Emma and the crew form The Majority Report discuss Dem U.S. Senator Dick Durbin calling for a cease fire in the Israel/Gaza conflict...also, kudos to Minneapolis area Rabbi Jessica Rosenberg for courageously asking for the same thing from President Biden (and I have a pretty good idea of what that fool Amy Schumer did, which is about par for the wretched course with her)...
Update 1: Hey, does anybody want to hear my admittedly-dumb-lefty-blogger take on this story?
(I mean, if Cenk Uygur can announce a run for president, then the least I can do is opine as a self-proclaimed foreign policy expert.)
I don’t know how many people have noticed the debate about funding for Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan and our border going on with our supposedly august U.S. Senate. There are those who want everything funded in one bill (Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao, Huckelberry Graham and others), and then there are those like Mike Lee and “Russia Ron” Johnson who want funding for Israel to be voted on as a standalone bill and vote on the other items separately (meaning of course that they’re willing to do Putin’s bidding and tell Ukraine and Zelenskyy to pound sand).
Well, although I certainly don’t have an inside track on this stuff, I don’t think it takes a genius to see that China is watching this too. And I also don’t know how many people have noticed that Hezbollah and Iran have been strangely quiet while the Israel/Gaza carnage proceeds apace (what better opportunity for them to intercede against “Bibi” than now)?
I think Iran and Hezbollah are shying away for now because China told them to. China is waiting to see if we approve military funding for Taiwan. Because if we do, China may just decide to pull back from the region and say, “OK, enemies of Israel and the U.S., go ahead and lob a shell or two at one of those ships in the Mediterranean. As of now, we don’t care.” And if that happens and we get hit and members of our military get killed, then we’ll respond of course, and we’ll all be speedily on our way to World War III.
People far smarter than I am no doubt know that we’re stuck in a vulnerable position. Hamas are cowardly, bloodthirsty murderers, but “Bibi” is proving that he’s little better. And the Israeli PM has been trying to sucker us into another Mideast mess ever since we extricated ourselves from Dubya’s Not-So-Excellent Iraq Adventure. Hell, if Netanyahu really wanted to get Hamas, he’d find a way to go after them in Qatar or put some kind of pressure on that government to give them up. But as far as I’m concerned, Netanyahu doesn’t want that. What he wants is a Palestinian genocide. And unfortunately, he’s getting it with our help thus far.
I’m saying this because I care very much about the fate of innocent Israelis and Palestinians, and I care even more about our military that could end up in harm’s way before all is said and done. I just don’t see any good way out of this without still more bloodshed on an ever-more-sickening scale, but believe me when I tell you that I want to be wrong (Update: And I almost forgot about this charming moment from "Bibi" - and yes, that's a bad joke I know).
...and focusing on domestic U.S. politics, David Pakman informs us that “MAGA Mike” Johnson’s wife scrubbed her website where she compared homosexuality to bestiality...so many issues with this guy, and I thought this was a good recent column by Charles Blow about the House Speaker...
...and David Shuster tells us that Johnson has “feels” apparently of Biden’s illegality, and that’s enough for an investigation by itself...and as Robert Garcia says, this is positively rich coming from a party whose de facto head is facing 91 criminals counts spread across 4 indictments (and nice work by Jen Psaki also)...
...and in keeping with those lunatics in charge of the U.S. House, Jayar Jackson and Jordan Uhl discuss the beyond-Dickensian budget cuts proposed by Not Your Father’s Republican Party and “MAGA Mike” in particularly (CHIP, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, the ACA, etc.)...what a weaselly little shit Johnson is, though I realize that shouldn’t be surprising (I think Jordan Uhl goes off the rails here a bit when criticizing Dems for not telling the IDF and Israel to call for a cease fire in Gaza since that’s a wholly separate issue, as noted in the first video, but I think the message has gone forth from TYT and Cenk Uygur in particular to find any way possible to bash Dems regardless of the issue...yes, there are times when that’s called for I admit, but TYT overdoes it big time...and I don’t completely buy Jayar’s argument at the end that we’ll run out of money; I’m not saying we should spend like drunken sailors, but that’s not an excuse for demagoguery either...by the way, on a bit of an unrelated note, you can expect to see fewer “Second Thought” and TYT clips because I think their content has become highly questionable for different reasons)...
Update 2: I can think of few better illustrations of the old adage "pride goeth before a fall" than this.
Update 3: Curiouser and curiouser (here).
Update 11/4/23: I have a feeling that the day will come sooner than later when Johnson wishes he'd never become speaker and stayed as a relative back-bencher...well, too damn late now (here).
Update 11/5/23: The more we learn about "MAGA Mike," the weirder (and more dangerous) he looks (here, to say nothing of corrupt as noted here).
...and turning once more to “the world’s greatest deliberative body,” Beau talks about the proposed bill from Brave Sir Josh Hawley allegedly getting big donor $$ out of politics (spoiler alert – the bill is a “red herring”) with Sen. Mr. Elaine Chao saying “not on my watch”...good explanation by Beau of just how daunting it would be to destroy Citizens United...not saying it’s impossible, but we would need a wholly other High Court (run by the “D” team, which hasn’t happened for over 50 years) from the one we have now to enable that (more from Jane Mayer is here)...
...and today marks the 50th anniversary of the release of “Quadrophenia” by The Who, their sixth studio album and second “concept” recording after “Tommy” (I've seen a release date of today as well as October 29th, for the record)...I believe they had a third "concept" recording they were working on called “Lighthouse” but they couldn’t quote pull it together, though it ultimately became “Who’s Next?,” which to me is their greatest work...this song fits on so many levels for yours truly, especially right now.
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