US POLITICS: AMERICANS, PLEASE WELCOME YOUR NEW PRESIDENT... SCOTT BROWN!

guys, BABY HUEY was from Indiana. seeing as how his version of "A Change is Gonna Come" is the best version of that song ever, uh... okay, Indiana sucks shit and i hate it, but there are great people from every state.

I wonder if losing their super-majority has made Congressional Dems realize that they need to stop being jackasses and pass something substantial.

― slapped by a bear (HI DERE), Thursday, February 18, 2010 8:06 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

Uh. How exactly would that work? Everything gets filibustered.

"Bipartisanship" is the only way anything will get passed. It really was the only way even with the 60 vote majority, since Lieberman is essentially a Republican.

Not if the Dems use reconciliation.

ha! i got the white house library doofus to update his story

yeah the point of reconciliation is that filibuster is impossible. it's how they got the bush tax cuts for the wealthy through and look how hard it's been to get rid of those. there are 21 senators pledging support already. so maybe. I'm not sure how many definite nos there are beyond 4.

(nos on the dem side that is)

it would be refreshingly ballsy if they could get their shit together to pull this off but I'm not holding my breath.

I have learned that if I have an early feeling that something good might happen in politics, it's best to shut the fuck up and not jinx it.

Obama's suggested bill or similar will be online Monday.

obama really needed to come out with that bill months ago, I feel.

Guy was too busy trying to teach basic civics to morans, which I could get behind if morans were not wilfully doing the fingers in ears 'I'm not listening' thing, or showing themselves up as members of Congress.

Is it wrong of me to suggest that GOP only respond well to can of whupass/rub nose in own poo moves?

i don't think they even respond to that. most of them are roughly as intelligent as puppies tho.

Is it wrong of me to suggest that GOP only respond well to can of whupass/rub nose in own poo moves?

Lord knows that if you did that kinda thing that they'd moan & snarl like a bunch of pitbulls getting their nuts ripped off w/ rusty pliers. which is amusing enough by itself regardless of whether it's effective.

Either way, you've ripped their nuts off, right?

Not if the Dems use reconciliation.

― Inculcate a spirit of serfdom in children (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 18 February 2010 23:06 (Yesterday)

There is a limited range of laws that can be passed through budget reconciliation. For example, most meaningful health care reform cannot be passed this way.

oh?

yah

No snark intended. I'd like to know which laws.

the way i've heard it broken down is that $$ can go through reconciliation, cos budgetary stuff can't be filibustered. the regulatory changes, creating the exchanges etc can't go thru that door.

http://www.boston.com/news/politics/2008/articles/2009/09/02/health_overhaul_may_ride_on_tactic/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqtKi547e0A&feature=player_embedded#

every time i read something that lamar alexander has to say about anything i'm just like smh

i'm just sort of amazed lamar alexander has managed to keep himself employed in the public sector for so long despite as far as i can tell never having accomplished anything anywhere. (his "education reforms" in tennessee are ancient history and had no discernible effect; his tenure as UT prez was a joke; so were his presidential runs.) even most tennessee republicans i know can't stand the guy. and yet. here he is, drawing a public salary and probably due some ridiculously sweet combined pension at the end of it all.

due a ridiculously sweet lobbying job at the end

x-post--I heard more talk this morning on the radio about trying to pass health care through reconciliation. Can the Dems even get 51 votes (will Blue Dogs vote for anything health care related at this point?)

it really depends on what you mean by "pass health care through reconciliation"

lamar is the ultimate "go along to get along" dude. he just says whatever he's told to and fades into the woodwork. it helps that he's a millionaire.

^^^^

CPAC guy above has just called liberal women ugly (dude is just butthurt about past female noncompliance with his getting-laid agenda) as well as being all 'Barack Obama did coke' - what a felchtard. If that is their Woodstock, I feel sorry for them.

Curmudgeon, we are just holding our collective breath here because of not jinxing what might be going down in DC right now.

Calling liberal women ugly is somewhat of a meme for the wingnuts, which makes me wonder if they've ever been to a republican rally.

xp to curmudgeon

health care has already been "passed" by both the senate and the house--just two different bills.

if the democrats still had 60 seats in the senate, then representatives from the house and the senate would meet, hash out a compromise between the two bills, which would then be passed by the house and senate, and then signed into law. the public option is guaranteed to be removed since several senate democrats (each and every one of whose votes was crucial to get cloture) have expressed an unwillingness to vote for it.

without 60 seats, democrats cant guarantee that the compromise bill wont be filibustered.

the house could just pass the senate bill as-is, and send it to obama to sign, but it has a set of demands (mostly dealing with the tax burden). the generally-accepted post-scott brown plan for HCR--i.e. the easiest path that would get us the best bill with the least amnt of controversy--would be for the house of representatives to pass the senate bill, and then for the senate to use reconciliation to pass a set of changes to its own bill that would satisfy the demands of the house.

meanwhile, a set of 'progressive' senators have started a letter campaign to get harry reid to push a public option through reconciliation, along with whatever other measures are being passed through reconciliation. whether or not this is a good idea and whether or not it will work... who knows.

Calling liberal women ugly is somewhat of a meme for the wingnuts, which makes me wonder if they've ever been to a republican rally.

yeah, but it's not just juvenile lol u ugly, it's dog whistle for BULL DYKES WITH NO MAKEUP AND HAIRY LEGS

it's also a v. carefully considered tactic for tabling any women's issues that they don't like

bizzare. if i had to stereotype, i'd think of liberal women as more attractive tbh -- all the hollywood-types the gop condemns as liberal includes all those attractive actresses, models, etc.

And loose women who get abortions b/c of their heedless, freneticly paced sexual activity. I mean who do Republicans think is sleeping with all those liberal hotties? Maybe they're jealous.

well but that's it--- it's not that they're not physically attractive, it's that they're not appropriately feminine

MEGAN KELLY IS HOTTER THAN ELEANOR ROOSEVELT

THIS MEANS TAXES SHOULD BE 1%

BOOYAH

slam dunk

SORRY HER NAME IS MEGYN

OPEN YOUR EYES

also were ppl really doing lots of coke at Woodstock?

or was it just a setup for the Obama joek

They don't like liberal men either b/c they're not appropriately masculine, so they've kind of painted themselves into a corner in that way (in addition to all the others). Because the only kind of outer candy shell they LIKE is a product of a really small and specific second in history, and an even more specific socio-economic stratum. Eh you know what I mean. Nuclear family post-war industrial surge blah blah blah

Yah but at least no grownup liberal men I know let their mommies pick out their big-boy clothes.

Yah but at least no grownup liberal men I know let their mommies pick out their big-boy clothes.

enh I wouldn't be so sure about that

LOL but you know what I mean! Also I thought that clip was a 'Michelle Obama is fugly' dog-whistle.

Yah but at least no grownup liberal men I know let their mommies pick out their big-boy clothes.

don't judge me

was gonna make a joke about your mother but one of the saddest aspects of aging is the increasing probability that said joke will be answered with "but she's dead", an effective lolkill.

^ does make it awkward in responding to said zings without spoiling light tone too tbf

aging: providing partial zing-protection since the dawn of time

lol u old, ironically, never gets old.

Don't worry, if I met one of these felch-holes in person I would have zero problem with a dozens-style takedown of 'dead mom' eg. 'you killed her by remaining a virgin'.

Hey Max:

xpost to Max--Re reconciliation I was talking about this:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/19/health/policy/19health.html?ref=todayspaper

Democratic officials said the president’s proposal was being written so that it could be attached to a budget bill as a way of averting a Republican filibuster in the Senate. The procedure, known as budget reconciliation, would let Democrats advance the bill with a simple majority rather than a 60-vote supermajority.

Officials said that the White House would post the president’s plan on the Internet by Monday morning. But even as Mr. Obama tries to unite his party behind a single plan, it is unclear that Democrats can muster the needed votes in the House and the Senate given the tense political climate of a midterm election year.

dude is just butthurt about past female noncompliance with his getting-laid agenda

lolz well done A+ Suzy