Rachel Maddow: Jim DeMint's Shenanigans
h/t Heather for the video.
Rachel Maddow argues that we should have seen it coming: Jim DeMint's insane threat to shut down the federal government through mis-use of Senate rules is part of a long and nefarious tradition of "government is bad" rhetoric from the Right.
My favorite part:
MADDOW: Mr. DeMint, when you spoke to your guidance counselor in high school, did that person really suggest governing as a good career path for you? Because the country does need running, it does need governing. And if you are against that on principle, then government service maybe shouldn‘t be the right fit for you.
Three things Rachel Maddow doesn't mention: first, the total disconnect within the Right-wing mindset between hating the "government" and depending on the government -- Social Security and Medicare -- for their day-to-day lives.
Secondly, that Jim DeMint is doing this to raise his profile among the completely batty GOP base for 2012.
And finally, that these guys have no idea about karma.
Transcript (via MSNBC) below the fold.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)RONALD REAGAN, FORMER U.S. PRESIDENT: I‘ve always felt the nine most terrifying words in the English language are: “I‘m from the government and I‘m here to help.”
REP. TODD AKIN, MISSOURI: I believe that Ronald Reagan had it right. I‘ve always felt that the nine most terrifying words in the English language are: “I‘m from the government and I‘m here to help.”
REP. RON LEWIS, KENTUCKY: Ronald Reagan once said the nine most terrifying words in the English language are: “I‘m from the government, and I‘m here to help you.”(END VIDEO CLIPS)
MADDOW: What if you are the government, though? Does that mean you shouldn‘t try to help? What are you trying to do with your job in government if trying to help is a very bad thing? What else could you do in government?advertisement | ad info
You know, what happened today in Washington we should‘ve seen it coming back. We should have seen it coming back in February. In February, most of the country was mortified when Republican Senator Jim Bunning, a lone senator with the reputation for eccentricity—Jim Bunning personally stood up and used his power as a senator to stop unemployment benefits for the country. Remember that?
Jim Bunning turned himself into a one-man roadblock as Democrats tried to pass an extension of unemployment benefits through the Senate.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. AL FRANKEN, MINNESOTA: Is there objection?
SEN. JIM BUNNING, KENTUCKY: Senator from Kentucky objects. I‘ll be here as long as you‘re here and as long as all those other senators are here. And I‘m going to object every time.(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: And object he did over and over and over and over again and over and over and over and over again. Senate rules allow that. And sometimes when you‘ve got a guy like Jim Bunning, people who are unemployed through no fault of their own, get cut off from unemployment benefits because of that one somewhat eccentric senator has decided he‘s got a problem with it.
When that happened back in February, we should‘ve seen then what was coming today, because after Jim Bunning finally relented back in February, after this millionaire ex-baseball player finally gave up his crusade against the unemployed, we should have seen what happened today in Washington coming. When the whole country was pretty much mortified by what Jim Bunning had done.
But one very important very small constituency felt otherwise. They were not at all horrified by what Jim Bunning had done—quite the contrary.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)
SEN. JOHN CORNYN, TEXAS: I admire the courage of the junior senator from Kentucky, Senator Bunning. Somebody has to stand up finally and say enough is enough.
SEN. JEFF SESSIONS, ALABAMA: He stood like a solid rock, and he didn‘t give in. And I respect him for the courage he showed.
SEN. JIM DEMINT, SOUTH CAROLINA: Senator Bunning from Kentucky has taken a courageous stand to hold the Democrats—in fact, all of us—accountable to the things that we say we believe.
(END VIDEO CLIPS)
MADDOW: When Republicans praised Jim Bunning back then, we should have seen what happened today coming. We should have seen it coming a month after the Jim Bunning fiasco too, when health reform faced its final passage in the Senate. Health reform had already passed the House at this point. It already passed the Senate once before. The Senate was just taking up some final fixes to the bill. Health reform was going to pass.
But Republicans—remember this? Republicans decided their strategy against it at that point what they wanted the big show boat of resistance to be at the end would be keeping the Senate in session until 3:00 in the morning. Remember this? Well, they voted on amendments that were essentially laugh lines.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. RICHARD DURBIN (D-IL), MAJORITY WHIP: One of the Republican amendments wants a public referendum in the District of Columbia on gay marriage. Another Republican amendment wants us to go after the organization ACORN, which just announced its bankruptcy. Another amendment says no prescription Viagra for rapists.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MADDOW: These amendments had nothing at all to do what was going on policy-wise. It was a just for show effort by Republicans to stop health reform for a while, for the sheer performative pleasure of being seen to be stopping it. It wasn‘t a real effort to stop the bill. It was an effort by Republicans to show what they were capable of doing, capable of doing by just blocking it for a while until late at night, just stopping any progress from happening for the sake of showing that they could. Not making any progress on their own, just stopping things.
We should have seen then what was coming today. Because today, a lone Republican senator, Jim DeMint of South Carolina, threatened essentially to shut down the federal government using the power that one senator has under Senate rules.
Quoting from “Roll Call” newspaper, “Senator DeMint warned his colleagues that he would place a hold on all legislation that has not been cleared by his office before the close of business Tuesday.” Any piece of legislation not personally cleared by Jim DeMint will be blocked by Jim DeMint. It is a threat that “Roll Call” newspaper described as, quote, “remarkable.”
Among the things that the Senate has yet to pass and which Senator DeMint could presumably block is a stopgap spending measure to keep government—to keep the government operating past September 30th.
So, Senator DeMint, in effect, is now threatening to shut down the entire government. A government shutdown like the one we had back in the ‘90s under Newt Gingrich. A few key differences here, though. For one thing, right now, it‘s just a lone Republican senator without a leadership position who is threatening this. In 1995, at least, Mr. Gingrich was the Republican speaker of the House.
The other difference is that the government shutdown in 1995 was at least theoretically about something. It was about Republicans wanting President Clinton to cut Medicare and Medicaid and education. This time around, Mr. DeMint is not even bothering to make a case that it is about anything. It‘s not that Jim DeMint wants some legislative thing he‘s not getting.
Like—remember when that Alabama Republican senator earlier this year put a blanket hold on all of the president‘s judicial nominees because he wanted some pork for his district? This is not that. This is not “I‘m trying to get this one earmark, this one policy thing changed and if I don‘t get it I‘m going to shut down the government.” This is just “I‘m going to shut down the government.”
This is just “I can and so I shall.” This is shutting down the government for the pure ideological joy of shutting down the government. It is the fetishization of government shutdown. It is the full fruition of the idea that governing itself is bad.
If you campaign for generations on the idea that government itself is bad, that governing is bad, that policy is bad, that having a legislature that legislates is bad, that the nine scariest words in the English language are “I‘m from the government and I‘m here to help,” because government can never help, it only hurts and government must be stopped. When you campaign on that for generations, then ultimately, your anti-government movement births politicians who stop government, who shut it down for no other reason than that they can because they think it‘s intrinsically good to do so.
And if you do not believe me, explain to me why this idea of a government shutdown keeps getting brought up by the right this year.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIPS)
REP. LYNN WESTMORELAND ®, GEORGIA: If the government shuts down, we want you with us. We want you with us.(APPLAUSE)
WESTMORELAND: We got to have you. We got to have you.
CHRIS WALLACE, FOX NEWS: So shutdown as possible.
NEWT GINGRICH, FORMER HOUSE SPEAKER: If the president wants to push it.
DICK MORRIS, POLITICAL STRATEGIST: There‘s going to be a government shutdown. Just like in ‘95 and ‘96, but we‘re going to win it this time.
(END VIDEO CLIPS)
MADDOW: Government shut down, woo!
Understand these arguments are not about shutting down the government for any reason, for any one unbearable thing. It‘s not a last resort way for Republicans to try to get this one thing that‘s very important to them that they can‘t get any other way. It‘s not that. They just want to shut down the government. Any policy excuse to do that is as good as any other.
And Jim DeMint has now just decided that the whole policy hook, that‘s beside the point. Shutdown itself is good because governing itself is bad, governing itself must be stopped. Legislating itself is evil and must be stopped—which is a relatively cogent sentiment coming from someone with a black bandanna over their face running with a “Smash the State” banner at a WTO summit in the ‘90s or something. But coming from a member of the United States Senate?
Mr. DeMint, when you spoke to your guidance counselor in high school, did that person really suggest governing as a good career path for you? Because the country does need running, it does need governing. And if you are against that on principle, then government service maybe shouldn‘t be the right fit for you.
The government shutdown back in 1995, the Gingrich shutdown, cost American taxpayers about $800 million. These things are not free.
Mr. DeMint today threatened to do it again just for the sake of doing it again. Jim DeMint wanting to do this is not surprising given how radical his own politics are.
So far, the supposed Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, has had no comment on Mr. DeMint‘s threat to shut down the government.
Watch to see how other Republicans and conservatives respond, though, to what Jim DeMint is doing. In policy terms, it is a little spooky about the Senate, that one senator can shut down the entire government if he decides to. In policy terms, it‘s a little spooky.
In political terms, it is even more spooky, if it turns out that Jim DeMint in this case is not standing alone.
How can ONE MAN shut down the damn government? Where in the rules does it say that can happen? What year is this again???
NOBODY 2012
It's hard to get things done when republican Senators are constantly stopping by Harry Reids office, taking the Majority Leader into a head lock, and running around giving him nuggies.
If I were a psychopath, I would join the republican party, and get in on the gravy train taking the Teabircher morons to the cleaners.
Wedgies
Republicans only get into politics to take government out.
They have no interest nor expertise in governance. They know nothing about legislation.
The American government is their enemy.
They are like an invading virus, motivated by hate for American Democracy, and the prospect of destroying it from within.
They are the enemy within. They don't even hide this fact any more, and every American knows it.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
Repukes always whining about government and wanting to drown it in a bathtub; and, they have nothing but contempt for both the Constitution and the American People.
So, why don't they freakin' quit running for office and screwing it up for the rest of us??!!! Or, perhaps we should just show all of them the door - elect only Democrats or members of any party but Republican in the next few elections....let their wish come true.
"Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of Stupidity" - Frank Leahy
?!?!?!
Isn't shenanigans sexist?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
Isn't that an Irish pub brawl?
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
...North 1, South 0".
The apples don't fall far from the tree in South Carolina.
Edmund Ruffin is known as the man who fired the first shot of the Civil War (he wasn't).
From Wikipedia: "After the surrender of Robert E. Lee at Appomattox Court House in 1865, this fiery Southerner penned these last words in his diary:
"I here declare my unmitigated hatred to Yankee rule—to all political, social and business connection with the Yankees and to the Yankee race. Would that I could impress these sentiments, in their full force, on every living Southerner and bequeath them to every one yet to be born! May such sentiments be held universally in the outraged and down-trodden South, though in silence and stillness, until the now far-distant day shall arrive for just retribution for Yankee usurpation, oppression and atrocious outrages, and for deliverance and vengeance for the now ruined, subjugated and enslaved Southern States!
...And now with my latest writing and utterance, and with what will be near my latest breath, I here repeat and would willingly proclaim my unmitigated hatred to yankee rule--to all political, social and business connections with Yankees, and the perfidious, malignant and vile Yankee race.
Shortly after writing this, Ruffin draped a Confederate flag around his shoulders and took his own life with a gunshot to the head. He stated in a suicide note that he would "rather be dead than live in a country subjugated by the Yankee race"
Sounds like a liberal whiner.
If I were a psychopath, I would join the republican party, and get in on the gravy train taking the Teabircher morons to the cleaners.
You mean a "liberal" whiner don't you?
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
and those sentiments have changed little since that day. Like many Middle Eastern societies they just can't get over sustaining vendettas over many generations. Most of these dim bulbs speak in a slow drawl which gives away their IQ.
And so perished the last literate Southerner....
"I could give a flying crap about the political process.... We're an entertainment company."
- Glenn Beck - Forbes interview; April 26, 2010
...was asked why he climbed mt. Everest, his reply was...
"because it was there"
audit-prosecute-incarcerate
Brilliant.
did you have your powdered wig re-fitted?
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
Never heard of George Mallory and Andrew Irvivine?
Diabolus est Deus Inversus
of the joke about dogs licking their special places
I sure am glad Lincoln and Grant kept these guys in the Union.
If I were a psychopath, I would join the republican party, and get in on the gravy train taking the Teabircher morons to the cleaners.
Wait, which party hates America again? My Fox News truth main-line is running in to an arterial blockage of cognitive disonance.
Due to projection.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
Republicans did better in the bottom line mode.
This man is mentally ill. I want him tested.
Say what you mean. Mean what you say. But don't say it mean.
Karma is a bitch.
So, it's a good thing that DeMinto is raising his visibility to the populace so when the Federal government CONVICTS HIM of conspiracy to commit murder and frog-march this clown off to SuperMax, EVERYBODY knows who he is and why he'll never be seen in public again.
Murder? Huh!
Maybe he's trying to become too big to prosecute.
"Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob"
-= Franklin Delano Roosevelt =-
what is wrong with you bass ackward folks....this guy is a nutjob
reached a new low, with his new ad, n i thought neocons were the only ones that distorted ads
Ooh, tell me more!
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
And before you begin with that tired "We're above that" bullshit see Al Gore, Max Cleland and John Kerry....
well for starters he could have not taken his opponent out of context... anyways I don't like politicians, and this dude just passed the test for being a total d bag... you are right about Al gore though
It's not distorted or taken out of context?
It sounds to me as though you should do a little more thinking. :P
Study the symptoms not the virus...
apparently i ain't great at sarcasm
p.s. How do you hide money from a hippy? Put it under the soap. :p
is the perfect example of why I do not understand how even the most progressive, whatever that is supposed to mean, do not get behind the Democrats whatever their disappointments with the achievements of the current administration. If the Republicans have found a winning formula, and I'm beginning to think they have,of claiming government is useless, inefficient and to be blocked at every opportunity while at the same time forming that government then you are going to be in big trouble. This will be their Great Leap Backward. The rules of the senate which have made any progress glacially slow will serve their purposes perfectly. They won't need or want to pass anything.
Hasa Diga Eebowai
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hjDnGBrhhaQ
Repeating actions with the expectation of a different outcome is one of the definitions of insanity.
I really hope he does it. When the TeaBaggers don't get their Social Security checks, maybe they'll finally see who's really on their side, and vote the Republicans out.
But I doubt it.
The people in the Plains who tried to make it through the dustbowl were self-reliant farmers who were too proud to ask anyone for help, until the survival of their families was in the balance. In the 30's they asked the government for help and the Roosevelt administration gave them help, and began soil conservation programs and other assistance. After subsisting as a carpenter, I went back to college in my 40's and got Pell Grants and low interest loans from the government, got a degree and a job. For many people government is the only thing between them and the abyss. Reagan started this mental illness and it's continued to this day.
...$800,000,000.00 the last time the right shut the government down, how much is that in 2010 $''s?
Why is Rachel the only one giving America a history lesson on this?
Mickey: "It was an epiphany. Do you know what an epipany is?"
Keoni: "NOT NOW MICKEY!"
..."And finally, that these guys have no idea about karma. "
Amen!
Seventh Coalition 1 - 0 French Empire
Fuck yeah!
Bite my shiny metal ass.
http://www.startalkradio.net/
"He was educated at Christ Church Episcopal School and Wade Hampton High School in Greenville."
I think you'll find, he believes he's fighting for glory... as apposed to those whom aren't.
Study the symptoms not the virus...
.
Study the symptoms not the virus...
Karma?
I wish there were such a thing as "Karma". If there were, then Bush would have died choking on the pretzel. I bet the only thing he really choked on was Jeff Gannon's penis. Bush, being as screwed up as he is, must be into the rough trade.
Why do people keep voting in Republicans to government when they say government is the problem?? If they think it is the problem why put them there so they can essentially run it badly and proven it?? They don't care about people just themselves....
...Reagan was a moron and a liar. He was a former FDR Democrat, so he hadn't "always" believed those words were terrifying. When his acting career petered out and he turned to selling soap on TV, he may have decided he couldn't afford to pay any taxes at all and thus was born the anti-government Reagan.
Somehow I think there were thousands of residents of New Orleans who, after Katrina, would have loved to hear someone say "I'm from the government and I'm here to help." And when one's house in on fire, are those words terrifying if spoken by a firefighter? Lost in a national park and need search and rescue? Would you be terrified if a park ranger found you and splinted your broken leg before calling for a helicopter (supplied at government, aka taxpayer, expense) to fly you to the hospital?
Those nine words are not terrifying. All they are is an applause line for a person who is just as stupid as the words themselves. I am so sick of these idiots.
The Republicans have it half right. They are part of government, and I'm afraid of that half.
And I'm not sure what's meant by karma? Does that refer to political karma - that is, payback from the Democrats? If so, why should they be afraid of karma? Democrats refuse to use the same tactics that the right uses. So why fear karma?
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