Seems we're all so busy trying to beat the other fellow in making things go faster and look shinier and cost less that Christmas got lost.

Wouldn't it be ironic that as one of Bush's last official acts as President he finally did the right thing for once and acted to bail out automakers?

I won't hold my breath.

But if we had any doubt that Republicans were going to put aside their partisan bullshit for the good of the country after the results of the last election I think the events of this week pretty much dispelled them.

We began the week with Republicans pushing the Clinton rules back into place in the media with the Blagojevich story. Apparently, just as it was in the 90s, innuendo from conservatives once again equals fact. Guilty until proven innocent and all that.

Watch for a strong push from congressional Republicans in the next session to replace Fitzgerald with a special prosecutor willing to dig into more than just this pay to play Illinois stuff. These fuckers play for keeps. Deja vu all over again.

Then we had Republicans take a shit on working Americans as they worked to bust the UAW. The headlines surrounding this are ridiculous. "Senate Bails on Auto Bailout: What Next?" Are you kidding me? How about "Senate Republicans Give American Economy the Andy Dufresne Treatment" as a more accurate headline?


Don't even get me started on this "Corker is a hero" bulshit. He was the Chief Obstructionist. He was an excuse. He was a tool. Nothing more.


Once again I hold out hope that Obama, Reid, Pelosi and the rest of the Democratic leadership will finally come to their senses and realize you cannot deal with these people in good faith. They are going to filibuster, and scream and clench their tiny little fists in faux rage at every step of the process as we try to set to work fixing the messes that they made.


Ignore the petty little fuckers. Utilize legislative solutions that work around them. Put everything, including health-care reform into ominbus budget bills that can't be filibustered. If they intend to filibuster then for God's sakes make them really filibuster.


But let's stop pretending Republican Senators care about this country because they don't. Not in the slightest.

Hey, maybe you haven't been keeping up on current events, but we just got our asses kicked, pal!

One of my favorite lines the last couple of months as the issue of gender has entered the presidential primary is to say we'd have a woman as president right now if congress did their damn jobs. I firmly believe this to be true. If congress was following their own constitutionally mandated role of oversight of the Executive Branch then I have no doubt that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would currently be working in the Oval Office.

The immediate reaction of realists when they consider that statement is to dismiss it outright. Simple math makes the idea that George W. Bush and Dick Cheney could be impeached and removed from office absurd. In the first place- the numbers aren't there for a conviction in the Senate. The whole thing would be an exercise in futility from the start.

It seems to me that this unfortunate reaction to my oft-repeated quip that if congress was doing their job Pelosi would be the president is based on the idea that I am attacking our Democratic leadership in congress in making that statement. In fact - I'm only partly attacking our Democratic leadership. I'm also attacking every other warm body in a suit on capitol hill, Democrats and Republicans, who refuse to accept their constitutionally mandated role in our federal government. Those that put the needs of their party or, more often, their own political careers ahead of the need of their country.

It also seems to me that the assertion of powerlessness of congressional Democrats in the face of a slim majority in the Senate as an excuse (and let's be honest an excuse is exactly what it is) towards inaction is also a tacit admission of the of the real problem facing us. Think about the above calculation on conviction and see if you can determine anything other than our leaders will not push for impeachment because, regardless of evidence, facts or public sentiment, Senate Republicans (and Lieberman) will vote in a block against conviction. Recognition of this reality may be rational, but acceptance of it is as a simple fact of life is beyond absurd.

This collective acquiescence to the true partisans in our government is what drives progressives like myself absolutely nuts. For over thirty years now we've watched as Democrats have continued to meet vicious attacks from Republicans by effectively rolling over and tucking their tail between their legs. We've watched as our constitution was subverted through Iran Contra or abused as it was through the impeachment of William Jefferson Clinton. Probably the worst thing we've had to endure is to watch that constitution be simply ignored as this President used a horrible tragedy as an excuse to consolidate power in the Executive not granted to it under our constitutional framework. Again and again our elected representatives in congress refused to acknowledge what they're we're up against.

I would ask the realists to consider this mathematical formulation: 61-39. That is the absolute minimum margin the next Democratic president will have to have in the Senate in order to get anything done. It doesn't matter if it's president Clinton II or Obama. NOTHING of any consequence will make it through the Senate without a Democratic majority of at least 61 Senators. Not health care reform. Not tax reform. Certainly not any progressive Supreme Court Judges. Republican Senators will block it all. They'll do it because they can.

God forbid the Democrats don't lose the House and/ or Senate while a Democratic president is in office, because that day in January that they swear that new congress in will be the day impeachment proceedings begin against that man or woman. They'll do it because they can.

Because they can. Because Democrats don't fight. Because Democrats continue to try and get along with these people or meet them half-way when all they'd rather do to the Democrats in return is put 'em in a bus and drive 'em off a cliff.

I understand the question of what impeachment would accomplish (and it it's really a moot question this late in Bush's term.) My honest answer is that I just don't know.

But I also know what NOT impeaching Bush has gotten us. Not to mention NOT forcing Senators to filibuster or NOT using the congressional powers of Inherent Contempt to really bring the hammer down on John Bolton and Harriet Meiers and a whole list of powers inherent to, but unused by, congressional Democrats which are too numerous to list here. It hasn't led to victory, legislative success or even compromise. It's led to one big GOP middle-finger in our direction.

If we're truly serious about the kind of country we want this to be then we need to bend that finger back until in breaks.

Do you remember things that made sense? Things you could count on? Before we all got so lost? What are we gonna do, Charlie? What am I gonna do?

I think it was don snabalus who first pointed me towards Fark.com. I check that site a couple of times a day and really enjoy the saucy comments, photoshopped pictures of our leaders and smart ass exchanges that make up most of the discourse at Fark. Fark is the perfect site for the permanently sarcastic, terminally hip and nerds-in-denial that make up a good portion of the internet.

What Fark isn't is a site for serious debate and deep discussion of the issues (although I'm at a loss to think of a site on the internet that is.) Showing a little bit of your true self or letting your guard down there will get you burned. Big time.

That's why I was stunned to run into the following post by somebody going by the Fark handle cackylacky this morning-

This made me cry.

I'm so damn sick and tired of feeling like this. I hate that this stupidman has taken a life that I and my family were once proud of and made it conflicted and confusing and painful.

I hate sending my husband off to Iraq and looking at my kids and knowing that, if the worst happens, I can't even look at them and say "Your daddy died doing what was right."

I hate having conversations with him that start over some random snippet of news and end with me sobbing in his arms, begging him to get out, and having him hold me and ask me, "If all the good men leave, who will be left? And what will happen then?"

I hate feeling responsible for this. I hate it.

I was lied to, and I bought it. I couldn't believe that our entire government was lying to us. It seemed so impossible, sooo... tin-foil hattish.

I hate going to Target and seeing boys being pushed around in Naval Hospital-issued wheelchairs by their wives, while holding their babies.

I hate funerals.

How did we get here? He joined when it was all rescuing downed pilots and non-combatant evacs. Saving the world and all that rot.

I think I'm gonna be sick.I hope noone reads this. I'll read it later andbe ashamed. I don't care. It's early in the morning, late in the thread. Screwit.

http://forums.fark.com/cgi/fark/comments.pl?IDLink=2939447

As Republican Senators spend last night and this morning pretending to be bored by the debate taking place in the Senate and the attempt to stop their obstruction I think of cacky, and people like her and I get pissed. Why don't you find her and yawn in her face Senatro Inhoefe?