US Politics, June 2018: This is a total goat rodeo.

McConnell told reporters that the nominee will be confirmed before this fall; Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) has said that historically it takes about two months on average from the time a president nominates a new justice to the time a Judiciary Committee hearing is held. What that means practically is the Senate is likely to have installed a firm conservative majority on the high court by the time voters go to the polls in November.

“The goal will be to get a conservative confirmed before the election,” said Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), the No. 4 GOP leader. “I’m delighted to see President Trump have another opportunity to appoint another Supreme Court justice. And I’m sure he’s going to appoint somebody just like Antonin Scalia and Neil Gorsuch.”

Whether Republicans can jam through another Scalia or Gorsuch remains to be seen. GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska are moderate on social issues and will have heavy sway in what’s sure to be a narrow vote. Murkowski declined requests for comment in a brief interview.

Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.) faces a difficult reelection in a swing state. And Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), who is retiring, said that he and other senators won’t “rubber stamp” a judge just because it’s a Republican nomination.

But Flake, like most in the GOP, expects the president to nominate someone far more conservative than Kennedy, a long-standing swing vote.

can't the nominee just lie their faces off to appease collins and murkowski anyway

well yeah, that's the deal

Today I'm thinking a lot of this quote from Andreas Malm in The Progress of This Storm, his book on climate & capital:

“Some on the left maintain that progressives should not stoke panic — they ought to be less ‘catastrophist’ and ‘apocalyptic’ — but if we accept the principles of climate realism and stay up to date with the science, the boot is entirely on the other foot. … Dare to feel the panic. Then choose between the two main options: commit to the most militant and unwavering opposition to this system, or sit watching as it all goes down the drain.”

for 'the principles of climate realism' perhaps substitute 'the history of ascendant fascism'

*sits*

Kennedy was an unprincipled simpleton and it was poisonous in its own way that everyone had to spend years and years inventing ways to discuss fundamental issues so as not to set him off, like the Twilight Zone kid

— Tom Scocca (@tomscocca) June 27, 2018

Are we supposed to take comfort in that or some gtfo

not comfortable with the terrorism hyperbole itt - this is a public forum guys

― an incoherent crustacean (MatthewK), Thursday, June 28, 2018 6:37 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Then leave.

― ian, Thursday, June 28, 2018 6:39 AM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This was really unnecessary, cmon guys. I know people are pissy but ILX is better than "if you dont like it leave" ffs.

I agree with Matthew. Speaking in what does come across as serious manner about terrorism and assassinations is NAGL. We've seen people have the feds on their doorstep for less on FB and such, just sayin.

Are we supposed to take comfort in that or some gtfo

calling someone stupid + pop culture reference = political insight

also great idea to burn down the suburbs, not like any voters live there

ah yes the suburban vote will bring us our socialist future

Thanks Trayce, that was the motivation behind my comment. I know people are angry and fully agree with the sentiment, I just think it's very unwise in the current climate to make jokes like that in a visible, traceable manner. "Then leave" is a shitty response to dissent.

To add to the conversation about Dems wanting to leave the country: please wait until after the next presidential before you decide that there is nothing left for you here.

I grew up in a suburb and now live in a suburb

I live in New York, my effect on the next presidential is exactly zero

You add to the popular vote total -- that's plenty.

because hillary's popular vote victory is pulling so much weight

Almost as much as Gore's!

just going to weigh in for a sec and say that, venting or not, talking about assassination is totally defensible rn and concern trolling about it is the fucking worst.

and yeah, if you don't like it, you can fucking leave! trust, you are not the one "dissenting"

I grew up in a suburb and now live in a suburb

― cr.ht (crüt), Wednesday, June 27, 2018 9:37 PM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

cool

In recent days we have heard shameless attacks on our courageous law enforcement officers. Extremist Democrat politicians have called for the complete elimination of ICE. Leftwing Activists are trying to block ICE officers from doing their jobs and publicly posting their...

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 28, 2018

...home addresses – putting these selfless public servants in harm’s way. These radical protesters want ANARCHY – but the only response they will find from our government is LAW AND ORDER!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 28, 2018

Somebody invite Trump to a Hot Dog Eating Contest next week, and the rest should take care of itself...

Oh, the horror

Sean Hannity just presented this agenda as a negative pic.twitter.com/mYoByIRyr5

— Andrew Lawrence (@ndrew_lawrence) June 28, 2018

I mean, really, at what point do viewers look at this and think some of these things aren't that bad?

Support seniors? You mean like 90% of the people who watch your show?

Seniors: "We support ourselves, thank you very much... except for <insert list of government programs> #MAGA!"

I live in New York, my effect on the next presidential is exactly zero.

You add to the popular vote total -- that's plenty.

idg the joke, as a similarly powerless NYer

map yr the worst bruh

concern trolling about it is the fucking worst

and yeah, if you don't like it, you can fucking leave!

Sweetheart, I've been here for 15 years, I'm not fucking going *anywhere*.

BTW: in my country, "if you dont like it, leave" is a racist dogwhistle said to immigrants.

"If you don't like it, leave" is going to be Trump's 2020 campaign slogan.

Next election, if you are in the suburbs, if you can take the day off from work, if you can convince your job to give people the day off or half a day, spend that time shuttling people to and from the polls. I would happily donate to gas funds. And then we can burn the suburbs down. We will probably need another thread for this eventually.

I mean, really, at what point do viewers look at this and think some of these things aren't that bad?

When you think that these things are going to be given to poor, probably non-white, people, and hard working whites like yourself are going to have to pay for them.

(I realise it was probably a rhetorical question)

^^^Yeah, people I know who have young kids, young kids who have disabilities are still against things like free education, healthcare. I've said this before but my brother who has a very young son who will need surgeries, leg braces, possibly a wheelchair his entire life is still against universal healthcare. He gets free Batman like gadgets from Children's Hospital donated (even though they could afford it) but he is fine taking that handout because "it's not from the government."

Y’all can mock Mathew K like a Narc, but Trump just tweeted about how doxxing ICE was on his radar. I suppose faith in due process and legal blindness prevails.

I also suppose most of you didn’t have the get go to fuck with a (rocks not neat) agent. So it must be nice to insult someone’s concern from a place you deem safe.

Doesn’t seem like that’s how lessons are going now, right? The neutralish rage of being barely online isn’t a moral good.

And being pissed at a someone asking for caution seems like the most pathetic fantasy at work

Next election, if you are in the suburbs, if you can take the day off from work, if you can convince your job to give people the day off or half a day, spend that time shuttling people to and from the polls. I would happily donate to gas funds. And then we can burn the suburbs down. We will probably need another thread for this eventually.

― Yerac, Thursday, June 28, 2018 8:58 AM (one hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

^^^^ this

I thought people not voting in 2016 was a pretty major factor still. Getting over apathy might help avoid anthe r 4 years of the current mess.

Also wondering if checking that one was on the voter register countermanded electronic attempts to oust people from being able to vote.
I mean if the current regime has done next to nothing to prevent further hacking, like.

13% of enrolled Dems voted in the Ocasio-Cortez primary

Samantha Bee has had a thing about this throughout the last year and a half. Apathy of Dems, who just hope that the next results will be better.
& I noticed taht michelle Wolf is going on about Dems not actually getting anything done whereas GOP is doing Evil.

Also, was just trying to work out if hacking had removed people who had checked once that they were actually on the electoral list. Like once you check once you're not going to go back and check again before the time you're actually in the polling station.
& if hacking is misalligning details in your electoral registry, making the attempt to vote invalid that could presumably happen between checking you're on and going to vote.

you guys' new friend Schmidt

Steve Schmidt attacks Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for ‘dishonest progressivism’ — and says it’s bad as ‘Trumpism’ https://t.co/WcdXEtsgki

— Raw Story (@RawStory) June 27, 2018

“And what Trump is doing is radicalizing American politics,” the conservative strategist continued. “And he is a beneficiary the more radical politics becomes. When it becomes a game of incitement between a far left who says everybody is going to have a government job, everybody is going to have daycare, everybody is going to have retirement, free schools, free college education — as we careen toward $30 trillion in debt.”

and of course the debt only counts when we’re talking about public benefit - trump’s tax cuts can add a staggering amount to the deficit and no-one in the gop blinks an eye

Granted everyone having a government job could be the military. Fuck it, I would be for mandatory military service if that gave people healthcare, a pension, free higher education etc. Tricare for everyone.

Her platform seems entirely reasonable, but people hate to share unless it's their head on the block.

I'm been teetering between my usual pessimism and cynicism and arguably worse things, like desperation and nihilism and fatalism. There are few reasons to be hopeful. At the same time, I sort of sometimes sense that feeling is itself, weirdly enough, a kind of luxury stemming from all the progress made more or less just over the span of my lifetime. Things feel desperate because we know what's at stake. We know what's at stake because we've overcome so much. When idiot was elected I had this conversation with a few people. In the '60s, we had MLK assassinated, Malcolm X assassinated, Kennedy and his brother assassinated, we were at unwinnable war (with a draft), racism was *legal*. And somehow things got better, even if we almost immediately got Nixon. And then soon after, Reagan. At the same time, it's disheartening to watch and listen to what is in essence the aggressive rejection and repudiation of decades of social progress. Just because those battles were mostly won does not make it heartbreaking to have to fight them all over again, for no reason at all beyond spite and ignorance and bad intentions and nihilism. There are all sorts of bad players in this, but I sometimes wonder if, similar to what I was babbling about above, some people really understand what's at stake, because they've spent their lives with much less at stake, thanks to progress in civil rights, labor rights, reproductive rights, economic rights, and so on, rights that have made their lives even slightly easier or better that they take for granted.

Anyway, I liked this thread:

I tweeted this earlier today but just going to say again: abolitionists lost every single SCOTUS case. every single one. John Brown failed. And chattel slavery is over now.

— Dr. T’Chanda Prescod-Weinstein🙅🏽‍♀️ 🇧🇧 (@IBJIYONGI) June 27, 2018

just a lotta bloodshed was needed

Yes, but at least people were willing to fight. I had this discussion with a friend yesterday, though: would people have mobilized in large, diverse numbers *without* the draft? The last years seems to indicate "yes," but I don't know what effect that has had so far.

My biggest worry, I realized last night, is that people who live in liberal-leaning states fight for their rights while those in conservative ones let their citizens die because, thanks to recent SCOTUS rulings and where we're going jurisprudentially, we're becoming an atomized country, reminiscent of the pre-New Deal and Progressive days: if you wanted redress, seek it from your state government because the fed can do nothing.

It will take a couple more severe shocks, at least, to get 60s-style/levels of mobilization going, I think. Society is much more atomized than before so it's tough. Kids in cages has upped the tension level; I shudder to think of what the next big trigger could be. (Roe v Wade getting overturned will be a big one but I suspect something else will happen sooner.) (xp!)