Enforcement And Anomie-- Trump vs Law And Order

"I’m strongly in favor of mandating things. If you do that, I think it’ll be a giant step towards interfering with the spread in the community."
- Dr. Anthony Fauci

How far can society go from protecting itself from existentially dangers posed by idiots within-- and when I say "idiots" I mean this described by Umair Haque in his interpretation of the etymology of the word from the ancient Greek meaning. To the Greeks an idiot was a contemptible, anti-social person, only interested in private gain, with no conception of a public good, common wealth, shared interest. Like the anti-maskers, who are putting the rest of us in grave mortal risk by refusing to cover their noses and mouths.

Still, I don't believe law enforcement agents should be allowed to go up to someone not wearing a mask and shoot him in the head without a trial. Early in the pandemic I was on line outside a grocery store in Los Angeles. Everyone was masked and socially distanced. A little guy making a lot of noise and without a mask pushed himself up against a big guy on the line. A few words were exchanged and the big guy decked him. I don't condone violence but I admit I felt some satisfaction to see the noisy little maskless fellow dragging himself across the parking lot.

But should it be up to customers and shop owners to enforce government mandates? In mid-May Neil MacFarquhar brought it up in a New York Times column, Who’s Enforcing Mask Rules? Often Retail Workers, and They’re Getting Hurt. Trumpists everywhere, including in California, where you don't see many of them, say they are standing up for their rights by not wearing masks. I've been complaining for months that Gavin Newsom's mandates don't come with endorsement, so do not protect us and are bullshit mandates. MacFarquhar wrote that "many retail workers have reluctantly turned into de facto enforcers of public health guidelines, confronting customers who refuse to wear masks or to maintain a wide distance from others. The risk of a violent reaction now hangs over jobs already fraught with health perils. A Target employee in Van Nuys, Calif., ended up with a broken left arm after helping to remove two customers who refused to wear masks... In San Antonio, a man who was told he could not board a public bus without a mask shot a passenger, the police said."

Hardball by Nancy Ohanian

Masks, he wrote "turned into a flash point in the country’s culture wars, with some defending their right to not wear one. The Trumpists whine about their individual rights-- the idiot argument, over which they get all indignant and even revolutionary over.

Public health experts said this argument was misguided.

“I never had a right to do something that could injure the health of my neighbors,” said Wendy E. Parmet, the director of the Center for Health Policy and Law at Northeastern University.

Mask opponents generally overlook the fact that such regulations are meant to protect other people, not the person wearing the mask, she added.

Americans are navigating a patchwork of conflicting national and local guidance on masks. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, for example, initially downplayed the efficacy of masks but now recommends them.

And they have become a ready symbol for those dubious about giving government officials wide powers for an extended period.

Retailers find the confrontations over masks a minefield.

“It is a very hot button issue,” said Kenya Friend-Daniel, a spokeswoman for Trader Joe’s. The company declined to allow Jesse, the employee involved in the confrontation, to be interviewed.

“We do not want to put our crew members in the position to have to enforce something like that,” she said, noting that customers “overwhelmingly” wear masks.

In all its 505 stores, Trader Joe’s has put up signs recommending that customers wear masks, not least to protect its employees, Ms. Friend-Daniel said.

Refusing is not grounds alone for being ejected from a store, she said, even where wearing masks in public is the law, but creating a disturbance that bothers other customers is.

Target, in places where masks are the law, has stationed security employees outside its stores to remind customers to wear them, said Jake Anderson, a spokesman.

Stores are not the only businesses involved. Uber announced that starting Monday, drivers and riders must wear masks, and those who refuse can be kicked off the platform.

Smaller retailers feel especially vulnerable to balancing the need for safety and the need to revive their bottom line.

...In Michigan, Gov. Gretchen Whitmer made masks mandatory in late April and allowed stores to bar customers who refused. But she did not criminalize such refusals, so police have only intervened when confrontations turned violent.

In Illinois, Rob Karr, the president of the Illinois Retail Merchants Association, compiled a list of episodes that took place in the first 48 hours after masks became mandatory on May 1.

One customer threatened to get a gun from his car to shoot the worker insisting that he wear a mask. Several employees were hit, while others were verbally abused. Sometimes customers fought each other. The list has only grown longer.

Some police departments refused to respond when stores asked for help, Mr. Karr said, while various retailers were fined $750 for not enforcing the ban.

In Warwick, R.I., a police union initially announced on its Facebook page that it would not enforce Gov. Gina Raimondo’s mandatory mask order, calling it “overreaching” and bound to destroy the bridge of trust built with the community. The police chief then issued a statement saying the department would act.

Lawrence O. Gostin, the Georgetown University professor who wrote the draft public health law adopted by many states, suggested that in the absence of national guidelines, retailers should develop one policy for all their stores and stick with it, whether it has the backing of state law or not-- that way the rules would be clear for all customers.

Some experts also suggested it was overkill to involve police in the general enforcement of public health measures.

The issue should be treated like wearing seatbelts or not smoking in public, which eventually became habits, Ms. Parmet suggested, but such consensus must develop much more quickly given the danger from Covid-19.

Monday morning one of the kings of idiots, Rush Limbaugh was quoting fake statistics on death rates and ripping the media for failing to talk about the "survivability rate" of coronavirus, arguing it was time to allow the "young and the healthy" to "live their lives and spread herd immunity. You need to not go along with this idea of shutting down the entire economy again, shutting down entire states," Limbaugh said. "What they’re not telling you is the death rate is falling. But you don’t know that, because they’re simply reporting this massive increase in cases and you’re supposed to assume every case equals a death... They’re not reporting the survivability rate. The answer, here: Don’t mandate closures. Don’t mandate social distancing. Don’t even mandate mask-wearing. Encourage people who are old or who have a compromised immune system to stay quarantined. Stay hidden away. Do not go out. But let the young and the healthy go out and live their lives … and spread herd immunity, because that’s ultimately-- until we get therapeutics or vaccine, that’s going to be the answer to this." He's distorting the facts and lying and should be deprived of his broadcast license for endangering the public health.

On Monday, reports of new cases from the states showed Texas taking the one-day lead from Florida-- 9,054 new cases, bringing the state total to 210,006 (7,243 cases per Texan-- worse than any country in Europe. Sweden is closest with 7,234, practicing an unspoken herd-immunity agenda like the one suggested by Limbaugh.) Because of the "Limbaugh option," a growing number of hospitals in Texas, Arizona, South Carolina and Florida are at, near and beyond capacity.

Officials in Texas also reported hospitals are in danger of being overwhelmed. Hospitalizations statewide surged past 8,000 for the first time over the weekend, a more than fourfold increase in the past month. Houston officials said intensive care units there have exceeded capacity.

Along the border with Mexico, two severely ill patients were flown hundreds of miles north to Dallas and San Antonio because hospitals in the Rio Grande Valley were full.

In Arizona, the number of people hospitalized with COVID-19 topped 3,200, a new high, and hospitals statewide were at 89% capacity. Confirmed cases surpassed 100,000, and more than half of those infected, or over 62,000, are under 44 years old, state health officials said.

As cases surge across the state, Katie Cameron said it appears some of her neighbors in Phoenix are in denial. The mother of two said she’s seen people tearing down caution tape meant to keep them off playground equipment in parks, large groups gathering to socialize and-- most concerning-- very few masks.

“I feel like people don’t care or don’t think its real,” Cameron said. “It’s kind of like ‘out of sight, out of mind’ or they are just lying to themselves because they don’t want to believe it.”

Health officials in South Carolina reported over 1,500 new cases Monday. If the numbers keep rising at their current rates, hospitals will probably have to adopt an emergency plan to add 3,000 more beds in places such as hotels and gyms, authorities said.

...[T]hree of the top U.S. medical organizations issued an open letter urging Americans to wear masks, social distance and wash hands often to help stop “the worst public health crisis in generations.”

The American Medical Association, American Nurses Association and American Hospital Association issued the plea in the absence of a mask-wearing order from Washington and said steps taken early on that helped slow the spread of COVID-19 “were too quickly abandoned.”

The White House again rejected calls for a nationwide order to wear face coverings, with White House chief of staff Mark Meadows saying on Fox News that it is a matter for governors and mayors to decide.

Late Monday night, the Washington Post noted that a growing number of Texas sheriffs are refusing to enforce Gov. Greg Abbott's mask mandate. Anomie and the social breakdown that accompanies it are becoming a real threat across the country-- almost as if it was planned this way.

Sheriffs in at least eight Texas counties-- Denton, Nacogdoches, Smith, Upshur, Kerr, Gillespie, Panola and Montgomery-- are refusing to fine or cite people who defy Gov. Greg Abbott’s order requiring masks in public.

Abbott, a Republican who had previously blocked cities and towns from enacting their own mask ordinances, reversed his stance last week and made masks mandatory statewide as coronavirus cases and hospitalizations exploded in Texas. The order allows authorities to fine repeat offenders up to $250 but states that violators cannot be detained or jailed.

That limitation has frustrated sheriffs in Montgomery, Kerr, Gillespie and Upshur counties, who say they’re unable to stop anyone who isn’t wearing a mask, since that could be construed as detaining them. The Gillespie County Sheriff’s Office has additionally claimed that “the wearing of objects near the face and neck provide an offender possible tools to impose harm to an officer.”

In other parts of the state, including East Texas’s Panola and Nacogdoches counties, local sheriffs have said that they lack the resources to enforce the order or keep track of repeat violators. Smith County, located east of Dallas, says it will “encourage voluntary compliance.”

Denton County, located north of Dallas and Fort Worth, is by far the most-populous county where the rule isn’t being enforced. Sheriff Tracy Murphree has expressed concerns about the prohibition on detaining people and told a local newspaper that he predicts Texans “will rebel and purposefully try to go into establishments without masks,” predicting that it would invite “chaos and protest.”

If you click on the image,  you'll be able to read it

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

One of my people came up to me and said, “Mr. President, they tried to beat you on Russia, Russia, Russia.” That didn’t work out too well. They couldn’t do it. They tried the impeachment hoax. That was not a perfect conversation. They tried anything. They tried it over and over. They’d been doing it since you got in. It’s all turning. They lost. It’s all turning. Think of it. Think of it. And this is their new hoax.

-Alleged President Trump, as he spoke to a rally of faithful nincompoops about coronavirus. Charleston, South Carolina 2/28/20

Ladies and gentlemen, the essence of being a republican is being clearly illustrated by the response of republicans to the very real threat of the coronavirus. Here it is:

1. President Trump, the president who hates everything that lives and breathes, except for what he sees in the mirror, told our country (not his) that the news of the virus was "a hoax" and just more "Fake News." He did this despite obvious evidence that the pandemic was already spreading worldwide and killing people. In fact, all Trump cared about was the stock market. As he said that, I could not help but remember when he told America that he liked it when the market went down because that's when he can get good deals on real estate.

2. Americans are now dying from the hoax. 22 dead in the state of Washington as I write this on Monday evening.

3. After Trump's blatantly lying at a press conference about the coming availability of a vaccine for the coronavirus, saying it's 2 or 3 months away when it's a year and a half away, Trump was not to be outdone by Vice President Mike Pence. When asked if the millions of Americans (over 30 million at best) who didn't have insurance would be able to get tested for the virus, Pence openly displayed his contempt for all of those tens of millions of Americans and all of those even more tens of millions of Americans who will be in contact with those who can't get tested. How did he openly display his contempt? Answer: he turned his back, said nothing, and left the room.

4. When the virus is in full bloom, the vaccine will be too late anyway. Too bad the president who hates all life cut so much Center For Disease Control funding for research. Too bad he fired the pandemic response team when he took office. Some will say and do say that he did that because his predecessor formed it. More than likely Trump also did it because Trump is a complete psychopath who dreams of inflicting human misery.

5. As late as this past weekend, Trump doubled down on lying about the availability of testing for every American. There are over approximately 325,000,000 Americans. As of this writing, we don't even have 100,000 tests. Oh, and of course he said it's a "beautiful test," as beautiful as a phone call no doubt. Sure, Donnie, whatever. Officials now say that 70,000 tests will be available by the week's end. That only leaves a potential 324,930,000 Americans in need of testing if they start feeling symptoms. Who gets tested? Do we draw straws? Or, is it only White House staff, billionaires, oligarchs, and those on the way to such rarified status?

6. Just like at the FOX Goofball: At last week's Conservative PAC (CPAC) klan meeting, the prevailing point being made about the coronavirus was that it was all part of some bigly intricate, multi-layered Democratic Party-"Deep State" bullcrap conspiracy designed to make their dear leader look bad and bring him down. Think about that. Huge sections of whole countries, countries that no one's ever heard of like China and Italy were closed off due to the infectious nature and relentless spread of the virus. Somehow, all of those sick people in all of those pandemic-ridden countries are all in on the grand Democratic Party conspiracy. Hey, just ask Tucker Carlson or Rush Limbaugh! Do they even really think the Democrats could ever get organized enough to pull something like that off? That folks, is the basic intellectual level of your typical conservative. But, there they were. They were foaming at the mouth about this supposed conspiracy, although, it might have been that they all have rabies.

7. When the American voting public started tweeting and calling their so-called reps in Congress to express concern about the virus, it wasn't just because the public's intelligence somewhat barely exceeded that of your typical Washington clown in a suit for a day. But enough of the congressional bozos see the election on the horizon and decided to cough up some cash. Trump had asked for far less than the required minimum. Of course, he did. Anyway, Congress came through with an authorization for nearly 4 times what Donnie Psycho had asked for. Too bad they didn't come up with the money when Trump took a chainsaw to the Center For Disease Control in the first place. That's Congress for ya. Oh, and one of the Republican Party's other shining lights, Trump boot licker Rep. Mark DUI Gaetz of Flor-i-Duh hasn't just called news of the virus a hoax, he also mocked the whole idea of voting to protect Americans by wearing a gas mask on the floor of the House of Representatives during the funding vote. Swell guy. Oh well, maybe he was drunk again.

8. It now seems that some of the C-PAC attendees were exposed to the coronavirus. God works in mysterious ways, don't he? One of them was the beloved $enator "Ted" Cruz. He has now "self-quarantined" himself. Too bad he didn't do that decades ago, but, may I suggest that, instead of self-quarantining, he should try self-guillotining?

9. Another typical Texan, Louis Gohmert was also exposed to the virus at C-PAC. He isn't self-quarantining. He must really have a ton of respect for his staff and everyone else he's coming in contact with. He's apparently fancying himself as a modern day Typhoid Mary. I'm also guessing he thinks he can flap the virus away with his ears.

10. The aforementioned Mark DUI Gaetz rode back from Florida on Air Force One with the president this past weekend. Pigs really can fly.

11. The White House decided against warning seniors not to fly even after CDC officials suggested they issue the warning.

Now I want to tell you the truth about the coronavirus... The coronavirus is the common cold, folks.

- Republican oracle Rush Limbaugh on 2/25/20, shortly after being given the "Presidential" Medal Of Freedom by Trump.

Universal Flu Vaccine? Bill Gates Is Optimistic In The Long Run-- But Not In The Next Ten Years

Warren Buffett doesn't sound too optimist about the coronavirus pandemic. This morning, markets crashed on coronavirus fears, right from the opening. When the Dow and NASDAQ were both more than 3% down I had a long talk with my financial advisor, who had already sold my only small investment in international travel (Carnival Cruise lines) and when I said that I'm nervous about this, she said, "Everybody is." Gold prices have been soaring since November-- from around $1,460 an ounce to around $1,685 today. Markets in China, South Korea and Italy are in panic-mode. If you've been following our coronavirus coverage, you've probably detected that I'm pretty skittish about this too, to put it mildly.

When I come into my house from outside, I wash my hands with hot water and soap. I listen to Chris Martenson everyday-- religiously. He's scarier than Jaws or Orphan, Cabin in the Woods or The Shining. I keep thinking about stocking my pantry up with pasta and other non-perishable foods. The new Chris Martenson came out this afternoon:





You like a rollercoaster ride? This is more like the infamous 250-foot-tall, long closed (1964) Parachute Jump at Coney Island. The market caught on long after Martenson. I knew I should have started selling equities sooner! Thank God I didn't own any airline stocks!

Stocks fell sharply on Monday, with Dow Jones Industrial Average losses reaching as much as 1,000 points at midday. The number of coronavirus cases outside China surged, stoking fears of a prolonged global economic slowdown from the virus spreading.

The Dow traded 962 points lower, or 3.3%. The S&P 500 slid 3.2% while the Nasdaq Composite traded 3.8% lower. The 30-stock Dow is also negative for 2020.

It was the biggest percentage drop for the S&P 500 since October 2018 and it was the biggest Dow point drop since February 2018. The Dow and S&P 500 also gave up their gains for 2020.

“The second-largest economy in the world is completely shut down. People aren’t totally pricing that in,” said Larry Benedict, CEO of The Opportunistic Trader, adding a 10% to 15% correction in stocks may be starting. He also said some parts of the market, particularly large-cap tech stocks, appear to be over-owned. “It seems like there’s much more to come.”

Airline stocks Delta and American were both down more than 7% while United traded 4% lower. Shares of casino operators Las Vegas Sands and Wynn Resorts dropped at least 3.8% each. MGM Resorts slid 4.7%.

Chipmakers were also down broadly. Nvidia shares were down more than 6% while Dow-component Intel traded 3.4% lower. AMD dipped 7.6%. The VanEck Vectors Semiconductor ETF (SMH) was down by 4.2%.

Apple and its suppliers took a hit as well. Shares of the iPhone maker were down by 4.3%. Skyworks Solutions and Qorvo dropped more than 3% each.

Overseas markets fell sharply. The European Stoxx 600 dropped more than 3% while Korea’s Kospi index slid 3.9%.In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng index fell 1.8%.

Legendary investor Warren Buffett said the coronavirus spread has softened up the U.S. economy, but noted it its still healthy. “Business is down but it’s down from a very good level,” Buffett told CNBC’s Becky Quick on Squawk Box. “You look at car holdings-- railcar holdings, moving goods around. And there again, that was affected by the tariffs too because people front-ended purchases, all kinds of things.” Buffett added he still recommends buying stocks for the long term.

And... the worst is yet to come. Also... just take a moment to contemplate who exactly is in charge of the U.S. response and what kind of a team he has around him. How brilliant does he look with his gargantuan cuts to the CDC? Pasta anyone? And speaking of Señor Trumpanzee, here are some words of wisdom from one of his biggest supporters, Rush Limbaugh: "It looks like the coronavirus is being weaponized as yet another element to bring down Donald Trump. Now, I want to tell you the truth about the coronavirus… You think I’m wrong about this? You think I’m missing it by saying that’s… Yeah, I’m dead right on this. The coronavirus is the common cold, folks."

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

At the end of last Friday's Midnight Meme about Rush Slimebaugh getting a Presidential Medal of Freedom, I speculated as to who could be next on the list of people Trump sees, in his collapsing mind, as American heroes deserving of that special recognition:

So, who's next? David Duke? A posthumous medal for segregationist democrat George Wallace? One for Strom Thurmond? Jesse Helms? Of course, there are plenty of possibilities. Hell, as Trump's mental state continues to deteriorate even further, maybe Jeffrey Dahmer will get one, and speaking of Jeffreys, how about his old pal Jeffrey Epstein? "He was so misunderstood." I bet Alan Dershowitz and Devin Nunes are on the short list, plus any number of conservative media knuckle-draggers and white supremacy leaders. How about that Nazi who ran down Heather Heyer in Charlottesville? "So man very fine people. So many bigly deserve a medal from me, your greatest president."

So yeah, there's any number of people that Republicans would stand and applaud for at the next State Of The Union Address & Game Show Extravaganza if their guy starts launching medals into the crowd. That assumes that Trump wins or "wins" another term. It's hard to beat any incumbent let alone one who would have zero qualms about doing a deal with Kim Jong-un, Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, the Saudi royals or all of the above to hack our voting machines and manipulate vote tallies. Some of those machines are made in China now and Moscow Mitch has already blocked any security measures because they might hurt republican chances. I can definitely see Trump moving the SOTU even further into the game show atmosphere with the launcher depicted above. Maybe Trump will have Melania give a medal to herself next time; only hers will be diamond and sapphire encrusted and come from Tiffany & Co. at taxpayer expense.

Ah, but if Trump loses, can't you see an even more demented Trump taking the whole idea on the road to stadiums and arenas across the country? He won't leave the White House without an argument so why not stand him on a podium built with rollers and have the Vindman brothers and Marie Yovanovitch wheel him out of the White House and off the grounds to the sounds of the United States Marine Band. Once off campus, Kellyanne "Alternative Facts" Conway can push him a couple of blocks away over to Farragut Square where he can give lunchtime harangues to whatever rats and brainwashed, braindead MAGA hat-wearing loons show up. I can see Don Jr. making a fake presidential seal for the roller podium that says "The Real President Of The United States" with the letters fashioned out of elephant ivory. "Please love me daddy, at least more than Eric."

No doubt Trump will expand on the above idea and have himself and his podium sent to New York where he will be wheeled down Fifth Avenue and over to a MAGA rally at Madison Square Garden and then embark on his national tour. His supporters will totally regard him as the real president as will virtually all republicans, led by Moscow Mitch. Why? Because the seal says so! It will be the Republican Party's way of effectively seceding like they always threaten to only without any borders having to be adjusted (with Sharpies or otherwise). The Trumpists can just renounce their citizenship. Of course, by then, I will be the head of Homeland Security and they'll have to apply for visas and a green card.

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

It's more than incompetence of course. Given Trump's love of his fellow racists and his utter disregard for veterans; awarding Rush Limbaugh a Medal Of Freedom right in the face of an also invited 100-year-old Tuskegee Airman was a perfect storm of nihilistic racist opportunity. It's so like Trump to go on TV, before the entire nation, having invited a living symbol of racist hatred and an African-American military man who served his country admirably, and then celebrate the racist like that. Deplorable? Absolutely. Trump just couldn't pass it up.

Trump giving Rush Limbaugh the Medal Of Freedom is just another example of Trump's evil and of how Trump loves to deliberately show his desire to disrespect, demean, and degrade American ideals, from the oval office itself down to this. It's hard to edit a list down to just a handful of Rush Limbaugh's most bigoted moments, but here are 6 quotes from Limbaugh's radio show, beloved by millions of Republicans everywhere. There are many other quotes attributed to Limbaugh from his early years. Some are even worse than these, including one where he allegedly praises Martin Luther King's killer, but finding reliable documentation is difficult. Many older radio transcripts in general have not been saved or properly archived.

You might say that these famous Limbaugh statements are what got him the Medal Of Freedom from our white supremacist president and will always endear him to republicans and you'd be right even though there's also the sexism and misogyny that are both part of the Limbaugh brand. But, for today...

1. “Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it.” (January 19, 2007, as shown in the show transcript.)

2. “Have you ever noticed how all composite pictures of wanted criminals resemble Jesse Jackson?” (Acknowledged as true by Rush Limbaugh in a 1990 New York Newsday article.)

3. “The NAACP should have riot rehearsal. They should get a liquor store and practice robberies.” (This quote, much discussed at the time, was attributed to Limbaugh in a 1993 issue of Flush Rush Quarterly.)

4. [To an African American female caller]: “Take that bone out of your nose and call me back.” (Acknowledged as true by Rush Limbaugh in the same New York Newsday article as #2 above although not from his radio show but an earlier Top 40 music show he ran in Pittsburgh under the name Jeff Christie.)

5. “They’re 12 percent of the population. Who the hell cares?” (This statement, from his radio show, caused quite a stir in New York City back in 1994.

6. “I think the media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well. They’re interested in black coaches and black quarterbacks doing well. I think there’s a little hope invested in McNabb and he got a lot of credit for the performance of his team that he really didn’t deserve.” (September 2003 on ESPN's Sunday NFL Countdown during Limbaugh's brief time with the channel. ESPN quickly heard from the public and realized the error of their ways, and he was shown the door.)

I didn't even include the fact that Limbaugh was a key mouthpiece, along with Trump and all of FOX "News," for the anti-Obama birther movement that the Trump Party adheres to to this day. I couldn't help but notice how much all of the republicans at the State Of The Union speech stood and applauded when Limbaugh got his medal. So, who's next? David Duke? A posthumous medal for segregationist democrat George Wallace? One for Strom Thurmond? Jesse Helms? Of course, there are plenty of possibilities. Hell, as Trump's mental state continues to deteriorate even further, maybe Jeffrey Dahmer will get one, and, speaking of Jeffreys, how about his old pal Jeffrey Epstein. "He was so misunderstood." I bet Alan Dershowitz and David Nunes are on the short list, plus any number of conservative media knuckle-draggers and white supremacy leaders. How about that Nazi who ran down Heather Heyer in Charlottesville. "So many very fine people. So many bigly deserve a medal from me, your greatest president."

Midnight Meme Of The Day

-by Noah

In case you've ever wondered why Republicans don't like the idea of people smoking weed or taking hallucinogenics, it may be because they are already so "out there" that they don't see anything to be gained. Case in point: One of the biggest reasons that over 60 million head cases voted for Trump is because they believed that his opponent was running a pedophile ring out of a pizza joint just outside of Washington, DC. One Trump terrorist even went there fully armed, intending to "rectify the situation."

Republicans believe all sorts of things. Just last week, Rush Limbaugh was telling his devoted followers that Hurricane Irma was fake news being pushed by crazy libtards that believed storms were getting bigger and more devastating due to climate change.

Then there's one of Trump's favorite news sources. No, I'm not talking about those kooks on FOX "News." I'm talking about Alex Jones, a major go-to news source for Republicans everywhere. Among the stories that he has broken is the news that the New Town Massacre was a "false flag" operation staged by the government with actors, that it was a hoax, never happened. Republicans often point to lack of coverage of this and similar stories as evidence that the "lamestream media" is not on the up and up. Think about how truly sick you have to be to believe this stuff. Supporting Trump is a manifestation of mass hysteria.

Cruelty is often a thread of the stories that Republicans swear to. Just think how cruel you have to be to go around preaching and repeating these things. Many Republicans are too sociopathic to consider the feelings of the parents that lost children at New Town or that a fellow American is just trying to make a go of running a nice pizza place to provide for himself and his family. Then there are those few who do not believe that real but have no problem spreading the stories if it helps get their candidates elected. So much for being pro-family.

This meme tells the story of another Alex Jones favorite that is now part of the Trumpworld of Republican alternate facts. How dare they spread this wicked lie! C'mon! Everyone knows the child sex colony isn't on Mars but on Planet Zontar 2 of the 4th Dimension, aka the home planet and birthplace of Barack Hussein Obama!

Are Trump Voters Going To Turn Out To Keep Ryan In The Speaker's Chair In 2018?

Yesterday, Cook's Amy Walter mused aloud whether or not big Republican support for Trump "is going to translate into turn-out and support for the GOP in 2018. You don’t have to go too far back in history to find an example of a president who came to office with backing from a new, enthusiastic group of voters, only to find that those voters failed to consistently show up for the party. The so-called Obama coalition never soured on Obama, but they also didn’t show up to vote for his party in 2010, 2014 or 2016-- i.e., the years he wasn’t on the ballot."
  

Here’s what all the stories about the president’s continued popularity in “Trump country” miss: the Trump brand is better liked than the congressional GOP brand. The UVA poll found Trump’s approval rating among 2016 Trump voters at 93 percent, with 42 percent who said they “strongly” approved of the job Trump is doing. Congressional Republicans got a decent, but lower, 81 percent approval rating, with just 20 percent strongly approving. Speaker Paul Ryan had a decidedly more anemic 52 percent approval rating. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell casts a much smaller shadow, just 56 percent rated him with 28 percent approving of the job he’s doing and 26 percent disapproving.

...Moreover, Trump voters blame congressional Republicans more than the president for the failure of a health care reform bill. The UVA poll of Trump voters found that  “only 5% of respondents said that Trump was the most responsible for the failed initial attempt to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Roughly half (48%) blamed Democrats, while the remainder blamed House Speaker Paul Ryan (12%), moderate Republicans (15%), or the conservative House Freedom Caucus (21%).”

In other words, as many Trump voters blame House Republicans as House Democrats for the failure of the health care bill. They are sticking with Trump while sticking it to Republicans in D.C. Anecdotal reports from the recent Trump rally in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania underscored this dynamic. As the Washington Post’s Marc Fisher wrote the Saturday night crowd:

They’ve concluded that the Washington machine is blocking him at every turn. They blame the conservative Republicans, and they blame the Democrats, and they blame the news media, and they blame, even now, Hillary Clinton.

They don’t blame Trump.

To be fair, a president is always going to be better known and better liked than his colleagues in Congress, even among his own partisans. The President can float above the fray in a way House/Senate leaders and members can’t.  However, there’s something ironic about the candidate who struggled to be accepted by the party now getting better marks than those who’ve been long-time GOP stalwarts.

Republicans control all levers of power in Washington. If they continue to struggle to accomplish significant stuff, it will be harder for Republicans to get their base to show up to vote in the midterm elections. Meanwhile, there’s no evidence that the dislike for Trump among Democrats is fading anytime soon. That’s a dangerous dynamic for the party in power.

And there are some on the far right starting to chip away at the foundations of the Trump base. Monday, Rush Limbaugh was bothered about the bill to keeping funding the government. "If this is what we get with a Republican President and a Republican Congress, " he asked, "why vote Republican?" His view of the deal is that it "funds sanctuary cities, Obamacare, EPA, Planned Parenthood; does not provide money for the wall... Why is anybody voting Republican, if this is what happens when we win?"

There’s no reason to keep electing Republicans if this is what we’re gonna get with this budget deal, which pays-- continually pays-- for sanctuary cities, funds Obamacare, funds the EPA, gives money to Planned Parenthood and no money for the wall. If you’re asking, “What am I voting for Republicans for?” you have a legitimate question. This is one of the reasons Donald Trump was elected. This is the swamp. This is what needs to be drained.

...Listen to this list of things that were funded in the latest budget deal and ask yourself: Why are you voting Republican? “The bill continues funding refugee resettlement and visas from the six countries from which Trump wanted to suspend immediate immigration, despite this budget being the last recourse against the judicial tyranny.” This was a… This budget was an opportunity to stick it to the judges. It did not. “Sanctuary cities were funded…” Congress could have weighed in in any number of ways to stop this. The American people are tired of it; Trump is tired of it.

Trump ran for office and was elected on this. Sanctuary cities continue to be funded against the law. “Planned Parenthood was funded, despite the long-standing GOP promise to fight to defund it, even when they only controlled Congress. … Increased spending for a number of liberal priorities rather than codifying Trump’s requested $17 billion in non-defense spending cuts. EPA was saved from the cuts proposed for this year by Trump’s [budget director]. A $295.9 billion bailout for Puerto Rico’s irresponsible Medicaid program...

“Sec. 543 of the omnibus contains a provision opening the door for more H2-B low-skilled workers this fiscal year. $990 million increase of the ‘Food for Peace’ program in Africa. Government-run health care? HHS will see a $2.8 billion boost in spending, of which $2 billion will go to the [National Institutes for Health], which was supposed to be cut by the Trump budget. Green energy programs within the Department of Energy, programs Trump would have eliminated, received a modest spending increase.

“The federal judiciary saw its budget increased by 3%, to $7.4 billion, from fiscal 2016, despite engaging in civil disobedience against the rule of law. The unconstitutional Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is fully funded despite GOP promises to dismantle it... California’s high-speed rail will continue to be funded by the Federal Rail Administration.” What was “not funded”? “The border wall. Although $1.5 billion in additional ‘border security’ funds were allocated,” and there were a couple of other little things done to ramp up border security and fewer people are coming in because of the fear factor, but this makes no sense.

...Let me be clear about something. It wasn’t just Trump that people voted for. It was Republicans in Congress, Republicans in the Senate. People voted to do the exact opposite of what has happened in this budget. It’s not just Trump voters. Now, you can say it’s betrayal. It certainly is. But it’s much more than that.

All right, now, look. I’m seeing all kinds of adjectives in the media various places how we got screwed, how we got betrayed and all of this. I… Folks, I think, yeah, yeah, yeah. There’s no question. But none of this should be a surprise. It’s disappointing, and the election had specific reasons for happening. People voted for specific reasons. Among them was stopping the current inertia, reinstituting the rule of law throughout our country; trying to save the constantly degrading culture, the growing expanse that is the Washington, D.C., government and the entitlement component of our government that just seems to have no end.

Then yesterday the House voted 309-118 in favor of the $1.1 trillion Continuing Resolution Limbaugh was freaking out over. 103 Republicans (+15 Dems voted NO). Hard-core extremists like Mark Meadows (R-NC), Virginia Foxx (R-NC), Mo Brooks (R-AL), Louie Gohmert (R-TX), Peter Roskam (R-IL), Lamar Smith (R-TX), Steve King (R-IA).

Tom Wakely, the progressive Democrat running against Lamar Smith, didn't seem surprise when we asked him right after the vote. "Once again Lamar voted party over country," he told us. "We have seen him do this year after year for thirty years. We have to remember that Lamar was the first member of Congress to endorse Trump. So, when Trump tweeded that a government shutdown is just what this country needs, Lamar was more than happy to jump on-board the President's train to oblivion. It seems that Lamar has come to embrace the 1960's and 1970's rallying cry of burn, baby burn."

Jenny Marshall is the progressive activist and public school teacher running for the central North Carolina congressional seat currently in the hands of Virginia Foxx. Foxx voted yesterday to shut down the government. Jenny told us that "Foxx should have remembered the billion dollar fiasco the last shut down caused, but no. No lessons learned for her.  She notoriously refuses to invest money in programs that help people, but has no problem throwing it away on shutting down the government. So much for being fiscally responsible."

The other big North Carolina proponent of government shutdowns is Mark Meadows, head of the Freedom Caucus. He has a real opponent for reelection for 2018, though, Matt Coffay, who's holding him accountable for every crackpot move he makes. "Yesterday," Matt told us, "Mark Meadows voted against a bipartisan budget deal that will keep the government functioning through September. This isn't surprising, though, considering that Meadows was the architect of the 2013 government shut down, which cost his district millions and millions of dollars. We need representatives in Congress who want to work for the people, and not just for their ideological agendas."

When Chicagoland Congressman Peter Roskam was 10, he fell down the stairs and had a serious concussion. Everyone else in his family is a normal progressive and they all-- including his sister, a doctor-- thinks the concussion turned him into a freak. He's was one of those who voted for a government shutdown. We asked Geoff Petzel, the progressive Democrat running for the IL-06 seat Roskam occupies. Geoff told us that "Roskam's vote to shut down the government is irresponsible. Shutting down the government would mean that veterans would not get benefit checks, hundreds of thousands of government employees would not get compensated for the days the government was shut down, federally backed mortgages would be halted and passport services would stop. Peter doesn't understand that real people, including people in the 6th District will be hurt if a government shut down happens. I would like to think that our Congressman would base his decisions on what is best for the people of his district, but once again, Peter has shown he is a radical right wing extremist with no regard for his constituents."

And Ann Coulter, writing for the Steve Bannon/Mercer News Breitbart was harsher, and far more deranged, than Limbaugh had been on Monday. "If this is the budget deal we get when Republicans control the House, the Senate and the presidency," she wrote, "there’s no point in ever voting for a Republican again." You go, girl! And she did-- right after Ryan: "Not only is there no funding for a wall, but-- thanks to the deft negotiating skills of House Speaker Paul Ryan-- the bill actually prohibits money from being spent on a wall." And Ryan isn't the only establishment Republican she was gunning for.

At a CYA press conference on Tuesday, Trump’s ridiculously chipper budget director, Mick Mulvaney, described the bill’s prohibition on building a wall as a MAJOR win. (At least Mulvaney said it in English, unlike his all-Spanish 2014 townhall.)

True, there will be no wall. But the Democrats graciously agreed to allow the administration to fix broken parts of any existing fences on up to 40 miles of our 3,000 mile border.

The other big wins, according to Mulvaney, are:

1) more defense spending, which is fantastic news, because I was worried Boeing and Lockheed Martin CEOs were falling behind Mark Zuckerberg with their gluttonous salaries; and

2) school choice, an obsession of Washington wonks that is hated out in America, where parents move to high-tax towns for the express purpose of avoiding schools full of disaffected urban youth, and the disaffected urban youth don’t want to spend two hours on a bus every day.

But Mulvaney assures us that this monstrosity of a spending bill has set things up beautifully for the next budget negotiation in October.

That has become the GOP’s official motto: “Next time!”

We can never win this time. Instead, Republicans’ idea is always to surrender this time, in hopes that their gentlemanliness will be rewarded by their mortal enemies next time. Then, next time comes, and Republicans again surrender in hopes of currying favor with the Democrats and the media for the next time.

Mulvaney’s most disturbing comment was to say that what upset Trump the most was the Democrats’ “spiking the football” on this deal.

Apparently, Trump’s fine with no wall-- and everything else in a bill straight out of George Soros’ dream journal-- if only the Democrats hadn’t been so rude as to tell the public about it. When your main complaint is that the other side is gloating too much, maybe you’re not that great a negotiator.

Yeah, sure, it’s only 100 days in, it’s an artificial deadline, the media is dying to say Trump has failed and so on.

Except: Planning for the wall should have begun on Nov. 9, and a spade should have been put into the earth to begin building it the day after Trump’s inauguration. Now, it’s 100 days later, and we still don’t have the whisper of a prospect of a wall.

Moreover, this isn’t one random bill funding Planned Parenthood (which this bill does). This is the budget deal. There won’t be another one like it until next October.

That’s a spectacular failure. Democrats have got to be pinching themselves, thinking, Am I dreaming this?

It’s theoretically possible that Trump could still build a wall, but he’s just massively lengthened the odds of ever prevailing. Sure, you can let the other team build a 20-point lead in first half and still come back to beat them, but it’s a lot easier if you don’t go into halftime 20 points down.

Trump entered the presidency with the only kind of power that matters. He didn’t owe Wall Street a thing. He didn’t owe anyone-- not donors, lobbyists nor any political party. What he had was the people, passionately on his side.

But as soon as he got into office, Trump started giving away his miraculous, unprecedented power. Hey, Wall Street! Even though you didn’t give me any money, is it too late to be your friend?

No amount of abandoning his supporters will get Trump anywhere with Wall Street, Hollywood or the media. Their ferocity will simply shift to ridicule.

Admittedly, Trump has the enormous handicap of having to work through congressional Republicans, who are feckless cowards. If Speaker Ryan and Senate Leader Mitch McConnell had been around for Reagan’s firing of the air traffic controllers, they would have been hysterically screaming, No! You can’t do that-- the planes will crash!

This isn’t new information. We knew Washington Republicans were useless. That’s why we elected such a comically improbable president as Donald J. Trump.

The deal was that we were getting the Hollywood version of a New York businessman: an uncouth, incurious rube-- who would be ruthless in getting whatever he wanted.

In addition to being the only candidate for president in either party taking America’s side on trade, immigration, jobs and crime, what set Trump apart was his promise that we would finally win.

Remember? There would be so much winning, we were going to get “sick and tired of winning,” and beg him, “Please, please, we can’t win anymore. … It’s too much. It’s not fair to everybody else.”

We’re not winning. We’re losing, and we’re losing on the central promise of Trump’s campaign.

And The Real Paul Ryan Has Now Stood Up-- Freedom Caucus Impotent To Do A Thing

The new Gallup poll that asks how satisfied respondents are with Congress found that just 17% of Democrats and 15% of Republicans approved the job Congress is doing. It's been a long slide since 2001 when a narrow majority of Americans actually thought Congress was doing a decent job. "In the past, " writes Gallup's Jeff Jones, "partisans may have been happy just to have their party in control of Congress, but now it appears Republicans take little solace in their party's majority status if it does not produce results in the form of passing legislation they favor. Republicans' poor ratings of Congress are a major reason for the institution's lower overall approval rating. Former Speaker Boehner was the target of much of the party's frustration, leading to his resignation this fall. Now new Speaker of the House Paul Ryan will attempt to move the GOP agenda forward. Unlike Boehner and Senate Majority Leader McConnell, Republicans view Ryan positively overall. How long that positive view will last remains to be seen, especially considering that the Republicans' chances for seeing their favored legislation become law remain very slim as long as a Democratic president is in office."

Regardless of the new beard, I'd say Ryan's approval rating among Republicans started dropping big time Wednesday when GOP voters got a look at the Omnibus he is pushing through the House. So the Liberty Caucus, which was already screwed over by Ryan in how he negotiated the deal behind closed doors and then just dumped it on them without giving them the time they needed to study it adequately (which, I presume, has something to do with Amash's opposition even if all he talked about was how Ryan sneaked in unconstitutional domestic spying provisions.) But it was Rush Limbaugh who was the first to articulate Republican rage over Ryan's horribly flawed Omnibus. "The country," he announced on his Hate Talk broadcast yesterday, "was just sold down the river again by your very Republican Party." And then he started getting madder a and madder. Obviously, he's playing fast and loose with the facts but what he says on Thursday is what Republicans parrot all weekend. He was yelling about "stabs in the back" the way the Nazis were before they came to power in the 1930s.

I have a headline here from the Washington Times: White House Declares Total Victory Over GOP in Budget Battle. That headline's a misnomer. There was never a battle. None of this was opposed. The Republican Party didn't stand up to any of it, and the die has been cast for a long time on this. I know many of you are dispirited, depressed, angry, combination of all of that. But, folks, there was no other way this could go. Because two years ago when the Republican Party declared they would never do anything that would shut down the government and they would not impeach Obama, there were no obstacles in Obama's way and there were no obstacles in the way of the Democrat Party.

When you surrender the power of the purse-- and that's the primary power the House of Representatives has. Not a penny of money can be spent in this country by this government without the House of Representatives authorizing it. Obama can spend all he wants, but if the House doesn't give him the mechanism, he can't spend any of it. But the Republicans squandered that. They gave up the power of the purse. The reason they did that is because for some inexplicable reason, they are literally paranoid and scared to death of even being accused of doing something that would shut down the government.

So to avoid even the accusation that they were going to or would ever even think of shutting down the government, they signaled that whatever Obama wanted to spend, he would get, because they figured that had less damage to them politically than the allegation that they were shutting down the government. So, very simply, ever since the Republican Party became the party of keeping the government open at all costs, we get bills like this. There's simply no stopping the Democrats. There's no mechanism. Every constitutional mechanism found in the power of the purse, Separation of Powers, the Republican Party years ago gave it away, in total fear of the media.

Now, there's also a factor that needs to be mentioned, too, and that is that many Republican donors want every bit of this money spent, and they have donated voluminously to key Republicans in order to get the money spent. So it's not all Republican fears. It's not all Republican caving. A lot of it is Republican fealty and loyalty to some of their donors. Some people today looking at this, and this is 2,009 pages. It's said to be a spending bill. Among the things that it does, it fully funds Obamacare. It fully funds Planned Parenthood. That, to me, is unforgivable, with everything now known about what goes on behind closed doors at Planned Parenthood, and that the federal government, led by a Republican Party, sees fit to pay for it. It is beyond comprehension, and it is a total squandering of moral authority to fully fund the butchery at Planned Parenthood. This spending bill fully pays for Obama's refugee plans, fully. This spending bill, this budget bill quadruples the number of visas Obama wants for foreign workers. This is even a slap at American union workers. Not the leaders. The union leaders seem to be in favor of it, but blue-collar people, known as working people, have been sold down the river along with everybody else here.

This spending bill even fully pays for every dime asked for by Obama on all of this idiocy that's tied up into climate change. Everything Obama wanted, everything he asked for, he got. You go down the list of things, it's there.

And this is causing some people to wonder if they just dreamed all that stuff about Boehner resigning. And then other people are wondering if they even dreamed all that stuff about the Republicans winning the largest number of seats they've had in Congress since the Civil War. We had two midterm elections in 2010 and 2014, which were landslide victories for the Republican Party. The Democrat Party lost over a thousand seats nationwide in just those two elections. People went to the polls in droves wanting exactly what was rubber-stamped last night (or what will be) stopped.

And instead they showed up in record numbers and they it turned out and they just defeated Democrats down the ballot. In the process, they elected Republicans to stop this. And now the Republicans have the largest number of seats in the House they've had in Congress since the Civil War. And it hasn't made any difference at all.  It is as though Nancy Pelosi is still running the House and Harry Reid is still running the Senate. "Betrayed" is not even the word here. What has happened here is worse than betrayal. Betrayal is pretty bad, but it's worse than that.

This was out-and-out, in-our-face lying, from the campaigns to individual statements made about the philosophical approach Republicans had to all this spending. There is no Republican Party! You know, we don't even need a Republican Party if they're gonna do this. You know, just elect Democrats, disband the Republican Party, and let the Democrats run it, because that's what's happening anyway. And these same Republican leaders doing this can't, for the life of them, figure out why Donald Trump has all the support that he has? They really can't figure this out?

Repeated stabs in the back like this-- which have been going on for years-- combined with Obama's policy destruction of this country, is what has given rise to Donald Trump. If Donald Trump didn't exist and if the Republican Party actually does want to win someday, they'd have to invent him. It's just mind-boggling when you figure out everything that has been granted Obama. All the money, the tax increases, the Cadillac plans in Obamacare. All kinds of punitive things in Obamacare, delayed yet again so that people will not be made aware of the pain and suffering Obamacare's gonna cause.

This budget even gives Obamacare cover by delaying some of the most harsh aspects of it. And the reason for that is, delay the harsh aspects and you prevent people from learning what they are, at the same time you get more years for the tentacles of Obamacare to deeply weave themselves into the fabric of society, making repeal of the thing more politically difficult. So you could also say that the Republican budget bill actually improves the odds of Obamacare surviving and growing. You have to look long and hard for this whole thing to find any opposition to anything the Democrat Party wants.

Jeff Sessions, senator from Alabama, is calling this a betrayal, fully funding the Obama immigration agenda, the climate change agenda, increasing foreign workers.  He said, "This is why Trump is now triumphing here and probably will win. The voters have come to believe that their own party's elites are not only uninterested in defending their interests, but-- as with this legislation and fast tracking the president's international trade deal-- Republican voters would not be wrong to conclude that their own Republican leaders are hostile to them, just as Democrat leaders are hostile to Republican voters."

And as Sessions points out, "This legislation represents a further disenfranchisement of the American voter." Clearly! In the last two midterm elections, the American electorate has stood up and loudly stated, 'No. We don't want this. Stop this." It didn't matter. It's so bad that over at Slate.com they're making excuses for Paul Ryan. I think in some places in the left-wing media, they can't believe the scope of the betrayal. They're feeling a little guilty at how easy this has been. They're feeling a little guilty here. I'm joking, of course. But one of the Salon.com columnists said, "Hey, you know, you guys need to cut Ryan some slack. He was left with a huge mess and not much time to fix it."

Isn't that what they always said with Boehner? "He was left with a huge mess"? Isn't that what they always say about Obama? "He was left with a huge mess. Man, it was much worse than he even knew. Nobody told him the truth." It seems to be a constant refrain and excuse. "According to Sessions, the American people elected Republicans to the majority in Congress in 2014 as a rejection of the Obama administration's immigration policies," and any number of other things. "'That loyalty has been repaid with betrayal,' he said... Sessions added, 'As feared, the effect is to fund the president’s entire immigration agenda.'"

"Planned Parenthood Unscathed in Spending Bill," from a very happy and cheering TheHill.com. "Planned Parenthood is praising Democrats in Congress after the spending bill released early Wednesday morning spared the organization from cuts. As expected, the spending bill does not defund Planned Parenthood, a clear deal-breaker for Democrats, but the absence of spending cuts is still noteworthy given the intensity of the push to defund the group..." There was never any intensity to... It's what we now know.

There wasn't any intensity to defund. All there was is just a bunch of words, just a bunch of people standing up saying they were going to. This wouldn't stand. They were gonna lead an effort to defund it. But nobody ever meant it. "Planned Parenthood Vice President Dana Singiser praised congressional Democrats on Wednesday for 'holding the line against these harmful policy riders and cuts to key women's health programs.'" Also from TheHill.com, another reporter cheering as well. "Funds for Obama Climate Deal Survive." They were never threatened, never in peril. There wasn't a battle."Secret Deal Quadruples Foreign Workers-- Chamber of Commerce Backs Guest Worker Program." Translation: More cheap labor will eagerly be brought into the country under a visa program or they will be employed. "Hey, why not, Rush? The unemployment's rate's 5%. We got plenty of room for foreign workers." Right. That, to me... All this Republican campaign stuff going on obfuscating or clouding this a little bit, but that really is the news of the last 12 to 18 hours.

Sanctuary cities, fully funded. All Mideast immigration programs, fully funded. All these things that have been exploited by terrorists. Sanctuary cities, fully funded. All refugees, fully funded. The release of criminal aliens, fully funded. Everything!

The Democrat leftist wet dream has just been paid for.

Not exactly. The bill that passed the House yesterday, the Tax Extenders crap, which was, in political reality, Part 1 of the Ryan Compromise Limbaugh is crying about, had every Freedom Caucus clown on board except Justin Amash. And 77 mostly corrupt conservative Democrats, like Patrick Murphy, Gwen Graham, Donald Norcross, Sean Patrick Maloney, Tammy Duckworth, John Delaney, Collin Peterson, Ann Kirkpatrick, Joe Crowley, etc. joined the Republicans to pass it. Donna Edwards explained why they were terribly wrong to do so:

Once again, Republicans forced a last-minute deal with this tax extenders package that is awful fiscal policy for the nation and is a holiday giveaway to their corporate friends’ interests. Yes, this package makes the child tax credit, the Earned Income Tax Credit, and the American Opportunity Tax Credit permanent, all of which I support to help working families’ make ends meet and reduce poverty. However, these family-focused tax credits should all be indexed to inflation to come close to meeting future needs.

When taken in totality this unpaid-for package will cost an estimated $803 billion, including interest, over the next decade, with sixty percent of the tax cuts going to corporate special interests. The costs of making many of these extenders permanent is expected to add approximately $2 trillion to the debt and deficits over the next 20 years. While Republicans send billions of dollars in tax cuts to corporations, they have forced massive cuts to discretionary spending, threatening the government’s ability to invest in and protect the American people. This legislation makes things even worse, and is simply unacceptable.

By permanently extending many of the tax policies without offsetting their cost, Congress is reducing the “revenue baseline for the future. This would make it less costly, and therefore easier, to reduce tax rates in the future as part of a revenue-neutral, comprehensive tax overhaul and would likely increase pressure to cut spending in order to reduce future debts and deficits. We need more revenue coming into the federal government, not less, to fund critical investments in education, health care, research, security, and infrastructure. I urge President Obama to veto this legislation, so Congress can work on fair, comprehensive tax reform that helps working families in Maryland and across the country move ahead.

Of course the Freedom Caucus or Liberty Caucus or whatever those phonies are calling themselves this week, know that uncomfortable feeling in their butts is Ryan's dick-- and no one doubts that had Boehner presented this budget-- his head would have been mounted on a trophy plaque at Tortilla Flats by now. Instead, it looks like they're all going to give him a carefully choreographed pass-- even after Heritage called on them to vote NO, laying out all their reasons and ending with an ominous: "Heritage Action opposes the omnibus spending bill and will include it as a key vote on our legislative scorecard." David Brat, the one who was unhappy that Eric Cantor wasn't pure enough, was praising Ryan out of one side of his mouth and saying that "The end product here is just cleaning the barn; it’s a disaster; we’re breaking our pledge on the budget caps to the American people, we’ve lost fiscal discipline, and we’re throwing it all on the next generation" out of the other side.

Matt Salmon, may actually have enjoyed by screwed by Ryan. "Paul," he told the media, "made some pretty sustainable commitments about things we’ll do next year: a major overhaul of our tax system, welfare reform, replacing Obamacare. These are major things. If we do those things and define clearly what we stand for, that’s the best we can hope for." He also postured for his base supporters, snarling about vetting standards for Syrian refugees being dropped from the bill at Pelosi's insistence. Gee, you can see why Rush has gone even more insane than usual! Ted Cruz wrote an OpEd for Politico about why he'd like to shut down the government again instead of voting for Ryan's omnibus. It's an endless, naive litany of Hate Talk Radio complaints about democracy under Obama aimed straight at the far right fringe of Republican primary voters.

[I]n a tactic that will go mostly unnoticed, this government funding deal was once again negotiated behind closed doors, and then, like several recent “must-pass” bills, will be rammed through the Senate in no time with limited debate and no floor amendments via a parliamentary mechanism called a "privileged message." A privileged message is a tool that has been abused by Congressional leadership to circumvent committees of jurisdiction and bypass regular order of business to expedite legislation for immediate final passage.

Leadership is employing this tactic to pass a one-trillion-dollar-plus spending bill at the last minute in a matter of days without giving the American people a chance to debate whether it advances their ideals or their best interests. It’s all or nothing. Take it or leave it. They will countenance no debate on whether we should continue to fund Obamacare, or Planned Parenthood, or the disastrous Iranian nuclear deal. There’s one light switch to fund the government, and we can turn it either on or off.

This morning, Ryan's Omnibus passed the House 316-113, with Ryan getting the majority of the majority he had been sweating about. 150 Republicans voted for it and 95 Republicans voted NO. I was more concerned that even more Democrats voted for this ugly bill than Republicans did! 166 Democrats voted YES and just 18 voted NO, although the 18 included some of the best Democrats in Congress, like Raul Grijalva, Keith Ellison, Mark Pocan, Xavier Becerra and Ted Lieu. More on this mañana.