The Wall Street Journal has a headline tonight.
Trigger warning: Talk about rape below the fold. I find this very upsetting myself.
This post is in: 2020 Elections, domestic terrorists, Election 2018, The War On Women, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome, Assholes, General Stupidity, Nobody could have predicted, Sexist Pricks, Sociopaths
The Wall Street Journal has a headline tonight.
Trigger warning: Talk about rape below the fold. I find this very upsetting myself.
From Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony:
“Indelible in the hippocampus is the laughter,” Ford says, her voice cracking. “The uproarious laughter between the two. They’re having fun at my expense.”
“You’ve never forgotten them laughing at you,” Leahy says.
“They were laughing with each other,” Ford replies.
“And you were the object of the laughter?” Leahy asks.
“I was underneath one of them, while the two laughed,” Ford says.
Is Susan Collins okay with her Republican colleagues laughing at her in the same way?
by David Anderson| 48 Comments
This post is in: 2020 Elections, Ever Get The Feeling You've Been Cheated?, Go Fuck Yourself
Susan Collins thinks her supporters are suckers.
We don’t.
Let’s make 2020 as unpleasant as possible for her.
And also the core organizing principal should be that “these go to 11” in a world where “51 and Fuck you” is the most recent precedent:
by Adam L Silverman| 134 Comments
This post is in: 2020 Elections, Activist Judges!, America, Domestic Politics, Election 2016, Election 2018, Open Threads, Politics, Popular Culture, Post-racial America, Silverman on Security, Women's Rights Are Human Rights
While we wait for Senator Collins to finish the longest public statement of “I’m voting yes” ever given in the English or any other language, I think it is important to take a moment and revisit the two much more courageous votes and statements of Senators Heitkamp and Murkowski. Especially so in the wake of Senator Flake’s weeklong end of summer stock reenactment of Hamlet that got so much press attention.
Here is Senator Murkowski’s statement to the press shortly after she voted no this morning during the cloture vote on Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination.
And here is Senator Heitkamp’s, which I also posted yesterday:
Senators Heitkamp’s and Murkowski’s votes and their statements are important for several reasons. Senator Heitkamp is in the final weeks of her re-election campaign and it remains to be seen whether or not this will help or hinder her in seeking another term in the Senate. Senator Murkowski is not up for re-election until 2022. Despite the stated and reported opposition by her Native Alaskan constituents, as well as Alaska’s governor and lieutenant governor to Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination, her re-election is far enough off that she could have just kept quiet and voted along with the GOP majority in the Senate and it wouldn’t have come back to bite her if she does choose to run again in 2022. Instead she now has Alaska’s premier ankle biter and matriarch of the state’s most dysfunctionally petty crime family calling out the other attack dogs in an attempt to claw out another fifteen minutes of fame.
What Senator’s Heitkamp and Murkowski have done isn’t just cast a no vote. Read their statements as to why. Neither of them are denying that the President, regardless of what they may or may not think about the election of 2016 and his de facto legitimacy as a result of what occurred in that election, has the de jure responsibility and authority to nominate who he wants to the Supreme Court based on whatever process he establishes to arrive at the nominee. Rather they are both stating flatly that the issue here is that Judge Kavanaugh is not the right nominee at this moment in political and social time in the US. Neither are saying they wouldn’t seriously consider a different nominee with an open mind. This is important. Neither Senator Heitkamp or Murkowski are doing what Senators McConnell, McCain, Cruz, and others did during the 2016 election when they stated that not only would Judge Garland not get a meeting, let alone a hearing or up and down vote to fill the vacancy left by Justice Scalia’s death, but that if Secretary Clinton were elected that they would hold that Supreme Court seat open for as long as the GOP held the majority in the Senate or as long as a Democratic majority in the Senate kept the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees in place. Instead they are simply stating that because of the circumstances and politics around this nomination and the current state of American politics and society, for the good of the Supreme Court, the Senate, and the US, Judge Kavanaugh was just not the right person to fill the current vacancy at this time.
Senator Heitkamp’s and Murkowski’s stated reasons for voting no also gets at another important point that we all too frequently ignore, if we even recognize it at all. Specifically that the purpose of the political processes that have been established and then evolved over time, and that are right now being severely stress tested, are the mechanisms that transform what may be politically unpalatable into government and governance that is politically palatable. Part of what Senators Heitkamp and Murkowski took a stand for, in addition to accepting Dr. Blasey’s testimony of what she had to endure in 1982, was the recognition that the US cannot continue going forward where the politics of might makes right, which is at the heart of all forms of fascism, regardless of whether it is a majority or a minority that has that might at any given moment in time, rules the day. They recognize that what the President, Don McGahn the White House Counsel, Leonard Leo who runs the Federalist Society and whose dark money networks bankroll the Judicial Crisis Network, and Senators McConnell, Grassley, Cornyn, Hatch, etc have done with judicial nominations – and in the case of the Republican senators done so going back to the Obama administration – has gone way past the point where the process can be used to transform the politically unpalatable into palatable government and governance.
Senators Heitkamp and Murkowski’s statements and the actions backing them up should sound as a clarion call that the system is fast approaching, if not already at, a breaking point. The subtext of their remarks is a recognition that the majority of Americans who did not vote for the President, despite his electoral college victory, or for either the GOP majorities in the House and the Senate, are fast approaching the point where Republican minoratarian rule, despite its constitutional/de jure legitimacy, is approaching the point of no return. That the relentless pursuit of power at all costs, whether through gerrymandering and voter suppression, manipulating and breaking the rules of the House and the Senate begun by Speaker Gingrich and perfected by Senator McConnell, packing the Federal courts, and/or the attempt to govern solely to the delight and enthusiasm of the President’s electorally minority base of white, largely evangelical and traditionalist Christians in the attempt to create a herrenvolk democracy, isn’t going to simply lock in permanent Republican control over the Federal government. It is going to irreparably break the Federal government and the United States polity and society.
While Senators Heitkamp’s and Murkowski’s stands will ultimately not be enough to stop Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination, the importance of their actions should be recognized nonetheless. They didn’t attempt to demonstrate just how much more moral than everyone else they are while predictably doing what they always do, like Senator Flake who always folds like a cheap suit after giving a sad speech with a crestfallen look on his face. Nor did they attempt to once again demonstrate how thoughtfully moderate they are, while always voting with the most conservative members of the Senate Republican caucus like Senator Collins. Instead they recognized that what the US Senate, the world’s greatest deliberative country club, actually needed was leadership. Not kabuki theater or crocodile tears or a political dance of the seven veils. What we’ve seen this week is a contrast between two senators – Heitkamp and Murkowski – who recognize and understand what leadership is and those who don’t – Flake and Collins. Leadership, either formal or informal, is doing the hard things when everyone is watching, not talking about doing the hard things and then not doing them because everyone is watching and someone might get mad at you.
As one of my professional forebears, Dr. Bernard Fall, so accurately observed in 1964 (emphasis mine):
Civic action is not the construction of privies or the distribution of antimalarial sprays. One can’t fight an ideology; one can’t fight a militant doctrine with better privies. Yet this is done constantly. One side says, “land reform,” and the other side says, “better culverts.” One side says, “We are going to kill all those nasty village chiefs and landlords.” The other side says, “Yes, but look, we want to give you prize pigs to improve your strain.” These arguments just do not match. Simple but adequate appeals will have to be found sooner or later.
Whether they recognize it or not, Senators Heitkamp’s and Murkowski’s actions and statements indicate that they recognize that the US has reached the point when the political arguments just don’t match anymore. And that sooner or later simple, but adequate appeals to resolve these serious problems will have to be found. Sooner or later…
A political battle has been lost, the larger political war for both the nature and the future of the US goes on. Check to make sure you’re registered to vote. Pester all your friends to make sure they’re registered to vote. Pester all your friends to make sure they pester all of their friends to make sure they’re registered to vote. Then vote. Pester all your friends to make sure they vote. And pester all of your friends to pester all of their friends to make sure they vote.
Open thread!
A Few Thoughts on Senators Heitkamp and MurkowskiPost + Comments (134)
by Betty Cracker| 198 Comments
This post is in: 2020 Elections, Open Threads, Politics, The War On Women, Women's Rights Are Human Rights
Housekeeping comment: This is a post about the 2020 presidential election. Yes, I know there is a midterm election happening in 37 days. Our focus should be, has been and will be primarily on that and other present-day issues. But this is an almost top-10K politics and pets blog, and if we can take time to talk about gardening, gaming, TV, movies, cat-shaving, home improvement, etc., without shattering the republic due to a lapse in concentration on the midterms, by golly I think we can occasionally cast our speculation forward without all coming to naught.
Senator Elizabeth Warren made an unsurprising announcement at a town hall yesterday (NYT):
Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts declared on Saturday that she would “take a hard look” at running for the White House in 2020 once the midterm elections are over, and called on the country to elect a female president to fix the “broken government” in Washington.
Ms. Warren made the announcement during a town-hall meeting in Holyoke, Mass., where she was decrying President Trump and Senate Republicans for digging in behind Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh, the embattled Supreme Court nominee who has been accused of sexual assault. She described the hearings as a spectacle of “powerful men helping a powerful man make it to an even more powerful position.”
“I watched that and I thought: time’s up,” Ms. Warren said, according to a transcript and video of her remarks provided by an aide. “It’s time for women to go to Washington and fix our broken government, and that includes a woman at the top.”
She continued, “So here’s what I promise: After Nov. 6, I will take a hard look at running for president.”
Senator Amy Klobuchar hasn’t mentioned throwing her chapeau into the ring, but an article by Aaron Blake and Dave Weigel in The Post speculated about her possible future as a 2020 nominee. It recounted the moment when Kavanaugh angrily demanded to know if Klobuchar is a black-out drunk in response to a politely posed and relevant question.
During the hearing, Kavanaugh publicly apologized to Klobuchar after the break, perhaps perceiving that his taunting question came across as rude and aggressive, especially since Klobuchar had just shared that her 90-something father is a recovering alcoholic.
The scene at the hearing — in which Kavanaugh was defending himself against allegations of sexual assault — has at once thrust Klobuchar into the national spotlight and reinforced what could be her central shortcoming as a 2020 contender for the presidency. In a party that by most accounts is searching for liberals and powerful personalities to counteract President Trump, Klobuchar has crafted a brand almost diametrically opposed to that. In many ways, Klobuchar’s running and winning in 2020 would defy conventional wisdom, just as Trump did in 2016…
“While she’s a down-the-line Democratic vote, she doesn’t have an image here as the partisan bomb-thrower,” said Minnesota Republican consultant Mark Drake. “I think Democrats are looking for someone who is the partisan bomb-thrower. She’s the senator next door, not the bomb-thrower next door.”
If both women run, we’ll be treated to all sorts of dumb stereotypes. I don’t look forward to that, but I’d love to see either Warren, Klobuchar or both in the race and/or continuing to play prominent roles within the party. Kamala Harris and Kirsten Gillibrand too.
It’s tempting to think that Hillary Clinton’s loss proved we’re just not ready for a woman president in America. I wondered that myself early on, but I don’t anymore — there’s a difficult and unfair double-standard the first woman president will have to overcome, just as President Obama had to clear extra hurdles to become the first black president. But I do believe it’s possible.
Clinton’s loss, rather than arguing against women’s viability as presidential candidates, is an argument in favor of it. She was sandbagged by a decades-long media defamation campaign, bogus “dynasty” charges, Russian active measures, third-party sneering and voter suppression, and she still won the popular vote by millions.
On the contrary, I think the Democrats NEED a woman on the ticket in 2020. Whoever she is, she will not only be an effective foil to Trump, she’ll be a walking reminder that we can’t afford another misogynist on the Supreme Court. May the best woman win.
by Adam L Silverman| 209 Comments
This post is in: 2020 Elections, America, Domestic Politics, Election 2016, Election 2018, Foreign Affairs, Open Threads, Politics, Popular Culture, Post-racial America, Silverman on Security, Not Normal
The President’s speech to the UN General Assembly this morning was basically a modified rally speech. He started off with his usual vigorous patting himself on the back, which was received well…
Trump begins his UN speech by saying his administration has accomplished more than "almost any administration in the history of our country." There is some laughter in the hall. "So true," he says. The laughter gets louder. "Didn't expect that reaction," Trump says.
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) September 25, 2018
WOW! The UN audience laughs at Trump after he claims, "my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country." pic.twitter.com/tXg50ejQqy
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) September 25, 2018
So that went well. But as the speech went on, it went someplace weird. And not just weird, but obscurely weird.
Trump: "We reject the ideology of globalism, and we embrace the doctrine of patriotism."
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) September 25, 2018
We already know that globalism is the code that Stephen Miller and Steve Bannon use to refer to not just the current global system of international trade, international relations, and international security agreements, but to Jews. It is intended to be understood, if I may, literally by the majority of people who aren’t anti-Semites or anti-Semitic curious and figuratively by the President’s supporters who are. But what is this Doctrine of Patriotism? The Doctrine of Patriotism was proposed by Charles Spurgeon a mid to late 19th Century Calvinist Baptist from London.
Specifically, Spurgeon wrote (emphasis mine):
Patriotism is an instinct which is found, I think, in every true Englishman. And most of the other nations of the earth can also boast of their patriots. Let it never be said that the Church of God has no feeling of patriotism for the Holy City, for the Heavenly Land and for her glorious King enthroned above. To us, Christian patriotism means love to the Church of God, for—
“There our best friends, our kindred dwell, There God our Savior reigns.”
Let us have loyalty, by all means, but, chiefly, loyalty to Christ! Let us have true patriotism, but, especially that patriotism which consists in love to “the land of the living” of which Christ is the one King and Ruler.
So here too we have the President using a phrase that is going to either just get a “hmm, that sounds a bit odd” or “what does he mean by that” from most listeners, including scholars of international relations and security and national security professionals and that is going to be heard and understood differently by a very specific group of the President’s base: white Evangelical Christians. Moreover, this concept dovetails with a lot of Putin’s attempts to use and leverage the Russian Orthodox Church to promote himself to white American Evangelicals, as well as a variety of American and European white supremacists, neo-NAZIs, neo-fascists, and neo-nationalists. The President’s use of the doctrine of patriotism, like his use of the term globalist, is meant to be taken figuratively by his base and fellow travelers, but literally by everyone else who doesn’t speak in this coded jargon.
Sweet jumping jeebus. Tha what? https://t.co/Sbb9W7809H
— Rick Wilson (@TheRickWilson) September 25, 2018
Aside from the fact that realism can’t really be principled by its very nature, neither of these two things – principled realism and the doctrine of patriotism – are actually the Trump Doctrine. The Trump Doctrine, as we’ve discussed here extensively, is “I will be treated fairly or else and only I can ensure that America will be treated fairly or else and only I can ensure that the forgotten men and women of America will be treated fairly or else.”
I’m sure tomorrow’s UN Security Council meeting is going to go very smoothly…
Open thread.
The President Had Quite the Morning at the UNPost + Comments (209)
This post is in: 2020 Elections, Proud to Be A Democrat
Just got back from an open meeting with Kendra Fershee at Bethany College, and we had a really good turnout:
Good turnout for @teamkendrawv at Bethany College pic.twitter.com/f8AA7VLyMM
— Nuck Fazis! (@Johngcole) September 21, 2018
She spoke for about 90 minutes, and there were a lot of great questions and a lot of great discussion. Some of the topics included universal healthcare, marijuana legalization, the supreme court nomination, the flawed environment v. business model, coal and natural gas, structural racism and social justice, cash bail and for profit prisons, court and criminal justice reform, education, the NRA stranglehold on the gun debate, women in politics, and much, much, more.
This was the first time I had met her in person, having only spoken with her via social media for the last year (I was an early adopter and got in touch with her shortly after she announced), and she’s the real deal. Just a great person, not slick and fake, she really connects with people when they engage her, and there isn’t a shred of the kind of arrogance you get with so many politicians. The students really liked her, and so did the adults. I’m really hoping she pulls it off because I think she is the kind of representation West Virginians deserve in Congress. You know how every now and then you just get excited about a certain candidate because they are a real person- that’s how I feel about Fershee.
Here she is posing with some students in front of the Bethany College mascot, the Bison:
BTW- she is not taking any special interest money and is really a shoestring candidate, and she needs all the support she can get. I’m throwing in another $100.00 bucks and I really hope you will, too:
Let’s get this baby to five or ten thousand! She has another event tonight at WVNCC, and I am thinking about heading to it.
#TeamKendra Visits My Thriving MetropolisPost + Comments (109)
by Adam L Silverman| 84 Comments
This post is in: 2020 Elections, America, Domestic Politics, Election 2016, Election 2018, Foreign Affairs, Open Threads, Politics, Popular Culture, Post-racial America, Silverman on Security, Not Normal
On Wednesday and Thursday Senator Harris kept coming back to a very specific set of questions for Judge Kavanaugh: did you have a conversation with someone at the law firm of Kasowitz, Benson, and Torres and if so, who was that person? Here’s the video from Wednesday evening:
Has Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh had a conversation about Robert Mueller or his investigation with anyone at Trump's personal attorney's law firm?
We don’t know. He refused to answer my question. pic.twitter.com/PAKxDGvEtZ
— Kamala Harris (@SenKamalaHarris) September 6, 2018
Remember, Marc Kasowitz is the President’s personal attorney and, for a time, was representing him in regard to the Special Counsel’s investigation.
Yesterday when Senator Harris went back to this line of questioning she finally got something more than panicked confusion and flop sweat from Judge Kavanaugh. Specifically:
Update:
– Kavanaugh acknowledges close friendship with Kasowitz atty Ed McNally
– White House and Kasowitz firm say McNally neither helped prep Kavaugh nor discussed Mueller probe with him. https://t.co/o41jnTDhoQ— Carol Leonnig (@CarolLeonnig) September 6, 2018
But what, exactly, is going on here. As silly as it is for Judge Kavanaugh to have tried to brazen out these two questions if there was just regular, social contact, I think there’s a really good reason for his response. I think that Senator Harris keeps coming back to these two questions because she has something that she and her staff have concluded is solid that links Judge Kavanaugh; his friend Ed McNally at Kasowitz, Benson, and Torres; and something inappropriate and/or improper in regard to the Special Counsel and his investigation. And Judge Kavanaugh does not know, or is not completely sure, what it is that Senator Harris has or how she and her staff got it. Which is why he kept trying to flip the dynamic and get her to give him the answer of who she was referring to at Kasowitz, Benson, and Torres and what it might be about. As you can see in the video above, she was prepared for that on Wednesday and she was prepared for it yesterday as well.
So what does Senator Harris and her staff have? I have no idea. And neither does Judge Kavanaugh, White House Counsel Don McGahn, Senator Grassley, or Senator McConnell. It may be that Senator Harris and her staff actually have nothing more than a tip that Judge Kavanaugh is good friends with Ed McNally and they socialize, so she decided to bluff and see if she could trip him up really badly. But given his reactions, as well as the multiple explanations required to get to even the semblance of a reasonable answer from both Judge Kavanaugh and the spokesperson for Kasowitz, Benson, and Torres before finally settling on that yes, Judge Kavanaugh knows Ed McNally and they’ve spoken in the last year, I think she’s engaged in more than just a bluff.
That moment where Kavanaugh mouthed “Kasowitz Benson and Torres” like he was hearing the words for the first time? His good buddy has worked there 9 years. https://t.co/XjcddT9V97 https://t.co/wYaIFD6YNm
— southpaw (@nycsouthpaw) September 7, 2018
https://twitter.com/AaronBlake/status/1037773924598210562
If this was just Senator Harris bluffing, then we won’t hear much more about it. But based on her statements during the hearings, doing news media hits after the hearings, and on social media, I don’t think that’s the case.
Kamala Harris just said that she received reliable information that Judge Kavanaugh had a conversation with someone from the Kasowitz firm…which is what led her to ask the question last night.
— Yashar Ali ? (@yashar) September 6, 2018
Rather, I think she’s got specific information about not just who Judge Kavanaugh spoke with, but what they discussed. And that she and her staff have vetted and validated it enough to weaponize it. The outstanding question is what is the end game of the Kamala Harris gambit? Was it just to spook Judge Kavanaugh during the Senate Judiciary confirmation hearings in the hope he screws up? Or does she intend to actually make it public when it is most strategically advantageous to her and the Democratic caucus’s attempts to defeat his nomination?
Stay tuned!
Open thread.
Kavanaugh, Kasowitz, and McNally: The Kamala Harris GambitPost + Comments (84)