McConnell to colleague Bret Baier: If I were the president, I don't think I'd have a two hour press conference again.
— Chad Pergram (@ChadPergram) January 21, 2022
Yeah, because #MinorityLeader ‘Speed Bump’ McConnell can’t even manage a ten-minute presser without stepping on his own… tongue:
In case you missed it, Mitch McConnell said the quiet part out loud last night: “African-American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans.”
Make sure everyone sees this.pic.twitter.com/ReOvHGJcnI
— MeidasTouch.com (@MeidasTouch) January 20, 2022
Philip Bump, at the Washington Post — “Awkward phrasing isn’t the only problem with his argument”:
Shortly after the Senate voted down a proposed change to filibuster rules — thereby dooming a Democratic push to implement federal voting standards — Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and other top Republicans held a brief news conference…
A reporter raised the most extreme version of concerns about that change to McConnell, referring to the legislation that would no longer move forward.
“What’s your message for voters of color who are concerned that without the John L. Lewis Voting Rights Act they’re not going to be able to vote in the midterm?” he asked.
McConnell replied, “Well, the concern is misplaced, because if you look at the statistics, African American voters are voting in just as high a percentage as Americans.”…
“A recent survey, 94 percent of Americans thought it was easier to vote,” he continued. “This is not a problem. Turnout is up, biggest turnout since 1900. It’s simply — they’re being sold a bill of goods.”
The point about turnout being up significantly in 2020 is true. This was the same point President Biden made during his news conference on Wednesday, that turnout had been so high even without new federal rules, which he presented as a reason for some optimism. But this ignores a crucial point: Turnout was that high because voting access was expanded in response to the coronavirus pandemic. With more states implementing the sorts of changes that the Democratic proposal would standardize — and, of course, with a hyperpolarizing incumbent on the ballot — turnout was up.
The concern expressed by Democrats is that there has been a backlash to the 2020 turnout that manifests in those new voting laws. Nineteen states passed new laws scaling back voting access. Sometimes those were efforts to unwind new policies that had been implemented for the pandemic. Often, they were broader. The entire point is that the 2020 benchmark provoked a backlash. For McConnell to point to it as proof that the system is doing fine is like a kid trying to assure you he hadn’t broken a vase by pointing to its having been intact when he picked it up.
There’s a useful analogue here. When the Supreme Court decided to remove the preclearance provision from the Voting Rights Act in 2013, Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. pointed to the lack of a racial disparity in turnout as a reason to do so. He described the law as having been “immensely successful at redressing racial discrimination and integrating the voting process” — and then used that success as a reason to upend the law. In a dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg memorably compared this to “throwing away your umbrella in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet.”
This is McConnell’s argument now. He’s telling non-White voters that because they didn’t get wet in 2020, there’s no need to bar [other] people from drilling holes in their roofs…
I *am* American. #mitchplease pic.twitter.com/DU1VZnKoCJ
— Jonathan Capehart (@CapehartJ) January 20, 2022
We were Americans before America was America. #MitchPlease pic.twitter.com/515oxVZQgz
— Lakota Man (@LakotaMan1) January 20, 2022
I want to personally thank Mitch McConnell
He just mobilized the biggest African American voter turnout for Midterms
— A Black Woman..The End (@battletested5) January 20, 2022
Excellent reminder:
McConnell is not a master of Senate procedure. Constant obstruction requires no skill, nor does hobbling the courts. He's either failed to pass legislation or moved through visionless bills. All while bolstered by the support of an increasingly homogeneous authoritarian caucus.
— Magdi Semrau (@magi_jay) January 20, 2022
Meanwhile, there is no evidence that McConnell had some cunning insight into Manchin & Sinema. He literally just did nothing & watched it all unfold. There's no tangled web here. Just a deeply immoral person who sat back & was rewarded by two people's pompous fecklessness. pic.twitter.com/qdfhJphvpI
— Magdi Semrau (@magi_jay) January 20, 2022
narya
I had to take a vacation day, in the expectation that my electricity would be turned off for at least four hours at some point. On one hand, I was stressing because work is a dumpster fire, the fire is spreading to another dumpster, and someone just slashed the tires on the fire truck. On the other hand, I’m Tidying–small things, a little here, a little there–and taking advantage of the cold to put the freezer contents on the back porch and defrost the chest freezer. The power hasn’t gone off yet, but I refuse to log into work. And I’ll have my weekend chores done before the weekend. /dumb boring stuff from my life/
Roger Moore
I agree with Magi Jay about McConnell. People treat him like he’s a genius, but he isn’t. It’s much easier to block and destroy than it is to build consensus and create. McConnell has been successful at getting the Republicans to agree to the easy parts- block whatever the Democrats try and approve all Trump’s judicial nominees- but has no clue about how to build anything. Despite having a majority, the Republicans couldn’t get anything done in 2020 without Democratic help.
rikyrah
@narya:
sometimes, you just gotta do the small stuff to stay sane
SiubhanDuinne
@narya:
I am finally beginning to thaw out — myself, not anything in my freezer. Heating unit died sometime overnight and I’ve been chilled to the bone since I woke up at around 3:30 am, but happily the building maintenance guy showed up about half an hour ago, worked some magic, and I can now feel my fingers and toes again.
rikyrah
@Roger Moore:
I agree too
He’s an evil piece of human garbage, and everything he does reflects that.
Wapiti
@narya: Having those nagging chores done and off your mental plate will be a good thing.
SiubhanDuinne
@Roger Moore:
QFT
trollhattan
@narya:
We had that last week–planned power outage on account of replacing a pole down the block (underground utilities, they exist, just not here) and went to the office instead, where I found (post office move) the desktop PC won’t boot, the furniture hasn’t been set up, and it’s nearly empty no none of that return-to-work “synergy” I was promised.
Long day. Only thing that works in the house when power is out, is the gas stovetop. Even the gas water heaters need power.
Good luck!
satby
Of you want to read a Twitter thread that will make you proud to be American, read the #mitchplease Twitter thread.
MisterDancer
There’s such a good article on all this at The Nation, y’all:
I found this article while looking for a good article on McConnell’s Confederate Flag debacle, which rightly keeps coming up (and is referenced in that Nation article).
Mitchy, my boy? We’ll stop pointing back to your past sins, dude, if you stop enabling racist crap.
MisterDancer
That maps with the guy who said, in announcing he’s not running for GOP nomination for a Senate seat, that all the current Senators he talked to were basically just blocking Biden until they can install a new GOP President.
Brantl
If I were Mitch McConnell, I’d have to shoot myself, to put me and everybody else out of my misery.
narya
@rikyrah: @SiubhanDuinne: @Wapiti: @trollhattan: Yes to all of you (and good luck getting heat, Subaru!). I was beyond agitated yesterday, and didn’t get a lot of sleep (though I did manage to unwind the anxiety and tension and anger so I could sleep), so this is very soothing. I made a bunch of tea this morning and put it in Thermoses (Thermi?), and I’ll eventually go for a nice long walk. It’s cold but sunny, so that will help, too.
J R in WV
@SiubhanDuinne:
I can relate to your over night problem, For many years persistent low temps at night would cause our gas feed to stop, until the distribution lines (probably installed in the 1920s) were replaced with new plastic lines and decades old bits were replaced. Plus no building maintenance staff, that would be me.
Tonight we expect lows under 9 degrees, so really really hope the gas supply and all decide to remain functional. There is a wood stove, and firewood, but hauling wood around at 4 am is not a good plan at my age and degree of decrepitude.
FelonyGovt
@satby: I’m so awed by all the people posting “I am an American” tweets with their photos and the #mitchplease hashtag. What a racist piece of shit he is.
SiubhanDuinne
@MisterDancer:
My sole quibble is with calling what Mitch said a “slip of the tongue.” That implies inadvertent, accidental.
Nope. I think Mitch knew exactly what he was saying.
jnfr
And another bit of Mitch’s essential nature:
Whoa.
@patriottakes
unearths another video of Mitch McConnell saying the quiet part out loud: “My party does really good with white people and I’m proud of that.” Make sure everyone sees this. #MitchPlease
https://twitter.com/MeidasTouch/status/1484561807498825730
Film at the link.
Geminid
Thank you Ms. Laurie for the “Mangy Jay” tweets!
Magdi Semrau is an impressive example of a citizen journalist. She’s as lucid and and perceptive as anyone out there. Semrau does not come with a law degree or a Master’s from the Kennedy School of Government, just a good heart, an open mind and a background in childhood education. I learn a lot from her.
Kent
He’s been very successful in building the GOP into a party that does nothing and stands for nothing but obstruction. There was a time when that wasn’t the case. Under McConnell, that has all been flushed out of the party and it is mostly due to him
Witness Sununu deciding not to run for Senate in New Hampshire. He simply didn’t want to be McConnell Republican and there is no space today for any other kind. At least in the Senate.
Kay
The “turnout is up so we don’t need federal civil rights protections for voting” has really taken off on both the Right and among centrists.
They don’t think we need federal civil rights protections for voting. They really couldn’t make it more clear. It’s an argument against any federal oversight of state voting laws, which is the actual conservative position, so shouldn’t surprise anyone.
I DO think we need federal civil rights protections for voting, which was absolutely the mainstream position up until John Roberts took the bench, so I think they’re the radicals and are incredibly cavalier about this right. But we’re going to find out the hard way, because very few of these people confidently predicting that no state will supress votes have lived in a US without federal civil rights laws protecting voting, so they should at least consider that they have no clue if this is a good idea.
I have the proven, prudent approach. They just pulled theirs out of their ass in 2015.
Baud
@Geminid:
No wonder she stands out.
narya
@satby: It’s really beautiful! I love all of those pictures, and it warms my heart. I got a flyer from a major retailer, and the pic on the front was a white dad, black mom, and their kid, lounging in their PJs; you would NEVER have seen that when I was a kid. Despite the major work that remains to do, I’m so glad to see the changes that went into that just being an everyday ad.
Brachiator
I certainly hope so.
Suzanne
@narya: When I was in AZ, my office did half-day Fridays. It was a game-changer. That afternoon was my time to grocery shop before the weekend, get my hair cut, take a Spawn to a medical professional of some type, do my holiday shopping, browse a bookstore for an hour with a coffee…. and I almost always got lunch by myself and sat alone, in peace and quiet, to read a book. Honestly, since the pandemic started, one of the things I have missed so much is just sitting at a Panera, eating French onion soup, and reading a damn book. Once every three months or so, the stars would align, I wouldn’t have any obligations, and I would get to take a Friday afternoon nap. Just absolutely heavenly.
Enjoy your Friday off.
Kay
They’ve all adopted Justice Roberts far Right theories on voting rights. That’s fine (except “centrists” should probably admit that’s what they’ve done) but since the John Roberts Theory of Voting has only been in place for two years I would suggest that they shouldn’t be so confident on its validity.
When you reach for a legal remedy that you need and it is no longer there, THAT’S when you wish you had it :)
Honestly it astonishes me how much people take for granted. I wasn’t this reckless when I was 16 years old.
trollhattan
@Kent:
Mich never varies from his mission to grab as much power for himself and the Republican Party as possible, while diminishing the power of the Democratic Party. There’s no nuance but it’s not really needed. Trump’s ability to retain focus on any one thing other than Ivanka’s butt is zilch.
Suzanne
In all seriousness, this is the kind of thing that is probably more important than any bullshit the Republicans do. It’s not just normalization and representation. It also changes the beauty and aspiration standard.
Kay
We’ll have some real info because the DOJ is suing Texas under the new laissez-faire, devil may care approach to voting rights the United States has just recently adopted in a jarring lurch to the far Right, so we’ll see how it goes.
We’ll find out if they’ll stop any state from doing anything. I doubt it. But no one should be making any predictions without case law. Maybe they will and…maybe they won’t. No telling.
Gravenstone
Loving the #MitchPlease tag…
Baud
@Suzanne: I’ve been seeing a lot more ads with gay couples.
narya
@Suzanne: Exactly! I work in the LGBTQ community, and that brings a whole other pile of variety. It’s just so much more . . . spacious, I guess, than the narrow channels and visions we’re supposed to have.
Baud
@Kay:
When turnout goes down, they’ll just claim 2020 was an outlier.
clay
I’m a little surprised that they’re openly acknowledging that the Minority Leader and a Fox News guy are colleagues.
Roger Moore
@Kent:
This is what’s really destructive. I think it’s good for political parties to be a bit more coherent than they were in the post-War era, but their members need some ability to exercise their consciences.
Roger Moore
@Suzanne:
Yes, but you can also see why it causes White supremacists to flip out. There’s a reason they saw miscegenation laws as essential.
SiubhanDuinne
@clay:
I don’t think that’s what he’s saying. Chad Pergram works for FOX News, and he’s referring to Bret Bauer as his colleague, not McConnell’s. I admit that without context, or a possessive pronoun, it’s an ambiguous and misleading tweet.
Jackie
@satby: Thanks for this! I‘be been scrolling and scrolling… STILL haven’t reached the end!
gene108
@Baud:
They’ll say white turnout is down, just like non-white turnout, so everything’s still fine and not racist.
Suzanne
@Baud: Yes, for sure. Also at stores that have a large wedding registry clientele, like Crate and Barrel, I’ve seen more “Mr. and Mr.” merchandise. I appreciate it.
Honestly, I feel like this stuff is a double-edged sword, though. Marketing imagery (including advertising) is so critical in creating our sense of aspiration, creating an aesthetic sense of other people’s lives. Like, when I hear people say that people who go to trade school are “disrespected”, it’s not a thing that I really believe, because I’ve literally never seen that. I have never seen anyone who went to a trade treated poorly or insulted due to that choice. What I have seen, though, is a creation of a visual culture that doesn’t really represent trades at all. And that’s then interpreted as “disrespect”. I remember, long before 2016, musing about how rural people were represented basically by Honey Boo Boo or Friday Night Lights. The visual shifts make a huge difference.
West of the Rockies
@rikyrah:
What would it be like to know, to just really know, that when you die, millions will cheer, and almost no one will truly mourn because your entire legacy is greed and restriction and destruction?
gene108
@Roger Moore:
Even when they controlled the House, neither Speakers Boehner nor Ryan could get a budget passed without Pelosi and the Democrats stepping in to bail them out.
At the Federal level, Republicans are incapable of governing.
Suzanne
@Roger Moore: Yes. Biracial people being thought of as beautiful is one of the biggest blows to white supremacy and grievance culture.
Even naming “neckbeards” as a type was a blow to this cohort.
Baud
@Suzanne:
I agree that a lot of media does a poor job of representing working class folks in a positive light, except maybe for truck commercials. Of course, when I say it, I mean all working class folks. Not just white guys in traditional male jobs.
mrmoshpotato
@West of the Rockies:
I hope that Moscow Mitch knows that the pissing on his grave will be epic.
Spanish Moss
Josh Marshall at TPM has a thoughtful essay that goes through several scenarios to show why Kyrsten Sinema’s political career is over:
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/rejoice-kyrsten-sinemas-political-career-is-already-over
Makes sense to me, I just wish it could happen sooner.
Suzanne
@Baud:
Um, yes, you mean like people who work in stores and cut hair and teach preschool and and clean hotel rooms and empty bedpans are also actual people with complex lives?!
mrmoshpotato
Yes!
Baud
@Suzanne:
One problem I have, with TV anyway, is that there is so much more content these days, a lot of it trageted to different demos, that it’s harder to say with confidence who’s being represented (and represented well) and who isn’t.
Baud
@mrmoshpotato:
Already there.
Suzanne
@Spanish Moss: I think the most important part of the piece is a throwaway at the end, which is that her bullshit has made it very hard for any Dem to win that seat. I love Ruben Gallego, but if I was a betting woman, he would be a long shot.
So that critical thing that tells us is that we have to focus our efforts and resources elsewhere.
Ella in New Mexico
All nastiness that is McConnell and the Republicans aside–WTF is wrong with these lazy assed “journalists” who didn’t immediately throw back at him not only what he just said, but the fact that these new laws roll back the access that allowed record voter turnout?
I mean, I don’t do journalism for a living and the first words out of my mouth in retort would have been those, so it’s not like brain surgery guys. How do you walk away from an opportunity to watch his slack jaw hang open for the 30 seconds it would take for him to think up some other dumb retort?
Seriously, the news media in general is doing an incredibly SHIT ASS job anymore. (example: Stupid Chris Jansing of MSNBC spent her morning spot running a piece on “Dems who are disappointed in Biden because he doesn’t have the magic power to make the Senate function” cuz that’s the new narrative to run with for the week.)
The handful of them that actually do their work correctly don’t ever seem to be at pressers like this, guess those cream puff jobs are reserved for butt sniffers and pretty faces anymore.
I hate pretty much everyone on cable news at this point. Fucking overpaid lazy asses.
Sorry, just another bad day in healthcare paradise making me cynical…
Suzanne
@Baud: Eh. The only stuff that really matters is stuff you’d hear about. It doesn’t change anyone’s perception if the audience is confined. And it’s less about individual works than it is about seeing themes across media.
jimmiraybob
Now I understand their claims that hundreds of thousands to millions of foreign illegal votes were counted.
Gin & Tonic
Speaking of Americans, my DIL has her consular interview this afternoon – last step in the green card process. Only two years and eight months after applying, and two years and four months after she last set foot in the US.
Baud
@Gin & Tonic:
?
Gin & Tonic
@Baud: Thanks, Baud. This has been a real ordeal.
sdhays
@Spanish Moss: This is what I’ve been thinking for quite some time.
One point about McCain that doesn’t often get pointed out is that the few times he bucked his party, he was on the more popular side of the argument. He voted with Democrats on the W tax cuts, which weren’t that popular, McCain Feingold was a good-government feel-good bill that was popular, and repealing the ACA wasn’t popular at all. McCain actually saved Republicans by killing it, along with Collins and Murkowski.
If Sinema wanted to be John McCain’s Democratic successor, she needed to be a bog-standard Democrat on popular stuff and find places where Democrats had less popular policies where she could burnish her “maverick” image. That way she might irritate Democrats and make independents happy, but few would grow to loathe her.
Her egomaniacal stupidity has been surprising, to say the least. I thought all of this was obvious.
sdhays
@Gin & Tonic: My wife actually got our wedding date wrong in her interview (we’d had 2 ceremonies, one in the US and one in her country and she got mixed up), and they just asked if she was sure.
I hope your DIL’s interviewer is similarly forgiving (and also that your DIL doesn’t need a forgiving interviewer).
sab
@Kay: Yes. My parents voted in the Jim Crow south (being white) and boy did they have stories. So does Jimmy Carter (where the presiding sheriff looked at your ballot before he put it in the box.)
Geminid
@Suzanne: We’ll know a lot more about the Arizona electorate in 2023. Sinema’s disapproval rating among Democrats tells me she can’t win reelection even if she somehow won a primary. I don’t know that much about Ruben Gallego except that he is a member of the House Progressive Caucus and has pressed for the Pentagon to better report on whatever they’re calling UFOs these days. Gallego also served in combat as a Marine officer, which counts for something with most people and could blunt attacks that he’s too far left.
If Gallego runs he’ll probably have a pretty clear shot at Sinema. Greg Stanton gets mentioned sometimes as a prospect, but I think this will be like Pennsylvania, where Chrissy Houlihan and Madeleine Dean were mentioned as Senate prospects, and then Conor Lamb ended up the candidate from the House. I think the three talked it over.
Steeplejack (phone)
Comedian Louie Anderson dead at 68.
clay
@SiubhanDuinne: Oh I know what he meant. But in my mind, it’s another case of “saying the quiet part out loud” ?
...now I try to be amused
This is something Republicans understand and I wish more Democrats did: Some political fights are worth it even when you lose today, if it prepares the way to win later.
bluegirlfromwyo
@Suzanne: I know Trumpsters who are well aware of this and hate it with a passion. It’s unnatural, disgusting, and something they “can’t have their opinion about” (blah blah blah whine whine whine). In other words, expect some Gooper jackass to say this quiet part out loud soon enough.
Kent
@…now I try to be amused: Exactly. Democrats should never allow anyone to “blue slip” legislation. In other words, kill it without getting your fingerprints on the deed. Make them own it and put their actual votes on record for posterity and all to see.
StringOnAStick
I’m surprised no one has noted that if our buddy Mitch is saying this, then Biden’s long presser was effective, otherwise Mitch wouldn’t be trying to be so gosh darned helpful.
I think holding the vote was worth it because it made it very, very clear who the two D obstructionists are, and obviously all the 50 R’s. Those still trying to make it a Green Lantern, Biden. didn’t. even. try. argument look even more ridiculous than usual, which certainly takes some effort.
japa21
@…now I try to be amused:
Yes, and in this case it showed that 48 Dem Senators are willing to kill the filibuster when needed. We always talk about how doomed we are if the GOP takes back the House and Senate. I think the GOP knows it is doomed if they don’t.
Also, this quote of 94% found it easy to vote neglects two things. As already pointed out is that many things were done to make it easier due to Covid. But maybe more importantly, it states that the GOP is basically willing to ignore 6% of the electorate and has no problem disenfranchising them.
Steeplejack
@Kay:
It’s of a piece with the point you have made elsewhere about wage and job-safety protections. People don’t remember the bad old days or don’t think we could ever go back, because . . .?
catclub
On the important if true front: CNN highlights a guy who has been predicting a stock market crash every year since 2009.
… But does not mention that record.
LongHairedWeirdo
This is another reason for the country wide shitshow. We talk about voting rights, but we push back against lies, rather than asking the right questions: why shouldn’t it be easy for all American citizens to vote?
Why should American citizens have to undergo burdensome obstacles, when mail-in voting is *so* safe and *so* secure, and it’s *so* easy to detect fraud? Why should Americans be deprived of safe, secure, dropboxes? Why should American citizens be forbidden to accept a water bottle when they’re thirsty after standing in hours-long lines? (For that matter, where are the pictures of the long, long lines, and people asking questions “Who can live in America, and find these lines acceptable? I mean, besides a coward who is hoping lots of people in that line won’t get to vote?”
catclub
That 94% is I think of Registered voters. How many could not get registered? State registrations vary From 25 to 45% of the population not being registered, for one reason or another.
Steeplejack
@clay:
Huh. I was going to say that that was the tweeter, Chad Pergram, putting a little snark in there, but, damn, he “covers Congress for Fox News,” according to his profile. Maybe he’s a little fuzzy and misunderstands the meaning of colleague, thinks it means “someone I know” or something? But, no, I went through his Twitter feed a bit, and it’s his standard way to refer to people he works with at Fox News. All righty, then. Carry on, Chad.
Steeplejack
@SiubhanDuinne:
Go0d point! Although it should have been obvious to him to put in that possessive pronoun to avoid clay’s and my pernicious misreading.
Steeplejack
@Gin & Tonic:
Congratulations! (I guess . . .) Hope all goes well with that.
RaflW
To the Madgi tweet about Schumer finally scheduling and having the 48 votes recorded, my gut feeling is that he knew that Manchin in particular was just going to keep Lucy-ing the football, possibly for months, and getting it recorded and over took that away.
Sure enough, immediately after Kyrsten and Joe debased themselves, Manchin was back on the hustings, saying he could ‘no longer support’ the exact BBB bill he said he wanted when it was the pared down version.
I don’t know what Chuck can do about that. It is incredibly frustrating. But what I think Dem Senators should do is move some other bills for now. Stop letting the coal state asshole set the glacial (and melting) pace.
J R in WV
@narya:
And Wife and I have noticed the same thing with gay parents and their kids. Unbelievable when we were kids! Now it’s common on TV commercials, intended to sell stuff. So sweet!!
Miss Bianca
@Spanish Moss: Read it, found it both uplifting and depressing at the same time
@Suzanne: Yes, I noted that as well.