MTG Doesn't Know the House She Sits In

 

SEE IT FOR YOURSELF: The Uniparty cheers for the man who is actually running the House, Hakeem Jeffries. pic.twitter.com/nQcrRmSTRU

— Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene🇺🇸 (@RepMTG) May 9, 2024

 Marjorie Taylor Greene, thinks that she has revealed that there is a "Uniparty" where somehow MAGA Mike Johnson, who is going along with 2020 election denial right this very day, and who vowed to do whatever was in his power to STOP the charges and investigation against Trump, is basically Jamie Raskin in Republican drag. 

OK, Marge at Large. Accept your soggy potato chip. 

MTG would rather have bad attention and be considered a chaos agent, a bad Republican, and so on, than for people to not recognize her at all. 

All very well and good. She is a special one of a kind snowflake in a very unique globe called the planet Earth, existing only this one time in cosmic history. She also isn't helping anyone else but mostly getting attention for herself and helping Donald Trump. Probably because she thinks Donald Trump will in turn do things for her.

Jim Jordan--Ineffective Thug (UPDATED)

 

There's a handful of things we know about Jim Jordan, who might have a vote Thursday to once again not be named Speaker of the House--he's Trump's minion (small, yellow, attendant to a real villain, speaks gibberish), he turned a blind eye to sexual abuse when he was a wrestling coach, and he's never actually passed any legislation at all during his congressional career.  Based on his failed votes so far for the gavel, I'm not even sure he can count votes.

But the thing I really am impressed with is that his manner of whipping votes for the speakership is open thuggery. Just right out there--strongarming folks. It's like he realized he could not win people over with his record or his winning personality, so, he just went directly to intimidation tactics. 

So when the wife of a Republican representative gets anonymous messages about her spouse, that's sort of gross, right? It's a bad look. If you want to unite the party behind you--how is threatening people the way to convince them you're looking out for the team?

It seems more like a way to say Team Jordan is a party of one--out for himself. 

All Clowns, No Ringmasters

 

The GOP search for a new Speaker of the House is quite the circus--but it looks like it's all clowns and no Ringmaster. Harriet Hageman seems to think she is a rodeo clown and brought a lariat to signify this is not her first rodeo. Nancy Mace wore a scarlet A which stands for "adultery" because she helped cuck McCarthy for Jim Jordan, who Trump endorsed and who--didn't get the most votes in the GOP conference about that. She said she supported Jim Jordan because...you know, I don't care what Nancy Mace says is the reason for anything she does? 

Oh, and George Santos was hit with a superseding indictment for credit card fraud and identity theft. And because Steve Scalise wouldn't answer him on the vital issue of whether he'd be spared from an expulsion attempt from his NY delegation, he's now a "bigly" anti-Scalise guy. Nice. He's got big and bronzed ones, for sure. 

The Debt Ceiling Crisis Has Been Averted

 

Breaking news: The Senate has passed a bipartisan bill to suspend the debt ceiling and curb federal spending, sending the legislation to President Biden to sign into law before Monday’s deadline to avert an unprecedented U.S. government default. https://t.co/UjfjMKELsT

— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) June 2, 2023

I need you to know, first and foremost, I hate this shit in theory. The debt ceiling thing should not exist. We should just pay our debts the way the Constitution says we must. If we are concerned about spending, the Congress should act on this with an actual budget that reduces spending and perhaps, and this the important part--considers raising revenues by going for the people who have money. 

But I am very happy that the Democratic House Members under the leadership of Hakeem Jeffries agreed to a bitter debt ceiling deal that was not clean, and that the Democratic Senate also voted to avert a financial catastrophe. The next debt ceiling deadline is in 2025--when maybe a second Biden term will have an even better hand to work with. 

We need to give Shalanda Young from OMB her flowers, because she was a crucial negotiator in this battle. She was determined not to let this default happen. 

And let's really bask in the accomplishments of the Biden economy. Record low unemployment. And a significant lowering of inflation over last year. 

I don't understand anyone wanting to fuck up a good deal for Americans.  I don't understand rooting for failure. I think patriotism is when you want your countrymen and women to do well, right? And I think the side that doesn't do that is...problematic. Maybe they should even be unelectable. Because I don't think anyone should be rewarded for any attempt to screw up the economy upon which so many depend. It is too serious a thing for silly assholes to play games with. 

Hakeem Jefferies A-Z Speech To the 118th Congress

He let them know: we will try to work with you where we can, but we know very well we are not the same. They can go ahead and boo--you know what's true.

He Doesn't Have the Votes

 

So, maybe someone out there felt a bit of momentum for McCarthy when the Phantom of Mar-a-Lago dipped his oar in to endorse his speakership. Whoever felt that, felt wrong, because Lauren Boebert summed up the problems as follows:

"Let’s stop with the campaign smears and tactics to get people to turn against us — even having my favorite president call us and tell us we need to knock this off," Boebert said on the House floor Wednesday. "I think it actually needs to be reversed; the president needs to tell Kevin McCarthy that, sir, you do not have the votes, and it’s time to withdraw."

Now, Trump isn't still the president obviously, but he's also demonstrably not the boss of the Freedom Caucus.  He's the leader of the Trumpiest people in the GOP--as long as they agree with him. That's a very interesting thing to know.  Trump is a figurehead, but not a respected one. He can be defied.

Anyway, McCarthy got one favorable vote today: the vote to adjourn after three votes went against him, and he wasted everyone's time to decide to put a pin in it and circle back at eight o'clock eastern standard just to decide that the definition of crazy is doing the same thing multiple times and expecting different results. 

To open up the floor to getting his nose rubbed in it starting noon Thursday? Is this a fetish he has? 

Who Do They Think is On Trial?

"An impeachment trial without witnesses would be a stunning departure from this institution's past practice...The Senate has always taken its responsibility to administer a fair trial seriously." -@RepJeffries on hundreds of years of precedent for witnesses in impeachment trials. pic.twitter.com/PwNX601DdA

— House Intelligence Committee (@HouseIntel) January 22, 2020

With every 53-47 vote taken with respects to requesting additional witnesses or documents, a pattern begins to emerge: the Republicans in the Senate really, truly, do not want to have any pertinent information at this impeachment trial. I don't think this should be news, even though many very hopeful people called Senate offices thinking: "We only need four honest Senators and true." (Who are not afraid to discover things like, what, when, how, why, where and with who?)

But the exercise of making separate motions and demonstrating a case for each motion isn't a pointless bit of drudgery intended to wear out Senators making an awfully late night of it. (How ever they would have managed the two nights into the wee hours that McConnell originally suggested, I do not know.) They are breaking down the very case that was made in the House with the peripheral information that would be illuminated by the additional information and getting the Senate GOP on record as having rejected each thoroughly articulated case.

Getting them on record for what they are willing to defend or support from this President has a certain value. Republicans are treating President Trump like he might be a floatation device going in to the 2020 elections, but there is a solid probability that he could be a rotting albatross tied to an anchor.

I think Jennifer Rubin is right, here:

In his calm and methodical presentation, Schiff scored a victory: Democrats have effectively built the case that the Senate would be guilty of a coverup if it allows Trump to continue to conceal witnesses and documents. (Since the public already believes by huge margins that witnesses should be allowed, Schiff has the wind of public opinion at his back.)

People don't innately trust Trump, the Senate, and sure as heck not McConnell. A substantial number of people believe we need to know what is going on, but here the GOP are, trying to make sure people don't hear everything. That really does look like a cover-up.

And we know that can be more damaging than the crime. But insofar as we have abuse of power and use of government resources for basically his own campaign, the underlying crimes (like, violation of the Impound Control Act and extortion and basically using government personnel to be his oppo research team?) are also really bad.

And so far, no Republicans can even show an interest. Sad!


Also, and not for nothing, Trump's defense? He is not getting the best people.

UPDATE: It's like this--

"My colleagues are now on record. And they will be haunted by history and perhaps by the voters because they're on record against witnesses and documents." - Sen. Richard Blumenthal on Senate Republicans defeating a series of amendments from Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer pic.twitter.com/CLFBqaQBis

— CNN (@CNN) January 22, 2020

what gnaws at me is that there is a certain optimism in the strategy--it's all very well to tell people outright that you have the eyes of the world upon you and are being judged, but I suspect the GOP side is depending upon apathy, confusion, and tribal loyalty. I want to believe people still know what a rat smells like when Senator McConnell is being one.

That said, Hugh Hewitt can get bent. Just entirely practice self-origami. And press down hard at the creases.