Whatabouts for Marjorie Taylor Greene Don’t Work
PSA to my conservative friends trying to draw a moral equivalence between Marjorie Taylor Greene and [insert Democrat Congresscritter of your choice]: the issue is not her dumb statements. It’s the violent ones.
As a reminder:
Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene repeatedly indicated support for executing prominent Democratic politicians in 2018 and 2019 before being elected to Congress, a CNN KFile review of hundreds of posts and comments from Greene’s Facebook page shows.
. . . .
In one post, from January 2019, Greene liked a comment that said “a bullet to the head would be quicker” to remove House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. In other posts, Greene liked comments about executing FBI agents who, in her eyes, were part of the “deep state” working against Trump.
In one Facebook post from April 2018, Greene wrote conspiratorially about the Iran Deal, one of former President Barack Obama’s signature foreign policy achievements. A commenter asked Greene, “Now do we get to hang them ?? Meaning H & O ???,” referring to Obama and Hillary Clinton.
Greene replied, “Stage is being set. Players are being put in place. We must be patient. This must be done perfectly or liberal judges would let them off.”
The best equivalent you have from a Democrat member of Congress on that point is Maxine Waters, who encouraged her supporters to hassle Trump administration officials at restaurants or at home over the family separation policy. While that was a despicable thing for Waters to suggest, and she ought to have been censured for it, it is light years away from approving of the concept of putting a bullet in the head of your political opponents.
And even looking only at the stupidity, there is a distinction between some goofball worrying about Guam capsizing and maintaining that particular school shootings are staged events. The latter is an affront to grieving parents of children shot and killed at school. The former is just dumb.
I also see conservatives whining that Big Media is making MTG the face of their parties. Here’s an idea for you, guys: stop helping them. It’s not an effective whine to say: “Democrats are trying to smear us as a group for everything said by our crazy colleague to whom we gave a standing ovation and an overwhelmingly lopsided vote of confidence.”
Just sayin’. It looks dumb. Cut it out.
They give her an ovation and succor in public because they know that the voters that Republicans must court agree with a lot of what MTG says and they don’t want to lose their support. Privately, they’ll wring their hands and express dismay over how ridiculous/dangerous the things she says are.
Why doesn’t the media pay attention to what’s in their heart of hearts as corroborated by those private details they won’t own up to in public?
JohnnyAgreeable (c49787) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:21 amWhy do you insist that people who oppose Congressional majorities to use naked power to police the minority is eqivalent to defending the idiocy of the member? Yes, the GOP should have acted here, but it didn’t and THAT should be sufficient politically. Hang the GOP caucus out to dry for it’s failure.
The precedent they set yesterday though will be used again, for a lesser offense. Or do you think that this GOP caucus, given a few more members, will refrain from going after the Squad at some future point?
If the action taken had reduced MTG’s visibility or resonance with the wacko-right, maybe it could be justified. But it will do the opposite, so not only is it a mistake, it’s a blunder.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:31 amIf the media could, they would make Jeffrey Dahmer the face of the Republican Party. Like I said in Dana’s thread, I can’t really cavil about the House Republicans refusing to shout out “Palomino!” to Nancy Pelosi. I can only fault them for their failure in intra-party discipline.
nk (1d9030) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:31 am*
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:32 amto useusingKevin, I agree with you that the dems shouldn’t have removed her, especially since she’s apparently of mainstream GOP views.
Time123 (89dfb2) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:42 amTed Bundy is the better example! He was involved in Republican campaigns in Washington and was a delegate sent to the Republican National Convention for Rockefeller.
JohnnyAgreeable (c49787) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:42 amespecially since she’s apparently of mainstream GOP views.
In what regard? Do you assert that the idea that Pelosi is a pederast, or even a serial pedicide, who should be shot is a mainstream GOP view? Or that Barack Obama should be hanged is a GOP platform plank?
I agree it is a mainstream GOP view that there exists one or more “Deep State” networks of career officialdom that thwart reform, but that is only because it is obviously true.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:50 amTed Bundy is the better example! He was involved in Republican campaigns in Washington and was a delegate sent to the Republican National Convention for Rockefeller.
Why not Hillary then? She worked for Goldwater! Make her the face of the GOP and watch heads explode.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 9:51 amHer CD’s area is probably the most extreme right-wing wacko district in the country, having sent a series of wackos to Congress. She represents them quite well. Maybe the next one will be a little more circumspect, but their views won’t noticeably change.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:02 am#6
You just made DCSCA sad…
Appalled (1a17de) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:03 amI don’t think it’s a bad precedent for people who publicly and repeatedly advocate the use of fatal violence against their colleague to be removed from their committee assignments. At some point you have to have standards and that one is extremely minimal.
Nic (896fdf) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:09 amThe precedents are Steve King and Ms. Greene. If there are Democrats out there akin to them, then yes, strip them of their assignments, but there are none that I know who are blatant racists or claimed to want McCarthy’s head on a pike.
Tim Miller has an interesting breakdown of the House, which is…
Paul Montagu (80b9a9) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:14 am–The Kraken Caucus, which is the 61 who wanted Cheney out.
–The Milhouse Caucus, which I’ll call the Traditional Caucus, which numbers 18 to 53 members, and
–The Fear Caucus, which I’ll call the Coward Caucus, out their fear of Trump and their own constituents; they make up the rest of the 97 to 132 members.
I agree with Miller’s assessment of the Coward Caucus.
RIP Christopher Plummer (91).
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:28 amI’m not aware of any other workplace in America where, when it was learned that someone had openly and notoriously called for the murder of their current coworkers, the reaction would be anything other than an immediate firing.
MTG should not have been stripped of her committee assignments. She should have been expelled.
aphrael (4c4719) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:40 amThe precedents are Steve King and Ms. Greene.
King was removed by Republicans. That was different.
It’s like this: if you spank your kid for breaking your neighbor’s window, that’s one thing. If your neighbor spanks him, it’s another.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:49 amMTG should not have been stripped of her committee assignments. She should have been expelled.
She should have been disciplined by her caucus. They failed to do that, and that’s on them. If Congress wanted to take further action, it should be with regard to the caucus, not MTG. But they would not have to — eventually the caucus would act, as they eventually did in King’s case after a long train of abuses. Public pressure after a further outburst would require it.
I suspect that the only reason that MTG was not removed by the caucus was that the Lynne Cheney thing came up at the same time and the Trump wing needed to win one.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:57 amKevin, if my neighbor and his kid are over at my house and his kid starts telling my daughter (in all seriousness) that he is going to kill her, I expect the neighbor to do something about it. If he does not do anything about it I will definitely be stepping in to ask them to leave.
nate (1f1d55) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:03 am@17, Thats reasonable, but when you decide to spank the neighbor kid in front of him the neighbor is going to object.
Time123 (89dfb2) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:04 amI’d say it’s more like the responsible grandparent spanking the child instead of the negligent parent, extend that metaphor.
Paul Montagu (80b9a9) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:07 amKevin M – how easy would you find it to work with someone who two years ago had publically endorsed your murder?
It’s within the power of Congress to eject such a person, and they should have done so. *Not* because of her politics, but because she’s openly declared that other members of the body should be killed, and that makes it unreasonable to expect any of those members to work with her. Her presence in the chamber is *per se* disruptive, and always will be.
aphrael (4c4719) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:08 amGreene is an awful person. Her violent conspiracy theories should keep her from holding office, but sadly that is not the case.
Meanwhile, the Democrats support abortion on demand.
So…how many dead people lay at the feet of Greene?
How many at the feet of [insert Democrat of choice here]?
Asking for a friend…
Hoi Polloi (139bf6) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:10 amAs someone who was adopted after his birth mother got pregnant at 17, I think about that every time I deal with a Democrat who had worked to ensure my mother could have simply had an abortion.
Hoi Polloi (139bf6) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:12 amI thought the issue was the racist and antisemitic statements. Are those in the dumb or violent category? Or some third group?
For those doing the “noting”; I haven’t complained about the dumb comments. If the rule were to kick members off the committee for dumb statements, it’d be hard to have committees with more than a couple of members.
frosty (f27e97) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:16 amTime123 (89dfb2) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:04 am
Especially when the neighbor doing the spanking runs the local crack house.
frosty (f27e97) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:18 am“Meanwhile, the Democrats support abortion on demand.”
“I think about that every time I deal with a Democrat who had worked to ensure my mother could have simply had an abortion.”
This is pathetic.
Davethulhu (6ba00b) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:27 amR.I.P. Christopher Plummer
Icy (6abb50) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:28 am@ Hoi Polloi On the upside, I should hope that your work colleagues aren’t advocating you be murdered now, as a born-person, which is what the topic actually is.
Nic (896fdf) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:43 amMarjorie Taylor Greene harangues Democrats, the media, some GOP after getting booted off committees
…..
At a press conference outside the Capitol on Friday, Greene said the vote Thursday evening to remove her from the House Budget Committee and House Education and Labor Committee wasn’t fair to her constituents.
“Free speech really matters, and yesterday, when the Democrats and 11 of my Republican colleagues, decided to strip me of my committee assignments — Education and Labor and the Budget Committee — you know what they did? They actually stripped my district of their voice,” Greene told reporters.
“I’m fine with being kicked off committees because it’d be a waste of my time,” Greene said……
Committee work would be fruitless under the “tyrannically controlled government,” in which President Joe Biden is advancing some aspects of his policy agenda through executive orders and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is “leading the Democrats to do whatever they want,” Greene said, adding, “They don’t care what Republicans have to say.”
…….
Greene also praised former President Donald Trump, saying that “the party is his” and “it doesn’t belong to anyone else.” The decision by 11 Republicans to vote with Democrats to remove her from the committees Thursday was a “big betrayal” that opened the door for Democrats to go after other Republicans in the same way, which “could cost us the majority in 2022,” she said, adding that people were “furious.”
……
At the press conference, Green was asked about her remark in 2019 that Pelosi is guilty of treason, “a crime punishable by death.” Greene did not apologize for the remark, instead demanding the CNN reporter who had asked the question apologize for stories about Russian “collusion,” which Greene claimed were fake — a reference to the special counsel investigation into the Trump campaign and Russian interference in the 2016 election.
……
Asked about previously liking a Facebook comment that called for the execution of Pelosi, Greene said the question was just like when the press continuously asked Trump to denounce white supremacy.
“Here’s the thing, when you want to keep telling the same story over and over, but you don’t want to tell the truth, that’s your problem. And that’s how we end press conferences,” she said before walking away from the podium.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:55 am>>>>>>>>>>>>
……when the Democrats and 11 of my Republican colleagues, decided to strip me of my committee assignments — Education and Labor and the Budget Committee — you know what they did? They actually stripped my district of their voice”…… This, of course, is patently untrue. She will still be able to speak on the House floor, introduce bills, visit media outlets, tweet, etc. and pursue her impeachment of President Biden. And as she said, committee meetings are a waste time, so she will have even more opportunities to speak.
#12 Paul Montagu (80b9a9) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:14 am:
Phillip Bump at WaPo has a similar breakdown:
The three factions of House Republicans
……
By now, a month into the 117th Congress, we can discern three separate but fluid groups within the Republican caucus based on how they’ve voted on key issues. One group we’ll call the Trumpists, and it is made up of those Republicans who declined to impeach Trump, voted against stripping Greene of her committee assignments and backed the effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election by voting against counting the electoral votes submitted by Arizona and/or Pennsylvania.
Then there is what we’ll call the accountability caucus, the group of Republicans who voted either to impeach Trump or oust Greene. Those are two very different issues, of course, but each vote demonstrated a willingness to criticize another Republican against the will of party leadership.
The third group we can call the pro-democracy Republicans, those who stuck with the party on impeachment and Greene but who also rejected the effort to overturn Trump’s 2020 loss.
……..
That first large cluster is the Trumpists, numbering 130 in total. It includes House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Minority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.). This is the group that has broadly expressed support for Trump by rejecting the election results in Arizona and/or Pennsylvania and refusing to impeach the president. Ninety-five of these 130 Republicans also signed on to an effort led by Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton (R) to have the election results in four states overturned by the Supreme Court.
The second cluster are the pro-democracy Republicans, all 58 of whom voted to accept the electoral votes. For 22 of them, though, we’re being a bit generous: nearly two dozen of this group also joined the Texas effort. Some such as Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Tex.) tried to rationalize that support as being nothing more than an effort to get the court to evaluate the argument. The court declined to hear it.
Everyone else falls into the accountability group. It’s 18 members in total, 10 who voted to impeach Trump and 11 who voted to punish Greene. Only three — Reps. John Katko (R-N.Y.), Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) and Fred Upton (R-Mich.) — voted to do both. For everyone else, one vote or the other was more compelling.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 12:07 pm…….
…….[F]or every House Republican willing to hold another Republican to account, there are seven who toe the Trumpian line.
>>>>>>>>>
16. Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:57 am
She was. Kevin McCarthy got her to make a speech retracting what she said before.
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 12:15 pmWhat was it that Bobby Jindal said about being “…the oarty of stupid?”
John B Boddie (d795fd) — 2/5/2021 @ 12:47 pmShe was. Kevin McCarthy got her to make a speech retracting what she said before.
Apparently not about Speaker Pelosi.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:01 pm@15. “It’s like this: if you spank your kid for breaking your neighbor’s window, that’s one thing. If your neighbor spanks him, it’s another.”
Essentially yes. Agree. Especially if your neighbor uses the umbrella backdrop of City Hall and does it in the town council chambers before the cameras of the local CATV channel.
So the next time a Congresscritter barks ‘Drop Dead!’ to a colleague in a heated exchange- or is found to have uttered similar “death threats” while watching a ball game between the Phillies and the Mets in a bar on a TeeVee set in Scranton [or Wilmington] in 1966 when Jim Bunning [later a member of Congress] was pitching– and pleads it was the ‘beer nuts’ talking– nail ’em anyway. Because it looks like responsible ‘leadership.’
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@20. Kevin M – how easy would you find it to work with someone who two years ago had publically endorsed your murder?
Ask Ike — who literally ‘worked with’ Germans hell bent on ‘killing him’ and a lot of others only a few years earlier. Von Braun, Debus and Dornberger–etc., etc., come to mind. Or ask a Catholic, too– wasn’t there a pope who served as a German AA gunner to shoot down Allied planes?
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@8. “Why not Hillary then? She worked for Goldwater! Make her the face of the GOP and watch heads explode.”
Yep. Now there’s a colorful Kingsman scenario. 😉
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@10. Something to wrestle with: a half-Nelson, perhaps; OTOH, Oswald was a United States Marine… guess he’ll never make it on a recruiting poster- but then Traitor Lee was a West Point grad; he got statues erected to him.
_____
It should be disturbing to everyone from which ever POV you have that these two political parties are so void of competent leadership- parties which a growing majority of Americans do not belong to-cull candidates like this to begin with, back them to win majorities, then are using the cover our Congress to police themselves because they do not have the internal structure, back bone nor courage to do it on their own. This is why populism keeps rooting deeper and deeper.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:02 pmArgument by House Majority Leader (second ranking Democra) to remove MTG from committesL
https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/steny-hoyer-house-floor-speech-on-marjorie-taylor-greene-transcript
a good idea but it wasn’t said by Edmund Burke. It was probably coined circa 1938 in reference to Hitler and was popularized by the League of Women Voters in 1944 who tried to turn that into an argument for voting.
One of the things she has been quoted as saying implied due process of law. Because how else could “liberal judges” stop it? But she was talking outside of normal law.
She was retracting all of that. But they were interesting in punishing people, and posturing, not in getting people to recant or stop saying things like that.
And maybe in making people afraid of what could become intolerable next. This also came with an assumption of honesty – that a person who said that said what they believed.
She recanted! and stop relying on quotes.
Really? She didn’t say she was wrong?
Now maybe she only talked about falsities of fact, not bad values, but if they wanted her to do thatt, she’d repudiate that too.
This was clearly fantasy. A live action political cartoon. Now fantasy can break loose. But there’s another House member from Colorado who’s worse about guns. She actually wants to carry a gun, into the House chamber, or pretend to.
There were people who got these women to run for office.
Good point. Steve King never indicated support for murder and revolution. But if she’s so bad the proper remedy is expulsion. At least say you would prefer that.
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:07 pmThis is Marjorie Taylor Greene’s speech:
https://www.rev.com/blog/transcripts/marjorie-taylor-greene-house-floor-speech-transcript-hearing-to-remove-greene-from-committee-assignments
She says she was a kook because of Facebook and becuse nobody trued to steer her away from things. Probably not true. Now she says:
Nothing about loose talk of a revolutionary government.
And she says:
Presumbably, she also knew this two or three years ago.
Her defense is that things she said were ripped out of context. And tries to say it’s like (unknowngly?) retweeting porn, and tries to say they’re against her because she believes “that God’s creation is he created them male and female and that should not be denied” and that she is against abortion/
She finishes by saying other people have said problematic things and we shouldn’t be divided and hate:
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:21 pmGreene’s apology should have been something like this (while hanging upside down, of course):
With apologies to A Fish Called Wanda.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:22 pmThis is a sort of an apology, except that it’s not specific:
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:24 pmIt’s Grandpa Munster who hang upside down.
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:24 pmHow I dream of a world where the choices are better then terrible policies I hate and barking mad liars who want a donation.
Time123 (53ef45) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:27 pmI think the major difference is that the whole Democratic party, mainstream media and social media are willing to brand the whole GOP party as crazy as MTG.
If we point this out, then we’re “whining” or being “petulant”.
*shrugs*
The best thing to do is to not engage in any of such framing and relegate MTG to the obscure wing of the party.
The Democarts have had (and currently!) their own problems with the crazies.
Not going to have any sympathy if GOP wins the house in two years when they strip the Squad of their own committee chairs.
whembly (c30c83) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:27 pm@Whembly@40
I think that would be an excellent idea. They can’t do it if they are going to give her standing ovations, though. When they do that, it isn’t “the whole Democratic party” or “mainstream media” or “social media” branding the GOP as crazy like MTG. It’s the party itself.
Nic (896fdf) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:32 pmDana,
I think we’re on the same page about MTG’s actual focus. So I’m starting a list of things I thin GOP representative from Rural GA should push for on the education committee. In no particular order
-Oversight and visibility on the plan to get kids back in seats K-12. What’s the plan and why isn’t it faster?
-What’s the long term policy on college costs? Biden wants to forgive debt. Oversight on that, as well as info on the long term impact on cost.
-Distance learning hits different demographics in different ways. Rural students may be more isolated and poorer students may not have the tech and additional resources the need to be successful. Also, children of essential workers have challenges with distance learning. Because they make up a higher percentage of low income families urban poor get’s more attention. Would be good to shine a lot on the rural situation.
-What’s the DOE plan to help students that have been left behind by the shelter in place? What’s the plan to help those school systems? A nation wide problem might require federal help. If not, what’s the plan not to waste money?
Would love to see someone with some visibility put energy and attention to those. It shows what a dumpster she is that her initial thought was “HA NOW I CAN OWN THE LIBS FULL TIME.”
Any more you want to add?
Time123 (53ef45) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:35 pmSammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:24 pm:
It’s Grandpa Munster who hang upside down.
Apparently you haven’t seen A Fish Called Wanda. Kevin Kline is holding John Cleese by his ankles over the street to extract the apology.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:36 pmTheir failure to do anything about MTG shows the GOP in the house is at least OK with her crazy.
Don’t threaten me with a good time. 😀
Time123 (53ef45) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:37 pmThe House isn’t like a normal workplace, with any boss or supervisor who can fire representatives at will. If you want to rid the House of Representatives of people like Marjorie Taylor Green, rid the country of mindsets like the one held in the GA 14th Congressional District.
Leviticus (617dc1) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:43 pmThat’s right, I haven’t.
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:53 pmSammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:53 pm
You should. Very funny caper film, also starring Michael Palin and Jamie Lee Curtis.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 1:59 pmThe plan right no is to believe or pretend to believe the teachers unions and give the schools so much money that they’ll have to say it’s enough for the school districts to open up. But the teachers unions are conditioning it on all teachers getting vaccinated, and on lower infection rates.
Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot has made a final offer. What is she going to do if the teacher’s union fails to agree? Take a strike? Fire them like Reagan did the Air Traffic Controllers and hire replacements?
https://abc7chicago.com/chicago-teachers-union-public-schools-cps-ctu-update-today/10316406
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:00 pm@45
Or, hear me out as this is radical, simply campaign against her in that congressional district.
whembly (c30c83) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:01 pm@48 Can city mayors, Governor even break unions like what Reagan did? (I don’t think they can)
whembly (c30c83) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:02 pm“ Or, hear me out as this is radical, simply campaign against her in that congressional district.”
– whembly
If we had an educated population, there would be no need to campaign against her (or people like her) in the first place.
Leviticus (617dc1) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:04 pmLiz Chaney ain’t wrong ya’ll:
whembly (c30c83) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:05 pmhttps://twitter.com/HotlineJosh/status/1357480516811976704
@49-
Our better yet, reapportion her district out of existence.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:05 pm“If we had an educated population, there would be no need to campaign against her (or people like her) in the first place.”
– Leviticus
But we don’t have that… we’re surrounded by idjits.
whembly (c30c83) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:06 pm@Sammy@48 If the process is anything like ours (and no guarantees on that, the education system east of the Mississippi tends to have some weird grandfathered in stuff that doesn’t play in the West) the next step is arbitration. If things break down in arbitration, there could be a strike. If they are, in fact, vaccinating 1.500 staff members a day and teacher vaccination is the sticking point, it may be moot by the time arbitration ends.
Nic (896fdf) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:17 pm53, too risky in GA…you may be imperiling 2 recently turned D suburban districts (Lucy Bath and 1 other that flipped this year, the only R to D flip in 2020) by adding R voters. What you recommended may be used in IL against this lady Rep who said Hitler was right about appealing to youths at a rally the day before the Capitol rush – shes a frosh in dwindling pop rural IL, though she might be saved if the Kinzinger seat is disappeared (indirectly via needed additions to suburban Chicago based districts).
urbanleftbehind (f9304e) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:47 pmI’d say it’s more like the responsible grandparent spanking the child instead of the negligent parent, extend that metaphor.
In this case, the grandparents are hostile to the parents and are just looking for a reason to point out what bad parents they are.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:13 pmKevin M – how easy would you find it to work with someone who two years ago had publically endorsed your murder?
Rhetorically or actually? Lots of things are said to shock and get attention. And she was not a candidate then.
Could you work with a politician that told a roomful of blacks that YOU want to put them back in chains? Isn’t accusing people of WANTING a return of slavery beyond the pale of acceptable public speech? Yet Romney is asked to work with Biden.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:21 pmThere are even broader ramifications:
nk (1d9030) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:24 pmOur better yet, reapportion her district out of existence.
How does that work? Make it so that the northwest corner of GA doesn’t get a representative? Or gerrymander it so badly that 5 other Atlanta districts each get a piece.
For democracy!
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:28 pmnk, what do you want to bet that congressional Democrats vote to overturn that election?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:30 pmSpeaking of bad parenting:
Alleged Mommy Capitol Rioter ‘Pink Hat Lady’ Has Been Arrested by the FBI
Wearing an easy-to-identify pink hat may have been the first mistake for a Pennsylvania mother of eight who participated in the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, urging rioters on with a bullhorn.
On Thursday the FBI searched the Mercer County home of Rachel Powell, the 40-year-old woman better known as the “Pink Hat Lady.” The home was vacant at the time of the search, but she was later taken into custody at the FBI’s New Castle office Thursday night, a spokeswoman for the law enforcement agency told VICE News.
She’s being charged with obstruction, depredation of government property, entering a restricted building, entering a restricted building with a dangerous weapon, and violent entry, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s Office told VICE News. She’s set to appear in federal court Friday at 3 p.m.
At the time of the FBI’s search, Powell’s neighbors told the local CBS affiliate KDKA-2 in Pittsburgh that the mother and several of her children had not been seen in over a week.
Since Jan. 16, the FBI had been searching for the unidentified woman seen using a battering ram to break a window into the Capitol building and later barking orders through a bullhorn, telling other rioters to better organize their efforts.
…….
Powell, who was featured in a lengthy profile published in the New Yorker earlier this week detailing her love of the former president, denies she was part of any organized effort to overthrow the 2020 presidential election last month. In the story, which featured Powell’s first public statements since appearing on the FBI’s growing list of people wanted in connection to the D.C. riots, she said she had little to do with the actual planning of the attempted coup and that her actions at the Capitol were “spontaneous.”
“I was not part of a plot—organized, whatever,” she told the New Yorker. “I have no military background […], I’m a mom with eight kids. That’s it. I work. And I garden. And raise chickens. And sell cheese at a farmers market.”
……..
From the KDKA story:
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Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:31 pmYou gotta wonder what she has been teaching her children. With no mention of a husband, if convicted they could all be sent to foster care.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:28 pm
How does that work? Make it so that the northwest corner of GA doesn’t get a representative? Or gerrymander it so badly that 5 other Atlanta districts each get a piece.
Of course NW Georgia will have a representative-may be four or five. Gerrymandering is as American as apple pie (or peach pie in Georgia).
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:33 pmHistorically, representatives for the majority party have been seated when they lost by a few votes, after some “investigating” changed the outcome. But 100 votes is hard to make go away after recounts, certification and court findings.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:48 pm#56 urbanleftbehind (f9304e) — 2/5/2021 @ 2:47 pm:
[Reapportioning MTG’s district out of existence]…too risky in GA…you may be imperiling 2 recently turned D suburban districts (Lucy Bath and 1 other that flipped this year, the only R to D flip in 2020) by adding R voters.
I doubt the Georgia General Assembly cares what happens to Democratic suburban districts. They would like to see them gone and one way to do that is to split MTG district and add more R voters to them.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:50 pmMore Dominion fallout: FoxNews just canceled Dobbs.
Paul Montagu (77c694) — 2/5/2021 @ 3:56 pmThe next lawsuit by Dominion has to be against OAN and the producer of chopped foam pillows, given that his “documentary” is now being aired on the network. The funny part is the disclaimer:
Good luck with that plan, Rip, most of the north of GA, outside Atlanta is R+20 or so and has elected Republicans since Jimmy Carter. The 3rd, 9th and 11th CDs that border her 14th CD are deep red, just not quite as deep red as hers. You would have to encompass her district with so many of Atlanta districts that they would electing Republicans, too. Two of them are already R+8 with Democrat incumbents.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:00 pmFoxNews just canceled Dobbs.
It’s about time. The man was long past his sell-by date.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:00 pmGood luck with that plan, Rip, most of the north of GA, outside Atlanta is R+20 or so and has elected Republicans since Jimmy Carter. The 3rd, 9th and 11th CDs that border her 14th CD are deep red, just not quite as deep red as hers. You would have to encompass her district with so many of Atlanta districts that they would electing Republicans, too. Two of them are already R+8 with Democrat incumbents.
I have no problem electing Republicans, as long as they are not nutty like MTG.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:06 pmThe history of that corner is “nutty.” Bob Barr was perhaps the sanest.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:08 pmThe history of that corner is “nutty.” Bob Barr was perhaps the sanest.
That’s why you split up the district. Put a few nuts in four or five districts, and they won’t be able to elect crazy candidates. They will be marginalized. Politics ain’t bean bag.
Rip Murdock (d2a2a8) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:10 pm68. His hair dye lives on: Reaganoptics.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:13 pm“It doesn’t matter what I do. People need to hear what I have to say. There’s no one else who can say what I can say. It doesn’t matter what I live.” – Newt Gingrich
Hosea 8:7, “For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.”
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:23 pmR.I.P. Christopher Plummer
Still, ‘the hills are alive…’
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 2/5/2021 @ 4:40 pmOT- pause for history: 50 years ago today… when America truly was great— when actions spoke louder than words stitched on a goofy red hat:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vI6A3YJiadw
“Outstanding!” – Alan Shepard
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 2/5/2021 @ 5:13 pmMy favorite Alan Shepard quotes:
And:
Rip Murdock (3ba0dc) — 2/5/2021 @ 7:17 pmWill Shepard make it to space safely? Will he come back in one piece? Everyone was on edge; poor AOC is probably traumatized just thinking about it.
Hoi Polloi (139bf6) — 2/5/2021 @ 7:30 pmConversely, MTG is speaking out against him because she believes the earth is flat.
Davethulhu (6ba00b) — 2/5/2021 @ 8:16 pmMaybe because so many of them gave her a standing ovation in that conference?
Patterico (115b1f) — 2/5/2021 @ 8:24 pmIt seems that people talk about respecting elections, but don’t really. The 14th District of Georgia elected this fool, and they should get represented by her good and hard.
If the other Congresspeople want to make themselves heard back in Georgia, instead of helping her fundraise they should be looking at what federal dollars they can take out of her district and what they can avoid putting in.
But disenfranchising the voters because their choice stinks is pretty much the same as not wanting to count ballots for Biden because you prefer Trump.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:08 pmKevin M (ab1c11) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:08 pm
This is becoming more apparent to more people everyday.
GA14 isn’t rolling in federal money as it is. The LBJ routine isn’t going to be effective on districts that are already lean. Anyway everyone is about to get a bad economy and they don’t seem to have time to work anything so small as shorting a GA district.
frosty (f27e97) — 2/5/2021 @ 10:27 pmThere are a few sane voices in the Republican party. Among them are Cheney, Kinzinger and Sasse. Yet look at what is happening to them now, only because they had the conscience and courage to speak out against Trump.
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/05/ben-sasse-2024-466424
What is happening in the Republican party today is a betrayal. It is no longer the party of principle, but of personality. That’s what happens when you nominate and elect a scripted Reality TV host.
The party is shrinking. The more the GOP moves to the QOP, the more it loses. Sensible people are not going to join or stay with a lunatic party. Lies, lies, lies, and damned conspiracies are not the basis for a party platform. The Republican party is fracturing, at war with itself.
I really don’t care about the GOP. I didn’t leave the Republican party; the Republican party left me.
I will not vote for lies, lies, lies, and damned conspiracies. I certainly will not offer fealty to Donald Trump.
I will not vote for any candidate of the QOP. And that’s the end of it.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 2/5/2021 @ 11:35 pm“Disenfranchisement” is arguably hyperbole. Were the voters disenfranchised when Carlos Danger, Stuart Smalley and Tricky Dick were forced out of office?
Even if Eva
Dave (1bb933) — 2/6/2021 @ 12:19 amBraunGreene were expelled, the voters would be able to elect a replacement, and it will not be a Democrat.@76. “A-OK” aside, by far his best quote:
The famed Shepard’s Prayer…
“Please dear Lord, don’t let me fvck up.”
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 2/6/2021 @ 3:10 am49.
I think depriving her of committee membership is one way to defeat her for re-election next time, although I’m not sure the Democrats really want that. they may be just more interested in promoting cancel culture in general and in intimidating opposition because nobody knows the rules in advance. It starts with people nearly everybody can agree said bad and wrong things bu it doesn’t stop there.
The Republicans never did that to Cynthia McKinney, but on the other hand, that was a different time. The publicity hurt her a little. She was defeated in a primary, then regained her seat when the woman who defeated her decided to run for the Senate, and then finally defeated the next time, in 2006, in a campaign in which Jon Ossoff played a crucial role. I don’t know what kind of maneuvering was going on
Sammy Finkelman (5b302e) — 2/6/2021 @ 6:14 pmI think a case could be made for censure of members of House and Senate who aided and abetted violent insurrection… with cash and openly for months. People died in those riots and the occupations… first the looting then the shooting in fights over territory and spoils, then on to general mayhem that tends to follow lawlessness and a police vacuum. They encouraged rioting and ignored that brown and black men were the majority of the deaths
It is not an apples to apples comparison because as stupid as MGT’s statements have been, her body count isn’t even close.
steveg (43b7a5) — 2/7/2021 @ 3:02 pmI am honestly a little confused here. As far as I am aware, no one here has proposed her expulsion. But that’s the only way in which you could really disenfranchise the voters. I don’t think Greene should be in Congress. But the people of her district have a right to put her there, and absent some actual criminal action, I wouldn’t support her expulsion.
I also don’t think Greene should have been on any committees. But I don’t support her removal from committees either, at least not the way it was done. I think it sets a bad precedent. However, no member of Congress has the right to sit on a committee. It’s a privilege, usually extended automatically with the office, which can be removed under appropriate circumstances. She still sits in the House, even if not on the Education Committee. So that can’t be what you mean by disenfranchisement.
As for gerrymandering her district out of existence, yes, that’s a nakedly, obviously political solution. But the state of Georgia has the right to draw their congressional maps any way they see fit. The only reason that district exists in the first place, and its current form and composition, is because the state legislature says it does. If they change their minds, for whatever reason, that’s their prerogative. The people who live in that district have a right to representation in Congress. But they do not have a right to live in a particular district, or with other particular constituents. Unless Georgia says they do. So again, that can’t be what you mean by disenfranchisement.
So, as I said, I’m confused. What exactly do you mean?
Demosthenes (d7fc81) — 2/7/2021 @ 8:42 pmMy personal opinion is that power plays like this one breed resentment of the power play perpetrators
steveg (43b7a5) — 2/7/2021 @ 8:59 pm“If the other Congresspeople want to make themselves heard back in Georgia, instead of helping her fundraise they should be looking at what federal dollars they can take out of her district and what they can avoid putting in.”
She already does not live in her district. She does not have to. Only in the state.
As for gerrymandering anything out of existence, the census determines how many districts a state gets out of the 435 total establisehd by law, and all a state legislature can do by gerrymandering is try to turn its apportionments more red or more blue. I guarantee you that the Republican-controlled Georgia legislature is not going to gerrymander one more blue district at the expense of one fewer red one just to lessen Taylor-Greene’s chances of being reelected.
nk (1d9030) — 2/7/2021 @ 9:22 pmnk – Safest guarantee ever.
I realize the instnct for coroprate punishment seems like one way to go.
The military is big on teaching that one man can drag down the rest.
Pvt. Plotz screws up and everyone else has to run six miles and do 200 push ups.
This has to be used carefully because it breeds resentment and resentment doesn’t always go where you want it to. Ideally the people would focus grievances on MTG but punishing them for some stupid thing she said a couple years ago? My personal response would involve a figurative f off.
steveg (43b7a5) — 2/8/2021 @ 8:55 am“the issue is not her dumb statements. It’s the violent ones.”
Please. Violence is simply a form of law enforcement, and your excerpts all indicate that it was exactly the context in which it was being discussed. Are lawyers and journalists the only people with Contextual Privilege in these matters?
Eric Swalwell literally called for the nuking of AMERICAN gun owners who resisted national gun confiscation AND literally screwed a Chinese spy, so no, I’m not going to make much of someone who probably clicked ‘like’ on every response before reading them or didn’t IMMEDIATELY CONTEXTUALIZE THE VIOLENT RHETORIC on a discussion about legal remedies for Obama’s cash bribes to his own favorite violent regimes.
The difference between the Republican and Democrat parties is that the Democrat party, by and large, has shown in both word and deed that it really does hate a large majority of normal American voters, really would murder them if they thought they could get away with it, and really are dangerous to the Constitution and the Republic at large. And it did so long before January 6th, which seems more like an excuse than anything else. At most, the Republican rank and file are only murderously angry at a very small number of very deserving Congressmen and other public representatives-but Congress’s defenders seem determined to make that number as large as possible!
In terms of sheer numbers, supporting the Republicans in this fight means that the absolute number of law-abiding people would increase or at least decrease less at the end of it all. Supporting the Democrats in their plots to disenfrachise someone who’s undoubtedly representative by all descriptions means a sharp-drop-off in the respect for the law by anybody, great or small.
You had the chance to accept Tiberius Sempronius Gracchus. You’ll be lucky if you get someone as friendly as Julius Caeser, or even Caesar Augustus. Either way, the death of the Republic is far advanced. Like a man trapped in a log cabin in winter and forced to burn his furniture to survive, you’ll be forced to feed more and more of the legal framework in which you claim to operate into the metaphorical wood chipper simply to maintain the positions you have.
Tiberian Twilight (43a158) — 2/8/2021 @ 3:33 pm@ Tiberian Twilight, #91:
https://youtu.be/lYnhckZcllU
Demosthenes (d7fc81) — 2/9/2021 @ 8:50 amIn New York State there was a constitutonal amendment, championed by Ed Koch, passed in 2014 creating a bipartisan districting commission (that would severely limit what the state legislature could do in redistricting but Governor Cuiomo is being accused of trying to sabotage it.
First, it should be noted that, for over 40 years, thanks to the miracle of gerrymandering, the State Senate was always Republican and the Assembly always had a veto proof Democratic majority. But finally trends roved too muxh, and the coalition between some Democrats and the Republicans was broken up and the Republicans lost their majority after the 2018 election (thus the pro crime legislation of 2019) and now, after the 2020 election have aveto proof majority in the State Senate. So the redistricting commission doesn;t look so good.
Twp things have happened:
1. A constitutional amendment was passed in the last term and is likely to be passed again this year (in New York State constitutional amendments require passage by two successively elected legislatures followed by aproval by the voters) and is therefor likely to be on the balot in November 2021. It would remove minority party involvement. I didn’t read any further details.
2. Governor Andrew Cuomo did not put any money in the budget for the redistricting commission. He claims it isn’t needed this year. But it is supposed to do research. Evidently he hopes the process will be changed in November.
Sammy Finkelman (e4c3a1) — 2/9/2021 @ 10:57 am