Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Accountability, motherfuckers.

The current Supreme Court is a rogue court. Very dangerous.

Every one of the “Roberts Six” lied to get on the court.

Books are my comfort food!

This really is a full service blog.

Republicans choose power over democracy, every day.

Everything is totally normal and fine!!!

It’s always darkest before the other shoe drops.

Too often we hand the biggest microphones to the cynics and the critics who delight in declaring failure.

This country desperately needs a functioning Fourth Estate.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

If senate republicans had any shame, they’d die of it.

An almost top 10,000 blog!

You know it’s bad when the Project 2025 people have to create training videos on “How To Be Normal”.

“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”

I’m sure you banged some questionable people yourself. We’re allowed to grow past that.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

Jesus, Mary, & Joseph how is that election even close?

We’re not going back!

The words do not have to be perfect.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

“Why isn’t this Snickers bar only a nickel?”

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

Another missed opportunity for Jamie Dimon to just shut the fuck up.

You are here: Home / Economics / C.R.E.A.M. / Wednesday Morning Open Thread: If They Weren’t So Dangerous, It’d Be A Sitcom

Wednesday Morning Open Thread: If They Weren’t So Dangerous, It’d Be A Sitcom

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This post is in: , , ,

First, some hopeful news:

======


And in the replies, McConnell is excoriated as a RINO, a Dem puppet, a tool of the (((globalists))). If he wasn’t #MitchMcConnell, you could almost feel sorry for the guy.


Reader Interactions

157Comments

  3. 3.

    Baud

    Not in the OP, but it occurred to me today that if a Dem Senator were blocking military appointments the way Tuberville has, the media would have already put up a countdown clock ticking off how many days things have been held up.

    I don’t usually give advice to Dems, but maybe that’s something they should consider doing.

  7. 7.

    SiubhanDuinne

    The closed-captioning in that first McCarthy clip is pretty funny, including a reference to the “appropriations bitch.” Sounds about right, Kevin.

  8. 8.

    Jeffro

    The Dems are doing a good job of letting the GOP eat itself alive for all the public to see.  The Post actually had a good piece up yesterday
    House flounders as GOP fails to appease hard-right members on funding
    and the accuracy of that headline, as unfavorable of it is to the GOP, made me do a double-take.  DC reporting NEVER flat out says “The Republicans are inept, craven, RWNJ-appeasers” but there you go!

     

    Oh and in other news, the GOP is ALSO about to rip itself to shreds over their infallible orange god-king’s obvious “flexibility” on abortion.  Oopsie!  trump wants Americans’ votes more than he wants to “save babies”, I guess?  LOL

    Henry Olsen speaketh the truth every now and then…

    Pro-lifers should also be wary of where Trump’s sympathies lie. He said the heartbeat bill that his chief rival for the GOP nomination, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, signed was “a terrible thing, a terrible mistake.” But Florida’s law is exactly what pro-lifers have fought for decades to achieve. In fact, many remain unhappy that such bills implicitly permit abortions in the earliest stages of pregnancy. When someone calls the fulfillment of your dreams “a terrible thing,” perhaps he’s just not that into you.

    Just as disturbing was Trump’s description of how he saw his role. He described himself “almost like a mediator,” which suggests he wants to remain neutral so as to help negotiators on both sides strike a deal. Pro-lifers have longed for a champion, not someone who explicitly says he wants to stand aloof from the fray.

    Trump’s views represent a minority within the GOP. An Economist-YouGov poll from January found that 67 percent of Republicans want abortion to be completely or mostly illegal. That would be impossible under Trump’s policy of finding “the right number of weeks” that would satisfy abortion rights advocates.

    Have at it, GOP!  Let us know how that chrome bumper tastes!!

  9. 9.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Sangh has learned from its past British masters well. Divide and Rule. I don’t think this guy was a particular threat to either India or Modi. This is the first time I heard of him.

    Things are not looking to good for the BJP in the upcoming assembly polls to be held in several states. So they go back to the tried and tested. Divide and Rule. And appeal to patriotism. The sad thing is how many people fall for it.

    Some are even justifying it for Canada’s inaction against the perpetrators of the Kanishka sabotage in the 80s.

  10. 10.

    Jeffro

    @Baud: if a Dem Senator were blocking military appointments the way Tuberville has, the media would have already put up a countdown clock ticking off how many days things have been held up.

    so true.  And it would be the first, last, and possibly only question that Dem Senators would be asked on the Sunday snooze shows*

    *assumes Dems would actually get invited onto said shows, which they don’t

  11. 11.

    Baud

    @Jeffro:

    In the early morning thread, I linked to a couple of CNN pieces that was amazing in their forthrightness.

    It’s like Sadie Hawkins day in the media.

  13. 13.

    Jeffro

    @Jeffro: PS best part

    Pro-lifers must make a hard choice: They must either swallow their true feelings and implicitly allow someone who has declared open opposition to their goals to become the Republican presidential nominee, or they must fight for their values and strenuously oppose him.

    That’s not a choice many will relish, but there is no middle ground

    We know most of them will, er, swallow…but still: anything that fractures the GOP and/or convinces some of them to stay home next November is a very good thing for America.

  14. 14.

    Freemark

    So my MCN (Magazine Conspiracy Nut) brother came up with a doozy. He showed me a supposed tweet from a supposed former Warner Brothers executive that ‘predicted’ Aaron Rodger torn Achilles happening. The executive is part of the MSM run by Jews. The NFL is scripted, this happened in NY, the Jets were playing the Giants the weekend 9/11 happened, this is all linked to the Jews and 9/11.

    The thing is I don’t even think his thoughts are that super unusual. Probably 10-20% of the population, maybe more, thinks this makes sense.

  15. 15.

    Baud

    @schrodingers_cat:

    Things are not looking to good for the BJP in the upcoming assembly polls to be held in several states

     
    That’s interesting, seeing how much good media Modi is getting with the moon landing and the summit.

  19. 19.

    Scout211

    Speaking of minority party with power, the GOP in the Senate and their one Senator who is blocking military promotions is a sad example. I read this last night and still don’t exactly understand it.  The senate rules are so weird.

    Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville and a group of his fellow GOP senators are plotting a new tactic to break the Senate’s gridlock on stalled military nominees: they may force a procedural vote on the Marine Corps commandant nominee, in a breach of Senate protocol.

    Senators huddled behind closed doors in Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s office to discuss taking the unusual step. It is extremely rare for a rank-and-file member to force a procedural vote – that is usually left to the Senate majority leader, due to concerns that normalizing this in the minority could make the already cumbersome Senate even more difficult to manage.

    With the effort, Republican are seeking to shift the blame in the growing feud over Tuberville’s block on Pentagon nominations to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who has refused to put individual nominees on the floor over concerns about the Alabama Republican’s tactics. The Democratic leader has argued that such nominations have long been quickly confirmed in the Senate by voice votes and doing otherwise would set a damaging precedent in the chamber.

    Edited for clarity.

  20. 20.

    narya

    The news about the banyan tree makes me unreasonably happy.

    W/r/t TIFG trying to be “moderate” on abortion? Dude, you’re the one who brags about ramming through the Court that created the Dobbs opinion.

  24. 24.

    Kay

    You keep running lunatics. You’re going to be in this position.”

    That’s what happens with a quality collapse, though. He thinks it’s that they “keep running lunatics” as if there are better quality GOP candidates to pick, and there aren’t. The bench will be more and more lunatics. You can’t make Lauren Boebert into a folk hero in your party without harming the whole organization. You reach a point where it’s impossible to turn it around, to redeem the organization, and they are there.
    They could have, perhaps, stopped running lunatics in 2012 or something, That ship has sailed.

  25. 25.

    Albatrossity

    Yeah, the irony of the GOP ultra-MAGAts turning their dark skills of destruction and obstinance against their own party would be hilarious, if only the rest of us didn’t have to pay for their diapers and baby wipes.

  27. 27.

    BlueGuitarist

    New ads criticizing Republicans in congress

    7 swing districts in

    AZ-6 Ciscomani

    CA-41 Calvert

    MI-10 John James

    OR-5 Chavez-Deremer

    NY-4,17,19 Esposito, Lawler, Molinaro

    Plus, unusual choice:

    NV-2 Mark Amodei

    (possibly aimed at reducing the R margin in the most R part of the state for statewide elections?)

    You can see the ad at:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aesgidGL7FY

  28. 28.

    schrodingers_cat

    @Baud: Upper castes in India are not the majority or even a plurality unlike white people here. I think that’s the difference. Because Modi and BJP’s popularity among those groups is sky high still

    If the comments on a G20 thread in India are anything to go by most Indian American BJers (and their spouses) and their relatives think that Modi is super popular. Because in their bubble he is.

    BTW Vivek Ramaswamy playing fast and loose with facts and upping the demagoguery is what the average RSS-BJP pol sounds like. I am wondering whether he went to the Sangh’s version of Sunday school. He is a TamBram so it is not unlikely.

  29. 29.

    Soprano2

    @Scout211:  Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville and a group of his fellow GOP senators are plotting a new tactic to break the Senate’s gridlock on stalled military nominees

    This is so funny, the tactic that would fix stalled military nominees is for Tuberville to quit holding them up! They can’t vote on 300 of them individually, it takes way too much time. Schumer is right to resist this. What R’s want is to get a few of the highest-level ones confirmed, so they can then say “see no problem”.

  31. 31.

    Soprano2

    @Kay: He thinks it’s that they “keep running lunatics” as if there are better quality GOP candidates to pick, and there aren’t.

    It’s even worse than that. Most of the time now when a “traditional” Republican runs against the now-common lunatic in a primary, the lunatic almost always wins. He’s overlooking that when R voters have a choice, they choose the lunatic. He’s trying to make it sound like these people are being forced on the voters.

  32. 32.

    Jeffro

    @Baud: I just went back and saw those – thanks!

    The media has been so incredibly screwy (ridiculously down on Biden, while ignoring trump’s descent into complete insanity) that straight-up, truthful reporting is shocking.  Which is also shocking, if you know what I mean.  It shouldn’t be a surprise but it is.

    Also: Def Leppard rocks and I’m going to go play Hysteria now.

  33. 33.

    Another Scott

    @Scout211: The senate only gets things done by doing “unanimous consent” to ignore the rules.  Otherwise, everything takes forever and legislation grinds to a halt.

    The normal way to do these military promotions is to do them in large batches.  There are 300 or so people who need senate confirmation to be promoted.  Doing them individually would take years.  Potatotown wanting to do one guy individually won’t solve the problem, and will actually make things worse (“we did that one guy, we should do this next guy because he’s just important”).  It’s a stunt.

    My understanding, anyway.

    It’ll be interesting to see Schumer’s counter.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  34. 34.

    Soprano2

    @Baud: They could also “break protocol” by saying one senator can’t hold up all those nominations. Notice they aren’t doing that. I think quite a few of them agree with what Tuberville is doing.

  36. 36.

    Baud

    Dear Google, if you want to own the tech industry, get your AI to solve to the their/there/they’re problem when using your phone keyboard.

    Throw in an in/on fix and I’ll even send you some dough.

  38. 38.

    Jeffro

    @Scout211: I think they (the GOP) wants that Marine commandant vacancy off the table while blocking all other nominees.  They know it’s an extremely bad look (that one post in particular)

    ETA or what Soprano said at #29 and Baud said at #30 and I’m just going to slow down and read more.   =)

  39. 39.

    Geminid

    Rep. Mike Garcia, mentioned in the post by veteran Capitol Hill correspondent Jamie Dupree, represents the 27th California CD. Although it was renumbered in the recent California redistricting,the 27th is basically tve district that Katie Hill flipped in 2018. Garcia, a Navy veteran and Annopolis graduate, won the special election to succeed Hill.

    Garcia won reelection in 2020 by less than 400 votes, and won again last year by a few percentage points. Like other purple district Republicans, Garcia stands to lose his seat because of the Freedom Caucus’s antics, but it doesn’t seem he can do much about it except complain.

  41. 41.

    Kay

    NH House Dems win another special election, creep closer to 50-50 split

    Former Nottingham town and school board member Hal Rafter said he favors abortion rights, environmental protection and support for public education and teachers.

    Political media keep telling me everyone hates public schools and their number one issue is stopping “wokeness” and if Yale law students are sufficiently deferential to Right wing federal judges, but I have to tell you, I’m not seeing it.

    I wonder if they’re out of touch with the common man?

  45. 45.

    Soprano2

    @Baud: I just heard on NPR that the House Judiciary is “preparing tough questions for Merrick Garland”, and I said to the radio “No they’re not, they’re going to beclown themselves by pounding on him about why Hunter Biden hasn’t been charged with all the imaginary crimes they’ve convinced themselves he committed. Why can’t you say that?” Ggggrrrr……

  47. 47.

    SiubhanDuinne

    Speaker McCarthy: “It’s hard to pass anything in this place. We started out in a five-seat majority. I got one member who’s now resigned, we’ve got a couple of members who are out as well. Anything we do is pretty tough”

    This is heartbreaking. The poor guy.

  48. 48.

    Geminid

    @Geminid: Jaime Dupree has been reporting from Capitol Hill since at least the 1990s, and was a fixture in Atlanta Jounal-Constitution and on radio station WSB. I kknewhim from his regular appearances on the Neil Bortz show, where he delivered the straight political scoop to the sceptical but respectful Boortz.

    More recently, Dupree came down with a rare neurological disorder that left him unable to speak but otherwise physically and mentally intact.

  54. 54.

    Princess

    @schrodingers_cat: From personal experience I can say that Canada was not completely inactive. I was working in a bank in the 80s and we were ordered to track donations and donors to certain Sikh groups. I remember photocopying dozens of cheques for 2 and 5 dollars. Probably a rcmp or csis request. So someone was looking for something, whether or not that info was useful or ever used.

  55. 55.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @Soprano2: I think they just selfishly want to preserve the ability to tie everything up for themselves. Because when they do it, it’s OK.

  58. 58.

    Anne Laurie

    @Kay: New Hampshire brags about having no state income tax.  Which means — as too many fools only discover after moving there — is that local schools have traditionally been supported almost entirely by local property taxes.  In the Granite State context, ‘I support public schools’ means ‘There’s only so much can be done by holding bake sales’.

    New Hampshire isn’t *quite* as snow-White as Vermont, and it has more noisy malcontents & ‘libertarians’.  Even the transplants are beginning to figure out that the top 10% is able to provide ‘outside funding’ that ensures *their* kids get into good colleges, while the bottom 90%… cannot.

  61. 61.

    Another Scott

    Dan Gillmor
    @[email protected]

    Don’t be fooled by the Republicans’ intra-party “fighting” over the government shutdown. They’re essentially all in on this.

    Their goal(s)? Occam’s Razor says:

    1) Trigger a recession that — because Big Journalism will publish whatever the Republicans claim, however untrue — will be blamed on Democrats since they hold the White House.

    2) Panic the Democrats (again with journalism’s help) to give into massive cuts in programs that, you know, help people.

    Yup.

    They’re cheering on OPEC+ to keep trying to cut world oil production, also too, because they know presidential popularity inversely tracks gas prices.

    Grr…,
    Scott.

  63. 63.

    narya

    @Kay: I wonder if they’re out of touch with the common man?

    Or, at least as likely, out of touch with the common woman. :-)

    The powers that be think we’ve forgotten Dobbs. We have not. Also, my guess is that there are plenty of normies who’ve served on a PTA or something who have had to deal with the cranks; that might be enough in some places to get folks to make it a point to vote.

  64. 64.

    Ken

    McConnell sounds unusually honest. I wonder if his recent “incidents” were the kind that cause a personality change?

  65. 65.

    WaterGirl

    I had to google the guy from the last tweet up top.  A republican who barely won his seat over an incumbent democrat.

    I think this must be an attempt to try to keep his seat in the next election.

  66. 66.

    ...now I try to be amused

    Ignorant question: What’s stopping Schumer from calling a vote on all the promotions as a package?

  67. 67.

    Kay

    @Anne Laurie:

    It’s great he ran on two issues – public schools and environmental regs- that only really “work” with liberal approaches and won. Those two issues are the bane of libertarians.

  69. 69.

    Kay

    @narya:

    Right. I put “public schools” and “environmental regs” in the mommy party category too (along with womens autonomy and agency) although maybe not fair of me with environmental regs. My husband votes on environmental issues.

  71. 71.

    Jeffro

    @Daoud bin Daoud: I’m really interested to see what happens when (if?) DeSantis and others take trump to task for wanting to ‘cut a deal’ over abortion restrictions.

    I guess what I mean more specifically is this presumed sequence of events:

    DeSantis/others go after trump for being a squish on abortion restrictions.
    trump fires back publicly, pointing out that he nominated the 3 SCOTUS judges who put the RWNJs well over the top and overturned Roe (he kinda already has?  Biden is already running ads about this)
    trump also notes publicly (he kinda already has?) that this is a losing position for the GOP in the general election
    ???  Do the Dems make hay of this hypocrisy?  I sure hope so.

  73. 73.

    narya

    @Kay: Yeah, I think there’s a non-trivial number of men who are agreeing with us wimminfolk. The polling shows a heavy rightward lean among white men, but it’s not total by any means, and I think there are people who can be pulled out of their chairs and off the sidelines to vote for Dems. (My Friend is exhibit #1: he rails about only having two parties, and not wanting ANY party to be in charge of everything, blah blah blah–but he also recognizes that the Rs are batshit crazy at this point, and he now votes. He stopped after Iran-Contra, out of disgust, but I bother him relentlessly and make Friend watch Chris Hayes on Fridays when Friend is here.) The issues may vary a bit, but I don’t care what the issue is that motivates them–get out and vote, damnit. Unless they’re an R, in which case, go ahead and stay home.

  74. 74.

    H.E.Wolf

    @narya: The powers that be think we’ve forgotten Dobbs. We have not. Also, my guess is that there are plenty of normies who’ve served on a PTA or something who have had to deal with the cranks; that might be enough in some places to get folks to make it a point to vote.

     

    A lot of local/state elections since Dobbs are being decided by the candidates’ position on reproductive freedom… and it’s not looking good for the forced-birth candidates.

    Another recent example (hat tip to JR in this morning’s dawn thread). @JR: “Dems won a special election in PA last night.​”

    Per the article linked below, the newly elected state rep is a young, pro-choice, progressive Black woman. Her opponent is Trumpist, anti-vaxx, and supported by anti-choicers.

    https://www.wesa.fm/politics-government/2023-09-19/democrats-retain-narrow-control-of-pa-house-after-lindsay-powell-wins-special-election-in-district-21#

    “[Lindsay] Powell is a former Congressional staffer who also served as an aide to former Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto. More recently, she’s served as the director of workforce strategy for the nonprofit InnovatePGH. She campaigned on a pledge to continue the work of the district’s former representative, progressive three-term Democrat Sara Innamorato.”

    Also, Lindsay Powell exemplifies the many strong young politicians rising through the Democratic ranks.

  75. 75.

    jlowe

    I work for an engineering firm that is a primary federal contractor, both DoD and non-DoD (in other words, NASA, EPA, DOE, BLM [Bureau of Land Management], FERC, etc.) We haven’t seen announcements yet about RIFs, delays in issuing contracts, stop-work orders or the other things that go along with a Federal government shutdown. So, not real yet despite all of the performative GOP crap. Will continue to monitor.

  76. 76.

    Frankensteinbeck

    It’d Be A Sitcom

    They are sitcom people who live in and believe in a world of sitcom tropes, like where husbands resent their wives and children, anyone without a job is a moocher, and everyone is always looking to make a cruel joke at any sign of weakness they can find.

    @narya:

    The powers that be think we’ve forgotten Dobbs.

    I am not a woman, but I feel like for damn near every woman under 40* the Dobbs decision is one that is constantly in your face and cannot be forgotten.  It is too life-affecting.

    *I am being conservative with the number because Reproduction Is Weird, although maybe the 40+ to menopause range cares even more because pregnancy gets more dangerous again.

  77. 77.

    H.E.Wolf

    @…now I try to be amused:What’s stopping Schumer from calling a vote on all the promotions as a package?​

     

    Good explanation here:
    https://electoral-vote.com/#item-3

    Electoral-Vote.com is an excellent resource in general – the final section of their blog post today talks about their overall perspective:
    “Broadly speaking, we don’t engage in advocacy when we write this site. It’s not our place to tell readers who to vote for or what to believe about tax policy or whatever. However, E-V.com was originally created to encourage people (especially people abroad) to vote. So, the one thing we will advocate openly for is democracy.”

  78. 78.

    Geminid

    @Anne Laurie: Speaking of New Hampshire, former Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown hosted a “No BS Barbecue” near the town of Rye last weekend. Brown and his wife have hosted these events on and off since 2016, taking a break while Brown served as Ambassador to New Zealand.

    Brown usually invites a potential Republican Presidential candidate to speak at his barbecue, but this time Robert Kennedy Jr. was the featured guest.

  80. 80.

    Kay

    @H.E.Wolf:

    PA is great but the NH seat is a Trump district (2016 and 2020) and the D won by 12 so IMO it’s better news. They shouldn’t be losing Trump 2020 districts.

  81. 81.

    Jeffro

    @Geminid: wow, they REALLY want to keep propping RFK Jr up in the hopes of splitting the Ds, don’t they?

    My goodness.

    Well, may they waste all their time and energy promoting that crackpot for as long as possible.  It’s not gonna work.

  82. 82.

    jonas

    @Geminid:  Brown usually invites a potential Republican Presidential candidate to speak at his barbecue, but this time Robert Kennedy Jr. was the featured guest.

    Oh, FFS!

  84. 84.

    Ken

    @Geminid: Speaking of New Hampshire, former Massachusetts Senator Scott Brown

    Is this a Tuberville/Hawley/Oz situation, or did he actually live in Massachusetts when he was its senator?

  85. 85.

    Geminid

    @Jeffro: New Hampshire is the guy’s best opportunity to make a showing. Joe Biden might not campaign there because the primary will be scheduled out of the order the DNC wants to impose. I think it will be an open primary also, and RFK Jr. hopes to attract Independent and Republican voters.

  86. 86.

    narya

    @Frankensteinbeck: I think older women, like me, are every bit as enraged. Sure, it’s not personal in the same way any more, but we have dealt with a lifetime of crap from men who want to metaphorically pat us on the head and grab our genitalia. The rage isn’t coupled with as much fear as it might be for someone whose life could be in danger, but it’s still rage.

  87. 87.

    Anne Laurie

    @Geminid: Brown usually invites a potential Republican Presidential candidate to speak at his barbecue, but this time Robert Kennedy Jr. was the featured guest.

    Well, in the truest sense, RFKJ *is* a Republican candidate — a Republican spoiler, pretending to be a Democrat.

    Scottie ‘Pink Leather Hot Pants’ Brown has a very specialized nose for potential scandal; I think the real meaning behind this invite is that he doesn’t believe any of the not-Trump candidates has a chance against TFG, so why risk pissing off the majority of Brown’s local voters?

    A boutique novelty like RFKj is a better ‘draw’ for his purposes — he’s going nowhere (at least in the Democratic party) but he’s Qrazy enough to draw the lookie-loos.

  88. 88.

    eversor

    @Jeffro:

    I get the joke.  But the dog that catches the car has a worse fate.  I’ve seen it happen twice.  They get the tire and then get sucked up into the wheel well and then ground up good and proper.  While we all feel bad for the dogs let’s hope the GOP get’s a similar fate.

  89. 89.

    BlueGuitarist

    @WaterGirl:

    Lawler will keep trying to hide, but he’s a Republican, he voted for Republican crazies to control the congress, and he votes with Republican crazies most of the time. There’s a contested Democratic primary to challenge him.

    The unusual district on the list above, where League of Conservation Voters, House Majority PAC, and Climate Power are running ads — NV-2 — is where Mercedes Krause challenged incumbent R Mark Amodei. He spent $1.2 million, she spent the $50k that she raised (4k from Balloon-Juice) and got 38% of the vote.

    AZ-6 is a winnable district, Kirsten Engel came close last time while being massively outspent; Ciscomani got about $7 million in outside spending for him or attacking her; she got $250k in outside support.

    That US House District overlaps winnable state senate seat and 2 winnable state house seats (AZ Legislative District 17).

    We supported a super swing district candidate for AZ House there, Dana Allmond, who got 49% of the vote; up ballot: the candidate for AZ Senate got 49%, and Engel got 49%. They lost, but it seems clear that’s a place where additional effort could matter.

  90. 90.

    H.E.Wolf

    @Kay:​PA is great but the NH seat is a Trump district (2016 and 2020) and the D won by 12 so IMO it’s better news.

     I agree with you! Both elections are bellwethers – and the D winning in that NH district is especially good news.

  91. 91.

    cain

    @Baud: I find it vexing that Dems never break protocol and then let themselves get their priorities (and ours by extension) stomped. I get that once you do it’s gonna give the other party a will to do things as well. So much of the Senate is all soft power type of agreements because it is tradition.

    But the GOP doesn’t seem to have any compunction to follow any rules as it has demonstrated over and over again.

  92. 92.

    snoey

    @narya: My mom is 99. She doesn’t like it when people have to talk about abortion on her TV but she gets screaming mad at the idea that anybody other than a woman and her doctor are involved.

  94. 94.

    eversor

    @Frankensteinbeck:

    The SO is in her late 40s and is very much against Dobbs.  Her four sisters though are very much for it as they all still attend church.  The SO left it and hates it.

    Most of that extended family is nieces to me.  All but one hates Dobbs but they also left church.  The one who still attends it is very much for it.  Same logic applies to the husbands and the one nephew.

    I should note they are all Asian.  The voting habbits follow along Dobbs as well.

  95. 95.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @cain: ​

    I find it vexing that Dems never break protocol and then let themselves get their priorities (and ours by extension) stomped.

    In this case, my understanding is that if they break protocol they get stomped an entirely different way. That is exactly why it’s Republicans who are trying to break protocol now. Trying to override Tuberville will grind the Senate completely to a halt.

  96. 96.

    cain

    @Soprano2:

    It’s good to continue to peel away more demographics away from you.

    The GOP will have to do some voter suppression on the troops soon enough.

  97. 97.

    rikyrah

    @Baud:

    Not in the OP, but it occurred to me today that if a Dem Senator were blocking military appointments the way Tuberville has, the media would have already put up a countdown clock ticking off how many days things have been held up.

     

    No Lie.

    They should have been done it.

    Senator Tubby needs to be the star of a Democratic Ad Campaign of how Republicans endanger the American Military

  101. 101.

    eversor

    @snoey:

    I don’t like abortion.  I don’t like surgery, chemo, colonoscopies, or being intubated either.  I’ve had the later four.  This gets in the wind though when talking about abortion for religions reasons.

  102. 102.

    Jackie

    @Baud: I agree with Schumer. It’s frustrating as all hell for our military and their families, but this is a quagmire for McTurtle to deal with and solve.

  104. 104.

    narya

    @Baud: @Jackie: Completely agree. We’ve learned the hard way that if the Dems try to be helpful, suddenly they are either saddled with the inevitable failure or don’t receive credit if the intervention works. Fuck’em.

  111. 111.

    jonas

    @eversor: There really isn’t an argument against abortion pre-viability that isn’t basically religious woo. They got nuthin’ that doesn’t simply involve citing bible verses. I know that shortly after Dobbs Roe was overturned a Jewish group tried to bring a suit against abortion restrictions in at least one state (GA? FL?) on religious grounds because there are rabbinical tractates that require the termination of a pregnancy that is not viable or has become a threat to the mother’s health. No idea where that went/what it’s status is, but it may be a novel approach to challenging these state laws that are also clearly based on nothing more than a selective, (Christian) fundamentalist reading of a couple of bible verses.

  112. 112.

    jonas

    @Geminid: Oh, geez! Don’t threaten the MSM with a good time! They would absolutely fap themselves to death over a “bipartisan ticket” like that.

  117. 117.

    Geminid

    @jonas: That’s why Trump and Susie Wiles might do it. By next summer, internal polling might tell them that Trump will lose unless he can shake up the race somehow. And Trump is a brand conscious guy, and might like the idea of attaching the Kennedy brand to his own.

    I still think it’s a long shot, though.

  118. 118.

    Jackie

    @Geminid: RFK Jr is the true definition of DINO. I truly doubt many Democrats support him. He’s the GQP’s shiny new toy – his poll rankings are 98% padded by them. I wish he had the stones to switch openly to Repug.

  119. 119.

    OzarkHillbilly

    @mrmoshpotato: Poisoning people is a constitutional right. It’s right there in Article…. Uhhhh…. One of them articles, I know it! Constitutional scholar Tucker told me!

  120. 120.

    rikyrah

    @Jeffro:

    That would be impossible under Trump’s policy of finding “the right number of weeks” that would satisfy abortion rights advocates.

     

    ROE WAS THE COMPROMISE.

    There’s no ‘ number of weeks’ that will satisfy the loss of body autonomy.

  123. 123.

    Geminid

    @Ken: I think Brown lived in Massausetts when he was a Senator and moved across the border after Warren beat him in 2012. Probably half his neighbors are former Massholes.

    My friend Debbie grew up in Medford Massachusetts, and 3 of her siblings moved to New Hampshire. They’re all still Democrats.

  125. 125.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @jonas:

    nothing more than a selective, (Christian) fundamentalist reading of a couple of bible verses.

    Pretty wacky and stretched readings, too.  Typical of evangelicals, they ignore the only open references to abortion that paint it as not a big deal, and use a tortured interpretation of a psalm verse to claim biblical definition that human life begins immediately in pregnancy.  They get really weird about the Sabbath, too.  There’s a lot of claiming they went back to the bible but just continuing the Catholic way of doing things.

  126. 126.

    Scout211

    Just for a few laughs at Elon and Donald, jr.’s expense:

    Donald Trump Jr.’s X account was hacked, his spokesman says

    Don’s account has been hacked,” Andrew Surabian posted on X, adding that a post claiming the former president had died was “obviously not true.”

    In addition to falsely pronouncing the death of the senior Trump, the compromised account also claimed that Trump Jr. would be running for president himself. Within minutes, the post had been reshared more than 1,000 times on X and viewed hundreds of thousands of times.

    Another post appeared to threaten the country of North Korea, while a pinned post on the account’s profile insulted President Joe Biden with the use of a racist epithet.

    Roughly a half-hour after the posts surfaced, they had been removed. X did not respond to CNN’s request for comment.

    The incident raises fresh questions about X’s role in securing user accounts, particularly those belonging to high-profile political figures as the platform prepares for the 2024 elections. In August, X said it is staffing up on its safety and election teams following mass layoffs last year that according to owner Elon Musk ultimately eliminated more than 80% of the company’s headcount.

    It is also unclear whether the compromise may have resulted in unauthorized access of Trump Jr.’s private direct messages, or whether Trump Jr. may have had two-factor authentication enabled on his account.

  127. 127.

    Bupalos

    @Baud: yeah as much as I’m always skeptical of any takes doing the “corrupt MSM” thing, that headline is kind of stunning.

    It’s overall a strategy to maintain the “gridlock.” The “gridlock” that is actually just hostage-taking and extortion.

  130. 130.

    Ruckus

    @narya:

    That was when he was IN power. Now he desperately, absolutely wants to get back in power so he won’t lose everything and spend his last days broke and quite possibly in confinement. He’ll likely never, ever admit to what he’s done in his shitty life, those 91 charges, but getting back in the WH would maybe, possibly protect him. I don’t see it but then I’m not facing such a wonderful ending saga to such a useless life.

  132. 132.

    Anyway

    @cain:

    But the GOP doesn’t seem to have any compunction to follow any rules as it has demonstrated over and over again.

    Yes! Speaking of which any lawyer types comment on Alabama’s attempt to defy the SCOTUS ruling regarding congressional district restructuring? of course, IOKIYAR

  133. 133.

    Ruckus

    @Baud:

    Interesting that the GOP response to their breach of protocols is to breach more protocols.

    In for a dime, in for a billion. They are desperate, there are norms in life, especially public, voted into power lives and they are bending/breaking pretty much every one of them. They are desperate. They are doing stunts because that’s all they’ve got left.

  134. 134.

    cain

    @Omnes Omnibus: It must really suck being within the GOP universe where this happens probably constantly – never mind their conferences are almost always filled with drugs, sex, and sex workers.

  135. 135.

    Princess

    The hacking of Don Jr,.’s account is disturbing. If someone hacked the president’s (any president’s account) account it could have awful consequences. I would hope security for government accounts is much higher than for failson idiots but with Musk, can we be sure? Maybe we can, I dunno.

  136. 136.

    Ruckus

    @Kay:

    THIS.

    They are desperate. They have been going deeper and deeper into failure for all of my life, because they want a government and country that no longer exists, if it actually ever did. They want to turn back time, conserve it if you will, to a time that never actually existed. Their ideal doesn’t have a benefit for anyone but very rich people, who because of actual communications among normal(ish) humans, like what we are doing, have properly and reasonably lost a lot of control. They are still rich but they have lost that overwhelming, quiet power, which is what their money used to bring them. They were top dogs, now they are just rich. They used to control lives, now people with and without normal money are no longer allowing that power. Smell that desperation. Doesn’t it smell good?

  137. 137.

    Ruckus

    @Albatrossity:

    Diapers and baby wipes are a lot cheaper than an entire county. 

    Everything has a cost, losing what should be this country, the ideal it was founded upon, would cost everyone far, far more than diapers and baby wipes.

  138. 138.

    Citizen Alan

    @Geminid: He could cut a deal with the democrats and switch. If the district is that closely divided, he could do just as well or better as a conservative Democrat than he does as a Republican. Or he could just whine and bitch while he’s waiting to be turned out in a year.

  141. 141.

    rikyrah

    @narya:

    @Frankensteinbeck: I think older women, like me, are every bit as enraged. Sure, it’s not personal in the same way any more, but we have dealt with a lifetime of crap from men who want to metaphorically pat us on the head and grab our genitalia. The rage isn’t coupled with as much fear as it might be for someone whose life could be in danger, but it’s still rage.

     

    Most of us have younger women in our lives – Dobbs means that they have FEWER RIGHTS THAN I DID.

    WHICH IS ENRAGING.

    Then, when you think about that they also are coming for BIRTH CONTROL….

     

    The RAGE SPIKES BACK UP

  142. 142.

    wjca

    @narya: The polling shows a heavy rightward lean among white men, but it’s not total by any means, and I think there are people who can be pulled out of their chairs and off the sidelines to vote for Dems.

    Speaking personally, this white male does lean conservative.  Which means that for the last couple decades I have pretty much voted a straight Democratic ticket. Because being actually conservative doesn’t require catering to RWNJs!   I suspect I’m not alone. 

    There’s an opportunity here, if Democrats are willing to tweak their rhetoric — denounce reactionaries, crazies, etc., sure; but ease up on trashing “conservatives” per se.  I do realize this may be painful for some progressives.  But there’s something to be said for saving democracy first.  Do that, and then we can go back to fighting over policy.

  148. 148.

    Paul in KY

    @Anyway: My take is that they are saying that Alabama is a conservative/Republican state and that if another congressional district is fixed so a African American (and presumed Democrat) can win, then the House may change majority and that would be disenfranchising to the majority of Alabamans who want Republican leadership.

    Of course, it is only because Alabama is majority GQP-White and has fixed the districts to elect those kinds that they feel they can forward this argument with an apparently straight face.

    I think they are just stalling, stalling, stalling and hoping the Alitogemony on the SC bails them out.

  151. 151.

    RevRick

    @Jeffro: If a Republican Congress passed a bill absolutely banning abortion, Trump would sign it.
    Don’t forget, in 2015, during the debates, Trump promised he was in favor of protecting Social Security and Medicare and would push for tax hikes on the wealthy. Thirty seconds after he took the oath of office, he was fully on board with whatever the GOP Congress wanted.

  154. 154.

    Nora

    @rikyrah: This older woman is INCANDESCENT with rage over Dobbs.  I was at the American Library Association Annual Conference in DC when the decision was announced and you’d better believe many of us older women were protesting outside the Supreme Court that day.  My daughter is of reproductive age and there is no way I am going to stand for her losing her rights without a fight.

  156. 156.

    Bill Arnold

    @Baud:

    Hey, just a couple more and Dems can control the House. So many problems solved.

    George Santos is holding in there, despite Federal indictment.
    Santos misses extended deadline to file financial disclosure, blames fear of a ‘rushed job’ (JAKE OFFENHARTZ, September 13, 2023)

    NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. Rep. George Santos on Wednesday missed another deadline to submit a key financial disclosure report, a months-long delay that the embattled New York Republican blamed on his federal taxes and the desire to avoid a “rushed job.”
    The disclosures, which are filed with the House Committee on Ethics, provide a public snapshot of a representative’s personal finances. They are meant to serve as a bulwark against potential conflicts of interest.

    The GOP will do or forgive almost anything for power.

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