Four More Years

The House is now in session.

Making our peace with Hillary Clinton last spring was like making our peace with watered-down Obamacare seven years ago: The legislation was poorly conceived and managed, it was neutered to appease an opposition that never intended to vote for it, but compared to the alternative, it was all we had. The Damn Bill Passed. Maybe they could fix it in Post.

And now that the initial version is beginning to self-destruct as predicted, we’re starting to hear happy chatter that Hillary may reintroduce our only protection — well, besides universal Medicare — against insurance-company mergers, pullouts and price hikes: the Public Option.

Fat chance.

We don’t doubt her sincerity — for once — but she’ll be facing the knuckle-dragging House, and perhaps still a Neanderthal Senate. Ain’t nothing getting done until at least 2020, by which time Republicans may have invented a Kinder, Gentler Fascist to run against her.

How bad can it get?

For starters, Ted Cruz has taken time off from seeking his lost manhood to place the opening bid in the SCOTUSstakes: No confirmed Hillary nominees ever, even if the Court dwindles down to Anthony Perkins and his mom.

And just Friday, Jason Chaffetz used the FBI Email Clusterfuck to preview his upcoming Clinton Investigation Now! cable channel, featuring 24/7 hearings from his House Oversight Committee, at least until Hillary dispatches him like everyone else who stood in her way.

But even earlier this week, the high-school debate squad that populates our nation’s pundit class was already rehearsing the line that without a decisive landslide, Hillary would lack a “mandate” to govern, because as everyone knows, you need a 10-point popular margin to justify your policies to everyone who voted against you.

Oh, you didn’t know that?

Golly, neither did we! Which is odd, since we’ve been around for every election since 1960, and don’t recall hearing about the Mandating Game until — c’mon, guess — 1992.

And then 1996.

But not 2000.

Funny how that works.

But no matter. As President Cheney incessantly demonstrated, the only thing that matters is power, popular-vote loss be damned. The Shrub Administration had a pliant opposition. Former pliant-opposition member Madam President won’t.

Which is why we won’t be getting four more years of Barack Obama, or even four more years of Bill Clinton. Instead it’ll be four more years of the last six, as America rounds out its second Lost Decade of the new millennium.

17 Comments

As usual, they’re keepin’ the latest Clinton escándalo de correo electrónico klassi at the NY Post:

Dickileaks: The Stroking Gun

@¡Andrew!: And now Alberto Gonzales, of all people, is criticizing James Comey for breathing new life into the email scandal right before the election. We are officially through the rabbit hole.

@mellbell: Hey now these finally may be the emails in which Clinton confesses to murdering all those people.

@mellbell: And now they’re bring up the fucking Marc Rich pardon from the end of Bill’s term? And Nate is showing the odds at 71% Hillary, 29% Trump with an actual “path to victory” for the orange Man Baby. I am freaking the fuck out.

@¡Andrew!: I think it was John Oliver who pointed out that if the Clintons actually had people killed, there’s no way Anthony Weiner would still be alive. And that was before the latest fiasco he’s caused.

@Mistress Cynica: I’m currently at about a 6 out of 10 on the poll fretting scale. But it’s inching up day by day, so I’ll probably max out next week.

Hillary’s still leading by 100 evs on the aggregation site I’ve been following since 2008 — and she’s straddling 270 on statistically sure states alone. It’s amazing the states she could lose and still win.

Less than a week ’til we find out who wins the contest to be captain of the Titanic.

@nojo: History may not repeat, but it often rhymes.

@Mistress Cynica: National Pantsuit Day is helping me stay sane this week. Kudos to whomever came up with that.

Per the WSJ, the FBI is currently working on a criminal investigation of the Clinton Foundation charity fraud. Meanwhile, the Guardian reports that a civil suit against Trump for raping a 13 year-old is scheduled to move forward in December.

I wanna be sedated.

@¡Andrew!: I’ll be curious about any FBI fallout post-election — anti-Clinton agents are leaking hard to the WSJ, which is, as I understand it, highly improper.

Hey kids! Remember J. Edgar? I do!

Also from the Guardian: FBI is “Trump-Land”:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/03/fbi-leaks-hillary-clinton-james-comey-donald-trump

@nojo: I remember JEH and the anti-Civil Rights activities of the Federal Bureau of Interference, as a friend who worked in MS back in the day called them.

@Mistress Cynica: Similarly chilling piece in Vanity Fair

And this WashPo article about how the GOP has pledged that we ain’t seen nothing yet with the past 8 years of obstruction made me despair.

And then I really screwed myself over and went to 538 and read Nate Silver’s latest and really started to stroke out or at least hyperventilate. Four more days of this shit.

It wouldn’t surprise me if Bill got a little close to, or over, the line at the Foundation. But in today’s context, I don’t care.

@SanFranLefty: I am not allowing myself to read 538. The WaPo article in chilling and probably dead on. If we don’t take the Senate, we’re completely screwed.
It did not help that a friend of Mr Cyn’s pointed out that the day after the election is the anniversary of Kristallnacht.

@Mistress Cynica: Well, uh, Dems aren’t recovering the Senate, unless it’s a big night. It’s been seesawing all season, 51-49 GOP the past week.

And, as usual, I don’t trust Nate’s models. Unlike baseball, politics has too many variables.

Add a Comment
Please log in to post a comment