Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

They fucked up the fucking up of the fuckup!

Republicans do not pay their debts.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

I didn’t have alien invasion on my 2023 BINGO card.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

The revolution will be supervised.

Prediction: the GOP will rethink its strategy of boycotting future committees.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

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

American History and Black History Cannot Be Separated

This fight is for everything.

I’d like to think you all would remain faithful to me if i ever tried to have some of you killed.

Putting aside our relentless self-interest because the moral imperative is crystal clear.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

And we’re all out of bubblegum.

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

The republican caucus is already covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

Second rate reporter says what?

When do we start airlifting the women and children out of Texas?

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

When someone says they “love freedom”, rest assured they don’t mean yours.

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

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

You are here: Home / Politics / Trumpery / Dolt 45 / Cold Grey Pre-Dawn Open Thread: Early SotU Reviews

Cold Grey Pre-Dawn Open Thread: Early SotU Reviews

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33Comments

  1. 1.

    poleaxedbyboatwork

    Only saw clips of the noxious campaign rally, but was struck by how eager (even now!) the entire GOP caucus was to bark and dance like trained seals at every stinking herring Trump callously pitched to them like paper towels to the Puerto Rican people.

    Even if one grants that Trump is a hostage to his base, that don’t mean they gotta follow. But they are. Enthusiastically. Rapturously. Good Germanly.

    Given Trump’s obvious legal and political exposure, it suggests that many, if not most (if not all) in the GOP caucus are compromised and enmeshed and — worst of all — invested in Trump’s net of criminality and deceit.

    One of the great many reasons why it’s vital for Dems to get their oversight on toot-fucking-suite is it will allow squishy media folks to (finally) say out loud what everyone who’s paid the least particle of attention already knows — the president of these United States is a criminal law-breaker who is unfit to serve. For manifold reasons, the Russian connex being but one.

    In the Watergate era, the oversight committees ran *concurrently* with the special prosecutor’s investigations, and they served the purpose of educating a timid and unbelieving electorate. Am decidedly of the opinion that waiting on Mueller (who FSM knows when he’ll fucking finish) is a tactical and strategic error of the gravest order.

    Let Mueller do Mueller, fine. He’s the lever for prosecution in the legal sense. But I’d like to see another fulcrum point applied in this mess that ain’t dependent upon the glacial pace of the criminal justice system. (To say nothing of the fact that the Mueller report may or may not ultimately getta fair hearing, being an adjunct of and subordinate to the Trump administration being investigated.)

    If it can be credibly established that the Trump administration is shot-through with corruption, venality and rank criminality (and it can), this will reinforce the Mueller investigation, and it will go a long way toward pulling back the curtain on this roiling rolling travesty. It will do the honorable and necessary work of documenting the atrocities and helping those who are willing to have the scales fall from their eyes.

    And it will make it politically tenable to not feel compelled to say, as Stacey Abrams did tonight (in the only low point of her address, imo) that “I still don’t want the president to fail”.

    Well, I do want him to fail. Because he never learns Because he only gives a shit about 40 percent of the country. And because he’s not just a unrelentingly horrible person, he’s an unindicted criminal. The very fact that anyone feels compelled to say, out loud, that they don’t want Donald Trump to fail is a stark reminder of just how far we still have to go in achieving a national consensus.

    imo

  4. 4.

    Balconesfault

    @poleaxedbyboatwork: Right now we have a three pronged assault on Trump’s corruption:

    1) Mueller
    2) SDNY and NY AG
    3) House Dems (I also suspect Burr will start issuing subpoenas the moment the dam breaks … but if he gets out ahead he knows McConnell wouldn’t bat an eye over replacing him no matter appearances)

    Investigations will proceed in the House … but Nancy knows that regular headlines need generated on Progressive Legislation being passed by the House (even as each bill dies in McConnell’s pocket) to defuse allegations that the Dems only care about taking out Trump.

  6. 6.

    NotMax

    Actually was going to listen to the thing. However, stretched out on the couch to rest my eyes a half hour prior and regained consciousness more than seven hours later.

    A clear case of the body being smarter than the mind.

    Presume Dolt 45’s message was delivered in his usual all anus, no sphincter manner.

  8. 8.

    poleaxedbyboatwork

    @Balconesfault:

    … Investigations will proceed in the House … but Nancy knows that regular headlines need to be generated on Progressive Legislation being passed by the House (even as each bill dies in McConnell’s pocket) to defuse allegations that the Dems only care about taking out Trump.

    Wholeheartedly agreed re: House Dems. In fact, am of the opinion that Dems in the House should send all sorts of bills to the Senate — a veritable this-is-us wish-list! It demonstrates the priorities of the Democratic agenda, and it serves as a stark reminder to the electorate (should they care to, you know, actually notice) about what’s possible should the obstructionist Repubs be removed from office and Dems take the Senate and presidency.

    My only point is, impeachment being an inherently political process, Dems in the House (separate and apart from the Mueller investigation and SDNY et al., which are constrained by the strictures of the law) would do well to start educating the American electorate on what is known and knowable that at present can only be gleaned obliquely by the criminal justice system while it grinds away.

    “Reading indictments” cannot compare, imo, to dramatic bombshells revealed in open hearings.

    And to that point, think it’s well within the House Dems’ capabilities to do both (produce legislation and conduct investigations) with happy-warrior vigor.

  10. 10.

    Cermet

    I see Nancy Smash has thrown down her gauntlet and the orange fart cloud had better start getting to work rather than continue to sit in his own shit stinking up the ameikan government. He either needs to do his job or flush himself down the toilet to allow real government workers to do their jobs.

  11. 11.

    JPL

    So twitter tells me that if the investigations on trump continue, we’ll have economic collapse and war. Mueller must be closing in on him and he knows it. nice

  14. 14.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @JPL: They’re just setting the table for when the inevitable economic down turn comes, no matter what, it’s not their fault. Conservatism can not fail, it can only be failed.

  15. 15.

    NotMax

    @JPL

    A flash poll of Blaze TV’s entire viewing audience immediately after showed a split.

    Shocked: 4
    Ambivalent: 3
    Don’t know: 9

  16. 16.

    OzarkHillbilly

    Song of Parkland often quietly, yet powerfully, observes healing in process. “Being in drama every day, working on a show, gives us a sense of normalcy. It’s almost a sense of strength,” said student Dylan Redshaw during one of the group meetings. Though accompanied by cameras, the students hardly seem watched; much of Song of Parkland is kids being kids, alternately goofing off and getting serious, depending on the moment.

    “Kids are incredible. They’re smart, they’re eloquent, they’re goofy, they’re emotional, they’re irrational, they’re brilliant, they’re inspiring,” said Schatz. “My intention was to let them be themselves, and I think the documentary shows them in their natural state. I don’t think anybody was performing for the camera; they were performing their production, but they were being themselves.

    “What I witnessed is that it was like getting back to the business of school, getting back to the business of production, and being who you always were to each other,” Schatz added. Part of that process was a songwriting project, in which students processed their emotions through original compositions. The film unspools a couple of those originals, recorded by studio artists, over moving images of grief and healing at Marjory Stoneman Douglas. “If there’s one thing I’ve been taught, it’s that we should make a sound,” one sings. “Fill the void with flowers, it’ll make a meadow – even in the darkest times, beautiful things can grow.

    “I think it was important for our kids to tell a story, and to tell their story,” said Herzfeld of Song of Parkland’s quiet, understated frame, “because when all the craziness was going on around them, there’s a whole population of kids that needed to be heard.”

    Song of Parkland airs 7 February at 7pm on HBO

  17. 17.

    J R in WV

    @poleaxedbyboatwork:

    Poleaxed Fisherman, well said. And thanks for avoiding the rural translator you sometimes use for your well reasoned thoughts!

    What a piece of work out Pres. is right now. And How German of the Republicans of the Congress and Senate, to applaud this weak sauce of fascism!!

  18. 18.

    HinTN

    @Balconesfault:

    Nancy knows that regular headlines need generated on Progressive Legislation being passed by the House (even as each bill dies in McConnell’s pocket) to defuse allegations that the Dems only care about taking out Trump.

    This is exactly right. I want the House to bring to light that which Mueller, in due time, may or may not. But I want a demonstration of FUNCTIONAL governance most of all. It’s a reason to vote.

  19. 19.

    NotMax

    Hoocudanode?

    Canadian case is another warning about the murky world of cryptocurrency
    [snip]
    …according to documents prepared for the court hearing, suddenly it turns out that a company widely seen as Canada’s biggest cryptocurrency trader, a company that described itself as a “leading bitcoin exchange” was really just a guy with a computer. Source

    So much winning.

    General Motors began involuntary layoffs on Monday in Detroit, with about 4,300 white-collar workers among those affected across North America.
    [snip]
    The company said last October that it would offer buyouts to 18,000 workers with more than 12 years with the company across its North American operations as part of cost-cutting efforts.

    GM Canada spokesperson Jennifer Wright declined to say how many jobs were eliminated or how many people may be laid off, sending a statement that read, “We expect to have a modest number of other salaried reductions completed shortly.”

    GM has a broader plan that will see three North American assembly plants and two component factories close by the end of 2019. Source

    In other news,

    When Dr. Jorge Chavarro’s team started investigating marijuana’s effects on sperm, they had every reason to believe weed would prove detrimental to “testicular function,” because other studies had said it to be so.

    Instead, they found the opposite. Source

  20. 20.

    BruceFromOhio

    @OzarkHillbilly:

    Fill the void with flowers, it’ll make a meadow – even in the darkest times, beautiful things can grow.

    Whoa. From anyone else this is just another lyric … knowing the context makes this much more.

    Thank you for sharing this.

  21. 21.

    NotMax

    For the ‘Okay, if you say so’ file. (Not from The Onion.)

    A university student thought her apartment was haunted after some of her stuff began to disappear and handprints started appearing on mirrors. Turns out it was a man hiding in her closet, wearing her clothing. Source

  23. 23.

    But her emails!!!

    @poleaxedbyboatwork:
    Trump is less hostage to his base than the other Republicans are. The base to some extent bends to his will. If Trump came out tomorrow saying he never meant his wall had to be physical, but instead started pushing for a virtual wall composed of enhanced surveillance, more border patrol and developing the capacity to more quickly respond to and track down any border crossers his base would be on board by Friday so long as Fox and friends, Rush and Coulter got on board.

    Trump is the base. The Republicans spent decades making their base into minitrumps. Now they have to clap like trained seals when he speaks because showing disrespect for leader is by proxy disrespecting his base.

  25. 25.

    Melusine

    It would be nice to see Dem MEN wearing white in a show of solidarity with their female counterparts. Like hell yeah, women deserved the right to vote, and we want to make sure every eligible voter in this country has the opportunity.

    Maybe toss in some purple or green so it’s less klannish. Seriously, would it fucking kill them to coordinate their clothing choices for one night without a woman having to manage it? Bet they could do it for sportsball.

  26. 26.

    Skepticat

    Congrats to @SpeakerPelosi for inventing the “fuck you” clap.

    Very apropos that it seems to be her take on the golf clap.

  27. 27.

    gratuitous

    An inquiring mind would like to know: Did Trump congratulate Pelosi on her regaining the Speakership? You know, like he congratulated Putin on his election victory after his aides gave him a note reading “DO NOT CONGRATULATE”?

  29. 29.

    J.A.F. Rusty Shackleford

    @Melusine:

    It would be nice to see Dem MEN wearing white in a show of solidarity with their female counterparts. Like hell yeah, women deserved the right to vote, and we want to make sure every eligible voter in this country has the opportunity.

    Maybe toss in some purple or green so it’s less klannish. Seriously, would it fucking kill them to coordinate their clothing choices for one night without a woman having to manage it? Bet they could do it for sportsball.

    This is a bad idea as it would diminish the presence and statement of the women wearing white. Also, the white suits on men would look ridiculous. The entire caucus would like like they’re about to greet the guests of Fantasy Island. “The plane! The plane!”

  30. 30.

    H.E.Wolf

    @raven:

    @Melusine: Now there’s an important issue.

    Yes indeed! Women comprise more than half the population and “women’s issues” are relevant and beneficial to virtually all of us.

    Wearing white, green, and/or purple, the colors of the 19th and early 20th century women’s suffrage movement, is a graceful way to honor women’s rights.

    I see no down side to Congressmen participating in that visual statement, as a signal of their intent to provide legislative as well as sartorial support.

    I noticed that Adam Schiff sported a white ribbon in his lapel. Were there other Democratic Congressmen participating in that fashion?

  31. 31.

    H.E.Wolf

    I also noticed, with enthusiasm, that Congresswoman Lauren Underwood and at least one other African-American Congresswoman were wearing kente-cloth stoles: a powerful and eloquent statement.

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