Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

Those who are easily outraged are easily manipulated.

Cancel the cowardly Times and Post and set up an equivalent monthly donation to ProPublica.

This chaos was totally avoidable.

He wakes up lying, and he lies all day.

Let me file that under fuck it.

Republicans don’t want a speaker to lead them; they want a hostage.

Narcissists are always shocked to discover other people have agency.

He really is that stupid.

Seems like a complicated subject, have you tried yelling at it?

The republican ‘Pastor’ of the House is an odious authoritarian little creep.

Someone should tell Republicans that violence is the last refuge of the incompetent, or possibly the first.

Following reporting rules is only for the little people, apparently.

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

“Loving your country does not mean lying about its history.”

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

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

Washington Post Catch and Kill, not noticeably better than the Enquirer’s.

Giving in to doom is how we fail to fight for ourselves & one another.

Republicans firmly believe having an abortion is a very personal, very private decision between a woman and J.D. Vance.

“What are Republicans afraid of?” Everything.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

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

When tyranny becomes law, rebellion becomes duty. ~Thomas Jefferson

You are here: Home / Foreign Affairs / Tuesday Evening Open Thread: Another Repub Up & Comer

Tuesday Evening Open Thread: Another Repub Up & Comer

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Mitch McConnell, Rand Paul… and *this* dude. The entire state of Kentucky may need a wellness check.

… Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.), the new chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee, said during an appearance on “Fox and Friends” that it was too bad that Trump didn’t launch a military attack on Mexico, a longtime U.S. ally, to try to stop drug traffickers.

“One of the things we learned post-Trump presidency is that he had ordered a bombing of a couple of fentanyl labs, crystal meth labs, in Mexico, just across the border and for whatever reason, the military didn’t do it,” said Comer. “I think that was a mistake.”

In 2020, Trump allegedly proposed firing missiles into Mexico to his then-Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who wrote about it in his book, “A Sacred Oath: Memoirs of a Defense Secretary in Extraordinary Times.” Esper, stunned, said Trump suggested this several times, telling Esper he believed “no one would know it was us” so they could keep it a secret.

When asked later if this was true, Trump said only, “No comment.”

A Comer spokeswoman did not respond to a request for comment on why he thinks it would have been a good idea to attack Mexico…

The GOP chairman’s extreme pronouncements are part of a bigger push by House Republicans to appear tough on border issues. It’s all so jumbled, though, that Comer may have forgotten that he proposed cutting off all funding for border security just a few months ago.

Comer’s comments come a day before Republicans on his committee are set to hold another subcommittee hearing on disrupting crime at the border.

Comer remembers which of his colleagues loves a good tongue bath, though…

Reader Interactions

75Comments

  1. 1.

    Baud

    The big question is, how will the various GOP presidential candidates try to compete in the race for the Ever Bigger Outrage.

  5. 5.

    Raoul Paste

    My favourite part is that Trump said “they wouldn’t know it was us“ if we bombed Mexico.

  7. 7.

    Gravenstone

    The Republican ethos has been “throw some little country up against the wall just to remind everyone that we’re the big dogs” for entirely too long. This is just an extension of that bullshit.

  8. 8.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Raoul Paste: wasn’t this the case where he wanted to disguise the planes as being from the Chinese AF? or was this one of the times he thought thought stealth bombers were like Wonder Woman’s invisible jet?

  10. 10.

    patrick II

    If they are going to do that, they should drop one on the Sacklers with their multi-billion getaway fund after they hooked about half of the country on oxy.

  11. 11.

    Suzanne

    that Trump didn’t launch missiles into Mexico to bomb meth labs

    Um does he know he could just bomb Kentucky instead and have the same result?

  12. 12.

    Geminid

    There sure are a lot of shabby politicians in that Republican House caucus. I think gerrymandering has led to a race to the bottom in that party.

  14. 14.

    Gvg

    I am sure the rest of the world would be fine if we started bombing countries that had criminals in them, not. Sabotage teams from around the world would hit us every way they could.

    And also I am sure drug smugglers, realizing they were being bombed by us, would also realize the safest place to be was among a large number of US citizens. And they would know how to get over the border. I imagine they might take some revenge, then start infiltrating our military, police and politics, just like home.

    Republicans are now all morons.

  15. 15.

    Baud

    One of the things we learned post-Trump presidency is that he had ordered a bombing of a couple of fentanyl labs, crystal meth labs, in Mexico, just across the border and for whatever reason, the military didn’t do it,” said Comer. “I think that was a mistake

    It’s because Trump had just watched Breaking Bad and told the military to bomb meth labs in New Mexico.

  16. 16.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    Comer last week:

    On Monday’s episode of the podcast “The Great America Show with Lou Dobbs,” Comer suggested without evidence that Joe Biden and his elder son, Beau Biden — the former Delaware attorney general who died in 2015 of brain cancer — should have been indicted along with Tigani.
    “This U.S. attorney had had dealing, had an opportunity to go after the Bidens years ago. In fact, it was Beau Biden, the president’s other son, that was involved in some campaign donations from a person that got indicted as well,” Comer told Dobbs. “But, you know, nothing ever happened. So I don’t know much about this U.S. attorney [Weiss] other than he’s had an opportunity to investigate the Bidens before and he chose not to. We all know that he’s just been silent for a long time.”

    Weiss is the Delaware US Attorney appointed by the DoJ in 2018, I think the Klanself was still in charge at the time.

  17. 17.

    delphinium

    @Geminid: Let’s not leave voters off the hook-they seem to be a-ok with keeping these folks in office, despite them not doing much to help out in their communities.

  19. 19.

    cain

    @Geminid: I think you’re right – and it will also have more and more extreme people who have no accountability to anyone including their own caucus. Eventually, no one can control them – hell, you can’t even control them now.

    The house is going to keep coming up with crazy ass bills. If by some shit luck the Senate is also GOP (and likely thin margins) the house and senate are going to start fighting.

  21. 21.

    cain

    BTW – lot of shit going on with our boy Tucker making it seem like Jan 6th was a sleeper. Even the Senate GOP was pissed off.

  22. 22.

    Bex

    Didn’t Lindsay Graham suggest we invade Mexico and annex the “northern part”?  Where have I seen that stratergy recently?

  23. 23.

    SpaceUnit

    I wonder how many times Trump ordered his chief of staff to assemble The Avengers.

  24. 24.

    EarthWindFire

    @delphinium: They’ve been groomed by the GOP to not expect or desire government help, until there’s a disaster a Democrat should show up for. Case in point: East Palestine

  26. 26.

    persistentillusion

    @Alison Rose: I used to have a horse who would hide behind phone poles.  He couldn’t see me therefore I couldn’t see his 1400 lb self. Oi, he may have been a secret Rethuglican.  No wonder he would balk at jumps.

  27. 27.

    delphinium

    @cain: Tucker is a proven liar, and this should be mentioned any time someone brings up anything he says. Has anyone heard if the other news orgs will be able to get the footage as well? I know they were trying to.

  28. 28.

    Sherparick

    I was wondering about all the meth labs in those hollows of Kentucky.  Perhaps napalming Comer’s whole district would be a start.

  29. 29.

    Scout211

    @cain: Yes.  Pushback from the Senate GOP, the Capitol
    Police and Officer Sicknick’s family.  They released a statement. Link

    Carlson also made a particularly cruel and insensitive jab at the death of Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, who succumbed to a series of strokes the day after being pepper sprayed in a physical altercation with the mob. The conservative media personality accused Democrats of turning Sicknick into a “prop” and a “martyr” for drawing connections between his death and the insurrection. Using the new video, Carlson showed Sicknick ostensibly ordering instructions to insurrectionists, claiming that the officer looked “healthy and vigorous” and that it is “hard to imagine” that his death could have been a result of the Capitol attacks.

    Sicknick’s family blasted Carlson for trying to downplay the relevance of the riots to his death, releasing a lengthy statement in response to “the lies started by Trump and spread by sleaze-slinging outlets like Fox.” “What will it take to silence the lies from people like Carlson?” the statement continued. “Every time the pain of that day seems to have ebbed a bit, organizations like Fox rip our wounds wide open again and we are frankly sick of it.  Leave us the hell alone and instead of spreading more lies like Supreme Leader Trump, why don’t you focus on real news?”

  30. 30.

    Ken

    @Bex: I don’t know about recently, but annexing chunks of Mexico and the Caribbean for the extension of slavery was pre-war southern, and later Confederate, policy. Hardly surprising the GQP is reviving it.

  31. 31.

    delphinium

    @EarthWindFire: Well then it looks like more train derailments, grid failures (TX), and rural hospital closings will be in their future. Not much we can do if they refuse to learn.

  32. 32.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @Suzanne: Um does he know he could just bomb Kentucky instead and have the same result?

    Trump bombing Kentucky wouldn’t be an international incident, but it’d be American money he was hurting. We can’t have that.

    Comer on Jim Jordan: “Jim’s the GOAT. Jim is the LeBron James of the House Republican conference.”

    Then the reverse should be true. Let’s try this together; “LeBron James is the Gym Jordan of basketball.”

    For anyone who needed clarification on how silly that thought was…

  33. 33.

    NotMax

    Wag the dog elephant.
    //

    Switching gears, this is (as Arte Johnson used to say) verrry in-ter-es-tink.

    The Indian Express reports from Iran’s PressTV that the country has discovered a deposit of 8.5 million tons of lithium in the Qahavand Plain of western Hamedan province. There are only 89 million tons of lithium in the world in known deposits so far, with the bulk of them in Latin America. If the report is true, Iran has about ten percent of the currently known world supply.
    [snip]
    Iran would thus be the fourth largest lithium power in the world if the announcement proves true. But Ebrahimali Molabeigi, the chief of the exploration department in Iran’s Ministry of Industry, Mine and Trade (MIMT), says that he expects more lithium deposits to be found in Iran. Source

  36. 36.

    Brachiator

    @Baud:

    The big question is, how will the various GOP presidential candidates try to compete in the race for the Ever Bigger Outrage.

    Oh, they will find a way!

  38. 38.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @WaterGirl: That’s currently only up for discussion in “quiet rooms” and maybe fundraisers.

    Dark corners of 4chan -> Intellectual Dark Web ->Fox News -> Rest of media -> Conventional wisdom

  41. 41.

    cain

    @Scout211: ​
     
    Perhaps if he were to agree to be similarly pepper sprayed to prove the point… I mean let’s prove that it can happen. Stand by your convictions Tucker!

  42. 42.

    The Kropenhagen Interpretation

    @WaterGirl: Varies. Sometimes they gotta tease out the way to present an idea for the masses. Pitch that dogwhistle just right.

    And idiocy can start at any link in the chain, but the 2nd and 3rd probably produce the most quantity, if I were to make an educated guess. And it is bidirectional.

  43. 43.

    David 🌈☘The Establishment☘🌈 Koch

    @Scout211: Sicknick’s family has a good lawsuit if they want.

    Courts won’t entertain suits for emotional harm with one big exception – when the harm relates to the death of a loved one.

  44. 44.

    Josie

    I hope someone is keeping a record of all Comer’s statements to use in an ad explaining why Republicans should not be in charge in the House from now on. The man is certifiable or shamelessly stupid or both.

  46. 46.

    Matt McIrvin

    @Scout211: If Murdoch were behind Tucker Carlson on this, I’d say, start the timer and see how long it takes for the senators’ story to reverse. But he might not be.

  50. 50.

    hells littlest angel

    Esper, stunned, said Trump suggested this several times, telling Esper he believed “no one would know it was us” so they could keep it a secret.

     

    Trump: Just say it was a bunch of black kids who did it.

  52. 52.

    Mr. Bemused Senior

    @Quiltingfool:  I recall a This Modern World cartoon from the W era illustrating the future Bush dynasty, where mad Ludwig Bush decides to nuke Florida.  Alas, I can’t find it on the ‘Net.

  53. 53.

    laura

    @craigie: Two Shite-Bags from Napa were recently sentenced for their plot to blow up the Democratic Party Headquarters in Sacramento. They were very sorry they were caught and blamed everything but their stupid selves for their criming.

  54. 54.

    sdhays

    @craigie: I’m convinced that the “GOAT” trend is Gen-Z trolling everyone into saying people are goats while seeming to pay them a compliment.

    It’s genius!

  55. 55.

    Suzanne

    @Quiltingfool: Or every GD state in the union? It’s not like meth isn’t being cooked up, uhhhhh, everywhere. Probably 100 feet from the Capitol.

    This is why I need a fucken anal scan to buy allergy pills.

  59. 59.

    RSA

    It turns out that most of the guns seized in Toronto have been smuggled from the U.S.  Canada presumably is not thinking about bombing Smith & Wesson factories in Tennessee—unless they’re listening to Comer, I guess.

  60. 60.

    Ruckus

    @delphinium:

    Not much we can do if they refuse to learn.

    I’m thinking that is isn’t that they refuse to learn, it’s that they are too fucking stupid to be able to learn.

  62. 62.

    Tony G

    @craigie: A guy from Kentucky is worried about meth labs in Mexico.  I guess he wants to eliminate the foreign competition so that the local businesses can make more money.

  63. 63.

    karen marie

    @Suzanne:  Kentucky may be number one in some books but it’s got competition.

    But which state is doing the most meth? Well, that depends on who and when you ask. The Missouri State Highway Patrol Report (which came about after the Show Me State led the nation in meth seizures) put Michigan at the top of the speed heap back in 2018. A year later Millennium Health placed Arkansas at #1. WalletHub also has a survey, which gauges states in their narcotized entirety, and it claims the District of Columbia ranks highest in most overall drug use, with West Virginia on its heels at #2.

    Let’s stick with the latest (Millennium Health) and the most extensive (WalletHub).

    1. Arkansas
    2. Iowa
    3. Washington
    4. Kentucky
    5. Minnesota
    6. New Mexico
    7. Alaska
    8. Montana
    9. Missouri
    10. Idaho

  64. 64.

    karen marie

    @Scout211: Where were those senators during Trump’s second impeachment?  Oh, that’s right, they were voting to hold him harmless for the insurrection he instigated.

    I’m sorry, they don’t get a pat on the back from me because they finally realized that Tucker and Fox aren’t really their friends.

  65. 65.

    Gravie

    Utter disregard for innocent lives: check. Performative violence that accomplishes nothing: check. Blustering “patriotism”: check. Add your own GOP atrocities.

  67. 67.

    Scout211

    More texts, emails and private messages were released today by the judge in the Dominion v Fox case.  One message from Tucker Carlson is interesting. LOL

    Link 

    Carlson, one of Fox News’ top hosts, made clear on Jan. 4, 2021, that he was getting fed up with Trump. In a text exchange with an unknown person, Carlson said, “We are very, very close to being able to ignore Trump most nights. I truly can’t wait.”

    “I hate him passionately. I blew up at Peter Navarro today in frustration,” he added, referring to the former Trump administration official. “I actually like Peter. But I can’t handle much more of this.”

    “That’s the last four years. We’re all pretending we’ve got a lot to show for it, because admitting what a disaster it’s been is too tough to digest,” he wrote in another text message. “But come on. There isn’t really an upside to Trump.”

  70. 70.

    hotshoe

    @craigie:

    Nuclear bomb attack on (one Utopian town in) California, ordered by a US rightwing govt, is a key plot point in The Shockwave Rider, by John Brunner 1975.

    It’s never been unthinkable to me that the government could order such a strike, nor that a bomber crew would obey the order. (Especially not after the fundagelicals subverted the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.)

    Well, the book has a happy ending.

    We have hope.

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