So shooter, where and when did democrats stull ballot boxes in 2020?
And where did you get that info?

Huh?

 

The definition of insanity is silty.

 

So the best we can tell, american hater does not support requiring the CIA to at least get a subpoena before they spy on Americans.

And apparently he has no problem with the CIA using taxpayer money to buy data on Americans from the likes of Google.

Probably he thinks its a great idea because he knows they will only go after trump and his supporters.

He's probably right about who the CIA would target.

 

Elise Stefanik's brag about humble origins busted by new investigation

Travis Gettys
April 15, 2024 4:14PM ET




Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) speaks during the 6th Annual Women Rule Summit at a hotel in Washington, DC on December 11, 2018. (Photo by MANDEL NGAN / AFP)




Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) grew up quite a bit wealthier than she has let on since entering politics, according to a new investigative report.

The New York Republican contrasted herself against her Democratic rival in 2014 as a scrappy underdog running against a "multimillionaire," but The Daily Beast found that the Harvard graduate came from a much more comfortable background than she has let on.

"If Stefanik was supposed to remember where she came from, she seems to have forgotten — to the point of making blatantly misleading statements, beginning in her first congressional campaign — how her family’s wealth has given her a leg up, from providing her with an expensive private-school education to her parents buying her a $1.2 million D.C. townhouse when she was just 26," wrote William Bredderman and Jake Lahut for the website.

She was actually asked about that townhouse, which is now valued at more than $1.85 million, according to assessor records, and while she has long described the three-bedroom residence as an “investment property,” the D.C. Recorder of Deeds office shows no other investors in house other than Stefanik’s parents and her younger brother.

Stefanik has repeatedly said her parents "risked everything" to start up the company Premium Plywood Products "from scratch," but The Daily Beast found that they secured a Small Business Administration-guaranteed loan worth $335,000 — around $755,000 in today’s money – shortly after incorporating the company in 1991, and her father was also able to resolve a federal tax lien lodged in 1997 for $21,621 in under a month.

The future lawmaker attended Albany Academy for Girls, where New York's political and business elites have long sent their daughters, and she graduated from Harvard in 2006 and went straight to work for then-president George W. Bush's administration with the help of an Ivy League mentor.

ALSO READ: A criminologist explains why keeping Trump from the White House is all that matters

The Daily Beast investigation also found evidence that Stefanik's own business ventures received substantial assistance from her parents' wealth, in contrast with her political biography's claims, and the lawmaker's team disputed the findings of what they inaccurately described as a "pitched story."

“Rep. Stefanik grew up in a hardworking small business family that her parents built from scratch, was the first in her family to have the opportunity to graduate from college, and is working hard everyday to serve her constituents to ensure they have economic opportunity that is currently being crushed under Joe Biden,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “Many Members own property in Washington D.C., yet the mainstream media continues their deranged obsession with attacking Elise.”



https://www.rawstory.com/elise-stefanik-2667775093/

 

So we can tell right away that american hater has never run a small business, been responsible for a payroll, or had to deal with asshole customers.
And apparently, neither have the authors of american haters copy N paste.
But say, Stefanik is a deplorable, and a rising star, so all's fair, eh?

TWAT

 

Just to defeat lies and false accusations I had my own small business for more than 10 years. I was editor, publisher, reporter, advertising manager and sales, and head of maintenance of my own general circulation newspaper. I hired and fired employees and had to set the budget.And on more than one occasion some of my asshole customers threatened to kill me. And one of them was a serious enough threat I started carrying a gun for a while.

And were the diversion fails is the story has nothing to do with running a small business. The point of the story is Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) lying about her background trying to claim she came from very humble beginnings when in fact she was privileged and pampered.

 

This one is personally satisfying to me. One of the hallmarks of treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans is no one can tell them what to do and no rules apply to them. Or in Trump's case now laws can be applied to him. And so some of them flaunted House rules on going through metal detectors and mask mandates. And so they got fined and then fought the fines all the way to the Supreme Court where the court told them to get fucked.


Supreme Court snubs House Republicans who dodged metal detectors in Congress after Jan. 6
Dan Morrison, USA TODAY
Updated Mon, April 15, 2024 at 3:33 PM MDT·3 min read
2.1k

• 
  

What happens in Congress stays in Congress, the Supreme Court signaled on Monday, as it turned away an appeal by three Republican congressmen who were fined $5,000 each by the House for dodging security scanners installed after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

The court’s decision comes months after justices snubbed the case of three other GOP members of Congress who had their pay docked in 2021 for flouting a mask mandate on the House floor during the COVID pandemic.

In the current case, Reps. Andrew Clyde, R-Georgia, Lloyd Smucker, R-Penn., and former Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas had asked the high court to intervene over the “massive fines” they incurred for ignoring magnetometers set up outside the House chamber after rioters assaulted the Capitol in a violent attempt at thwarting certification of President Joe Biden’s election.

The scanners were controversial at the time and the House rule to install them passed by a handful of votes. "It is beyond comprehension why any member would refuse to adhere to these simple, commonsense steps to keep this body safe," Nancy Pelosi, then the House Speaker, said following the vote.

Two weeks after the Capitol attack, news outlets reported that Rep. Andy Harris, Republican of Maryland, had been turned away from the chamber after a scanner revealed he was carrying a concealed handgun.



It was unclear when the incidents involving Clyde, Smucker and Gohmert took place. Gohmert said in February 2021 that he had briefly stepped off the House floor to use a washroom and wasn't aware he needed to be scanned again before returning.

"At no time until yesterday did anyone mention the need to be wanded after entering the restroom directly in front of the guards," he said. "Unlike in the movie The Godfather, there are no toilets with tanks where one could hide a gun, so my reentry onto the House floor should have been a non-issue." Gohmert retired in 2022.

Clyde, Smucker and Gohmert refused to pay their fines after losing an appeal to the House ethics committee, and each saw their pay docked by $5,000. Members of Congress earn a base salary of $174,000.

The security-dodgers then sued the House sergeant at arms and the body’s chief administrator, arguing that the officials had violated the Constitution’s 27th Amendment by “varying” their congressionally mandated pay. They said the metal detectors and the payroll issue fell outside Congress’ legislative function − making them fair game for the federal courts despite the separation of powers at the heart of U.S. government.



Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, speaks during a June 14 press conference held with Rep. Andrew Clyde, R-Ga., outside the U.S. Capitol to announce the filing of a lawsuit challenging fines levied for violations of the new security screening policies for members of the House of Representatives to enter the House chamber.

Lawyers for the House officials replied that Congress' work belongs only to Congress under the Constitution, and that elected representatives have their pay altered regularly for tax withholding and other matters.

A federal appeals panel held − just as it did in the masking case brought by Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Georgia, and two other Republicans − that the judiciary doesn't have oversight of Congress.

On Monday, the high court affirmed that ruling by declining to take the metal detector case.

The metal detectors came down in 2023 after Republicans gained a majority in the House. But that didn't settle the issue.

In February 2023, sparks flew at a meeting of the House Natural Resources Committee after Rep. Jared Huffman, D-Calif., asked for a rule to be reinstated barring guns from the committee room.



“I feel I need one everywhere here," Rep. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., reportedly said. "There are often times we are harassed in the hallways. We walk alone.” She added any gun she carried would “not be an unloaded weapon.”

Capitol Police and a spokeswoman for Rep. Harris didn't respond to inquiries about the status of a reported investigation into his 2021 gun incident.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/supreme-court-snubs-house-republicans-134306876.html

 

Ah. So then american hater understands fully that when one starts and runs a small business they are not automatically made part of the "privileged class". Or perhaps american hater, because he owned a "small business" considers himself part of the privileged class? if so, please turn in your despicable voters card.

In fact, the company the Stefanik family has employees fewer than 25 employees with annual revenues of under $5 MILLION, making it a small business.
Got that, american hater? The company at issue is in fact, by every definition, a SMALL BUSINESS. A SMALL FAMILY OWNED AND OPERATED BUSINESS.
And getting a small business loan from the government hardly qualifies as "privilege" does it?
Did your hack job reporting show whether the loan was repaid?
On time?
You understand how small business loans through the government work, right?
You understand, a government small business loan is hardly considered "privilege", right?
Or maybe it does, if one is a deplorable and a despicable is judging them?

Now perhaps the fact that Stefanik went to Harvard is the "privilege" american hater is twirling about.
Indeed, 2/3 of students at Harvard would be described as "Privileged".
But the other 1/3 actually come from what we would call "poor people". You know, on scholarships, work/study etc.
Economic diversity and student outcomes at Harvard - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Did your hack job reveal how Stefanik paid for her Harvard education?
Would it matter to you?

Or perhaps its the DC Townhouse her parents bought for her. That MILLION DOLLAR TOWNHOUSE!
Which has nothing to do with "humble beginnings", does it?
Isn't that the American dream after all?
To start a small business, work hard and build it so you can send your kids to a better school, and maybe even buy them a home?
You know, a nice home? A TOWNHOUSE EVEN??

But perhaps the real problem american hater has is that Stefanik is a deplorable. What despicables love to describe as uneducated, unwashed, brainwashed red necks.
Is that the privilege american hater is twirling about?

Nah. It doesn't matter to american hater. Just skewering all things deplorable is the mission, especially anything connected to trump, no matter how tenuous the connection might be.

Isn't that true, american hater?

 

Ex-Navy SEAL GOP candidate apparently caught in another lie about battle wound: WaPo

Travis Gettys
April 17, 2024 10:32AM ET




Tim Sheehy (Credit: Tim Sheehy for Senate press materials)




Republican Senate candidate Tim Sheehy claims he suffered a gunshot wound while serving as a Navy SEAL in Afghanistan — but newly revealed documents suggest he's been caught in a lie.

The decorated war veteran says he was hit, possibly by friendly fire, by a ricochet bullet during a 2012 firefight.

The Washington Post revealed earlier this month that Sheehy actually reported to officials that he shot himself in the arm three years later when he accidentally discharged a firearm in Montana's Glacier National Park — an account he told the newspaper was a "lie" he'd made up, "To protect himself and his former platoonmates from facing a potential military investigation into an old bullet wound."

But a newly discovered detailed written statement from Sheehy to a law enforcement officer seemingly confirms that he accidentally shot himself in 2015 when his Colt .45 revolver fell and discharged in the national park.

“As a highly trained and combat experienced wounded veteran, I can assure you this was an unfortunate accident and we are grateful no other persons or property were damaged,” Sheehy said in a 2015 statement apologizing for illegally discharging his firearm in the park. The statement was obtained by the Post after it filed a Freedom of Information Act request.

ALSO READ: A criminologist explains why keeping Trump from the White House is all that matters

“Due to my ongoing security clearance and involvement with national defense related contracts, I request leniency with any charges related to this unfortunate accident.”

Sheehy told investigators he had kept the gun in his vehicle as bear protection, according to the National Park Service documents released to the Post.

But he had told the newspaper that he made up the accidental shooting story in October 2015 to cover up a wound he says he sustained while fighting in Afghanistan.

"A National Park Service summary of the incident, which was also included in the newly released documents, says an unidentified park visitor reported an accidental gun discharge in Logan Pass," the Post reported. "That differs from Sheehy’s current account, that law enforcement was first contacted by personnel at a hospital that treated him for wounds that he now says he received from falling during a hike. The summary does not identify the park visitor who made the report of a gun discharge."

The Park Service documents were filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Montana, and Sheehy went to a hospital in Kalispell to treat the gunshot wound, according to records, and he first spoke to the ranger who responded to the shooting call at the hospital and later paid a $525 fine for illegally discharging his weapon in the national park.

Sheehy now claims the gun never went off, and he told the Post he decided to lie to hospital staff and then the ranger to ensure the older wound would not launch a military investigation that could have harmed the careers of his former platoon mates, according to his campaign and an attorney who represents him.

That lawyer, Daniel Watkins, questioned whether the park visitor mentioned in the documents actually existed, saying the ranger never indicated that he had interviewed that individual as part of his investigation, and suggested that hospital staff notified park dispatchers of the incident after Sheehy lied about the accidental shooting.

“The released reports corroborate the information we have provided, and they confirm Mr. Sheehy’s recollection of what took place,” Watkins wrote in a letter to the Post.



https://www.rawstory.com/tim-sheehy-navy-seal-2667799294/

 

I bet they are silent but deadly.



House conservatives have a special group dedicated to preserving their power. Of course, it's called the FART team.
Brent D. Griffiths
Thu, April 18, 2024 at 1:24 PM MDT·3 min read
26

• 
  

• House conservatives have organized a crack team to monitor to potential ways to undermine their power.
  
  
• The House Freedom Caucus has formed a Floor Action Response Team.
  
  
• Yes, they called it FART.
  

The far-right House Freedom Caucus has formed a crack team of conservative lawmakers to monitor the House floor lest Speaker>Mike Johnson or other Republicans try to limit their power.

Naturally, the band of rabble-rousers that loves generating headlines for its members has called the group the Floor Action Response Team or FART. Because, why not?

According to Politico, this group will make sure that no other Republicans try to rush through changes that would make it harder for lawmakers to oust Johnson from power or that would strip three Freedom Caucus members of a powerful perch they all hold. The publication reported that the Freedom Caucus does not expect any such maneuvers but is remaining vigilant just in case any of their colleagues try to be silent but deadly to their cause.

Conservatives' tensions with Johnson have surged since the $1.2 trillion government funding bill to avert a partial shutdown. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican and former Freedom Caucus member, filed a motion to potentially remove Johnson from power in response to the funding bill. The situation has only grown worse after Johnson made clear he would allow the House to vote on additional US aid to Ukraine.

Greene could force a vote on Johnson's future at any time. Earlier this week, Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican with a libertarian bent, became the first Republican to pledge to join Greene's effort publicly. Massie is also not a member of the Freedom Caucus, whose membership is technically secret, but he does support many of the caucus' broader aims.

The team does not appear to be a new creation. The X account PatriotTakes, which frequently trolls Republicans, posted a clip in 2022 of Rep. Lauren Boebert, a Colorado Republican and Freedom Caucus member, discussing a FART team.

"Myself and other members of members of the House Freedom Caucus, we have a Floor Action Response Team," Boebert said during an appearance on a Blaze Media show. "F-A-R-T, I'm a mother of four boys, I can appreciate that."

Kevin McCarthy is partially responsible for the stink.
Former Speaker Kevin McCarthy initially resisted setting the "motion to vacate" at the threshold of just a single lawmaker before reversing himself to wrap up the votes to what ultimately became his doomed speakership. Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida made history by successfully using the motion to vacate to force McCarthy's ouster. Gaetz teamed up with seven other House Republicans and House Democrats to boot McCarthy from power.

FART is also worried that more centrist GOP lawmakers could move to strip Massie, Rep. Chip Roy, and Ralph Norman from the powerful House Rules Committee. In another McCarthy-era concession, Republicans allowed the three conservative lawmakers to serve on the panel responsible for determining how most legislation reaches the floor. In recent weeks, the trio has increasingly used their power to effectively block Johnson from carrying out his agenda.

On Wednesday evening, Rep. Mike Lawler, a New York Republican who represents a swing district, said the three lawmakers should either resign from the panel or be formally removed by their colleagues.

"They are there on behalf of the conference, not themselves," Lawler wrote on X.

Read the original article on Business Insider



https://www.yahoo.com/news/house-conservatives-special-group-dedicated-192428628.html

 

As it turns out, the biden administrations hope for a renewed FISA warrant process without any pesky protections to keep overzealous law enforcement from fucking over the opposition is in trouble.
See, we've all heard about the excesses of the FBI/DOJ in getting FISA warrants to spy on Trump and his election campaign. From falsifying e mails, hiding information about the Steele Dossier that they were using to justify FISA warrants, and just plain lying about the source of lies they used in their warrant applications.

So anyway, a few despicables and some deplorables who haven't sold their souls to the deep state have put their backs up and are refusing to vote for an extension of the current FISA process. At least, not without some amendments that will (hopefully) close up some of the abuses we've seen.

Of course, Schumer is screaming that failure to vote for the bill, AS IS, RIGHT NOW, TODAY, WITHOUT ANY CHANGES!!
Will be the biggest intelligence community failure in modern times.
We think he shouts a bit too loud and too shrill, eh?​

Schumer has only hours left to avoid FISA warrantless surveillance shutdown (msn.com)
Schumer has only hours left to avoid FISA warrantless surveillance shutdown
Story by Alexander Bolton
9h

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has less than 24 hours to reauthorize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act’s (FISA) warrantless surveillance program before it expires at 11:59 p.m. Friday, and he has a tough path ahead to meet the deadline.

Schumer needs to get around a coalition of Republican and Democratic senators who want to dramatically change the House-passed bill, which would almost certainly result in intelligence and law enforcement agencies losing important authorities for a few days.

On the Republican side of the aisle, Sens. Rand Paul (Ky.), Mike Lee (Utah) and Josh Hawley (Mo.) are pushing for changes to the bill.

They want to add provisions to bar intelligence and law enforcement agencies from buying Americans’ data from third parties and to prohibit FISA from authorizing any surveillance or searches of Americans.

On the Democratic side, two of Schumer’s top deputies, Senate Finance Committee Chair Ron Wyden (Ore.) and Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.) are aiming to rewrite core elements of the bill.

Wyden plans to offer an amendment to cut language that would expand the scope of businesses required to comply with data requests, while Durbin has an amendment to require warrants to review Americans’ information swept up in the surveillance of foreign targets.

But Senate leaders warn that making changes to the bill will prevent it from passing by the deadline and force intelligence surveillance programs to “go dark.”

“There are things I’d like to change in the House bill as well. But the reality is, we’re out of time. The choice is before us — and as we think about amendments, this is the case — pass this bill or allow 702 [to] sunset,” said Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Mark Warner (D-Va.), referring to the surveillance power authorized under FISA’s Section 702.

Warner warned that amending the bill and sending it back to the House would “invite a sunset” in authority, which he called an “unspeakable outcome that the president’s own intelligence advisory board has said will be remembered as one of the worst intelligence failures of our time.”

Schumer urged his colleagues not to delay the bill, pointing to the looming deadline.

“We obviously don’t have a lot of time left before FISA authorities expire,” he warned.

The Senate voted 67 to 37 to advance the House-passed FISA reauthorization bill Thursday, but senators still need to take at least two more procedural votes just to set up a vote on final passage, something that could take days unless all 100 senators agree to speed up the process.

Paul says he will push the debate past Friday’s deadline unless he gets enough time to debate and vote on changes to the bill.

“If all else fails, I think we can live under the Constitution maybe for a day, maybe two days. I think we’d survive,” he said, arguing the country got along fine before Congress passed FISA in 1978.

He said if FISA lapses, intelligence and law enforcement agencies could go to regular courts to secure warrants to surveil Americans and don’t need any special permission to spy on foreigners.

“Article III courts are pretty lenient. If you go to a judge in D.C. and say, ‘We think this guy has a bunch of meth,’ they’ll give you a wiretap,” Paul said of regular criminal courts.

Paul on Thursday afternoon said he and his allies want to offer six to 10 amendments to change the bill.

“They all have to get votes. There needs to be sufficient time to debate them,” he said.

A Republican senator said that at least three of those amendments have a chance of passing, which would then require the Senate to send it back to the House before it goes to President Biden’s desk for a signature.

One amendment that has a good chance of passing is sponsored by Durbin, the No. 2-ranking Senate Democratic leader, and Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.).

The amendment would require the government to obtain court approval before accessing the content of Americans’ private communications swept up in surveillance of foreigners authorized by FISA’s Section 702. It’s similar to the amendment sponsored by Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.), which barely failed by a vote of 212 to 212.

A Senate Democratic aide said the close vote in the House shows that amendments would have a chance of passing in the Senate. The source cautioned, however, the stakes are higher now because any amendments adopted at this late stage would mean keeping the bill in Congress past Friday’s deadline.

Wyden, a senior member of the Intelligence Committee, wants to amend the FISA bill to strike out language crafted by House Intelligence Committee Chair Mike Turner (R-Ohio) that he says would dramatically expand the number of businesses that would be forced to comply with surveillance requests.

“Now if you have access to any communications, the government can force you to help it spy. That means anyone with access to a sever, a wire, a cable box, a Wi-Fi router, a phone or computer,” Wyden warned on the Senate floor.

That claim prompted a strong rebuttal from Warner, the Senate Intelligence Committee chair.

“It’s not expanding FISA,” he insisted. “It’s a complete mischaracterization.”

He said when Section 702 was first crafted 15 years ago, cloud-based data storage and other new technologies didn’t exist.

“The world on telecom has changed since 2008, and things like the cloud in 2008 was something [that] was going to rain on you. Data centers are items that didn’t exist,” he said. “So you have to update your definitions.”

Tensions in the Senate are rising as lawmakers stumble close to the deadline without a plan for how to handle the demand for amendments.

Senate Republican Whip John Thune (S.D.) warned that Schumer will have to agree to vote on amendments in order to make the deadline.

Lee, who is demanding changes to the bill, along with Paul, Wyden and other senators, on Thursday argued that no real authority would lapse if Congress fails to reauthorize FISA by the weekend.

“They are lying when they say that FISA 702 collection will end abruptly at midnight tomorrow. It will not,” he insisted on the Senate floor, noting that Congress included language in the last reauthorization bill that would allow the program to continue as long as it has the certification of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

But other senators are disputing that theory, including Warner and Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), a member of the Intelligence panel.

“That’s not true. I know there’s a legal theory that because the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court certified the program for a year that somehow maybe we can continue to use those tools, but I don’t believe that’s true,” Cornyn said. “That certification was in expectation that the [congressional] authorization would resume in effect, and there is no other authority.”

 

Greene seems to be picking up support for her motion to vacate the Speakership so why hasn't she filed her motion yet? I think its because she is taking so much heat she is getting cold feet and chickening out. But we will see if it actually gets filed.




Gosar becomes third House GOP member to back effort to oust Johnson from speakership
Melanie Zanona, Annie Grayer, Manu Raju and Shania Shelton, CNN
Fri, April 19, 2024 at 12:40 PM MDT·5 min read
366



(Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images/File)

• 
  

Rep. leaving the page." data-wf-tooltip-position="bottom" data-wf-reset-every="90">Paul Gosar on Friday signed on to the effort to remove Speaker Mike Johnson from his job, the Arizona Republican announced in a news release, becoming the third member to do so.

Gosar huddled on the House floor earlier in the day with GOP Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie, the other two co-sponsors of the motion to vacate the speakership.

They have not taken steps to force a floor vote on the resolution. The House adjourned for the rest of the day on Friday afternoon, meaning the earliest Greene could move to oust Johnson is Saturday.


If Greene takes that consequential step, the House will have to consider it within two legislative days. This means leadership could wait to handle it on the floor after the weeklong recess if they so choose. A floor vote to oust Johnson would require a majority to succeed.

Conservative lawmakers, who are unhappy with the speaker over his proposed foreign aid bills among other priorities, have attacked the speaker for relying on Democrats to advance the bills.

Rep. Chip Roy, a key hardliner who sits on the House Rules Committee, accused Johnson of giving away Republicans’ leverage on border security. However, he would not say if he would support ousting the speaker.

“I’m not getting into that right now,” he said, but when pressed on whether moving to oust the speaker would hurt the House GOP conference, he replied, “I mean, it’s bad for our party not to lead,” and lamented the GOP’s inaction on border security.

Other GOP hardliners were also seething on Friday.

“It’s tough to defend him right now. You know, and that’s hard to say, but it’s just a reality,” said Rep. Eli Crane.

The Arizona Republican, who voted to oust former Speaker Kevin McCarthy last fall, didn’t rule out supporting efforts to remove Johnson.

“My position is that I’m open, and I’m not going to tell you guys what I’m going to do. We’ll see if that materializes, we’ll see if the trigger is pulled on this. That won’t be up to me, but I’m definitely frustrated like a lot of the conference and like a lot of the American people,” he said.

“He knows how frustrated I am. I do it as respectfully as I can, but I’m not going to pull punches because at the end of the day this is so much bigger than me or the motion to vacate or Speaker Mike Johnson,” Crane added. “To me, this comes down to, ‘Are we going to try to save this country, or are we just going to continue on with the Washington uniparty that continuously sells out the American people?’”

Rep. Dan Bishop targeted his ire at the House GOP Conference’s leadership as a whole, calling their actions “pathetic.”

“My purpose is not really criticism of the speaker, per se, it’s the whole – it’s the power sources within the Republican Conference and the way – and the speaker, unfortunately, has acceded to it – but it’s the way that they never prioritize center-right Americans’ priorities. Never. And that’s where we’ve ended up again, and I think it’s pathetic,” he said.

Bishop was clear that he is not supporting removing Johnson from the speakership – for now. “I don’t see any particular advantage in solving the problem I just described by moving against the speaker at this time,” said the North Carolina Republican.

Gosar’s move comes as Johnson has faced growing threats to his speakership for his handling of legislation to send foreign aid to Ukraine and Israel.

That threat reached its highest point yet on Thursday after CNN and other outlets reported that Johnson was being lobbied by his members to raise the threshold required to trigger the procedure to oust the speaker – a move that would help ensure the Louisiana Republican can pass foreign aid bills and still keep his job without needing to rely on Democrats to bail him out.

The speaker was surrounded on the House floor on Thursday by a number of far-right lawmakers in a heated discussion. The group implored Johnson to give them assurances that he would not raise the threshold on the motion to vacate, but the speaker would not commit, leaving many of the lawmakers fuming and some even saying this was a red line that could propel the motion to oust him forward.

After that pressure, Johnson said later in the day that he will not change the procedure for removing him from the speakership.

Prominent conservative lawmakers echoed Bishop in refusing to back removing Johnson from the speakership until at least the election in November.

House Freedom Caucus Chairman Bob Good told CNN’s Manu Raju that Johnson “has failed us,” and sharply criticized his handling of the foreign aid bills, though he added that he is opposed to ousting Johnson ahead of November.

“I don’t defend the performance of the speaker, I don’t defend the actions that have been taken, including today, I think this is a terrible mistake. However, that doesn’t mean that I support what I would consider to be not the most prudent action right now. We’re 6 months before an election, we’ve got a two or three vote margin. There’s a far greater degree of uncertainty in that situation than there was back in September,” he said.

Rep. Ralph Norman, another Republican hardliner, agreed that they should leave Johnson in place through the election, and said he hopes Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene holds off on her effort to oust the speaker.

“We’ve got seven months until an election. We’ll have a new president, hopefully, and then we’ll see how the speaker race comes out. And to be honest, I don’t know if Mike, after all this – he’s going through a lot, he’s doing in his mind what he thinks is best. I will not criticize them. I disagree with him, I’m not going to criticize him,” said Norman.


https://www.yahoo.com/news/gosar-becomes-third-house-gop-162741736.html

 

Well, boogers!
Poor Schumer didn't manage to get his FISA secret police powers act passed before the deadline.
His predictions that the world would stop revolving and life as we know it on earth would cease to exist seem to have been a bit exaggerated. ​

FISA bill stalls over Senate amendment fight hours before deadline (msn.com)

FISA bill stalls over Senate amendment fight hours before deadline
Story by Alexander Bolton

A bill to reauthorize the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act’s (FISA) warrantless spying program stalled in the Senate on Friday because of a fight over amendments that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) worries could pass and send the bill back to the House.

Senators and Senate aides in both parties now say that FISA’s Section 702 authority is likely to lapse at midnight because Schumer isn’t close to giving colleagues who want amendments a chance to vote on their proposals.

In return, senators who want changes to the bill are refusing to yield back floor time to allow a final vote before FISA’s expanded surveillance power under Section 702 expires at the stroke of midnight.

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), a member of the Senate GOP leadership team and a senior member of the Intelligence Committee, said the warrantless surveillance program is likely to “go dark” because of the Senate stalemate.

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) told reporters Friday afternoon that Schumer may not even have the 60 votes he needs to advance the intelligence authorization bill to a final vote unless he agrees to let senators vote on amendments.

Cramer and Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.) have sponsored an amendment that would require the government to obtain court approval before accessing the content of Americans’ private communications swept up in the Section 702 surveillance. It has a good chance of passing.

“What’s getting me … is they’re clearly afraid it will pass. What really offends me is that they don’t let us vote on anything that might pass that alters their plan.

And by doing such, they’re demonstrating that they know better than we know, that yes there are 100 senators, but only one or two should determine what we have the right to vote on because something might pass,” Cramer said.

“All amendment deals around here start with the premise, ‘Whip it first, make sure it won’t pass, then let them vote on it,’” he said. “If that’s the case, why do we have the most deliberative body in the world made up with 100 people each with one vote? We can all just go home and let Chuck Schumer do whatever the White House tells them.”

Durbin told reporters that there’s been little real negotiation about setting up votes on amendments.

“I don’t know that they’re underway,” he said. “I’m hoping for an amendment deal soon.”

Durbin said he hasn’t yet “been approached” about a possible vote on his amendment, which is patterned after the amendment sponsored by Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) in the House, which narrowly failed by a vote of 212-212 earlier this week.

Durbin said his and Cramer’s amendment is more likely to pass than the Biggs proposal.

“I think it’s narrower than that amendment, and it has a better chance of passage,” he said.

While the Durbin-Cramer proposal would require an amendment to access the content of Americans’ communications swept up in the 702 program, the Biggs amendment would have required a warrant to review Americans’ data more generally.

The other amendments that have a good chance of passing are proposals sponsored by Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Mike Lee (R-Utah).

Wyden’s amendment would strike language added to the bill by House Intelligence Committee Chair Mike Turner (R-Ohio) that would expand the scope of businesses required to comply with government surveillance and data requests.

Wyden warned on the floor that the provision is worded so broadly that “there would be practically no limits to who can be forced into spying for the government.”

“Any company that installs, maintains, or repairs Wi-Fi or other communications systems in any American business, home or church can be dragged into this,” Wyden argued on the Senate floor.

The third amendment at issue, sponsored by Lee, would broaden the role that amici curiae, or friends of the court, would have in Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court proceedings, giving outside groups a chance to rebut or offer comment on government surveillance requests.

The Senate passed Lee’s amendment to strengthen third-party oversight of the FISA process by a vote of 77-19 in 2020, but the proposal stalled in the House and failed to become law.

Cornyn warned Friday that if adopted, Lee’s amendment would create a “massive legal hurdle in the 702 process.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), emerging from a GOP lunch meeting Friday afternoon, said Schumer is in a tough position because if the bill is amended, it would have to go back to the House before reaching President Biden’s desk, which means Congress would blow through the deadline for reauthorizing the program.

“If any of them pass, it throws the bill in a ditch,” he warned of the amendments.

But he also pointed out that if the senators demanding votes on amendments refuse to yield back time, the FISA bill won’t pass the Senate until Monday or Tuesday.

 

Yeah this is bullshit. Treasonous conservative/America Hating/Republicans will cower and suck Trump's dick the first change they get. But in this case funding for Ukraine had so much support if Johnson didn't bring it to the floor for a vote they would have blasted it out with a discharge petition that would have passed the Senate bill. So they didn't want top look like Putin stooges. So this time they voted against Trump/Putin.


'Trump lost': Ex-Bush speechwriter shows how GOP 'has rebelled against him' in latest vote

David McAfee
April 20, 2024 7:43PM ET




Donald Trump at a campaign rally at the Giant Center in 2019. (Evan El-Amin / Shutterstock.com)




" Trump deflates," writes former Bush speechwriter David Frum.

Frum, who previously assessed former president Trump was prone to stoking violence, writes for the Atlantic about how the U.S. House voted to approve something Trump has steadfastly stood against.

"Ukraine won. Trump lost," he wrote. "The House vote to aid Ukraine renews hope that Ukraine can still win its war. It also showed how and why Donald Trump should lose the 2024 election."

ALSO READ: Revealed: What government officials privately shared about Trump not disclosing finances

Frum goes on to suggest Trump is used to getting his way within the GOP. But that appears to be changing with Ukraine, he noted.

"On aid to Ukraine, Trump got his way for 16 months. When Democrats held the majority in the House of Representatives in 2022, they approved four separate aid requests for Ukraine, totaling $74 billion. As soon as Trump’s party took control of the House, in January 2023, the aid stopped. Every Republican officeholder understood: Those who wished to show loyalty to Trump must side against Ukraine," he wrote in the piece published Saturday. "Three months later, Trump’s party in Congress has rebelled against him—and not on a personal payoff to some oddball Trump loyalist, but on one of Trump’s most cherished issues, his siding with Russia against Ukraine."

Frum suggests the "anti-Trump, pro-Ukraine rebellion" began in the Senate.

"Twenty-two Republicans joined Democrats to approve aid to Ukraine in February. Dissident House Republicans then threatened to force a vote if the Republican speaker would not schedule one. Speaker Mike Johnson declared himself in favor of Ukraine aid," he wrote. "This weekend, House Republicans split between pro-Ukraine and anti-Ukraine factions. On Friday, the House voted 316–94 in favor of the rule on the aid vote. On Saturday, the aid to Ukraine measure passed the House by 311–112. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said the Senate will adopt the House-approved aid measures unamended and speed them to President Biden for signature."

Trump still has strong GOP support, but "the cracks in unity are visible," according to the writer.

Read it here.



https://www.rawstory.com/trump-lost-gop-rebelled-frum/

 

I am sure it won't get read but this is a really interesting article backed up with solid data with really good researchers.



Want to die young? Vote Republican

Thom Hartmann
April 21, 2024 7:13AM ET




Trump supporters waiting for the arrival of President Donald J. Trump on Thursday 01/30/2020 at his Keep America Great Again rally in Des Moines, Iowa. (Shutterstock.com)




Want to die young? Immerse yourself in conservative media and vote Republican. Seriously.

We should have known, but, still, the science is shocking: when conservatives run governments, suicides and homicides go up; when liberals run governments, suicides and homicides go down.

We got the first clue back in 2002, when, in a 100-year longitudinal study published that year in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, Australian researchers found that the suicide rate in that country and the UK increased throughout the 20th century whenever a Conservative government (similar to Republicans here in the U.S.) was in power and declined measurably when the liberal Labour Party was in charge.

The BBC cited the research, noting that tens of thousands of Australians and Brits would not have committed suicide if conservatives had never run either government during the 20th century.

READ: What most assuredly happens when Trump sits down with the New York Times

Their headline was unambiguous: “More Suicides Under Conservative Rule”:

“When the Conservatives ruled both state and federal governments,” the BBC summarized, “men were 17% more likely to commit suicide than when Labour was in power. Women were 40% more likely to kill themselves.”
Referencing the researchers’ work, the BBC concluded:

“Overall, they say, the figures suggest that 35,000 people would not have died had the Conservatives not been in power, equivalent to one suicide for every day of the 20th century or two for every day that the Conservatives ruled.”
They added, as the last sentence of the article:

“The UK Conservative Party refused to comment on the research.”
More recently, here in the US, a 2014 study by Bandy X. Lee, Bruce E. Wexler, and James Gilligan published in the journal Aggression and Violent Behavior titled Political correlates of violent death rates in the U.S., 1900–2010: Longitudinal and cross-sectional analyses found pretty much the same outcomes as the result of Republicans versus Democrats running our country.

Arguing that “violence is not random but a problem in public health and preventive medicine,” the researchers were blunt:

“Suicide, homicide, and combined suicide/homicide rates from 1900 to 2010 were found to be associated with an increase under Republican presidents and a decrease under Democratic ones with statistical significance.”
Yesterday I interviewed one of the researchers, forensic and social psychiatrist Bandy X. Lee MD, and she was emphatic about their findings:

“My colleagues and I did a study about 10 years ago looking at the two different parties in the United States — not in terms of ideology or policies but purely in terms of violent death rates — and, astonishingly, we found that over a 110-year period, almost without exception, whenever there was a Republican president who was elected, the murder and suicide rates would double, and whenever there was a Democratic president elected the murder and suicide rates would halve.”
She added that people don’t generally notice this because there’s a roughly 2-year time-lag between elections and the time the increases or decreases in suicide and homicide measurably set in.

And, she said, it wasn’t just the economic policies of the parties that was driving the violence; it was primarily how they talked about America and thus caused us to think about ourselves and each other:

“We controlled for changes in the economy such as unemployment rates or GDP and so it was basically not related to their economic policies, although their economic policies quite often diverged as well…
“Whenever Democrats are elected, we tend to do well, to prosper not only in terms of unemployment but also in terms of rising GDP, but [we] also see a change in violent death rates, so that showed that there was not just an ideological difference or a policy driven difference, but a difference based on whatever the party brings, whether it's rhetoric or public perception. The party alone made the difference in violence rates.”
We’re apparently seeing that dynamic right now. Murder, suicide, and violent crime rates increased during the Trump presidency and began a rapid downward slide by the second year of President Joe Biden’s tenure.

As the Brennan Center for Justice noted seven weeks ago:

“In 2020, President Trump’s last year in office, murder rates climbed by nearly 30 percent and assault rates by more than 10 percent. …
“But since 2021, violent crime has started to fall. According to the FBI, as of 2022 violent crime rates had fallen by 4 percent and murder rates by roughly 7 percent since 2020. Preliminary data suggests those declines accelerated in 2023.”
If, as Dr. Lee suggests, a major factor is the kind of rhetoric that Democrats use (“we, us”) versus Republicans (“they, them”) then Trump’s constant rants about Americans from “shithole countries” and “murderers and rapists” from south of the border apparently drove some Americans into a homicidal or suicidal frenzy.

Republicans, after all, lean heavily on hate and fear as primary motivators to get people to the polls: gays are coming for your kids, immigrants want to rape or kill your wife, Black people are stealing your job, and Democrats love to kill babies the minute they’re born.

When people are marinated in such rhetoric, it’s almost impossible not to end up drenched in fear, anger, and hate — the necessary precursors to violence and self-harm.

On the other hand, President Biden’s soothing “we’re all in this together” and “I’m the president for all Americans” appears to have collectively brought most of us back to our senses.

And Democratic policies of reducing childhood poverty, strengthening schools and child-care systems, feeding people via food stamps and WIC, providing housing subsidies, expanding healthcare via Medicaid and Obamacare, lowering the cost of prescription drugs, and driving up salaries by encouraging unionization all make life in America less threatening and more comfortable.

Back in 1996, Virginia Tech’s Dr. L. David Roper did a single-year analysis of suicide rates in states that voted for Democratic President Bill Clinton versus states that went for Republican Senator Bob Dole. He found:

“Democratic votes for the states had a 57% negative correlation with increasing SR [suicide rates] and the Republican votes had a 45% positive correlation. States with high suicide death rate vote much more Republican than Democratic and vice versa.”
Another study, published by Plos One in 2022, looked at the relationship between political policy and mortality rates between 1999 and 2019. They found strikingly similar statistics:

“We modeled the associations between working-age mortality rates and state policies during 1999 to 2019. We used annual data from the 1999–2019 National Vital Statistics System to calculate state-level age-adjusted mortality rates for deaths from all causes and from CVD [cardiovascular disease], alcohol-induced causes, suicide, and drug poisoning among adults ages 25–64 years. …
“Especially strong associations were observed between certain domains and specific causes of death: between the gun safety domain and suicide mortality among men, between the labor domain and alcohol-induced mortality, and between both the economic tax and tobacco tax domains and CVD mortality.
“Simulations indicate that changing all policy domains in all states to a fully liberal orientation might have saved 171,030 lives in 2019, while changing them to a fully conservative orientation might have cost 217,635 lives.”
NBC News, reporting on the study, quoted Syracuse University sociology professor Dr. Jennifer Karas Montez, one of the study’s authors, who summarized the consequences of states putting Republicans or Democrats in charge of policy:

“This analysis points to another major player, and that’s state policymakers. Policymakers may not feel that they’re responsible for our health or think that they’re responsible for our health, but the reality is every decision that they make affects our health and our risk of dying prematurely.”
Ya think?

READ: House Republicans increasingly sick of MTG’s performance politics



https://www.rawstory.com/want-to-die-young-vote-republican/

 

+wrong story +american hater = bullshit, lies, and propaganda.

 

This is right and its all just so simple. They cower in the face of MTG because she is loud and aggressive and good friends with Trump and fear she will sic Trump on them. But here's the problem. MTG is stupid, ignorant, and mentally ill. She is a spoiled little rich kid brat with behavioral problems. And therefore it doesn't matter what it is. MTG only wants to dominate, get her way, and get attention. So it is impossible to govern cowering to MTG because no one can predict what she will do next because she does not know herself.



House GOP has 'willingly castrated its own power': Axios

Brad Reed
April 23, 2024 6:31AM ET




Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA). Win McNamee/Getty Images




A new report from Axios highlights the unprecedented implosion of Republicans in the House of Representatives.

The report begins by contending that "never before has the party in control of the House of Representatives knowingly and willingly castrated its own power so thoroughly as today's Republicans," and it then proceeds to document all the steps the GOP took that led them to this point.

Per Axios, two decisions in particular paved the GOP's road to ruin: The decision to let Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) oust former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and "surrendering authority of the Rules Committee, which sets the terms for how legislation will be handled during votes."

When it comes to the Rules Committee, the appointments of hardliners like Reps. Chip Roy (R-TX) and Thomas Massie (R-KY) has rendered the committee an obstructive force that routinely thwarts the will of the speaker, as it has killed seven bills in just the last year.

READ MORE: Breaking our democracy is all part of the GOP plan

"This is an unprecedented collapse in control," Axios adds. "Former Speakers Nancy Pelosi, Paul Ryan and John Boehner never lost a rules vote."

The House GOP has also not been helped by multiple resignations, as well as the expulsion of scandal-plagued Rep. George Santos (R-NY), that have shrunk its majority down to the slimmest of margins.

All of this has forced House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) into an uneasy coalition government-style arrangement in which he depends on House Democrats to perform the basics of governing such as avoiding government shutdowns and providing American allies with military aid.

Although three House Republicans -- Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), Paul Gosar (R-AZ), and Massie -- have vowed to support a motion to vacate Johnson as speaker over his deals with Democrats, at this point it appears that there are enough Democrats who would come to Johnson's rescue to defeat such a measure.



https://www.rawstory.com/house-republican-chaos-2667852823/