Liberals Are Extreme And Irrational The Chattanoogan Trump handily beat Clinton in part because a lot of decent moral people are getting really fed up with liberal judgmentalism, liberal self-righteousness, liberal name-calling, liberal violence and hate, liberal intolerance, liberal bullying, liberal ... |
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Liberals Are Extreme And Irrational - The Chattanoogan
After weeks of publicly complaining that Senate Democrats were going easy on Neil Gorsuch, liberal activists are close to securing a successful filibuster of President Donald Trumps Supreme Court pick. But theyre not stopping there.
Activists are now vowing to make Republicans pay a political price if they decide to rip up Senate rules to push Gorsuch through with a simple majority vote. And if Majority Leader Mitch McConnell does kill the Supreme Court filibuster to confirm Gorsuch, liberals say theyll still come out on top having further emboldened a base that wants Democrats to brook no compromise with Trump.
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Democrats showing they can unify [against Gorsuch] helps energize the grass roots, MoveOn.org Washington director Ben Wikler said in an interview. If Republicans decide to go nuclear, that will further energize the resistance movement. The only bad path here is for Democrats to flee the fight.
Simply getting to this point is a victory for the left, which began the Supreme Court battle frustrated with Senate Democrats and bluntly urging them to "do better" as Gorsuch appeared on track for easy confirmation. But over the past two weeks, as liberals kept nudging Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's caucus to push back harder, Democrats have abandoned their reluctance to commit to a filibuster.
The shift can be largely credited to the aggressive campaign from liberal groups, though a number of Democrats also became inclined to favor a filibuster after they found Gorsuch's answers far too noncommittal during his marathon confirmation hearing.
Most GOP senators have signaled theyre ready to back McConnell on a critical vote to unilaterally change Senate rules. But a handful have remained skeptical enough to fuel speculation among Gorsuch foes that the Kentucky Republican may be short of the votes.
Amid continuing talk of a last-minute deal to preserve the filibuster for Supreme Court picks, liberals are starting to publicly prod Republicans to explain why they would change the Senate rules.
I dont always see eye to eye with these folks, but some of them are expressing caution about changing the norms of the Senate, said Ilyse Hogue, president of the abortion-rights group NARAL Pro-Choice America. So well see. I dont know that they have 51 votes yet but thats on them to prove, not me.
As the Senate drew closer to a possible "nuclear option" scheduled for the end of next week, few Republicans were optimistic about defusing the tension.
The Democrats, they know better, Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) told reporters. But their base, you understand, wont allow them to do the right thing.
Corker referenced liberal protesters gathering outside Schumers Brooklyn apartment earlier this year as a reason that hes making these arguments about [Gorsuch] being extreme. We all know thats not true.
Senate Democrats don't share some liberal activists' skepticism that McConnell will muscle through a rules change that promises to further poison relations in the polarized Senate and which could spark blowback for his party when the GOP next loses the White House.
But Democrats do agree with one strategic move by their base: They're starting to press Republicans to own their decision to end filibusters for Supreme Court nominees, not just talk about it.
Everybodys talking about whether Gorsuch gets confirmed and thats essential and right in front of us, Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) said in an interview. But the broader question, in the sweep of history is: What happens to the Senate? And thats in the hands of just a handful of Republicans, not us.
"There are enormous implications of changing the rules of the Senate in order to force an unpopular Supreme Court justice through," adds Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). "I hope Republicans think about the consequences of what theyre thinking about doing."
For the moment, Democrats' progress towards a viable filibuster is attracting outsized attention on Capitol Hill. Politico's count stood at 36 Senate Democrats ready to block Gorsuch after Sen. Claire McCaskill of Missouri made a pivotal announcement of her opposition on Friday. Sens. Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Manchin of West Virginia are the only Democrats in the yes column.
On Monday, left-leaning groups, including Sen. Bernie Sanders' Our Revolution, plan to send a message to Democrats who are considering joining Heitkamp and Manchin. They have organized a petition publicly imploring the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to withhold support from any Democratic senator who backs Gorsuch.
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Once Schumer's caucus gets to 41 confirmed votes to block Gorsuch, the focus will shift to Republicans who remain less than publicly committed to supporting the so-called nuclear option to change the rules including Corker and Sens Susan Collins of Maine and John McCain of Arizona.
Liberal activist groups are pushing as hard as possible to move scrutiny to the GOP whip count, touting a poll they commissioned that shows 69 percent of all voters and even four in 10 Trump backers oppose Republican changes to Senate filibuster rules.
"McConnell has very cunningly kept all the attention off his conference for this whole arc," said one liberal strategist working on the Gorsuch nomination, describing moderate Republicans as "leaning into it, bluffing" on where they stand. "He does an excellent job of giving the impression that getting the votes to change the rules isnt a problem."
McConnell, for his part, is well aware of the pressure Democrats are facing from liberal groups opposed to Gorsuch.
"This isnt about the nominee at all," McConnell said on the floor earlier this week. "Its about a few on the left whose priority is to obstruct this Senate and this president, whenever and wherever they can. Months after the election, theyre still in campaign mode calling for Senate Democrats to obstruct and resist."
But with McConnell's guarantee that Gorsuch will be confirmed by April 7, liberals are warning Republicans of the potential midterm-election ramifications of jamming Gorsuch onto the court.
Hogue, of NARAL, said anti-Gorsuch rallies spearheaded by her group on Saturday would be aimed as much at Republicans as at Democrats.
"Its really important for people to remember that if this judge is confirmed, especially if Republicans change the rules to get Trumps guys in, it wont be theory in 2018," Hogue said. "This guy will have ruled. It will be a Gorsuch court and it most likely will have ruled on some of Trumps agenda."
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Liberals taste victory no matter Gorsuch outcome - Politico
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An awful lot of American liberals have become rather possessed by the possibility that President Trump is somehow in league with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The circumstantial evidence that there is some sort of connection is rather strong Putin very probably helped Trump win in 2016, some Trump associates have a rat's nest of connections with Russia, and Trump himself has been relying on financing from Eastern Europe for many years.
But definitive proof has yet to surface. So in their quest to find a connection particularly some sort of direct conspiracy between Trump and Putin some liberals are abandoning good sense and becoming credulous toward nutty thinkers.
It's important to avoid this not only because clear thinking is important, but because it is the best way to root out the truth.
I'm reminded in a way of the Second Red Scare. The era of Joseph McCarthy is rightly remembered as a time of deranged witch hunts and fevered anti-Communist paranoia. Something that is a bit less remembered is that the Soviet Union did indeed have extensive espionage success within the American government, particularly during the Second World War. They penetrated the Manhattan Project, they scooped up all manner of non-nuclear weapons technology, they recruited one of the very top economic policy officials in the country, and on and on.
In other words, the defining characteristic of McCarthyism was not a false belief that KGB spies had infiltrated the government, because they had. It was paranoia and hysterical panic about such spying, especially in how it was used to further partisan Republican ends. McCarthy was a fool and an incompetent drunk, but other Republican elites tolerated him and his accusations because he whipped up unhinged outrage against Democratic Party elites and policies. They loved it when he was falsely smearing Dean Acheson and George Marshall as secret Soviet sympathizers, or slagging public housing bills as the first step to Communism. It was only when McCarthy's erratic, diseased thinking, his constant lying and fabrication, and his utter investigative incompetence became undeniable that they began to desert him.
A corollary of this is that McCarthy was an active impediment to anti-espionage efforts. During the Red Scare, it's possible his various lists of supposed Communists included a small fraction of actual Soviet spies. But what tiny truth was there was swamped by the huge number of innocents caught up in the panic. What's more, after McCarthy's downfall the whole idea of Soviet infiltration of the American government was badly tainted by association with his vile methods.
(As an aside, it's important to note that all of this is orthogonal to the question of whether Soviet spying necessitated a hyper-belligerent diplomatic stance towards the USSR. All countries spy, America very much included, and in the end all the espionage probably didn't amount to much indeed, it may have actually calmed tensions somewhat.)
Now, liberals' Trump-Russia fever is not remotely as bad as what struck Republicans during the McCarthy era. There is no full-blown panic, nor any show trials. Yet there is an echo of the basic mechanics. Instead of a Wisconsin senator, we have Louise Mensch, a former Conservative MP and bug-eyed conspiracy hound who has been all over cable news making one unsubstantiated accusation after another and even somehow got a piece in The New York Times. And she is only the most prominent of a cottage industry of instant Russia "experts" who have sprung up to write long tweet threads and create infographics in Microsoft Paint validating liberals' darkest suspicions about Trump.
Again, it's important to emphasize, it really is possible Putin and Trump did collude somehow, or had some other connection. Liberals are right to smell blood in the water, and as I've argued before, it's only right and proper for a full investigation to be conducted. Ideally Congress would serve its constitutional duty, but with Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee, especially Chairman Devin Nunes, giving every sign of working hand-in-glove with the Trump administration to quash the ongoing investigation, that route may be closed off for the time being.
In the meantime, outside investigations and journalism are all that we have. But it's still critical for liberals to maintain a grip on reason, and require proof for extraordinary accusations. Even if Democrats manage to take back the House in 2018 and mount a true investigation, they can't assume that a smoking gun particularly one proving direct Trump-Putin collusion will be found.
In the meantime, there are plenty of horribly unpopular things Trump is doing, and horribly unpopular policies his party supports, to use as political weapons.
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Liberals are losing their minds over Trump and Russia - The Week Magazine
In opposition as in government, Justin Trudeau has never quite managed to command the attention of the House in the way that he often does in an unscripted format. It may be that he never bothered to try, writes Chantal Hbert. ( Sean Kilpatrick / THE CANADIAN PRESS file photo )
Justin Trudeau does not much like the House of Commons and the feeling is mutual.
This is not a statement on the people who sit alongside or across from the prime minister, or the latters feelings toward them.
A majority of MPs owe their seats to Trudeaus campaign skills and they are grateful to him for that. Most opposition members do not wake up at night to hate the current prime minister. On both sides of the Commons, some save their most negative feelings for colleagues of their own party.
No, this is really about the venue itself a stage for which Trudeaus affection seems inversely proportional to his love of rallies, parades of all kinds and even the most contrarian of town halls.
In opposition as in government, Trudeau has never quite managed to command the attention of the House in the way that he often does in an unscripted format. It may be that he never bothered to try.
Even in his early days as opposition leader, he did not have a lot of time for the mini-dramas that tend to grip the attention of Parliament Hill insiders.
While Thomas Mulcair systematically dominated question period, and earned kudos for his performance, Trudeau was content to achieve the required minimum to stay on the radar.
Today it is Mulcair who on the way out and Trudeau who is half way into a majority mandate. His House performance in his new role as prime minister has been consistent with his daily performances as opposition leader.
What agitates the Commons is often unrelated to what drives the mood of the country. Thats a disconnect that political leaders (and those who are paid to report on them) lose sight of at their own peril. But Trudeau is at risk of going to the other extreme.
Possibly because he earned poor marks for his spotty attendance in the House over his first year in office the prime minister has been more assiduous in question period since the new year. He is often there in body only.
Trudeau rarely engages with the opposition in a meaningful way. For the most part he speaks past his critics arguments. The attentive hearing he affords those who challenge him in town halls does not extend to opposition parliamentarians. When not on his feet, Trudeau can be the picture of adolescent boredom.
Trudeau leads by example. His attitude has filtered down the Liberal benches. They are filled with rookies who won seats for the first time in 2015. One of them Bardish Chagger serves as the governments house leader. She has perfected the art of delivering unhelpful answers with a smile.
Another is Finance Minister Bill Morneau. If cardboard cut-outs could speak he might have one take his place in question period. On budget day he told me he feels that what happens in the Commons is for the most part destined to never make it out of the bubble. Like his leader he does not see the point of putting a lot of energy on his parliamentary game.
All of which brings one to the wide-ranging House reforms the Liberals have recently brought forward under the guise of what they call a discussion paper.
For the four opposition parties the proposals add up to a heavy-handed bid to erode their already limited capacity to hold a majority government to account.
There is a bit of verbal inflation at play here. Some of the government proposals used to be championed by Conservative MP Michael Chong as part of a bid to breathe more life in Canadas parliamentary democracy.
But overall the spirit that seems to have presided over the drafting of the Liberal wish list is a desire to make the House function in a more convenient manner for the government. In opposition, Trudeau would have fought many of the proposals tooth and nail.
The Liberals already enjoy the powers of a majority on the basis of a minority of the votes cast in the last election. It does not help that they apparently feel no obligation to seek if not unanimity at least a multi-party consensus before changing the way the House operates.
Only a governing party that is tone-deaf to the mood of the House would have initiated such a sensitive discussion in this way so soon after having led the opposition down the garden path on electoral reform. In this instance the tone-deafness is deliberate.
Chantal Hbert is a national affairs writer. Her column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday
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Trudeau, Liberals tone-deaf to House of Commons: Hbert - Toronto Star
Toronto Sun | Sunshine list swells under Liberals Toronto Sun The number of Ontario public servants making $100,000 a year or more has grown by 727% since the Liberals gained government in 2003. It is now routine to see teachers, police officers, firefighters, nurses, paramedics, school caretaking team leaders ... |
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