Yes, I did quite literally laugh aloud at “The far-right cable channel One America News Network has hired Matt Gaetz to anchor a new nightly talk show, a position that does not require confirmation by the Senate.”
Possibly bad news for American labor: Senator Manchin just gave Lauren McFerran a thumbs down, endangering the chances to lock in a Democratic majority on the National Labor Relations Board for the first two years of Trump’s term. By a vote of 49–50, the cloture on McFerran’s renomination to the NLRB failed.
Edit: Senator Sinema did not show up for any votes last week, but she made it a point to show up for this one – and together with Manchin, voted against Democrats and Biden.
Joe Manchin is such a pain. Honestly, I’m glad to see him go. When we win the senate again, I hope we no longer have to deal with any of these “moderate” senators.
While Manchin is indeed a pain, I am not glad to see him go. He’s best we could do in West Virginia, a state that is lost to Democrats without Manchin.
Edit: Also, Senator Kyrsten Sinema could and should have supported President Biden by voting for McFerran, letting VP Kamala Harris cast the tie-breaking vote.
The Hill Article said that she DID show up just to vote against McFerran. Kyrsten and Joe giving one last double bird to the working class on their way out the door. I wish nothing but the worst for both of those corporate tools.
I stand corrected. It was Senator Marshall who didn’t cast a vote. Given that he’s a Republican from Kansas, I seriously doubt he would have supported McFerran.
Imho, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer should have had the foresight to hold this vote when Republican senators, and possibly also Manchin and Sinema, were absent.
Joe Manchin represents everything the working class hates about Washington. Good riddance. I hope his yacht has an encounter with some Orcas before he leaves DC.
I'm not glad to see him go in an absolute sense: he's 1000x better than any republican in that seat.
But I am glad to see him go in a relative sense. If we had to lose any one senator, losing him was the best outcome for us, with Sinema right after.
He (and she) frequently undermines our messaging and would slow our governing down for no good reason. He sought out moderation for the sake of moderation, rewarding republicans for their Overton window shifting.
It's easy to miss because all of us that come here follow politics extensively, but for most "normies" they only pick up the surface level stuff. A single senator fucking over our messaging gets through to those people. They won't know the exact details, they'll just know that democrats are not united in their messaging, or that democrats held congress but the minimum wage stayed the same anyway. We know why those worked out the way they do, but most voters will not.
I'd still rather have him than not, but Manchin did come with a real cost to our ability to sell the party to voters because of his insistence on going against the party as often as he did.
My sentiments exactly. Yes he was better than any alternative and I'd rather have him than not, but the way he'd run to the press with every grievance or perceived grievance was so narcissistic and bad for our branding. At least Sinema for all her faults pissed people off largely behind closed doors.
We're certainly not winning the Senate back again with only progressives. I could have ended that sentence without the last three words and it would be just as true for the foreseeable future.
Also, what may be considered "progressive" differs in states depending on the appeal of the Democratic Candidates. Senator-Elect Ruben Gallego won the AZ-SEN race and happens to have a staunchly progressive voting record while being an Army veteran and a Latino with a real understanding of the bread and butter issues.
Yeah, and it helped Gallego that he was blunt and didn’t sugar coat things. He’s honest be truthful with his difficult life as a Latino and plenty of Latinos connected with him in that sense.
There is a huge difference between progressive on economic issues and being a culture-war progressive. Middle America has a lot less tolerance for the latter.
I am really disappointed that Democratic Senate Candidate Glenn Elliott didn't get more % of the votes than the less than 30% he got in the WV-SEN election. Although Manchin endorsed him, Elliott was far better on the issues and a real Democrat instead of Manchin who is indeed a pain in the ass.
Per the Guardian, a Democratic West Virginia Delegate mentioned that the WV-SEN race would have been much closer if the DNC was more closely involved. The delegate said that it was a big miscalculation that the DNC and DSCC didn’t invest in the race.
You could be right although the real issue Glenn Elliott faced in his Senate campaign was visibility and getting enough awareness about it to West Virginians across the state.
The issue isn't about whether Elliott would have won or not but rather the support he would need in order to make the Senate race more competitive. From what the West Virginia house delegate, Shawn Fluharty, had said it was that Jim Justice had high negatives coming in. I think he and WV Democrats wanted more involvement in Elliott's Senate campaign as it had very little outside support.
Trump’s strength in West Virginia has political forecasters predicting no surprises in November. GOP candidates are expected to sweep the governor’s mansion and federal offices up for grabs, and party fundraisers and campaign organizations have sent little money to Elliott or any other candidate.
“I think it absolutely was an error,” said Shawn Fluharty, a West Virginia house delegate who has managed to hang on to his seat representing Wheeling for the past 10 years, even as the state has grown more Republican.
“I think that Jim Justice is not as well liked as he was probably two years ago when they started polling that race. And I believe there was an opportunity. If Glenn had the full backing of the DNC, this race would be a hell of a lot closer than what the polls currently show.”
Time will tell. Feels like he's the Sinema type who will go wherever his Republican "Friends" suggest. I hope I'm wrong but I'd still like to see him primaried regardless.
I'm starting to have a little bit of anxiety about him too. He's got that performative "look at me" gene that it just a terrible look for a politician...
Aside from a few areas like Israel, Fetterman seems mostly reasonable. Sure he's more moderate, but that's expected in a purple state like PA. He's shown himself to be adequately progressive, if not at least populist leaning. Would I like him to be more openly progressive and support causes like Medicare for All like Gallego and Baldwin have? Sure. But I get his need to to grandstand and carve a brand and personality for himself, even if that means antagonizing other Dems and playing a bit too nice with Trump.
I think Fetterman and Gallego both are of the same ilk - They are blunt, honest and truthful without typical Democratic Party sound bytes.
FYI, Fetterman is for universal healthcare so there should be little concern he would need to be persuaded on the Medicare-For-All proposal. He supports lowering the minimum age for getting Medicare.
I believe that health care is a basic, fundamental human right, not a privilege. But health care in America is far too expensive and convoluted. In the richest nation on earth, I believe we have a moral duty to guarantee quality health care coverage for every American, and end the disgusting practice of corporations profiting from people’s health and well-being.
In the Senate, I will support any legislation that gets us closer to the goal of universal health care coverage. I’m less fixated on what you call it, and more focused on the result: ensuring access to health care for every American. I will also support efforts to lower the Medicare eligibility age to 60 while expanding its benefits to include vision, hearing, and dental care.
What I fail to understand is why Schumer didn’t finalize the vote after an hour or so. Even with the vote at 49–49, VP Harris could have made an appearance and cast the tie-breaking vote.
Instead, there was a rumor that Senator Manchin was on his way back to the Capitol. Schumer kept the vote open for 90 minutes, so Manchin could cast his vote!
How is this not political malpractice by the Majority Leader??
(Moreover, you bloody well make sure you have the needed numbers before you call for a vote. I don’t recall Pelosi ever losing a vote on the House floor. Schumer does so time and time again. Whatever happened to whipping the vote? That’s Durbin and Schumer’s job!)
In the House, Pelosi gave way to Hakeem Jeffries, and yet she remains as his mentor, the Speaker Emerita. The rest of the House leadership also yielded to younger talent. Now younger Democratic politicians are taking the top seats on the committees.
High time the Senate Democrats do the same. This is no time for traditional institutional thinking and seniority.
The North Carolina State Board of Elections voted Wednesday to reject a Republican challenge to throw out 60,000 ballots in a state Supreme Court race that the Democratic incumbent leads by just over 700 votes.
This is really terrible. It means that Trump will get to put a criminal in as head of the FBI right away, the easier to persecute and intimidate dissidents and targets of Trump's bigotry. Watch closely as authoritarianism continues to creep forward, aided by non-authoritarians quitting, compromising and kissing ass without being forced to do so.
The North Carolina House voted on Wednesday to override Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto on a GOP-backed bill that will strip power from the newly-elected Democratic Gov. Josh Stein and Attorney General Jeff Jackson. The vote total was 72-46.
. . . .
The bill contains a number of provisions, but most notably, it gives the newly-elected Republican state auditor Dave Boliek, authority over the five-member state election board. This is a responsibility that is typically given to the governor. There is no other state auditor in the country who holds this power.
The bill also does not allow the attorney general to take positions that are contrary to the general assembly.
81 cowardly Democrats voted to deny Tricare insurance coverage for gender-affirming care for trans children of service members in the NDAA that passed 281-140. Shame on them!
This will go to the Senate, and we hope to have that provision removed there.
Yes, I did quite literally laugh aloud at “The far-right cable channel One America News Network has hired Matt Gaetz to anchor a new nightly talk show, a position that does not require confirmation by the Senate.”
I loved that line, too. All credit to Jeff Singer.
Moreover, OANN doesn’t give a damn about ethics.
I presume Mr Gaetz will be doing hands-on coverage of the "youth" vote?
North Carolina Republicans are the worst. Even worse than Wisconsin Republicans
I'm surprised they didn't try to outlaw Democrats when Gov. McCrory was in office.
top of piece.
jefferson Riggs. All Riggs all the time
you meant griffin
Ps love your stuff, always have
Possibly bad news for American labor: Senator Manchin just gave Lauren McFerran a thumbs down, endangering the chances to lock in a Democratic majority on the National Labor Relations Board for the first two years of Trump’s term. By a vote of 49–50, the cloture on McFerran’s renomination to the NLRB failed.
Edit: Senator Sinema did not show up for any votes last week, but she made it a point to show up for this one – and together with Manchin, voted against Democrats and Biden.
Joe Manchin is such a pain. Honestly, I’m glad to see him go. When we win the senate again, I hope we no longer have to deal with any of these “moderate” senators.
While Manchin is indeed a pain, I am not glad to see him go. He’s best we could do in West Virginia, a state that is lost to Democrats without Manchin.
Edit: Also, Senator Kyrsten Sinema could and should have supported President Biden by voting for McFerran, letting VP Kamala Harris cast the tie-breaking vote.
The Hill Article said that she DID show up just to vote against McFerran. Kyrsten and Joe giving one last double bird to the working class on their way out the door. I wish nothing but the worst for both of those corporate tools.
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/5035142-senate-blocks-nlrb-re-nomination/
I stand corrected. It was Senator Marshall who didn’t cast a vote. Given that he’s a Republican from Kansas, I seriously doubt he would have supported McFerran.
Imho, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer should have had the foresight to hold this vote when Republican senators, and possibly also Manchin and Sinema, were absent.
Once again showing how utterly unqualified he is for this current moment.
Joe Manchin represents everything the working class hates about Washington. Good riddance. I hope his yacht has an encounter with some Orcas before he leaves DC.
No love for Manchin, but I'd actually say Jim Justice represents everything the working class SHOULD hate about Washington.
I'm not glad to see him go in an absolute sense: he's 1000x better than any republican in that seat.
But I am glad to see him go in a relative sense. If we had to lose any one senator, losing him was the best outcome for us, with Sinema right after.
He (and she) frequently undermines our messaging and would slow our governing down for no good reason. He sought out moderation for the sake of moderation, rewarding republicans for their Overton window shifting.
It's easy to miss because all of us that come here follow politics extensively, but for most "normies" they only pick up the surface level stuff. A single senator fucking over our messaging gets through to those people. They won't know the exact details, they'll just know that democrats are not united in their messaging, or that democrats held congress but the minimum wage stayed the same anyway. We know why those worked out the way they do, but most voters will not.
I'd still rather have him than not, but Manchin did come with a real cost to our ability to sell the party to voters because of his insistence on going against the party as often as he did.
My sentiments exactly. Yes he was better than any alternative and I'd rather have him than not, but the way he'd run to the press with every grievance or perceived grievance was so narcissistic and bad for our branding. At least Sinema for all her faults pissed people off largely behind closed doors.
Yep. Starting next month, we'll never again have to worry about a Senator from West Virginia who votes with Democrats "only" 80% of the time.
"When we win the senate again, I hope we no longer have to deal with any of these “moderate” senators."
Sheer geography makes that sentence problematic.
Ok
We're certainly not winning the Senate back again with only progressives. I could have ended that sentence without the last three words and it would be just as true for the foreseeable future.
That's a fair assessment of things.
Also, what may be considered "progressive" differs in states depending on the appeal of the Democratic Candidates. Senator-Elect Ruben Gallego won the AZ-SEN race and happens to have a staunchly progressive voting record while being an Army veteran and a Latino with a real understanding of the bread and butter issues.
Gallego also moderated a lot for his run including getting an endorsement from a police union. And was helped by the biggest asset for AZ dems Lake.
Yeah, and it helped Gallego that he was blunt and didn’t sugar coat things. He’s honest be truthful with his difficult life as a Latino and plenty of Latinos connected with him in that sense.
There is a huge difference between progressive on economic issues and being a culture-war progressive. Middle America has a lot less tolerance for the latter.
Ok
I am really disappointed that Democratic Senate Candidate Glenn Elliott didn't get more % of the votes than the less than 30% he got in the WV-SEN election. Although Manchin endorsed him, Elliott was far better on the issues and a real Democrat instead of Manchin who is indeed a pain in the ass.
Agreed. Elliott was getting some buzz for running a good campaign. I thought he'd at least outrun Harris by 5 points or so.
Per the Guardian, a Democratic West Virginia Delegate mentioned that the WV-SEN race would have been much closer if the DNC was more closely involved. The delegate said that it was a big miscalculation that the DNC and DSCC didn’t invest in the race.
https://amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/18/election-west-virginia-senate
I highly doubt they could have improved more than a handful of points. Not everything's the fault of the DNC.
You could be right although the real issue Glenn Elliott faced in his Senate campaign was visibility and getting enough awareness about it to West Virginians across the state.
The issue isn't about whether Elliott would have won or not but rather the support he would need in order to make the Senate race more competitive. From what the West Virginia house delegate, Shawn Fluharty, had said it was that Jim Justice had high negatives coming in. I think he and WV Democrats wanted more involvement in Elliott's Senate campaign as it had very little outside support.
https://amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/18/election-west-virginia-senate
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Trump’s strength in West Virginia has political forecasters predicting no surprises in November. GOP candidates are expected to sweep the governor’s mansion and federal offices up for grabs, and party fundraisers and campaign organizations have sent little money to Elliott or any other candidate.
“I think it absolutely was an error,” said Shawn Fluharty, a West Virginia house delegate who has managed to hang on to his seat representing Wheeling for the past 10 years, even as the state has grown more Republican.
“I think that Jim Justice is not as well liked as he was probably two years ago when they started polling that race. And I believe there was an opportunity. If Glenn had the full backing of the DNC, this race would be a hell of a lot closer than what the polls currently show.”
F them. Good riddance.
Sinema hates the Middle Class so much she came back JUST to vote against the pick. I hope her wine always tastes like Vinegar.
She’ll be handsomely rewarded by corporate America.
Or No Labels.
Senator Ruben Gallego will be a huge upgrade over Kyrsten Sinema!
I feel like the new problem child in the next Congress is gonna be Fetterman.
I don't see him being a problem with anything substantive.
Yeah, not nearly to the extent that Manchin and Sinema were
Time will tell. Feels like he's the Sinema type who will go wherever his Republican "Friends" suggest. I hope I'm wrong but I'd still like to see him primaried regardless.
I'm starting to have a little bit of anxiety about him too. He's got that performative "look at me" gene that it just a terrible look for a politician...
Aside from a few areas like Israel, Fetterman seems mostly reasonable. Sure he's more moderate, but that's expected in a purple state like PA. He's shown himself to be adequately progressive, if not at least populist leaning. Would I like him to be more openly progressive and support causes like Medicare for All like Gallego and Baldwin have? Sure. But I get his need to to grandstand and carve a brand and personality for himself, even if that means antagonizing other Dems and playing a bit too nice with Trump.
I think Fetterman and Gallego both are of the same ilk - They are blunt, honest and truthful without typical Democratic Party sound bytes.
FYI, Fetterman is for universal healthcare so there should be little concern he would need to be persuaded on the Medicare-For-All proposal. He supports lowering the minimum age for getting Medicare.
https://johnfetterman.com/issue/guaranteeing-health-care/
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I believe that health care is a basic, fundamental human right, not a privilege. But health care in America is far too expensive and convoluted. In the richest nation on earth, I believe we have a moral duty to guarantee quality health care coverage for every American, and end the disgusting practice of corporations profiting from people’s health and well-being.
In the Senate, I will support any legislation that gets us closer to the goal of universal health care coverage. I’m less fixated on what you call it, and more focused on the result: ensuring access to health care for every American. I will also support efforts to lower the Medicare eligibility age to 60 while expanding its benefits to include vision, hearing, and dental care.
What I fail to understand is why Schumer didn’t finalize the vote after an hour or so. Even with the vote at 49–49, VP Harris could have made an appearance and cast the tie-breaking vote.
Instead, there was a rumor that Senator Manchin was on his way back to the Capitol. Schumer kept the vote open for 90 minutes, so Manchin could cast his vote!
How is this not political malpractice by the Majority Leader??
(Moreover, you bloody well make sure you have the needed numbers before you call for a vote. I don’t recall Pelosi ever losing a vote on the House floor. Schumer does so time and time again. Whatever happened to whipping the vote? That’s Durbin and Schumer’s job!)
https://www.axios.com/2024/12/11/schumer-nlrb-vote-manchin-sinema
This is another reason why Schumer should be forced out of leadership.
In the House, Pelosi gave way to Hakeem Jeffries, and yet she remains as his mentor, the Speaker Emerita. The rest of the House leadership also yielded to younger talent. Now younger Democratic politicians are taking the top seats on the committees.
High time the Senate Democrats do the same. This is no time for traditional institutional thinking and seniority.
The North Carolina State Board of Elections voted Wednesday to reject a Republican challenge to throw out 60,000 ballots in a state Supreme Court race that the Democratic incumbent leads by just over 700 votes.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2024-election/north-carolina-elections-board-gop-challenge-supreme-court-race-rcna183771
https://politicalwire.com/2024/12/11/christopher-wray-to-resign/
This is really terrible. It means that Trump will get to put a criminal in as head of the FBI right away, the easier to persecute and intimidate dissidents and targets of Trump's bigotry. Watch closely as authoritarianism continues to creep forward, aided by non-authoritarians quitting, compromising and kissing ass without being forced to do so.
Further info at https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2024/12/11/2291407/-Trump-bullies-FBI-Director-Chris-Wray-into-stepping-down?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=top_news_slot_3&pm_medium=web. His term doesn't expire until 2027. Thanks for stepping up to defend democracy, asshole!
Trump was going to fire him.
Uh, did you forget James Comey also held that position and was fired despite helping Trump because he wouldn't commit to being a lickspittle?
He could have still fought. Biden should have fired Wray in the first place, and he had strong grounds to do so.
Keep cheating assholes!
The North Carolina House voted on Wednesday to override Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto on a GOP-backed bill that will strip power from the newly-elected Democratic Gov. Josh Stein and Attorney General Jeff Jackson. The vote total was 72-46.
. . . .
The bill contains a number of provisions, but most notably, it gives the newly-elected Republican state auditor Dave Boliek, authority over the five-member state election board. This is a responsibility that is typically given to the governor. There is no other state auditor in the country who holds this power.
The bill also does not allow the attorney general to take positions that are contrary to the general assembly.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/with-house-veto-override-vote-north-carolina-republicans-power-grab-is-complete
81 cowardly Democrats voted to deny Tricare insurance coverage for gender-affirming care for trans children of service members in the NDAA that passed 281-140. Shame on them!
This will go to the Senate, and we hope to have that provision removed there.
https://www.advocate.com/politics/anti-trans-defense-bill-advances