While gathering kettle corn and assembling beer bingo supplies for the Comey Show, let’s keep in mind that the spectacle means jack and shit, aside from its entertainment value. Trump essentially confessed to Lester Holt that he shit-canned Comey because of the RussiaGate investigation. At least one Republican operative has admitted he used information from Russian hackers to tailor campaign outreach to win a tight House race — and said he’d do it again.
On the strength of what are acknowledged facts right now, Republicans in congress who wanted to act in the interests of the American people rather than their donors could work with Democrats to rid us of the manifestly incompetent and embarrassing buffoon in the Oval Office. They could work with Democrats to get to the bottom of Putin’s meddling in our election and force the resignation of anyone who benefited from collusion with a hostile foreign power (looking at you, Brian Mast [R-FL]). But they aren’t, and they won’t.
Valued commenter Ruemara eloquently described this reality in a thread yesterday:
Let’s get honest. There isn’t a damned thing that would get the GOP to impeach this American fascist regime. They could (and are) very much implicated in colluding with a foreign power, they’ve already been shown to be undermining fair & free elections in America and every newspaper could have bombshell testimony that Trump gave the nuclear codes, and the NSA wifi password to Russia and Saudi Arabia and all the GOP would do is justify it. Not to mention that fuckheaded base of craven peasants that are key.
They are going to crack down on voting in the black, latino and young communities. Meanwhile, Dems and progressives are still humping Wilmer’s leg. We need your help to get us our votes. There is no savior coming out of these hearings. We need to know, but the work is not about knowing this. It was obvious from last May. Systemic voter suppression is why Clinton lost. Illegal voter tampering aided, but it wouldn’t have worked without the blind eye to local seats endemic to liberal & progressive voters and failure to act with full force on getting people registered, and out to vote.
If I sound angry, you’re goddamned right. Watching yet another person of color get choked to near death on video because the husband(!) of an off-duty sheriff felt he had a right to chokehold him until he stopped moving, while white people blocked access to the pair and tried to block them from taping the assault, it fucking makes me all the more aware of how the results of the 2016 election are affecting my communities. We pay first in our blood while everyone else gets to be “tired” and waiting for someone to say just the right goddamned thing to move people who’ve been proven to have the ethics of a worm.
Nothing coming out of this week will save this country from a party in control who have abandoned the principles of democracy. They’ve been showing that’s who they are for years. Yes, pay attention to what’s going on in the hearing, but don’t look for some grand denouement of criminality brought to justice. That’s movies and tv. This is real life and the people in charge will glad break this country down to its evil roots of terror, disease and poverty for everyone except a bare few. And enough voters are stupid enough to believe that they’re part of the few.
Ruemara is right; the Republicans aren’t going to do the right thing — they’re corrupt shitweasels who will countenance any attack on democracy, any loss of national credibility, any destruction of our institutions to hang onto power. The brain-dead morons who are sticking with Trump even as he schemes to take away their healthcare so he can give himself and the billionaires in his cabinet tax cuts aren’t going to suddenly gain 50 IQ points, lose their racism/sexism/xenophobia and stop punching themselves in the nuts.
So it’s up to us to turn the collaborators out of congress, and one of the best ways to do that is to counter voter suppression and gerrymandering efforts. Ruemara mentioned voteriders.org and flippable.org. Those organizations focus on getting IDs to folks the GOP deliberately disenfranchises and swinging state-level races so that statehouses reflect the political will of the voters rather than the Koch Bros.
Got any other ideas about how to make this happen? Here’s mine: Go to your local Democratic Party meetings and advocate for this approach. Volunteer to register voters, and when there’s an election — any election — volunteer to get out the vote. Donate to organizations that are taking on the vote thieves and gerrymanderers.
Meanwhile, enjoy the show.
Elizabelle
Maybe Republicans won’t do the right thing. My hope: American citizens take the wheel, and GOP are late for the train.
rikyrah
This comment was on point.
And, it’s time for the Democrats to stop being so polite.
These muthaphuckas are TRAITORS to this country, and it should be said every phucking time a Democrat gets on television.
They collaborated with a HOSTILE FOREIGN POWER TO UNDERMINE AMERICAN SOVEREIGNTY.
If THAT is not TREASON, then what is?
rikyrah
Kansas Republicans Finally Turn on Sam Brownback
by Martin Longman
June 7, 2017 4:30 PM
The news out of Kansas is highly amusing, as you can see in this report from the The Wichita Eagle:
Kansas is such a Republican state that even Brownback’s epic mismanagement hasn’t turned the state purple or blue, but he’s done his best. He’s made Republicans sound like Democrats. For example, look at this:
Corner Stone
I was really angry yesterday when Coats and Rogers refused to answer questions. I wish there were a mechanism for them both to be held in contempt and jailed.
Today we will see the flip side. The witness will respond to questions about facts but probably not much else. This time it will be the questioners that dabble off into rabbit holes in an attempt to eat time and suirt ink into the arena.
The only positive thing that may come of it all is that Trump hears something he doesn’t like, tweetstorms about it, and basically ends up confessing to more shady shit.
Jeffro
@rikyrah: Amen. Vichy Republicans Must Go!
JPL
@Corner Stone: There actually is a mechanism to hold them in contempt, but that is used for dems.
Chris
And as far as obstruction of justice goes, if Trump’s tweet threatening Comney if he talked wasn’t an attempt to intimidate a witness, I don’t know what is.
In other words, yeah. Pretty much whatever Comey has to say is stuff that anybody will already have figured out simply from what’s already out in the open. And the NeverTrumpists, who solemnly assured us that they would make sure Trump didn’t step out of line, won’t do a goddamn thing, because it’s always Party First with these people.
D58826
So one Goper wants to talk about Hillary.
The Moar You Know
Comey’s gonna shank us all but good today. I can feel it coming. He did it before the election and he’s about to do it again.
Ian G.
@rikyrah:
There may still be hope that when reality hits the GOP upside the head with a 2×4 enough times, they’ll react to it. I’m just worried that it will take 20,000 dead in some lunatic invasion of Iran or North Korea, or a debt default and runaway inflation before they finally concede to reality on a national scale.
Elizabelle
@rikyrah: I have seen their enablers moving the goalposts
“They didn’t take up ARMS against the USA. Ergo, no treason.”
No idea if that’s the legal standard, but I would suspect not.
Judge Crater
Having watched Nixon and Watergate I would just venture that it ain’t over till it’s over. The rot is deep in the Trump administration. There may be a John Dean out there who can change the calculus. It’s 50-50 that Trump won’t serve out his term.
Lapassionara
Thanks to Ruemara for pointing to our most pressing civic problem, and thanks to Betty for using it in a post.
I was part of an election protection effort during the 2004, 2006, and 2008 elections. There is very little that can be done on Election Day to solve problems with a voter’s registration. Those types of issues need to be addressed for 2018 starting now.
schrodingers_cat
Rs are not going to save us from T, we have to do that ourselves. They are either intimidated by T and his base or up to their eyeballs in the collusion themselves. Putin did what Stalin couldn’t, used the avarice of the R party to bring down its most powerful foe, without firing a single shot.
Betty Cracker
Y’all, I think I’m going to pull this post and wait until the circus is over to repost it. I don’t give a shit about my post getting squished, but I do want Ruemara’s comment to get a wider audience. What do you think? However, the process may shit-can your comments; I don’t know.
robert thompson
Ruemara’s short but epic rant yesterday deserves this front page effort. It is wondrous. My personal take is to reform the Democratic Party from the inside out. I know many of us do attend committee meetings, but frankly we all need to, myself included. There is no need to reinvent the wheel. The Democratic party has the infrastructure already in place but it needs new passion. Bring along a friend too. They are the only capable organization to save our republic. There isn’t any time left to us to build another.
different-church-lady
@Betty Cracker: Just do a new post with Ruemara’s comment featured, and leave this one in place.
scav
Team Trump: resort of last resport for unpopular governors.
Droppy
This is the downside of living in a “democracy” – granting that in this case the right-wing party has rigged the system in their favor to a degree that’s hard for the average schmoe to understand – but the fact remains that a significantly large minority of voters are just stupid and/or selfish enough to keep empowering the people who would rather prop up an oligarchy than help out the little guy in any meaningful way. Unffortunately, we only get our Lincollns and FDRs after we’ve gotten to the point of civil war or great depression.
D58826
oh god Burr is going down the Hillary e-mail rat hole
schrodingers_cat
@Betty Cracker: Don’t pull this one, you can do another post highlighting ruemara’s comment again after Comey’s testimony is over.
Chris
@Betty Cracker:
I endorse that.
Lapassionara
Post it again. This is critical stuff, Thx
charluckles
l think Impeachment is more likely than many might think:
-Trump won’t shut the heck up. Whether it’s twitter or in person, he keeps stepping in it.
-It’s way too early yet. I have been impatient since before the election, but it takes a long time for momentum to build, doubly so when the President is new in office.
-And I can’t help but keep coming back to the fact that the economy right now is relatively good. When the sh8t hits the proverbial economic fan things could change and fast.
Uncle Ebeneezer
@Lapassionara: Agreed. Read Rue’s comment yesterday and thought it was absolutely dead-on. Highlighting it again would be justified.
Ladyraxterinok
Some years ago I mentioned to a young woman here in OK that NC was trying to restrict voting rights. She said it was about time! She simply couldn’t understand how Obama could have won twice. It just showed there was something wrong in the voting process! She’s from MO and an Evangelical.
Chris
@charluckles:
Also, even assuming Republicans do it, they’ll probably wait until they’ve got at least a few legislative victories under their belt. Like the AHCA.
Ten Bears
A highly vocal minority imposing a tyranny upon the majority. The Second Amendment provides a solution to that problem.
SFAW
As others have said, thanks to ruemara for the comment, and Betty for re-posting it. I scanned the comment yesterday, but completely missed the VoteRiders mention. Just went over there, left a donation, will try to keep doing that.
SFAW
@Ten Bears:
Please don’t start that shit here. If you want to do that, go to fucking Freeperland, or Red Stoat, that’s their style.
SFAW
@Ladyraxterinok:
Good thing you left off the “Christian.”
Smedley Darlington Prunebanks (Formerly Mumphrey, et al.)
I’m not as cynical about this as many others are. This hearing by itself won’t prod Republicans to do anything to end this shit show fail parade. But it’s another few millions of gallons of water dumped into the pond behind a dam that’s already badly overloaded. This is going to harden the beliefs of those already against Czar Manbaby, and weaken the beliefs of those who are now weakly behind the czar. Things are building. I don’t know if Republicans are smart enough to do something in their own interest, but if they ever do that, it’ll only be because the pressure on them keeps getting worse.
kindness
While I believe what you present here is valuable I still feel liberals were betrayed by their own purity trolls. A good friend of mine routinely through the campaign spouted the Republican oppo research points during Bernie’s run at the primary and then continued to post them in voting for Jill Stein. I love the guy but have only seen him a few times since the election. I tried to bury the hatchet and got called out on being the reason liberals lost because I supported electing Hillary. Let’s just say it didn’t go well.
Fuck them. All we needed was 50,000 of those Jill Stein votes in a few states and we would have Hillary instead of the next Trump Reich at the head of the Federal Government.
SFAW
@kindness:
And while you’re at it, read them TBogg’s “Mumia sweatshirt” post. It may not convince anyone — purity trolls are especially resistant to examining their own behaviors, I think — it will allow you to tell them to Grow The Fuck Up.
Betty Cracker
@kindness: I consider people like that as lost a cause as the blithering idiot Trump voters Cole highlighted in a post last night. That’s why we’ve got to get people who are disenfranchised registered and pull folks off the sidelines. The awfulness of Trump works to our advantage there.
AnotherBruce
@SFAW:Shouldn’t have left out “fascist”.
oldgold
OMG – McCain!
What an embarrassing performance!
TenguPhule
@Ten Bears:
Corrected for accuracy.
The ones most in love with their guns are definitely not believers in Democracy.
Camembert
@kindness: The issue here is that we lefties have been screaming into the void that perhaps going Republican Lite for 30 years would have long-term consequences, and we were told to shut up and sit down, since our place was to be a reliable ATM, voting bloc, and ACORN-style punching bag. Veal pen and all that.
It looks like the new meme is that the Dem establishment is gonna stop viewing the Fascist right with tolerance and the left with disdain and switch. I honestly think that’ll work pretty well; I don’t mind being tolerated; I understand that we have different endgoals but are headed the same direction for now. It’s all about who you call “fucking retarded” once you get power.
Betty Cracker
@Camembert: “Veal pen” and “retarded.” Sometimes I wish Balloon Juice had a mute button.
neldob
I would contribute to some nice billboards in a few of the rat infested states in an attempt to communicate beyond Faux Snooz and talk radio garbage. Maybe give the low info voters more info, get em to soften their tribal boundaries. Also, Democrats are the real conservatives.
Camembert
@Betty Cracker: That’s probably the best summation of the establishment’s view of the base I could ask for.
Tim in SF
Who’s Wilmer?
Steeplejack (phone)
@Tim in SF:
It’s a (stupid) code word for Bernie Sanders, because apparently some trolls have or had a flag set to notify them to descend on the blog at any mention of Bernie Sanders’s name. Some people seem to not realize that the trolls can also flag any mention of “Wilmer.” But the nickname has stuck.