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Fuck these fucking interesting times.

Fani Willis claps back at Trump chihuahua, Jim Jordan.

Stop using mental illness to avoid talking about armed white supremacy.

The words do not have to be perfect.

So it was an October Surprise A Day, like an Advent calendar but for crime.

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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Well this is Nucking Futs

Well this is Nucking Futs

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Hoo Boy:

House Republicans this week reinstated an arcane procedural rule that enables lawmakers to reach deep into the budget and slash the pay of an individual federal worker — down to a $1 — a move that threatens to upend the 130-year-old civil service.

The Holman Rule, named after an Indiana congressman who devised it in 1876, empowers any member of Congress to offer an amendment to an appropriations bill that targets a specific government employee or program.

A majority of the House and the Senate would still have to approve any such amendment, but opponents and supporters agree that it puts agencies and the public on notice that their work is now vulnerable to the whims of elected officials.

Democrats and federal employee unions say the provision, which one called the “Armageddon Rule,” could prove disastrous to the federal workforce, when combined with president-elect Donald Trump’s criticism of the Washington bureaucracy, his call for a freeze on government hiring and his nomination of Cabinet secretaries who seem to be at odds with the mission of the agencies they would lead.

“This is part of a very chilling theme that federal workers are seeing right now,” said Maureen Gilman, legislative director for the National Treasury Employees Union, which represents 150,000 federal employees.

No worries, both sides do it, and they’ll probably only use it on the agencies Republicans hate and that get in the way of their looting. Oh, wait. That’s all of them.

And to think I was worried we would not make it as a country until 2020 and hopefully have a course correction. We’re not going to make it to the fucking midterms.

Reader Interactions

180Comments

  7. 7.

    O. Felix Culpa

    My theory (which is mine) is that the gibberish-link is in reference to the GOP application of the Holman rule, knocking recalcitrant Federal employees’ pay down to $1. Or it’s something about a brontosaurus being very thin at one end.

  9. 9.

    ? Martin

    Cut John some slack. He nowhere near 400 lbs and his bed is covered with pets, so you can’t expect him to be a wizard with the cyber.

  11. 11.

    Yarrow

    Okay, it’s fixed now. From Adam Silverman in the thread below:

    This rule only allows members of the House of Representatives to do this. The Senate is not bound by the House’s rules. Moreover, it is likely that this would be challenged under the Constitutional prohibition on bills of attainder.

  13. 13.

    ? Martin

    What happens when the largest economy and world superpower goes balls-in with a Kansas-grade experiment in libertarianism? We’re about to find out.

  14. 14.

    Enhanced Voting Techniques

    his call for a freeze on government hiring

    Maybe Trump can outsource to China to pick up the slack. Run it like a buisness and all that.

  15. 15.

    Xantar

    Hold on a second. I’m not a lawyer, but doesn’t this violate the Constitutional ban on rules of attainder?

  16. 16.

    Yarrow

    And to think I was worried we would not make it as a country until 2020 and hopefully have a course correction. We’re not going to make it to the fucking midterms.

    Just figuring this out now? I’ve been depressing people for months saying this very thing. Told one of my best friends, a staunch liberal, on November 10th that I didn’t think we’d have elections in 2018. People don’t like to hear it.

    We have to resist everything. Every. Fucking. Thing. Organize NOW before the ability to do so easily is gone. Make offline connections so you know who you can count on if the internet is mysteriously shut off. Take it seriously now. Perhaps we won’t need it, which would be great. If we do we’ll be prepared.

  17. 17.

    comrade scott's agenda of rage

    This is just the tip of the iceberg:

    http://www.govexec.com/pay-benefits/2017/01/republicans-expected-slash-feds-pensions-outsource-more-work/134333/?oref=channeltopstory

    I survived the Bushies when the A-76ed my position. Ever since Nancy SMASH put a stop to that back in 07, Repubs have been itching to gut us all the while looting the Treasury on steroids (the Bushies provided the template).

    The 80K pissed off white voters in 3 counties in 3 states that swung this election to Trump: phvck you with a jagged stick.

  20. 20.

    SenyorDave

    @O. Felix Culpa: kudos to the reference to the Python skit. I had to go and watch it on Youtube, its amazing how they could take something so ridiculous and make it funny as hell. Humor is going to help me get through the next four years.

  21. 21.

    MomSense

    @Xantar:

    Hahahaha. Violate constitutionality? Such a quaint notion. The Consitution will be whatever the Ochre Ogre says it is.

  23. 23.

    Bex

    OT but there is a recall on 9-Lives and Special Kitty cat food. The lots affected are lacking in thiamine, which is essential for cats. Apologies if this has appeared in other threads.

  25. 25.

    SatanicPanic

    @Yarrow: Let’s not go overboard though- not holding elections would be too obvious, and even though I think Trump is that stupid, he’s got at least a few people around him who aren’t. They’ll hold elections, they just won’t be as free and fair as we’re used to, Putin style.

    EDIT- not that I think this is likely, just that if he were going to do this, it’s much more likely than outright shutting them down. Also, voter suppression is going to go into overdrive, that much I am confident about.

  27. 27.

    schrodingers_cat

    @John Cole:

    And to think I was worried we would not make it as a country until 2020 and hopefully have a course correction. We’re not going to make it to the fucking midterms

    Can you just stop with the incessant negativity? If you think you have lost, you have already lost. This is no way to go into a fight. They are evil and powerful, and we are in for the fight of our lives.

  29. 29.

    hovercraft

    they’ll probably only use it on the agencies Republicans hate and that get in the way of their looting. Oh, wait. That’s all of them.

    There is one exception to their hate, Defense, the military industrial complex has always prospered under both parties, no one wants to look weak. I suspect the GOP is about to love, love them some, Energy, Interior, Treasury and Education Departments. There are so many wonderful opportunities for our tax dollars to be steered to the private sector for the ‘good’ of the nation. maybe it’s time for us to let off a couple of nukes, while we are modernizing and expanding our arsenal, Federal lands can be raped and pillaged, we can go back to turning a blind eye to any and everything the sharks on Wall Street want to do, and make sure they know that if anything goes wrong, we’re here to bail them out, and why keep wasting all that money on teachers, when you can funnel it to for profit charter companies, they’ve done such a great job improving our schools.

  30. 30.

    Chris

    People who think they’re going to try and roll us back to the pre-New Deal era are wildly optimistic. They’re going to roll us back a lot further than that. In this case, the civil service reforms of the Gilded Age are going to be hit hard.

  32. 32.

    max

    @Xantar: Hold on a second. I’m not a lawyer, but doesn’t this violate the Constitutional ban on rules of attainder?

    No. Why would it? It’s just a one-shot salary reduction. (To be a bill of attainder it would have to deprive permanently someone of their goods &or property. A salary – government or otherwise – isn’t property. I’d bet you could make a better argument for post-conviction restrictions on felons being in de facto violation of that clause. But then, this is the country will civil forfeiture.)

    The Holman Rule, named after an Indiana congressman who devised it in 1876, empowers any member of Congress to offer an amendment to an appropriations bill that targets a specific government employee or program.

    Huh.:

    As congressman, Holman was most known for his opposition to government spending, especially in subsidies and aid to private enterprises, notably the transcontinental railroad lines. Throughout the 1880s, he did what he could to have the federal government take back the public lands given to some of the largest companies, which had failed to fulfill the work promised on time. Nor did he have patience with the cattle-barons that had fenced off nationally-owned land as if it were their own domain. That made him the ideal choice to chair the Committee on Public Lands in the 1880s, and his work at forcing railroad companies to disgorge probably restored millions of acres for actual settlers to take up. He hated any kind of government spending, from river and harbor improvements to salary increases for officeholders. “When Mr. Holman takes his walks abroad and sees Government clerks promenading the avenue in coachmen’s coats and toothpick canes he ‘objects,'” a Republican newspaper jeered.

    When a Republican proposed an appropriation to take observations on the transit of Venus, Holman objected. It would do no practical good, he insisted. That kind of learning was all humbug, anyhow. But he also fought hard against congressmen raising their own pay, and in 1873 made himself one of the most active opponents of the so-called “back pay” grab, where lawmakers raised their salaries retrospectively. The following winter, he tried to bring the Democratic House caucus into line behind a resolution repudiating the grab, and was so abused that, according to general reports, he went off on a several-day binge. (“Holman does go off on sprees & may be off now,” his friend and colleague, Congressman Samuel S. “Sunset” Cox wrote a friend; “but he is honest & just above all men I ever knew here. He will stay 6 months sober; & then break. Don’t allow him to be abused or slandered.”) The big-navy advocates knew in him an inveterate enemy, and when he found a place on the Select Committee on American Ship-Building, the Washington Post growled that Americans had “a great, unutterable yearning … to behold a ship made on the Holman plan.” No doubt many such could be made, it thought—just big enough to be hung on watch-chains “or otherwise employed as curios.” Admirers called him “the watchdog of the Treasury” and the “Treasury Cerberus,” though a few critics noticed that the watchdog sometimes seemed to be taking a well-deserved nap when a bill paying one of his constituents came up.

    His frugality became legendary. One story his friends loved to tell about him was how nefarious interests, realizing that their only chance lay while the congressman was absent from the floor, waited until he was being shaved in the Capitol’s barber-shop before offering their bill. In vain: Holman rushed into the chamber, his face covered with lather, to shout his objection. In 1885, he went west on an inspection tour with other members of the Committee on Indian Affairs. Unlike the rest, he refused to go by sleeping car, because it would cost the government too much, and slept in his seat instead. When they reached Fort Yates, in Dakota Territory, he balked at paying five dollars for the steamer ride to Bismarck, pointing out that the post had army ambulances and mules. “The mules are not earning anything,” he argued. “They are idle; they will convey us.” And so they did, much to the annoyance of his fellow-traveller, Congressman Joseph Cannon of Illinois, who tipped the wagon-driver to run over every single stone in the road as a punishment. As he arrived at Fort Lincoln, the commander proposed that they fire a salute. “No! no! for God’s sake, don’t!” Cannon protested. “He will object to the useless waste of powder.”
    [..]
    Visitors described his homestead as the model for southern estates, located on a high bluff where the Ohio River bent, and with a good view of three states (the others being Ohio and Kentucky). There he would rhapsodize about his livestock or show off his flower gardens and transplanted shade trees, with anyone who would listen.[8] He died a poor man, never tempted by wealth or, for that matter, notoriety. Taking his chewing tobacco from a leather pouch, sitting tipped back in his chair and toying with a jackknife, the Indiana congressman looked more and more like a throwback to Jacksonian days, as the Gilded Age wore on. “Wherever Holman sits, or stands, there is a red sea of tobacco-juice,” a reporter wrote in 1876. “Such tobacco chewing never was seen. He must get it by the wholesale. Standing in his place in the House his most energetic outbursts are suspended at the very climax by the necessity of disemboguing the red stream from his distended jaws. The … cleaners of the congressional halls, declare that Holman requires a relay of spittoons three times a day, where other chewers are provided with one.”

    So. A standard-issue Dixiecrat from Indiana. I got 20 bucks says he was a racist as hell and otherwise a disgusting human being, and thus a perfect model for our modern Neo-Confederate Republican party.

    max
    [‘Fight for the British during the Revolution? They’d have called Jefferson Davis a squish for being too considerate of black people.’]

  33. 33.

    Yarrow

    @SatanicPanic: One of the late night political shows – Daily Show, John Oliver, Sam Bee, forget which one – pointed out that dictators always win 95% of the vote. So, yes, if the elections are completely controlled then they’ll happen. Watch for 95%.

    It may take some time for that to happen so some urgent event like major terrorism could lead to a State of Emergency and the elections would “have to be postponed out of an abundance of caution.” It’s easy for that kind of thing to happen with the milquetoast press we have. They’ll cheer it as “keeping the public safe.”

    I agree, it’ll be voting rights first. Clamp down on them like crazy. But if it isn’t enough, other paths are available.

  34. 34.

    RealityBites

    Well. It was a VA congressman that led the plot to kill the ethics committee. Now ANOTHER VA congressman does this. Sucks for my State. But not surprised. We have areas in the state that are deep, deep red.
    I guess we can all phone Congress again. We might have to crash the phone lines every day.

  35. 35.

    Chris

    @hovercraft:

    they’ll probably only use it on the agencies Republicans hate and that get in the way of their looting. Oh, wait. That’s all of them.
    …
    There is one exception to their hate, Defense, the military industrial complex has always prospered under both parties, no one wants to look weak.

    That’s not to say that individual servicemembers and bureaucrats are any more protected than their counterparts in the EPA, however. Remember the shit they dragged Shinseki and Zinni through. (I bring up Zinni, a retiree at the time, because it occurs to me that if they target wages, they can probably target retirement pensions as well. Thus limiting even the traditional “resign and then speak out” route).

  36. 36.

    Yarrow

    @RealityBites:

    We might have to crash the phone lines every day.

    This is a good plan. We need to be calling as often as possible. Once a week at a minimum. Make sure they know we’re here.

  37. 37.

    sherparick1

    @Yarrow: Yep. From Wikipedia on “Bills of Attainder” …The Court changed its “bill of attainder test” in 1946. In United States v. Lovett, 328 U.S. 303 (1946), the Court confronted a federal law that named three people as subversive and excluded them from federal employment. Previously, the Court had held that lack of judicial trial and the narrow way in which the law rationally achieved its goals were the only tests of a bill of attainder. But the Lovett Court said that a bill of attainder 1) Specifically identified the people to be punished; 2) Imposed punishment; and 3) Did so without benefit of judicial trial.[36] As all three prongs of the bill of attainder test were met in Lovett, the court held that a congressional statute that bars particular individuals from government employment qualifies as punishment prohibited by the bill of attainder clause….” By the way, it was for a Congress and President like this that the Founders inserted tings like the “Bill of Attainder” clause in the Constitution. These are very bad and evil men and women.

  38. 38.

    SatanicPanic

    @Yarrow: and I think it won’t be national, at least at first. It will be due to inaction- the states will start coming up with ridiculous rules and DC will turn a blind eye. California, Oregon, etc. will still be holding real elections, other places not so much.

  39. 39.

    chopper

    as a fed I have to say I’ve always expected them to come for my pension but this other bullshit is just nuts.

  42. 42.

    Another Scott

    No doubt that the Teabaggers are grabbing for every lever they can to destroy the Civil Service, but we shouldn’t panic over this. A short summary of its uses in the past (18 page .pdf).

    Yes, it’s bad legislation and we should fight it, but don’t be too hyperbolic. We survived it being in place before.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  43. 43.

    hovercraft

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Can you just stop with the incessant negativity? If you think you have lost, you have already lost. This is no way to go into a fight. They are evil and powerful, and we are in for the fight of our lives.

    Yes we’re fighting for our lives, but we are also here to vent and release all that negativity in a safe place.
    Thing is that I think most of it here is meant to galvanize people, to point how truly bad and terrible a situation we are all in. While there are times some of us express despair, we for the most part turn right around and say that we must all do something, not just curl up in a ball and sob. We are venting, voicing our frustration, but none (very few) are giving up. I come here to vent and bitch and laugh and cry, sometimes what I read is depressing, but for the most part, I am encouraged to see so many people who like me are shocked and angered by what just happened. We get to share stories about how we are going to fight, in some cases for our basic rights, in others for our very lives, but we are all doing something, even if that means just getting out of bed everyday and not giving up, surviving can be as much a victory as thriving.

    We have lots of curmudgeons here who’s posts seem negative, but are in fact a call to arms. Pointing out that allowing this shit to go unchallenged is a good thing. Just look at the last couple of days, the Ethics Office survived, PEOTUS is denying that they were going to restructure the Intel agencies, all because people kicked up a storm.

    I get that the negativity bugs the shit out of you, and I’m sorry for that, but your being here to yell at us to STOP being so goddamn negative is all on it’s own a good thing. No one is trying to make anyone despondent, we want everyone to understand what we up against. Families disagree, and they fight, that’s part of what makes us a family.

  44. 44.

    Nashville_fan

    @Yarrow: I totally agree about the there not being anymore elections . . . sad thing is . . . most folks will just go along. It will be reported with less hysteria than emails “found” on a “device” – and all this time I thought emails were not tied to “devices” . . . silly me . . . move along . . . nothing to see here . . .

  45. 45.

    EBT

    So, *right* after the incoming administration sends out a bunch of letters wanting to know the names of positions and people who did things the right hates now they talk about cutting people’s wages to a dollar.

  47. 47.

    Major Major Major Major

    @sherparick1:

    By the way, it was for a Congress and President like this that the Founders inserted tings like the “Bill of Attainder” clause in the Constitution.

    And, you know, the electoral college, but we’re not really using that either.

  48. 48.

    TriassicSands

    @RealityBites:

    We might have to crash the phone lines every day.

    Phone lines. Henceforth, all government communications will be handled by the Trump Courier Corporation. (CEO Barron “The Computer Wizard” Trump).

  49. 49.

    Ridnik Chrome

    Reminds me of a great line from Charles Pierce a few days ago, something about how at some point the henhouse turns into a foxhouse.

  50. 50.

    piratedan

    damn, if only they put as much fucking effort into fixing the ACA as they do legislating their vindictiveness.

  53. 53.

    Timurid

    They’re rolling in hot. There’s no long con frog boiling plan in the works. They know that if they play (mostly) by the rules, the whole enterprise will collapse quickly.

    As I’ve said before and will say again… Trump and friends are acting like people who think they’ll never have to win another election…

  55. 55.

    mai naem mobile

    Elections have consequences or something like that. Also, can OBama do it to Comey?

  57. 57.

    Mnemosyne

    @SatanicPanic:

    I’m as freaked out by Trump as the next person, but do people really expect all elected government at all levels — that’s city, county, and state — to grind to a halt and stop holding elections? How would that even work? Would the current state legislatures all become reps-for-life? Does Jerry Brown stay governor until he dies? What about the city clerk and city treasurer where I live? Are they now forced to stay on for life? How are they replaced if they need to leave?

  58. 58.

    ET

    This put his requests for individual names at Energy and State in an even more sinister light.

  59. 59.

    mai naem mobile

    @piratedan: they have no ideas to fix anything. Only to break stuff. They’re super-duper awesome at breaking stuff. See: the Great Depression ,the Great Recession, the ill-fated Iraq War, Iran Contra and on and on.

  60. 60.

    Mnemosyne

    @Timurid:

    To me, they’re acting more like smash-and-grab men — desperately trying to loot as much as possible before they start hearing sirens.

    The ones to watch out for are the Kochs and their minions, not Trumpers per se.

  63. 63.

    Another Scott

    @mai naem mobile: Congress could do that, but I don’t think the President has similar “Holman Rule”-like powers to act on his own. His superior/supervisor (Lynch) would have to decide whether he needed to have his pay cut, to be put on probation, etc., I think.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  64. 64.

    SatanicPanic

    @Mnemosyne: yeah, this strikes me as implausible and something that kind of makes us sounds nuts to people when we bring it up. Along with nuclear attack and martial law I file it under- stuff we’ll just have to deal with if it happens, but too out of our hands to worry about right now. Elections officials in plenty of states, however, would go along with some pretty crappy voting restrictions, that’s what we should be worried about.

  65. 65.

    Shalimar

    @debbie: Average salary was between $1 and $2 a day in 1876, so even then this was meant to get federal employees to quit.

  66. 66.

    Mnemosyne

    @SatanicPanic:

    Yep, even more voting restrictions are going to be the first step. I wouldn’t be surprised if the asshole states also start putting more restrictions on allowing people to get copies of their records they would need to prove they can vote, like birth certificates, marriage/divorce paperwork, etc.

    But there are slightly over 90,000 elected municipal governments in the US, plus county governments, plus 50 state governments. It’s not even workable to ban all those elections, especially since elections are regulated at the state level, not the federal level.

  67. 67.

    kindness

    @EBT: The actual violence stuff. Early on after the election I couldn’t stop saying this. It upset people. It upset my liberal peeps as well as others. So I more or less stopped as I didn’t want to piss off everyone. But you are correct. There will be violence and it is no secret that it won’t start with violence coming from liberals. It’ll start with the gun nuts & the militia idiots thinking they can take things they couldn’t get otherwise. And then it will spread. I don’t want it to happen but I won’t deny it will. And when it happens reacting as Jesus/Budda would, won’t help fellow liberals. That is really gloomy but truth.

  69. 69.

    agorabum

    Will any Trump voters even notice? Seems like they’ll be too busy consuming their fake news, having their glass of gin, and participating in the Two Minute Hate against Eastasia to notice.

  71. 71.

    Weaselone

    You people are silly. There’s no need to ban elections, you just make sure it’s all but impossible for anyone but your party to win the important ones and then make sure you have the ability to steamroll any governments further down the pecking order if they step out of line.

  72. 72.

    BBA

    @Mnemosyne: The central government can just appoint the local governments. Or you can have a Hong Kong style election where you can only choose from people the Party has already approved. I don’t think they’d try anything so crude.

    I expect them to go for a Russian-style hollow democracy, where enemies of the Party just happen to find themselves in jail for vaguely defined crimes and thus unable to run in the scrupulously fair, free elections that the Party coincidentally always wins.

  73. 73.

    Calouste

    @Mnemosyne: Yep, there will still be elections. In some states they will even be free and fair. Of course it is going to damage the shitgibbon’s ego that he won’t get the universal adulation that dictator’s think they are entitled to, so there will be a massive effort to run the Democratic candidate into the ground, which will make us nostalgic about 2016. If he gets that far that is.

  75. 75.

    Jeffro

    @RealityBites:I was bemoaning the whole 2-nuts-from-VA-in-a-row thing a bit back…c’mon Virginians! We’re gonna get a reputation if the Commonwealth keeps sending the crazy this fast n’ furious! Rest up and let Oklahoma do something really shitty…or maybe Kentucky or something…

  77. 77.

    SatanicPanic

    @Nashville_fan: as much as I didn’t think he could win, there was a clear way for him to do so. Shutting down elections doesn’t even have a clear motive. Even Putin holds “elections”.

  80. 80.

    Jeffro

    On a lighter note to all: some clown on Twitter is insisting that Tucker Carlson’s going to get much better ratings than Megyn Kelly when he takes over for her at Fox News (since TC’s a REAL conservative, dontchaknow)

    Yes.

    Absolutely.

    Because most Fox viewers were watching MK for her astonishing…amazing…in-depth coverage of the issues of the day.

    Also, Tucker Carlson does not, has never, and never will make people want to reach through the screen and punch him smack in his annoying gob.

  81. 81.

    Mnemosyne

    @BBA:

    The central government can just appoint the local governments.

    So all state constitutions cease to exist on January 20? What mechanism does the federal government use to vacate all 50 state constitutions?

    According to Wikipedia, China has about 48,000 municipal areas. The United States has slightly over 90,000. You really think that the Trump administration will be more efficient and detail-oriented than the government of China?

  83. 83.

    PIGL

    @Mnemosyne: the élections don’t matter if substantive powers are stripped from local governments. And that’s these people to be hollow out state local, and school board levels of government so there’s nothing left but the façade. So they can work their will in peace and without any accountability whatever.

  84. 84.

    Nashville_fan

    I am a lurker . . .but I have commented before . . . and I am quite okay if in fact we do have more elections of course . . . not campaigning for that or anything . . . just confirming that the thought has also crossed my mind . . . perhaps I forgot to add that I will be on the front lines of the revolution should that come to pass . . . and hopefully it will not . . . if you think about it . . . the fact that we can’t laugh this off is the saddest part of all.

  85. 85.

    JPL

    @debbie: I definitely agree. It’s time for pointing out that his name calling is not only rude, but it’s not proper behavior for a two year old, never mind the President-elect.

  86. 86.

    BBA

    @Mnemosyne: I mean, presupposing that Trump declares the constitution null and void and proclaims himself Caudillo by the Grace of God, and his followers go along with it, the existence of local governments is not a barrier. I don’t think this is remotely a realistic possibility, but if most of our institutions have gone to rot the remaining few won’t save us.

  87. 87.

    Jeffro

    @debbie: @JPL:

    “I’d say to President-elect [sic] that this is serious, serious stuff. People’s health is at stake, and people’s lives are at stake,” Schumer told reporters on Capitol Hill when asked about Trump’s comments.

    The President-elect called Schumer a “clown” in a tweet early Thursday morning and blasted Democrats for not working with Republicans on a plan to replace Obamacare. The tweet followed Wednesday comments from Schumer that Democrats will wait to see Republicans’ Obamacare replacement plan.

    On Thursday, Schumer again called out Republicans for not yet having a plan to replace Obamacare.

    “Now, we understand that President-elect Trump is in a difficult spot, that Republicans are in a difficult spot. They want to repeal ACA, and have no idea how to replace it,” he said. “But instead of calling names, [the] President-elect should roll up his sleeves and show us a replacement plan that will cover the 20 million Americans who gained coverage, that will cover students or post-college students, 21 to 26, who want to stay on their parents’ plan, that will show how we cover people with pre-existing conditions.”

    “So I’d say to the President-elect and the Republicans that this is not a time for calling names. It’s time for them to step up to the plate if they want to repeal, and show us what they’d replace it with,” Schumer added.

    Close enough?

  88. 88.

    Steve in the ATL

    The Holman Rule predates the Fair Labor Standards Act, which prevent anyone’s salary being cut to $1 per year. Can’t see any court, not even blatant political whores like the Roberts SCOTUS, opposing a challenge to a Holman Rule action under any of a variety of existing laws.

    Caveat: while I am a lawyer, I never claimed to be a competent one!

  90. 90.

    Shalimar

    @Jeffro: I don’t understand who they are adding to their lineup. Tucker Carlson already took over for Greta Van Susteren when she left. The current lineup as of yesterday is Baier, Carlson, O’Reilly, Kelly, Hannity. If Carlson takes Kelly’s spot, then someone has to take Carlson’s spot.

  91. 91.

    manyakitty

    @schrodingers_cat: I’m not new, nor am I saying much out loud, but I do think this was the last chance at anything resembling free and/or fair elections we’ll see in a while. It’s also crossed my mind to pull all extra money out of the bank.

  93. 93.

    The Moar You Know

    Its funny that many new commenters have emerged with the meme of no elections after the latest one.

    @schrodingers_cat: HARD NOT TO NOTICE. Vlad’s pay scale for trolls must have dropped quite a bit, the new guys aren’t cutting the mustard.

    Oh yeah, and I call BS. We’ll keep having elections. They’ll be interfered with both internally and externally, but we’ll have ’em. And the external threats…well, some hands have been overplayed, I’ll just say that.

  94. 94.

    Jeffro

    Gotta run, but wanted to put this up for consideration:

    The GOP has a plan to keep you from learning about Trump’s cabinet picks (mostly, the worst ones)

    Key quote:

    Democrats are eagerly awaiting the confirmation hearings. Tillerson’s close ties to Russia and Sessions’ fitness for office, in particular, are two issues they hope will generate noise and endanger a nomination. But these potential conflicts may not matter, even if they spur a memorable exchange. It’s likely the public will be easily distracted from negative headlines given the sheer amount of news happening all at once. Like drinking water from a fire hose, the GOP schedule will overload consumers of news and the press alike.

    Wait…where have I heard that “fire hose” kind of comment before?

    Oh yeah…it was here, noting how it was a favored Russian tactic for disinformation…

    I wonder how you pronounce “Gish Marathon” in Russian?

  95. 95.

    cmorenc

    @Xantar:

    Hold on a second. I’m not a lawyer, but doesn’t this violate the Constitutional ban on rules of attainder?

    Not unless the appropriation withholding is deemed by SCOTUS to constitute a declaration that the targeted person is guilty of a crime and being punished therefore without trial. I put the word “crime” in italics, because that’s the potential weasel-word in the definition. The existing Supreme Court cases on the subject going all the way back to Justice John Marshall in Fletcher v Peck (1810) and going through US v Brown (1965) would suggest that if past precedent is respected and extended here, this action would be held to constitute a bill of attainder. However, we should not underestimate the capability of the conservative wing of the current court to spin a piece of devious sophistry to distinguish past precedent from present situation, especially if the GOP slim senate majority proves capable of ramming through confirmation Trump’s in-the-mold-of-Scalia faux-originalist nominee to the seat that should have belonged to Merrick Garland.

  99. 99.

    Turgidson

    @Jeffro:

    Are they going to give Tucker Carlson a head and leg transplant so that he looks like an Ailes-approved female Fox host? That’s his only chance to compete with Megyn’s numbers with the geriatric/male key FauxNooz demographic, I think. And even then, he’s such an insufferable snot that he’s almost certainly doomed to be a colossal failure. Again. For like the 8th time.

  100. 100.

    The Moar You Know

    Some of them are ex-Berners, doing it for love rather than rubles.

    @schrodingers_cat: Pretty sure at least 90% of the “ex-Berners” posting here were on the payroll as well.

  101. 101.

    cmorenc

    @Yarrow:

    @SatanicPanic: One of the late night political shows – Daily Show, John Oliver, Sam Bee, forget which one – pointed out that dictators always win 95% of the vote. So, yes, if the elections are completely controlled then they’ll happen. Watch for 95%.

    The GOP leaders are smart enough to settle for a consistent 55% average vote in their favor, so long as the standard deviations make a downswing of more than 3 points in any given election very unlikely. They’ve nearly got that now with a safe majority of House of Representative seats, via gerrymandering + voter suppression.

  103. 103.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Pretty sure at least 90% of the “ex-Berners” posting here were on the payroll as well….

    Including St. Sanders himself

    Given that he’s one of the people on our side who’s already fighting this fucking coup in DC, could ya just get over the GD Primaries already and focus on the issues at hand?

    It’s totally bizarre in the first place, this persistent hate for a flawed but decent liberal socialist who just wanted single payer and free college for all. But to fucking lump Russian trolls in with legitimate Sanders supporters who post here is just stupid.

    Jesus, as great as a commenter as you and a few others here can be, GET OVER IT. He didn’t lose the election. WE did.

    Focus, Goddamit.

  104. 104.

    debbie

    Talking about nucking futs:

    BREAKING: AP Source: Trump selects former Indiana Sen. Dan Coats as director of national intelligence.

  105. 105.

    liberal

    @Ella in New Mexico: Nah, she’s a douchebag who’s only focused on combatting those who wounded or insulted the goddess she worships. Not to mention being a nasty piece of work who likes to smear people based on nothing.

  107. 107.

    cmorenc

    @schrodingers_cat:

    @Ella in New Mexico: Where are his tax returns?

    I see you’ve paid your 2017 membership dues to the liberal circular firing squad. Gotta practice to keep your “ready, fire, aim” skills sharp.

  108. 108.

    germy

    @debbie:

    Coats made headlines in August 1998, when he publicly questioned the timing of President Bill Clinton’s cruise missile attacks on Afghanistan and Sudan, suggesting they might be linked to the Lewinsky scandal: “While there is clearly much more we need to learn about this attack and why it was ordered today, given the president’s personal difficulties this week, it is legitimate to question the timing of this action.”

  109. 109.

    liberal

    @RSR:
    I think it’s because the article seems to imply the douche behind it is a VA congressman.

    If the VA dems have their shit together, they’ll go for the jugular. Federal salaries comprise a huge fraction of VA’s income.

  110. 110.

    Chris

    @germy:

    Yeah, I had to wikipedia him and noticed that too.

    It’s going to be a hacks’ cabinet like we haven’t seen in… I don’t even know how long.

  111. 111.

    EBT

    @cmorenc: Here is I know that this blog is a joke compared to the place that tells actual dick jokes. The place that tells actual dick jokes finished with the circular firing squad bullshit in a single goddamn day. Cole could solve this if he had the slightest idea how to run a community.

  114. 114.

    schrodingers_cat

    @cmorenc: @liberal: Was never a big fan of HRC, FWIW. I did think that she was the only thing that stood between us and disaster. Unfortunately, many supporters of her primary opponent did not see it the same way. His continued attacks on her, way past the time he had any realistic chance of winning did not help.

  116. 116.

    germy

    @EBT:

    Here is I know that this blog is a joke compared to the place that tells actual dick jokes. The place that tells actual dick jokes finished with the circular firing squad bullshit in a single goddamn day. Cole could solve this if he had the slightest idea how to run a community.

    Start your own blog. And then provide a link. If I like what I see, I’ll join your community.

    I feel like I need all the help I can get. I welcome whoever can push against the insanity.

  117. 117.

    Calouste

    @debbie: Another 70-ish white guy. Trump’s cabinet is looking like his high school reunion. Is there anyone in there under 60?

  118. 118.

    Mnemosyne

    @PIGL:

    Well, have fun rolling over and letting the Republicans fuck you however you please. Maybe they’ll throw you a few scraps afterwards. I’ll be opposing them, so get the fuck out of my way.

  120. 120.

    Mike Dixon

    I’ve got a good idea for a poison pill:
    “No member of congress shall be paid more than 100 times the salary of the lowest paid full time federal worker.”
    Any one of these fuckheads tries to act on this shit, instantly pulls all these parasites off the taxpayers teat!

  124. 124.

    Mnemosyne

    @schrodingers_cat:

    His continued attacks on her, way past the time he had any realistic chance of winning did not help.

    Yep. And his supporters’ inability to understand that and realize that a lot of us fully expect him to sell us out again to advance his own career is quite annoying.

    Again: the man who ran on a platform of his personal financial purity vs Hillary’s corrupt giving of paid speeches to Goldman Sachs never released his tax returns. We still have no idea where his income was coming from while he was whining about every dime that Hillary made that he only knew about because she’s been releasing her tax returns for the last 25 years.

    If Sanders wants to convince me that he’s more morally pure than Hillary and has never taken a dime from anyone he shouldn’t have, he needs to present his proofs. NOW. Otherwise, he’s just another careerist political hack.

  126. 126.

    hovercraft

    @debbie:
    Ah yes, the woman who warned us all that there would be reprisals if we didn’t support hair furor. Appointing her to your outreach effort speaks volumes. It’s bad enough that the appointees are terrible people, but he’s put them into positions for which they are most ill suited. Feature not a bug?

  127. 127.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Where are his tax returns?

    Is this really helping you? Staying curled up in this angry little ball-fisted pile of butt hurt? Cuz it’s not helping your cause.

    Move on.

  130. 130.

    Mnemosyne

    @Ella in New Mexico:

    You first. I’m fucking sick of Sanders supporters telling me to “move on” after they stripped the Democratic candidate naked, weighed her down with 16 tons of bullshit, and then exploded with I told you so’s when they couldn’t be arsed to give her more than tepid support.

    Sanders supporters keep demanding that I “admit” Hillary was a bad candidate and that’s why we lost the Electoral College. Again, I say, You first. Sanders did ENORMOUS damage to the Democratic Party that hobbled us in this election and he and his supporters absolutely refuse to admit it.

  131. 131.

    hovercraft

    @Mnemosyne:

    @schrodingers_cat:
    Again: the man who ran on a platform of his personal financial purity vs Hillary’s corrupt giving of paid speeches to Goldman Sachs never released his tax returns.
    —————————————————————————————————–
    Also, all the talk of crooked Hillary and rigged elections was weaponized in the general election campaign by HRC’s Republican opponent.

    It’s almost as if they don’t understand the damage he did, and that constantly claiming their hero would have won, pisses people off. Bernie picked up the exact memes the GOP has been using against Hillary for 20 years, he used the same attacks from the left, and they wonder why we can’t just get over it. These are the same people who refused to understand math when it didn’t show what they wanted to see. Who reversed their positions on superdelegates and anything that gave them a prayer of ignoring the writing on the wall.

  132. 132.

    germy

    @hovercraft: And now he’s showboating with big printouts of drumpfs old tweets.

    I saw the historic photo of him being arrested in the 1960s during his civil rights “protest” and he has a smile on his face I’ve seen before. It’s the smile of people who aren’t really afraid of losing anything in their “protest”

    He ain’t afraid at all as the cop drags him away. His privilege will protect him.

  133. 133.

    Mnemosyne

    @hovercraft:

    Bernie picked up the exact memes the GOP has been using against Hillary for 20 years, he used the same attacks from the left, and they wonder why we can’t just get over it.

    Bingo. And they’re still attacking Hillary on Facebook and Twitter and patting themselves on the back for “seeing through” her and the Democrats just in time.

    Fuck these people. With a rusty pitchfork.

    And, no, when someone has pissed on my leg and told me it’s raining, I’m not going to pretend it never happened just because they now want to pretend they never did it.

  134. 134.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @schrodingers_cat: yeah, you’re angry. So am I, and so are a lot of people. Punching my friend in the face every time I think about how he voted for Sanders isnt fixing things, it’s acting like a sulking, impotent crazy person who nobody will take seriously in the future.

    This is what the fucking Russians and Trump and the Republicans want us to do-diminish our real power by getting us to fight each other so we’re not able to get in their way.

    So seriously, stop wasting your energy and anger by being angry at fucking Bernie Sanders.

    You just look cray-cray for being fixated on something that’s in the past and dredging it up every time you feel the wave of anguish we all do when we see what’s happening to our country. More importantly, it solves nothing.

  135. 135.

    goblue72

    @Mnemosyne: Prove it. You are OBSESSED. Everyone else in the big broad Democratic Party world outside your little bubble has been able to admit that Clinton was a deeply flawed candidate and the the Clinton campaign royally screwed up.

    And if you think Sanders was rough on Clinton, JFC, you have absolutely no experience in politics. I’ve seen rougher primaries for city council seats.

  137. 137.

    Emma

    @Ella in New Mexico:

    You just look cray-cray for being fixated on something that’s in the past and dredging it up every time you feel the wave of anguish we all do when we see what’s happening to our country. More importantly, it solves nothing.

    Aren’t you the sweet concern troll?

    Tell you what. The day you get some of the Bernie bots to change their tune we’ll change ours. And no, they haven’t changed it a bit. Now they’re just passive-aggressive and all concernedy.

  140. 140.

    JPL

    Let’s go back to the original post, which is this is just fuckin nuts… This is why we need to work together

    Ivanka’s top adviser on child care and women’s issues? A Goldman Sachs official.

    In order to pay for tax deductions for those earning 500,000 and less, lower income people receiving subsidies for child care, are going to see that slashed by 2/3rds.

  142. 142.

    cmorenc

    @schrodingers_cat:

    @cmorenc: @liberal: Was never a big fan of HRC, FWIW. I did think that she was the only thing that stood between us and disaster. Unfortunately, many supporters of her primary opponent did not see it the same way. His continued attacks on her, way past the time he had any realistic chance of winning did not help.

    I can agree with that – and even with the proposition that among several factors that were each sufficient unto themselves to create the critical 70k aggregate deficit in Pa, Mi, and W, Bernie’s excessively prolonged primary challenge attacking her as part of the corrupt establishment were likely among them.

  145. 145.

    germy

    @JPL: A lot more votes than “Bernie” got.
    He couldn’t even win the primary. Maybe if he’d had a single coherent idea.

  146. 146.

    goblue72

    @JPL: All of which were in California, where she didn’t need them.

    California is also where the meme that “Democrats got more votes for Senate than Republicans did” comes from.

    Just like you don’t win the World Series by running up the score in a single game, you don’t win Congress or the White House by running up the score in one big state.

  148. 148.

    Mnemosyne

    @cmorenc:

    Thank you. There were multiple factors that turned the election, including Comey’s actions, voter suppression, Russian meddling, and some Clinton campaign decisions about the Rust Belt that were poor in hindsight.

    I am NOT saying it was all Bernie’s fault. I just want his supporters to accept that he has a share of the blame, but they’re so blinkered that they can’t even admit that maybe possibly it wasn’t a great idea to laser focus on DNC corruption and disrupt the telecast of the DNC going in to the general election to make it look like the primary was somehow “fixed” because Hillary only got 3 million more votes than her opponent.

  149. 149.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @Mnemosyne: @Emma: @germy:@schrodingers_cat:

    Ok, you win. Sanders is evil and he singlehandedly destroyed Hilary Clinton. No matter what, he will never atone for that sin. You’re all right.

    There. Now will you move on?

    Meanwhile, Congress is ripping America apart piece by piece…guess that’s too overwhelming to focus on.

    It’s more gratifying to keep trying to punch the generic “Bernie-bots” flying everywhere in the belfry.

  150. 150.

    Mnemosyne

    @goblue72:

    Yes, please tell us from your ivory tower in San Francisco how you totally understand the heartland better than the rest of us. That one never gets old.

  151. 151.

    germy

    @goblue72: Very funny goblue. I’ve read your comments over the past few months, and you’re one of the biggest assholes here. You’ve been humiliated more than a few times, and yet you keep coming back for more.

    Shorter: Fuck You, Troll.

  153. 153.

    germy

    Just like you don’t win the World Series by running up the score in a single game, you don’t win Congress or the White House by running up the score in one big state.

    Dumb, de dumb dumb…

  154. 154.

    Mnemosyne

    @Ella in New Mexico:

    Ok, you win. Sanders is evil and he singlehandedly destroyed Hilary Clinton. No matter what, he will never atone for that sin. You’re all right.

    How about a little less hyperbole? How about, Sanders screwed up by focusing too much on supposed DNC corruption that didn’t actually happen?

  156. 156.

    goblue72

    @germy: I don’t think you know what a troll is. I’m sorry you can’t get past your butthurt. I’m sorry that the truth hurts. I’m sorry that you can’t see how royally the Democratic Party screwed up this election, how royally Clinton screwed up her campaign, and how royally cocked up the Democratic Party has been for going on well on two decades plus.

    Fixing things is going to require admitting how badly the party has gone off the rails and that no amount of technocratic bullshit is going to save it, contrary to Richard Mayhew’s fantasies.

  158. 158.

    goblue72

    Mnemosyne: How about growing up and understanding how politics works. If you can’t take a punch, that’s not the other guys fault. Esp. when the other guy is punching you with giant pillows attached to his fists.

  159. 159.

    Mnemosyne

    @goblue72:

    Yes, when Russian hackers released emails that purportedly “proved” that the DNC was conspiring to Keep Bernie Down, that’s just one of those things that happens in every city council race.

    St. Bernard the Incorruptible’s garments remain unstained by any filthy party politics. We mere Democratic mortals are so fortunate that he deigned to grace us with his presence for as long as he did before returning to his lofty perch of Independent.

  160. 160.

    Hob

    @hovercraft: I agree with you in spirit but…

    “They will try to make it so we don’t have elections in 2020” is a call to arms.

    “We won’t have elections in 2020” is not. Not even if you follow up by saying something like “I’m just saying that to make sure we keep fighting.” If that was the purpose of the statement, there’s no reason it couldn’t have been said the other way. It’s venting, and it’s venting in a destructive way that encourages despair.

    Similarly, “If you don’t quit smoking you’re going to get lung cancer and die” is a call to arms that might be helpful. “I bet you have lung cancer and you’ll be dead in two years” is just being an asshole. “I bet you have lung cancer and you’ll be dead in two years. …Well actually, what I meant by that is you should think more about your health” is being a weirdly clueless asshole.

    I don’t think it’s hard to understand this, and I think the people who persist in doing it anyway have decided that they don’t care at all about the effect of their words; they’re venting in a hurtful way because that’s what they want, and it’s not cool.

  163. 163.

    Hob

    I mean people can talk however they want, if someone really thinks everything is hopeless and feels a strong need to say so then that’s what they’re going to do, I just don’t like to pretend that that is somehow helpful to the cause.

  164. 164.

    germy

    @goblue72:

    How about growing up and understanding how politics works.

    Again, a link to your blog, please? I want to absorb your wisdom. Do you move your mouth while you write? Tell us more about how we’ll all live in a progressive utopia once all the boomers die out.

    Please provide a link to your blog. In dark times such as these, we need your wisdom more than ever.

  165. 165.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @Mnemosyne: Hyperbole? It’s pretty much word for word what the past few posts from you guys have said.

    Yet, I do agree with your italicised point. I think, especially knowing now what would later unfold, he overplayed his hand. Granted, at the time few people in terms of votes were still listening and he actually wasn’t doing anything that in a normal election wouldn’t have been met with the appropriate puzzled shrug by most voters. The campaign was completely over in early May. By then, for the most part, we knew he’d lost and we’d all moved on.

    But the truth is, this was not a normal election. NOBODY expected a fucking foreign enemy to so broadly hack private email servers and state voter data bases and selectively, cunningly use them to advantage one American candidate over another. Or to plant carefully crafted fake news stories designed to play to the pre-existing grudges Americans already had with the targeted candidate. And NOBODY expected said candidate to clearly have been in cahoots with a fucking foreign enemy in the first place. NOBODY could have predicted the lengths the FBI director would go to to try and swing an election two weeks before the vote. I saw Bill as a big fact liability and loose cannon, but did he actually help her with his little chat at the airport with the AG?

    True, we need tI at some point figure out what got us here and fix those errors and misrepresent next time around. But for now, we’ve got a nasty battle going on that requires we stay focused on the issues at hand. Stop wasting your energy on Bernie Fucking Sanders.

  166. 166.

    germy

    @Ella in New Mexico: Here’s the thing, asshole. I come here and express my opinions. And when you reply with “cray cray” all I can say is go fuck yourself. Are you a front pager? Are you in charge of what people are allowed to say here?

    I’ll say it again. Fuck you.

  167. 167.

    Hob

    @schrodingers_cat: On the other hand, I’ve been thinking I should stop hanging out here again for other reasons anyway. So the quality of the comments isn’t my lookout.

    It’s just a feeling I often have in a lot of online hangouts. It’s not unlike how I can no longer deal with a certain friend of the family who’s in the habit of posting every “the Earth is definitely doomed for real, there’s no hope, anyone who thinks there’s anything we can do is just naive, I believe the whole human race will literally go extinct within my lifetime, and we deserve it” thought that crosses her mind… and then following up later with “or maybe not, but anyway what I really mean is we should concentrate on being good to each other”… even though she has a goddamn ten year old kid.

    Anyway, carry on and best wishes.

  168. 168.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @germy: Just stop. You’re spending your time calling an ally an asshole and a troll and why? Because you’re wallowing in self pity and no one else wants to hear it.

    Why are you here with all this anger anyway? Isn’t there some Twitter fight you could take it to?

    Jesus, it’s gotta be beer thirty where you live. Go take a break.

  169. 169.

    Mnemosyne

    @Ella in New Mexico:

    It’s pretty much word for word what the past few posts from you guys have said.

    Not really, but Sanders supporters are so overdefensive that even a slight criticism like Why was Bernie using Hillary’s tax returns against her while refusing to release his own? is felt like a low blow.

    People around here are still pissed at Sanders because his supporters still refuse to believe that his campaign’s actions contributed to (but were not solely responsible for) the disaster in November. In fact, they keep lecturing us about how Hillary was the worst candidate ever and if we had just listened to them and nominated Bernie instead, none of this would have happened, blahblahblah.

    So, yes, I will no longer coddle Sanders supporters. He contributed to all of us getting fucked over, and I refuse to pretend otherwise to protect his fanbase’s feelings. If they refused to stand with me when I needed them to get Hillary elected, why am I supposed to believe them that they’re totally with me this time, no kidding, no backsies?

  170. 170.

    germy

    @Ella in New Mexico: Just stop? Is your job here to tell people what they can and can’t say? And you’re sort of implying I’m an alcoholic with your beer thirty witticism? You really are an asshole. And telling me to take a break? One more time: Fuck you.

  172. 172.

    germy

    @schrodingers_cat: And then she’s all “why are you here with all your anger? Shouldn’t you give it a rest and go get drunk?”

    Passive aggressive Berniac who is simply having a wonderful time now that she has drumpf to oppose. Sort of like Susan Sarandon, but without the celebrity or money.

  173. 173.

    Ella in New Mexico

    @Mnemosyne:

    So, yes, I will no longer coddle Sanders supporters. He contributed to all of us getting fucked over, and I refuse to pretend otherwise to protect his fanbase’s feelings

    I’m not sure why it matters to me that you understand that it’s undermining your ability to be credible but it is. Maybe because I think, based on your previous comments, you’ve got something to contribute that shouldn’t be ignored. I’m just trying to tell you that it’s not helpful, because the wolf’s at the door and it’s not—you know who.

    Another fuck you, germy? Really? Here’s a suggestion, and it’s my last to you for tonight: Just keep posting “Fuck you, Ella. Fuck you fuck you fuck you! Fuck YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOU ELLLLLAAAAAA!!!!!” like 20 or 30 more times here. Just get it out of your system. Hell, go 40 more times if it feels good.

    You’re losing it kiddo.

  175. 175.

    germy

    Really? Here’s a suggestion, and it’s my last to you for tonight:

    Sorry, not taking suggestions tonight, kiddo. Take a break.

    cray, cray

  176. 176.

    ChrisGrrr

    @hovercraft: I’m encouraged, too. Smart people are “real” enough to vent and weigh options to resist.

    Despite the trolls – who couldn’t do any real harm if their bounteously long lives depended on it – I’ve gotten what I need here, and look forward to field reports about vital good being done by ACLU, OfA, Moral Mondays etc. etc.

  177. 177.

    jefft452

    @Mnemosyne: “If they refused to stand with me when I needed them to get Hillary elected, why am I supposed to believe them that they’re totally with me this time, no kidding, no backsies?”

    well said!

  178. 178.

    villiageidiocy

    @EBT: My response, as a federal employee, is to go the Spartacus route. “I am Spartacus”. If we all did it, and I mean ALL did it, we would grind the country to a halt. We are, after all, the largest employer in the US. We don’t have to even strike. We all just have to say “yes, I work on climate change”. “Yes, I work on women’s rights.” “Yes, I work in the public service for the benefit of the public and that means EVERYONE of all colors, ages, races, religions, genders, political orientations, employment status, company . . . EVERYONE. I am a civil servant and I serve and support ALL of the public, even you, you snot-nosed johnny-come-lately teahadists who can’t tell your ass from a hole in the wall. That is what public service is. Dispose of me and dispose of your country.”

  179. 179.

    J R in WV

    @Mnemosyne:

    People are still pissed at Sanders, because the election (that Hillary won by almost 3 million votes) was so close that the things that Sanders did could have thrown the whole election to Trump, who one by, what 88,000 votes?

    Fuck Bernie Sanders with rusty farm tools. Fuck James Comey, who could also have thrown the whole election by himself. I’m not even going to Putin. He could have just stood back in the shadows and watched his pal, Trump, win without his help.

    There are small towns with more than 88,000 votes cast. And Hillary won by over 2.8 million votes. Except for 88,000 votes in crooked states with Republicans in charge of the election process, and screwing over anyone who looked like a Democrat.

    People caught lying about free IDs available at motor vehicle offices, people being withdrawn from the voter registry because they didn’t reply to junk mail from a Republican scam, this election was as stolen as it could possibly have been. Indiana State Police raiding a Voter Registration campaign, a move right out of Jim Crow Indiana, which we still have to cope with. Indiana Jim Crow!

    I grew up with the duck and cover threat of nuclear war. We nearly forgot about that after the “End” of the Cold War. And now we have hot wars in the Middle East, and a Cold War with Asian countries. And a moron taking over as Commander in Chief. I tried to dig a fallout shelter with a pick, digging in hard rock. Now I have a back hoe, and can’t be bothered.

  180. 180.

    Sloegin

    $1. Now we know why the incoming Admin wanted those lists of the ‘Greens’ in the DOE and EPA.

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