Showing posts with label mitch mcconnell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mitch mcconnell. Show all posts

Sunday, February 12, 2017

Mitch McConnell "Silences" Elizabeth Warren

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Senator Mitch McConnell decided to make an example of Elizabeth Warren. During the debate over appointing Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions as Trump's Attorney General, Warren started reading from a letter written by Coretta Scott King, wife of Martin Luther King. In that letter, Coretta King states that Jeff Sessions is a racist and not fit to be a Federal Judge.

McConnell then made what could be the biggest blunder of his political career. Using an obscure parliamentary rule, he "silenced" Warren, then made a statement for the record that may go down in history as one of the greatest rallying cries for women:

From Slate
“She was warned,” McConnell said on the Senate floor after the confrontation. “She was given an explanation. Nevertheless, she persisted.”
It’s hard to imagine a pithier encapsulation of nearly every struggle for justice in the history of humanity. Without even trying, McConnell wrote the future epitaph of hundreds of people who have the phrase “nasty woman” in their Twitter bios.

It's the quote that launched a thousand Twitter and Facebook memes, and McConnell probably regretted saying it right away.









Of course, Warren fought back, continuing to read the letter in the hallway outside the Senate, then discussing it with Rachel Maddow on MSNBC, who also read the letter on the air. Then she started tweeting back in defiance:









Then after he was confirmed by the GOP:









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Monday, February 15, 2016

Justice Scalia Dies ~ GOP May Never Recover

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The death of Antonin Scalia is "YUGE" for the Presidential Primaries as well as for the fate of our country. He died while President Obama still has many months to go as President, and all Democrats are eager for the conservative Justice to be replaced with someone younger and liberal. However, the Republicans in the Senate including leader Mitch McConnell immediately stated they would not cooperate in confirming a successor to Scalia, once again hoping to obstruct progress for the President.

There are also questions surrounding Scalia's death at a remote shooting ranch in Texas that will feed into the paranoia of conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones for years to come. In fact, Alex Jones has already called it a "murder," and implicated the President as somehow involved.

The death was announced just before a GOP Primary Debate on CBS-TV, and from the out-of-control behavior on the stage, it's obvious the candidates were thrown for a loop by the news.

While many in Washington and the legal community strained to say nice things about the dead man, my reaction like many others was "Ding Dong the Bigot is Dead!" There's no point in sugar-coating his life or opinions when he was so quick to attack every possible group in the U.S. and make laws to oppress them.



From the Washington Post
. . . “It wasn’t a heart attack,” Guevara said. “He died of natural causes.”
In a statement Sunday, the U.S. Marshals Service, which provides security for Supreme Court justices, said Scalia had declined a security detail while at the ranch, so marshals were not present when he died. “Deputy U.S. Marshals from the Western District of Texas responded immediately upon notification of Justice Scalia’s passing,” the statement said.

. . . Scalia joined about 35 other people invited by Poindexter, who declined to name the other guests.
Later that day, Scalia went out with the group to hunt blue quail. But “he did not exert himself,” Poindexter said. “He got out of the hunting vehicle, and walked around some.’’
Law enforcement officials said Scalia attended a private party that night with the other guests, and left to go to bed early. But Poindexter said that didn’t seem unusual: All of the guests were tired from traveling to the remote ranch, as well as the day’s other activities. Everyone was in bed by 10 p.m., he said.
. . . The next morning, Scalia did not show up for breakfast. Poindexter at first thought he might be sleeping late, but eventually grew concerned. Late Saturday morning, he and one other person knocked on the door to Scalia’s room, an expansive suite called the “El Presidente.” When there was no answer, they went inside.
“Everything was in perfect order. He was in his pajamas, peacefully, in bed,” Poindexter said.

From RightWingWatch
(Conspiracy Theoriest Alex) Jones said that “this is the season of treason, this is the time of betrayal and we would be fools not to ask the question” if Scalia was assassinated, suggesting that bad actors may have slipped something into the justice’s drink to trigger a heart attack.



























Debate Chaos









Conspiracy Theories














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Wednesday, March 11, 2015

GOP Infamy ~ #47Traitors Twitter Hashtag Trending Worldwide - Updated


Previous Related Posts:
Traitors in U.S. Senate Write Letter to Iran

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The Hashtag #47Traitors Trending Worldwide and in the USA Tuesday night, March 10, 2015. There is also a petition to charge the GOP Senators who signed the letter to Iran with treason posted on WhiteHouse.gov that has garnered over 123,000 signatures. I signed it yesterday when there were only about 6,555. Over 100,000 signatures in 24 hours!

Update: From President Obama:



Update: As of noon on 3-11-2015, #47Traitors is still trending!





























If these Senators really think they can dodge this mess or play "Blame Obama" with it, they really are delusional. Some are already blaming Netanyahu for rabble rousing and pointing at Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) as a scapegoat for writing the letter.

Far-right wingnuts have come out of the woodwork to support Tom Cotton and the rest, while Tom Cotton tries to 'splain what they were doing.
























The bottom line is that the GOP has gone too far this time, and history will remember!

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Tuesday, March 10, 2015

#47Traitors in U.S. Senate Write a Letter to Iran, Break the Logan Act

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The Logan Act states the following:

"Any citizen of the United States, wherever he may be, who, without authority of the United States, directly or indirectly commences or carries on any correspondence or intercourse with any foreign government or any officer or agent thereof, with intent to influence the measures or conduct of any foreign government or of any officer or agent thereof, in relation to any disputes or controversies with the United States, or to defeat the measures of the United States, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than three years, or both."

However, 47 U.S. Senators, including Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, and ex-Presidential candidate John McCain, decided to ignore that law and write a letter to the leader of Iran, threatening that any treaty made with President Obama wouldn't be ratified by them. So they have broken the Logan Act and shamed the United States once again on a global scale.

I'm proud to say that neither Senator from Tennessee signed this letter. Good for Corker and Alexander showing they can stand up to the mob!

Via Politico
In a highly unusual move, a group of 47 Republicans in the upper chamber has written to Iran’s top leaders to let them know that any nuclear deal they reach with the United States would be “nothing more than an executive agreement.”
Freshman Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) organized the letter, which features signatures from top Republican Senate leadership and potential presidential candidates such as Sens. Marco Rubio of Florida, Ted Cruz of Texas and Rand Paul of Kentucky.
The following Republican senators did not sign the bill: Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Dan Coats of Indiana, Thad Cochran of Mississippi, Susan Collins of Maine, Bob Corker of Tennessee, Jeff Flake of Arizona and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
. . . The letter, first reported by Bloomberg View columnist Josh Rogin, is meant to turn up the heat on President Barack Obama to give Congress some power over the nuclear negotiations.
“It has come to our attention while observing your nuclear negotiations with our government that you may not fully understand our constitutional system. Thus, we are writing to bring to your attention two features of our Constitution—the power to make binding international agreements and the different character of federal offices—which you should seriously consider as negotiations progress,” the senators wrote. “Anything not approved by Congress is a mere executive agreement.”









It's bad enough that Congress allowed Netanyahu to make his case just last week, but this goes beyond taking advice from a foreign leader. This is tampering with the Constitutional duties of the President of the U.S., who is the only one who can make treaties with foreign leaders.

In a case of classic Group Think behavior, the group of 47 followed the lead of the Junior Senator from Arkansas, Tom Cotton, a yahoo if there ever was one. They have followed him out on a limb and right over a cliff on this one. If Pres. Obama and the Democrats had the will and the nerve, they would throw the book at all of them and slap them in prison on treason or sedition charges. But unfortunately, that's not how Washington works, so this will probably just be another embarassment to our country that we don't do anything about, like school shootings and Tea Party led shutdowns.

Senator Harry Reid, Democratic Minority Leader in the Senate spoke out:

From The Hill
“Republicans are undermining our commander in chief while empowering the ayatollahs,” he said from the Senate floor. “We should always have robust debate about foreign policy, but it's unprecedented for one political party to directly intervene in an international negotiation with the sole goal of embarrassing the president of the United States.”






And Iran's government responded to the letter, schooling the Senate on how this works:

From Washington Post
“It has come to our attention while observing” the negotiations, the letter says, “that you may not fully understand our constitutional system.” Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif got an undergraduate and master’s degree from San Francisco University in international relations and another master’s from the University of Denver, so it’s possible he knows. (The president, however, went to college in Scotland.)
Zarif dismissed the letter — and lectured the authors — Monday as “propaganda.”
. . . “We believe that the letter has no legal value and is propaganda,” Zarif said, quoted in Iranian media. “The senators must know that under international law, Congress cannot change the content of the agreement,” he said, and “any congressional action to prevent the implementation of any agreement will violate [Washington's] international commitments.”
He then said: “The world is not just in America.”

Vice President Joe Biden was much more blunt about the letter:
Via Huff Post
In thirty-six years in the United States Senate, I cannot recall another instance in which Senators wrote directly to advise another country -- much less a longtime foreign adversary -- that the President does not have the constitutional authority to reach a meaningful understanding with them. This letter sends a highly misleading signal to friend and foe alike that that our Commander-in-Chief cannot deliver on America’s commitments -- a message that is as false as it is dangerous," Biden said in a statement released by the White House.
"The decision to undercut our President and circumvent our constitutional system offends me as a matter of principle. As a matter of policy, the letter and its authors have also offered no viable alternative to the diplomatic resolution with Iran that their letter seeks to undermine."













































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Tuesday, December 16, 2014

Clueless Ted Cruz Helps President Obama

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Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, still doesn't understand how the Senate works. He only knows that every "patriot" and Tea Party member needs to hate Obama, and they need to keep throwing down the gauntlet to the old-style GOP members who aren't extreme enough for his liking. What he'd love is another big government shutdown that puts the spotlight on his favorite Senator, himself. But Mitch McConnell has already put the kibosh on that idea since it was a big turn-off for the rest of the country last year.

And now it's hilarious to watch Cruz pitch a tantrum and try to get Mitch McConnell to do his bidding. Old Mitch would rather strike deals with lame-duck Majority Leader Harry Reid than let Ted "Anointed One" Cruz have more power over the Senate. And that's exactly what happened - the GOP turned against Ted Cruz, mainly because he is never a team player.



This time it really backfired on Cruz, LOL. He and his toady, Mike Lee R-Utah, insisted that the Senate work through the weekend so they could have a vote on whether the President's Executive Order on Immigration was Constitutional. The vote didn't go as expected, with many GOP Senators voting the opposite from Cruz, and on top of that the President suddenly got the green light for some of his languishing nominations since they were in session anyway.

And then today the Senate stood up to the NRA lobby and passed through the nomination of Vivek Murthy as Surgeon General.

Thanks, Ted Cruz, you idiot! Merry Christmas!

From Talking Points Memo
It began on Friday evening, when Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) were close to securing an agreement to quickly vote on the $1.1 trillion "CRomnibus" spending bill to avert a government shutdown. Cruz, along with Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT), blindsided Republican leaders by objecting and dragging out the process as they demanded a vote to defund Obama's executive actions on immigration.
What Cruz didn't count on was Reid instead seizing on the occasion — which forced the Senate to stay in session for procedural votes — to move forward with starting the confirmation vote clock on a whopping 24 Obama nominations that otherwise might have been jettisoned. The Texan's tactic angered numerous Republican colleagues.
"I think most Republicans think that Christmas came early for Democrats," Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said, according to Roll Call, blaming Cruz. "I haven't seen Harry smile this much in years, and I didn't particularly like it."










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Thursday, November 6, 2014

Election 2014 - Landslide for the GOP

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The Tuesday, November 4th, Midterm Election 2014 was a landslide victory in most states for the Republicans. Mitch McConnell beat Alison Grimes in Kentucky. Rick Scott beat Charlie Crist for the governorship of Florida. Wingnut Cuckoo Joni Ernst won in Iowa, and Kansas re-elected Governor Brownback and stayed firmly Teahadist.

Needless to say, it was a bad night for Democrats everywhere. Optimistic people are using the hashtag #silverlining, but it's rather thin and unsatisfying. My husband suggested #bluelining, but that sounds like a suitcase interior - not that inspirational. The only bright spot is that here in Tennessee we finally got wine in grocery stores, passed almost unanimously by every city and town. No one campaigned against that.

My #silverlining





Just the Facts:















Press Conference and Tweets:



























Senate and Congress and Governors, Oh My



























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Tuesday, October 21, 2014

NBC's Chuck Todd Shills for Mitch McConnell Against Alison Grimes

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Previous Related Posts:
Chuck Todd Admits that Truth Isn't Part of His Job Description
Jealous Clowns Brooks and Todd Question Obama's Manhood as the Alpha Dog
John Stewart Invents #McConnelling
Kentucky Zingerfest: Grimes Vs. McConnell at Fancy Farm

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NBC recently decided to replace the dreadful David Gregory as host of their Sunday "Meet the Press" show. Lo and behold, they chose Chuck Todd, who is so much like Gregory that news watchers everywhere predicted instant failure. Just a few weeks later, Todd is caught up in a political web that fulfills the expectations of his non-fans (including myself).

He has always been negative towards Democrats and especially President Obama, saying it "wasn't his job to sell Obamacare" and implying that the President failed when ACA was actually a roaring success. But this time he went on Morning Joe and said that Dem candidate Alison Grimes had "disqualified herself" from the job of Kentucky Senator by downplaying the fact that she voted for the President, as if he suddenly thinks the world of Pres. Obama - yeah, right. Of course, he doesn't explain how it would HELP Grimes to admit close ties to Obama in a state where she is vying for every crossover GOP vote. Every Democrat in a Red State has to do this at times to survive, so Todd put way too much emphasis on what she said.

The cringeworthy crew on Morning Joe discuss Alison Grimes as cringeworthy.



Now to be fair, many Dems also criticized Grimes for her position on that day, and even agreed with Todd - at first. But when it became clear that Grimes was just speaking like a careful politician, while Todd seemed to be shilling for McConnell, the picture was clear.

And believe me, the Mitch McConnell team saw a golden opportunity in Todd's dismissal of Grimes (almost as if it was planned, cough, cough), and immediately used the clip in one of his campaign ads.

From Washington Post
. . . the harshest critique probably came from "Meet the Press" host Chuck Todd, who appeared on "Morning Joe" on Friday to discuss Grimes's weird reply. "I think she disqualified herself," Todd told host Joe Scarborough — an extremely strong statement.
Miss that segment? Well, don't worry, Kentucky. The campaign of Grimes's opponent, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R), will be putting it into heavy rotation with its new ad, titled "Disqualified."



Todd, meanwhile, denies that any of it matters, he's not partisan, he's not helping the GOP. And anyone who thinks so is not living in reality, apparently - or as Todd defines reality, whatever the Beltway pundits are saying at the moment. You gotta hand it to Todd - he is a consistent toady. But once again he is insulting our collective intelligence if he thinks he can at once be a "fair" judge of politics while bashing a major candidate trying to overturn a GOP leader in a Red State. He pounced on that one line and ignored how well Grimes is doing in every major poll (except on Fox News, of course, where they are always right - oh wait).

From Facebook via politicusUSA
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Right - if people choose to vote for Grimes they are "cheerleading," but if Todd sends a great quote to McConnell he is being "realistic." Riiiight.







And he went even further, blaming Grimes herself and taking no responsibility for what he said:

Via Daily Kos
How does Chuck Todd respond to this journalistic mistake? He blames the candidate. "I think that is one of those situations where she invited this on herself," Chuck Todd said. "It feels like she had a lot of consultants whispering in her ear, 'Whatever you do don't give Mitch McConnell a line for a TV ad.'" Alison Lundergan Grimes did her part. Chuck Todd failed as a journalist. He became the news. He gave Mitch McConnell a line for a TV ad.

And a disclaimer: I'm not here to be "fair" to Todd. I think he is an ambitious warped individual who started out as a numbers guy and he's risen to a nice level of incompetence due to the Groupthink at MSNBC, where they routinely let go of any talented person who questions the GOP (Martin Bashir, Goldie Taylor, etc). I have been a critic of Todd on Twitter, and was recently blocked from retweeting or responding on his account right after having this conversation, which seems legit considering some of us saw Gregory as a loser for YEARS before NBC gave his job to Todd. Maybe they should listen to us now.



It seems as if Alison Lundergan Grimes is going to get the last laugh on both Todd and McConnell, as she is leading in the polls now. Which I'm sure he will say is incorrect, or just more cheerleading. Whatever!







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Monday, March 17, 2014

Jon Stewart invents #McConnelling

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Previous Related Posts:
Mitch McConnell Forced by Tea Party to Vote For Debt Limit
Mitch McConnell Sad Over Filibuster Loss
Clownish Mitch McConnell Filibusters Himself

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The new Mitch McConnell campaign video features he and his wife making smiley faces for the camera over and over again, which sent comedian Jon Stewart into fits of laughter last week on The Daily Show. He and his crew then used different soundtracks to make the video even more funny, and he urged viewers to go out and make their own versions and post them under hashtag "McConnelling." And thus a hilarious new internet meme was born.


















These last two are mine, Enjoy!




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Thursday, March 6, 2014

CPAC 2014 ~ Guns in the Air, Clowns on the Stairs

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Oh, CPAC - the Clown Show of my Dreams. The Conservative Political Action Committee. The Annual GOP Meeting at which all the goons let their hair down and try to inspire the unruly troops. Four days of Fabulous Buffoonery. People you won't see there: gays, atheists - who are banned - or many women on the main stage.

Metaphor for GOP - Clowns on Stilts on Stairs












There will be hawks and doves, social conservatives who fret about the spread of gay marriage and fiscal conservatives who’d rather move beyond that debate, and all stripes of libertarians. The three-day conference wraps up Saturday with the CPAC presidential straw poll, a window into the sometimes fleeting allegiances of the GOP base two years before the presidential primaries.
~ Politico.com


. . . by virtue of your being here today, tomorrow, each and every one of you is going to be audited by the IRS
. . . We are at the edge of a cliff. Liberty is under assault.
~ Senator Ted Cruz, R-Texas, at CPAC

(Senator Paul) Ryan insisted that liberals were only offering people “a full stomach and an empty soul.”
He then told a story of a “young boy from a very poor family” who received free lunches at school “from a government program.”
“He didn’t want a free lunch,” Ryan insisted. “He wanted his own lunch, one in a brown paper bag, just like the other kids.”
“He wanted one, he said, because he knew a kid with a brown paper bag had someone who cared for him. This is what the left does not understand.”
~ Paul Ryan, Via RawStory

Christie received a standing ovation from the conservative audience and shouted,”Let’s win elections again!” as he strolled off stage.
~ American Overlook

To President Carter, I want to issue a sincere apology. It is no longer fair to say he was the worst president of this great country in my lifetime, President Obama has proven me wrong.
. . . I got some attention for standing up to defend the ‘Duck Dynasty’ family when they got in a little bit of trouble. You may have thought I was defending the Robertson family because they’re from Louisiana … because my kids are just huge, huge fans. … But the reality is this: I stood up for their right to speak up and articulate their beliefs because I am tired of the left. I’m tired of the left that claims they’re tolerant, claims they’re for diversity and they are, they’re tolerant and they’re for diversity except when you dare to disagree with them
~ Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, via Politico

At a panel on “Benghazigate: the ugly truth and coverup” held by a rival conservative conference to CPAC, Ginni Thomas, a conservative activist and wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, asked a panel that included controversial retired General Jerry Boykin if the Obama administration had committed any crimes, in particular, providing material support to terrorists. The panel all responded affirmatively.
~ Daily Beast






























































































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