Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Trump’s cabinet: like a magic 8 ball that only gives wrong answers.

If ‘weird’ was the finish line, they ran through the tape and kept running.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Welcome to day five of every-bit-as-bad-as-you-thought-it-would-be.

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

We are aware of all internet traditions.

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

There are more Russians standing up to Putin than Republicans.

Shut up, hissy kitty!

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

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

“Until such time as the world ends, we will act as though it intends to spin on.”

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

Hot air and ill-informed banter

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

’Where will you hide, Roberts, the laws all being flat?’

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

With all due respect and assumptions of good faith, please fuck off into the sun.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

No Kings: Americans standing in the way of bad history saying “Oh, Fuck No!”

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

Republicans do not pay their debts.

You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Don't Mourn, Organize / No time like the present

No time like the present

by | 101 Comments

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Keep calling the Senate.

In the meantime, remember this: the Republican Congress is about to either pass the most unpopular piece of legislation ever to pass Congress (I shit you not) or fall on its face failing to do so. There will be a guilty plea today in what is by far the worst political American political scandal since Watergate if not of all time.

Did I mention that Democrats are up double digits in the generic ballot?

There has never been a better time to get involved in Democratic politics. There will probably never be a better time to get involved in Democratic politics. I have a friend who wants to eventually hold local office. He was thinking he’d want to wait a few years (he’s in his early 30s) until he’d established himself more, but now he thinks he has do to it in the next few years. Why? He has his eye on a seat that’s a toss-up, or maybe leans R, under normal circumstances but will probably go to a Democrat in the next race because of the national political climate.

Every crisis is an opportunity. We’re in the middle of a terrible national crisis, really of several national crises at once. It would have better to avert these crises, but if we can’t, we’ve got to take advantage of the opportunities they present.

Let’s have an open thread where people discuss how they’re getting involved how they think others can get involved.

I’m not in a place in my life where I can do much, but when I was, I got very involved in two local Congressional races and two State Senate races, and I had a great time doing it.

Reader Interactions

101Comments

  2. 2.

    Chris

    Far, far worse than Watergate. Watergate didn’t involve Nixon coordinating his crimes with the USSR.

  7. 7.

    piratedan

    brought up from extremely down thread… I sit here digesting all of this and I’m sitting at my keyboard and type here with the thought that we had a major political party candidate coordinate with a foreign power to gain the Presidency. Not just that, but that his party willingly knew that this was the case and went along with it. At what point did these guys stop being Americans? At what point did they stop believing in America itself or did they never understand what it means to be an American?

  8. 8.

    acallidryas

    Yes, call your local group—local Democratic Party, Indivisible, Flippable whatever it may be—and ask how you can help. Run for office or help on the campaigns of the people who are. I’m in VA, and we’re still riding on the high of winning big because we ran people *every where*.

    And, pay attention to the local politics. Go to your city council or county board meetings. I know they’re boring, but people count on them being too boring for regular folks. Go and make your voice heard. And pay attention to the way Rs are trying to use the system to avoid paying a price. Do what you can to support voting rights in your city and state, and look at places like Defend Local, http://www.defendlocal.com, who are fighting preemption, basically red states passing laws to override decisions made by blue cities. Just because the conservative ideas are hideously unpopular and undemocratic doesn’t mean they’re not using every tool possible to fight for them.

    So, get engaged every place that you can, donate either time or money, talk to your friends and family and get as many involved as you can, and win big in 2018.

  10. 10.

    Roger Moore

    @Chris:

    Watergate didn’t involve Nixon coordinating his crimes with the USSR.

    True. Oddly, the previous cases where Republican candidates did coordinate with our foreign enemies (Nixon with North Vietnam, Reagan with Iran) came out too late to be useful attacks against them. Trump wasn’t subtle enough in working with Russia to get the same advantage.

  11. 11.

    bluehill

    Heard some commentator speculate on why the repubs are so insistent on pushing through such an unpopular bill. Basically, they realize their party is done either way and they might as well as get what they can on the way out. How exceptional.

  13. 13.

    Yarrow

    Saw a report on Twitter that someone just got through to Collins’ DC office again. KEEP CALLING!

  14. 14.

    beef

    Flynn’s not just going to testify against Trump. According to ABC, he “is prepared to testify…against Pres. Trump, against members of the Trump family, and others in the White House”. Yikes.

  17. 17.

    germy

    Judd Legum‏Verified account
    Judd Legum Retweeted Brian Stelter

    We never talked to the Russians

    We talked to them, but only once

    We talked to them a bunch of times, but never about the election

    We talked to them a lot about the election, but it wasn’t illegal

    Some people did illegal stuff, but no one close to Trump.

    Everyone lies.

  18. 18.

    Roger Moore

    @piratedan:

    I sit here digesting all of this and I’m sitting at my keyboard and type here with the thought that we had a major political party candidate coordinate with a foreign power to gain the Presidency.

    This should come as no surprise. The Republicans have done their best to bury the history, but Nixon and Reagan each also coordinated with foreign enemies to help their electoral chances. The big difference is that they were established politicians who were making a temporary deal to get ahead, while Trump is a wholly owned subsidiary of the FSB.

  19. 19.

    germy

    @Jeffro:

    FYI : top article on Fox News right now is…

    …about the Clinton-Lynch tarmac meeting.

    No shit.

    Oh, definitely. I wonder if Hannity has any scoops on HRC’s emails tonight?

  21. 21.

    Betty Cracker

    Great point about opportunity in a crisis! I’ll be interested in hearing what other folks are doing and getting new ideas from that. As for me, my focus since the election has been voter registration, and I’ve been involved in that in three different ways:

    1) Registering new voters and making sure registered voters’ info is up-to-date.

    2) Obtaining signatures for a ballot initiative to restore voter rights for non-violent felons who’ve served their time (FL law doesn’t automatically restore rights, and the state GOP makes it practically impossible for folks who’ve served their time to get rights restored).

    3) Registering as many recent arrivals from Puerto Rico as possible.

    To be honest, I fucking hate accosting people at street festivals, outside libraries, in front of the CostCo, etc. I also hate phone banking with the white hot heat of 10K suns. I hate going to boring-ass party meetings when I could be chilling with the mister over a glass of wine after a long day’s work. But it’s either that or give in to despair. I try to keep choosing hope.

  23. 23.

    West of the Cascades

    @Calouste: Plus it gives Manchin some cover in his reelection campaign to “reach” without ultimately getting in bed with. If WV elects Don Blankenship as Senator, Cole should investigate moving his whole family elsewhere.

  25. 25.

    Ridnik Chrome

    @Chris: Don’t forget that Nixon sabotaged the Paris peace talks so he could win the election in 1968. Let’s not whitewash the man just because of who came after him.

  29. 29.

    Kathleen

    I actually talked to people in Portman’s DC and Columbus offices. They were both very pleasant and professional. Cincy was busy and Cleveland went straight to mailbox full.
    My plan is to work on voter registration issues starting first of the year. Some purging of the rolls happened in Cincy and Cleveland.

  31. 31.

    PhoenixRising

    @Chris: Nixon DID reach out to our actual shootin-war enemy of the time, Vietnam, which extended the US war by interfering with the peace talks. We think around 7 million SE Asians died because of that, but that number might be higher or lower by 50%–it’s not off by an order of magnitude, is what demographers agree on.

    So yeah, Nixon didn’t bring the Soviets in on Watergate, but they’re not even til Trump looses a bunker buster on Pyongyang. Which, I’m hoping they took the keys earlier this AM.

  32. 32.

    iwritesometimes

    I mostly lurk and enjoy reading the fine material you all provide. But it’s times like these I’m reminded why I am sitting through local Dems council meetings that drag on and sometimes break down into pointless bickering, why I am donating to politicians who live hundreds of miles from me, why I just gave $20 to Resistbot: I spent a long time not caring enough to get involved. Now I care way too much not to at least try.

    Anyway, here, I made popcorn for everybody. :)

  34. 34.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Jeffro:

    FYI : top article on Fox News right now is…

    …about the Clinton-Lynch tarmac meeting.

    No shit.

    I know you said “no shit,” but I thought it was shit, so I went to take a look at that shit.

    It is what you said. No shit.

  38. 38.

    Ridnik Chrome

    @Patricia Kayden: I hope it burns all of the top Republican leaders — Pence, McConnell, Ryan, Kevin McCarthy and all the others. They all knew what was going on, and they were willing to go along with it so they could pass their lousy tax bill and put another wingnut on the Supreme Court. They all need to go down.

  39. 39.

    Yarrow

    @Betty Cracker: In that video I posted in the first comment Brian Ross said Flynn is prepared to testify against Trump and his family. Not enough popcorn in the world. And that he just made the decision in the last 24 hours. I’m sure that bail deal with Manafort had nothing to do with that. Nothing at all. Nope. Oh, and he’s in financial trouble and going to put his house on the market. So sad.

  41. 41.

    Roger Moore

    @Yarrow:

    #BREAKING the government wants Martin Shkreli to hand over the Wu Tang album in forfeiture (!!!) pic.twitter.com/bOzWjlLeOx— David Mack (@davidmackau) December 1, 2017

    Do not disrespect the Wu Tang Clan.

  45. 45.

    Mnemosyne

    It’s hard for me to call from work, so I send faxes. Even if your representative or senator doesn’t have a fax number listed, sometimes you can google to track it down.

    My senators are Harris and Feinstein, so fortunately I just need to send them repeated “attagirl!” thank-you notes.

  48. 48.

    H.E.Wolf

    Let’s have an open thread where people discuss how they’re getting involved how they think others can get involved.
    I’m not in a place in my life where I can do much…

    I’m meeting today with a staff member at the local office of our State Dems, to add a 2nd database project to my volunteer task list. Hooray! (And proof that there are valuable political tasks for volunteers, that do not require phoning strangers or knocking on doors.)

    This is part of my two-stage plan to get myself more involved, and to bring in as many other volunteers as I can – each of us to do a very small amount of work.

    Remember those kids’-book illustrations of the many little fish who formed themselves into the shape of a big fish, to chase away predators? That’ll be us.

    Wherever you are, and whatever the circumstances, a tiny amount of help will be welcome, and magnified by the contributions of others.

  50. 50.

    bystander

    I prayed the DFHs would be at the courthouse to greet Flynn with “Lock him up” and they were ! Yay!

  52. 52.

    germy

    @Yarrow:

    Oh, and he’s in financial trouble and going to put his house on the market. So sad.

    Does the house have a dungeon? I assume he had to keep his kidnappee somewhere before the flight.

  53. 53.

    dww44

    Thank you, Doug, for being such a fighter and urging us to be fighters as well. There is nothing to be gained by giving into the depression and disillusion that comes daily from Trump and the GOP. You help me keep focused on that.

  54. 54.

    B.B.A.

    Well, the tax bill is still likely to pass (without the votes of any of my Congresscritters, thank god), and I still don’t see any conceivable way Flynn flipping leads to impeachment or resignation or Trump losing the undying loyalty of the 27%… but still:

    Merry fucking Fitzmas.

  56. 56.

    Jeffro

    @chris: I fully expect every fox news report from here forward to add “Obama administration official” in front of Michael Flynn‘s name

  57. 57.

    WaterGirl

    @Yarrow: Sadly, I think we’re nowhere near the clock striking. Not yet. But I am very pleased this morning to have confirmation that we are indeed on the road.

    Tick, tock, motherfuckers.

  58. 58.

    gvg

    I can’t help wondering about what these greedheads think is going to happen after they get their tax break causing a huge depression with no safety net followed by Democrats winning and jacking the taxes up and improving the safety net. Possibly even some protax and safety net infra structure “New Republicans” winning primaries. They have to think that these proposals are not going to cause a disaster or else they expect to die of old age before it happens. Which means most of them are rather deluded too.
    People are going to die while it goes through this cycle which is why we have to fight it, but I am sure of the economics and history.
    I looked over on Fox a few times lately, to see what their partisan bias makes them post and I am more struck with how many of their top stories are about bizzare violent crimes. they really sell the fear more than pro Republicans. People who read them all the time are being made paranoid. that has tended to benefit Republicans but I almost think you could argue it’s not the prime cause. I think those fear stories are click bait and revenue driven. The stories seem to be um exagerated and the headlines are more than the stories.
    I wonder if it could be improved by making a law no adds during news hours. I think that would hurt CNN too but I can see advertisers being attracted to FOX

    How soon will we hear Flynn testify?

  60. 60.

    H.E.Wolf

    @Mnemosyne:

    … I send faxes. Even if your representative or senator doesn’t have a fax number listed, sometimes you can google to track it down.

    FaxZero.com (with thanks to the BJ commenters who first mentioned it) is great for this. 5 free faxes per day, with a clickable list of fax numbers for Senators/Reps.

  61. 61.

    bluehill

    I’m kind of half-joking about this, but I hope Flynn is taking precautions because Putin seems pretty comfortable using aggressive active measures.

  62. 62.

    Yarrow

    @WaterGirl: It’s a lot closer than you think. Flynn is big one but there are plenty of others to follow. But I’ll keep saying it because it’s fun! Tick tock, motherfuckers! Tick tock.

  63. 63.

    chris

    @Jeffro: Yup, starting at the top.

    Team Trump is going with the LOOK OBAMA strategy: Trump's lawyer calls Flynn a "former National Security Advisor at the White House for 25 days during the Trump Administration, and a former Obama administration official." https://t.co/F4zzy35w6q— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) 1 December 2017

  64. 64.

    Mike in DC

    I’d like to run next year, but my financial situation is rather precarious. Perhaps I can volunteer for someone else to get some more experience with a campaign.

  69. 69.

    Percysowner

    I use Resistbot. Next week I’ll hit the phones on Net Neutrality, because RB doesn’t do the FCC, that I know of.

  71. 71.

    Jeffro

    I’m so happy I might just go home at lunchtime and get out my Dave Hause “dirty fucker” T-shirt with Trumpov’s rage-a-holic face on it ( why not? It is casual Friday right ?)

    I know that none of my fellow liberals in my office suitewill care that’s for sure

  72. 72.

    Roger Moore

    @gvg:

    I can’t help wondering about what these greedheads think is going to happen after they get their tax break causing a huge depression with no safety net followed by Democrats winning and jacking the taxes up and improving the safety net.

    I’m hoping they’ll take advantage of the time when the estate tax is repealed to make sure their heirs receive their estates tax-free.

  73. 73.

    Another Scott

    ICYMI, Marketwatch is live blogging the Senate tax bill again today:

    11:58 amADD A COMMENT
    Now McConnell telling reporters Republicans have the votes for the tax bill.

    Says final vote will be “later today.”

    11:28 amADD A COMMENT
    Markets are NOT liking this news about Flynn and Trump.

    But the tax bill marches on.

    Sen. Ron Johnson’s office says the bill will increase the amount of pass-through income that may be deducted from taxes to 23% from 17.4%. That’s more generous than a deal worked out just two days ago that would have put the amount at 20%.

    The Wisconsin Republican announced he’d vote yes on the bill after negotiating on pass throughs. Another Senate aide also told MarketWatch the deduction will be 23%.

    […]

    Keep fighting. If they insist on doing this, throw them an anvil. And remember, the final bill still has to pass both houses – this isn’t over even if McConnell is right today.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  74. 74.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Kenn White‏Verified account @ kennwhite

    ABC: “We are told [Gen Flynn] is prepared to testify against the President, against members of the Trump family, and against others in the White House”

  75. 75.

    B.B.A.

    I don’t have a single Republican elected official, if you consider members of the electoral college to be elected rather than their appointees.
    I don’t care for Governor-for-Life Cuomo, but better him than an actual Republican.

  76. 76.

    bemused

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    Flipping channels I stopped at Fox. It was Ingraham and some radio guy talking about Obama Christmas cards only said Happy Holidays, not Merry Christmas and flashed a photo of the Clinton’s at WH in front of Christmas tree that was decorated with “condoms and vibrators”. Insanity!

  77. 77.

    bluehill

    @Yarrow: Given the news, makes sense because the repubs have nothing to lose now. Might as well make sure the donors are happy and keep funding them when they are out of office (knock on wood) because if the dems take back control and Trump goes down, these cuts probably get reversed. The worst case scenario now would seem to be if Trump survives and the repubs survive 2018 elections. No telling what they will feel they can do then. This is what a slippery slope really looks like.

  79. 79.

    Jeffro

    @chris: well it makes sense since if Obama was born in another country and is actually a secret Muslim the naturally he would be the one who told Flynn to cooperate with the Russians

  81. 81.

    Yarrow

    Flake caved.

    !!! @JeffFlake is a yes on tax bill, secured deal to work on “growth-oriented legislative solution to enact fair and permanent protections for DACA recipients” as part of it (!)— Seung Min Kim (@seungminkim) December 1, 2017

  85. 85.

    The Moar You Know

    I prayed the DFHs would be at the courthouse to greet Flynn with “Lock him up” and they were ! Yay!

    @bystander: 95% of the time the DFHs give me nothing but a headache, but every now and then they more than justify their existence. That is just wonderful.

  87. 87.

    The Moar You Know

    Team Trump is going with the LOOK OBAMA strategy: Trump’s lawyer calls Flynn a “former National Security Advisor at the White House for 25 days during the Trump Administration, and a former Obama administration official.” https://t.co/F4zzy35w6q— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) 1 December 2017

    @chris: Even the Trumpets in my office aren’t buying that one. They’re very upset this morning.

    I am not. Nothing but sunshine and light.

  88. 88.

    Tazj

    @Yarrow: I hope this is why they’re not voting. I read that Susan Collins hasn’t quite come to an agreement over the SALT exemption for Maine. Everyone’s ok with this? Remember the furor over the cornhusker kickback? That was wrong as well, and never should’ve been offered.

    I can’t help but think of my fellow Republican neighbors here in western NY who enjoy nothing more than to whine about our state and local taxes. It’s a religion to them. Are they ok with these exemptions for other states?

  89. 89.

    Spanky

    If they had the votes it would be over by now. And if/when they finally do have the votes I suspect it will have made the Senate version too toxic for the purity ponies in the House. ‘Taint over yet.

  92. 92.

    Raoul

    @bluehill: Yup. It’s a trillion dollar smash-n-grab.
    That and putting unqualified ideologues in lifetime judicial seats. They know the tidal wave is coming, and are at this point egging it on.
    What destructive, evil fools they are.

  93. 93.

    Raoul

    @Jeffro: Fux Nooz is at the level of North Korea state media now. Glorious leader! No problems anywhere, except the bad Clinton bad person we hate.

  95. 95.

    The Moar You Know

    What is a DFH?

    @germy:

    Dirty
    Fucking
    Hippie

    They frequently have pretty good ideas that are acknowledged as such about 40 years too late, like labor unions and ending Vietnam.

  97. 97.

    Tazj

    @Tazj: Ok , I misunderstood. Everyone gets a $10,000 SALT exemption, and this is what Collins supposedly secured. The bill is still horrible and now she is to.

    They’re all assholes.

  99. 99.

    TenguPhule

    @gvg:

    I can’t help wondering about what these greedheads think is going to happen after they get their tax break causing a huge depression with no safety net followed by Democrats winning and jacking the taxes up and improving the safety net.

    They’re betting that we can’t undo this once it passes.

    And we can’t until 2020. Not legally.

    And if they can jam up just one chamber, they can stop us from fixing everything. And have the public blame us for not fixing it. It worked for them before in 2010.

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