Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

They are lying in pursuit of an agenda.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

How stupid are these people?

Quote tweet friends, screenshot enemies.

We’re watching the self-immolation of the leading world power on a level unprecedented in human history.

T R E 4 5 O N

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

There is no compromise when it comes to body autonomy. You either have it or you do not.

75% of people clapping liked the show!

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Fear or fury? The choice is ours.

Wow, you are pre-disappointed. How surprising.

The rest of the comments were smacking Boebert like she was a piñata.

Petty moves from a petty man.

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves? (hint, door #2)

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Give the craziest people you know everything they want and hope they don’t ask for more? Great plan.

You passed on an opportunity to be offended? What are you even doing here?

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Jack Smith: “Why did you start campaigning in the middle of my investigation?!”

You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Don't Mourn, Organize / Friday Morning Open Thread: TGIF

Friday Morning Open Thread: TGIF

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.

And who could blame her, given the last few days?…

And yet…


***********

What else is on the agenda, as we prepare to wrap up the week?

Reader Interactions

277Comments

  2. 2.

    Baud

    Schooley is an idiot it he thinks Trump won’t sign whatever is put in front of him.

  3. 3.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    (CNN) Susan Sarandon, a Bernie Sanders’ surrogate, says Donald Trump would be more likely to usher in “the revolution” than Hillary Clinton.

    “Some people feel that Donald Trump will bring the revolution immediately, if he gets in”, said Sarandon.

    The Trump/Sarandon “revolution” just cut Medicaid by $900,000,000,000 billion dollars.

    Congratulations, Alt Left

  10. 10.

    germy

    Schitzgibbon had nice things to say about the Australian healthcare system.

  13. 13.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    Cornel West‏ @CornelWest

    Brother Bernie and Brother Trump are authentic human beings in stark contrast to their donor-driven opponents.

    7:04 PM – 24 Aug 2015

    720 replies 1,057 retweets 1,382 likes

    (link)

  15. 15.

    germy

    Australia has a government-funded universal health-care system, which is called Medicare, and people can buy additional private insurance. As the Washington Post notes, it’s funded partly by taxes, including taxes on the wealthy.

    The president’s remarks might not make any sense, but Senator Bernie Sanders really seemed to enjoy them.

    “I’ll be sure to quote you on the floor of the senate,” sanders tweeted.

  17. 17.

    Kay

    today is a good reminder that class war is actually a war — it involves rich people literally killing poor people

    The Democrats who say this will get slammed (Warren said ‘people will die’ which is the more polite version) but it’s undeniably true at this point. They’re killing off a whole bunch of poor people to get a tax cut.

  18. 18.

    Mary

    @Sab: I think the implication is that the kitten was hiding in the tissue box the whole time.

  19. 19.

    germy

    Here’s the official statement which New York AG Eric Schneiderman released today:

    “The healthcare bill passed today by House Republicans is a threat to the health and wellbeing of all New Yorkers. In addition to the devastating impact this bill would have on every New Yorker’s access to affordable healthcare, the legislation that passed the House today is unconstitutional in several critical respects—and I stand ready to challenge it in court.”

    “First, House Republicans’ attempt to effectively deny women access to reproductive healthcare services is a cruel and unconstitutional attack on women’s rights – especially the most vulnerable. Further, the Collins-Faso Amendment is a cynical ploy by House Republican leadership and President Trump that exceeds Congress’s authority by interfering with how New York has long elected to fund its Medicaid program. This bill threatens to slash essential healthcare services for millions of New Yorkers who need them the most. For these reasons, if this disastrous and unconstitutional healthcare bill is ultimately signed into law, I will challenge it in court.”

  21. 21.

    MomSense

    I’m back at feeling rage. There is no hope for the United States while the GOP exists.

  23. 23.

    Kay

    I saw Senate Republicans are nervous about cutting off Medicaid funding that allows disabled kids to go to school. That’s literally what it does- they can’t attend public schools without it.

    When they “restore” funding to some lower level they’ll act like they invented it.

    Just so you know, The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), was enacted in 1975.

    There’s been some speculation that Trump’s son has some kind of disability. Of course, he attends private schools and I don’t know that he actually has one, but yesterday the President was celebrating a bill that would make it impossible for certain kids to go to school at all.

  24. 24.

    OzarkHillbilly

    So the flood waters are receding on the Meramec, Bourbeuse, and the Big rivers. I-44 has finally emerged from the water with no damage and the wife has to drive into STL for work today. Snif, snif, no more working from home, all good things must come to an end and the masters must assert their superiority face to face. Without that the serfs and slaves might get to thinking they are equals or some such.

    But now the Missouri and Mississippi are rising. One of my favorite holeinthewall redneck lunch spots, the Dutzow Deli has taken water. I has a sad. Their grilled bacon and braunschweiger sandwich is pure heaven..

  25. 25.

    Baud

    @Kay:

    Just so you know, The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), was enacted in 1975.

    Ford was America’s last liberal president.

  27. 27.

    debbie

    @Baud:

    He’s smart enough to know that Trump will care less about the mid-terms than himself. My fear is that the Senate will delay and delay until after the mid-terms.

  30. 30.

    satby

    @debbie: and if people get out and vote and the GOP takes the losses they deserve, delaying until after the midterms is fine, because the abomination goes nowhere.

  31. 31.

    Yoda Dog

    Im still here, lurking. I’m just too much rage to even speak words anymore. You guys are awesome. Everyone else in this country that let this shit happen can die in a fucking fire for all I care anymore.

    Thats all I got. FSM bless, Juicers, and have yourselves a weekend.

  33. 33.

    debbie

    @Kay:

    Seriously, what kind of depraved animals see rape as a pre-existing condition?

    I want a lawsuit that will force the Congress to have the same kind of healthcare they’re condemning their constituents to. If Trumpcare is as good as they say, they shouldn’t mind at all.

  38. 38.

    debbie

    @Baud:

    You really couldn’t be more wrong. They’ll lie and lie and without showing they’re lying, they’ll hold onto their majority.

  40. 40.

    debbie

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    “I can’t do a good James Brown, but I feel good,” said Rep. Jeb Hensarling, the normally reserved Republican chairman of the committee, referring to the singer often called the godfather of soul. Hensarling wrote much of the overhaul legislation.

    I hope the Dems are practicing “Hot Pants” for when this passes.

  43. 43.

    MomSense

    Here’s a lovely profile in courage complete with family medical emergency, trying to hide from a reporter in a women’s bathroom and lying about what the bill would do to his constituents.

    Bruce Fucking Poliquin.

  44. 44.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: I’m still wondering where Brother Wilmer’s donations all went. Not to supporting other progressives, that’s for sure. But dumbshit limousine liberals sure loves them some Brothers West and Wilmer.

  45. 45.

    Mike Lamb

    But is no one concerned that the Democrats sang the Republicans off the floor? It gave me the vapors and my social media contacts simply could not tolerate the embarrassment…

  47. 47.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @debbie: A vegetarian buddy of mine says brauschweiger is the one thing he really misses. I think it is one of those things most people feel really strongly about, good or bad, very few in the middle. I love the stuff.

  49. 49.

    satby

    Not liking this either:

    16h
    Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior
    Replying to @sarahkendzior
    Bill is devastating in own right, but also ominous. You don’t pass something this unpopular thinking there will be free and fair elections.

    3,657

    4,474

    Propane Jane™ Retweeted

    16h
    Sarah Kendzior @sarahkendzior
    Replying to @sarahkendzior
    When you flaunt disregard for public will this blatantly, you’re assuming public will is irrelevant. You have a lock through corruption

  50. 50.

    mai naem mobile

    This sounds little and inconsequential but then blue states really should come up with stuff to name after Obama, on a regular basis while Dolt 45 is in office. Just to needle Dolt 45.
    This is the kind of vote that you make them party own so that people know what party stood for all their damage that will occur. I keep on hoping they whole thing dies in their Senate but I think McConnell wants his tax cuts too badly not to push it through . They pretty much have Manchin because they’ll threaten his daughter with prosecution over the Mylan deal.

  51. 51.

    Quinerly

    @MomSense:
    I had to step away from all politics for most of the day yesterday. Just couldn’t take it. Finally tuned back in around 10PM. Have been in a rage all night. I now am to a point this AM that I really want to hurt someone.

  53. 53.

    amk

    With Kay threatening to become a rethug, this blog has gone to dogs, I tellz ya.

  55. 55.

    MomSense

    @satby:

    Probably in the basement of that house on a cul de sac in Virginia owned by a media company no one ever heard of.

  56. 56.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @debbie:

    They’ll lie and lie and without showing they’re lying,

    That’s why we have to show them. Presently working on a “Letter to the Editor” to all of the local right wing news rags. We’ll see how many of them print it.

  57. 57.

    MomSense

    @Quinerly:

    INORITE! This is what brings people to the point of having family picnics next to operating guillotines.

  58. 58.

    Quinerly

    @satby:
    @#49. Funny that you would post this right now. I read it on line in the middle of the night and was like a splash of gasoline on my rage.

  59. 59.

    Baud

    @debbie: Maybe more than two years. Not sure that people who have tasted fascism will give it up anytime soon.

  61. 61.

    Kay

    @Yoda Dog:

    Well, hi! I’m more upset about it than I thought I would be.

    We’re doing a program for the 3rd graders to celebrate the end of state testing today. They are incredibly distracting (in addition to their other many good qualities) so that’s good. Yesterday one of them told me her father owns the concrete company here and her seatmate asked me, seriously, “is she allowed to brag?”

    I love that kid. “Allowed”.

    I’m not a teacher so I can say what I think so I said “no, she’s not” :)

  62. 62.

    debbie

    I still can’t find any verification that the Republicans sang to the Democrats after the 1993 vote on Clinton’s tax plan!

  63. 63.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @satby: that’s the thing. He’s obviously planning on running in 2020 for president, but if he wins he won’t be able pass anything without a democratic congress, yet he doesn’t seemed interested in raising money to elect congress to vote for his programs. In fact, he does the opposite, attacking Ossoff until it blew up in his face.

    These people (Sarandon, West, RoseAnn DeMoro, Wilmer) are completely dysfunctional.

  64. 64.

    gene108

    @satby:

    When you flaunt disregard for public will this blatantly, you’re assuming public will is irrelevant. You have a lock through corruption

    Or you assume Cleek’s Law is a constant with enough voters that it does not matter what you do, as long as you make liberals mad.

  65. 65.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @debbie: it happened. take my word. they did it to Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky

  67. 67.

    greennotGreen

    This morning i woke up feeling so bad I thought, “I’m done.” But some Dilaudid, half an Ativan, and a home-made Dr. Pepper Icee (don’t laugh) later, and I think I can live to fade another day. I have a few more emails to get out, and I’m certainly not drained of snark for the Trump regime.

    My first cousins once removed were here yesterday, and it’s so interesting what they’re doing with their lives. The brother is running a pilot industrial hemp farm and looking into drone monitoring of the fields. I didn’t catch all of it because of cross-conversations, but I’m a big supporter of smaller family (our family) farms, and this looks like one way to keep them viable. The sister is a part-time art curator who will be running the sale of what art I have left after family has chosen. I have collected and created for decades, and I want all the pieces to go to people who will love them, not stick them in attics.

  68. 68.

    satby

    @Quinerly: I’m not big on conspiracy theories because my dad the homicide detective used to say people can’t keep secrets well enough for them to be successful. So, I don’t think there’s an overall nefarious plot, just lots of little voter suppression ones combined with the Republicans unshakable conviction that voters don’t pay attention and 1/2 the people don’t care enough to vote. They’ve been safe in assuming that. More people than us need to prove them wrong, but we’re the start.

  74. 74.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: here’s a CNN (link)

    This is not the first time that the primary sentiment of the Steam song, later covered by the Supremes, was evoked on the House floor. In 1993, House Republicans sang “goodbye” to Rep. Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky from Pennsylvania, who voted in favor of President Bill Clinton’s deficit-reduction package — breaking with her own previous opposition and that of her conservative district. She cast the House’s 218th and deciding vote for the bill, which went on to become law.

  77. 77.

    Phylllis

    @Kay: I have been low-level furious with our finance director since the election, because she voted for Trump. Which means she voted for this, for school district services to be gutted. It takes all I have every day not to say “It’s what you wanted & you’re fixin to get it, good and hard.”

  81. 81.

    AnonPhenom

    Is it just possible, maybe, that the plan of these Republican con artists -given their low information/bubble dwelling voters- is to simply declare that they’ve done something they haven’t really done (repeal the ACA/Obamacare), and go about declaring that the ACA program is the ‘new, improved’ AHCA even though the Senate doesn’t pass anything and there’s no actual bill for Trump to sign?

    I mean they all seemed pretty traumatized and depressed about that first 100 days FAIL thingy…

  85. 85.

    Patricia Kayden

    @MomSense: The GOP can exist. People need to stop voting for them. We have at least 2 years where the GOP controls everything and gets to do pretty much anything they want. This is a disaster. This feels as bad as the Bush years and we’re only a bit past Trump’s first 100 days.

  88. 88.

    rikyrah

    @satby: I am encouraged by the resistance being overwhelmingly​ women. The thought that a mother of a child with pre-existing conditions will just go ok. Or the daughter who’s responsible for the care of her parents. Or has anyone afflicted will just slink away?
    Delusional.
    I’m not talking about the stupid muthaphuckas that voted for the GOP, thinking that they would take Obamacare from THOSE people, only to find out that THEY are THOSE people.

  89. 89.

    satby

    @Phylllis: say it. I will be, every time a Trump, or Johnson, or Stein voter whines within earshot of me. Because third party voters voted for this too, so fuck them.

  92. 92.

    schrodingers_cat

    People who are criticizing the Democrats for singing can just stuff it. Perspective, you have none. And again I see a preponderance of BS supporters among those who are concerned. Coincidence? I think not.

  96. 96.

    Chyron HR

    @AnonPhenom:

    Is it just possible, maybe, that the plan of these Republican con artists -given their low information/bubble dwelling voters- is to simply declare that they’ve done something they haven’t really done (repeal the ACA/Obamacare), and go about declaring that the ACA program is the ‘new, improved’ AHCA even though the Senate doesn’t pass anything and there’s no actual bill for Trump to sign?

    Repealing the ACA and replacing it with trillion dollar tax cuts for the owners of Wal-Mart isn’t something the GOP is forced to do because voters demanded it, it’s something they conned voters into supporting because the owners of Wal-Mart demanded it.

  97. 97.

    AnonPhenom

    @Chyron HR:
    I only ask because Trump’s election and continued popularity with the Republican base has convinced me that there is no ceiling to the size of the lie that could be told, nor basement to the gullibility and stupidity of their voters.

  98. 98.

    rikyrah

    Several things
    1. Stop being polite to THOSE voters. You are pissed. You have the right to be.
    2. If you encounter one of those voters and they have Employer provided Healthcare coverage-you MUST inform them that Trumpcare applies to them too.
    3. Never stop bringing up that this was a tax cut bill disguised as a healthcare plan. That MILLIONS will lose Healthcare to give rich people a tax cut.

  99. 99.

    Just One More Canuck

    @greennotGreen: You remind me of my father – as he was leaving us, his only concern was for my mother, to the point of pushing her in a wheelchair as they took his last walk outside. As I read your comments, he comes to mind, because of your grace, dignity and good humour

  100. 100.

    OzarkHillbilly

    “Look how happy those old white guys are. I guess they’re just happy the finally passed something that wasn’t a kidney stone. No longer covered by the way.”

    -Seth Meyers

  101. 101.

    germy

    @schrodingers_cat:

    People who are criticizing the Democrats for singing can just stuff it.

    Do they not know the repubs blasted the theme from “Rocky” and then pounded cans of bud afterward to celebrate?

  103. 103.

    kd bart

    Oct/Nov 2018, The GOP will just shout “The Liberal Dems are coming for your guns.” and the sheep will come running home to vote for them because they find access to firearms more valuable than access to avoidable health care.

  105. 105.

    Oldgold

    As this legislative and regulative carnage proceeds and all political norms are being eviscerated the Russian investigation is being slow walked.

    When Comey testified this week, I was disappointed the Democrats did not emphasize the need to expedite this investigation.

  106. 106.

    clay

    @germy:

    Here’s the official statement which New York AG Eric Schneiderman released today:

    “The healthcare bill passed today by House Republicans is a threat to the health and wellbeing of all New Yorkers. In addition to the devastating impact this bill would have on every New Yorker’s access to affordable healthcare, the legislation that passed the House today is unconstitutional in several critical respects—and I stand ready to challenge it in court.”

    Oh, come on. I find it hard to believe that a major bill that no one actually read and was written on a 48-hour bender with the only goal of “screw the poor and sick”…. I find it hard to believe that this would fail to pass Constitutional muster.

  108. 108.

    Gin & Tonic

    @Oldgold: I predict that in the end, the Russia “investigation” will produce no results. It will be slow-walked until it stalls and dies, with no indictments and no impeachments.

  110. 110.

    Woodrowfan

    @MomSense: I’m back at feeling rage. There is no hope for the United States while the GOP exists.

    same here, I feel like I did the day after the election.

  111. 111.

    Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire

    @amk: No, that passenger was wrong. Where would they have put that car seat for the two year old if his 18 year old brother had been on the plane?

    White folks looking for a pay out. Dr. Dao deserved to get paid. These folks don’t.

  112. 112.

    raven

    Berkeley author George Lakoff says, ‘Don’t underestimate Trump’

    This theory explains why even college-educated Trump voters could ignore so many facts about their candidate. And it also explains why progressives have been ignoring Lakoff’s findings for more than two decades. Progressives are still living in the world of Descartes and the Enlightenment, Lakoff said, a neat world governed by the rules of logic. Descartes said, “I think therefore I am,” but Lakoff claims that we are embodied beings and that 98 percent of thought is unconscious.

  113. 113.

    hovercraft

    @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch: @Baud: @David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch:

    Susan Sarandon, a Bernie Sanders’ surrogate, says Donald Trump would be more likely to usher in “the revolution” than Hillary Clinton.
    ___________________________

    Occupy Wall Street endorsed anyone for president. Only Wilmer, it seems. Nothing came up for after the primary.
    ____________________________

    Cornel West‏ @CornelWest

    Brother Bernie and Brother Trump are authentic human beings in stark contrast to their donor-driven opponents.

    When the revolution comes can we send these morons off to Guantanamo along with the GOP. They are all Deatheaters, it doesn’t matter if you are willing to kill people just to get a tax cut or you are willing to kill people just to prove a political point, you are just as bad, no actually worse because you know better but you want to throw a tantrum. I hate theses people.

  114. 114.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire: They wouldn’t have brought the car seat then. The 18 yr old brother had flown out earlier, they had already paid for that seat and saw no reason why they shouldn’t have been allowed to use it. Federal regulations said they could, as long as the child using it also passed security checks. Seeing as he was going to be on the flight anyway, it goes without saying he already had.

  115. 115.

    Jeffro

    just a quick note for anyone who thinks the Turtle & Co. won’t pass pretty much the same abomination that just got passed in the House…here’s “moderate” GOP Senator Lamar Alexander (per TPM):

    In a floor speech soon after Thursday’s House vote, Senate HELP Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-TN), whose committee has partial jurisdiction over the health care bill, laid out his vision for where the Senate bill will ultimately land: “rescue” those in areas with no ACA plans; “lower premium costs;” “gradually” give states more “flexibility” on Medicaid, without pulling the “rug out” from enrollees; and making sure those with “ pre-existing health conditions have access to health insurance.”

    There’s that pesky word, “access”, again…and that other one, “flexibility”…

    C’mon Dems, if you can’t rally the troops and fight this nonsense, you don’t deserve to govern. Let’s GO!!!

  116. 116.

    Baud

    @Jeffro:

    C’mon Dems, if you can’t rally the troops and fight this nonsense, you don’t deserve to govern

    Charles Pierce used the same rhetoric yesterday. I wish we would stop it. It’s harmful.

  117. 117.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @raven: Underestimating Trump is not the problem, no matter how low we set our expectations, he goes lower. Our problem is and always will be overestimating the American electorate.

  118. 118.

    tobie

    @kd bart: The Republicans are so good at propaganda and we have such a feckless press corps that it will be really hard for the Dems to get any message out. That’s what I find most frustrating. ‘He said, she said’ journalism has so failed us. And the fact that the press can’t own up to the role they played in this past election is pretty terrifying. They are willful rubes, either because the GOP scares them or because they want to run with what they think of as the cool crowd.

  120. 120.

    tobie

    @Baud: I agree. It assumes we have a megaphone. We don’t. Massive monthly protests may be our only choice right now.

  122. 122.

    efgoldman

    @Kay:

    They’re killing off a whole bunch of poor people to get a tax cut.

    And a significant portion of them (half? more?) are their voters.

  123. 123.

    Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire

    @OzarkHillbilly: No, that seat was in the 18 year old’s name, not the toddler using the car seat. Passengers 2 and older have to have a purchased ticket. Especially if they are using a car seat (which IS safer).

  124. 124.

    efgoldman

    I got most of my venting in last night
    There was an obnoxious Dems are doin’ it rrrroooonnnggg whiny troll around, which made it easier to yell and break things without actually breaking things
    I’m calmer today. I’ll probably stick to snark and mockery.

  125. 125.

    hovercraft

    Politico: Hillary Clinton To Launch Political Organization

    Hillary Clinton is working to launch a political group focused on pushing back against President Donald Trump’s agenda, Politico reported Thursday, citing “multiple people close to” Clinton.

    The group, which will likely be called Onward Together, could launch this week, according to Politico. Clinton has spent the past two weeks talking with potential donors and efforts to fund, as well as potential members of the group’s board, per Politico. The organization will not focus on its own initiatives and will instead funnel money to other groups, according to Politico.

    Axios also reported on Wednesday that Clinton is looking to launch a PAC to help fund groups and candidates in 2018.

  126. 126.

    SFAW

    @kd bart:

    more valuable than access to avoidable health care.

    I know it was a typo, but it’s actually what the Rethugs want — avoiding health care for anyone outside of the rich.

  128. 128.

    hovercraft

    @greennotGreen:
    Good morning. I’m glad the meds kicked in and you are feeling more comfortable.
    Virtual hugs {{{{{{{greennotGreen}}}}}}}

  129. 129.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: I agree. For better or worse they are only thing that stands between us being trampled by the power mad rogue elephant. Charlie Pierce is an overrated hack with dated quips and was a BS purity pony until quite late* in the primaries. He can go fuck himself.

    * Long after Senator Wild Hair had any chance of a win.

  131. 131.

    gene108

    @hovercraft:

    Why, oh why would the Democratic Party machine want to back a lady, who goes out of her way to campaign for candidates, raise money for candidates and has been doing this for decades?

  132. 132.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @raven:

    So if you are going to craft a message that can reach people who disagree with you, you have to understand their subconscious worldview. Lakoff calls this worldview a “frame,” and claims that Republicans have done a much better job with framing over the past 30 or 40 years. Republicans understand the narrative that governs many people in this country, and they target their message directly to that worldview. Democrats, on the other hand, ignore the worldview and focus instead on rationality, facts and policies.

    I agree with him, have been saying this exact thing for some time now. Just said it again here 2 days ago. Of course, he says it much more intelligently than I do, with far more to back it up than I have. I just cut to the chase: “Give the GOP and their Frank Luntz’s credit where credit is due.”

  135. 135.

    efgoldman

    @Mike Lamb:

    But is no one concerned that the Democrats sang the Republicans off the floor? It gave me the vapors and my social media contacts simply could not tolerate the embarrassment…

    Oh for Fuck’s sake
    We hashed this out overnite – 360+ comments – with a pearl clutching, tone policing, Dems’r doin’ it rrroooonnnngggg troll. Don’t be bringing that weak shit in here.
    In a week no one will give a shit, it will be down the memory hole.
    For context, look up the 1993 tax bill.

    Fuckem

  136. 136.

    Corner Stone

    @schrodingers_cat:

    People who are criticizing the Democrats for singing can just stuff it.

    I also too am sooo tired of shit like that. They can go screw if they don’t like it.

  138. 138.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire:

    No, that seat was in the 18 year old’s name

    That’s what I said. To repeat myself:

    Federal regulations said they could, as long as the child using it also passed security checks. Seeing as he was going to be on the flight anyway, it goes without saying he already had.

    From the Guardian:

    Delta policy generally prohibits passengers from using a ticket bought in another person’s name. Federal regulations do not bar such a switch as long as the new passenger’s name can be run through a database, according to a Transportation Security Administration spokesman.

    It still goes back on Delta: “We have your money, now go fuck off.”

  139. 139.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Republicans have done a much better job with framing over the past 30 or 40 years

    Sure, remember the Lee Atwater quote? “You can’t say n****, n****, n*****…”. So sure they’ve developed a narrative that speaks to voter’s ‘guts’ but it’s a repulsive narrative at it’s root.

  140. 140.

    hovercraft

    @Jeffro:
    There is no such thing as a “moderate” republican, they are all sociopaths, some of them just play “moderate” on TV, but when push comes to shove, they vote the party line.
    Also I agree with Baud, it’s not that we don’t deserve to win, we are fighting, we’re just fighting an opponent who cheats at every opportunity, and creates as many opportunities for them to cheat, and the referees have been trained to never call them on their cheating and in fact penalizes us when we point out that they are cheating. Yesterday was depressing, but it also enraged many of us, so we will fight on, it’s our job to prod our side to stand up to this shit and use their megaphones to try to shame shameless people into doing the right thing. They are far from perfect, but that’s a big difference between us and them, we know that everyone is flawed and we don’t expect to always agree with them about everything, purity is dangerous, it rules out compromise. I’m not saying to compromise with these ghouls on this, but give me an Obama or Hillary who gets shit done over BS who aint done shit except piss off the democratic base.

  143. 143.

    Corner Stone

    @kd bart:

    and the sheep will come running home to vote for them because they find access to firearms more valuable than access to avoidable health care.

    With the price points we’re all about to see I suggest that is a reasonable reaction. Pretty soon you’re going to need to rob your health care provider at gunpoint to be able to acquire help.

  144. 144.

    SFAW

    @Baud:

    Charles Pierce used the same rhetoric yesterday. I wish we would stop it. It’s harmful.

    Yes and no. The Rethugs have given us enough ammunition to do serious damage to their party. But if we don’t use it to beat on them every fucking day, then we give away that opportunity.

    Those motherfuckers have managed to keep the fauxtrage turned up to 11 for the last eight years (well, more, actually, but …). If we cannot keep legitimate outrage at a HIGH LEVEL for another 18 months, and convey it to the non-moron/non-racist members of the public, then why would we think we can change the makeup of Congress?

    I am often reminded of the James Spader “This time for sure” speech on Boston Legal. It seems most of the electorate /doesn’t/don’t really follow the things they need to.

    We need to remind people every fucking day that the Rethuglicans are trying to kill them, impoverish them, or both. If we can’t do that, then we’ll be about as effective as Occupy Wall Street, or Charlie Crist.

  146. 146.

    satby

    @Baud: and right on cue, the PeopleforBernie FB meme goes after Diane Feinstein for supposedly taking donations from medical groups and opposing single payer. I guess there’s no Republicans they have bigger problems with.

  148. 148.

    Corner Stone

    If I owned stock in AthenaHealth I would be dumping every single share right now. This CEO is fucking nuts and spastic. Stephanie Ruhle is cautioning him like he’s a child.

  149. 149.

    efgoldman

    @Oldgold:

    the Russian investigation is being slow walked.

    My regular reminder:It was 26 months between the Watergate break in and Tricksie Dicksie Nixie’s last helicopter ride.
    This investigation is orders of magnitude more complicated
    Patience, Grasshoppers

  150. 150.

    Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire

    @OzarkHillbilly: There is no indication in any of the reports that I have seen that the parents were able to change the seat from the 18 year old’s name to the 2 year old’s name at check in. If they were able to do that (get the two year old’s name on the ticket for the 18 year old’ seat), then there probably wouldn’t be this whole mishegas about the seat. Parents need to guarantee that their children two and up have a seat, and airlines need to make that clear- especially if a car seat is involved.

    Also, I find it strange that they purchased an airline seat for the two year old (complete with use of car seat) TO Hawai’i, but didn’t do that for the return trip. Something in this milk ain’t clean.

  151. 151.

    hovercraft

    @gene108:
    You’re such a sucker! Everyone knows that she’s only doing this to advance herself, she doesn’t really care of democrats win, she’s just doing this so that she can run again, or better yet run Chelsea so she can be president by proxy! Everyone knows this! Or if she thinks that wont work, she’s just trying to make herself relevant and drive up her speaking fees, everyone knows the Clinton’s are grasping money grabbers, which is why Obama taking money is so disappointing, he was supposed to take a vow of poverty so that number one he’d stay in the place the moral scolds have determined he should be, and even better he could have been used as a bludgeon against her just to make sure she will never try to impose herself on the body politic again.

  152. 152.

    schrodingers_cat

    @satby: BS is a Russian stooge, he and his supporters are certainly acting like it. Trying to discredit and destroy the only opposition Putin’s puppet in the WH house has.

  153. 153.

    Corner Stone

    @Gin & Tonic:

    I predict that in the end, the Russia “investigation” will produce no results. It will be slow-walked until it stalls and dies, with no indictments and no impeachments.

    Unfortunately I am coming more and more to this viewpoint. I did not want to but the slow drag of the inevitable is taking hold.

  154. 154.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @?BillinGlendaleCA: Credit where credit is due. They have also scared the pants off media figures such that they will do anything to avoid even an appearance of partisan bias, including ignoring facts. My hat is off to their obviously superior messaging. Now Repubs just lie all the time and nobody (well, almost nobody) presses them on it.

  159. 159.

    Corner Stone

    @tobie:

    The Republicans are so good at propaganda and we have such a feckless press corps that it will be really hard for the Dems to get any message out.

    There is only one message the D’s need to get out. Over and over again. No other messaging for 2018. The GOP stole your health care so they could give a trillion dollars to the richest people in our country.
    It doesn’t matter what the question is, where the event is or anything else. They stole health care so they could watch you suffer and die while they gave a trillion dollars to rich people.

  162. 162.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @hovercraft:

    they vote the party line.

    There were 20 who voted against the party line and 2 others who were probably too afraid to take a stand one way or the other. Not that they aren’t sociopaths anyway (I don’t even know who they were), they probably are, but we have them worried, so worried this monstrosity barely made it over the line with the minimum # necessary.

  163. 163.

    efgoldman

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Sarcasm.

    On second thought, probably. It’s just the late night thread raised every hackle I ever had or ever will have. Rubbed me the wrong way with a new Brillo pad.

  166. 166.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Corner Stone: I don’t think they can get ahead of all the contradictions. It may take time but there are too many interested parties. This will bring them down, it may not happen as fast as we want it to, but it will happen.

  167. 167.

    Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire

    @amk: Well then Delta is stupid. The parents are stupid, too. No way I’m not going to guarantee that my kid has a seat. Piss poor planning.

    No skin off my teeth.

  168. 168.

    schrodingers_cat

    OT oh BTW I did send a reply to my ex-friend’s birthday wishes. I thanked her for her card and wished her for her birthday in an email. No pleasantries, no nothing. That should send the message.

  169. 169.

    satby

    @Weaselone: she has always done what Wilmer should have been doing for both of their very long lives. The only thing Wilmer does better is flap his yap without any concrete results to show for it. In that, he excels.

  170. 170.

    martian

    @greennotGreen: An easy journey to you. It’s lovely that your family will have your art to love and care for, and to remember you by. I sure hope I can accomplish the same. Have you ever posted links to see it here?

  171. 171.

    germy

    Official statement from New York AG Eric Schneiderman:

    “The healthcare bill passed today by House Republicans is a threat to the health and wellbeing of all New Yorkers. In addition to the devastating impact this bill would have on every New Yorker’s access to affordable healthcare, the legislation that passed the House today is unconstitutional in several critical respects—and I stand ready to challenge it in court.”

    Here’s the Palmer Report’s interpretation:

    If the Senate votes no on the AHCA, or if the Democrats are able to filibuster it, then it will fail, and Obamacare will remain intact. But even if it does pass, it’s clear the battle will just be beginning. And if New York can get the AHCA ruled unconstitutional, it would be nullified in all fifty states. If the Democrats then win the midterms, they could reinstate Obamacare.

    Question for Balloon-Juicers: Is this interpretation correct?

  172. 172.

    Jeffro

    @SFAW:

    Yes and no. The Rethugs have given us enough ammunition to do serious damage to their party. But if we don’t use it to beat on them every fucking day, then we give away that opportunity.

    Those motherfuckers have managed to keep the fauxtrage turned up to 11 for the last eight years (well, more, actually, but …). If we cannot keep legitimate outrage at a HIGH LEVEL for another 18 months, and convey it to the non-moron/non-racist members of the public, then why would we think we can change the makeup of Congress?

    I’m good with beating on the GOP every fucking day.

    (And Baud I hear you too – I thought I was just saying the same thing most of us here are saying, in a different way. I’m not giving up on the fight or down on Dems…I’m saying let’s get fired up. So next time I’ll just say, “Let’s get fired up!”)

  173. 173.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Adria McDowell (formerly Lurker Extraordinaire:

    There is no indication in any of the reports that I have seen that the parents were able to change the seat from the 18 year old’s name to the 2 year old’s name at check in.

    They weren’t, Delta wouldn’t let them.

    Something in this milk ain’t clean.

    You may well be right, but of one thing we can be sure, Delta is guilty as hell. The whole industry’s business model is predicated on fucking their passengers as much as possible while dismissing any complaints outright and if anyone dares to try and assert their rights as human beings threaten to have them thrown in jail. If that doesn’t do the trick, throw them in jail.

    In light of recent events I fully expect they will soon ban all cell phones, lap tops, or any other device capable of video recording from flights.

  177. 177.

    JMG

    From parsing Alexander’s statement, it seems to me his idea (and he’s just one of 52, not a particularly influential one, either) would be to 1. Keep the tax cuts, natch. Push off the Medicaid cuts into the 2020s, that is, for several election cycles. 3. Pretty much broom all the things affecting non-Medicaid insured that was put in by the House Freedom Caucus. If I had to bet, I’d bet something close to that would be what the Republican caucus might agree to. Remember, if the same percentage of Senate Republicans balk as did House Republicans, that’s four Senators and the bill fails.

  178. 178.

    Jack the Second

    @Kay:

    today is a good reminder that class war is actually a war — it involves rich people literally killing poor people

    The Democrats who say this will get slammed (Warren said ‘people will die’ which is the more polite version) but it’s undeniably true at this point. They’re killing off a whole bunch of poor people to get a tax cut.

    Messaging question: Would it be better to use the line, “Republicans are literally killing off the middle class for an upper-class tax cut.”?

    I’m just worried that when you use the word “poor”, the racists — I’m sorry, I mean — “the white working class” just hears “black people”. And the middle class is not going to be spared the age tax or the “pre-existing condition” tax, so it’s certainly fair to rub their noses in it.

  179. 179.

    Bruce K

    Warning to the rest of the gang: incandescent fury tends to burn you out and leaves you needing time to recharge and stop thinking about the tire fire burning in the swampland of DC and poisoning the rest of the country. Speaking from experience (and recovering from burnout) here.

  181. 181.

    hovercraft

    @satby:
    I’m really BiP ; )

    @Weaselone:

    She is an actual democrat, so you know if she started frequenting the talk shows they would savage her as a bitter sore loser who just can’t get past the fact that she failed. Unlike the winner Wilmer who won the “hearts” of a huge swath of democratic voters!

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Yes they did, but only out of fear, and while I’ll take any resistance I can get, these people can’t be relied on. They are more afraid of the voters than Twitler that’s all.

  183. 183.

    Jack the Second

    @germy: It violates the equal dignitude of the States, something I’ve been told is very, very important.

  185. 185.

    amk

    @germy: Who cares if he is right or not? Just drown the corrupt to the core mofos in multiple lawsuits across the blue states. Just like they did to the kenyan care.

  186. 186.

    hovercraft

    Well would you look at that. This should help stiffen some GOP spines in the senate, and we haven’t even gotten around to running ads with constituents who’ve been hurt by this monstrosity.

    Cook Report Moves 20 House Seats In Dems’ Favor After O’Care Repeal Vote

    By Caitlin MacNeal Published May 5, 2017 9:21 am

    Cook Political Report on Friday morning changed its ratings for 20 House seats, predicting that Democrats’ odds of winning those districts has increased now that House Republicans passed a bill to repeal Obamacare.

    “Although it’s the first of potentially many explosive votes, House Republicans’ willingness to spend political capital on a proposal that garnered the support of just 17 percent of the public in a March Quinnipiac poll is consistent with past scenarios that have generated a midterm wave,” Cook Political Report’s David Wasserman wrote in a post explaining the ratings changes. “Not only did dozens of Republicans in marginal districts just hitch their names to an unpopular piece of legislation, Democrats just received another valuable candidate recruitment tool.”

    He wrote that for some Republicans, backing the American Health Care Act is an “unequivocal political risk.”

    Cook Political Report moved three districts from leaning Republican to toss-ups, 11 districts from likely Republican to leaning Republican and six districts from solid Republican to leaning Republican.

  189. 189.

    SFAW

    @Jeffro:

    I’m good with beating on the GOP every fucking day.

    Every day, in every way, until we are the BEST at doing it.

  190. 190.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @germy:

    And if New York can get the AHCA ruled unconstitutional, it would be nullified in all fifty states. If the Democrats then win the midterms, they could reinstate Obamacare.

    It takes years for a case to be settled. Long after the mid terms. It would all hang on a preliminary court injunction being imposed against the AHCA and upheld by the relevant appeals court and Supreme Court, a thing I would not want to bet too heavily on. Lacking such an injunction and the inevitable implementation of the AHCA without one, the ACA is dead, no matter how the courts eventually rule.

  191. 191.

    rikyrah

    @satby:

    @schrodingers_cat: agreed. Though I have come to believe he’s more of a sleeper agent than a stooge

    I don’t give a phuck what he is. But, I am done caring about his feelings or the fools that follow them. They, too, can go phuck themselves.

  192. 192.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @schrodingers_cat:

    BS is a Russian stooge, he and his supporters are certainly acting like it.

    This. And some on my FB feed are still having vapors over Obama’s speaking fees. I foolishly waded in…and then decided engaging with my progressive betters (aka shrieking monkeys of the left) wasn’t worth it.

  193. 193.

    rikyrah

    @Corner Stone:

    There is only one message the D’s need to get out. Over and over again. No other messaging for 2018. The GOP stole your health care so they could give a trillion dollars to the richest people in our country.
    It doesn’t matter what the question is, where the event is or anything else. They stole health care so they could watch you suffer and die while they gave a trillion dollars to rich people.

    Amen.

  196. 196.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jack the Second:

    Would it be better to use the line, “Republicans are literally killing off the middle class for an upper-class tax cut.”?

    Probably.

  197. 197.

    oldgold

    @efgoldman:

    Yes, Watergate did take considerable time to play out. But, in my opinion, the malignancy at the heart of this matter is much more virulent and prone to rapidly metastasizing than Watergate. As such, the process has to be expedited. Otherwise ……

  199. 199.

    O. Felix Culpa

    @Jack the Second:

    Messaging question: Would it be better to use the line, “Republicans are literally killing off the middle class for an upper-class tax cut.”?

    Yes. And it would be true.

  201. 201.

    Weaselone

    @O. Felix Culpa:

    Let be honest. This is essentially Republican Billionaire’s killing off everyone who makes less than a quarter million dollars a year for tax cuts.

  202. 202.

    germy

    Records show that a white Texas police officer who was fired for fatally shooting a black teenager was briefly suspended in 2013 following a complaint about his conduct while serving as a witness in a drunken-driving case.

    Personnel records from the Balch Springs, Texas, Police Department obtained Thursday by The Associated Press show former officer Roy Oliver was suspended for 16 hours in December 2013 after the Dallas County District Attorney’s Office filed the complaint. Oliver also was ordered to take training courses in anger management and courtroom demeanor and testimony.

    The Dallas County attorney’s office now is investigating the shooting Saturday night in which Oliver fired a rifle at a car of teenagers leaving a party, striking and killing 15-year-old Jordan Edwards.

    The personnel records also included periodic evaluations that noted at least one instance when Oliver was reprimanded for being “disrespectful to a civilian on a call.” That evaluation, dated January 27, 2017, called the reprimand an isolated incident and urged Oliver to be mindful of his leadership role in the department.

    The complaint from the prosecutor’s office said the office had a hard time getting Oliver to attend the trial, he was angry he had to be there, he used vulgar language that caused an assistant district attorney to send a female intern out of the room, and he used profanity during his testimony.

    “In an email from one of the prosecutors he states you were a ‘scary person to have in our workroom,'” then-Balch Springs Police Chief Ed Morris wrote in the suspension findings.

  205. 205.

    germy

    President Donald Trump said Thursday his first foreign trip as president will feature stops in Saudi Arabia, Israel and the Vatican, where he will meet with Pope Francis, an ambitious foray onto the world stage that will include meetings with NATO and a summit in Italy.

    Trump, joining religious leaders in the Rose Garden on Thursday, said his first foreign trip would “begin with a truly historic gathering in Saudi Arabia with leaders all across the Muslim world.”

    “Saudi Arabia is the custodian of the two holiest sites in Islam and it is there that we will begin to construct a new foundation of cooperation and support with our Muslim allies to combat extremism, terrorism and violence and to embrace a more just and hopeful future for young Muslims in their countries,” Trump said.

  208. 208.

    rikyrah

    “Republicans are literally killing off the middle class for an upper-class tax cut.”

    Absolutely. Spread the word.

  211. 211.

    hovercraft

    This is just sad, so sad!

    A Trump-supporting caller to Rush Limbaugh’s Thursday show named Tony said that he is “red-hot angry” at President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence for turning out to be politicians who have to work with other politicians in Washington to accomplish their agenda.

    Tony raged that the Trump administration did not shut down the government, but instead put off the shutdown until September.

    “OK, so what that says to me is that nothing is gonna happen, Rush, OK?” Tony ranted. “Because they just become… They become part of the system.”

    He continued, “Let me tell you, there’s not gonna be any health care, there’s not gonna be any wall, there’s not gonna be any tax bill… The money is too big, and the Republicans are getting too much money put in their pockets, OK, by the lobbyists, by K Street, and they don’t want to see any changes.”

    Limbaugh and Tony went back and forth for a moment before the caller said, “OK, what I see in this, OK, is that — you know, hate to say it, but — as far as I’m concerned, he’s a sellout.”

    “Aw, come on, it’s too soon to say that,” protested Limbaugh. “It’s too soon to say he’s a sellout. It’s not even six months yet. You can’t go there.”

    He’s not doing the things that give us the big stuff. He’s giving us the little stuff. He’s giving us the executive orders, OK. We’re not getting the big like I said, you know, Washington needs a heart transplant,” Tony concluded.

  214. 214.

    Shalimar

    @satby: We will see in the remaining 3 House races. If Republicans survive “scares” and barely hold onto all 3 seats, there is a pretty decent chance the elections were rigged and we are unofficially in a dictatorship.

  216. 216.

    SenyorDave

    IMO, one angle that has to be pushed constantly is the tax cut for the wealthy.

    From an analysis, “two of the biggest tax cuts in Republican proposals to repeal the Affordable Care Act would deliver roughly $144 billion over the coming decade to those with incomes of $1 million or more, according to a congressional analysis”.

    Push that like crazy, frame it as a $144 billion tax cut to millionaires while taking away your health care. That has to be a main message. And emphasize that Trump, as a self-professed billionaire, will be getting a huge tax cut (just throw some figures out as to how much, if it becomes an argument just say “release your taxes so we can know how much). Scare people, and make them angry. Doesn’t have to be particularly accurate, just get it in their heads. Make them understand that tax cuts for the wealthy is what the GOP is all about.

  217. 217.

    A Ghost To Most

    @Mike Lamb:

    But is no one concerned that the Democrats sang the Republicans off the floor?

    Fuck No. It is called defiance, and we all need to defy those assholes at every opportunity.The time to be nice is long gone. Now is the time to afflict the comfortable.

  218. 218.

    rikyrah

    @Shalimar:

    @satby: We will see in the remaining 3 House races. If Republicans survive “scares” and barely hold onto all 3 seats, we are unofficially in a dictatorship.

    If we lose 3 races, that, by all measure, should never be remotely competitive?

  219. 219.

    Shalimar

    @hovercraft: The depressing line in that to me is the last one. He says “Washington needs a heart transplant”, but what he wants is completely heartless. They aren’t screwing over enough people for him.

  220. 220.

    Shalimar

    @rikyrah: It would worry me if Republicans keep getting just enough votes to survive, yes. I don’t trust electronic voting machines with no paper trail like they use in Georgia. Not sure about the other 2 races.

  221. 221.

    schrodingers_cat

    @rikyrah: Too many people just want to give up, I wonder what’s up with that. We has already lost. I have no idea what that’s supposed to achieve except demoralize Dems and their voters.

  222. 222.

    Corner Stone

    @germy:

    Trump, joining religious leaders in the Rose Garden on Thursday, said his first foreign trip would “begin with a truly historic gathering in Saudi Arabia with leaders all across the Muslim world.”

    This terrifies me.

  225. 225.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Corner Stone:

    said his first foreign trip would “begin with a truly historic gathering in Saudi Arabia with leaders all across the Muslim world.”

    If Isis is invited I might be for this trip.

  228. 228.

    Elizabelle

    Washington Monthly, Nancy LeTourneau. Senator (Mark Warner) says the odds are two to one against Trump completing a full term

    Some of this links back to a long New Yorker article by Evan Osnos: How Trump Could Get Fired.

    Senator Mark Warner, of Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, privately told friends that he puts the odds at two to one against Trump completing a full term. (Warner’s spokesperson said that the Senator was “not referring specifically to the Russia investigation, but rather the totality of challenges the President is currently facing.”)

    … One source suggested the official investigation was making progress. “They now have specific concrete and corroborative evidence of collusion,” the source said. “This is between people in the Trump campaign and agents of [Russian] influence relating to the use of hacked material.”

    Here is the specific line of inquiry that Sen. Warner is following:

    Mr Warner said: “We know about the hacking, and selective leaks, but what really concerns me as a former tech guy is at least some reports – and we’ve got to get to the bottom of this – that there were upwards of a thousand internet trolls working out of a facility in Russia, in effect taking over a series of computers which are then called botnets, that can then generate news down to specific areas.

    “It’s been reported to me, and we’ve got to find this out, whether they were able to affect specific areas in Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, where you would not have been receiving off of whoever your vendor might have been, Trump versus Clinton, during the waning days of the election, but instead, ‘Clinton is sick’, or ‘Clinton is taking money from whoever for some source’ … fake news…

    The key states of Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania which Mr Warner named all fell narrowly – and unexpectedly – to Donald Trump.

    That kind of targeting would have been difficult to accomplish unless it was coordinated with the Trump campaign.

    If this is proven, I want fresh elections, fuckers. A one-off. Or bring Obama back as a caretaker until the 2020 elections, if he agrees to serve. (Have the Supreme Court approve that too, as a one off.) We could always seat the fucking POPULAR VOTE winner, too.

    But throw out this awful cabinet of plutocrats and grifters and know nothings. We did not vote for this. We do not deserve this.

  229. 229.

    hedgehog the occasional commenter

    @schrodingers_cat: I think that’s the purpose, to demoralize us early. Fuck that. (I am taking the weekend off to regroup, then back at it Monday.) A while ago you wrote that in battle, you enter without expectation of winning or losing, but you fight because you must. I’m sure I got it wrong, but the gist has stuck with me.

  230. 230.

    germy

    @Elizabelle:

    The discontent with Donald Trump on Capitol Hill runs very deep and also very wide. I’ve been told that upwards of two-thirds of the Senate Republicans, in particular, discuss—in the gym and in clusters on the Senate floor—their desire to see him gone. These senators talk rather openly—even with their Democratic colleagues—about their fear of Trump’s recklessly getting the country into serious danger, about the embarrassment he causes it in the world (his petulantly refusing to shake hands with Angela Merkel was just one example of his mishandling of foreign leaders), about his overall incompetence.

    http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2017/04/05/no-one-to-blame-but-trump/

  232. 232.

    Tilda Swintons Bald Cap

    @gene108: This. We forget that there is a very sizeable portion of this country that thinks yesterday’s vote was just the best thing ever. We are livid over this but, there are a lot of people who are very happy this morning.

  233. 233.

    schrodingers_cat

    @hedgehog the occasional commenter: Thanks, that’s what Krishna’s advice to Arjun is on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, when he is paralyzed by inaction seeing the vast armies of the Kauravas among whom are many of his friends, relatives and elders. Its an incredible hard thing to do, being a निष्काम कर्मयोगी (nishkama karmayogi) doing your duty without regard to reward or failure, or what other people say. President Obama came as close to that ideal as any politician I have seen.

  235. 235.

    Tenar Arha

    @OzarkHillbilly: Agreed.

    (It also really helps when you have your own propaganda networks to reinforce the frame, while simultaneously having browbeaten the news into spouting your frame as if it were facts, rather than an ideology). /unnecessary parenthetical

  236. 236.

    Elizabelle

    @Tilda Swintons Bald Cap: re that sizeable portion: yes, they are there and loud and cruel and have an outsized megaphone and enablers in the “liberal” press.

    But they’re a smaller group, relative to us. We need to isolate them. And somehow lance the boil.

  237. 237.

    Tenar Arha

    @debbie: I tried posting this yesterday, looks like it never went through. I’m sorry if this is now repetitive. I’d start with Josh Marshall’s info on the TPM blog to try and pinpoint the date in 1993. Then I’d look in the Congressional Record and the next day’s newspaper. I’d start with the Washington Post archives, because “local.”

    ETA If I wanted video, I’d work on finding out if CSPAN has an online archive too. Hope this helps.

  238. 238.

    hedgehog the occasional commenter

    @schrodingers_cat: Thanks! And I think you are right about President Obama.
    Also, doing one’s duty with regard to the Resistance is a good lesson; it is hard to remember but this is a marathon, not a sprint, and we keep going because we must.

  240. 240.

    Elizabelle

    @schrodingers_cat: You are one of the people who keep me here.

    I get so sick of the Eeyore types. Thank you for coming out fighting, and for calling them on their ridiculousness. Why declare defeat pre-emptively? Our political opponents never do. And they have the $$$ to keep rising again, like the zombies they are.

  242. 242.

    Corner Stone

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    If Isis is invited I might be for this trip.

    That’s actually what I am afraid of. That there will be a failed attempt to harm the US delegation and we’ll go full Nazi in Der Homen Strasse Gruppen Furherville.

  243. 243.

    TenguPhule

    I finally figured out what species the Republicans are under their human disguises after drinking.

    They’e the fucking Quintessons.

    *Picture of Kimmel’s baby boy*

    Paul Ryan: Guilty or Innocent?

    Jason Chaffetz: Innocent.

    Paul Ryan (Ghoul Face): Feed him to the Sharkticons!

  246. 246.

    hovercraft

    @Timurid:

    They’re terrorists, not Good Samaritans.

    I’d say the Twitler and his regime are terrorizing the millions of Americans who are about to lose their health insurance and the millions of South Koreans and Japanese and the millions on the West Coast and in the Pacific who would be directly affected if he attacks Little Kim and all the people who are terrified by his decisions to roll back efforts to slow down global climate change and….. Okay he’s terrorizing the world so meeting with ISIS wouldn’t be that big a deal, terrorist groups do talk to each other sometimes.

  247. 247.

    Miss Bianca

    @OzarkHillbilly: Count me in the “love, love, love braunschweiger” class.

    I thought the Mississippi had already breached its banks last week? So hard to keep track of all the moving disasters we got going on in this country right now…

  250. 250.

    hovercraft

    HHS Secretary On Premium Hikes For The Older: ‘Somebody’s Going To Pay’

    In an interview with “Fox & Friends,” HHS Secretary Tom Price was asked about part of Republicans’ bill that widens the possible ratio of premium prices between young and old people from 3:1 to 5:1, allowing insurers to charge older people more.

    “That’s going in the wrong direction,” Steve Doocy said.

    “Well, it’s pricing for what individuals’ health status is, and that’s important to appreciate,” Price said. “Somebody’s going to pay for health coverage for the American people, and the question is how do you do that. And right now, what we’re seeing is that the current plan doesn’t work, because you’ve got 20 million individuals out there who’ve said, ‘Nonsense, I’m not even going to participate in this process.’”

    Price was referring to individuals who opted not to buy insurance under Obamacare, either paying a fee or claiming a “hardship exemption.”

    Pressed on whether the government would provide assistance for “people who are going to end up paying five times more,” Price said individuals would “absolutely” receive help, “depending on where you are in the economic spectrum.”

  251. 251.

    Tilda Swintons Bald Cap

    @Elizabelle: Yes, just sayin’ that the original tweet that this vote is a prelude to no elections or other strictly fascistic moves is silly IMHO. The Republicans are assholes and they’ve taken a calculated risk that they won’t pay a price. I think there’s a lot of evidence to support their conclusion. Also, they play the long game and even if this ultimately goes nowhere they will NEVER stop trying to do this, even if they were to be kicked out in 2018. Eventually they’ll be in control and will try again.

  252. 252.

    Chris

    @Patricia Kayden:

    @MomSense: The GOP can exist. People need to stop voting for them.

    In Washington DC, the Statehood-Green Party once won more votes in an election than the Republican Party (2006).

    Quite frankly, that is what a sane political scene looks like.

  253. 253.

    hovercraft

    First Female White House Chief Usher ‘No Longer Employed’

    By Matt Shuham Published May 5, 2017 11:37 am

    The first female White House chief usher left that position sometime before Friday morning, a rare turnover in a post marked by long tenures.

    A White House official confirmed to TPM that Angella Reid “is no longer employed by the White House. We are very grateful for her service and wish her the very best.” They did not answer questions on the reasons for Reid’s departure.

    The Washington Post, which first reported the story, said that the White House fired Reid. The Post noted that Reid was just the ninth chief usher since 1885, appointed by then-President Barack Obama in 2011.

    The chief usher is responsible for managing all White House staff and grounds, from cooks to plumbers, acting as a general manager of sorts for the 132-room residence.

  254. 254.

    hovercraft

    GOP Senator: Our Obamacare Repeal Bill Must ‘Pass The Jimmy Kimmel Test’

    Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) on Friday morning said that the Senate’s bill to repeal and replace Obamacare must “pass the Jimmy Kimmel test” and ensure that a sick child gets all the care he or she needs.

    During an interview on CNN, host John Berman asked Cassidy if he would support a bill that would allow insurance companies to cap payments to customers.

    “As you present that, I ask does it pass the Jimmy Kimmel test?” Cassidy replied. “Would the child born with a congenital heart disease be able to get everything she or he would need in that first year of life? I want it to pass the Jimmy Kimmel test. So the simple answer, I want to make sure folks get the care they need.”

    I see the “all life is sacred” has actually crept out of the womb, and in this case is being extended to one whole year!
    Progress people!

  255. 255.

    germy

    Keeping positive

    Not only did dozens of Republicans in marginal districts just hitch their names to an unpopular piece of legislation, Democrats just received another valuable candidate recruitment tool. In fact, Democrats aren’t so much recruiting candidates as they are overwhelmed by a deluge of eager newcomers, including doctors and veterans in traditionally red seats who have no political record for the GOP to attack – almost a mirror image of 2010.

    http://cookpolitical.com/story/10342

  258. 258.

    hovercraft

    Chaffetz Going After Obama’s Pension Instead Of Investigating Russia
    By John Amato

    Jason Chaffetz
    ✔
    @jasoninthehouse

    Obama’s $400,000 speech could prompt Congress to go after his pension https://usat.ly/2pyJUSb via @USATODAY Yes, it will
    8:24 PM – 3 May 2017
    Photo published for Obama’s $400,000 speech could prompt Congress to go after his pension
    Obama’s $400,000 speech could prompt Congress to go after his pension

    Last year, the former president vetoed a bill that would have cut his pension.
    usatoday.com

    1,642 1,642 Retweets
    2,573

  260. 260.

    MCA1

    @germy: I don’t buy this. These (supposed) people (supposedly) discontented enough with the leader of their party to (supposedly) openly talk of removing him from the White House just got together and passed a piece of shit bill that, if any negative electoral ramifications come of it, will impact them, not him, and then went to his house for a kegger. All so he could see his flaccid poll numbers spike for a week or two on the wind of a “victory.” It’s likely that multiple R members of Congress just committed political hari kari for Drumpf yesterday. That’s not what you do when you think a guy needs to be removed from office. Neither is slow walking/sabotaging the Russia investigations that they know damned well would sink Hair Furor to depths that would make it easy to depose him.

    It’s always the same. Always. Talk talk talk mavericky this moderate that. They never actually DO anything out of line. Ever.

  261. 261.

    Elie

    I dunno if someone upstring has already asked, but why aren’t the major institutional providers who would get burned bad by the absence of Medicaid, not screaming from the rooftops? Not only are these providers at risk, but they are big employers, particularly in rural areas. I also don’t get the general silence of the insurance industry, which despite the fact that they will pull out of markets, will also cut hundreds if not thousands of jobs that were in place to administer Obamacare. The people who will not receive care will have two negatives: 1) they won’t have coverage and 2) even if they can scrape up the cash, in many places there won’t be enough providers — (and this was a problem to some extent even during Obamacare).

  263. 263.

    TenguPhule

    @Elie: They were making noise. Republicans rushed this vote through in 3 days.

    Now they’re really going to start making noise.

  264. 264.

    MCA1

    @tobie: I’ve decided that (just as I felt back in November) all of this requires a complete reorientation of both long term strategy and short term tactics from Democrats. Which is why this is all so depressing. That will take decades. People should go out and resist and do so with gusto, but it’s damage control. It’s a band-aid. Our polity is broken, and there’s no way to fix it without stooping to the levels of those who broke it.

    Republicans have spent half a century now attempting to infantilize politics and their supporters, through the creation of its own propaganda media, constant attempts to corrode the public’s trust in traditional media, and full embrace of lowest common denominator, wedge-driving, race to the bottom appeals to the lizard brains of Americans. And it worked. They have successfully created their own world, full of their own conventional wisdom that need not be supported by facts because their tribe just believes it to be so. That conventional wisdom includes several completely poisonous ideas: that liberals aren’t patriots or “real” Americans, that they’re trying to take away from the deserving and give away free things to the undeserving (and that their audience, of course, are part of the former), that they’re communists, OK with bankrupting America, and they want desperately to confiscate everyone’s firearms and kill their “way of life.” They radicalized their followers, and built both-sides-do-it to depress the middle of the electorate, and now they reap the benefits. They built a society in which hyperpartisanship, basic ignorance of civics and history, cynical indifference to politics, and belief that both sides are terrible is so great that they stood there and baldly told the nation a year ago that any Supreme Court nominee put forward by a properly elected (x2) Democratic President is fundamentally illegitimate, and 60% of the nation either cheered for it, or collectively shrugged its fucking shoulders and said “OK.”

    For most of this time, the Democratic response to all of this has been to appeal to our better, more logical, humane angels. As Mann and Ornstein concluded nearly a decade ago now, the hyperpartisanship in American politics has been massively assymetrical. It’s a logical, and admirable, response to what Republicans have done. The fever has to break at some point. Peak Wingnut will arrive, and sense will eventually prevail. Demographics are inevitable. The election of President Obama made it feel like this was the right way to go, and it was working. People had finally woken up to the incoherence and incompetence that inevitably takes over in a party of nihilism.

    Well, we all see now, that was wrong. Democrats need to be all shrill, all the time from here on. Call the other side liars and traitors and a party of Russian sleeper agents. All day, every day. Paint yourselves as the “real” Americans. Start framing Republicans as all the same, with no redeeming qualities whatsoever, and repeat it over and over and over and over and over until it becomes accepted as fact. And wage war on the media instead of trusting they’ll eventually figure it out. This, unfortunately, is a process that won’t bear fruit until a lot of us are dead and gone.

  266. 266.

    hovercraft

    @Elie:

    They are pissed, this was rushed, but their timing gives the other side to ramp up to try to stop this.

    Republican bill generates unity—patients hate it, docs hate it, hospitals hate it, insurers hate it
    By Mark Sumner
    Friday May 05, 2017 · 11:11 AM EST

    It turns out that Donald Trump and Paul Ryan really are capable of bridging divides and bringing the nation together.

    It is a rare unifying moment. Hospitals, doctors, health insurers and some consumer groups, with few exceptions, are speaking with one voice and urging significant changes to the Republican health care legislation that passed the House on Thursday.

    What does the AMA think of the latest Trumpcare bill?

    “None of the legislative tweaks under consideration changes the serious harm to patients and the health care delivery system if AHCA passes. Proposed changes to the bill tinker at the edges without remedying the fundamental failing of the bill – that millions of Americans will lose their health insurance as a direct result of this proposal.

    What does the AARP say about Medicaid cuts in the bill?

    The impact of such a huge loss of federal Medicaid funds on people with disabilities and poor seniors will be devastating—especially for 11 million Medicare beneficiaries who are also eligible for Medicaid.

    But aren’t the insurance companies supposed to love this?

    … Blue Shield of California, came out in opposition to the bill before the vote. “We feel compelled to oppose it,” said Paul Markovich, the company’s chief executive. “It raises the specter that the sickest and neediest among us will be disproportionately hit in losing access.”

  267. 267.

    hovercraft

    @Just One More Canuck:

    Black, Female, Obama cooties? Any one or all three would be enough, add that she’s probably uppity and you have more than enough cause to get rid of her.

  268. 268.

    Jinchi

    @Baud:

    I googled to see if Occupy Wall Street endorsed anyone for president. Only Wilmer, it seems. Nothing came up for after the primary.

    I didn’t realize that Occupy Wall Street was an intact and established organization with a leadership that was capable of endorsing anybody.

  269. 269.

    TenguPhule

    @hovercraft:

    When the revolution comes can we send these morons off to Guantanamo along with the GOP. They are all Deatheaters,

    May I remind you the Deatheaters enlisted the evil abomination guards of their prison as allies, escaped and proceeded to wreck havoc because the idiotic pacifist wizards decided that terrorist serial killers didn’t deserve the death penalty?

  270. 270.

    TenguPhule

    @MCA1:

    The fever has to break at some point. Peak Wingnut will arrive, and sense will eventually prevail.

    Dude, even John Cole gave up on this happy delusion.

  272. 272.

    TenguPhule

    @efgoldman: At the current rate of increasing fuckedupness this nation is not going to survive 26 more WEEKS of this shit.

  273. 273.

    MCA1

    @TenguPhule: Oh, I know. So did I, although I guess a part of me still carried a related delusion: that a significant enough percentage of people could see that the fever existed and would act appropriately. I think institutional Democratic thinking has been to assume more people were laughing at the Republicans than were being successfully brainwashed by them, when the opposite turns out to be the case. I knew the fringes of the Right wouldn’t start moving back toward the middle anytime soon, but I didn’t appreciate how many people had been ringfenced over there. I don’t recall saying before the election last year “Those people are unreachable” and meaning literally a third of the country the way I do now.

  276. 276.

    lethargytartare

    @raven:

    Why My Father Votes for Le Pen

    TLDR: “he’s a virulent racist and homophobe, but it’s really because he feels ignored”

    wevs

  277. 277.

    No One You Know

    @Kay: It works like voter suppression…. it’s student suppression. Gives the rich republican kids less competition?

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