Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

This chaos was totally avoidable.

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

Many life forms that would benefit from greater intelligence, sadly, do not have it.

The real work of an opposition party is to oppose.

The words do not have to be perfect.

Historically it was a little unusual for the president to be an incoherent babbling moron.

Good lord, these people are nuts.

Their boy Ron is an empty plastic cup that will never know pudding.

Of course you can have champagne before noon. That’s why orange juice was invented.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

I would try pessimism, but it probably wouldn’t work.

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

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

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

… pundit janitors mopping up after the gop

Every decision we make has lots of baggage with it, known or unknown.

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

People really shouldn’t expect the government to help after they watched the GOP drown it in a bathtub.

The Giant Orange Man Baby is having a bad day.

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

If you cannot answer whether trump lost the 2020 election, you are unfit for office.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

“Facilitate” is an active verb, not a weasel word.

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Say that you’ll be true

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Rand is also a no on motion to proceed and Heller seems to be too. If they all stick to it, then the bill’s as dead as Dillinger.

I don’t what’s the dealio with Murkowski and Capito, but they probably aren’t anxious to vote for this POS either.

Reader Interactions

132Comments

  2. 2.

    Smiling Mortician

    Current list from 5calls.org has the following GOP senators as “No” votes, for whatever that’s worth:

    Rand Paul (R-KY)
    Susan Collins (R-ME)
    Dean Heller (R-NV)
    Ted Cruz (R-TX)
    Mike Lee (R-UT)

  5. 5.

    WaterGirl

    Doug, someone was saying on a previous thread that The Turtle had 2 free passes for “no” votes to give out and that these two have those free passes. So I think this means nothing.

    *Unless the bastards still don’t know how to count, which wouldn’t totally surprise me.

  12. 12.

    dmsilev

    @WaterGirl: Motion To Proceed. The first formal step to bringing the bill to a vote. And because the Senate is weird, they vote on whether or not to vote on something.

  14. 14.

    dmsilev

    Of course, Susan Collins being an Official Washington Centrist(tm), it’s entirely possible that she means to vote no on Meet The Press.

  16. 16.

    SatanicPanic

    I don’t buy it that Rand Paul is a firm no. What’s he going to do, pass on a chance to roll back government? Yeah, right.

  17. 17.

    Hungry Joe

    If it appears it’s doomed it won’t be close: The “center-right” posers will vote No and cruise on that forever (“She really IS a moderate voice!”) and the loons on the far, far right will do likewise (“He really IS a man of principle!”). But if push comes to shiv, Susan C. and one or two others will fold.

  18. 18.

    MisterForkbeard

    Would be very surprised if Murkowski and Capito stuck their heads out. If the bill is going to fail, they don’t need to piss off their people by saying how they’ll vote.

    This only changes if they decide it really IS that odious in their states.

  22. 22.

    Davis X. Machina

    The way you cave w.o. leaving fingerprints is to vote ‘yes’ or ‘no’ against party on motion to proceed, and ‘no’ or ‘yes’ as whipped on the underlying bill.
    Keeps everyone happy, sort of.

    Manchin, e.g. voted ‘no’ on motion to proceed on Obama’s DADT repeal, then abstained on the bill.

    Voting ‘no’ on mtp is no-in-all-caps.

  23. 23.

    JPL

    Obviously, Pence can step in to break a tie on bills, can he do the same on the motion to proceed?

  24. 24.

    debbie

    @dmsilev:

    So if she votes no on the MTP, but loses, she can still vote yes on the actual vote, right? Her Tweet is meaningless.

  25. 25.

    NorthLeft12

    Sorry/Not sorry, but I don’t believe this at all. The Rogue Repubs will fall in line and vote to cause the deaths of thousands of Americans. Young, old, disabled, whatever. McConnell may throw a literal bone at them so that they can rationalize to their state that they held out for a better deal, but they will fold.
    I just don’t understand how people can be that mean and heartless. Not sure where I read this, but someone said that the US is still the richest country in the world and yet cannot be bothered to ensure the health of its own citizens.

  26. 26.

    Roger Moore

    Rand is also a no on motion to proceed and Heller seems to be too. If they all stick to it, then the bill’s as dead as Dillinger.

    Not really. That just means they’re holding out for more changes. The bill isn’t any more dead than the House version was when Ryan had to hold off the vote because he didn’t have the numbers to pass it. I won’t believe this bill is dead until it’s staked through the heart, beheaded, has its mouth stuffed with consecrated hosts, and the whole thing is buried at a crossroads at midnight.

  28. 28.

    Omnes Omnibus

    I bet that, if at least three GOPer vote against, then the total GOP nos will be 6-8.

  30. 30.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Roger Moore: Can we give the changes designed to win them over cute, folksy nicknames based on the states they represent? That’s how it works, right?

  31. 31.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Wing nut welfare recipient and antiObamaCare activist, talking about his own people

    Philip Klein‏Verified account @ philipaklein 27m27 minutes ago
    Philip Klein Retweeted Sen. Susan Collins
    I smell the Rural Maine Hospital Improvemenent Amendment brewing.

    On a more hopeful note, if she’is really planning on running for governor, several tweeters (Wikler was one, I think) are saying this obscenity will fuck with state budgets in ways that aren’t even being realistically addressed, so maybe she doesn’t want to put that headache on her new job, especially with an aging population in Maine.

  32. 32.

    dmsilev

    @Roger Moore: There is a deadline coming up that they have to deal with, which is that the reconciliation instructions expire on Sept 30th. After that, it becomes a 60-vote threshold. And those 3 months aren’t as long as they might seem, because Congress will take off several weeks in the summer and there are a bunch of other must-pass things (such as the debt ceiling) which need to be dealt with as soon as they come back. In principle, in that scenario they could try again next year but that’s an election year…

    It’s a narrow path, but not impossible.

  34. 34.

    Ben from Virginia

    They control all three branches and will likely get it through. Republicans will get what they want until we get back control of at least one part of the government.

    This might not be very popular on here, but at least some of the blame for this bill rests squarely on the shoulders of the Democratic Party leadership from 2009-2016–including Obama. Being electorally uncompetititve in such large parts of the country led not only to Trump, but it enabled the Republicans to sabotage Medicaid expansion and the state exchanges.

    Obama and his leadership did a piss-poor job of getting anyone elected but Obama.

    And as the Georgia results show, I’m not sure we’ve learned the lesson yet.

  36. 36.

    JPL

    @Ben from Virginia: Early on, I realized that if he could come within five, that would be a win for me. GA 6th is a very conservative district. There’s a reason why Price wasn’t challenged.

  37. 37.

    Ben from Virginia

    @JPL:

    Could have won it with better messaging (needed somebody who could at least engage in (largely meaningless) cultural signalling on abortion and guns in that particular district) and less toxic House leadership.

    How many people bitched about “conservadems” during the Obama years? Well I bet you wish we had, say, Ben Nelson and Max Baucus in there now, don’t you?

  38. 38.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Breaking News! Balloon Juice Comment Thread Exclusive: New concern troll remains concerned! We’ll have more on this story after this break…
    /five commercials for a new medication for eczema, male pattern baldness and swimmers thumb, some of which may cause male pattern baldness and socially inappropriate gas/
    The term “troll” comes from the Old High German Drülle, which was thought to designate, in 7th century Saxony…..

  39. 39.

    Splitting Image

    @Hungry Joe:

    If it appears it’s doomed it won’t be close: The “center-right” posers will vote No and cruise on that forever (“She really IS a moderate voice!”) and the loons on the far, far right will do likewise (“He really IS a man of principle!”). But if push comes to shiv, Susan C. and one or two others will fold.

    I agree with this. The bill won’t fail by one or two votes. Either McConnell will whip the vote to 50+Pence or ten craven cowards will swtich to no at the last minute to either burnish their moderate credentials by voting against an unpopular bill that will kill people or their conservative credentials by voting against an unpopular bill that doesn’t go far enough to repeal the ACA.

    Keep at them phones.

  40. 40.

    Another Scott

    @Hungry Joe: Agreed. If it is failing, then McConnell will pull it or it will go down hard.

    CSPAN-2 has Democrats in the Senate speaking. Van Hollen just finished and Schatz is talking now. They’re making good, strong points, but they’re not screaming as if the world is ending. I would like to think that it means that they know it will not pass, but I’m not an expert on the speaking styles of Democratic senators….

    Keep fighting.

    Fingers crossed.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  44. 44.

    gene108

    @Major Major Major Major:

    We do know that Mitch just wants this the fuck over with either way, but I’ll believe it when I see it.

    Mitch wants to win. He and the Republican donor class, which is calling the shots here, want their tax cuts and will primary the fuck out of any Republican who votes no.

  47. 47.

    Keith P.

    [Rand] Paul’s answer is to allow groups other than just employers to pool their risks and make it worthwhile for insurers to cover the whole group

    I actually like this idea, and I suggested it in a conversation recently. Since single payer, etc. is causing so many issues, and no one can come up with an agreement, how about various tech companies (or any profitable industry) band together to form a (non-profit) consortium for the purpose of providing an alternative to employer-based group coverage (group coverage has been a lifesaver for me on occasion)

  48. 48.

    Davis X. Machina

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: The Maine state legislature passed Medicaid expansion six times with big bipartisan majorities, just to run into six vetos from Governor Ragey Asshole. Then 66,000 people signed petitions to put it on November’s ballot as a citizen initiative. The state’s pretty loudly thrown in with Medicaid — as Collins said, one Mainer in five is on it. We’ve also got an opioid crisis as bad as any in WV or OH.

    I don’t think a technical fix or cosmetic patch to provisions in the bill affecting rural hospitals is going to do the trick.

    Mitch McConnell can’t put Collins in the Blaine House, but he can make it much harder for her to put herself there.

  49. 49.

    Ben from Virginia

    @schrodingers_cat:

    The Russia obsession is entering “Protocols of the Elders of Zion” territory here and makes us look unhinged to swing voters and independents.

  53. 53.

    Ben from Virginia

    @?BillinGlendaleCA:

    You don’t make it easy for them, which is what we do with Pelosi. She is a literal “San Francisco liberal”. It would be like the GOP making Louis Gohmert Speaker.

  57. 57.

    hovercraft

    @Cheryl Rofer:
    Perpetually concerned Lindsey say it will not fail 49 to 51, it will either scrape past or it will fail bigly, in the 30’s. It’s such a shitburger that if they know it’s going down then anyone not in a ruby red state will bail, if it’s close Yertle will buy the votes he needs to get over the finish line.

  58. 58.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Omnes Omnibus: Supposed Democrat thinks President Obama and Nancy Pelosi are failures, wants Dems to be Republican Lite on gun control and reproductive rights. Talks about Elders of Zion and Brezhnev. Pooh-poohs Russian interference.

  59. 59.

    Barbara

    @Eljai: He doesn’t intend to help. He intends to divert. He is better at it than most, but its’ still really obvious.

  60. 60.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Ben from Virginia:

    This might not be very popular on here, but at least some of the blame [etc.]

    Ya know, I think I’ve heard this theory before, both recently and, like, every single motherfucking day since Election Day 2008.

  62. 62.

    Ben from Virginia

    @schrodingers_cat:

    I am directly controlled by the Kremlin, clearly, an FSB agent who has nothing better to do than target little-known liberal blogs.

    Trump’s victory has clearly broken some of your minds…I know a lot of you made serious emotional investment in the Cult of Hillary, but Jesus…

  65. 65.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Major Major Major Major: I don’t think it’s that guy — JHB is more triumphalist, like a juvenile-socialist version of the BOOKMARK IT LIBS! guy from the glory days of Sadly, No, who I think morphed into one of the trolls at LGM. This guy does sound familiar, though. There was someone else who was based in Virginia and used to finger-wag at everyone about how Democrats should admit that guns were neato. I’m not remembering the name…

  66. 66.

    Turgidson

    @Ben from Virginia:

    The GOP made an Ayn Rand-worshipping sociopath who wouldn’t know the truth or correct arithmetic if it hit him in the face with a bronzed copy of Atlas Shrugged their Speaker. And before that their Speaker was possibly an alcoholic who only entered public service in order to engage in flagrant corruption. Before that, they had a Speaker who has since been thrown in the clink for being a pedophile. And the Majority Leader from that era has also spent time in the slammer.

    But tell me again how we should just accept at face value the dipshit notion that Nancy Pelosi is toxic and run her out of town because some David Brooks-type wankers tell us to.

  68. 68.

    Ben from Virginia

    Anybody who thinks Nancy Pelosi’s brand is toxic in swing districts, or thinks that maybe the Democrats should run more moderate candidates on social issues in said swing (or conservative) districts, or thinks that maybe we shouldn’t write off nearly half the country as racist, is clearly a Russian agent.

    WTF is wrong with you people? Do you even realize how you sound?

  72. 72.

    Ksmiami

    @Ben from Virginia: hey Ef you buddy lots of great things have come from San Fran and outlying areas including the keypad you’re typing on. Dems just need to push back harder and meaner

  74. 74.

    Roger Moore

    @Keith P.:
    I don’t think this will work because of adverse selection. Employer group coverage works because people can’t just decide to get jobs with good health coverage. If anything, there’s some selection in favor of healthy people, since employment-based coverage excludes people who are too sick to work. If you have non-work-related groups, though, they’ll fill up with people who can’t get coverage any other way, i.e. sick people. Unless you add in a coverage mandate, you’ll get a death spiral. If you do add a mandate, you’ll need to add subsidies so everyone can afford to join, and the new coverage will wind up being essentially the same as the current exchanges.

  75. 75.

    Barbara

    I don’t think Collins will vote for it. I don’t know who else will sit it out. Most likely Heller. Toomey and Portman are banking on having five years to redeem themselves. Flake and Capito are from states where voting for this should be unthinkable, except that they don’t really think at all. So I don’t know.

  77. 77.

    p.a.

    Hey remember when repeal was dead in the House? Good times…

    Scorpion. Fox. River. It’s who they are.

  78. 78.

    Ksmiami

    @Ben from Virginia: that’s it once you call balloon juice denizens a cult of Hillary followers youve earned a time out- if anything this is the jackal den of independent cats. Dude this is one of the most independent thinking blogs on the interwebs. So in other words gfy

  81. 81.

    Davis X. Machina

    @Barbara: Capito’s looking at the same math Collins is — Maine is WV with lobsters, basically. Of course, it’s an open secret that Collins is running for governor in ’18 and Capito isn’t.

  82. 82.

    gene108

    @NorthLeft12:

    Not sure where I read this, but someone said that the US is still the richest country in the world and yet cannot be bothered to ensure the health of its own citizens.

    Our GDP is more than the the next three richest countries combined ( China, Germany and Japan).

    Thanks to shitty media and shitty policy that keeps slashing services, in the name of tax cuts, most Americans cannot grasp how much money is sloshing around in this country.

    But I think the super rich are very aware and want it all.

    The US was only surpassed by China as the largest manufacturing economy within the last five years. The size of the US manufacturing sector is about half of Germany’s entire GDP.

    We are arguably the richest nation in the history of the world.

  84. 84.

    SFBayAreaGal

    Hey you all if you ignore the troll, it will crawl back underneath its bridge and starve to death. So don’t let this ugly fake concern piece of shit high jack the conservation. Let the troll starve and die underneath the bridge it came from.

  86. 86.

    EBT

    @SFBayAreaGal: People should use the pie filter like cole intended. Sometimes it lags like half a second so I think I saw ben threaten to dox people but I couldn’t be sure.

  91. 91.

    JMG

    The bill’s far from dead. But it sounds as if there won’t be a vote this week. That’s a plus. Pols usually show up for 4th of July celebrations, Those in Maine, WV, Ohio, Nev and Ariz should be especially well attended if you catch my drift.

  92. 92.

    Turgidson

    @SFBayAreaGal:

    I just wanted to seize the opportunity to list off how the last few GOP House leaders have been crooks and/or insane. (not mutually exclusive, of course)

  94. 94.

    Davis X. Machina

    @JMG: ME’s a small state. I’ve met all of our senators personally going back to Mitchell and Cohen. Graduations, fairs, stuff like that. She’ll get an earful, if she goes anywhere.

  95. 95.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @FlipYrWhig: There was someone else who was based in Virginia and used to finger-wag at everyone about how Democrats should admit that guns were neato. I’m not remembering the name…

    That Steve is now, I believe, posting as Adamantine RBG, or something. The other Steve ran a really good business creating jobs, which he kept afloat on his Discover Card, and that was being crushed by ObamaCare.

  98. 98.

    gene108

    @Keith P.:

    The issue with pooling non-employer groups and even some employer groups, is the groups want to avoid insuring really expensive people.

    If you are on blood pressure medicine, they don’t really care, as treatments to manage chronic conditions is relatively cheap.

    It is the folks on organ transplant lists or other possiblely expensive treatments they want to keep out.

    It’ll take a lot of regulation to make those groups work for high cost populations.

  103. 103.

    Eljai

    @JMG: Agreed. The more this thing gets delayed, the more people have a chance to find out what a vicious piece of crap it is, and the more time we have to organize.

  105. 105.

    SFBayAreaGal

    @Turgidson: You might like this. A friend of a friend did some research about Republican administrations having been much more criminally corrupt over the last 50 plus years than the Democrats.

    “When comparing criminal indictments of those serving in the executive branch of presidential administrations it’s so lopsided as to be ridiculous. Yet all we ever hear is how corrupt the Democrats are. So why don’t we break it down by president and the numbers.

    Obama – 8yrs in office. Zero criminal indictments, zero convictions and zero prison sentences. So the next time somebody describes the Obama administration as “scandal free” they aren’t speaking wishfully, they’re simply telling the truth.

    Bush, George W. – 8yrs in office. 16 criminal indictments. 16 convictions. 9 prison sentences.

    Clinton – 8yrs in office. 2 criminal indictments. One conviction. One prison sentence. That’s right nearly 8yrs of investigations, tens of millions spent and 30yrs of claiming them the most corrupt ever and there was exactly one person convicted of a crime.

    Bush, George H. W. – 4yrs in office. One indictment. One conviction. One prison sentence.

    Reagan – 8yrs in office. 26 criminal indictments. 16 convictions. 8 prison sentences.

    Carter – 4yrs in office. One indictment, zero convictions and zero prison sentences.

    Ford – 2 1/2 yrs in office. One indictment and one conviction. One prison sentence.

    Nixon – 6yrs in office. 76 criminal indictments. 55 convictions. 15 prison sentences.

    Johnson – 5yrs in office. Zero indictments. Zero convictions. Zero prison sentences.

    So, let’s see where that leaves us. In the last 53 years Democrats have been in office for 25 of those years while Republicans held it for 28. In their 25yrs in office Democrats had a total of three executive branch officials indicted with one conviction and one prison sentence. That’s one whole executive branch official convicted of a crime in two and a half decades of Democrat leadership.

    In the 28yrs that Republicans have held office over the last 53yrs they have had a total of (a drum roll would be more than appropriate), 120 criminal indictments of executive branch officials. 89 criminal convictions and 34 prison sentences handed down. That’s more prison sentences than years in office since 1968 for Republicans.

    If you want to count articles of impeachment as indictments (they aren’t really but we can count them as an action), both sides get one more. However, Clinton wasn’t found guilty while Nixon resigned and was pardoned by Ford. So those only serve to make Republicans look even worse.

    With everything going on with Trump and his people right now, it’s a safe bet Republicans are gonna be padding their numbers a bit real soon.

    So let’s just go over the numbers one more time shall we:

    120 indictments for Republicans. 89 convictions and 34 prison sentences. Those aren’t “feelings” or “alternate facts” those are simply the stats by the numbers. Republicans are, and have been for my entire lifetime, the most criminally corrupt party to hold the office of the presidency.

    Written by Peggy Ruch”

  109. 109.

    Lurking Canadian

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: That Steve guy was the least successful troll of all time. He seemed to be trying to pick a fight, but nobody would ever fight with him. His thing was that the Democrats had to choose between social justice or liberal economics, walking and chewing gum at the same time being impossible.

    It sort of presaged the dreary primary fight of 2016, except I could never tell which of the two (social issues or economics) he thought the Dems should pick, and which they should discard. Maybe, like a high school debater, he was prepared to argue either side, if only SOMEBODY would pick up the damned gauntlet, but nobody ever did.

  114. 114.

    D58826

    So the senator from Alaska doesn’t have enough information yet to decide who to vote on Trumpcare.
    HOW much data does she need – 23-24 million people will lose their healthcare. Go in a closet, close the door, close your eyes and ask what would Jesus do? Not really hard Lisa.

    What continues to amaze me is that it is taking all of this political activism to try and make a simple point – in the richest nation in the world it is totally immoral not to ensure that every citizen has access to quality medical care simply because of money.

    The activism is great and hopefully can be leveraged over to other issues bu this should be a non-brainer.

  123. 123.

    D58826

    Rachel is discussing Jared’s business deals. Now Der Fuhrer has so much confidence in him that he went to the ME to solve the Palestinian/Israeli issue. But we are find out more about his business dealings. It turns out that we have been wrong about his amnesia over meetings with the Russians. It turns out that he doesn’t remember talking to Germans either, to the tune of 300 million dollars in loans. But he is a busy guy so losing track of 300 million dollars is no big deal, just a rounding error.

  127. 127.

    D58826

    And on the SCOTUS immigration decision, according to a former Obama homeland security lawyer – that if this is a win for Trump than let him have more wins like this. Since the court upheld the lower court decision affecting people with a connection to someone in the US that means that 90% of the people will be allowed in. The portion of the EO that will be allowed to go into effect will impact individuals from these countries who just want to visit the US as tourists.

  128. 128.

    Citizen Scientist

    @Ksmiami: “the jackal den of independent cats”. Boy, I can’t wait until that becomes an official post tag.

  130. 130.

    Keith P.

    @gene108: I have ESRD and am on dialysis, but every employer I’ve had since then has let me join their group. I’ve never even been asked to provide proof of continuing coverage. IMO that’s the major upside to group coverage, and with a consortium, it allows for a much, much larger group. The govt could, say, offer members of the consortium tax breaks in addition to the non-profit consortium in exchange for letting non-employees sign up. Not sure if the numbers would work, even on that scale, but at least there’d be GOP support for it (although it’s always possible to risk waiting on them being politically forced to accept single-payer)

  132. 132.

    Mnemosyne

    @Ben from Virginia:

    Nice to see that Citizens United has been shoved down the memory hole once again. Now it’s all Obama’s fault that the Democrats started to lose as soon as unaccountable SuperPACs were allowed to pump huge amounts of money into local races.

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