Just a few years ago, the GOP had total control of the House, Senate, and White House to ram through their radical agenda – and the American people voted them out. We shouldn’t let Minority @LeaderMcConnell and his desperate party keep their veto now. https://t.co/B7VZKSNTom
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) March 16, 2021
You ask me, the old man — and he is an old man, and doesn’t look well in these clips — is pushing all his chips onto the felt, hoping enough cravens and ‘moderates’ will help him kneecap HR1 (the voting rights protection act), if nothing else. If he fails (when, please Goddess, he fails), he can totter off to his wife’s very nice estate, and give endless interviews to the credulous media about ‘the good old days, when *those people* knew their place’.
His bluff, we need to call it!
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell warned Democrats that ending a long-standing Senate procedure known as the filibuster would bring President Biden's agenda to a standstill and lead to retribution in years to come https://t.co/gijWXQ5mx7 pic.twitter.com/c7DwT1BBVK
— Reuters (@Reuters) March 17, 2021
"if you try to reform this procedural rule that we have weaponized to stop the senate from working properly, we will destroy the entire institution of american government, for the sake of revenge" are you supposed to just say that out loud
— flglmn (@flglmn) March 16, 2021
Breaking: President Biden said he supports changing the Senate's filibuster rule back to requiring senators talk on the floor to hold up a bill, the first time he has endorsed reforming the filibuster. https://t.co/WZoEeEhdXc
— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) March 17, 2021
Biden tells ABC News he supports a return to the "talking filibuster," which would require Republicans opposed to Dem bills to be on the floor for days or weeks if they want to block something. Manchin said earlier this month he supportive too. Doesn't get Ds all the way though.
— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) March 17, 2021
the last week sure has looked a hell of a lot like a plan coming together https://t.co/vpq3aciGBE
— professional cancellation arbitration machine (@golikehellmachi) March 17, 2021
he’s already doing this so uh ok good bluff mitch https://t.co/N5A1xziLd5
— kilgore trout, ted’s travel agent (@KT_So_It_Goes) March 16, 2021
the dems and biden are not stupid. they lived through the last four years of a gop senate. and politically, they see there is not much downside to pushing through wildly popular legislation (as with the covid relief bill) https://t.co/R8VIBfjxZV
— Gerry Doyle (@mgerrydoyle) March 17, 2021
Fmr. Senate Majority Leader Reid calls for killing the filibuster: "The country's better off having a real democracy, not a fake democracy. 60% is not a real democracy." https://t.co/PYGHq7x44b
— MSNBC (@MSNBC) March 17, 2021
"I'll make sure no republican votes for your legislation."
"ok, we would like to hold majority votes on legislation, like we used to."
"if you do that I'll make sure no votes are ever held at all."
sure, that seems like what you'd say if you were concerned about bipartisanship
— Gerry Doyle (@mgerrydoyle) March 17, 2021
They have to keep meeting quorum calls, meaning they have to stay close. It's harder to maintain than break. https://t.co/nUeEd2wLXV
— Jeff Fecke (@jkfecke) March 17, 2021
this is less a threat than it sounds like. mcconnell is essentially threatening to saddle his caucus with the most unpopular items in its agenda, which gets to how the filibuster is advantageous to the party that wants to hold power without doing anything. https://t.co/WQT7EOb4We
— b-boy bouiebaisse (@jbouie) March 16, 2021
The big tell here is that if ending the filibuster were truly so great for the GOP, they would’ve already done it in 2017. In truth, many GOP proposals are so unpopular that senators can’t vote for them without triggering a backlash, so GOP instead gets the courts to enact hem https://t.co/39dq85myHc
— Stephen Wolf (@PoliticsWolf) March 16, 2021
The filibuster didn't stop privatization, Nancy Pelosi did. Republicans couldn't even get a bill out of committee in the House. https://t.co/DiuC6xBlnO
— Jeff Fecke (@jkfecke) March 17, 2021
With Kentucky ranked 48 out of 50 states for standard of living; in his 36 years as a Senator; Mitch McConnell voted to give himself a raise 6 times and voted against raising the minimum wage 15 times.
— YS (@NYinLA2121) March 16, 2021
"Democracy really is special… Without voting rules that treat every voter equally, all other processes are built on sand. Bipartisanship may be a nice goal, but bipartisanship is irrelevant when democracy vanishes." https://t.co/r1z0kgmOPq
— Lee Drutman (@leedrutman) March 16, 2021
Just Chuck
Feinstein will torpedo anything that touches the filibuster. She values tradition more than the survival of this country.
Anonymous At Work
I, like every other sane and informed person on the face of the earth from now until the Sun burns out, would really really like to know how “scorched earth” differs from what McConnell normally does.
Joe Falco
@Anonymous At Work: I guess McConnell acts like a bigger asshole about it than usual?
Anonymous At Work
@Joe Falco: The only two ways that is possible involve either: Moscow Mitch cloning himself and having Ted Cruz raise it, or cloning Ted Cuz and Moscow Mitch raising it.
Dagaetch
Could a simple majority change Senate rules so that unanimous consent wasn’t required so often? Seems to me like that’s the obvious response…
germy
MattF
Yeah, blame McConnell, but bear in mind that the whole R Senate caucus is presumed to be following in Mitch’s footsteps. They’re all guilty— Mitch is out in front but is doing what the caucus wants.
Anonymous At Work
@Dagaetch: You’d have to re-introduce a motion to call the question, aka “shut the frak up and vote” motion and identify which types of legislation to which it applies. That list would get longer over time, generally. Manchin wouldn’t support it because you can call the question at any time.
Bobby Thomson
@Just Chuck:
Amazing. Everything you just said is wrong.
germy
@Bobby Thomson:
I think the filibuster serves a purpose. It is not often used, it’s often less used now than when I first came, and I think it’s part of the Senate that differentiates itself.
—Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) (September 2020)
Has she changed her mind? I haven’t seen anything recently from her.
Betty Cracker
“You better not eliminate the extra-constitutional barrier that I am cynically using to torpedo your agenda because if you do, I will torpedo your agenda!”
Call. His. Bluff.
dmsilev
@Dagaetch: Yes. And that’s probably the path we’re headed down. McConnell’s threat was to withhold unanimous consent on everything, even the most banal and routine procedural matters. At which point, the obvious response is to jam through a different set of Senate rules that eliminates the need for u.c.. Rules and procedures similar to what the House uses, in other words.
germy
@Betty Cracker:
Can someone play hardball politics with him? Take him into a room for a private meeting to inform him of investigations into his wife and her family’s business and her use of taxpayer money?
Maybe his wife would tell him to back off after that meeting.
Baud
Seems inconsistent with the idea that he minority can shut down the Senate by denying unanimous consent.
Benw
I imagine it would look like every single member of the republican Senate caucus enabling a vapid orange goon to destroy the United States government to the point that terrorists are hunting congresspeople through the halls of Congress while 500,000+ Americans die pointlessly because of their indifference and inaction, but I’m not serving in that chamber so I guess I don’t count.
Another Scott
Of course McConnell would say things like this. We all know, only Democrats have agency.
Ultimately, the majority must be able to rule. Sometimes it sucks. But it’s the only way for a representative democracy to function. We need a functioning national government, so the filibuster/cloture system must be changed so that Democrats can rule when they have the majority.
Similarly, if the courts try to block or reverse progress then they too must be changed. Fight for 15!! works for SCOTUS, also too.
Cheers,
Scott.
taumaturgo
Centrist Democrats Senators at a crucible, either be all in for Biden’s populist liberal agenda or fold back to protecting the Senate’s legacy rules that favor the status quo. Stay tuned.
Edmund Dantes
They just need to flip the onus on the team filibustering. If you want to, go ahead.
Need to keep 41 (if you keep current rules) senators as a quorum for your filibuster. Cause if you are holding up business for the country, you should demonstrate the importance of having a audience of your voting peers to hear your arguments.
No phones, electronic devices, or computers on the floor during this momentous occasion to hear why the will of the American public should be thwarted. If found looking at one, ejected from chambers for 1 hour. Quorum call can be called in your absence ending the filibuster.
The arguments have to be germane to the bill at hand. They also can’t be overly repeat I’ve or derivative. “No beer and no tv make homer something something” on a loop doesn’t count can be ruled on by the parliamentarian.
No breaks other than a 5 minute bathroom break at every 12 hours. Quorum is auto called at 5 minute mark. If not present, over.
Etc
Edmund Dantes
@dmsilev: easy fix for the reading of the bill is it must be requested by 41 senators. And filibuster rules apply. Quorum Must be in chambers for entire reading. Quorum call at any time to check 41 present, no electronics, etc
Delk
O/T we just got our stimulus check deposited in our account.
Immanentize
@Dagaetch: Yes. But that has its own down sides.
The idea being floated by some is that cloture can be had by 51 votes (rather than the current 60 which can be triggered by just one Senator saying they intend to oppose cloture), but that any Senator if they choose, could conduct a talking filibuster. This would allow Manchin and Sinema to claim a win while really altering the minority power.
Immanentize
@MattF: But if they had to do it in the public eye, it wouldn’t happen for long. Right now this is all done in secret.
debbie
Watching McConnell’s threatening remarks last night was like watching one of Hitler’s speeches.
The Moar You Know
Obstructing – not threatening but actually doing so – all Dem legislation and enacting fascist Republican policies is all that the GOP has done for the last twenty years.
We already don’t have the filibuster for judicial nominees. We saw what the GOP did with that. I see no reason to not get rid of it entirely. My preference would be to restore it in its entirety for everything, but the main reason to do that sailed away with Former Guy and Mitch packing the judiciary full of the worst Federalist Society scum that they could find for four years straight. No reason to not just remove it entirely now.
Anonymous At Work
@Immanentize: Right now, any one Senator can talk about anything for as long as they want, if they don’t yield the floor by doing a laundry list of random no-nos. So, that’s not a change.
A talking filibuster forces every member of the minority to stay in/around the Senate chamber to maintain the filibuster and they have to continually send members up to debate the bill. Can’t go to fundraisers, can’t meet constituents, can’t visit family, can’t get a decent meal and can’t sleep in a bed. Also, have to stay within proximity of Cruz and Hartley.
Edmund Dantes
If you have concerns look at how quickly GOP in House have gotten fed up with constantly being dragged back by Marjorie Taylor Greene for her adjournment show. And that is just the pain of returning to chambers to vote.
now imagine that pain on steroids. Where the Dems only have to rotate 2-3 senators through chambers on shifts, and the rest can be out fundraising, dealing with constituents, hobnobbing at parties, sleeping in their owns beds, etc. while their gop colleagues have to be in the senate chamber for the entire filibuster?
what if they serial filibuster everything? Awesome. How many times do you think they will exceed 30 hours? Cause that is the current “debate” time required. Just tweak the rule so that filibuster replaces the “debate” time and you will see more bills pass in less than 30 hours.
Old School
@Delk: Woo hoo! Our payment is now pending as well.
germy
bluehill
Wonder how the press will both-sides this one.
Bobby Thomson
@germy: oops. I read the comment as being about someone else. Feinstein desperately needs to retire, but Manchin and Sinema are giving her cover on the filibuster at the moment. We can burn that bridge when we get to it.
Immanentize
@Anonymous At Work: The problem isn’t that aspect of the filibuster, it is that, under current rules, any one Senator can announce they intend to filibuster which instantly invokes a 60 vote rule to even begin debate. This is often done in secret.
Yes the current rule was crafted after a Senator died while on the floor giving a talking filibuster, but there are risks to all such efforts.
Anonymous At Work
@Edmund Dantes: “Germane” becomes weird and likely a non-starter. IF you can rule something “germane” or not with 51 votes (i.e. fire the parliamentarian if ruled against), that’s a de facto 51 vote system. Instead, require that Senators cannot return to floor to speak until either all others in their caucus have spoken or yielded time to you.
I do like the no electronic devices on the floor but am not sure about removing a member from the Chamber. Again, a bridge too far and ripe for abuse. And quorum calls would probably be 15 or 30 minutes, 5 is excessive.
Anonymous At Work
@Immanentize: 51 votes to overrule the parliamentarian of germane and 51 votes to end cloture are the same thing. Having a Senator announce a filibuster publicly wouldn’t change anything. Do Cruz or Hartley have ANY shame whatsoever? Shame’s secret is that it has no power on the shameless.
Making talking filibuster about talking and about maintaining quorum to support the talking are the keys. Senators will not vote to do away with their right to talk as long as they want, just the right of a group to abuse it. When thinking about it, don’t take away your ego; INFLATE it. Every one of them, every single one, has a giant ego, for good and ill. Just have to play to the ones without self-awareness.
Just Some Fuckhead
Shorter McConnell: if you stop us from breaking the Senate with the filibuster, we will break the Senate another way.
rikyrah
Phuck Moscow Mitch.
Seriously.
Phuck him.
Major Major Major Major
Standing by my prediction that there will be an end run around the filibuster to pass (something like) HR 1 by August. Not sure they actually have 50 votes for HR 1 specifically. There’s a lot in it.
Betty Cracker
@Benw:
Needed to be said. Thank you!
Just Some Fuckhead
So does this mean Republicans won’t support the 400 House bills that sat on McConnell’s desk for years? Cause that’s terrible news.
Redshift
@Just Chuck:
It seems like returning to the pre-1975 filibuster (talking required, cloture vote is 2/3 of those present instead of 3/5 of all senators, present or not) should appeal to traditionalists. I guess we’ll find out if she really cares about tradition and the filibuster actually doing some of what they claim they want, or just “nothing should change.”
Another Scott
@Anonymous At Work: Indeed. A previous Virginia governor stripped out a good provision from the state budget by saying that it wasn’t “germane”. On his say so. No opportunity for the legislature to over-ride as if it were a veto.
It’s a bad idea because it’s easily abused.
Cheers,
Scott.
LurkerNoLonger
@Delk: We got ours too. One for me, one for my wife, and one for the kid. Much needed because we had to have our hot water heater replaced.
Amir Khalid
I just bought myself a home gym: folding exercise bike and a 10kg set of weights. Yay me.
Re Mitch McConnell. The Democratic party’s propaganda apparatus urgently needs to focus on tearing him down. Not long ago I said that in America it was hard to demonise an old white man — I was speaking of Joe Biden. While McConnell is a Mr Potter from It’s A Wonderful Life on steroids, and a present danger to Americans’ welfare, he is still an old white man, and he gets sympathy points for that. It’s still hard to make him look as bad as he deserves. But if you can break/defeat him, that would do a lot to help make the Democratic agenda happen.
Nettoyeur
schrodingers_cat
@Amir Khalid: His wife and her shady deals involving her family can be investigated by the new DoJ.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Those people as in Black, Hispanics, women, LGBT, young people, the disabled, immigrants, redheads, union members, teachers, the military, scientists, doctors, Tik Tok users, Weather Forecasters, men with beards, atheists and model railroaders.
snoey
@Anonymous At Work:
Quorum calls are a burden on the majority.
The minority only needs a few senators to tag team speeches, and a failed quorum call is a perfectly good delaying tactic.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Amir Khalid: I don’t think it’s that hard to do, Biden is your cool uncle Joe, McConnell is the old twat next door who has plastic slip covers on all his furniture and calls the cops anytime someone parks a car outside his house. There is a positive and negative to the Old White Guy stereotype.
mrmoshpotato
Oh Moscow Mitch. Don’t ever change. Actually, do change. FOAD!
Benw
@Betty Cracker: word.
rikyrah
@Delk:
BidenBucks :)
prostratedragon
Senator Doomsday Shroud.
mrmoshpotato
@prostratedragon: Senator Asshole-for-sake-of-it
Baud
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
Has liberalism gone too far?
prostratedragon
@mrmoshpotato: Senator of many titles. Just saying the words with the proper shake of the jowls is supposed to send us quaking.
mrmoshpotato
Some incomplete bullshit Mexico paid for. Oh wait…
Sure Lurkalot
@mrmoshpotato: IAF!
Thor Heyerdahl
@Enhanced Voting Techniques:
As opposed to the list of Republicans so eloquently listed by Harvey Korman
https://youtu.be/fLpmswBKVN4
H.E.Wolf
It’s interesting to note which commenters habitually use slurs for women’s reproductive organs to indicate their disapproval of someone.
There are plenty of other opprobrious epithets that don’t equate “female” with “bad”, so the word choice is illuminating.
There are only a few people on this site who do this, and it is really noticeable.
Elizabelle
Will you consider making a generous donation to pet rescue or even those accursed, cowardly Democrats if Senator Feinstein proves you wrong?
Because that’s a really definitive statement you just made, and I suspect it is nothing but crap. It’s shit, really.
I think Feinstein still talks to her colleagues. I am pretty sure they are discussing with her how terribly the Senate has changed; that we are in uncharted waters. I think she is well aware of GOP attempts to impose 21st century Jim Crow voting restrictions, and the peril to democracy that would ensue. We cannot live in mortal terror of every presidential election and midterm.
Mostly, accompanying her husband to some far-flung post would be a graceful exit for a path-breaking politician who has done a lot of good over the course of a very long (OK, maybe too long) career.
She does not deserve your derision for an action she has not yet committed to, or performed.
What a sour ass comment to see, first thing in this thread.
mrmoshpotato
@Baud: Damn hippies and (yes, “and cowboys”, autoincorrect!) their model railroads!
RaflW
Moscow Mitch Is back on his heels. He may look powerful to the D.C. press that somehow remains cowed by him, but his yelling out his blunt obstructionism is more Mighty Oz than anything.
I can see how he is thinking about retiring. How fun is kicking puppies if Democrats no longer flinch?
Edmund Dantes
@snoey: No. it’s a flipped quorum call. If the filibuster doesn’t have 41 senators present to listen. Then the filibuster fails.
Just One More Canuck
@mrmoshpotato: Are you implying that it was all done for show, and for the grift? Shocked, I tells ya
Amir Khalid
@Elizabelle:
Bitte futtern nicht den Troll.
Elizabelle
@Amir Khalid: Ja. And enjoy that folding bike, the weights, and how many guitars now??
Still need a cat to adopt you, though. I’m rooting for that to happen, sooner rather than later.
mrmoshpotato
@Just One More Canuck: Oh no. Not at all! Grift? What’s that to a Soviet shitpile mobster con artist crime family?
Miss Bianca
@Baud:
How is this actually different from the way he’s been operating before?
AJ - Mustard Search & Rescue Team
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: they came for the model railroaders…
germy
Violent incel. I don’t believe him when he says it wasn’t racism, though.
The Thin Black Duke
@germy: Bullshit on it “not being racially motivated”.
snoey
@Edmund Dantes:
That’s a reform to the cloture vote, and a good one.
It still leaves the 51 vote quorum requirement before the cloture vote. Could be some gamesmanship – sudden quorum of the majority appearing in the middle of the night trying to catch the minority out. Have to see how that plays out.
In the long run it puts the burden on the filibusterers though.
Miss Bianca
@germy: If he really wanted to punish the one responsible for feeding his addiction, he would have shot *himself*.
Old School
@germy: So he didn’t hate Asians. He was sexually attracted to Asians.
Still seems racially motivated to me.
Grumpy Bunny
test
laura
Sex work Is Work. These were workplace killings. The young mass murderer sure felt like visiting multiple workplaces to murder women and did so – and will likely get a lot of attention. The dead have so far been lumped together in a faceless, nameless “asian women” despite the fact that not all of the victims were asian women. I’ll be watching the media to see how the dead are treated and expect the same old same old. And yes, he’s a racist and a misogynist and he’s a church going God loving young murderer despite the Commandment not to kill.
prostratedragon
Speaking of grifts, someone is getting desperate. And what low-order critter would be pushing this through after the game is already so exposed? (“Trump’s Florida resort touted as potential gambling destination”)
Mike S
I think Mitch is more concerned with maintaining his own power as his wife is investigated for her massive corruption. If he loses any real power, or FSM forbid his seat, he gets pulled into the investigation. We already know he used his power to protect her while she was she was in the process of enriching the whole family.
Amir Khalid
@Elizabelle:
Still only five guitars. I tried to buy a sixth, a cheap copy of Chuck Berry’s favourite cherry-red ES-335; but after my purchase had gone through, the vendor declared they were out of stock and refunded to my e-wallet. So I decided to spend the money on other things I needed: new boots and exercise gear.
I’ll have to get an Epiphone. It costs quite a bit more, about three times as much, so I’ll wait a while before I do that.
Matt McIrvin
@Old School:
For some of these guys… that’s the same thing.
Edmund Dantes
@snoey: No. we are changing the rules. It’s a special quorum call for filibuster only. It’s an exception to the need of 51 for a votes. It’s a check on whether the filibuster is sustaining its obligations. It’s not a vote. It’s just are there 41 (or make it 45 to allow for one or two Dems to be in room) senators present as required for a filibuster?
failure to have the minimum there is an auto end to filibuster and it’s over and can’t be done again for that bill.
Elizabelle
@Mike S: Mitch McConnell’s threats sound like flopsweat to me
And we’re talking about the filibuster. Not the insurrection. “Shiny object, here, here, here.”
Humanities Prof
@germy: I’m not sure that “I didn’t kill them because they were Asian, I killed them because they were women!” is going to be the winning legal defense strategy that this guy thinks it is.
AJ - Mustard Search & Rescue Team
On HR 1, John Judis is back on his bullshit, suggesting Dems should only propose things that could get 10 R senators on board…..
Really wish Josh would cut him loose
Baud
@Miss Bianca:
This time, he would be even more adamant that it’s really our fault.
Baud
@germy:
Nevermind. I misread.
germy
@Miss Bianca:
AJ - Mustard Search & Rescue Team
Did the site eat my comment about John Judis being back on his bullshit? Ugh
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/democrats-should-avoid-overreaching-on-hr-1
I knew it was him just from the headline
Old Dan and Little Ann
I asked 3 people about their “Biden bucks” yesterday. They’d not heard the term before. Wtf?! My parents received theirs Friday in their credit union account. Nothing for my household, yet.
Gin & Tonic
@germy: Why is the Cherokee County Sheriff acting as this dude’s PR flack?
JPL
@germy: The Atlanta police said that they do not have proof that it is racially motivated at this time. The Cherokee county sheriff is the one who discounted that, and it is the sheriff who said how helpful the parents were. Don’t you know the kid just had a bad day.
There is little information about whether or not he worked and if not how he had the money to buy the guns.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic: It’s what the suspect said about his motive. The article is not as clear as it should be, but the quotes are just relating what the shooter said.
Bluegirlfromwyo
@Old School: In a lot of people, hate and sexual attraction are entwined.
JPL
@Gin & Tonic: Because it’s Cherokee County.
MisterForkbeard
@Miss Bianca: I was going to say. They didn’t even entertain amendments or suggestions from Democrats on their Bills – they wrote them in secret and voted in lockstep.
Compare to the ARP – publicly stated what was in it months ahead of time, invited Republicans to offer changes. Republicans worked in bad faith and Dems still brought them in and so on to discuss it before telling them to get serious.
Republicans refused. Still got some amendments in but ALL refused to vote for it.
snoey
@Edmund Dantes:
How do you bypass Article 1 Section 5?
eta All the minority has to do is call quorum that is privileged.
germy
Just Some Fuckhead
@Elizabelle: Having no position on the filibuster is operationally the same as supporting the filibuster since the filibuster is a current reality.
JPL
@germy: My bias is showing, but I would not base an opinion on what a Cherokee County sheriff said.
JPL
@germy: I did wonder whether or not, Long was going to plead guilty, but mentally ill.
KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager))
OK, before I read any of this, I have to go completely OT to tell you guys about what’s in my back yard right now.
On Sunday a deer was hit in front of my house, and dragged itself down behind the house into a floodplain/environmental easement to die. Animal Control wouldn’t remove it, so over the last few days we’ve been watching a succession of scavengers from our windows. Today, right now, I saw what was a first for me: a bald eagle! I know bald eagles are scavengers (hence the ‘bald’ part), but I’ve never seen them scavenging here in my suburban-very-near-urban part of Maryland.
That environmental easement, and the parkland right behind our house, mean we’re plagued by deer. The fact that our street is designated a ‘rustic rural road,’ and we’re on a sharp curve, means we see more than our share of dead deer in the yard. I’m unfortunately familiar with the favored parts that foxes, coyotes, and buzzards choose, and the order in which they come. But this is the first time I’ve seen an eagle. That bird is BIG! He is actually dragging the carcass around!
OK, sorry for the detour to bloody wildlife. Back to bloody Republicans.
Betty Cracker
@laura: An article I read this morning had a story about the killer’s fairly recent “rebaptism” in a church where his dad is a youth minister or something like that, IIRC. The story included a bizarre account of the murderer being inspired to return to the church by the parable of the prodigal son. It sounded like he had some exceptionally weird ideas about the meaning of that parable. The church took down a video of his “testimony” from its FB page, now that he’s famous for being a misogynist, racist mass murderer.
germy
@KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager)):
The deer would say they’re plagued by speeding cars.
Betty Cracker
@KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager)): I see Bald Eagles occasionally around here, and when they’re on the ground or otherwise near something that gives me a sense of scale, I always marvel at how BIG they are. Seriously massive birds, eagles.
JPL
@KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager)): Ugh.. I’ve seen cayotes, fox, deer, and lots of hawks in my yard, but no bald eagles. The most magical moment was when great horned owl chicks visited.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Betty Cracker: His testimony only got better after a few murders. That’s how testimony time works. You bring your sinful A game.
Edmund Dantes
@snoey: Neither chamber can conduct business without a quorum, but the Supreme Court long ago held that each House determines whether a quorum is present when a bill passes.
https://constitutioncenter.org/interactive-constitution/interpretation/article-i/clauses/760
also the rule will be written then a majority quorum call (if called by the party filibustering) fails during a filibuster it is also over unless there are 41 senators voting to continue the filibuster absent a majority quorum.
Ruckus
@Benw:
Right up to the last point, you were good. The last part was even better, because rethuglicans really don’t care about anything other than their bank and stock accounts.
Benw
@KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager)):
I mean, the coming of the Eagles is what turned the tide of the Battle of Lonely Mountain. Way too much info here on Tolkien’s obsession with eagles:
https://masteroflore.wordpress.com/2013/03/18/the-eagles-are-coming/
germy
Yes, he could have shot his dick off. Problem solved.
snoey
@Edmund Dantes:
I think that means that you can’t retroactively challenge a law for being passed without a quorum.
Bigger picture – however it games out – this makes a filibuster a problem for everybody since it now prevents other business from being conducted and thus puts pressure on the fillibusterers to end it.
Ruckus
@Old Dan and Little Ann:
Nothing for me yet either. And I didn’t get the last $600. Had to claim that on my tax return.
The Very Reverend Crimson Fire of Compassion
@Amir Khalid: Your collection won’t be complete until you have a custom Tongues of Flame axe, but maybe someday . . .
Elizabelle
@JPL: The parents were helpful. They recognized their son in the surveillance photos and called the police. Which enabled them to track the shooter via his cell phone.
NY Times update: Parents turned the kid in; he graduated from killing deer to humans.
KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager))
@germy: The problem with DiFi is that her mind has changed, e.g. she has lots of plaques in her brain. IOW she can’t hold short-term memories anymore. See, eg, her statement that the filibuster isn’t used as much as it used to be.
She needs to retire gracefully or be removed disgracefully.
Betty Cracker
@Just Some Fuckhead: True!
Your comment reminds me of something that happened in fifth grade at the Southern Baptist school in which I was unfortunately enrolled at the time. (My mom had made the disastrous decision to outsource our education to her parents. It did not go well. But I digress…)
Anyhoo, the homeroom teacher would lead morning prayers and then ask us if there was anyone in our lives who should be added to the class prayer list. At first, that went about how you’d expect, with kids asking classmates to remember their grandma who was having gallbladder surgery and stuff like that.
But then one day a kid told this long and tragic tale of a calamity that befell his neighbors. I have no idea whether it was true or not, but other kids took it as a challenge, and over the space of a week or so, prayer list time became a recurring horror story swap as kids competed to share the most lurid and shocking stories imaginable.
The teacher couldn’t prove anyone was lying, but I’m certain she figured it out. Pretty soon, that segment of the morning prayers routine was retired, permanently, and the poor teacher not too long after, God rest her martyred heart.
Geminid
A full repeal of the filibuster the filibuster seems unlikely in this Congress. More likely would be a special carve-out for voting rights legislation. There already are carve-outs for budget reconciliation, lower court federal judges, and most recently, Supreme Court Justices. Even then, any voting rights act will still have to be approved by all fifty Democratic Senators, and H.R.1 might not be passed in it’s present form.
This will be very frustrating for many. The only solution to this and other problems may be to increase the Democratic caucus by flipping Republican Senate seats in 2022 and 2024, and holding to seats like those in NH, GA, AZ, and NV up in 2022.
The Moar You Know
@Elizabelle: Seconded. And it doesn’t matter what anyone here thinks about her abilities or beliefs or what actions she will take: she’s not leaving. That’s very clear. She’s going to pull a Byrd or Kennedy and die in office because that’s what she wants, and there’s nothing anyone can do to stop her. So fucking deal with it and find something else to bitch about.
wizened_guy
I think another reason McTurtle is so freaked out over the filibuster is that he’s been procedurally pantsed twice now by Schumer. First, when the Dems moved quickly in the wee hours of the morning in the near-empty chamber to shorten debate on the Covid release bill after Ron Johnson’s stunt forced a reading of the entire bill; and second, by quickly invoking cloture on the nomination of Merrick Garland, again in a near-empty chamber in the early hours of the morning, after the all-night vote-o-rama on the Covid bill. McConnell was caught with his pants down and he’s furious about it.
Matt McIrvin
@KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager)): My parents live in Colonial Beach, VA, on the Potomac downstream from Washington, and bald eagles hang around there for part of the year eating fish from the river. The other part of the year they get ospreys–I think the ospreys go to South America when the bald eagles come down from the north–and I think the bald eagles and the ospreys may even alternate using the same nests. The nests are HUGE.
KayInMD (formerly Kay (not the front-pager))
@germy: The speed limit of 30 mph, and the sharp curve/ steep hill mean the cars really aren’t going that fast, most of the time anyway. When they are they usually end up wrapped around a tree or in our front yard. And it’s cute to watch the does teach their fawns to stop and listen/ watch for car and bicycle traffic. But someone always gets careless, usually during rutting season, or at the end of winter when they’re hungry and ready for winter to be over already.
Just Some Fuckhead
@Betty Cracker: Yeah, we always loved the holy shit this guy is a terrible sinner testimonies but nothing got our jaws working like the unspoken prayer requests. What sexual misconduct could this be??? Let’s speculate..
J R in WV
@JPL:
OK, I’ll buy that. Great Horned Owls are like eagles with style… not quite as big, but still evolved into nearly perfect hunter-killer birds. Silent in flight, night vision, dropping silently from the sky onto their dinner.
Great Horned Owl chicks just might be the most magical birds ever to see in the wild. The adults are amazing! The chicks have to be also amazing, but more concentrated.
TomatoQueen
Here are some recommendations for live eagle cam watching:
A scandal: New bald eagle moves in at National Arboretum nest – The Washington Post
Jackie and Shadow are on eggs at a little over 6500 feet: Big Bear Bald Eagle Nest | Friends of Big Bear Valley
trnc
One more reason to re-implement soon.
Just Chuck
Enough tinkering around the edges. How about just adopting the fucking House rules?
WaterGirl
@AJ – Mustard Search & Rescue Team: I’m gonna guess that WordPress does not like the dash or hyphen in your nym, so it gets marked as spam.