Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Trump should be leading, not lying.

When we show up, we win.

Giving up is unforgivable.

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

People are weird.

Hot air and ill-informed banter

The party of Reagan has become the party of Putin.

There is no right way to do the wrong thing.

I did not have this on my fuck 2025 bingo card.

Dear elected officials: Trump is temporary, dishonor is forever.

My years-long effort to drive family and friends away has really paid off this year.

We need to vote them all out and restore sane Democratic government.

We can’t confuse what’s necessary to win elections with the policies that we want to implement when we do.

I’m more christian than these people and i’m an atheist.

Sometimes the world just tells you your cat is here.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

He seems like a smart guy, but JFC, what a dick!

Sadly, media malpractice has become standard practice.

This country desperately needs a functioning fourth estate.

Stamping your little feets and demanding that they see how important you are? Not working anymore.

They punch you in the face and then start crying because their fist hurts.

America is going up in flames. The NYTimes fawns over MAGA celebrities. No longer a real newspaper.

We are aware of all internet traditions.

You are here: Home / Elections / 2022 Elections / Thieves Fall Out Open Thread: McConnell v Scott v Thiel

Thieves Fall Out Open Thread: McConnell v Scott v Thiel

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#MoscowMitch McConnell is an old-school political grifter — the kind of man who’s willing to spend decades sucking up to donors in return for a steady, slow growth in his own political influence and personal fortune. Rick Scott, on the other hand, didn’t make his millions waiting for others to unlock the cash register — he jumped right in there with a crowbar and stole everything he could grab.

Right now, Republican prospects in November look distinctly less hopeful than they did at the beginning of the year, so… per the NYTimes:

The Senate’s Republican campaign chief on Thursday appeared to escalate an ugly quarrel with the party’s longtime leader in the chamber, Senator Mitch McConnell, in the latest sign of the G.O.P.’s eroding confidence about winning back the majority in November.

Without naming Mr. McConnell, Senator Rick Scott of Florida, the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, lashed out in a blistering opinion piece in The Washington Examiner at Republicans he said were “trash-talking” the party’s candidates, an apparent reference to comments last month in which Mr. McConnell said that “candidate quality” could harm the G.O.P.’s chances of retaking the Senate. Mr. Scott called such remarks “treasonous” and said those who make them should “pipe down.”…

Speaking to reporters in his home state last month, Mr. McConnell conceded that Republicans had a stronger chance of winning back control of the House than the Senate in November.

“Senate races are just different — they’re statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome,” he said at a Chamber of Commerce lunch in Florence, Ky. The comment was widely interpreted to reflect Mr. McConnell’s growing concern about Republicans’ roster of Senate recruits, which includes several candidates who have been endorsed by former President Donald J. Trump and appear to be struggling in competitive races.

The intraparty feuding comes at a fraught moment for Mr. McConnell, who once boasted of being “100 percent focused” on stymieing President Biden’s agenda and appeared confident of his chance to reclaim the mantle of Senate majority leader given Democrats’ tiny margin of control. Those aspirations have dimmed substantially of late as Democrats have racked up a series of legislative accomplishments and Republican candidates have foundered in key contests…

Privately, some Senate campaign operatives have savaged Mr. Scott, saying they were befuddled by his decision to embark last month on an Italian yacht vacation at the same time that the committee was pulling television reservations in critical states, signaling it was losing hope of victories there. The trip was reported by Axios.

Mr. Scott has been at odds with Mr. McConnell since Mr. Scott released his “11-Point Plan to Rescue America,” presenting it as a policy platform for the midterm elections. Mr. McConnell emphatically rejected the plan, telling reporters, “We will not have as part of our agenda a bill that raises taxes on half the American people and sunsets Social Security and Medicare within five years.”…

Allahpundit, from inside the GOP fortress: Rick Scott: Certain people who shall remain nameless should stop trash-talking our Senate candidates

… There are three reasons why the Scott/McConnell tension is worth watching. First, there’s history here. Scott pissed off McConnell and other Republicans when he insisted on publishing his own policy agenda for the midterms earlier this year. McConnell’s strategy has been not to offer any agenda to midterm voters, believing that that will help turn the election into a referendum on Biden and the Democrats. If voters go into the booth thinking about inflation and Afghanistan, Republicans will have a good night. If they go in there wondering if they prefer Biden’s policies to the Republican alternative, that could get dicey. McConnell’s worries were confirmed when Dems pounced on some of the recommendations in Scott’s plan, accusing him and the GOP of wanting to slash Social Security and Medicare and to force seniors who currently pay no federal income tax to pony up. Which led to this extremely cringy scene in March. Looks like there’s bad blood now.

Second, Scott isn’t just any Republican senator. He’s the chair this year of the NRSC, the group responsible for getting Republican candidates elected to the Senate. If the GOP flames out, the NRSC will be blamed. And if the NRSC is blamed, Scott will be blamed. The NRSC has already taken flak for burning through most of its war chest this cycle, leaving it with $28.5 million in the bank at the end of June compared to $53.5 million for its Democratic counterpart. The cash crunch led to the group dialing back ad spending in some key races this fall and an urgent plea from the head of the RNC to major donors to chip in soon before the Senate slips away. “People are asking, ‘What the hell is going on?’” said one GOP strategist to Politico about the disappearing ads. “Why are we cutting in August? I’ve never seen it like this before.” Meanwhile, Scott was recently caught vacationing on a yacht in Italy instead of hunkering down for the fight ahead. (I wonder who could have leaked that news to the media.) If GOP candidates in swing states get outspent by the Dems (very likely) and end up falling just short (increasingly plausible), fingers will point at Scott. So here he is pointing his own finger at McConnell in advance for having supposedly demoralized conservatives with his criticism or whatever.

Third, Scott has been touted as a potential challenger to McConnell to lead the GOP caucus…

BREAKING: Another expose drops!

… The National Republican Senatorial Committee has long been a critical part of the party apparatus, recruiting candidates, supporting them with political infrastructure, designing campaign strategy and buying television ads.

By the end of July, the committee had collected a record $181.5 million — but had already spent more than 95 percent of what it had brought in. The Republican group entered August with just $23.2 million on hand, less than half of what the Senate Democratic committee had ahead of the final intense phase of the midterm elections.

Now top Republicans are beginning to ask: Where did all the money go?

The answer, chiefly, is that Mr. Scott’s enormous gamble on finding new online donors has been a costly financial flop in 2022, according to a New York Times analysis of federal records and interviews with people briefed on the committee’s finances. Today, the N.R.S.C. is raising less than before Mr. Scott’s digital splurge…

One fund-raising scheme used by the Senate committee, which has not previously been disclosed, involved sending an estimated millions of text messages that asked provocative questions — “Should Biden resign?” — followed by a request for cash: “Reply YES to donate.” Those who replied “YES” had their donation processed immediately, though the text did not reveal in advance where the money was going.

Privately, some Republicans complained the tactic was exploitative. WinRed, the party’s main donation-processing platform, recently stepped in and took the unusual step of blocking the committee from engaging in the practice, according to four people familiar with the matter…

For months last year, the National Republican Senatorial Committee was far and away the nation’s biggest online political advertiser, outspending every other party committee combined and pouring money into platforms like Google at levels almost unseen except in the fevered final days of 2020.

The sums were so breathtakingly large — peaking at more than $100,000 a day on Facebook and Google — that some concerned Democrats began to study the ads, fretting that somehow Republicans had unlocked a new sustainable way to raise money online.

They had not.

The Senate Republican bet had been this: By spending vast amounts early, the party could vacuum up contact information for millions of potential donors who could then give repeatedly over the coming months.

The internal budget document showed the shortcomings of the approach. The first month of outreach investment, June 2021, was projected to generate $3.2 million for the committee by November 2022. But the other $22 million in investments over the next seven months combined were projected to add up to a narrow net loss by Election Day…

Though the committee exists chiefly to help Republican Senate candidates, under Mr. Scott it has only occasionally leveraged its enlarged email list to fund-raise directly for them. And when it does, the fine print indicates the N.R.S.C. keeps 90 percent of the proceeds…

Lots of seamy details laid out — worth reading the whole thing, especially if you appreciate a good true-crime narrative.

======

Speaking of true crime tales — #MoscowMitch is also taking flak from a certain high-profile venture capitalist, per the Washington Post — Peter Thiel rebuffs Mitch McConnell over Senate rescue in Arizona

… Thiel, a co-founder of the payment processor PayPal and the first outside investor in Facebook, bucked left-leaning Silicon Valley by betting big on Trump in 2016. Last summer and fall, the tech entrepreneur contributed to a wide range of pro-Trump congressional candidates, igniting hopes among some Republicans that he was positioning himself to become a megadonor on the scale of libertarian brothers David and Charles Koch, or former New York mayor Mike Bloomberg, who has given millions in recent years to Democratic candidates and causes. But Thiel has told associates that he has no plans to spend more this cycle — and that his aim was to elevate younger Republican candidates who would mark a sharp break from the party’s neoconservative wing, not to engage in a tit-for-tat spending war with Democrats…

McConnell told Thiel over the phone last week that Vance’s race in Ohio was proving more costly for the Senate Leadership Fund than anticipated, that money was not unlimited and that there was a need for the billionaire to “come in, in a big way, in Arizona,” as a person familiar with the conversation described his words. Law, in a call with Thiel the day before his group cut back on the Arizona ads, expressed concern about Masters as a candidate and pessimism about his campaign’s viability. Both Vance, 38, and Masters, 36, are friends and former business associates of Thiel’s; Masters stepped down from roles at Thiel’s investment firm and foundation this year.

The message from McConnell and Law, according to people with knowledge of their pitch, was that they should essentially split the cost, with Thiel cutting a check to their super PAC matching whatever funds they put behind Masters. Another option, these people said, was that the Thiel-funded super PAC could take over the ad reservations initially made by the McConnell-linked group….

McConnell previously expressed dissatisfaction with Thiel’s move to bankroll independent super PACs backing Vance and Masters, telling the billionaire investor last year that his money would go further if he gave it to the Senate Leadership Fund, which “can put some real lead on the target,” recalled a person familiar with the exchange.

In last week’s call with McConnell, Thiel argued that Vance and Masters have not criticized the Republican leader, unlike other GOP primary candidates, which drew a dissent. “That’s not true at all,” McConnell replied, according to a person with knowledge of his comments, though he added, “I’m not into revenge. That’s Mr. Trump.”

During his primary, Masters called for McConnell to be replaced as GOP leader, expressing his support for Sens. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and Tom Cotton (R-Ark.). “I’ll tell Mitch this to his face,” Masters said during a debate in June. “He’s not bad at everything. He’s good at judges. He’s good at blocking Democrats. You know what he’s not good at? Legislating.” Vance has also offered a dim view of McConnell, calling him “a little out of touch with the base” and saying it was time for “new blood.”…

Josh Marshall:

…Thiel’s gambit is very redolent of the standard VC play. It’s sort of a question why Thiel isn’t picking up the tab for these guys in the general. After all, at his level of wealth funding a senate campaign isn’t a huge lift. But why should he pay? After he made Masters and Vance the nominees McConnell and the GOP generally simply had no choice. What are they going to do? Surrender the senate seats to spite Thiel? Of course not. By getting them the nominations Thiel’s hand picked candidates became the only path to the majority. It’s rather ingenious actually. Fund them in their start up phase and then leave it to others to get them through the really hard part. McConnell is left playing the part of the legacy corporation now saddled with a high priced startup that wasn’t all that it appeared.

What may be complicating things is that Masters is doing really, really badly. He’s a bad candidate. Dobbs has hurt him. Mark Kelly is significantly ahead of Masters and has been comfortably around 50% for a while. Unlike Vance, pouring money into Masters campaign certainly looks like throwing good money after bad. So McConnell and his Senate leadership campaign may be ready to cut him loose and focus on really critical races in Georgia, Ohio, Wisconsin, North Carolina and Nevada. Maybe that’s why there’s an argument at all.

Regardless, give Thiel some credit for thinking how to apply some of the logic of the VC world to the electoral realm.

We’re still required to keep fighting every step of the way, but I personally enjoy watching the GOP Death Cult set up their very own circular firing squad. Couldn’t happen to a more deserving mob!

Reader Interactions

107Comments

  3. 3.

    Baud

    Privately, some Senate campaign operatives have savaged Mr. Scott, saying they were befuddled by his decision to embark last month on an Italian yacht vacation at the same time that the committee was pulling television reservations in critical states, signaling it was losing hope of victories there.

    It was a houseboat.

  4. 4.

    Baud

    If voters go into the booth thinking about inflation and Afghanistan, Republicans will have a good night. If they go in there wondering if they prefer Biden’s policies to the Republican alternative, that could get dicey.

    The only voters who will be thinking about Afghanistan in November are the ones that work for the Village.

  5. 5.

    Baud

    Mr. Scott called such remarks “treasonous”

    Republican ethics treat talking honestly about their candidates as worse than selling the nation’s secrets.

  6. 6.

    patrick II

    McConnell:

    “Senate races are just different — they’re statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome,”

    Gerrymandering has made Republican candidate quality unnecessary, probably even a drawback, for House races.

  9. 9.

    Ken

    I for one am surprised — not that the money somehow vanished under Rick Scott’s careful management, but that they can trace it to payments to Google and Facebook. I would have expected most of it to have vanished into the maw of fake “consulting firms” which, after years of forensic audits, would turn out to be controlled by Scott through a dozen layers of shell companies.

    And at the risk of triggering eversor, I am reminded of John 12:6: Judas did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.

  10. 10.

    Ken

    @Baud: The only voters who will be thinking about Afghanistan in November are the ones that work for the Village.

    If they can scrape up any money, the Republicans will probably be doing some push-polling to try to remind people of Afghanistan. They may combine it with their usual helpful mailers telling people that election day has been moved to the third Wednesday in November.

  11. 11.

    CaseyL

    Leonard Leo gave the GOP $1.5 billion.  They don’t need Thiel.

    Hopefully, they’ll squander most of the Federalist Society founder’s largesse as well.  There must be plenty of consultants drooling at the thought of standing under that spigot with their mouths open.

  12. 12.

    NorthLeft

    I just find it completely laughable that the media did not think that anything would change from March until November. Especially inflation.

    Kudos to most Dems who just kept at it and actually delivered some results for voters.

  14. 14.

    Ksmiami

    @Ken: still can’t believe they think women will gloss over becoming 2nd class citizens…-for a little more than a few cents at the pump

  16. 16.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Rick Scott, is to put it simply, a criminal sack of shit. The GQp deserves him, and deserves to lose their money to him, for the stupidity of putting him in charge of their money.

  22. 22.

    MattF

    McConnell can see an electoral abyss for Republicans looming at the mid-term elections. All his careful calculations swept away. He supposes, for the record, that it’s fixable, but he’s also looking for someone to blame.

  26. 26.

    Ken

    @MattF: As a public service, we could remind McConnell of the time Preston Brooks beat Charles Sumner with a cane. Tradition is so important to the Senate.

  28. 28.

    Another Scott

    I was just coming here to embed a tweet about this that I saw at nycsouthpaw.  Should have known that AL would already have it and much more.

    :-)

    The GQP will have plenty of money – they always do.  But us pointing and laughing about this will make some of the normies notice and maybe think – “hmm, maybe the Democrats are on to something…”

    Thanks.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  29. 29.

    West of the Rockies

    I am stunned that anybody finds Hershel Walker fit for office, especially in contrast to the excellent Rafael Warnock.

  33. 33.

    gene108

    @West of the Rockies:

     

    @Baud:

    Walker’s candidacy is plumbing the depths of Republican nihilism and racism.

    Our guy’s black too. See we aren’t racist. So what if it seems like he might’ve suffered traumatic brain injury from his football career, is a pathological liar, and says incoherent things. He’s black, just like the DemoCrap guy. Makes them both as equally qualified.

  34. 34.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Baud:

    The only voters who will be thinking about Afghanistan in November are the ones that work for the Village.

    It is an amazing example of creeping Blobbism

  36. 36.

    Geminid

    @Baud: Republicans will try to persuade Georgia voters that a vote for Warnock is really a vote for Chuck Schumer, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren. Negative partisanship is really all they’ve got going for them at this point.

    It likely will not work there. The election will be closer than it should be, but I think Walker will lose. He’s just too weak a candidate.

  38. 38.

    Ksmiami

    @Geminid: I imagine if you’re an upper middle class professional Black American -of which there are many in Georgia, -Walker’s candidacy is such an insult and more proof that the republicans really really do not care about your aspirations, cares, dignity..

  39. 39.

    Bill Arnold

    @Baud:

    The only voters who will be thinking about Afghanistan in November are the ones that work for the Village.

    And not including the few at-least-slightly-self-aware members of the Village Hive Mind that realize that the withdrawal from Afghanistan was, as such things go, very well executed, and took advantage of a surrender negotiated by Trump/Pompeo (in return for no/less military action by the Taliban vs US forces in the run-up to the 2020 election). Executed quickly to surprise the US neocons and military-industrial complex.

  41. 41.

    Ken

    Should the people of Georgia make the ghastly mistake of electing Walker, I console myself that he’ll be completely undisciplined and impossible to control. With any luck he’ll start voting with the Democrats (“I wasn’t sure what to do, so I asked the other Georgia senator, Ossoff, how he was voting…”), which would be the cherry on top of McConnell’s cerebral hemorrhage sundae.

  42. 42.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @West of the Rockies:

    Every time I see a clip of Walker mouthing some ineffably stupid word salad, I find myself feeling very sad for him. This poor damaged man is simply being abused and manipulated by TFG and whatever others are behind his misguided campaign. It’s infuriating and sickening, and as an occasionally compassionate human being, I find it heartbreaking. He’s a terrible candidate and would be a terrible Senator, but he doesn’t deserve to be the chew toy of a handful of rich old white men.

  43. 43.

    Cameron

    Scott, McConnell, Thiel…..the dream rivalry of every pro wrestling fan.  “Now – it’s not mano-a-mano, it’s mano-a-mano-a-mano!  In the ring, on the canvas, at the same time, it’s Nosfraudatu – the Mighty King Yertle – Big Cockroach!  They’re in it for The Whole Game – three go in, none come out!”

  45. 45.

    Jackie

    @Ksmiami: Republican women want access to abortions and the horrific stories of women being forced to carry non-viable fetuses to term scare them, too.

  48. 48.

    James E Powell

    @Baud:

    Do our voters care about a vote for McConnell?  I don’t think I remember us trying that.

    I don’t know why not, but we never run against “The Republicans” or their odious leadership like they run against us.

  51. 51.

    gene108

    @Bill Arnold:

    The salient point the media tried to highlight a couple weeks go on the one year anniversary of the Taliban takeover is the country’s a mess, and the people there are suffering.

    The economy has collapsed, no country on Earth recognizes the Taliban government as legitimate, and people are starving.

    It’s a real genuine humanitarian crisis the world ignores.

    The Taliban isn’t doing itself any favors by pissing off Pakistan by letting the Pakistani Taliban (TTP) operate from within Afghanistan.

    They have internal conflicts with the National Resistance Front in the Panjshir Valley, in the north of the country, led by Abmoud Massoud, son of assassinated Northern Alliance leader Ahmoud Shah Massoud.

    ISIS Afghanistan (ISIS-K) is trying to overthrow and replace the Taliban. They’ve made terrorist attacks over the last year.

    The Taliban’s still firmly in control, but there’s opposition at the edges.

    The Taliban’s still terrible on women’s rights, and civil liberties, in general. They are desperate for any kind of international recognition and foreign investment. They could get it, if they let women back into the workplace and public life, and stopped supporting terrorists.

    The U.S. didn’t make any special provisions to expedite visa applications from Afghanistan, for the people we couldn’t airlift out of the country, unlike special provisions made for Ukraine this year. Afghans seeking asylum or other visas to come to the U.S. are stuck in the black void that is USCIS, with no clarity on what’s happening. The usual issues are compounded by having no diplomatic presence there. I’m not sure how we’re managing communications on visa applications that are normally done through embassies and consulates, if we bother at all.

    I honestly wouldn’t mind more coverage on Afghanistan. The place is a mess. People are suffering, who didn’t do anything to deserve it. Ignoring isn’t going to help or cause the Taliban to collapse. We’ve tried to isolate North Korea, Iran, and Cuba for decades but the governments we object to are still there.

    I don’t know what to do. I don’t know if there’s anything we can do. I think we shouldn’t just ignore what’s going on there.

  52. 52.

    Bill Arnold

    @eversor:
    You know, you’d get pied a lot less if you focused your ire on highly politically-active right wing Christianity. E.g. how would you reduce the influence of such on US politics by 50 percent in the next 5 years? I mean, even theologically, they are absolutely incoherent at best, and often straight-up Mammonites. Prosperity Gospels are literally magic for selfish ends wrapped up in cherry-picked theology to attempt to get around (torah) biblical prohibitions against [causality violation] and scripture badmouthing wealth; rules lawyering for selfish ends. Etc. Can they be schismed? Transformed? Made to sublimate away?
    Maybe make a pot of coffee and (if you haven’t already) read some of patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/
    (different writers there, including at least one atheist.)

  54. 54.

    Cameron

    @gene108: One thing the US could do, if it doesn’t want to turn over all of that Afghan government money it’s holding to the Taliban, is convert that money to humanitarian aid.  US is sitting on a pile of cash that it doesn’t own, and is being pretty blase about watching Afghans starve.  I’m not going to hold my breath waiting for that to happen, though.

  56. 56.

    Chacal Charles Calthrop

    @SiubhanDuinne: why not? If he didn’t want it he could’ve said no. No-one forced him to run.

    @gene108: same with Pakistan, which is suffering the fate of Kentucky & Mississippi in terms of disaster from flooding due to climate change. But, as with Mississippi & Kentucky, part of the problem with their corrupt leadership is that a sizable portion of the population that lives in these places does actually support their McConnells and the bin Ladens. They are in a world of hurt, but do not understand that the first rule of being in a hole is to stop digging.

    I do not know how to help people who won’t help themselves.

  57. 57.

    gene108

    @James E Powell:

    I don’t know why not, but we never run against “The Republicans” or their odious leadership like they run against us.

    Pro-Republican entities, from the time of Rush Limbaugh to the likes of OANN now, have created a media system that repeats the same points over and over again to an audience that doesn’t go anywhere else for information.

    There’s no equivalent media ecosystem for Democratic voters. We have to scavenge our news from all over the place.

  58. 58.

    gene108

    @Cameron:

    From what I’ve read, the sticking point in converting the money into humanitarian aide is who will administer the aide.

    The Taliban wants control. The U.S. wants it to go to NGO’s. We don’t trust the Taliban to use the aide fairly.

    There’s a fuck ton of things the Taliban can do to make things better there, but they aren’t willing to meet the world half way beyond not having public executions in soccer stadiums anymore.

  59. 59.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @gene108:

    Also, ‘hate’ really isn’t our motivator.  It is very easy to figure out what kind of message works for Republican voters, and not only do those same types of messages not work for Democrats, what does work is much harder to work out and more local-specific.  It’s the Big Tent vs Reactionary Minority problem.  I’m pretty sure that a message of ‘Walker works for McConnell and will do his bidding’ is not going to get the reaction that ‘Warnock works for Nancy Pelosi and will do her bidding’ does.

  60. 60.

    Bill Arnold

    @gene108:

    I honestly wouldn’t mind more coverage on Afghanistan. The place is a mess. People are suffering, who didn’t do anything to deserve it.

    I actually agree with all of your critique.
    Part of the problem is the Republican/Media use of Afghanistan as a cudgel to whack POTUS Biden with; it decreases his/his administration’s political maneuvering room to improve matters for Afghanistan.

    Point about helping Afghanistanis who worked with the US to escape; that was a huge US failure pre withdrawal. (Much on Trump, but still.)

  61. 61.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Chacal Charles Calthrop:

    If he didn’t want it he could’ve said no. No-one forced him to run.

    Not in the sense of putting a loaded handgun to his temple and forcing him to sign the paperwork, no. We don’t know how the decision was made to put him up as a candidate, but I would be incredibly surprised if he made the decision independently. He literally does not have the mental capacity to think through a decision of that magnitude (whether through repeated TBI episodes or just natural dullness I cannot say).

  62. 62.

    gene108

    @Chacal Charles Calthrop:

    Torrential monsoon rains are causing flooding in India and Bangladesh, too.

    Millions are displaced across the subcontinent. Hundreds are dead.

    Global warming is just beginning to really manifest.

  63. 63.

    ian

    @gene108:

    We have to scavenge our news from all over the place.

    That sure is an interesting way of saying we have diversity of thought.  I am glad we don’t have a Democratic version of Fox news.  I think we as a political party and as a nation would be worse off for it.  It does make it harder for us to herd our cats.

  64. 64.

    Another Scott

    @gene108:

    The UN World Food Program is working in Afghanistan. I assume that the US and other countries are quietly working behind the scenes there.

    WFP works in all 34 provinces of the country and has a fleet of 239 trucks on the road every day, delivering food to some 800 food distribution sites across the country. In May, WFP provided 590,000 people in Paktika province and 320,000 in Khost with emergency food and nutrition assistance. Since the start of 2022, WFP has assisted 18 million people with food, cash and livelihoods support in Afghanistan.

    WFP is ever poised to act swiftly and is calling for US$1.15 billion to respond in Afghanistan for the next six months.

    But you’re right, it’s a disaster, Pakistan is a disaster, too much war is making many parts of Africa a disaster. And a member of the UN Security Council – russia – is making it all worse.

    :-(

    It looks like the USA has given nearly 10x as much to the WFP this year as the next country (Germany).

    Thanks.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  67. 67.

    Another Scott

    @gene108: You’re right there is a mess for people trying to get out of Afghanistan and into the US.

    But there is a “parole” process, even with all the challenges.

    USCIS.gov:

    Afghans in Afghanistan

    If you are in Afghanistan, you may file a request for parole, or someone may file one for you. At this time, we are unable to complete processing of your parole request while you are in Afghanistan because the U.S. Embassy in Kabul is closed and all normal consular services in Afghanistan have been suspended. If we determine that you may be eligible for parole, we will issue a notice informing you that you must arrange your own travel outside of Afghanistan to a country where there is a U.S. embassy or consulate before we can fully process your parole request.

    USCIS is unable to help you leave Afghanistan at this time. If you were in Afghanistan when your request for parole was filed, and you subsequently leave Afghanistan, please notify USCIS of your new location. If you go to a third country for further processing as a potential parole beneficiary, we will work to complete consideration of your request for parole as expeditiously as possible. However, you should be prepared to remain there for several months.

    Afghans Outside of Afghanistan

    A U.S. embassy or consulate cannot help USCIS complete processing of your parole request until USCIS has completed initial processing of your case. If we find that you may be eligible for parole, we will issue a letter informing you that we have referred your case to the U.S. embassy for additional processing. This additional processing will include taking your fingerprints and additional vetting. Unless an exception applies, you must undergo medical screening and vaccinations at your own expense by a panel physician before you will be approved to travel to the United States.

    While we attempt to process all urgent requests for parole quickly, the processing may take several months. We currently are prioritizing the parole applications for Afghan nationals outside of Afghanistan given the availability of completing processing for those individuals at a U.S. embassy or consulate, but we continue to process parole applications for individuals in Afghanistan as well.

    The Continuing Resolution may make things a little better. RollCall:

    The House is writing a bill that’s expected to extend programmatic funds generally at current-year spending rates through Dec. 16. But in many cases the current funding level will be outdated, fall short of what agencies say their most critical needs are and prevent new projects from getting started during the period they are operating under the stopgap measure. The White House is also seeking several legislative changes in certain programs’ authorizations.

    “This package of technical assistance provides guidance to lawmakers on funding and legislative adjustments that are necessary to avoid disruptions to a range of important public services,” Young wrote in her blog post.

    Provisions sought by the White House include a package of changes intended to pave the way for Afghan nationals “paroled” into the U.S. to obtain green cards as well as continue to receive benefits such as resettlement assistance and access to food stamps and Medicaid.

    The US Government is trying, and that’s a good thing. More can always be done, of course.

    Thanks.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  68. 68.

    Jackie

    @SiubhanDuinne: I seem to recall Trump hammering him for months to run. Walker was living in Texas, minding his own business, when Trump decided Walker was the chosen one. College football star, black, and had formerly played for Trump’s professional football team before it went bankrupt. To Walker’s credit, he really wasn’t interested, but Trump kept coaxing him…

    Trump got Tuberville – Auburn football coach and dumb as a stump – so why not Walker?

    I, too, feel badly for Walker – as a human being. He is definitely being used by white men who don’t care about his life at all – as long as he can put an “R” in the senate column.

  70. 70.

    bbleh

    @Ksmiami: @Baud: @Ken: @Suzanne: @Jackie:  I remember how abortion was considered a winning issue for Republicans because, even if general sentiment was against their position, there was a sizable group of “single-issue voters” who would vote for them for that and no other reason.

    Not to ignore the genuine horror of what they’ve brought about, but from a purely political PoV, seems like maybe the shoe’s on the other foot now?  Alas for them …

  72. 72.

    James E Powell

    @gene108:

    I’m aware of all that, but that does not explain why Democrats do not run campaigns against the Republicans as a party, as ruling group, as the organization with Mitch McConnell, Lauren Boebert, Ted Cruz, etc. They are not hard to demonize. Rick Scott’s plans should be a commercial with “this is what Republicans are going to do”

  77. 77.

    bbleh

    @Jackie: I’d say it’s already happened in Kansas and elsewhere, and the voter registration data show it strongly too.

    They rode the tiger, and now it seems they’ve come to the “uh-oh” part.

    You might think millennia of history would teach the dangers of deliberately interjecting religion into politics, but apparently not.

  78. 78.

    James E Powell

    @different-church-lady:

    How the fuck does anyone construct those scenarios and leave out Dobbs?

    They refuse to acknowledge it and want everyone to forget that they had anything to do with it. It was all the supreme court, an entity they have never had any influence over, one that is mysterious, but unassailable in its wisdom.

  80. 80.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @eversor: “Christians”, try.  Because the people you have a problem with are worshipers of Mammon and Moloch who have wrapped themselves in Jeebus, not Jesus.  They ignore everything in the Bible that Jesus of Nazareth was reported as talking about.

  81. 81.

    Fleeting Expletive

    I just thought of trump’s boffo next act, and I bet he hasn’t thought of it yet.  What if, outlandish possibility, he finds Opus Dei jeebus, and swirls up all the rubes’ money, double your money, bob’s your uncle, King of the World, Ma!  Sure, some libs would mention stuff like repentance, restitution, and punishment, but who cares, it’s a freakin’ miracle, hallelujah. consolidates all the wealth motherlodes too.

    Come to think of it, have the church mainliners and evangelicals risen to his defense?  I haven’t seen it, myself.

  82. 82.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @Kelly: Phil Knight is supporting that vile Johnson woman for OR governor to the tune of $1.75 million.  He can fuck the fucking fuck off.

  86. 86.

    Kelly

    @Villago Delenda Est: Phil Knight has donated around a billion dollars to the U of O. Biggest chunk to athletics. Paid for U of O to be a big time program. I sometimes miss the quirky hippie vibe it used to have. I see lots of monster trucks with U of O stickers these days which wouldn’t happen if the Ducks were what they were in the 1970’s.

    Yeah he’s an asshole.

  87. 87.

    bbleh

    @SiubhanDuinne: Ooo, unexpected play for the kink and Goth votes, and maybe some corners of glam too.  You might expect it from the WWE guy.  What a talent!

    We better get to work on the Trump Kink memes.  Unexpected, like Dark Brandon, but much much more disgusting.

  89. 89.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @bbleh:

    Ooo, unexpected play for the kink and Goth votes, and maybe some corners of glam too.

    Plus Furries if we throw in some horsehair shirts.

  90. 90.

    divF

    @Kelly: In the early 70s, the Firesign Theater did a riff on one of their radio shows regarding a headline in the LA Times: “Duck Passing Worries UCLA”. It was assumed that no one outside of Southern California would have any idea what this meant.

  92. 92.

    Edmund Dantes

    @James E Powell: because the media would eviscerate Dems if they ran anything near to the stuff the gop ran.

    Biden went off the beaten path a hair with the “semi-fascist” thing and look how the patented hissy fit is playing. It’s taken decades to get to where the Dems don’t reflexively back down and apologize ir call out their own when the media start bleating at them.

    Dems still do it too much giving into the false caterwauling from the gop and media. But they are at least getting better at ignoring.

    so maybe Dems could start running those types of campaigns but it’s going to take more time and more refusals to backdown to the fake whiners.

  94. 94.

    Chris T.

    I love this bit:

    they’re statewide, candidate quality has a lot to do with the outcome

    Translation: “We can’t gerrymander the Senate races the way we do the House ones. With the House races, whatever random garbage human wins the Republican primary, wins the seat.”

  96. 96.

    RaflW

    @Baud: But selling the nations secrets out of a country club in Florida is fine, so by circular logic, nothing is treason. Or everything is.

  98. 98.

    Kent

    @Baud: No shit.  I follow some conservative forums where I have family and Afghanistan is LONG forgotten.  What do they actually talk about?

    FBI overreach and the Trump search warrant

    The latest propaganda out of Russia like how Biden’s sanctions are utterly failing

    Homelessness, crime, and Democrat cities on fire

    Immigration invasion.

    and so forth.

  99. 99.

    Kent

    @Kelly:

    @Villago Delenda Est: Phil Knight has donated around a billion dollars to the U of O. Biggest chunk to athletics. Paid for U of O to be a big time program. I sometimes miss the quirky hippie vibe it used to have. I see lots of monster trucks with U of O stickers these days which wouldn’t happen if the Ducks were what they were in the 1970’s.

    Yeah he’s an asshole.

    I grew up in Eugene in the 1970s and graduated HS in 1982.  Those were the glory days of both Eugene and the UO when the Grateful Dead could draw more than the Ducks.  And a good season was winning more than one game in the Pac-8.  Autzen Stadium was the home stadium of my HS (shared with 3 other teams).  They would have a HS double header there every Friday.  And my teammates and I would bike over for Saturday afternoon games and would basically have the end zone to ourselves.  That was when they basically wore Packers uniforms with a UO rather than G on the helmet, not what they wear today.

    I went back on a college visit with my daughter two years ago (she ultimately picked UW-Seattle) and was rather taken back by the changes.  The academic buildings I remembered like the library and academic quad were largely unchanged in 30 years.  But the Nike branding and all the new athletic facilities and student amenities (to attract all the out of state CA students) were just over the top.  By contrast, most of the money spent at UW in the past 30 years has been on academic programs and buildings.  Striking the difference when you are attuned to it.

  100. 100.

    Kent

    @Villago Delenda Est:@Kelly: Phil Knight is supporting that vile Johnson woman for OR governor to the tune of $1.75 million.  He can fuck the fucking fuck off.

    Vile is right.  She is basically running as the female Joe Manchin except that OR is not WV so she has no chance of winning, only playing spoiler.

  101. 101.

    Kent

    @Baud:Do our voters care about a vote for McConnell?  I don’t think I remember us trying that.

    No, because the only people for whom McConnell is a negative are already partisan Democrats.  Most “persuadable” swing voters don’t know and could give a shit.

  102. 102.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

     He’s not bad at everything. He’s good at judges. He’s good at blocking Democrats. You know what he’s not good at? Legislating.

    Masters has an undergrad and law degree from Stanford, yet he speaks at a 5th grade Flesch-Kincaid reading level.

    That said, the broken clock is right about Cocaine Mitch – 38 years in the Senate and he’s never passed anything. Yet the Village treats him like he’s Henry Clay.

  103. 103.

    David 🌈 ☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    @Kelly: ​
     Out on the road today I saw a Deadhead sticker on a Cadillac. A little voice inside my head said: “Don’t look back, you can never look back.”

  104. 104.

    yellowdog

    @SiubhanDuinne: After he is elected he will suffer some ‘illness’ or ‘accident’ that will force him to retire. Kemp will then appoint an appropriate replacement (Kemp?).

  106. 106.

    Dave

    @Bill Arnold: NO…Just NO. Everyone was warned uncle sugar was leaving well ahead of time and chose to make their own arrangements. There was a 10 to one force structure advantage for the puppet government we propped up which set a new world record for surrendering. Anyone who has watched the air force move anything would say that operation was a masterpiece. When do the Afghans have any responsibility for their own actions by your (and press corps) reasoning?

  107. 107.

    Bill Arnold

    @Dave:
    Chase up the thread links next time, please. Me at 39: “the withdrawal from Afghanistan was, as such things go, very well executed,”
    I was responding to Gene108’s response to me, acknowledging that the US could have done a few things better. Not a big deal; mea culpa for editing a couple of paragraphs out about the Soviets (I’m not sure whether an older relative (a field biologist) involved both pre soviet-occopuation and post us invasion is still visiting Afghanistan.)

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