BREAKING: Now they've even got Justice Kennedy!

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 27, 2018

A big difference between Them and Us:
Now it looks like Donald J. Trump will also replace Justice Kennedy.

This helps us contemplate a difference between Them and Us.

After yesterday's decision on the travel ban, many people called it a win for Mitch McConnell. All through Obama's final year, he refused to allow a vote on Judge Garland. In the end, the seat went to Justice Gorsuch, creating yesterday's 5-4 vote.

For the record, there's no assurance concerning the way a Justice Garland would have voted. Having said that, consider a very basic difference between Them and Us:

When Justice Scalia died in 2016, McConnell played the very long game. He refused to permit a vote all year, all based on the chance that Donald J. Trump would win.

Over Here, in our liberal tents, we took a different approach. We spent the year assuring ourselves that Trump could never win.

When Comey launched his first attack on Clinton, the Maddow Show actually took Comey's side in the matter. On a weekly basis, our greatest sachems kept showing us polls alleged to prove that Donald J. Trump couldn't win.

It was always possible that he could win, but we were having some good solid fun. This lasted right up to the last Friday night, when Professor Wang told Lawrence that nothing but a major weather event could produce a Donald Trump win.

True story!

We gamboled and played and we had lots of fun. Steve would stand before "the big board," sleeves rolled up, telling us, perhaps a bit like a carnival barker, that things looked very good.

Over There, in the other team's tents, McConnell maintained a long fight. We began our resistance on the day after Donald Trump won.

We've been this way for at least thirty years. Also this:

As a group, we're completely unable to see how inept we are.

60 comments:

  1. This isn't Pres. Trump's last year and the Republicans went with Kagan in 2010.

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    Replies
    1. "This isn't Pres. Trump's last year and the Republicans went with Kagan in 2010."

      Precedents? Those ought to protect you. Haha ha ha ha ha ha ha

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    2. Mitch McConnell says the American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court Justice.

      Get out and vote!

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    3. McConnell will run away from that principle belief, faster than a College Republican running from a military campus recruiter.

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  2. "We gamboled and played and we had lots of fun."

    Actually, as I recall, you had quite a hate-fest, accusing The True American Hero of racism, misogyny, being too rich, not being rich enough, being a secret Russian agent, and what-not. The usual.

    So, don't repent too much, Bob; your zombie death cult is still behaving as it's supposed to.

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    Replies
    1. "Actually, as I recall, you had quite a hate-fest..."

      Evidence, please.

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    2. 4:27,
      Snowflake be snowflaking.

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  3. It's easy to win when playing the "long game", when you hold all the cards and cheat, like McConnell.

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  4. Somerby is too lazy to read columns by people like Nate Silver. His analysis clearly showed that the polls were correct. The problem was the late effect of Comey's second announcement, combined with vote suppression in those three key state, combined with the Russian-funded Facebook campaign and computer hacking which suppressed votes for Clinton among young women and African American voters specifically. In other words, the election was on track and Clinton was going to win (as she did win the popular vote) except for interference and tampering with the election.

    The problem was not anyone's clowning or over-confidence. Clinton's campaign worked very hard. The problem was election rigging and outright fraud, coupled with malfeasance by Comey. I expect that Mueller's investigation will fill in the details.

    Somerby now wants to blame Democrats and people like Maddow for Trump's win. That doesn't wash. Of course those third party voters should have taken Trump more seriously (Somerby among them, I suspect). But they wouldn't have mattered without all the other wrongdoing.

    Somerby is supremely happy with his preferred explanation for what happened. Don't confuse him with any facts. It is more soothing to his guilty conscience to blame Democrats, liberals, the media.

    I was one of the people who worked hard for Clinton, right up to the end when she lost. I will not accept any blame for that loss. I do consider Somerby one of the people who should have known better and should have done better. He needs to worry about the mote in his own eye -- the one that led him down Bernie's path with the other bros, hand in hand with Vlad, and gave us Dear Leader and all that comes with our demented President. I hope he cannot sleep at night because lord knows he doesn't deserve to.

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    Replies
    1. You should have told her to go to Wisconsin.

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    2. First, she was in PA almost constantly and still lost that state so it is unlikely her visits affected the outcome. Second, statistical analyses confirm this had no impact.

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    3. IMHO an honest FBI would at least have stripped Hillary of her security clearance, thus forcing her to withdraw. The result would have been the election of a Democrat -- probably Biden.

      I find it deliciously ironic that FBI malfeasance was designed to help the Democrats, but it instead led to their defeat.

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    4. David in Cal, speaking as an acolyte of Bob Somerby and his love ethic, I view you as a valuable human being and I humbly try to understand your viewpoint. Of course, we must also face the fact that you may be mentally ill, a sociopath. But I say that out of pity, not hate. K?

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    5. IMHO, an honest media would have called out the bigotry of the Right-wing for the last 40 years, the hurt fee-fees of the snowflakes be damned.

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    6. Yes, the media making believe the Right-wing is made up of anything more than morons, racists, and cowards isn't really working out for the rest of us.

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    7. FBI malfeasance

      Fucking traitor, David. You're a fucking traitor.

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    8. "Putin's bitch" has more dramatic flair.

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    9. "Putin's bitch"?

      Yes, from this morning.

      **************
      @realDonaldTrump .......Russia continues to say they had nothing to do with Meddling in our Election! Where is the DNC Server, and why didn’t Shady James Comey and the now disgraced FBI agents take and closely examine it? Why isn’t Hillary/Russia being looked at? So many questions, so much corruption!
      ****************

      That is the president of the United States. Defending Putin and attacking the FBI.

      And whining. Continuing his fucking cowardly chickenshit whining.

      Waaawaaawaaaa, What about Hillary.

      Donny Chickenshit, our fucking treasonous president. Fucking coward. Fucking Traitor. Fucking lying sack of shit.

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    10. Oh, yeah, mm, J. Edgar Hoover is turning over in his grave.

      And buy me a box of Kleenex before you start sputtering on me.

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    11. Fortunately, Trump's defense only works on morons.

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    12. The Right-wing support of treason against the United States of America is the least surprising thing to happen in my lifetime. I knew it the minute they called me a traitor for criticizing the 2003 Iraq War. It's ALWAYS projection with these fuckers.

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    13. I actually don't think Cec is a moron, unlike DinC and Mao, but she is completely amoral with no principles and intellectually dishonest.

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    14. mm,
      Yup. It's the old are they X, or are they just making believe they are X, because they don't argue in good faith.
      In the run-up to the ACA, they were making believe they didn't understand the concept of insurance ("Why should my tax dollars go to pay for someone else's surgery? What's fair about that?"), even though they buy home and car insurance.

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    15. Conservatives never argue in good faith. At some point in the future, they'll even make believe they don't understand why Wall Street was burned to the ground.

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    16. mm, I must say you're very gifted with your unhinged profanity-laden declarations on the infantilism and bad faith of Trump and other conservatives.

      Such illustration by example.

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    17. I am perfectly hinged, Cec.

      One thing I learned growing up, a man is only as good as his word.

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    18. I just figured it out. Cecelia is actually Chris Cillizza. Tell me I'm not a genius.

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    19. Cecelia is not a serious commenter, she is only here to stroke her fragile ego via a strategy of stifling discourse. Responding to Cecelia does nothing but prop up her delicate sense of herself.

      Delete
  5. Bob,
    Good point that Democrats should have run an inveterate racist if they wanted to win the Presidency of the United States.
    No one is going to argue that.

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    Replies
    1. Oh man
      I got smoked by the old, "I know you are, but what am I " defense.
      It's like pre-school all over again.

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    2. Trump defense in the money-laundering charges will be that "Mueller is a poo-pooh head".

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    3. Cecilia, are you the same Cecilia that posted some time ago? That Cecilia seemed reasonable. But now, Obama was an "inveterate racist?!!!" This mirrors repugnant right wing propaganda. And by the by, though a Democrat, I think a lot of Dems and dem pundits have gone off the rails with identity politics and calling everyone racists (though some are, e.g. our Nazis) and obsessing over the Russia probe. Nothing is really simple, and few talk rationally about anything.

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    4. What do you guys expect after the silly comment by Anon 8:00pm?

      There's only so many straight-lines a person can resist...

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    5. 8:00 not PC enough for you, Cecelia?.

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    6. “There's (sic) only so many straight-lines a person can resist...”

      Well, so far you’ve managed to resist all the funny ones.

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    7. Boy, doesn't know his straight-lines from punch-lines.

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    8. "Boy, doesn't know his straight-lines from punch-lines."

      So you're trying to be funny. Glad you cleared that up.

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    9. "Tough crowd."

      Now that's funny - and true.

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    10. Yeah 8:00 is extremely silly. Who ever heard of an inveterate racist being elected President of the United States? If you don't push back on this, the next thing you know 8:00 will be telling us snow is cold.

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    11. Exactly. Which would have been yet another non sequitur.

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    12. Speaking of cold snow, 8:00 is really bothering the snowflakes with his truth.

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  6. I wonder if the "long game" of their media critics includes refusing to watch the powerhouse station of the opposition, and basically only running down the home team. Hmmm..... such a strategy might not have led to victory!! As an honest writer used to say long, long ago..."Can we talk?" Bob couldn't be happier in these days of destruction, all the people he hates are being hurt.

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  7. I'm cooking up some fish cheek tonight.

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    Replies
    1. Had to google it, but "fish Cheek" apparently is some yucky dish stereotypical liberals are eating. But the dark Greg gives us some info here. This was probably a short lived liberal joke on far right radio, telling us something about Dark Greg.... on the other hand.... Bob did try to be a comidian.....

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  8. Bob, you know they "cheat" on every level and we cannot. (Ms. Bee used the C word and everyone was on her like SonS, but at least she got heard.) They own the TV, radio, and much of the internet. They tell the gullible fun lies like we cannot. They own Maddow, Matthews, and got Donahue - one of the few semi-liberals ever on TV - off the air. We still got the most votes by a clear margin yet Evil still won. Is that our fault? There was no one able to get the word out that Hillary had committed no crime - everyone that works for the Gov is prevented from using gov email for personal stuff so we all had separate email. The "her own sever" was a total Red Herring - I had "Oz.net" host back in the day. They wouldn't know security if it bit them. All gov employees are supposed to have other email for personal business. Just because some Repub says there was a classified word in a message is hardly proof that here was and even if so, They have to prove that she intended/meant for that to happen. Intention to break the law is an "element" of the crime. VP Cheney was not "locked up" for assault - he did shoot his attorney - not locked up because assault of his attorney was not his purpose. Only Repubs could think she was doing more than trying to do her job.
    So how do you suppose we magically get a TV network? I have coffee with Repubs most mornings. You can't tell them anything. Stockmarket's down? So what. Social Security is less? so what. Kids are lost? Well they were criminals. We are doomed, I tell you. Lemmings, all of them, right off the cliff.

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  9. "We gamboled and played and we had lots of fun."

    Who is "we?" Our "liberal tents" don't look too unified, as the split between Bernie and Hillary showed. There is a not insignificant portion of the left who don't even view Hillary as a liberal. Some of these people couldn't in good conscience bring themselves to vote for Hillary. Were they gamboling and playing?

    How about Hillary's supporters? Did they gambol and play? No; they worked their asses off and voted for her.

    Did Hillary herself gambol and play? Was she a weak candidate? (I believe Somerby has said so). Did Bernie gambol and play? Did he work hard enough to get Hillary elected?

    Bottom line, the "left" doesn't resemble a "tribe" in any real sense.

    Perhaps implicit in Somerby's criticism of "liberals" is that they should be MORE tribal:
    1. when in power, cheat and use any means necessary to maintain power (like that master game-player McConnell)
    2. act more like a tribe, like the unified Republican Party
    3. have MSNBC be more like Fox

    These three things seem to be working like a charm for Republicans. And in days when the Republican party and their mouthpieces have no intention of adhering to norms or fairness or giving up one inch of tribal advantage, it would seem that ceding the ground by playing fair in a rigged game is not the way to progressive success.

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