As some of their far-right colleagues salivate over Texas Gov. Greg Abbott’s performative legal and political standoff with federal border agents, vulnerable House Republicans are toeing an all-too-familiar line between criticizing their hardliner colleagues’ rhetoric and still demonizing the Biden administration.
That counts as a cat pic?
‘Rep. Don Bacon (R-NE) dismissed the notion that anyone is talking about an actual civil war: “I don’t take it literally,” he said.’
When Republicans say “I demand that we have a civil war now, and it has to be violent, and we need to kill our enemies and establish unchallenged one-party rule in which pregnant women will be put in prison and trans people will be put in concentration, I mean conversion camps,” we need to take them seriously. But not literally.
U.S. national media: "Righty-o then. I assume you are speaking in total good faith, and so I’ll publish a story on your serious but not literal calls for violent civil war titled “Increasingly heated Republican rhetoric signals growing political divisions.” Will you still answer my telephone calls?
Cowards refuse to call it out as unAmerican which it is.
So he takes it seriously, then?
Every one of those responses should have had a follow up along the lines of:
“And what, exactly, did then-President Trump actually DO to solve this problem while in office–not just talk about, but accomplish? AND BEORE YOU ANSWER, Keep in mind that that short length of fence could not, did not, and was not intended to solve the entire border crisis AND the alleged crisis was there when he took office?”
Actually the question should be prefaced with “Many people would like to know what, exactly…” So those clowns will “understand” it.
Here in the DC media market, where I live, local NBC anchors this evening reported the impeachment of Sec. Mayorkas as if it was a legitimate effort. THIS IS THE FUCKING DMV! VA can go sideways but DC and MD are deeply blue and democratic. These anchors know they are speaking to government workers and contractors and the military. Yet they feign this indifference and refuse to report the truth. Shame on Jim Handley and Eun Yang. Yeah, I’m talking to you.
EDIT: I am not asking for biased reporting, I am asking for honest reporting.
Hopefully the voters (R & D) will treat these charlatans as they deserve, but I doubt it. Sad!
The question is when will the “not crazy” Republicans take back at least some control of their Party by doing what the Crazy Caucus has done to gain control.
That is by using their power to destroy the GOP, the crazy caucus has cowered the rest of the Party to go along with all their craziness. But in truth the not crazies have more power because not only could they overthrow a Speaker, they could elect Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker.
I mean if the not crazies wanted to take back their Party, they would just say to the crazies either agree to put a border bill on the floor for election or we will not only vote to oust Johnson, we will vote to elect a Democrat. This would leave the Crazies with two choices both of which trivialize them, to stop being so crazy or have a Speaker and a House body that cares nothing about their opinions.
On the subject of immigration:
Terry Gross’s “Fresh Air” today featured an interview with the New Yorker’s Jonathan Blitzer about his new book Everyone Who Is Gone Is Here: The United States, Central America, and the Making of a Crisis, “about how today’s crisis at the border connects with the U.S. foreign policy and immigration policy starting with the Cold War of the mid 1960s through the Reagan era, when the U.S. bolstered Latin American dictators in an attempt to prevent the spread of communism.”
It was a fascinating conversation – well worth the time to listen to it. (Try to ignore that the headline writer on the “Fresh Air” web site referred to a “boarder crisis.” Blame it on AI.)
Good luck with that. That would result in an informed public, people who can see who’s fucking them and who the villains are. The billionaire class won’t allow that. It’s not in their interest.
The answer is, sadly, that they won’t. They had 2 chances to put Trump down. They are so focused on staying in power short term they have not recognized that they had a chance to be “out of power” for a few cycles to reclaim their brand. When the party fully explodes (sometime in the next 2 or 3 cycles, hopefully) they will be out of power for much longer.
They should have walked away and formed a “New GOP” and left the Crazies to themselves. Yes, they would have had to put up with us selfish, woke, vindictive liberals for awhile, but that is eventually what is going to happen…IF the crazies don’t actually succeed in destroying this Democracy.
This country refuses to reckon with the reality that 250 years of slavery followed by a century of legally sanctioned murder under Jim Crow (and the rest of the country was just as racist, don’t be fooled), didn’t end the violent oppression of an entire race of people by another. And they’re still freaking the fuck out over the Civil Rights Act. You really think people in this country have the capacity to comprehend that WE caused the border crisis?
Louis CK said it best. America is like the worst girlfriend you ever had. She remembers every single thing you did, but if you point out one bad thing she did, she freaks the fuck out.
Yeah, the crisis at the border, with hordes and caravans and gazillions of who-knows-what kind of people pouring across our totally unsecured borders, is such an existential threat to our nation, that the GOPniks propose to do … ABSOLUTELY BUGGER-ALL about it for most of a year, in order not to run the risk of Biden getting some points for helping to solve it.
Did I get that right?
That really helps to calibrate how urgent they actually think the problem is.
Of course, it also helps that the Orange Imbecile keeps saying the quiet part out loud.
And we thought Qevin was dumb.
The Messenger spoke to a handful of “moderate” House Republicans, in their words — the GOPers who are running in districts that President Biden won in 2020.
A sampling:
“That is not the rhetoric I would use,” Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-SD) told The Messenger…
South Dakota is a “district” that Biden won in 2020…?
I was just thinking that these Republican Congresscritters who are hesitant to actually condemn such violent rhetoric regarding, well, anything really, should be asked to recite their oaths to defend the US Constitution from its enemies, both foreign and domestic. Gov. Abbott is using unconstitutional means to achieve his wildest and wettest dreams. Force those who will not condemn his behavior to publicly pick a side by simply requesting that they swear their oaths all over again. If they can’t do it, or choose not to do it, then they forfeit their rights to serve in elected office forever.
Whiners and cowards. I heard SEVERAL RWers screaming about ‘lying’ Mayorkas as they ‘lied’ and were surrounded by the liars they protect. And now the border. Boebert screaming about COLORADO’S southern border, Abbott doubling down on stupid and now a few ‘vulnerable’ RWers are admitting that maybe THEY could do something instead of blaming everything on the Dems. Honest to God.
Yep