American politics 2016: Lawyers, Guns, and D-Money

Pretty sure they're not supposed to be openly discussing Project Final Countdown.

uh, that's Europe, not USA

Gohmert: How many same-sex couples would you put on a spacecraft to perpetuate the human race?

depends, are they Republican?

Rep. Rick Allen (R-Ga.)

https://terrynewberry.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/rickallendrums1.jpg

?

So right wing that he doesn't even have a left arm.

House Republicans will never change--

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2016/05/27/congress-leaves-town-with-no-zika-resolution-lengthy-negotiations-ahead/?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_daily202

Congress abandoned the Capitol Thursday for an almost two-week break without addressing how to combat Zika, even as public health officials issue dire warnings about the spread of the mosquito-driven virus with summer approaching.

Republican leaders insist a deal can be struck soon to provide the money federal health officials say is needed to develop a vaccine. They also downplayed the risk of waiting a little longer, arguing existing money is available for the initial steps needed to help contain the virus while lawmakers resolve the larger funding fight.

....

But an influential bloc of conservatives remain committed to reining in government spending, demanding cuts from other portions of the budget before allowing increased funds to battle Zika. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), a fiscal hawk, called it “weak” policy to just push another $1 billion into the effort without any assurance of the outcome, without some corresponding cuts to other federal programs.

“The big disagreement that we have and the difficulty we deal with is,” Sessions said, “should every time a billion-dollar or $2 billion project comes along, do we just borrow the money?”

YES, MOTHERFUCKER, THATS WHY YOU ARE THE STATE

Interesting detail to that recent House committee meeting that was broken up by a fundie rep disgusting even other Republicans: very few reports mentioned which Bible bits were quotes, but this post does, and deconstructs the particular clobber texts used:

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/slacktivist/2016/05/27/chapter-and-verse/

guvmint of Texas makes post-fracking "caramel plumes" photos disappear

State officials ordered the photos removed from a website operated by the University of Texas at Austin. The photos, which weren't generally known to the public until the Times' story, showed potential environmental damage caused by flooding in oil drilling areas, including fracking sites. The photos provided useful information, particularly to people who live in or near the affected watersheds. But a state official said the photos were meant to be used by emergency management personnel in real-time settings.

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a45349/texas-fracking-water/

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2016/05/local-media-collapse-is-making-congress-worse.html

Middle-of-the-road voters, reliant on their local news, are often left in the dark.

Overall, there are more reporters covering Congress than ever, except they increasingly write for inside Washington publications whose readers are lawmakers, lobbyists and Wall Street investors. A Pew Research Center study released earlier this year found that at least 21 states do not have a single dedicated reporter covering Congress.

Thus, the easiest way to become known if you are a member of Congress is to get "earned media" on such strident partisan outlets as Fox News, or to raise a lot of money from activists and lobbyists to inform voters of your many virtues and your opponent's many vices via paid ads. Either of those paths takes you into the partisan and ideological fever swamps, and the more fearsome a swamp creature you become, the more attention you get.

ignorance is great for the politics biz

almost posted this to the "burn after reading" thread

20-yr pentagon employee harassed a nanny, stole her license plates

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/a-warning-left-on-a-nannys-car-license-plates-stolen-and-a-top-pentagon-official-in-big-trouble/2016/06/01/50699a3a-2816-11e6-a3c4-0724e8e24f3f_story.html

Inadvertently funny detail:

The homeowners, who along with their nanny declined to comment, reported the crime to police, replaced the plates and paid AutoZone to bolt them on, court records indicate. They repeated this process later that week after the rear plate was stolen again.

Who pays an auto parts store to put on their license plates?

If your plates are put on with a Phillips or standard screw, no one. However, some people use a Torx or hex screw, at least partly because the tool to remove them is not one that most random miscreants would have on hand. I can see someone getting a person with a specialized tool (heh) if I were concerned about plate theft.

Ah, fair point. It just struck me as a bit quid-ad: "They have a nanny! And don't know how to put on license plates!"

lol my sister-in-law covered this for the DC CBS affiliate: http://www.wusa9.com/news/local/dc/pentagon-officials-steals-nannys-license-plates-in-parking-war/228917402

Hey folks, not sure if this has been discussed on the campaign thread, but Paul Ryan's got a new (ok, same old cliché-filled) plan that he mentioned in his I am voting for Trump piece in his local paper:

This month, we’ll show the country what a better tax code looks like. We’ll outline a plan not just for repealing Obamacare but replacing it with a better system, more focused on patients, choices and lower costs. We’ll offer a plan to restore the Constitution and the separation of powers that decades of executive overreach have eroded. We’ll present the ideal national security and foreign policy to keep Americans safe. We’ll show how we can reform rules and regulations so they’re spurring the economy and creating jobs, not destroying them. And we’ll offer a better way to help lift people out of poverty and into lives of self-determination. It will be a positive, optimistic vision for a more confident America. It’s short of all that’s required to save the country, but the goal was to focus on issues that unite Republicans. It’s a bold agenda but one that can bring together all wings of the Republican Party as well as appeal to most Americans. One person who we know won’t support it is Hillary Clinton. A Clinton White House would mean four more years of liberal cronyism and a government more out for itself than the people it serves. Quite simply, she represents all that our agenda aims to fix.

http://www.gazettextra.com/20160602/paul_ryan_donald_trump_can_help_make_reality_of_bold_house_policy_agenda#sthash.13yOQNI2.dpuf

All the gop cares about is tax cuts for rich people so Hillary is actually the main beneficiary of their "agenda"

“In the Orlando area, Democrats are touting Val Demings, a former police chief who is poised to win a safe Democratic seat. But in a neighboring district, the party has not found a challenger for John L. Mica, who represents a district with a fast-growing Latino population and where Obama tied with Romney in 2012. The party has until a June 24 filing deadline to find a candidate,” Ed O’Keefe and Mike DeBonis report in a broader piece on whether Democrats could actually win the House

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/inside-democrats-trump-fueled-scramble-to-take-back-the-house/2016/05/31/deddd502-1e97-11e6-b6e0-c53b7ef63b45_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_daily202

These stories never fail to make me laugh and cry and also vomit: http://www.syracuse.com/crime/index.ssf/2016/06/owner_of_diner_whose_menu_lampoons_obama_guilty_in_welfare_fraud_case.html

One person who we know won’t support it is Hillary Clinton.

This is so juvenile I'm stunned Morbz didn't write it.

oh, your guilt

Facebook friend:

"The Benghazi committee, which was set up in May 2014, has been operational for longer than the 9/11 Commission was. It has dragged on longer than congressional investigations into the attack on Pearl Harbor, the assassination of President Kennedy, Watergate, the Iran-contra scandal, the 1983 bombing that killed 241 American service members in Beirut and the response to Hurricane Katrina."

Translation: "We're getting close to the truth!"

at last a good name for the super-lobbyist breed: "Heathers"

https://theintercept.com/2016/06/03/heather-podesta/

my homeboy is being courageous again: Marco Rubio blocks confirmation of judge he recommended.

The kind of judges he wants:

By comparison, Rubio’s office added that the senator supported the confirmation of three Obama nominees in other parts of Florida — Patricia Barksdale, William Jung and Philip Lammens — because they have all clerked for Republican-appointed appellate judges, including Jung for the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice William H. Rehnquist. That is a “good indicator of their understanding of the appropriate role of the courts,” a Rubio spokesperson said.

Even Politico notes that Paul Ryan's poverty plan doesn't add up--

The Achilles’ heel for Ryan’s plan is his party’s record of underfunding some of the same job training and child development priorities he needs to meet his goals.
Adding work requirements to benefit programs for the poor is politically popular with conservatives, no doubt. But to be effective, past experience indicates it requires more public investment upfront to train and place low-income individuals in jobs.
Yet even after the budget deal last fall, the Employment and Training Administration in the Labor Department was left with fewer real dollars — adjusted for inflation — than it had in 2006 under former President George W. Bush and a Republican Congress. In the case of early child development, Head Start has enjoyed real growth in recent years with bipartisan support. But taken altogether, current discretionary spending for the Administration for Children and Families is less in real dollars than what ACF received in fiscal 2010, before the GOP captured the House.

http://www.politico.com/story/2016/06/house-gop-poverty-223969#ixzz4AwJ14Brp

president rodham-clinton? or just president clinton?

What? She's sometimes gone by three names but she's never hyphenated afaik.

Clinton Onassis

(she'll marry one of em after Bill's fatal stroke yelling at BLM intruders in Philly)

BLM intruders in Philly should be next politics thread title imho

American Politics 2016: BLM intruders in Philly / Cleveland

Did ilx super delegates decide we needed a new thread today?

no, just Donna Brazile and Barney Frank

presidential campaign has narrowed / "taken a turn"

this isn't the campaign thread!

@AP
BREAKING: Federal appeals court says people do not have right to carry concealed weapons in public under 2nd Amendment.

oh shit for real? that's kinda huge.

Posted here as well w/link to the opinion: Repeal the Second Amendment

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/ryan-restrict-open-amendment-process

In a consequential shift to how House Speaker Paul Ryan hoped to proceed with House business, Republican leadership announced Wednesday it will limit the consideration of amendments, which Democrats had been using to inflict political chaos.

While the move to a so-called "structured rule" reeks of insidery wonky parliamentary maneuvering, it is a significant departure from how Ryan had promised to run the House. It is also implicitly a concession that Democratic efforts to make life miserable for House Republicans by introducing politically awkward amendments had been effective. The most prominent of those amendments -- one that preserved protections for LGBT Americans -- derailed a major energy appropriations bill last month.

With the change, members will not be able to freely introduce amendments without going through the House Rules Committee, a move that could limit the amendments considered on legislation. Any amendments will be approved through the House Rules committee prior to a vote hitting the floor, an attempt to stop controversial amendments from sinking the must-pass spending bills.

Any member can still submit amendments, but the Rules Committee will have the final say

interesting development, can see how this would bite Freedom Caucus in the ass as well

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/david-perdue-let-obamas-days-be-few

Georgia Senator Perdue's bible quoting

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/06/david-perdue-vengeful-bible-verse-obama

This was not an original thought that Perdue had. The verse has become a popular anti-Obama slogan in some right-wing circles. It has even been printed on bumper stickers. And it has been controversial. As a sitting senator, Perdue may be the highest ranking public official to direct this vengeful verse against Obama.

Update: Perdue's office emailed Bloomberg and denied that he intended any harm to the president. Despite asking the audience to pray very specifically on the psalm verse he was quoting, Perdue claimed the media was taking it out of context.

David Perdue spokeswoman Caroline Vanvick responds in an email: "He in no way wishes harm towards our president" pic.twitter.com/PPj5jtZv0n

wow fuck that guy

you lie like a rug

http://images.huffingtonpost.com/gen/103683/thumbs/s-JOE-WILSON-large.jpg

"If [either] party threw its weight behind a truly populist platform, if it stood behind unions and prosecuted Wall Street criminals and stopped taking giant gobs of cash from every crooked transnational bank and job-exporting manufacturer in the world, they would win every election season in a landslide."

is that Trump stepping up his game or

Matt Taibbi in Rolling Stone

t or f