That was the plan all along.

For 8 years of Obama, the Dems tried to reach out and compromise. They negotiated against themselves and took less than they wanted in order to reach out in a real bipartisan way.

And they got called radical and socialist and partisan and overly political.

So, having learned that no matter what they do, the GOP will call them radical (and the media will dutifully repeat the line), the Dems have (it seems) decided to start doing what they think will result in the best policy outcomes.

The GOP brought this on themselves. They have somehow managed to make the Democrats--the Democrats--into semi-competent politicians.

Had they been willing to throw the Black President half of a bone now and then, they'd have the Dems as the GOP-lite party. But they couldn't even do that.

The GOP is now saying they won't support a debt limit increase.

Nobody should be supporting a debt limit increase without immediately cutting the deficit.

We should get rid of the debt limit.

If we don't want debt, we should tax more and spend less.

Requiring a post-hoc vote to raise the limit *after* we've cut taxes and increased spending does nothing to raise taxes or decrease spending. It just makes our bonds slightly more risky. Which ends up increasing the deficit by increasing the cost of borrowing.

If you're putting Gym Jordan on a panel, you aren't taking the process serious in the first place.

This is the guy that smashed the window Ashli Babbitt tried to climb through. Still insane he didn't get a felony murder charge but not surprising based on his skin color.

This is the 2nd defendant this week to disrupt proceedings

Alam just told prosecutor, "Can I get an offer?"

Judge warns him to stop talking again

Alam responds again, "I'm talking for myself. (My lawyer) is not talking for me.." Tells judge, "I don't take your advice"

— Scott MacFarlane (@MacFarlaneNews) July 21, 2021

Pretty sure that has more to do with what they think they can reasonably secure conviction on, it's not always about skin color. But, yeah, he is a douchebag and deserves pretty much the maximum of whatever he gets charged with and should be held in contempt.

The level of privilege these people think they are entitled to is staggering. Saying the prosecutor isn't doing her job by not offering a deal. Unreal.

Yeah, this guy is broken and will always be a menace, he learned absolutely nothing from this.

I think this is all spot on. No matter who the Democrats line up, whether Biden or Bernie or Marx or they will be labeled a communist, socialist, and Antifa (still not sure why being anti-fascist is seen a bad thing, but here we are). The Democrats best pathway to retaining and growing their majority and their value is to demonstrate that government can still function. Today's Republicans seem like their top priority is to break the government so that they can say that the government is dysfunctional and does not work. I think Sherrod Brown, a few months ago, said that the best way to regain the goodwill of the people is to govern well. Most of the Republicans currently in power are not interested in seeing that happen right now.

They use felony murder charges all the time when someone dies during a crime. Store owner shoots a robber and the getaway driver gets charged with felony murder.

This guy was literally breaking the window and helping her through it when she was killed. There is no better example of felony murder than what took place.

Like I said, felony murder is only used against certain criminals.

I think this is an interesting article on that subject.

Felony Murder and the Storming of the Capitol - Lawfare

https://mobile.twitter.com/RealCanda...86513651568648

They always come this close, then apparently their system reboots.

I know how it works my friend, but they also as a practice won't apply a charge that likely won't stick regardless of what the criminal looks like, you can't broad brush everything, it doesn't represent the full picture. He broke the window, but it would be hard to tie her actions, in trying to enter, to what he did. Again, the guy is a POS and hopefully gets every years of his 40 year max sentence after his behavior, but I really doubt they would have gotten felony murder to stick.

OK Boomer...That mindset was jettisoned in the 80's, it's just that the world didn't realize it yet and only kept it around to sound smart. That argument also lost any sort of validity the moment that the previous congress and administration passed that tax overhaul that gave away a trillion a year in good times. We saw the economy collapse and the only out was more spending. It only amplified the concept as stated above, that deficits don't matter and won't ever again.


Just wait until the next trump-like president blanket pardons every. single. one.

Talk to me when the filibuster is altered in such a way they actually DO something.

Ok Dick Cheney. Deficits don't matter. Runaway debt never hurt any government, ever. And if the last administration increased the deficit then it was good policy right? Because that's the one thing everyone associates with the Trump Presidency, that they had good policy right?

You're arguing against the bipartisan decisions of the US government for the last 40 years. Arguably, the shit went from eh, we can manage, to fuck it and forget it, but still, it's the policy of the country. No other country is comparable in that regard to the US, because no other country is as successful as the US economically past or present and therefore comparisons are somewhat moot.

No, the debt limit should be automatically increased depending on the yearly budget. Deficit fights should take place then, not when the country is voting on whether or not to pay the bills.

And can you tell me exactly what the deep cratering of the US economy (much less the world's) would do to help the deficit once the US doesn't pass the debt ceiling increase and defaults on its debts?

Sorry but this is horseshit. The federal government goes with heavy handed charges all the time. People who were merely in the vicinity of people causing trouble during the inauguration faced 60 years in prison.

J20 protests: All you need to know about the nearly 200 people facing 60 years in jail for protesting Trump | The Independent | The Independent

If these were Muslims or black protestors, not only would a lot of them be dead, but every person who stepped into the Capitol would have been charged with felony murder.

The DOJ went soft on these people, including the organizers who have not faced any legal consequences. Five people died, others were injured, millions in damages, and pipebombs found. Next to no serious charges filed and I doubt any suspects see more than a couple years behind bars.

You don't have to go back far to see the disparity.

America's protest crackdown: five months after George Floyd, hundreds face trials and prison | Arizona | The Guardian

Imagine a Muslim man violently stormed the Capitol, had extremist views on social media, a pipebomb in his residence, and ordered over 30 guns AFTER being arrested and is still out on bond. The dude would be at Guantanamo.

FBI Found IED Components in Thomas Robertson's Home: Report

Remarkable:

Texas Republicans are pushing for an audit of 2020 votes -- but only in the biggest counties.

Its chief sponsor, asked why the audit doesn't include smaller counties, actually says this:

"What's the point? All the small counties are red.”https://t.co/QFGWVy5X0l pic.twitter.com/FxxBn5B1wj

— Greg Sargent (@ThePlumLineGS) July 23, 2021

He said the loud thing out loud.

Can you really say the blatantly obvious, in an anymore blatantly obvious fashion? They don't care about election integrity, it's about subverting democracy for power.

Every county in Oklahoma went red and some in the Senate there are pushing for an audit.

Will be very interesting to see if he just runs off to the Middle East.

https://www.cnn.com/2021/07/23/polit...ing/index.html

Someone with enough resources to secure a 5 million bond payment is definitely worthy of being considered a flight risk.

Barrack had to put up $250 million! I'd say that's enough to keep you in the country, but the guy is 74 facing prison for the rest of his life. Plus he's worth over a billion and has made a lot of friends in the Middle East. I'd be shocked if he didn't bolt.

Sort of sounds like Gaetz might skate.

Gaetz case takes bizarre tabloid turn

Sounds like somebody got the expected payoff, that fucker is such a slimeball

It appears that we have an opportunity to turn the tide on the Trump-related anti-vaxxers (although personally I think too many of them are too far gone to budge from their positions), but looking back, it still amazes me that knowing what another shutdown would do to the economy, the GOP play wasn't to simply declare victory for Trump on the vaccine and urge everyone to get it.

I guess the "do the opposite of what your sworn enemy wants" urge was too hard to resist, since the only policy positions the GOP run on now are outrage at what the other side wants, guns, abortion, and white culture.

It used to be conservatism is the opposite of liberalism, updated daily. Now I think the updates are hourly.

The crazy thing is, in an alternate universe where Trump actually wins the election, I think he continues pushing the vaccine - if for no other reason than he can claim total credit for the entire thing if it's successful. And judging by the way his administration handled pandemic funding, not only would his followers have willingly gotten the vaccine, they probably would have been first in line when they prioritized the red states over blue states. Instead, here we are now on the brink of another masked up fall as school and flu season begins.

The theory I heard is that b/c Trump's initial approach was "the virus isn't that bad," the GOP was committed to that approach throughout the campaign.

That never made sense to me. It isn't like the the truth has stopped them before. I would have expected a "We've always been at war with Eastasia" pivot along the lines of "Trump has always been committed to stopping the China Virus. It's the Democrats who want to keep everyone sick." followed by a huge "Real MAGAs wear Masks!" campaign.

He'd be President Trump right now if they'd made that play. I'd love to be the fly on the wall to understand why they never did.

You have a good point there.

His followers are going to go along with anything he says or does. So, why not go with what gets you the most support?

I am dumbfounded by this BS where they're against the vaccine just because it would be perceived as a Biden victory. You push the vaccine, claiming it is because of you that it happened and beat him somewhere else if you have to.

Because they know if they push the vaccine and we get to herd immunity it is a Biden win and a big one. The economy would get rolling again, jobs would be up, schools open, people can go see grandma for Xmas, etc....

They need to keep this rolling through 2022 to try and make Biden look as bad as possible. It is a hail mary but it is really all they have. Other than some verbal miscues, CRT, transgenders in sports, and faux outrage about the border they have nothing to pin on Biden.

You guys know this, but that is just plain stupid.

Trump took credit for the vaccine being created as quickly as it did. So, keep taking credit for it. More people will be on board and support you than what you have now.

This is why I try really hard not to pay attention to politics. This shit is maddening.

Back to not paying attention...

Literally 40% of voters choose their platform to be whatever FOX News, OAN, etc...tells them to be angry about that day. Lately it is Bidens gestapo going door to door holding people down and injecting them.

Honestly, Trump could have one press conference where he claimed credit for the vaccines, reminded everyone that he got it on day one, and told all his followers to get it today. Then when the rates went way up, he could point to that graph and say (somewhat truthfully) "I did more to make the numbers go up in five minutes than Biden could do in the last three months".

I've given up on the Trump-ified GOP ever doing anything for any reason beyond grievance and his ego and owning the libs, but this checks all those boxes. It's right there for them.

He should also, just to keep his sycophants scared, pick a random GOP pol or pundit who is anti-vax and call him out individually. "Look at this guy? He's worse than the Democrat politicians! He's trying to get you killed! Why is he against my vaccine?" Every GOP pol and media member would become the most pro-vaccine people imaginable.

Yep. And he'd tie the media into pretzels trying to find some anti-Trump angle on the whole thing ("He should have done this sooner!"), which then plays right into his hands about the media witch hunt against him even when he does something good. It's win-win.

There is definitely a cultish vibe with Trump and his minions, but I don't know if he has that kind of pull. Part of his allure is he has a "populist" message with them. He tears the mask off and makes it acceptable to be a racist, criminal, and sex pest.

The vaccine is now part of the culture war and there is not much he can say or do to change that. And if anything, I think it would hurt his support if he came out with different messaging on vaccines.

These are people who craved validation on their previously held beliefs. He gives it to them. The minute he stops, he loses control over them.

I should add that it is a problem all Republicans have now. The messaging they need to win elections is not popular with their base. That's why they've made such a dramatic shift toward an autocratic government.

So the pivot is complete - Trump bore some responsibility for January 6th, to nothing happened on January 6th, to Pelosi is responsible for what happened on January 6th. Meanwhile, no one who supports these people questions the inconsistency or shifting of these positions. It's like the virus/vaccine thing, all over again - the virus is a hoax or overblown but Trump deserves all the credit for getting us a vaccine so fast that I won't take because the virus is a hoax or overblown and it's Biden's fault Trump supporters won't get the vaccine.

Tyler Perry is involved in the conspiracy! I should have known.

the new Trump diehard theory is that Joe Biden was repelled from entering 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue by "the military" on inauguration day and has been living in an 80% replica scale model of the White House on Tyler Perry's Atlanta estate. pic.twitter.com/uK7QUFRInl

— K. Thor Jensen (@kthorjensen) July 26, 2021

I really don't get this theory. It's been going around for months. They think Biden is the pretend president and Trump is the real president while at the same time blaming the fake Biden administration for all the bad things such as the door to door forced injections.

Cults can have an immense impact on people. No clue how they get so entrenched but it happens. I think Q is popular because it plays to their authoritarian desires and can be changed on a whim to fit whatever narrative they want to tell.

This is so depressing.

I’m a Parkland Shooting Survivor. QAnon Convinced My Dad It Was All a Hoax.

K. Thor Jensen.....now that is a name I haven't heard in a long time.

This is the real truth

I also heard that the inside of the White house has been redesigned to match Mar-A-Lago and Trump is pretending to be a former President, while still living in the White House and signing Joe Biden's signature to everything.

— Fast Eddie C (@ChiltonEddie) July 27, 2021

This stuff just boggles the mind...

It just makes you realize how many stupid people there are in the world.

Also kind of fucked up that their ideal country is one where a dictator ushers dissidents away to be tried by the military and executed in secret. We can call them crazy for believing this stuff but also remember they are ardent fascists.

I just want to go on record with how much respect I have for Adam Kinzinger. I couldn't give 2 fucks about the R or D after his name, because he has respect for his duties, respect for the constitution and puts what is right over his political ambitions. Can't say that about more than a handful of republicans right now and plenty of democrats can wear that badge of dishonor too.

Totally agree on Kinzinger. I keep hoping one day the lights will come on and he'll appreciated for the patriot he is. I'm not understanding why this is such a hard road to go down for more R's. I get it, you may lose your job, but for God's sake having some principles and being able to look at yourself in the mirror used to mean something.

He must have led a hell of a clean life or they would have destroyed him by now.

I don't know what ambitions Kinzinger has, but I'm sure Liz Cheney wants to be the President. It looks like a longshot, but placing yourself as the one voice of courage and truth isn't a bad play if you aren't ever going to go full MAGA.

That was my thought-she wants to be the leader of whatever emerges from the wreck of the Republican Party

It didn't work out too well for Justin Amash, among a few other examples - i.e. the rash of Republican politicians who have retired from public life rather than continue in the current environment. People know what's going to happen to them if they don't buy what Trump is selling.


If it doesn't mean something to the electorate (and it means very little to them, clearly) then it won't mean much to their representatives. I wish it wasn't that way, but that's the way it is.

But Trump will be dead within ten years. There's nobody else that has the magic of Trump, so I think someone like Cheney is patient and positioning herself for whatever comes next.

Eh, the damage is done. Trump proves you can tap into half this country's baser desires and win, and if you don't win, you can destroy it out of spite.

I think it's broader than that. It seems now that you can do/say almost anything and as long as you have the imprimatur of one of the two parties, a solid 45% of the country is going to vote for you no matter what. As this plays out long enough into the future, I don't think it is really going to matter what the positions are, or what side they are on.

The argument is you need to either go full MAGA or fully anti-MAGA. Maybe MAGA never dies, even in a post-Trump world. But just in case it does, people who were fully anti-MAGA will be set up for success.

An example is someone like Marco Rubio. He is currently seen as too MAGA by the anti-Trumpers and not MAGA enough by the Trumpers. He's screwed either way, whereas the Cheneys and Kinzingers at least have a chance.

This. You don't want to be neutered and humiliated like George P. Bush. If you aren't full MAGA, pick a different lane and lead that. It may not work, but being half MAGA won't work either.

I do wonder if someday their will be a "cult of personality" figure that comes out of the Democratic side. Someone that fully takes the mantle of the far left, but then really just twists it into his or her own populist thing. It hard for me to imagine, but I can't say that it could never happen. Heck, I would really love a super charismatic person to take up the Democratic mantle, though that does run it's own risks.

The right tried to make Obama seem like that, but Bernie was probably the closest but is actually genuine his beliefs.

It would be tough because the entire establishment would be against it. Not just other politicians in the Democratic Party, but the mainstream media, and incredibly wealthy donors who control most of the country.

Obama was the closest to a figure on the left that had a cult of personality going. But he was also a moderate and didn't really alter politics that much.

Bernie has a following but the media hates him, his party hates him, and their donors hate him. It's an uphill battle.

Also like how Bernie's policies are "far left" when they're mostly in line with the first world. We're the extremists in politics from a global perspective.

There's a well-documented difference in the tolerance for authoritarianism between the left and right in the U.S. It's much more likely for the right to follow a Trump because there's already a desire to follow a strong leader among people with a conservative ideology. (Yes, not every conservative...)

I mean, Bill Clinton became the figurehead for progressives & Democrats (at least in the right's mind) for like a quarter of a century despite his conservative fiscal policies, sweeping de-regulation of corporations, and truly oppressive criminal & prison policies, all of which we are still suffering from directly.

And the media and establishment loved Trump?

Bernie doesn't have the wide-spread charisma needed to pull it off. I would think for it to be someone from the left, they would to be young, dynamic, and well educated. JFK with Bernie like positions. Then they would have to turn true Soviet-style communist once they gain power and popularity to be a Trump level danger. I don't think an open lefty authoritarian (a Casto-esqe figure) could win an election. They would have to come into power and then make the turn.

In their fictional definition of the world, but he was never as unwaveringly popular among Democrats as Trump is with his crowd.

It's not half, it's not even a plurality. It's a whiny little minority that demands to be placated and doesn't believe they can ever lose, or that they should.

The more I think about it...I would think that the only place a true left wing demagogue could come from is just not very likely: Organized Labor.
A true labor movement would have the broadest appeal across racial demographics, but there isn't really a strong labor movement in this country. The GOP have done a good job destroying organize labor since the 80's. Most of the people in any labor movement have already moved to Trump and are scapegoating brown people.

The people who vote for Trump aren't consuming mainstream media. They're watching Fox News, Newsmax, OAN and gathering other information from Facebook. The entire party is built around the idea that you can't trust any media that isn't far-right and constantly fawning praise on them. It works incredibly well to shelter them from criticism.

Outside of a couple popular podcasts and some Twitter accounts, progressives don't have that kind of apparatus at their back. Any momentum they have to disrupt the establishment is going to see massive pushback from their own party.

Maybe that changes down the road, but as long as the wealthy call the shots in politics, it's going to be next to impossible for progressives to build a large coalition with the public and stand a chance in major elections.

Democrats did a pretty good job of destroying labor support for themselves too. That's why a lot jumped to the Republicans. Biden seems like he wants to change that, but he's only go as far as he can without upsetting those who pay the bills.

A movement like this would also come from outside media, and would chiefly be online. As it the, the most progressive demographic is under 30, which largely doesn't follow mainstream media now. I think you over estimate the power of mainstream news.

I will add, it isn't unthinkable that a far-left movement would mostly be funded by small money donors (look at what Bernie did) along with a couple of tech billionaires providing media infrastructure.

No shocker here, but he should have said gone with Q Congressmen instead.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/07/30/trum...ttee-says.html

Not a good day in Trump world-Justice Dept orders Treasury Dept to turn over Trump tax returns to the House Ways and Means Committee after subpening them nearly 3 yrs ago.

and we have learned by now none of this will matter. It will be fake news or deep state, etc...

The people who need to understand how corrupt he is never will because there is always a built in excuse.

These people are dangerously crazy. https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_6...impression=tru

Sent from my SM-G996U using Tapatalk

At what point does this cross into treason?

I think that bridge has long been crossed, it's like 1861 all over again.

I'm going to mark my place on near Bull Run with a MyPillow for when the shooting starts.

It's weird watching history happen in real time. Like you read about it in books and are like "how did this happen?" "How were people so blind or stupid?" "How did people not know this was going to end badly?"

SI

I finished season 2 of Narcos Mexico and while I lived thorough the Mexican elections that were covered there in the 80's I didn't remember what had happened. The similarities (or attempted) were astounding.

There was concern that when the returns for Mexico City came in and showed the underdog winning, that it would embolden the rural areas to vote and would undermine the PRI candidate (who was the preferred in this case). So they rigged the system to show the PRI candidate winning in Mexico City and when the PRI candidate had a strong showing it suppressed the turnout of the rural areas as they succumbed to the idea that their vote wasn't going to matter and nothing would change.

The other part of that was to declare victory prematurely (once the early returns showed that they were winning). Then contest any further results. Claim corruption (if they ended up winning and say your opponents for cheated.

Sound familiar?

crap...does that mean we have to memorize a lot of dumb generals and battlesite info?

No, we will just name Army bases after them in 60 years ;)

It's okay, Republicans will just rewrite history anyway

We can all relax. Nobody's having a civil war. Nobody cares enough. A whole bunch of people are going to say a whole lot of nonsense, and meanwhile President Biden will continue on with his administration.

While it is highly unlikely there will be a civil war in the traditional sense your nuts if you think this doesn't greatly weaken us on an international level. There is also no end in sight to the erosion of democracy and the mistrust in our elections that has been completely fabricated.

Maybe I am an alarmist, but I think it is amazingly naïve of anyone to think our democracy isn't facing the biggest test since the actual civil war.

"And today, kids, turn to page 65 in our Pearson Official History Books. We're going to talk about when General Motors beat General Mills at the battle of Abilene, on the PepsiCo Battlefield."

SI

My comments are embellished since it is mostly just a whole lot of bluster, but as Lathum says, it shows great cracks in our democracy and does weaken us globally. Russia and China are already exploiting that and it is only going to get worse short term. At least until we get to a point where the extremes on both sides, and the cult of Trump are marginalized.

And while nothing full scale will happen, we have still seen almost as much domestic terrorism since 2010 as we had experienced prior to that year going all the way back to the late 1840's. And the ease in which hates groups and the lunatic fringe can connect online is the reason why and that isn't changing anytime soon.

Some of these people are out there purposely sowing discontent because they know there are a whole bunch of people out there that are easy to manipulate, and they don't give a fuck about the consequences of their actions.

Vermont—Dem stronghold and with through the roof vax rates—has a GOP governor.

In any sane world, he’d be the GOP front runner for president.

He's pro-choice.

I do wonder what a SCOTUS ruling allowing states to outlaw abortion doe to national politics. Will it help or hurt guys like Scott, Baker, and Christie?

hell republicans STILL get abortions....they just do so while cussing out the doctors giving the abortions and scream at them they are going to hell.

Not making this up either.

Seeing it a lot in the news about Trump and his PACs raising millions and not spending money on what they were set up for.

Is this a common political tactic that Trump is getting attention for because it is him or is this him being him?

Yes to both. It's common but Trump also cares less if people know he's doing it.

You're not wrong, but I think that this was building for decades and going back to what I said at election time, I don't view this as us being stable and then tumbling off a cliff. It's more, we've been heading towards circling the drain for a number of decades and the cracks are just now real obvious since we reached a tipping point.

I also think it's bigger than the US. Extremism is on the rise in many 'western' nations. Trump came along at the right ... or rather wrong ... time to make it more obvious and blatant here, but we're not alone in the problems we're having. The world will look much different in the Age of China. What exactly that entails I don't know, but 'democracy' as it was known in the second half of the 20th century probably doesn't come along for the ride.

There were enough people talking about civil war, and I often can't tell the difference between hyperbole and seriousness around here, so I wasn't certain people weren't thinking it was going to literally happen.