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Posts posted by Ghost of LL
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I have some empathy for the Koch brothers. They're good old-fashioned rich-guy business Republicans who just wanted to make an asston of money and needed government regulation not to prevent them from doing so. The only thing unique about them was their extremity, both in their objectives and in the pursuit of those objectives.
In pursuing their objectives by financing the Tea Party, they unwittingly facilitated the rise of the white-nationalist Party of Trump. In that, they're not alone (I say as I look in the mirror).
Unlike some others, they recognized what has become of the GOP. Their donations went down significantly over the past four years. That's to their (limited) credit.
We all make bad decisions. We just don't have the wherewithal to dump billions of dollars in furtherance of those bad decisions. But even within my limited means, I often look at my bad decisions and the consequences caused by them and mournfully think "what the fuck have I done?".
I can't imagine the scope of the "what the fuck have I done" that the Koch brothers ask themselves.
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Every R accusation is a confession. For 30 years, RushFoxHannity spewed the idea that no D in Congress could be trusted when crafting legislation. D's passed ACA with multiple R amendments iirc.
In 2019, you send a House bill to the Senate, and it dies a slow death in Turtle's inbox.
There were no Republican amendments. Pelosi and Reid pushed it thought without any Republican support or say-so.
But regardless—Biden is wrong. There are no good Republicans. That’s why a question he needs to be asked in a debate is whether he would pardon Donald Trump.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk-
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1 hour ago, softlynow said:
I still don’t get that one. Greed isn’t a trait peculiar to a negative stereotype of Jews. I get that they’re associated with money-exchanging occupations, but it just seems too much of a stretch to say that tweet was a slur.
Are you serious?
You've never heard the phrase "Jew him down" when speaking of a negotiation? Have you not read Shakespeare?
The "greedy jew" is totally an anti-Semitic trope.
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11 hours ago, DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt said:yep. to support the current GOP while espousing traditional conservative principles is not possible. literally nothing i was brought up to believe about GOP principles was true. it was all a complete lie.
Yep.
I was a George Will/Ronald Reagan/Al Laffer conservative. I genuinely thought that if you cut taxes for the upper classes, then they would spend and invest and the economic result of that would be a net positive for the entire economy and everyone in it. I mean, it looks good on paper.
And we tried it. Twice. And it didn't work. It didn't really increase economic activity. It certainly didn't trickle down to people in the lower socio-economic classes. It just further enriched the already wealthy.
I'm not going to sit her and tell you that, having run an experiment twice and watching it fail, that we should continue running the experiment to see if one day it will succeed. That's stupid. I'm not sold on the Elizabeth Warren model. And I'm steadfastly opposed to the Bernie Sanders model. But it is correct to say that the Laffer model is a complete and total failure.
And I don't even think that anybody actually even believes it anymore. It's just a bunch of rich people who want lower taxes for themselves and a bunch of rubes who have been suckered.
And then there's something darker.
I suppose I always knew that there were racists who made up part of the Republican base. I didn't think it was very big. But I knew they were there. And I was plenty happy to accept their votes because, hey--they agree with me on taxes. And, ultimately, I thought my view on taxes helped everyone. So who cares if they're racists if they favor economic policies that helps everyone?
But in particular, me.
That was a pretty fucking craven calculus. It was a morally culpable one, too. I'll get to answer for that one day.
But as it turns out, I was wrong about that, too. The GOP wasn't a conservative party with a small racist fringe. It was a racist party with a small conservative fringe. I wasn't using them to enact policies I support. Because look at the GOP budgets since forever--they never enacted conservative policies. They were using me to enact the racist policies that they support. And they did promulgate plenty of those.
So not only was I craven, but I was also stupid. So that feels real great.
And that's what's left of the Republican Party. They're a racist party. It's fundamental to their appeal. And there are some people left who are like I was--"I'm not a racist, but I really like lower taxes." Those people--and there are plenty of them--are either craven or stupid or both.
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47 minutes ago, Hugo Stiglitz said:
Liz Cheney is also calling for him to go.
I have to be fair to my Republican friends. Yes, they may be overtly racist and abysmally misogynistic. But I honestly think that they oppose rape committed by black men.
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I swear I participated in exactly this same event in 1992, except it was at Northaven Park.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk-
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14 hours ago, troph said:
Give me some time I’ll pm you. Save 11/3 on your calendars though. Will be Texas Lege focused. If we can flip the house - and we will - then this insanity will stop over night. 9 seats, that’s it. We are that close.
In34.
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23 hours ago, Chad Fuck said:
Expound on the English flag vis-à-vis white nationalism angle. Is it their Gadsden Flag now?
Yeah--kind of something like that. It's more like an "England for Englishmen" kind of thing. I don't think we have anything that's really like it because we've never been a very ethnocentric society--at least not within the past 150 years.
There was an article about it in the Economist within the past year. It used to be the Union Flag was used by those people because UKIP was their political extremist-party-of-choice. But UKIP has cratered with Brexit becoming mainstream and it losing its legitimizing program. So now you have the British National Party, some of which has spun off into the English Defence League. So along with devolution of white nationalist parties, there's been a devolution of their iconography.
I think it's more akin to what the white nationalists would like to do with the Betsy Ross flag. But that hasn't exactly taken off.
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2 minutes ago, Mojo Hand said:
Are you talking about flags flying from random houses and buildings, or like an "official town flag" sort of thing?
Both. It's really quite striking to me, as I've spent a fair amount of time in the UK over the years.
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So now something is going on in Baton Rouge?
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On a train through the UK now on my way up to Glasgow.
Until recently, the flags in the small towns in England were always the Union Flag. Once you got north of Hadrian's Wall, you'd see St. Andrew's Cross. But south of the border, it was always the Union Flag.
That's not true anymore. Now, in almost every English town I saw the red St. George's Cross flying.
Yeah--it's hard to take too many things away from a train ride. But it is striking, especially since the English flag has earned certain connotations vis-a-vis white nationalism.
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11 minutes ago, atomheartbevo said:
If the GOP in Texas were smart enough to be looking 3 elections down the road, they would be trying to find Hurd a state office to run for next year, even if it means going after an incumbent R, because when those state spots start flipping, they aren't going to come back to the Rs.
That would not surprise me in the least.
Look--life as a member of the minority party in the House sucks. There's absolutely no way to influence shit. It's just a miserable, soul-draining experience.
Much better just to use the next two years to come back to Texas, survey the landscape, and beginning a campaign for lt. governor.
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3 hours ago, Js1 said:
Decent? No. Would it be more likely with a top-tier Senate candidate? Fuck yes it would be.
Need 9 seats. They also have to defend the 12 seats they flipped last year.
64, 66, 67, 92, 93, 96, 108, 112, 134, 138 are your best pickup opportunities. 8 of those are North Texas. How much longer can Sarah Davis hang on in Harris County?
Moral of the story: if the Democrat party's gains in the suburban female vote is real and not just a Trump-blip, then yes, they have a chance. Because all of those seats are fast growing suburban seats in Dallas and Houston.
I would agree with that. Right now, I'd give them 1 chance in 4 (maybe 1 chance in 5). But the reality is that their gerrymander is broken. It's build on the assumption that that suburban, highly educated whites are going to be Republicans. That's no longer true.
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As sterling descends below $1.22, I'm really appreciating Boris Johnson's premiership from the standpoint of my upcoming vacation.
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1 hour ago, Brisketexan said:
just yesterday, my daughter was lecturing me on how she doesn't buy that man is totally and irredeemably depraved. I told her that I disagreed, but I'm glad she thinks that way. In any case, the good thing is that we all end up at the same place -- they believe it's for a cause that can win, I believe it's for a lost cause, but in either case.....we all believe in fighting and not quitting.
You know, at some point you're just making the record for history.
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3 hours ago, Bama Chick said:
(And when I say “American enough” I mean white enough.)
Don't worry--we know what you meant.
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One wonders if the Republicans wouldn't be better off at this point without Collins. Her brand has really taken a beating over the last 12 months.
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42 minutes ago, Js1 said:
Pete Olsen is retiring. R+4 district.
That's interesting. Most of that district is Fort Bend County, which is now pretty solidly Democratic.
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7 hours ago, bolverk said:
And that no-deal Brexit might just be what sends the global economy into the overdue recession.
The most sure-fire way to ensure that Trump loses re-election is for there to be a recession in November 2020. And Boris Johnson is just the guy to deliver it via a no-deal Brexit.
Honestly, Boris Johnson's ascension to the premiership may be the high-water mark of this round of global populist insanity.
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So, . . . Royce West, anybody?
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3 hours ago, Brisketexan said:
This.
I think that only a small percentage of Republican voters are truly evil (that percentage gets higher once you get into this actual administration, though - Stephen Miller is genuine evil, and the sycophants who enable horrific behavior for short-term career gains are evil as well).
Bull-fucking-shit. I'm not going to identify Stephen Miller as the devil and give his acolytes a pass.
You and I both know plenty of people who vote Republican so that they can get a lousy 2% off on their taxes. They'll put children in cages and abandon all American values for a few thousand dollars.
That kind of moral nihilism is the very heart of evil.
I mean, say what you will about the tenets of National Socialism, Brisket--at least it's an ethos.
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2 minutes ago, Bateshorn said:
Honestly, it probably mostly comes down to district demographics. Have enough D's moved into the hill country and enough olds died to find the 2.1 points she needs?
It's not the Hill Country where the Ds move. That's where the olds die (I'm looking at you, Kerrville). It's South Austin where the Ds are moving into.
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1 hour ago, Bateshorn said:
One of several districts drawn to deny Austin a democrat in Congress. The amount of work it took to crack Travis county is absurd.
Wendy Davis is such a turd.
More broadly, the real races will be in state houses. With the Supreme court allowing gerrymandering to stand, if the democrats can hold/take a few statehouses and governorships, they will finally have a seat at the redistricting table for the first time since 1990. The GOP lost the senate in NY. There's a bunch of upstate GOP members who are about to be forced into districts together or have to introduce themselves to voters in the Bronx.
I'm not crazy about Wendy Davis. But I will recognize that she will be able to raise more money than Kopser was. And that alone will help.
And here's another thing I wonder about--how different is the political landscape in 2020 from 2014 on her signature issue? With Kavanaugh on the Court and with the anti-abortion bills in Alabama and Missouri, has the political calculus on that issue changed over the past six years?
And, perhaps more to the point, does it matter? In our hyper-partisan era, does it matter who the Republican and who the Democrat is for a House seat?

SCOTUS - Ginsburg
in Cloak Room
Posted
No fucking shit.