Maybe it’s because 2013 was such a stupid year but, as it comes to an end, I have been preoccupied with how incredibly paralyzingly stupid our country has become. Matt Taibbi appears to be having similar thoughts.
Then, of course, there’s the irony. Men like Karl Rove and Dick Armey practically invented the politics of stupid. In fact, they practically invented the politics of winning millions of votes every time some oversexed cosmopolitan liberal of the Matt Damon/Sean Penn genus used words like “dumb” or “stupid” to describe the preoccupations of Middle America’s God-and-guns culture.
To see these same Beltway Svengalis trapped now in this crazy role reversal, denounced by the far right for being the same kind of condescending establishment snot-bags they themselves spent decades trying to find and campaign against – well, that’s just seriously funny.
At least Taibbi is capable of seeing the humor in it all. Increasingly, I am not finding it funny at all.
Well, they do not have a lock on stupid. If Dems wanted to impress voters on how important unemployment insurance was for the long term jobless, they might have included it in the deal. Instead, they milk it.
Yes, because we all know that getting a budget passed under regular order for the first time during the Obama Presidency would take place entirely on terms dictated by the Democrats- all they had to do was ask. Never mind the insane Republican-controlled House and the GOP Senate Caucus’ ability to filibuster.
Government- how does it work?
Can they filibuster a budget? And what, exactly, did the GOP give up?
Oh my God, were you paying no attention at all? Mid-December was taken up by daily reports that the Senate Republicans might filibuster the Murray/Ryan budget which had already passed the House 332-94. Reid had to spend a week making certain the Senate had 60 votes while the Tea Party/Hertage wingnuts screamed their opposition at volume 11.
The GOP gave up, among many other things, the eviscerations of the Ryan Budget and the Farm Bill, which included turning Medicare into a voucher system and cutting $40 billion from SNAP over the next decade. The Ryan Budget passed three years in a row by the House, I heard. The list of abominations surrendered by Republicans goes on and on.
And to be clear, OF COURSE THIS BUDGET SUCKS. Budgets will continue sucking until the voters take Congressional and Executive power away from the Republicans again. Blaming Democrats for this budget provides aid and comfort to the GOP.
Total anticipated funding for the budget is set for $1.01 trillion. Obama’s proposed 2014 budget was around $1.25 trillion.
Not quite. Since the House DID vote passage, the Senate resolution could have passed with 51 votes.(http://www.economist.com/blogs/freeexchange/2012/02/parliamentary-procedure)
And while the Dems may have decided they could not get UI in this budget, turning around the next day and saying how impt, etc, etc, makes them look like cynical jerks,imo.
The problem is and has been the House GOP. That’s where the problem lies and where we need to focus on to help fix this stuff.
This report actually talks about the 2014 budget negotiations, and it documents the need for the Senate to overcome a filibuster attempt:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/after-senate-budget-vote-few-hopes-for-a-productive-2014/2013
/12/15/5c944478-65a3-11e3-a0b9-249bbb34602c_story.html
There’s tons of contemporary reporting of this. Why do people have to invent reasons to be disappointed with Democrats? I agree there’s plenty of reason to be disappointed by many Dems based on the facts; I just get so sick of all the baloney on top.
The FACT is, the President’s proposed 2014 budget had a baseline which had about 20% more funding than the budget which was passed. Yet many Dems labeled him a Republican in Dem clothing. It’s strange.
We passed a budget under regular order; that has value. The leverages of government shutdowns has been taken away for two years, and will soon take away in a meaningful way the GOP’s ability to take debt limit increases hostage. Recognition of these facts would be appropriate and HELPFUL to our common cause.
I agree that keeping UI extended, passing a reasonable Farm Bill, and getting a better settlement of the sequester would have been better. Let’s help our Dems keep the GOP exposed on some of these issues, now that they’re held in isolation. We don’t help them accomplish that when we inappropriately muddy the waters ourselves. That doesn’t help the President and Congressional Dems get better.
“Then, of course, there’s the irony. Men like Karl Rove and Dick Armey practically invented the politics of stupid.”
George was the perfect “try out” candidate.
Remember the joke from 2004?
Why does Bush talk at his rallies like he is talking to
a bunch of 10 year olds?
Because that’s how his “experts” explain it to him!!
I hafta disagree. The more stupid, the better. They are far past the point of diminishing returns; all they’ll gain from continuing this foolishness is the scaring-away of more voters. They don’t need to “fire up the base” anymore, the base is frothing-at-the-mouth rabid already. The next Republican primaries are gonna be a freak show, and a great many low-info voters are going to see some crazy shit. I’m betting a goodly number of Red State women are none too pleased to be told they’re too stupid to manage their own genitalia. Rednecks are not as dumb as many people believe (paraphrasing LBJ, we do know the difference between chicken salad, and chicken shit), and the true nuts among the base just don’t have the numbers to do more than fuck up the plans of the money boys who still think they run the party.
Just my guess…
Things won’t get any better when all the Democrats can offer is people like T-Mac.
Say it again, Brother. Say it again.
Spoken like a true partisan.
Does it help Democratic prospects in future elections? Of course.
In the meantime, a lot of these yahoos, at the state and local levels, have real power, and literally millions of lives are being destroyed as a result of their ignorance, bigotries, and venality.
But I guess it’s OK cuz it’ll help our team in the next election, right? barf
I’m with Boo. This is not funny. At all. Our country is being destroyed, from within, from a type of homegrown fascism that is both new and very old. It both feeds on and is a product of ignorance and hatred. The fact that its leaders and fans alike keep spewing ignorant, hateful things isn’t a bug; it’s a feature. And as ridicule-worthy as some of it is, its purpose is not to provide us all with comedy gold. We should be so lucky.
Ah, but they’ve been upping the funny component ever since “Mission Accomplished.” Yet still the morans don’t get the joke. (Rushing in to defend a western version of OBL, the duck guy, is beyond anything The Onion could concoct.)
So sad for all the people that have been hurt in the US and other countries by the jerks in both US political parties, but that’s what happens when people buy their government from infomercials and pulpits.
There is no one more surprised than a revolutionary being revolted against.
There is nothing more typical than a revolutionary being eaten by the very revolution which he spawned. Trotsky in Mexico, etc
Robespierre
Condorcet
Hadn’t heard of him. He certainly makes a scary example for modern Progressives.
I’m not entirely sure what to make of my afternoon. I took the dogs for a hike and when I returned there was a nice officer in my yard. He explained that he was there to inspect and verify my new pup…! Now I got the pup up in Canada (long story) and upon bringing him across the border had to fill out some health forms which were sent to the CDC.
This gentleman was at my house to verify I’d gotten the pup in to get his series of vaccinations. Ok fine.
But, the interesting part was that because of the Sequester, which he said meant layoffs for 50% of the local staff, he was actually the meat inspector and was having to do double duty for things like checking my dog’s vaccination schedule. So…meanwhile, the local grocery stores had to wait??
And this was 2013’s last day
Maybe he wanted to check if the dog was for human consumption.
I just thought it was a sign of the times that the Sequester has meant doubling and tripling up for the govt workers still on the job and how bizarre it is to have a meat inspector taking on the role of animal control. He was very nice and obviously out of his element and very thankful my papers were in order. Then of course the big Newf knocked him down. Sigh.
Times are hard. Perhaps he was doing double duty on the same visit. No telling where your dog might have would up had your papers not been in order…
Several of my friends with long carriers in Indiana government have taken early retirement for exactly that reason. My s-i-l just retired from her school corp. job after hearing she would be expected to absorb the entire workload of another professional who had left the job. ‘Course if a person isn’t close to having the time in service built up to retire, they’re just royally screwed.
Gosh, I can remember back when our unions still had some clout and we could actually get fair treatment – at least part of the time.
This is always what happens in revolutions. The revolution is invented by the revolutionaries to solve a problem. The revolutionaries begin by using Mssr le Guillotine to cleanse the aristos and shorten them by a head. But then, the mania for purity spreads, and the original revolutionaries are found wanting. And then one day, SNICK off go their heads.
Napoleon is waiting in the wings for the entire revolution to collapse as it is doing. He proceeds to lead the revolution out of the shadows, and becomes the problem that the revolution was intended to fix.
See numerous nations, 2013, Northern Africa for particularly harsh current examples of this historical trend.
Yup, Sotomayor.
Obama’s appointee, Sotomayor was nominated to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York by President George H. W. Bush in 1991, and her nomination was confirmed in 1992. Another Catholic, tell me again about Freedom From Religion.
.
.
“The motion for a stay went to Sotomayor as the justice with oversight for the 10th Circuit. She gave the government until Friday to respond.”
The “stupid” is a very profitable grift. Just ask Rush Limbaugh, Sarah Palin, and now Phil Robertson. Not to mention all the entrepreneurial preachers on the religious right, with billionaire Pat Robertson leading the pack of parsons who ripped off generations of very religious little old ladies.
And miraculous and anti-scientific religion and politics are endlessly profitable as long as you can make the gulls be-lieve-vuh.
It’s also profitable even in state and local politics. A good pol can set up his buddy to bid fire sale prices on a priceless (until you talk to Christie’s or Sotheby’s) piece of art from the Detriot Institute of Art.
And a big Catholic corporate CEO can rip Pope Francis a new one for not being sufficiently capitalist. Rich Catholics, it seems, are going Galt–following the philosophical tactics of an atheist.
But it’s good that some of the elite folks are beginning to think the tiger devouring the Republicans who have been riding it to victory is amusing. At the same time that A&E gives the Duck Dynasty grifters a pass.
When the tiger finally devours Rush and the Duck Dynasty play-actors and Louis Goehmert and Paul Ryan and CNN, NBC, CBS, Fox, and ABC, and expecially Regnery Books–you might find quite a few people awakening from a forty-year-long spell cast by Lewis Powell.