US Politics June 2021 - "Where we're going, we don't NEED bipartisanship"

Jackson's specific point is that they can gerrymander their way to a House majority in '22 regardless of anything else. Which is probably true. Anything can happen etc., but lots of things are in their favor on that. My state (which voted 60-40 for Trump) is likely to go from 2 Democrats in our 9-person legislative delegation to 1. That's going to happen in all the red states.

There’s also a horde of Democratic voters who showed up because Trump was on the bill, of course.

Because of Trump, yeah. In a normal year Doug Jones still would have lost to the child molester by 12 points.

It's the money, they need to get more transparency on who is putting this cash into the elections. At some point in the 80s, someone just realized you can just buy into any of these elections.

I had a 300 level campaign finance class in Polisci in the early 90s and the prof made us go and use this dial up on the 'internet' to log into the Gov website to download campaign finance donations and research it out. He stated 'we would understand why' in a few years...being the internet. But the thing that was wild I could remember as I had do reporting based on some of the house races in my local district, which I can remember how low the total amount of cash being spent on campaigns - it was chump change compared to now. I remember Andy Jacobs (D) in Indy spent only like 5-8k on his whole campaign, now he had been in office for a couple decades at some point and was near retirement, so people knew who he was.

But the thing that changed was that someone for the money realized this and I think it just became a race to bottom to dominate the money to the point now the GOP is often largely often not able pick their candidates (more than the Democrats that have work harder to raise same funds). There are more than a few house members and governors where pretty much their daddy or benefactor pretty much bought them into office.

McConnell and Co. with Citizens United pretty much broke the dam, and there is so much money sloshing around - pretty much the only thing that matters is raising money. And if the powers that be are putting up money for these show ponies, they better f'ing perform and they do.

I don't see anything changing or improving until this gordian knot can be untied. I think the phrase I remember being used was money in campaigns is like water, you might stop it one way but it fill find a way to flow. I sadly think it is just going to end up in America bungling further into incompetent totalitarianism. Too much rot in the foundation, house won't hold up.

so the plan is to bring up this new manchin-approved voting rights legislation, let mcconnell completely stonewall it, then manchin (and national joke sinema) won't allow the filibuster, and then it dies. and the big plan is for this to demonstrate to well-informed americans that it's the republicans and mcconnell who stand in the way of bipartisanship. this way in 2022 americans will all vote in the midterm and remember who really stood in the way of progress, leading to a strong democratic majority for 2022 on.

NICE FUCKING PLAN!!!!!!

an alternate plan would be to get rid of the filibuster and pass some shit

take it to the "so not going to happen" thread

Can't get rid of the filibuster without 50 votes + Harris. It's still the same dog chasing its own tail.

president manchin, vice president sinema

taking a stroll down memory lane this morning and reading about the 2013 Supreme Court decision to gut the Voting Rights Act (5-4 conservatives, of course). and the transparent LUDICROUS reasoning that Republicans would cooperate with Democrats to pass new Voting Rights legislation, as if the core project of conservatism wasn't suppressing the rights of anyone who isn't straight, white, and christian.

But, writing for the court’s majority, conservative Chief Justice John Roberts said that America is not the country that it was a half century ago when the Voting Rights Act was passed to end a century of attempts by former slaveholding states to block blacks from voting.

“Our country has changed, and while any racial discrimination in voting is too much, Congress must ensure that the legislation it passes to remedy that problem speaks to current conditions,” Roberts wrote.

But Democrats have accused Republicans at the state level in recent years of enacting a series of measures intended to suppress the vote of minority groups likely to support Democratic candidates.

Just last week, the Supreme Court struck down an Arizona law that required people registering to vote in federal elections to show proof of citizenship, a victory for activists who said it discouraged Native Americans and Latinos from voting.

Tuesday’s decision placed the burden on Congress - sharply divided along party lines to the point of virtual gridlock - to pass any new voting rights law like the one sought by Obama.

...

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat, on Tuesday pledged to move quickly to try to restore voting rights protections after the ruling.

“I intend to take immediate action to ensure that we will have a strong and reconstituted Voting Rights Act that protects against racial discrimination in voting,” Leahy said.

Republicans were largely silent on the court’s ruling. Neither House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner nor Mitch McConnell, the top Senate Republican, had any immediate comment.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-court-voting/supreme-court-guts-key-part-of-landmark-voting-rights-act-idUSBRE95O0TU20130625

America is not the country that it was a half century ago

1) in some ways, nothing on earth is what it was a half century ago. nothing on earth is the same as it was 10 minutes ago. fuck you

2) in some ways, the very same walking racist pieces of shit that were alive 50 years ago are still alive and well today, only now they're old so they have a lifetime of unearned white privilege wealth which attracts conservatives like a honey pot pulls in winnie the pooh

3) maybe we should at least wait til henry fucking kissinger finally eats shit for good before even beginning to consider that we're remotely past that era

i imagine all of these people at maralago, just hardcore fucking each other and laughing, and they all fucking die at once as the earth explodes. this is the deleted footage from any star wars Death Star scene. when they show the planet exploding, you have to imagine that the planet fucking deserved it

Hopefully Zed can infiltrate Maralagoo and put and end to the charade once and for all...

https://wondersinthedark.files.wordpress.com/2016/07/zardoz09.jpg

Morgellons at Mar-a-Lago

Breaking: Sen. Manchin announces that he'll vote to break the filibuster and begin debate on voting rights legislation.

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) June 22, 2021

kyle griffin, noted accurate reporter.

tweet deleted within minutes because it's extremely not true.

Activate the Death Star

kyle griffin, noted accurate reporter.

― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Tuesday, June 22, 2021

noted cute reporter though

Updated: Sen. Manchin announces that he'll vote to begin debate on voting rights legislation.

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) June 22, 2021

i.e. no change to filibuster. not even a one-off override. better than nothing but not by much.

lol @ "updated", like he thought his monstrous news cycle story-level original tweet was actually accurate

This means S1 will go down 50-50 on a procedural Senate vote today.

It needs 60 to advance.

— Sahil Kapur (@sahilkapur) June 22, 2021

good stuff

kyle griffin, noted accurate reporter

noted cute reporter though

noted trapezoidal hairstyle reporter though

eh I've hit on too many squares

Slate bringing the heat

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2021/06/stop-telling-breyer-to-retire.html

In fairness, Manchin might not vote to confirm anyone but his nephew.

no one should quote Noah Feldman on SCOTUS lately.

"Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday signed legislation that will require public universities and colleges to survey students, faculty and staff about their beliefs and viewpoints." https://t.co/Cb4SURFt4a

— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) June 23, 2021

By damn, we'll prove those universities are just hotbeds of commies. Then we can shut 'em down!

The scene tonight at a raucous Loudoun County school board hearing where many came to voice opposition to critical race theory. The meeting was stopped when the crowd wouldn’t quiet down and two were arrested. pic.twitter.com/WkiZCGJ6Jm

— Evelyn Hockstein (@evelynpix) June 23, 2021

coming soon to a school board meeting near you!

I think I figured out who's teaching that woman's kids critical racist theory

gabbneb has a lot to answer for

i typed a sarcastic message, i typed a doomer message, i typed an angry message

fuck

that 1-2 with DeSantis' Orwell legislation, holy shit. they're going to test students to see if their beliefs changed...WHILE IN COLLEGE?

and no one should talk about race, or what happened and is happening in this country. ok, check....check. cool, ready to watch the football game with my boys this weekend and forget about all of it!!!!!

As was detailed in the comments somewhere, apparently nothing about teaching race or anything even remotely close to it was on the agenda, these people just... showed up.

The thing is, it'll get challenged as a constitutional affront, as he expects. This legislation is yet another plank in DeSantis' 2024 platform.

putting the squeeze on public universities doesn't seem like a strategy that would help him in the long run, have to imagine plenty of his supporters have kids in public universities or planning to go in the future

I'm ignorant to what critical race theory is but I'm assuming that no fucking way is it taught in public high schools?

I heard an interview yesterday with a Southern Baptist scholar who said he thought the CRT panic was stitched up as a distraction from all the sexual abuse cases in the SBC in 2019. Which fits the bill, it's what the Religious Right has always done.

I'm ignorant to what critical race theory is but I'm assuming that no fucking way is it taught in public high schools?

Unless they are teaching law school level legal classes in that high school, I'm going to say no.

The thing is, it'll get challenged as a constitutional affront, as he expects.

right, as soon as i read the headline i thought "will it make it to the supreme court before it gets shot down?"

but am i wrong in being so pessimistic that it seems like IF it makes to the Supreme Court, it has a decent chance of being upheld?

i'm probably wrong about how i think about things like this, but these days i imagine that when "controversial" legislation like DeSantis' 1984+ bill enters the legal system, it's like Plinko. some of the pegs are Obama judges and the 1984+ bill bounces over toward the left. some of the pegs are Bush and Trump judges, and they bounce off back toward the right. a controversial case is appealed a million times, bouncing back and forth between people who care about the law and trump's appointees, and some of them eventually arrive in the Golden Boy's lap at the supreme court while he's fucking an old beer can from college, thinking about how he never changed his beliefs at college, ever

ums you should take a minute to get familiar with critical race theory and related stuff. not only is it something that is good and helpful for everyone to know about, but the nu-Tea Party idiots are distorting it and using it as a weapon against the left. you may have to confront an old white person yelling at you about CRT soon, it's best to know what it is before they do

As was detailed in the comments somewhere, apparently nothing about teaching race or anything even remotely close to it was on the agenda, these people just... showed up.

― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Wednesday, June 23, 2021 12:21 PM (thirteen minutes ago)

I wish the history of the Tea Party's magical emergence on the scene the second a Dem was elected was better known and understood, this feels awfully familiar

addressing cis white people reading this who, like me, have been able to insulate ourselves somewhat from the kinds of visible, highly tangible ugly ignorant stuff going on -

i know i'm a little touchy with this because my dad just committed suicide via ignorance, but i am not exaggerating when i say "they are coming for you". this stuff is getting closer and closer. and personally, i am done with just smiling and moving on. it is coming for you. the idiots are coming for you, and when i say that, i mean they expect you to join them. and understanding that in their movement, they're not looking for you to say Yes to their beliefs. they're checking that you do not say No to them. so make sure you say a big fucking FUCK NO when they close in on you

and i highly recommend reading up a little about CRT so that when rather than just saying NO, you can also fucking annihilate them intellectually

The last several posts otm

they won't understand or care that their arguments have just been annihilated, but it makes a difference. if you annihilate an idiotic white supremacist mom's argument in a forest, and no one hears it, did it really happen? yes, it did. flawless victory, fuck them, move on

sorry, i'm done. this stuff really gets to me. it sucks to see it getting closer, again and again

a decent summary: https://www.edweek.org/leadership/what-is-critical-race-theory-and-why-is-it-under-attack/2021/05