Enough With The Cutesy Titles, People Are Dead: US Politics January 2021 pt 2

for a lot of affluent straight white males, hitting bottom with alcoholism is really their only chance of ever growing or changing as people

I mean, when society in its entirety has been molded to cater exclusively to you, where's the impetus?

Alpha House is a TV show from 2013, this video is ancient

― fbclid=fhAZ3l (f. hazel), Thursday, January 28, 2021 11:52 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

The CNN reporter dropping the word "metrosexual" makes it seem even older

Go big, Chuck!

But many Democrats say privately that they see little hope of attracting the 10 Republican votes they would need to overcome a filibuster and avoid using the budget reconciliation process to advance the bill unless they significantly scale back Mr. Biden’s ambitions.

Haunted by what Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the majority leader, referred to as the “mistake” of 2009, when the Democratic Party was in control of both chambers and the White House but was “too timid and constrained in its response to the global financial crisis,” top Democrats are pushing to avoid settling for a small package.

“If our Republican colleagues decide to oppose this urgent and necessary legislation, we will have to move forward without them,” Mr. Schumer said, adding that he planned to press ahead with a budget resolution as early as next week.

did he get a spine implant?

He really, really doesn't want to fight for his political life down the line is my assumption.

or his literal life

good news

Interesting breakdown on how the cases against the capitol invaders are shaping up

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/the-federal-case-against-the-capitol-insurrectionists-is-becoming-much-clearer

Think we should have the offenders for dinner.

And by that i mean we should actually eat them

And if Schumer fails us, feed him to them.

Helluvan ecosystem that

I'm gonna regret saying this but I'm actually kind of...optimistic about what Schumer and Biden are doing so far?

like what i'm hearing but i've been hurt too many times

it's quite possible that they'll manage to put together an ambitious package through reconciliation, it's also quite possible that nothing else ambitious will happen beyond that.

hmmmm yes

At least most of the harm has been paused it seems.
So at least first do no harm seems to be happening which is a step forward from waiting for the other boot to drop and finding that the person upstairs has more feet than you expected

President Biden is asked if he supports using reconciliation to pass covid relief. “I support passing covid relief with support from Republicans if we can get it. But the covid relief has to pass. No ifs, ands or buts,” he says. pic.twitter.com/3IOgmkrTme

— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) January 29, 2021

Holy crap, his clothes fit.

Good! Honestly aren't the GOP being a bit dense on this one? It passes either way, they have the chance to at least take some of the credit.

It's such a small thing, but I'm so happy to see him photographed in a mask so often already.

my prediction: mcconnell will force the democrats to use the reconciliation path for covid relief in order to test how well the public responds to the usual feigned outrage that the republicans weren't allowed to weaken it and water it down and therefore it is a travesty of democracy!!!!

if it polls well in the right states, he'll goad the democrats into nuking the filibuster and then go full bore on outrage over republican exclusion, "silencing" and "censorship" as the big election issue for 2022. if it polls badly enough, he may cooperate a bit more in order to win some bipartisan brownie points, but still do as much as he can get away with to sink or ruin every democratic initiative.

nuke the GOP imo

sounds good. how?

p sure outrage over republican exclusion, "silencing" and "censorship" are all dead letters electorally if they're up against "massive and effective COVID response and even more massive economic recovery act" but i agree with you that Mitch will probably try it anyway, there are plenty of talking heads and editorialists ready to parrot the story ad nauseum

It's such a small thing, but I'm so happy to see him photographed in a mask so often already.

― soaring skrrrtpeggios (jon /via/ chi 2.0), F

^^^ I can't explain some of my mild happiness when I see Biden on TV, and I realized: he takes fucking masks seriously.

he takes fucking masks seriously.

eyeswideshut.jpg

The $1.9 trillion package Biden proposed is pretty modest in reality, compared to the size of the problems, and the results it is able to produce my fail to impress the ordinary public, who will judge the administration according to the most basic "do I feel good about everything now?" standard. I doubt mediocrities like Manchin and Sinema would buy into a $4.5 triilion package, so this is what we'll get.

lol crut

do I feel good about everything now?" standard

it really is as simple as giving. people. money.

taxing rich fucks and giving people money is an insanely popular thing the democrats have never tried

my prediction: mcconnell will force the democrats to use the reconciliation path for covid relief in order to test how well the public responds to the usual feigned outrage that the republicans weren't allowed to weaken it and water it down and therefore it is a travesty of democracy!!!!

i think even he realizes that maybe 1 voter in 1000 gives a shit about procedural issues. there is no need to test this empirically.

The truth is that since '16, down-ballot Rs have struggled the most when Trump is *not* on the ballot ('18 blue wave, GA runoffs, etc.) From a raw political perspective, there's little incentive to "move beyond" him.

— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) January 29, 2021

this is extremely true and a reason to be maybe a little bit optimistic that the democrats will cling on in 22.

otm

it really is as simple as giving. people. money.

The $1.9 trillion package does some of this, but not to a level that will really move people's emotional needle out of the crisis zone. bleh.

One immediate problem is that the membership of Congress will remain static until 2022 and as far as anyone can tell, yet, the margins favor the center-right and continued timidity. The one gleam of light is that those margins are very slim and possibly external pressures could move a few votes over the threshold. At least the Democrats now control the Senate floor and can bring House-passed bills to a Senate vote.

The other immediate problem is that, once again, a Republican regime has created a huge mess of crisis proportions for a Democratic regime to try to clean up and that effort will absorb immense amounts of time and attention from institutions that have become nearly crippled or paralyzed.

yeah. nuke the GOP. identify their crimes and prosecute the criminals. asap.

"... when Trump is *not* on the ballot..."

I think they can still write him in on the "Patriot Party" ticket, yeah? Don't worry about any other contests, just write in TRUMP!, that's my advice to the faithful

I'm gonna regret saying this but I'm actually kind of...optimistic about what Schumer and Biden are doing so far?

― frogbs, Friday, January 29, 2021 12:58 PM (three hours ago) bookmarkflaglink

I am cautiously optimistic as well, there could have been a lot more fuckups or backpedaling by now

this is extremely true and a reason to be maybe a little bit optimistic that the democrats will cling on in 22.

I guess 2022 will be a good day to die.

my prediction: mcconnell will force the democrats to use the reconciliation path for covid relief in order to test how well the public responds to the usual feigned outrage that the republicans weren't allowed to weaken it and water it down and therefore it is a travesty of democracy!!!!
i think even he realizes that maybe 1 voter in 1000 gives a shit about procedural issues. there is no need to test this empirically.

― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Friday, January 29, 2021 3:02 PM (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

god yeah the senate esp the older ones are so up their own butt about the grand institution and literally everyone thinks they are fuckheads and no one cares

These senate rules are infuriating. If nothing ever gets passed with the defined majority, and filibusters and reconciliation are now the norm, why not just fucking make everything pass with a simple 51 vote majority? All this shit does is waste time.

Sometimes I think that's the whole idea.

hmmmmmmmm you may be onto something

yeah that seems to be the feature not the bug that sTriCt cOnStYOoOtIoNaLiSt cheer.

I suspect a lot of centrist Dems are secretly glad for it as well

Allows them to place the blame on Republicans instead of on Joe Manchin.

Apologies if this was already posted here

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/29/black-lives-matter-nobel-peace-prize-petter-eide-norweigan-mp?fbclid=IwAR1i-FsWV4Xo40U_sgw5HFZAgCNKgoYBr7WM2IOOuWXlN2Vz_e5MrJLX3cc

Bonus points for making the worst people in the world incoherently angry.

fbclid=IwAR1i-FsWV4Xo40U_sgw5HFZAgCNKgoYBr7WM2IOOuWXlN2Vz_e5MrJLX3cc

Just saw a story that Biden declined to extradite Anne Sacoolas.

Not to re-litigate this, but it seems like it would be better if sic posted the url, stripped of the tracking info, rather than vice versa.

Not if performative rage, rather than utility, is the point.