Ted Rall for November 25, 2022

Can’t disagree. It IS good (short term) for the ones who have the seats in the Senate. And they won’t get much, if anything done, though the two parties will blame each other for it.

If the repubs did win the senate, Mr Rall would probably still find a way to blame the democrats.

The republicans will block everything Rall mentions.

Civic spirit was awakened in young voters — and it saved the Senate for Democrats: analysis

Landslide support for Democrats and a surging youth vote were likely decisive in key Senate races that allowed Democrats to remain control of the upper body. John Yang of PBS News interviewed John Della Volpe of the Harvard Kennedy School Institute of Politics and Victor Shi of Voters of Tomorrow about what they had learned from studying the results.

But of course you know you could inspire people to go and vote even if in the 100s or 1000s of his viewers

But of course ted is too cynical to have the mindset of putting his own country first over his insufferable backwards ideals of “only bernie and nobody else”

Not without support from the House.

For Mr. Rall and those who don’t understand the process legislation:

https://www.house.gov/the-house-explained/the-legislative-process

Also, as seen the past 2 years in the Senate, just because the Dems have held a majority, there are Senators opposed to a progressive agenda so that proposed legislation must be negotiated to get their concurrence, weakening the bills.

Like always, Democrats will write the bills, force debate, and do all the political heavy lifting to make those goals a reality, while Republicans continue to whine and cry and tantrum and refuse to do anything even remotely beneficial for the country. And Mr. Rall and friends will continue to find ways to create (solely through disparagement of the Democrats) in making it seem as though the Republican Party has a valid reason to exist here in the 21st century.

Tell me again how an abused system of checks and balances that makes congress increasingly dysfunctional with each new session, benefits the public.

College education has always been funded by the state-it is University of California or Texas not US University in Berkley/Austin. The states use to fully fund their universities and students paid nominal tuition; the Federal government should not take up the slack the states should. In January > 50% of Medicare recipients will be on for profit Advantage plans

So, when the gop had the senate, what did they do?

N. O. T. H. I. N. G. ! Per usual.☹️

Right now, the dems are — prematurely — celebrating their “victory.” The Republicans? They’re planning for 2024. (The dems will definitely start doing that too. Soon. Ask again in a few days.) The Republican path for 2024? On Jan. 20, 2023, the House will instigate investigations into Joe Biden. It will not be pretty, mainly because there probably IS some sort of corruption going on there. The Republicans will keep the sideshow going for months. They’ll argue that a president under investigation shouldn’t be appointing any judges at all. The whole government will be shut down for the remainder of Biden’s presidency.All that’s missing? Control of the Senate. If Walker wins Georgia, the tally goes to 50-50. A tie. I can’t begin to imagine how much the Republicans will offer Manchin or Sinema to switch parties. The dems thought Hillary Clinton losing to an oaf like Trump was humiliating? (It was.) If the Republicans can recapture the Senate, even after the dems “kept” it, the action will be one of the most effective political emasculations of all time.

Well, of course not.. but rest assured had they lost the senate, what little you have now would be reduced or eliminated.

They wouldn’t just repeat ‘we kept the senate’ they’d go into detail on the power and long term advocacy of judicial appointments.

The Democrats won the Senate. And everyone knows that the only policy position that the Republicans will put forth is to try to kill whatever the Democrats try to initiate. So getting things done will be an uphill battle; however, one needs to keep in mind that Democrats got an infrastructure bill, reduced cost for insulin and a groundwork for getting medication costs better controlled, increased veterans’ benefits, and a chips and science bill passed. This despite Mr. Biden’s anemic approval ratings and a 50-vote Senate bloc, of which 2 were often unwilling to go along.

The Dems are already one vote ahead, and we can only hope that Mr. Walker’s monumental unfitness for office will be on the minds of Georgia voters this coming election.

Regardless of that outcome, though, the main effect of winning the Senate is the preservation of what could be called our democracy. If Republicans had taken both houses, we would be watching what happened in Turkey and in Hungary right here at home. Although it may be the only victory the Democrats can celebrate for the next two years, THAT is the most important win the country could have hoped for.

Mr. Rall’s interpretation is similar to a person stating that he got to work on time, without mentioning that if he had gotten to that bridge two minutes earlier, he would have been in the river like all those other unfortunates.

UH…. Mr. Rall…. He who controls the Senate, controls who does or does not get on the Supreme Court and various other official offices… DUH!!

Y’all ever notice that Ted Rall does alot of the Strawman fallacy?

Number five is a real laugh. Hate to tell you folks, but people spend hard work, years, and boo koo money on becoming a good doctor, nurse or technician to make money. There are the few that donate time to serving the poor, but even they are very wealthy. P.S. The Canadian Institute for Health Information has been tracking doctors’ destinations only since 1992. Since then, between 60 and 70 percent of physicians who emigrate have headed south of the border. In the mid-1990s, the number leaving for the U.S. spiked at about 400 to 500 a year.

Ted bitterly criticizes Democrats for being unable to overcome Republicans’ obstruction.

I guess one more instance of It’s OKAY If A Republican Does It.

The Democrats will stop the Republican/conservatives from:

Ending Social security. Ending Medicare. Ending Medicaid. Ending SNAP. Giving the wealthy more tax cuts. Ending our constitution with their planned constitutional convention. Ending our democratic-republic.

Our Congress will be busy the next four years: The repubs attacking the dems, and the dems spending most of their time & energy defending themselves. BOTH sides will also be fundraising for themselves. Just more craziness and wealth distribution (upward) folks. Don’t get your hopes up.

So, Ted, tell us all about the absolutely FABOO plans the Republicans had in mind for dealing with the economy, inflations, gas prices, etc. Oh, wait, that’s right – Mitch McConnell said they’d only discuss plans AFTER the midterms (presuming back in late 2021, that they’d take back the Senate). Oopsie…

Progressives should think twice about advocating an all powerful federal government intervening in local/state/education matters in case in 2025 DeSatan is President and republicans control Congress. What then??

when one party is obstinately, intransigently, devoted to preventing the dems from successfully governing then nothing will change. If Ted wants to point fingers maybe for once he could point them at the party that’s ACTUALLY responsible.

And with DINO’s like Manchin and Sinema, even that’s iffy.

“They” is bigger than one political party. Not enough Americans want these things. If they did, both parties would be interested in solving them.

Democrats told us they need more Democrats to enact their agenda. If Warnock holds on in the runoff, they’ll have an actual majority and still get nothing done, because [filibuster | Manchin (D, WV) | Sinema (D, AZ) | Senate Parliamentarian | something else] just stopped them from getting it done. Sorry, everyone, who expected things to improve when Democrats held power!

To paraphrase the great Steve Earle, its two more years of things not getting worse. I’ll take it even if its all i get.

Well, they are trying, but the “loyal opposition” keeps getting in the way of progress. :-|

Well we know the QOP in the House have no intentions of doing any of those things either. The next two years will be a lame duck Congress in both Houses.

What Democrats really want is power and wealth. They don’t give a flip about kitchen-table issues or wanton spending on programs that enrich themselves, their family members, and high-rolling friends in industry. They’ll give just enough lip service to matters of concern to the middle class to convince that cross section of voters to keep them in office; and then they’ll go back to doing business as usual.

Republicans aren’t much better, with the likes of Mitch McConnell and the parade of clowns, like John Cornyn and John Thune, who stand behind him like potted plants at press conferences. If Republicans ever toss McConnell and his retinue to the curb, they might have a chance to do something FOR the average American, unlike the entire lineup of Democrats in the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Wow Bob Wow

Your not helping.

How is a Senator going to house the homeless?

O/T, PROBABLY

Go to https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/79/Ilja_Jefimowitsch_Repin_-Reply_of_the_Zaporozhian_Cossacks_-Yorck.jpg which shows in nice detail the late-19th c. painting by Ilya Repin that portrays the composing of the semi-historical reply by the Zaporozhnian Cossacks to a letter from Sultan Medmed IV. In his letter, the Sultan demanded that the cossacks swear allegiance to him even though they had recently (this was in the mid-1600s) thoroughly defeated his army. The basis for his demand was that he was such an important man. The reply, being composed in the painting, disputes his self-important claims in a funny, vulgar way.

The beer-bellied man in a red coat and white astrakhan hat guffawing just to the right side of the painting supposedly represents Tara Bulba (despite the character in Gogol’s novel appearing nowhere in the historical record).

Look at the man standing to Bulba’s right and slightly behind. Only part of his face can be seen, and he’s watching Bulba laugh. Does his face remind you of someone?

The Senate will confirm judicial appointments.