The Politics Thread

[marceline]

 

I'm not sure. We're in uncharted territory. If he does end up in prison, it will have to be part of a plea bargain. A trial would tear this country apart and radicalize his followers even more. I know some people say they are already radicalized but it would be so much worse. We'd be looking at suicide bombings.

 

I think a better outcome is asset forfeiture for Trump and continued deplatforming as part of a plea bargain then go after his family and enablers like Bannon and Stone and focus on the Republicans who supported the Insurrection. Once Trump is dead, those are the people who will continue to be a threat.

 

Admittedly, this is just me blue-skying. I don't know how feasible any of it is.

[Juliajms]

Hopefully he'll die before the next election.

[DRW50]

 

They aren't asking because he's doing what they want. They hate Democrats and they want Republicans to have a big comeback. Even better, Manchin is setting terms they eat up with relish - they can just blame Democrats for not being bipartisan enough, which they tried to make into an issue with Biden for months. It's a win-win because there really is no idea to what Manchin even wants. He just says "bipartisan" and then walks away. He doesn't want to actually do anything because he doesn't have to - he's rich, he's bought and paid for, and he knows he is likely in his last term. 

 

 

McConnell is now attacking Biden for not being bipartisan enough, and Manchin's games are helping people to believe this. 

 

McConnell is now flat-out saying there will be no John Lewis Act, and you can bet Manchin will, in a day, or a week, or a month, blame Biden and Democrats for not being bipartisan enough to get it passed. 

 

 

A lot of leftists are saying that Manchin is just a "rotating villain" Democrats are throwing out into the public eye so they won't have to do anything. To be honest I've heard enough about uneasiness with HR1 to think that could be true on voting rights, but it's obviously not true on infrastructure. Yet thanks to Manchin, not to mention Merrick Garland, many are likely to believe Biden really does not want anything to change, and are more likely to be demoralized. 

[DramatistDreamer]

What is Gillibrand's reason for missing a crucial vote?

 

I guess Cher can now feel justified in accidentally tagging her in a scolding tweet that was really meant for Sinema.

[DRW50]

 

I'm sure she has a valid reason, but this isn't the first time Gillibrand has come across as phony and grandstanding.

 

If Schumer is holding these votes to try to send a message about Republicans, it does no good when Democrats repeatedly miss the votes as well.

 

There really is no coherent strategy at this point. The more time passes the more I tend to believe the people who claimed that a lot of Senate Democrats were hoping the Senate would stay Republican this year. 

 

In other wonderful news:

 

 

Over and over and over the media and deadend leftists claim that Democrats are beholden to queer people and pandering to them, yet over and over and over we get the above as the true reminder of our place. 

[DRW50]

Multiple times now I've read about how many different things have been taken out of this bill. Here we go again. By the time it does pass it's going to just be the same lip service nobody needs more of:

 

 

[Vee]

I'm not particularly happy about that, nor am I happy about Garland upholding the old institutionalist turn-the-page norms on certain things where it's not wholly necessary (and that's not just a question of the Carroll case). There's a number of things I can not be happy with. But that would happen in any administration, and it won't be the last time. The key is it's also a process, and a series of moving conveyors. I understand the urgency of the moment, nobody needs to remind me.

 

This is a frustrating and tedious period with the infrastructure logjam and the uncertainty over voting rights. But it's not the first. A lot of that is just the nature of the Senate. I think the trajectory now, as all the bipartisan kerfuffle slowly dissolves by the hour, is that things are going to get done, if clearly less swiftly than I'd like, over the next few weeks and months as all this crap fades away. I'm tending to tune out the minute by minute cat-herding tweets about the Senate atm (often from giddy Capitol Hill reporters like Sherman who hero-worship the 'savvy' of McConnell and scoff at Democrats who work to make deals, then ignore them when they actually pass legislation) and am going to give them a pass on posting until real results begin to manifest, which will probably only begin sometime next week. Maybe. That's the Senate for you.

 

If I spent all my time watching leftist accounts I'd think everything is fucked, that the Dems don't want to win and it's all doomed. That's not the case; that's simply what they want because they value vindication and perceived moral superiority over progress. I don't believe for a second the Senate Dems didn't want to win. That doesn't mean there weren't and aren't plenty of blinkered Democrats in the Senate who made mistakes last year and some who are making them now. Same old story for many years. Doesn't mean we can't do anything right. Right now, the force within the party rank and file is to go it alone.

 

There are a lot of things we can eternally criticize Democrats for, especially Democrats in the Senate, especially re: messaging and tactics which will be a generational reeducation process to be honest, but I think ultimately the train will come down the track on some of the key issues of this month - possibly while I'm ready to throttle everyone involved. That's bureaucracy. In the meantime, I am not going to take my mood cues from leftists or CNN.

Edited June 9, 2021 by Vee

[marceline]

I'm just tired of people who are ostensibly on our side looking for reasons to attack Democrats.

 

For example, y'all know I love Joe Biden but personally I disagree with his summit with Putin. I think it would be better to shun and marginalize Putin in every way. That doesn't mean I think Biden's weak. I just disagree with him on this.

 

Merrick Garland is another example. The leftists saying that he should step down and Sally Yates should replace him are vapid ass-holes running an op.

 

I'm not even going to get into AOC stepping to Kamala Harris. Sandy is going to regret that.

[Vee]

A good thread:

 

 

[DRW50]

The main problem is most involved play a lot of very awkward word games (most recently shown with Jacky Rosen). That's likely one of the reasons it's easy to believe they are just hiding behind Manchin a nd Sinema.  

[dragonflies]

 

 

 

 

s=20

 

[DRW50]

 

[dragonflies]

 

[DRW50]

This is like one of those quotes you see splashed in a documentary right before the nation falls. 

 

 

[Franko]

Lord, she needs to retire already ...