What's Wrong With Congress

Ryan Costello (R-PA06) went on All In last night and couldn't manage to say much of anything except that it all makes him sad.

MSNBC - Pressure building to expel Steve King
(MSNBC sucks green weenies when it comes to embedding their video)

BTW - I'm not interested in bashing the Dem for "soft-peddling" on this. Boyle made his point even though I'd like to hear it made in much sharper terms.

Costello (and Repubs in general) refuse to confront the problem. They speak in neutral terms - like Costello saying it's up to the people to vote Steve King out. He says the voters need to send King the message that they're not with him.

Here's the thing, Mr Costello - you have to put your money where your mouth is. You have to stand up in public, and in Congress, and tell King straight out: "I won't be voting with you on anything. I won't support or endorse or co-sponsor anything you propose. Ever. And Mr Speaker, until you do something about Mr King, I won't be voting with the Republican caucus on much of anything either."

Stop blaming his asshole constituents for a problem they refuse to solve when you refuse even to help them identify the problem as a problem.

You're a leader - so fucking lead already.

Robin DiAngelis - On White Supremacy  and why being nice isn't going to end racism:

Today's GIF

Hello, Monday

Respite

Seems like everything really sucks right now, so here's an otter juggling rocks.

On Fairness On Sunday

What exactly is it you live by, Christians?

Luke 21, 1-4:
Just then he looked up and saw the rich people dropping offerings in the collection plate. Then he saw a poor widow put in two pennies. He said, “The plain truth is that this widow has given by far the largest offering today. All these others made offerings that they’ll never miss; she gave extravagantly what she couldn’t afford - she gave her all.”

Remember now, Jesus loves you -
everybody else thinks you're a dick

Today's Quote

Of all men, distrust most the man who tries to incite one set of Americans against another set of Americans.

-- Teddy Roosevelt

York PA, 1906

hat tip = FB pal, Doug Rapier

Today's Tweet

Bryant Goldbach, Owensboro KY

A man in Owensboro went to a community Halloween event last night dressed as a Nazi and dressed his child as Hitler

His costume is disgusting...but dressing his child like this is heartbreaking pic.twitter.com/LPq8oSXaz5

— Matt Jones (@KySportsRadio) October 26, 2018

The crucifix pin is what really sets off the whole ensemble - cuz nothing says "Real America" more than some asshole Nazi Christian making sure we all know what an asshole Nazi Christian he is.

Today's Tweet

President St Helens

Ya think it's messy now - gonna get real bad if that thing blows.

Unity! https://t.co/Kx7lzzDbNB pic.twitter.com/gpFvm1Iqj4

— TenGraves (@Tengrain) October 27, 2018

When A Cigar Is Just A Cigar

Tim Wise at Medium:

For several days conservative commentators suggested or even outright insisted that the bombs were likely hoaxes sent by liberals or antifa so as to discredit the right in time for the mid-terms.

Among the right-wing pundits pushing this line were Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Mike Flynn Jr., Frank Gaffney, Kurt Schlichter, Candace Owens, Lou Dobbs, Laura Loomer and Dinesh D’Souza, among others.

Limbaugh, for his part, went further than merely denying the conservative provenance of the recent bombs, actually suggesting that bombings and terrorism are things that right-wingers simply don’t do. Which is totally true, except for:

Tim McVeigh and Terry Nichols

Or Eric Rudolph

Or Joe Stack

Or Lawrence Michael Lombardi

Or anti-abortion extremists like Michael F. Griffin, Paul Hill, John Salvi, Robert Dear, James Kopp, Justin Carl Moose, Scott Roeder, Shelley Shannon, Paul Ross Evans, Matt Goldsby, Jimmy Simmons, Kathy Simmons, Kaye Wiggins, Patricia Hughes, Jeremy Dunahoe, Bobby Joe Rogers, Francis Gradyand Ralph Lang among others

Or anti-Muslim arsonists like Bruce and Joshua Turnidge

Or James David Adkisson

Or neo-Nazi Wade Michael Page

Or Byron Williams

Or the right-wingers involved in at least 60 bombing, shooting and/or terror plots in the ten years following Okahoma City, including:

Charles Ray Polk

Willie Ray Lampley

Cecilia Lampley

John Dare Baird

Joseph Martin Bailie

Ray Hamblin

Robert Edward Starr III

William James McCranie Jr.

John Pitner

Charles Barbee

Robert Berry

Jay Merrell

Brendon Blasz

Carl Jay Waskom Jr.

Shawn and Catherine Adams

Edward Taylor Jr.

Todd Vanbiber

William Robert Goehler

James Cleaver

Jack Dowell

Bradley Playford Glover

Ken Carter

Randy Graham

and the list goes on.

The problem is not “angry rhetoric on both sides.” It is not a generic “incivility.” And no, being spoken too harshly or made to feel unwelcome in a restaurant is not remotely equivalent to receiving a bomb from someone who wants to kill you.

The problem is a president who has normalized a rhetoric of demonization and dehumanization since the day he launched his campaign.

When you start your political career generalizing about Mexican migrants being rapists and drug dealers, and you say during that campaign that you wish to shut down all immigration by Muslims, and you suggest your opponent should be jailed for using an unsecured e-mail server (even as you have continued to use an unsecured cell phone), and you refer to the media as the enemy of the people such that your most loyal fans verbally assault reporters at your rallies, you are the problem.

You, and all who empower you and embolden you.

It is time to put an end to this foolishness, beginning on election day and every day afterwards.

Podcast

Daddy State Awareness Rule 6: 
If everybody's guilty, cain't nobody hold us accountable

Holy fuck, the Republican party is full of Republicans.  But no matter - I just need my confirmation fix.

Stochastic Terrorism - will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest!?

The Professional Left

with driftglass & Blue Gal

do the swag

Poor Pitiful You

Jennifer Rubin, WaPo:

It takes remarkable skill, when you think about it, to claim victimhood when your enemies are threatened with assassination. But for President Trump, his state media and his cultish following, victimhood is central to their identity and critical to their mobilization. A party in control of every branch of government is the victim. White males — even a wealthy Yale graduate with a lifetime appointment to the federal bench — are victims. The cops who shoot unarmed black teens are victims. Residents of the small towns in the Rust Belt where few, if any, illegal immigrants live are victims of immigrants. Forget the crime statistics; we’re victims of criminals who are here illegally. Conservatives who control an entire media universe devoid of journalistic standards are victims of the mainstream media. Americans are victims (ripped off!) by an international system that made us the world’s only superpower.
- and -

As we learn that one suspect is in custody in the mail-bomb investigation, we still do not know the exact motives behind the assault on our democracy. But one thing is for sure: Trump will take no responsibility for his incendiary language, not even for his praise of a congressman who body-slammed a reporter, his dehumanization of immigrants, his incitement of violence (“I’d like to punch him in the face”) or his insistence that the media is the “enemy of the people.” He’s not only not responsible for the bombing attempts in any way; he’s a victim of the media citing his inflammatory language as inspiration for political violence.

The consistency is always there:

• I didn't hit you
• But if I did, I didn't hit you hard
• But if I did, you had it coming because you told everybody that I've threatened to hit you
• You made me do it