LA Times columnist Mark Barabak recently tooled up to Bakersfield, the deep-red heart of Kevin McCarthy's congressional district, to find out what his constituents thought about impeaching Joe Biden. Here's a sampling:
“We as conservatives need to fight back. You have to keep the enemy off balance at all times.”
Biden has “made a mockery of our country.” Impeachment “should have happened a long time ago.”
“He’s just a mouthpiece. And not a very good one.”
Democrats went after Trump “from the get-go. It’s only fair [Biden] should be impeached.”
“I don’t think the Republicans would be doing this if [Democrats] didn’t go after Trump.”
The first thing you should notice is that no one mentioned Hunter Biden. These folks might marinate daily in Fox News, but they either don't know or don't care about the "Biden crime family." They just don't like Biden and think he deserves impeachment because Democrats have been mean to Donald Trump. Not one of these five people mentioned any actual thing Biden has done. They just loathe Democrats and that's enough.
Of course, it's worth noting that Republicans in California successfully recalled Gov. Gray Davis for no particular reason, and have tried ever since to recall other Democratic governors just because they're Democrats. So maybe this is hardly surprising.
That's been the deal with Republican voters for a long time now, in my limited experience. They're mad as hell, hate any "Democrat" president, deplore what those Democrats are doing ... but never give any specifics, even when asked. But they've got a boatload of bizarro world theories -- oh, pardon me, "knowledge" -- of alleged crimes and atrocities which seem to have nothing to do with governance, let alone any backing in the Real World. (They won't go there -- too many Libz.)
California really does need to be broken into at least 4 new states. One centered on SF, one centered on LA and one centered on SD, with the inland empire just spun off into its own state, which will immoderately join WV in the running for “worst decision to secede from the state we used to belong to” ever. (WV would be a hell of a lot better off economically and infrastructure-wise if it had never split off from VA.)
Make Republicans own the failed states they inevitably leave behind in their wake. (Even “high growth” FL is going to become a hellhole once they run out of drinkable water and land that isn’t inundated with sea water.)
Austin: WV in the running for “worst decision to secede from the state we used to belong to” ever.
Having a short memory like Austin's is often a blessing. It was a long time ago, for sure, but failing to go along with seceding from the USA and going to war against the USA hardly seems to me to be a bad decision then, or any other time.
I assume he is a Neo-Confederate.
Or stupid.
Davis was blamed (unfairly) for Enron. Their attempts to recall subsequent California governors were laughable failures.
Can't we just go back to "California, Love it of Leave it"
If all those people who hate California, and the Nazis/Commies/Fascists in Sacramento that run it, would just leave, California would be a much more pleasant place.
Nonono, the opposite should happen. Biden beat Trump in 2020 in California by over 5 million votes, meaning that in our first-past-the-post system, California could/should strategically absorb some crazies from other states.
For example, in Texas, Trump beat Biden by just ~650k votes. Meaning, if California absorbed a million "Let's Go Brandon" types from the Lone Star Republic(an) state, California would still reliably vote Dem, but Texas would be blue forever.
Excuse me, but we already have plenty of crazies. Note that even though Biden won here by a lot, more people in California voted for Trump than any other state. Move them all to Idaho or North Dakota. Those places need to earn their electoral votes.
We are seeing the results of decades of home schooling. Critical thinking - what's that?
It will only get worse.
In fairness, if Biden got us into World War II, he is definitely too old to be president.
Ironically, the president who was there at the beginning of WWII actually was physically feeble and not too far from death. Turns out he was one of our best presidents ever, and even when he died and the not-so-amazing VP took the job, we still won the war!
Re: Gray Davis
As California goes, so goes the nation.
I wish! Rolling blackouts/Enron triggered the Gray David recall. ERCOT collapses, Texas freezes, and actual people die as a result, and Abbot gets elected for a _third_ term.
Social conservatives have no capacity for serious engagement in public life. What they want is a parade that ends where they get to kill somebody.
It's not that they think it will appease the gods, it's just that they want to get away with killing somebody while they think a popular sense of a need to do something is at their backs.
Doing something about whatever caused that popular sense would never occur to them, in fact they'd be fanatically against it, taking disaster's side wherever they safely can.
When can we cut off the oxygen to these lunatic repulsives, including their leader? What a mephitic bunch. Makes one want to have reverse peristalsis.
I think one reason why we’re in our current predicament is that the institutional Democratic Party is basically too passive. There’s basically no price to be paid for outrageous things that Republicans are doing. One reason why people customarily adhere to norms is that they want the other side to continue to adhere to them and, naturally, if one side trashes the norms the other side will surely retaliate.
But the Democrats never retaliate. Sometimes the voters retaliate but the institutional Democratic Party never does. And so Republicans are incentivized to violate norms because the other side will always do nothing and allow the Republicans to create whatever narrative they want or do whatever they want without the slightest consequences.
῾But the Democrats never retaliate. Sometimes the voters retaliate but the institutional Democratic Party never does῾
What would that look like, exactly? More speeches? Different speeches?
They'd threaten to start talking about talking about something.
One obvious example would be redistricting. When Newt Gingrich did his out of sequence redistricting and so that his party could take the House, the Democrats complained and assumed that the referees would fix everything. But, at the time the Democrats controlled lots of states and could have retaliated by redistricting/gerrymandering the Republican Party out of existence. Instead , the Democrats did nothing and Republicans learned that they could get away with anything.
But also, giving speeches would actually be very helpful in correcting the Democrats other mistake— which is to consistently allow Republicans to set the narrative. There’s no message discipline. Every Democrat strikes out on his or her own in order to appeal to nonexistent conservatives who would vote Democratic if only we spoke to them like bigots. The reality is that even though they wouldn’t vote for a Democrat under any circumstances, we still feel the need to cater to them and not to argue with their word salad of lies. This is a very serious mistake.
" But, at the time the Democrats controlled lots of states and could have retaliated by redistricting/gerrymandering the Republican Party out of existence. "
That is the wrong attitude.
What they should have done is to pass legislation that makes redistricting non-partisan.
First: stop directing 60% of IRA funds to red states with shitty anti union rules and low wages. Stop subdidizing the failed lifestyle.
Second: focus medical resources on hospitals in suburbs and cities. Make it so the rurals can't get care and die because they have hospitals. Close. Rural hospitals. Relatedly flood their towns with fentanyl. Encourage them to die off from despair.
Third: actually weaponize DoJ. Manchin acting up? Investigate his daughter. She has done a number of business deals. Republicans have too. Don't make shit up just double check that they aren't frauding many of them will be. Find it.
In other words govern for your supporters not the fake American GOP electorate. Them we want to encourage to die.
Its not that we "don't retaliate" is that when the R's adopt, as official policy, the position that "government is a joke" and that as a result anyone who is in favor of sound government policy is "a liberal traitor," and that therefore taxation is "theft" -- well, you know why that is difficult to counter analytically, yes?
Its difficult because those arguments are aimed at morons with zero to no critical thinking ability. So:
A. remember, the voters you are losing are morons, so "well, I can give you many reasons why government is not a joke" is a nice starting point for someone with analytical ability, but its 13 words, basically at least ten words too long for the voters one is trying to reach.
B. Ok, then, so they shut the government down because a certain number of their imbecile voters think "that's showing 'em." Then what, obviously shutting the government down the next time the Rs' are in power is not happening because it is stupid and wasteful, not because we are too passive.
You need look no farther than Tuberville's current stunt. Its substantively and procedurally absurd. Yet, to the average moron Tuberville supporter its fine. There is no Dem equivalent that's easy and does not involve lying in its own right.
Countering this is harder than it looks I think.
By comparison, countering, say abortion policy is easy, and Dems do it and will do it in the future.
Countering intentional stupidity is much more difficult.
This is why a Biden impeachment is such a political loser for the GOP. It is just so blatantly partisan, and once you have the public's attention focused on it, it will turn off low-info, "moderate" voters.
It has been common to throw around impeachment talk fir the last 20 years. But at least on the past people tried to come up with an actual reason.
There’s a serious effort in eastern Oregon to secede and join Idaho. 11 counties have voted to begin this process.
I hope they succeed because it would make both Oregon and Idaho more liberal. Seems like a win-win for the people in both states.