2015 American Politics Thread: The 114th Congress Is in the House!

Obama vetoed Keystone

Despite their majority in the Senate, Republicans are four votes short of being able to override Obama's veto.

They have vowed to attach language approving the pipeline in a spending bill or other legislation later in the year that the president would find difficult to reject.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/24/us-usa-keystone-idUSKBN0LS2FH20150224

boehner's response:

"The president’s veto of the Keystone jobs bill is a national embarrassment," he said, adding: "The president is just too close to environmental extremists to stand up for America’s workers. He’s too invested in left-fringe politics to do what presidents are called on to do, and that’s put the national interest first."

probably a lot easier move for Obama when we have an oil glut

put the national interest first.

Canada's?

O did not really "veto Keystone." He may leave the final decision to the next prez.

Now the environmentalists are "fringe" and "extremist". I swear these people at this point just want to choke us to death - environmentally and economically. Was a time - in the 70's - when even Republicans at least paid lip service to environmentalism. Promoting the corporate-introduced notion that environmentalism is "fringe" and "extreme" is even worse.

So is our environmental situation. Again, I swear these corporate assholes want the rest of us dead so they don't have to compete with us.

that's always been the plan

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_vKuslG3BxAw/TROr5hOzKLI/AAAAAAAAA_o/yjixs3MTiq0/s1600/Capitalism1280x800.png

This stuff about Obama *is* racist, and I'm sick and tired of Republicans being bullies about it. First Giuliani calls him a "communist" and far left, now Boehner says he's extreme and fringe.

No one calls them on it, but it's part of a history of suspicion of black politics as extreme, sentimental and irrational. The RW has for years libeled black politicians as too "far left" and " anti-colonial" in their literature.

People should call them racist - straight up, and not back down. Fuck these earth-killers.

hey now it's not fair to play the race card!

do not GSI race card btw

they call HRC far left too, and Bubba

out country is like a junior high run by sadistic 7th graders. it's a good thing taxes are low though

they call HRC far left too, and Bubba

Exactly. Republicans would be saying exactly the same things about a white Democrat POTUS. No?

Not to the same extent. O gets extra hate because of race

Washington Monthly thinking about 2018 midterms via Washington Post Dem Plum Line blog interview with Connecticut gov--

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2015_02/yes_its_time_to_think_about_20054389.php

PLUM LINE: Isn’t the problem that Democrats still don’t know how to deal with the midterm dropoff among their voters? What will stop that from happening in 2018, when all these big governors’ races are at stake?

MALLOY: I don’t think Democrats in most cases have come up with a strategy for that drop-off. We did in Connecticut. That’s why I’m still standing. We had a 56 percent participation rate. We contacted voters over an 18-month period of time. Republicans have done an exceptionally good job of making their voters feel like they’re part of a team. We need to replicate that. We need to make our voters feel like they are part of a team, that this is a continuing process, that every year there’s an election of importance. We need to retrain our voters.

So is that the answer? Better voter contact over a longer period of time? I dunno. It would be helpful, though, if Democrats also spent some time figuring out how to up their game with voters who do show up in midterms, like old folks, among whom the Silent Generation is being rapidly replaced by us Baby Boomers, who are a bit more open to voting Democratic.

As per the discussion above though, the context of who is actually going to be POTUS will be an enormous factor in 2018?

cpac y'all

https://twitter.com/MSignorile/status/571429737266069505

no justice no peace!

walker/palin 2016!

WASHINGTON — In a huge embarrassment for Republican leaders, the House voted down their bill Friday to avert a Homeland Security shutdown hours before the midnight deadline.

The House GOP plan was to pass a three-week stopgap bill to delay the immigration fight against President Barack Obama's executive actions until March 19.

But even that failed to pass, losing conservatives who considered it too much of a surrender to a lawless president as well as Democrats who demanded a yearlong DHS funding bill without any restrictions on Obama's immigration policies.

The vote was 203-224. Fifty-two Republicans voted against it, while 12 Democrats voted for it.

"This was a conscience vote about trying to uphold the Constitution," Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC), one of the "no" votes, told TPM. "If you're supposed to cave in because you don't want 30,000 people to lose their paychecks — how do you make a stand if you don't take a stand? ... It's the only option we have."

looooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/faaaaaaaail

good URL

its the only option we have.. aside from, you know, governing

how do you make a stand if you don't take a stand

i seem to recall those lyrics from the title song to a sly stallone film, can't remember which...

long-forgotten Professor Griff line iirc

http://33.media.tumblr.com/f316d7d2917fe0b9a5a367f66cf6c06e/tumblr_nkgpt1KBMZ1qdmmiqo1_500.gif

Work of art!

he's a goddamned patriot

smooth crotch = perfect touch

A 1 week extension. Will have to wait and see what brilliance the House will come up with by then

data collection forevah

http://www.nationaljournal.com/tech/nsa-spying-wins-another-rubber-stamp-20150227

Sad.

gonna miss ya: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/us/politics/senator-barbara-mikulski-of-maryland-to-retire.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Gonna be a fabulous week with Bibi in town.

matthew yglesias sees a constitutional crisis coming:

http://www.vox.com/2015/3/2/8120063/american-democracy-doomed

rolls together poli sci stuff about presidential (rather than parliamentary) systems, polarization, the "executivization" of governance and constitutional hardball

The best we can hope for is that when the crisis does come, Americans will have the wisdom to do for ourselves what we did in the past for Germany and Japan and put a better system in place.

Hmmmmm, not sure of the crisis coming or that these other systems are better

I would love to have a parliamentary system

The best we can hope for is that when the crisis does come, Americans will have the wisdom to do for ourselves what we did in the past for Germany and Japan and put a better system in place rising coastal waters swallow every major city.

nearer my God to theeeeeeeeee

so HRC and those emails: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/us/politics/hillary-clintons-use-of-private-email-at-state-department-raises-flags.html

I can't figure out WHY she used personal email for four years and no one brought it to her attention. In Florida Rick Scott has conducted a lot of public business on private emails precisely so he can get around one of the country's fiercest public disclosure/sunshine laws and I'm mad as hell about it. As usual with the Clintons they choose mystery.

I can't figure out WHY she used personal email for four years and no one brought it to her attention. In Florida Rick Scott has conducted a lot of public business on private emails precisely so he can get around one of the country's fiercest public disclosure/sunshine laws and I'm mad as hell about it.

Your second sentence answers your first sentence.

iit's the "and no one brought it to her attention" that's left unanswered. you would hope that one of her handlers would realize it was a problem early on and tell her to quit it. but then again, other agency heads also used personal email over the last few years and endured minor scandals, and i'm sure others are still doing it today.

i am not an HRC fan by any stretch but she could have killed and grilled puppies and i'd still vote D, compared to what i'm hearing out of scott walker/JEB/ben carson/rand paul/ALEC/etc. if/when the yglesias crisis comes i hope that how outnumbered and old fox/gun/KKK nation is affects for the better whatever new set up

if she killed and grilled puppies it would be a misdemeanor in that world

the house finally gave up on the DHS funding/immigration thing.

coincidentally, this was announced just before netanyahu's address, which will probably dominate the news

aren't they smart

tbh even if it was a slow news day, otherwise, i don't have a good feel for how much people care about the GOP/DHS/immigration shutdown thing. the other day I was trying to explain it to someone who hadn't heard anything about it, and unless you're the author of a book on communicating succinctly, it's nearly impossible to explain in a concise manner. and even after the explanation, the person didn't really care at all. it's hard to get a good read of whether anyone cares about this shit at all. the results of the most recent mid-terms suggest that not many people do.

a handy list:

* April 2011: House Republicans threaten a government shutdown unless Democrats accept GOP demands on spending cuts.

* July 2011: Republicans create the first-ever debt-ceiling crisis, threatening to default on the nation’s debts unless Democrats accept GOP demands on spending cuts.

* September 2011: Republicans threaten another shutdown.

* April 2012: Republicans threaten another shutdown.

* December 2012: Republicans spend months refusing to negotiate in the lead up to the so-called “fiscal cliff.”

* January 2013: Republicans raise the specter of another debt-ceiling crisis.

* September 2013: Republicans threaten another shutdown.

* October 2013: Republicans actually shut down the government.

* February 2014: Republicans raise the specter of another debt-ceiling crisis.

* December 2014: Republicans threaten another shutdown.

* February 2015: Republicans threaten a Department of Homeland Security shutdown.

http://www.salon.com/2015/03/05/the_right_has_fked_up_minds_meet_the_researcher_who_terrifies_gop_congress/

does anyone read much in this vein of "political psychology"? this was a very interesting interview, but my inclination is to think that the types of analyses the interviewee advocates underplay the role of clannishness or group affinity in determining political affiliation.

maybe this has been discussed on (an)other thread(s)