Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[smjjames]

(there's a fairly well known variant of jury rigging that it took me until my mid to late teens to notice what the hell I was actually saying, ferex)

You too? I still find that phrase springing to the tip of my tongue on occasion, only to be subconsciously beat down with mental 2x4s and punched in the face like a baker's dozen of Richard Spencers.

I'm still hopeful that the health bill will die a horrible ignominious death. But I'm less ecstatic about the electoral ramifications. The calculus for the GOP so far has gone something like this:

1. If the bill passes, we'll get reamed in the general election by the Democrats as the majority register their outrage.
2. If the bill dies, we'll get reamed in the primaries by Tea Party types as the minority register *their* outrage.

Classic "damned if you do, damned if you don't". I suppose the best that can happen is for them to at least attempt to get it to a vote and say "Hey, we tried!".

Also, #2 will be joined by consistuents and Republicans angry that their congresscritter (as some people like to put it) tried to kill their healthcare, and the Democrats are definetly going to remember which ones voted yes.

What they've been desperately hoping for is someone to come stop them from what they're doing, while allowing them the illusion of doing something. Enough moderates, for example, to sink the bill to allow the conservative members to vote for it while confidently knowing it'll fail and they'll be spared the actual consequences. They used this formula for the last seven goddamned years to whip up their base and squeeze out votes, and then the unthinkable happened and they got a trifecta of power and now there's nobody to credibly save them from themselves.

Which could mean the bill dies, and we get a slate of new GOP candidates in 2018 that make Ted Cruz look like Dwight Eisenhower. And with gerrymandering still very much in vogue in many parts of the country, I'm not confident that these candidates would constitute a bridge too far. I'm not sure there *is* an "unelectable" candidate anymore. Not after Trump.

Seems like a lot less the Teapartier strain and a lot more the Trumpite strain. Also, Kid Rock is supposedly running for Senate in Michigan. 'Supposedly' because he's flung around a bunch of stuff stating he just might, without actually starting it officially. There's also this guy who wants to basically do it no-holds-barred rockemsockem against Sen. Kaine.

And as for 45, any elation over the most recent Russia bombshells has dissipated as I come to realize that absolutely NOTHING is going to happen. Nothing has consequences anymore. In order for something to happen, we'd need a working Justice Department. And Attorney General Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III (that's the man's actual honest-to-God name) isn't, I say, isn't about to let that kind of thing happen on HIS watch, boy!

We'd need a Congress actually doing their moral job too

[Frumple]

Fun thing about sessions and the DoJ, though. Folks have apparently actually started going through with getting the guy disbarred, and on that front there's actually decent enough odds of it happening -- so far as lawyery ethics stuff goes, the guy's screwed up fairly hard in the last few months, and the bar critters tend to be not particularly forgiving. Which would lead to the interesting situation of most of the DoJ more or less being legally (or near enough) incapable of listening to anything sessions says when it comes to legal issues.

Be neat if we get to see exactly what happens when you have an attorney general that's not able to practice as an attorney, ehehe.

[RedKing]

And now it's coming out that contrary to Don Jr's initial statement, there were more than four people in the meeting. Like, at least TWICE that number.

Among them? A former Soviet counterintelligence official now registered as a lobbyist for Russia.

As Stephen Colbert put it, "This has gone from a 'nothing-burger' to an 'all-you-can-prosecute buffet'."

[redwallzyl]

One of the things with the wall is you need transparency. You have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can’t see through that wall — so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what’s on the other side of the wall.

And I’ll give you an example. As horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don’t see them — they hit you on the head with 60 pounds of stuff? It’s over. As crazy as that sounds, you need transparency through that wall.

I have no words for this level of stupid.

[Draignean]

One of the things with the wall is you need transparency. You have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can’t see through that wall — so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what’s on the other side of the wall.

And I’ll give you an example. As horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don’t see them — they hit you on the head with 60 pounds of stuff? It’s over. As crazy as that sounds, you need transparency through that wall.

I have no words for this level of stupid.

So, we need to make our fifty-foot solar wall transparent in order to protect our border guards from the inevitable mexican drug catapult siege?

Or. You know, we could maybe put a camera on top.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Tell me this is just a ruse.

[TheDarkStar]

While it uses an odd analogy, Trump does make sense here. I mean, there's a lot more to transparency but it's just a simple analogy to try to explain why transparency is good.

Well, kinda. Really transparency is about accountability, but I suppose that if you see what your government is doing you can know how to respond to it rather than being uncertain shortly before being hit with unexpected fines and being arrested or something.

[redwallzyl]

Tell me this is just a ruse.

Nope.
http://www.cnbc.com/2017/07/13/trump-explains-why-he-wants-to-be-able-to-see-through-his-border-wall.html

[Loud Whispers]

We need more transparency in government, replace all gov buildings with pure windows

[MetalSlimeHunt]

And then we can hire people to smash the windows, and then hire more people to repair them! The economy will explode! Take that, China!

[nenjin]

Question: You were joking about solar, right?
Trump: No, not joking, no. There is a chance that we can do a solar wall. We have major companies looking at that. Look, there's no better place for solar than the Mexico border -- the southern border. And there is a very good chance we can do a solar wall, which would actually look good. But there is a very good chance we could do a solar wall.
One of the things with the wall is you need transparency. You have to be able to see through it. In other words, if you can't see through that wall — so it could be a steel wall with openings, but you have to have openings because you have to see what's on the other side of the wall.
And I'll give you an example. As horrible as it sounds, when they throw the large sacks of drugs over, and if you have people on the other side of the wall, you don't see them -- they hit you on the head with 60 pounds of stuff? It's over. As cray as that sounds, you need transparency through that wall. But we have some incredible designs.

Christ, it's like a TV interview with a 14 year old. "We need transparency because we need to be able to see the guy about to throw a 60 pnd drug bundle over the wall and on to your head."

.......K?

[Neonivek]

OHH NO! Mexicans are trying to destroy our power grid by coating our solar panels in cocaine!!!

[Draignean]

OHH NO! Mexicans are trying to destroy our power grid by coating our solar panels in cocaine!!!

God, that's sig worthy.

[Criptfeind]

Enough cocaine to cover the boarder? Damn, we should scrape it all up, sell it to inner city youth, and use that cash to fund taking over Canada so we can burn their trees for power.

[EnigmaticHat]

Tell me this is just a ruse.

Maybe he has Alzheimer's.