Yesterday, Common Cause filed a complaint with the Justice Department calling for an investigation of Trump’s attorney’s payment of $130,000 in hush money to porn star, Stormy Daniels as an unreported campaign contribution. It makes sense, since the payment was made to help Trump win the election. I think I start popping popcorn.
I might be jumping the gun but my reaction right now is …
Progressives are hammering Sen. Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) for his agreement with Senate Republican leadership to end the government shutdown on Monday.
Even House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has spoken out against the deal, saying there was no reason to support it.
“I don’t see that there’s any reason — I’m speaking personally and hearing from my members — to support what was put forth,” Pelosi said at a press briefing shortly before Schumer signaled Senate Democrats would agree to it.
There is one sign of hope.
“The Majority Leader’s comments last night fell far short of the ironclad guarantee I needed to support a stopgap spending bill,” said Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) “I refuse to put the lives of nearly 700,000 young people in the hands of someone who has repeatedly gone back on his word. I will do everything in my power to continue to protect Dreamers from deportation.”
Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) all voted against closing debate on the agreement.
The Dallas Republican Party has filed a lawsuit to have 128 Democrats kicked off the Democratic primary ballot because … oh yeah get ready for this … they claim the Dallas County Democratic Chair did not sign the petitions of 128 candidates.
Here’s the deal – everybody with stuffing between their ears knows that Democrats are going to win almost every election in Dallas in 2018, so all the Republicans have left is voter suppression.
Democrats were caught off guard by something this petty but hell, we’re talking about a Party that by all appearance is run by Stephen Miller.
So, this mess is going to court because, you know, Republicans don’t believe in clogging up the court system with frivolous lawsuits and by gawd, we need smaller government.
If you click the graphic below, it will talk you to the email addresses of the Dallas County Republican leadership. Their leader, Missy, y’all, her name is Missy Shorey, might need to hear from you.
Trump is an idiot, and we all know it. Now it comes to light, via Lindsey Graham, that the shutdown is being lead by none other than Trump’s white supremacist boy, Stephen Miller. Every time senators get Trump to pull his head out of this Twitter long enough to make a deal, Miller runs in and jerks it back. This little shit is making life miserable for everyone, and it’s time for Trump to send him the way of Steve Bannon and all the other creatures who’ve been pushed out. The Hill has good reading and video on the little snake.
The silly brinksmanship played in Washington these days has become as idiotic as it has harmful. NO country on the planet runs itself like the US. We don’t do budget reconciliation and planning. We do “continuing resolutions” so the government can limp along for another few days. We regularly hold (the sick, poor children, immigrants, minorities, education) fill in the blank here _________ hostage for cynical political purposes. It stupid. It’s destructive. It costs billions in economic slowing. It hurts everyday Americans.
But here’s the problem – Republicans use government shutdowns now as a political weapon, but it’s not really a shut down anymore. In 2013, after Ted Cruz led the idiotic shutdown, President Obama shutdown the national park system and other services. The shock to the system drove both sides to the table, even though it took 16 days to do so. During this shutdown, though, Trump is trying to make it invisible to everyday Americans. The parks, or at least most of them, are staying open. Other essential services are being maintained. The only people hurt in the short term are the poor, the sick, the old, and the voiceless. After all, who cares about them, right?
Shutdown is now just another tool the Republicans cynically use to put pressure on the opposition. The public, though, because so many services are maintained (even though government employees don’t get paid), there’s no price that most Americans pay. Because of that, many people, who have no idea how government actually works say “Shut the government down. It doesn’t affect me anyway.” I say, let’s make the government shutdown an actual shutdown. Shut down the military. Shut down the air traffic control system. Shut down customs, border security, national parks, social security, medicare, education, everything. The way to stop this kind of nonsense is to make it real to every person. The costs to the economy and everyday Americans would be so severe that politicians wouldn’t dare to use it as a political tool.
I’m pretty sick of the politics of self destruction we’ve seen develop the last 20 years. It’s time to stop it.
Oh Lord in heaven above, they’ve had to take another Republican off the House Ethics Committee because he’s a creep.
A Republican congressman was removed from the House Ethics Committee on Saturday after it was reported that he used thousands of dollars in taxpayer money to settle a misconduct complaint by a former staffer.
Bye, bye, Patrick Meehan, Republican from Pennsylvania.
A married father of three, Mr. Meehan, 62, had long expressed interest in the personal life of the aide, who was decades younger and had regarded the congressman as a father figure, according to three people who worked with the office and four others with whom she discussed her tenure there.
He made life miserable for her when she did not reciprocate. A settlement was made using taxpayer money.
Finding an ethical Republican in congress is like trying to find a virgin in a bawdy house.
Thanks to Barb in DeeCee for the heads up.