Maybe not all GOP Senators are corrupt all of the time.
I never know quite what to think of Sen. Collins. I despise the way, with similar language, she slow-walked the Affordable Care Act for 18 months, only to join the Teapublicans in voting it down. Yet I know she fought with and cajoled her colleagues, including a few Democrat hold-outs, to end DADT when it wasn’t entirely clear that it would actually happen. (People tend to forget these things after they pass).
I welcome another chip in the armor, but I’ll believe she’ll follow through when she does. In the meantime, at least she’s adding a voice that may make it easier for those few willing - or wary - Republicans still out there to move in the direction of hearings as well.
Translation: “We have to at least look like we are trying.” Sorry, but you pulled that shit on the ACA. You have no credibility on anything anymore. Don’t worry, the Dems will be sure to return the favor.
I wonder how much that statement will cost her. The Borg do not suffer autonomy well.
Funny how it’s only selected republican senators in danger of losing their seats who are appearing to act sane. Must be a coincidence.
Since when does the Republican Party give a flying f*ck about being “fair?” If Collins was truly concerned with “fairness” she wouldn’t be a goddamn Republican in the first place.
She’s nothing more than a massively hypocritical enabler of radical GOP nuttery. There is nothing more pathetically useless on this earth than a “moderate” Republican.
Very little. The GOP as we once knew it, is in shambles. They have their hands full trying to ward off the tsunami coming brought on by Trump; they are still fighting a civil war between Tea Party and Establishment, and the list of Senators backing away from this scorched earth policy on the SCOTUS is steadily growing.
I think by the summer, there is a very good chance that Garland gets appointed. The public is strongly against them not giving him the hearing, and once they do that, there is no foundation to deny him the seat.
McConnell has already lost this, he just doesn’t realize it yet. Continuing to play games is only making an unfavorable election environment even more unfavorable.
Oh please. Please spare us, Susan
She’s a woman – they’ll probably blame it on “that time of the month” and just think a little less of her (like they would any woman).
Right on. The funnest thing about McConnell is all of his options are futile. The Republican Congress has learned more and more about doing less and less. At this point they know pretty much everything about nothing.
She won reelection in 2014 so something else is motivating her then upcoming reelection.
McConnell on Fox News Sunday
I can’t imagine that a Republican majority in the United States Senate would want to confirm, in a lame-duck session, a nominee opposed by the National Rifle Association,”
McConnell’s racist decision is proving problematic for a lot of Republican Senators running for re-election. My guess is they will ultimately pressure the GOP leadership into participating in some sort of nominating process.
The Rs can dress it up in lame duck session talk, but it’s the continuation of the Senate’s policy of opposing anything the president proposes. It does not hold hearings, does not confirm, leaves highly qualified people out to dry and in some ways hinders fighting terrorism such as in the case of Adam Szubin, the Treasury Department lawyer nominated to serve as under secretary for terrorism and financial intelligence. The under secretary is tasked with enforcing American sanctions against North Korea and Iran and cutting off funding for terrorist groups.
He waited 325 days for a Senate banking committee vote, which was held on March 10 2015. The full Senate has yet to consider his nomination. The blockage has deprived a critical division at Treasury of a leader who is fully empowered to make decisions and coordinate a unified response to international challenges. Mr. Szubin’s experience is not an isolated case. The banking committee has moved forward only one of 19 nominations put before it since the beginning of 2015.
Mr. McConnell could put an end to these inexcusable failures to conduct routine Senate business. But, of course, he and the rest of the Republican leaders long ago stopped doing anything in the interest of the country. Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush got 528 and 545 officials confirmed during their last two years in office. Mr. Obama has managed to get only 193 nominees confirmed since early 2015.
Collins is VERY hard to dislodge from Maine if she continues to run. In other contexts, she was and could be one of those swing votes that help Dems carry the day on controversial legislation.
But with Paige in the governorship and enough rabid right wingers buried out in the woods with the blackflies, like so many other potentially rational opposition candidates, she must ALWAYS take care to avoid getting primaried from the far right…and she does. If Garland ever gets to a vote, my guess is that the pressures would make her a no, but as long as McConnell and Grassley are running the show, that is a vote she is not likely to have to face.
Two Face Collins strikes again, BSing about moderation while she votes in lock step with Mitch…
That she said what she did out loud counts. A majority of Americans say the SCOTUS nomination process should proceed as usual.
No one but us political geeks will pay attention to what she actually does in the end, but if we get a few more citizen heads nodding “Yeah, that’s right.”, it’s a small, but incremental win.
The fair thing to do here is to vote gop out of Senate control.
Anything that can break through the “three Nos” and force Republicans to take a position on the merits of the candidate is a win for us. Whether or not he is confirmed is of secondary importance to keeping the discussion in the news cycle for as long as possible.