Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

“Squeaker” McCarthy

Today’s GOP: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Despite his magical powers, I don’t think Trump is thinking this through, to be honest.

This fight is for everything.

Glad to see john eastman going through some things.

Let’s delete this post and never speak of this again.

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

I know this must be bad for Joe Biden, I just don’t know how.

Black Jesus loves a paper trail.

Some judge needs to shut this circus down soon.

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself.

fuckem (in honor of the late great efgoldman)

This really is a full service blog.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

Optimism opens the door to great things.

As long as McCarthy is Speaker, the House will never be in order.

The poor and middle-class pay taxes, the rich pay accountants, the wealthy pay politicians.

Roe isn’t about choice, it’s about freedom.

Fuck the extremist election deniers. What’s money for if not for keeping them out of office?

If you’re pissed about Biden’s speech, he was talking about you.

No one could have predicted…

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

Chutkan laughs. Lauro sits back down.

Why is it so hard for them to condemn hate?

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Bidding Wars

Tuesday Morning Open Thread: Bidding Wars

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I hope this viewing party is well stocked, because if I know corgis, their temporary “royal” will most definitely pit one admirer against another for a share of doggy attention.
 
Speaking of bidding wars…

To update a notorious quote from a certain Senate Majority Leader for the age of social media: If these Repubs insist on fornicating pigs, we can at least make them own it. Per Ars Techica:

The US Senate is scheduled to vote Wednesday, May 16 on whether to reverse the Federal Communications Commission’s repeal of net neutrality rules.

Republican senators were hoping to avoid the vote, but Democrats are using a Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution to force the full Senate to vote. The CRA resolution would nullify the FCC’s December 2017 vote to deregulate broadband and kill net neutrality rules and would prevent the FCC from taking similar actions in the future.

“By passing my CRA resolution to put net neutrality back on the books, we can send a clear message to American families that we support them, not the special interest agenda of President Trump and his broadband baron allies,” Sen. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) said in an announcement today.

Republicans are pushing for weaker broadband regulations and have tried to discourage Democrats from pursuing the CRA vote…

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai announced last week that his repeal of net neutrality rules will take effect on June 11.

There are 50 senators, including one Republican, who have pledged to vote to prevent the net neutrality repeal. That may be enough to get the resolution through the Senate Wednesday because of the cancer-related absence of Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).

Democrats face longer odds in the House, where Republicans hold a 236-193 majority. President Trump could veto the resolution if it makes it through both chambers of Congress.

Congress isn’t the only obstacle in the way of Pai’s net neutrality repeal. The FCC must defend the repeal in court against a lawsuit filed by about three dozen entities, including Democratic state attorneys general, consumer advocacy groups, and tech companies…

Reader Interactions

61Comments

  1. 1.

    bystander

    Anyone else guessing that some laugh lines will be smoother and a brow a little higher after Melania’s “benign kidney surgery”? I had a knee replacement and was sent home two days later.

    WAAAAH!!

    Morning all, from Gay Paree!

  3. 3.

    frosty

    Good morning all from a Confirmed Night-owl who woke up early and can’t get back to sleep. Here’s hoping things revert to normal and you don’t see me here again at this hour. :-)

  5. 5.

    NotMax

    So convoluted that a snippet or two wouldn’t being to convey the machinations. Read the whole thing, please. (Took multiple readings before I began to feel might have begun to suss it out, but still many unfilled blanks.)

    $1 million mystery gift to inauguration traced to conservative legal activists

    A million here, 3/4 of a million there, $20 million from a “low-profile, very wealthy and on the young side” somebody. Wheels within wheels, all spinning in the shadows.

  6. 6.

    Jeffro

    Hey the usually too-milquetoast-for-my-taste Eugene Robinson didn’t appreciate being called an elite, and he REALLY resents the way Trumpov & Co – aided by the both-sides media – think that they can label themselves “real” Americans.

    The most offensive and corrosive idea in our politics today is that some Americans are more “real” than others. Don’t you dare buy it.

    Republicans are cynically peddling this un-American conceit. “Real Americans” elected and continue to support President Trump, they claim, in defiance of snooty “coastal elites” who are hopelessly out of touch with the country. It’s a total crock, and shame on those using it for political gain.

    The whole point of democracy is that every citizen’s voice is supposed to have equal weight — even voices in favor of fair and compassionate immigration policy, universal health care, fighting racism, promoting gender equality, enshrining LGBT rights and other progressive causes. There is no need to be tentative about these views for fear they somehow make you, I suppose, “unreal.” They do not.

    Nor does living within some arbitrary distance of an ocean, having a college education or preferring big-city life deprive anyone of standing as an American.

    Of course the whole thing was actually written because he wanted to hate on the Schlapps – uber-elites that they are – for pretending to be “real” Americans while hating on John McCain. Sigh…if that’s what it takes to rouse the mushy middle…

    Gene, you’re a little late to the party, but hey come on in! Here’s a bat…

  8. 8.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Jeffro:

    I know the Schlapps. They are nice people, when not engaged in demagoguery.

    Ummm, no Eugene, they are not nice people. They may be “pleasant” or “personable,” but they are not “nice.” Nice people don’t demagogue.

  10. 10.

    NotMax

    From out Amir’s way.

    …“We were too drunk on our own Kool-Aid, and this is a sobering lesson for us which we’ll remember for the rest of our lives.” Source

  11. 11.

    mai naem mobile

    The single republican is Susan Collins so you might as well forget the single Republican vote.

  14. 14.

    satby

    @OzarkHillbilly: I think a hard thing we all deal with is trying to reconcile the people who are personable and pleasant, friendly even, to your face and the knowledge that they knowingly support policies that actively hurt people. There’s a low level civil war on and like the first one it’s splitting families and communities.

  15. 15.

    oatler.

    I have a dog costume I can customize to “corgi” and I’m open to “viewing parties”.

  17. 17.

    Eric S.

    The Orange Shitgibbon has invaded my dreams! In my dream he wss entering negotiations with NK and told a reporter he was changing the terms of the agreed framework.

  24. 24.

    WereBear

    @satby: I think a hard thing we all deal with is trying to reconcile the people who are personable and pleasant, friendly even, to your face and the knowledge that they knowingly support policies that actively hurt people.

    Akin to:

    “I can’t believe my honorable colleague would force himself on a vulnerable and powerless person,” said another rich white guy.

  28. 28.

    danielx

    Having year-old cats occasionally has its downsides. Like being wakened at five in the morning by a seven pound cat bounding across the bed, followed by a fourteen pound cat in hot pursuit. I haven’t figured out which one left the claw marks on my leg. Neither party involved offered an explanation, much less an apology.

    Daughter unit informed me earlier that the male’s name is Boris, NOT “Boris goddamnit”. Evidently my response to this bodily assault was louder than I thought.

  30. 30.

    Kay

    I was choosing whether to volunteer for Cordray or Sherrod Brown. Sherrod Brown’s campaign got back to me immediately, which I appreciate, but Cordray is more of a long shot – Sherrod is the favorite while Cordray is the underdog- and honestly with Trumpists in power at the fed level I’d just as soon look at state level. Less depressing.

    Ohio Democrats used to do “coordinated campaigns” which seemed like a great idea to me but it looks like they aren’t doing that this year. So, for example, you would canvass for Obama and also do Sherrod, same time.

  32. 32.

    Tata

    Awhile back, I popped in to say I’d taken a part-time job baking cookies and cakes in a restaurant to pay for sending my grandson to space camp. My daughter decided day camp would be better for him at his age and found a Lego robotics camp program at a nearby university, which turned out to be much more affordable. Further, there was an equally good day camp for my granddaughter at the same university. This week, I wrote a check to cover both camps from the money I made baking cookies. I’m overjoyed!

    And now, I can start saving for next summer’s space camp, because that is expensive. I can do it!

  36. 36.

    Jeffro

    Btw for those inclined to put a (mental) icepick in your brains, today’s column waste of valuable op-ed space by Brooksie is a marvel. Did y’all know he’s a Whig? Yes really!

    Also the Fallows’ new book is totes awesome because it confirms everything Brooksie already knows to be true: if we could just get out there in the heartland, REAL America, and have great conversations with REAL Americans without disrespecting them or veering into that vicious 10% fringe on both sides, we’d practically be in Utopia already.

    I’m going for a walk…

  37. 37.

    Leto

    Election day for Idaho, Nebraska, Oregon, and Pennsylvania primaries today. First time in almost a decade I won’t be voting by absentee ballot. Really looking forward to it.

  38. 38.

    Kay

    @Baud:

    Cordray. I can’t resist the pencil-necked underdog :)

    He has a big vocabulary (oh, no) and the NYTimes has already decided he’s boring based on 15 seconds watching a local tv clip or something. DeWine is actually boring, truth be told. He drones on and on. DeWine is tiny- really a small person- and Cordray is tall. I wonder if that matters. They’ll have televised debates. Cordray will be towering over him.

    You know they’ll send the Trump assholes out here to lie about him. Probably on chartered jets we paid for. On their way to Florida to golf.

  42. 42.

    Kay

    A mere 72 hours after the Chinese government agreed to put a half-billion dollars into an Indonesian project that will personally enrich Donald Trump, the president ordered a bailout for a Chinese-government-owned cellphone maker.
    “President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast,” Trump announced on Twitter Sunday morning. “Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done!”

    I think we solved the Trump cell phone mystery! That crime wasn’t difficult to crack, I must say. You can’t even call them “schemes” anymore- it’s just unrestrained looting.
    I love how blatant the self-dealing and corruption are- the Trump Family must think they’re untouchable, and maybe they are.
    Maybe they know something we don’t.

  43. 43.

    Leto

    @Kay: Trump had to bailout that company because Cohen needed to replace his seized phones. You think Samsung or HTC has that many spare phones available right now? Ha! /s

  44. 44.

    Kay

    @rikyrah:

    Even after more Republicans than Democrats voted in Tuesday’s primary, Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown begins the general election campaign as the favorite to win his third term against Republican Congressman Jim Renacci, who is making his first run for statewide office.
    Although Renacci was urged to enter the race by White House officials and has been warmly embraced by President Donald Trump, he did not win 50 percent of the vote in a multicandidate Republican battle.
    He enters the fall campaign trailing Brown in campaign cash and name recognition among voters. Brown, a two-term member of the U.S. Senate and a former Ohio secretary of state, is regarded as among the savviest politicians Ohio has produced.

    Brown is “savvy”. He’s very good at this. It’s just hard work. He knows what voters want because he talks to them constantly.

    People say his constituent services are very responsive too- when people get a response they tell a lot of other people, in my experience, because they’re shocked that anyone is actually listening to them. I called him once and his staff were very speedy and efficient. They couldn’t help me for legal reasons related to the person I was trying to aid- his age-which I knew but I said I would call so I did.

  45. 45.

    Kay

    @Leto:

    The multiple phone thing is so funny because it’s such a “tell”. We get judges- “why do you have 4 phones?”

    They’re on to this! :) Many of them are not the most tech savvy people in the world so it takes a long time, but they get it!

  47. 47.

    rikyrah

    @Kay:

    UH HUH
    UH HUH

    A mere 72 hours after the Chinese government agreed to put a half-billion dollars into an Indonesian project that will personally enrich Donald Trump, the president ordered a bailout for a Chinese-government-owned cellphone maker.
    “President Xi of China, and I, are working together to give massive Chinese phone company, ZTE, a way to get back into business, fast,” Trump announced on Twitter Sunday morning. “Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done!”

  51. 51.

    The Ancient Randonneur

    @rikyrah: Fantastic! And, of course: Thanks Obama!

    Here’s some encouraging news (I do prefer he run as a Democrat but I understand his thinking.):

    As the top federal prosecutor in New York, it was Bharara who brought the case against the once powerful Democrat, and the verdict may have cemented his reputation as a crusading corruption fighter. Yet, even before the jury came back, Bharara was already weighing a run for the suddenly vacant spot of New York attorney general — possibly doing so as an independent, free of ties to Democrats and Republicans, according to a person familiar with his thinking.

  54. 54.

    Schlemazel

    @Kay:
    I go through the same calculations every election. Thankfully I live in a safe district & Keith Ellison will be returned without my help – both my state reps have served forever & will contiune. I refuse to help Klobuchar after the way she behaved when elected. I am on the fence about Smith who is also running for Senate this year to backfill Franken’s seat (which was Wellstones and Humphries – that is a hell of a legacy)

    If I can I probably will work for Rebecca Otto because I believe her fight for Governor will face some headwind in a state that still has far too many pockets of stupid. But that might all be put on hold as I have some major surgery that will leave me in the hospital for 2-3 weeks & off work for 2-3 months that will happen this year.

  59. 59.

    Elizabelle

    I want a corgi for a viewing party. Or just to hang out with. What a great idea.

    FWIW, QE2’s last corgi, Willow, just passed recently, aged 14. Elizabeth is not without dogs, however. Princess Margaret’s (!) dog impregnated a few of the household canines, so there’s some continuity. Think she has at least one dorgi (dachshund-corgi mix).

    WaPost: Queen Elizabeth II loses her last corgi, Willow, marking the end of a scrappy canine dynasty

    Sweet story with pictures, very worth a click.

  60. 60.

    J R in WV

    @Schlemazel:

    I saw that, and really feel for her. She’s a lovely young woman, and shouldn’t feel that her new face is any less attractive or beautiful than her original face. I hope she doesn’t get into repeated attempts to “fix” her scars, they are actually signs of survival and victory.

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