House conservatives plot revenge against John Boehner
Last week John Boehner continued his long-standing policy of punishing House conservatives who vote their conscience (and presumably the will of their constituents) instead of blindly toeing the establishment line. John Boehner might have finally gone too far as it is now being reported that some conservatives in the House are going to hold a meeting to look at ways of ending what they are now calling the “culture of punishment” up to and including a shakeup in leadership.
Here is more:
A key bloc of conservatives is laying plans to throttle legislation on the House floor and will meet privately this week to discuss a shakeup of GOP leadership.
The group is irate at what one called a “culture of punishment” that Speaker John Boehner’s leadership team has instituted against dissenting members — most recently the removal of Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) from a subcommittee chairmanship after he bucked Republican leaders on an important procedural vote.
“A change of leadership will start to be talked about in more earnest terms,” Meadows told POLITICO during an interview in his Capitol office Monday. “I’m not angry, but I do have a firm resolve that we change [the process] for Americans.”
He added, “It’s not about ideology. It’s about that all members of Congress need to have their voice heard and this is a place for debate. Not a place for punishment. People should not be worried about the type of vote they cast, ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ based on retribution.”
Did Karl Rove call for repealing the Second Amendment?
The internet has been abuzz with the news that Karl Rove called for the repeal of the Second Amendment this morning as the only way to guarantee an end to gun violence in America but is that really what he said?
Here is the video:
He clearly stated that repealing the Second Amendment is the only way to guarantee a drastic reduction in gun violence however he did state it was not going to happen until someone had the “oomph” to repeal it. If you stop listening to the video at this point it certainly sounds as if he longs for the day someone will step up to begin the repeal process, however he continued and when he did he said he did not think it was an answer.
So the question I have is this: what was Karl Rove really saying? This comment can be interpreted in two different ways altogether. Either he meant it was not an option period or he meant it was not an option because nobody was going to step up to the plate and call for its repeal.
Which one is it? I am not sure but I do know that as an establishment lackey who has made it his goal with the formation of a Super PAC to protect establishment Republicans against any and all challenges to their power that I do not trust him at all.
Even floating the idea that repealing the Second Amendment as the answer is something I have a major problem with. I find it troubling, what do you think?
Malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
I have been saying for quite some time that the Republicans and the Democrats are on the same side; that they are playing a game with a predetermined result and that they are only putting on a show to give the American people the illusion of having a choice.
I still believe that for the most part this is true, at least with the establishment, however there is a small group of conservatives in the House who have been trying to stop the establishment from implementing its agenda and they gave it their best shot when it came to the TPA–they were able to delay it but not stop it.
But now they are beginning to pay the price for not following the agenda of the establishment: much like we saw a few years ago when John Boehner began removing conservatives from budget committee chairs for trying to make good on campaign promises instead of toeing the establishment party line, the Republican establishment is beginning to punish conservatives for holding up procedure on the TPA.
Open thread for Sunday, June 21st: ‘Faith’
Here is the open thread for Sunday, June 21st. Please feel free to post links to interesting articles and to discuss whatever issues arise during the course of the day. Nothing is off-topic here.
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Now for the moment you have all been waiting for! This is the week I reveal my number one favorite band of all time and this award goes to….The Cure.
First up this week is one of my all time favorite songs by The Cure and it is an early one. This video is from 1980 and it is entitled “Play for Today.” At this point in time the band was still touting its “anti-image” image but as you will soon see The Cure eventually found an image and abandoned the “anti-image” idea.
Next up is “A Night Like This” as recorded live in 1996.
And here is “The Love Cats” performed live in 1984.
This next song is a song which Robert Smith once called the perfect pop song, it is entitled “Just Like Heaven” and this version is from 1989.
This brings us to the conclusion of the first set. Now we move on to the brooding goth/mope rock sound which the band is most famous for. First up in the second set is a song called “Treasure.”
Next up is “Siamese Twins.”
“Prayers for Rain” is next:
In 1981 The Cure played a festival in which Robert Palmer was the headline act. The whole festival was behind schedule and Robert Palmer was not happy; he stated that if The Cure did not cut their set short he would not perform. Because most of the people in attendance were there to see Robert Palmer The Cure was told they could only play one more song.
Needless to say they were not happy but there was nothing they could do so they played one more song. However, The Cure did not go quietly into the night: the band is famous among fans for extending and improvising the endings of a couple of songs during live shows. One of those songs is called “A Forest” so the band decided to play a 10 minute version of the song, getting in a last laugh of sorts because the improvised lyrics included “such a long end.” When the song was over bass player Simon Gallup yelled into the microphone “fuck Robert Palmer and fuck rock and roll.” This has become one of the most collectible bootlegs from the band.
But, as I alluded to above there is one more song The Cure is famous for extending and improvising and that is the quintessential song by The Cure and the one song which stands above all the others. It is called “Faith” and like the “fuck Robert Palmer” version of “A Forest” there is one live version of this song which all true fans of The Cure must own. It is the Tienanmen Square Square version and it is powerful at over 15 minutes long. It was performed on the evening of the massacre and was dedicated to the victims.
Is John Kasich preparing to run for President in 2016?
I believe there is a disconnect between the presumptive Democratic nominee for President, Hillary Clinton, and the base of the party. We continue to see her trustworthiness numbers fall and the far left in the base seem to have reservations about whether she is liberal enough and doubt whether as a millionaire she can relate to the plebeians.
I also believe the base is longing and hoping for another viable candidate to come along and challenge her, that is why Bernie Sanders is not as long a shot as some people are making him out to be. But can a self-avowed socialist win the Presidency or is he too far to the left to win a general election?
If the left answers that question in the affirmative they may begrudgingly vote for Hillary Clinton unless another option comes along. Of course many of them are still holding out hope for Elizabeth Warren but there is another candidate who just might declare his intention to run for the Presidency in 2016 and that person is Ohio Governor John Kasich.
Afterburner with Bill Whittle: ‘Death by Dynasties’
In his latest Afterburner video entitled “Death by Dynasties” Bill Whittle takes on the prospect of Hillary Clinton versus Jeb Bush in the 2016 election and why it is a bad idea.
Enjoy:
The House passes stand alone TPA bill
John Boehner made good on his promise to bring the Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) bill back to the floor for a vote today and it passed 218-208. This means the House has willingly handed power over to the President to negotiate trade deals by himself before bringing them to the Congress for an up or down vote without the chance to offer amendments to the proposed treaty.
This was spearheaded by John Boehner and other establishment Republicans in leadership positions–you know the ones; they are the same ones who have been complaining about the President usurping powers not granted to him in the Constitution. What a bunch of frauds and hypocrites! They are selective Constitutionalists who really only claim to believe in the founding document when they are up for reelection, but who are willing to subvert it when they have a chance to take a stand because their agenda is at stake and that is all they care about when push comes to shove.
Barack Obama has been seeking expanded power to negotiate trade deals, specifically the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but while a bill granting him this power passed the Senate it was killed in the House last week despite John Boehner’s best effort.
This was only a temporary setback however and now it looks as if John Boehner is going to bring a stand alone TPA bill to the floor for a vote tomorrow. Here is more:
President Barack Obama and top Republicans in Congress joined forces Wednesday on a quick, bipartisan rescue attempt for the administration’s trade agenda, left for dead in the House last week in a revolt carried out by Democrats and backed by organized labor.
Officials said the Republican-controlled House would vote Thursday on a stand-alone bill to give Obama the enhanced negotiating authority the administration seeks as part of an effort to complete a 12-nation trade deal with Pacific Rim countries.
Hillary Clinton claimed that even though she conducted all State Department business on a private email server and even though she destroyed thousands of these emails that she turned over all official government emails and the ones she destroyed were only personal correspondence. End of story–we can trust her…
Except that it is not the end of the story because Mrs. Clinton went to great lengths to ensure her emails were not discovered by the wrong people and by wrong people I am not talking about enemies of the United States–if you get my meaning…
In addition to hiding her State Department emails on a personal server Hillary Clinton also had a secret adviser–a person Barack Obama told her he did not want in the State Department–in the form of longtime family friend Sidney Blumenthal, who was being paid by the Clinton Foundation while secretly advising the former Secretary of State on Libya.
But what Hillary Clinton seems to have forgotten is that while she might have destroyed some emails hoping it was the end of the story the person on the other end of those emails also has a copy…unless of course that person also destroyed it. And in the case of Sidney Blumenthal he did not.
Here is more:
Emails that a longtime confidant to Hillary Rodham Clintonrecently handed over to the House committee investigating the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, raise new questions about whether the State Department and Mrs. Clinton have complied with a series of requests from the panel.
The emails, provided by Sidney Blumenthal, a close adviser to Mrs. Clinton, include information about weapons that were circulating in Libya and about the security situation in Benghazi in the year and a half before the attacks. The committee has asked the State Department and Mrs. Clinton several times in the past year for emails from her and other department officials about “weapons located or found in” Libya and about the decision to open and maintain a diplomatic mission in Benghazi.
The emails from Mr. Blumenthal have widened a rift between the State Department and the committee.
So, Hillary Clinton has claimed she turned over all the official emails that she had and yet Mr. Blumenthal has provided the committee with emails from Hillary Clinton that the former Secretary of State did not turn over. There are only two possibilities here that I can think of.
Either Hillary Clinton had these emails all along and lied when she claimed she had fully complied with the investigation or she lied when she claimed she only destroyed personal correspondence.
Malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
According to this story the IRS has found another 6,400 of Lois Lerner’s emails but is refusing to turn them over because they might be duplicates. Here is more:
The Internal Revenue Service may have found 6,400 emails from Lois Lerner, who oversaw the tax agency’s Exempt Organizations Unit, but the government agency has no plans to share.
Attorneys from the Department of Justice representing the IRS say the emails won’t be shared because the service is making sure that none of them are duplicates.
Judicial Watch is not buying this excuse:
Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton, has said that the inspector general’s office has already checked for copies. “Even though TIGTA already identified and removed emails that were duplicates, the IRS is in ‘the process of conducting further manual deduplication of the 6,400’ emails, rather than reviewing them in response to Judicial Watch’s FOIA requests that are more than two years old now,” Fitton told The Daily Caller. “Our legal team will continue pursuing all necessary and available legal options to hold the IRS accountable for its flagrant abuse of power.”
And who can blame Judicial Watch for being skeptical? After all the IRS has not proven to be very trustworthy of late. It seems to me that if the IRS and the Department of Injustice were serious about getting to the bottom of this scandal they would hand over all these new emails and let Judicial Watch determine whether or not they are duplicates–that is the only way to get to the truth. Otherwise it leaves open the possibility that the IRS is trying to hide the damning emails by claiming they are duplicates and how would we know?
The only way to show the people these emails are duplicates is to release them, we cannot trust the IRS at this point to do what is right.
Malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
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