...because the bad guys kind of won, and the people who are supposed to be the good guys seem to spend most of their time negotiating with the phantom decency they imagine the other side has
https://twitter.com/GothamGirlBlue/status/1441594764156153856?s=20
https://twitter.com/GothamGirlBlue/status/1433116529084747781?s=20

That's why the answer to the question [only ever asked of Democrats], "How ya gonna pay for it?" is always, always, always, "The same way we pay for our unlimited supply of military hardware."

If you’ve been following the reconciliation debate — in which people have been absolutely obsessed with the supposedly terrifying number of $3.5 trillion — you might have thought the defense bill would produce enormous breast-beating about out-of-control spending and debt. After all, that $3.5 trillion is over 10 years, or $350 billion a year, less than half of what we’re going to spend on the military.

But that’s not what happened. Apart from a brief to-do over whether the bill would include funding for Israel’s Iron Dome defense system, the defense bill moved through the process efficiently and with little controversy.

There were no painful negotiations, no ultimatums, no desperate threats. President Biden did not have to beg and plead to secure anyone’s vote. And you sure didn’t see centrist members of Congress expressing deep concern about its size, claiming it was irresponsible to add so much to the national debt — although we’ll easily be spending $8 or $9 trillion on the military over the same 10-year period.

MORE:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/09/24/meltdown-among-democrats-shows-our-budget-debates-are-insane/

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2021/9/25/2054308/-Abbreviated-Pundit-Roundup-The-fraudit-affirms-a-Biden-win-in-Arizona#comment_81911112

On Monday, we learned that after last year’s election, John Eastman, a well-connected lawyer advising former president Donald Trump, outlined a six-point plan to overturn the outcome of the election and install Trump as America’s leader. They planned to cut the voters’ actual choice, Democrat Joe Biden, out of power: as Trump advisor Steve Bannon put it, they planned to “kill the Biden presidency in the crib.” This appears to have been the plan that Trump and his loyalists tried to execute on January 6.

That is, we now have written proof of an attempt to destroy our democracy and replace it with an autocracy.

This was not some crazy plot of some obscure dude in a shack in the mountains; this was a plan of the president of the United States of America, and it came perilously close to succeeding. The president of the United States tried to overturn the results of an election—the centerpiece of our democracy—and install himself into power illegitimately.

If this is not a hair-on-fire, screaming emergency, what is?

MORE:
https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/september-24-2021

BOSTON (AP) — A Superior Court judge has turned down a request by the union that represents 1,800 Massachusetts State Police troopers to delay Gov. Charlie Baker’s state employee coronavirus vaccine mandate.

The State Police Association of Massachusetts filed a lawsuit last week saying the Oct. 17 deadline would cause troopers “irreparable harm” and they wanted more time to “negotiate the terms and conditions of their employment.”

A delay in implementation of the mandate would not serve the public interest, Judge Jackie Cowin said in Thursday’s decision.

“Specifically, the public interest is, unquestionably, best served by stopping the spread of the virus, in order to protect people from becoming ill, ensure adequate supply of medical services, and curtail the emergence of new, deadlier variants of the virus,” the decision said.

https://apnews.com/article/coronavirus-pandemic-health-police-lawsuits-charlie-baker-008c5800781d4d8cadf245750edebbb8

https://www.bobcesca.com/suicide-bomber/

@TheRickWilson

1/ Now, let me take a moment to note something for the 1/6 committee.

Each one of these Trump mooks will resist the subpoenas. Each one of them will demand to testify in private. Each one with make spurious claims of executive privilege. Each one of them will lie and lie.

2/ Now...and this is the tricky part, but do try to pay attention.

Fuck. These. Guys.

Don't let them or their lawyers wedge you into the phony courtesies and hollow formalities of the Old Washington.

These are people who would have gladly burned down our nation.

3/ They TRIED. 1/6 for them wasn't a failed coup. It was training exercise. Bannon -- an avowed Leninist who wants to destroy every institutions to rebuild them in his own alt-reich vision. Meadows, an apparatchik who would carry out any excess. Patel, dirty from the jump.

4/ They are all the most hostile of witnesses. Hostile to the truth. Hostile to the country. Hostile to democracy and the Republic.

They'll be playing for the Fox camera. Your task isn't simply to investigate but to humiliate.

5/ Keep in mind the power of spectacle, which is too often underappreciated in politics. Keep in mind that the Trump acolytes and anal leeches will plan and execute this same outrage, at scale.

These are enemies of the American people and should treated as such.

6/ I'm a sterner sort than anyone on the committee, but for ONCE, get the taste of blood in your mouth. For ONCE, act like you fucking mean it. Enforce subpoenas. DOJ will back it. Jail obstructionists. Demand candor.

7/ Follow the phones. Follow the money. Follow the email trail. The Venn diagram of White House/Trump World conspirators and the angry mob is filled with some truly degenerate and vile human filth like Roger Stone and Ali Alexander.

8/ Live hearings. Fill the media void with the Trump mutant parade. Bring in the spawn of Trump. Make it hurt.

Enough for now. More to come.

https://twitter.com/TheRickWilson/status/1441193845069279232?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1441193845069279232%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.dailykos.com%2Fstory%2F2021%2F9%2F24%2F2054067%2F-Abbreviated-Pundit-Roundup-Boosters-and-public-policy-in-the-spotlight

https://www.reddit.com/r/northdakota/

The book quotes McConnell calling former President Donald Trump, “a fading brand. Retired. OTTB as they say in Kentucky -- off-the-track Thoroughbred.”

“There is a clear trend moving,” McConnell said, toward a place where the GOP is not dominated by Trump. McConnell added, “Sucking up to Donald Trump is not a strategy that works.”

If that’s true, it’s not advice being heeded by many Republican candidates who are thus far largely embracing Trumpism and defending the former president at every turn.

https://www.kentucky.com/news/politics-government/article254432803.html

https://twitter.com/tbtduluth/status/1440702575733461006?s=20