Divided Government – Page 13

Democrats’ Strategic Failure Continues to Haunt

When President Obama won re-election in 2012, Democrats increased their majority in the Senate, but the House of Representatives remained in Republican hands. In House races in 2012, 1.7 million more votes were cast for Democrats than for Republicans, but Republicans came away with 33 more Congressional seats.

How did this happen when in 2008, Republicans lost a “wave” election, and were looking at eight years in the minority? The Republicans were staring down a demographic tidal wave, and the Democrats were talking about a decade of changing politics. The Democrats had taken a super majority in the Senate. The real risk to the GOP was that, by the 2020 census, demographics could keep them in a semi-permanent minority for a very long time.

Then, along came a Republican strategist named Chris Jankowski. He had a strategy, one which the Democrats failed to react to. A strategy that turned a period of a likely permanent GOP minority to a GOP majority in four years. All of this is covered in “Rat-F*****: The True Story Behind The Secret Plan To Steal America’s Democracy“, by Salon’s editor-in-chief, David Daley.

Jankowski’s strategy was to gain control of as many state legislatures as possible in 2010. The plan was to control the state’s redistricting process for Congressional districts, once the result of the 2010 Census was available. That is because state legislatures draw most of the congressional boundaries across the country. The GOP’s plan was called REDMAP for Redistricting Majority Project. The idea behind REDMAP was to hit the Democrats in several state legislatures where Democratic statehouse majorities were thin. They targeted races with vast sums of money and were able to flip many state houses.

In 2009, Democrats held the majority of seats in both houses of the state legislature in 27 states. In six more, they held a majority in one house. The Presidency, the US Senate, and the House of Representatives were all in Democratic hands.

In 2010, Republicans gained nearly 700 state legislative seats, which, was a larger increase than either party has seen in modern history. The wins were sufficient to push 20 legislative chambers from a Democratic to a Republican majority.

Most significantly, the GOP took control over both houses of the legislature in 25 states.

REDMAP’s success was made possible by funding from a super-PAC called the Republican State Leadership Committee. It raised $30 million, mostly from corporations, of which $18 million was received just weeks before Election Day.

Pennsylvania is an object lesson: So skillfully were the lines drawn by the Republican legislature that in 2012, when President Obama carried Pennsylvania by 300,000 votes and the state’s Democratic congressional candidates collectively out-polled their rivals by 100,000 votes, Republicans still won 13 of Pennsylvania’s 18 seats in the House of Representatives.

In Michigan, the 2012 election was a huge success for Democrats. Voters elected a Democratic US Senator by more than 20 points and reelected President Obama by almost 10 points, but Republicans ended up with nine of the state’s Congressional seats to the Democrats’ five.

This was among the greatest political achievement in modern times. If you’re a Republican, you look at this and say, we played by the rules, we played within the law, and we won!

And the Democrats spent 2009-2011 asleep at the wheel, presiding over a catastrophic strategic failure.

Worse, the GOP plans were announced by Karl Rove in a March 2010 op-ed in the Wall Street Journal. Rove said they were going to use redistricting to take back the Congress. The GOP plan was in plain sight.

This takes us to Hillary Clinton’s possible choices for Vice President. Apparently, she is leaning towards Tim Kaine, (D-VA). Kaine is attractive in that Hillary needs to win in Virginia to win the presidency. Kaine is a Harvard-educated lawyer and was governor of Virginia from 2006-2010.

We mention him here since he was Chair of the Democratic National Committee from 2009-2011.

That’s right, it was Tim Kaine who the Republicans outsmarted with their REDMAP strategy. It is Tim Kaine who let the GOP place so many different locks on the door to Congress. Undoing that will take years of really concentrated effort, state by state, chamber by chamber. It’s going to take the Democratic Party at least until after the 2020 census to undo what Tim Kaine let happen in 2010 and 2011.

Perfect choice for VP. He’s the right guy to follow a Hillary Presidency.

In preparation for the next census, Democrats have come up with a REDMAP-like plan of their own. They call it Advantage 2020, and say they plan to spend $75 million.

Republicans have announced REDMAP 2020. Their spending goal?

$125 million.

Pant Suit vs. Pant Load, Part III

(Note: this week there will be no Sunday Cartoon Blogging, since Wrongo will be visiting MA and PA through Sunday, returning on Monday.)

Wrongo and long-time blog reader Terry engaged in a short email dialog on how to “fix” the US political system. We were concerned that there is no individual Congressperson accountability. A backbencher can follow an agenda that can imperil our nation (and a few have done just that) without consequence.

But in America, accountability is managed by election district. Your only alternative is to round up enough votes to replace poor representation. So, if you wanted to reform the impact that money has in our politics, or the way the filibuster works in the Senate, you have to reform Congress.

Yet, under our Constitution, only Congress can reform Congress. And today, there are three parties vying for control of it, and since they rarely are willing to work with each other, not much gets done. So you can completely forget about Reform.

And the parties have not been willing to deal with the not-so hidden desperation in America that shows up in statistics like increasing opioid addiction and suicide rates. The political class ignores how lethal the US economy is for the less fortunate: The New York Times reported this week that US death rates have risen for the first time in a decade.

The increase in death rates among less educated whites since 2001 is roughly the size of the AIDS epidemic. One reason is the use of opioids. And, despite Mr. Obama’s speech in Elkhart, IN where he said our economy is doing well, there has been a spike in suicides to levels higher than during the 2008 financial crisis.

The little people know that the economic policies followed by both parties have brought income inequality to Gilded Age levels. They know that all of the post-crisis income gains have accrued to the top 1%. Unlike in China which continues to grow, our economic expansion has brought with it high unemployment and underemployment, particularly among the young.

As a result, people feel powerless. In fact, a RAND survey in January found that 86.5% of GOP voters who strongly identified with the statement “people like me don’t have any say about what the government does” were Trump supporters.

And, since so much of politics is about corralling money into the bank accounts of our politicians, your Congresspersons have no intention of listening to you unless you have given at least $10,000 to their campaign fund, or are the CEO of a major employer in their district or state. In US politics, money=speech. But, there is little meaning to free speech without free access to influence the political process.

Many of us feel nihilistic about our politics and our government. So the Pant Load’s support seems a lot like a form of public political vandalism where The Donald is the can of spray paint.

Most people can see that a large portion of Americans are poorer with each new election cycle. After all, the reason Trump (and Sanders) are doing well is because many, many workers are seeing their job security, income security, and retirement security all go up in smoke. That’s no mystery, just the natural outcome when the government fails to represent the people in favor of the rich who fund their campaigns. It’s no wonder the Pant Load is easily corralling the frustrated.

But can the Pant Suit reverse the Democratic Party’s abandonment of the working class in America?

We know that she needs to focus on drawing more potential working class and young supporters, but so far, Democrats are content to run only in their municipal strongholds, following a strategy of stitching together interest groups, largely in states with big urban populations.

Energizing people around the fact of our corrupt political system is both a way to get higher turnout, and a way to elect members of Congress and state legislatures to fix the corrupt system. That is Bernie’s message, what he calls a “political revolution.” But Sanders is not the person to bring this about. Consider Sanders just the messenger.

Strategically, the Pant Suit needs to figure out how to get folks energized enough to vote for her and against Trump for reasons that don’t so paralyze them with fear that they stay home. If she is successful, it could be the start of re-establishing the New Deal coalition, and a re-installation of the principles of the civil rights movement.

That’s a huge job that will not be completed in one election cycle.

This threat is the GOP’s worst nightmare. They have worked for 40 years to eliminate these ideas, so expect the GOP to unanimously support the Pant Load:

COW Never Hillary

The Bernie Dems will rally behind Hillary for similar reasons.

Trump/Arpaio 2016: Because immigrants are the greatest threat to the nation.

The Pandering Pant Load

Trump is a thin-skinned Pandering Pant Load© with rabbit ears: He hears everything that is said about him and responds to it all. Say something, and @realDonaldTrump will tweet back something nasty.

We saw two examples of his pandering in the past few days. First, Trump attended “Rolling Thunder” an annual event which brings hundreds of thousands of motorcyclists to DC to raise money for POW-MIA’s of the Vietnam War. On Sunday, He told about 5,000 that illegal migrants in the US are often better cared for than the nation’s military veterans:

Thousands of people are dying waiting in line to see a doctor. That is not going to happen anymore

Although Trump has used this comparison of the treatment of immigrants and veterans before, it isn’t true. Congress and many states have written an assortment of laws and policies designed to restrict government services to people living in the country illegally.

Could Congress do more for vets? Absolutely. Do we do less for them than we do for illegals? NO.

We know that the Pandering Pant Load© claimed to have raised $6 million for veteran’s groups, including $1 million of his own money when he held a fundraiser for veterans’ causes in place of an Iowa debate that he skipped.

But so far, he hasn’t distributed it, or said where it is going. He is expected to hold a news conference today to announce the names of the charities selected to receive the money. We’ll see.

Still, when you tell an interest group that you will do more for them than we do for illegals, you are setting the bar very low.

Second, the Pandering Pant Load© supposedly told House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) he supports cutting Social Security but cannot admit it publicly because it would hurt his election chances, according to Bloomberg BusinessWeek. Trump said of cutting Social Security:

From a moral standpoint, I believe in it…But you also have to get elected. And there’s no way a Republican is going to beat a Democrat when the Republican is saying, ‘We’re going to cut your Social Security’ and the Democrat is saying, ‘We’re going to keep it and give you more.’

Bloomberg reported that The Pandering Pant Load© made the above comments during the May 12 meeting with Mr. Ryan aimed at improving ties between them, citing an unnamed source who was in the room.

So the deal was made, and what we have been watching is theater. And from a “moral standpoint”, Trump just lies about what he plans to do, because his audience is against it?

HuffPo reported that Trump’s opposition to cutting Social Security (SS) has been both a hallmark of his campaign and one of his greatest departures from traditional conservative ideology. Now it seems, he is simply pandering. Consider this:

Many conservative House Republicans told The Huffington Post shortly after the May 12 meeting with Ryan that that they were unconcerned about Trump’s public posture on Social Security.
Why? Because Trump policy advisor Sam Clovis had already appeared to reverse course on May 11, indicating that Trump would be willing to consider cuts as president.

The media have their nice, shiny Trump, and they have signed on for the whole ride, so don’t expect to hear much more about his pandering.

The Pant Load will try to dupe people (this week, Vietnam Vets and the middle class) into voting against their interests, because he is sure that they can’t be bothered to pay enough attention to understand that he’s lying.

The truth is that SS faces a funding gap beginning in 2034. Without Congressional action to either raise the program’s revenues or scale back benefits, there will be an across-the-board benefit cut of approximately 20%.

We all know this.

Why is the Pandering Pant Load© being dishonest about it? Maybe the real shock shouldn’t be that Trump is devoid of integrity; if he’s breathing, he’s lying.

It’s that his base doesn’t seem to care that he’ll throw them under the bus without a second thought.

The Pant Load Party

Happy Friday! You are busy, and don’t need a long-form note from Wrongo. But, here are a few items you may have missed that accurately describe the Republican Party today:

First, The GOP didn’t follow its own rules during a vote on Thursday. The subject was a measure to ensure protections for the LGBT community in federal contracts, and it failed to pass after “initially passing” during the time allotted for members to vote. Then, the Republican leadership urged their members to change their votes. The leadership kept the vote open as they pressured members to change sides, allowing lawmakers switch their votes without following the “Regular Order” process of walking to the well at the front of the chamber.

By changing their votes, the House GOP inserted a poison pill that overrides Obama’s executive order banning LGBTQ discrimination in federal defense contracts. From The Hill:

Initially, it appeared Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney’s (D-NY) amendment had passed, as 217 “yes” votes piled up over 206 “no” votes when the clock ran out. The measure needed 213 votes to pass. But it eventually failed, 212-213, after a number of Republican lawmakers changed their votes from “yes” to “no” after the clock had expired.

“Hey GOP: Stop Being So Mean”

Trump thinks the GOP is trying to keep him from scoring The Deal of the Decade, or as the rest of us know it, the GOP nomination. Here is the predictable reaction in TrumpWorld from today’s New Yorker:

COW So Mean (2)

Wrongo got to spend time with the owner of his local PC repair company today. During the work on the PC, the talk turned to politics. The owner said quite a few things that everyone in America seems to feel, that politicians can’t be trusted, that they do nothing to solve America’s problems, and are just there to line their pockets.

He is a two-time voter for Obama, but is leaning this year towards Donald Trump. Two issues are fueling his thinking: First, that illegal immigration is a real issue, and that our economy, and to some extent our society, are being harmed by a large flow of immigrants. We live in Connecticut. Our county has the lowest population density of any county in Connecticut and is geographically, the state’s largest county. We are the whitest county: The 2010 census shows our county to be 94% white, and 1.3% black or African American. People of Hispanic or Latino origin made up 4.5% of the population. So, we enjoy little diversity, although many of our lawn and construction workers are Hispanic.

My computer guy points to a neighboring city in another county which has had large increases in black and Hispanic populations since 2000, now with 25% of its population Hispanic, and 8% black, both up dramatically.

Second, he thinks that Obamacare hurts his business. Never mind that his healthcare comes through his wife’s job, and that he has less than 5 employees, so his business isn’t paying for health insurance.

He also gives Obama no credit for America’s recovery from the Great Recession, saying that it took a really long time to recover, and the economy probably would have recovered on its own.

He is concerned that Trump would be an inappropriate president, a guy who can’t speak civilly to foreign leaders. He isn’t sold on Trump’s foreign policy either.

It is a sample of one. A two-time Obama voter who doesn’t think he has anywhere to go in November. He doesn’t think Hillary is the one; he thinks Sanders is a fringe player, right along with Trump.

He’s looking for a leader, and wonders why nobody who is truly great wants the job.

But that’s easy to understand. Too many people pin their hopes on getting “the right person” in the presidency, not realizing that it takes much more than just the leader to get the wheels of change moving.

Without courage and support from both houses of Congress, government won’t move an inch. Trump or Sanders could win, and be completely unable to steer the ship of state anywhere but where the oligarchs choose for to go.

Connecticut will be a reliable state for the Democrats in the fall, but they need to think again if they plan to use the same old interest group song and dance that worked to elect Obama in 2008 and 2012.

My PC guy isn’t gonna buy it.

It’s doubtful that he’s alone.

The Pant Suit vs. The Pant Load©

Over the next few months, Wrongo will be writing an extended series of columns about the 2016 presidential election, called “The Pant Suit vs. The Pant Load”.©

The starting premise is that Hillary Clinton will be the Democratic nominee, and whoever gets the Republican nomination will be the designated Pant Load.

Pant Load #1 is of course, The Donald. Pant Load #2 is Ted “Canada” Cruz.

That leaves Pant Load #3, House Speaker Paul Ryan, who today’s NYT tells us, is running very fast, all the while saying he is not interested. It says a lot about the leadership of the GOP when their leading candidates for the Presidency make Paul Ryan look like a good idea.

Some Republicans who are hoping for a more “moderate” answer to Pant Loads #1 and #2, think that Ryan, possibly with Rubio as his VP candidate, will turn 2016 into a GOP presidential win. However, anyone who thinks that Paul Ryan is a moderate, needs to take the time to read what his plans are for programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid and tax reform. He would rip up the social contract and shred the safety net, leaving us in a societal Hobbesian nightmare.

Anyway, the GOP is very nervous, and possibly for good reason. Pollster Stan Greenberg has evidence that groups that were core to the Obama wins are now becoming much more engaged than they were in 2015. A few of Greenberg’s findings:

The GOP civil war is producing an eye-opening number of Republicans ready to punish down-ballot candidates for not making the right choice with respect to how to run in relation to the front-runner. Moderate Republicans are already peeling off
The focus groups with white unmarried women, millennials and African Americans showed a new consciousness about the stakes in November. In this poll, the percentage of Democrats giving the highest level of engagement has increased 10 points
The result is that the country might be heading for an earthquake election in November.

An “earthquake election.” Take all that with a grain of salt, since his firm (which includes James Carvelle) is very partisan. The survey took place March 17-24, 2016. Margin of error is +/-3.27 percentage points at 95% confidence. 65% of respondents were reached by cell phone.

So, the desperation is rising. Nancy Letourneau writes today about Grover Norquist’s plan to turn this around for the GOP:

Into this breach comes Grover Norquist with…what can I say…a “creative” solution. He has identified six new voting blocs that have developed over the last 30 years that won’t want Hillary Clinton in the White House. Between the lines, his contention is that she is just so out of touch with what is happening in the world that she’s missed them.

Here are Norquist’s six voting blocks that will challenge the Rising American Electorate:

Home schoolers
Charter school supporters
Concealed-carry permit holders
Fracking workers
Users of e-cigarettes and vapor products
Uber drivers

Norquist thinks the Republicans can tap these groups in order to stop Clinton in November. Wrongo isn’t sure, but Norquist’s ideas seemed to make more sense when we were at Burning Man on peyote. But now that our clothes are back on, it all seems dubious. This is micro targeting for no apparent gain.

For example, would a vaping Uber driver (with a concealed carry permit) who home-schools his/her children be Grover’s (and the GOP’s) ideal target? The size of that demographic approximates the number of American unicorns.

And who out there thinks that the home schooling bloc are not already voting Republican? Something like 95% of school-age kids are in traditional public schools, despite all the press that charter schools and homeschooling get, so we are not speaking of a huge demographic.

And how many fracking workers can there be? Aren’t most of them in Texas, and Oklahoma, not exactly swing states?

Those who have a concealed carry permit are most likely also already voting for the GOP.

Ya gotta love the smell of conservative desperation in the springtime.

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – April 10, 2016

This week, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) tore her Republican colleagues a new one in the pages of the Boston Globe:

For seven years, through artificial debt ceiling crises, deliberate government shutdowns, and intentional confirmation blockades, Senate Republicans have acted as though the election and reelection of Obama relieved them of any responsibility to do their jobs. Senate Republicans embraced the idea that government shouldn’t work at all unless it works only for themselves and their friends. The campaigns of Donald Trump and Ted Cruz are the next logical outgrowth of the same attitude — if you can’t get what you want, just ignore the obligations of governing, then divert attention and responsibility by wallowing in a toxic stew of attacks on Muslims, women, Latinos, and each other.

If Senate Republicans don’t like being forced to pick between a bullet and poison, then here’s some advice: Stand up to extremists in the Senate bent on sabotaging our government whenever things don’t go their way.

Warren’s anger is righteous anger, it is well directed and well-spoken. But, politicians who make it in our political system are those who hide most of their anger (righteous or not) under a veneer of unctuous civility. She chooses to give as good as she gets from the frat boys in the GOP. Maybe, after another 4 or 8 years of federal failure, that kind of anger will resonate with the American electorate.

Cartoons this week reflected the general coarsening of our society and politics. The bathroom habits of certain minorities made news in North Carolina. Apparently, they should pee in Virginia:

COW NC Bathrooms

Mississippi made similar news:

COW Miss Church

The NY Dem primary will be fought out on the sidewalks of NY:

COW Sidewalks of NY

The NY primaries have both parties looking for some room:

COW NY Primary

The Panama Papers tell us once again that we live in two Americas:

COW Panama Papers

Of course, Tax Day this week is mostly for the little people:

COW Tax Day2

And You Know That It’s Right

Last week Andy Newman died. You need to be as old as Wrongo to know who he was, but it’s likely you have heard the 1969 song “Something in the Air”, or of the group who recorded it, Thunderclap Newman. Back then, if you weren’t on the LBJ/Nixon Establishment team, you wanted change. Wrongo was discharged from the US Army in 1969. 1969 was Woodstock, the first man on the moon, Vietnam, the Manson family, the Black Panthers, and the 500,000 person march on Washington,

The song captured a moment.

The group was the idea of Pete Townshend, and he plays bass on “Something”. The guitarist was Jimmy McCulloch, who went on (in 1974) to be the lead guitarist in Paul McCartney’s band, Wings, and compose the song “Medicine Jar” for the album “Venus and Mars”. McCulloch died at 26 from a morphine and alcohol overdose.

This is a blip in rock and roll history, but the track survives. It was covered by Tom Petty. Wilco has performed it live for years. Steely Dan performs it live on tour as well. The song has been used in many movies, including The Magic Christian (1969), Almost Famous (2000) and The Girl Next Door (2004), and in commercials for Coca-Cola and British Airways.

It was written by Speedy Keen, who had been Townshend’s chauffeur. Andy Newman was the piano player for Thunderclap Newman, the nickname coming in high school from his heavy-handed playing style. He did not have a long career in music. After this one-hit wonder, he became an electrician.

Here is the song:

Some lyrics:

Call out the instigators
Because there’s something in the air
We’ve got to get together sooner or later
Because the revolution’s here, and you know it’s right
And you know that it’s right

1969 and 2016 are similar. It doesn’t matter who wins the presidency this year, there will still be widespread anger and discontent, the populace is no longer willing to accept political lip service instead of solutions. And they want the two Americas that the rich and powerful have foisted on us to be more equal.

Lock up the streets and houses
Because there’s something in the air
We’ve got to get together sooner or later
Because the revolution’s here, and you know it’s right
And you know that it’s right

The difference between then and now is that people today no longer believe in the American dream, they are no longer on the same page. We’ve become a strange brew of very narrow interests, all competing for the ears of our politicians, but they never do anything. Back in 1969, many of us wanted change. Today, despite (or because of?) Bernie and The Donald, and the two Establishment parties, we have no change, just political chaos.

Hand out the arms and ammo
We’re going to blast our way through here
We’ve got to get together sooner or later
Because the revolution’s here, and you know it’s right
And you know that it’s right

Different from 1969, we don’t have to hand out the ammo, it’s already in most homes.

But, sadly, just like in 1969, we have no answers. Bernie isn’t the answer, Trump isn’t the answer. The Establishments of both parties do not have answers.

And you know that it’s right

Congress Can’t Get Its Responsibilities Right

It is always good to know why and how we got where we are. Here is a little history about our military position in the Middle East. From Steve Coll in the New Yorker:

In 1967, British Prime Minister Harold Wilson gave up on the remnants of Pax Britannica. His Labour Government pulled British forces from Malaysia, Singapore, Yemen, Dubai, Qatar, Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, and other Persian Gulf emirates.

At the time, Denis Healey, the British Defense Secretary, said England should not:

Become mercenaries for people who would like to have a few British troops around.

And since nature doesn’t tolerate a vacuum, the US decided to leave a few American troops stationed permanently in the Gulf.

Now, 49 years later, American warships still patrol the Middle East. US fighter jets fly from a massive base in Qatar. Over the decades, Republican and Democratic administrations (and Congresses) have colluded to give a blank-check to successive presidents, keeping our troops deeply involved in the ME.

Andrew Bacevich has a new book, “America’s War for the Greater Middle East: A Military History,” which highlights the inexplicable passivity of Congress in our ME wars. He points out that from the end of World War II until 1980, virtually no American soldiers were killed in action while serving in the Middle East, while since 1990, virtually no American soldiers have been killed in action anywhere except the ME.

After the Cold War wound down in the 1980s, the US began what Bacevich calls the “War for the Greater Middle East”. As this new war unfolded, hostilities became persistent: From the Balkans to the Persian Gulf and Central Asia, US forces embarked upon a seemingly endless series of campaigns in the Islamic world, without conclusive success.

Actions undertaken with expectations of promoting peace and stability produced just the opposite. As a consequence, phrases like “war on terrorism,” “permanent war” and “open-ended war” have become part of our everyday politics. When it came to the ME, despite Congress having the Constitutional duty to declare war, they stopped offering any check or balance to America’s continuing ME wars.

It wasn’t always that way.

In 1964, Congress passed the Tonkin Gulf Resolution. The Congress urged President Lyndon Johnson “to take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States and to prevent further aggression” across the length and breadth of Southeast Asia. LBJ used it as legal cover to ramp up in Vietnam, as well as in Cambodia and Laos.

Fast forward to 2001, and Congress passed the Authorization to Use Military Force (AUMF). We can consider it to be the grandchild of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution. This directed President George W. Bush:

To use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations, or persons.

In plain language, it was a blank check. Now, nearly 15 years later, the AUMF remains operative, and has become the basis for military actions against innumerable individuals, organizations, and nations with no involvement whatsoever with the events of September 11, 2001.

And in 2015, when Obama asked Congress for a new AUMF addressing the specific threat posed by ISIS, asking that they rubber-stamp what he had already launched in Syria and Iraq, Senator Mitch McConnell worried that a new AUMF might constrain his successor. The Majority Leader remarked that the next president will:

Have to clean up this mess, created by all of this passivity over the last eight years…an authorization to use military force that ties the president’s hands behind his back is not something I would want to do.

So, Republicans think the proper role for Congress was to give this commander-in-chief carte blanche so that the next one would enjoy similar unlimited prerogatives. The GOP-controlled Congress thereby has transformed the post-9/11 AUMF into what has now become, in effect, permission for permanent armed conflict.

The illogic astounds: On ME warfare, Republicans collaborate with a president they despise, implicitly concurring with Obama’s claim that “existing statutes [already] provide me with the authority I need” to make war on ISIS.

Something that is at best, extra-Constitutional.

Yet, when Obama is clearly acting in accordance with the Constitution, nominating a new Justice to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court, they spare no effort to thwart him, concocting bizarre arguments to justify their obstructionism.

How does Congress square shirking its responsibilities in our ME war with its activism against Merrick Gardner?

Sunday Cartoon Blogging – April 3, 2016

Something you may have missed this week was that an increasing number of hospitals were held hostage by attacks on their IT departments. The attackers were looking for ransom. It started last month with Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center.

Last week there were three more, and this week, a whole hospital chain was attacked by ransomware, this time affecting the servers of 10 related MedStar facilities in Maryland and Washington DC.

Apparently most hospitals have paid the ransom.

Is this extortion or terrorism? Patients probably don’t care which. Let’s hope no patients were harmed by the IT outages. The biggest question these attacks on hospitals raises is: Why aren’t hospitals better prepared against ransomware? Hospitals are considered critical infrastructure, but unless patient data is impacted, there is no requirement to even disclose that a hacking occurred, even if operations are disrupted.

Computer security in the hospital industry is generally regarded as poor, and the federal Department of Health and Human Services regularly publishes a list of health care providers that have been hacked with patient information stolen.

Onward to the rest of our silly season. Donald Trump had a bad week on the abortion issue:

COW Trumps an Asshole