Yesterday, the Smithsonian newsletter included a link to their Andean Bear cub cam (at a month and a half, their eyes have not yet opoened, nor can they hear), and that page also includes a link to the Giant Panda cam. I didn’t try the pandas. I watched the cubs for a minute or teo, saw no motion, but heard a tiny “squeep.” It might have been a baby snore – not, I think, a baby sneeze. Also, I received a grocery delivery.It looks like i got everything except the lip balm, and there’s no huge hurry on that. In actual news, The PCCC (Bold Progressives wants to know whether or not we think it would be a good idea for Katie Porter to run for the Senate next time. Initially I shuddered, thnking of Tim Ryan (and so many others),. and then I thought, wait a minute – her district was already red, and redistricting just made it redder – she probably actually has better prospects state wide. So I answered yes. Of course they also want funds but they’ve labeled it “optional,” so no pressure. Here’s the link.
I cannot say it was a slow news day. In fact, it was so much the opposite that it’s going to take me a while to digest it.
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Crooks & Liars – Russian Wife Wants Her Husband To Go Die In Ukraine For A New Car
Quote – A Russian woman named her goal in the war against Ukraine…. [O]ne Russian woman confirmed that she wanted to send her husband to die to get a car for him…. And she did it right in his presence…. The Russian confirms that he supports the dictator Vladimir Putin and will go to the front when he is summoned. Click through – If this is real, and not some twisted joke, it’s easy to see why GQP voters are so in sync with Russia.
CPR News – Colorado sees more avalanche deaths than any other state. A training course at this mountain park hopes to change that
Quote – While carrying avalanche safety equipment has become the norm for many backcountry skiers and other recreators, remembering how to use it in an emergency properly is another skill entirely. So where can one practice for the unthinkable? At a park just outside of Minturn, now open for its third season, there are eight transmitters that people can practice finding with their beacons. Click through for story. Good thing we have technology, because avalanches are a phenomenon which climate change is not going to make less common. Now people just need to learn how to use it.
Yesterday, Joyce Vance wrote a prequel column to her normal “The Week Ahead” column which comes out today. It’s called, “How does the First Day of a New Congress Work?,” and she wrote it in order to get the normal stuff out of the way so she can pay more attention to the abnormal stuff she, and everyone else, is expecting. Even professional analysts are overwhelmed by the happenings of last week. Actually, it’s quite possible that te more one knows, the more overwhelmed one is. Heather Cox Richardson quoted some from Jeffries’s speech, including the entire A-to-Z section, which I re-quote here because it is so comprehensive:
“American values over autocracy, benevolence over bigotry, the Constitution over the cult, democracy over demagogues, economic opportunity over extremism, freedom over fascism, governing over gaslighting, hopefulness over hatred, inclusion over isolation, justice over judicial overreach, knowledge over kangaroo courts, liberty over limitation, maturity over Mar-a-Lago, normalcy over negativity, opportunity over obstruction, people over politics, quality of life issues over QAnon, reason over racism, substance over slander, triumph over tyranny, understanding over ugliness, voting rights over voter suppression, working families over the well-connected, xenial over xenophobia, ‘yes, we can’ over ‘you can’t do it,’ and zealous representation over zero-sum confrontation. We will always do the right thing by the American people.”
Also there was a Trump**-style coup attempt in Brazil. And Brazil may not be the last country to play copycat (thoughwhy it’s called copycat, I can’t imagine – cats are not known for being followers, of anyone or anything.)This is a deeloping story and you shouldn’t have any trouble finding developments.
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Southern Poverty Law Center – Rosewood Remembered
Quote – For almost 60 years the massacre, which left at least six murdered while the rest, including dozens of children, escaped in the middle of the night, running through swamps, hiding in the woods and leaping onto train cars, was all but erased from historical memory. No law enforcement agency investigated, and no one was ever charged with crimes. The erasure mirrored that of racial violence across the U.S., where lynchings and mob attacks in Chicago, Tulsa, Omaha, and in small towns and large cities across the country were, and in many cases continue to be, left unremarked and unremembered save by communities of survivors. Click through for article. It does frost me that white Floridians (and Georgias, and Oklahomans, and Illinoisians, and Nebraskans, and white people alll over our country were are are so hell-bent on covering up our real history. The cover-up really is worse than the crome. Obviously they don’t get that.
The Daily Beast – New Congresswoman Fights Rival Over Witchcraft Accusation
Quote – Rep. Anna Paulina Luna came to Congress on her first day in office ready to do battle—not just with Democrats, but also with her own party, as she became one of the 20 Republicans to vote against electing Kevin McCarthy speaker. But back home in her conservative Florida district, Luna is waging a very different kind of war: a legal fight with political enemies who say she is a literal witch. A letter obtained by The Daily Beast reveals that the Florida Republican retained the high-powered law firm Holland & Knight to go after a would-be rival who leveled a series of outlandish allegations against Luna on the Bubba the Love Sponge radio show in the fall. Click through for details. The legal action itself proves she is not a witch. Casting a spell would be easier and cheaper than going to court – if sh could do so . So, she can’t. (And I have to say the title “Bubba the Love SPonge” doubtless tells you everything you need to know about the intellectual level of the program.)
Experts in autocracies have pointed out that it is, unfortunately, easy to slip into normalizing the tyrant, hence it is important to hang on to outrage. These incidents which seem to call for the efforts of the Greek Furies (Erinyes) to come and deal with them will, I hope, help with that. As a reminder, though no one really knows how many there were supposed to be, the three names we have are Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone. These roughly translate as “unceasing,” “grudging,” and “vengeful destruction.”
Well, the “Freedom Caucus” has purchased Kevin McCarthy’s soul and re-sold it to the devil, and gotten him to commit himself to some serious chaos even before committee chairs are named. The one bright spot is that another condition he agreed to is that a single representative can call for and get a vote of no confidence … which, if it succeeds, means we will again be without a Speaker. And having no Speaker is better than having Kevin McCarthy as Speaker.
This article was written before the final vote, but it is still valuable now – particularly if one of those votes f no confidence succeeds.
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Kevin McCarthy voted Speaker of the House on 15th vote — we had some questions about the chaotic week in Congress and got a few answers
Editor’s note: This article was published prior to a 15th vote in the House of Representatives that saw Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California elected as House Speaker in the early hours of Jan. 7, 2023. It still has lots of super interesting information and analysis in it though, so please do read on.
In the space of four days, members-elect of the House of Representatives have held more than a dozen votes over who would take on the role of speaker. Yet, as of Jan. 6, 2023, the position remains unfilled.
As a result, representatives have not been sworn in to start the job they were elected to do. The sticking point: A dwindling group of holdout conservatives in the GOP are refusing to toe the line and fall behind the party leadership’s preferred candidate, Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California.
The Conversation had a plethora of questions over what this means for governance, and the authority of the speaker – whoever that may be. So we put them to Rachel Paine Caufield, an expert on all thing Congress at Drake University.
Can the House do any other business while there is no speaker?
In short, no. The only business being done in the U.S. House of Representatives at the moment is voting for the role of speaker.
No other business can proceed until a speaker is in place. And this is for one very simple reason: No representatives can be sworn in until there is a speaker. So right now we have no formal representatives serving in the House of Representatives, and as a result no one has the legal authority in the House to carry out the work of government.
Other usual House activity, such as briefings on issues including security, is also not happening. Would-be representatives can’t be briefed yet because they have not been sworn in.
They can still meet with constituents. But they can’t make any formal request of government, because they are just representatives-elect until they are sworn in – and that applies to both new members of the House as well as returning members.
Does it affect the Senate?
The Senate can still operate, and there are certain things the Senate alone is responsible for, such as ratifying treaties and confirming judicial nominees.
But any legislation needs to go through both the Senate and the House – so no laws can be passed until a speaker is in place.
Can unofficial business be done in the House?
Certainly representatives are meeting while this situation is going on. My guess would be that the Democrats – who are unified in their support of Hakeem Jeffries as their nominee for speaker – are having conversations about future legislative activity.
For the Republicans, the priority right now is how to navigate this impasse over the speaker position. But don’t think that some of those discussions are not also about legislation. The holdouts in the GOP are looking for concessions on things such as term limits for representatives – and that is a legislative issue; they will need to pass law on it.
But for the most part, the fight over the speakership is the only issue in town.
What is the U.S. missing out on in terms of House business?
If you look at the House calendar for the first few weeks of the year, there isn’t an awful lot on it.
In the first few days, normally you would have the selection of the speaker and swearing in of members. And then they would traditionally break. There wasn’t expected to be a huge amount of legislation being pushed straight out of the gate.
One thing that is being delayed is a revision of the rules of the House of Representatives – something that happens at the beginning of each session of Congress. A rules package decides what the rules of the House will be in that session; then representatives get down to legislative business.
You have to keep in mind that legislative activity is heavier at the end of sessions – and we just finished a session of Congress in December. If legislation doesn’t pass in the House and the Senate in a single two-year session, then it dies – so there is no leftover business from last year; everything starts over again.
As a result, you traditionally don’t see a lot of dramatic legislative activity early in a House session.
But what happens if the impasse continues?
The one pressing thing the House has coming up that is not being dealt with is a vote over the raising of the debt ceiling.
But the House still has four or five weeks until this really is a pressing issue – and brinkmanship is common when it comes to the debt ceiling, so expect that to be a protracted debate and negotiation in any case.
Can this situation continue?
Yes. The U.S. Constitution identifies only three congressional roles that need to be filled – the speaker of the House is one, the other two being the president of the Senate (the constitution designates that the vice president of the U.S. fills this role), and the Senate president pro tempore, a ceremonial position to serve as the president of the Senate if the vice president can’t fulfill his or her Senate duties.
So there does need to be a speaker in place. The Constitution requires only that the House shall elect a speaker, but doesn’t specify how or lay out a time frame – they can vote for weeks or even months.
By tradition, the speaker is elected by a majority of the House – so right now that would mean 218 representatives, assuming all are present and voting. Although the House rules currently specify that a majority is needed, that can be changed – it isn’t in the Constitution. The GOP could lower the vote majority needed to 213 to push McCarthy over the line, although they wouldn’t go lower as that could allow the Democrats to select Jeffries, who already has the support of all 212 Democrats in the House.
Hang on! If representatives aren’t sworn in, who can change the House rules?
That could come down to the clerk’s office that is currently presiding over the House session. In the same way that the clerk’s office is allowing representatives-elect to nominate speakers, they could allow a motion putting forward a change in the House rules.
It has never happened before, and it would raise a number of procedural questions – but theoretically it is possible.
Who can be a House speaker? We have heard a lot of names
The Constitution has no rules whatsoever about who can and cannot be the House speaker. Representatives-elect can nominate – and even elect – someone who is not a member of the House to be speaker. That is why you have seen Donald Trump be nominated by one member; someone even joked about former speaker Newt Gingrich.
There are requirements for serving as a member of the House of Representatives – you have to be over the age of 25, a U.S. citizen for at least seven years and live in the state from which you were elected. But as a speaker doesn’t have to be a member of the House, these rules don’t apply. So you could, theoretically, nominate a 7-year-old German child.
Could Trump really be the speaker?
Constitutionally, yes. Practically, no. There seems to be very little appetite for this among GOP members in the House – he only received one vote, and may not want the job in any case.
How has this all affected the authority of the role of Speaker?
The short answer is we don’t know yet. The fact that it has taken this many votes and still we don’t have a speaker in place in itself will have an effect. It indicates a divided majority party that will be difficult to lead – that in itself will diminish the power of the role.
Any concessions struck to reach a deal over the speakership could further erode the speaker’s authority. What is being negotiated by holdouts in the GOP are largely measures to empower individual members at the expense of party leadership.
This isn’t that uncommon. Over history the power of the speakership has ebbed and flowed.
One of the most powerful speakers in U.S. history, “Uncle” Joe Cannon, was removed in 1910 by his party for that reason – they thought the speaker had too much power. In 1974, the influx of so-called “Watergate babies” – a group of northern liberal Democrats elected as part of a backlash after Watergate – led to an effort to diminish the power of committee chairs in the House. The rules changes left a vacuum that was filled by the speaker, with the result that the power of the position increased.
That all said, what is being discussed is unheard of. The main concession – a change to the “motion to vacate the chair” rule so that any one member, or a small number of members, can initiate a process that is effectively a vote of no confidence – has never been tried before.
Another request by the GOP holdouts is to open the rules on the house floor so that any member can propose amendments to any bill. There are 435 members, and all have pet projects and constituent needs. Such a change would be chaos. In effect, it would mean that 435 people will be involved in the making of the legislative sausage right on the house floor.
Will any concessions be binding?
They don’t necessarily have to be adopted by future speakers, no. Some will have to be adopted in a new rules package for the House, but the rules package is changed every new session, so they won’t be binding forever. Indeed, some Democratic representatives have indicated that if concessions are made, they would potentially challenge the rules package or vote against some of the most extreme measures that holdouts are demanding.
Some of the concessions being discussed won’t need a rule change at all. They are, in effect, agreements between different factions in the Republican Party. For example, a concession that the GOP leadership will not use its SuperPac to favor candidates in open Republican primaries – that is something that can’t be dictated by House rules; it is more an issue of trust.
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AMT, I’m not finished with this subject. Give me another week before expecting a request from me.
Yesterday, the radio opera was “Medea,” by Luigi Cherubini. Cherubini ws a contemporary of Beethoven, and was considered by him to be (as one musicologist put it) “the greatest living composer not named ‘Beethoven.'” Maria Callas was a big fan of this opera, and while I was still in the military I found a (vinyl) recording of her performance of it, and snapped it up. From the first measure of the overture (which still sends chills down my spine) I was hooked. While stationed in Washington (DC), I was privileged to see a performance live at Wolf Trap (where we had thunder and a little lightning during the overture – which would not enhance every opera, but did this one.) All of those people (on the record and at Wolf Trap) are gone now. But this cast did not disappoint. The intermission features included the annual review of those singers we lost in 2022. This year there was only one singer whose name I recognized – Maria Ewing – she didn’t sing a whole lot of roles, but during the pandemic one of the videos available was “Dialogues of the Carmelites” in which she sang the leading role of Blanche. Sigh. (Her daughter, Rebecca Hall, was on “Finding Your Roots,” I forget which season.)
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Mother Jones – American Myths Are Made of White Grievance—and the Jan. 6 Big Lie Is Just the Latest
Quote – [I]t is insufficient to claim that the Big Lie is merely that the 2020 presidential election was stolen or that Trump’s election-fraud conspiracy was the root cause of the riots. As we confront the insurrection on its two-year anniversary, it’s important to remind ourselves of what motivated the rioters that day: the idea that the United States is for white people, whose power must be protected at all costs. Click through for full article. I might add that the phrase “Christian Nationalism” really means “white nationalism” – as if people of colorwere not as good Christians (they’re usually better, in my experience) as wypipo. “Patriarchal Nationalism” would be closer to the truth.
Denverite – Colorado’s plan to relieve pressure on Denver: busing migrants and state workers volunteering at shelters
Quote – The state said it was partnering with two nonprofits to help migrants move to their intended destinations, where some may have friends or family waiting for them. So far, Polis said, many who have arrived and overwhelmed Denver’s existing and emergency shelters actually planned to be in Miami, New York and Chicago. Migrants do not have to prove that they have friends or family in other cities, but Polis said the local emergency managers are coordinating the arrival of larger groups of migrants with other cities. Click through for details. Since MY governor is not a Nazi, I want to stress that THIS busing is 100% voluntary, and will be to places they were intending to go to before getting sidetracked. Also that the state employees who volunteer will be doing so on (paid) administrative leave.
Yesterday, the Daily Beast newsletter was a gosip rag, and Steve Schmidt wrote about January 6. Rep. Scott Perry told us that the adage “Be nice to people you meet on the way up; you’ll meet them again on the way down” even applies to Republicans like Kevin McCarthy. In other news, Bold Progressives is collecting signatures for a Get-Well message to Jamie Raskin.
Also yesterday, my new space heater (and a spare) arrived 5 days earlier than promised. They are larger than I expected but they fit in the space, and they are most definitely adequate for the job. So I expect to be able to qui wearing socks with my (faux of course) fur lined shoes and boots.
And I would add Cavin’Kevin was finally elected on the 15th ballot … but it was after midnight in DC, so it actually happened today.
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Crooks and Liars – Now It’s The Proud Boys’ Turn To Find Out
Quote – The seditious conspiracy trial of Proud Boys leader Henry “Enrique” Tarrio and four [other] members of the Proud Boys … is underway. Opening statements have not yet begun, however. Instead, jury selection has moved at a glacial pace at the federal courthouse in Washington, D.C…. [They] face nine charges apiece including seditious conspiracy; conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding; obstruction of an official proceeding; conspiracy to prevent an officer from discharging their duties; obstruction of law enforcement during a civil disorder; destruction of government property; and aiding and abetting, and assaulting, resisting, or impeding officers. Click through for story. The seating of the jury is taking longer, because the Proud Boys are a tad more notorious than the Oath Keepers – otherwise, we can hope this trial will go pretty much like that one.
Wonkette – Dipsh*ts Charged In Christmas Attacks On Four Washington Substations
Quote – Matthew Greenwood, 32, and Jeremy Crahan, 40, were charged in federal court Tuesday with conspiracy to damage energy facilities, and Greenwood also caught charges of possessing unregistered firearms. When Greenwood was arrested, he was found with an illegally modified short-barreled rifle with a homemade silencer, as well as a short-barreled shotgun, neither registered as required by law. In the Justice Department press release announcing the charges, US Attorney Nick Brown noted, “We have seen attacks such as these increase in Western Washington and throughout the country and must treat each incident seriously. The outages on Christmas left thousands in the dark and cold and put some who need power for medical devices at extreme risk.” Click through for details. Basically, these people are murderers who are too cowadly to face their victims. There are colder places than Western Washington (the ocean to its west gives it some protection from the kind of blizzarda and sub-zero temperatures we see on the prairie and in the northeast) but it can still get cold enough fot hypothermia to kill- even if one doesn’t need oxygen or other electric-powered medical support.
