No Future for the GOP?

padraig (u.s.) said:

I think there would be very little help from libertarian right, simply bc there are very few actual libertarians in the U.S.

digression: like all empires, we have a core value - rugged individualism - we nominally cherish and use to measure the worth of our society against others, but for the most part don't live up to or want to live up to

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Yes very true. I noticed on twitter how many people said "We don't want hearings to discover whether our democracy or constitution was under attack, look at the price of gas" - now of course I know that this was itself a lie... but after a lifetime of being told that Americans prioritise freedom, liberty and so on above everything, it was surprising that so many would even pretend to say that that was only true when petrol was cheap.

Another digression - it's interesting when you see the same argument again and again and again on twitter, the official party line if you will, I always wonder to what extent people realise they are parroting a given argument, and if they do realise, whether they care. But in this case I found it particularly odd that the chosen argument was "Petrol price is more important than freedom after all" - of course they would say that they already knew that it wasn't an attack on democracy so hearings were unnecessary but - if they were honest with themselves - a child could see that that is putting the cart before the horse.

Leo said:

And you just know GOP/conservative woman (or their daughters) will be among those who will still get abortions in cases where their pregnancies are inconvenient/unwanted.

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I bet Trump's been personally responsible for more than a couple.

French cartoonists cutting loose....

You have to feel sorry for Susan Collins right? Always being let down by the very people she lets off the hook. For example, after Trump's first impeachment she voted to acquit him

“I believe that the president has learned from this case,” Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said last February, explaining why she would vote to acquit Trump. “The president has been impeached. That’s a pretty big lesson"

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And you could certainly say he learned a lesson from that experience - the lesson that there were no consequences for his crimes so far and next time he might as well really go for it.

And now Collins reveals that she voted to confirm Kavanaugh - despite countless warnings - cos he promised that he definitely wouldn't make any attempt to overturn Roe vs Wade. Apparently she feels betrayed.

“I feel misled,” the Maine senator Susan Collins told the New York Times. In a lengthy meeting on 21 August 2018, the Republican reportedly grilled Kavanaugh to explain why he could be trusted not to overturn Roe.
“Start with my record, my respect for precedent, my belief that it is rooted in the constitution, and my commitment and its importance to the rule of law,” Kavanaugh responded, per notes taken by “multiple” staffers at the meeting, the Times said. “I understand precedent and I understand the importance of overturning it.”
“Roe is 45 years old, it has been reaffirmed many times, lots of people care about it a great deal, and I’ve tried to demonstrate I understand real-world consequences,” Kavanaugh elaborated, according to these notes, and also claimed, “I am a don’t-rock-the-boat kind of judge. I believe in stability and in the Team of Nine.”

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I'm starting to believe that Senator Collins is perhaps a little too gullible for the cut and thrust of top level politics.

Or as George Takei so eloquently puts it

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me three times, who am I, Susan F-ing Collins?

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Though let's be honest she's not that stupid, it's quite the opposite isn't it? Collins gets to keep the Dems happy by telling them that she has spoken to Trump/Kavanaugh/The Snake and extracted a promise that they won't have an insurrection/overturn roe vs wade/bite her, but at the same time she also keeps Reps happy by not actually using the powers she has to stop them doing any of things. So you have to hand it to her, if we accept that her main aim is to keep herself as popular as possible with voters from both sides and thus remain as a senator then she is a brilliantly skilled practitioner, though some cynics might ask, what is the fucking point of a senator whose main aim is simply to stay there doing nothing and tricking everyone into thinking that she is on their side?

You do wonder with people like this if they ever feel the slight twinge of guilt. I mean, I bet she is in favour of women having the option of abortion and thus presumably was in favour of Roe vs Wade remaining in place. And yet, from where I'm sitting it looks as though she basically sacrificed Roe vs Wade for her own political career. Or at least risked it being sacrificed.

Mr. Tea said:

I bet Trump's been personally responsible for more than a couple.

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IdleRich said:

You have to feel sorry for Susan Collins right? Always being let down by the very people she lets off the hook. For example, after Trump's first impeachment she voted to acquit him



And you could certainly say he learned a lesson from that experience - the lesson that there were no consequences for his crimes so far and next time he might as well really go for it.

And now Collins reveals that she voted to confirm Kavanaugh - despite countless warnings - cos he promised that he definitely wouldn't make any attempt to overturn Roe vs Wade. Apparently she feels betrayed.



I'm starting to believe that Senator Collins is perhaps a little too gullible for the cut and thrust of top level politics.

Or as George Takei so eloquently puts it



Though let's be honest she's not that stupid, it's quite the opposite isn't it? Collins gets to keep the Dems happy by telling them that she has spoken to Trump/Kavanaugh/The Snake and extracted a promise that they won't have an insurrection/overturn roe vs wade/bite her, but at the same time she also keeps Reps happy by not actually using the powers she has to stop them doing any of things. So you have to hand it to her, if we accept that her main aim is to keep herself as popular as possible with voters from both sides and thus remain as a senator then she is a brilliantly skilled practitioner, though some cynics might ask, what is the fucking point of a senator whose main aim is simply to stay there doing nothing and tricking everyone into thinking that she is on their side?

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honestly @IdleRich no i don't "have to hand it to her" you want to know why? because in the position that she's in she's comfortable her kids are comfortable sure she can talk about how she's embarassed and can't believe what a set back this is for women everywhere but she's OK at the end of it all her and her family are protected what about the people who don't have any of that? we BEEN known the mask has fallen off with these people why would you just take them at their word, like these people like her and Pelosi and them are playing with peoples lives at this shit and have done for decades because they kept allowing these people to just run loose and never challenge them or protect the things that they've stated for ages and ages that they were going to overturn and get rid of.

Also if anything she's not "skilled" because in trying to please both sides she's pleased NOBODY because the Republicans are utimatley pessimistic in that they don't believe in the idea of the state they know that it's all about power dynamics and smashing and grabbing what you can get right there and right now where as the Democrats are still thinking with this "incremental progress" idea they still believe in this idea of what the state represents. This is why right wingers look at liberals and leftists like eeediats in the sense of "you really believe all that shit you say don't you?" and likewise that they believe all the shit that they're they are saying aswell?

she's no better than any of those eediat Guardian pundits who kept writing articles saying how as much as they liked Corbyn's policies they still couldn't vote for him and after the tories got that grand sweep seats those same people realise that they're pussyfooting didn't ammount to anything because Johnson and the rest of em were coming for them like everybody else, stop gap people like Collins are some of the first to go when the wave hits.

Mr. Tea said:

I bet Trump's been personally responsible for more than a couple.

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Vince Mchmahon too since they're good friends

@IdleRich and in all honesty not only was she let down by the people she let off the hook she in turn let so many more people down who thought that she would have the sense and the decision making skill to not let these people off the hook just because they made a pinky promise.

She caved to the pressure(more likely bribes) and now her whole ting is tainted

Um, I think you completely missed the point of what I said there mate.

OK, maybe sarcasm doesn't always come across that well on the internet but what I'm saying there is that Collins has deliberately taken no action except some cynical manoeuvring to save her own skin and then she has pretended to be shocked by the outcome which she did absolutely nothing to stop. And that she has done this several times. And the outcome on this occasion is a particularly disastrous one, the possibility of which (at least) was entirely foreseeable. I find her disgraceful and dishonest and that she has betrayed people yet again. And she wants to have her cake and eat it by pretending that it only happened cos she was somehow tricked.

The only slight mitigating factor is that really she is probably one of several people (Manchin for instance who also claims to have been tricked in the same way) who ought to have done something.

IdleRich said:

Collins has deliberately taken no action except some cynical manoeuvring to save her own skin and then she has pretended to be shocked by the outcome

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the real irony is the she and Lisa Murkowski would be among the first up against the wall in a successful January 6-type insurrection

trying to please everyone usually just leads to you being respected by no one and despised by all

Collins and her type of self-serving, two-faced enablers are in a way worse than the religious fanatics and MAGA true believers

or if not worse, than more galling

give me an open enemy over a mealy-mouthed fence-sitter any day - I know where I stand

she's been quite careful to only vote against the GOP when it's clear her vote won't make the difference, as with DeVos

Yeah this kinda weaselly position of pretending to be some kind of progressive ally, getting hopes up and then always dashing them. Such a waste of space.

IdleRich said:

Yeah this kinda weaselly position of pretending to be some kind of progressive ally, getting hopes up and then always dashing them. Such a waste of space.

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and this is what they Democrats have REALLY been playing into as of late they think just projecting more "progressive" and black/brown faces is the way to show their progressive but at the end of the day if they still hold many of the same positions and do worse then its pointless none of them have any of the same charisma Obama had.

and i know what they're playing off of the idea that these people are looking to change the system from within it, that's how Lori Lightfoot got in because it was thought black lesbian woman as Mayor would see about great change and it hasn't gone like that.

Yeah I guess Collins is a Rep so why do I expect her to be progressive? She's had good PR which created the expectation maybe.

Extremely naive question incoming:

If Trump packed the SCOTUS with ultra-reactionary judges, what's to stop Biden from just reversing that by sacking them and replacing them with, well, people who aren't hateful nutcases? Is it just that he can't be arsed? Or can it only be done at a certain point in the presidential term? Or what?

Supreme Court judges leave the bench only when they retire or die. like a tenured professor, they can't be fired.

Leo said:

Supreme Court judges leave the bench only when they retire or die. like a tenured professor, they can't be fired.

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Would it be possible to, uh, help some of them to die? In a democratic way, of course.

It would be hard to get rid of any. If he wants to change the balance of the court he could I understand increase the number of seats and add progressives... but that has its own problems to say the least.