Kay dropped this in the comments of the last post:
Pete Hegseth, President Trump’s pick to run the Pentagon, regularly abused alcohol to the point that he passed out at family gatherings, and once needed to be dragged out of a strip club while in uniform, according to an ex-relative’s account of his behavior that was given to U.S. lawmakers and reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.
The sworn statement, submitted in response to a request from Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the top Democrat on the Senate Armed Services Committee, was signed by Hegseth’s former sister-in-law, Danielle Hegseth. It states that she was with Hegseth when he passed out from drunkenness in the bathroom of a bar in Minneapolis in about 2013. It also describes another night, when she said Hegseth drank so much at a restaurant in Minneapolis that the Uber driver had to pull over on Interstate 94 so he could throw up.
The ex-relative is his former sister-in-law, and wife #2 (Samantha) has issued a denial no-comment statement (probably due to a NDA), but the guy is obviously a scumbag.
Anyway, what are Democrats going to do? Here’s Kate Riga, the DC correspondent for TPM:
The “blockbuster” hearings on Donald Trump’s most unavoidably unfit Cabinet nominees feel completely hollow.
Republicans have no interest in running afoul of Trump (look what happened to Joni Ernst), and Democrats are largely too demoralized and limp to execute a compelling campaign against the nominees.
The crusade against Pete Hegseth petered out into repetitive women in combat gotchas (which he was prepared for) while Republicans complimented him on his musculature. During the hearing last week, everyone seems either elated or resigned that he will likely be confirmed.
[…]This is the trap Democrats keep falling into. They don’t want to come out against a Trump nominee too aggressively, out of fear of alienating Republican fence-sitters. But in the same breath, they’ll tell you that Republicans aren’t actually open to listening to what they say, as they’re determined to pass Trump’s fealty tests. So Democrats land in a place where they can neither mount an aggressive campaign, perhaps at least incurring some cost to the Republicans senators and the Trump administration, nor have any hope of swaying their GOP colleagues to their side.
So we end up where we are on Hegseth. Democrats have all but given up, and Republicans can embrace Trump’s darkest choices without even a chance that they’ll be made to feel uncomfortable about it.
Note that Riga filed that piece after the news Kay mentioned came out. By the way, I think she’s a hard-working, smart reporter, and I listen to her every week on the Josh Marshall podcast, which is free.
Josh Marshall has a follow-up on this that he published this morning. (That should be a gift link but they seem not to work after a few people visit them.) Josh’s prescription for Dems is two-fold. First, for the nominations, attack the Republicans like Collins, Tillis, maybe Ernst and the new Florida Senator Ashley Moody. For the rest of the many shitty things, for one example, Democratic reps should go to the well of the House and start reading off what some of the J6 shitbirds that Trump pardoned did.
I’m getting real flashbacks to the Iraq War discourse with the current crop of mainstream Democrats: scared to oppose what they perceive as a popular juggernaut. Trump not getting a majority of the popular vote means very close to half of the population doesn’t like that asshole. They’ll like him less the more noise that our electeds make about his bad choices.
KatKapCC
Good Lord, get a room, GOP. Preferably a room that doesn’t have dozens of other people in it.
Steve LaBonne
Here’s a fresh gift link to Marshall which hopefully will work. https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/democrats-are-surrounded-by-low-hanging-fruit-get-to-it/sharetoken/a3d0bf90-c61b-41c3-a6c1-0e9aa826775c
John S.
@KatKapCC:
The GOP love their “daddies”. When I was in Tennessee over the holidays, I saw a lot of MAGA swag that said “Daddy Trump”. It’s gross.
Trivia Man
Just like 2 impeachment hearings… even if the conclusion is obviously predetermined, it matters to try. “Keep your powder dry” is meaningless in today’s political climate.
hit hard, hit often, hit the same point repeatedly.
Steve LaBonne
@John S.: Worship of hierarchy is the fundamental conservative value.
Aussie Sheila
Just discovered that the demented felon pardoned a libertarian drug trafficker and possible accomplice to murder-a guy called Ross Ulbricht who operated a dark website called ‘Silk Road’.
This pardon and its ramifications need to be shouted from the rooftops. This is an administration that wants to execute drug traffickers. Very well. Start with this scumbag.
This pardon is much simpler than the Jan6 pardons, even though they are of course execrable.
This guy is a rich drug trafficking, possibly murdering, smartarse. There is nothing or nobody the average normie hates more than this type of scumbag.
Scout211
I am not at all sure that her statement is a denial. It sounded to me like she had an NDA and will not comment.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Clearly Dem Senators didn’t get the memo that to be an opposition party, you need to *oppose*.
Steve LaBonne
@Trivia Man: ESPECIALLY because the outcome is predetermined. There aren’t going to be any defectors so there’s nothing to lose by putting their vulnerable Senators through the wringer. And we complain about leadership, but there’s nothing to prevent rank and file members of both houses from following Marshall’s advice.
@mistermix.bsky.social
As if on cue. Lotta scumbags got pardoned.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@Scout211: Thanks, you’re right, that’s a better way to construe her statement, updated the post.
Suzanne
@KatKapCC: Complimenting Hegseth’s musculature, not homoerotic in the slightest.
Chris
Another common point is that 2024, like 2004 though much more so, was a really narrow electoral victory, which should imply there’s plenty of room for pushback.
Citizen Alan
Just to play Devil’s Advocate, perhaps the Dems calculus is that anyone Shitgibbon nominates for a cabinet position will be utterly awful. So maybe we’re better served by having someone who is utterly awful and who is also likely to be mired in scandal from day one get through than someone who is utterly awful but is capable of acting normal and possibly doing more serious damage. Personally, I am much more worried about the risks of Russian Asset Tulsi Gabbard as DNI just cc’ing Putin on every top secret communique than I am about a habitual drunkard passing out in his office at 10am every day.
zhena gogolia
@Citizen Alan: I’m more worried about Gabbard too.
Baud
@Citizen Alan:
@zhena gogolia:
Three.
Steve LaBonne
@Citizen Alan: Moot because Dems can’t and won’t prevent any of these lowlifes from being confirmed. So they should take Marshall’s advice and hammer vulnerable Republicans for supporting them.
Baud
Baud
Scout211
Senate Democrats block GOP’s ‘born-alive’ abortion bill
Just interjecting a positive into all this negativity re: Senate Dems.
lowtechcyclist
@Steve LaBonne:
Come on!!! I can fully understand why they didn’t think Rubio was worth fighting over. But Hegseth?? Exactly what sort of ‘wringer’ would they have faced back home for vigorously opposing this guy who is a drunkard, and would be totally unqualified for the job even if he were 100% sober?
ISTM that if you’re going to take on only a handful of the waste cases that the First Felon is sending over to the Senate (and there’s normally a good argument for doing this, though this group of nominees is so atrocious that it’s a much weaker argument than usual), this guy has to be one of that handful.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Citizen Alan: I agree that any Trump nominee for any position is likely to be awful. The Democrats have no power, though, to control who will finally get any given post. I agree with Josh Marshall, go all out in opposition.
[ETA I see @Steve LaBonne beat me to it.]
ColoradoGuy
Tulsi and RFK Jr are the truly dangerous ones. Tulsi is straight-up KGB/FSB seeking the destruction of the country, and RFK Jr is determined to drag the country into the Middle Ages. Both are also fairly young and are hard-core fanatics that live in Q-Anon World.
Hegseth is “merely” an incompetent drunk misogynist, pretty average by Republican standards. Kind of equivalent to GWB’s pick for FEMA … grossly incompetent, but not actively seeking the destruction of the nation. Tulsi and RFK Jr are.
Chief Oshkosh
I don’t follow the argument. Sure Gabbard may be a much worse threat, but how does NOT opposing Hegseth put Democrats in a better position to oppose Gabbard? I think the reverse it true. There’s actually some chance of stopping the Hegseth nomination (well, there WAS until Dems apparently went all 2004 on it), which would put blood in the water and show that Trump can be denied.
Now, by apparently rolling over, the Dems have made it even harder to oppose Gabbard’s nomination.
Jay
Day 1: Nazi salutes
Day 2: Threatening a bishop with deportation
Pace yourself lads, you’ve got four years. At this rate you’ll be on ‘drop-kicking infants into a volcano’ by Easter. – Nick Pettigrew
Baud
@ColoradoGuy:
RFK isn’t young. He’s like 70.
Baud
@Chief Oshkosh:
How have they rolled over? Are any Dems voting for Hegseth?
ETA: To answer your question, when people complain about everything, they tend to get tuned out. In the end, of course, it’s up to Republicans.
Steve LaBonne
@lowtechcyclist: Putting vulnerable REPUBLICANS through the wringer for supporting these turds.
Mr. Bemused Senior
It worked fine for Mitch McConnell.
I say, flame on.
Josh Marshall’s other point is that political power is unitary. Any defeat weakens Trump.
lowtechcyclist
@Baud:
Excellent!!!!
Speaking of which, there’s this WaPo piece about the mass pardon:
The GOP’s stunning response to Trump pardoning those who assaulted police
The ‘stunning’ part, per the writer, was the absence of much objection to the pardons. My comment was that they’d misspelled ‘unsurprising.’
Baud
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
Ok. I’m not offering advice. I’m explaining why someone would choose a different approach other than “we can’t possibly succeed.”
lowtechcyclist
@Steve LaBonne:
Oops, sorry.
Jay
@ColoradoGuy:
Nope, just the destruction of the DOD, US Army, US Navy, US Air Force, US Space Farce, and is all in on the US Military killing Americans in Blue Cities, aiding mass deportations and “administering” concentration camps.
@mistermix.bsky.social
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
Thanks for mentioning that. It’s a good point and I didn’t put it in my summary.
Baud
Gretchen
Josh Marshall is also having Iraq war flashbacks. He said that at that time they had decided they wanted to invade but then they had to decide which dubious reason they wanted to give
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Baud: fair enough. I am offering advice but no one ever listens to me 😁
Baud
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
Same. That’s why I stopped offering advice.
Hildebrand
Let me ask this – in this media climate, will Democrats get any kind of positive bump from going ballistic? What’s the return on that investment?
It shows they fight? And? I mean sure, it’s satisfying, but what happens next?
comrade scotts agenda of rage
As a former intel officer, I’ve said this repeatedly: Gabbard is a massive national security risk.
Okay, so is the Orange Fart Cloud so if I think about it more carefully, it’s not as if Gabbard’s any *more* of a national security risk than he it.
But at least the Senate theoretically has a say in whether or not to approve that particular national security risk. Opposing her nomination strenuously would allow Dems to constantly call out their (R) “colleagues” as the hypocritical, lying sacks of shit that they are when it comes to national security. Pound that home constantly when she’s there.
Dems gotta play the long game here and they almost never do.
zhena gogolia
I’m tired of hearing how horrible Democrats are.
Professor Bigfoot
@Baud: “Any unsolicited advice is criticism.”
So I’ve just gone to offering criticisms and eliminating the middleman.
Steve LaBonne
@Hildebrand: You don’t think it’s worthwhile to soften up Republicans in vulnerable seats to possibly make it a bit easier to knock them off in their next election? Sure that’s a long shot, but what’s the downside?
Baud
@zhena gogolia:
I don’t think the internet is going to furnish different content for you.
Professor Bigfoot
@zhena gogolia: Democrats have been called incompetent ever since Black people developed political power there.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Steve LaBonne
@zhena gogolia: Marshall never does that. But sometimes he points out where opportunities are being missed.
Hildebrand
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: What will pounding the Republicans do? It’s not like shame works. They will still vote to install these incompetent security risks.
I think we need a better plan than just trying to win the vibes war.
Steve LaBonne
@comrade scotts agenda of rage: Gabbard will understand the intelligence she sees and which of our adversaries might like to have a look at it. Asshole is too dim to be any good at that.
KatKapCC
@Citizen Alan: You really don’t think it’s a problem if the person running the Pentagon is absent from the job and doesn’t do what the job requires?
Old School
@zhena gogolia:
But they’ve asked about Hegseth’s drinking, potential use of the military against Americans, invading Greenland or Panama, etc. the wrong way!
Hildebrand
@Steve LaBonne: When has it worked recently? Sure, we can pick off the random loon, but going after the headaches like Collins, or the real shitheads like Cruz? It doesn’t move the bloody needle at all.
I’m not trying to be such a wet blanket, but our opposition has to be more than just feeling good that we opposed something.
Chief Oshkosh
@Baud: I based my comments on what’s being presented in this thread (hence my multiple uses of “apparently”). Too many things on my plate today to read further. If the Senate Dems haven’t given up (contrary to what’s been stated in the thread), then GREAT NEWS! :)
Second, I agree that when people complain all the time, they may get tuned out. That doesn’t apply here. It is actually the job of the Senate Dems to oppose bad nominees. Every Trump appointee so far is a horror story (I don’t even give them Li’l Marco) and should be opposed vigorously. To do otherwise doesn’t serve anyone except the MAGAs.
Miss Bianca
@Jay: well before Easter for infants into volcanoes, I would imagine. The crucifixions, on the other hand…well, that would be a perfectly seasonal sort of amusement, wouldn’t it?
Baud
@Chief Oshkosh:
Yeah, I have no idea. The Iraq comparison seems stupid unless a bunch of Dems are going to cross over on Hegseth. Right now. I can only see Fetterman doing it.
Jay
@KatKapCC:
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Hildebrand:
I agree with that. Whenever somebody starts blathering about “vibes”, it’s another eye-rolling moment highlighting the unseriousness of such utterances.
But, long-term messaging means pounding, pounding, pounding for decades. So many (R) examples of that:
Gubmint = bad (sadly shared by a lot of Yglesias types on the “left”)
Republicans = Strong on National Security
Sure, it’s taken decades for just those two knee-jerk associations to take hold but the distinction is that they have been pounding crap like that forever and it’s a baked-in perception, accurate or not.
This is *a* chance to start pounding back in a similar manner, particularly at an area they’ve always considered their strength. Pound now, pound tomorrow, pound every day from here to when the asteroid hits or we burn ourselves up.
The klowns are there to pound-it’s not about shaming (R)s into doing anything, it’s about how we might, in a decade, change the basic narrative on this subject.
Steve LaBonne
@Hildebrand: I can only suggest that you read Marshall’s piece.
Kay
@@mistermix.bsky.social:
Knew it! 700 of them, mm. A lot of them will reoffend.
VincentN
@Hildebrand: Maybe pounding the Republicans won’t have immediate benefits but it’s also important to rally Democratic supporters especially if you want them to come out and vote in the future.
This attitude of ”We didn’t even try because the outcome was preordained” is unlikely to impress the base.
Princess
@John S.: MAGAts real daddies didn’t love them either.
Hildebrand
@VincentN: And if that is the true value – great, let’s just be honest about it.
Mr. Bemused Senior
I fear for Stewart Rhodes’ family.
Kay
@@mistermix.bsky.social:
All the tech billionaires endorsed this lawlessness yesterday. They’ll live to regret that photo of them standing behind Trump.
Kay
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
Yeah, they’re violent offenders and now they’re emboldened. Bad people.
I just can’t get over how fucking dumb it was for US CEOs to endorse this. None of them worry at all about reputation or credibility, I guess. We all have low standards now.
laura
Because this administration is founded on misogyny and christian white male supremacy, attacking the nominees over their sex pestery, marathon boozing and steadfastness against sharing power with the non-white and non-male seems like a waste of time to me when that absolute unfitness for the position is just hanging low here. Senator Duckworth used her time fairly well in asking about the nuts and bolts of the role of Sec Def and thirsty pete was caught absolutely flat footed. Same with inquiring about past public statements. These are chumps and know nothing’s. They deserve withering and humiliating questioning, not righteous high dudgeon. Pointing, laughing and ridiculing these unqualified job seekers is my personal preference, but I’m just an old and my opinions are rarely valued.
scav
@Kay: All the violence will merely be evidence of the regained masculinity of ‘merkan culture and thus fêted. Plus, it makes journalists job easier and more dramatic, cultural win-win!
Princess
@zhena gogolia: It feels especially strange to have people complaining Dems aren’t fighting against Hegseth right after Reed got this damning statement from his ex SiL. Isn’t that fighting? That’s fighting; that’s literally what you do.
Geminid
@Steve LaBonne: What is so important about hammering Tom Tillis in the 36 or 48 hours before he actually votes on this nomination? Democrats will have well over 600 days to hammer him between that vote and next year’s election.
This isn’t about dirtying up Tillis; it’s about dirtying up Senate Democrats.
hrprogressive
Democrats really living up to that Controlled Opposition charge.
It’s a big club, and we ain’t in it.
Princess
@laura: Duckworth did a great job and I agree on the morals stuff. It’s like trying to persuade people that Musk did a Nazi salute instead of focusing on how Trump let violent criminals out of jail to roam our streets.
Professor Bigfoot
@Princess: BUT ARE THEY DOING IT RIGHT?
Of course not.
bjacques
@Baud: The Laken Riley Act. Democrats stampeded into voting for a shitty law that will haunt them re-election or–God forbid–a Presidential run, as with the 2002 Iraq vote.
sab
Ohioan here.
Moreno has been elected to a six year term. Trump has a four year term. Bernie can vote No for the drunk for Defense ( forget the rape. They are Republicans. The pass-out drunk alone should be disqualifying.)
Two years later no one will even remember.
We need to let our new Senator know that we are watching how he votes.
Lily
I read that as part of the divorce agreement there was a statement from Samantha (W#2) that there was no physical abuse. Now why would that be required … //
taumaturgo
@Kay:
Sincerely doubt it.
“Behind every great fortune, there is a perfect crime” Honoré de Balzac
sixthdoctor
Senate failed to advance Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, vote 52-47, no Dems voted for it, Sen. Hagerty (Tenn.) did not vote.
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5100557-senate-abortion-bill-born-alive/
Kay
There’s a good book about Russ Ulbricht. American Kingpin.
His parents raised him as a special snow flake exempt from laws and rules ordinary people follow. Exempt from any contribution too – they were far Right and anti- tax. No taxes for the Ulbrichts. They free ride and you pay their way. They’re just that special.
His parents had a place in Costa Rica they had set up as a compound to run to if they were ever prosecuted. Sadly, Lil Russ did not make it there in time and was picked up in San Francisco.
So, in summary, another arrogant tech bro asshole.
Kay
@taumaturgo:
The reason we stay engaged is we don’t know what will happen. If we knew the ending we would stop watching :)
prostratedragon
Another gift link to the TPM article.
Jay
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cj029138n4zo
Alce _e_ardillo
@Steve LaBonne:
@Steve LaBonne: I think that Schumer and Pelosi are more afraid of alienating their donors than the Republicans.
Old School
A lot of people are going to be standing around.
kindness
Unless Democrats convince 4 Republican Senators to vote against any of Trump’s drooling abominations, they will all be seated to the positions they were offered. I don’t know why it’s so important to some to blame Democrats for Republicans being scumbags, but that certainly is how too many folk roll. I mean Susan fucking Collins is voting for them all. Oh Maine, how you let me down again with that succubus.
Jay
I get my news and opinions from reliable sources,
https://www.wonkette.com/p/is-pete-hegseths-nomination-in-danger
rikyrah
@Aussie Sheila:
I read the story about him. Just a phucking nightmare. All the way around.
sab
@sixthdoctor:Is that the “torture infants who were going to die anyway so that they die more painfully later while also in the public eye act”?
Asking for a friend.
rikyrah
@@mistermix.bsky.social:
He could have commuted their sentences. He didn’t. He PARDONED them.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
@Old School:
We call that:
Milling About Smartly.
Baud
@bjacques:
But that’s not what we’re talking about here.
sab
@rikyrah: Biden’s people researched their pardons.
Trump’s people just ticked off a checklist. Bad hire borderline performers. There is a reason they are available to work for Trump and it is not just loyalty. They weren’t employable elsewhere.
satby
Proud of this guy from my ancestral homeland calling out the EU’s need to oppose the new US regime: Aodhán Ó Ríordáin speaks for all of us.
Another Scott
There were some comments earlier today about the federal hiring freeze. As usual with Donnie, there seem to be pretty big exceptions:
Hang in there, everyone.
Best wishes,
Scott.
Trivia Man
@Steve LaBonne: Many years ago i ran for congress as a nuisance candidate.**.
I hoped to put him on the record officially as FOR and AGAINST as many things as possible. But it was as pre-social media (I had a Usenet presence and a website but it was closer to cave paintings than todays media world). Not much traction but i tried.
**Spent less than $10k total, 80k+ votes, >25% share. And a lifetime core memory.
Bill Arnold
Digby has a piece about Russ Vought with a bunch of confirmation hearing video clips of questioning from Democratic Senators. I expect that major media will ignore this. Some edgy questioning.
The Most Dangerous Man In The Cabinet (digby on January 22, 2025)
Trivia Man
@Baud: I have seen 20+ subreddits announce the same ban
zhena gogolia
@Princess: Yes. Doesn’t seem to impress anyone.
Lily
It took decades (once attempts began) to protect members of the military from retaliation, forced retraction and discharge if they tried to report rape, sexual violence or harassment. Voting for Hegseth is voting to endanger LGBTQ members and straight women, and everyone whose safety and morale depends on their performance.
Baud
@Trivia Man:
Now they’ll have to link to Blue sky when talking about how feckless Dems are.
Trivia Man
“There’s a lesson, son. ‘Can’t win, why try?’”
-homer j simpson
sixthdoctor
@sab: That’s the one.
rikyrah
@Baud:
They will rue the day.
Miki
No blame to the 2nd ex – they have kids together, FFS. She owes no one an explanation or defense.
Heggers is incompetent for the position beyond his being a crap-ass partner. He’s a bundle of misogynistic dried-out santorum. That should be obvious to anyone with a half a brain.
Move the fuck on, please.
Kay
@Lily:
Democrats hit that issue very hard, from what I saw. They spent a lot of time on what it would mean for women in the military to have a rapist confirmed.
No one cared. So, message sent and received. No one outside 5 or 6 Democrats care about women in the military. I think they should get out if they can – this is permission to assault them.
But Democrats did try.
Kay
@Lily: p
Rape is fashionable now. No more of that “political correctness” with reporting sexual assault.
Did you not see America’s douchiest CEOs endorsing it, standing behind Donald Trump?
Baud
@Kay:
The story is why we are where we are, I three words.
Citizen Alan
@Baud: In a just world, Covid will do him in by the end of the year.
Citizen Alan
@KatKapCC: Compared to someone who will show up for work bright and early and spend the whole day working on behalf of our nation’s enemies? Hell yeah
JoyceH
In one of the “come collect the drunk” expeditions in the affidavit, Hegseth was hauled away shouting “No means yes.” Sexual assault is going to skyrocket in the military.
My take is to oppose Hegseth as long and loud as possible because the longer it takes to really dig in your heels, the harder it becomes to do. Along comes RFK jr and the thought is “ well, why not confirm this guy? You confirmed that other incompetent.”
Wondering how soon Trump will pardon the guy who hammered Paul Pelosi and broke his skull, and the nut bar who mailed all those pipe bombs to Dem politicians and media outlets?
Melancholy Jaques
That, more than anything, is what led to the Howard Dean movement.
Lily
In my opinion a major goal and motivation of this admin. is to get rid of the laws and policies that punish sexual harassment and violence in the workplace and on campus. (And on sports teams of course.) They’re angry that it’s even considered an issue for jobs, appointments, hearings. They’re insulted to even be asked to respond (Kav, CTh) to these attacks on their “masculinity” and (as RK Jr put it) “rambunctious youth.” T ’16 ran on ‘boys will be boys.’
I suspect this is partly behind the claim that corporate culture has been de-masculinized. How can they say that when the vast majority of CEOs are men? Because (it’s said) men are ‘afraid’ they’ll be fired for being sexually aggressive aka masculine by nature.
(eta Obv I’m talking about the T-supporting white men who want to use the admin to destroy. Not the decent ppl of this blog.)
sab
@Kay: My city turned out to be sort of a rape capital when DeWine in his last job (Atty General) pushed to have rape kits tested.
Everyone knew we wouldn’t prosecute.
I knew from talking to female friends that we were very rapey. I did not know we were well above average.
We had many, many rapes but only one rape investigator, an aging female cop slated for retirement.
That is how important rape was to our cops, our busy shooting black traffic offenders cops.
Protecting our community. Of course they were, ///
My husband, being an elderly inner city parochiol school graduate, knows lots of cops. They are not happy.
The current cops aren’t the same as the old cops. Bad training. Bad attitude. Bad people. Scary people. Not our friends.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@Lily: Me Too freaked these men out. They’ve been trying since to shove the genie back in the bottle. We have to make sure they fail for the sake of all the younger women who don’t know how bad it was for the older generations. I’m Gen X. I remember when sexual harassment laws were passed and were relentlessly mocked by men my age and older, along with the kind of ‘pick-me’ women who’d learned to flirt to get their way in the workplace. It was gross. It feels like Trump and all really are trying to set the clock back as far as possible. I hope they fail and fall so flat on their faces they wreck the GOP brand for a generation.
Matt McIrvin
@Hildebrand: It’s a long game. Expect nothing to happen now. Eventually, things go to shit because reality gets a vote and *then* you want to have been on the side of the angels. See Iraq
One thing I will say for the right, not an imbecile like Trump but the hardcore movement types, they can play a 50, 75-year long game without blinking.
sab
@sab: When the whole Jayland Walker thing blew up I was outraged but I felt sorry for our police chief. Your guys fucked up.
Not anymore. He was fine with us being Ohio’s rape capital. Also with us being Ohio’s capital of cops murdering black motorists.
Gloria DryGarden
@Matt McIrvin: I’m reading about that long game the right has been playing, in “The Maga Diaries.”
comrade scott,
who might form an effective Democratic cohort for planning out a long game? Is there nothing of this sort going on? Do you think it’s because of all the dem in -fighting? Or because we don’t tend to play dirty the way we see from the right?
Baud
Matt McIrvin
@Baud: going after Dems for NOT opposing Trump is one thing, but this kind of theater criticism makes me eyeroll.
Sally
@@mistermix.bsky.social: trump doing what he did in Afghanistan, releasing hundreds of violent criminals. Who then went on to attack Americans. These J6 violent criminals will do the same.
Harrison Wesley
@Baud: Wonder how Tampa Bay will feel about being owned by genuine pirates.
Harrison Wesley
@Jay: Not one mention of air defense against Jewish space lasers. And libtards try to say that Newsom is doing his job. Hah!
pajaro
@Melancholy Jaques:
This isn’t the Iraq war vote, where Senators supported the President. This is a nomination that all Democrats will oppose. I don’t know whether you are deliberately ignoring the difference, or that the tenor of the linked articles doesn’t make clear that its the intensity of the criticism, rather than the fact of it, that’s being discussed.
pajaro
@Alce _e_ardillo:
I have no idea why you would believe that it would alienate democratic donors for Schumer to oppose nominees like Hedgseth. Do you have a shred of support for your speculation?
Allen Henderson
FWIW, I emailed my Sen and Rep with this while blatantly stealing content from at least two blogs (you’re one of them! Lucky you!):
With Trump’s election, I’m writing to ask you to be the opposition party member we need. I realize that many oppositional acts may seem pointless, in that upcoming battles are destined to be lost. However, we need you to extract maximum political costs to Trump and MAGA Republicans for current and future policy atrocities.
When I read this from TPM (https://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/democrats-are-surrounded-by-low-hanging-fruit-get-to-it/) it struck me as *exactly* the correct approach. Shortly afterwards, I received a fundraising request from the DNC. I responded with strong language, because the Democratic party – my team – too often abdicates its responsibility to make bad Republican policies expensive. There aren’t “two sides” to criminality, lawbreaking or open fascism. So here is my request: make their harm explicit. Making harming others, and breaking the law, cost them something. Trump did XYZ objectively terrible thing, and here’s who will suffer as a result. He released violent criminals onto the streets. He supports people who shoot cops. He lied to his voters. Fracture the MAGA power base by direct, honest appeals. You have all the content you need to do this accurately.
I need you, my senator, to be completely fearless and uncompromising right now. We *all* need that of you. These are dangerous times. We voters gave you a powerful voice and position. Use it, but just as importantly, do whatever it takes to get your peers to use theirs as well. Call out tepid counterattacks. Support brave speech. Oppose.
As Truman said, “Given the choice between a Republican and someone who acts like a Republican, people will vote for the real Republican all the time.” Show your voters (I’m one of them!) that you are different. In public. In clear, simple language. Every day.
Yours in opposition,
etc
Enhanced Voting Techniques
What part of “rape is a felony, incompetence isn’t” do you not understand, Mark?
Matt
Alternative theory: they’d rather lose limply over and over than EVER admit that the people pushing them to try harder were correct.