means “hunting someone down so that you can shoot them”?

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