Nuns v. Republicans

 

My dude, here’s a pic of nuns visiting the same stretch of border. None of us needed tactical gear

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Governor Brian P. Kemp

@GovKemp

· 9h

Just finished a boat tour of the Rio Grande to survey the border.

12:08 PM · Apr 30, 2021 from Silver Spring, MD·Twitter for iPhone

The GOP Delenda Est

 Click here for an article by Richard North Patterson at The Bulwark, entitled "The GOP Delenda Est." Subtitle: "The Republican party isn’t interested in governing. It scorns science and denies facts. It can’t be reformed. It can’t be worked with. It must be stopped." 

As Patterson explains,  

Cato the Elder’s prescription for Rome’s greatest enemy was stringent. He concluded every speech with this singular imperative: Carthago delenda est—Carthage must be destroyed. Until, at last, it was.

He continues:

Now American democracy has a more lethal antagonist. Regardless of ideology, our imperative must be the political destruction of today’s Republican party. Until then, all the rest—trying to reform the GOP; founding a third party; or imagining a sweet spot in the political center—are dangerous distractions.

The GOP’s pathologies run too deep to temporize. Their most glaring manifestation is but a symptom: the party’s enthrallment to a dangerous, unstable, bigoted, and nihilistic narcissist possessed by autocratic cravings, a contempt for law, and a poisonous disdain for all other human beings—epitomized by his murderous neglect of a deadly pandemic which needlessly killed over half a million Americans and, thereafter, by his incitement of, and pleasure in, a deadly attack on our Capitol by extremists inflamed by his lies and determined keep him in power.

It's an excellent article, a great takedown of the abysmal state of the Republican party.

 

Tidbits

David Frum's suggested amendment to the Second Amendment:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, a jumpy individual's right to carry weapons to menace his neighbors, coworkers, and drivers who take the parking space he wanted shall not be infringed."

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Sarah Huckabee Sanders (whose father was governor of Arkansas from 1996 to 2007)  is running for governor of Arkansas. She just finished raising $4.8 million in donations in 8 weeks -- a record for any statewide office in Arkansas. As Don Winslow puts it, it may mean the end of the world as we know it.

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The Alabama state constitution is 12 times as long as the average state constitution, 44 times as long as the U.S. constitution. It's the longest and most amended constitution still operative anywhere in the world.

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Last year Boeing lost $12 billion; its CEO made $21.1 million. Norwegian Cruise Line lost $4 billion; its CEO made $36.4 million. Hilton laid off 1/4 of their corporate staff and lost $720 million. Its CEO made $55.9 million. Something wrong here somewhere?

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CNN's Rick Santorum: "We birthed a nation from nothing. I mean, there was nothing here. I mean, yes we have Native Americans but candidly there isn't much Native American culture in American culture."

George Conway's response: "Who's this 'we,' kemo sabe?" 

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From Heather Cox Richardson's daily newsletter:

Tonight, FNC personality Carlson called for his audience to start direct action. He told them to confront people wearing masks, which he says are signs of “political obedience.” He maintained that 64% of white Americans who called themselves “liberal” or “very liberal” “have been diagnosed with an actual mental health condition.” He called them “aggressors” and told supporters, “it’s our job to brush them back and restore the society we were born in.” He said to call the police immediately if they see children wearing masks and keep calling until someone arrives: it is child abuse, he says, and his audience is “morally obligated to prevent it.”

HCR Hits It Out Of The Park, Again

Click here for the April 22 newsletter from Heather Cox Richardson. It's a good one.

She ties together three political stories from today:

1. The House voted 216 to 208 to admit the District of Columbia as a state. Since this would mean two more Democratic senators -- D.C. voted 93% for Biden in 2020 -- the Republicans will block it in the Senate.

2. Speaking to reporters on the Capitol steps, Ted Cruz said:

“You didn’t see Republicans when we had control of the Senate try to rig the game. You didn’t see us try to pack the court. There was nothing that would have prevented Republicans from doing what they’re doing other than respect for the rule of law, other than basic decency, other than recognizing that democracy matters, and packing the court and tearing down the institutions that protect our rights is fundamentally wrong.”

HCR's take: "This is classic Cruz: straight up gaslighting." Republicans have been doing their best to pack the Supreme Court since the Reagan administration. It's been particularly bad in the Trump era: After the death of Scalia, McConnell used his Senate majority to block Obama from appointing a Supreme, claiming it was too soon before an election -- 8 months. Trump then appointed Gorsuch, stealing a seat for the Republicans -- and he could only do it by blowing up the status quo, doing away with the filibuster for SCOTUS appointments, so that the Republicans could confirm Gorsuch with just 51 votes. McConnell's hypocrisy was incredible when he pushed through Amy Coney Barrett when Ruth Bader Ginsburg died -- EIGHT DAYS BEFORE THE ELECTION. Too soon before an election? Only when the nominee is a Democrat (the McConnell Rule).

3. The filibuster.

Biden's Democrats have an ambitious agenda, but they're likely to be blocked, even when their proposed legislation has widespread popular support -- even among Republicans -- because a Republican filibuster means the Democrats have to come up with 60 votes, which would require 10 Republican senators to vote for the Democratic proposal. That'll happen when Satan starts lacing up his Tackaberrys.

Normally cheerful and optimistic, HCR seems rather glum today, closing her post as follows:

It seems to me that these three stories about the mechanics of our government show that our democracy is in a bad place right now. Republicans have stacked the deck in their favor for a long time and have come to rely on that unfair system, rather than policies that appeal to voters, to retain power. Now that Democrats are trying to level the playing field, they howl that the Democrats are cheating.

R.I.P. Henri, le Chat Noir

Click here for an article at Ars Technica by Jennifer Ouellette, entitled "R.I.P. Henri, le Chat Noir, angst-ridden feline YouTube star for the ages."

There are a whole series of Henri videos; be sure to check out "Paw de Deux."

Minneapolis, George Floyd, Daunte Wright, Civil War (April 12, 1861, Fort Sumter, South Carolina)

Click here for  Heather Cox Richardson's newsletter entry for April 12, 2021. She talks of the George Floyd trial in Minneapolis last May -- and the police killing of 20-year-old Daunte Wright (a black man, oddly enough) yesterday in Minneapolis, just a few miles from where the trial of Derek Chauvin is taking place.

She claims that "What is on trial is the fundamental American principle of equality before the law," and refers to Civil War days:

On this day in 1861, Confederate forces fired on Fort Sumter, the United States fort located in Charleston Harbor, launching a Civil War that would take more than 600,000 lives and cost the United States more than $5 billion. The leaders of the Confederate States of America believed that the government of the United States of America had a fatal flaw: it declared that all men were created equal.

The men who framed the Constitution had made the terrible error of believing in equality, Georgia’s Alexander Stephens, the newly-elected vice president of the Confederacy, told a crowd on March 21, 1861. Northerners, he said, stupidly clung to the outdated idea that “the negro is equal, and hence conclude that he is entitled to equal privileges and rights with the white man.”

In contrast to the United States government,” Stephens said, “the Confederate government rested on the “great truth” that “the negro is not equal to the white man; that… subordination to the superior race is his natural and normal condition.” Stephens told listeners that the Confederate government “is the first, in the history of the world, based upon this great physical, philosophical, and moral truth.”

Abraham Lincoln rejected this radical attempt to destroy the principles of the Declaration of Independence. He understood that it was not just Black rights at stake, but also democracy. Arguments like that of Stephens, that some men were better than others, “are the arguments that kings have made for enslaving the people in all ages of the world,” Lincoln said. “You will find that all the arguments in favor of king-craft were of this class; they always bestrode the necks of the people, not that they wanted to do it, but because the people were better off for being ridden…. Turn in whatever way you will—whether it come from the mouth of a King, an excuse for enslaving the people of his country, or from the mouth of men of one race as a reason for enslaving the men of another race, it is all the same old serpent….”

She says:

Almost four years to the day after the firing on Fort Sumter, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Army of Northern Virginia, marking the defeat of the Confederacy and its attempt to create a nation in which some people were better than others. 

The Destruction Of Ted Kennedy

Democrats do it too, even "the lion of the Senate," Ted Kennedy. (Never mind Mary Jo Kopechne and Chappaquidick.)

Click here for an article from the archives of The Washington Post, dated February 1, 1990, by Michael Kelly, entitled "Ted Kennedy on the Rocks."

As Bret Stephens puts it in his article co-authored with Gail Collins (Click here), entitled "Matt Gaetz is Both Unique and ... Not So Unique," dated April 12, 2021:

Ted Kennedy is still remembered worshipfully by liberals as the “Lion of the Senate,” even though he was almost certainly guilty of what most of us would consider an appalling sexual assault in the company of Chris Dodd, his Democratic Senate pal, who also retired honorably.

Tucker Carlson's White Supremacy

Click here for an article in The Washington Post by Michael Gerson entitled "How Tucker Carlson's racist rhetoric gives new life to Trumpism."

He is the prime example of a professional troll. The Anti-Defamation League has demanded Carlson’s firing for his unapologetic embrace of “replacement theory.” Here is how Carlson defined this idea in the process of defending it last week: “The Democratic Party is trying to replace the current electorate of the voters now casting ballots with new people, more obedient voters from the Third World.”

Why people should be offended by this mystifies Carlson. “Everyone wants to make a racial issue out of it,” he continued. “No, no, no, this is a voting-rights question. I have less political power because they are importing a brand-new electorate. Why should I sit back and take that? The power that I have as an American, guaranteed at birth, is one man, one vote, and they are diluting it.”

There is a reason, of course, that “everyone” wants to make a racial issue out of this. Because it is a putrescent pile of racist myths and cliches. Nearly every phrase of Carlson’s statement is the euphemistic expression of white supremacist replacement doctrine. “The Democratic Party” means liberals, which translates into Jews. They are importing “new people” from the “Third World” means people with black and brown skin. Those kinds of people, in the racist trope, are “obedient,” meaning docile, backward and stupid. Their votes do not constitute real democracy because they are replacing the “current electorate” — which is presumably whiter and less docile. These paler, truer Americans are thus deprived of their birthright of political dominance. And fighting back — making sure the new Third World people have less power — becomes a defense of the American way.

This is what modern, poll-tested, shrink-wrapped, mass-marketed racism looks like. Carlson is providing his audience with sophisticated rationales for their worst, most prejudicial instincts. And the brilliance of Carlson’s business model is to reinterpret moral criticism of his bigotry as an attack by elites on his viewers. Public outrage is thus recycled into fuel for MAGA victimhood. And so the Fox News machine runs on and on.

 Further, Gerson says:

In Carlson’s version of the MAGA worldview, politics is played for the highest of stakes. “Western civilization” is under attack from liberalism. “America isn’t falling to foreign invaders,” Carlson has said. “It is rotting from within because the people in charge don’t think it is worth preserving.” And one of the main instruments that liberalism uses to secure power and undermine Western culture is elevation of “diversity” as a social ideal. In fact, according to Carlson, people from non-Western countries dilute and adulterate America’s culture and heritage. Immigration makes the country “poorer and dirtier and more divided,” he said in 2018. (Earlier, Carlson said Iraqis come from “a culture where people just don’t use toilet paper or forks.”) Mass migration, according to Carlson, is not merely a threat; the promotion of mass migration is a political conspiracy. Liberals are attempting to control the country by changing its ethnic makeup and polluting its culture. And this deprives true Americans — those with, say, the racial makeup of Fox News viewers — of their rightful place of social and economic influence.

 And:

Trumpism is an argument that Western society, and American society in particular, is being infected by dirty outsiders who are destroying the country’s very nature.

Max Boot: "The GOP Can't Be Saved."

Click here for an article by Max Boot in The Washington Post entitled "The GOP can't be saved. Center-right voters need to become Biden Republicans."

Boot lauds Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) for speaking out against Trump and defending the Republican party, saying that he himself used to feel that way. He says, "My hope was that a decisive win for Hillary Clinton would bring the GOP to its senses." The day after Clinton's loss, he re-registered as an independent.

He cites a new Reuters-Ipsos poll which saysL

81 percent of Republicans have a favorable impression of Trump. Wait. It gets worse: 60 percent say the 2020 election was stolen from him, only 28 percent say he is even partly to blame for the Capitol insurrection, and 55 percent say that the Capitol attack “was led by violent left-wing protestors trying to make Trump look bad.”

That's pretty frightening: 72 percent of Republicans believe Trump is completely blameless for the January 6 insurrection? Unbelievable.

He pooh-poohs the idea of forming a third party, and says people like him face a binary choice:

Support either an increasingly extremist and obstructionist Republican Party or a Democratic Party that, under President Biden, is working to solve our most pressing problems.

He cites popular support for Biden's policies:

At 53.1 percent, Biden’s approval rating is higher than Trump’s ever was. Polls show that 73 percent approve of Biden’s handling of the coronavirus and 60 percent of his handling of the economy. There is also broad support for his infrastructure plan, with 64 percent backing tax hikes on corporations to pay for it.

The solution he proposes: vote for Biden.

 

Driving On The Autobahn

Driving on the Autobahn: slowing down from 190 mph to 100 mph when a car pulls out to pass a truck ahead of you:

Bob Rankin Article: Windows Keyboard Shortcuts

Click here for a Bob Rankin article entitled "Try These Handy Windows 10 Keyboard Shortcuts."

I'm a keyboard guy (typed 80 w.p.m. in court reporting school), and I'd way rather use the keyboard when I can, instead of the mouse. I already use some of these, but some of them are new to me.

Hallelujah!

From Fort Frances, Ontario, Cassandra Star and Callahan Armstrong -- 10 and 19 years old -- sing Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah."

I'm not a religious guy, but the beauty of their voices brought tears to my eyes. Leonard Cohen's version is great, but it never did that.

Republicans Do Not Have Popular Support

Click here for Heather Cox Richardson's newsletter for April 4. Among other things, she points out how Republican legislators are far out of touch with their constituents:

Americans as a whole do not like the policies of current-day Republican lawmakers. Seventy-seven percent of us like the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan, and yet not a single Republican voted for it. Eighty-four percent of us like background checks for gun purchases, and yet that policy is anathema to Republicans.

Seventy-nine percent of us want the government to fix our roads, bridges, railroads, and ports. Seventy-one percent of us want the government to make sure we all have high-speed internet. Sixty-eight percent of us want the government to replace our lead pipes, the same percentage as people who want the government to support renewable energy with tax credits. Sixty-four percent of us want to pay for these things by increasing taxes on corporations and big businesses.

Republican lawmakers oppose all of these popular measures.

She goes on to say:

Because our political system is currently skewed toward the Republican Party, its members’ opposition in Congress is far more powerful than it is on the ground. Because of gerrymandering, Democratic candidates in 2020 defeated their Republican opponents by 3.1 percentage points nationally and yet lost a dozen seats in the House of Representatives.

The Senate is even less fairly representative. It is currently divided evenly, with 50 Republicans and 50 Democrats (technically, 48 Democrats and 2 Independents who caucus with the Democrats). But the 50 Democrats represent 41.5 million more people than the Republicans do (the U.S. has a population of about 328 million).

That Republican minority can currently stop all legislation other than budget bills and judicial appointments through the process known as the filibuster, which forces 60 members of the Senate to agree to a bill before it can move forward.

 

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