Last Call For The Whole Ball Of Wax

GOP is playing with fire here, but it seems like they're confident they will keep control of the Senate in 2016.  If they get the White House too, then the game is over for the Dems if they pull this off.

Top Senate Republicans are considering gutting the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees — a move that could yield big rewards for whichever party controls the White House and Senate after 2016.

The move, still in its early stages, reflects growing GOP confidence in its electoral prospects next year. But it could also have a major immediate impact if a justice such as 81-year-old Ruth Bader Ginsburg steps down, making it far easier for President Barack Obama to get a replacement confirmed.

The proposed change would expand on the dramatic move Democrats made in 2013, when they killed the 60-vote hurdle for executive branch nominations and almost all judicial nominees. Republicans have complained bitterly about the Democrats’ action ever since, saying it violated the Senate’s tradition of being a deliberative body where the minority holds big sway. But now, GOP supporters contend, it may be time to bring majority rule to votes on Supreme Court nominations, too.

The 60-vote filibuster threshold would remain for legislation.

The GOP understands that there's a very good change the next President will be able to appoint 2, maybe 3 justices.  They seem to be willing to leverage blocking any further SCOTUS appointments for Obama into assuring that they have precedent for packing the court in 2016 if there's a GOP president.  And let's face it, if a Democrat wins and they still control the Senate, well Hillary or whoever isn't going to be able to appoint anyone anyway.

There is massive upside and very little downside right now for the GOP doing this.  They are counting on cover from the Village, and a short memory of the public, two extremely safe bets.

We'll see what happens, but if I were the GOP, I'd throw the dice on this.

The Mask Slips Again...

...and Republicans accidentally reveal how they really feel about the "working poor".

California Republican Rep. Tom McClintock said on Thursday that the minimum wage should not be raised because low pay was necessary for minorities and other unskilled workers who were not worth more than $7 an hour.

During an appearance on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal, host Greta Brawner asked McClintock if he could get behind a presidential candidate like Mitt Romney, who is one of an increasing number of Republicans saying that the minimum wage should be at least $10.10 an hour.

But McClintock argued that raising the minimum wage would “rip the first rung in the ladder of opportunity for teenagers, for minorities, for people who are trying to get into the job market for their first job.”

The California Republican explained that the minimum wage was not supposed to be a living wage that could support families.

“It’s not supposed to support a family. The minimum wage is that first job when you have no skills, no experience, no working history. That’s how you get into the job market, that’s how you develop that experience, develop that work record, get your first raise, then your next raise, then your promotion.”

McClintock continued: “If your labor is an unskilled person just entering the workforce is worth say $7 an hour at a job and the minimum wage is $10, you have just been made permanently unemployable. That first rung of the economic ladder has been ripped out and you can’t get on it. That is a tragedy.”

We saw GOP Rep. Aaron Schock attack the minimum wage with a similar argument after the State of the Union address.  If those people were supposed to be earning more than $7.25 an hour, then God and the Free Market would pay them more then that.  The notion to pay people $10.10 anyway just hasn't accurred to Republicans, because they think the millions of families trying to live on that minimum wage aren't worth it, and don't matter.

Since the majority of them vote Democrat, no, they don't matter to Tom McClintock, nor do they matter to the GOP.  They are the enemy, and must be "dealt with".

This is how the GOP treats poor people: you're poor for a reason, and you don't count.  They're too busy sucking up to the billionaires that increasingly own more and more of America's wealth.

Weasels And Measles

Dear anti-vaxxer nut jobs:  This is why you suck and are awful people.



In all seriousness, the anti-vaccination crusade has now brought measles back to the US, a disease that was effectively eradicated here 20 years ago.

We have quadrupled the number of measles cases in the US in one year because of this idiocy, from 150 to more than 600.

Vaccinate your goddamn kids, people.

StupidiNews!

• Saudi King Abdullah has passed at age 90 according to Saudi state television, he will be succeeded by his 79-year-old half-brother Crown Prince Salman.
• An outbreak of measles in California has expanded to 59 new cases as at least two dozen of the cases are of unvaccinated people.
• The US is pulling more staff out of the embassy in Yemen's capital of Sanaa as the collapse of the government of President Hadi to anti-American rebels continues.
• The European Central Bank's $1.14 trillion bond-buying program far exceeds the expectations of most of the eurozone, taking the financial world by surprise.
• Internet security officials say as many as 5,300 gas stations could be vulnerable to internet-based attacks on fuel monitoring systems.