Retribution Execution, Con't

Team Trump has finally lost patience with House GOP Speaker Kevin McCarthy, and unless he can get out of this hole quickly with the Tangerine Tyrant, he may not be Speaker of the House of much longer.

 

The former president embraced McCarthy — once dubbed a “RINO” by conservatives — during his time in the White House, elevating the California Republican as he feuded with other GOP congressional leaders. He personally intervened in January to ensure McCarthy won his dream job, ultimately convincing his critics to stand down amid a battle for the speakership.

And just a few weeks ago, Trump notably kept quiet about the debt ceiling deal McCarthy struck with President JOE BIDEN — a major, and intentional, boost for the speaker that was crucial in ensuring the deal could withstand a conservative pile-on.

That’s why it came as a shock yesterday when McCarthy dissed Trump in a CNBC interview, openly questioning whether Trump would be Republicans’ best presidential nominee in 2024 after carefully avoiding the topic for months.

“Can he win that election? Yeah, he can win that election,” McCarthy said, referring to a Biden-Trump matchup. “The question is: ‘Is he the strongest to win the election?’ I don’t know that answer.”

Unsurprisingly, Trump world flipped out. We’re told top aides to the former president and allies who know both men quickly traded messages asking, in short: What the fuck? Some called McCarthy a “moron,” we’re told. Others looked to Trump campaign hand BRIAN JACK, who also advises the speaker and has been a critical bridge between both men, to play mediator as Trump hit the trail in New Hampshire.

McCarthy immediately pivoted into clean-up mode. He called Trump to apologize, according to the NYT’s Annie Karni. He offered Trump-loving Breitbart reporter Matt Boyle an exclusive interview, where he walked the comments back and accused the media of taking them out of context.

“Trump is stronger today than he was in 2016,” McCarthy told Boyle.

This morning, we can report that none of these moves have assuaged the fury in Trump’s inner circle. McCarthy, they feel, has taken advantage of the former president when it benefits him and failed to show unflinching loyalty in return. They don’t understand how he could “misspeak” — as McCarthy, we’re told, put it to Trump — on something so critical.

In fact, McCarthy’s damage control made things worse. After the debacle yesterday, the speaker’s campaign allies pushed out fundraising emails and texts claiming, “Trump is the STRONGEST opponent to Biden!” — then asking for money.

Fundraising off of Trump’s name without permission is a huge no-no for the former president, whose team requires explicit approval for any campaign to use his name and likeness. Trump’s team, we’re told, asked McCarthy’s last night to take down the fundraising pitch.

Now, it’s not the first time McCarthy has been crosswise with Trump. Shortly after the Jan. 6 insurrection, McCarthy floated the idea of censuring Trump for his actions and was later caught on tape discussing the idea of asking Trump to resign. Yet the two continued their symbiotic bond: McCarthy quickly assumed a key role in restoring Trump’s prominence in the GOP, and Trump stayed in McCarthy’s corner as he battled for the gavel.

But yesterday’s drama came at a sensitive moment, with a major question already bouncing around Trump world: Why hasn’t McCarthy endorsed Trump?

While it’s unclear if Trump has explicitly asked McCarthy for his support, his silence on the matter has baffled the former president and his close allies.

McCarthy has told some Trump backers that he’s holding off because an endorsement “might hurt” Trump by tying him to the party establishment, according to one GOP campaign consultant who asked not to be named. He’s also suggested that as the highest-ranking Republican in office, just two heartbeats away from the presidency, perhaps he should stay neutral.

But Trump’s allies aren’t buying that. The former president, the thinking goes, will never allow McCarthy to stay on the sidelines in a nasty GOP primary and expects his full support, something many of them think he’ll get eventually — and perhaps, now, sooner rather than later.

“At what point is it okay for Kevin McCarthy not to endorse Trump?” the consultant above asked. “Donald Trump has been very good to Kevin McCarthy.”

Yesterday’s brouhaha also raised questions about how long Trump should — or would — support McCarthy.

Many of the ex-president’s strongest allies in Congress have been stacking up their grievances against McCarthy, waiting for the right moment to make a move. Several would be more than happy to force a vote to oust the speaker if Trump wanted — and Trump knows that.

“If Donald Trump wanted … he could have him out as speaker by the end of the week,” the GOP consultant said.

 

Now, a large part of this is Team WIN THE MORNING high school kabuki bullshit.

 

But not all of it. 

 

McCarthy already has had to deal with several of his caucus supporting Ron DeSantis, most notably my own Congressman, Thomas Massie, who took his Rules Commitee slot and then jumped the Trump ship. McCarthy endorsing Trump could cost him his job. 

 

But Trump wants results: impeachments of Biden, VP Harris, several cabinet members, and more, expungements of his own impeachments (ahich actually aren't a thing but hey) and most of all for McCarthy to directly interfere with Jack Smith's investigation and indictments, and McCarthy can't deliver on those.

Personally I'd love to see this fight go public and for Trump to call for McCarthy's ouster, and if that actually happens, woo boy. Whether or not McCarthy can continue walking a greased tightrope in a hurricane is anyone's guess. He's made it to the six-month mark. But if Trump wants him gone and names, say, Elise Stefanik as his favored replacement, well, get the popcorn.

We all know how Trump treats his contractors and lackies in the end.

Shutdown Countdown, Armageddon Edition, Con't

House Democratic Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries got the job done yesterday as the debt ceiling deal overwhelmingly passed with bipartisan support, and now GOP House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has to try to save his job.

 

With overwhelming bipartisan support, the House voted Wednesday to pass the debt ceiling legislation negotiated by Speaker Kevin McCarthy and President Joe Biden, sending it to the Senate with days to spare before a potentially disastrous default.

The vote was 314 to 117, with 149 Republicans joining 165 Democrats.

The bill would extend the debt limit for two years alongside a two-year budget agreement if it is signed into law. It is the culmination of months of political warfare and weeks of frenzied negotiations between the two parties that finally broke a lengthy stalemate.

The deal overcame heavy criticism from GOP hard-liners, who argued that its spending cuts and conservative provisions are too weak. It also faced opposition from Democrats, who criticized the added work requirements and nondefense spending cuts negotiated by the two men.

“You are getting so many wins for the American people in this bill,” said McCarthy, R-Calif., who hailed it as a measure that “moves us in the right direction” fiscally. He said his message to fellow Republicans on Wednesday was: “You’re not spending more money. There’s no new government programs. There’s no tax increases. There’s nothing in the bill that you really should be negative about.”

Biden praised its passage.

"This budget agreement is a bipartisan compromise," Biden said in a statement. "Neither side got everything it wanted. That’s the responsibility of governing."

The bill now goes to the Democratic-led Senate, where it needs 60 votes before it can get to Biden’s desk. Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., have both endorsed it and called for speedy passage.

 

Ironically it was my own normally useless congressman, Thomas Massie, who was the biggest indicator that the bill was going to have the GOP votes needed.  Massie signed off on the bill in the House Rules Committee along with Patrick McHenry, my congressman from back home in NC. Both of these performative contrarians fell right into line when pressed.

Jeffries meanwhile brought the Democrats.

Spokespeople for House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) disputed four Democratic sources who told Axios the two leaders had cut a deal for Democrats to help advance the debt ceiling bill to a final vote.

Why it matters: The 52 Democratic votes on a measure to bring the debt ceiling bill to the floor were necessary for the bill's survival after 29 Republicans had voted against moving it forward Wednesday afternoon. The bill eventually was approved on a 314-117 vote.

What we’re hearing: Four Democratic lawmakers said they had been told of a deal, with two saying they believed it involved boosting federal funding for projects in Democrats’ districts — known as earmarks or “community project funding” — if Democrats voted to advance the bill.

What they're saying: McCarthy had told reporters after the initial afternoon vote that he had not cut a deal to ensure the Democratic votes. A spokesperson later told Axios that there was "absolutely no deal" — and that suggestions to the contrary by Democratic lawmakers were "not accurate."

Jeffries' office also denied there was a deal.

"There was no side deal. House Democrats simply did the right thing and made sure the procedural vote passed because failure was not an option," spokesperson Christie Stephenson told Axios.

Earlier, when reporters had asked Jeffries whether there had been a deal, the minority leader said: "House Democrats to the rescue to avoid a dangerous default and help House Republicans get legislation over the finish line that they negotiated themselves."

The context: The GOP resistance in the procedural "rules" vote was an unusual breach of norms — typically the majority party alone is considered responsible for putting a bill on the floor on those votes.

If Democrats hadn't stepped in, the push for a final vote to move toward avoiding a catastrophic default by the U.S. government would have ground to a halt.

 

"What deal?" says the man who learned everything from Nancy Pelosi a sly grin resting on his face,  now having left Kevin McCarthy to face his caucus alone.

 

As the kids say, GIGACHAD move.

Ron And Elon Have Gone Wrong

Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis launched his 2024 residential bid on Wednesday using Elon Musk's broken toy and "things did not go well for them" is perhaps the greatest understatement in American politics so far this year.

 

It was the announcement not heard ’round the world.

Ron DeSantis plotted to open his presidential campaign early Wednesday evening with a pioneering social media gambit, introducing himself during an audio-only Twitter forum with Elon Musk. His 2024 effort began instead with a moment of silence. Then several more.

A voice cut in, then two — Mr. Musk’s? — only to disappear again.

“Now it’s quiet,” someone whispered. This was true.

“We got so many people here that we are kind of melting the servers,” said David Sacks, the nominal moderator, “which is a good sign.” This was not true.

Soon, all signs were bad. Hold music played for a spell. Some users were summarily booted from the platform, where hundreds of thousands of accounts had gathered to listen.

“The servers are straining somewhat,” Mr. Musk said at one point, perhaps unaware that his mic was hot, at least briefly.

For 25 minutes, the only person unmistakably not talking (at least on a microphone) was Mr. DeSantis.

The Florida governor’s chosen rollout venue was always going to be a risk, an aural gamble on Mr. Musk, a famously capricious and oxygen-stealing co-star, and the persuasive powers of Mr. DeSantis’s own disembodied voice. (“Whiny,” Donald J. Trump has called him.)

But the higher-order downsides proved more relevant. Twitter’s streaming tool, known as Spaces, has been historically glitchy. Executive competence, core to the DeSantis campaign message, was conspicuously absent. And for a politician credibly accused through the years of being incorrigibly online — a former DeSantis aide said he regularly read his Twitter mentions — the event amounted to hard confirmation, a zeitgeisty exercise devolving instead into a conference call from hell.

“You can tell from some of the mistakes that it’s real,” Mr. Musk said.

At 6:26 p.m., Mr. DeSantis finally announced himself, long after his campaign had announced his intentions, reading from a script that often parroted an introduction video and an email sent to reporters more than 20 minutes earlier.

“Well,” he opened, “I am running for president of the United States to lead our great American comeback.”

After ticking through a curated biography that noted his military background and his “energetic” bearing, Mr. DeSantis stayed on the line. Mr. Sacks, a tech entrepreneur who is close with Mr. Musk, acknowledged the earlier mess.

“Thank you for putting up with these technical issues,” he said. “What made you want to kind of take the chance of doing it this way?”

Mr. DeSantis swerved instantly to his Covid-era stewardship of Florida.

“Do you go with the crowd?” he asked, recalling his expert-flouting decision-making, “or do you look at the data yourself and cut against the grain?”

Rivals agreed: If he hoped to differentiate himself, Mr. DeSantis had succeeded, in his way.

“This link works,” the @JoeBiden account mocked, inviting followers to donate.

“‘Rob,’” Mr. Trump posted on Truth Social, a standard troll-by-misspelling, winding to a confusing (if potentially juvenile) punchline: “My Red Button is bigger, better, stronger, and is working.”

Even Fox News piled on.

“Want to actually see and hear Ron DeSantis?” read a pop-up banner on its website. “Tune into Fox News at 8 p.m. E.T.” (Urging donations once he got on the air, Mr. DeSantis wondered if supporters might “break that part of the internet as well.”)

 

Seeing both DeSantis and Musk turned into laughingstocks across the internet represents the kind of apotheosis of loserdom that far exceeded my wildest expectations of failure to launch. Two white guys with gobs of money and political power were exposed for the frauds and incompetents that they always have been, and both of them are done. 

Musk will slink off to be managed by Twitter's new CEO, Linda Yaccarino, the former global advertising chief for NBCUniversal. DeSantis will slink off and rule his little swamp kingdom for as long as he can before his campaign end up being chucked into the Everglades of failure. What little credibility either of these clowns had left due to political and financial inertia was stripped clean from them yesterday.

The only thing that makes this better is that my own clown of a congressman, Thomas Massie, hitched himself to this disaster from the start and crashed and burned along with them.

 

Good riddance to bad rubbish, as they say.

Climate Of Emergency, Local Edition Con't

President Biden yesterday visited Eastern Kentucky counties devastated by flooding two weeks ago and pledged more FEMA aid to the region.

 

President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden on Monday witnessed the damage from deadly and devastating storms that have resulted in the worst flooding in Kentucky’s history, as they visited the state to meet with families and first responders.

At least 37 people have died since last month’s deluge, which dropped 8 to 10-1/2 inches of rain in only 48 hours. Gov. Andy Beshear told Biden that authorities expect to add at least one other death to the total. The National Weather Service said Sunday that flooding remains a threat, warning of more thunderstorms through Thursday.

The president said the nation has an obligation to help all its people, declaring the federal government would provide support until residents were back on their feet. Behind him as he spoke was a single-story house that the storm had dislodged and then left littered on the ground, tilted sideways.

“We have the capacity to do this — it’s not like it’s beyond our control,” Biden said. “We’re staying until everybody’s back to where they were.”

In the summer heat and humidity, Biden’s button-down shirt was covered in sweat. Pacing with a microphone in his hand, he eschewed formal remarks as he pledged to return once the community was rebuilt.

“The bad news for you is I’m coming back, because I want to see it,” the president said.

The Bidens were greeted warmly by Beshear and his wife, Britainy, when they arrived in eastern Kentucky. They immediately drove to see devastation from the storms in Breathitt County, stopping at the site of where a school bus, carried by floodwaters, was crashed into a partially collapsed building.

Beshear said the flooding was “unlike anything we’ve ever seen” in the state and credited Biden with swiftly approving federal assistance.

He praised responders who “have moved heaven and earth to get where we are, what, about nine days from when this hit,” he said.

Attending a briefing on the flooding’s impact with first responders and recovery specialists at Marie Roberts Elementary School in Lost Creek, Biden told a delegation of Kentucky leaders that he would do whatever was necessary to help.

“I promise you, if it’s legal, we’ll do it,” he said. “And if it’s not legal, we’ll figure out how to change the law.” 

 

That would be a threat coming from The Former Guy.

 

I'm glad the Commonwealth will get the aid it needs, and I guarantee you that if GOP Rep. Thomas Massie can find a way to vote against it, he will. 

Watch.

Another Day In Gunmerica, Con't

Republicans are the party of mass firearms deaths, and they proudly run on it, because the people who vote for them are bloodthirsty lunatics who want to water the Tree of Liberty with the blood of tyrants, and "tyrants" is anyone who votes Democrat.

 

Former hedge fund CEO David McCormick first shoots the hunting rifle he says he used as a teenager. Pow. Next, he cocks the rifle he says he used at the U.S. Military Academy and fires. Pow. Then he points a semiautomatic assault rifle like one he says he used in Iraq at a faraway target. Pow. Pow. Pow. Pow.

Former television personality and surgeon Mehmet Oz loads a shotgun and shoots. “When people say I don’t support guns? They’re dead wrong,” Oz says. The camera then zooms in on Oz locking a magazine onto an AR-15 style rifle.

McCormick and Oz, the finalists in a high-stakes Republican primary for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania that has gone to a recount, have spent months trying to showcase their conservative bona fides to GOP base voters and head off skepticism of their elite backgrounds on Wall Street and in Hollywood, respectively. Part of that strategy involved commercials showing them shooting guns.

Although candidates in both parties have long used guns as a campaign prop, the images have in recent years become more prevalent, and intentionally provocative, in Republican advertising, holidays greetings and other forms of communication with the public. Such placements convey a cultural and political solidarity with conservatives more powerfully than most anything else, according to Republican strategists and aides.

“It is a very visual example. It’s an illustration of where both sides are in that the more the right feels they are going to lose their Second Amendment rights, the further they’re going to go to defend them,” said Terry Sullivan, a veteran Republican strategist.

But as the nation reckons with a pair of deadly mass shootings at a Buffalo grocery store and a Texas elementary school, some are warning that these photos and videos are harmful and glorify the use and ownership of firearms designed to kill.

“These ads create a dangerous impression that firearms, and assault-style firearms specifically, are casual tools rather than dangerous weapons,” said Kris Brown, the president of Brady, a gun violence prevention organization. “To use them to grandstand and to provocate is dangerous.”

Some Republicans rejected that position, arguing they are promoting safe and legal gun use.

Last Christmas season, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) posted a holiday photo on social media showing him and his family posed in front of a Christmas tree, all clutching military-style firearms.

Rep. Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.), who has built her political brand in large measure around her devotion to guns, responded to Massie’s tweet with a photo of her and her sons holding similar assault rifles with a message to her colleague: “The Boeberts have your six” — military jargon for having someone’s back.

While most representatives of the elected officials and candidates cited in this report did not immediately respond to a request for comment, John Kennedy, communications director for Massie, defended his boss’s decision to promote his photograph and said it did not send a dangerous message.

“Rep. Massie’s photo was so popular with his Kentucky constituents that the most commonly heard complaint we received was that this photo was not released as the actual Christmas card,” Kennedy said.

 

I have to assume from his actions that Massie would love nothing more than to be given carte blanche to shoot constituents like me, and if that's true, you'll no longer wonder why I don't go out much around here in Gunmerica.

Last Call For Climate Of Disaster, Con't

As the death toll from Saturday's massive tornado outbreak here in Kentucky continues to mount, with entire towns "gone" according to Dem Gov. Any Beshear, Republican members of Congress are quick to say that President Biden needs to give the state millions now in emergency aid before more perish in the cold without power, nevermind the fact that people like Sen. Rand Paul and Rep. Thomas Massie repeatedly voted against such aid for anyone other than their own constituents, calling it a "waste".

Throughout his two terms in the U.S. Senate, Paul has prided himself as a Tea Party fiscal conservative willing to say no to the most milquetoast causes if federal spending is involved. Opposing federal disaster relief is one of his pastimes.

In 2017, Paul was one of just 17 senators to oppose an emergency $15.3 billion federal relief bill for victims of Hurricane Harvey. It had wreaked havoc similar to Friday’s tornado, but not in Kentucky.

In 2013, Paul was one of 31 Republican senators who voted against a $50.5 billion relief aid package for Hurricane Sandy -- “after previously disaster aid for their home states,” as reported by ThinkProgress.org.

In 2011, Paul’s first year in the Senate, he was among 38 Republicans voting against a major FEMA funding package despite the fact -- not lost upon publicintegrity.org -- that his own state of Kentucky had been the nation’s largest recipient of FEMA funding ($293 million), mostly because of a 2009 ice storm.

A decade later, Paul wrote to Biden like the two were old liberal spendthrift friends.

“Last night and early this morning devastating storms swept across multiple states, including Kentucky. A single tornado from that system may have been on the ground for over 200 miles, and a large swath of the Commonwealth has been severely hit.

“As the sun comes up this morning we will begin to understand the true scope of the devastation, but we already know of loss of life and severe property damage.

“The governor of the Commonwealth has requested federal assistance this morning, and certainly further requests will be coming as the situation is assessed. I fully support those requests and ask that you move expeditiously to approve the appropriate resources for our state.”

Paul’s stinginess with federal aid to people outside of Kentucky has hardly been limited to aid responding to physical disasters.

In the very first coronavirus Senate aid package -- a mere $8 billion passed on March 5, 2020 -- Paul stood out as the lone Senator to vote no.

His complaint: Congress never cuts other spending as the direct offset he insists upon having for federal aid not earmarked for Kentucky:

“This isn't the first time we've had emergency money,” Paul complained after the first COVID-19 spending passed. “This is probably the tenth time we've done emergency money in the past two or three years. So everything is an emergency."

 

As for Massie, all he is willing to offer is "thoughts and prayers". 

Stop voting for Republicans who want you dead.

Last Call For In Which Zandar Answers Your Burning Questions, Con't

Philly Inquirer columnist Will Bunch asks:

 

Deadly weapons like the machine gun brandished by Congressman Massie on his Christmas card or the 9mm Sig Sauer that Ethan Crumbley hid in his backpack aren’t some American cultural quirk but very much wrapped up in the post-1980, post-civil-rights zeitgeist of every man and woman for themselves — a holiday spirit not of sharing but of clinging to what’s mine with one finger already on the trigger. Is there a way out of this mess, short of a cataclysmic civil war?

 

 Short answer: History says "probably not."

Long answer: I don't honestly know for sure and anyone who does is lying, but what I am sure of is this: 

 

It will be the marginalized, Black folks, LGBTQ+ folk, non-Christians, brown folk, immigrants, and women, who will suffer the most in the years ahead, as it has been for 400 years here.

That's always, always been the case in America, if not its defining trait.

The Vax Of Life, Con't

More and more employers are now requiring employees to take the COVID-19 vaccine, regardless of incoming federal mandates being fought over in the nation's courts.

The latest Gallup COVID-19 tracking survey finds 36% of U.S. employees saying their employer is requiring all its workers without a medical exemption to be vaccinated against COVID-19. The percentage has steadily increased each of the last three months, rising from 9% in July.

In addition to those saying their employer is mandating vaccination, the Oct. 18-24 survey finds 39% of U.S. workers saying their employer is encouraging but not requiring them. This percentage has declined from 62% in July as those who say their employer requires vaccines has risen.

Meanwhile, 25% of U.S. workers say their employer has not indicated a vaccine policy, a proportion that has been relatively steady since Gallup first asked the question in May.

More U.S. employees say they favor mandates (56%) than are opposed to them (37%). The percentage in favor has grown from 46% in May, while there has been little change in the percentage opposed. Fewer today than in May (7% vs. 15%, respectively) say they neither favor nor oppose vaccination requirements.

Most U.S. workers hold strong opinions on vaccination requirements. A combined 75% either strongly favor (45%) or strongly oppose (30%) them. In May, 60% of workers had strong opinions in either direction. Back then, those with strong opinions were equally likely to favor as to oppose vaccine requirements, 29% to 30%. The growth since May, then, has come in the percentage who are strongly in favor.

A key concern for employers is whether vaccine requirements will cause employees to leave their organization to find a job with a COVID-19 vaccination policy that matches their personal preferences.

Nearly one in three U.S. workers are poised to look for a new job if their employer sets a policy on COVID-19 vaccinations with which they disagree. This includes 16% who are strongly opposed to vaccination requirements and 15% who are strongly in favor of them, determined as follows:

Thirty percent of all U.S. workers are strongly opposed to employer vaccine requirements, and of these, 52% -- equivalent to 16% of all U.S. workers -- say they would be "extremely likely" to look for a job with a different organization if they disagreed with their employer's policy on vaccine mandates.

Forty-five percent of U.S. workers strongly favor employer vaccine requirements, and 33% of this group says they are extremely likely to look for a different job over disagreements about employer vaccine policy. That translates to 15% of all U.S. workers.

Those figures are likely upper bounds of potential job losses tied to COVID-19 vaccine policy, as many will find themselves in sync with their employers' stance -- or not follow through and leave their job even if they disagree. For example, some workers strongly opposed to vaccination requirements may ultimately decide to get vaccinated in order to keep their job. Also, some workers concerned about COVID-19 transmission at work may decide to stay at their job even if their employer does not mandate vaccinations for all workers there.

 

The two big takeaways are that most Americans now support vaccine mandates by employers, and that the percentage of Americans opposed to vaccines remains steady at 30%.

As more and more of the unvaccinated get sick and die though, we're seeing more surviving Americans become more sold on vaccines and mandates for them as a good idea.

Still, 70-75% vaccinated is most likely the best we'll get as a nation right now.

Finally, the vaccine is better than "natural immunity" and significantly so.

 

Earlier this month, the conservative radio host Dennis Prager announced he had contracted the coronavirus. This was, as far as he was concerned, good news. The unvaccinated Prager had hoped to protect himself against COVID-19 the old-fashioned way: by getting sick.

“It is infinitely preferable to have natural immunity than vaccine immunity,” Prager said, echoing an anti-vaccine argument echoed by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and other pro-Trump figures who have turned coronavirus vaccination into a culture war that, public health officials say, could prolong the pandemic for everyone.

Prager is wrong, suggests a new study published on Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that finds that natural immunity offers far weaker protection than does a vaccine. The new study finds that people who had natural immunity from having recently fought off COVID-19 and who were not vaccinated were 5.49 times more likely to experience another COVID-19 infection than were vaccinated people who had not previously been infected.

“The data demonstrate that vaccination can provide a higher, more robust, and more consistent level of immunity to protect people from hospitalization for COVID-19 than infection alone for at least 6 months,” a CDC press release said.

 

Five and a half times less likely to contract COVID again, but my idiot GOP Congressman continues to lie to his constituents about this. 

Massie of course staunchly refuses the vaccine and is spreading disinformation on purpose while Kentuckians die from the virus.

But that's what he wants: dead constituents don't use federal government resources, and he hates that more than anything.

Last Call For The Vax Of Life, Con't

Here in Kentucky, Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear has ordered a school mask mandate and Republicans are vowing to overturn it as the court fight over powers stripped from the Governor's office drags on, but the Lexington Herald-Leader has consigned Beshear to the dustbin of history already saying that he went down doing the right thing.

 

For thousands of Kentucky children, the first day of school started with excitement, trepidation . . . and masks.

Yes, another start to school amid a flaring pandemic, only this time caused by many grown-ups’ willful disregard of the science. It’s not hard — if people won’t get vaccinated against COVID-19, and many Kentuckians won’t, then we must wear masks indoors.

Gov. Andy Beshear may have just signed away his chance to win re-election, but he did the right thing. The Delta variant is making more people and more children sick. Voluntary masking, as adopted by roughly two-thirds of Kentucky school districts, will not work. Universal masking, as Kentucky did last spring for a successful end to the school year, will.

His decision was bolstered by a new study out of North Carolina of 100 school districts — and nearly 1 million students —by two pediatric specialists at Duke University.

“Although vaccination is the best way to prevent Covid-19, universal masking is a close second, and with masking in place, in-school learning is safe and more effective than remote instruction, regardless of community rates of infection,” the authors wrote.

Children under 12 cannot be vaccinated yet. So we have to find a way to protect them, and masks are the best way. To Kentucky adults who are not vaccinated and protest masks: You can’t have it both ways. Our children must bear the brunt of our selfishness, and masks are a relatively painless way to do that. The places where masks will not be required? Places that have high vaccination rates, where hospitals are not filling back up with COVID patients.

Yes, our children are anxious. But not because of masks. Because they are living in a pandemic that has been far too deadly, and all they can see and hear are adults screaming about freedom rather than doing all they can to stop the disease.

We know this. We did it last year. Fayette County did a tremendous job of keeping kids safe, healthy and learning, which is, in the end, the real goal.

That COVID-19 has become so politicized, and thus continues its reign is a huge disappointment and frustration.

 

Amen to that.

Honestly, I expect Beshear to lose by double digits in 2023, almost certainly replaced by GOP AG Daniel Cameron. Beshear will be vilified and hated and will probably lose his court battles, but hopefully by then COVID delta will be under control here.  The fatalism I'm seeing here is astounding: "We're all going to get COVID, the faster you accept that the faster this will be over" from the state's GOP and Rand Paul and Thomas Massie.

We can do better, but Republicans are stopping us.

Oh, and Rand Paul should be ejected from the Senate.

 

Sen. Rand Paul revealed Wednesday that his wife bought stock in Gilead Sciences — which makes an antiviral drug used to treat covid-19 — on Feb. 26, 2020, before the threat from the coronavirus was fully understood by the public and before it was classified as a pandemic by the World Health Organization.

The disclosure, in a filing with the Senate, came 16 months after the 45-day reporting deadline set forth in the Stock Act, which is designed to combat insider trading.

Experts in corporate and securities law said the investment, and especially the delayed reporting of it, undermined trust in government and raised questions about whether the Kentucky Republican’s family had sought to profit from nonpublic information about the looming health emergency and plans by the U.S. government to combat it. Several senators sold large amounts of stocks in January or February of last year, prompting a handful of insider-trading probes. Most of those investigations concluded in the spring of 2020, according to notifications from the Justice Department to lawmakers under scrutiny.

“The senator ought to have an explanation for the trade and, more importantly, why it took him almost a year and a half to discover it from his wife,” said James D. Cox, a professor of law at Duke University.

Kelsey Cooper, a spokeswoman for Paul, said the senator completed a reporting form for his wife’s investment last year but learned only recently, while preparing an annual disclosure, that the form had not been transmitted. He sought guidance from the Senate Ethics Committee, she said, and filed the supplemental report along with an annual disclosure Wednesday.

She also said Paul’s wife, Kelley, an author and former communications consultant, lost money on the investment, which she made with her own earnings. The purchase was of between $1,000 and $15,000 of stock in Gilead, which makes the antiviral drug known as remdesivir.

The drug was initially invented as a hepatitis C drug a decade ago and tested for possible use against other infectious diseases, such as Ebola. Remdesivir gained emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration in May of last year and was administered to then-President Donald Trump when he was sick with covid-19 in October, before it gained full approval. Results of a WHO-sponsored study released later that month raised doubts about the drug’s effectiveness, prompting the agency to reverse itself and recommend against its use as a treatment for covid-19. The drug brought in $2.8 billion for Gilead last year.

Remdesivir was backed on Feb. 24, 2020 — two days before Kelley Paul’s purchase — by a WHO assistant director general, who described it as the only known drug that “may have real efficacy” in treating the novel virus.

The existence of public information causing Gilead’s stock to rise, said Joshua Mitts, an expert in securities law at Columbia University, doesn’t rule out the possibility that the senator gained additional knowledge in private. Paul is a member of the Senate health committee, which in January hosted Trump administration officials for a briefing on the coronavirus.

“Not everything about the product was necessarily clear from existing announcements,” Mitts said. “There could have been information about interest that certain individuals within administration may have had in the product, or that hospitals here in the U.S. were already loading up.”

Cooper said the senator attended no briefings on covid-19. Eight days after his wife invested in the company behind the antiviral drug thought to be effective against covid-19, Paul cast the lone vote in the Senate against $8.3 billion in emergency spending to combat the emerging outbreak.

 

And people will die as a result in Kentucky and across the country.

Vaccination Nation, Congress Edition

Democratic lawmakers on Capitol Hill are all vaccinated and proud of it. Even all but a handful of GOP Senators are too. But less than half of House Republicans are vaccinated, and that's a major problem.

Democratic lawmakers in both chambers of Congress have a 100% vaccination rate against Covid-19, a CNN survey of Capitol Hill found this week, significantly outpacing Republicans in the House and Senate and illustrating the partisan divide over the pandemic. 

For Republicans, at least 44.8% of House members are vaccinated and at least 92% of senators are, CNN found. 

In a follow-up to a March House-wide survey and interviews with members, CNN confirmed that 312 of the 431 members of the House -- just over 72% of the 431-member body -- have now received a Covid-19 vaccination. Of that, all 219 House Democrats have reported being vaccinated. Among the Republican conference, 95 of the 212 members -- 44.8% -- have said they are vaccinated. 

One hundred and twelve Republican offices did not respond to multiple CNN inquires. 

Although the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced Thursday that people fully vaccinated against Covid-19 do not need to wear masks or practice social distancing indoors or outdoors except under special circumstances, the House mask requirement will remain in place until all members and floor staff are fully vaccinated. 

"No," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said when asked if the rule mandating masks unless a member is speaking on the House floor would be modified. She then asked, "Are they all vaccinated?"

 

Now guess which House Republican is the proudest and loudest about not being vaccinated.

 

Go on, guess. 

 

One House Republican, Rep. Tom Massie of Kentucky, said he is not vaccinated.

"The Pfizer and Moderna trials showed no benefit from the vaccine for those previously infected, so I will not be taking the vaccine," Massie said in a statement to CNN.

Both clinical trial and real-life data finds the mRNA vaccines are more than 95% effective at preventing severe Covid-19 illness, hospitalizations and death.

 

Ladies and gentlemen, of course it's my own Congressmoron, Thomas Massie. What a spectacularly performative dumbass.

 

Three other Republicans -- Reps. Greg Steube and Kat Cammack of Florida and Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia -- said they did not want to share the information.

"I'm not going to talk about it. I don't think anybody should have to share their personal, private medical information with anybody," Steube told CNN.

Rep. Guy Reschenthaler of Pennsylvania told CNN, "I have the antibodies" when asked if he had been vaccinated. But experts don't know how long antibodies last in a person who has recovered from Covid-19, and research suggests that coronavirus vaccines will provide better protection, especially when it comes to some of the worrying variants. One study found that people in South Africa who received the Pfizer vaccine after B.1.351 became the dominant circulating virus were still very strongly protected from infection, and that protection lasted for at least six months.

 

Even Insurrection Barbie is like "None of your beeswax!" But Rep. Massie?

Performative ignorance of the highest degree, and yet he'll easily be re-elected for as long as he wants.

The State of Statehood, Con't

Just a couple of years ago, DC statehood was a non-starter even among Democrats with 64% of the country and a vast majority of both parties against the notion. A lot has changed since July 2019 when that Gallup poll on statehood was taken, however. What hasn't changed are the terribly racist and stupid Republican excuses against DC statehood, knowing full well that it will give Democrats two more Senators.

Each time statehood comes before Congress, Republicans often cite the intent of the Founding Fathers in their opposition, along with a potpourri of other claims. Remember when Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) was concerned that D.C. statehood would impact his staffers’ ability to park their cars near the Capitol? Or when Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) said that Wyoming was “more deserving” than D.C. of statehood, despite its smaller population, because it was a “well-rounded working-class state.” Rep. Glenn Grothman (R-Wis.) echoed a version of this argument on Monday, asking D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser whether the District had mining, manufacturing, and agriculture, because “that’s how nation’s build wealth.”

“We do not have any mines, Congressman,” Bowser said, pointing out that D.C.’s diverse economy was not reliant on the federal government. She said in her opening statement that she was expecting a series of bad-faith arguments from statehood opponents.

The new argument du jour from Republicans came courtesy of Rep. Jody Hice (R-Ga.), who said that D.C. ought not be a state because it didn’t have car dealerships, landfills, or airports. (The GOP witness, Zack Smith of the Heritage Foundation, said basically the same thing while putting it differently, contending that D.C. lacks the “amenities and resources found in many other states.”)

While the Constitution does not establish any prerequisites for states, Hice’s argument was especially befuddling because D.C. does have a number of car dealerships. When multiple speakers pointed that out, Hice responded that his claims were not arbitrary but instead “based in reality … I apologize for being wrong [about the existence of car dealerships in the District]. I have no idea where it is.”

But somehow, that didn’t put the car dealership question to rest. Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) piggybacked off Hice to note that, while D.C. may have a car dealership, it’s a Tesla dealership. Again, the Constitution makes no mention of an electric car exception, but Norman too was wrong, because that isn’t D.C.’s only car dealership.

Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said Republicans were “simply trying to gin up whatever argument they can think of,” saying that, while they accused Democrats of trying to pass statehood for partisan purposes, Republicans “are the ones trying to create a political and ideological test.”

Many Democrats, meanwhile, painted statehood as an issue of fairness and of racial equality. D.C. would be the only majority-minority state, as Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) mentioned. “D.C. statehood is a racial justice issue,” she said, noting that the measure could help diversify the halls of Congress.

While some of the specifics differed, the four-hour hearing mirrored ones and appeared unlikely to change any lawmaker’s mind on the issue. While the measure is likely to pass the House, it faces a larger challenge in the Senate. Advocates say it won’t make it to a vote unless the Senate abolishes the filibuster.

 

And that's the bottom line.

 

Not a single Republican will ever vote for a majority Black state to be created, with two US Senators and autonomy and a budget in the billions. It's the most tacit admission yet that Republicans are racist assholes who know they will never be able to convince Black folks to vote for them.

 

That terrifies Republicans more than anything else on this Earth.

Last Call For Getting Sick Of Massie

My own (unfortunately) Congressman, Rep. Thomas Massie, tells Glenn Beck that he tested positive for COVID-19 in January recovered fully, and is now openly questioning why America is worried about something he considers no more dangerous than the common cold.

U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie has tested positive for coronavirus antibodies, he recently said on right-leaning political commentator Glenn Beck's radio show.

Massie, a Republican representing Kentucky's Fourth Congressional District, told Beck that he took both a coronavirus test and antibodies test at the end of July, and he received a positive result for the latter at the end of last week.

"I've had the 'rona, and I have recovered from it," Massie said on Friday.

Massie said he is "convinced" he had it in January "before we knew what 'rona was" while Congress was still adjourned for the holidays. During that time, Massie said he laid out on his couch for four days with a fever, sore throat and low energy — all symptoms of COVID-19.

"I went to the doctor — I hadn't been to the doctor for sickness in like 10 or 15 years. That's how sick I have to be to go to the doctor," Massie said, "and I said, 'look, I gotta go back to Congress, give me whatever you got,' and they gave me a strong antibiotic, shot in an antihistamine and I was feeling better within a day." 

I don't believe Massie for a second. But in grand Trumpian fashion, he's making COVID-19 all about him, about how he's donating his plasma, rather than the sick and unemployed here in KY-4.

Granted, this area is better off than most of the country. Kentucky's unemployment rate is under five percent, but that's because the number of people looking for active work dropped like a rock in the last few months.

The state is still suffering thanks to Republicans like Massie and Mitch, and Massie is babbling about plasma rather than helping people here in NKY.

About five months after Kentucky reported its first loss of life from covid-19, its economy continues to sputter amid the coronavirus pandemic. Many unemployed workers say their benefit checks aren’t enough to afford their bills, and some here simply have stopped looking for jobs. Businesses say they’re also hemorrhaging cash, and local governments fear they’re on the precipice of financial ruin, too.

The economic tumult in Kentucky is vast, and it has added new urgency to the political standoff on Capitol Hill, where the prospect of a prolonged deadlock could worsen the financial woes in a state that was hurting long before the pandemic arrived. Caught in the middle is McConnell, 78, who some critics say has struggled to navigate the priorities of the president, the political desires of a fractious Republican conference and the economic needs in his own backyard.

McConnell declined to be interviewed for this story. His spokesman, Robert Steurer, said in a statement that the Senate majority leader’s efforts have directed approximately $12 billion to Kentucky. The aid originates in large part from previous coronavirus relief legislation, which Steurer said would help “address urgent housing, transportation, health care, education and economic development priorities” in the state.

For Kenny Saylor, the money was good before the pandemic began this spring. The 42-year-old in Corbin, Ky., once a bustling railroad shipping hub in the southeast part of the Bluegrass State, had been driving his own truck, hauling returns six days a week for Amazon to the pallet stores that sell off consumers’ unwanted purchases.

But business began to slow around April, “and that’s when everything went south for me,” Saylor said. Unemployment payments helped fill the gap, but the reprieve proved short-lived after lawmakers in Washington failed to authorize additional coronavirus stimulus aid. A self-described “die-hard Republican” his entire life, Saylor said he has now found himself angry with some of the GOP leaders who had long represented him, including McConnell.

“I’m scared to death of losing everything,” he said.

The country’s economic unraveling — the worst in a generation — has spared no community from severe hardship. But in a state like Kentucky, where some communities already had been grappling with joblessness, poverty and stagnation, the coronavirus often has made matters worse. About half of all adult residents have seen some reduction in their employment income. Meanwhile, about a quarter of a million residents say they do not get enough food to eat, and nearly one-third of households are struggling to pay their rents and mortgages, federal data show.

“We’re seeing huge numbers of people needing help,” said Jason Bailey, the executive director of the left-leaning Kentucky Center for Economic Policy, who added: “I can’t imagine a state that needs additional relief more than Kentucky does.”

Sure wish Republicans gave a damn.

Kentucky Goes Viral, Con't

As I expected, Kentucky's GOP Attorney General Daniel Cameron has now filed for an immediate injunction and motion to void all of Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear's COVID-19 orders, leaving the state operating at 100% normal, pre-pandemic capacity and putting Kentuckians entirely at the tender mercies of the state's Republican lawmakers and the cornoavirus.

Attorney General Daniel Cameron filed a motion Wednesday to block all of Gov. Andy Beshear's past and future executive orders under the current COVID-19 state of emergency, alleging that the governor's actions are arbitrary and violate Kentuckians' constitutional rights.

The motion was filed in Boone County Circuit Court, where a judge recently issued a restraining order against Beshear's public health orders related to auto racetracks and daycare centers.

The governor on Wednesday asked the Kentucky Supreme Court to uphold his emergency public health orders in this case and a related one involving agritourism businesses in Scott County, following a ruling against his COVID-19 orders by an appellate judge Monday.

Cameron's motion seeks a temporary injunction to prohibit the governor from "issuing or enforcing any executive order or other directive" under Kentucky's state of emergency statute, calling Beshear's past orders "an arbitrary and unreasonable burden" and a direct violation of citizens' constitutional rights.

Beshear fired back at Cameron in two tweets Thursday morning, stating he had just learned of the motion that, if granted, would "void every COVID-19 rule or regulation, and prevent any future orders needed to respond to escalating cases."

"With no rules, there is no chance of getting kids back to school, we will lose over $10 billion in our economy, and many Kentuckians will die," Beshear tweeted. "I hope everyone understands how scary and reckless this is."

Cameron knows exactly what he's doing too, neutering Beshear, putting 4.5 million Kentuckians at risk, and forcing the governor to call a special session of the state legislature so that Kentucky lawmakers can finish the job of removing all power from him.

In a series of tweets two hours later, Cameron responded by criticizing Beshear for not collaborating with his office and Republican legislators on his public health orders.

"Judges at every level have found constitutional problems with his orders," Cameron wrote. "Instead of collaborating with our office and the General Assembly to fix these issues, he’s pointing fingers."

Cameron's 31-page motion took aim at the rationale of Beshear and Dr. Steven Stack, the commissioner of the Kentucky Department of Public Health, behind the COVID-19 orders, saying a recent deposition by Stack revealed they were based on "values-based judgment and ad-hoc rationalization."
"Although there are nearly 4.5 million people in Kentucky, and state government is composed of three branches of government, with a general assembly composed of 38 senators and 100 representatives, right now nearly every aspect of the lives and livelihoods of those 4.5 million Kentuckian is purportedly governed by one man, and his political appointees: Gov. Andrew Beshear," stated Cameron's motion.

Cameron is also attacking the notion of even needing any of these orders in the first place, all but taking up the reprehensible Rep. Thomas Massie position on health emergency orders, that the government has no business in protecting Americans from health problems.

This is horrific news.  If Cameron is successful, Kentuckians will suffer like never before.

And he knows it.

Egghead Week: Trashy With Massie

My congressman, Thomas Massie, is hated by pretty much everyone, but it turns out he's far from the worst Republican running for the seat.

Always one to start a revolt, Representative Thomas Massie is now facing one down — from his own colleagues — less than two months away from his election. 

Mr. Massie, a libertarian from Kentucky known for his contrarian streak, last month drew the wrath of Democrats, Republicans and President Trump when he objected to the passage of a $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief package without a recorded vote, forcing scores of lawmakers to defy public health guidance and drive or fly back to the Capitol amid the rapidly spreading pandemic. 

The move so infuriated members of his own party that the third-ranking House Republican, Representative Liz Cheney of Wyoming, donated to his primary challenger, Todd McMurtry, in a stunning repudiation of a sitting lawmaker by a member of the leadership. Representative Michael R. Turner, Republican of Ohio, also donated, telling Mr. Massie in an acerbic message on Twitter that he did so “because I believe that you don’t belong in Congress.” 

The donations reflected the depth of Republicans’ long-simmering contempt for Mr. Massie, who has for years created procedural headaches and intense frustration for party leaders as the “Mr. No” of the conference, opposing even symbolic legislation as a matter of principle. But in their eagerness to inflict political pain on Mr. Massie, Republicans appear to have handed him a potentially potent political weapon of his own.

Mr. McMurtry, a lawyer who gained prominence when he defended a Covington Catholic student who sued CNN over its coverage of his encounter with a Native American protester in front of the Lincoln Memorial, has written and shared a series of Twitter posts and articles that contain racist tropes, anti-immigrant sentiment and transphobic material. 

In one tweet from December 2019, Mr. McMurtry wrote of the “need to push back against demonization of white people,” adding that “we should not be willing scapegoats for someone else’s agenda.” In another, he complained that “some cartel-looking dude is playing a video of some wild Mexican birthday party at full volume” in an airport, and cited it as a reason that “we should question unlimited immigration. We just cannot integrate so many people.” 

In a separate tweet, he approvingly shared a 2016 blog post subtitled “A Very Brief Primer on Being Alt Right,” which condemned as “cowards” people who describe themselves as conservatives and embrace a progressive agenda, saying they were afraid of being branded “racist, sexist, homophobic.”

“Let’s see them start telling the truth about transsexualism being a mental illness, or about the implication of IQ disparities between different racial groups,” the post read in part. 

In an interview on Friday, Mr. Massie questioned why Ms. Cheney would donate to Mr. McMurtry, citing the posts.

“He has views on race and culture and ethnicity that I don’t think have a place in the G.O.P.,” Mr. Massie said. “But maybe Liz has a different plan for the party, and maybe she thinks backing an alt-right candidate would curry favor with part of the conference.”

In a fight between Liz Cheney and Thomas Massie, I'm rooting for a meteor strike, but Massie has won this round. Cheney has since disavowed McMurtry and demanded her donation back.

Of course, the real lesson is that the Democratic candidate, Dr. Alexandra Owensby, is the person we need in KY-4.

Separation of Church And Virus

Here in Kentucky, Gov. Andy Beshear is serious about stopping church gatherings for Easter Sunday services in the era of COVID-19 and is directing local law enforcement to get license plates in order to issue quarantine orders.

Expecting that a “handful” of churches and other groups across Kentucky will defy his executive order and have in-person mass gatherings on Easter Sunday, Beshear said local officials are being directed to record license plate numbers of participants to pass to local health departments.

Those who attend these gatherings can expect public health officials to show up at their doors with mandates that they self-quarantine for 14 days, the governor said.
“If you’re going to expose yourself to this virus, it’s not fair to everybody else out there that you might spread it to,” Beshear said. “Understand, this is the only way we can ensure your decision doesn’t kill somebody else.”

This order doesn’t apply to drive-in services.

Kentucky Republicans are livid at the move.

Taking license plates at church? Quarantining someone for being Christian on Easter Sunday? Someone needs to take a step back here.

Kentucky Governor Announces Plan to Record License Plates of Easter Church Goers and Force Them to Quarantine for 14 Days https://t.co/z7U42liQRh

— Senator Rand Paul (@RandPaul) April 11, 2020

What the actual hell?

“Democrat Kentucky Governor Announces Plan to Record License Plates of Easter Church Goers and Force Them to Self-Quarantine for 14 Days”https://t.co/p6bAR8U3M2

— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) April 11, 2020

Frankly, Beshear is 100% correct here and as the state's former Attorney General, he knows he has the law on his side here.  He's not using law enforcement to break these services up, but he's damn sure making it clear he has four million Kentuckians to worry about too.

Compare that to Florida's Ron DeSantis, who is scrambling to give nursing homes blanket immunity from COVID-19 lawsuits.

Just weeks after a coronavirus outbreak in a Florida assisted living facility, the state's most powerful nursing home organization sent a letter to Gov. Ron DeSantis with an urgent request: Grant the homes sweeping protections from legal claims arising from the viral scourge.

The response: DeSantis is considering it.

In one of the first such requests in the country, the governor’s office is consulting with some of the state’s top lawyers to see if such immunity can be provided to nursing homes and other healthcare providers, the chief of Florida’s top healthcare agency told members of the Florida Health Care Association on Thursday.

The letter to the governor, signed April 3 by the industry group’s executive director, Emmett Reed, prompted angry responses from one of the state's most well-known elder advocates, who has long fought to improve conditions in Florida's elder homes.

"It's jaw dropping," said Brian Lee, Florida's former chief long-term care ombudsman. “That they could, in the middle of a worldwide crisis, that they want to protect their interest, that they would make this request just floored me."

If granted, the measure could set up a battle between the governor's office and legal advocates in a state with a booming long-term care industry and the largest percentage of people older than 65 in the country. So far, the state has logged 731 virus cases among residents and staff members in the homes.

Democrats are trying to protect the people.  Republicans are trying to protect businesses who screwed up.

Stay at home, folks.

Massie In A Mess, Con't

Trump's pathological need for praise and his malignant desire to be the hero that saved America from COVID-19 is so massive that anyone else who steals the spotlight from him, even for a moment, faces getting run over by Trump's Twitter-based wrath. Justin Amash found this out the hard way, that glibertarian grandstanding at Trump's specific expense gets you crucified and strung up on a meathook to bleed out. 

Yesterday Thomas Massie decided he was going to make national news again with his contrarian tantrum hintong he was strongly considering delaying passage of the COVID-19 phase 3 relief bill by forcing a floor vote. Now Massie is finding out the price for his folly and that there's no room in the GOP at all for anyone whose "principles" interfere with Dear Leader's glory.

A $2 trillion coronavirus stimulus package was supposed to get a voice vote Friday by the House of Representatives — until one Kentucky congressman disrupted those plans.

Republican Rep. Thomas Massie, of Kentucky’s 4th District, has other congressional members fearing he will force an in-person vote on the bill in Washington, D.C., causing the vote to be delayed and potentially forcing representatives to gather in person at the Capitol during the COVID-19 outbreak to vote.

President Donald Trump hammered Massie Friday morning on Twitter, calling him a “third rate Grandstander” and “a disaster for America, and for the Great State of Kentucky.”

“Workers & small businesses need money now in order to survive,” Trump said in one of his tweets about Massie. “Virus wasn’t their fault. It is ‘HELL’ dealing with the Dems, had to give up some stupid things in order to get the ‘big picture’ done. 90% GREAT! WIN BACK HOUSE, but throw Massie out of Republican Party!”

Trump had previously commented on a potential “grandstander” delaying the vote, but he didn’t mention Massey by name. He was still confident it would pass after it passed the Senate unanimously, according to the Washington Post.

“You might have one grandstander, and for that we’ll have to come back and take a little more time and it’ll pass, it’ll just take a little longer. But let’s see whether or not we have a grandstander,” Trump said at the White House Thursday, according to the Washington Post.

Oops.

I stand by my statement that Massie remains a national embarrassment and should be made to resign over this.  It's by far from the first time he's pulled crap like this, delaying votes on disaster relief bills to demand amendments and full floor votes to let everybody on Earth know he has no interest in being a federal government employee in a federal government he has no intent of believing in.

But now he's poked the big orange bear and possibly cost Trump his weekend victory lap.

I'll continue to go unheard as Massie's constituent and a dirty, unwashed plebeian blogger.

He won't survive Trump's wrath much longer though.  And yes, Massie has a serious primary challenge from Republican Todd McMurtry, one of the lawyers representing Nicholas Sandmann in the Covington Catholic defamation case, if you think this area is capable of producing a non-embarrassing, non-asshole Republican.

But you know what?

Massie has a serious Democratic challenger this time, nurse practitioner Alexandra Owensby who is running and needs our help.

 

Massie In A Mess, Con't

Now my awful congressman is threatening to delay House passage of the entire COVID-19 relief package with his grandstanding and politicking, and it will kill people when he does it.

A Congressman from Kentucky plans to vote "no" on the $2 trillion coronavirus relief package, which the Senate passed 96-0 Wednesday evening.

U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie, a Republican who represents Kentucky's 4th District, also hinted that he might object to a voice vote in the House of Representatives, which would force all members to return to Washington, D.C. and slowdown movement on the bill.

Massie told 55 KRC radio Thursday morning he plans to reject the measure — which includes one-time $1,200 checks to certain individuals and $367 billion in loans and grants to small businesses — due to concerns over spiking the national debt.

"If it were just about helping people to get more unemployment (benefits) to get through this calamity that, frankly, the governors have wrought on the people, then I could be for it," Massie said.

"But this is $2 trillion," he continued. "Divide $2 trillion by 350 million people — it's almost $6,000 for every man, woman and child. I'm talking about spending. This won't go to the men, women and children. So if you have a family of five, this spending bill represents $30,000 of additional U.S. national debt because there is no plan to pay for it."

Massie did vote for a coronavirus relief measure in early March, but missed the vote for a second measure on March 14. However, he recently told The Cincinnati Enquirer that he would have voted no on the bill even if he had been in D.C. because he was concerned the bill would put small companies "out of business."

Later in the interview, Massie discussed his opposition to a voice vote, or a method of voting that does not require more than a majority vote for its adoption. The House is scheduled to have one on Friday morning.

I have a lot of problems with the COVID-19 bill, it's not a stimulus bill in any sense of the word.  It's a relief bill and more will be needed.

Perhaps the most important thing about the $2.2 trillion stimulus bill the Senate passed late Wednesday night is that it is not a stimulus bill at all. 

It is not intended to stimulate growth and spending to offset a potential downturn; it is designed to prevent mass homelessness, starvation and a wave of business closures not seen since the height of the Great Depression.
Why it matters: The bill's price tag is around 10% of U.S. GDP, and Congress is already bickering internally — as well as with various lobbyists and policy advocates — about whether it goes far enough in a plethora of directions.

Even if the bill passes, the story won't be over: 

We are likely to be in this same situation again, economists say — and soon.
Another stimulus bill will likely be necessary to get the economy running after the COVID-19 outbreak has been contained. 

More immediately, it's possible that a second massive spending bill will be needed just to stop further bleeding.

What it means: "This should not be thought of as a stimulus bill — this should be thought of as social insurance in a disaster state of the world for the most hard hit," Jonathan Parker, professor of finance at MIT, told Axios during a virtual briefing with reporters Wednesday.

So when my asshole of a congressman decides he's going to delay it and force all the House to come back into session when the bill is going to pass anyway, but delay Americans getting that relief by several days, it's just a heartless move that accomplishes nothing but hurting his own constituents.

Which I assume is the point.

This man wants us to suffer.

Maybe we shouldn't re-elect him?

Massie In A Mess

I've mentioned a number of times how Rep. Thomas Massie, glibertarian asshole, is a national embarrassment, but his comments on COVID-19 here necessitate his resignation.

Northern Kentucky U.S. congressman Thomas Massie blasted novel coronavirus precautions taken by governments on his social media platforms this week.

His posts from Facebook and Twitter knocked the cautionary steps governments took to slow the spread of the pandemic. He called for the private sector to solve testing issues, said eliminating dine-in options at restaurants would "lead to worse public health outcomes than if they had remained open," and was one of the 17 Republicans who didn't vote on the Coronavirus Relief Bill.

"When this is over, I fear FDR’s internment of Japanese-Americans is going to look like a 'light touch.'" he wrote on Facebook Monday morning. President Trump announced at a press conference later in the afternoon that people should avoid crowds larger than 10 people.

The candidates who want to unseat Massie denounced his comments as the number of confirmed novel coronavirus cases in Kentucky rose to a total to 25, as of Monday evening.

Todd McMurtry, a Republican running against Massie in the rescheduled June 23 primary election, called his actions "shameful," in a statement sent to The Enquirer and added "Frankly, he should resign."

"I stand by all of my social media posts," Massie told The Enquirer.

Massie said McMurtry's comment was "laughable," defended his comments and pointed to the thousands of likes and shares the posts got as a sign that they were well received.

McMurtry said Massie's posts weren't appropriate for a crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic.

"He brags about his 'sass,' calling himself 'Sassy Massie,' but these times and our current needs demand someone who is serious," McMurtry said. "What we need from our representative is competence and hard work. Massie has failed us. It’s time for a change."
The two Democrats vying for the Democratic party nomination for the congressional seat, Alexandra Owesnby and Shannon Fabert, also criticized Massie.

A day after he missed the Coronavirus Relief Bill vote, Massie tweeted from his farm in Garrison, Ky., home to 866 people, about the mini ecosystem on his land and his canned pickles and peaches.

Massie told The Enquirer he would have voted no on the bill even if he had been in D.C. because he was concerned the bill would impose hardships on small companies and "put them out of business." He also claimed the bill wasn't fully written yet.
He added that he did vote for the $8 billion coronavirus package in early March, which aimed to combat the spread of the virus. President Trump signed that deal in early March as well.

Massie is not self-quarantining, he told The Enquirer, even after learning one of the attendees of the Conservative Political Action Conference tested positive for novel coronavrius.

"I do think people should exercise caution," Massie said.

Caution he's not willing to engage in himself.

The man is not just a joke, but a dangerous example of what not to do, and he has no business being anywhere near Congress. It really takes something to get both Republicans and Democrats in NKY on the same side, but there you go.

And if you want proof Massie is 100% wrong, you have only to look next door in Tennessee.

Look at the difference between how the Kentucky Governor and Tennessee Governor handled the Coronavirus

And look at the results of those policies pic.twitter.com/U3T4WMuF5a

— Matt Jones (@KySportsRadio) March 21, 2020

Resign, Congressman Massie.

Do the right thing for the first time in your career.

No Relief In Sight

My Representative in the House, Thomas Massie, continues to be a national embarrassment and now he's hurting the rest of the country, holding up the latest disaster relief bill for Midwest flood victims out of pure spite and rancor.

For the second time in less than a week, the House on Tuesday failed to pass the Senate-approved $19 billion bill providing disaster aid funding to parts of the United States hit by hurricanes, flooding, earthquakes and wildfires after a Republican lawmaker objected.

Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., objected to a request to pass the measure by unanimous consent during a pro forma session. If the bill had passed, it would have gone straight to President Donald Trump’s desk for his signature. Most lawmakers are back home in their districts this week for a weeklong Memorial Day recess.

"The speaker of the House should have called a vote on this bill before sending every member of Congress on recess for 10 days, and I object," Massie said on the floor.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., told reporters afterward that the chamber will again attempt to pass the bill by unanimous consent Thursday. If it's blocked once again, the full House would be poised to pass the bill when lawmakers return the week of June 3.

"House Republicans need to immediately end this shameful sabotage, and allow the House to pass the bill that the bipartisan Senate has finally agreed to," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement. "How many more communities need to suffer before Republicans end their political games?”

Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., slammed Massie's move Tuesday on Twitter, calling it an example of a politician "putting their own self-interest ahead of the national interest."

Even other Republicans are objecting at this point to these idiotic antics.

Massie has to go in 2020, and I hope the DCCC has plans to get rid of him.

It's Mueller Time, Con't

The House has unanimously passed a resolution urging the release of the Mueller report to the public, in a move that I'm even surprised by.  It's very telling that no Republican in the House would go on record to say they were against it, not even the regular slate of loonies, racists, and assholes like Gohmert, Steve King, or my district's own Thomas Massie (he had the shame to be a coward and vote "present".)

The House on Thursday overwhelmingly passed a resolution calling on the Justice Department to make special counsel Robert Mueller’s findings and full report public and available to Congress.

The 420-0 vote came after a fiery debate on the House floor, during which some Democratic lawmakers were admonished for their criticisms of President Donald Trump.

Republicans said the resolution was unnecessary and a waste of time, but ultimately joined Democrats to approve it. Four Republicans — Reps. Justin Amash of Michigan, Matt Gaetz of Florida, Paul Gosar of Arizona, and Thomas Massie of Kentucky — voted “present.”

Democrats used the resolution to put pressure on Attorney General William Barr, who during his Senate confirmation hearings did not commit to making Mueller’s highly anticipated findings public.

“A vote for this resolution will send a clear signal to both the American people and to the Department of Justice that Congress believes transparency is a fundamental principle necessary to ensure that government remains accountable to the public,” said House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), the lead sponsor of the effort.

It's still a pro move by Pelosi.  Mitch McConnell will be under a lot of pressure for a similar Senate resolution, especially after the vote against Trump's emergency declaration nonsense, but Lindsay Graham blocked it by objecting to the vote, calling for a second special counsel to investigate the FBI and Democrats.

Still, yes, this puts scores of House Republicans on record saying they want the Mueller report released to the public, and they won't be able to dodge it.

The question is why.  After more than a year of refusing to protect the Mueller report, suddenly 420 of 435 Representatives signed on to this bill with no real warning it was coming.

Either the Mueller report is so mild that Republicans are more than happy to approve its release, or the table is being set for Mike Pence.  This resolution coming a day after Pelosi said that there would have to be overwhelming evidence to impeach still means both of those possibilities are in play.

The "not worth it" caveat makes me unfortunately think that it's the first scenario, especially when combined with Thursday's news that Mueller's top prosecutor, Andrew Weissmann, is planning to leave the Mueller team.

I want to be wrong here. We'll see if I am.