Thune’s literal job description is centered on his being able to rally and unify the Republican Senate body around the agenda of the president. He is incapable of doing that. He is a lousy leader.
Mitch McConnell, louse that he tragically turned out to be, was a master at it. The Republican Senate today has become a herd of wild cats under Thune’s so-called “leadership”.
And where are the confirmations of Trump’s nominees, still in limbo, now held up for over 15 months? Grassley, with his sudden devotion to Blue slips using them as his excuse. Thune, were he an actual Leader, could stop that in its tracks, to say nothing of his deliberate refusal to allow a recess longer than 3 days to afford the President the ability to get his nominees.
No. Senate rules, Senate schmules. There is a deliberate and concerted effort by Senate Republicans, being at least encouraged by if not entirely led by Thune to stonewall the presidents agenda. No matter the consequences to their constituents or the country itself.
Shame on all of them, starting with Thune on down.
Within the current rules is there any means for a small number of senators to force the so-called talking filibuster or a true recess that would enable the president to make recess appointments?
The Idea that government would work indeed a talking Filibuster is very droll, what a romantic the author is…
Perhaps something more up to date like a stream on TikTok? Traditionalists might complain muh constitution* and it would open the door to AI governance and the question of why other than a President and Vice President we have elections at all? But the people demand results, not that they vote that way. As to the hard work of building a coalition…
Please. Those of us working have no time to waste on pointless rituals.
As to the 5 senators; go forth! That would be 5 more men in Congress than we presently have…
*I am aware the filibuster has no Constitutional status beyond rules of the Senate, also that it doesn’t matter.
You could probably get half the 14 Democrats, or even more, just by changing the SAVE bill to accept ordinary Driver's Licenses (or non-driver State ID) instead of requiring expensive passport-quality documentation.
But maybe making voting annoying and expensive is the point?
I'd be for accepting driver's licenses if whatever state wants to use them has strict rules (that are actually followed) that limits driver's licenses to US citizens only.
You don’t actually want this. Green Cards? Foreign students?
Now, six states do distinguish citizenship on their driver’s licenses. The problem is that since we don’t start with a central registry, the precursor documents to prove citizenship can be a big and expensive pain.
I found out—and this is a problem than Time will solve—that there were parts of the Jim Crow South where they didn’t even bother to register births of poor Black children, who were usually born at home. So, no birth certificate. They weren’t, after all, going to vote.
Lincoln began to reluctantly concern himself with slavery no later than 1854 with a House Divided Speech in his 3d decade of Public Life.
However you are very correct about something;
Lincoln’s cause for decades was improving the lot of the Common Man. Infrastructure of canals, railroads, technical schools for agriculture and other scientific education with public funding by Bonds and other government instruments. Lincoln was a Henry Clay Whig. Lincoln very reluctantly was drawn into anti slavery by the Southern Oligarchs machinations to spread slavery to the new territories acquired from the Mexican war. Free Labor as we see now isn’t competitive with slave labor. Lincoln was in many ways what we would now call a Labor Leader (not at that time) and the core of the Republican Party was free labor and Free Soil (farming) and abolitionism quite fringe.
Economic matters had been aggravated by President Jackson’s hard money policy which played unintentionally into the hands of Oligarchy in particular in the South-85% of Southern Whites were cash and land poor - and further aggravated by mass immigration which is always destabilizing.
Extremists on both sides drove the slavery issue to the front and then secession, war. Lincoln was from accounts not interested in war (Sherman was quite critical of his initial impression) and even more reluctant to embrace Abolition.
We may add Lincoln’s actual Life’s work of building railroads and technical colleges for the common man continued throughout the war. His 2d VP Andrew Johnson finally got his Homestead Act of 40 acres for a filing fee passed in 1862 after nearly a decade languishing, blocked by Democrats. The war at the time began in many ways as a common laborer or farmer vs Oligarchy conflict, it was also championed as Preserve The Union- for obvious geographic reasons.
So very true, the real man is far more interesting than the martyred Saint.
If PRO is synonymous with Progress, then CON is synonymous with congress. It seems they are against everything. It’s
so unfortunate that the GOP doesn’t work as hard keeping republicans in power as the demon rats are working to win back control. If they do win back control in the midterms, we will lose everything. What with the muslim and foreign takeover of this country everything Trump and others have worked for will be for naught.
Thune needs to be a leader and work the floor to get the votes, not just say it can’t be done or it’s too hard or not enough time. He needs to work the time and make it work. He needs to lead!! If he held a vote and these back-stabbers had to publicly vote NO, they can be held responsible by their constituents. Get SAVE in the floor for a vote and a record for constituents to hold them accountable.
More like a DIRC. He is what open primaries get us. It's an actual plan that democrats pretend to be and run as republicans and their friends and the uninformed vote them in.
Point taken. But it seems to me that this is rationalizing inertia; even if it takes 27 votes to boot Thune and they MAY not be there right now is no excuse for not sending him a strong message of disapproval. His bull-headedness, especially in light of Carville’s recent declaration of war on Republicans, is a pretty clear confession that Thune is part of the problem, not part of the solution.
Just what DOES Congress do with their time? They talk a lot but don't seem to walk that walk. I am just a regular John Q. Public American who wants Congress to work FOR the people instead of themselves.
Thune’s literal job description is centered on his being able to rally and unify the Republican Senate body around the agenda of the president. He is incapable of doing that. He is a lousy leader.
Mitch McConnell, louse that he tragically turned out to be, was a master at it. The Republican Senate today has become a herd of wild cats under Thune’s so-called “leadership”.
And where are the confirmations of Trump’s nominees, still in limbo, now held up for over 15 months? Grassley, with his sudden devotion to Blue slips using them as his excuse. Thune, were he an actual Leader, could stop that in its tracks, to say nothing of his deliberate refusal to allow a recess longer than 3 days to afford the President the ability to get his nominees.
No. Senate rules, Senate schmules. There is a deliberate and concerted effort by Senate Republicans, being at least encouraged by if not entirely led by Thune to stonewall the presidents agenda. No matter the consequences to their constituents or the country itself.
Shame on all of them, starting with Thune on down.
THIS! 100% on 🎯
Within the current rules is there any means for a small number of senators to force the so-called talking filibuster or a true recess that would enable the president to make recess appointments?
The Idea that government would work indeed a talking Filibuster is very droll, what a romantic the author is…
Perhaps something more up to date like a stream on TikTok? Traditionalists might complain muh constitution* and it would open the door to AI governance and the question of why other than a President and Vice President we have elections at all? But the people demand results, not that they vote that way. As to the hard work of building a coalition…
Please. Those of us working have no time to waste on pointless rituals.
As to the 5 senators; go forth! That would be 5 more men in Congress than we presently have…
*I am aware the filibuster has no Constitutional status beyond rules of the Senate, also that it doesn’t matter.
I think it’s never easy when you get down to the brass tacks of it all. Everyone is an expert but few are actually in the ring.
Thank you Alexander for taking an excellent shot at this!
You could probably get half the 14 Democrats, or even more, just by changing the SAVE bill to accept ordinary Driver's Licenses (or non-driver State ID) instead of requiring expensive passport-quality documentation.
But maybe making voting annoying and expensive is the point?
I'd be for accepting driver's licenses if whatever state wants to use them has strict rules (that are actually followed) that limits driver's licenses to US citizens only.
You don’t actually want this. Green Cards? Foreign students?
Now, six states do distinguish citizenship on their driver’s licenses. The problem is that since we don’t start with a central registry, the precursor documents to prove citizenship can be a big and expensive pain.
I found out—and this is a problem than Time will solve—that there were parts of the Jim Crow South where they didn’t even bother to register births of poor Black children, who were usually born at home. So, no birth certificate. They weren’t, after all, going to vote.
I doubt if much trust exists between the base and the Senators. I have none. We need to remove the RINOs and get real Republicans in office.
The singular real Republican was Abraham Lincoln and the Democratic Party handled him in their customary fashion.
The Republican Party rose and fell with Lincoln.
Lincoln did not even concern himself with slavery until two years into the Civil War. He’s not quite the hero that everyone thinks.
Lincoln began to reluctantly concern himself with slavery no later than 1854 with a House Divided Speech in his 3d decade of Public Life.
However you are very correct about something;
Lincoln’s cause for decades was improving the lot of the Common Man. Infrastructure of canals, railroads, technical schools for agriculture and other scientific education with public funding by Bonds and other government instruments. Lincoln was a Henry Clay Whig. Lincoln very reluctantly was drawn into anti slavery by the Southern Oligarchs machinations to spread slavery to the new territories acquired from the Mexican war. Free Labor as we see now isn’t competitive with slave labor. Lincoln was in many ways what we would now call a Labor Leader (not at that time) and the core of the Republican Party was free labor and Free Soil (farming) and abolitionism quite fringe.
Economic matters had been aggravated by President Jackson’s hard money policy which played unintentionally into the hands of Oligarchy in particular in the South-85% of Southern Whites were cash and land poor - and further aggravated by mass immigration which is always destabilizing.
Extremists on both sides drove the slavery issue to the front and then secession, war. Lincoln was from accounts not interested in war (Sherman was quite critical of his initial impression) and even more reluctant to embrace Abolition.
We may add Lincoln’s actual Life’s work of building railroads and technical colleges for the common man continued throughout the war. His 2d VP Andrew Johnson finally got his Homestead Act of 40 acres for a filing fee passed in 1862 after nearly a decade languishing, blocked by Democrats. The war at the time began in many ways as a common laborer or farmer vs Oligarchy conflict, it was also championed as Preserve The Union- for obvious geographic reasons.
So very true, the real man is far more interesting than the martyred Saint.
If PRO is synonymous with Progress, then CON is synonymous with congress. It seems they are against everything. It’s
so unfortunate that the GOP doesn’t work as hard keeping republicans in power as the demon rats are working to win back control. If they do win back control in the midterms, we will lose everything. What with the muslim and foreign takeover of this country everything Trump and others have worked for will be for naught.
Thune needs to be a leader and work the floor to get the votes, not just say it can’t be done or it’s too hard or not enough time. He needs to work the time and make it work. He needs to lead!! If he held a vote and these back-stabbers had to publicly vote NO, they can be held responsible by their constituents. Get SAVE in the floor for a vote and a record for constituents to hold them accountable.
He's a RINO, expect nothing from him.
More like a DIRC. He is what open primaries get us. It's an actual plan that democrats pretend to be and run as republicans and their friends and the uninformed vote them in.
Point taken. But it seems to me that this is rationalizing inertia; even if it takes 27 votes to boot Thune and they MAY not be there right now is no excuse for not sending him a strong message of disapproval. His bull-headedness, especially in light of Carville’s recent declaration of war on Republicans, is a pretty clear confession that Thune is part of the problem, not part of the solution.
Just what DOES Congress do with their time? They talk a lot but don't seem to walk that walk. I am just a regular John Q. Public American who wants Congress to work FOR the people instead of themselves.
Time? They Collect payoffs, this has been known for decades.