Liz Cheney is going to teach at her home state college (the University of Virginia) and rumor has it that she’ll run as an independent in the 2024 Senate race against Tim Kaine and (probably) term-limited Glenn Youngkin.
Taking nothing away from Cheney’s work on the J6 Committee, she’s not the worst kind of Republican, but she ain’t good. Her positions on most issues are terrible, and even if she wouldn’t technically caucus with Republicans, she’d probably be a reliable vote for terrible Republican legislation and/or delay.
The churlish fucker in me wonders how much shit the beltway media will want Virginia Democrats to eat simply because of Liz’ J6 work. Are they supposed to pressure Tim Kaine to drop out? Should all right-minded Virginia Dems vote for Liz to thank her for her service? And how low are they supposed to bow when she passes?
Liz did a good job on the J6 committee, but you know what else she did? Her fucking job. That’s what every Republican should have done, and only two of them did. The fact that her work is viewed as heroic by some is an indication of just how badly this country is doing.
geg6
Agreed. She (and Kinzinger) only shines because she did what she was supposed to do. She’s the new maverick and I’ll bet she invites them (the Village) to her estate, equipped with a tire swing, for some donuts. And she will forever be in their hearts.
JPL
@geg6:Will the donuts have sprinkles on them?
trollhattan
She’ll be a 98% party-line voter and can be summarized as “well, she’d at least better than Youngkin.” But at least she won’t lie about who and what she is.
Tim Kaine? Anybody else on the Dem bench? I’m getting Florida Democrat vibes here.
Steeplejack
Can’t look it up now, but I think that, apart from impeachment and J6, her voting record was standard GQP party line. She would be a terrible senator for Virginia—or anywhere, actually.
Roger Moore
I think you’re understating what she and Kinzinger did just a little bit. Yes they did their jobs, but they did their jobs when they knew perfectly well that doing their jobs was likely to cost them their jobs. Deciding to do what’s right despite the obvious bad personal consequences is something that deserves some praise.
The big problem is that praise needs to be paired with opprobrium for all the cowardly Republicans who looked after their personal interests first and ignored their jobs. If we’re going to criticize the media, it should be for ignoring that point. Republicans will continue to get away with being awful as long as that kind of selfishness is normalized.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Seems to me a porcupine-like never-trumper with a history of carpet-bagging and flip-flopping on issues to the point of throwing her own sister (and SIL, and I believe their children?) under the bus when convenient (have they reconciled? seems to me I read that somewhere) won’t fare too well against the fleece-vested smiling VC who’s shown his trumpist ass, and they’ll split whatever R vote can’t bring themselves to vote for kindly moderate incumbent Tim Kaine. But as ever we shall know
allmostmany things in the fullness of timeAcallidryas
@trollhattan: VA dems have an amazing bench, including our fantastic newest representative, Jennifer McLellan. The only reason Youngkin won is because McAuliffe skated through the primary on name recognition and thought he could do the same in the general. He barely ran a campaign.
That being said, though, there’s too much at stake to risk any seat. If Cheney actually cared about the country she should go to a red state and split the ticket there. Be a spoiler where if you don’t get in you kick out a fascist.
Shalimar
Liz Cheney absolutely is what used to be the worst kind of Republican. The kind who wanted to get us into any war they could imagine. God how far we have declined in 15 years that she and Bill Kristol are now the moderates.
MomSense
That’s gonna be a no from me, dawg.
Omnes Omnibus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I don’t know VA politics that well, but it does seem to me that a three way race would benefit Kaine more than anyone else.
Geminid
@trollhattan: Tim Kaine is the most popular Democratic politician in Virginia. And Virginia is not Florida.
Also, Glenn Youngkin may be term limited, but his term as Governor does not end until January, 2026. He won’t run in the 2024 Senate race.
Sure Lurkalot
Fuck Liz Cheney, the two time Trump voter who supported just about everything he proposed. Fuck her saying that Democrats abort babies after they are born and that violent insurrectionists are misled patriots. Fuck her for promoting that 1/6 was pretty much all Trump which continues to mislead and deflect about just how many “card carrying respectable Republicans” are fucking treasonous traitors.
And now she’s reverse carpetbagging herself in Virginia? I hope she and Youngkin eat each other alive.
RaflW
Liz Cheney is a right winger. She’s just not a crazed right winger. No one seems to care about being a carpet bagger* any more, but this just smacks of senate seat-shopping. And if she (ptuh, ptuh feh!) wins, she’s a vote for Mitch McConnell or some other POS as majority leader.
Fvk off, Liz.
*eta: @Sure Lurkalot Leave it to Balloon Juice to show me that at least someone cares about this!
gene108
Liz was the third ranking Republican in the House, before turning on Trump.
She’s very much a dedicated Republican.
Outside of the media, I’m not sure what voters would be interested in her, other than as a protest vote.
davecb
That media is probably like the “traditional” media in Canada. For example, in Toronto we have
* The National Post, who’s owner started our version of the Tea Party
* The Globe and Mail, which is explicitly conservative, but not insanely so
* The Toronto Star, which is explicitly liberal… but is owned by two far-right investors. Maybe down to one this week (;-))
Baud
OT, but hoocoodanode.
Shalimar
@Roger Moore: I have more respect for Kinzinger than Cheney. He made a stand with nothing to fall back on. Liz was clearly aiming for higher office (though Virginia seems like a poor choice to pursue that ambition) and daddy still controls multiple think tanks that can provide her a comfortable income for life.
RaflW
Among other things, she’ll be one to watch on how she decides to thread the needle on trans rights. She very famously shived her lesbian sister, remaining steadfastly anti-same sex marriage for years after her sis married, and even well after her very conservative dad publicly supported freedom to marry.
Liz made vague mouth noises in support of trans existence while still in the House, but then (via Truthout)
I rather suspect Younkin will be grossly anti-trans, which I hope will be a loser for him in relatively moderate VA. Liz will be sure to triangulate, but how and what will she say to her obvious voting record?
She can’t be trusted, that’s for sure.
Barbara
My crystal ball says that Tim Kaine isn’t going anywhere. Liz Cheney may live in Virginia but she has never represented Virginia. She could appeal to voters in places like Virginia Beach, which have increasingly voted Democratic (which is why it has become so challenging for Republicans to win statewide) but it’s hard to see how she would appeal to Republicans in the redder parts of the state, or to Democrats in the bluer parts of the state. I don’t think Youngkin will run either, because I don’t think he aspires to be a senator and I think he is smart enough to know that in a presidential election year, Republicans are definitely disadvantaged in Virginia by Democratic leaning turnout.
$8 blue check mistermix
@davecb: I’ve read the Star off-and-on over the years and my impression is that none of the big US papers are anywhere near as explicitly liberal as they are.
RaflW
@Baud: Sooo… Repubs in Disarray?
(As if the press would ever)
Nina
Hasn’t Charlottesville suffered enough?
Edit to be fair, according to my parents Cville almost elected a very good Dem who was beaten by one of the worst Republicans by gerrymandering in some farm country. If Liz Cheney challenged Bob Good from the left it could make for an interesting election.
Geminid
@Omnes Omnibus: Cheney can pick up votes from disaffected Republicans. That’s something like 10-20% of the party here. She’ll get some votes from moderate Independents, but Kaine is popular among that group as well.
The campaign will be a suitable platform for Cheney’s message, but I don’t think she will change the outcome. She’ll just increase Kaine’s margin against the Republican candidate.
trollhattan
@Baud: They might want to compare notes with Greece, but that would take work.
(The very same issues of neglect and understaffing are front and center following the deadliest rail crash in Greek history.)
trollhattan
@RaflW: Have said for 20 years the wrong Cheney kid got into politics.
GibberJack
The first two will def happen. The last one is sorta hyperbole it that it won’t actually be said but we know our shitty MSM will be thinking it.
dww44
@Geminid: Does this potential threat to Tim Kaine explain why he’s on board with the GOP plan to make changes to Social Security and Medicare? At least that was the headline I read yesterday.
RaflW
@Barbara: Youngkin is certainly ambitious. The record of politicians converting from Senator directly to POTUS is checkered. The last two were Dems (JFK & Obama), and only one R has managed it (Harding, way back in 1921).
The last Republican to make the jump at all was Nixon, and he had 16 years between leaving Congress and (somehow, ugh) winning nationally. Biden of course was a Senator, but golly did he have another job in between!
Geminid
@dww44: I haven’t seen the Medicare/Social Security story yet, but I very much doubt that Senatory Kaine sees Liz Cheney as a threat in 2024.
FelonyGovt
OT Spain has just adopted legislation guaranteeing the right to abortion for 17 year olds, strengthening protections for trans people, and banning LGBTQ conversion “therapy”.
Sigh. Why can’t we be more like… Spain???
Librarian
She did not do a good job on that committee. She ran interference for the GOP and kept the focus on Trump while making it ignore everybody else, including Ginny Thomas. No wonder she wanted to be on it so badly.
JML
No way is Kaine going to bow before Liz Cheney, and VA dems aren’t going to flip for her. I welcome her carpetbagging ass into this race so she can siphon off the 10-20 of sane-ish republicans and republican leaning independents to guarantee that the nutball lunatic the VA GOP will nominate has zero chance at winning. Game on.
bbleh
I wouldn’t bet against Kaine, who is a popular and “moderate” Democrat in an increasingly Democratic state, especially against two Republicans, unless something happens nationally to cause a Democratic rout.
As to how things sort out on the Republican side, it’ll be interesting. The media certainly will give Cheney regular tongue-baths, but look how well that has worked out for John Kasich: you can win the green rooms but fall flat with the voters. OTOH, Youngkin has recently been making MAGA-like noises — seems dumb to me cuz he’ll never win the crazies over if there’s anyone like DeSantis around, but maybe he’s feeling exposed to a primary — and mmmmaybe the media will decide that Cheney is the “responsible middle alternative” to Youngkin and a Democrat, in which case I’d bet the Republicans would split the Rep/Rep-curious and Waffling Center vote and Kaine would take it.
trollhattan
Pennsylvania man, or Florida man? Experts disagree.
IIRC Muffley was the name of the president in “Dr. Strangelove.” Semi-related, TSA notes gate gun seizures are way up. Beginning to think there are so many, that folks are running out of places to store them and they don’t all fit in the double-wide.
Baud
@FelonyGovt:
Blue states are like that. Harder at the federal level because of the filibuster, so a simple Dem majority isn’t enough.
Ohio Mom
Liz Cheney is a snake. I sometimes consider the possibility she took the stand she did about January 6 not because of any sense of right and wrong, or patriotism, but because she calculated it had the best “rate of return” for her future ambitions (Kitzinger I think was motivated for the right reasons).
Likewise, I can only assume she picked Virginia to run in because she is certain it’s a good bet for her.
Meanwhile, I understand Tim Kaine has Long Covid, though he seems to be managing with it. I’m not his biggest fan but I want him to remain where he is.
Old Man Shadow
Call me ungrateful, but the “Congratulations, you’re not as big of a jerk as you could have been” award I sent them should have been enough.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
What plan is that, exactly?
Geminid
@bbleh: Tim Kaine won reelection in 2018 by 16 points.
He first won the seat opened up by Jim Webb’s retirement in 2012, by slightly under 6%. His opponent was former Governor and Senator George Allen, who lost the seat to Webb in 2006.
dave319
@geg6: And, of course, F.A.R (F*ck All Republicans) as a matter of principle. Ever meet any good Nazis?
dave319
@Geminid:Macaca Allen!
bbleh
@trollhattan: IIRC Muffley was the name of the president in “Dr. Strangelove.”
Yup. Merkin Muffley I think. I cracked up when I heard this guy’s name.
different-church-lady
The return to relative normality after the Trump years has really laid bare just how theatrical much of the beltway “reporting” is. Like the Trump upset just gave them all permission to do a cliffhanger with every stroke of the keys. (What’s Latin for “chaos from a machine”?)
bbleh
@different-church-lady: “Chaos” is actually a Latin word, obviously from classical Greek (online Latin dictionary says nom. sing. is “chaon”. And “chaos ex machina” kinda rhymes …
UncleEbeneezer
@FelonyGovt: Where we can elect Dems, we’re good:
robtrim
You said the magic word, “Glenn Youngkin.”
His campaign for governor was a classic in tap dancing with the MAGAs while seeming moderate in a very purple state.
Youngkin is looking for a place on the GOP ticket in 2024 – Vice President would be ok, President is what he wants. He’s a “feed the rich” multi-millionaire who is as craven as they come. Don’t underestimate the guy!
Geminid
@dave319: George Allen’s mother was French-Algerian. I remember speculation at the time that he had picked the word up from her.
Whatever the word’s provenance, that incident may have made the difference in a very close loss to Jim Webb in 2006. Aside from producing another Democratic Senator, Allen’s loss derailed his Presidential prospects for 2008.
rikyrah
Liz Cheney did what she was supposed to do if you are an American Congressman who took an oath to protect THE CONSTITUTION.
She deserves no cookies for doing what she was supposed to do.
She’s still against my rights.
The Dark Avenger
@trollhattan: TSA is a joke. A friend of a friend works for a company that does the TSA stuff, and he said as long as you bring less than an ounce of week and no firearms onboard you won’t get in trouble. It’s a racket, not a security measure.
Tony Jay
Speaking of appalling right-wing authoritarians that the Media tells us we all love…
The fucking BBC cut from its breaking news bulletin (about the leaking of WhatsApp messages that basically show how full of shit the then Health Secretary Matt Hancock(womble) was in early 2020 when he claimed to have thrown a ‘ring of steel’ around Britain’s care homes – in short, no, he didn’t, and thousands of old people died in terror and misery because he failed them) to give all of its attention to a flaccid, balding lump of liposuction waste called Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson that was, for some unfathomable reason, being paid actual money to make a speech at a ‘Soft Power Summit’ in London.
This hideous abomination in roughly humanoid form used to be Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland before he was forced by his own MPs to resign in unmitigated disgrace, but since most of the people currently running the BBC were appointed by him, and since the journalistic establishment as a whole still loves him like your Nan loves a 10-stroke vibrator, we were forced to endure his bibble-babble flobbalobbing nonsense yet again. The short version is Flobalob lied, a lot, a whole hell of a lot, in fact, but since that’s more or less the only thing the Flobster ever does when there’s a camera and a microphone in the vicinity, caveat fucking emptor, etc. Slightly longer version, the ghastly whaleskin spunkpuppet is trying to position himself as the Guy Who Was Always Right about everything, only to be betrayed by a bunch of snivelling faux-conservative wets who are, even now, betraying the One, True, Glorious Brexit that he was in the process of delivering when he was rudely ejected from his rightful place at the top of the Spaffing Tree.
If I were a betting man, I’d put quite a wedge on Flobalob making another Cosplay Churchillian lunge at relevancy by jumping from the Conservative Party to the Reform Party at the next General Election, bringing with him the Brextremists and appealing to the rabid Conservative base for whom no Brexit is too Hard and there most certainly ain’t no black (or brown, or pink) in the Union Jack.
It will be some comfort to him that on this very day of all days, that drearily room-temperature ice sculpture Sir Keir Starmer, known in some quarters as Leader of His Majesty’s Opposition and in others as “that lumpy figurehead fellow with the soft mouth”, chose to announce that his new Chief of Staff was going to be none other than Sue Grey, the senior Civil Servant with the well-earned reputation for masterminding cover-ups of embarrassing political faux pas who was most recently in the news for heading up the Partygate inquiry that revealed juuuuussst enough of the squalid debauchery going on behind the scenes of Flobalob’s Downing St to push him towards the exit door, without embarrassing too many VIPs or investigating the vast majority of his law-breaking scandals.
Why would Flobby be happy that Starmer has saddled himself with Grey as his closest political fixer? Because a Parliamentary Standards Committee is just embarking upon what many expect to be a brutal inquiry into the whole Partygate fiasco and Flobalob’s role in it. The kind of inquiry that could see a chap found guilty of all kinds of things that would bar him from political life for the foreseeable. But if the senior Civil Servant who carried out the original probe is now bonded at the hip with the Leader of the Opposition, that puts all kinds of ammunition into the blunderbusses of a national media that is only too happy to cover Flobby’s arse with accusations of bias, bribery and corruption against his accusers. It’s the kind of political malpractice Starmer’s Nu-Lab corporate franchise has specialised in since he lied his way into the leadership spot, and the kind of thing that, in retrospect, is only surprising in that we didn’t see it coming. Nu-Lab are like houseflies, in that they exist only to eat shit and crap all over nice things.
This fucking country. Just put a bullet in it and sell the remains to the Dutch for land-reclamation.
azlib
Since Virginia is trending blue and wil be bluer next year, I doubt Cheney will run. I think she just wants to be near her DC base which is where she really grew up.
artem1s
Hard NO. Liz used her position on the J6 committee to protect Ginny Thomas and others who will now owe her. This was always her goal. To push out the MAGAts and reinstate the Bush Crime family operations in DC. Hard NO.
Baud
@different-church-lady:
Agree.
Geminid
@azlib: This fall’s General Assembly elections will be a good indicator of political trend in Virginia. Like you, I think the trend still is towards the Democrats. Youngkin’s win in 2021 raises a question mark, but I think the result this November will show that to have been an outlier.
Jackie
This is interesting:
U.S. Abortion Bans Are A ‘Human Rights Crisis’ That Violate International Law, Groups Tell UN
https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2023/03/02/us-abortion-bans-are-a-human-rights-crisis-that-violate-international-law-groups-tell-un/
“A coalition of human rights groups urged the United Nations to take “urgent” action against abortion bans in the U.S., arguing in a letter Thursday the restrictions on abortion in the wake of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade constitute a crisis with “devastating” consequences that violate the U.S.’s obligations under international law….”
MattF
I’d bear in mind that Liz is deeply despised by the Republican base. They are mostly Trumpites, and they aren’t going to forget what she’s said about the Dear Leader.
Kay
@Librarian:
Agree. She was an impediment to truth. I don’t think anyone could have kept her off the committee but she added nothing.
Citizen Alan
I remain convinced that Liz Cheney’s sole objection to 1/6 was that it was in service of Donald Trump and not President Jeb Bush (or any other GOP president from her wing of the party). I spent 2002-2008 in constant fear that another terrorist attack would hit the country and the Bush Administration would use it as a pretext for declaring martial law and ushering in Karl Rove’s “permanent Republican majority.” It still astounds me that as much as I despised Dubya at the time, looking back, he was a figure of towering moral strength and true patriotism simply because he didn’t seize the opportunity for dictatorship when it came before him.
Nina
Y’all are focusing on statewide offices, I’m personally wondering if La Cheney is actually angling to get back in the House to be a spoiler.
VA 5th district was won 57-42 by Bob Good, who is a very Trumper Trumpy. Charlottesville and Albemarle next door are the only reasons that wasn’t 80-20. UVA people are incredibly politically active. I could see her causing real trouble for Good in a primary, and if she gets through then she would pull a lot of national attention and campaign cash. She would probably pull in the Horse Farm Republican and retired civil servant cash and votes.
Kay
Cheney also got in the way of looking at the law enforcement response to J6, and that should have been investigated including a real inquiry into the Secret Service behavior at the Trump rally.
Law enforcement failed to protect the country. I would like to know why and I would like to know why we just gave them massive amounts of additional funding, no questions asked.
Subcommandante Yakbreath
@trollhattan:
Very definitely Pennsylvania Man…
Geminid
@azlib: Also, the Charlottesville-Albermarle County area is a very nice place to live, especially for the well-to-do. And the University of Virginia is very prestigious locally.
Cheney should fit right in. She might find life so enjoyable she passes on this “rumored” Senate run in 2024. Mark Warner’s seat will come up in in 2026 anway, and it could even be an open seat if Warner retires.
trollhattan
@Tony Jay: Whee! Always enjoy a proper rant, even if I get but half the context.
Since BoJo was ejected he’s pursued acting as though he’s on a sabbatical and “will be right back” to Number 10 once he’s bagged another intern to father another lucky offspring as he competes with his closest rival (forget if that’s Elon Musk or Hershel Walker).
Shorter me: no way you’re done with him.
On the same Beeb they wrangled an interview with a “former ambassador to Russia” who went full tankie on Blinken–accusing him of delivering a “ten-minute lecture” to Lavrov at G20 instead of, I don’t know, bringing world peace? Saying “fuck it, you can have Ukraine”? I assume a Tory because he was so full of his sniffy self and disdainful of the idea Russia was, you know, violating every international law ever invented.
Citizen Alan
@Ohio Mom:
I was not aware of that. I wonder if Cheney might be gambling that his health declines to the point he retires between now and then and she has a better shot against Youngkin and a Dem non-incumbent (or Kaine if he shows health problems in 2024). I only learned this week that Long Covid is what finally got Louie Gohmert out of office.
Baud
@Citizen Alan:
I did not know that.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
It’s funny, because it’s mean. And rooted in truth
BenCisco 🇺🇸🎖️🖥️♦️
Glad she recognized that TRE45ON wasn’t her brand of shit. That said, she’s still shit:
Will never trust her as far as I could throw my datacenter.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Citizen Alan: @Baud: me neither, I think it was James Inhofe who admitted the same thing, after he was out.
ETA: as for Liz Cheney, I think I’ll wait till she does something to try to discern her various nefarious motivations for doing it
trollhattan
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Funny. Now brain bleach, stat!
Was “so dreamy” uttered at any time?
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Inhofe’s long COVID is probably a hoax because snowballs still exist.
The Moar You Know
@Kay: this is part and parcel of America’s bootlicking approach to law enforcement in general. They get any amount of funding they ask for, they never have had to show that they’re effective (they aren’t) and they never get questioned when they turn on the citizens they are supposed to protect. How bad is it? Even privileged white people who get victimized by the cops are told to fuck right off, and if they sue they almost always lose.
We have never had, not once in our history, any sort of “day of accountability” for the police in America, and that really needs to happen.
Citizen Alan
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Shit, you’re right. It was Jim “Snowball” Inhofe, not Gohmert. All these fucking Nazi idiots start to look the same after a while.
Geminid
@Nina: Fifth CD Republicans will probably renominate Good with a caucus-convention process. That’s how they rolled incumbent Republican Denver Riggleman in 2020. Bob Good might have beaten the charisma-free Riggleman in a primary, but the radicals and Bible thumpers who dominate the party in the 5th CD made sure by using caucuses to elect Delegates to the District Convention, held at Liberty University. They will most likely use that process again next year.
I thought Democrats ran a strong candidate in 2020. Cameron Webb lost the 5th CD by pretty much the same margin as Joe Biden. The 5th has since been redistricted and is a few points more Republican now. Webb passed on a rematch, and the Democratic candidate last year was pretty much a nonentity, the only candidate who could even get on the primary ballot.
Baud
@Geminid:
I feel like heavily GOP districts present a good opportunity for Dems to experiment with different styles of political marketing. If you find that a particular strategy or tactic increases your turnout by a significant amount, you can then export it other areas. You probably don’t want to take that sort of risk in a true swing district.
Paul in KY
@Shalimar: That’s another thing I can add to my ‘Shit You Would Have Said in 2012 That I Would Have Thought Is Crazy’:
Me agreeing from time to time with Bill Fucking Kristol.
JCJ
@Roger Moore: Yes, they knew they would lose their jobs, but I don’t think she will be worrying about making a rent payment or having the money to buy her kid new shoes because he outgrew the last pair.
EarthWindFire
Northern Virginia Republicans with their heads in the sand about the state of their party are ripe for crossing over to Liz. Are there enough of them to swing the election to her? Don’t know.
Roger Moore
@Shalimar:
I can accept that, though I think Republican who put their career on the line to stand up to Trump deserves some kind of accolade. That said, the bigger issue is that the vast majority of Republicans who opposed any kind of investigation got away with it with little if any criticism.
As I’ve said before, the unfortunate truth is there’s a “man bites dog” problem with our political coverage. The Republicans have been so awful for so long, it’s no longer newsworthy when they’re awful. It’s only newsworthy when one does something good for a change, which means they get fawning coverage when it happens. The flip side is the Democrats are generally sensible and public-spirited, so them behaving that way is normalized. It’s only when one of them does something awful that it’s considered newsworthy, so that’s what gets attention in the media.
Geminid
@Baud: Democrats have to get good candidates to experiment with. I think they’ll get a better one for the Va. 5th CD in 2024. Virginia Delegate and Senator elections are in odd years, so a state legislator could run without giving up their office, which is a part time job anyway.
I don’t think that seat will be in reach for Democrats for a while, but running good candidates can be a good way to build the party. And demographic and political shifts could make the district winnable by 2028.
UncleEbeneezer
Life, the world, and people are complicated. Some of the stuff Cheney did on 1/6 Committee was good and important and I’m glad she did it (because election integrity is important and we need some % of non-MAGA Republican voters on board to have any chance of saving our Democracy). In other ways, she failed and kneecapped the Committee in exactly the ways I would expect from ANY Republican. If Bernie Thompson, Jamie Raskin, Adam Schiff etc., think she did some valuable work on the Committee, I’m gonna take them at their word. Doesn’t make her a savior. Doesn’t mean I’d vote for her or approve of her terrible politics. But I do want MORE Republicans to be brave and start going against Trumpism, even if it starts only with baby steps. So I’m gonna applaud those baby steps rather than shit on the person for not jumping into a full run. I can and will bash Cheney’s shitty stances/votes and actions that hindered 1/6 Committee but I’m not gonna pretend that nothing she did had any + value.
Roger Moore
@RaflW:
Nixon had that same job between his time as Senator and election as President. And let’s be 100% clear: Nixon’s victory in 1968 was massively aided by him covertly working to sabotage peace talks that would have ended the Vietnam war. Trump getting foreign help to win his election is old hat for the Republicans.
gvg
@azlib: I think she wants to be near DC so she can more convenintly fight the radicals who have taken over “her” party and taken her leadership roles. I take this as a sign she is not going to slink away in defeat. I don’t see success in her running for that seat. I wonder if that is just blather by people who like to pretend they know more than they do and can’t imagine someone like Cheney might not be running right now. I do not see an easy win for her anywhere, even though I don’t think the MAGA idiots hold is all that solid everywhere. They are not good managers and people are going to have buyers remorse. So Cheney may have calculated she needs to be where she can find out whats going on the fastest and shout out her take and be heard the fastest and loudest. I think she will look for a way to get heard.
janesays
A three way race between Kaine, Youngkin, and Cheney would heavily favor Kaine.
misterpuff
@trollhattan: Is Mark a nickname for Merkin?
I am sure that Mr Muffley is a fine “Merkin”.
RR_Mikey
I live in Virginia and won’t be voting for Liz (didn’t they call people like her “carpet baggers” back in the day?). Kaine is pretty popular but I can see the press lining up behind LC commending her for the “courageous act” of doing her job. Youngkin is a disaster of a Governor but he’s term limited. If Liz takes up his standard, we will again be subjected to four years of nothingness with a healthy appetite for the office on Pennsylvania Avenue.
Cheryl from Maryland
@Acallidryas: THIS. To me, running after returning to VA for just a year to try to upset Kaine negates much of her work on the Jan.6th Committee. Because if she wins or helps Youngkin win by siphoning off never-Trumper votes, that’s one more Senator for the somewhat Crazy GOP caucus. She ain’t going to caucus with the Dems. If she wants to turn the GOP ship around, she needs to stay in the GOP.
Ruckus
Liz is basically old school republican.
Likes all the restrictive, vindictive laws, likes money and a lot of restrictions for “normal” people.
Doesn’t want her views and actions to be seen as vindictive or racist because she does have to be that way to get what she seems to actually wants – MONEY Policy. That is that the wealthy get treated better, that excess money is fine, in the right hands. And yes that right is political angle, conservatives get favors and freedom and everyone else gets to pay for it. It’s old school republicanism. Good ole boy republicanism with a new twist, women get to participate. And be heard.
I followed politics over half a century ago because it seemed interesting. When I figured that a hell of a lot of people playing the game weren’t about individual freedom – the thing this country is supposed to be about, but were about financial freedom for those in charge. People could be SFB and get away with it. And SFB’s main problem to them was 2 fold. First, he sucked at it, and second he’s maybe one step above moron. He’s obvious. First rule among republicans who appear/act reasonably normal is not to be obvious that monetary policy is what every other policy is about. Said monetary policy is that conservatives can be rich, liberals can not. And because of that their outcomes always lead to someone getting wealthier and the lot of us getting poorer. Including the country. Over my lifetime, and a long time before that, every single on of them in power fucked up the economy to make them and their financial supporters wealthier. It’s what they are all about, their freedom to be wealthy and control the flow of money upwards to them.
Geminid
@gvg: I don’t expect to see Liz Cheney ever win public office again. She might campaign for office as an Independent for the speaking platform it would give her though, and a Virginia Senate campaign would get her plenty of attention in national media. DC-based journalists would love drive into Virginia an hour or two for a Cheney story. They’ll be comparing notes on the best restaurants and wineries to visit on the way home.
Betty Cracker
@UncleEbeneezer: I think Cheney did a great job in the J6 hearing presentations, and there’s reason to believe she was instrumental in persuading key witnesses like Hutchinson to testify.
She was a stumbling block too in some ways, but like you said, probably about the same as any other Repub would have been.
I’d never vote for her in a million years, but we have to share a country with a lot of shitty people, and I’d rather have Cheney representing them than, say, Gaetz.
Tony Jay
@trollhattan:
Yup. Yup. Yuppity-Yup. The BBC is a fully owned appendage of the Tory Party right now. Fox News with fewer blondes.
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
This.
ian
@RaflW:
Is this something we should care about? Does it really matter if your politicians were born in the state they want to represent?
This seems to be a cudgel that is used selectively. In this case, Cheney (who lived in Virginia but represented Wyoming) is now “carpetbagging”. Is Tim Kaine, who is from Missouri originally, also a carpetbagger?
IMHO, demanding that someone needs to be “from here” is parochial and small minded.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
@Roger Moore: Were you the one who posted to a dead thread the other day about “Baby, It’s Cold Outside?”
I enjoyed that perspective. I was always in the “It’s rapey” camp, but you helped me see how it’s more complicated than that.
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
Also – This.
rikyrah
The details of this bill are so odious.
Melissa Murray (@ProfMMurray) tweeted at 7:01 PM on Wed, Mar 01, 2023:
Feast your eyes on this proposed bill from the great state of Texas.
Clear eyes, full uteruses . . . can’t lose.
HT @lsepper https://t.co/35cxEFqHHX
(https://twitter.com/ProfMMurray/status/1631097386150907904?t=RdHIX0aw-E-_dTgndAbxyg&s=03)
Kate Huddleston (@k_huddleston) tweeted at 7:28 PM on Wed, Mar 01, 2023:
It disproportionately benefits white families, bc only for homeowners. 69% of TX homebuyers are white non-Latinx; 40% of all Texans are.
The bill sponsor described it as TX saying to couples “get married, stay married, & be fruitful & multiply.” Subtext: white, straight couples.
rikyrah
Brian Krassenstein (@krassenstein) tweeted at 4:24 PM on Wed, Mar 01, 2023:
BREAKING: Senator Josh Hawley, who ran from the US Capitol for his life during the Jan 6th insurrection, decided to ask Merrick Garland if the DOJ has ‘anti-Catholic bias’.
Pretending that one of the most widespread religious groups in the US, the same religion that Biden…
Charles Robert Lee (@CharlesRLee83) tweeted at 5:38 PM on Wed, Mar 01, 2023:
Garland is Jewish, and Hawley knows this (the same dude who ran like a bitch during the insurrection that HE participated in). What he’s doing is throwing red meat to his Neo Nazi MAGA base, or as he calls them, “his voters.”
Truly a two-faced coward to the end.
Shana
@trollhattan: Gerry Connolly would be great. And his House seat would stay in the Democratic column
Jeffro
This is kind of a dumb post. No one expects Virginia Dems to line up behind Liz Cheney. We do expect her to help us split the VA GOP and send Tim Kaine back to the Senate, though.
trollhattan
@ian: I’ll give an example of political carpetbagging in the form of Rep Tom McClintock (R) CA.
He was born in New York but that’s not important–he attended UCLA and settled there, becoming a southern California state assemblyman, a seat he held for several terms while also giving the US House a shot, unsuccessfully. He went from Assembly to State Senate and also ran for various statewide offices, unsuccessfully.
The, a shiny bug appears in the form of, John Doolittle, who gets scandaled out of Congress (see Abramoff, Jack at all) and seeing an opportunity to go after a safe seat, McClintock decides he’s now a northern Californian, Sierra Foothill type, parachutes in and grabs that safe as milk Republican seat, which he’s held ever since, despite being shuttled about via redistricting. He also has little regard for actually living inside, you know, his actual district boundaries.
That’s a carpetbagger.
Amir Khalid
@rikyrah:
It rhymes with Poutine calling Ukraine’s elected government, led by a Jewish President, neo-Nazis.
Jeffro
(catching up after being out all morning)
sab: I saw your note about your dog…’5 on a 10 scale’…LOL. Mine is like a 1 to humans, and a 9 to other dogs.
Betty: you’re going to let us know if/when those last steps get put in, right? =)
ian
@trollhattan: I think about something that comes up every time we debate term limits here, what do the voters want? McClintock’s district could very well choose to select someone else if they desired.
The voters in that district selected him. They could choose someone else (well, in the primary. It is a Republican district.).
The debate in this thread seems to be about why it is wrong for someone who doesn’t have deep ties to a district or state representing them. I don’t see the problem. Who are we to care if a majority of voters make that decision anyways?
Ohio Mom
@ian: I think it more than reasonable that someone runnning to represent a state or area have some connection to the place. Else, how can you claim to understand the needs and values of your voters?
Cheney has real ties to Virginia, it’s where she graduated high school. She has a home in McClean, Virginia (a D.C. suburb); her husband is a partner at a big DC law firm.
So while I rather not see her win, I’m fine with her running in Virginia. How weird would it be though if she ran in say, Arkansas or Michigan or another state she may never have stepped foot in?
ian
@Ohio Mom:
It suggests that someone who is not from an area can’t understand the values or people who live there. I personally disagree.
Some examples I can think of “carpetbagging” politicians are RFK and Hillary Clinton. Would we suggest that HRC didn’t understand her constituents or their values?
If people want to use the criteria of “where are you from” to decide which candidate to support, that is their business. However I do not find it a persuasive argument. YMMV.
trollhattan
@ian: The issue seems more that it’s a bridge too far to use the term. McClintock is carpetbagger who after multiple terms doesn’t understand his district’s issues. He thinks he deserves the seat anyway and if you know the California Republican Party then you understand they couldn’t give two shits about that.
And we’re eight years away from the next redistricting.
Frankensteinbeck
@Amir Khalid:
Yeah, but that’s a whole traditional Russian thing. Apparently the Russian popular belief since WWII has been that Hitler’s focus was anti-Slav, not anti-Jew. A Jewish Nazi is not a contradiction from a Russian standpoint.
Baud
@Frankensteinbeck: I’m pretty sure Hilter had enough hate to go around.
terraformer
Never trust a Cheney
ian
@trollhattan: Well the term itself has some loaded implications, coming as it does from reconstruction South.
To me personally, I find it somewhat weird that it (as in the concept, not what we call it) should matter where a person grew up and was raised. If the voters want to choose someone who isn’t from an area, that should be their cup of tea. If those same voters think that it is an issue, well I might not agree with them but that isn’t up to me.
So long story short from all that, I find it weird when people who don’t live in a district complain about the representative not living there. If Missourians want to have issues with Hawley living in Virginia, they are welcome to. For me, as someone in Wyoming, were I to care that Hawley isn’t living in Missouri, that would strike me as extremely unusual.
Ramalama
@rikyrah:
Would be hilarious if Garland said “YES. I am biased against those Catholics who don’t follow their own spiritual leader, Pope Francis, who has decreed many things that go against the grain of the Republican party.”
Maybe throwing in a ‘cafeteria-Catholic’ here and there, too.
delphinium
@Ramalama: Not to mention, those who don’t follow the basic tenets of their own religion, spelled out fairly clearly in the bible. It even includes a handy summary per the 10 commandments.
rikyrah
Bob south florida water man (@WaterDean) tweeted at 4:46 AM on Thu, Mar 02, 2023:
Emotional meeting ends with DeSantis’ New College of Florida board abolishing diversity office https://t.co/nPSguzfeMG Welcome to the WHITE state of floriduh.
(https://twitter.com/WaterDean/status/1631244458468556800?t=O06Ndu2yQSAmOkP6l0Hzdg&s=03)
rikyrah
UH HUH
UH HUH
Daniel Dale (@ddale8) tweeted at 9:37 AM on Wed, Mar 01, 2023:
I asked Greene’s office last night about her tweet blaming the Biden administration for these deaths in 2020 under Trump. Spokesman Nick Dyer responded by saying lots of people have died from drugs under Biden and “do you think they give a fuck about your bullshit fact checking?”
(https://twitter.com/ddale8/status/1630955415746883586?t=0dQHpAiTcordsVFtOyZYnw&s=03)
Daniel Dale (@ddale8) tweeted at 9:41 AM on Wed, Mar 01, 2023:
I also gave Greene congressional spokesman Nick Dyer an opportunity to comment regarding Greene’s multiple false claims yesterday about the 2020 election, such as the lies that Trump won Georgia and that there were thousands of dead voters there. His response: “Fuck off.”
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: Appalling x 1,000.
eclare
@rikyrah: And with her district, she is in Congress til she decides not to be.
Shana
@dave319: It may not be true but I heard that the kid who was taping Allen and who Allen called “Macaca” put as the first line of his application essay for college “I am Macaca”. AIR he got accepted
Alison Rose
About fucking time:
delphinium
@ian: Given the very few standards/qualifications for Federal office, it shouldn’t be too much of an ask to expect people running for office to actually live in and be familiar with their state. The point of their representation is supposed to be that they will understand and vote on bills that will be beneficial to their state and constituents-hard to do if you are living several states away. Not saying folks have to be lifers but swanning in a couple months before an election or pretending to live in state that you don’t (see Dr. Oz) makes a mockery of the process and potentially pushes out local folks who may have wanted to run for office. YMMV
delphinium
@rikyrah:
So, Marge Greene’s spokesperson is just as much of a lying, nasty POS as her. Color me unsurprised.
UncleEbeneezer
Allison Gill just made a really great point: Merrick Garland’s own investigators (the FBI) didn’t want to search Trump’s premises, but Garland OVERRODE THEM and PERSONALLY signed off on the decision to go ahead (knowing full well how Republicans would lose their shit over it).
So much for the timid, Feckless Garland…/sarcasm
She also noted that if one of the two (DOJ Prosecutors or FBI) were gonna be split on the decision, it’s much better that the Prosecutors wanted to go ahead with the search, rather than the other way around. It’s a good sign of the seriousness and aggressive spirit of Garland’s DOJ. I’m looking forward to hearing Andrew McCabe’s take on the whole thing on the next Jack podcast. I have a feeling there is more complexity and nuance to the whole thing than is being reported/tweeted.
Scout211
Since we are drifting off topic . . . today’s new California drought map.
17% of the state is completely out of drought conditions. The county where I live is part of that 17%!
Now only 49% of the state is in severe or moderate drought and 0% of the state is in extreme or exceptional drought.
The cold, the rain, the piles and piles of snow in the mountains, the power outages, the flooding and wind damage may be (almost) worth it if it ends the drought.
Anyway
@Jeffro:
I think the fear is that enough “centrist-Dems” might vote her and make it a tough race for Kaine.
Alison Rose
@Scout211: I’m in D0, not bad. I just hope people don’t act like dipshits this Spring and Summer and waste water with abandon because we had a lot of rain. (They will. I know. But one has to try to hope.)
Roger Moore
@ian:
I think accusations of being a carpetbagger* need to be made sparingly. You don’t have to be born in a place to be legitimately allowed to represent it. What seems important to me is that you have established yourself there for long enough you can understand the place that’s electing you and can do a good job of representing your constituents.
I don’t think that describes Cheney, though. She represented Wyoming in Congress in 2022. If she runs in Virginia in 2024, she’s clearly someone who has moved purely because it improves her electoral chances, which IMO is what defines a carpetbagger.
*And we probably ought to come up with a better word, given the way “carpetbagger” is associated with the Lost Cause.
Geminid
@Anyway: Liz Cheney would find slim pickings among Democrats if she ran. Tim Kaine is popular from one end of the Virginia Democratic Party to the other.
I don’t hear Virginia Democrats complain about him, just out of staters. (they sometimes complain that he is too moderate). Some Virginia Democrats might wish he was more “progressive,” but most see him as a good fit for the Virginia electorate. Among the general public, Kaine is probably Virginia’s most popular Senator since John Warner.
Roger Moore
@The Kropenhagen Interpretation:
Yes, I was. I wish I could claim to have originated that interpretation, but I’m really just spreading it. One thing I might have said is that it’s OK to give up on the song even if it isn’t that bad with a full explanation. If you need to explain why it isn’t as problematic as it sounds, you should probably just find something less controversial.
NotMax
@Roger Moore
Officesneaker.
Jeffro
Let’s translate that:
“We’re going to keep lying.”
“We don’t have to be honest – we just need to keep our folks whipped up and enraged.”
“We think so little of our own voters (and they demand so little of us in the way of integrity, standards, etc) that we’re just going to say whatever we want…and then tell you to fuck off when you call us on it.”
What can we do but keep highlighting the fact that GQP clowns like Greene flat-out lie to their voters because they’re offering NOTHING but rage.
scav
@delphinium: One can live in a state/locale and absolutely have allegiances and overwhelming personal objectives “foreign” if not antithetical to ones neighbors/constituents. Where one plops one’s “childhood” “actual” or “official” residence never guarantees that one will actually listen and take seriously ones neighbors/constituents. Individual character would seem to be more important that simple geographic happenstance in these instances. I can see that familiarity with the local power structures and individuals that is usually amassed over time would be an advantage, but again, a) people can learn or b) be utterly oblivious to what should be staring them in the face so again, comparison of individuals might be key. Contrariwise, sometimes, a little distance and lack of personal entanglement is exactly what is needed to mediate snd see through a tricky situation or long term rut. All very complicated and as far as I’m concerned, that’s what elections are for. To my mind, money (and related class issues) is far more a distorting influence on elections than geography. Entrenched local elites and outside cash behemoths can both be pernicious influences.
Jeffro
@Anyway: That sounds like exactly no one that I know of. Every VA Dem is well aware of the stakes this fall and in ’24. Kaine is waaay popular with VA Dems, too.
Reproductive rights alone should carry the day for Kaine.
JWR
Good.
Baud
@JWR:
Dammit, now feckless Garland is knee capping Biden.
Kay
@The Moar You Know:
There were people with guns in trees at the hate rally? Trump told them to go around the security checks? I don’t get it. Where were the Secret Service? That’s BEFORE we even get to the part where they overrun the capitol in a government absolutely bristling with security. No one is even going to ask? We just give them 2.1 BILLION more dollars after this utter failure?
2.1 billion! In addition to the 120 billion Homeland Security already gets. It’s nuts.
Kay
@The Moar You Know:
I went to the 2012 Obama inaugeration. I cannot imagine people in trees with guns or people just blithely going around metal detectors. The place was locked down tight. They just stopped enforcing rules when Donald Trump lost an election?
JPL
Should we start a fund for Betty Cracker?
JPL
@JPL: The republicans want to pass a bill to force bloggers to register with the state if the mention government officials or face a fine.
Baud
@JPL:
Oh man, it’s probably directly targeting her. I hope she sues.
rikyrah
Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) tweeted at 6:45 AM on Thu, Mar 02, 2023:
Now that Fox News has been decisively exposed as rank propaganda, Dems need to fundamentally adjust their posture. No more treating Fox as a news outlet in any sense at all.
“This is a seminal moment in the history of mass media,” @ChrisMurphyCT tells me:
https://t.co/0ydq6vdwlh
(https://twitter.com/ThePlumLineGS/status/1631274419552133121?t=4UAVF9pNUB5rtgXKxN-3TA&s=03)
Manyakitty
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I just screamed and scared my parents. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Manyakitty
@Betty Cracker: Hey, how’s the stairs situation?
Jackie
Sigh… He was the first openly gay mayor of College Park. I know all Democrats aren’t infallible, but this sucks.
“The mayor of College Park, Maryland, was arrested on dozens of counts of alleged child pornography Thursday and resigned from his post,” NBC News reports.
“Patrick Wojahn, 47, was charged with 56 counts of alleged child pornography that included 40 counts of possession of child exploitative material and 16 counts of distribution of child exploitative material.”
JPL
@Baud: There are probably lots of Crackers in FL so she might be difficult to locate.
Manyakitty
@Jeffro: and that’s the GQP platform in a nutshell.
eclare
@JPL: Holy shit! Ratcheting up the fascism.
delphinium
@scav: Yes, I get the reality is that both local and non-local candidates can be more beholden to their millionaire/billionaire funders than to their constituents regardless of where they came from. My perspective was more akin to the ‘election-shopping’ per the recent Walker and Oz senate races when neither was really qualified nor interested in the office itself. There may have been other local candidates who wanted to run (and may have been more qualified) but felt they couldn’t compete due to money or the media frenzy surrounding those 2 outsiders. Hope that makes a bit more sense.
JPL
@eclare: Since the supremes think bounty hunting in TX is okay, I’m sure they will just smile and nod.
scav
@delphinium: To my mind “not really qualified nor interested in the office itself“ is a character issue irregardless of geographic affiliation and the cash/media influences deterring potential more fit candidates again, is not entirely geographically determined as local monetary / elite structures also deter cash-poor candidates.
scav
@scav: Handy example of the joys of a local elite stranglehold on politics (judicial / law enforcement / social, etc) is provided by the Murdaughs.
delphinium
@scav: Okay, but then what is the advantage to a state allowing anyone from anywhere to jump into a local race? Why not go with the in-state people good or bad? I haven’t seen that any election-shoppers are much better than any potential local candidate; and if they feel it is so important to run for office then they can do it in their own state when an opportunity arises. Again, not implying the only people who should run locally must have lived in a state for decades, but I don’t think being a resident for at least a few years is that unreasonable.
RaflW
@ian: To me, the issues is she ‘represented’ Wyoming for three terms, lost in a landslide, and is reportedly shopping for a new Senate seat 2000 miles away just two years later.
People relocate and make roots, and that’s fine. This careerist move by Liz isn’t that, to me.
I was not at all fond of the idea of Hillary Clinton, in my perhaps poorly informed opinion, suddenly being a New Yorker so she could run for Senate. I was critical of it at the time, but NYers said “ok” so there we are.
If I had access to an independent expenditure committee, I’d want to be finding clips of Liz saying how much she loves Wyoming, how important it is to her, etc, and start clipping that to run ads in VA saying “Is Liz Cheney running to represent Virginia, or is she just desperate for any job she can grab?”
Gvg
@Kay: no, they are supposed to follow the Presidents orders. The problems is that President.
Our rules really just don’t deal with the actual President being treasonous and murderous.
In fact I do think there was a lot of resistance to him including I think just not telling him things that any other President was told.
Gvg
@delphinium: it is up to each state. They all get to make their own rules and have. Some make a certain amount of residency a requirement, others do not. There is no uniform rule. It’s also a local people attitude. I have read in some states you need to be their for generations to be considered. I think New Hampshire? Anyway, other states don’t even require residence in the district being represented. So basically you have to look up the rules there.
Here in Florida local county board members have been forced out when someone found out they didn’t live in the exact area they represent but they wouldn’t have had to have lived there long if they had followed the rule. I do think everyone should follow whatever the rules there say. Then voters opinion matters in the end.
scav
@delphinium: I’m not saying there shouldn’t be rules, some of which may be geographic. I’m trying to point that a bias toward local being necessarily better is also problematic and that leveling the media and monetary playing field will very likely produce better long-term results.
I’m also implying that letting voters decide how important having local connections are may be reasonable. I can envision situations where electing people with fewer local entanglements and having expertise in alternative systems and solutions might be attractive to a voting population. Bring in people with demonstrated competence, yes acquired elsewhere, and use them to jump-start a dysfunctional local system. Within the realm of possibility.
brantl
GOB dammit, Liz Cheney is for TORTURE, she’s against Gay Marriage, and her SISTER IS GAY, AND MARRIED. She IS one of the worst kind or Republicans, THE ONES THAT NEED HEART IMPLANTS.
She’s done one thing right in her whole life, it doesn’t get her a free pass.
janesays
@ian: I don’t think somebody necessarily has to originally be from a particular state they want to represent in Congress, but they should have at least some roots in that state. Mehmet Oz had absolutely no business running for a Senate seat in Pennsylvania last year, nor would anyone else in his position.
If you want to represent a particular group of people, you should be a member of that group of people, and not just for five minutes beforehand.
Kaine was born in Minnesota and raised in Missouri, but he’s been a resident of Virginia since 1984, and had lived there for a decade before he ran for any public office in the state. Not really a carpetbagger in the sense most people think of it.
billcinsd
@ian: There is a large difference between moving somewhere when young, but “growing” up in the state politically as compared to representing another state, losing, then running in a new state.
billcinsd
@Gvg:other states don’t even require residence in the district being represented
The Constitutional requirement is that they live in the state, not the district. That’s in Article I, Section 2.
scav
Scale a few of the statements above up to a national level and there are a fair number of people verging on arguing that immigrants shouldn’t be allowed to serve in Congress. What about Army brats largely raised overseas? In or Out?
It’s also not like state boundaries are magic. Does it really matter which end of Kansas City you live in? I’m not arguing that geography doesn’t matter: I’m a fucking geographer. I’m just saying geographic influences are complex, untidy and generally frustrate simple approaches.
Feckless
Kaine is trying to steal my social security to give Donald Trump a tax break why would I ever bother to vote for bag of s*** like that f*** him.