My theory is that democrats want to get this infrastructure deal off the table so that the Beltway media will begrudgingly give them points for genuflecting at the altar of bipartisanship. So, they don’t want to push too hard on HR 1 in the meantime so it doesn’t jeopardize the infrastructure deal. The optimistic side of me says that once that deal is brought over the finish line, they’ll push harder on voting rights.
At least, I hope that’s what their strategy is, because nothing else makes sense.
Why in the world did they give two senators to Rhode Island and Delaware at the time they were forming this great nation of ours, when they told New York and Pennsylvania and Ohio, hey, you only get two too?
The founding fathers gave 2 Senators to Ohio? Wasn't Ohio, like, not a state in 1789, much less 1787?
Yep. Manchin and Sinema should have offices in a sub basement of the Capitol and NO committee assignments at all as well as no budget for those offices and zero support for reelection.
Manchin’s attitude at least makes sense when you consider he’s from a super-red state that went with Biff by 30+ points. He has to talk about how much he loves bipartisanship or he’ll never get re-elected. Sinema is the one that baffles me. She’s in a swing state that is trending blue. All she’s doing is alienating the people she needs to get re-elected.
Dems are really bad at this U.S. Senate shit, and for that reason must deal with Joe Manchin, a guy who must swallow gallon after gallon of coal industry jizz to win statewide elections in West Virginia. Hell, we can't even get to a true 50-50 split. If one of the two Senate independents lost his goddamn mind and decided to caucus with the GQP, we'd be fucked even harder.
Democracy is fucked. Ours is, for sure. Has been since the Republicans stole the presidency in 2000.
And while democracies sometimes come back from an authoritarian takeover, an analysis of the last century of fascist regimes suggests that only about 20% of collapsed democracies can actually be revived: the descent into authoritarianism is apt to be permanent.
Even when a democracy struggles back, it must contend with enormous pressure from the forces that brought about its collapse in the first place (in our case, a coalition of fascist billionaires, grifting and power hungry operatives, white supremacists, woman-hating religious fanatics, and the Beltway ruling class including the owners, editors, and many of the reporters for most of the nation's prestige news outlets).
Behind closed doors, those who are not actively gloating and putting the champagne on ice are shaking their heads more in sorrow than in anger, and declaring that while it's unfortunate that democratic solutions didn't work out, perhaps it's time someone took a firm hand, and are you summering on the Cape again this year?
This is how it happened in Europe a century ago: while factions were battling each other in the streets, rich old men in opulent rooms played their winning hand.
The only interesting point that remains to be determined is whether we will end up with a Mussolini style fascism, a South African apartheid version, or whether the Republicans will feed their base with actual Nazi style policies of racial targeting, mass murder, expropriation, and of course, for us ladies, Kinder, Küche, Kirche, the other KKK.
Add the Kerry-Bush race. In precincts with manual, paper-based voting, John Kerry's lead was exactly what the exit polls said, while in computerized voting precincts, Kerry won the exit polls but Bush "won" the vote.In Obama's election, Anonymous discovered that the Republican secretary of state for Ohio was going to use computer software processing in another state to alter the vote totals and interrupted the plan. Obama won the state and the presidency. Carl Rove lost his shit on live TV when Obama carried Ohio. That wasn't supposed to happen.Republicans have been using dirty tricks since the fifties that I know of. Their computer trickery started in the 2000s. All the things they accuse the Democrats of are things they have done (projection). Unfortunately, the extreme vulnerability of computerinzed voting has been revealed and efforts made to prevent it, so they are going back to what they used in the fifties, sixties, seventies, and eighties, on steroids.
The fear of the original 13 states was that the most-populated and largest state, Virginia, would dominate the new government. Creating the Senate and giving each of the states two votes was to counter that fear. That worked to assuage their fears, which were legitimate. Two hundred plus years later, the consequences are starker and starker.
If the South had won, the slaves that were already revolting and escaping in droves would have fled to the rest of the union or Mexico. They were already leaving by any means possible. The South would be a basket case of a country and wouldn't be such a drag on the rest of the nation. I grew up and live in the old Confederacy and I wish Abraham Lincoln had just turned his back on it. Then we could have a decent nation. Instead, what we have experienced is the "southification" of our politics and nation.
My theory is that democrats want to get this infrastructure deal off the table so that the Beltway media will begrudgingly give them points for genuflecting at the altar of bipartisanship. So, they don’t want to push too hard on HR 1 in the meantime so it doesn’t jeopardize the infrastructure deal. The optimistic side of me says that once that deal is brought over the finish line, they’ll push harder on voting rights.
At least, I hope that’s what their strategy is, because nothing else makes sense.
Clyburn is the House whip. He has no ability to pressure senators.
Jesus wept, and so did I.
Why in the world did they give two senators to Rhode Island and Delaware at the time they were forming this great nation of ours, when they told New York and Pennsylvania and Ohio, hey, you only get two too?
The founding fathers gave 2 Senators to Ohio? Wasn't Ohio, like, not a state in 1789, much less 1787?
JAQ.
Yep. Manchin and Sinema should have offices in a sub basement of the Capitol and NO committee assignments at all as well as no budget for those offices and zero support for reelection.
Manchin’s attitude at least makes sense when you consider he’s from a super-red state that went with Biff by 30+ points. He has to talk about how much he loves bipartisanship or he’ll never get re-elected. Sinema is the one that baffles me. She’s in a swing state that is trending blue. All she’s doing is alienating the people she needs to get re-elected.
For Sinema, I would go with Histrionic Personality Disorder.
ha, stealing this one.
Dems are really bad at this U.S. Senate shit, and for that reason must deal with Joe Manchin, a guy who must swallow gallon after gallon of coal industry jizz to win statewide elections in West Virginia. Hell, we can't even get to a true 50-50 split. If one of the two Senate independents lost his goddamn mind and decided to caucus with the GQP, we'd be fucked even harder.
Democracy is fucked. Ours is, for sure. Has been since the Republicans stole the presidency in 2000.
And while democracies sometimes come back from an authoritarian takeover, an analysis of the last century of fascist regimes suggests that only about 20% of collapsed democracies can actually be revived: the descent into authoritarianism is apt to be permanent.
Even when a democracy struggles back, it must contend with enormous pressure from the forces that brought about its collapse in the first place (in our case, a coalition of fascist billionaires, grifting and power hungry operatives, white supremacists, woman-hating religious fanatics, and the Beltway ruling class including the owners, editors, and many of the reporters for most of the nation's prestige news outlets).
Behind closed doors, those who are not actively gloating and putting the champagne on ice are shaking their heads more in sorrow than in anger, and declaring that while it's unfortunate that democratic solutions didn't work out, perhaps it's time someone took a firm hand, and are you summering on the Cape again this year?
This is how it happened in Europe a century ago: while factions were battling each other in the streets, rich old men in opulent rooms played their winning hand.
The only interesting point that remains to be determined is whether we will end up with a Mussolini style fascism, a South African apartheid version, or whether the Republicans will feed their base with actual Nazi style policies of racial targeting, mass murder, expropriation, and of course, for us ladies, Kinder, Küche, Kirche, the other KKK.
That's exactly backwards. "Reporters" just report what happened. Who said what to who. "Stenographers", as we distainfully refer to them.
Journalists ask hard questions, press for answers, do analysis. We need good old-fashioned journalists.
Add the Kerry-Bush race. In precincts with manual, paper-based voting, John Kerry's lead was exactly what the exit polls said, while in computerized voting precincts, Kerry won the exit polls but Bush "won" the vote.In Obama's election, Anonymous discovered that the Republican secretary of state for Ohio was going to use computer software processing in another state to alter the vote totals and interrupted the plan. Obama won the state and the presidency. Carl Rove lost his shit on live TV when Obama carried Ohio. That wasn't supposed to happen.Republicans have been using dirty tricks since the fifties that I know of. Their computer trickery started in the 2000s. All the things they accuse the Democrats of are things they have done (projection). Unfortunately, the extreme vulnerability of computerinzed voting has been revealed and efforts made to prevent it, so they are going back to what they used in the fifties, sixties, seventies, and eighties, on steroids.
The fear of the original 13 states was that the most-populated and largest state, Virginia, would dominate the new government. Creating the Senate and giving each of the states two votes was to counter that fear. That worked to assuage their fears, which were legitimate. Two hundred plus years later, the consequences are starker and starker.
If the South had won, the slaves that were already revolting and escaping in droves would have fled to the rest of the union or Mexico. They were already leaving by any means possible. The South would be a basket case of a country and wouldn't be such a drag on the rest of the nation. I grew up and live in the old Confederacy and I wish Abraham Lincoln had just turned his back on it. Then we could have a decent nation. Instead, what we have experienced is the "southification" of our politics and nation.
Well shit. I stand corrected today. Again.
I was wrong. Make that Dick Durbin, of Illinois. Corrected.