Random Political Posts

[andydp]

Old news, but bears repeating. 

When one person makes an accusation, check to be sure he himself is not the guilty one. Sometimes it is those whose case is weak who make the most clamour.

Piers Anthony

[goldenvalley]

[LFC]

Oh, goodie. He has real evidence now, right? RIGHT? Hello? Is this thing on?

On Tuesday, MyPillow CEO and election conspiracy theorist Mike Lindell pushed his latest claim that he is on the brink of overturning the 2020 presidential election — and even claimed that on Thursday, "if everything goes right," he will secure a "preliminary injunction" against the long-settled results.

"We are — the preliminary injunction, the first one in the United States, it's going to be, come out on Thursday. We're looking at Thursday, if everything goes right," said Lindell on his show. "Now, I'm not going to give all the details, there's a lot of surprises. It's going to shock the country, as a matter of fact. How we're doing these, and how they're going down."

Lindell then lashed out at the media for not taking his wild claims about election fraud seriously.

[LFC]

Big, wet, sloppy kisses to Ron DeSatanist from the real estate industry.

Real estate developers, investors and realtors who are profiting from Gov. Ron DeSantis' moves to reopen Florida ahead of other states during the COVID-19 pandemic are showing their appreciation by contributing massive amounts of money to the governor and his political action committee.

A Politico analysis of campaign contribution disclosures found that the real estate industry donated more than $7 million to DeSantis in the past year, making it one of the largest donor groups. Some $2.5 million of that came from real estate industry players who previously have not given or had been dormant for several elections.

According to that analysis, DeSantis has $96 million cash in the bank, a sum vastly larger than the combined $10 million cash-on-hand total for his three Democratic challengers, Rep. Charlie Crist, Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried and Florida Sen. Annette Taddeo (D-Miami).

DeSantis has received huge sums from the hospitality industry, as well as the health care, insurance and finance sectors, but real estate is king. One industry executive is blunt about why it supports his reelection: profits.

“I think a combination of two things, we absolutely support all the keep Florida open business policies the governor adopted,” said Carlos Beruff, a Sarasota County homebuilder and longtime Republican donor. “The second thing is, I call it the Covid phenomenon in real estate. Unfortunately, Covid has been a terrible plague on us, but in the real estate industry, there has been a boom.”

“Everyone in the industry just has more walking around money,” he added, explaining the increase of new real estate industry donors to DeSantis.

[goldenvalley]

Apr 20, 2022 17:30:38 GMT LFC said:

Big, wet, sloppy kisses to Ron DeSatanist from the real estate industry.

Real estate developers, investors and realtors who are profiting from Gov. Ron DeSantis' moves to reopen Florida ahead of other states during the COVID-19 pandemic are showing their appreciation by contributing massive amounts of money to the governor and his political action committee.

A Politico analysis of campaign contribution disclosures found that the real estate industry donated more than $7 million to DeSantis in the past year, making it one of the largest donor groups. Some $2.5 million of that came from real estate industry players who previously have not given or had been dormant for several elections.

According to that analysis, DeSantis has $96 million cash in the bank, a sum vastly larger than the combined $10 million cash-on-hand total for his three Democratic challengers, Rep. Charlie Crist, Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried and Florida Sen. Annette Taddeo (D-Miami).

DeSantis has received huge sums from the hospitality industry, as well as the health care, insurance and finance sectors, but real estate is king. One industry executive is blunt about why it supports his reelection: profits.

“I think a combination of two things, we absolutely support all the keep Florida open business policies the governor adopted,” said Carlos Beruff, a Sarasota County homebuilder and longtime Republican donor. “The second thing is, I call it the Covid phenomenon in real estate. Unfortunately, Covid has been a terrible plague on us, but in the real estate industry, there has been a boom.”

“Everyone in the industry just has more walking around money,” he added, explaining the increase of new real estate industry donors to DeSantis.

It's their money to waste.  At a certain point the amount becomes meaningless except to make sure their candidate stays bought. See for example Saudi Arabia and Jared Kushner.

[LFC]

Columbia University has finally, but veeeerrrrryyyy quietly, dumped Oz.

After years of criticism, Columbia University Medical Center has finally—quietly—cut public ties with celebrity doctor turned Republican Senate candidate Mehmet Oz.

The acclaimed teaching hospital, where Oz held senior positions like vice chair of surgery and director of integrated medicine for years, stripped his personal pages from their website in mid-January.

The move came a day after HuffPost reported on Jan. 12 that Columbia had established a new distance from Oz, changing his title to “professor emeritus.” The truth, however, was that Columbia had made that change years ago, as HuffPost later clarified in an updated version of its article.

But what HuffPost seemed to get wrong actually set off a chain of events, ironically, making the post right—albeit a day too early.

His colleagues all knew he was a quack but for some reason the administration wouldn't touch him. Maybe they were afraid of Oprah?

Columbia’s affiliation with Oz had been under fire long before he launched a surprise Senate run in late November. In 2015, when Oz testified before the Senate about his endorsement of shady “miracle” cures, a group of some of the country’s top medical professionals sent Columbia a blistering letter demanding the renowned medical school fire the Oprah-blessed daytime star.

“Dr. Oz has repeatedly shown disdain for science and for evidence-based medicine, as well as baseless and relentless opposition to the genetic engineering of food crops,” the physicians wrote. “Worst of all, he has manifested an egregious lack of integrity by promoting quack treatments and cures in the interest of personal financial gain.”

Dr. Daniel Summers, a Boston-area pediatrician and writer, called Columbia’s stealth purge a “chickenshit” move.

“Their handling of his status there is a massive blot on their reputation. What a chickenshit thing to do,” Summers told The Daily Beast.

Fainthearted as it may seem, Columbia’s move did wipe its public connection with Oz. And that, Summers observed, is more than can be said for an arguably more influential cultural institution: talk show legend Oprah Winfrey.

[goldenvalley]

ST. LOUIS, Mo. – A lawmaker getting paid to represent Missourians while living in Illinois has been the focus of several FOX 2 investigative reports. Now the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office has charged Andrew Purcell, 36, with stealing by deceit.

Court documents state that he was appointed to the Bridgeton City Council in April 2018. He represented the second ward and his home address was listed in Bridgeton.

In 2020 Purcell was re-elected to the city council for another two-year term. Police say that he rented an apartment in Bridgeton from April 7, 2020, until June 4, 2021. His tenure as a city councilman ended on April 5, 2022, because he did not seek re-election.

Purcell signed a rental agreement for a property in Carterville, Illinois on November 5, 2021, and registered to vote in the state. Police say that he lives at the Illinois address.

So he's living in Illinois while still serving on city council in Missouri. And then he tells an Illinois official:

”It is my contention, under oath, that I am a resident of Williamson County and have been since March 1 of 2021,” stated Purcell during an Electoral Board meeting in Williamson County, Illinois.

Why?

FOX 2 reporter Chris Hayes says that Purcell was trying to run for office in Williamson County, Illinois, about 140 miles away. The Republican Party there learned he was getting paid as a Bridgeton councilman, so they brought him into a court hearing to find out where he was really living.

Can't find the gif of Mike Ehrmantrat shaking his head.

[AnBr]

May 6, 2022 19:59:01 GMT goldenvalley said:

Can't find the gif of Mike Ehrmantrat shaking his head.

[LFC]

The FTC finally gets its 3rd Democrat which means it might get things done. The Republican members are, of course, all about protecting businesses rather than people.

It took eight months of hearings, nominations, health-related delays, and a tie-breaking vote from the vice president, but the Senate has confirmed Alvaro Bedoya as the Federal Trade Commission’s fifth commissioner. More importantly — and almost certainly why his confirmation was such a drawn-out and contentious process — he’s its third Democrat, and soon will likely be a deciding vote himself.

In a statement, Bedoya said he was excited to work with the four other commissioners and “truly thrilled to work alongside the public servants of the Federal Trade Commission.”

The FTC has been gridlocked with two Republican commissioners (Noah Phillips and Christine Wilson) and two Democrats (chair Lina Khan and Rebecca Kelly Slaughter) for most of Khan’s tenure. Anything Khan wanted to do that needed the commission’s vote would either have to get the support of at least one Republican or it wouldn’t happen at all. That won’t be the case anymore.

It’s more likely that Republicans’ issues were not with Bedoya or his tweets, but with the fact that Bedoya gives the FTC the Democratic majority it has lacked since Rohit Chopra left in October. Republicans aren’t thrilled with Khan’s work at the FTC, to say the least, seeing her as a divisive radical progressive who is intent on reshaping the agency’s approach to antitrust and giving it more authority than they think it should have. The business world isn’t a fan of Khan, either. The lobbying group US Chamber of Commerce has made no secret of its issues with her, and recently sent a letter to Sens. Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell urging them to put off the Bedoya vote because his confirmation would give Khan a majority.

Antitrust reform and privacy advocates, on the other hand, celebrated Bedoya’s confirmation.

“Alongside Chair Lina Khan and Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, we can finally envision an effective FTC that plays a vital role in leveling the playing field and restoring our nation’s economy,” Stacy Mitchell, co-director of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, said in a statement.

Bedoya’s confirmation was decried by Big Tech-friendly lobbying groups, such as NetChoice, which said: “Chair Khan has the votes she needs to accomplish her radical progressive goals at the expense of politicizing the FTC,” which would “harm all Americans by ruining healthy and competitive markets.”

[LFC]

George W. Bush delivered one of the greatest Freudian Slips of all time.

[goldenvalley]

From NYT

A button-maker who worries about political divisions

Mort Berkowitz, who has been designing political buttons since Watergate, is going in a different direction.

A Democrat who has long made products poking fun at politicians in both parties, he now refuses requests to make Trump-themed merchandise.

He’s designed his fair share of buttons that push the envelope, and he sold MAGA-related merchandise during the 2016 presidential campaign, but Trump’s messages have gone too far for him.

“It’s divisive to the point of hurting the country,” said Berkowitz, who stipulated that he continues to create buttons for other Republican politicians, like Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley.

Berkowitz reeled off a list of buttons he’s designed over time: “Richard the Lying Hearted” for Nixon, “You Can’t Run for President With Your Fly Open” for Gary Hart, and so on.

His most famous button might be a 1996 pin for Hillary “Rodman” Clinton, turning her hair orange to replicate the N.B.A. star Dennis Rodman. She included a reference to it in her 1996 Democratic National Convention speech.

Berkowitz was particularly proud of his work during the Watergate scandal (“4 More Years, Mr. Nixon, Then 10 to 20”), and recalled designing a button featuring Ronald Reagan and George Orwell that didn’t land with attendees at the 1984 Republican National Convention.

“Very few people had any idea who George Orwell was,” he said. “They wanted to know why I wasn’t for George Bush.”

Buttons he designed are at the Smithsonian and other museums throughout the country. Currently, his biggest sellers are pins that show support for Ukraine. But his top requests are for pro-Trump merchandise — items that say things like “Amend the Constitution,” or “Re-elect Trump to a Third Term.”

During the 2016 campaign, Berkowitz churned out Trump-inspired merchandise. He recalls that one of his friends placed an order for 10,000 MAGA hats. “I had nothing against Trump when he ran or when he won,” he said. But that started to change, and was cemented after the 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va.

He didn’t sell any merchandise for the candidates running in Pennsylvania’s G.O.P. primaries this week, either, calling the candidates “vicious” and “anti-American.”

Loved the Nixon button.

[LFC]

WTF, Dems? Put your foot on the accelerator and go, go, GO!!!

President Joe Biden's staff boasted at the end of last year that he had nominated and confirmed a historic number of judges to start off his term, but the president and Senate Democrats could leave more than 60 judicial vacancies at the end of this year -- and they may not have a chance to fill them once a new Congress is sworn in, argued legal expert Christopher Kang in a new column for Slate.

"With the possibility looming that Republicans may retake the Senate, we know that leaving any vacancy open in January could well mean letting a newly empowered Mitch McConnell blockade them, just as he did President Barack Obama’s picks, from Merrick Garland’s Supreme Court nomination to dozens of lower court nominees," wrote Kang, co-founder and chief counsel of Demand Justice and former deputy counsel to president Barack Obama.

The White House and Democratic senators must challenge self-imposed norms and move as relentlessly as Republicans have done to restore balance to federal courts that conservatives have dominated for decades, Kang argued.

"That means filling every vacancy, even if it means breaking with the few remaining judicial confirmation process norms left in McConnell’s wake or standing up to Republican senators," he wrote. "Beginning to bring balance to our judiciary is more important than respecting Senate traditions."

That includes bypassing the Senate tradition of "blue slips," which allow any senator to essentially veto district court nominations from their home state and was weaponized by segregationists, frequently used against Obama nominees and ignored by Republicans during Donald Trump's presidency.

[LFC]

The major distributors of opioids were just let off the hook. Disgusting. BTW the population of Cabell County is less than 100,000 people but yeah, over 50M doses or 500+ doses for every man, woman, and child in less than a decade sounds totally legit.

The three largest drug distributors in the United States have won a major court victory, with a judge ruling that they were not responsible for record opioid addiction in one part of West Virginia state.

About 10 percent of Cabell County's population is or has been addicted to opioids -- at a huge economic and social cost, acknowledged Judge David Faber.

But "while there is a natural tendency to assign blame in such cases, they must be decided not based on sympathy, but on the facts and the law," he wrote in a decision released Monday night.

The "plaintiffs failed to show that the volume of prescription opioids distributed in Cabell/Huntington was because of unreasonable conduct" by defendants AmerisourceBergen, Cardinal Health and McKesson, Faber wrote.

Tasked with supplying pharmacies, the three firms delivered more than 51 million doses of pain medication in the county between 2006 and 2014, and local authorities accused them of turning a blind eye to suspicious order volumes.

But "there is nothing unreasonable about distributing controlled substances to fulfill legally written prescriptions," Faber said.

He put the blame on manufacturers who "aggressively market prescription opioids," rather than the companies that distributed them.

After becoming addicted to pain pills, many people increased their consumption and eventually turned to illicit drugs such as heroin and fentanyl, an extremely powerful synthetic opioid.

[LFC]

Elizabeth Warren is pushing to help get young voters registered. Of course Republicans will be against it since that's not a demographic where a majority supports them. In other words they're the wrong kind of people and they'll do anything they can do to keep them from voting or at least making it hard.

As election laws continue to come under attack in Republican-controlled states, Congress has struggled to pass voting-rights reforms due to the delicate 50-50 Senate. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is trying to change that with a new bill targeting a historically low-turnout voting group: young people.

Warren’s new proposal, which she plans to introduce Monday, would expand voter registration at public colleges and universities, ensure all states allow 16- and 17-year-olds to pre-register to vote, require colleges and universities to have polling places on campus and ensure that all states include student IDs as a form of voter ID, among other proposals, according to a draft of new legislation obtained by The Daily Beast.

The bill is based on expanding implementation for the 26th Amendment, which was ratified in 1971 and established the right of individuals aged 18 and older to vote. Previously, all voters needed to be at least 21 years old.

Though youth-voter turnout has increased in recent years, including an 11 percent uptick during the 2020 election as compared to 2016, young people continue to have the lowest voting participation of any age group.

Rep. Nikema Williams (D-GA), who leads the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s voter protection efforts, is co-sponsoring the bill in the House.

[AnBr]

Jul 11, 2022 16:07:14 GMT LFC said:

Elizabeth Warren is pushing to help get young voters registered. Of course Republicans will be against it since that's not a demographic where a majority supports them. In other words they're the wrong kind of people and they'll do anything they can do to keep them from voting or at least making it hard.

As election laws continue to come under attack in Republican-controlled states, Congress has struggled to pass voting-rights reforms due to the delicate 50-50 Senate. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) is trying to change that with a new bill targeting a historically low-turnout voting group: young people.

Warren’s new proposal, which she plans to introduce Monday, would expand voter registration at public colleges and universities, ensure all states allow 16- and 17-year-olds to pre-register to vote, require colleges and universities to have polling places on campus and ensure that all states include student IDs as a form of voter ID, among other proposals, according to a draft of new legislation obtained by The Daily Beast.

The bill is based on expanding implementation for the 26th Amendment, which was ratified in 1971 and established the right of individuals aged 18 and older to vote. Previously, all voters needed to be at least 21 years old.

Though youth-voter turnout has increased in recent years, including an 11 percent uptick during the 2020 election as compared to 2016, young people continue to have the lowest voting participation of any age group.

Rep. Nikema Williams (D-GA), who leads the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s voter protection efforts, is co-sponsoring the bill in the House.

e

[LFC]

Pelosi is dragging her feet, or at least not offering her shoulder, to shut down congressional insider trading.

When Speaker Nancy Pelosi stepped into her weekly press conference one day in February, she found a room full of reporters dying to ask her the same question.

That morning, the Beltway tipsheet Punchbowl News had reported that Pelosi was expected to endorse some sort of ban on lawmakers’ ability to trade stocks while in office.

For months, a broad swath of lawmakers—Democrats and Republicans—had been pushing various proposals to reform congressional stock trading rules, in response to growing public outrage over a string of stories showing potential conflicts of interest in lawmakers’ trades.

That push had picked up serious momentum in the House and Senate. Pelosi, along with a number of other top lawmakers, didn’t exactly embrace it. But given the overwhelming public support for a ban on lawmaker stock trading, she likely knew she couldn’t entirely dismiss it, either.

So, when Pelosi left her press conference, she somewhat miraculously got the headlines she wanted: a number of news outlets reported that the speaker had “shifted her stance” on the issue, or that legislation was “moving.”

In reality, the closest thing to an endorsement that Pelosi offered was this tepid statement: “If that’s what members want to do, then that’s what we will do.”

The task, the Speaker said, was to “build consensus.”

Six months later, not much has changed.

There are several bills in both the House and Senate to restrict stock trading that have earned broad support, but none have received a vote—or as much as a markup on the committee level—as the issue falls further and further down Congress’ increasingly packed to-do list.

[LFC]

Well this is interesting. It appears that Schumer and Manchin have come to an agreement. If the bill is reasonable I'll have to give Manchin a few points, as much as I hate to do it.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) jointly unveiled a deal centered on climate investments and lowering prescription drug prices, a seemingly resurrected version of the bill Manchin killed two weeks ago.

The bill, befitting the reason Manchin nixed its predecessor, is called “The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.”

The bill will invest “$369 billion in Energy Security and Climate Change programs over the next ten years,” will allow Medicare to negotiate prescription drug prices and will extend critical Affordable Care Act subsidies for three years, per a bill summary.

It will also put into place a 15 percent minimum corporate tax, but only on companies of $1 billion or larger, per Manchin’s statement. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), who killed a corporate minimum tax provision of the Build Back Better reconciliation package, has since come out in favor of such a tax when applied to corporations making $1 billion or more in profits.

Some of the details in the plan are still murky: it’s unclear which drugs Medicare will be able to negotiate down, and the climate provisions are broad — the summary characterizes them as a “historic down payment” to “reduce carbon emissions by roughly 40 percent by 2030.”

Manchin, who personally and significantly profits off of the coal industry, included in his statement that this bill will not invest in renewables to the exclusion of fossil fuels.

Apparently Moscow Mitch was willing to kill The CHIPS bill (Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors) with fairly broad bipartisan support (passed the Senate 64-33) just to f*** over Democrats. Now he and other Republicans are whining that they weren't allowed to control the Democrats' agenda.

The Salt

On Wednesday, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) announced that they had reached a deal on a reconciliation bill to address climate change, drug pricing and corporate taxes, titled “The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.” And Republican senators are throwing a fit.

• Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) accused Manchin of pulling a “double cross” on Republicans Wednesday night during a Fox appearance.

• Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who had tried to bully Democrats away from this exact outcome by threatening to hold the bipartisan CHIPs Act hostage, griped on Twitter that Democrats “want to pile on giant tax hikes that will hammer workers and kill many thousands of American jobs” with the legislation.

• Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) complained about the “terrible deal,” saying, “I can’t believe that @sen_JoeManchin is agreeing to a massive tax increase in the name of climate change when our economy is in a recession.”

Josh Marshall believes there's no way that Manchin wasn't in on this.

In case you didn’t notice I wanted to draw your attention to one thing. While Senator Schumer and the White House were trying to revive some skinny version of the BBB and climate legislation with Joe Manchin Senator McConnell tried to scuttle those talks with a threat. He would pull GOP support from the China competition/CHIPs bill if the Democrats did not drop those negotiations. As it happened, Manchin scuttled the deal so the threat became moot. Then the CHIPs bill passed the Senate yesterday and then within like an hour – voila – the Manchin deal was back and somehow finalized. Senate Republicans were clearly pissed but the bill had already passed the Senate.

It certainly seems like Senate Democrats pulled a fast one on their Republican colleagues. As surprising as it may seem, it’s hard to see how Manchin wasn’t in on it at some level. House Republicans certainly seem to think so. They’ve now switched to whipping members to vote against the bill. Notwithstanding the fact that it actually has broad bipartisan support, as well as strong support from the semiconductor industry and the foreign policy and national security community. But the House isn’t the Senate. Democrats don’t need Republicans to break a filibuster. They probably don’t need Republicans at all. The question is whether enough House progressives will take the lead of Senator Bernie Sanders and vote against the bill as a giveaway to corporate America. But the administration seems to have members of the House Progressive Caucus broadly on board. Adding to the complexity and the fun, voting against the bill probably represents an electoral liability for Republicans in a number of key districts.

[LFC]

A group of former Democrats and Republicans are trying to create a new third party. Good luck to them.

A group of former Republican and Democratic officials are forming a new political party called Forward, in an attempt to appeal to what they call the "moderate, common-sense majority."

"Political extremism is ripping our nation apart, and the two major parties have failed to remedy the crisis," David Jolly, Christine Todd Whitman and Andrew Yang wrote in a Washington Post op-ed published Wednesday. "Today's outdated parties have failed by catering to the fringes. As a result, most Americans feel they aren't represented."

Jolly is a former Republican congressman from Florida, Whitman a former Republican governor of New Jersey and Yang is a former Democratic presidential and New York mayoral candidate. The three will merge their political organizations into the new party, whose launch was first reported by Reuters.

The group cites issues including guns, climate change and abortion as those that could benefit from a moderate approach. The new party will also advocate ranked-choice voting and open primaries, the end of gerrymandering, and nationwide protection for voting rights.

"Sixty-two percent of Americans now want a third party, a record high, because they can see that our leaders aren't getting it done," Yang told CNN's Brianna Keilar on "New Day" on Thursday in a joint appearance with Whitman. "And when you ask about the policy goals, the fact is the majority of Americans actually agree on really even divisive issues. The most divisive issues of the day like abortion or firearms -- there's actually a commonsense coalition position on these issues and just about every other issue under the sun."

Forward is planning a national convention next summer and will soon seek ballot access to run candidates in 2024, according to the Post op-ed.

[jackd]

The only issue worth discussing about a  third party is which of the existing parties will it hurt the most.

[LFC]

More on the Republican temper tantrum over being outmaneuvered. Moscow Mitch has pulled bait and switch plus various rule maneuvers so many times but once the Democrats put one on the board they show they're nothing but a bunch of whining children screech, "IT'S NOT FAAAIIIIRRRR!"

“I think that could be something you call ‘getting rolled,’” Sen. Mike Braun (R-IN) told The Daily Beast on Thursday.

“There had to be a little bit of trust. I guess, someone, it looks like they either misunderstood or it didn’t work out the way it should have.”

“It’s a sour taste,” Braun continued, “for some of us.”

The Senate GOP’s Oxford-educated dispenser of folksy wisdom, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA), was characteristically more blunt in an interview with Politico. “Looks to me like we got rinky-doo’d,” he said. “That’s a Louisiana word for ‘screwed.’”

To Democrats, the GOP meltdown is befuddling. Schumer and his caucus never made an agreement to give up on their plans for a party-line package in order to pass the high-tech manufacturing bill.

Democratic lawmakers questioned how they could have rolled Republicans on a deal they never actually cut.

“I literally have no idea what they're talking about,” said Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT). “Nobody in the Republican conference should be surprised that we want to pass legislation cutting drug prices and addressing climate change.”

But the timeline of events has a distinctly Machiavellian twist. To some Democrats, it smacked of something their longtime GOP tormentor in the Senate might have gladly pulled off.

And now in their childish fit of pique they're ready to hold veterans hostage because, well, of course they are.

Republicans, seemingly caught flat footed, decided to retaliate by opposing bills that many of them had previously supported. In June, for instance, nearly all Republicans voted to advance long-awaited legislation to expand health care benefits for veterans exposed to toxic substances on the job.

After Manchin released his statement on Wednesday announcing a deal, the Senate held a vote on final passage of that bill—and 41 GOP senators revolted, blocking the legislation at its final hurdle.

Democrats, along with veterans and their advocates, were left flabbergasted that Republicans—many of whom had already supported the bill—would vote down health care for servicemembers seemingly as a response to Democrats’ maneuvering.

“Republicans now are basically holding the veterans hostage because they're mad,” Manchin said on Thursday.

Schumer and the Democrats are finally playing by Moscow Mitch's rules and winning some battles. Obviously the Republicans don't like having their own rules used against them but that's just expected for a party that defines itself by its victimhood.

For McConnell, this week marks the second time in the last year that a characteristic hardball threat has seemingly backfired.

Last year, when Congress needed to raise the federal government’s borrowing authority—and avoid a catastrophic default—McConnell told Democrats they’d need to do it on their own, with 50 votes, rather than the customary 60.

When Democrats called his bluff, McConnell agreed to a two-month extension of the debt limit and promised no Republican help on the next round. But in December, he provided enough GOP votes to agree to a one-time exception to the filibuster, allowing Democrats to raise the debt limit on their own.

[LFC]

Jon Stewart had words for Senate Republicans who are gladly reversing themselves and allowing American military veterans to continue to suffer and die, from exposure to toxins that occurred in the line of duty, just to throw a political hissy fit. These people are evil. I don't give a f*** how they treat their spouses, kids, or dogs. Holding suffering vets hostage for political points is evil and evil is as evil does.

When lawmakers, military veterans, and their advocates gathered outside the U.S. Capitol on Thursday morning, they were supposed to be celebrating.

On Wednesday, the Senate teed up final passage of long-awaited legislation, called the Honoring Our PACT Act, to expand health care for veterans who were exposed to toxins in the line of duty.

The bill had previously garnered overwhelming bipartisan support and was expected to pass easily. But when it came to the floor, 41 GOP senators—many of whom voted to advance the bill once already—revolted, voting down the bill and blocking its passage.

The planned celebration had turned into a grieving, angry rally. And no one was more pissed off than Jon Stewart.

The comedian and former host of The Daily Show has long been an advocate for veterans, and played a key role in amplifying their fight to secure better health care to veterans sick and dying because of their exposure to toxins.

Speaking to press outside the Senate on Thursday, Stewart laced into Republicans for blocking the bill. “How are these people human?” Stewart asked. “Where's any sense of decency, from any of them?”

The fact that veterans and their families were anticipating a victory they’d worked to secure for so long, said an emotional Stewart, “makes the gut punch that much more devastating.”

Stewart saved particular venom for Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA)—who voiced the last-minute GOP reservations about a bill that many of them had already voted for—calling him a “coward.”

A leading supporter of the PACT Act, Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT), told The Daily Beast he didn’t know if Senate Republicans blocked the legislation in retaliation or to maintain some leverage. “If they did, it’s a stupid reason,” Tester said.

In a separate press conference, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), the key swing Democrat who brokered the deal with Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), was more blunt. “Republicans now are basically holding the veterans hostage because they're mad,” Manchin said.

A fuming Stewart said that veterans put their lives on the line to “defend [senators’] right to this fuckery.”

[LFC]

Sen. Susan Collins (R-MEh Concern Troll) went full metal plastic Gumby as she whined about Democrats doing the same type of maneuvering her side has done for years. She is SUCH a mealy-mouthed piece of shit. Bonus points for somehow believing that the she and her fascist colleagues who have been dismantling the ability to work together for decades should have been informed on the status of the Schumer-Machin discussions. W...T...F, Suzie?

U.S. Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) is under fire after threatening bipartisan support of legislation to protect same-sex marriage because Democrats were finally able to put together a historic tax and climate change bill – a huge win for Democrats, the Biden administration, and Americans.

“I just think the timing could not have been worse and it came totally out of the blue,” Senator Collins told HuffPost Thursday. The news outlet's Jonathan Nicholson reports her remarks were focused on "Senate Democrats’ unveiling of their bill to raise taxes on some companies, boost IRS enforcement and spend the resulting money to fund anti-climate change efforts."

HuffPost adds that "Collins warned that the manner in which that victory was secured, where it appeared Democrats kept Manchin and Schumer’s negotiations under wraps until a separate bipartisan computer chip production incentive bill was passed by the Senate, hurt the effort to gather support among Republicans to bring the gay marriage bill to the floor."

HuffPost Editorial Director and Washington Bureau Chief Amanda Terkel tweeted, "Susan Collins tells @jnicholsonindc that same-sex marriage bill may be doomed now bc of what Dems did on the inflation reduction bill."

Response to what many on social media saw as a threat from Collins was fast, with strong outrage and accusations of putting politics over morality and the lives of same-sex couples. "I love when our elected representatives admit that they vote based on spite. It makes government feel like family," sarcastically tweeted one social media user.

"Gay people shouldn't have rights because Democrats raised taxes on billionaires," said another, appearing to mock Collins.

Journalist Jeff Sharlet, author of the book and producer of the Netflix series "The Family," writes: "Shorter Susan Collins: you can be married or have a planet to live on. Pick one. Don’t be greedy."

This was a good one.

Referring to Sen. Collins, top DNC attorney Marc Elias warned, "If this is who you are trusting to pass Electoral Count Act Reform, I want you to introduce you to a girl named Lucy and her football."

There are many more reactions at the link. None are any kinder.

[LFC]

And that leaves Sinema. She's proven to be a real piece of shit in the past. I could see her doing another little dance and thumbs down like she did over raising the minimum wage just to get some press. I could also see her becoming a Republican if they retake the Senate. I don't think she has a principled bone in her body.

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), who jointly unveiled a deal on a reconciliation bill with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) last week, made a public pitch for fellow centrist Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ) to back the bill during a series of appearances on Sunday TV shows.

Sinema, who could potentially make or break the deal in the evenly-split Senate, has not issued public comments on it as she awaits the Senate parliamentarian to cut any non-budgetary items from the bill.

During his appearances on Sunday TV shows, Manchin said he was unsure whether Sinema would vote for the bill, but urged her to do so.

Sinema, who has stated her opposition to tax rate increases, previously killed a corporate minimum tax provision of the Build Back Better reconciliation package. The reconciliation deal that Manchin and Schumer announced last week would implement a 15 percent minimum corporate tax, but only on companies of $1 billion or larger. Sinema has since stated her support of such a tax when it comes to corporations making $1 billion or more in profits.

During an appearance on CNN, Manchin said Sinema is a “dear friend” of his and “has so much in this legislation.”

Manchin said Sinema “formed quite a bit” of the bill, pointing to a provision of the bill that gives Medicare the authority to negotiate the reduction of prescription drug prices.

“And I agree with her 100 percent in that we are not going to raise taxes and we won’t,” Manchin said. “When she looks at the bill and sees the whole spectrum of what we’re doing and all of the energy we’re bringing in all of the reduction of prices and fighting inflation by bringing prices down, by having more energy, hopefully, she will be positive about it. But she will make her decision. And I respect that.”

[LFC]

Jul 29, 2022 14:29:07 GMT LFC said:

A group of former Democrats and Republicans are trying to create a new third party. Good luck to them.

Andrew Yang already destroyed any chance that decent people would take the new Forward Party seriously in one event. I guess he should have looked at what the event is clearly about rather than how it's billed.

Former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang will speak Saturday about his new Forward Party and creating political coalitions at the 2022 FreedomFest in Las Vegas, which will feature far-right libertarians with ties to white nationalists and antisemites.

FreedomFest, which begins today, is a yearly festival that bills itself as “an open-minded environment” that is “independent, non-partisan, and not affiliated with any organization or think tank.” But the festival skews towards libertarians and other members of the liberty movement, portions of which belong to the extremist antigovernment movement. It is sponsored in part by Epik, a web hosting company that has provided services to neo-Nazi and white nationalist websites.

A group of antigovernment sheriffs who believe they have the power to ignore laws they deem unconstitutional is also expected to be there.

The conference was set to host white nationalist holocaust denier Nick Fuentes and air his short film “The Most Canceled Man in America.” Organizers booted Fuentes after taking a “deeper look” into his ideology, the Daily Beast reported.

Still, some libertarian speakers belonging to the Mises Caucus, a far-right group that won control of the Libertarian Party in May, associate with far-right figures. Dave Smith, a comedian and Mises Caucus member who now runs the party’s social media, is a featured speaker at FreedomFest. Smith and Fuentes have appeared on each other’s podcasts at least three times. Smith has called Fuentes a “fellow traveler.”

[LFC]

While the Republicans plans were the first true attempted coup in America it turns out the same kinds of people (right-wing backed by the wealthy who hated regulation) had planned a coup to oust FDR. Seems like the right has a history of accusing the left of trying to destroy democracy, only to turn around and try to destroy democracy. What a shock.

Donald Trump’s elaborate plot to overthrow the democratically elected president was neither impulsive nor uncoordinated, but straight out of the playbook of another American coup attempt – the 1933 “Wall Street putsch” against newly elected Franklin Delano Roosevelt.