My understanding of Senate procedure used to come in handy. But it’s not a very interesting asset anymore because there isn’t anything happening in Congress worth paying attention to. At least, there aren’t any bills that you or I particularly care about to discuss and there aren’t any appointments moving through.
There are still things to understand about what’s happening in Congress. But these things are mainly about how many different ways there are to describe getting your ship caught up on the shoals or driving your car over a cliff.
What happens if Congress fails to do x, y, or z in a timely manner?
I remember when we were all trying to figure out how to add transparency to the subcommittee hearing process. But those days are long gone. They perished with the 2010 midterms and the loss of Democratic control of both chambers of Congress.
This current state of affairs is not only dispiriting…it makes me feel a little useless.
Well there is the upcoming TPP vote in the House.
Obama’s legacy gift to the nation. Not that partisan Democrats will ever own this POS any more than they do the laundry list of rightwing crap that Clinton saddled this country with.
Marie3, are you Marie2 formerly Marie at Dkos?
Yes. Am still hopeful that my computer meltdown can and will be fixed and I’ll be back to Marie2 in another couple of weeks. But for now am Marie3, formerly Marie2, formerly Marie.
I was worried something worse than a computer meltdown happened. Am relieved that’s all it was ^_^
Kind of you to notice my absence. Probably should be more organized and disciplined and not such an idiot in managing my computer to avoid anyone wasting mental energy/space if unnecessary blather from me is suddenly missing.
I was wondering where you were but figured I was just missing your posts or something. Sorry about the computer trouble!
My fault really – everybody knows that computers crash and die. Maybe this time I will have (finally) learned my lesson.
Why would a borked computer cause you to change usernames?
I have some knowledge of the field. What happened? How can I assist you?
Obviously you have some other computer access. Have you forgotten your password (I have). Maybe Booman can e-mail it to you.
Did you have a physical meltdown or did Windows get borked? I have no knowledge of Apple so if you have a Mac I can’t help but can assist you with Windows or Linux.
If it can be restored, my computer guy can do it. He just really doesn’t want to and would prefer that I upgrade. I prefer not to junk yet another computer — and I really do like my old ThinkPad.
He shut me up by giving me a loaner. Don’t like it because it weighs more and has Vista. At the moment I’m being stubborn about upgrading. If possible to get another six to twelve months out of the old one before adding to the e-waste pile, it’s what I want to do.
So it doesn’t boot? It doesn’t turn on? You’re locked out? Forgot your password? BTW, lots of Thinkpads running Linux. I hate to see people pay the Micro$oft tax. If you are forced to go with Windows 8, I can direct you to a shell that I installed on my sister’s computer that makes it look like XP. OTOH if you like the smartphone look of Windows 8, GNOME3 is available, on UBUNTU and other Linuces Libux distributions.
If you are uncomfortable discussing it in public, e-mail me at asegredo7 at gmail.com
Outside of my wife, you are the most exasperating woman that I have ever met. But I like you and want to help.
DAMN! really need an edit button.
Linuces LibuxLinuxTo answer your question, I’d have to know why the operating system crashed and won’t load. Jon hasn’t exactly answered that question and I suspect that’s in part because he hasn’t gotten around to it. Plus he agreed to fix it for very little money and later regretted agreeing to do so.
Still, I’m the idiot that didn’t have everything backed up on a flash drive. Or even all those passwords, etc. written down somewhere other than what’s on the computer.
In real life, I’m considered amusingly exasperating by men that don’t feel morally, ethically, or intellectually threatened by me. Those that do, dislike me.
I’ve posted a Diary on what you can do yourself. Hope it helps.
You’re paying him but he’s trying to sell you another computer while fobbing off getting your data? Get another computer guy or girl, there are plenty of bright women in the IT field and they usually have better manners than men.
Thanks, but expect Jon will come through this time as he has in the past. He does have a point that my machine is near the end of its life. Can’t expect electronic gizmo guys to appreciate a quasi-Luddite like me. Nor how much I’ve come to detest machines that today must be tossed instead of fixed. When my fourth (or is it fifth?) coffee maker died a couple of years ago, I said, “That does it” and recalled that I’d been perfectly satisfied with a drip Melitta pot and would never have switched to a Mr. Coffee if not for a friend buying me one and I was too polite not to use it.
Our Mr. Coffee caught fire years ago. No more Mr. Coffee. We have Keurig machine now,
Expect more Mr. coffees with TPP.
I DO expect to get around to fixing that 15 year old laptop and I have an
oldancient AT computer (AMD k6-III+) in the basement acting as a wake-on-lan server for the other computers. I also have my first computer, a Micron 486DX-100 and even my daughter’s old Commodore 64, but I think you can’t count those. I can’t bear to part with the Micron. It cost me $3000 when $3000 meant something. I keep planning to put the Commodore on e-bay along with our old (mint condition) Princess telephone. Collectors are paying real money for both of those.House procedure is far less interesting because the minority has only almost no rights.
Pelosi whipping votes for TPP on White House orders is pretty interesting, but only tangentially procedural.
Just say at Dkos that it passed. Nothing much matters anymore.
They voted to vote on it, afaik.
I’d like to have a little acknowledgement from the frpnt page that they were wrong to think Obama was going through the motions.
Grrr! Those procedures are a lawyer’s wet dream. That’s why I wanted Booman to follow it. To get an expert translation and prognosis.
I am reminded of “The Scent of a Woman” and Al Pacino’s quote ” If I were the man I was five years ago, I’d take a FLAMETHROWER to this place!”
We just have to get through the next 15 or 20 years and then demographics will shift things at the Senate and even the House level. We should use this time to organize around a constitutional amendment to abolish corporate personhood and allow for regulation of campaign contributions. I worry that it could be too late to turn back global warming by then — at least without huge damage to the planet. But we can only do our best.
If the next campaign finance reform regulation legislation is as effective as the last two, the political center will end up somewhere near Scott Walker today.
This is unfortunately true, plus there’s the issue of restricting the franchise. Fidesz in Hungary shows it’s possible to doctor the electoral system to guarantee power for possibly decades. The oncoming demographic shifts aren’t that huge – even achieving Texas’ current level of voter supression could leave the Republicans in power for at least 30 years.
What happens is that Congress makes itself irrelevant. A very bad precedent. I keep thinking about the movement to transfer Elizabeth Warren to the White House before she’s had a chance to accomplish anything in the Senate. She’s done a lot of good work, of course, but it’s really just more of the same kind of thing she was already doing. She hasn’t had a chance to do the one thing that Congress is supposed to be about, which is to makes new laws.